It gets better, really!
 

This week, Extra Punctuation is about the response to Yahtzee's review of Monster Hunter Tri for the Wii, a game he panned and people got offended over. I always thought the point of ZP was to watch him make fun of games, but apparently some people treat him as a serious reviewer.

Serious or otherwise, however, I thought his response to the "controversy" was interesting, regarding the notion that it "gets better later."

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Read the rest and in context

Seems to be getting more common these days, and it's mildly annoying to think that it's justifiable for the first " X hours" of a game to be a chore, and for the idea that if you suffer through five or ten hours, you'll be rewarded by finally getting to play a good game.

I've heard similar cracks about the new Final Fantasy. I don't really care about modern FF titles, and so I can't say anything about it, but a lot of people seem to think that one should completely wipe clean any negatives about the first several hours because " it gets better."

Of course, when I look at a review, I wonder if I am going to like the game. The games I have on pre-order or buy day one are ones I'm already sold on, and barring " this game will kill you and rape your loved ones," I'm probably not going back on that. I read reviews to help me decide and not to reassure me over titles I've already decided I love. Which brings me to the next part, does a ten hour "introductory" deal jive with the average consumer? Again, ignore the fact that it was Zero Punctuation, would most people even get through the ten hours?

I'd rather play a fun game that lasted five hours than play through ten hours of boredom to get to some potentially good game. Is this an offshoot of the demand for longer single-player experiences and more "replayability?"

Honestly, though, is it worth a commitment of ten hours (on top of the price) just to see if you'll like it?

I don't watch much of ZP besides the occasional couple of episodes every so often but I have a feeling he probably hasn't "reviewed" past Monster Hunter titles on PSP or PS2 since the series is notorious in Japan for being a time waster.

The game gives you the freedom to fight anything but in order to actually be strong enough, there is a huge amount of grinding needed similar to a lot of RPGs.

Sort of surprised people still think of him as an actual reviewer when he's always been more like an Angry Video Game Nerd in terms of comedic reviews.

I played Final Fantasy XIII for 5 hours and was like "fuck, this is boring as shit. WTF, why is this tutorial so long? Why is the main character such a bitch for no good reason? Why can't I actually explore shit? FUCK YOU ENDLESS HALLWAYS DFGKJKASDLKJHSD!" and then didn't play it again. Eventually I'll probably finish it, but I seriously hate shit like that.

Start off with a bang. Fuck this slow build trend.*




* Unless, of course, it's done right and there is actually good shit from the start that just continues to get better.

Yahtzee's never been a big fan much in a J-Something genre. Not only am I sure he didn't play prior ones, but I'm surprised people are surprised when he doesn't like something that's big in Japan. That'd be like being shocked that I didn't like an FPS. Well, if I'm not a fan of the underpinnings, why would you expect me to like it? Poor pattern recognition, I wager.

Regardless, checking the threads on the Escapist, people who are fans of the game and the series readily concede the first ten hours aren't that good. It's not just that it's a time waster, and wasting time isn't always bad. It's that one needs to get through an extended (ten hour or so) tutorial to enjoy the game. As stated by the fans of the genre. I mean, I wouldn't take Yahtzee's word for it, because he's not serious 80% of the time, but I read the comments after last week's ZP, and there were a lot of them.

Anyway, I'm with Funky. If it starts good and goes somewhere bigger, awesome. If it's a chore for almost half a day of solid play time, fuck dat sheet.