The Ascent - Game Pass - Out Now!

[Count Buffalos]

Good point about the PS1 vibes. What was that top-down shooter called - Loaded? The backgrounds do look great but the character models have a plasticky, 360 energy.

[Boothjan]

Yeah I was reminded of Loaded.

[Rayn]

What started out as a slow and bug ridden mess turned out to be a really fun co-op experience for my mates and I. 

The first few missions are quite dull and offers no challenge at all but once the game opens up and the difficulty is ramped

up we had a lot of fun. This is by no means goty material, but it’s been solid fun for us!

[Pob]

I think my eyes actually shut down momentarily when I reached the outside bit in this, such was the amount of visual detail hitting my retinas. Or maybe I was just tired.

[Transient Curse]

I played a bit of this last night waiting for the Halo beta to kick off and had a quick look here to see what reactions were and was surprised at how negative they were. I'm pleased that a few people seem to have enjoyed it, as I did. 

 

I think the story bits are a bit meh, and the environment is the star but crucially I think the gameplay is alright. I play using an Elite pad and being able to map some controls to the paddles underneath the controller probably makes a world of difference when it comes to being able to drop in and out of crouch without taking a thumb off the right stick.  I felt like the gameplay got a bit better as I got more used to using the environment and ducking in and out of cover a bit more.  How much depth there'll be beyond that, I don't know, but enemies had just started putting mortars down last night, which makes me think there might be lots of diving in and out of cover as the game progresses, it'll be interesting to see if they have any more tricks up their sleeves, if they have, I think there's a good chance I'll stick with it. 

[rgraves]

Seems like RLLMUK is split the same as reviewers....clearly not a classic for everyone, but some folks will enjoy it. I've downloaded it, but got tied up in the glorious blood-lust of Ryse last night (bless you GP, I'd have never played that if not) so have yet to boot it.....

[Sixkiller]

Looks lovely, but so far very basic play.

 

Atmosphere-wise this feels very modern.

 

Gameplay (so far, only 30-45mins in really) reminds me of Alien Breed on the Amiga.

 

Will keep playing.

 

 

[mikeyl]

12 hours ago, the_buddha_of_gaming said:

 

Fun fact, he was in charge of reviewing existing games that Psygnosis could publish and had Radiant silvergun, Silhouette mirage, and Grandia in on Japanese saturn to review to see if Psygnosis would publish PlayStation versions of them, and turned them all down. 

wait what, then the developers deserve nothing. 1/10 

[Gabe]

I had a look at this last night and did the first mission. It was okay I guess? I suppose I'm not really sure how I think this type of game could wow me though, because it's too light in RPG stuff and roaming big maps with pointless dead-ends is never something I particularly enjoy.

 

I already feel I've seen the extent of what it can offer, too, so whilst I'll give it a bit more time, the mechanics don't really grab me and will most likely bore me long before the end (and I suspect its a game that will be full of padding, too.) 

[Andy_Why]

3 hours ago, Boothjan said:

 

Ah - I think my game might have a bug then. I've definitely got the light red circle and have explored every small area of it but there's not a single person within it.

 

I had this on Series X and a quit to main menu and reload sorted it for me.

 

So this is kind of janky, but I think I might love it? I like the world they've created and the dialogue is fun so far too. The first game that has ever given me proper Chaos Engine vibes and I adored that game. I think I'll play through most of it with friends though. Seems like the most enjoyable way to experience it.

[Boothjan]

4 minutes ago, Andy_Why said:

I had this on Series X and a quit to main menu and reload sorted it for me.

 

Ah okay - I'll try this.  Cheers, sir.

[amc]

Got it sat here via GP. Think I'm going to swerve it for a while until the devs release some patches. I think a game like this gains a lot of its enjoyment from its spectacle and from what's getting posted it's pretty unpolished atm. I want all the DLSS and RT DX12 swag so I'm taking a chill pill and letting it sit. 

[matt0]

This is settling in to a real 1st episode of a shareware game you played off a PC Gamer cover CD in 1996 and always meant to register but never did vibe.

[luckypierre]

3 minutes ago, Boothjan said:

 

Ah okay - I'll try this.  Cheers, sir.

FullChrome bug?

 

Let me know if it works for you. I've tried it god knows how many times now with no joy. I've now done a few side missions, levelled up to 10, died a few times then returned to grinder and the fuckers still wont spawn.

[PikaStu]

I was really getting into this on PC, but I keep getting a hard crash at the same point. I’ve tried DX11 and DX12 modes (DX11 is actually more stuttery unlike what some reviews say was the case with the pre-release build). 
Also, I’m sure John Linneman mentioned DLSS but I can’t see that option?!

Its a shame as initial impressions were very good.

 

Edit: Ah I see earlier in the thread it’s mentioned that the Gamepass version hasn’t got DLSS yet! I got past the crash point (it was trying to start a cut-scene). 
4k on my 3070, but resolution set to 80% until DLSS appears.

DX12 is currently running better than DX11 for me. Some screen tearing even with v-sync on though…

[Pob]

3 hours ago, Wahwah* said:

I play using an Elite pad and being able to map some controls to the paddles underneath the controller probably makes a world of difference when it comes to being able to drop in and out of crouch without taking a thumb off the right stick.

This is a good tip - I've just got to the bit where you can start use cover and this does indeed make a big difference.

 

EDIT: as does increasing the aim assist.

[grungekid]

edit: wrong thread

[BadgerFarmer]

10 hours ago, BadgerFarmer said:

Reading about these bugs has me wondering if I had something similar with a side quest. I followed the marker to a level 2 quest, the steroid collection one, and it took me into an area full of level 17-18 goons, and then to a door that opened but wouldn't let me enter. I thought I'd gone the wrong way, but no idea now.

Seems I didn't have access to this area yet, as I just unlocked it via a story mission. So there's a level 2 side quest locked behind a level 10 main mission. Hmm...

[QuackQuack]

Could they make the text any smaller on this? 😒 

[Giddas]

6 minutes ago, QuackQuack said:

Could they make the text any smaller on this? 😒 

 

yes

[StumpyJohn]

12 hours ago, BadgerFarmer said:

Just tried ray tracing on my RTX2070 and, no, that's just not happening. Frame rate stutters, then dies when enemies appear.

 

Reading about these bugs has me wondering if I had something similar with a side quest. I followed the marker to a level 2 quest, the steroid collection one, and it took me into an area full of level 17-18 goons, and then to a door that opened but wouldn't let me enter. I thought I'd gone the wrong way, but no idea now.

 

I do, however, quite like the actual action in this. The cover mechanic and the weapons - got a shot gun now - are pretty decent. And I'm still in the first 3 hours.

Yeah, I had that too.  After I opened up all the side quests I thought I would do the lowest level one but it leads to that door that does nothing and a bunch of much higher level baddies are stationed close by that you can easily trigger.  Am enjoying this overall so far but there are a few areas where it could have done with a bit more polish

 

27 minutes ago, QuackQuack said:

Could they make the text any smaller on this? 😒 

Yeah, its tiny on my TV (65 inch) I also have no idea as to what any of the symbols are on the armor so it's hard to work out what gear to wear and have picked up a couple of cyberdeck items but don't seem to be able to hack any more stuff or find them in the UI.  I guess it updates as you pick them up but its very unclear.

 

Could swear the sell duplicate items thing isn't working properly either as some weapons still have numbers against them and it's not the mk level so if it's not the number I hold either then I have no clue what it is!

[spanx]

Yeah I hit that level 2 mission weirdness too. 
 

I did end up banging this on for another hour last night as the Love Island noise was doing my head in and quite enjoyed it. Cleared out a side mission in that opening area that was quite fun. It’s a weird one, you can tell a lot of love has gone in to this, but I’d rather they’d polished up the moment to moment gameplay rather than throwing all the GPU features at the wall. I’ll prob persist for another session and see how it opens up. 

[rafaqat]

Quite enjoying it actually. The little hint system of where to go next is neat.  Felt a bit slow going till I picked up the machine gun.  Deffo one I'll keep at.  Lovely particle effects too. Piston punch and you can see their soul leave their body. 

 

[BadgerFarmer]

After a few more hours, I feel like the only real reason to play this is to look at the locations. Some of them are as incredible as anything I've seen in a game. But when you get down to what you actually have to do, there's so little reason for any of it to exist. Amazing they went to this much trouble to model this world when they had nothing more substantial than this to fill it.

[Opinionated Ham Scarecrow]

I'm not sure about everyone else, but I was expecting this to be a ridiculously over the top Cyberpunk twin-stick looter shooter and that's exactly what it is. It's greet fun.

[hub2]

I've warmed up to it a little. The controls are still not to my liking, but I wimped out and set aim assist to high, got a new weapon (SMG?), and realised I had 10 skill points to spend to make my character a little more resilient/dangerous.  

 

No real depth but I think I stick with it for  few more levels.

[rafaqat]

Deffo a game where Coop will add a lot to it.

[matt0]

This is giving me a really strong urge to buy Cloudpunk... 

[Strafe]

56 minutes ago, BadgerFarmer said:

After a few more hours, I feel like the only real reason to play this is to look at the locations. Some of them are as incredible as anything I've seen in a game. But when you get down to what you actually have to do, there's so little reason for any of it to exist. Amazing they went to this much trouble to model this world when they had nothing more substantial than this to fill it.

Yeah, some of the environmental story telling is ace. Crashed hover cars surrounded by cops, people doing their thing.

[PK]

Yeah, the shooting's reasonably good fun but I can't help wishing they'd made some sort of detective adventure game in that world instead, it could have been wonderful.