Thoughts on Astral Chain?

Bought this yesterday and I've played a few hours of it. Right now I'm having some mixed feelings.

Good:

Combat is very fluid and fun

Art Style is fantastic

Presentation is great

Music is SOOOOOO good

Bad:

The controls are rough to get used to, I have a hard time playing in handheld mode, have to use pro controller.

The story is horrible

Characters are uninteresting, the character you play as doesn't talk

There's lip sync issues with English VO, would rather have subs

The Legions control like V from DMC5, there's a little more control the farther I get so hopefully this ends up not being a negative.

The levels are feeling very linear right now, hope the game opens up later.

I would give the game a 7.5, right now I wish I didn't spend $60 and waited for a sale. I'm about 6 hours in, anyone else play more? Do some of my negatives get resolved the longer you play?

I'm much further in than you are.

You definitely get used to the controls, the story ramps up after the introductory stuff, and the levels are jam-packed with content off the main path.

I think the game is excellent, especially now that I've started to consistently get S or S+ ranks. My only complaint is that it feels a little too easy on Pt Standard - I haven't run out of health at any point so far (and I'm up to file...7? 8?).

I’ve played quite a bit and I am enjoying the game a lot. Also playing on standard but oof it certainly has been rough, I go through most of my health items on every mission. Controls are the biggest hurdle, I don’t mainly play on switch so that probably has a lot to do with it (or I just suck). It feels like playing a suped up version of nier gameplay wise.

One of my noticeable gripes with the game is that it’s annoying trying to get your legion to attack your target. In the midst of battle I believe you need to call the legion back to yourself, then send the legion to the enemy you’re facing. It’s not enough to just tap ZL2 but actually having to face the targeted enemy is a pain while you’re fighting. The gameplay I think is some of the best I’ve played, granted I haven’t played DMC5.

Everything aside from gameplay is decent though. Nothing else really stands out but there’s side missions, photo taking, customization options, humor, story. Main draw is the combat and once I get a better handle on it I’ll sing more of its praises.

Have you read any of the logs you acquire in game as it tends to supplement the on screen story. The character you play doesn't speak..........like many protagonists in other highly regarded games? Yes, the syncing with the dialogue is off by a few steps especially if you fast forward through each box of dialogue.

Six hours in is premature, IMO, to make certain assessments.

I am on chapter 7 currently and I am loving the game.

I consider myself quite a fan of Platinum Games, and Astral Chain has really been subverting my expectations yet at the same time resonated as something identifiable towards Platinum.

The thing that really caught me off-guard is the adventure game aspect. I've gotten a good feel of the flow and I have been very into absorbing all the details in the world. The combat itself is top-notch Platinum.

Its controls definitely took a lot of getting used to, and that's why the first couple chapters show a lot of tutorial and slower - but once you get into the game it really picks up and it's simply awesome.

Very immersive cyberpunk, neo-noir atmosphere. The character models, art and everything is very well-done. The soundtrack is very awesome too.

Hearing a lot people calling it the "poor mans Nier Automata".

It's giving Nier: Auto Tomato a run for its money for worst, good platinum game. It's probably gonna be a one n done for me much like Auto Tomato was.

Yeah, agree with pretty much everything you said. I'm about half way through, and is already nudging Katana Zero off as my GOTY.

Love it!

I think it's very good. The controls were not clicking with me at first, so I changed the control scheme in the options. I also stayed in training mode fighting the bots until I got confortable. Note that the gameplay gets much better as you progress and add more abilities to your move-set. Levels seem linear, but there is a lot you can miss which can affect your rating at the end of a file.

The graphics look great and the cinematography in the cutscenes are top notch. It's the first game in a while that makes me wish work would go by faster so I can go home to play lol.

The story is becoming more interesting, and I actually think 90% of the characters are fine. Sometimes funny in their simplicity. I also dig the setting and am impressed with the UI, and the combat of course.

I have to say, I am a big fan of character action games like Bayonetta and Viewtiful Joe so this is right up my alley, so I would score it higher than the average gamer maybe. For me this has been a 9/10 experience so far.

PS: If you're in doubt whether to play the boy or the girl, I have felt very good about my decision to play the boy.

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(Hmm I think I haven't gotten a higher rating than a C at the end of a File (I'm at File 7 IIRC as an almost-promoted Specialist).

Maybe it's because I miss a lot of secrets even though I'm exploring every nook and cranny. I haven't really figured out what counts the most toward a high rating. Nor have I particularly cared. (Does completion time matter a whole lot? It seems like it does. And I have definitely been taking my sweet time exploring the levels.)

Standard difficulty can be a little easy. I'll try to go back to a previous File after I finish this one. The Files are not exactly short and I still don't have all my tools, so I have been a little reluctant to. But this is a game that I am going to 100% because I feel that rare urge to do it.)

It looks pretty sweet. I'm no big fan of PlatinumGames, but this game seem like I could enjoy. Love those graphics. The combat looks more fun than Bayo series. I'll probably get it later..

What is it that you disliked from previous Platinum games?

I can understand with a game like Bayonetta, it rarely gives a chance to breathe when the entirety of the game is basically one big set-piece after another.

Astral Chain is different from Bayonetta in the sense the former has a much defined adventure game aspect to it. There is a lot more quieter moments in Astral Chain and detective sequences reminiscent to L.A. Noire.

I've played some more last night and the game is opening up, there's some branching paths and I ran into a pretty fun boss fight, Cerberus, after the boss fight I noticed other portals open up as side missions so the content seems to be there.

But I am having a really hard time with the controls, I may need to adjust them in the menus like others said, and I'm having a hard time countering when the red slash symbol appears on enemies.

IF I could get used to these controls I think I would be having a better time.

@Star67: change them to control type C, thank me later

Bayonetta felt really messy to me. I didn't have fun with the gameplay, too many QTEs and there was way too many ridiculous cutscenes I didn't find fun at all. The camera frequently zooming in on her crotch was just annoying as opposed to funny, or whatever they were going for. The Bayo games just didn't click with me. Looking at their other games:

Wonderful 101 was just.. odd. Fun idea, I guess, but nothing I want to play. And again with the mess. Did it have to be so messy? Makes it hard to see what's going on.

Vanquish looks pretty lame.

Mad World was fun. For 10 minutes.

They helped out on Starfox Zero. A lame game.

They made a horrible TMNT game.

Scalebound looked shit.

The PG game that looks best by far before Astral Chain is Nier: Automata, in my opinion. And I decided to not get that game, since I don't like when games combine many different gameplay types.

I love Okami and Viewtiful Joe, though. Not sure how many employees PG have left from those games..

Between watching footage from an E3 and then reading reviews, the game was supposedly terrible but I haven't found that to be true. What was horrible about it?

I've never played it, so I can't answer. When I looked at it long ago I remember it looked like a half assed, very repetitive action game.