A Critique of A Plague Tale: Innocence

“And he’s Hu-gone from the castle” just gonna slide that in and pretend we won’t notice, eh?

>Can kill healthy big soldiers with one rock >Can't kill old man with one rock, needs three

Its weird, when I saw a 40 minute video I was thought to myself: "That's a rather short one." You spoil me Joseph.

about the rocks spawning like theyre mysteriously everywhere: rocks are actually everywhere, its just she thinks of picking them up when shes out

Cutscene incompetency is a common symptom in most video game protagonists

I feel like you were 1 step away from asking ''BUT WHAT DO THEY EAT'' the whole video

"At the beginning of....The Witcher" I'm in for a ride aren't I? o h n o. . . . .t h e t o r c h

rock flies out from behind wall in plain view Guard: "Huh?" goes to where the rock landed

Me: I’m so bored Joseph: What did you say? YOU WANT ANOTHER 40 MINUTE VIDEO??

"Jean Wick" Very clever lol

I absolutely loved the shit out of this game, I kinda get some of your gripes like not handing torches around, and while that makes sense, I felt the game got me immersed enough that I just rolled with it

About Hugo not reaching the first threshold of the Prima Macula when he is forced to massacre the guards and why he blindly attacks Amicia - it is actually explained, and it's two different things, but maybe too sublte and easy to forget if you don't play the game in a single run. 1. When Beatrice says that Hugo doesn't progress because of Amicia, she instinctively knows that her daughter cared enough to go back to the chateau and somehow finished her work, maybe with the help of the healer / alchemist she sent her kids to. She doesn't know how she did it, but she's certain her daughter was able to help. The potion Lucas comes up with actually serves to halt the progress before the first threshold, that was the whole point of making it. It might not be easy to realize this from a single "Amicia!" and her expression, but consider this: Beatrice's whole life revolved around making that potion. She spent five years with minimal help to be able to slow down the sickness before the first threshold just to gain enough time to educate her son about the Prima Macula and the voices in his head. She fails to do so, and knows she will be captured, but sends her daughter to the ONLY living alchemist, who knows about the details of her work and how to finish it. Hugo simply being alive is a sign that Amicia did just that. 2. When you play as Hugo and crawl through the alchemists laboratory, at the highest point of the library, there are two alchemists talking about the progress of the Prima Macula. According to the old tomes, the carrier is said to go mad or be at ease "next to the one who tamed it". Hugo needs Amicia, because Amicia is the one that tamed him and the taint he carries in his blood. He is visually shown to be actually half conscious throughout most of the scene. It is easy to mistake as a solemn look, but you can see that he only visually reacts to Amicia and no one else. He doesn't speak with or listens to the knight with him, doesn't show his anger until the final conversation, doesn't try to defend himself for his decisions or to brag about how he found her mother without Amicia. In short he doesn't show his usual behavior patterns or behaviors that would be plausible from a kid. He is on the verge of transcending his current self, and when Amicia takes the leap of faith to him, risking the attack of the rats, he is shown to wake up and completely change his behaviour.

“At the beginning of........ The Witcher”

Also a prime example: Dark Souls 2; Shrine of Winter. The Chosen Undead has to go and collect four legendary souls to access what lays past the Shrine of Winter BECAUSE he can't climb over knee high rubble.

How did you not remember Dark Souls 2 and the "I can't climb this meter high pile of rubble and will instead kill 4 great souls!"

Agreed with everything you said, but honestly, all those little things didn't dampen my gameplay experience at all (the only one that bothered me a bit and stood out was leaving the torches and other fire sources behind while the game tries so hard to sell you on the importance of fire and light as a strategy against rats). I mean come on, it was a team of like 40 people that put together what feels and plays like a AAA experience, and they did an incredible job. The game was narratively focused, well paced, emotionally impactful, had excellent gameplay mechanics, and had an extremely satisfying ending. I would much much rather prefer those 40 people spend the precious little energy and time they have on things like performance, optimization, proper save systems, great environments, intuitive UI, character development, localization, accessibility, etc. Which they did! At the end of the day, despite all its little flaws, we got something amazing and I really think the studio did a stellar job at focusing on what matters to players and delivering that. I'm also looking forward to the sequel because I didn't expect this one to be this good! Seriously, it's one the sleeper hits of 2019 for me.

"Witcher will be the next video." BUT THAT'S JUST KAYAYDAY'S LIE, ISN'T IT!?!?

NOBODY EXPECTS THE SPANISH INQUISITION!

I enjoyed Plague Tale as more of a light novel with some gameplay.

Speaking of introduced dead ends, I remember them pointing out the mosaics in the courtyard of the castle. I didn't think anything of it at the time but when Rodric was with you exploring the castle I noticed that the pillars all converged into the center with different colors. I thought that at some point you'd have to have everyone do a thing that unlocks a hidden feature in the castle. Even later Lucas says something like "this place was made for these kinds of attacks" when they're escaping Nicholas. Maybe it actually is nothing but I thought it was strange that Hugo would point out the design as though it had some kind of special meaning and then not follow up on it later.