XSGC - Killer7 - No Holds Barred

[Ekkebus]

I had similar feelings the first time I tried playing Resident Evil. I didn't understand why people would want to punish themselves by playing a game with such limited resources where you can't just shoot everything in sight and where you spend most of your time plodding around to find X crest to put into Y slot. The fact is that Killer7, like Resident Evil in 1996, just presents gameplay concepts in a different manner than we as gamers are accustomed to. Its not overly difficult and its certainly not masochistic but it does require a certain degree of acceptance and adaptation from the player in order to be enjoyed.

[King wiL]

*Edited on my PC for formatting reasons as i can't seperate paragraphs on my mobile phone browser, where i originally posted this*

Didn't have any real problems with the combat, I quickly learned that you don't necessarily need to go for accuracy, just pummel the fuck out of the smiles. I used con cause he's fast. Didn't need to upgrade yet but i'm sure I will moving forward. I got a little confused when you turn around to run from smiles a few times and got myself killed, but I always went in smooth and steady with garcian to recover so all went well.
I liked the techno rave corridor it was pretty fun and unexpected and random, just like most of the game so far.
The anime face on the angel I thought was strange, and the fight itself was a little contrived, it was annoying having to remember to stand still long enough for her to fire but it was the first boss so what do you expect? I used kaede for her zoom ability on the gun, it helped alot.
Don't really know what's going on with the diver man who keeps dropping down and scaring the crap out of me but it's early days yet.
Enjoying it so far, looking forward to next sunday when I play my next chapter.

[Wood]

Soooooooooo I ended up with more time than usual and ended up doing both parts of Sunset. Unfortunately I can't talk about it until Monday, but I learned that you have to "wake up" some of the other personas unless the chapter actually calls for them. So imagine my chagrin thinking hard mode "locked" out my other personas, making it that much harder. Coyote with foot shot is ridiculous when there's smiles with weakpoints on their legs. Dan has gotten the majority of the upgrades thus far. But yeah, can't wait to talk about Sunset Pt 1, and looking forward to even more discussion of Pt 2, which really, REALLY warrants a lot of discussion.

Also played through Cloudman. It'll be a while before I can talk about that chapter, which is definitely weird. Super super weird.

After completing that chapter, and pretty much upgrading my smiths a lot, went back to Sunset Pt 1 get more story. I'm starting to piece together the overarching story from that chapter alone.

[Zeiram]

I've been pretty tied up with work and expect to be through Monday, hence my lack of talking points and my slight delay on Sunset Pt. 1. I'll play catch up in a few days.

[Ekkebus]

Alright, Sunset Pt1 is open for business and Sunset Pt2 is due for next week. You'll likely also notice that I've updated the thread title to reflect what chapter is currently being discussed.

[bokista]

Didn't get in any Killer 7 time last week. Will try to knock out parts one and two at the same time.

[Wood]

Pt 1 and Pt 2 aren't bad to knock out in one sitting, especially on a 2nd playthrough. However, I'm sorry to do this, but I HAVE to talk about Pt 1. There will be quite a few spoilers.

[*]Sunset Pt 1 opens up with all of the world building elements of Killer 7. International highway systems bring people and goods all over the world, while air travel and anything dealing with the word "Nuclear" is outlawed. World at peace and everything is dandy...oh, and Smiles blow shit up now. "Killer 7" are the only people that can actually kill Smiles apparently.

Garcian's contact calls leaving a message about "gaining his vote for the Republic party for this coming election", which alludes that it's a code phrase for Garcian's contact to, well, contact him. Harmon is a really old man, and damn near catatonic, that gets abused by his caretaker, Samantha, and Garcian has no issues paying for her services. When Garcian wants to talk to Harmon, it's through the TV, which transforms the room into something that only exists in a void, with Samantha playing the subservient maid, and Harmon speaking as a wise master assassin, giving orders to his padawan of sorts. It's weird how much that TV of a role that thing plays. I wonder if it gets explained in the later chapters.

Meanwhile missiles are launched straight at Japan. The US has absolutely no clue where the attack is coming from, and the game never tells us. The only thing that's important is that it's heading for Japan, and Fukushima is the middle of the whole thing. He's being backed by I think the UN party, and the goal is to convince the US to stop the attack. Apparently, from what I got out of this, is he's the architect of the Yakumo Party Policy, or Yakumo for short. So, I'm guessing his plan was to reveal the Yakumo, or use it to bribe the US into stopping the attack. As to exactly "what" the Yakumo is, this chapter doesn't go into any sort of detail about it. However, I'm not sure Tim or anyone else that has at least gotten to the "HOLY SHIT" reveal agrees with me, but I think I know EXACTLY what that policy is (but we'll have to wait until Lion, I believe).

However, and this isn't the first time I've seen stuff from Japan, this goes back to the unconditional surrender of Japan, ending WWII. Namely the agreement that Japan is not allowed to have a standing army. Period. In fact, it's only protection comes from the US and other allies. Rather, Japan's only protection is staying in good graces with the other nations. So, of course, the fate of a nation rests with assassins and backdoor politics (wouldn't be the first time...ZING!) A lot of this comes from Travis. For being a ghost, he is extremely well informed on how the current situation is panning out and how it got to there.

Right now it seems like a total shame that Mask is so much more of a bad ass in cutscenes than he is in gameplay. I never thought dual grenade launchers would be so ineffective against anything outside of a cutscene. Though he really doesn't get enough chances to HEADBUTT A FUCKING BULLET...AND WIN! Also, when Con uses his jump, the text says "The Eagle has Landed on the Roof". I keep thinking that's a "Lunar Lander" reference.

[Wood]

Is there anyone else up to this point?

[Ekkebus]

I am, I just haven't had time to get my comments together yet.

[Ekkebus]

Crazy week. I should probably get a few thoughts down since I'm starting up Sunset PtII at the moment.

While Angel introduces us to the Smith Syndicate and their association with the US government and the Heaven Smile cult, Sunset introduces the other big overarching story of Killer7, that being the missile attack on Japan that only the US can stop. The story definitely gets a bit confusing here as Travis unloads the political history of Japan and the US onto the player. The overarching theme though is Japan is helpless and totally dependent on the US for help, leaving it in a very frail position in the world. This leaves Garcian in the position where his actions may destroy another country in the interests of his own. Its a tight spot as some might say.

I love the opening scene in the pentagram shaped Department of Defense with all of the military suits sitting around the table yelling at eachother over ear pieces rather than talking directly to one another. Amplifying American action movie cliches is a recurring Suda theme the farther you go in his game library but this was the first time I was subjected to it and it stands out because of it.

In terms of setting this level is just gorgeous. I especially love how abstract the exterior areas of the restaurant are. This is where I start to use KAEDE more as her range is extremely helpful in these large open areas. I also started to use Kevin more than I ever have before, just to change things up. His big advantage is his foot speed and the fact he doesn't have to reload. I have trouble aiming his knives sometime in spite of the reticule on the screen but I'm getting the hang of him. This level also forces you to switch to MASK a few times to open certain doors, giving him a few bits of dialogue and starting to work up his character with the player. He's still not too useful in combat other than the ridiculous amount of damage he can absorb but...eh, we'll see. The boss battle of this stage, the gun fight with the assassin (name is failing me, Julie Kasarugi or something like that?) is pretty hilarious. I made sure to walk in with Con and the final score was something like 164 - 32.

[Wood]

On that shootout I made the mistake of walking in with Dan. However, it went to 32-35 in Dan's favor. Somehow I walked out with a win on that one. One thing I'm noticing with the set pieces is that Suda really uses the level design to go with the story. A distinctly Japanese location burning is very much a metaphor for the nation of Japan under fire. There's no doubt the other locations in the later chapters reflect what is going on in the story, and the messages Suda is trying to convey.

[King wiL]

I did the shootout as con. Guess what the score was? About 120-35 it was only that low cause i didn't realise what i was supposed to be doing for a split second and wasn't playing as con at the start of the fight so i lost time in switching out and starting to fire.

I liked the pentagram building, that was pretty funny. And learning about the political state of USA and Japan was pretty interesting to me as i don't know the real political histories so i have no "Real" history to compare it too which makes it easier to take in. In fact i'd love to play a game with britrish history in so you lot can be educated and i look super intellectual lol.
And Mask headbutting a bullet was awesome! And doing wrestling moves on large rocks! Shame i haven't used him yet as you don't get the blood when using him i guess cause he annihalates everything in his path. Mask's badass. I'm getting some ideas about diong a Killer 7 cosplay at MAGfest X now. I'm thinking mask or con, as i can hide my hair easier when you don't see it. Maybe tie it in with Con's bandanna thing hanging off his head. Plus i'm not really built like a huge wrestler.....

Anyhow i'm off to get showered up and then shower in lots of blood in Sunset Pt. II. Which i've been looking forward to all week. I like saving my episodes till sunday afternoon to give me something to look forward to plus my housemate is watching me play through it and joining in the discussion during play

[Wood]

I didn't realize that dates are included on all of the assignments. To put this in perspective, Both Angel and Sunset Pt I and II happened while I was still deployed. Cloudman happens after Go For Broke day, if i remember correctly.

[Ekkebus]

I actually had a Con Smith costume packed with me for M3 but didn't get it busted out. At this point I'd do MASK though. Speaking of MASK, the fun of using him in combat generally comes towards the end of a level when the blood machine is already broken and collecting blood is irrelevant. At that point you can just happily blow shit away without worrying about aiming really. Course he's still a bit slow to start but he gets very powerful later on.

[Ekkebus]

Sunset Pt2 is open for business.

On the docket for next week, one of my favorite chapters in the game: Cloudman