Alice: Madness Returns

[Jeivar]

Has anyone here played this yet? I loved the first game back in the day and I'm hoping I can love this one too. The trailers all make it look amazingly beautiful and atmospheric, but what about the gameplay itself?

[Typewriter]

I bought it, and found out at the last minute that my wife was interested, so she's been playing while I watch.

She's having a lot of fun, but she's been frustrated at the lack of save points in the game. Without being able to save whenever you're at the mercy of the game, and when you've been playing for an hour and need to do something else 'NOW' it kind of sucks to just hope it's saved recently.

Beyond that everything seems pretty cool. The gameplay is fun and the platforming is solid.

The art style is amazing, if inconsistent. Sometimes textures will just randomly blow for a while, and then you'll go to a new area with better textures.

My only real complaint, and one that my wife shares, is that several areas have multiple paths, and if you want to explore but accidentally go the 'right way' there's no way back. Two paths both look legit, but you have to pick one - one will eventually circle around back to this area so you can take the other path, but there's no way to know which path that is - until its too late.

[warty goblin]

I got the complete version off EA's 'new' download store thingy, and have been playing a bit.

I like the platforming bits, they're fun to think through and don't seem to require any leaps of faith do to bad camera angles. Also they are fun to look at.

The combat so far I'm less convinced by. It's not bad by any means, but it's certainly not anything great as of yet. It has been getting better though. The first few areas had really, really boring enemies, but the new types I've encountered are definitely more interesting. They're generally well introduced so you've got an opportunity to learn their weaknesses without two or three other foes getting all up in your face. It really is a matter of learning their weaknesses for the more interesting sort as well, I'm not even sure it's possible to kill an Eyepot with the Vorpal Blade. Goes down in a hurry to the pepper grinder though.

Also, this game has the coolest dodge move ever. Avoiding attacks by turning into butterflies is all kinds of fun.

Storywise I'm in the wait and see camp. It could turn out well, or it could not, it's simply too early to tell. The London segments are pretty cool though, and seeing things there show up in Wonderland is a nice touch.

[Jeivar]

Okay. Any other thoughts?

[warty goblin]

I had to hack a .ini file to get the umbrella block working, which was slightly annoying. Combat seems like it'll be a lot more fun with that added to the mix.

I'm really digging the aesthetic of the game the more I play of it. Everything just has so much character, it really gives the scenes a great sense of place even though they're completely fantastic in design. It's definitely got some of the best art design of anything I've played this year, and I don't usually like stylized graphics very much.