Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 highest rated game in history

JustAShcookius

JustAShcookius

It Wandered In From the Wastes
Here we have a new spin, fresh from Montpellier, France on the classic Final Fantasy turn based combat system, souls-like with real time QTE for attack and defense...

Except out of nowhere this game became the highest rated video game in Metacritic's history. Wait what?

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Yup, that 9.7 user score is the highest rating any video game has received that is listed in Metacritic, doing even better in Opencritic, outscoring cornerstone titles like Doom (1993), Legend of Zelda, Fallout games, Half Life 2, Team Fortress 2, COD: Modern Warfare and others. Even supplanting the Final Fantasy titles that inspired it.

I heard the hype and so I tried it, despite never playing a JRPG genre game before (largely due to prolific anime influence):

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What could I say? What could I possibly say that would be appropriate for how amazing the game is?

Maybe because active combat in a turn based system keeps you glued to the screen instead of dosing off? Where the game actually rewards you for being good instead of arbitrarily handicapping you to preserve some sort of forced "tension" in combat?

It could be because the excellent story was appropriately paced and timed in a fashion, that prevents unnecessary 100+ hour slog playthroughs, leveling out at about a comfy 25 hours of playtime for the main story?

Maybe because the adults act like adults in the story and do not follow a modernist trope of infantilizing everyone? Or turning them into two dimensional horny fan service (Baldurs Gate 3)?

Maybe because the characters possess and project healthy traditional masculine and feminine roles in their interactions with each other? So that you cannot help but love even the antagonists and deuterantagonists as well?

Could it be because the soundtrack manages to be over 11 hours long, with the weakest composition in the game still being squarely above most contemporary video game soundtracks?

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I am what you call a well rounded gamer. I am beholden to no genre and generally move around a lot. As a side consequence, my library of played titles is somewhat impressive. I will say that every review and internet glazing session over this game is profoundly warranted. I would be extremely careful to place this title in the top game I have ever played in my life myself, I will mull over it for some time to come, but as it stands, this game is definitely a top three for me.

Whether or not you are like me, and neglected the genre completely due to understandable circumstances (gacha, underaged thousand year old dragon girls ect), or whether you are a die hard Final Fantasy person, I believe this game has something to bring you. I found no fault with the story, the gameplay, or the characters, with the sole complaint being that a certain point later in the game, some characters get kinda sidelined. Still a rather small complaint.

There you have it, a true everyman's and everywoman's game.

Without further ado, I would recommend that all give that 2 hour Steam refund thing a spin. Fair warning, the game hooked me in the first 10 minutes.

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It looks like pretentious slop to me.
Just like The Last Of Us which people raved on and on about how amazeballs it was.

Whenever the unwashed masses collective comes together to go "game good" whenever it goes on sale enough for me to try it I end up extremely disappointed with it. Happened with RDR2, Nier Automata and Deep Rock Galactic.

Why is that?
I don't know and at this point I don't care.
The more everyone goes :jiggy: about something the more I narrow my eyes with skepticism.
There's some reason for why this is.
Maybe it's just that everyone wants to jump on a trend.
Maybe it's a bias because they are trying something new and different.
Maybe people are using it as a fuck you to the rest of the industries bad practices and inflating its positivity.
Dont know. Don't care.
Been here before, tried it before, been burnt before.
Not doing it again.

It looks like wank.
French wank.
 
Mr Fish said:
It looks like pretentious slop to me.
Just like The Last Of Us which people raved on and on about how amazeballs it was.

Whenever the unwashed masses collective comes together to go "game good" whenever it goes on sale enough for me to try it I end up extremely disappointed with it. Happened with RDR2, Nier Automata and Deep Rock Galactic.

Why is that?
I don't know and at this point I don't care.
The more everyone goes :jiggy: about something the more I narrow my eyes with skepticism.
There's some reason for why this is.
Maybe it's just that everyone wants to jump on a trend.
Maybe it's a bias because they are trying something new and different.
Maybe people are using it as a fuck you to the rest of the industries bad practices and inflating its positivity.
Dont know. Don't care.
Been here before, tried it before, been burnt before.
Not doing it again.

It looks like wank.
French wank.
Click to expand...
I am sorry you feel completely burnt out about things. But this is not the way. In turn I would posture a descent into blind cynicism is equally as destructive as the actions of these so called "unwashed masses collective" you speak of, as I do stress to you that I agree with your take on the Last of Us. As you have said Red Dead Redemption 2 was a bit of a letdown. For me personally, I find it adopts Rockstar Games' policy of creating fantastical time sinks. Every action in the game is fatiguing, every menu dramatically slowed and clumsy, every travel gets old after the first two times. I am with you here.

All I can offer to you is my opinion, based upon the fact I have played all these games you have mentioned, with the exception of Nier: Automata. All I can offer you is my truthful and frank opinion that there is really something to this Clair Obscur game that separates it from these titles you posture as examples. Take it or leave it.

Hang in there man.
 
See, when I heard you talking about how this has the highest rating of video games of all time, I thought the typical NMA Cynicism was about to follow - Like you were going to be like "How could this game be as high rated as DOOM or Legend of Zelda, there's something suspicious going on here"

Was pleasantly surprised to see a genuine passion for a recent game.

IDK if it'd be my cup of tea personally - IDK I don't really go for games with conventional graphics, or big budget, or anything really mainstream or big budget nowadays, partially because I'm broke and can't afford the cost, partially because they can be visually overwhelming and typically aren't very chill and relaxed to play - I kinda want something I can take my time with and chill out to nowadays and that's not most mainstream games. Plus I've never been a fan of JRPGs. I think personally I'm just going to play Fallout 2 mods, Crusader Kings 2, and Catacalysm DDA on repeat until the day I die.

But you know, I do love when people are clearly passionate about something, or they've played a game and feel as though they've discovered Jesus.
JustAShcookius said:
Maybe because the characters possess and project healthy traditional masculine and feminine roles in their interactions with each other? So that you cannot help but love even the antagonists and deuterantagonists as well?
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Can't imagine the thought "These characters conform to traditional gender roles and that makes them loveable" ever really crossing my mind. I love characters that are well-written, but like, actively thinking about whether characters conform to gender roles or not just seems an odd think to preoccupy yourself with.
 
Yeah the moment I saw it was JRPG but with quicktime events I just tuned out.
Don't get me wrong, it's great that games are made for a genre that doesn't get a lot of attention.
I'd love myself some Dungeon Keeper style game for example.
JRPG gameplay but with quicktime dodges and stuff just isn't for me.
 
Jogre said:
Can't imagine the thought "These characters conform to traditional gender roles and that makes them loveable" ever really crossing my mind. I love characters that are well-written, but like, actively thinking about whether characters conform to gender roles or not just seems an odd think to preoccupy yourself with.
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There has been this trope these days, of video game writers creating characters that push the boundaries of sexual identity and stuff. A lot of big recent titles and video game adaptations have suffered from these attempts, like the Star Wars Outlaws game and Last of Us Part 2.

Now I normally have no problem with a super strong female protagonist, or a kind and emotionally aware male protagonist. Hell I liked Lara Croft's Tomb Raider games a lot, minus some personal pet peeves aside. Gustave from Clair Obscur was kind, softspoken, and somewhat shy, but able to take the physical fight if he had to, you couldn't help but like him, still was a good example of masculinity.

But these video game writers are hellbent on stripping away everything that makes a woman a woman, or a man a man. If you are going to place the personality of a gruff, decadent, and slobby military man into a female character, well, you just created a man in a woman's body. At that point, you might as well just take the extra inch and make them full on transgender.

Most of these ruined characters are women unfortunately, the men just get written as a fool or an asshole, off and on for 60 years now as it has been. The video game industry has a lot of female writers, many of the same people who throw around "girl power" "erase the patriarchy" and whatnot. They systematically write out all feminine attributes of their characters. Gee its almost like they hate being a woman....

PS: I grew up in the traditionalist American country where women were badass and feminine. So I am particularly susceptible to getting bothered.
 
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Woker propaganda is just that - propaganda. I also skip all the games, movies, books etc with woker propaganda. Post-soviet countries had half a century of leftist propaganda, we don't want to consume that garbage again, we had so many of it during USSR that we still use those socialist books for our fireplaces.

So yes, it is always nice when a game/movie/book/etc is free of woke cr*p, if I'd need stuff to burn I can just buy wood instead.
 
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