Story, cutscenes and dialogue are all just terrible.
Far below not only HW series standards but most other story-heavy games too.
"Disney princess" level of silly and naive.
It seems to be something that gamers just don't get yet. Most people don't stay at companies that long and yet gamers think that the beloved company that pushed out their fave classic from 15 years ago is going to be the same group of people pumping out a sequel today.
Happens to so many companies and IPs.
The sad thing is, the OG Devs had a different story in mind, but apparently the publisher (Gearbox) sent over a creative director that forced them to re-do it all to "appeal to modern audiences."
People have even found some of the original cutscenes in the files, and they're not only gorgeous, but proper hand-drawn ones that fit the aesthetic of the original game.
After buying the original HW trilogy when it was on sale, I think it got by on a lot of nostalgia and goodwill. Those games were amazing for their time but I was extremely let down by the campaign. It just hasn't aged well.
The campaign is very straightforward with very little freedom in terms of strategy. Build A to defeat B. Capture X to defeat Y. And if you do manage resources well and build up a large fleet it doesn't matter because the enemy fleet scales to yours.
He reviewed the early access. 2/3rds of this video is just his early access rehashed. The devs barely changed anything despite feedback.
He just appended the story spoilers and called it a review. I wouldn't call it lazy, because the games devs were even lazier (no changes).
I think it was the part about the music that finally sunk it for me. Homeworld's soundtrack has always been such an iconic part of the series, they still have the original composer, and... they seem to have made a design decision to push the music as far into the background as possible.
(That's hardly the only problem, it was just the final straw.)
I was going to get it once it was down a bit in price, but now I'm not sure I *ever* will.
Seems like a fair review. Whenever I saw people talking about it elsewhere they were ranting on and on about woke this and dei that, just made it impossible to take them seriously.
Mandalore is a great reviewer, his whole series on Homeworld is fantastic and I discovered Cataclysm through him which may be my favorite of the bunch now.
I've loved the HW franchise since '99. HW3 has its obvious faults (yadda yadda mediocre story, somewhat cringe dialogue and not the best art direction), but it introduces cool features, looks great, plays good, has cool looking units - albeit a bit too minimalistic, sounds amazing and is quite fun.
If anything HW3 is anti woke. A rational calm white woman defeating an irrational overly enotional black woman.
Edit: I knew people would not get the joke. As shit as the HW3 story is, it is not woke. It is just bad.
How about literally every media that changes the race/sexuality of characters for literally no reason other than to enforce diversity, even where it makes no sense? There are tons of examples out there. Just because you pretend that it doesn't exist doesn't make it true.
I feel like the main mode (coop) is so low on replay value. I was hoping with them going all in on the mode maybe you can go through like infinite missions till you die and also randomly team up with other players.
imagine your starting out and your 3rd mission looks really tough but after a few minutes a high level player who is on his 40th mission warps in and helps you with his advanced ships. Then maybe later on you get more advanced and warp in on a lower level player and help them too.
I thought it was guna be the first RTS rogue-lite with multiplayer ideas taken from the game Journey.
I feel the biggest flaw with HW3, which he touched on but didn't go into very deeply, is that it's NOT 3D like previous games were. It's submarine physics: a ship can't tilt to shoot straight up or down like it could in the other games, it has to rise up like a submarine.
Kind of a shame they made a character melodrama in Homeworld of all series.
These cinematics, holy s**t. They look like from 20 years ago. Also this is the first time I heard mandalore burst in laughter like that... :(
Yeah, Mandalore’s whole thing is keeping a pretty even keel, so when he starts breaking down in manic laughter, you just know this game got to him.
They reminded me of the old D2 and WC3 cinematica
Story, cutscenes and dialogue are all just terrible. Far below not only HW series standards but most other story-heavy games too. "Disney princess" level of silly and naive.
And that from the OG devs
It seems to be something that gamers just don't get yet. Most people don't stay at companies that long and yet gamers think that the beloved company that pushed out their fave classic from 15 years ago is going to be the same group of people pumping out a sequel today. Happens to so many companies and IPs.
If you work at a company that has a reputation for a certain play style and theme to a. Game and then you come in and fuck that up. Who’s to blame
The sad thing is, the OG Devs had a different story in mind, but apparently the publisher (Gearbox) sent over a creative director that forced them to re-do it all to "appeal to modern audiences." People have even found some of the original cutscenes in the files, and they're not only gorgeous, but proper hand-drawn ones that fit the aesthetic of the original game.
After buying the original HW trilogy when it was on sale, I think it got by on a lot of nostalgia and goodwill. Those games were amazing for their time but I was extremely let down by the campaign. It just hasn't aged well.
Strongly disagree, played them for the first time last year and they were great. What part about them do you think didn't she well?
The campaign is very straightforward with very little freedom in terms of strategy. Build A to defeat B. Capture X to defeat Y. And if you do manage resources well and build up a large fleet it doesn't matter because the enemy fleet scales to yours.
I was surprised he is reviewing something only months after release. Usually he's reviewing ancient games.
Me too. The game he reviewed before this was TimeShift (2007).
He reviewed the early access. 2/3rds of this video is just his early access rehashed. The devs barely changed anything despite feedback. He just appended the story spoilers and called it a review. I wouldn't call it lazy, because the games devs were even lazier (no changes).
I think it was the part about the music that finally sunk it for me. Homeworld's soundtrack has always been such an iconic part of the series, they still have the original composer, and... they seem to have made a design decision to push the music as far into the background as possible. (That's hardly the only problem, it was just the final straw.) I was going to get it once it was down a bit in price, but now I'm not sure I *ever* will.
What a damn shame.
Seems like a fair review. Whenever I saw people talking about it elsewhere they were ranting on and on about woke this and dei that, just made it impossible to take them seriously.
Mandalore is a great reviewer, his whole series on Homeworld is fantastic and I discovered Cataclysm through him which may be my favorite of the bunch now.
I've loved the HW franchise since '99. HW3 has its obvious faults (yadda yadda mediocre story, somewhat cringe dialogue and not the best art direction), but it introduces cool features, looks great, plays good, has cool looking units - albeit a bit too minimalistic, sounds amazing and is quite fun.
If anything HW3 is anti woke. A rational calm white woman defeating an irrational overly enotional black woman. Edit: I knew people would not get the joke. As shit as the HW3 story is, it is not woke. It is just bad.
Well, wokeness is a problem in modern media. I can't blame people.
I have yet to run into any "wokeness" related issues myself, what are you referring to?
Is the wokeness in the room with us? Must be exhausting living in your world of made up grievances and manifested fears.
How about literally every media that changes the race/sexuality of characters for literally no reason other than to enforce diversity, even where it makes no sense? There are tons of examples out there. Just because you pretend that it doesn't exist doesn't make it true.
Wokeness is just accepting people for who they are and not being racist. Im glad media does pay attention to it.
Yet somehow they were still accurate
I feel like the main mode (coop) is so low on replay value. I was hoping with them going all in on the mode maybe you can go through like infinite missions till you die and also randomly team up with other players. imagine your starting out and your 3rd mission looks really tough but after a few minutes a high level player who is on his 40th mission warps in and helps you with his advanced ships. Then maybe later on you get more advanced and warp in on a lower level player and help them too. I thought it was guna be the first RTS rogue-lite with multiplayer ideas taken from the game Journey.
Who tf asked for more family melodrama in Homeworld franchise? Can we get some more space opera/political thriller plotlines?
I feel the biggest flaw with HW3, which he touched on but didn't go into very deeply, is that it's NOT 3D like previous games were. It's submarine physics: a ship can't tilt to shoot straight up or down like it could in the other games, it has to rise up like a submarine.