The Video Game Critic

Well, I'm playing it. It's quite nice. I love the first mission, it gets you familiar with driving, hacking, and everything you'll be doing so far.

I don't see what the big deal is with this game.  The graphics look nice and I guess the hacking stuff looks interesting.  However, like FPS I'm pretty tired of these open world games.  Most of them lack focus and really just aren't that interesting.  Being able to go anywhere and do anything sounds good in theory...but it tends to lead to rather blah experience.  I'd personally rather have levels and structure...I find driving around cities to get from mission to mission a rather dull and tedious experience.  As I get older I'm finding I don't want to play games that look realistic or try to mimic things in real life.  Give me a colorful, imaginative world with stuff I've never seen before.  Make the game an escape from real life that gives me joy when I am playing through it.

The more AAA hyped games that come out for these new systems, the more I realize that my gaming tastes are completely out of touch with what is considered hip/cool/marketable.  Watch Dogs looks like a completely forgettable game that is just getting an absurd amount of hype for some reason.  You couldn't pay me $60 to play it.

I was a lot more excited for this game before I started reading reviews of it. I like the idea of someone using hacking to manipulate the world around them, but the reviews I read made the usage of it seem closer to quickly pushing a button to do a Quicktime event or interact with an object, rather than it being made to be the core of the game. There was probably a much more unique and interesting game in development at one time, but now it sounds more like "Grand Theft Auto with a gimmick".

Also (like Robert Smith said below), I've had a difficult time getting into open-world games in general. There have been a few recent ones that I would like to try for various reasons (Assassin's Creed IV for the sailing, Far Cry 3 for the story, the last two Saint's Row games for their craziness and humor) but I keep putting them off. When you drop me in an open-world game with the promise of being able to do anything, I often find that I lose interest. Some of this is just the way my brain works, I'm sure (plenty of gamers I know have a blast with open-world games), but I'll take purpose-driven, well-designed linearity to a huge mess of mini-games spread around a half-empty world any day. I did like Arkham City, but I probably still enjoyed the steadily-expanding world of Arkham Asylum more.

[QUOTE=JustLikeHeaven]I don't see what the big deal is with this game.  The graphics look nice and I guess the hacking stuff looks interesting.  However, like FPS I'm pretty tired of these open world games.  Most of them lack focus and really just aren't that interesting.  Being able to go anywhere and do anything sounds good in theory...but it tends to lead to rather blah experience.  I'd personally rather have levels and structure...I find driving around cities to get from mission to mission a rather dull and tedious experience.  As I get older I'm finding I don't want to play games that look realistic or try to mimic things in real life.  Give me a colorful, imaginative world with stuff I've never seen before.  Make the game an escape from real life that gives me joy when I am playing through it.

The more AAA hyped games that come out for these new systems, the more I realize that my gaming tastes are completely out of touch with what is considered hip/cool/marketable.  Watch Dogs looks like a completely forgettable game that is just getting an absurd amount of hype for some reason.  You couldn't pay me $60 to play it.[/QUOTE]


Agree 100%. And might I prescribe Transistor....

Call of Duty get's slammed for being linear and having to follow set paths, then open world games get slammed for too much choice ? What do you want people !
Or are we just getting old and cranky and just don't want to like modern games ?

Wellmissedme - 1440p @ 60fps ! That is a meaty system you have there.

I am waiting for a couple more reviews and videos before I decide on Watch Dogs, I'll be going for the PS4 version if I decide to go for it. Not sure if the exclusive content Vexer/Darkrage mentioned adds anything again I will wait for further information.

Keep us posted on your thoughts guys !

Apparently having fun on the latest consoles is "Dudebro"

Perhaps the first thing everyone should do is just unlock CtOS access in every district. It's the first thing I did. Just to have the entire map available for scan. As far as map size, it's about the size of GTA 5's Los Santos. Only much, much more interesting. The city is beautiful. Now, during the day, the game looks good, but unspectacular. But when it rains, oh wow, when it rains, it's mesmerizing. Seeing individual raindrops, bouncing off the ground, seeing the puddles slowly get larger, watching your coat flap about in the wind. I can almost SMELL the rain. And after the rain, the puddles are STILL on the ground, and slowly dry up. I like that. The game is just so immersive.  I don't know about the digital trips. I tried one, it was hilarious, but unspectacular (it was the psychedelic one). Now, the map has variety. The loop is the big city action we all want. Parker square, while large, is largely residential. Mad Mile, well, it's still like a big city, only less crowded. Brandon docks, is industrial, and very nice to explore. The wards is the ghetto, and the buildings look seriously degraded. And lastly, Pawnee is the country outskirts. Also, the easter eggs are pretty cool. I love the Rabbid hiding about on the shelf inside of a bar in Pawnee. I don't know why people complain about the driving, when I think it's fantastic. I'm surprised a lot of people are disappointed. I got exactly what I expected. It's no different from the trailer. And I went on youtube. Too many people commenting "GTA CLONE!". No, it's not a clone. You can only compare the worlds of both of the games. The missions are too different to compare. But when push comes to shove, the Watch_Dogs map isn't overbloated like GTA 5's. A little bit of countryside is nice, but too much, like GTA 5, and it's just out of hand!. To be honest, this is a fantastic game, so immersive, so wonderful. I think EVERYONE should try it!

Good news it seems that the bug ridden PC version of this game is going to get an update
http://www.pcgamer.com/2014/05/30/watch-dogs-pc-performance-patch-planned-to-reduce-lag-and-stuttering-issues/

I honestly am not a fan.  It didn't live up to the hype for me.

Here's a good review that sums up a lot that I feel is wrong with it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjX9MIAMqUg

I know a lot of people liked it, and that's cool, I just don't think it was as good as it could have been.