Hotline Miami.. HMMMMMM

[louisg]

I finally got Hotline Miami. Now, the atmosphere is great, the music is great, it's thrilling.. but.. I don't think it's quite a fair game. I'd be interested to hear shmuppers' impressions on this.

So far I'm up to the 4th chapter in the game, and winning has been a matter of dying a thousand times until something happens to work. Often, it seems like you can do the same thing twice and have wildly different outcomes, owing in part to weapon shuffling.

The strategy which seems to work more often than not seems to be to set off a gunshot and pump guys full of lead as they round the corner. I wish the game was more of a matter of split-second thinking and enemy prediction, but the controls seem ill-equipped to deal with the amount of action IMO (maybe it's just me, but I lose my mouse pointer. I let off a shot and my character is facing one way when I thought I had moved the mouse the other way. I wish they had opted for dual-stick control), and I've seen enemies behave, well, randomly-- everything from not attacking me when they probably should have to eyes-in-the-back-of-their-head.

I went looking for walkthroughs, and what I found on YouTube were strategies where someone run and guns the entire thing, throwing stealth out the window and not dying once. Now, I suspect he tossed out runs where he died. I also found another video where the author *did* admit to cutting those out, saying it would take all week if he had left them in.

Now, I'm not asking for the game to be easy, per-se, but do you think it's possible to one-life it (or ten-life it)? Is it possible to approach levels without having already died on them a bunch? Is the game only playable because of its infinite lives and instant restart? And, if you do think it's possible, how do you approach the levels?

[dcharlieJP]

I finally got Hotline Miami. Now, the atmosphere is great, the music is great, it's thrilling.. but.. I don't think it's quite a fair game. I'd be interested to hear shmuppers' impressions on this.

So far I'm up to the 4th chapter in the game, and winning has been a matter of dying a thousand times until something happens to work. Often, it seems like you can do the same thing twice and have wildly different outcomes, owing in part to weapon shuffling.

The strategy which seems to work more often than not seems to be to set off a gunshot and pump guys full of lead as they round the corner. I wish the game was more of a matter of split-second thinking and enemy prediction, but the controls seem ill-equipped to deal with the amount of action IMO (maybe it's just me, but I lose my mouse pointer. I let off a shot and my character is facing one way when I thought I had moved the mouse the other way. I wish they had opted for dual-stick control), and I've seen enemies behave, well, randomly-- everything from not attacking me when they probably should have to eyes-in-the-back-of-their-head.

I went looking for walkthroughs, and what I found on YouTube were strategies where someone run and guns the entire thing, throwing stealth out the window and not dying once. Now, I suspect he tossed out runs where he died. I also found another video where the author *did* admit to cutting those out, saying it would take all week if he had left them in.

Now, I'm not asking for the game to be easy, per-se, but do you think it's possible to one-life it (or ten-life it)? Is it possible to approach levels without having already died on them a bunch? Is the game only playable because of its infinite lives and instant restart? And, if you do think it's possible, how do you approach the levels?

there's one of the later levels that , first time through, is absolutely horrifically hard and it took me a while to get through it and it -absolutely- came down to executing without making a mistake (i switched to an XBox pad early on as the mouse wasn't helping me) - you definitely need twitch reactions so i'd advise using a pad.

You can run and gun it but it's pretty much one miss and you are dead - which is pretty awesome really, plus there's a whole stack of bonuses available depending on how you play.

I'm sure someone could one life clear it given a huge amount of time, but i think you'd need a very big slice of luck given that chunks of the levels are randomised - especially with weapons placements. There's sometimes you'll get a crap weapon, everyone armed with machine guns, and you just know you're pretty much screwed.

I lo the game though - the music is outstanding - and remember... doors and sound are your friend!

And the trailer is brilliant :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2o9SUPgyZRY

[louisg]

i'd advise using a pad.

Ahh it looks like the Mac version doesn't support controllers (wtf!). It's also not vsync'd unless it's windowed, making it rather hard to see what's happening (grumble).

Do doors block sound? I can't quite figure out what the rule is.

[AntiFritz]

The random weapon spawns in this killed the game for me. It's fun, but I hated how my success on a level was somewhat dictated by what weapons spawn where.

[dcharlieJP]

Do doors block sound? I can't quite figure out what the rule is.

doors can kill people when opened it's much more useful using them that way

The random weapon spawns in this killed the game for me

definitely makes single life clearing insanely hard but at least the game is snappy in restarting

[Obiwanshinobi]

These boards could use an official Mac (games) thread. I own one, which makes me feel okay about poking fun at the thing.

[Friendly]

Is there a release date for the PS Vita port? I'll most likely go with that. IIRC it was supposed to be released right about now.

[Udderdude]

As others have said, the randomness ruined things for me too. It feels like it attempts to band-aid up the death-due-to-randomness thing by giving the player restart points on every floor. Press R to restart! Or not ..

[louisg]

As others have said, the randomness ruined things for me too. It feels like it attempts to band-aid up the death-due-to-randomness thing by giving the player restart points on every floor. Press R to restart! Or not ..

That's exactly my reaction. One thing that the indie scene really reminds me of is the Amiga game dev scene-- tons of style, very little good gameplay or understanding of game mechanics (like, "we copied this NES game, but everything that makes it good went over our heads"). We put up with it now because it's new and fresh and exciting, but some day it won't be. Somewhere in my mind there's a Hotline Miami that doesn't exist which is all about strategy and skill, doesn't fall back onto a million instant-restarts, and is a truly great game that's more than a cheap thrill.

As Udderdude pointed out, you can't even consistently plan your attack with the randomization the way it is, especially when it comes to people sitting down (you have to always assume they have a gun I guess). Ideally, you'd be able to eyeball a level and say, "OK, I can take that guy out with my fists, grab his gun, use that guy as a human shield, and complete the level that way". But what I'm seeing is that the level of randomization is high enough that this isn't consistently possible. Sure, *eventually* you will beat the level because things will line up just right. And it's not that you don't have to play at least somewhat decently. But to me, it feels like a slot machine with really cool graphics and sound.

I really feel like this is the equivalent of designing a shmup where half the time you can't avoid blowing up, but people play it because there are a million explosions going off and it *feels* like you're in control just enough. But it's cool! We've got infinite continues!

That said, the casual-style thrill and soundtrack of Hotline Miami is probably enough to keep me playing for now. And who knows, maybe it's a lot better with a game controller (if so, I have no idea why they'd ship this version without support for one).

[dcharlieJP]

I really feel like this is the equivalent of designing a shmup where half the time you can't avoid blowing up, but people play it because there are a million explosions going off and it *feels* like you're in control just enough. But it's cool! We've got infinite continues!

I'd agree there's some design choices that could have made HM an even better , tighter game - but i'd disagree with the second part.

The randomness isn't great especially in some levels where it makes certain segments impossible - but that's scenarios where long corridors + enemies with ranged weapons + no other route. I'm not saying it doesn't suck, because it does.

I'd say people play it because in HMs case it's genuinely good especially as the game progresses and the levels become more like huge puzzles.

Now if this was Fez, i'd happily be there to help throw it under the nearest train

[Udderdude]

especially as the game progresses and the levels become more like huge puzzles.

Meh, I felt like I did the overhead action/puzzle thing much better in Twin Reaper's Possessor .. the levels are set up more like actual puzzles, and there's no randomness .. and it's possible to lose by not doing the puzzle parts right instead of just pure action.

[Mischief Maker]

For top scores you need to be switching weapons constantly. Some weapons drops are random, others aren't. It's really a non-issue.

Hotline Miami starts out feeling like a predatory stealth puzzle, but as you get better and better at the game it turns into a high-speed destruction rampage as you tear through the levels like a force of nature.

Again, reckless behavior, getting spotted, etc, equals higher scores.

If you're looking for a perfect R-Type memorization exercise this ain't it. Think of it more akin to a Kenta Cho random shmup like Parsec 47.

[Udderdude]

I didn't even mention the scoring system, but I'm not liking the randomness there either.

(I suppose I should also mention I don't like any of Kenta Cho's abstract RNG-fests either)

[Mischief Maker]

If you don't like the randomness, just use the wolf mask that gives you a free knife at the start. It's pretty much the ultimate melee weapon in this game.

There. Randomness addressed.

[Udderdude]

#1 That's not really addressed as much as semi-bandaided, which was an issue I had in the first place ..
#2 I have to get a highscore on a stage later in the game to even get it .. worth it to me? Nah.

[louisg]

Yeah, the whole thing is really band-aided up. I like how Udderdude puts it. I got a little further today, but I'm still seeing all kind of erratic AI behavior that makes it pretty hard to put together a plan (pretty much what I outlined in my original post, plus some collision weirdness). You *do* have to put together a plan to conquer a level, which is good, but whether it succeeds is really down to a few random factors, even besides the weapon placement.

It's still more fun than GTA though And that's gotta count for something.

[mortified_penguin]

Easily my favorite game from last year. I can see why the randomness is annoying to a lot of people here, (shmup site and all), but you gotta play it balls to the wall reckless.

I don't know, just something about how hard and fast it played, the soundtrack, the totally batshit story. Came out of nowhere and turned out to be the best $10 I'd ever spent.

[Obiwanshinobi]

Hardly anybody played missions in the original GTA seriously. Now the hunt for any reason why many people enjoy the hell out of Hotline Miami is upon.
Hmmm, I see my vintage PC should be enough to play it...