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Post by GamerL on Jan 31, 2015 18:44:49 GMT -5
I own Haunting Ground since years, but newer quite got to play it. Never finished CT3 either, because it starts well enough, but than magical girl boss fight, and rave music clock tower appearing, and poor man's Kefka twins... ugh. I thought Clock Tower 3 was pretty good, until after you kill the gas mask guy, then the game's quality takes a big nosedive, I agree.
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Post by wyrdwad on Jan 31, 2015 19:43:31 GMT -5
I thought Clock Tower 3 was... abysmal, personally. Especially after Clock Tower on the SFC and Clock Tower (2 Japan, 1 U.S.) on the PS1 were so good.
Clock Tower: Ghost Head, a.k.a. Clock Tower 2: The Struggle Within in the U.S., was a pretty bad followup, but Clock Tower 3 was just... embarrassing. Haunting Ground felt like an apology for that game, in my mind.
-Tom
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Post by Deleted on Jan 31, 2015 20:36:16 GMT -5
Well at least the series went out with a bang? More than some franchises get to do.
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Post by wyrdwad on Jan 31, 2015 21:51:33 GMT -5
Not really, unless you count Haunting Ground as a Clock Tower game. If you don't, then the series went out with Clock Tower 3, which was... not a good note to go out on at all. I'd personally rank it as the single worst entry in the series, by far.
-Tom
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Post by Deleted on Jan 31, 2015 21:57:44 GMT -5
Personally, I do rank Haunting Ground as a Clock Tower game. Suppose it technically isn't, but that feels like splitting hairs.
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Post by GamerL on Feb 1, 2015 6:06:00 GMT -5
I thought Clock Tower 3 was... abysmal, personally. Especially after Clock Tower on the SFC and Clock Tower (2 Japan, 1 U.S.) on the PS1 were so good. Clock Tower: Ghost Head, a.k.a. Clock Tower 2: The Struggle Within in the U.S., was a pretty bad followup, but Clock Tower 3 was just... embarrassing. Haunting Ground felt like an apology for that game, in my mind. -Tom Abysmal? Really? After a certain point the game is no good, but even then it's still playable, I managed to still finish it, to me an abysmal game is something like Superman 64, a game that is literally unplayable. But up until that point it may certainly not be anything great, but it's decent. Personally, I do rank Haunting Ground as a Clock Tower game. Suppose it technically isn't, but that feels like splitting hairs. Well technically it never involves an actual clock tower at any point, so I think "spiritual successor" is the better term, just like how Bioshock is the spiritual successor to System Shock 2.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 1, 2015 6:20:11 GMT -5
That's why I use the qualifier "personally". It doesn't technically count, but I consider it to be a part of the series. Also, I think a game can be such a stark departure from its predecessors as to warrant the use of terms like "abysmal", even if it's technically competent. Resident Evil 6 is a prime example of this.
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Post by GamerL on Feb 1, 2015 6:34:26 GMT -5
That's why I use the qualifier "personally". It doesn't technically count, but I consider it to be a part of the series. Also, I think a game can be such a stark departure from its predecessors as to warrant the use of terms like "abysmal", even if it's technically competent. Resident Evil 6 is a prime example of this. Hmmmmm, fair enough.
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Post by wyrdwad on Feb 1, 2015 7:03:20 GMT -5
Yeah, that's more what I meant. Clock Tower 3 is playable, but everything that made the Clock Tower series engaging is absent from it. The biggest boon of the original games was the surprise factor -- you could go for 45 minutes without ever seeing Scissorman, then BAM, you open a locker and he leaps out, narrowly missing you with his shears! The constant anticipation -- the worry that Scissorman MIGHT show up at any moment, even though chances are good that he won't -- is scarier than if Scissorman showed up every 1 minute and 5-10 seconds on the dot (which is how often the villain shows up in Clock Tower 3; I actually timed it!). When you can predict your antagonist's attacks and hide pre-emptively, the gameplay stops being scary and starts just becoming a chore. There's also the loss of helplessness. Part of what made the original Clock Tower games scary was the fact that you simply COULD NOT FIGHT Scissorman. When he showed up, you could maaaaaaybe disable him temporarily by knocking a bookcase on him, or using a fire extinguisher, or something like that -- but usually, you'd have to hide. And there'd always be that slight chance he'd see through your hiding spot and you'd be on the run again, which kept the tension high. But ultimately, the key was that you were never trying to DEFEAT Scissorman -- you were just trying to outrun him, and escape with your life. In Clock Tower 3, then... magical girl bow and arrow boss sequences with terrible controls. In a way, you are helpless, but only because that damned bow doesn't let you adjust your aim once you've already drawn it! And that's not a GOOD kind of helplessness for a horror title. Then there's the matter of Scissorman himself. The constant SHING! SHING! sound of the scissors slowly approaching your position -- which you always heard a split second BEFORE the music -- was genuinely very creepy, I thought, and was a cool way to let the player know that Scissorman was on his way. Haunting Ground did something similar with Hewie, who would start growling whenever the killer was a room away, letting you know it was time to hide. Both of these are effective gameplay means of signaling that the enemy is near that also maintain immersion, since they're relatively realistic indications of an evil presence (albeit over-the-top, in the case of Scissorman, but that was part of the charm!). In Clock Tower 3, the villains didn't really wield "noisy" weapons, for the most part, and aside from opening and closing doors, there was no aural indication of their approach much of the time aside from... the music. A good 50% of the time, you knew the villain was nearby because the villain music started playing -- that was your first indication, before you heard any footsteps or door slams or saw any trace of him. And while that works as a gameplay mechanic, what is that supposed to translate to in-universe? How did your protagonist know the villain was coming? It's immersion-breaking, and that's just about the worst thing you can be in a horror title. All of this added together to make Clock Tower 3 a very functionally bankrupt horror title IMHO, particularly when compared to its predecessors. Even Ghost Head had a little more sense, I thought. -Tom
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Post by Pixel_Crusher on Feb 1, 2015 7:12:21 GMT -5
Not really, unless you count Haunting Ground as a Clock Tower game. If you don't, then the series went out with Clock Tower 3, which was... not a good note to go out on at all. I'd personally rank it as the single worst entry in the series, by far. -Tom Personally, I found Clock Tower 3 to be a very good game by itself and a godsend when compared to the dreadful Struggle Within.
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Post by wyrdwad on Feb 1, 2015 7:49:05 GMT -5
Personally, I found Clock Tower 3 to be a very good game by itself and a godsend when compared to the dreadful Struggle Within. Struggle Within/Ghost Head is not a good game, granted. But at least it still maintains the basic tenets of a Clock Tower game: there's an antagonist who shows up infrequently enough to maintain an adequate level of anxiety, the antagonist announces its presence through something that makes sense in-universe (in the case of the little girl, for example, she giggles menacingly), and your protagonist is helplessly unable to fight against the encroaching threat (and must instead run and hide). It's all done very poorly in that particular game, to be sure... but the structure still makes sense. It's still recognizably Clock Tower, and still is at least making an attempt (albeit a feeble one) to uphold the traditions upon which the series was founded. Clock Tower 3... did not. And thus, for me, Clock Tower 3 is an even bigger failure than Struggle Within. It may arguably succeed more as a game, and certainly succeeds more as a story, but it fails miserably as an entry in the series. -Tom
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Post by kaoru on Feb 1, 2015 13:56:51 GMT -5
Well technically it never involves an actual clock tower at any point, so I think "spiritual successor" is the better term, just like how Bioshock is the spiritual successor to System Shock 2. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't even think all the Clock Towers involve a clock tower. Pretty sure Struggle Within/Ghost Head does not, and I don't remember one in Clock Tower 2 either.
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Post by wyrdwad on Feb 1, 2015 14:21:46 GMT -5
There is one in 2, but only for a brief second, and it feels more like an easter egg than anything -- it has nothing to do with the actual plot.
Only the first game had anything at all to do with a clock tower.
-Tom
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Post by Garamoth on Feb 1, 2015 14:33:13 GMT -5
Not sure the clock tower is really that important. It's just a title.
Do all Resident Evils have a residence? Hmm... they do have a lot of mansions. I guess they all have Biohazards, though, and they all have lab levels. So maybe we should call the series Lab Level?
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Post by dskzero on Feb 1, 2015 15:12:13 GMT -5
Not sure the clock tower is really that important. It's just a title. Do all Resident Evils have a residence? Hmm... they do have a lot of mansions. I guess they all have Biohazards, though, and they all have lab levels. So maybe we should call the series Lab Level? Or maybe just Biohazard?
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