» Thu Oct 11, 2012 3:52 pm I am usually not a huge adventure game fan. In fact, after all of the GTAs, LA Noires, Mafias, ACs, the genre is tired and stale. It seems every new game is just a cut-and-paste, trite "mission-success-mission-success-end", "go-through-the-motions" copy of the last game. The entire genre is infected with SSDG, Same Story, Different Game. That is, until now.
Oh yes, you WILL find the gameplay, the flow and format, awfully familiar (awful being the key part). Dishonered has the same mission-based runs, same moves/movement/action (with some sparklingly clever exceptions), etc. that are so familiar to the action/adventure genre. BUT... from the very get go, you will find that you really don't care about all of that. THAT is what makes Dishonored so special in every (honest and qualified) review. The gameplay and missions are the stars here, it's the world, the environment, the characters. Dishonored (so far) is its own solid and unique world, with its own aesthetics, its own story. The intro will leave you wondering why you purchased the game, it will have you shaking your head and repeating, "SSDG". BUT, once you've run through the first "mission", that will ALL change. As you explore the world, pay attention to its extraordinarily rich details, its characters and what they talk about when they know you're listening and when they don't, you become more and more invested. Suspending disbelief, you'll find, is something that you will not need to work at, or even recognize, as Dishonored absorbs you. After playing for a few hours, I found myself looking at the clock and saying, "Holy crap! I have to go to work in the morning." There are very, very few games that do this for me, that take hours and make them seem like minutes.
What a good adventure game is "supposed" to do is grab you up and place you into its world and story. If there's any one main goal, this is it. Dishonored succeeds in this so well that you'll find no nostalgia for the ACs and GTAs of the gaming world. Because they've been dethroned by this newcomer that took all of that tired old gameplay and polished it up nice and shiny, creating something that truly feels new and exciting.
Oh, sure, there are things, I am sure, that will be incongruous to this "review", but I have a very good feeling that I will (barring gamekilling bugs) EASILY forgive them from what I have seen so far. No game is perfect, but Dishonored is as close as they come (genre-centric) and easily outshines its competition.
