The Ascent... Not a good Console game?

[mattspace]

So I grabbed The Ascent for Xbox from Game Pass, and it was all very pretty - clearly made by DEEEP fans of the cyberpunk genre.

First disquiet came trying to go through the character customisation options - I kept finding myself off in random menus, with no clue as to how I'd arrived there. Then eventually, I noticed it was from having the left stick ever-so-slightly off to the left or right while moving up or down.

So I get into the game, and the first mission, first encounter, Ferals in the SI... You crouch down... to shoot over an enemy? Then these little $%^$ers run at me, and I'm spinning wildly on the spot, because the character can only fire in dead straight lines, and there's only ~16 segments in the full 360 of the character's turning circle, whereas the opponents can run in from anywhere, and there's no target highlighting, no target stickyness or locking, and all my shots seem to be going over their heads.

This was described as "Diablo 3 with guns" but doesn't feel anything like Diablo to play. I'm actually wondering if it's a mouse-oriented game, where you'd shoot by mousing the precisely controlled reticle onto the target. That might also explain the wacky menu behaviour (which works better with the D-Pad).

Has anyone had more success with it?

 

[T'hain Esh Kelch]

Is there a hit mechanic in the game? Because it could just mean you are missing your shots.

 

[mattspace]

Is there a hit mechanic in the game? Because it could just mean you are missing your shots.

Possibly, but you wouldn't know it, the game is so visually busy, it's hard to see anything very clearly. You have a permanent directional indicator around the character, but there's no telltale of which enemy you're targeting, whether you hit or miss etc.

The feeling of the gunplay, is that the character's rotational speed is constant, so its basically impossible to target anything at range because your targeting sweep moves faster, the further the target is from you, and added to that the targets can move between the fixed angles you can shoot at. Again to Diablo 3 - you aways know which enemy you're engaging, because it highlights that enemy, and your attacks stick to that enemy, even if you're a little off-angle.

The bast way to describe the feeling, is they made a game that has all the closely cropped to the character model hit boxes, and fine granularity of movement and map coordinates of a FPS game, and then set it to an isometric camera, with a limited to 8 cardinal directions arcade joystick for directional control when firing a gun.

 

[diamond.g]

Have you tried hooking up a keyboard and mouse to your xbox to see if it gets more precise aiming?

 

[Macalicious2011]

This was described as "Diablo 3 with guns" but doesn't feel anything like Diablo to play.

Hmm. That's disappointing to hear. It appears to be a game that would have been more precise and gratifying to play if it was developed exclusively for K&B.

It's disappointing to learn because I have downloaded the game but not started playing it yet. My conclusion after reading reviews and comments about Ascent is that playing a a game on launch date is likely to result in disappointment.

Either one of the following is disappointing:

• Game mechanics
• Absence of promised features
• Bugs and glitches
• Missing options settings like DLSS, DV, 120hz or 60fps

It's increasingly making more sense to wait a couple of weeks to play a "better" version of the game and at a lower price.

 

[mattspace]

Have you tried hooking up a keyboard and mouse to your xbox to see if it gets more precise aiming?

no, I'm really not into kb&m for games.

 

[diamond.g]

Hmm. That's disappointing to hear. It appears to be a game that would have been more precise and gratifying to play if it was developed exclusively for K&B.

It's disappointing to learn because I have downloaded the game but not started playing it yet. My conclusion after reading reviews and comments about Ascent is that playing a a game on launch date is likely to result in disappointment.

Either one of the following is disappointing:

• Game mechanics
• Absence of promised features
• Bugs and glitches
• Missing options settings like DLSS, DV, 120hz or 60fps

It's increasingly making more sense to wait a couple of weeks to play a "better" version of the game and at a lower price.

From my understanding the xbox version runs great, it is just the gamepass pc version that has some of those issues.