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A Hat in Time


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#31 Anthus

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Posted 19 September 2018 - 08:45 PM

More thorough first impressions of the DLC: Probably spoilers. Just skip my wall of text, spoiler tags make the text small >.>

It's bad. The end, go home, see ya. Okay, it's not all bad, but it does have problems. I never thought I'd be saying anything bad about this game, but this DLC has been very polarizing within the HIT community. There were definitely parts, and levels I liked, and enjoyed, but on the whole.. I gotta say, I'm glad this was free when I got it, and I really, really hope this is not what future DLC will look like.

The 100% issue has been changed/ fixed.
Firstly, I have a slight issue with how the DLC takes your 100% file down to 70%. This sadly means I will never 100% Hat in Time again, cause I know I'm not going to beat some of the later contract levels. :( I feel that the sharp difficulty spike in this DLC may devalue the original game, if it is included in a "GotY edition" or whatever bundle. The original game, while not overly easy, was never too hard to beat. There were parts where I'd get stuck for a few tries, but nothing seemed outright unfair, or flat out badly designed*. This difficulty spike is literally like going from World 3 in NSMB, straight to World 7 in SMB2J. It's that steep.

This DLC? Well, I hope you like grinding on the same level dozens of times, and hoping you just get lucky on some of these, cause fairness has left alongside good design choices*. Maybe this DLC isn't for me. I'm not a tryhard. I play games to relax, and have fun. Hat in Time was perfect for that, but these new levels are the very antithesis of fun, in some cases. They feel like kaizo fan levels. For the record, I've been talking about the Death Wish levels, not the new chapter, which just you wait, I'll be getting to.

Before I go on, one of the biggest arguments I've seen about this DLC has been along the lines of, "This is too hard/ I can't beat it so it's bad" to which people say "They are challenge level gg, person" which is usually followed by the OP, or someone else saying "It's not about that, this DLC is for a niche group, and it's not fair". I'm mentioning this, cause I feel sentiments from all three camps. I'm really good at the base game. After playing through it again, and starting the DLC a second time, I was able to beat "Beat the Heat", "She's back form outer space", "Distorted Rift: Mafia Town" (or whatever it's called), and the Upped security in Dead Bird Studios (which was one of the few levels I liked, btw). I also enjoyed she's back form outer space, except for one little bit of bullshit at the very end. So yeah, I was able to beat four of these levels without using the easy mode, Peace and Tranquility. Everything else? Too annoying/ frustrating to even attempt more than a few times. So.. I guess I liked half the levels I beat? I will probably chip away at them, and use P&T as needed, but then I feel like a pleeb, even though hat kid takes you to the "No judgement zone" which I'll admit, was really cute, and funny.. the first five times I saw it, anyway. >.>

I simply did not enjoy most of those levels. I'm not going to try to act like I know a lot about game design, but I don't think my lack of enjoyment means these levels are automatically bad though. I've seen people like them. I've seen people actually be good at them. I think it just means that they are not for me. That's where I have a problem though. Who asked for an official challenge mode? Seriously. We have hundreds of fan levels, and mods that offer up all kinds of crazy stuff (those damn mushroom levels, which I did beat >.>). So why make the base game so much less enjoyable for the vast majority of owners to appease a very small group of players? That's what I don't get about it. I can accept that I'm not as good as others, and don't have the patience, but I feel kind of slighted here. I know I shouldn't but it's how I currently feel.

Then, there's the new chapter. I'm not going to go on for as long about this, but on the whole, I love the level's theme, and the music is nice. But, I'm still stuck on that second mission, and at this point, I'm probably not going to finish it. I don't usually whine like this, but it is fucking dumb, unfun bullshit, that I don't want in my game. Chapter 6, Act 2 is garbage*. Absolute*. Garbage*. Uhg. What upsets me is, it didn't have to be. They could have just made a regular level, then kept all the tedious kaizo bullshit to the DW levels, but nope. Hell, keep the fetch quest, just get rid of the time limit completely, or make it use less items, like Act 1. The amount of time it takes to get, say, 18/20 objects in act 2, only to fail is about 15 minutes. Give me a one or two minute challenge level, and that's fine, but ask me to replay a full, tedious sequence of collecting shit, just so I can maybe fail? and do it all again? No. Unfun, bad design*, imo.

Edit: Forgot to mention the Deep Sea time rift. It was really, really hard, but the level was enjoyable for me. I even got all of the photographs. I really loved the look of that level too. It's probably my favorite thing about the DLC.

*Obviously, this is all my own opinion, I'm sure people liked the DLC, and I'm glad that at least some people could enjoy it, but it was definitely not for me.

Still love the base game though, and the more I play it, the more I genuinely think it might be better than Odyssey. There, I said it.

#32 Nicholas Steel

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Posted 20 September 2018 - 10:38 AM

There's nothing particularly spoilery about your post, Anthus.

 

The DLC also has it's fair share of gameplay bugs that exasperate the difficulty, tediousness and unfairness of some of the content and the first 3 or so patches primarily focused on easing access conditions for the content rather than the gameplay bugs, this is fine but hopefully they are now focusing on fixes for the gameplay issues which made the content a poor experience even for those with the skills to handle the content (when it's working right). below is a summary of the kinds of issues I've been seeing during my time spent in their Discord's Bug Reports channel.

 

  • Multiple Boss fights with attacks that feature broken collision detection.
  • Erroneous cutscene triggers during boss fights (locked in to a cutscene while a boss kills you).
  • Holes in terrain that let you fall in to a void outside of the level.
  • Contracts that can't be cancelled because of a bug (seems to involve entering or exiting Easy Mode while under the influence of certain contracts and then removing the contracts in a certain order).
  • Performance issues have been reported.
  • Wonky terrain collision that results in weird stuff like infinite sliding or a death that resurrects you with a broken camera.
  • Game crashes.

Edited by Nicholas Steel, 19 October 2019 - 12:44 PM.


#33 Anthus

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Posted 21 September 2018 - 12:49 PM

The worst thing is, the Hat in Time community is now split in two, and everyone is fighting about it.

#34 Nicholas Steel

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Posted 29 September 2018 - 02:45 AM

I think the DLC is in a pretty reasonable spot now that there's been several patches for it addressing various gameplay issues, including the completion percentage issue (the Death Wish content will now increase your completion percentage to 110% instead of being the last 10% of 100%).


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#35 The Satellite

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Posted 23 January 2019 - 03:36 AM

Can't believe I haven't gone back to this thread yet.

 

I got my new laptop back in early December and one of the first things I did was finally play through this game. Actually, I started off playing it offline, then ended up playing through the rest on stream.

 

It was one of the best experiences I've had with a game in a long time.

 

The amount of heart and love poured into this game is immeasurable. It's adorable, funny, and charming as peck. The gameplay is topnotch and Hat Kid feels great to control, the level design is unique and carries their own individual stories, the story's cute, the music's wonderful... All of these elements together create such an enriching, fulfilling experience that I haven't felt in a while. I'm trying not to oversell it, but this game left such a positive impact on me that it's hard not to gush about it. I think about it a lot even though I've been done with the main game for a little while by now. I... was even willing to suffer through the Death Wish DLC just to play more of this wonderful game.

 

I'd just play a second file, but I'm waiting for the Switch port seeing as I don't mind double-dipping.

 

My complaints are few. There are moments when the physics feel a little buggy. While I loved the fourth chapter as a level, it lacked any personal investment like the other three chapters. I wish we got to learn more about the badge guy. And... that's about it.

 

Now onto the DLC... Well, Arctic Cruise is a decent level, but like Anthus, I hated the second mission. I uh, had actually quit stream while playing it, finished it offline, then came back later to stream the next mission. I kind of do want to get all achievements for this game, but that requires grinding that mission out until I get basically a perfect performance. Not going to be fun. Time Rift was fun though, felt like a fair challenge. Either way, I hope the next DLC world is much better than this one.

 

Don't feel the same about Death Wish. I have no shame in using Peace and Tranquility to 100% this thing. I like to try to beat the challenges on my own, but I won't deny Peace and Tranquility when offered because some of the extras are just downright awful. However, I do like the bounties that you take into other chapters in order to pull off a couple small challenges. Those are fun. More of those, less bullshit.

 

Negatives aside, please play this game. It's absolutely wonderful.


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#36 The Satellite

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Posted 11 May 2019 - 01:30 AM

Either way, I hope the next DLC world is much better than this one.


THANK CHRIST.

...

So Nyakuza Metro, the second DLC, came out today (technically yesterday now). I've played through it all and am confident in saying it is worth everyone's time. Unlike Arctic Cruise, it actually has thoughtful level design. The personality is through the roof, on par with and even surpassing the main game's worlds, and there's a lot more to do. And, the greatest blessing, there's no new Death Wish garbage! ... actually there's a Snatcher Coins contract, but that's perfectly acceptable. Just stuff to find, no big deal. Admittedly, I haven't tried the online party stuff yet, but I would like to and now have to in order to unlock all achievements. 

 

Which yes, I ended up doing since the last post. I did in fact clear all of Death Wish... using Peace and Tranquility for 95% of it. I think there's maybe one challenge that wasn't a time rift I didn't use Peace and Tranquility on, but according to the game, it counts, and that's good enough for me. Although I get a weird bug that shows my file as only having 66 Death Wish stamps instead of the full 111 (now 114 with the Nyakuza Metro Snatcher Coins), which is apparently solved by selecting the file, then exiting to the main menu... although it still resets every time you launch the game. Weirdly, when I launched the game today to play the DLC, it showed all stamps... then reverted to showing 66 after I got the new Snatcher Coins. The fix still works, but it's a very odd bug that also annoys me; I completed that bullshit, show me the proof, dammit!

 

... but yes. There's eight new achievements with the new DLC, I've acquired four of them already, and three of the last four require online party mode. I'll achieve those soon enough. Anyways yes, I can thankfully recommend this DLC, unlike Seal the Deal, which I can honestly only recommend if you're a completionist or super hardcore. You could do worse for $5, but still... (For the record, Nyakuza Metro is $7, but still very worth.)


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#37 The Satellite

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Posted 19 October 2019 - 04:00 AM

The physical release of the Switch version was delayed until November 8th unfortunately. So I did what any sane person would do... buy the digital version while waiting for the physical release. :heh:
 
Played around for a bit in the first two worlds, got twelve time pieces, here are some general observations:
 
- First thing I noticed right off the bat are the lengthy load times. Even booting the game takes a little while. Then add onto that loading the spaceship... then loading into a level... back into the ship... back into the level... Honestly kind of painful. Load times were snappy on my PC. Don't know what they're like on PS4 or XB1.
- Graphics took a definite downgrade. Not that they were the pinnacle before, but they had plenty of color and a style to them. Things are now a bit more flat, though still generally pop well. Textures are downscaled, not too noticeable in motion, but are when you stop to take a look, or if they're still images in a cutscene. Some visual flair is missing as well... or, in the Brewing Hat's case, inconsistent. There's a flash of light when it finishes charging... sometimes. Or it just doesn't show up other times. Honestly I'm pretty sure this was a small bug in the PC version too, but it didn't happen nearly as often there.
- It's prone to stuttering. A few moments, it might even freeze up entirely. The freezing up seemed more common in the short amount of time I spent playing in handheld mode, which I only did for the fun; I generally play docked.
- Speaking of handheld mode, the graphics take another hit there, but that shouldn't be any surprise by now.
 
All these issues aside, the game is pretty serviceable... it just needs some optimizations. I'm not sure what methods they used to port the game over to switch; supposedly, Unreal Engine 3 was incompatible with the system originally. At least, that's what I kept hearing. There are other games I'm sure are more intensive that run better, but I also get that this is a probably a complex port. Hopefully we can see some optimizations in the future. If Switch is your only option to play this game, I still say it's worth picking up, but if you have an alternative, especially PC, then swing that route for now.

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#38 Anthus

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Posted 21 October 2019 - 04:38 PM

I'm gonna wait for the physical release, since I don't have any more space on my switch, and don't want to delete anything/ buy an SD card. >.>

 

Can't say I'm shocked the switch port has some issues, but hopefully it is stuff that will be patched, and worked on as time goes by. I'm also really hoping they bring over the actually good second DLC pack too.

 

EDIT: Okay, yeah, no, it's over 16GB. I'd have to literally archive half my games. Definitely waiting for physical :P



#39 Anthus

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Posted 23 October 2019 - 08:19 PM

Okay, so I caved, ended up getting the digital version. I needed a new card anyway, so I sprung for a 128GB SD card so hopefully I'm good on space for the foreseeable future.

 

That said... I'm having horrible deja vu with what happened to Rayman 2. A great game comes out, then the various ports degrade in quality substantially. Now, the game itself is still solidly designed, and a ton of fun, but it is marred by a technically mediocre port at best. There are frame drops, and outright freezes when turning the camera in dense areas. And this isn't a one or two time thing, this happens all the time.

 

Oh and there's input lag now which can cause you to miss-time a dive, or cancel if it happens mid air, and just a general feeling of jank that isn't present in the original PC version. Texture pop-in and effects popping in makes the game look like an incomplete tech demo. The excessive depth of field makes the game look like my glasses are smudged. I'm not asking for Pixar quality here, I'm asking for a game that is playable at all times, cause again, these issues are here the whole time, and not isolated. Switch games are capable of running way better than this. I feel this port is not a good representation of how great this game really is, and that is a damn shame.

 

This is not the Switch's fault either, entirely. Hat in Time is just not a very well-optimized game, graphically and that is no secret. Smash Ultimate, Mario Odyssey, and even BotW; a launch title can somehow look better, and run better. The port just feels like a really bad representation of the game, which is my biggest problem. For a lot of potential players, this might be their first time with the game. If I had not played the game before, smoothly, I would have probably stopped cause I wouldn't be able to get into it. I've played up through Alpine Skyline so far, and over all, I am not terribly impressed with this port of the game. In spite of the base game being amazing, and one of the greatest standalone games of all time, I could not recommend this version to someone who hasn't played it already, and liked it. It would not be a good first impression of this game imo.


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#40 The Satellite

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Posted 23 October 2019 - 09:35 PM

Thankfully I've had zero issue with input lag. It still felt responsive enough to control. The other issues though, yeah. Honestly this port has me entertaining the idea of what a complete rebuild in a newer engine would look like. Probably would run a hell of a ton better. Could also see some tweaking to animations; compare early game cutscenes to Nyakuza Metro cutscenes and you can see the massive gap in quality. I get they're a small team so I don't expect this anytime soon, but I feel like something like this in the future would probably be the best thing to happen to the game.

 

Here's hoping they can iron out some bugs. Looks like they've opened up a bug report thread and seem to be preparing a patch to take care of some of them. That's pretty nice... although I hadn't considered the fact that the game is somehow bigger data-wise on Switch than on PC. What could that possibly be about?


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#41 Anthus

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Posted 23 October 2019 - 10:11 PM

 

although I hadn't considered the fact that the game is somehow bigger data-wise on Switch than on PC. What could that possibly be about?

 

Yeah, for real. This game is nearly 17GB O_o

 

That's bigger than Mario Odyssey, AND Smash combined.

 

My totally legit theory is they made a ton of LOD models, and that is what is causing the bloat, cause that totally wouldn't make the game run worse or anything :blah:

 

I think ultimately the game is playable. It's definitely not broken, just a bit.. rougher than it needs to be. It's just not a good representation, and for all those who said "Oh, I'll wait for the Switch version" well, I think you are getting the short end of the joy-con here, if you ask me. I think the team is mostly good, and transparent, but yeah it is just a few people so I don't see any major overhauls any time soon.

 

Unrelated to my misgivings with the port, I always thought the graphics had a certain charm, but I could never put my finger on what it was exactly. It's not the lighting, or the textures. I think what it is, is how all the models look "hand drawn" but in 3D >.>

 

Oh, they also nuked the camera badge options. 1/10 port.

 

 

EDIT: I meant to share these in my other post, but here are some screens of some weird graphical shit that happened while playing.

Spoiler

 

EDIT 2: Oh, but wait! There's more. I remember in the original version you could do a cool OOB trick here, and walk on the collision under the island. But now we get, uh.. absolutely floored by the quality of this port. :P



#42 The Satellite

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Posted 26 October 2019 - 12:07 AM

For what it's worth, they're already compiling bug reports and patching them. There's no released patches yet, seems like they're planning to roll out one big patch sometime soon. There's a reddit thread for it here. So it's nice that they've at least acknowledged things.




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