Text/Repair&Isaac

Since the end of 2022, after the first word-of-mouth explosion of the game under Inhuman, it has become one of the most anticipated Tencent games in my heart, and I even want to remove the "one". Because it is really a very rare game under the Tencent system.

However, in the comment area at the time, many people still questioned that this PV demo was not a real machine recording and could not represent the real level of the game; Although the graphics look stylish, the gameplay part is still questionable, will those cool camera scheduling interfere with the combat experience? How deep can the fun of the game of attack and defense be between friend and foe?

It's normal for everyone to have this kind of concern, "teaser deception" is not uncommon in the industry, and game producer Roy is leading a team to do a project for the first time.

In order to dispel this concern, Grape Jun went to Guangzhou a while ago, and tried out several parts of the game under the inhuman, such as PVE plot, PVP battle, and difficult challenge, on the offline machine. After playing for an afternoon, I can confirm that the content in the first PV of the game is the real thing, and the actual combat has not shrunk, and it is even more fun than it looks.

Of course, at present, this demo version does not have commercialization, cultivation system, operation activities and other parts of the game that are most likely to be sprayed in the past, so the part praised this time is limited to the core gameplay and content quality of the game.

Don't be afraid of the embarrassment of Grape King, in fact, the media in the same industry have a very high evaluation of the game, but the project team itself is under great internal pressure, saying, "Don't praise too much, seek truth from facts, and be low-key." ”

In fact, the content version of this game trial is the WTO accession test that will be available to players on December 9. If you have any doubts, you can go to the official website of the game to sign up for the test now, and then come back to see if the experience is consistent with that of Grape King.

I have to say that this time it really makes people don't want to stack their armor, so I let go of Kuais Tencent once.

*Due to the confidentiality agreement, this article cannot use the actual machine trial materials, and can only use the public video as an auxiliary explanation.

01

What does the game really look like?

Let's start with the part that everyone is most concerned about: what kind of product is the game under the alien?

To put it simply, the game is divided into three parts, one is the main plot mode with linear levels and strong narrative performances; the second is a PVP battle that focuses on offensive and defensive rules and psychological games; The third is the PVE mode, which includes gameplay such as difficult challenges, which is used as a "non-one-time consumption content" for the game.

At the same time, the gameplay of the game will not be limited to the form of 1v1 battles. For example, there are many scenarios in PVE levels where players can pick up the ground or knock out weapons in the hands of enemies to gain new attack skills and moves.

And in some boss battles, the game presents a completely different style from "fighting games", with stage transitions, health bar locks, and combat performances, and I even feel like I'm playing soul like for a moment.

Another example is PVP, although this trial only has a classic fighting mode - each person chooses three characters, and then takes turns to fight, and the first three wins are considered victory. But the planner told me that the game is testing more types of PVP modes such as multi-V and multi-player chaos.

At the moment, the game doesn't show a development system, and if it does, I guess it's probably a development account, not a development character. As for the commercialization part, I've seen the way the Season Pass and some heroes are acquired in this demo, and the overall feel may be similar to the logic of a fair play game.

Seeing this, you can probably guess the operation mode of the game, PVE, as the core main content, is the guarantee of attracting new traffic; The PVP season is used to achieve long-term operations and tap into the depth of the action system. Character acquisition, external bodies (similar to psychic beasts and scrolls in the Naruto mobile game), and special effects skins will probably be part of the game's commercialization or resource investment.

The development team said that the game will be more restrained in the commercialization part, and the characters do not need to be synthesized in pieces, and there will be no rarity differentiation, what you see is what you get. "I hope it's a defensible way to play, with more playability, and more sustainable and updated content planning, including characters, story experience, etc., we feel that this is the core."

02

How good is the game?

Roy once told me that instead of making a commercial mobile game with formulaic routines, they hope that the game under the alien can make users perceive its tonality and temper.

I think the team did it. Whether it's the "Mortal Song" concept PV in the background of the login screen, or the restraint shown by the UI layout of the main menu, it only takes a few minutes for the game to open to make its own tonality.

The transition and transition effects of the interface at all levels of the game are done very carefully, and while doing enough visual effects, they are also closely related to the freehand blank feeling of the IP of "Under One Man", which is very "cinematic" as the producer said. While this may not be a good analogy, the game really gave me the feeling of a 3D version of Back to the Future 1999.

It's no wonder that Enzo (Zhang Hanjin), president of Tencent Game Cube Studio Group, believes that even if the game under Inhuman is played with all the strongest products in the two-dimensional game, it will have a strong recognition.

The story mode is the most intuitive "good" part of the game, whether it is cutscenes, camera scheduling, or the action moves of the boss in battle, it can be said that it has put in a lot of work, and it is the kind of thing that you can see at a glance that "the money is burning".

The experience of this part also basically confirms Roy's statement that "the story mode is where the most investment in game assets" and Enzo's previous answer:

Many people have asked me a question: the anime and manga already tell the story well, and you spend so much money to retell the plot in the game, why should I watch it? I can answer this question very well: if I do the same scene at 10 times the price of animation, it will definitely be done better, it can give you a new shock, and it doesn't cost money, why don't you come?

The plot range selected by the game's "WTO accession test" corresponds to the entry of Wang Ye into the WTO in the original book, and only three of them are open in this trial. Each level showcases a different style of playthrough. For example, one-to-many miscellaneous battles, parkour/walking handsome movie performance scenes.

In any case, the whole level flow is very similar to a single-player game, or the team hopes to do the story mode in the direction of a traditional linear game, including the configuration of enemy soldiers, the mechanism of boss battles, the structure of the process, the shaping of the story atmosphere, and so on. At the same time, for the bridge sections in the original book that are not too much due to the length, the game has been further expanded and played.

Although it is not a so-called triple-A game, it is logically similar to a triple-A game, and you can simply think of it as a fully enhanced Naruto Ultimate Storm.

What's even more commendable is that in addition to the "content quality" of the game, it is definitely hard enough in terms of combat rules and action design, not the kind of "good-looking but not fun" vase game.

How hard is it? Before we started the trial, we planned to sacrifice the PPT first, and spent half an hour talking about the combat mechanism and battle logic, which gave us the illusion that we were in class. If it weren't for a hardcore fighting game, you wouldn't really be able to do this......

Note, however, that this does not mean that the game has a high barrier to entry. On the contrary, players will actually learn and feel no more complex than a regular competitive game, action game, or MMO.

Players who have played the Rubik's Cube game will easily feel that the combat rules and design of the game under the Inhumans are in line with their fighting products.

To put it simply, the core of the game's combat is to see the moves. It's still the rock-paper-scissors idea - your basic options are basic attack, defense, dodge, forced exit, flat move (blue light skill), dangerous move (red light skill), and stunt (ultimate move). They are interlinked: a draw move can be defended and triggered by an anti-counter; Dangerous moves cannot be defended, but can be dodged for 1 stamina; When caught in the opponent's combo, you can also use 12 seconds of CD to force out for 3 HP.

Only here, it feels a bit like "Wolf" - the red light is equivalent to "danger", you just need to defend or dodge, and then attack by stitches. But there's also a key mechanic added to the game: when the opponent is defending, your basic attack will automatically turn into a grappling, and you can make a throw while breaking the defense.

Each character's grappling moves are different

In this way, the logic of the entire battle, in the process of the two sides testing each other and reacting to make moves, formed a "chain of suspicion" cycle that triggered and erupted extremely quickly. For example, I guess that the opponent will make a blue light first and defend in advance, but the opponent guesses that I will defend, and when a basic attack comes, I will be thrown to the ground by the grappling technique. If I make consecutive mistakes and deplete my stamina for 5 points of continuous recovery, I will be caught by the opponent in a vacuum and violently output. This set of logic has constituted a strong gaming experience.

To put it bluntly, this is still the underlying logic of fighting games. But what the game does better under Inhuman is that on the basis of simplifying the operation and understanding threshold as much as possible, it also pulls the upper limit of combat very high. How to pull it up? There are three points worth talking about:

First, similar to many fighting games, Inhuman allows you to forcibly cancel an action - this operation is not complicated, it is integrated with the roll, forced exit is integrated in the same key, when there is no action, it is a roll, when you are stuck in the opponent's combo, it is forced to exit, and when you use a skill action, it is canceled. But it has a lot of room for improvement, for example, if I play the Blu-ray skill first, the opponent will definitely have to defend and dismantle the move, at this time, I cancel the skill and replace it with a basic attack, and I can counter the opponent.

Second, the game uses and excavates the rules very deeply, and after the player understands a basic setting, he will slowly learn advanced gameplay, and continue to gain a sense of accomplishment in the process. For example, you know that you can trigger anti-reversal by defending against Blu-ray skills, but after playing more, you will find that anti-counter attacks can also be counter-attacked, which seems to constitute a traditional martial arts experience of pushing hands, making reactions and games more interesting.

Third, in the basic attack combo and skills, there are quite a lot of hidden mechanics of the game plug under the Inhuman. For example, Feng Baobao's small skill is to stab forward, this stabbing has a second stage of pursuit, and at the same time, pressing the chase at the perfect time will additionally trigger the determination of the upper flirting effect. If you don't read the instructions or guides, it may be difficult for you to understand this kind of detailed operation.

In addition to skills, each character's flat A combo is also very carefully designed, such as the first three stages are flat pushes, and the last two sections have special judgments; Some skills can be offset, while others will reset the combo...... Every role, every set of rules is different. Making good use of these hidden mechanics will greatly increase the upper limit of operations, which is also a common practice in the Rubik's Cube in the fighting category.

Combined with such combat mechanics and character design, the game follows the characteristics of the "Naruto" mobile game: it sells not only simple characters, but also its unique combat experience. For example, when I play Wang Ye, I feel more about the flexible use of Qimen's technique, while when I play Barron, I feel a variety of grappling, joint skills and other fighting skills.

03

Does the game have a chance?

Having said that, if you ask me what I think of the chances of Inhuman Games, I can tell you with certainty: this is already a large-scale product with extremely high level of completion and quality, and is unique on the market.

Placed in any tab, the game almost has irreplaceable highlights under Inhuman. For example, in two-dimensional style games, there are not many games that can make PVP so hardcore, strong competitiveness, and strong sense of impact; What about fighting and competitive games? There are not many games that can achieve PVE plot content that not only has a complete world view and tonality, but also has a high-quality performance experience. There is really no opponent.

At this point, there are actually not so many concerns about the game under Inhuman.

Perhaps the biggest challenge is what the demo and test didn't show. For example, under the premise of maintaining high quality of characters and content, what should be done to cultivate and commercialize? If it is deepened, it may affect the tonality and competitive experience of the game; If it is shallow, it may be difficult to assess the payment situation.

Regarding this part, the planner clearly answered on the spot that the game under the Inhuman will not take the route of extracting fragments; Judging from some of the content of the trial, the future commercialization will likely focus on passes, characters/outbody exchanges. I can feel that the Rubik's Cube attaches a certain importance to tonality and competitive experience, and as for how to balance the scale, it should take some time to explore.

As for the problem that some people are worried about "the number of well-known IP characters is too small", the planner said that the game will dig deep into some supporting characters who do not have much space in the original book, but are actually full of personality and special exercises, such as Yuan Tao, who plays with beads, and his partner Handaner.

In general, the game under the alien has Tencent's consistent thinking - big DAU + competition + popular IP, and at the same time, it has a tone and painting style that is not so Tencent. In recent years, it should be considered one of Tencent's most unique products.

In my opinion, this game under the alien is not only a high-quality IP work, but also has the opportunity to raise the IP influence of "Under One Man" to a higher level; It is also a proof of Tencent's Rubik's cube's strength in the field of "content games".

As for whether the Rubik's Cube can actually do it in the end, let's wait and see.

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