.hack//Infection Part 1

The end of this first episode of .hack - dubbed Infection - will leave players hanging and longing for more.

I also realized that what really made it good wasn't just its refreshing take on conventional RPGs, but that it also captured some of the community aspects of a MMORPG. [Mar 2003, p.82]

.hack scores major points for its unique setting, but there's also some very solid game design to back it up. [Nov 2002, p.50]

NPC reaction isn’t all that diverse, as it would be in a real MMORPG. The visuals, aside from the character designs, aren’t all that impressive.

The main bulk of the gameplay, which mainly consists of battles in fairly unattractive dungeons is clichéd, and highly repetitive. The graphics as a whole fall a little below average, and for a standalone game, it’s fairly short.

Ugly. It's got a muddled battle system. [Feb 2003, p.44]

The most disturbing thing about .Hack is how short it is. Perhaps the whole series, or at least two of the games, could have easily fit on one disc.

Played on PlayStation 2. Gameplay: GREAT. Story: GOOD. Graphic: GOOD. Music/Sound: GREAT. Dialogue: GOOD.

A game that I truly miss, it was entertaining to say the least. The world the designers built was remarkable, even though it had some faults I didn't really pay too much attention to them.

You know a game is good when even with crappy visuals it still holds on to you, this is even more evident in RPGs. This short but great RPG should be in every collectors catalog as it's one of the many great RPGs of the PS2 era.

.hack Infection is the first of 4 games in an episodic series of games. The plot involves a game within the game. you had just signed up to a game called "the world". After a few tutorial quests with a friend, you run into a special and almost unbeatable monster. The monster performs a move that sends him into a coma in real life. He then finds himself with a bracelet that has the power to change the programming code of "the world" so it severally weaken his enemies. with this comes accusations of him being a hacker or a virus and many allies along the way. At least that's what i got. The game abruptly ends with many questions unanswered. For a 2003 game the graphics look ok. The levels look decent with the use of 3-D meets anime art style. The problem is that for what it tries to be it fails at. It tries to simulate a wide MMO, but every level is closed off and is accessed through other means. There are tons of dungeons in the game, but not a lot are needed to finish the game. Not to mention a good chunk of them look the same. They recycle the same style for 80% to 90% of them. same goes for the enemies. Sure a lot of them are menacing, but they get recycled so often that it can get mind-numbing. The audio is ok. The music is appropriate for dungeons and has a high quality sound to it. The game is also almost completely voice acted, which is a lot more than MMOs can say at the time. The problem is some of the voices are absolutely annoying. Certain key items keep saying their names out loud. You end up getting them, not because you want them, but to shut them up. The voice acting during the plot on the other hand is serviceable at best. No one in particular is good or bad. The game-play is boring. The game is a hybrid between an MMOs and a Action/RPG combat system. The problem is that it does neither very good. Every fight plays the same. You go up to your opponent and play shot for shot till someone dies. Not to mention none of the enemies are loaded in. Every fight has a giant sphere in which monsters are loaded in. this really takes you out of the experience if you ever played Everquest or similar games. Another problem is the dungeons. Plot crucial dungeons have set place for you to go to complete them. This makes the game even more repetitive when you realize you do the same thing to get a good item from a dungeon. The difference is that you teleport out during at the end of main quests. So it fails to simulate a MMO, it fails at being good RPG and since it cuts the plot off so soon, it fails to have more than a paper thin plot. Overall .hack Mutation is a bad game that is held together with a cool concept. If the first is a sign of things to come, this is going to be a long ride crappy ride for you. If you have any interest in the series, i'd say play at your own risk. This is a cash grab. Do not be duped. They spread this along 4 games to see how many **** would give them $250 over 4 games.

Sous prétexte d'une pseudo-simulation de MMORPG, voilà une petite daube d'une rare indigence qui ne vaut même pas la peine qu'on marche dessus. Le jeu japonais est en déclin ? avec des pseudo-jeux (et vraies daubes) de ce genre, ça ne m'étonne pas du tout. L'interface a été pensée avec les pieds et la jouabilité a été réglée avec des moufles. L'ensemble niaiseux à n'en plus pouvoir est à vomir des arcs-en-ciel.