Hellgate London preview

games: Hellgate London preview

November 3 2007 | WilHarris

It’s London baby! But not as we know it. Step this way for a look at the Hellgate: London demo. The full game is released today (2nd Nov) and looks to be a pretty stylish offering for fans of the emergent RPG/FPS crossover genre, although all that Templar stuff looks like it may well just be a cool setting rather than offering much in the way of plot (not quite as bad as Dan Brown, but you get the idea). And guys, what’s with the accents? Did you think no-one from England would play this game or something?

Enjoy! Don’t forget to subscribe or check back on Monday when I’ll be giving The Witcher the once over.

-Katharine

comments

Xythen

November 3rd, 2007 - 7:27am

Great preview! This is one of your best vids yet, second only to the Zelda DS review in your cute Link outfit.
I’ll have to get the demo now just to see this Murmur character. Your description of him made me laugh! (In a real way, not in an lol’ing text speak way.)

As for the accents, you’re right, they sounded abysmal. Why didn’t they just get good English voice actors? My favourite game for that was Dragon Quest VIII when they got Ricky Grover to play Yangus. I’m from Scotland so I know the pain of having to hear a game developers’ pathetic attempt at a non-American character, since seemingly every dwarf I’ve come across has some generic “Scottish Highlands” accent.

Looking forward to your next video!!

Phill

November 3rd, 2007 - 11:33am

It will be interesting to see how they real world locations look. I’m particularly interested in St Paul’s as I was there the other day and it is breathtakingly crafted. Any developer would have their work cut out for them. I hope it hasn’t been reduced to a burned out husk. If anywhere would have surivived a demon attack wouldn’t it be a holy place like St Paul’s?

I hope it’s modable like Oblivion. All sorts of great stuff came out for Oblivion, even minor things like changing the leveling system or the look of armour.

Thanks for the preview, I look forward to the full on review.

Norbit

November 3rd, 2007 - 2:50pm

Nice preview but I’m not sold yet although I must say killing Zombies on Tottenham Court Rd sounds a lot more interesting than buying cheap electronics which is what I normally do down there lol

The recreation of London is a bit disapointing as are the voices. The only game I’ve seen which does a good job of London visuals and voices was ‘The Getaway’ although it was all a bit ‘mockney’ (but intentionally).

I’m still hoping they make game of ‘The Long Good Friday’ because Bob Hoskins ‘Harold’ would be one of the greatest game characters ever imo

Guy Sherman

November 4th, 2007 - 7:41pm

Really like the show!

Katharine

November 5th, 2007 - 5:37am

Cheers Xythen
Yeah, the accents are so bad you feel like they are parodic, but I can’t for the life of me work out what there is to parody (other than English people having different accents to the American developers of the game) or why anyone would think that it would fit with this kind of game. Silly confused people. It makes it a whole lot worse that the sampled dialogue is seemingly random and irrelevant to what is happening in the textboxes. It can be quite amusing though; make sure you go get hit on by the techsmith at the Covent Garden gate (regardless of the sex of your character) and you’ll see what I mean! Oh, and I share your pain about Scottish accents - I was watching Braveheart again yesterday having spent last weekend with my Scottish cousins and there were more than a few flinch-making moments!

Katharine

November 5th, 2007 - 5:48am

Hey Phill

For now it looks like you’re out of luck on the modding front:
‘Flagship Studios does not currently plan to support modding for Hellgate: London.’ (from http://hellgate.wikia.com, FAQ 2.16.2).

I haven’t played the full game yet, but I’ve heard that the RL locations used in the game are a lot smaller. Have you read Alan Moore’s From Hell? If you’re interested in London architecture of mystical/religious buildings there’s some quite interesting stuff in there, particularly in his lengthy notes in the back of the graphic novel. Also check out Ian Sinclair’s work.

I’m not sure if this is going to get a full scale review - there’s so much out to cover at the moment in just 3 shows a week!

Katharine

November 5th, 2007 - 5:53am

Lol Norbit - I hear that! It would have been hilarious if you had to do little real life tasks like put credit on your Oyster card before you could go through the underground portals. I missed ‘The Getaway’ but it looks really cool. I’ll check it out when I can - thanks.

Alex

November 6th, 2007 - 7:00pm

Thoght you guys would like this. It’s from an American site I love called Penny Arcade. It’s about the different play models of Hellgate: London.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2007/05/11

Katharine, They recently talked about you on TWiT - that’s how I heard about you. I hope you get a lot of traffic from it - You have a great show

Katharine

November 7th, 2007 - 2:05pm

I love Penny Arcade too; ‘Free Play User says what?’ nearly had me in tears. My favourite is still this one though. Thanks for the comment, glad you like the show And thanks to Leo Laporte for the mention.

Alex

November 7th, 2007 - 7:25pm

“CS3 fo life”
(flashes nerdy graphic designer gang signs)

Alex

November 7th, 2007 - 7:27pm

On another note is there anyway we can see the upcoming games you’ll be reviewing? I’d love to see a review on Mass Effect or Super Mario Galaxies.

Katharine

November 8th, 2007 - 4:29pm

Lol Alex!

And on upcoming reviews, at the moment we don’t schedule too far in advance as game release dates are always moving about, and sometimes I’ll plan to review something only to get to the shops on the day of release and find it’s sold out or not come in. I’ll always tell you in the text introduction to each episode what will be coming in the next show though. I will definitely be reviewing Mass Effect. Probably not SMG though as I don’t have a wii (it’s a shame, the game looks so good). Do keep letting me know what you want to see reviews of and I will bear it in mind. Cheers.

sasha brinkova

December 11th, 2007 - 3:48am

Contrary to popular belief, the end of the year is one of the best times to look for, awesome descion

Lunewhite

January 9th, 2008 - 10:55pm

i expected much much more from such a high set of programers ie wow and diablo ex employes i did beta test this and cardboard cutouts from the back of a cereal box spring to mind if your old enough to remeber the daleks trying to relate to your char is also hard to do so the extreme mode wont be played by many.(extreme mode 1 death and thats it you have to make another char) practise makes perfect they say.this title isnt p2p but you can get extra items buy purchasing the gold account you get more slots and better armour also you look diffrent to the none subscribers.All in all free to play mmorpg thats solid enough and a lil diffrent to goblins orcs and fairys has to be worth £39 pounds of anybodys money.