Behind the Zelda and Dark Souls is also a game more like Fez or The Witness. It's a game that trusts and expects you to figure out a lot with very little.
I bet a majority of Ubisoft devs probably want to make games like this. I would say it’s more so the company telling the devs they have to make their games a certain way.
@@lucascarracedo7421 Because it's easier to scream at individual game developers who have social media presences and are actually likely to read the things you say to them, than it is to scream at nebulous shareholders and publishers, who make the ACTUAL decisions on what garbage should be shoveled out on a yearly basis.
Your review sold me on the game. Playing for five seconds or so made me realize I had to stop and get my wife to watch my playthrough. That is literally all we did for several days. Set the kids down in front of some cartoons or in the playroom and just binged through Tunic. Notes everywhere. Before we finished I decided to try to fully translating the manual so I spent a few hours on that. Then I went for the secret achievements and the secret content that you actually need the manual's text translated for. I gotta say, wow that decontextualized things for me.
I just completed the main game yesterday and I agree 100% with everything in this review, including the criticism about the late game. I will add that, while the classic Zelda and Souls comparisons are apt enough, I would also say there's a bit of the Outer Wilds spirit in there, in that often a "key item" isn't really an "item" at all, but newly gained knowledge that, by virtue of having ascertained it, allows you to explore the world in new ways. And if you haven't played Outer Wilds, definitely do so!
@@FellixNoAmatsu it's still on my list, Baldurs Gate 3 has devoured my life. But I haven't forgotten. Gonna start it after I finish up BG3 and Hollow Knight.
That's it. The final nail. You just sold me on this game. It looks to be right up my alley. I'm buying it right now, at full price, and will start playing today!
I normally wait for sales on games, but I was a bit anxious to play Tunic when it came out. So I pirated it. However, I still bought it at full price after I beat it because I thought it was worth it.
As someone who recently completed tunic I must say that do not use a guide if you play tunic. It truly sours the experience and as someone who used a guide to assist me even just a little on the final puzzle and few other (I thought) minor things it truly made the final puzzle a completely different experience from the satisfaction rat described. Commenting to boost this video on the algorithm. Your videos are always great rat keep it up.
Hi i usually dont write comments in youtube but i had to thank you for this review. If you did not post that i problably would never knew that this game exist and its such an amazing experience. I have a lot of fun playing it, dicovering new areas and instruction pages. Thank you so much. You are doing amazing job!
Its on gamepass right now. If you see some other games available that your interested in it might be worth buying a months sub. Its a pretty short gaming, so you can defs finish it before your subscription runs out.
yea, i always hear this game from other reviewers but this is the first time i've heard about the "unreadable game manual" aspect of the game, and now i'm hooked.
Tunic made me feel a nostalgic feeling no other game was able to replicate for me. It reminded me of when I tried to play Zelda OoT with a very basic understanding of english or when I tried to play Vagrant Story in Japanese
It is rather splendid, Isn't it? I'm 5 hours in, and I am absolutely blown away. The game is so cryptic that I didn't even know you could level up until I brickwalled at the garden knight. What a wonderful little game.
For me I took up to the first big boss progression-wise in the forest to finaly discover how to level up. Painful it was to go through the area, hitting like a wet noodle.
Amazing game. That overworld music is special, and makes me feel things that I can’t begin to describe. The end was an odd beast though. The bad ending sees you face a seriously challenging boss, yet the true ending has no boss at all, but rather some tough puzzle solving. Neither path felt fully satisfying. People need to experience this game.
I'm surprised I don't hear this comparison more, as I thought the same thing almost immediately; the invented language and using the camera perspective to obscure things are important elements of both HLD and Tunic. I personally prefer HLD, as I think it's a more focused experience; Tunic has maybe a few too many ideas which don't really make the game better; it's worth playing, and has some fun "Ah ha!" moments, but I found the endgame to be pretty tedious.
The Golden Path made me more excited than any game has made me ever before. Ever. I got out a pen and grid paper and started plotting it out, and following along. Finding fairies for the back cover was equally as great. I cant recommend this game enough
I played tunic earlier this month, it is by far my favorite indie game. The gimmick of the strange language and the game manual combined with genuinely great level and boss design kept me interested the entire time.
I share a lot of the sentiment with the end-game. I was not at all ready for the transition from a action adventure with light puzzles to a puzzle game. I played the game blind up to the final boss, but sadly ended up giving in and got some help for the puzzle section. I didn't spoil the whole thing for myself, and I was able to solve the final puzzle mostly on my own, but that experience left a sour taste in my mouth. I desperately wished I hadn't used a guide, but I really lost patience sitting there flipping through the guidebook not sure what to do, and some of the puzzles felt really obtuse. I wish this game existed in a world without the internet. I also agree the last section should have been better paced. I would be fine for a bigger focus on puzzles, but this should've been iterated with exploration and combat.
Great review! Pretty much agree on every point. Though I will say the "true" ending kinda-sorta has some more narrative content. No combat yes, which is a shame. But there is a bit of story being told in that ending and it makes you ask more questions. More importantly though there's technically still more to do. While not an "ending" there's the even harder puzzles that lead to you needing to figure out the language and the reward is small but pretty powerful I'd say!
Truly one of the greatest experiences I’ve ever had with a game, ever. Easily stands on the level of classics like Ds1 and Bloodborne. I highly, highly recommend everyone watching try to go in as blind as possible and not look anything up during your first play through. Unmatched feeling of discovery
I’m glad you tackled this game. In my opinion it’s a masterpiece and on par with some of the best AAA games released this year (last year, I guess). The phrase “it made me feel like a kid again” gets thrown around way too much these days, but this game’s premise is exactly that and it absolutely accomplishes it in my opinion.
Glad to see you go over tunic, and good to see that you liked most of it. It was quite a surprise this year, and I figured it fit in fairly close to the souls content and what you seem to like fairly well.
I loved Tunic, but it was hard for me to describe what I loved about it without feeling like I was spoiling them. It's one of those games, like The Witness, where when you know, you know. But to me even saying that is too much. I'm glad that I played the game day one, because I knew nothing. Nothing other than the combat system and very general world exploration. The first manual piece I got I was like, "oh, really cool way to do a tutorial, wow". But when I got a piece a little later I was like :O this isn't simply a tutorial... and the revelation of finding out how to pass a roadblock due to an ability I always had but didn't know. It was made all the better not knowing what to expect. Finding manual pages was the main goal for me to be honest. That and the whole "golden path" thing was too cool finding out about naturally. This is one of those games that I can never have that first experience again. Replaying the game right after beating it was its own reward for sure, but it'll never be the same when you know how it all works. I spoiled myself on The Witness and can't play it now, because the joy is in discovering it yourself; it's an element of the game design. Playing it after knowing all of that feels like starting a game like Terraria with free golden gear or something, if that makes sense. But that's why I say that replay value doesnt decide a game's value, not that replay value is a bad thing to have to be clear. Just that despite the fact that I'll never be able to relive even a fraction of what I liked about Tunic future playthroughs of it, I will stand by how good I think it is. I like games with plenty of replay value, but there will always be an appeal for these one-playthrough only games as well. Even if my personal enjoyment would have easily been diminished be it for one of those silly UA-cam thumbnails that always put spoilers on it.
I attempted the final boss and got my teeth kicked in more times than I'd care to admit. I then went into puzzle solving mode, got the all pieces I needed to get the true ending, decided to fight the last boss because I knew in my heart what was going to happen. So I did both endings within minutes of each other. Still, I agree that a final encounter, or something very challenging on top of the golden path to test everything that you've learned in the game would have been more satisfying. But I'm not displeased at all with what Tunic presented. It's a very satisfying game and a breath of fresh air amongst other available titles. Such an unassuming game with so much to say. I'd give it a solid 9/10 with my little nit picks and a 10/10 for the heart put into it.
I can't lie I wrote this game off because it reminded me so much of Death's Door; and while Death's Door is not a bad in any way, nothing about it really resonated with me, and some things even frustrated me at times. After watching your video, you and Colin Moriarty over at Last Stand Media have convinced me there's more to this game than the impression it gave. Thank you for the video.
I enjoyed Tunic until about 70% of the way through; at some point shortly after discovering the "Holy Cross" and doing those puzzles I just found them to be tedious. I personally didn't feel like a genius when I solved the "Golden Path" puzzle, as -- by that point -- I completely understood what I had to do, and so it just felt like a grueling time-sink. I really think the manual pretty much tells you exactly what you should be doing at any given point, even with regards to the "Golden Path." Some of the puzzles (especially the wind chimes) were interesting ideas, but were minimally fun to actually complete. ( I will admit I did feel a tad smart when I realized what I had to do for that particular puzzle, though actually doing it was super tedious.) I also appreciate that this game has several invented languages, and that's a big-brain kind of flex -- especially the tone-based "Tuneic" language spoken by the fairies, used on the main menu screen, etc. -- but those things don't make the game itself any better or more fun as a game; they just serve to bleed the game world into our world, which is neat, but it would have been nice if (and maybe it just hasn't been discovered yet how) it altered the actual game-play experience. I didn't bother to translate the Truenic language, and honestly don't feel like I missed-out on anything the game had to offer as a result. Overall I think this game is worth playing, but in the end the "Holy Cross" overstays its welcome, and some of the game's ideas feel like they get in the way of the actual game.
Agreed, the game is certainly good but is generally too repetitive/padded. I got pretty tired of the exploration/backtracking/combat towards the end, and then hooked again by the concept of the Golden Path, then bored by how much of it was just "go to this page and look for a pattern". I think if the game was shorter, keeping its most unique ideas and discarding the fat, I would have enjoyed it a lot more.
Hah, this is exactly what I wrote back in April after playing it: "This is for the weird cross-section of gamers that like Zelda, Souls and The Witness". I agree with everything you said in the review, although I will say that I am less disappointed about the lack of new combat at the end of the game. I can see that as a way of making the truly difficult puzzles completely optional in a way that they wouldn't be (or at least wouldn't feel) if an ultimate boss encounter were locked behind them.
I heard good things about this game being one of the top indies you must play(so I did since it was on gamepass) and after experiencing it for myself I can see why. The music is beautiful and calming. Now the combat can be a bit frustrating since you need to press LB (in Xbox)to change weapons or use consumables. I wish there was a better way to implement inputs while in combat without going into the menu and switching your shortcuts constantly. I also experienced getting stuck in the environment quite a few times and sometimes the path wasn't very clear when going under hidden areas. The blue gem took me the longest to uncover and the last boss was brutal LOL. Other than that exploration is amazing in this game and the manual has everything you need to figure out your journey Absolutely a gem.
Oh tunic! My bro showed me this game, it was super fun to explore every secret, except for the true ending. wait that’s insane that you found out the true ending on your first playthrough, but unfortunate that you didn’t get to experience the boss & etc.
Love you rata, the games coming as a PS+ game this next month and am very excited to dive in. Eventually. Lol DD2 and the upcoming elden ring dlc will probably come first.
I think I might pick this up. I had kind of assumed it was just another modern-zelda clone, but it sounds like it's more than that. BTW, have you by any chance played La-mulana? It sounds like this is a bit similar, and seems like something you'd like.
Honest and pretty accurate review. As flawed as the game is, I can't help but consider it a masterpiece, and feel a deep satisfaction having played it. It's this magic that only someone deeply dedicated to creating a game, for a long time, and being extremely talented, can achieve. Tunic is definitely one for the gaming history books.
Dont tell me what to do. I will not unsubscribe. Also, just finished the game. I agree with all said here: Some improvements related to the endgame could be done, but its still an amazing and unique experience.
yeah, the badge system is great. I've really enjoyed it so far but theres one issue I have. As much fun as it is figuring out what each badge does, I am probably not going to use them that often because the scavenger's mask looks *so god damn cute on the fox.* I am still gonna try and figure out what each badge does but I am going to wear that adorable little mask everywhere, even into the final boss fight and theres nothing that can stop me (unless theres a specific badge need to access it or something lol) edit: found out what the gold coins do :3
Agreed with the review. I got spoiled on the game quite early on by accident but I still had a blast of a time with the puzzles, music and everything else. However, there's something missing here, what you have put in this review is everything involving the mainstory and it's endings and yet I'm a bit miffed about not making a side glance at the crazier secrets involving the more important set of optional collectables that not only involve puzzles as crazy as the last one for the true ending but send you down a rabbit hole of the same quality to the Red Cubes of FEZ. I'm gonna keep it at that, won't tell what to do or what you find along the way, just be warned that if you liked the complexity of the true ending's final puzzle then It's probable you'll like the more obscure, harder puzzles hidden in the game. TLDR, the spoiler I got was involving how to start using the Holy Cross and the only other thing I spoiled myself with was with that one water reflection puzzle in that room.
I'm glad they patched the game to allow you to fight the final boss no matter what. They listened to the criticism that some would miss out otherwise. Me, I got the ending for fighting the boss first. And I don't know if it was just me, but it was one of the hardest bosses I ever fought in a game. I had more trouble with it than most Souls bosses, more trouble than stuff like Absolute Radiance in Hollow Knight. Beating it was so rewarding, yet left me so exhausted that I was happy only non-combat post game content was left afterward. It felt amazing and rewarding to get to flex my brain to solve the final puzzle, instead of having to test my combat skills like in the rest of the game. It was interesting to hear from someone who got the endings in the opposite order from me though. Again, it does make me very happy they patched in an option to do the fight no matter what, if you so choose.
I’ve been 50:50 on picking it up, but seeing this video has solidified it. Can’t get it now, but I know I should go blind so I’m just commenting for the algorithm.
I know it's 4 months late but I just found your channel (after completing dark souls 1). I just wanted to let you know that you can attack the true ending npc to get the boss fight you missed out on
I dont like how in certain areas the camera shifts on its own accord doing a 180 on the overhead perspective. Either keep it consistent in one perspective or let the player control the camera
It entrusts me "so much" that it allows me to turn myself invincible in the options menu, for that lack of guts it's hard for me to respect the game as an piece of art, cause it jumps on that bandwagon of an in my view false understanding of "accessibility".
Those who "beat" this game think that they are playing an Action Adventure Game. Those who "complete" this game *KNOW* that they are playing an Augmented Reality Game. The writen language of Trunic requires a Subreddit to figure out. The *SPOKEN* language of Tuneic requires a Spectrometer to figure out. (The Fairy trapped in the Fairy Fountain has unique dialog filled with spoilers, BTW.) The Tower tied to the Treasure Room is a *LITERAL* ARG. And the True Ending is sharing all you have learned, and breaking a cycle of systemic generational violence. ...or something like that. 🤔
I tried playing Tunic. Got about 45 minutes in and there just didn't seem to be anything to really grab me. I 've always wondered if it got better later on in the game, but never bothered to look.
I recently played Tunic, and I actually managed to work out the Golden Path puzzle. But the reward for that, and that it implied 20x as much work as I put into the Golden Path...I was just demoralised. I went to try the bad ending, and it was insanely hard of course, so I ended up just looking it up. I'm actually *glad* I looked up the endings, and so I'd say that your point about the lack of rewards in the endgame/true ending is the biggest let down for me. Having seen both endings, I'd have been honestly a bit angry if I had gone through all that work for...that. I would still recommend this game to people though, because of the rest of it.
I’m so happy I played this game blindly I really enjoyed how they build this world and style though I kind of wished the final boss was in the true ending kind of like a weakened but doesn’t die way
Started this like a week ago. having a blast with the exploration and puzzle solving but the bosses feel so... bad? Maybe im just spoiled by monster hunter and some other games but man every time i ran into a boss i wasnt looking forward to a fun fight, but almost wanted to turn the other way and go somewhere else. Dodging their attacks wasnt difficult, they didnt have any complex attack patterns. its just start move, end move, start next move, repeat. And many of them didnt feel punishable because of the AI's insistence to run away from me. It just became a game of using my MP to either directly damage or to extend/create openings, but once that is empty it just turns into waiting for a damage opening or for the boss to spawn some small enemys to get some MP back. The most interesting way they challenged me was with stamina constraints but overall i really didnt like them. And i think all of this would have been fine if the game wasnt trying so hard to make the bosses challenging. A bad boss that dies quickly and easily isnt gonna sting so hard. But one that is challenging me in what i find to be some of the worst ways i can think of? That is gonna leave a mark Edit: This reads like i hate this game. NO, i actually really like it. Its because i like it that the bad stuff annoys me so much xD
A friend of mine got me to play this game. It's one of my favorite games of all time now, absolutely fantastic. Regarding the end criticisms, I half-agree. I understand and respect what they were going for thematically, etc. But I also sympathize with the desire for a final challenge. Spoilers below. I also got the true ending on my first attempt, and so to finish the experience in a way that felt "proper" to me, I reloaded my last save and fought the last boss, which led to the last thing I saw being the bad ending. I agree that it doesn't ruin anything, really, but it does sour the moment of parting a little bit. The last boss was really good, at least.
I played the Tunic demo that came out months ago and absolutely hated it. I had completely written Tunic off because of that, but your review made me interested again. It sounds like the release game is worthwhile.
I didnt find the True ending blind because i was sure there was gonna be a True Final Boss expected fox to Show her the Book After the First Phase and to get a different second Phase and i didnt press a at the Beginning instead of just attacking her because That Puts you in a tactical disatvantage in a very Hard Boss
I agree with basically everything you said here but somehow had an opposite experience. Primarily about the engagement. I was initially very engaged and was having a lot of fun as I was thinking about what could be behind the runes but felt let down as I progressed. The combat curved out for me pretty early too. I thought there was a lot of interesting ideas and I'm very excited about the prospect of any followup from the dev. But had a very mid experience with Tunic itself, enough so that I stopped playing it before beating it
Just had an idea about you doing an analysis video on why there some hype or interest about dragon dogma 2. Going in depth why people like the first one and want a sequel.
Bro... you need to discuss the lore of this game because HOLY FUCKING SHIT... Also, I don't know if this game actually takes any inspiration from it, but playing thru it reminded me somewhat of Brave Fencer Musashi too, especially with the first two legitimate bosses with the large health bars and the idea that you're actually kinda working against yourself the whole time.
I find the game to be a bit more frustrating than my experience with dark souls to be honest but everything else about the game so far has been really good. Particularly my frustration comes from the camera as grinding up against a wall to find a pathway I can’t see overstayed it’s welcome and lost the charm of finding a secret very quickly.
Wow. I just played Tunic and had a very similar experience. In describing its appeal to a friend, I also referenced that Miyazaki anecdote. Personally I didn't bother with the true ending; not yet, anyway. Even so, I found the final boss and "bad" ending to be disappointing, so it's interesting to hear that the true ending isn't ideal either.
I loved Tunic as well, but I have an additional complain related to the difficulty curve. The game, generally speaking, is not very challenging when it comes to the combat. It's no pushover either, but it's about in line with a Zelda game. Except the boss fights. Those are tuned way harder than needed, and the fight at the bottom of the last dungeon (phrasing it like that to avoid spoilers) is also similarly a huge spike. I wouldn't mind if the game was hard all the way through or easy all the way through, but those overtuned boss fights really hamper my enjoyment and I imagine they will prevent many less-skilled players from experiencing the wonderful puzzle content the game has to offer.
@@Ageleszly I doubt it works very well. It's not exactly communicated that the option exists so it's quite plausible that someone never notices it. And it's well known that the threshold of frustration required to ragequit a game is often lower than the threshold required to turn on godmode.
@@NotaWalrus1 Since it's under the "accessibility" tab. It's supposed to be some kind of excuse for people who are unable to play the game otherwise, but I dunno it's not like invincibility is helping you playing the game, it's rather deactiving one important core component of it, while i'm sure it's not disabled players who are using it rather weak willed players or those with no regard for the combat. The framing is what bothers me that accessibility means everyone is supposed to play through an game otherwise the game is not "accessible". :/
This game is definitely on my radar and I am super intrigued by it. Glad to see you review it. Also, it's kind of cute that your call to action is better described as an anti-call to action. I just imagine you as some DnD gnome who's super shy and friendly because of it. It would take some some very specific commentary to make me unsub and everything I've seen of this channel leads me to believe you are the opposite of the kind of thing that would make me do that.
Thinking about knowledge-gated exploration.... have you ever played The Outer Wilds? It's a masterpiece of a game, highly recommend it. Go in blind, try to avoid spoilers.
Tunic is a game every Ubisoft developer is scared of
I bet a majority of Ubisoft devs probably want to make games like this. I would say it’s more so the company telling the devs they have to make their games a certain way.
Every uncharted/god of war/ the last of us player.
@@PointlesslyNecessaryConvos yeah I have no clue why people talk about the devs in the context of decisions and bad choices.
@@lucascarracedo7421 Because it's easier to scream at individual game developers who have social media presences and are actually likely to read the things you say to them, than it is to scream at nebulous shareholders and publishers, who make the ACTUAL decisions on what garbage should be shoveled out on a yearly basis.
@@PointlesslyNecessaryConvosThis.
Your review sold me on the game. Playing for five seconds or so made me realize I had to stop and get my wife to watch my playthrough. That is literally all we did for several days. Set the kids down in front of some cartoons or in the playroom and just binged through Tunic. Notes everywhere. Before we finished I decided to try to fully translating the manual so I spent a few hours on that. Then I went for the secret achievements and the secret content that you actually need the manual's text translated for. I gotta say, wow that decontextualized things for me.
tthis is so cute
I just completed the main game yesterday and I agree 100% with everything in this review, including the criticism about the late game. I will add that, while the classic Zelda and Souls comparisons are apt enough, I would also say there's a bit of the Outer Wilds spirit in there, in that often a "key item" isn't really an "item" at all, but newly gained knowledge that, by virtue of having ascertained it, allows you to explore the world in new ways. And if you haven't played Outer Wilds, definitely do so!
I'm currently beating Sekiro, but I got Outer Wilds based on Ratatoskyr's recent video on it and it's up next!
@@idlemindedmage6925Did you play Outer Wilds? What are your thoughts if you ended up completing it.
@@FellixNoAmatsu it's still on my list, Baldurs Gate 3 has devoured my life. But I haven't forgotten. Gonna start it after I finish up BG3 and Hollow Knight.
@@idlemindedmage6925 Did you play Outer Wilds? How'd you like it?
That's it. The final nail. You just sold me on this game. It looks to be right up my alley. I'm buying it right now, at full price, and will start playing today!
I normally wait for sales on games, but I was a bit anxious to play Tunic when it came out. So I pirated it. However, I still bought it at full price after I beat it because I thought it was worth it.
Same!
As someone who recently completed tunic I must say that do not use a guide if you play tunic. It truly sours the experience and as someone who used a guide to assist me even just a little on the final puzzle and few other (I thought) minor things it truly made the final puzzle a completely different experience from the satisfaction rat described. Commenting to boost this video on the algorithm. Your videos are always great rat keep it up.
The in-game manual is truly the only guide anyone needs to find (and solve) everything; it even spells-out the "big" puzzle pretty clearly.
It was between using a guide or quitting. I’m glad I have a 100% walkthrough video handy so I can finish the game.
Hi i usually dont write comments in youtube but i had to thank you for this review. If you did not post that i problably would never knew that this game exist and its such an amazing experience. I have a lot of fun playing it, dicovering new areas and instruction pages. Thank you so much. You are doing amazing job!
This game has been on my wishlist for a while. You've tipped me over the edge I'll get it next time it's on sale lol
Its on gamepass right now. If you see some other games available that your interested in it might be worth buying a months sub. Its a pretty short gaming, so you can defs finish it before your subscription runs out.
Only mentioning it because thats how i played it with a free month i got.
Same here
It's on sale right now, although not by much.
yea, i always hear this game from other reviewers but this is the first time i've heard about the "unreadable game manual" aspect of the game, and now i'm hooked.
Yes, is an amazingly original game; I’m so impressed by it and glad that it exists to color the impressions of future projects
Tunic made me feel a nostalgic feeling no other game was able to replicate for me. It reminded me of when I tried to play Zelda OoT with a very basic understanding of english or when I tried to play Vagrant Story in Japanese
Ever since finishing the game a few days ago I've had an itch for more games like this, truly an incredible experience.
Did you find any? Please let me know. :)
@@the.forlorn try hyper light drifter
It is rather splendid, Isn't it? I'm 5 hours in, and I am absolutely blown away. The game is so cryptic that I didn't even know you could level up until I brickwalled at the garden knight. What a wonderful little game.
Literally the exact same thing happened to me 😄. Then it happened again with fast travel!
For me I took up to the first big boss progression-wise in the forest to finaly discover how to level up. Painful it was to go through the area, hitting like a wet noodle.
Well that’s the best 10 minute review of a video game I have ever seen
Amazing game. That overworld music is special, and makes me feel things that I can’t begin to describe. The end was an odd beast though. The bad ending sees you face a seriously challenging boss, yet the true ending has no boss at all, but rather some tough puzzle solving. Neither path felt fully satisfying. People need to experience this game.
I just started this game for the 2nd time this week. Awesome to see you give it much deserved love
I never subscribed, never get notifications, and look up all your videos manually. You are powerless.
Those were probably my favorite moments while playing, the moments of realization that "holy shit, I could've done that all along!"
The game reminds me a ton of "Hyper Light Drifter". Haven't bought Tunic yet, but I'll definitely get it
I'm surprised I don't hear this comparison more, as I thought the same thing almost immediately; the invented language and using the camera perspective to obscure things are important elements of both HLD and Tunic. I personally prefer HLD, as I think it's a more focused experience; Tunic has maybe a few too many ideas which don't really make the game better; it's worth playing, and has some fun "Ah ha!" moments, but I found the endgame to be pretty tedious.
The Golden Path made me more excited than any game has made me ever before. Ever. I got out a pen and grid paper and started plotting it out, and following along. Finding fairies for the back cover was equally as great. I cant recommend this game enough
Have you tried translating the manual yet? 'Cause that was a blast once I had page 54 of the manual.
@@PrinceTrillian na, that's not something I'm interested in
That last puzzle was AMAZING and yeah, felt so good to solve!
This game has secrets within secrets!
I played tunic earlier this month, it is by far my favorite indie game. The gimmick of the strange language and the game manual combined with genuinely great level and boss design kept me interested the entire time.
I share a lot of the sentiment with the end-game. I was not at all ready for the transition from a action adventure with light puzzles to a puzzle game.
I played the game blind up to the final boss, but sadly ended up giving in and got some help for the puzzle section. I didn't spoil the whole thing for myself, and I was able to solve the final puzzle mostly on my own, but that experience left a sour taste in my mouth.
I desperately wished I hadn't used a guide, but I really lost patience sitting there flipping through the guidebook not sure what to do, and some of the puzzles felt really obtuse.
I wish this game existed in a world without the internet. I also agree the last section should have been better paced. I would be fine for a bigger focus on puzzles, but this should've been iterated with exploration and combat.
Great review! Pretty much agree on every point.
Though I will say the "true" ending kinda-sorta has some more narrative content. No combat yes, which is a shame. But there is a bit of story being told in that ending and it makes you ask more questions.
More importantly though there's technically still more to do. While not an "ending" there's the even harder puzzles that lead to you needing to figure out the language and the reward is small but pretty powerful I'd say!
Truly one of the greatest experiences I’ve ever had with a game, ever. Easily stands on the level of classics like Ds1 and Bloodborne. I highly, highly recommend everyone watching try to go in as blind as possible and not look anything up during your first play through. Unmatched feeling of discovery
I’m glad you tackled this game.
In my opinion it’s a masterpiece and on par with some of the best AAA games released this year (last year, I guess). The phrase “it made me feel like a kid again” gets thrown around way too much these days, but this game’s premise is exactly that and it absolutely accomplishes it in my opinion.
Most underrated game of 2022.
Glad to see you go over tunic, and good to see that you liked most of it.
It was quite a surprise this year, and I figured it fit in fairly close to the souls content and what you seem to like fairly well.
I loved Tunic, but it was hard for me to describe what I loved about it without feeling like I was spoiling them. It's one of those games, like The Witness, where when you know, you know. But to me even saying that is too much. I'm glad that I played the game day one, because I knew nothing. Nothing other than the combat system and very general world exploration.
The first manual piece I got I was like, "oh, really cool way to do a tutorial, wow". But when I got a piece a little later I was like :O this isn't simply a tutorial... and the revelation of finding out how to pass a roadblock due to an ability I always had but didn't know. It was made all the better not knowing what to expect. Finding manual pages was the main goal for me to be honest. That and the whole "golden path" thing was too cool finding out about naturally.
This is one of those games that I can never have that first experience again. Replaying the game right after beating it was its own reward for sure, but it'll never be the same when you know how it all works. I spoiled myself on The Witness and can't play it now, because the joy is in discovering it yourself; it's an element of the game design. Playing it after knowing all of that feels like starting a game like Terraria with free golden gear or something, if that makes sense. But that's why I say that replay value doesnt decide a game's value, not that replay value is a bad thing to have to be clear. Just that despite the fact that I'll never be able to relive even a fraction of what I liked about Tunic future playthroughs of it, I will stand by how good I think it is. I like games with plenty of replay value, but there will always be an appeal for these one-playthrough only games as well. Even if my personal enjoyment would have easily been diminished be it for one of those silly UA-cam thumbnails that always put spoilers on it.
This is near top of my must play list for a reason
I attempted the final boss and got my teeth kicked in more times than I'd care to admit. I then went into puzzle solving mode, got the all pieces I needed to get the true ending, decided to fight the last boss because I knew in my heart what was going to happen. So I did both endings within minutes of each other. Still, I agree that a final encounter, or something very challenging on top of the golden path to test everything that you've learned in the game would have been more satisfying. But I'm not displeased at all with what Tunic presented. It's a very satisfying game and a breath of fresh air amongst other available titles. Such an unassuming game with so much to say. I'd give it a solid 9/10 with my little nit picks and a 10/10 for the heart put into it.
Really enjoyed listening to your review. More reviews please!
Good review, nice how you managed to not spoil the game.
Not meant to be sarcastic, genuinely well done
Automatic subtitles outdid itself this time. "Hello everyone, this is Reddit Oscar."
I can't lie I wrote this game off because it reminded me so much of Death's Door; and while Death's Door is not a bad in any way, nothing about it really resonated with me, and some things even frustrated me at times. After watching your video, you and Colin Moriarty over at Last Stand Media have convinced me there's more to this game than the impression it gave. Thank you for the video.
I enjoyed Tunic until about 70% of the way through; at some point shortly after discovering the "Holy Cross" and doing those puzzles I just found them to be tedious. I personally didn't feel like a genius when I solved the "Golden Path" puzzle, as -- by that point -- I completely understood what I had to do, and so it just felt like a grueling time-sink. I really think the manual pretty much tells you exactly what you should be doing at any given point, even with regards to the "Golden Path." Some of the puzzles (especially the wind chimes) were interesting ideas, but were minimally fun to actually complete. ( I will admit I did feel a tad smart when I realized what I had to do for that particular puzzle, though actually doing it was super tedious.)
I also appreciate that this game has several invented languages, and that's a big-brain kind of flex -- especially the tone-based "Tuneic" language spoken by the fairies, used on the main menu screen, etc. -- but those things don't make the game itself any better or more fun as a game; they just serve to bleed the game world into our world, which is neat, but it would have been nice if (and maybe it just hasn't been discovered yet how) it altered the actual game-play experience. I didn't bother to translate the Truenic language, and honestly don't feel like I missed-out on anything the game had to offer as a result.
Overall I think this game is worth playing, but in the end the "Holy Cross" overstays its welcome, and some of the game's ideas feel like they get in the way of the actual game.
Agreed, the game is certainly good but is generally too repetitive/padded. I got pretty tired of the exploration/backtracking/combat towards the end, and then hooked again by the concept of the Golden Path, then bored by how much of it was just "go to this page and look for a pattern".
I think if the game was shorter, keeping its most unique ideas and discarding the fat, I would have enjoyed it a lot more.
Aint no way, Ratatoskr reviews? This is what I didnt know I wanted but I knew I wanted when I saw it.
Hah, this is exactly what I wrote back in April after playing it: "This is for the weird cross-section of gamers that like Zelda, Souls and The Witness". I agree with everything you said in the review, although I will say that I am less disappointed about the lack of new combat at the end of the game. I can see that as a way of making the truly difficult puzzles completely optional in a way that they wouldn't be (or at least wouldn't feel) if an ultimate boss encounter were locked behind them.
I heard good things about this game being one of the top indies you must play(so I did since it was on gamepass) and after experiencing it for myself I can see why.
The music is beautiful and calming.
Now the combat can be a bit frustrating since you need to press LB (in Xbox)to change weapons or use consumables. I wish there was a better way to implement inputs while in combat without going into the menu and switching your shortcuts constantly. I also experienced getting stuck in the environment quite a few times and sometimes the path wasn't very clear when going under hidden areas.
The blue gem took me the longest to uncover and the last boss was brutal
LOL.
Other than that exploration is amazing in this game and the manual has everything you need to figure out your journey
Absolutely a gem.
The only real contestant to elden ring in GOTY material
Played this after a bad day at work and it really put me in a zen state.
I just finished this game with ending 1 tonight! Such a great game. Looking forward to diving back in for ending 2 tomorrow!
Oh tunic! My bro showed me this game, it was super fun to explore every secret, except for the true ending.
wait that’s insane that you found out the true ending on your first playthrough, but unfortunate that you didn’t get to experience the boss & etc.
Favorite philosophical talking squirrel recommends a game? Gotta have to check it out
A runic language, that deciphers phonetically to a maritime accent
Love you rata, the games coming as a PS+ game this next month and am very excited to dive in. Eventually. Lol DD2 and the upcoming elden ring dlc will probably come first.
Love you Ratatoskr
I think I might pick this up. I had kind of assumed it was just another modern-zelda clone, but it sounds like it's more than that.
BTW, have you by any chance played La-mulana? It sounds like this is a bit similar, and seems like something you'd like.
Honest and pretty accurate review. As flawed as the game is, I can't help but consider it a masterpiece, and feel a deep satisfaction having played it. It's this magic that only someone deeply dedicated to creating a game, for a long time, and being extremely talented, can achieve. Tunic is definitely one for the gaming history books.
Dont tell me what to do. I will not unsubscribe.
Also, just finished the game. I agree with all said here: Some improvements related to the endgame could be done, but its still an amazing and unique experience.
Lovely video. Had to stop early because I haven't played it and have heard other glowing reviews.
Guess it's time to buy Tunic.
yeah, the badge system is great. I've really enjoyed it so far but theres one issue I have. As much fun as it is figuring out what each badge does, I am probably not going to use them that often because the scavenger's mask looks *so god damn cute on the fox.* I am still gonna try and figure out what each badge does but I am going to wear that adorable little mask everywhere, even into the final boss fight and theres nothing that can stop me (unless theres a specific badge need to access it or something lol)
edit: found out what the gold coins do :3
Agreed with the review. I got spoiled on the game quite early on by accident but I still had a blast of a time with the puzzles, music and everything else.
However, there's something missing here, what you have put in this review is everything involving the mainstory and it's endings and yet I'm a bit miffed about not making a side glance at the crazier secrets involving the more important set of optional collectables that not only involve puzzles as crazy as the last one for the true ending but send you down a rabbit hole of the same quality to the Red Cubes of FEZ. I'm gonna keep it at that, won't tell what to do or what you find along the way, just be warned that if you liked the complexity of the true ending's final puzzle then It's probable you'll like the more obscure, harder puzzles hidden in the game.
TLDR, the spoiler I got was involving how to start using the Holy Cross and the only other thing I spoiled myself with was with that one water reflection puzzle in that room.
I'm glad they patched the game to allow you to fight the final boss no matter what. They listened to the criticism that some would miss out otherwise.
Me, I got the ending for fighting the boss first. And I don't know if it was just me, but it was one of the hardest bosses I ever fought in a game. I had more trouble with it than most Souls bosses, more trouble than stuff like Absolute Radiance in Hollow Knight.
Beating it was so rewarding, yet left me so exhausted that I was happy only non-combat post game content was left afterward. It felt amazing and rewarding to get to flex my brain to solve the final puzzle, instead of having to test my combat skills like in the rest of the game.
It was interesting to hear from someone who got the endings in the opposite order from me though. Again, it does make me very happy they patched in an option to do the fight no matter what, if you so choose.
I'm playing this right now. I love it. ❤
Tunic is the Dark Souls of clothing
I loved this game
Crazy timing on this review drop. I just spent the free time i had over the past two days finishing this.
I had this game on my wishlist for a while and immediately bought it when I heard souls like lol
I literally started thinking today if I should buy tunic or Triangle Strategy before, lol
I dont even usually like games like this but Tunic is pretty special
I’ve been 50:50 on picking it up, but seeing this video has solidified it. Can’t get it now, but I know I should go blind so I’m just commenting for the algorithm.
I’m just playing through it so the timing is just a bit off. I’ll come back later once I’m done :)
The wife and I are having a lot of fun figuring things out and taking turns.
This game has secreats within secrets!
I know it's 4 months late but I just found your channel (after completing dark souls 1). I just wanted to let you know that you can attack the true ending npc to get the boss fight you missed out on
I dont like how in certain areas the camera shifts on its own accord doing a 180 on the overhead perspective. Either keep it consistent in one perspective or let the player control the camera
It entrusts me "so much" that it allows me to turn myself invincible in the options menu, for that lack of guts it's hard for me to respect the game as an piece of art, cause it jumps on that bandwagon of an in my view false understanding of "accessibility".
you can turn on god mode but you can't make lock on toggle. my poor finger...
Those who "beat" this game think that they are playing an Action Adventure Game. Those who "complete" this game *KNOW* that they are playing an Augmented Reality Game. The writen language of Trunic requires a Subreddit to figure out. The *SPOKEN* language of Tuneic requires a Spectrometer to figure out. (The Fairy trapped in the Fairy Fountain has unique dialog filled with spoilers, BTW.) The Tower tied to the Treasure Room is a *LITERAL* ARG. And the True Ending is sharing all you have learned, and breaking a cycle of systemic generational violence. ...or something like that. 🤔
I tried playing Tunic. Got about 45 minutes in and there just didn't seem to be anything to really grab me.
I 've always wondered if it got better later on in the game, but never bothered to look.
YES! GIVE THIS GAME MORE EXPORSURE
Man you definately have to try out Blue Fire and make a video about it, I've got the feeling that you'll love it.
What timing. I literally just finished the game yesterday, started the day before.
I recently played Tunic, and I actually managed to work out the Golden Path puzzle. But the reward for that, and that it implied 20x as much work as I put into the Golden Path...I was just demoralised. I went to try the bad ending, and it was insanely hard of course, so I ended up just looking it up. I'm actually *glad* I looked up the endings, and so I'd say that your point about the lack of rewards in the endgame/true ending is the biggest let down for me. Having seen both endings, I'd have been honestly a bit angry if I had gone through all that work for...that. I would still recommend this game to people though, because of the rest of it.
I’m so happy I played this game blindly I really enjoyed how they build this world and style though I kind of wished the final boss was in the true ending kind of like a weakened but doesn’t die way
Started this like a week ago. having a blast with the exploration and puzzle solving but the bosses feel so... bad?
Maybe im just spoiled by monster hunter and some other games but man every time i ran into a boss i wasnt looking forward to a fun fight, but almost wanted to turn the other way and go somewhere else. Dodging their attacks wasnt difficult, they didnt have any complex attack patterns. its just start move, end move, start next move, repeat. And many of them didnt feel punishable because of the AI's insistence to run away from me. It just became a game of using my MP to either directly damage or to extend/create openings, but once that is empty it just turns into waiting for a damage opening or for the boss to spawn some small enemys to get some MP back. The most interesting way they challenged me was with stamina constraints but overall i really didnt like them. And i think all of this would have been fine if the game wasnt trying so hard to make the bosses challenging.
A bad boss that dies quickly and easily isnt gonna sting so hard. But one that is challenging me in what i find to be some of the worst ways i can think of? That is gonna leave a mark
Edit: This reads like i hate this game. NO, i actually really like it. Its because i like it that the bad stuff annoys me so much xD
I have to agree, the boss fights aren't great and are way overtuned difficulty-wise compared to the rest of the game.
A friend of mine got me to play this game. It's one of my favorite games of all time now, absolutely fantastic.
Regarding the end criticisms, I half-agree. I understand and respect what they were going for thematically, etc. But I also sympathize with the desire for a final challenge.
Spoilers below.
I also got the true ending on my first attempt, and so to finish the experience in a way that felt "proper" to me, I reloaded my last save and fought the last boss, which led to the last thing I saw being the bad ending. I agree that it doesn't ruin anything, really, but it does sour the moment of parting a little bit. The last boss was really good, at least.
I played the Tunic demo that came out months ago and absolutely hated it. I had completely written Tunic off because of that, but your review made me interested again. It sounds like the release game is worthwhile.
I didnt find the True ending blind because i was sure there was gonna be a True Final Boss expected fox to Show her the Book After the First Phase and to get a different second Phase and i didnt press a at the Beginning instead of just attacking her because That Puts you in a tactical disatvantage in a very Hard Boss
I agree with basically everything you said here but somehow had an opposite experience. Primarily about the engagement. I was initially very engaged and was having a lot of fun as I was thinking about what could be behind the runes but felt let down as I progressed. The combat curved out for me pretty early too. I thought there was a lot of interesting ideas and I'm very excited about the prospect of any followup from the dev. But had a very mid experience with Tunic itself, enough so that I stopped playing it before beating it
First comment!
Keep up the great work Ratatoskr, love the rate that you’re putting out fantastic content. Love reviews.
for any people that want to try it, its real fun and you can try it out on Xbox gamepass
Yeah, imma need a physical copy of this, please?
Just had an idea about you doing an analysis video on why there some hype or interest about dragon dogma 2. Going in depth why people like the first one and want a sequel.
Such an underrated game. The whole old school instruction book and how knowledge itself is a mechanic is pure genius.
All I've ever seen about it has been high praise, and it won plenty of awards. So I'm not sure how its underrated
@@r6scrubs126 it hasn't won any awards lol but ok
The only issue I had with this game is at the end it can be annoying flipping through all of the pages. It's an amazing game.
This game is probably my goty.
Bro... you need to discuss the lore of this game because HOLY FUCKING SHIT...
Also, I don't know if this game actually takes any inspiration from it, but playing thru it reminded me somewhat of Brave Fencer Musashi too, especially with the first two legitimate bosses with the large health bars and the idea that you're actually kinda working against yourself the whole time.
Tunic with Neon White were the best indie games this year. Maybe Vampire Survivors too.
SIGNALIS 🏆
@@piotr78 I need to play that one!
I've wanted to try this one. Have you heard of Steel Rising? If you want another souls inspired game, give that one a try!
If you loved Tunic you should try Death door
I find the game to be a bit more frustrating than my experience with dark souls to be honest but everything else about the game so far has been really good. Particularly my frustration comes from the camera as grinding up against a wall to find a pathway I can’t see overstayed it’s welcome and lost the charm of finding a secret very quickly.
Not able to watch because I don't want spoilers 🥺🥺. Excited to watch this after I finish the game
Wow. I just played Tunic and had a very similar experience. In describing its appeal to a friend, I also referenced that Miyazaki anecdote.
Personally I didn't bother with the true ending; not yet, anyway. Even so, I found the final boss and "bad" ending to be disappointing, so it's interesting to hear that the true ending isn't ideal either.
I loved Tunic as well, but I have an additional complain related to the difficulty curve. The game, generally speaking, is not very challenging when it comes to the combat. It's no pushover either, but it's about in line with a Zelda game. Except the boss fights. Those are tuned way harder than needed, and the fight at the bottom of the last dungeon (phrasing it like that to avoid spoilers) is also similarly a huge spike.
I wouldn't mind if the game was hard all the way through or easy all the way through, but those overtuned boss fights really hamper my enjoyment and I imagine they will prevent many less-skilled players from experiencing the wonderful puzzle content the game has to offer.
I won't prevent any players from progressing because you can turn yourself invincible in the options menu.
@@Ageleszly is that really an elegant solution to a wonky difficulty curve? Do you that would feel like victory to someone?
@@NotaWalrus1 No definitely not that's a gripe I have with the game. It's a safety measure that was implemented out of fear to lose players.
@@Ageleszly I doubt it works very well. It's not exactly communicated that the option exists so it's quite plausible that someone never notices it. And it's well known that the threshold of frustration required to ragequit a game is often lower than the threshold required to turn on godmode.
@@NotaWalrus1 Since it's under the "accessibility" tab. It's supposed to be some kind of excuse for people who are unable to play the game otherwise, but I dunno it's not like invincibility is helping you playing the game, it's rather deactiving one important core component of it, while i'm sure it's not disabled players who are using it rather weak willed players or those with no regard for the combat.
The framing is what bothers me that accessibility means everyone is supposed to play through an game otherwise the game is not "accessible". :/
i love this game
This game is definitely on my radar and I am super intrigued by it. Glad to see you review it. Also, it's kind of cute that your call to action is better described as an anti-call to action. I just imagine you as some DnD gnome who's super shy and friendly because of it. It would take some some very specific commentary to make me unsub and everything I've seen of this channel leads me to believe you are the opposite of the kind of thing that would make me do that.
Good to know. Beat the final boss then finish the game
Fair criticism as well!
Thinking about knowledge-gated exploration.... have you ever played The Outer Wilds?
It's a masterpiece of a game, highly recommend it. Go in blind, try to avoid spoilers.
Thank you for including a spoiler warning.