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It was a busy week for Ready at Dawn’s upcoming PS4 exclusive The Order: 1886.
On Monday, this gameplay video was posted via the #4theplayers PlayStation YouTube channel:
Here are some things you may noticed:
- It looks almost as if the characters don’t quite fit on the screen. It is very pretty, but what’s up with that? It is due to Ready at Dawn’s decision to use a unique (for most people at least) resolution and aspect ratio for the title. The game will run at 1920 x 800 and use a 2.40:1 aspect ratio. This cuts the screen up slightly and delivers more focus on a smaller area.
- At about 2:00, there is a cinematic taking place in a dark basement that clearly showcases the best graphics yet seen from a next gen title. At about 2:30, they overdid the shadows a little bit and I came back down to Earth.
- The quick time events and the seamless transitions from gameplay to cinematics give me a distinct Tomb Raider/The Last of Us feel. This is wonderful.
- Whoever they had playing The Order: 1886 was terrible. Maybe he or she was looking to showcase the detailed animations of bullets firing into buildings instead of motionless bad guys, but I couldn’t help but chuckle a little bit.
On Thursday, the official Sony Blog bestowed upon the faithful a Developer’s Diary from Ru Weerasuriya, the CEO of Ready at Dawn and the game’s director:
Weerasuriya gives us a lesson in history and shows us how his team changed it around a little bit to fit the theme of Arthurian Knights battling half-breed monsters in Industrial Revolution London.
He also dives a little bit into what it feels like to develop a game solely for the PS4. He is quick to point out that, while the chance to create games for powerful new hardware is exciting, it is important to prioritize the actual content of the game and the player’s experiences.
I think that is a mega-huge point: nobody wants to play a horrible game just because it looks really pretty. Most of the people diving into these mature games need a little more substance than polish.
Well, except the millions of people who bought Call of Duty: Ghosts or Battlefield 4. However, I forgive them, for they knew not what they were doing.
Finally, the game received a random plug during an interview conducted between GamePur and Basement Crawl’s (a new PS4 exclusive that hit the PlayStation Network earlier this week) Marketing Manager Aron Cender.
Cender said this about the PS4:
“It’s an amazing piece of hardware, and I’m glad we got a chance to work with Sony. I’m sure in the near future you’ll see how powerful it is. You get the first example with The Order: 1886, and it’s gonna only get better. I think what stands out for The Order: 1886 are environment details, ligthting and animations, like clothing for example. I doubt it would be possible on any other platform, except PC, so PlayStation’s power is certainly a very important factor here.”
I think that’s a nice feather in the cap for both PlayStation and The Order: 1886. The praise certainly seems sincere, but it is important to note that the guy is marketing a game that just released on Sony’s network, so he couldn’t really bash them even if he wanted to.
Still, the point is there. The images available are clearly better than anything else we have seen on a next gen console, and I would argue that they are the best gameplay images currently available. That little 30-second tidbit where you could easily distinguish the individual links of chain mail and the red of the knight’s coat just sold it for me.
I think we should also give The Order: 1886 a round of applause simply due to its originality; though it is borrowing from centuries of Arthurian Myth (DETAILS!). It certainly isn’t every day that we see a new IP, let alone one that is also going to revolutionize video game graphics.
Is it still early? Certainly. Am I getting way too far ahead of myself? Probably, but I don’t care. The game looks awesome, and I am as giddy as a schoolgirl for it.
The Order: 1886 is expected to release in Q3 of 2014.
Originally posted to Gamer Headlines