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ABZÛ |OT| A Journey into an ocean of wisdom

Nia

Member
I assume I'm early in the game still. I played an hour today. I was pleased to see an
Octopus
, but disappointed I seemed unable to meditate to it.
 

See bottom quote...

I assume I'm early in the game still. I played an hour today. I was pleased to see an
Octopus
, but disappointed I seemed unable to meditate to it.

What kind of
Octopus
and where was it?

Welp, I guess PC it is then.

PC is also locked at 40 with a reasonably steady 30 most of the time.

Aside from tweaked resolutions, the PS4 version is identical.
 

c0Zm1c

Member
PC is also locked at 40 with a reasonably steady 30 most of the time.

Aside from tweaked resolutions, the PS4 version is identical.

I don't think there's any framerate lock on PC. It ranges between 40 and 60fps on my system. That's on low settings however (old PC). But I've read comments from others saying they can get much higher framerates even on Ultra settings.
 
I don't think there's any framerate lock on PC. It ranges between 40 and 60fps on my system. That's on low settings however (old PC). But I've read comments from others saying they can get much higher framerates even on Ultra settings.

I've heard of frame-rate dips identical in both versions and that users are having to tweak display settings to achieve higher than 1080p resolutions.

If I'm incorrect in what I've heard, then please enlighten me :)
 

c0Zm1c

Member
I've heard of frame-rate dips identical in both versions and that users are having to tweak display settings to achieve higher than 1080p resolutions.

If I'm incorrect in what I've heard, then please enlighten me :)
Apart from saying the framerate is locked on PC I don't think you're incorrect.

Regarding the issue with resolutions, that appeared to be solved after the patch. Or at least it allowed me to enable ultrawide without any file tweak.
 

ghibli99

Member
I've heard of frame-rate dips identical in both versions and that users are having to tweak display settings to achieve higher than 1080p resolutions.

If I'm incorrect in what I've heard, then please enlighten me :)
980 Ti user here. I played it with a render resolution of 1920x1080, although my native resolution is 2560x1440. Solid 60fps with just a couple hitches throughout the entire game at Ultra. I wasn't able to achieve the same results with a 2560x1440 render resolution without dialing things down.
 
Apart from saying the framerate is locked on PC I don't think you're incorrect.

Regarding the issue with resolutions, that appeared to be solved after the patch. Or at least it allowed me to enable ultrawide without any file tweak.

As long as everyone on PC can enjoy this game as well as PS4 users - everyone wins!
 
Was bummed when I started playing on ps4 and noticed it wasn't 60fps.

There are times when I completely understand this mentality, and other times when I really don't.

This is the latter. No way should that ruin your experience.

Game plays extremely well and is truly outstanding, regardless of frame rate.
 

dsk1210

Member
Played the PC version (980ti) at 1080p with 125% render quality and ultra settings. Smooth 60 fps.

Gorgeous game, the shoals of fish are stunning.

Deckard I have no idea how you thought it was locked to 40 fps, I mean that makes no sense at all.
 

ironmang

Member
I would say it's the best ocean GOAT.

Don't get me wrong, I love Journey - but it's only real "wow" moments are the visuals, the Trials section and then of course, how it ends.

Literally every second of ABZÛ is a "wow moment. If Giant Squid really does release some kind of Special Edition that has extra levels that added both content and narrative; this game could possibly be GOAT.

I would love to see a level in between the Atlantis section and the next chapter that was deeper in the abyss, possibly at the very bottom of the sea [a place like the Mariana Trench] that was pitch black, other than the light from your helmet lights and also from the drones you would find and it featured Megalodons and Mosasaurs and any other massive, sea-dwelling, prehistoric creatures.

That would give all the people that said there wasn't enough tension in the game something to be tense about! That, and it would give us an extra level or two and a lot of other cool, prehistoric sea creatures!

There's your next mission Giant Squid LOL! ;)

Well I guess we have to agree to disagree about my opinion lol. Journey will forever be ahead of ABZU for me.
 
Deckard I have no idea how you thought it was locked to 40 fps, I mean that makes no sense at all.

See my above post.

PS4 is the only guaranteed resolution/fps that I was informed of. If the PC version [understandably] renders higher without modifications, I was not aware :)

I only asked GS about the PS4 version and having heard PC users complain lately about resolutions, Denuvo and fps etc. I just figured that the PC version had to be tweaked to equal the PS4 in terms of performance.
 

dsk1210

Member
See my above post.

PS4 is the only guaranteed resolution/fps that I was informed of. If the PC version [understandably] renders higher without modifications, I was not aware :)

I only asked GS about the PS4 version and having heard PC users complain lately about resolutions, Denuvo and fps etc. I just figured that the PC version had to be tweaked to equal the PS4 in terms of performance.


It's a fantastic pc version. It was patched yesterday as well.

I did not want anyone being put off picking this up thinking it was poor.
 
Finished it today and loved it.

Would have loved 60 fps and the black bars when meditating to disappear after letting you know what sea life you were spectating however.

Wonderful experience nonetheless 🙏 Something I will certainly come back to just to swim around or have on in the background.
 

Auctopus

Member
The comparisons to Journey are sort of getting a bit tiring now. Yes, there are people who worked on it that worked on Journey but that doesn't mean every aspect of one game needs to be compared with the other. I even heard on Gamespot's Lobby this morning the reviewer say "I was disappointed it didn't have the multiplayer aspect that Journey had...". - So, I suppose I can say that I'm disappointed Titanfall 2 isn't set in Hell like Doom is?

I don't what it is about "Art-House" games that instantly make people compare them with eachother when they should be the most unique experiences around.
 

Ferr986

Member
I wonder if (story spoilers)
the floating island you can see in chapter 1 is not an island but the triangle ship from the last chapter.

It looks similar in form and basically the last chapter is about rising the water level every time you destroy a triangle.
 

ced

Member
The comparisons to Journey are sort of getting a bit tiring now. Yes, there are people who worked on it that worked on Journey but that doesn't mean every aspect of one game needs to be compared with the other. I even heard on Gamespot's Lobby this morning the reviewer say "I was disappointed it didn't have the multiplayer aspect that Journey had...". - So, I suppose I can say that I'm disappointed Titanfall 2 isn't set in Hell like Doom is?

I don't what it is about "Art-House" games that instantly make people compare them with eachother when they should be the most unique experiences around.

I think the issue is that it is trying to be Journey, from the gameplay to the lore presentation. It just felt like a re-skin of Journey to me, that's not to say it wasn't great.
 

semiconscious

Gold Member
Finished it today and loved it.

Would have loved 60 fps and the black bars when meditating to disappear after letting you know what sea life you were spectating however.

Wonderful experience nonetheless �� Something I will certainly come back to just to swim around or have on in the background.

giant squid patch requests:

1) collectible info for each chapter on the chapter select menu screen

2) eliminate meditation black bars

thanks! :) ...
 

Auctopus

Member
It's probably just me but once the first two notes of the theme are struck I get strong Tomb Raider II/III theme vibes.

100%! I forgot to mention this! Although I could've sworn it was TR1...

Tomb_Raider_(DOS)_01.png
 

Inkwell

Banned
The comparisons to Journey are sort of getting a bit tiring now. Yes, there are people who worked on it that worked on Journey but that doesn't mean every aspect of one game needs to be compared with the other. I even heard on Gamespot's Lobby this morning the reviewer say "I was disappointed it didn't have the multiplayer aspect that Journey had...". - So, I suppose I can say that I'm disappointed Titanfall 2 isn't set in Hell like Doom is?

I don't what it is about "Art-House" games that instantly make people compare them with eachother when they should be the most unique experiences around.

There aren't very many games like this so it's easy to compare the two. On top of that, it's quite obvious that Abzu was trying to be a lot like Journey and illicit those same emotions and feelings. Your example feels very disingenuous. Why are you using the setting for your argument? Way off base compared to the comparisons being made here. And yes, you can make actual comparisons between Titanfall and Doom. What's wrong with comparing mechanics and features between the two?
 

Soma

Member
So I'm in the area where
you just finished swimming with the blue whales and are now where all the evil triangles are
and I thought it'd be neat to swim all the way back to the top.

About halfway through I completely lose my sense of orientation and had no idea if I was going up or down anymore. I just keep swimming into a certain direction for a bit and eventually I come up to the surface where it's just the sun on the horizon. Really nice scene but then I look back down to see where I need to return and all I see is just complete emptiness and I feel very shook all of the sudden. It's a really daunting feeling to see absolutely nothing below you for miles so... I just restarted the level. The scale of this game is really something else.
 
giant squid patch requests:

1) collectible info for each chapter on the chapter select menu screen

2) eliminate meditation black bars

thanks! :) ...

Yes!

So I'm in the area where
you just finished swimming with the blue whales and are now where all the evil triangles are
and I thought it'd be neat to swim all the way back to the top.

About halfway through I completely lose my sense of orientation and had no idea if I was going up or down anymore. I just keep swimming into a certain direction for a bit and eventually I come up to the surface where it's just the sun on the horizon. Really nice scene but then I look back down to see where I need to return and all I see is just complete emptiness and I feel very shook all of the sudden. It's a really daunting feeling to see absolutely nothing below you for miles so... I just restarted the level. The scale of this game is really something else.

I think I tried swimming back up from there and it wouldn't let me! Where did you start moving upwards - do you remember?
 

Z3M0G

Member
Would be so good if it was 60fps (on PS4)... for some reason without it it feels "lacking" since the graphics are quite simple... yet I get that they are pulling off cool things with the large clusters of fish.

I played the first 30 min or so the other day and while it is fairly neat, it doesn't quite have the magic of Spore / Flower / Journey... at least not yet.

I hope to see stuff that WOW me going forward...
 
Would be so good if it was 60fps (on PS4)... for some reason without it it feels "lacking" since the graphics are quite simple... yet I get that they are pulling off cool things with the large clusters of fish.

I played the first 30 min or so the other day and while it is fairly neat, it doesn't quite have the magic of Spore / Flower / Journey... at least not yet.

I hope to see stuff that WOW me going forward...

Oh, you will!
 

ghibli99

Member
One of the last scenes
where the whales are breaching the ocean's surface
is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. So many images from this game are forever burnt into my brain.
 
One of the last scenes
where the whales are breaching the ocean's surface
is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. So many images from this game are forever burnt into my brain.


Did you find the
Finding Nemo Easter egg? After you grow the third Coral Tree, when you go into the temple keep looking at the ceilings and in one of them there is a hole you can swim into and in the large room there's a Clown Fish and a Blue Tang swimming around, chasing each other. Obviously a Finding Nemo reference!
Good job Giant Squid!

I wonder what other nods there are?
 

Wanderer5

Member
Started playing it today, and god what a absolute beauty filled with life! Presentation is just so freaking strong here while the gameplay aspect seems to hold up fine enough for now.
 
Started playing it today, and god what a absolute beauty filled with life! Presentation is just so freaking strong here while the gameplay aspect seems to hold up fine enough for now.

The swimming mechanics are the best I've experienced in any game to date. I don't see how it can be topped - the freedom of movement is simply staggering.
 

Granjinha

Member
Just finished it, absolutely INCREDIBLE.

There's so much stuff to like about this game. The incredible presentation, with some of the best vistas and scenes in gaming, period. The fluid controls which make controlling the swimmer an absolute joy. The small interactions with all the sea-life, each one carefully crafted with beatiful animations. That FUCKING SOUNDTRACK. Austin Wintory is one of the best composers around. The music in this game just fits everything SO WELL, and in doing that makes every aspect of the game even better.

I love this game.
 
The missus is out for the night next weekend so I'm going to hold off and do this in one sitting then, journey style.

Can't wait to see what it's like.
 
Just finished it, absolutely INCREDIBLE.

There's so much stuff to like about this game. The incredible presentation, with some of the best vistas and scenes in gaming, period. The fluid controls which make controlling the swimmer an absolute joy. The small interactions with all the sea-life, each one carefully crafted with beatiful animations. That FUCKING SOUNDTRACK. Austin Wintory is one of the best composers around. The music in this game just fits everything SO WELL, and in doing that makes every aspect of the game even better.

I love this game.

Great write-up!

I love it too. It doesn't get stale or boring, either.

I hope we get a physical edition with extra content, levels, etc. - there can never be enough ABZÛ!
 
Sorry if anything I'll say will bum out someone in here, but I can't say I enjoyed the experience.

As a huge Journey fan, I would say that this game captured all the superficial aspects of that game but nothing of its essence. It's visually very pretty but that's about it, the swimming action is very well done but the game thinks it can manage tight corridors as well as the open areas, and every time I wanted to explore I was redirected back to the corridor path the game wanted me to stick to. Even the music, while very well produced and interesting, seemed affected by this sense of vagueness, lacking one simple coherent theme. I won't propose my wife to play it together like we did with Journey as I initially planned.
 
Sorry if anything I'll say will bum out someone in here, but I can't say I enjoyed the experience.

As a huge Journey fan, I would say that this game captured all the superficial aspects of that game but nothing of its essence. It's visually very pretty but that's about it, the swimming action is very well done but the game thinks it can manage tight corridors as well as the open areas, and every time I wanted to explore I was redirected back to the corridor path the game wanted me to stick to. Even the music, while very well produced and interesting, seemed affected by this sense of vagueness, lacking one simple coherent theme. I won't propose my wife to play it together again.

Wow, I'm sorry it didn't connect with you. Maybe try playing it again in the near future? Second chances make better impressions sometimes!
 

spekkeh

Banned
Just finished it. It's my favorite game of the year so far, though that's an indictment of the year as much as praise for the game. The art direction is really second to none, and I also loved the tranquility and enigmatic story, though I'm not sure I fully understood it, or whether it's meant to be.

However I do agree with the Journey (and also Flower) comparisons and that it ultimately falls short. The game really misses Jenova Chen and feels exactly what happens if you let the art director instead of the game designer take control, even though the thing that happens as a result of that is undoubtedly insanely beautiful. (very mild spoilers)

This game follows the Journey template to tell a new story. But both Flower and Journey weren't meant as templates for a story; their game design and interaction were developed precisely to enhance the rhetoric of the story. Journey was a parable of life and how the only thing that makes our barren journey to the end worthwhile is being together with other people. And so the whole game design revolved around creating that meaningful connection with another soul until the passing to the other world (read Eurogamer's interview by Simon Parkin to understand how). Flower, a much simpler story of course, used its gusts of wind mechanic to enhance the feeling of blowing away evil spirits, much like Tibetan Buddhism. Maybe Abzu had this too, but I am oblivious to it. However, nothing in the swimming interaction seems to particularly enhance the message.

Lacking that, Abzu misses, well I'm not going to say soul because that it has, but definitely some profoundness.
 

jacobeid

Banned
I too wasn't a huge fan. The soundtrack is *by far* the best part of the game.

On PC I experienced intermittent frame drops and sound would cut out here and there (970). I had no difficulty with the camera in large areas but once I was in a more enclosed space I had serious issues with the camera. The game didn't connect with me emotionally compared to Journey (not sure if that's because this seemed like Journey 2 beat-for-beat), but even the
whale
section, which is clearly the best part of the game, wasn't nearly as polished as Journey. I was ripped out of that moment when
fish swim into the mouth of the whale
and half of them end up just clipping through.

Abzu certainly has character but it needed some more technical work in addition to something else to put it all together.
 

Rndm

Member
It's probably just me but once the first two notes of the theme are struck I get strong Tomb Raider II/III theme vibes.

Same. Guess that's because it's the same instrument (oboe) and you don't often hear that in a solo in the beginning of a song. Is there any other game with an oboe heavy soundtrack? ABZÛ really seems like an exception here and Austin even said that the oboe is the star in ABZÛ much like the cello is the star in Journey.
 

WoolyNinja

Member
Sorry if anything I'll say will bum out someone in here, but I can't say I enjoyed the experience.

As a huge Journey fan, I would say that this game captured all the superficial aspects of that game but nothing of its essence. It's visually very pretty but that's about it, the swimming action is very well done but the game thinks it can manage tight corridors as well as the open areas, and every time I wanted to explore I was redirected back to the corridor path the game wanted me to stick to. Even the music, while very well produced and interesting, seemed affected by this sense of vagueness, lacking one simple coherent theme. I won't propose my wife to play it together like we did with Journey as I initially planned.

Thanks - you've saved me a lot of typing as I agree with everything you've said. It was an ok game but nowhere near my Journey experience.
 
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