CHV Lives On

Has anyone heard of this game?
...this post is basically me poking a dead board with a stick to see if it moves.

Alright, nobody's biting. So I guess I have free reign over this board...
Mwahahaha.
I'll just take this opportunity to rant.
Primal is one of the most graphically impressive PS2 games I've seen in a while. 480p progressive scan, widescreen mode, Dolby DTS surround in-game, texture detail that is frankly amazing given the PS2's 4MB of VRAM, beautiful architecture/models, and zero load times.
Then there's the game content itself. A nicely gothic game with a battle system vaguely reminiscent of an actual fighting game (let's hope it's better than The Bouncer...speaking of which, where's Pyrojaz?) with dozens of moves to perform. It's a sort of partner-game, where you can switch between the main characters (a vampy goth chick and a stony demon gargoyle) at will, utilizing their individual abilities. Music is by some band called 16Volt, never heard of them before, and while it may be a little over-the-top, I guess it suits the tone of the game.
Today's, what, the 13th? Yeah. I think the new Jampack is coming out in a couple of days, and Primal should be on it. I'll try to pick it up and give the game a spin, get some hands-on impressions for myself.

I'm just waiting for Ape Escape 2. http://webpages.charter.net/gestahr/Movie2.swf

Well, got the Winter '02 JamPack demo, and wouldn't you know it, Primal was on it.
Boy, what a disappointment. I really hope this is a very early-production demo.
I loved the transformation sequences that Jen and Scree undergo, and the textures are good. I like the animations for the most part, though I never got a look at any facial animation, if any. Architecture is good, though a bit bland and static. But the vaunted 60FPS just wasn't constant. I agree about the loose camera, seeing as how it gets stuck so easily in the environment. There were other glitches, like invisible step-stones scattered about, and some of the clipping is pretty bad. The models are great, particularly Jen's face/gratuitous bounce physics and Scree's texture-work. Gameplay-wise, the battle system was disappointing. So much for an in-game fighting system to rival Tekken and VF, this doesn't even rival The Bouncer. The characters move pretty slowly, though whether this can be attributed to "reality" or just the programmers making sure you don't get from one area to the next before it completely streams off the disc, I don't know. Plus, the voice-acting seems a bit nonchalant...
I dunno, I'll try to keep my hopes up about SCEE, but this demo just doesn't pique me at all. The Ratchet&Clank demo on the same disk just nails home a lot of the problems I mentioned.