THE QUIET MAN™

An "accolades trailer" is one that features gameplay and cinematics overlaid with glowing review scores and kind words from outlets such as ours—this one from the brilliant What Remains of Edith Finch is a fine example. Today, Square Enix released an accolades trailer for The Quiet Man , the live-action adventure/brawler about—as I understand it—a deaf guy who kicks ass in memory of his mom.    At this point you may be wondering how a game that Tyler described as " spectacularly bad " before he gave up in disgust could possibly be worthy of such a thing. The short answer is that it's not. The trailer is in Japanese, and the auto-generated English subtitles aren't exactly precise in their syntax, but there's no mistaking the quotes from the reviews: * "Inexplicable"; * "Catastrophic failure"; * "Worst Joke of the Century"; * "Trashhhhhhhhh"; * And yes, our take on it is in there too:; If you're wondering why exactly Square Enix would embrace the awfulness to this extent, I can think of two p

There are too many games. November is over, but it was a big month, and our giant collective digi-trough runneth over with shooters, stabbers and clickers. It s repulsive and very wasteful, quite frankly. Thankfully, the RPS podcast (aka the Electronic Wireless Show ) is here to snort up the good uns and stamp all over the bad uns. This week the pod squad are running through as many newly released games as they can, from Hitman 2 to Darksiders III to Just Cause 4 to well, lots more. (more…)

The Quiet Man made a hell of an impression back in June with " the worst trailer at E3 ," and it more than lived up to that potential when it finally came out last week. Tyler, who played it so that you don't have to, described it as " a spectacular disaster ," not just a bad game but a full-scale catastrophic failure whose existence is even more remarkable when you consider that it comes from a major, reputable publisher.  But hey, maybe that's your thing, and if so, the new "Answered" update could be right up your alley. It adds all the sounds and subtitles that were missing—intentionally, as an artistic choice (that, like pretty much everything else, doesn't pan out)—from the game in its original release.    " allows players to re-experience Dane’s journey to rescue the singer Lala with sound, voices and full subtitle support for the first time," Square Enix said. "This new experience will provide the final answers to the lingering mysteries of The Quiet Man and let players know the truth within this unique intera

The Quiet Man, which released today, stars an Abercrombie & Fitch model—actually a bodyguard, I think—who seems to be obsessed with a woman who looks like his dead mom. I mean, maybe? The coupling of live action video and 3D combat is such a layer cake of clichés that I can't tell if it's meant to be a story or a promo for a stock video collection. Woman smiles. Men converse. It's a spectacular disaster, which feels like a rarity these days: there are lots of bad games, but for a game that was announced at E3 and made by a major publisher and studio to be this catastrophic is something. A quiet game The troubles start with an artistic premise that demands an amount of creative ingenuity that I quickly realized was not present. The protagonist, Dane, is deaf, and Square Enix and Human Head Studios commit to his perspective. During the live action cutscenes and interactive 3D fights, footsteps and punches are muffled crunches, and all dialogue is inaudible (except at the very beginning), heard as synthesized chimes. There are no subtitles. It's a bold decision (that feels like it was meant to be called a bold