Playing Neuro: The Lost Last Game of 2006 (is weird)

we ignorant of ourselves make often our own harms which device powers deny us for our good so find we profit by losing of our prayers today we're playing Europe a game I'm confident exist in the minds of less than a thousand people in the english-speaking world I may have significantly raised awareness of it merely by telling a few mates of its existence and now I hope to bring it into your life as well I'm going to be taking you on an odyssey with an oddity with an emphasis on odd a game that after I first beat it I was unsure what I had just saw semi generic shovelware a dumb game banking on a handful of good ideas just ideas or a work of absurd genius might by incompetence time budget any number of things neuro has invaded my mind over the last month I've been playing note-taking and writing it clocks in at a humble 6 hours long short for a game perhaps but it's sure in much the same way a boxing match can be it gives you a lot to screw over in and out of the ring and a headache nirodh was originally released in 2006 by revolt games it's a linear FPS with a focus on psychic powers telling a dark techno noir plot of conspiracy corruption the cruelty of humanity and abuse of the naive I'm only really confident of that last fee revolt was a company that mostly ployed games for the russian market with only a couple of original titles under their belt neuro would sadly prove to be their last work according to MOBA games anyway their website which updated just last year says they make fun casual games that can be enjoyed anywhere curiously neuro never came West but it was intended for worldwide release at some point in development revolt didn't believe in anywhere just yet a Taiwanese company recently republished Nero more than a decade after its initial release and well I'm going to quote Keith Duffy he runs a blog dedicated to bringing games like neuro there deserved attention this is the post I was linked to when neuro was sent my way here's the two amazing things about this license number one the whole production appeared suddenly in both spoken and written English and number two actually runs on a Windows 10 operating system heretofore as the anguish coins below this post the test many players were having trouble getting this puppy to run in anything other than Windows XP and even some were having trouble that this is an update from an older post where keeper translated a Russian copy of neuro seven years prior letter by letter it invaded my mind they infected his he needed to know I'll be linking his blog post in the description which contains a download for the game which also comes from a translated manual I'll be delving into that when the time is right but if you want to play in Europe you can go and do so right now this video has spoilers at the end though I will say you may need to come back to this video sooner than you think any last bit of tragedy forfeiting of neuro I was told about this game via a YouTube message which is a service that died a while ago for no good bloody reason as YouTube continues to ruin things that work perfectly fine I don't have a screen cap so I'm sorry but I can't thank the person by name who told me about neuro anyway let's get onto the video proper thank you whoever and wherever you are let's get going I hope this video is worth the very long wait we open on a spaceship headed somewhere nur is going to give you a thesis statement before anything approaching context the humanity has always yearned for the stars they're called Beauty beckons many generations of poets and dreamers stupid delusions that's what they are you want some stars I'll give you them who sail and we tail tell me is there a place in the whole universe where people leave in good conscience is there a place where you can take a deep breath not fearing that someone would slash your throat in a dozen of waste strange that a man would say something so clumsily poetic strange is still that he'd say in the presence of someone else do you think that humans are degrading this is Craig Richards and this is James Grayson the one man easily pushed around enough to want to be Craig's friend James is really slumped in that absurd idea of ergonomics he looks really small and sort of pathetic between that and his voice it's a perfect introduction to the little twerp oh also he's who will be playing as Jim try listening to me with ears for a change if anyone tells you that our earth ancestors were living in a golden age of peace and prosperity and there were no wars and dissensions called him a liar and spit in his face crate is such a misanthrope he's going off subtitle to hammer at home which okay that isn't that uncommon people cut lines at them or sometimes they'll just say whatever they want regardless I respect Craig's conviction James doesn't we did not degrade we are only what we speed a bunch of arrogant [ __ ] Gregor Rock we're named don't listen to this Yap or he'll dry no crazy with his philosophy so yes your likes to Ferrari players in at the deep end we're going to be knocked around blind for a while and hopefully we'll get an idea of the setting the powers that play their hierarchy what's actually going on and most importantly you know on behalf of all that thread and clan I welcome you dear comfort Reds get to our dummy what is this bloody voice acting I'm here to say I love it it's the glue which holds everything together for me it's both ironically lovable and it genuinely works let me explain all but a couple of voices are done in phonetic English by actors with an at best tenuous grasp of the language words are often mispronounced sentences have bizarre emphasis especially when they attempt sayings in cliches and due to what I imagine is a dub job done without any ability to modify much of the game itself timings between the lines to better account for the different paces between English and Russian delivery are unchanged either leading to lines playing back to back to back or awkwardly long pauses in conversation it all adds up to a beautiful mockery of English the conversations are incredibly alien and listening to them is a treat because despite all of that despite the clear lack of familiarity with the specifics of English every character is cursed pitch perfectly the individual words sound off but all the actors are really giving the characters well character they're on point unlike the subtitles over the coming hours we're going to learn James is a [ __ ] an ignoramus one of the stupidest protagonists I've ever had the privilege of piloting I'm seasoned when it comes to playing pillars but James may be fake what it really means to be a dullard what about their mission his voice gets across his naivety wimpish nests and gullibility so well i buy he's the only one who can be bullied into hanging around Craig I mean regardless of them being the only to scifi a special agents in this part of the galaxy yes they're special agents he's still a [ __ ] you'll just have to work that one out for yourself Craig are seasoned philosophic and alcoholic superior and friend I guess puts up a gruff tough-guy act that Mabel I a heart of gold our superior Basel well he sounds like a squirrel impersonating a general of a head cold but it works it may not seem like it suits him but I promise this will pay off down the line we're in here free 66 of the space era which replaced the old calendar around 21 40 AD so you can just imagine this is what English sounds like 500 years down the line the presentation of the story is handled in odd ways overall visual and auditory both let's wrap up the actual intro just know I'll be adding details the game explains poorly or not at all but also know I'm not entirely sure of those details again things are explained extremely poorly we work for the SBI and well the illusion there is pretty obvious we're an intelligence agency and a wing of the earth Confederation government so we oversee much of human civilization across the stars but don't directly run everything and we are visiting the trading plan on the planet Pluto they're a small clan but incredibly technologically advanced and I think we're set up to feel uneasy about the whole thing you can take a one-round and overview our ground if you don't mind of course you never want to see the word farm in quotations like that what do you think about the road he's gonna polite but I bet there are iron fists underneath all that loves James doesn't notice he's just thinking hang on he's not wearing gloves I don't want to upset a good it's here we get our title drop and we're timing like this I surely can't be alone in thinking that we're meant to be on edge right are we about to be turned into sausages James is the type of character who would wind up in a horror game well fortunately for here man really all involved we're not this diplomatic mission is mostly on the level there is something sketchy going on but it's not because of the troy'd ins now we get to the codec there's a lot to go into of these they feature more of this game's best feature dialogue if you're wondering why the subtitles are between the two characters rather than in that nice big box well that's because that box is reserved for our object sieves we won't see those until we get into the level proper but the subject was aren't going to steal their space anyway we have a repeat button I appreciate that used it from time to time if you're worried that the English versions don't have a lip sync don't worry it's universal look I've got the video files right here yeah Annie damn it max and then a war now James wants to inspect the face but Craig has his priorities straight and we're just going to get some booze but Craig doesn't care much for the mission overall but there is a reasonable reason for Craig's reasoning don't tell me you never wondered why we got this important assignment right when we finally head room owned by the vault there's conspiracy afoot I think now I get it exactly don't worry and stick with me I know what I'm doing James clearly left the thinking to Craig a while ago but James still says they shouldn't shirk their duties so Craig agrees to a tutorial just so you know I'm not actually playing neuro yet this is a cutscene I didn't actually care about that screen that was all James this is how most of Neuros cutscenes are and it's jarring there is rarely a smooth transition control is ripped away so James can look at what the game wants but it doesn't disable the hood and James's movements are not smooth at all and for something fun okay the gun you start the game with beeps when you look at people there's only one scene in the game that remembers to silence it and it's not this one luckily everyone is too polite to bring it up but then James does have a gun in their face so what are they going to say also despite the fact that this is a cutscene James bumps into stuffing that's important I'm coming back to that later I love that happens in and of itself but it has significance the tutorial that follows is short but strange we're introduced to our beeping pit of ballistic bollocks the resonator crate complains it's ugly I'll complain that there's a knob on the side that needs to be twittered with before it can shoot anyone over I'm sure marksmen love that here's the first bit of insanity was that beeping left in on purpose they do take it out later and then forget to but why not in the opening I think it's because the opening cutscene has James look between Craig and a distant guard which conveys its incredibly short range but it does this before you know anything about the guns operation it's the wrong place to give this lesson and will probably be completely forgotten this baby goes right well it has to have something going for it Craig shoes James James shoots him and so we learn about our healing power gyro is from 2006 the year that regenerating health to our hit on med kits I can't find a one in this game they may be in hiding but neuro ties regenerating health to your manner so it's draining from the same pool as other abilities abilities like extra vision we can see through walls our job is to find the Troy Dan's assigned to watch us I overthink it we have a giant room a fair few guards I assume it would have to be someone at least in the room and I might have to tag them yeah that's fair that was a stupid idea all right I'm making a quick save maybe I just shot the wrong guard ironically quick saving is very slow less like Roenick Lee and more just downright tragically when I reloaded it I'm now blind turns out quick load interferes with the neural implants so I try again and this time the game crashes this then becomes the standard when trying to load quick saves granted this is a level dependent standard as in one third of the stages will let you load a save luckily saves grade at the beginning of each stage were not victim to this it also stopped remembering what I named my saves and left the space is empty then when I stop bothering to enter anything yeah real funny judging by the overall state of the save system I think neuro gets a bit offended by the idea you won't be being in one sitting and this is it being passive-aggressive while I may be doing a bad job finding our tail turns out they're doing a worse job watching us so yes your tutorial is how to shoot and two abilities from what little I've gathered about Craig I guess it makes sense he'd get bored quick alright and up with it trading let's get it boring get wasted I recognize his telekinesis in a lie that a peasant will be a homework you'll practice them later on less productive members of the human society and then the to go and have a bar fight [Music] we've been on closer only for a few days Craig pursued the colonel to return home earlier than planned I think he's planning something get ready James we're going for a mode but never has a more masterful smash-cut been ruined by a loading screen James is apprehensive but Craig thinks they should strike while no one expects it go over their superiors heads God confess I had no idea where anyone in the galaxy was are we still on Pluto are we headed to another planet I mean surely Ramone isn't on Pluto otherwise why were we assigned here it's the future so space travel may be easy but if that's the case why didn't they tie these two down with more work well maybe someone upstairs was banking on the Troy Daan's being more suspect or at least keeping a better eye on them are you Kirino nut well yeah I guess I shouldn't knock initiative James has talked around and Craig affirms that they need to act fast today Ramon is buying 12 containers of uncatalyzed lilac death this amount is enough to wipe out or go three times unbelievable this is a prohibited substance I know I guess we're headed from saw go then I do love James is surprised that the criminal thereafter has criminal Gertz oh good James muted his gun be careful and don't rely on there is an agent remember mind is your weapon free grunts to the lift then uses his special sci power to skip to the end of the mission oh no I guess he did play it out James has no comment on the corpses his mate just made he says not to rely on the resonator but I still trust it more than James's mind nevermind neuro doesn't have a ton of tools with which to really tweak difficulty it has one enemy type a human they can use any gun in the game but they all act the same way so it will mostly just slowly crank up how much health they have stage to stage it mostly tweets the difficulty through stage design and in clever yet very limited ways for our first stage we have just unlocked the mental strike and we get our hands on the second bit of kit oh good he's dead finally but most of the stage gun wise you got the resonator and this the center or Egan and no that isn't a pun since you know this isn't a sentry gun it's a slow firing laser calling it a musket is maybe a little bare muskets have some oomph behind them it makes gunfights a rather slow and stilted affair gyro translates mouse movement about as well as it does English I did start wondering if all the weapons would be kind of like this perhaps neuro is a future where we try to end all wars by making them very tedious to actually fight I did learn that this is a weapon meant for fighting in sensitive environments where you want to avoid damaging equipment or perhaps breaching the side of a spaceship so perhaps it makes sense or maybe those gods pissed off for superior completely and they do know how to play alright back to the resonator mental strike costs a full bar to use so with this ability in those two weapons for a good amount in the run time this is going to be a slow stage the cost of disability means you can't heal after using it which isn't too much of a problem right now with fighting enemies with centaurs so we're not dying terribly fast anyway it's the game's combat but in slow motion letting you feel things out get a grip on your powers charge time and learn the considerations of combat in a low-risk environment how does level plays is distinct but what you learn here carries over to the rest of the game psy abilities are often a question of offense versus defense since they dip into the same manner pool do you want to cash in on big showy attacks or hold a reserve for health and extra vision this is a question which remains if it gets asked more vigorously it also sweetens the pot by letting you fling people with mint with strike with what amounts to impunity for a while I love the sound it makes this is the sound of a human being violently switched off shame the ragdolls don't make any noise so we run about the base making sure the lilac death isn't chipped off while Craig makes his way to Ramon when we're done Craig tells him to get going but James is uneasy and thanks to Craig not responding to his calls James decides to go and find out what's going on oh good a corpse it can't be far off oh we find him about to make another and so control is ripped away James is steering this ship Ramon is trying to buy off Craig who's having none of it James interrupts he wants Ramon to face a fair trial while Craig wants him to face a fair trial by fire hey I would've liked some with that and worse you too before you know getting my head blown off hey this isn't UKUSA for oh I see how it is oh my soul gets to live I have no idea if that's a creepy childish metaphor for guilt or a creepy childish metaphor for being gunned down I'm away Ramon isn't facing judgment but a judge thank you young man yeah well when you say it like that I'll never have his fair trial two days later he was released from custody now that's a masterful cut and then with less mastery the audio cuts James mouth isn't moving so I guess these are his forts and well they're a doozy it makes what just happened even funnier describing powerful higher-ups lying to the press assuring everyone of ramones good character while James recounts that the man has taken hostages and was responsible for bombing a mining asteroid giving him a body count in the thousands without any reason for his acts given I like to imagine Ramone just kind of bumbles into these situations he commits crime for the hell of it I mean he can clearly pay his way out James's resolve is redoubled he can't just stand and watch him walk luckily he sat down much like Craig who's at the bar hey Greg I've got a plan we have to crawl back to Ramone and nicely ask him to return to his luxury cell yeah that would work fine idea but mine's better Craig isn't buying right now he's a man filled with whiskey and rich in wisdom it's Jim Bo they wonder day and you have to accept that you can do squat I started off insulting Craig but I'm starting to come around on the guy what follows is a wonderfully petty argument the two of them are just throwing insults at each other until Craig caves and agrees to come along I'm in let's run our heads into the news I don't need your help and now Craig has to put the work in to convince this petulant child you file that you alone on this one the word stupid will get in you meanie where's the punchline I'm not joking yep now I love Craig he doesn't even let James explain his plan they're just going to do his instead we'll find all we ever wanted to know about financial affairs of our mutual friend why do we need a bunch of numbers for okay pause I had a segment in mind for somewhere in this video this is earlier than I thought it would be but I believe it will come in handy for understanding why I feel the way I do about what comes later I'm updating what this segment is called James interplanetary lad of lunacy after what just transpired doesn't understand why Craig wants to go after ramones cash flow so yes I'm blown away by the depths of James's dimness he has jumped right to the top of the idiot totem pole I've had idiot protagonists I've despised and ones I've loved and I found two commonalities for why I love the ones I do now writing is an art it's not a science someone could bungle all the right moves or create something great with the big quotes wrong ones number one know who and what you're writing this could also be know how your character comes off watchdog's aiden pearce is hiked in law treated in story as and supposed to be a street smart social engineer so he spends the whole of watchdog's bumbling around extending the plot and making boneheaded moves while thoroughly lacking in personality or self-awareness it's a dangerous move to make a protagonist that isn't meant to be unlikable in a thriller you want player investment and it's easier to invest care into someone you like the goings-on need to be really interesting to pick up any slack but watchdogs exacerbates Aidan's worst qualities while really getting anything good out of his few positive ones there's nothing to latch on to then just Dead Rising for Frank what a dopey bellend in ways that weren't even sensible for the character meanwhile soul Myers from boiling point all the game tells you is that he's ex-special forces but boiling point then doesn't go on to talk up soul Myers soul Myers does and no one but him cares it's entertaining to listen to the weird action dad try and sound cool and only make a fool of himself in the process then we have the fog from kingpin the game tells no lies about him he's a bastard with a gun pursuing a short-sighted vengeance with extreme violence the character being an idiot isn't bad writing bad writing is miss handling that fact are you always did dub neuro knows James is an idiot it's going places with it get excited number two being idiot along the way not in the way I've softened on right to hell over the years I look back on it fondly could be that I've played much worse since but I digress Jake schemes are completely nonsensical and he acts in a way that it's abundantly clear the game is just padding things out this also relates to Aiden but well I can't just pile everything on watchdogs electric fence blow up a damn lock door seduce the woman with the keys German do jobs for him there are one-step solutions to each of these problems that Jake will make a flowchart for instead jean-luc from wind back he does get dragged down by everyone else but for the most part he is all forward progress his idiocy comes up along the way it doesn't divert path again but from kingpin he isn't clever but he's in a setting where he doesn't need to be his path is the straightest line available to him this isn't a call to make games as short as possible cutting out all the fluff no I'm not that much of a commotion it's about how progress is framed a player fighting so the player character can undercut their progress is rarely a rewarding experience yes neuro does start with James letting Ramon go but that's the inciting incident so I argue we let that slide his idiocy is going to get more proactive and focused it's part of his arc but then well James breaks this commonality anyway hopefully you'll understand why i fairly enjoy my time playing as him regardless these are far from absolutes as I said just commonalities that help it boils down to knowing they're an idiot leveraging that fact and trying to make them being an idiot not put too much of a brake on things a protagonist having a lack of knowledge is often done in service to the viewer so the others can explain the setting to them and this is what is very strange about James James is a Special Forces soldier a psy fighter part of the earth Confederation they oversee much of the galaxy and part of James's job is escorting captains and diplomats he's a big fish in a big pond even if it's not key to his role James should at least no the important people planets political landscape current events and it seems he knows what they are if not why they are he knows who the troy'd ins are but not why he was assigned to visit them Craig is the more astute of the two he sees the why Craig can tell his naive cohort what's going on under the surface this isn't to make the player feel like an idiot it's just that they're inhabiting one but then Craig barely tells us anything the game rattles off things in the universe but we get the barest minimum of context so it's not just that we're inhabited gems we're well and truly put in his shoes if a protagonist is a window through which to viewers saying James has the curtains drawn just shut up and listen slow by now Craig has finished his drink and several more besides he has a man inside Ramones organization so we're going after his finances regardless of any ignorance on anybody's behalf Craig is already in sight wherever we are and we need to catch up James sounded terrified there perhaps he knew he was entering a stealth section it's actually very short and very easy about a minute in length if you know where you're going so I did learn some fun things along the way for instance that's the stealth weapon I mean I guess the ragdolls are silent and stranger yet that's a stealth weapon yeah hey Craig you forgot to fill us in on something these baby goes right through armor no [ __ ] does it shoots through sodding walls suddenly this terrible gun makes sense it's not every game that gives you the ability to see through walls if you will still give you a gun that can then shoot through them it's a rare game that gives you both as part of your standard load out with effectively unlimited uses of both I mean cool down notwithstanding on 2f you keep all the powers you have at that point but lose every weapon save for the resonator most of the time anyway sometimes neo forgets to take weapons so we make it to Crais and his buddy Phil our job is to go and work the power box phil is worried about the man guarding it as well he should be and then there's just this one line where Craig is voiced by someone else but there's no time to think about that Phil the absolute rat betrays us why do you do that because of fear my friends these creepers were afraid of his boss than me Steph's off the table fair trials are on the menu I'm wary of abilities that let you see through walls it's mostly a Ubisoft thing but tagging and the like are rarely balanced in a way when you ever need switch it off besides the a snake hit there's no drawbacks asking you to way up there use extra vision I really like however there's a lot to it that makes it work it trades a great deal of environmental awareness to aid inciting enemies you develop tunnel vision in a sense using it is trading off your ability to use offensive powers and taking from your healing pool to aid in your marksmanship it plays a droning beeping noise which is another good hit to your senses enemies have a ton of chatter they often announce themselves pulling the player into their direction once again it's boosting part of visual perception at the cost of other senses besides this I love how it looks how light burns into your vision enemies have a subtle trailing effect it gives it a good degree of believability it's a cool ability its overall useful but it has sensible downsides even if it didn't drain from the bar I would not use it infinitely but what can I do infinitely well kill enemies through walls with ease most games would shy away from that design and not unreasonably the sake of comparison what's an ability that lets you kill enemies without exposing yourself in other games explosives these are balanced in a few ways grenades required judging fro arcs which while they may allow angled arcs that a gun can't achieve are at the same time trickier to master powerful explosive weapons also tend to be given to players sparingly they are a valuable volatile resource I'm calling this a foundational convo since the rest of the game has to account for the players ability to do something like this from moment one no less and it does a lopsided job of it some of the ways it's had to balance around what I'm calling the extra rez have come at the cost of other elements one of the two key limitations of the extra rez is range it can reach several meters why it is that's nothing to shake a stick at if you kill enemies on neighboring floors before you need set foot there neuro is a corridor shooter it's a showcase of connecting rooms walkways passages bridges if it brings two rooms together neuro has it in spades occasionally you enter where they lead to Quinn is a lot of this game is indoors so to make sure you don't end every gunfight won't ever needing start one Neuros rooms tend to be big and empty the corridors wind you away from enemies so it can make you approach them from the front and this is just ridiculous cover itself now not only exists as a way to block bullets but as a potential spot to return fire with impunity the physics objects make for a fun showcase as you slowly inch cover towards enemies to line them up for the extra res the wonky physics at least make this a bit of a challenge to pull off [Music] besides how it affects combat it leads to stages being overly large and dull visually if am using architectural II there's a ton of empty space to just plod through the other limitation is fire rate between each shot is a long wind-up and cooldown it's a one-hit kill but it's giving out those hits fairly slowly and this brings me to Neuros floundering AI the enemies are unpredictably predictable as several states have gruffly swaps between and it merely accounts for my ability to kill through walls so despite flopping between states on a whim how they act within those states is very easy to read you just don't know when they'll get bored of it sometimes they'll change forcing you to swap to a more direct combat other times they'll slowly approach often winning groups of two or more so at least one will make it around the corner and be able to confront you assuming you don't just pull a bit sometimes they just accept death stealth AI suffers from this worse they'll freeze at the sight of a dead body or slowly approach it they don't so much respond to a dead body as much as they decide to join them look they say AI is looking at me he knows I'm here but he doesn't know I'm here I feel bad for him it's a lot like animal wrangling or horse breaking you have to wear enemies down occasionally every kill with the extra res is like its own minigame in a good way not a bad one sometimes enemies will have scripted paths but once they reach an end state they start acting freely which kills the set pieces this mid game ambush has several people charged out and take up positions which not only cover this room and allow a second team to flank they are out of extra rez right I can explore rez the people pushing if they don't get aggressive and then the people in good positions eventually also get bored and approach the same way they are dangerous up until they follow the flags James he's talking to you Nero clearly understands why has given the player yeah it does a fairly awkward job controlling it but I love Nero for this fact not in spite of it I struggled to think of a game that could balance the extra res without crippling it anyway in a more polished game this ability would have far more limitations on it ammunition enemies that ignore it or in a hypothetical dullest case use restricted to puzzle s Karina's so yes it's rather ill-conceived but these videos are about my experiences with games this half-assed accounting for my power was so refreshing I'm playing a special forces tie fighter and this is a genuine edge and ability few in the galaxy would seemingly possess how many games why played where I can kill an entire floor of enemies before I get there well I'll be one neuro I mean I then had to walk through an empty stage that's my fault oh [ __ ] that was Craig hey you were invincible earlier now I go go back to the start you know Craig I don't trust this Phil guy I call it a foundational combo but really every game has to weigh up what capabilities it gives the player that's part of how challenge is created it's just that few abilities are this devastating if you come in this early if you require as much work in other areas as the extra rez for what it is neuro does do an admirable job balancing what is a balancing nightmare since despite all I've said I do have to use all the weapons I can be forced away from it and AM semi-regularly it's not an all winning combo just one that utterly dominates a specific yet common occurrence it's also not thoughtlessly easy I have to think about how to get enemies in range find spots I can hit them without exposing myself I have to track them for the several second windup which we're this aiming is a challenge in and of itself I have to question whether a spot is truly safe to break it out risk having enemies charge me while I'm using a weapon not made for direct combat it's a fun powerful tactical consideration that occasionally breaks everything I knew you'd make it oh you mood is everything intact tired wanna see a doctor I'm fine and for your information your jokes officially suck yeah and whose pilgrim and with that we kill Phil and make our exit to blame but Craig still rebuffed me for everything I did indeed not he was screaming when I tried to suggest in my backup plan ten minutes later he dragged me out of the safehouse in slums it's not that I don't understand him after what we have done at Ramon's both the Mafia and the police are eager to stop us with Lee there is no choice but to lay down I'm so mad I'm gonna take a [ __ ] nap god I love everything about how much of a fast this has been we start the story with our two heroes bundling going over their superiors heads twice in a row and now they're hiding in a slum hunted by both law lawless and all James can see fit to do is [ __ ] and moan about how unfair it is in an ineffectual tone and then Craig just gets sick of his [ __ ] and leaves a few days later break disappeared right before his ex turned up hi Jimmy you're looking way too good for this dump where's Craig gate how did you get in here this is K okay James mentally spells her wrong name right getting it wrong 100% at a time she's here looking for Craig but seeing as he's left James will do and I'm sick of sitting here doing nothing but eating sleeping and watching myself fulfilled in evening news at I think that was the news James I think that was you've been framed Kate seems to have some lingering resentment towards Craig James tries to defend him but she's known him longer saying he's a man who always runs when the going gets tough and well I get a speech you get a speech go grab your tongs cuz it's some word salad and he forgot to tell you where he was going to you his best buddy and an honest officer of the law this alone speaks lengths about his faith in you do you know why I left him I loved him with every fiber of my soul but he was so weak look closer at his bravado and you'll see that there's nothing behind it he doesn't have the guts to do a real deed be it an unspeakable madness or a noble crusade to fight evil and save the world all he really cares about is whether or not his stomach would be able to fight an umpteenth shot of whiskey bet he's doing it right as we speak I do love the insanity of this script sometimes that's a new level of poetic [ __ ] and I like the ends with the implication Craig left James to go on a day's long bender it also glosses over the two buildings he was involved in shooting up doesn't have the guts to do a real deed perhaps that isn't a real deed in ever relations I guess James has been yelling at the walls of a safehouse for the last few days luckily K is his get James out and back into action good thing he was probably going to starve before - long before that however let's have something that comes out of nowhere and is deeply disturbing hush we have little time hold me Jimmy okay this man is not capable of consent but he belongs to the past luckily for us they then don't actually do anything they just stand in silence stage for it because what's in a relatively detailed techno slummin kate is going to try and lead us out of here it's scant moments before we're caught by folks masquerading as cops and a gun fight breaks out luckily James is so angry he's learned a new power berserk oh good ah [ __ ] me power I'll have to think on that one so after a gun fight which winds up with a few dead bystanders we go through a level transition ah these are the Spartan corridors I'm used to do neuro hasn't odd time with mid-level checkpoints a good few stages have none the longer levels may be split down the middle so a deaf in Europe can't send you back a good 20 minutes to half an hour that checkpoint in the slums barely a minute from where the stage starts that is the one checkpoint in this stage so you don't have to struggle through that pretty easy opening skirmish again it's clearly there jutted a much more dense detailing and graphical fidelity compared to the rest of the stage I have no idea why so much more work went into this one area but I guess they learn not to replicate it thereafter you don't need to explore it in fact you are led out instantly so that's a weird one checkpoints are a concession to how much the game can load first and play a convenient second now for something stranger of all the things Bureau does incredibly well companions I'm not joking they are finely tuned and fun to fight alongside even taking into account that they can die and this triggers a game over this is something Triple A games stumble over and give up on while neuro just casually aces it they can fight they can kill enemies and they generally will not make fun headed moves it was uncommon that their deaths felt like the game had screwed me they don't need babysitting if you fight competently they are near enough to live is one of the balances on the extra race funnily enough the slower fire rate and the fact that allies draw gunfire pushes you into more proactive approaches they don't steal gameplay from the player they're not wiping out enemy squads but they'll chip in a kill or two considering most encounters consist of 4 to 8 enemies that's nothing to sneeze there that's not to say they won't bugger off and get killed just that it's not something I really had to worry about I'm actually stunned by this companion AI that can dive that does fight but doesn't make me feel suffocated by their presence I'm talking about checkpoints and companions back-to-back and I'm not talking about a disaster in motion let's split go check out this alley you go further the catwalk you make it they also tend to not hog whole stages and yes I may have just gone on about how they don't really die but when she said to split up I didn't realize she meant it so literally she opened fire James so now James is pissed and so we slowly fight our way through the huh sickening never seen a skybox do that before we escaped into the alright I'm getting distracted twice in a row this might be the least handicap-accessible Future ever devised random stairwells everywhere bumps on every floor that James's flowy physics can bounce off of I think one of the benefits of an elevator is that people in wheelchairs can use them nope okay this has nothing to do with the handicap I want you to appreciate how much worse we've made forklifts in the future all right okay what were we doing oh yeah yeah okay okay she's dead because of the system were rotten politicians speed on the law and murderers receive a get-out-of-jail-free card sorry to stage five codec is James talking - aha there you are and joy of joys it's James's psyche you're calling me a coward you don't have the guts to do a real deed James is arguing with himself and everyone else yelling his own personal philosophy sore self you can heal the world by plunging it into cares with with the cheap Malthus well there is life there's hope hope is for fools and lovers and men but your moral tummins are too far removed from specific practical needs practical needs as in the ends justify the means and how do you justify your means James graves shut up this is new I have never seen someone simultaneously losing an argument with themselves within themselves and with everyone else that's a good enough excuse for me so we're in one of Ramon's warehouses James is pumped pissed he's so fired up he's gotten a new power fire powers it's not dark it's perfectly always setting me up you're setting up for one-liner here have a light ha ha we're in the story do you imagine we are it may not feel it with my narration the Neuros plot feels like it's zipping between plot beats tons of questions have been raised Craig's allegiance is in doubt it looks like we're on the border of getting answers James is fully motivated having gone from reluctant to ready and raring to go we just got our lost power and we're launching a one-man assault on Ramon I thought I was nearing the end but we aren't just slightly over halfway through stage 5 of 8 in the story this is the one stage that start-to-finish seems to fully account for the extra rest it's a mazy vertical climb through a warehouse by ceiling to make sure I'm not killing people before I get there and long sightlines ask me to use my other tools the extra res is still possible it's just that the stage design makes it far less practical I'm going to talk about general combat and balance when I get off full arsenal so one stage from now but let's talk about what this looks like from a formatic perspective James is no longer dealing with problems the same way taking a route he fought slow and Shaw trusting in blind justice he's enforcing justice loud and clear direct violent and out in the open so instead of the extra res we're shooting [ __ ] on a larger scale however this stage itself is a mazy design meant to misdirect and slow you down it doesn't do a great job most of those Mazie elements immediately terminate with dead ends but at one point you come to a t-junction the left and right paths are mirrored but the first one you take will always be the wrong one the lifts won't work so you have to then backtrack and go through the other is this symbolic probably not we also loop through the same room a couple of times the first time we see Oh Craig and he locks the door on us creak oh my god gate was right Nura then decides to taut it busts in on the fact that extra vision can see not only people but ammo I guess this is only slightly more slick than saying hey [ __ ] look down which does lead us below the ground and into full damage when we reopen the door something strange happens don't have the guts to do it be indeed be it an unspeakable madness or a noble cause defied evil save the world that line was about Craig but going forwards James has seemingly adopted it for himself he thinks on it once more in this stage and then never again but I guess James is finding himself trying to hold himself to a higher standard than his former friend who if he couldn't already be any lower well let's listen to him on the floor above I don't know I didn't order to shoot [ __ ] business as usual no one is responsible for anything if Ramones got the wind we're screwed but the good Iranian who stays in the later do a Glock run are you sure you're not trying to fool me are you no sir I would never all right when this mess is over you'll get your free passage from puto please did crank really say toodles anyway something doesn't sit quite right with me about all this but we'll come back around to that this stage really does account for the extra resi after a bit more shooting I accidentally bumble into the end of the level who do we have here the boots are already dispatched your boss promised me personal immunity scare that have you ever wondered what miners from Mirza felt when your goods burned them alive but people from berenguer felt when they had to breathe Baku a many more will die because of you son-of-a-bitch what are you hi I am just a middleman um we're stuck we've got a protagonist so socially awkward he stayed the stage losing an argument with himself and then freezing up against another person let's call it a social soft lock it's a bit worrying the game can do this this stage had no checkpoints and as I said Nero isn't a fan of middle level saves so this time let's scare right yeah have a light felt forced on a second go around James was able to work out a witty retort officer you were magnificent I'm impressed it's not often one feels the hatred so deep impure like yours say hello to warden avatar the leader and messianic figure of his own cult and he wants Ramon dead - the man's a mid-game treat the interactions between James and warden avatar are an absolute joy by this point James is a confused incredibly volatile tit and warden avatar is a smug self-assured [ __ ] show me the direction to the future of yours because as far as I can see my world doesn't have one Oh God was I really that dense one mustn't give in to despair these are the words of an avatar that walked the earth Ian's ago an unstoppable density hitting an immovable madness lucky for us even James is too wise to buy into whatever that was are you one of them officer I'm not really in the mood for quasi religion brainwash so they don't like each other but since they have a mutual Golf and uneasy alliances formed officer we must act sweetly the plan is to minimize the collateral but without getting overly sentimental will you help us if this will get me closer to Ramon yes excellent well when you put it like that killing all these people take the heat off you is perfectly reasonable James that's some collateral I don't know okay so in the last stage we got our last power and in this one we complete our selection of firearms this isn't as bad as it's going to sound but starting in the previous stage and continuing into a finale Neera hits a bit of a slump the gimmicks which were present in early stages just disappear and the gameplay stagnates we're now just going to shoot our way for industrial zones for a couple of hours so let's talk about that shooting I don't dislike it but it really is just serviceable the hitboxes are on point the weapons are an unwieldy balancing act and the psychic powers are not sure what shortcoming they're making up for let's take the extra res out of the equation for a moment neuro is not a game with a two weapon limit James is lugging everything enemies can use every gun but the resonator most weapons are taken from foes and since neuro doesn't want you to permanently lose anything this means you'll still find poor saps using the scent or Egon very late into the game its environmental storytelling you know they're bad people otherwise they wouldn't be forced to use it conversely oh if you want a grenade launcher quite you're [ __ ] have one this does result in a weapon spread that feels random enemies use weapons that are fairly weak even into the late game enemies are somewhat varied free weapons but the weapons don't synergize enough to make battles feel all that different from one another and even though enemies can have the grenade launcher I think it's damage is capped so it can't take more than half your life which does take some fight away from it neuro is on the easier side but that's if you play the game cautiously a single shot from the dwyer which enemies feel fairly often that can cut your health in half instantly it's just that enemies will struggle to land that shot in terms of scaling and balance whether Nero flogged it depends on what they were going for but it's unclear what that is if they intended weapons to have ranges and rolls so nothing becomes obsolete they've loved it if it is intended to be a somewhat linear power scale where you get better stuff as the game goes along well they still flogged it albeit a bit less the SOG can only function at close range but even there it is an underpowered inaccurate mess it's high rate of fire doesn't over combis it can't even manage fruit since the magazine work of ammo will rarely take down more than one enemy the assault rifle is a mid-range powerhouse that can handle enemies up close and up to a good distance James is pretty inaccurate with it though he has enough bullets that he'll eventually make his shots it's an all-rounder that's unfortunately filled with dust always nice to lose sight of people with each shot the heavy rifle is the oddest thing a slow firing heavy hitter it's more unwieldy than the assault rifle and it's short a magazine size means its ability to put out damage is about on par with anything else if not worse besides it flinging ragdolls ferpa which is good he undercuts itself then we come to the O'Dwyer we actually get this on level 2 and it's common throughout it's a semiautomatic shotgun with incredible damage output fantastic accuracy up to medium range and a good fire rate there are no situations in which the SMG is better and it's only extreme ranges that the sniper an assault rifle outperform it here's a fun fact yo Dwyer was made at the end of the 20th century but only became popular hundreds of years later so if any of you watching have a note while lying around well I'm a bit worried about you but you can be ahead of the curve I can't really explain the sniper so we'll play like this have you ever used the sniper rifle from a game made in 2003 it's that albeit a bit weaker Niro came out in 2006 the grenade launcher is fantastic it has an arc and limited ammo but you know no one gets to survive that kinesthetically a good few of the guns are rather lacking even the old wire which is incredibly powerful doesn't really sell it the more however I love everything about this gun in design and in use I don't think the guns in this game are bad I think James is a terrible shot but in the end it's all the same to the player the balancing of sight powers are a bit stranger they overestimate how much of this game will be played stealthily the men will strike and pyrokinesis are both one-hit kills but mental strike takes a full bar whereas pyrokinesis takes 70% I thought this was balanced around the fact that flying rag dolls are much more fun it turns out because this well that isn't stealthy apparently pyrokinesis is considered cruel so they're slowly shifting to teaching sight fighters to instead detonate any and all ammunition carried by an enemy which means the manual left me wishing I had a different power okay I've decided I'm allowed to talk about the extra Reza ghin stefan neuro is already over compensated for by the extra res once you can silently kill people through walls without limit considerations like fire versus flinging feel a little bit flat extra vision and healing drain the bar over time so you're meant to be weighing up damaging abilities against the reserve of healing and wall hacking it works out pushing you into a very cautious play style you can't out heal damage and your to instant kill moves will leave you dry after one enemy or at least very close to dry if you're in a situation where you need an enemy dead right now you've likely already used your health regen and fast can't use them make that 10 minutes that's only the halfway point of the stage James berserk start is my least favorite side power but I grew to love it it turns enemies hyper-aggressive they'll attack anyone they see getting in their face and mag dumping them I'm a fan of infighting and powers that cause it most games protect the player from the rage they've created and as we've seen euro is not most games they already wanted you dead all that's different is how motivated they are it's the cheapest offensive power for a reason it's not only not an instant kill it can in fact make fights more dangerous for you but it's still useful even if the enemies come at you since yes that enemy is more dangerous but he's also 100% predictable it's a far more interesting consideration than instantly bottoming out the mana bar you roll the dice with this power but once you know it can turn on you it is a calculated risk Nero removes a few safety nets you may be used to like in what way I companions enemies can't use the best weapons and making sure the powers won't turn on the player it's refreshing as for how guns and powers stack up euro solution is to make James rather shoddy with guns offensive powers like berserk have marginally better range Plus enemies are bullet sponges that can take a beating on the one hand it makes one hit kill powers more tempting but on the other it made it so I wanted to hold on to healing if they can take a beating I need to be able to stop up damage as well you get a lot of ammo but by god you'll need it magazine sizes tend to be good for killing one enemy that's ignoring this wire but be Spears this doesn't really balance out it just makes James only really good up to medium range and his inaccuracy is barely covered by his powers and so little of the game is really Goods woodstove but they're not really supplying any demand if you remove the powers from Europe you have a more boring game albeit one that is just as functional save for healing which would require med packs or standard magic regeneration instead of this magic regeneration even the resonator would still work without extra vision it still beeps when it detects someone through walls it would be a far less broken gun the stage ends of us ambushing a group of guards from behind as they try and fight ward and avatars boys we kill them everyone runs into place and James regroups man he already despises I see that you're still with us officer you've decided to go towards your amyl oh I admire your courage you call this garage did you notice how many people I had to kill in order to get here that was slaughterhouse yes you have all reasons to be conscience striking officer but don't worry these people have died for a good cause we're not just oh yeah the social softlock is back warden avatar is so flabbergasted he got interrupted that he's decided we're just gonna stand in place for all eternity unlike the first part this one is 100% consistent I have been stopped dead there is a small mercy and that this stage doesn't crash when I load a save game but so far it looks like I'm loading back to the edge of eternity but I'm stubborn enough to hope I'll find a way through sadly Bryan Lancaster didn't make neuro so he's not an option this time besides anything else he's too busy in Panama first I tried the console I spent some time looking for level codes but no joy there there is a help command but no way to scroll so that's a bust I go looking online for cheats but do you think anyone who's heard of this game it's nice to know game fa Q's has a spot ready for neuro empty as it is so no if there is a solution outside of the game I have not found it so back in I go first I try waiting thinking that if the guard runs into place he'll deliver his line correctly no dice that god is triggered by this conversation he will always come in and interrupt his leader I try sneaking around the conversation turns out he's watching the whole door know like there so I'm going to take the opposite approach everyone runs into place when the last enemy dies and I can trigger the conversation when warden avatar hits his mark but what if I don't wait I kill the enemy on the far side of him and leg it past the conversation this at first doesn't work James is a little embarrassed so he doesn't make eye contact but I'm still not done bear is level down here it's not modeled but there is collision so I'm praying there's a level flag down here somewhere and I'll feel around like a blind man for it I'll search the whole bloody void now you and I both know I'm not that lucky there's no level trigger just trippy occlusion effects we've nothing to draw down here we're left to draw a conclusion I have a theory for why this is happening it's because of the bloody English language wooden avatars line probably finishes on time in this game's native tongue and so that son of a [ __ ] doesn't interrupt him the level change is triggered by the end of the cutscene not by a location I'm clutching at straws bumping into things down here I don't want to go to Russian though I'm enjoying this voice acting too much wood and avatar is genuinely helped by his blundering delivery it's perfect for a long-winded windbag he is a man who believes his own [ __ ] that even James can see through in an instant and more than anything else I can't be sure if anyone has heard the English dub beyond this point this is either local to me or no one has played to this point I've seen their comments about it I want to be the first person passed here so yes I'm reaching I'm desperate and I am still not done if he's going to win throughout the boss I'm going to interrupt him I see that you're still with us obviously yes you have all reasons to be conscience strike an officer but don't worry these people have died for a good we are not just hunting some criminal we're helping the whole planet what an avatar the elevators ours I can't [ __ ] believe that what I was so happy I had to just spend a few minutes wandering around in circles fist-pumping to myself I felt like such a [ __ ] genius I love neuro it's so astoundingly busted I just fixed a rickety rope bridge with duct tape and I'm proud of myself this is brutal moment for all people of sore go our next stop the station yeah would never talk how about you don't say the word stop in front of me you fickle tin pot toss pot B is now obvious that this universe has rotten down to it's very foundation it must be cleansed Brad I think this game ever got patch but I'll confess I never checked some James asked how warden avatar intends to do that and warden avatars use a non-answer so obvious it's transparent even to James every third newborn child is a freak but we stopped them with medicines so that they can pass 40 genes to next generations we buy new and improved artificial kidneys we consume Angie hair shedding pills that cause didn't Titian instead we so love to play God lilac death is only a scintilla of high-tech abominations invented and must produced on Clute oh this planet is alike pests whole spreading putrid miasma decay around itself we will put an end to that in other words let's ban all technologies brought back to caves and worship the almighty world inhabited well solid plan puts a whole new spin on insane your sarcasm is just a primitive self defense mechanism which hinders you from saying the horrible truth thank you for assisting us in the hunger from here what's wrong here habitat are you sure you don't need my help with a cleansing I'm afraid you're not ready yet to embrace our unique vision we all knew this relationship wasn't going to end well and now James is killing both coasts and custodian despite the fact the stages are just getting fatter and fatter earner their biggest yet the next two levels show some real budgetary strain we take three different routes through the same Hagah there are a ton of repeated rooms just with different boxes and enemies yeah I need directions too so we're killing enemies in the widest rooms yet while the game repeatedly gives me heart attacks with mid-mission cutscenes this station must be destroyed what are you it's nice that you've developed a sense of humor James since I now spend these interruptions holding my breath we do eventually catch up toward an avatar and his cronies and trigger a cutscene in terribly ironic fashion to heaven you still don't grasp the idea officer yes it seems harsh but complete isolation of Cluedo is the only effective weapon against corporations and I have a very effective weapon against delusions of grandeur right here you're hopeless officer kill him all right one bad one whiner one that was almost cool wooden avatar isn't a boss flight he goes down as easy as anyone I buy that but now the station is exploding James makes his way to station control and someone is trying to work out what the hell is happening I love James so much I mean yeah on the one hand he is responsible for the terrorist attack getting this far on the other he did stop it as soon as it became any convenient we talked to traffic control and she's able to land the station which still exploding and point us to Ramon ship on the 13th floor I'm unsure why but she doesn't make it then Craig manages to ring us over the ship's comm the conversation is icy and Craig has a major reveal you have a good heart gem but your minds always rushes to judgment and you still haven't learned to pick your battles you can't run amok killing everyone in your sight just because someone told you to justice is blind Jim that's stupid and leaves his friends behind your psychology 101 was bring Kate back stupid or not but I am going to kill them on fear bartered what do you seriously believe that I'm a traitor damn why did he say that Kate's dead I saw her just yesterday [Music] Kate's dead but what about Kate man James dropped that bomb and then left before the boom yeah the presentation flat-out kills this moment okay let's back up I love the interactions between James and warden avatar while the gameplay is a little slow there spats more than kept me going through this bit James's arc is fascinating because over the course of the game he becomes a worst person he starts the story off trying to hold Craig to some standard of due process and justice and it failed after the seeming betrayal of Craig and death of Kate he goes on a rampage while he is incredibly driven he is still very much his stupid blunt overly honest whiny self then we meet warden avatar and in a more hackneyed story James would buy into Ward and avatars vision and only realized too late that he's being duped by a charismatic snake and James working with him would come off as frustrating a move that's too short-sighted even for him instead this takes a far more interesting route one that's a little darker James allows warden avatars violent crusade even as it's clear he's dealing with a horrible person James is still recognizably himself he makes his disgust of warden avatar known the only difference between him and Ramon is that warden avatars body count isn't as high yet maybe you get the feeling the moment their goals no longer line up water'd avatar is next on James's list the two are really fun right next to each other even James can pick apart Ward and avatars ideology with ease which doesn't bother the man through warden avatar we get to see how far James is willing to go he's pulling a hypocritical move but since James doesn't lie to himself all warden avatar about his feelings i buy that this is a move James is pulling through feeling cornered feeling like he's willing to take any advantage he can get he's shedding his idealism in a way that if it was handled even slightly differently would feel incredibly contrived you've heard of a battle of wits but this was a battle of dimwits and it was a joy to watch okay so I started this video by saying that I was unsure if Nura was genius or not I now know where I stand I'm here to convince you that Nero should be remembered as B game genius sadly forgotten B game genius but then you can't be remembered if you were never heard of I guess I hope that changes today I may just be going insane from thinking about this game as much as I have but my course is set and that course is through the same stage but now it's backwards in their screen shakin explosions that's level 8 baby this game doesn't have the capabilities to really convey a space station exploding which shouldn't surprise you the game just failed to show a character hanging up the phone regardless it tries we're seeing enemies run for their lives but since they only have the one animation they've got their guns at the ready and are going at a steady if white jock oh no wonder this place is falling apart it's all made of cardboard Nero can do scale but it really struggles with weigh danger and immediacy this is hurt by the complete lack of music outside of the title screen which is a rather bombastic piece that conveys just the right amount of mystery this is a song to let you know that you know nothing every single level has diegetic sound nothing to back up the stealth the action the running away nurse just like that codec before and in many gameplay scenarios it is straight jacketed in work and show but it tries anyway [Applause] so James finally tracks down Ramon the final boss and this time mercy is the last thing on his mind don't you mean you're making a big mistake please don't you see I'm just the small fish in this bomb what am I chopped liver oh wow this was worth dying for we ignorant of ourselves make often our own harms which device powers deny us for our good so find we profit by losing of our prayers yeah vigilante justice seems like a mixed bag Ramon's death severe my last Titus ergo I turned off navigational beacons and set course for the void of space i light steel engaged at the star says my lifeboat drifted towards oblivion I had no will to leave I don't know how great did it but he found me four days later I was picked up by ABS our transport we Came fullcycle now we're back on clue toe Craig has insisted that I will be his double in the upcoming experiment I guess this is my atonement for what I did back at the station yep he turned out to be a really shitty avenging angel and I'm also a terrible friend all this time I thought that Greg is a traitor but in reality he was secret agent laying in a major raid on weapons smugglers stupid jerk what I am Richard hasn't said a word to me since we returned sorry I'm letting things run on for so long but I'm not gonna stop doing it regardless the way James and Craig wind up is fascinating it's cynical yeah idealistic to a fault which are the defining traits of Craig and James both of them tinged by the other I both like it genuinely and find it really funny when James and Craig became fugitives for trying to catch Ramon James went outside the law to carry out justice and ultimately killed Ramon along with many others by his own and and James despite having become a hypocrite to get there doesn't treat himself as above his own justice so he puts himself in exile disgusted with and punishing himself Craig who alone hadn't gone rogue tracks him down and allows him to return to civilization it's not an entirely happy note their friendship is still soured but there's a spark of optimism I do also love the reveal Craig became the one trying to take down not only remote but an entire criminal web and in a way that would likely limit collateral damage done by the books meanwhile James became the one solving problems at the barrel of a gun you could argue that if Craig had just told James what was going on involving him in some way this could have been avoided but that had already gone poorly for him involving James is what cocked everything up in the first place Craig was doomed from the beginning James starts the game by screwing up great plan then spends the rest of the game doing it again on a much larger scale but the roles are reversed James ends up absolved but not forgiven and I think this is a nice if ambiguous ending no one looks squeaky clean but no one looks truly awful anyway if you think I'm reaching and I can understand why you would just note I haven't even started yet I may have said the story has eight levels but the game has nine what just happened feels conclusive to me but the camera is still rolling and what happens next is more interesting because of that detroyed ins we were visiting at the star of the game they probably didn't hear about what just happened since they've invited us back we're in for a scientific experiment on psychic powers there's a lot of buzz about the room as well as a good deal of uncertainty great guy sure if you don't tell me right now we don't know how can your infant wracked with these biochemistry sorry for interrupting gentlemen never mind I must say I'm really impressed by technologies of your clan I thank you very much please continue your experiment I'll just stand here and watch Richards I'm not going anywhere fire it up already I'm tired of all right everyone get ready administer the solution start the countdown Richard can you hear me I hear you loud and clear but even same way too loud make him stop twerking and raise his hands it works it's amazing verifying the scientific experiment Blake son don't be so skeptical an opportunity such as this is given once in a million years Greg what's going on get a medic in here plug in more sensors we need to record everything can't be our newer compensators are a hundred percent safe we have an emergency in lab 3 requesting medical Tim Boris calls are worried sick James he is picking his words carefully since he knows what happens when James is fired up questions later and I have to give it to Boris he is a patient man and so the final stage opens with us waiting on an evac ship and the escalation continues with finally outdoors let's celebrate with a petty argument here your shuttle will answer wait man you have one of those really embarrassing arguments where you just [ __ ] it all up and you hope everyone involved off what's just kind of died so no one can remember it Oh now isn't the time to practice your new comedy catchphrase James the Troy Dan base is under attack by a group called the practice Oh No I surrendered my gear [Music] yeah you've got time magic it's winter the final stage is opening with local comedy beats because what's inside when we start navigating the base to find Craig it's a slaughter in here gameplay wise inverts the first stage the only weapon we scrounge for a good while is the heavy rifle every enemy is wielding it they're very good with it James is not so we get the minutes long intro again the door joke loses its luster the second time we need to take the long way around Craig is down in a labs but we're gonna have to go up and over a blockage it's up here we find bones and off we go some plaque tours he has the time of day for us thanks for the news flash bomb why are you anyway are you one of those compacts you should get upstairs bow they're going to evacuate your eggheads this conversation combined with the argument at the landing pad along with how basil treats James it makes a lot of things work for me it's why I love that Nero ends on this stage not the previous one I'm going to be killing people as I talk or trying to we're starting to get some of the other weapons back and this stage is gimmick changes to a really fun one masked combat with a lot of allied and enemy AI easy a short but a lot more bombastic it's not just about James saving Craig it's about who James is now that the ramone incident is over we don't always get to see the hero after the journey well with James we get to see that he's gone from a spineless idiot to a confident idiot regardless of what I said about his noble self exile James is now a worse person taking down Ramone didn't make him sharpen didn't make him less naive it gave him confidence he should not have I love that we get to see that the widest setting of neuro does not care Ramones death doesn't affect the day-to-day life of betrayed ins it didn't change the universe or really fix anything on the contrary we got in the way of some actual good happening James didn't change the system that failed Ramone out before yet James doesn't see it that way I've said I hate stories feeling meaningless this was meaningless but to James it wasn't and we're witnessing it two bones and the other guards trying to evacuate us and the boffin con fed scientists we're nothing more than one of the people they have to drag off station while they fight and die for their homeworld this is the start of a bigger story this is the start of a wall but to James it's background that fun larger-scale combat gimmick kind of drives it home for me James isn't the deciding factor of these battles no one is praising the site fighter who's winning the day here because he isn't he's just one more man on the ground and with them fought off we go to open up hey hey that's my tree get your own outcomes Walter the rather nervous scientist he's about ready to get off planet and thinks James is insane for trying to go and get Krag a few more minutes and the invaders will destroy our last means of escape I am NOT leaving them here besides the Trojans are going to counter-attack I think she'll oh great but James's newfound confidence does win his and he agrees to head down to the labs with us I'm going with you you won't get far without the access codes anyway Walter James and phones fight their way through the base it's more group combat nothing new gameplay wise but the biggest scale does give it something fresh even it was easier it is a little let down by Walters complete lack of urgency as he and bones slowly sought to their way across these giant rooms Walter is really strange he starts a coward ready to flee is talked into mustering his resolve and coming to save Krag and as we near the labs he not only back pedals he makes a fair point that by ignoring the evacuation order James is not only insulting the droid UNS who are fighting for our lives but we are delaying the evac all right I'm going to the Med station whatever decays what exactly did you understand Grayson you probably think I'm chickening out on you that I'm a pitiful coward clinging to my life think again there is a whole shuttle of people up who've put their lives on the line for us and you're willing to gamble everything so you could save your possibly dead friends usually when a character does this they've written to look like they're in the room but Walter is totally right James comes off like a selfish jackass for gambling people's lives on Craig right now for God's sake just shut up and go as I said this stage exists to show that James isn't an all-knowing hero he's just a fool with a gun and an ineffectual one at that he had Walters trust for all of 10 minutes before he realized that this was a fool's errand so yeah Walter you get going I'll stay with James I want to see what the crazy bastard does next the second half of this fairly long stage sadly drops the group combat very much slower pace a giant room you need to trek across with long sightlines and constantly respawning enemies it's not hard it's just very very slow but it does lead to the labs and here we find basil that explosion earlier was a neuro side attack a bomb which hits anyone with implants frying their brains hence James's survival Krieg is alive but unconscious Basil's plan is to Nick a plaque to a [ __ ] load Craig on board and the free of us will bail this is the final leg of our journey we're joined by basil he's got a grenade launcher Oh welcoming committee good yeah I said it would pay off wait hang on your name's basil well maybe it is Ivan or Vasily it doesn't matter he's got a grenade launcher whoever he is there is a small problem the lift controls are busted so we have to scale down the side of the base and bring it up from the bottom if we want to leave with Craig oh great James's feeble legs aren't made for these jumps and I'm jumping into the open ah yes great a really painful landing into the waiting sites of a grenade launcher well hey if you want to fight on fair I'll meet you on that I'll just kill everyone from above don't [ __ ] with a sigh fighter Jim take cover it's still late [Music] Craig is that you oh my god [Music] what was that we'll discuss it later he's gonna fall help me careful hold the hand let's carry him to the ship and then we flee taking the fruits of detroiters research with us and just so you know the troika's are totally abandoned the earth confederation the SBI who we were working for we do not help Detroit ins whatsoever we're leaving them to a war they won't lose you want to know how I know well it's time to talk about the manual well it's a tome of madness before I played Nero I skimmer it the first few pages then put it down because I was completely lost this was the right thing to do it's only after finishing the game then coming back and reading this that anything about the widest setting starts falling into place those poorly explained details they're in here and you have to mentally pass them the first page is an overly long sales pitch that made me think I was about to play an RPG what follows is a lengthy backstory called the prehistory which dumps 300 years on you which is mostly inconsequential but it looks like Nero wasn't trying to launch a game or start a franchise loftier than that they were making a universe and judging by the final stage of Nero we were playing a story that wasn't even that impactful within it which is a bold opening gambit it's also hard to tell what the story would be from reading this alone this intro covers Wars political upheaval a government forming to control widespread disorganized colonization in the early days of space travel there are so many plot hooks in this thing then near the end it says Nero takes place in the year 366 the backstory then ends in 369 saying that the Troy de soie forced off their homeworld of Clotho persecuted by numerous enemies the backstory goes further than the game is packaged with it spoils the fate of one of the major groups but does it it's not like that happens in the game itself it makes the ending at a game so much darker the whole Ramon plot looks like nothing in comparison neuro itself and six months after the initial attack it can be Mozart in everyone's dead were the only survivors do you remember anything you know break it was your jokes have been missing I've come up with a new Craig's myself that's great and all but Detroit has got [ __ ] I like to think at least basil tried to get something going I mean the plaque tours launched a bomb on a base that had visiting Confederation personnel on it yet the wider galactic community doesn't even seem to lift a finger over the Confederation is actually ineffectual or they could stand to help and aren't doing it one of the themes of neuro is that no matter how advanced we get humanity itself never really improves and you know what it's really going the whole nine yards with that besides that the manual can't help itself weapon and power descriptions are ten percent useful gameplay information and 90% law I've been quoting fun tidbits whatever else Nero was it can't have been anything but the sadly unsuccessful start of something bigger this is why I say the story ended on stage eight but the camera kept rolling you cut your a one-stage earlier and you still have an ending it's more ambiguous but one that actually feels larger in scope James is set to serve the galaxy no longer a greenhorn this stage does have the more obvious reason to exist I know the real through line of the story James and Craig's friendship that wasn't really resolved yet but that doesn't really match up to the bigger ramifications of what's going on James and Craig are doomed to screw each other over for a long time to come but the Troy Dean's are just doomed James isn't actually a man who will save the world you don't have the guts to do a real deed be it an unspeakable madness or a noble cause to fight evil and save the world and in the end James became the man Kate described the one she said she loved and sure she might not have been Kate but James doesn't know that so by now you may be thinking I'm really over selling this you may think I am really full of [ __ ] dr. I need you to do me a favor can you restore the records of our giant experiment with the conference I've been thinking about it myself but this is going to be difficult the equipment was destroyed we lost huge amounts of data well it won't have to try brave Trident wants to oversee this matter personally to understand what it means if you succeed the new science vessel will be ours Oh stralla too nice I'll do my best sir so let's talk about the tutorial I think the tutorial really for shadows and shows up everything there's a ton it only hints at without saying out loud before you even have control James bumps into those barrels besides introducing the fact there are physics objects it perfectly communicates James clumsiness James is a man who will cause collateral damage it then opens with Craig shooting the player you are setup to dislike him from that moment over all that stuck in my mind so much more than the fact that we then shoot him back overall it looks dodgy it leaves an untrustworthy impression despite the fact it's on the level after all we can heal Craig's lesson is also really sure it barely covers the game's mechanics and poorly explains what mechanics it does cover this baby goes right Craig's fatal flaw is that he always gives incomplete information he takes shortcuts keeps people out of the loop he would sooner be misunderstood while trying to fix things himself you are clued in immediately that Craig is going to be leaving you in the dark then the final lesson Craig teaches you is to look down and in the end that really came in handy so the question remains was everything I've said about neuro step complexity foreshadowing tone and message complete and utter [ __ ] do I believe a word of what I just said well I think it's [ __ ] but I believe it I want to believe it it all works for me it's this beautiful comedic fast with fun characters and a sort of trite story but done in an incredibly unique way and I love it accidentally or otherwise this is what is in front of me and I hope you can see it as well so to summarize it's a game with competent yet in balanced gameplay I think the story is very clever and really entertaining but I might be full of [ __ ] a lot of the stages are boxy blind corridors at two points it's soft blocks at one point with 100% consistency and I had to trick the game to even continue the save system only works a third at a time and the manual is not only useless for actually telling the player what they'll do and how they'll do it it spoils the ending overall I kind of love neuro this went on far longer than I expected neuro makes me happy and sad few games make me just sit back and think on individual lines of dialogue for so long case line that gets repeated on my first go-around I fought it was just empty and pretentious a pointless story beat scrambling for meaning but then I thought about why actually means for James and I couldn't get out of my head puzzle pieces just died fitting together every new fall I had on the story had me excited it took time for it to sink in what I had just witnessed despite it being my job to explain why I don't think I fully can words fail me on this I just had so much fun thinking about neuro and I'm sad for similar reasons I've played weirdness I've seen weird things and got excited to share them with an audience I love bringing things like this to people I can only talk about neuro once and I'm not sure I'll find something on this level for a long time but maybe that's a good thing can't get desensitized after all I mean I can't just gush the gameplay is heavily imbalanced is a very standard shooter but there's enough I haven't seen elsewhere balanced in ways I haven't seen before and it's fun if basic in and of itself if you like mid 2000s Jax shoot as for the shooting itself Neuros got you there but it won't wow you on that front boxy bland stage a stags and a non-stop parade of corridors also mean the stage design is just insanely repetitive but also dares to give players such insane powers it's a brave move I can see other games raining the resonator in berserk powers in I'm happy to play a game that doesn't it's the difference between a bike with training wheels and one without and at the end I have to admit this is my reading of neuro I interpret both as a knowing comedic fast and an okay drama I wasn't near tears at any point worried James would never forgive Craig and vice-versa I would probably hate this story if there was one hair out of place in place in a different place one wrong move and this goes from an entertaining Lee high-energy cynical story of how humanity will never really improve to a meaningless tale where no one really got anything done sometimes the key difference is how much you were captivated along the way the wonky enthusiastic delivery which hands things up wonderfully the curious mix of idealism and cynicism James left me constantly flabbergasted as he made stupid move off the stupid move but I was never truly annoyed with him I always wanted to know what he would do and say next and he never disappointed and Craig just what a [ __ ] hero and what a [ __ ] that man is so this was neuro which I consider a work of insane genius ten years out of time thank you for watching if you like this video please spread it around so more people can know if you want to support me more directly I do have a patreon everyone who donates is credited the lovely people are scrolling past right now $3 patrons can read my script two notes where you can see how these videos come together and my $5 patrons receive access to bonus after four videos answering questions testing requests in the game and wrapping up any last second forts so yeah I need to go and lie down neuro has given me another headache

Channel: Tehsnakerer

Views: 289,923

Rating: 4.9479365 out of 5

Keywords: Neuro Game, Neuro gameplay, neuro dub, neuro, neuro review, neuro analysis, playing neuro, tehsnakerer, unreleased games, neuro critique, fps games for pc, free games pc, crappy games, neuro playthrough, bad voice acting, bad video game dub, jank game, sci-fi games, game glitches, playing Neuro, Neuro the lost last game, the lost last game, Neuro russia game, unreleased video games

Id: dXMtQ1ptQh4

Length: 98min 6sec (5886 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 25 2019