no no no no no NO ;) (Gaming)

by Cody Miller , Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Saturday, February 18, 2017, 17:34 (2839 days ago) @ CruelLEGACEY

Vanquish does not tie your health to your ability meter. Did you play the game dude? Your health is 100% separate. Your meter is for dodging, dashing, melee, and bullet time. Completely independent of your health.

I did play it, but it was years ago so I'm probably getting the exact details wrong. But there is some relationship between taking damage and your ability meter, no? Is it that your ability meter drains faster when you take damage, or it recharges slower while taking damage... I can't remember exactly.

You take more damage when you are overheating. When your health drops to a certain point, you will automatically enter bullet time mode which will start draining your meter. Of course if you have no meter when you start taking damage, you will not enter bullet time. Thus, using meter is a tradeoff. But it is not linked to your health. You always have the same amount of recharging health.

Playing on normal, the game offers almost no challenge. I could slide and bounce and zip around all over the place, but I never needed to. Everything just died so quickly, it became boring almost instantly. So I set the difficulty 1 level higher, and all of a sudden I needed to spend most of my time hiding behind cover, waiting for my health and/or ability meter to recharge. It became so punishing that I couldn't engage with the only mechanics that made the game any fun.

God hard is the mode where you have to constantly take cover since you are very vulnerable (two shots will kill you). On Hard, you can't play the way you were playing. You absolutely need to use your meter to quickly and efficiently dispatch enemies. The key to success on Hard is precisely the opposite of what you were doing: you need to stay moving and always utilize your powerful moves. This also means using bullet time sparingly since it unnecessarily drains your meter. It also helps to know how guns work. Things like the LFE gun have little tricks that can make life easier. I glossed over the LFE gun on Normal, but it is an indispensable tool on Hard. Melee attacks are likewise vital, but they do instantly drain your meter. It's about finding the balance between flow and recovery. It's amazing.

God Hard is like a different game altogether.