Will God of War and For Honor cause a resurgence in AAA hack and slash games?

[bigtakilla]

MTZehvor said:

Fei-Hung said:
Can someone explain what hack n slash is as I was certain GOW was hack n slash.

Anyhu, if not GOW, we are getting Nier Automata which seems to be very much hack n slash. I would argue Bloodborne was hack n slash too with some rpg elements thrown in.

I do hope the genre makes a comeback as it was my favourite during the PS2 era. Even the PS3 had some decent hack n slash games although not as many great ones as the PS2. Maybe a new Lollipop Chainsaw.

Generally speaking, hack and slash gameplay is differentiated from brawlers or pure action titles by the amount of complexity avaliable in the combat. Long combos, multiple weapons that can be switched between on the fly, quick movement from the protagonist, a fairly zoomed out 3rd person camera that allows for seeing most of the battlefield at one time, an an emphasis on creativity and "stylishness" in combat, and the ability to keep enemies afloat in the air by continually hitting them are all indicators that a title is a hack and slash rather than an action title. game. Doesn't need to fit all of these, but if a game has a number of them it's probably hack and slash.

Admittedly it does get blurry in some places with something like God Hand, but I think from what we've seen so far God of War 4 pretty clearly falls outside the genre. 

Yeah, Bloodborne is kind of the antithesis of hack and slash as far as combat mechanics. Hack and slash typically throws you in to over the top situations filled with enemies for the player to decimate, and the player is essentially rewarded by how much skill is used in the decimation. Bloodborne and the Souls series take more of a survival approach. Though it is by far the closest thing someone has compared to the hack and slash genre as it does focus on gameplay a LOT, but combat, not so much. It actually discourages combat to an extent.