@griffin -> Priceless

Maybe he should wait until Killzone 2 is released to say it looks good and plays like crap. If he is so offended by "graphics whores", he should use a game that is currently on the market that fits better with his views. This article is a great example of why "journalists" should not blog on the Internet.

So, in summation: Pretty graphics can't make a bad game good, but they can make a good game great.

Seems like something we can all agree on.

Killzone 2's gameplay, attention to detail and environments look awesome. Hopefully the story is well thought out and well executed.

Highly anticipated for me!

1) Gameplay
2) Game environments and level design
3) Graphics
4) Story
5) Audio

In that order for me regarding most types of games, but all those assets need to be at least 'good' to create a top game experience overall.

IMO it's sad so many fanboys pre-emptively want to diss this game just because of the issues Killzone 1 had. The PS3 is far more powerful than the PS2 and there's a far bigger team working on polishing up and tweaking this game. Killzone 2 seems very promising to me and most people who had their hands to the pre-alpha.

I think the best games will usually have the best graphics, If you have a kickass story and sublime gameplay ideas companies usually feel far more comfortable investing more into the game and hire top class artists, musicians and engineers to work on the game. Working towards the best possible end result. Wouldn't you be sad if the Lord of the Rings movies would have had bad special effects, bad actors, poor lighting, bad audio, etc?

For some games like movie license games these will already sell just because of their connection to a popular movie, companies may then mainly invest into graphics to represent the parts of the movie, they build their game around the movie and what works well in a movie may not always be the best choices for a game. There have been many horrible movie license games, but also some good ones like the Indiana Jones adventure games.

I think a very bad choice for the writer to pick on Killzone 2 specifically, there are far better examples to be picked on.

apparently a newspaper here in Sweden had a videogame journalist in London( I think) during sonys Playstation day and he said KZ2 look good but the gameplay sucked with stupid AI and right now the game didnt deserve all the hype.

Guess thats why it wont be released until 09 

@ Naum

A hands-on from TTP, a well known NeoGAF regular:

TTP: "Ok, just got back from London and I guess it's time for me to share some Killzone 2 impressions with you.

First of all, in order to actually play the game I had to wait in line for around a fucking hour. Just three kiosks + dozens of people all playing the demo from start to finish = me spending half of the even watching others playing.

By the time I got the DS3 in my hands, I already knew the demo in and out. Could almost do it all blindly.

Demo starts with a bang. Kinda like the E3 demo, you are flying with your comrades towards the war zone. The scale of the scene is amazing. No fog whatsoever hides the busy battleground 200 meters ahead of you. The amount of detail is so high I can barely discern the single elements. As u get close one of the allied flying vehicles ahead of you explodes into a cloud of flaming debris and corpses. You end up flying into it (one of the corpses actually crashes on you vehicles), resulting in a crash landing. Mr Fucking Convoy is first to jump out of the vehicle. You follow and game starts. Before going ahead I looked above me, behind me, towards the other side of the river (I guess it was a river) just to check if there was any less detail around me than there was on the path I was supposed to traverse. There were no such compromises. I could see the buildings standing tall and 3D on the other side of the river. In the sky, there was traffic: vehicles, anti air missiles and stuff.

First thing I noticed graphics wise is the CGI quality of the lighting. It was so non-gamey and realistic it felt real. It's usually easier to impress with dark settings these days, while bright ones look washed out or whatever. Not in this case.

The post-processing muscle of the engine was put to good use with subtle motion blur and the most impressive lens flare effects I've ever seen in a videogame. And when I blowed that bridge with the rocket launcher... WOW. I could see it crumble piece by piece and the dust filling the area, with sun rays raining diagonally through it. It was so realistic in its volumetric authenticity I almost coughed. But apparently that was not enough spectacle for Guerrilla. While the dust was still settling, a flying vehicle came from behind me and went right through it leaving spiralling whirlpools of dust in its trail. That was seriously awesome and a pity most players didn't notice as they where looking in a different direction when that happened. (Note for Guerrilla: add a Gears of War-like press-button X-to-see-cool-stuff-going-on-around-you functionality).

Anyway, I go ahead, graphics keep impressing. Soldiers leave footprints. Animations are smooth and realistic. Detail abound. At one point I was shooting at this Helghast hiding behind a low concrete wall. I could barely see his left shoulder from a corner. I kept shooting trying to hit every bit of Helghast I could spot until it kinda looked like he moved. Is he still alive dammit? I wonder. I look closer and I see a pool of blood expanding on the ground from behind that cover. Yeah, he's dead.

Another detail. Real time shadows. Impressive. Not pixellated anymore and are EVERYWHERE. You see an Helghast shooting from 100 meters ahead? Look closer and u'll notice the muzzle flash sending blinks of his very shadow on the wall behind him. This happens both in dark sections and in light ones. Obviously shadows look more or less dark accordingly.

Fastforward and I'm at the "Sixaxis moment" where I have to rotate a wheel in order to open a steel door. That's a pretty nice implementation of the tilt functionality. You "grab" the wheel by holding both R1 and L1, rotate the controller 45° anticlockwise, release R1 and L1 in order to center your hands on the wheel and grab it again for another 45° anticlockwise spin and you keep doing this until the door is opened. Very nice.

This said, I have a complain to make. While aiming and shooting was spot on, both responsive and with a very good feeling, the controls layout was kinda odd to me. It probably just needs getting used to it, but having the ironsight view on R3 rather than L1 (which is used for cover/crunch) gave me troubles. The good thing is you dont have to keep R3 pressed to stay in ironsight mode. It's on/off stuff. The bad thing is, while pressed behind cover (holding L1), you cannot go straight into ironsight mode by pressing R3. You have to first lean on the top or the side of the cover (meaning having to keep the L stick in the respective direction) and then press R3. This makes sense, and I'm sure I'll get used to it, but I'd have loved to be able to stick to the cover with the press of a button (a la Uncharted/Gears of War) and then pop up in ironsight view with L1. Anyway, controls are still worked on and the option screen seems to allow u to change the layout (default one was "Type A", didn't try Type B or whataver was there to choose from).

Another thing is your companions. When they get hit too much they lay on the ground unable to help you out in the firefight. You can ignore them and keep going or "revive" them by pressing Circle. At times you need them to progress (like you saw at some point in the vids) so revive is not an option but rather mandatory. The thing is reviving them is too fast and easy. You can litterally run by them and press Circle "on the fly". There is no "reviving animation" going on. Hence there is very little risk involved in reviving them. Grated, if they are out in the open it is risky to just reach them, but when they go down they usually do so behind their covers so it's very easy to just run, cure and hide again. They should at least add a brief animation
showing you injecting something in them, so that you are forced to stay exposed for a couple of seconds.

Anyway, other than these very minimal complains, I had a blast. Oh, almost forgot. Frame rate is perfect 99% of the time. Solid 30fps. There are small pauses here and there like you saw in the E3 demo, but they are going to be fixed for sure and they only happen whne game loads next section, never during action. Also noticed some LOD pop-ups on the characters. Not too bad tho. Hopefully they fix this as well. Textures where MUCH better than at E3. Very crisp and detailed.

Any questions?"

Q: ah, you did. Hows the rumble?

TTP: "Great! THE SHOOTING IS GREAT! The sound, the rumble, the feeling. They nailed it"

@MikeB
Because first impressions are always right. :P

-edit-

And for how much I shit on this game I think I'm finally going to pick this up next week when I get Boom Blox.  Movie Trading Company has it for like $10 and I should have enough credit left over to pick that up so I can finally know first hand what I'm constantly knocking on.   

@ twestern

Lair is IMO a well above average game and although parts of the game seem unpolished and rushed, other parts were amazing for me. And I greatly prefer Sixaxis controlls over analog sticks I should add (the biggest complaint by many journalists). I wonder why people keep bringing up this game as the pinnacle example of a bad game, I guess most of such people haven't played Lair at all.

I play Guitar Hero and Brain Age for the graphics.