The Obligatory Forum Video Game Thread.

[ContraBardus]

Moved to here from ToT. This thread, it's replies have possibility of becoming overly large.

 

DO NOT HIT **REPLY** TO ANY POST. FEEL FREE TO REFER BACK TO THE POST'S NUMBER TO WHICH TOU ARE REPLYING. DO NOT USE REPLY AND OVER FILL YOUR POST WITH PAGES OF THINGS WE HAVE ALL READ PRIOR.

 

BETTER:  SNIP THE EXACT SECTION TO WHICH YOU ARE REFERRING TO DROP IN YOUR POSTS QUOTE BOX.

 

Thanks, enjoy discussions.

 

kL

 

 

 

I almost titled this the 'What are you playing?' thread. I was thinking about putting it in the Critic's Corner, but this topic is meant to be a bit broader than simply reviewing games. Feel free to do so, but also to discuss anything related to the subject, whatever it might be. Post Screenshots, review a game you've played or are playing, talk about the business and technology side, discuss hardware, software, or whatever. Random video game stuff without any specific topic or focus.

 

There's a lot going on in the industry, E3 is coming up in just a few short weeks that will flood us with information, sales pitches, and practically drown us in what's coming up in the near future of electronic entertainment.

 

It's a thread that will gladly lend an ear to whatever you want to say about whatever game you like, hate, are currently playing, or are looking forward to playing. It will also be glad to hear whatever you feel like bitching about that's game related. Like how EA or Microsoft seem to currently be having an ongoing pissing contest about who can be the biggest dochebag and screw over their customers the most.

 

Not that it will stop some of us from buying games from them we want to play, but there's plenty wrong with the both of them and they should feel bad. Unfortunately they are both corporate entities that have all the moral sensibilities of a monkey that's told it shouldn't masturbate in front of the five year old girl looking at it through the bars of it's cage at the zoo. The little bastard is grumpy and sociopathic and more likely to fling poo at you and then pick it's nose while spooging in the ice cream cone in her hand while giving a screaming monkey laugh at you for being dumb enough to ask.

 

But I digress.

 

Anything game related, be it industry, what's currently sitting in your disk drive, or whatever game the industry wants you to think will be the most amazing thing ever despite the fact that it's obvious it's just another entertaining but predictable shooter. Complain about the state of modern gaming and how much more awesome that game from fifteen years ago that you just started playing is.

 

Ask for help with a level that's got an obvious solution that you haven't noticed because using that stick you picked up five levels ago to put in that one brick that looks suspiciously like a lever without a handle hasn't crossed your mind. Not that it's your fault you've forgotten about it, as it's been relegated to a tiny square of a three hundred slot grid inventory screen for the last fifteen hours of gameplay.

 

Gush about how a game has been published that has a color palette that includes a light shade of violet intermixed with the twenty-six-hundred shades of brown and gray.

 

Post screenshots of the giant breast shaped mountains of pure gold with a huge diamond cock tower rising from between them you've just spent several days building in Minecraft, or the giant field filled with bullet riddled corpses and body parts you've created with that new minigun that shoots three thousand exploding bullets a second with a shark with chainsaw teeth tied to the top of it in Steroid Action Masculine Hardon Duty 12.

 

Tell us about a hidden gem you downloaded that was fifty cents for two hours on Steam and about how horrible it was that the rest of us missed out and have to pay $65 for if we want to play it ourselves before it goes on sale again in six hours.

 

Whatever. Anything game related, seriously.

 

I play a lot of games, I have a lot of free time, and I'm inconsistent about finishing them. I usually do eventually, but I've got quite a ways to go on about fifteen different games. I've started them, I know that sooner or later I'll finish them, but as of right now, I'm content to simply pick at them as my mood suits me.

 

I get a lot of games for free as I'm housebound and I usually play multiplayer with my Dad instead of talking on the phone with him. He tends to gift me whatever he gets for himself even if it doesn't have multiplayer. My mother is a conservative Christian, and the most I could get her to play is 'Words with Friends'. It's kind of hard to get myself to play 'Scrabble' again after I've grown accustomed to asking Dad about his day while shooting him in the face with a shotgun, knocking the body around with a rocket launcher, and then tea bagging the remains before they vanish and he respawns and unloads about five grenades on my position.

 

In all honesty, it does make listening to him talk about his cats much easier when we're both fending off waves of an Alien horde with laser weapons with a high rate of fire.

 

I do get games off of Steam when they go on sale quite a bit for a few bucks. I play a lot of games he's not interested in as my taste varies a little more.

 

I've recently picked up Neverwinter, which is an MMO, which is kind of abnormal for me, but it's a beta, free to play and download, and I've been playing D&D videogames since Treasure of Tarmir and Cloudy Mountain on the Intelevision. I haven't done more than boot it up, but I'm going to give it a shot and see how it goes. I have a suspicion I'll be losing quite a bit of my summer to it.

 

I've also picked up Dust: An Elysian Tail. It's a very pretty side scrolling hack and slash RPG similar to Super Metroid or Symphony of the Night. Though, furries. I don't have an issue with furries, but it's not a fetish I share. There's nothing really sexual about the game as far as I know. It's fast paced, beautifully animated, and pretty badassed so far. Not overly difficult though, I like hard, and this isn't. It's still entertaining though as it's pretty enough to keep my attention and the story is interesting enough to keep me going.

 

 

I'm a little way into Bioshock Infinite, but I keep getting distracted.

 

For example, I picked up Spec-Ops the line, and Xcom Enemy Unknown super cheap on sale last year, and forgot about them. I got them before I went into the hospital, and just noticed that they were in my games Library on Steam yesterday. I did have to redownload them, and I've only booted them up for a few minutes so far. It's obvious that I won't be getting into Bioshock yet.

 

Xcom is a sort of 'Men in Black' kind of game. It's a turn based strategy RPG where you manage and control the government organization that combats alien invasion. I've had a craving for a decent RPG that isn't a first person action game for a bit now, and what I've played of it so far satisfies that itch enough to get my leg thumping my foot on the floor. It's based on a Game from the 90's I didn't play and don't really give a shit about. Though, I have heard it was good. I don't care enough to go back and play it. Games that old are only good if you're nostalgic, and that sort of strategy wasn't my cup of tea back then.

 

For example, Fallout is fun to play to this day, but not because it's a good game. It was amazing at the time, but it's not really a very good game anymore. Kids who aren't in training to be Hipster douchebags who think things games are 'cool' simply because they are old wouldn't care for it. The controls are spotty, there aren't many options, there's a timer, and the graphics are shit.

 

Anyway, moving on. I've played very little of it, but Spec-Ops is a military shooter. That's not all that unusual. It's set in a desert. Probably ahead of it's time, we'll be seeing a lot more of that once that shit in the MId-East settles down. Sure, there are games that do it now, but it tends to not be the entire game. Maybe a level because a lot of people are still kind of sensitive about that sort of setting. You know, because they were actually there and don't want things to remind them of the horrible things they saw there.

 

At any rate, it's based on Heart of Darkness, which as you may know, was the inspiration for 'Apocalypse Now'. It's supposedly a very psychological and well written story that delves deep into the psychology of war and how good men can do terrible things and become forced to make awful choices. I've not played enough to say, I've only booted it up long enough to make sure it was running so far. As I've heard it, it's an amazing game that's head and shoulders above the Medal of Duty shooters that are released every six months and offend a new group of people each time.

 

I'm looking forward to playing it really as it's supposed to be rather thought provoking and intense rather than the rather boring stand behind a concrete block that's being chipped away by gunfire before calling in a missile strike to take out the entire building that a single sniper is roosting in so you can charge forward to the next block of concrete cover and poke your head around it taking pot shots at people who sort of resemble whatever foreign country offended our freedoms five or so years ago with AK-47's while you wield a Death Dealer 9000 Big Fucking Gun of Bullet Hell with a visor that lets you count the pubic hairs on the enemy that is three rooms away behind three walls, a dresser, and a set of bed springs with no mattress before circumcising them with an armor piercing homing 9000 caliber round.

 

I do have to wonder why despot countries supposedly oppress their people by not allowing them to have mattresses and force them to sleep on stripped down rusted metal bed frames without even the comfort of a pillow. Or why everyone's bedroom seems to be filled with nothing but cardboard boxes, milk crates, plastic bottles, magazine pages, piles of rocks, and water stained sinks that don't have running water. I know totalitarian dictators are supposed to be douche bags, but that does seem to be taking things a bit far. I don't understand why video game developers feel the need to have entire towns of abandoned buildings as if evil warlords have some sort of weird fetish about wasting valuable real estate in which every room is a sparsely furnished bedroom without a single soft surface and disgusting curtains with a broken television on a dresser in the corner and a reading lamp that mysteriously has power, or a bathroom with an empty medicine cabinet, and a disgusting toilet that looks like someone sat down on it and then had an explosive bowel movement so powerful that their butt cheeks ceased to exist, and a bathtub and shower that has never seen a single teaspoon of Comet in it's entire existence, much less running water.

 

Video game logic can be a bit strange.

 

Oh, and I also picked up Darksiders, which is supposedly a bit like 'The Legend of Zelda'.

 

 

Apparently Link has developed some anger issues since I last saw him. I suppose I can understand how that might happen though.

 

I haven't even finished installing it yet, it's currently downloading. It might be a while before I actually play it, but I'm sure I'll have something to say about it when I do. I get the 'gameplay' similarity aspect, but I somehow doubt that it will be as whimsical or evoke much of my childhood memories of running about in green tights saving a helpless blond princess who I go to an awful lot of trouble to save to end up back at some quaint village with no weapons or money by the time the next title rolls around.

 

Yes, I know that there are years of separation and several generations involved, but you'd think that after all the times the little blond kid has saved the princess from evil monsters and wizards, I dunno, maybe their ancestors would be related or something. At the very least, you'd think they'd keep the blond kid on staff at the palace and maybe have him hang around just in case another evil wizard shows up to try to nip it in the butt before things get out of hand to begin with.

 

I guess I sort of understand that they might have to put the magic sword back for some reason. Maybe it has a limited battery life, but why put all the other stuff back into some deep dark dungeon so that the next time some other poor sap has to travel on a long inconvenient journey picking up one at a time just to gain the ability to get to the next one? I think the princess would appreciate a faster rescue by just stashing it all in one place and having the kid pick it up all at once and be on his way rather than risking his neck by going into a dungeon filled with monsters and a giant thing of some sort that all want to kill him without the proper equipment.

 

Not to mention, since some twelve year old keeps saving the day, if I was that princess I'd have every single member of the royal guard beheaded for being such useless idiots. All those grown men can't do a thing, but this little kid dressed like Peter Pan can swoop in manage to kill all sorts of huge monsters, get armed to the teeth doing it, and save the day? At the very least I'd be pulling a Donald on their collective useless asses. "You're Fired."

 

I suppose I should stop ranting and go play something for a bit. I'd bitch about the Xbox 1, but I already did that in the Critics section so it'd be redundant to do it again here. Feel free to do so yourself, or defend it if you're a crazy weird sadist who likes wasting your own money.

 

Anyway, Vidya Game thread. Feel free to contribute.

[ContraBardus]

Got gifted Grid 2 from a friend in NY and I've spent the better part of the last three hours playing it with him.

Anyway, it's awesome. If you like racing games, you should check this out for sure. It's the prettiest racer I've ever played, the controls are tight and responsive, and it's more arcade racer than sim. It's easy to play and get into.

I could do without the annoying guy talking to me on the menu screens. I think it's the same guy from Burnout Paradise, but he's not trying quite as hard to be a hipster douchebag because he's not pretending to be a fake radio announcer this time. It does bear some similarities to Burnout Paradise, as well as Need for Speed. It's not open world, the cars are destructible but more realistically so and a bit tougher than Burnout or NFS's vehicles.

 

The A.I. is very interesting too. There are about 80 different 'qualities' and each CPU controlled racer in the game gets a random set of 3 of them. So, some racers will come after you for revenge if you hit them, others will try to avoid contact, another might refuse to allow passing, where as another might let you pass. It creates a very dynamic race where no two racers behave the same way. It's really cool so far and the behaviors can vary wildly and you never know exactly what kind of racer's you'll be up against in a given race.

 

Another neat feature are the 'Live Routes' in which the tracks actually dynamically change as you race them. That forces you to pay attention and keeps you on your toes. There are also overtake events, in which you have to drive past a line of slow moving trucks without crashing gaining score for each one passed without incident. Hitting something knocks your score down as does not passing something in a set amount of time. The rest of the races are the standard group of track rules that have shown up in various racing titles like elimination, drift events, face off, Togue, and your standard, but not any less well done 'finish first' standard race.

 

The tracks seem very alive. Squirrels dart across the road, geese fly through the air, and tons of people line the sides of the raceways. Seriously, there's a lot and they are well animated. The human models are actually kind of low res and muddy, but you won't notice it during a race because they go by so fast. It can be a little jarring in the pre-race scenes where the camera pans about a little around the starting point.

 

Oh, and up to twelve cars on the tracks at once. That's quite something to see, especially when they are all controlled by human players. For those who don't know, that's very impressive for this sort of game.

 

Anyway, high speed fun, destructible cars [either realistic or cosmetic damage], and an awesome rewind feature that makes giving into the urge to do something stupid just to see what happens all the more easy to give into.

 

The original Grid was a game changing racer that had a huge influence on the genre. It appears that Grid 2 is no different. Amazing game and well worth the wait.

 

Check my screenshots. This is running on the Ultra settings:

 

 

 

 

 

This game is seriously sweet so far. I highly recommend it to racing fans.

[LifeCycle]

Definitely a racing fan, I will check out Grid 2...  I loved the original Darksiders but haven't yet played part two.  I'm now getting back into the gaming swing of things as I started Borderlands 2 (Finally!) over the weekend.  I think I'm a level 15 Assassin now.  Great graphics and just overall fun - just like the first one. I own so many games now after last summer's Steam summer sale that I need to really get it in gear and start playing them.  Good times.

[midniterider]

Lets see. Shooters and MMOs are my primary interest. I've done multiple versions of Team Fortress from the Quake mods, Unreal Mods, Half Life mods up until they actually came out with TF2. Because I'm a bad shot and typically on a laggy low end computer I end up playing some class like the engineer who can be a bit strategic without needing to jump around and be in your face with bullets. TF2 is fun and free and because it's old will run on most any crappy computer.  I looked into Planetside 2 last Novemberish and played for a while. It's a free-to-play shooter mmo with great graphics, and most importantly a persistent battlefield to give you some continuity to the game. There are a number of character classes like in TF2 as well as vehicles from a small personal offroad 3 wheeler (I think) to multi-rider tanks and APCs. There are flying vehicles from small single seat fighters to bombers and troop transport craft. The point of the game is control point (which is a facility) attack and defense. I enjoyed the anti-aircraft, anti-ground vehicle defenses built into the control point facilities and also driving some of the tanks. In one-on-one battles I just got mowed down in two seconds as usual so I often picked the engineer class or medic in hopes of staying alive longer.

 

My quick history of MMORPG's is Ultima Online, a lot of World of Warcraft, some Everquest 2, Rift, Eve Online, and a  mishmash of the completely free offerings which takes us up to Christmas last year where I got GuildWars 2 as a present. GW2 solved a lot of the irritations of past MMOS replacing most quests with area events that you automatically join just by walking into the area where it is occurring. While I immensely enjoyed levelling thru WoW dungeons, GW2's dungeons just seemed to be 'wipe and repeat' affairs for me and so I quit trying after a dozen times of dying on the same monster. Instead I found 5 months worth of enjoyment in GW2's World Vs World area where three servers' players are pitted against each in a persistent pvp world. It consists of running around with a mob of players and epic multiplayer battles over control of camps, towers and castles. You can build and use seige weapons like catapults and trebuchets to attack castles.  GW2's PVE world is also fun with much better graphics than the ancient WoW and EQ. The price is $60 for the software and no subscription fee.

 

Now we move to last week where I decided to try The Secret World. I got it thru Steam for $30 (the normal price) and there is no mandatory monthly subscription but you can subscribe for some premium goodies. The graphics in this game are one of it's major selling points. They are stunningly realistic (compared to any ofther PC game I've played) yet they don't lag my 3 year old computer with 5 month old mid range graphic's card. Secret World is an MMO set in an alternate modern day Lovecraftian world where people (you) who discover they have special powers are recruited by the secret society's such as the Illuminati and other factions to battle against a strange invasion of monsters, and zombies and other stuff I havent yet encountered. There are no player levels or classes per se, which is similar to Eve Online in some respects. You just earn experience points which lead to skill points and ability points. Skill points let you level up your basic weapon and armor (talisman) skills so you can buy the next better set of gear at the auction house. Ability points let you purchase basic abilities (like spells). Though you are free to buy any abilities you want you can only have 7 active and 7 passive abilities slotted into your character at one time. This will limit your role and also saves space on the screen (remember WoW with 6 hotbars eating up space on the screen)? Now if just picking abilities from the pile bugs you and you want a little more class structure there are 'decks' available which are like character class builds you can use to strive towards and when you get all the abilities for that particular 'deck' then you get a nice uniform for that deck and some other reward. You can create your own personal decks as well which might be for DPS, Tanking, Healing, etc. Eventually, with enough play time you will gain all the abilities in the game and can switch your character to any role at will. This means you really only need one character though I imagine you would get tired of looking at the same character all the time. There are thee factions in the game, The Illuminati, The Templars and The Dragons and you can have thee characters so try one of each. :-)

 

One nice thing about The Secret World is it is not G rated. NPCs say the F word and characters can wear skimpy outfits. The PVE world is graphically beautiful and contains real world places like London (well parts of it anyway), New York and other real world locations. The questing is not always the typical "Kill 10 monsters" but solving puzzles and mysteries and putting clues together, and of course the monsters are going to get in your way. The built-in web browser and game hints encourage seaching for the answers on the internet for harder quests.  I started doing the dungeons which are fun and will probably spend most of my time there until I max out my character. Then I might try some PVP. Secret World has 2 match-based team PVP maps and one persistent map with control points to take over. I'm a noob so did a lot of dying in there. Oh well, enough of this. Time to go upgrade my character. Have fun. :-)

[ContraBardus]

Lets see. Shooters and MMOs are my primary interest.

 

I'm about shootered out for now.

 

I've never played an MMO. Not because I don't like them, but because I'm generally unreliable when it comes to raiding and such. I'm not much use to a Guild because I'm often playing other things, and generally not willing to plan my scheduling around the game. I like interacting with other players, but tend to 'lone wolf' and hire myself out as a temporary mercenary if a slot needs filling in a raid party. I'm not the type to drop out once I'm involved with a quest or raid, I'll see it through, but I tend to be the type to wander off to do my own thing once it's finished. My playtime is spotty, sometimes I'll play for three days at a time on a single game, and then not play again for a week, or even a month before I get back into it.

 

However, thanks to my long history with D&D video games, I've caved and am now playing the Beta for Neverwinter.

 

It's been entertaining so far, but I keep getting distracted [see above]. I've gotten a couple hours into it, and it's more 'action' RPG than something like Warcraft. You have a main attack and swing your sword with a mouse click, no targeting with tab. As I understand it, people used to playing MMO games will likely have to get used to it where as an action game veteran like myself is likely to be more comfortable with how it plays. It's not got the tightest or most accurate of controls, but they work well enough. It feels a little clunky for someone used to super smooth action titles, but I've not had any trouble aiming and hitting targets as the game doesn't move that fast. It's not excessively easy, but I've not actually died yet. I'm only about level 7 right now and pretty much fresh out of the tutorials, so that's not saying much. It works well and has kept me entertained thus far.  The environments are large and very detailed, but be aware that it is not an open world game. It uses a hub system to go from place to place, you select an area off of a map and are transported there. Once there, there is plenty to see and do, but you won't be wandering the landscape going from city to city on foot either.

 

Looks good too, and isn't extremely taxing on my PC, but there's not much that is, so I couldn't say how it'll run on a mid ranged PC. I can say it's not a huge graphics hog. The environments are very detailed, there's a lot of players and NPCs bustling about, and the character models are decent for a game with so much going on at once. Thus far I've not needed to grind killing low level bunnies and such. I've not payed much attention, but I think you gain XP by completing quests and not by grinding. I've not run into any sort of resource I need to farm either, but I've only scratched the surface of the game so far. I spent about equal amounts of time wandering the 'warzone' the game opens up in and tooling around in Neverwinter itself. It is neat to see it again from a different perspective and I'm looking forward to visiting some of the other familiar places such as Baldur's Gate. You can just jump straight in and go it solo and start questing immediately. I've cleared out a hoard of zombies, been sent stop a theft, collected arrows from dead bodies, and wandered about the city of Neverwinter a bit. I like having the option of being a lone wolf wandering the world without a guild or care in it. Neverwinter fits that need nicely so far.

 

Also, I'll be playing Elder Scrolls Online. I've played through every ES game at least once and they've said going solo is a viable option in that game as well. I'll be using a Brenton, as that's always the first character I make in any ES game. Kind of a tradition with me I guess. I figure Neverwinter will be a good way to get familiar with playing an MMO. I'm nerdy enough I'm not confused by terminology, but there are some things I should get used too. I'm looking forward to having the whole of Tamriel to play with again, I've not had that since Daggerfall.

 

I'm buried under a huge pile of games now. So many that I often end up playing 'What do I want to play?'. Still, it's not too bad and I've managed to make progress in several titles. I've got a long way to go though.

[Thurisaz]

I'm not a rabid gamer, the one constant I've had for years now (since 2007) is Eve Online. My main character there is able to fly everything of his own nation including the big bad Titans, but due to my limited time I have precious little experience in pvp fights and such

 

On the side, I have some single-player thingies I spend my time with... a few of the X series games, the Thief games, and I've toyed around with Stalker: Call of Pripyat too. That's pretty much all I can remember currently

[ContraBardus]

I'm not a rabid gamer, the one constant I've had for years now (since 2007) is Eve Online. My main character there is able to fly everything of his own nation including the big bad Titans, but due to my limited time I have precious little experience in pvp fights and such

 

On the side, I have some single-player thingies I spend my time with... a few of the X series games, the Thief games, and I've toyed around with Stalker: Call of Pripyat too. That's pretty much all I can remember currently

 

I have many fond memories of the Thief series. Another one I've been in on from the start.

 

No release date or anything yet, but they've officially announced that Thief 4 is on the way and in development. It's been announced for PC and Xbox 1, and I'll be extremely surprised if it doesn't show up on the PS4 as well. Expect to hear more about it at E3. Hopefully we'll get a release date out of them during that.

 

Check it out and drool along with me:

 

 

 

 

 

Once they announce the release date, I'm going to play through the lot of them again just to be ready when it lands.

[ExCBooster]

Wow, Thief 4 looks cool. On account of my being stingy, I'm still working ye olde PS2. There are so many games, and cheap as dirt. My favourite racing series is Burnout. Just finished a replay of Legacy of Kain: Defiance. Love that series. Underrated, because they just didn't know how to market the thing.  'Cause it's such a good storyline, and you're not likely to play it, here's the Defiance's cutscenes:

, and

. If you're intrigued, there's lots of other games in the series, that might help you make sense of the story, with cutscenes readily available on youtube. (Time travel, the non-existence of free will as a plot point, and an evil god, what more could you want?). So much moral and storyline complexity, top-notch writing and voice acting. Got a bunch of games lately, due to a sale, and I've been playing Mark of Kri. Weird little game. Disney-esque graphics, but with utterly feral combat moves and brutal kills (especially

). Unique fighting and targeting system, marred only by a terrible AI. I do play some RPGs, notably good ol' Dragon Quest VIII. Oh, and Dynasty Warriors 5: Empires, for when I want a hint of strategic thinking with my hack n' slash rampages.

[Thurisaz]

I wonder how, if at all, Thief 4 will tie in with the previous releases... the end of Thief 3 pretty much finished the storyline.

 

Of course the same could be said of Alien III...

[ContraBardus]

I wonder how, if at all, Thief 4 will tie in with the previous releases... the end of Thief 3 pretty much finished the storyline.

 

Of course the same could be said of Alien III...

 

They've already said it's a reboot for Thief 4 and not a not direct sequel.

 

That's worked out pretty well for several franchises over the past few years, so it doesn't make me as nervous as it might have in the past. [James Bond, Tomb Raider, Star Trek, Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit, Fallout 3, Metroid Prime, etc.]

[ContraBardus]

Wow, Thief 4 looks cool. On account of my being stingy, I'm still working ye olde PS2. There are so many games, and cheap as dirt. My favourite racing series is Burnout. Just finished a replay of Legacy of Kain: Defiance. Love that series. Underrated, because they just didn't know how to market the thing.  'Cause it's such a good storyline, and you're not likely to play it, here's the Defiance's cutscenes:

, and

. If you're intrigued, there's lots of other games in the series, that might help you make sense of the story, with cutscenes readily available on youtube. (Time travel, the non-existence of free will as a plot point, and an evil god, what more could you want?). So much moral and storyline complexity, top-notch writing and voice acting. Got a bunch of games lately, due to a sale, and I've been playing Mark of Kri. Weird little game. Disney-esque graphics, but with utterly feral combat moves and brutal kills (especially

). Unique fighting and targeting system, marred only by a terrible AI. I do play some RPGs, notably good ol' Dragon Quest VIII. Oh, and Dynasty Warriors 5: Empires, for when I want a hint of strategic thinking with my hack n' slash rampages.

 

I hate Dynasty Warriors. The first couple were okay because the novelty of the 'large scale battles' was kind of neat. Sequels upped the ante so to speak by adding more and more NPC's to the fray, but it was pretty much the same boring game game with new skins and higher rez graphics. Mash X a lot = Win!! I wouldn't exactly give it the credit of saying that there's even a 'hint' of strategy involved. Unless you call tilt your analogue stick towards the biggest ugliest thing on the battlefield while pressing X a whole bunch a 'strategy'.

 

Of course, I like to play Doom or Duke Nukem to chill out sometimes. I get the idea of playing something simple and getting into it just for fun. Neither of those is particularly complicated or difficult anymore. [Circle strafe and hold down fire = Win!]  It's cathartic on some level, so I can understand that. It's not what I'd call a 'good' game anymore though. It's only cool to me because of nostalgia.

 

If you want strategy in a hack and slash, go with Ninja Gaiden 1+2. That's a game where button mashing and simply memorizing combos will get your ass handed to you. You really do need to think or you'll just die a lot, you probably will anyway, but if you think and plan you'll last a little longer. Dark Souls and Demon Souls are another set of hack and slashers that require some thought and will spank you for thinking you're smart enough to handle it.

 

 

If you want something a little more forgiving that still requires a bit of thought, try Devil May Cry 3, 4, DMC, or Bayonetta.

 

 

I do still have Mark of Kri and the considerably less awesome sequel Rise of the Kasai. They were a lot of fun to play through, but they were more stealth action games than hack and slash. The animation style and character art were disturbingly similar to Disney's Mulan. It's a shame the series got axed, but it kind of got usurped by other games that played similar. If you're into Mark of Kri, you might want to check out the Tenchu series, especially if you can track down a copy of the original. It's a stealth hack and slash title that's a lot of fun. You play as a Ninja doing stealth kills that are similar to Mark of Kri's stealth mechanics. If you're really into that sort of gameplay, you might pick up Splinter Cell or check out the Hitman series as well.

 

 

It's cool that you're into Dynasty Warriors, but I felt I should speak up as it's not a series I'd really recommend to others. It's kind of easy, very repetitive, and doesn't really change much beyond adding more NPC's for you to kill at once to the battles. In reality, most of the 'enemies' are simply background animations with actual NPC's only appearing within your attack radius. It was fun for a little bit, but it gets old fast and doesn't do anything to liven itself up or toss any new challenges at you.

[midniterider]

 

Lets see. Shooters and MMOs are my primary interest.

 

I'm about shootered out for now.

 

I've never played an MMO. Not because I don't like them, but because I'm generally unreliable when it comes to raiding and such. I'm not much use to a Guild because I'm often playing other things, and generally not willing to plan my scheduling around the game. I like interacting with other players, but tend to 'lone wolf' and hire myself out as a temporary mercenary if a slot needs filling in a raid party. I'm not the type to drop out once I'm involved with a quest or raid, I'll see it through, but I tend to be the type to wander off to do my own thing once it's finished. My playtime is spotty, sometimes I'll play for three days at a time on a single game, and then not play again for a week, or even a month before I get back into it.

 

However, thanks to my long history with D&D video games, I've caved and am now playing the Beta for Neverwinter.

 

It's been entertaining so far, but I keep getting distracted [see above]. I've gotten a couple hours into it, and it's more 'action' RPG than something like Warcraft. You have a main attack and swing your sword with a mouse click, no targeting with tab. As I understand it, people used to playing MMO games will likely have to get used to it where as an action game veteran like myself is likely to be more comfortable with how it plays. It's not got the tightest or most accurate of controls, but they work well enough. It feels a little clunky for someone used to super smooth action titles, but I've not had any trouble aiming and hitting targets as the game doesn't move that fast. It's not excessively easy, but I've not actually died yet. I'm only about level 7 right now and pretty much fresh out of the tutorials, so that's not saying much. It works well and has kept me entertained thus far.  The environments are large and very detailed, but be aware that it is not an open world game. It uses a hub system to go from place to place, you select an area off of a map and are transported there. Once there, there is plenty to see and do, but you won't be wandering the landscape going from city to city on foot either.

 

Looks good too, and isn't extremely taxing on my PC, but there's not much that is, so I couldn't say how it'll run on a mid ranged PC. I can say it's not a huge graphics hog. The environments are very detailed, there's a lot of players and NPCs bustling about, and the character models are decent for a game with so much going on at once. Thus far I've not needed to grind killing low level bunnies and such. I've not payed much attention, but I think you gain XP by completing quests and not by grinding. I've not run into any sort of resource I need to farm either, but I've only scratched the surface of the game so far. I spent about equal amounts of time wandering the 'warzone' the game opens up in and tooling around in Neverwinter itself. It is neat to see it again from a different perspective and I'm looking forward to visiting some of the other familiar places such as Baldur's Gate. You can just jump straight in and go it solo and start questing immediately. I've cleared out a hoard of zombies, been sent stop a theft, collected arrows from dead bodies, and wandered about the city of Neverwinter a bit. I like having the option of being a lone wolf wandering the world without a guild or care in it. Neverwinter fits that need nicely so far.

 

Also, I'll be playing Elder Scrolls Online. I've played through every ES game at least once and they've said going solo is a viable option in that game as well. I'll be using a Brenton, as that's always the first character I make in any ES game. Kind of a tradition with me I guess. I figure Neverwinter will be a good way to get familiar with playing an MMO. I'm nerdy enough I'm not confused by terminology, but there are some things I should get used too. I'm looking forward to having the whole of Tamriel to play with again, I've not had that since Daggerfall.

 

I'm buried under a huge pile of games now. So many that I often end up playing 'What do I want to play?'. Still, it's not too bad and I've managed to make progress in several titles. I've got a long way to go though.

 

 

I hope you have a good time with Neverwinter. I hear people talk about Elder Scrolls but have never tried it (them) but will file that info away when I get tired of Secret World. :-) I'm not much of a guild loyalist so like you I play games on my own schedule and if the guild happens to be doing something at that moment I might join in. Before playing GW2 my only interest in guilds was the chat they provided while I was out doing solo stuff. :-) Definitely having fun in dugeons in this game I'm doing now though and havent run into much personality conflict issues or idiots.

[ExCBooster]

Oh, don't get me wrong, ContraBardus, I wouldn't call me a Dynasty Warriors fangirl by any means. I'm a Three Kingdoms Era (220CE to 280CE) fangirl. You're absolutely right: most of the games are mindless hack n' slash heaps of steaming poo, and repetitive. It took six iterations of the series for them to even get into the Jin Dynasty (!!!). I'd only recommend the Empires variants (specifically the one I mentioned, the others are badly dumbed-down), and I only play on Chaos. And, even then, I'd suggest it for hardcore history geeks only. (Imagine playing as Winston Churchill, in a WWII game, with nunchucks for some reason. FDR in an armoured wheelchair?? The ridiculousness is definitely a large part of the appeal.) I, myself, ended up playing it, not from a gaming standpoint, from from a history one. For everyone else, for the love of crud, read Romance of the Three Kingdoms instead. Or, you know, just read it anyway. I own the thing, and it's 1,700 pages of straight up face-stabbing awesomeness. It's one of the four most famous classic Chinese novels, along with Red Chamber Dream, Outlaws of the Marsh, and Journey to the West.

 

Officer Biographies from the Sanguozhi -- and that's the official history, by the way. Some of that stuff was arguably toned down, for the games. Especially all the bromance, and violence. There's a reason KOEI's been able to milk just sixty years of Chinese history for so many games. The Dynasty Warriors games are just the tip of the centuries of pop culture iceberg, going back to literal apotheosis of people,

, TV shows (yes, that's a song number and a fight scene at once), and

.

[Ramen666]

Currently Playing:

 

Castlestorm (created by Zen Studios who did Pinball Fx, Zen Pinball, Planet Minigolf)

Ni-no-Kuni (basically you are playing a Studio Ghibli movie and it is awesome, haven't played any JRPG's this whole gen till now and this is the best)

 

Recent Completion:

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon (I am not going to spoil anything about this, other than how awesome it is, it has nothing to do with Far Cry other than using the engine, if you a kid of the 80's or like 80's movies you will love this)

Tomb Raider (2013) (the best thing about the game is the voice acting + new gameplay which is similar to Uncharted, great reboot to the series)

Bioshock Infinite (location, location, location, story at the end seemed like a JJ Abrams cop out)

Star Trek (2013)- (got the entire cast to do the voices, even got the original soundtrack composer, but it felt a bit like Mass Effect gameplay)

[Thurisaz]

Just to have said something (yes I'm drunk, blame it on the weekend vodka ):

 

I find it fascinating how, as it seems, a problem that struck me in Eve Online recently seems to be a mistake not of the game devs but of the Nvidia driver devs. For some 10 days I think, when I logged in to Eve I found my screen colored all wrong - imagine a grey-scale image colored toward the red at the left side of the screen and toward the cyan regarding the right edge. Just saw the login news that it seems like it's an error in the Nvidia driver with certain gfx cards, and a workaround was stated. Which works for me.

 

I wonder how all those folks who show the classical knee-jerk reaction "something's wrong, blame the Eve devs!!11111!!!oneoneone!!!!" will react to that

[midniterider]

Just to have said something (yes I'm drunk, blame it on the weekend vodka ):

 

I find it fascinating how, as it seems, a problem that struck me in Eve Online recently seems to be a mistake not of the game devs but of the Nvidia driver devs. For some 10 days I think, when I logged in to Eve I found my screen colored all wrong - imagine a grey-scale image colored toward the red at the left side of the screen and toward the cyan regarding the right edge. Just saw the login news that it seems like it's an error in the Nvidia driver with certain gfx cards, and a workaround was stated. Which works for me.

 

I wonder how all those folks who show the classical knee-jerk reaction "something's wrong, blame the Eve devs!!11111!!!oneoneone!!!!" will react to that

 

So, are you a nullsec scallywag? Or a highsec pilot? I gave Eve a go twice and decided I didnt have the stamina or something for it. Mining was lucrative but a little dull. Buying and selling would have been better had I stuck it out for a cloaked vessel. Looting other people's wrecks and mining cans was fun too. :-) Waiting for skill training queues did me in probably. Oh well, kudos to you for sticking it out for all these years.

[ContraBardus]

Finally got around to finishing up the main plot in Borderlands 2 tonight. Was entertaining enough, but I haven't actually done any of the DLC. I went to Torque's Baddass Crater of Badassitude and immediately laughed my ass off before I did anything. It's like a sick cross between Macho Man Randy Savage and Terry Crews doing the Old Spice commercials. Amazing.

 

Anyway, I've put that away for a bit.

 

Still messing with the Neverwinter Beta as well. I've never been one for text chat in a game, I'm usually too occupied to bother, though I do respond if someone speaks to me directly and I notice it. There's no microphone chat unless you're in a party, and I've got no interest in that at the moment. I've been running around soloing for a while and it's been fun. I'm lvl. 12, and I've not had to do a single bit of grinding. You get a bunch of experience for finishing quests, and a little bump every time you kill something. I've started crafting as well, but it's not necessary. It's not particularly difficult either. It's just messing around in a menu every few hours or so. You can't do a bunch at once either, you've got a limited amount of slots you can use, and it takes time for a task to be completed. For example, creating a leather shirt might take fifteen minutes, where as creating a pair of armored grieves might take four hours. You can unlock more slots later on by meeting certain goals that allow you to do more at once of course, but you're still looking at a limited amount of production and you can't simply grind out a hundred chainmail shirts by simply gathering a bunch of resources and repeatedly tapping a 'craft' button on a menu screen. Generally speaking, the more powerful whatever it is you're making is going to be, the longer it will take. I don't know about higher level items, but some of the crafting options I currently have available can take several hours. I imagine later on I'll be able to craft things that may take as much as a few days to make. I'm not entirely sure yet.

 

As I said before, it's not exactly a 3rd person action game. You can't move while attacking for example, but you can dodge and/or block depending on your character class. It's more action oriented than WoW, but not really like playing Darksiders or Zelda either. It kind of reminds me of a real time KotOR where you don't queche moves and they just happen instantly. Special moves have a cooldown of course to prevent spamming, but it's fast paced and I've yet to run into any sort of boring grind. You can if you want, there are places that allow you to hang around killing things for loot and leveling if you want, but there's no need to do that I'm aware of yet.

 

It does keep you moving along as there is a 'glowing trail' that those familiar with previous D&D video games will recognize. It can be turned off easily. You've also got a minimap in the top corner of the screen that shows you the general direction of your current objective. You can have multiple quests going, but only one 'active'. Exploration is rewarded, I found a hidden boss behind a wall by interacting with a skill switch. However, it's difficult to get lost and you'll always know where you need to be going. It's easy to spot the interactive items as they sparkle like a vampire in Twilight. Quests are easy to find as well, as NPCs that have something for you to do or provide some type of service have an icon over their head so you don't have to wander about talking to anything that doesn't have a player name. Most are in towns or rest areas along the way, but a few can be found in the 'danger zones' as well. There's a lot going on and tons of players and NPCs on the screen at any given moment, so it's kind or necessary to have an icon to let you know what type of interactions you can have.

 

I'm sure those with experience in MMO games can attest that player names can be quite inventive and amusing at times. It can be fun just to wander about a heavily populated area and simply look at who is running about. Chuck Norris, Ahnold, Lord Ballbottom Naughtypants, Nucking Figgers, Ana Lshex, TrixxxRabbit, Count Chocula, Dixi Cupps, Mamu Garahm, Dolf, etc.

 

The 'skill switch' I'm talking about are loot or switches you can only interact with if you've got a certain skill. I'm playing as a Rouge so I can use objects that require the thief skill naturally. However, there are 'Nature', 'Dungeoneering', 'Religion', and a few others that I can't use without a 'kit' for the specific type of object or switch. I can also disarm traps which other character types have to avoid.

 

A lot of stuff is obviously unlocked by leveling. I couldn't use the Rogue's 'sneak' skill till around level 10 or so. There are also buffs that you can pick up that last about an hour from rest areas [campfires] or around alters in the game world. Things become gradually unlocked over time, but at level 10 you have most of the basic functions at your disposal and from then on it seems you are simply upgrading and tweaking stats for the most part. There are a few things you can't do until you reach around level 10 as well, such as certain quest types, PVP, but there's enough to keep you occupied up to that point that it's not too much of an issue. I don't really care about PvP in an MMO anyway. Pretty much levels 1-10 act as your tutorial phase and once you reach that point the game starts on it's proper course so to speak. I doubt it would take me more than a few hours or so to get to that point if I started a new character now that I'm more familiar with how things work. It's effective as a tutorial and gradually introduces you to each of your abilities.

 

I would have liked to have access to my stealth a little earlier even if it was more stunted than it is now. It's kind or what makes my character special, and before I got it I was just a guy with two knives running around stabbing things in a world full of people tossing about fireballs and riding about atop giant spiders and swinging about swords as big as my character. I get the idea that you work your way up, but it's kind of missing the point of having me pick a class if I can't do what sets the character apart until I've dicked around for ten levels. I mean, I've played a game or two of D&D in my day, and while at early levels even though your character class's 'special power' was absolute shit and failed more often than it worked, you could still at least attempt to use it.

 

There are a lot of standard features as well, an auction house I've not bothered with, and a micro transaction system. Relax, I know what that sounds like, but you can actually earn the currency in game with a little effort. Namely playing through the group based 'skirmish' levels or, my personal favorite, playing through a 'daily quest' by using 'job boards' placed around the city, or by simply using a menu that you can call up at any time to start them.

 

That's probably the coolest thing I've found. It essentially creates an endless pool of content with a system similar to Little Big Planet. Using a GUI users create dungeons and levels for others to play through. It's an MMO so there are restrictions, for example you can't place specific loot, you're still getting whatever you're going to get as a reward from chest and monsters from the leveled list. It also means no modding, so you can only use resources that are available in the GUI as far as I know. I've not messed with the Forge itself yet beyond giving it a look over, but I've played through a few of the user created levels as it's one of the ways you pick up a certain type of currency. There is quite a bit you can do with the level creator and it's very cool. It fits in very well with the D&D setting as it allows players to become DM of their created content. It's easy to access these levels, and they can be for groups, solo players, or both.

 

Star Trek the game was awful. The weapons were weak and the A.I. was dumb. A friend was unfortunate enough to have bought it for himself and I played through it in co-op in about two and a half hours. It's not a good video game.

 

Blood Dragon is amazing. It's as much a piece of 80's nostalgia as GTA Vice City. It's very different, but it's completely campy and totally worth playing through. Fans of action movies from the eighties will get more out of it. For example, the lead character is voiced by Michael Biehn. It's pure win.

 

Tomb Raider was a good reboot. It's got a little too much Uncharted in it, and I thought the bow was overused. I missed the dual handguns and kept hoping she'd pick up another along the way once I finally got one. Even after you get other weapons, you'll still find yourself using the Bow the most. It's a bit of a Swiss Army Knife in the game and used for all sorts of things. A bit too much I thought, but it doesn't make the game worse. I'm hoping the next game will use firearms more. The survival thing was kind of underplayed. You don't need to kill any animals after the initial tutorial, so it's there for no good reason. There isn't anything to really gain by doing it aside from some crafting items that you'll find plenty of through other means.

 

Also, way too many QTE moments early on. Fortunately, they're really restricted to the first part of the game. There are a few here and there, but they don't really intrude into gameplay much after the opening sequence.

 

The deaths are completely gruesome. It's great, but it's not a game for the kids. It's a very gory game with a lot of adult themes. There is no 'rape scene' despite there being something of a controversy about it. Laura doesn't get through the first part of the game easily, it's painful to watch, but there's nothing sexual about what's going on. In fact, it's a little disturbing as the men want women, but not for raping. I won't spoil it, but it's disturbing and fits the story. Story isn't great by the way, but it's not terrible either.

 

The hair physics thing is pretty neat though. Though, as far as I could tell it's just Laura's hair and everyone else has standard video game hair. It apparently took a bit of processing power to do it. Though, it doesn't look too out of place as she's the only one with long hair in the game really.

 

Also, Laura really sucks at rescuing people, and the 'Tombs' were kind of out of place and didn't fit well within the story. I know it's 'Tomb Raider', but you're supposed to be kind of in a hurry for most of the game according to the story. Even though you can take as much time to do anything as you want, nothing is timed. It's still a bit jarring to get sidetracked by shiny objects when your friends are being held hostage or fighting for their lives against a group of pirates. "Don't worry, I'll be there right aw...hey what's in this little cave I wonder?" They make for interesting puzzles, but they seem out of place despite the nature of the game due to the seemingly urgent nature of most of the plot. It's a minor gripe, but it bugged me a bit. Though, if you play you shouldn't pass the Tombs up. They are one of the best sources for resources to use for upgrades.

 

They should have gotten an actual British Actress to voice her as well. If you're familiar with the accent you'll notice that she slips up and it breaks the immersion when she does. It's not horrible and you'll likely not even notice if you're not very familiar with the accent already though. She doesn't do a bad job, but there are moments where I noticed it was fake.

 

Still, it's one of the best games in the series. Not just because it's new and has lots of technical bells and whistles and more forgiving controls. Laura Croft ended up as 'Barbie Indiana Jones Adventure Playset the Video Game' after a while, and this is a refreshing and welcome change of course for the series. As long as it doesn't turn into 'Barbie Uncharted Adventure Playset' I'll keep checking the series out as new titles are released.

 

Still haven't gotten into Bioshock Infinite beyond the tutorial level. I started it, but ran into the low res Glitch where the game would run at Ultra settings for a short time, and then abruptly go to the lowest graphics settings for no reason in the middle of playing. It's since been patched, but I haven't gone back to it as I've been playing other things instead.

 

Picked up Alan Wake and American Nightmare on steam today for about $4.50. Alan Wake got good reviews, so I figure that was a worthwhile purchase for less than five bucks.

 

@ExCBooster

 

I can understand liking something because the subject matter is of interest outside of whatever it was. Like I said, there are a few games that aren't that great that I like as well. I've never really been interested in Chinese mythology myself, and Dynasty Warriors didn't impress me much. I liked Afro Samurai though for pretty much the same reasons, and it wasn't a very good game at all. Not horrible, but not really very good either.

 

I never got why Christians hated the game Doom so much. I mean, it's the perfect Republican Christian game for so many reasons. It's not like you're playing as a demon. You're a Marine, who goes to hell, and literally kicks Satan's Army's ass by yourself using a large collection of guns. What about that doesn't say Republican Christian Right exactly? They should be completely in love with it and use it in churches as a training aide for the day when the Beast rises and the great war of the end times begins so they are all ready to fight for Jesus.

 

Even when I was a Christian I didn't understand what the issue was with the game. I never understood what the big deal was or why it was considered so evil. Sure there was evil imagery, but you weren't there to worship Satan, you were there to put a BFG round up his ass after you royally fucked up all his friends to get to him.

 

Chrisitans are so weird.

[Thurisaz]

So, are you a nullsec scallywag? Or a highsec pilot? I gave Eve a go twice and decided I didnt have the stamina or something for it. Mining was lucrative but a little dull. Buying and selling would have been better had I stuck it out for a cloaked vessel. Looting other people's wrecks and mining cans was fun too. :-) Waiting for skill training queues did me in probably. Oh well, kudos to you for sticking it out for all these years.

I've been in null sec a few times but due to my limited available time to join fleets I always started to think eventually that it's not fair if I reap the benefits of being out there without contributing enough to defence. So, currently I hang out in Ammatar space, doing missions to finally get my Amarr standings back up to positive - after the years of fighting for the Minmatar the evil morontheists could hardly hate me more, and it does have its advantages to be at least accepted everywhere

 

Yes the skill training times can be frustrating (do not ask me how long it took me to train capital ships to 5 so I could open the titan skillbook! ) but then they also keep the spoiled wow brats out of New Eden. Plus, with the upcoming Odyssee release CCP will introduce dual character training on accounts among several other things. For example, exploration will become quite a bit easier and less boring. Getting to the goodies in a scanned-down archeology or hacking site will now resemble a cyberpunk decker defeating ICEs to get to the corporate data she wants to steal.

 

The game's complexity is its bane (due to all the time you need to get familiar with it) and its boon (for holy fuck it's fascinating!).

[ContraBardus]

Microsoft's E3 press conference fails to impress me.

 

Yeah. Not so far. Ooh! World of Tanks! You mean I can pay money to play a game I've been able to play since 2010 for free? Sign me up.

 

Wow! Kojima! Open world gaming is finally going to make no sense! Thanks for showing up at the beginning, now run along to Sony's Press Conference where your real job is.

 

Another quirky Xbox live platformer that will be on Steam within a month!? Wow! I'm hugely impressed.

 

Gasp! You've made the Xbox 360 uglier. Great to hear all those Microsoft Employees in the crowd are so amazed. Seriously, E3 needs to stop with this 'canned applause' shit. That's not just Microsoft either. If it's uncomfortably silent, it's because you're not impressing anyone, and you deserve it.

 

Got to admit that Saving Private...er I mean RYSE doesn't look bad. Seems to be using a combat system similar to Darksiders. Meh. I'd guess the game incorporates annoying Kinetic controls for controlling your troops though. Crytek = will be available on PC.

 

Killer Instinct. Okay, cool. About ten years too late, but doesn't look bad. I'm not so sure the game will translate well into modern fighters though. One exclusive that will possibly remain exclusive due to Microsoft owning Rare. Also appears to be a remake and not a sequel.

 

Insomniac. Yeah, this was expected. Their exclusivity deal with Sony only covered the PS3's lifespan. Again, not likely this is a game that will be a true exclusive but a timed exclusive. Microsoft just gets first crack. Expect this to eventually be released pretty much everywhere else after a couple of months or so.

 

Forza 5. Duh. Looks good. Not a system seller. The cloud A.I. thing is not something 'only Xbox 1 can do', that's just a tag line. The writing has been on the wall for this sort of thing for a while now if you've been keeping up with tech journals. A lot of games will be starting to use technology similar to this over the next few years with A.I. It's also worth noting that it requires a connection during play as it's using cloud computing to do it. That's not saying that there is no traditional A.I. involved, so gamers who don't have internet can still play games. It's more of an enhancing feature at this point, but very cool. Not anywhere near an 'Xbox 1 exclusive technology' though.

 

Wow! Yet another edition of Minecraft that has less features than the one I've already got. Oh boy!

 

Quantum Break looks good, but seems kind of boring. While it might be running in the 'real time game engine' I didn't see anything that looked like player interaction. Meh. Pretty, little else of note. Plus, I'm not going to watch some crappy Sci-fi drama series.

 

Project Spark. This is cool. It's building on previous technology such as Little Big Planet, RPG maker, and various level builders supplied with all sorts of games. We can expect more like it on other systems as technology allows for better GUI systems for level building in all sorts of games. Not a system seller, but looks like a cool toy. It's neat, but it's a sign of a larger trend and not as unique as the developers would have us believe.

 

Argh. Smart Glass. WiiU fail. It didn't work for Nintendo, and it's not going to work for Microsoft. Just a bunch of useless features no one will really use. The connectivity of uploading gaming videos and 'live streaming' gameplay is kind of pointless and a truly useless feature. Just what the world needs, more 'let's play' videos on the internet. Oh boy. Seriously, who is dumb enough to think anyone wants to watch them play video games online?

 

I do like that they are moving away from MS points.

 

Ignore sound issues and move on. At any rate, oh boy, a Panzer Dragoon clone...in 2013. These 'exclusives' keep getting better and better.

 

Dead Rising 3, cool, but also not a true exclusive. This will pop up everywhere else just like the other two sooner or later. Looking forward to this on PC, no annoying little girl that you have to keep going back too and take care of. I've let the brat die I don't know how many times just so I could run around doing as I please.

 

Witcher 3, cool. There is no possible way this will not be released on PC, and it will look even better there.

 

More technical difficulties with BF4. Looks good. See above.

 

Simplistic looking Zelda clone.

 

Halo game. Cool, but are we really surprised?

 

Wow! 60fps? Full HD? Yeah. No thanks, I've already got that. Had it for several years actually. Cloud computing supported gameplay? Yeah, that's software, not something 'only Xbox 1 can do' already got it.

 

Titanfall looks cool. Not an exclusive despite Microsoft ending the show with it and implying that it was.

 

All and all, not enough to change my opinion. Nothing here makes worth putting up with the hardware and crap Microsoft is shoving off on us. Yeah, it's pretty, but so is the PS4 and my computer is already better. Very few actual exclusives, just a bunch of timed exclusives.

 

This is a definite improvement over the huge fail of their initial conference, but nowhere near enough to make up for it. I'm pretty sure that this system at best will be in the position Sony was in last cycle with the PS3 and at worst tank spectacularly.

 

Better, but still not good enough. The hardware, restrictions, and various padding features few will use has turned me off, and the software lineup isn't enough to change my mind. Not near as many actual exclusives as they'd like us to believe either.

[stryper]

Well it took a bit longer, but stagnation has set in the gaming industry. Just like hollywood they can't come up with anything new because they are too worried about making money. 


simply no more innovation.

[ContraBardus]

Went on to EA's conference next.

 

Starwars: Battlefront on Frostbite 3. Fuck yes. >_< Total nerdgazm.

 

NFS looks pretty cool as well. Interesting integration between single player and multiplayer. Could also result in chaotic clusterfuck, but that can be fun in a game like that.

 

Another Dragon Age game, open world this time apparently. Doesn't look bad, but not extremely impressive. Might be cool...maybe.

 

Don't play sports games, but the Ignite engine is pretty impressive. The engine uses that 'only Xbox 1 is powerful enough' cloud computing system across all platforms, including PC with FIFA. Funny that.

 

Mirrors Edge 2, finally out of development limbo. Cool. Not hugely excited, but the first one was fun. Looking forward to seeing where they go with 2. A lot of people will be creaming their shorts over this one.

 

Not a bad show from EA. Most of the more interesting/impressive things are a ways off though. From the sounds of things E3 next year will be more interesting as far as EA is concerned.

[ContraBardus]

On to Ubisoft.

 

The new version of Rocksmith looks cool. It's a niche product but an awesome one.

 

Splinter Cell. No Ironsides, no sale. I've got plenty of other stuff to play.

 

Rayman. Cool. Supposedly harder and larger than Rayman Origins, which was stupid hard and huge to begin with. Rayman is kind of emasculating. It's cute looking and colorful, but hard enough to bitch slap you across your face.

 

The Mighty Quest for Epic Loot. Ubisoft has a knack for putting humor into games. I probably won't actually play it, maybe, but the trailer was funny as hell.

 

Stick of Truth. Finally some idea of a release date. Not an exact date, an approximation. You know how video games are.

 

The Crew. A sort of Driver/Test Drive Unlimited hybrid looking game? That makes sense considering the publisher. I'm kind of wondering about the scale of it all though. The entire US? Hardly, it's scaled down, but does look like one hell of a large map for an open world driving game. From the look of it the map is a scaled down and slightly deformed version of the US. Sounds interesting.

Edit: Later information revealed that it's about 500km. It'd take about two hours to drive from one end to the next. There is a fast travel option available.

 

Watchdogs looks as cool as ever, nothing really new about it though.

 

A Rabbid's Television show. I've not watched Nickelodeon since the 90s. I probably still won't, but I'll check it out once it's available streaming for sure.

 

Assassin's Creed looks good, very much like the privateering sections of III. I suspect those sections of the third game were in fact developed for this. Haven't been interested in AC in a while though.

 

The Division looks pretty cool. Looks like MMO games are moving towards more action oriented style controls in general. I like that.

 

Decent showing from Ubisoft.

[ContraBardus]

Sony is the big one for this E3 I think. This is the best chance they have to 'win' the conference in years. We'll see if they manage to pull it off.

 

Somewhere around the end of the Ubisoft conference the stream became complete shit. I know it's not a problem on my end either. Sony's conference is full of lag, skipping, and delay. It's not an issue with Sony either. Gamespot just sucks.

 

Anyway, PS3 lineup is okay. Last of Us is the only thing I really find of any interest. GT 6 looks almost as good as Forza for the Xbox 1 and it's a PS3 game. Beyond Two Souls...meh. Looks okay, but not of interest to me.

 

Arkham Origins looks great. The Sony conference is the most footage we've seen of the game yet. I'm really looking forward to it.

 

It's official, the PS 4 looks like an evil giant black Wii. [There's a joke in there somewhere, I just know it!] It's smaller than the Xbox 1, but overall not bad looking.

 

The Order. Steam punk monster hunters. Looks like co-op. Not sure about exactly what they were fighting, werewolves maybe? Never got a good look. No gameplay shown.

 

Infamous, Killzone, Knack, and that driving game thing all get a short reel that doesn't really show anything new.

 

Transistor...um. Yeah. Looks pretty cool, not sure what it's about or what type of game it is exactly. In some respects it looks like an RPG, in others more of an action platformer thing. Maybe a bit of both.

 

Sony is 1uping Microsoft on indie games. While Microsoft is making indie games more difficult to publish on their platform than before, Sony is going the opposite route and outdoing even the 360 by allowing self publishing. Interesting, but I still think PC will lead in that area for a long time to come. We'll see how it pans out later I'm sure.

 

Nice Indie game montage, but nothing really stood out. Might check out the Oddworld remake if I ever pick up a PS4.

 

Final Fantasy...I'm confused and no longer give a shit. Is it vs. XIII or XIV, or whatever? They keep making sequels for the shitty ones and lost my interest a while a go. Very pretty though.

 

Nerds of the world rejoice, Kindom Hearts finally gets a proper sequel. It won't sell me a PS4 on it's own, but if I get one I'll be playing it. This is probably the biggest software announcement of the conference for Sony really. Nerds the world over have been begging for this for years.

 

Assassin's Creed had a great demo, but ran into a glitch and ended up stuttering and freezing. That's a major technical malfunction for every single conference thus far with the exception of Ubisoft, and this particular glitch counts as one of theirs since it was one of their games. So, technical problems all around for everyone.

 

Elder Scrolls Online. Neat, nice to see some new footage including quite a bit of gameplay. Still not buying that on a console, but if my PC was any lesser I might be forced to buy a PS4 to get in on that Beta.

 

Hmm. Mad Max...interesting, but I'd need to see more about that. Could be really cool, but also has just as much potential to be a huge pile of steaming shit.

 

It is now official, used games are supported, lending, selling, and trading without restriction. No requirement for always on connections either. No online verification, no checking in periodically to 'verify' games on disk. PS 4 hardware will not stop working if you haven't authenticated within 24 hours. Well, that pretty much won E3 for Sony right there.

 

Sony now requires a PS Plus membership ala Xbox Live to access multiplayer for PS 4. Not a huge surprise. Bummer. Well, my multiplayer is still free anyway.

 

Destiny looks cool. Sort of Halo meets Borderlands.

 

PS4 $399. That's pretty much the final straw. Less restrictive, just as powerful, has more actual exclusives and not just timed exclusives, and it's $100 cheaper. PS 4 should handily outsell the Xbox 1 by quite a large margin. Microsoft's failure is now complete.

 

I'd say Sony handily had the best overall conference. It's one of their better conferences to date and they've definitely learned a few lessons from the PS3. Hopefully Microsoft will learn something from this. I'm pretty sure they're going to take a beating over the holiday season from Sony this time.

 

It's been a long day, but neither one is pulling me away from my PC's mouse and keyboard anytime soon. Still the best gaming system there is in my opinion. Still, I'll probably end up with a PS4 after it's been out for a bit and has a few exclusive games built up to make it worth the expense. I doubt I'll ever buy an Xbox 1, it just seems like a poor investment at this point.

[ContraBardus]

Skyrim modded to Hyper-Ultra. Quite a few settings at +75% over ultra, heavily modded textures and all sorts of other things added [creatures, mobs, weapons, plants, items, etc.] and shadow distance set to about 30,000 at 4k resolution [default Ultra is about 8,000 at 2k resolution.]

 

I have pretty much replaced every single texture in the game and it's fucking awesome. Runs at 60fps in 3D on my PC [meaning everything is rendered twice]. It's also incredibly stable. Took me the better part of a month to get it done, but it is totally worth it.





























 

[ContraBardus]

A couple more of Skyrim...

 

The settings are similar, I hadn't turned shadows up quite as far as above yet, and I was using ENB lighting instead of Ultra Realistic World Lighting, everything else is the same though.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This one is my current desktop image ...