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The spreadsheet I used for my computations and graphs can be downloaded here. It's in OpenOffice format.

Nice to see people use opensource software, he could of released the data in excel.

Incidentally, this is also coming out for the PS2, although without the graphical upgrade and soundtrack enhancements, AFAICT. But that's not why I posted.

Biggest Missing Feature:
Motorcycles in Liberty City.

Honestly, that would suck me into playing GTA3 all over again, just trying out the bikes for hours seeing what I could pull off. If they added that, I'd consider selling my GTA3 and GTA:VC for the PS2 just to have the upgraded version of GTA3 in the double pack.

Surely they thought about this. What's holding them back? Make it an easter egg, if need be, so you can avoid the "we couldn't test all situations and it wouldn't pass QA" argument.

Oh, and while you're reading, I always love plugging this little article. In short, GTA3 much better than GTA:VC, and that's all there is to it. Flame on! :^D

Was Max Payne's story, with hammy voice acting and so forth, a joke or serious? That is, did they think they were making a work of serious fiction or were they trying to spoof the hard-boiled detective "noir" genre?

I never found a story or interview indicating that it was meant to be parody/satire, but I could have missed it. So I took it as an attempt to be serious, one that was painful to watch. Others saw it as intentionally bad for humourous effect.

So, anyone have hard evidence one way or the other?

Anyway, here's hoping MP2 is somehow better. I didn't realize it was coming out on the PS2, so I guess I'll have a chance to rent it to see it for myself. (Previous curmudgeoning of Max Payne here and here for the morbidly curious.)

Was Max Payne's story, with hammy voice acting and so forth, a joke or serious? That is, did they think they were making a work of serious fiction or were they trying to spoof the hard-boiled detective "noir" genre?

I never found a story or interview indicating that it was meant to be parody/satire, but I could have missed it. So I took it as an attempt to be serious, one that was painful to watch. Others saw it as intentionally bad for humourous effect.

So, anyone have hard evidence one way or the other?

Anyway, here's hoping MP2 is somehow better. I didn't realize it was coming out on the PS2, so I guess I'll have a chance to rent it to see it for myself. (Previous curmudgeoning of Max Payne here and here for the morbidly curious.)

Now, if in fact the $99 price still includes either a game or a GBP then this is a significant deal. Honestly, with the GBP the Cube becomes a great little system to have. I recently finished Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow entirely on the GBP and that was a GREAT experience. Other GameBoy, GameBoy Color, and GameBoy Advance games also benefit from the big screen format, although you may finally realize how awful some of that 8-bit sound was on your older games. Those older games are relatively cheap to get used, so you can get by inexpensively on those. Add in Animal Crossing and other great games on the Player's Choice list and then you're talking a good time. Heck, you can even play Soul Calibur II, if you want.

Sure, you won't be playing Halo 2 or the next Grand Theft Auto, but there is still some good gaming to be had on that cheap Cube.

Now, if in fact the $99 price still includes either a game or a GBP then this is a significant deal. Honestly, with the GBP the Cube becomes a great little system to have. I recently finished Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow entirely on the GBP and that was a GREAT experience. Other GameBoy, GameBoy Color, and GameBoy Advance games also benefit from the big screen format, although you may finally realize how awful some of that 8-bit sound was on your older games. Those older games are relatively cheap to get used, so you can get by inexpensively on those. Add in Animal Crossing and other great games on the Player's Choice list and then you're talking a good time. Heck, you can even play Soul Calibur II, if you want.

Sure, you won't be playing Halo 2 or the next Grand Theft Auto, but there is still some good gaming to be had on that cheap Cube.

Back on topic, I'm not sure I ever thought that there needed to be that much writing to go with Gordon Freeman himself. The writing was mostly in what Cigarette Smoking Man said and what all the people around him said.

And I'll go ahead and say it now: if Gordon speaks in HL2, then it will ruin the very quality that the parent comment to this one spoke about.

If this really happens, then I think I'm pretty much guaranteed to upgrade. After I got my PS2 and got tired of Ridge Racer V (ugh) I went on a used PSX (aka PSOne) game-buying spree. My library of PSX games went from about 20 to about 40 in the space of a couple of months, and while somewhat expensive for some titles, many of them were sub-$15 and a few were sub-$10. From a gamer's point of view, a gamer who doesn't mind some chunky graphics, it was a time of great fun. During that time, I got into Ape Escape, for example. (Review. Sequel.) A great, but slightly flawed, PSX game that I might not have bought had PSX game prices not dropped precipitously after the advent of the PS2.

The PS2 is still our DVD player, too. In terms of use of entertainment hardware, the PS2 is second only the TV itself in our house.

The only bit about the blurb posted here on /. that I don't understand is that they guy says that PSX emulation is done in software. That sounds wrong to me, since I thought that it was just using the PS2 input processor, which happens to be the same as the main chip in the PSX, as a PSX. Add in the PSX BIOS and perhaps some tiny software bits here and there, but still isn't it mostly hardware?

If this really happens, then I think I'm pretty much guaranteed to upgrade. After I got my PS2 and got tired of Ridge Racer V (ugh) I went on a used PSX (aka PSOne) game-buying spree. My library of PSX games went from about 20 to about 40 in the space of a couple of months, and while somewhat expensive for some titles, many of them were sub-$15 and a few were sub-$10. From a gamer's point of view, a gamer who doesn't mind some chunky graphics, it was a time of great fun. During that time, I got into Ape Escape, for example. (Review. Sequel.) A great, but slightly flawed, PSX game that I might not have bought had PSX game prices not dropped precipitously after the advent of the PS2.

The PS2 is still our DVD player, too. In terms of use of entertainment hardware, the PS2 is second only the TV itself in our house.

The only bit about the blurb posted here on /. that I don't understand is that they guy says that PSX emulation is done in software. That sounds wrong to me, since I thought that it was just using the PS2 input processor, which happens to be the same as the main chip in the PSX, as a PSX. Add in the PSX BIOS and perhaps some tiny software bits here and there, but still isn't it mostly hardware?

This article was in a similar Slashdot post a while back and is just about the GBA. It kind of backs up the GameCritics guy's point at the end that consumers are maybe just getting what they want. Sure that definition of "original" is kind of lame in the GBA article, but look at all that licensed crap! If the market is really giving people what they want, then they want stuff they've heard of before. So you get games based on Disney and Pokemon.

First, the controls: they're not awful, they're just different. After the first couple of levels, I never thought about the controls because I knew how to do what I wanted. Essentially, they became transparent.

Next, the bugs are there, let there be no doubt. However, the only persistent bug is the slowdown (something that can be fixed on the PC, while the PS2 users, like me, have to suffer a tiny bit) and it's a minor annoyance. The main gameplay bugs are all in the first third of the game. I did not see a single gameplay bug after that point.

Also, the design is a fair bit better than TR2 and TR3, but not nearly as good as TR1. (Those are the only ones I've played. The heartbreak of TR2 and TR3 made me give up...until TR:AoD.) Because it was pushed out the door early, I believe that some parts of later levels were left out, which is a real shame since they were very promising.

Finally, the bit that most people won't get because they give up too early is the story and the characters. This is actually supposed to be the first part of a multigame story arc. (SPOILERS IN THE FOLLOWING LINK!!!!) This page puts it all in context, and having finished TR:AoD, I can appreciate what they were trying to do. Additionally, the new character, Kurtis, was worth adding to the series. Now there is another persistent character in the world and Lara's not quite sure what to make of him, and neither are we. Throw in the twist at the end of TR:AoD and I feel it's one of the more coherent attempts at a sustained storyline in recent videogames.

I'm sure I'm in the minority. Most people hate the game. I fully expect to be flamed and modded down for my view. :^)

To get back to Galleon, I'm curious to see how it turns out, but most of my interest waned before the turn of the century. ;^)

A lot of what I have to say can be seen in Lara the Murderer (about the series itself) and this TR:AoD first impressions article and my later update. I think they're a better read than a Slashdot post, but oh well.

If you step back and look at TR1, TR2, and TR3, you can see a progression. TR1 was brilliantly designed, coherent in story and goals, and technologically impressive for its time. TR2 showed more of a story, but took the game in two different directions that didn't suit it. First, more guns and more killing of humans. This seemed a deliberate act to make the game appeal to action movie fans that weren't as much into exploration and movement puzzles. It also put Lara into urban settings, a setting for which the game engine just wasn't suited. The technology has improved, but not much at this stage. Vehicles you can ride have been added, a gimmick that doesn't work very well. Finally, in TR3, you have a collection of loosely connected levels, more killing, more guns, and more vehicles. None of these make the game interesting, and a save game bug in the final version corrupted my game, at which point I gave up.

Until the new game, that is. While the reviews were negative, they did comment that hardcore TR fans might be able to overlook some flaws (bugs and controls) to enjoy a game with a great story and some classic TR design. As it turns out, the issue with the controls has been blown way out of proportion. They're different, but they are not poor. The reaction seems sluggish to some, but I've found it to be more than acceptable, even comfortable.

There are bugs and you will encounter them. They should have been gotten rid of before shipping and I regret that the PS2 version won't ever be patched to fix some of them, especially the graphical slowdown in certain areas, But having just passed the 2/3 mark last night I can say that they have not been painful and haven't diminished my interest in the game. I've laughed at a few of them, and I hope there is a next game that has more time to iron those kinds of issues out, but my experience isn't nearly what you might think from reading reviews and posts on USENET.

The best part is certainly the story. The voice acting and writing are actually decent, which is better than can be said of many other games, and it does have the classic TR level design in certain areas. Moreover, it now has a graphics engine now allows for realistic urban areas, and for once those can feel like a natural part of the game.

It isn't for everyone, I'll admit. But it also isn't as bad as people have made it out to be either.

A lot of what I have to say can be seen in Lara the Murderer (about the series itself) and this TR:AoD first impressions article and my later update. I think they're a better read than a Slashdot post, but oh well.

If you step back and look at TR1, TR2, and TR3, you can see a progression. TR1 was brilliantly designed, coherent in story and goals, and technologically impressive for its time. TR2 showed more of a story, but took the game in two different directions that didn't suit it. First, more guns and more killing of humans. This seemed a deliberate act to make the game appeal to action movie fans that weren't as much into exploration and movement puzzles. It also put Lara into urban settings, a setting for which the game engine just wasn't suited. The technology has improved, but not much at this stage. Vehicles you can ride have been added, a gimmick that doesn't work very well. Finally, in TR3, you have a collection of loosely connected levels, more killing, more guns, and more vehicles. None of these make the game interesting, and a save game bug in the final version corrupted my game, at which point I gave up.

Until the new game, that is. While the reviews were negative, they did comment that hardcore TR fans might be able to overlook some flaws (bugs and controls) to enjoy a game with a great story and some classic TR design. As it turns out, the issue with the controls has been blown way out of proportion. They're different, but they are not poor. The reaction seems sluggish to some, but I've found it to be more than acceptable, even comfortable.

There are bugs and you will encounter them. They should have been gotten rid of before shipping and I regret that the PS2 version won't ever be patched to fix some of them, especially the graphical slowdown in certain areas, But having just passed the 2/3 mark last night I can say that they have not been painful and haven't diminished my interest in the game. I've laughed at a few of them, and I hope there is a next game that has more time to iron those kinds of issues out, but my experience isn't nearly what you might think from reading reviews and posts on USENET.

The best part is certainly the story. The voice acting and writing are actually decent, which is better than can be said of many other games, and it does have the classic TR level design in certain areas. Moreover, it now has a graphics engine now allows for realistic urban areas, and for once those can feel like a natural part of the game.

It isn't for everyone, I'll admit. But it also isn't as bad as people have made it out to be either.

A lot of what I have to say can be seen in Lara the Murderer (about the series itself) and this TR:AoD first impressions article and my later update. I think they're a better read than a Slashdot post, but oh well.

If you step back and look at TR1, TR2, and TR3, you can see a progression. TR1 was brilliantly designed, coherent in story and goals, and technologically impressive for its time. TR2 showed more of a story, but took the game in two different directions that didn't suit it. First, more guns and more killing of humans. This seemed a deliberate act to make the game appeal to action movie fans that weren't as much into exploration and movement puzzles. It also put Lara into urban settings, a setting for which the game engine just wasn't suited. The technology has improved, but not much at this stage. Vehicles you can ride have been added, a gimmick that doesn't work very well. Finally, in TR3, you have a collection of loosely connected levels, more killing, more guns, and more vehicles. None of these make the game interesting, and a save game bug in the final version corrupted my game, at which point I gave up.

Until the new game, that is. While the reviews were negative, they did comment that hardcore TR fans might be able to overlook some flaws (bugs and controls) to enjoy a game with a great story and some classic TR design. As it turns out, the issue with the controls has been blown way out of proportion. They're different, but they are not poor. The reaction seems sluggish to some, but I've found it to be more than acceptable, even comfortable.

There are bugs and you will encounter them. They should have been gotten rid of before shipping and I regret that the PS2 version won't ever be patched to fix some of them, especially the graphical slowdown in certain areas, But having just passed the 2/3 mark last night I can say that they have not been painful and haven't diminished my interest in the game. I've laughed at a few of them, and I hope there is a next game that has more time to iron those kinds of issues out, but my experience isn't nearly what you might think from reading reviews and posts on USENET.

The best part is certainly the story. The voice acting and writing are actually decent, which is better than can be said of many other games, and it does have the classic TR level design in certain areas. Moreover, it now has a graphics engine now allows for realistic urban areas, and for once those can feel like a natural part of the game.

It isn't for everyone, I'll admit. But it also isn't as bad as people have made it out to be either.

When I was Everquest Online Adventures there was this guy running around shouting "CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?"

His name, of course, was Verizon.

I just called my game Schnark. No good reason...just liked it.

Tomb Raider, the original, was brilliant.

Tomb Raider 2 was pretty ok, but I was a bit confused to find Lara swimming around Venice shooting thugs.

Tomb Raider 3 had Lara gunning down aboriginals in their own village. It also had a hideous savegame bug that required a complete game restart to fix.

I don't understand what happened at Core, but it looks like they didn't really comprehend what was good about the first one and fell into the trap of pumping out subpar material annually, just in time for the Xmas season. So, we end up with Lara the Murderer and (just recently) a a boring GBA game.

I'm getting ready to play TR: Angel of Darkness, but I have to admit I'm not expecting much, given Core's record. When I heard they were including Kurtis (or whatever the new guy's name is) I immediately thought of Poochie's appearance on Itchy & Scratchy (or Roy's appearance at the Simpsons' dinnertable)...a lame addition to a show that's run out of ideas.

Tomb Raider, the original, was brilliant.

Tomb Raider 2 was pretty ok, but I was a bit confused to find Lara swimming around Venice shooting thugs.

Tomb Raider 3 had Lara gunning down aboriginals in their own village. It also had a hideous savegame bug that required a complete game restart to fix.

I don't understand what happened at Core, but it looks like they didn't really comprehend what was good about the first one and fell into the trap of pumping out subpar material annually, just in time for the Xmas season. So, we end up with Lara the Murderer and (just recently) a a boring GBA game.

I'm getting ready to play TR: Angel of Darkness, but I have to admit I'm not expecting much, given Core's record. When I heard they were including Kurtis (or whatever the new guy's name is) I immediately thought of Poochie's appearance on Itchy & Scratchy (or Roy's appearance at the Simpsons' dinnertable)...a lame addition to a show that's run out of ideas.

Max Payne was hacky story and one gameplay gimmick (bullet time). Sure, bullet time was fun to do the first three dozen times I used it. But only the most die-hard FPS fans can stand level after level of pedestrian design and endless shooting. When I ended up in a warehouse full of crates...CRATES FOR CRYING OUT LOUD...I knew I'd reached my limit.

To make it worse, the voice acting and writing were awful. It was as if they wanted to sound like a modern Raymond Chandler, but weren't clever enough to know a stupid metaphor if it came running at them screaming like a scaly, hot demon from hell and bit them in the icy, cold ass of writing skills. It's just wrong to subject gamers to tired level design *and* bad writing. The hammy acting didn't help, of course.

Ok, I'll stop there. Max Payne 2...big deal. More complaining here and here.

Max Payne was hacky story and one gameplay gimmick (bullet time). Sure, bullet time was fun to do the first three dozen times I used it. But only the most die-hard FPS fans can stand level after level of pedestrian design and endless shooting. When I ended up in a warehouse full of crates...CRATES FOR CRYING OUT LOUD...I knew I'd reached my limit.

To make it worse, the voice acting and writing were awful. It was as if they wanted to sound like a modern Raymond Chandler, but weren't clever enough to know a stupid metaphor if it came running at them screaming like a scaly, hot demon from hell and bit them in the icy, cold ass of writing skills. It's just wrong to subject gamers to tired level design *and* bad writing. The hammy acting didn't help, of course.

Ok, I'll stop there. Max Payne 2...big deal. More complaining here and here.

Posted my take on the new system earlier today. The short of it is that the pricing structure is good from a business point of view, as it allows a modest increase in pricing that can be sold reasonably well to the consumer (i.e. the consumer won't feel like they're being completely ripped off and might actually feel they're getting a good deal).

The increase is not just in the starter kit. Renewal is $50, but that's for service only. Remember that the first year was $50 and included a headset and game.

But truly, how excited are you after the somewhat controversial (was it epoch-making, or just decent?) Metal Gear Solid 2?"

• Game & Watch Gallery series brings their 1980s Game & Watch devices to the GameBoy and then GameBoy Color and then GameBoy Advance. Further, you can get keychain versions of the same games (although they may have discontinued them now).
• E-Reader cards with rehashed NES games.
• SNES games reworked for the GBA, including a remake of SNES Zelda.
• Port of Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time as a bonus for GameCube Zelda preorders
• Remake of Resident Evil for GameCube using all new graphics and some new features.
• Rereleases of Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 3 for the GameCube at the outrageous price of $40 each. Very little, if anything, updated since the DreamCast versions of these games.

It's time for another interview here on Curmudgeon and this time we have with us Brian Hook, president of Pyrogon Games and former developer at id Software and Verant/Sony Online Entertainment. Before working on the seminal shooters Quake 2 and Quake 3: Arena, Brian was the original architect of the Glide API used by the 3dfx Voodoo line of video cards. After departing id, Brian worked as a Senior Technology Architect at Verant, concentrating on development of technology for next-generation massively-multiplayer online games (MMOGs). After founding Pyrogon in 2000, he created the puzzle game Candy Cruncher, which we reviewed earlier this year. Two additional Pyrogon games have appeared since then, NingPo MahJong and Letter Linker, both available for Windows and MacOS X. (A Linux version of NingPo MahJong will be shipping in the near future.)

This interview covers a wide range of topics: game design criticism, OpenGL/D3D, making money as a smaller game developer, and the importance of porting software to different platforms. Indeed, something for just about everyone. It's quite long, so you might want to bookmark it and consume it in more than one reading.

The interview questions were prepared with the assistance of regular CG authors ruffin and michael.

jvm: What kinds of games do you enjoy playing the most?

Hook: That's a tough question. I guess in some ways I just have very high expectations about software these days, so most games pretty much turn me off within the first 5 minutes when I spot egregious design flaws.

That said, the games I've played and enjoyed the most recently have been No One Lives Forever 2, which I felt had some of the best production value I've ever seen in a game, and Ghost Recon, which is a hoot in multiplayer.

jvm: So you play mostly on a PC, as opposed to a console?

Hook: I should really get some consoles and play console games, but it's hard to justify the time.

jvm: Could we get an example of a game with these egregious design flaws, complete with a breakdown of those flaws? The more popular the game, the better.

Hook: That's dangerous ground =)

But a typical example I have is what I call "simulations that think they're games". To me, a game should be fun and exciting, which means that I should be making interesting decisions that lead to success based on the data I have at that time. Too many games today STILL punish you by just killing you because that's "realistic".

Hitman 2 is a good example of this. Starting with the very first mission, you can pretty much expect to go through and play that mission 20 times before you complete it, because there are timed events that you don't know about a priori. Which is a shame, because the actual mechanics in Hitman 2 were extremely fun. It was probably the one game in recent memory that I really wanted to like but which ended up being so frustrating and tedious that I couldn't enjoy it. Obviously it's a popular game, so I'm in the minority on this.

I think the games that really got a lot of this down were the 1980s LucasArts adventure games like Lo

It's time for another interview here on Curmudgeon and this time we have with us Brian Hook, president of Pyrogon Games and former developer at id Software and Verant/Sony Online Entertainment. Before working on the seminal shooters Quake 2 and Quake 3: Arena, Brian was the original architect of the Glide API used by the 3dfx Voodoo line of video cards. After departing id, Brian worked as a Senior Technology Architect at Verant, concentrating on development of technology for next-generation massively-multiplayer online games (MMOGs). After founding Pyrogon in 2000, he created the puzzle game Candy Cruncher, which we reviewed earlier this year. Two additional Pyrogon games have appeared since then, NingPo MahJong and Letter Linker, both available for Windows and MacOS X. (A Linux version of NingPo MahJong will be shipping in the near future.)

This interview covers a wide range of topics: game design criticism, OpenGL/D3D, making money as a smaller game developer, and the importance of porting software to different platforms. Indeed, something for just about everyone. It's quite long, so you might want to bookmark it and consume it in more than one reading.

The interview questions were prepared with the assistance of regular CG authors ruffin and michael.

jvm: What kinds of games do you enjoy playing the most?

Hook: That's a tough question. I guess in some ways I just have very high expectations about software these days, so most games pretty much turn me off within the first 5 minutes when I spot egregious design flaws.

That said, the games I've played and enjoyed the most recently have been No One Lives Forever 2, which I felt had some of the best production value I've ever seen in a game, and Ghost Recon, which is a hoot in multiplayer.

jvm: So you play mostly on a PC, as opposed to a console?

Hook: I should really get some consoles and play console games, but it's hard to justify the time.

jvm: Could we get an example of a game with these egregious design flaws, complete with a breakdown of those flaws? The more popular the game, the better.

Hook: That's dangerous ground =)

But a typical example I have is what I call "simulations that think they're games". To me, a game should be fun and exciting, which means that I should be making interesting decisions that lead to success based on the data I have at that time. Too many games today STILL punish you by just killing you because that's "realistic".

Hitman 2 is a good example of this. Starting with the very first mission, you can pretty much expect to go through and play that mission 20 times before you complete it, because there are timed events that you don't know about a priori. Which is a shame, because the actual mechanics in Hitman 2 were extremely fun. It was probably the one game in recent memory that I really wanted to like but which ended up being so frustrating and tedious that I couldn't enjoy it. Obviously it's a popular game, so I'm in the minority on this.

I think the games that really got a lot of this down were the 1980s LucasArts adventure games like Lo

It's time for another interview here on Curmudgeon and this time we have with us Brian Hook, president of Pyrogon Games and former developer at id Software and Verant/Sony Online Entertainment. Before working on the seminal shooters Quake 2 and Quake 3: Arena, Brian was the original architect of the Glide API used by the 3dfx Voodoo line of video cards. After departing id, Brian worked as a Senior Technology Architect at Verant, concentrating on development of technology for next-generation massively-multiplayer online games (MMOGs). After founding Pyrogon in 2000, he created the puzzle game Candy Cruncher, which we reviewed earlier this year. Two additional Pyrogon games have appeared since then, NingPo MahJong and Letter Linker, both available for Windows and MacOS X. (A Linux version of NingPo MahJong will be shipping in the near future.)

This interview covers a wide range of topics: game design criticism, OpenGL/D3D, making money as a smaller game developer, and the importance of porting software to different platforms. Indeed, something for just about everyone. It's quite long, so you might want to bookmark it and consume it in more than one reading.

The interview questions were prepared with the assistance of regular CG authors ruffin and michael.

jvm: What kinds of games do you enjoy playing the most?

Hook: That's a tough question. I guess in some ways I just have very high expectations about software these days, so most games pretty much turn me off within the first 5 minutes when I spot egregious design flaws.

That said, the games I've played and enjoyed the most recently have been No One Lives Forever 2, which I felt had some of the best production value I've ever seen in a game, and Ghost Recon, which is a hoot in multiplayer.

jvm: So you play mostly on a PC, as opposed to a console?

Hook: I should really get some consoles and play console games, but it's hard to justify the time.

jvm: Could we get an example of a game with these egregious design flaws, complete with a breakdown of those flaws? The more popular the game, the better.

Hook: That's dangerous ground =)

But a typical example I have is what I call "simulations that think they're games". To me, a game should be fun and exciting, which means that I should be making interesting decisions that lead to success based on the data I have at that time. Too many games today STILL punish you by just killing you because that's "realistic".

Hitman 2 is a good example of this. Starting with the very first mission, you can pretty much expect to go through and play that mission 20 times before you complete it, because there are timed events that you don't know about a priori. Which is a shame, because the actual mechanics in Hitman 2 were extremely fun. It was probably the one game in recent memory that I really wanted to like but which ended up being so frustrating and tedious that I couldn't enjoy it. Obviously it's a popular game, so I'm in the minority on this.

I think the games that really got a lot of this down were the 1980s LucasArts adventure games like Lo