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The STALKER PC game series is my favorite single-player first person shooter type series of all time. The spooky atmosphere created in the game is just fantastic when you play the game in a darkened room at night. I would highly recommend the games to everyone.

The book A Roadside Picnic is also pretty good giving you a nice emotional ride of what it's like be a Stalker and to go into the zone. The old black and white movie Stalker is somewhat good in giving you some background about the Zone but it's nothing to the atmosphere that you feel in the games when you play.

STALKER Game Website

Stalker Wiki

Also be sure to check out these mods:
STALKER - Shadow of Chernobyl
Oblivion Lost 2.2.1 for 1.0005 - Forum Thread
Supermod Pack v2.4 and Patches

STALKER - Clear Sky
The Faction War v3.7

Fortunately the gamer community stepped in and restored a lot of the missing content. PC version only, obviously.

I've always wanted to play a serious World War II shooter from the perspective of a German soldier. I mean, we've stormed Omaha beach so many times... it'd be interesting to defend it. And we'd get to participate in some really unique content that hasn't been completely done to death by every shooter ever.

Have you heard of Battlefield 1942? It is one of the most popular World War 2 games ever and is a multiplayer game -- meaning that you can play both sides of the war. It even has a Omaha Beach map.

Yes:

Hexen: Edge of Chaos:
http://www.moddb.com/mods/hexen-edge-of-chaos
Classic Doom 3:
http://www.moddb.com/mods/classic-doom-3
The Ruiner:
http://www.moddb.com/mods/ruiner
In Hell:
http://doom3.filefront.com/file/;83607
Shambler's Castle:
http://www.moddb.com/mods/shamblers-castle
Serengrove:
http://www.moddb.com/games/doom-iii/addons/sp-serengrove-tudor-town-of-doom

I managed to find a copy of the second part of the video, combined the first and second parts, and put the video online again:

1. FileFront
2. DivShare

Download and mirror!

it's infected. don't download. repeat: DO NOT DOWNLOAD.

1. FileFront
2. DivShare

Download and mirror!

I'm American, and speak only English. When I bought the movie "Run Lola Run", it had both the English voice-overs and the original German with English subs. The voice-over was honestly excellent and couldn't have been done better, but I still preferred the sound of the original German.

I think I would like to play S.T.A.L.K.E.R. in a similar way - with the original Russian being spoken with English subtitles. Normally this sort of reverse localization isn't done, but I see there's a mod for that, which I might experiment with:

http://stalker.filefront.com/file/In_Game_CC_and_Subtitles_for_Oblivion_Lost_22%3B97756

"After installing InGameCC you can bravely replace all sounds to Russian with Authenticity Sound Pack or a similar sound mod..."

I would expect it to be a raging success, as no other company has as rabid a fan-base that will buy anything Apple throws at them without complaining and will even infect others who should know better to buy them as well.

That sounds just like some Linux and Windows fans. Apple has no lock on rabid fans. "Remember when Kurt Cobain died? Copy-cat suicides the whole works...will this happen with MJ fans too we shall see."

Falcon

Incidentally: FileFront is closing in five days, taking with it any files that aren't hosted elsewhere.

I am told that many of the Half-Life mods hosted there are not available anywhere else, so get while the getting is good...

Incidentally: FileFront is closing in five days, taking with it any files that aren't hosted elsewhere.

I am told that many of the Half-Life mods hosted there are not available anywhere else, so get while the getting is good...

It's just called Classic Doom, it was released in '05 but got a patch a while ago to work with the Steam version of D3. If you have the game via steam, it's probably available via Steam.

Otherwise check filefront, or this link http://doom3.filefront.com/file/Classic_Doom_3_ZIP;83549

I know it works in WinXP and linux versions of Doom 3 from my CD with the latest patches. It is pretty cool. The soundtrack is available free from ocremix.org, search for dark side of phobos. Should be available as mp3, wav, and flac.

Here's a much better link: (ASF format, 313MB, 640x480px)

http://files.filefront.com/Tour+2009+zip/;13005092;/fileinfo.html

(Link taken from here)

Things like this happen more often than you might think, it's just that it generally isn't the kind of thing to garner a lot of attention, or publicity. I've noticed a few changelogs that mentioned that they've removed DRM, and I know there are at least a couple games that don't have DRM on-disc once they reach bargin bin age.

THQ did it with Supreme Commander:
http://files.filefront.com/Supreme+Commander+v3220+to+v3223+Patch/;7131296;/fileinfo.html

Westwood did it with Red Alert:
http://files.filefront.com/Command+Conquer+Red+Alert+3+v105+Patch+EN/;12554251;/fileinfo.html

Not sure about others off the top of my head, but I know that I see if from time to time in change logs.

I don't know if these companies that produce DRM tools license them to publishers on a one time fee basis, or a subscription, or a cost-per-disc basis.
I suspect though that if it's not a one-time cost, that it's not worth it to a publisher to keep paying for DRM after the first few months.

Things like this happen more often than you might think, it's just that it generally isn't the kind of thing to garner a lot of attention, or publicity. I've noticed a few changelogs that mentioned that they've removed DRM, and I know there are at least a couple games that don't have DRM on-disc once they reach bargin bin age.

THQ did it with Supreme Commander:
http://files.filefront.com/Supreme+Commander+v3220+to+v3223+Patch/;7131296;/fileinfo.html

Westwood did it with Red Alert:
http://files.filefront.com/Command+Conquer+Red+Alert+3+v105+Patch+EN/;12554251;/fileinfo.html

Not sure about others off the top of my head, but I know that I see if from time to time in change logs.

I don't know if these companies that produce DRM tools license them to publishers on a one time fee basis, or a subscription, or a cost-per-disc basis.
I suspect though that if it's not a one-time cost, that it's not worth it to a publisher to keep paying for DRM after the first few months.

Wolfenstein ! Enemy Teritory. Free quick easy dirty good game. I can always find a good server. Many save XP servers for a good time. I like those. http://files.filefront.com/Wolfenstein+Enemy+Territory/;852002;/fileinfo.html

You mean Classic Doom, available at filefront.com. They only completed the first episode with the arguent that this was the only one released as shareware so they weren't going to be causing as much trouble as if they had done the other episodes.

It's definitely worth a look if you're a fan of the original Doom

At this point nothing of the propaganda generated by EA surprises me. Lets not forget that this is the same company that calls Selling of Used Games a 'Critical Situation,'. Apparently reselling used games is a danger for the business and their profits.

From my point of view crap like this and maleware like DRM software is the true danger to the business. I love computer/video games; and I want to give my money to companies that provide me with entertainment. But this type of policy makes me feel like I am under suspicion for just thinking about buying their product. I can't be bothered selling my old games; though I might give them away if a friend asks nicely.

Since I was a teenager I have exchanged console games, music, books and VHS/DVDs, with my friends. If they give me music I like I buy the record. Though with movies and books we usually just pass it around within our group. Computer games we buy individual copies since we are into Multiplayer and like to play online. However the increased crap thrown at us by the industry has made us reconsider, we have actually returned to our board game roots (or at least playing more board games these days); while there are several factors for this; the draconian rules and stupidity by people like EA is a subject frequently re-visited. Somehow we feel like we are betraying our own principles by buying EA products almost making us consider piracy just so we can play without SecurROM infesting our computers. In fact I know people that have bought games only to download a version of the web for just this reason (not to mention installing and running and image from your Hard-Drive is a tad faster than by CD/DvD).

To conclude; the true treat to the industry and video games in general comes from customer hating companies like EA. Not only are most of the products hyped and pushed by these people crap; we practically have to prove our innocence every step of the way when you want to play one of the products. Even going so far as to installing stuff on your machine that could lead to crashes and sapping resources.

The WoW updater uses a not-so-well modified Official BT client using the standard default BT ports like 6881 the last time I checked. Quite a few ISPs have totally squelched outgoing traffic on that port. Not to mention that the client itself isn't tweaked to the connection it's running on, etc. which can also kill the connection of end users.

It's also pretty safe to say that most players on there probably don't know how to configure their firewall or router either.

I think now you get the idea on why you get crappy rates on that thing.

It's why I just download any game patches from places like FileFront.

If it gets /.'d

http://www.fileplanet.com/182564/180000/fileinfo/Warmonger-Gold-Install-(Free-Game)
http://files.filefront.com/Warmonger+Operation+Downtown+Destruction/;9142023;/fileinfo.html
http://files.totalgamingnetwork.com/file/4835/Warmonger.exe/
http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/863/Warmonger_-_Operation:_Downtown_Destruction_Full_Game.html
http://www.gamershell.com/news_43755.html
http://www.chip.de/downloads/Vollversion-Warmonger_29641300.html

I have quite a few, many of which have someredundancies, but I just don't want to miss out on information :)

They are also cathegorized:

1.) Games
- www.areagames.de - quite decent german gaming site, especially important for local releases
- www.gametrailers.com - a lot of junk I don't care about, but every now and then very good HD vids
- http://news.filefront.com/ (Gaming Today) - Great gaming Feed
- http://sarcasticgamer.com/wp - Often funny, and good comments on things
- http://www.thelastboss.com/ - Was my favorite, giving lots of Vids and stuff, but it seems to be dead since over a year

2.) General Tech
- http://feeds.computerworld.com/Computerworld/News - A little too ITish at times, but great comments and opinions
- http://www.dailytech.com/ - Most of the time the right amout of ITism, but few opinions and trivia
- http://www.chip.de/rss/rss_tests.xml - A lot of reviews on different produkts
- http://slashdot.org/ - Could be more ITish at times, but good general articles make up for that

3.) Handy Stuff (in German mobile = handy, so this is a wordplay)
- http://www.areamobile.de/ - Not so good on the hardware part, but great for knowing releases and new contracts in Germany
- http://feeds.computerworld.com/Computerworld/Handhelds/News - Again good comments and opinions
- http://www.engadgetmobile.com/ - Very good for hardware and some trivia
- http://news.google.com/news?q=i-mate+7150&output=rss - Was looking forward to that device is it looks dead to me...
- http://www.slashphone.com/ - Kind of redundant with Engadget mobile, might get the axe, but still a good feed.

4.) Hardware
- http://www.anythingbutipod.com/ - Good MP3-Player feed, updated seldomely, but is still good
- http://aqua-computer.de/newsfeed_de.rss - A RSS feed of a watercooling company
- http://www.notebookcheck.com/ - Good reviews on new models, updated infrequently
- http://www.notebookjournal.de/rss/notebookjournal_news_feed.xml - Notebook news, updated infrequently
- http://www.notebookjournal.de/rss/notebookjournal_tests_feed.xml - Notebook reviews, very good, updated infrequently
- http://www.notebookreview.com/ - Great page for getting first looks on the new or upcoming top notebooks
- http://www.themp3players.com/ - Also on MP3 player, updated very seldomely
- http://www.hardwarezone.com/ - Good on general hardware (graphics cards and stuff)

5.) Science
- http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/sci/tech/default.stm - Good articles but sometimes too much on legislation and stuff
- http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Science.xml - Also great with some good long interesting articles
- http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/ - A very good quick view on what has been discovered or researched

6.) Stuff
-

right here

Wow! Nice informative links, and well thought out arguments. I guess my real world experiences of not being able to play a turn based game without choppy and distorted graphics on a Toshiba P205-S6337 are completely imaginary.

http://forums.cnet.com/5208-7813_102-0.html?forumID=133&threadID=237419&messageID=2424465

http://www.computing.net/gaming/wwwboard/forum/8832.html

http://forums.filefront.com/company-heroes-general-discussion/301188-why-game-slow-my-comp.html

Oh what the hell, just google games are slow on vista and see the 10+ pages of returns.

Fortunately Portal has a very strong community behind it with some very interesting and challenging custom maps.

http://www.myaperturelabs.com/
http://halflife2.filefront.com/files/Portal/Maps;9887
http://www.thinkingwithportals.com/

(To name a few)

Sure there's a lot of crappy maps - especially some of the older ones when the game first came out - but there's a lot of really good ones that add new game play mechanics like altered gravity fields and unique physics objects. Definitely worth checking out.
=Smidge=

And of course the next guy after you looked at your directory of Python scripts, declared them hopeless, and rewrote them in something else, continuing the cycle.

That could happen, but it wouldn't happen for any lack of making my code clearly readable, maintainable, and extendable by others. It comes down to good practice, and some languages accommodate it better than others. You can do anything in Perl that you can in Python. However, your cost in time and tedium will definitely be higher in most cases beyond the quick 100-line regular expression script.

If you have the PS3 version of Rock Band, then here's how to mod your drum kit:

Step 1: Plug drum kit into PC.

Done. Your PC will detect the PS3 drum kit as a MIDI device.

Check out this link for details for the Xbox-360 version:

http://news.filefront.com/rock-band-drums-for-pc-xbox-360-vs-ps3-kit/

How about an affordable, wearable, 800x600 display that I can use with my broken laptop to turn it into a cyberdeck! a.k.a. a wearable monitor... We don't want to watch movies on the train... We want to kill people! Here's an idea, take a 800x480 (n800 || psp size) lcd w/controller and package it with as little bulk as possible (yes I realize there may be some bulkiness involved) and sell it to us with a webcam that can be used to overlay data on the world and as a multitouch like this dude did with the wiimote Wii-mote Hack Adds Multitouch Without the "Touch"; Now we have a cyberdeck! w/ VR controls! Yes I realize the z800 does this with head tracking but if you could get the form factor of this PMP... OH Baby! I'd bust out the buckz!

A 5 second Google search turned up this - http://news.filefront.com/xbox-360-sells-more-games-per-system-wii-and-ps3-similar/ but I guess that might be too much work to look up.

That is actually not true. You can get to the first star however you want, too. There's no path in any of the levels (apart from very few, like the sledding levels). For some obstacles, there's only one way to negotiate them, but most of the time, you can find your own path to the star.

That evaluates to 14% of the actual money spent. As I've said, heavy gamers are a small part of the market in terms of total money spent. Comparing the "Mass Market Gamers" (which I guess is NPD's term for casual gamers) to the heavies gives the following picture: 2%x13 games = 26 for the heavies (I'm not going to normalize this); 15%x2 games = 30 for the casuals. So the casuals buy more games than the heavies according to this study; and that doesn't even include "casual kids."

Yeah, really. Did you even read that link? The attach rate for the Wii and PS3 are about equal, and both are about half the 360's attach rate; which makes sense, because the 360 was on the market twice as long, and thus gamers had twice as much time to buy games. As I've said, the Wii's attach rate suggests that most casual gamers will buy quite a bunch of games.

You just gotta look past the titles. Ive been content playing the Forgotten Hope mod for the battlefield 1942 engine for a while now, and it will soon have a version out for Battlefield 2, which will be nice to swap between with something like Project Reality. There are people out there who actually care about gameplay more than what the annoying lowest common denominator wants. Sure the graphics arent quite as good as say Crysis, but it looks good enough, and with 64 players, these games can be intense.

Some BF2 mods for those who havent looked:
WWII as it's meant to be played (coming soon)...
http://forgottenhope.filefront.com/main.php?module=&lang=english&flash=yes&mod=

Intense, team-based, and tactical (available)...
http://www.realitymod.com/

Great fun (available)...
http://www.bfpirates.com/

Here's a faster (for me) mirror:

filefront.com

Here's the list: http://news.filefront.com/its-official-sony-confirms-sixaxis-rumble/

"...perhaps a selection of DIY PDF pamphlets which you print out yourself and carry through security, with titles like 'These Security Measures Aren't Doing Much For Your Public Relations, You Know' and 'Could You Work Harder At Making This Screening Process More Efficient And Effective Please?'

Sort of like a bug report."

And then:

"Here's a selection of DIY pamphlets:

[Link]

Why not make your own, print out some open source book you've been wanting to read? A flight, and the necessary long wait in a security line, is the perfect opportunity."

Here is the story:

"Wacky Jacky is currently suing the mediator, Judge Dava Tunis, along with the Florida Supreme Court and the Florida Bar.

Thompson's reasons for subpoenaing The President are a bit esoteric and would make great fodder for an X-Files episode or anything else in the realm of conspiracy theories and Science Fiction. This bit of paranoia stems from the "nefarious" Blank Rome law firm, which represents the defendants in the Strickland vs. Sony lawsuit where an 18-year old in Alabama was allegedly under the influence of Grand Theft Auto when he murdered two police officers and a police dispatcher in 2004. Apparently, the "evil" Blank Rome firm are lobbyists as well as Republican donors and Thompson believes that the law firm was the main culprit in having him thrown off the case by an Alabama Circuit Court judge in November, 2005.

The Bar complaints filed by Judge Tunis are in relation to this case and Thompson's conduct when he failed to have Bully declared a public nuisance last October." [ Gaming Today - Sept. 7, 2007]

Ahh Wacky Jacky.... When will you ever learn that the world hates you and these donkey shows amount to nothing?

_____
"A little violence never killed anybody!"

If you have Half-Life 2 then you can play the Exite Mod which has a "Portal Gun" and you open portals just like in Portal. I am pretty sure its legit because its been up for months if not a year now and its really fun! http://halflife2.filefront.com/file/HalfLife_2_Exi tE_Mod;70107 Only downside is sometimes on my computer I fall through the floor forever falling into the void or it crash's. But most of the time it runs great!

http://files.filefront.com/Ghostbusters/;6357091;/ fileinfo.html

I didn't enjoy it quite as much but that's because somethings seem different than what I remember of the game play. Anyone else try this remake? Would love to get opinions on this.

It had the first bots that you could play against for hours and not even notice you were offline.

I spent probably 6 years messing around with the original UT's AI, on and off. I never felt like I was playing human players for a moment, but it was possible to get them to do some interesting things. One thing I was able to do in a map I put together was create around four different routes to the flag, and then fill that with alternatepath nodes with different weights such that their path selection was at least somewhat random, and would use underwater routes as well, so they'd come into the flagbase from a few different directions...that added to realism. Turns out FileFront got a copy of the map somehow, so you can grab it here if you're interested...I don't think anyone else has ever downloaded it. ;) I was trying to create a scenario where a bot would follow one particular path for a certain distance, and then actually change to another in transit. I think to some degree I got them to do it.

UT's AI was actually fairly limited in some respects...it didn't handle underwater areas well, and it also had no dynamic ability whatsoever...anywhere that didn't get covered with nodes didn't exist as far as it was concerned. I could never get the translocator to work with it in the first game, either...no matter what I did, the bots wouldn't use it properly.

Where I was able to really make the AI more interesting was when I downloaded some modifications for the game, primarily Bullet Time, MatrixMoves, and Unreal4Ever. Bullet Time meant that I could essentially turn the bots into the equivalent of the Agents from The Matrix. Unreal4Ever was primarily a weapons pack, and the most interesting thing about that was that some of the weapons did work with Bullet Time, and some of them didn't. That meant that you had the effect of a Matrix-like environment with some weird glitches; it might seem odd, but that actually added to the surrealism of the environment rather than detracting from it. The reason why is that it meant you had to adapt specific tactics not only in order to avoid certain weapons, but also to kill the bots if they were using bullet time as well. They could dodge bullets, but not explosions. They were also actually able to dodge such things as acid clouds and individual flames to a limited degree.

I also found various maps and renovated them somewhat; for example, there was this really awesome Stargate themed map, but the Stargates in it were connected via teleporters. I took the teleporters out, and rebuilt the gates so that they used WarpZones, a feature of the game which made the gates in the map function identically to the gates in the film/tv show in the sense that you could walk right up to the event horizon and through it, and you could also shoot through it and throw projectiles through it as well.

Fun stuff.

5. What about griefing? There's always idiots that do that. How do we deal with them?

America's Army has the best solution to that - the in-game Army Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth.. "If a player violates enough ROE he is transported to a virtual jail cell at Fort Leavenworth with nothing to do but clink against the bars, pondering his sins. As if to create remorse, one can view the tip of a sunset from the lone, high window the cell but only if one is standing on the toilet."

Yeah, we have "hemvärnet" aswell, althought I have no idea how large any of our military stuff is nowadays. I think we are down to little over 200 airplanes to begin with.
The swedish defence whatever informs me that Hemvärnet got around 40.000 people of which 1.500 is musicans ;)
Well, atleast our subs kicks american ass ;/

Bridge Commander becomes a lot more than okay when you start adding free mods that enhance the Quick Battle mode.

Start with NanoFX--among other things, damage to warp engines now appear as plasma trails instead of "smoke in space."

Granted, many mods are visual improvments to stock ship models and effects, or add new ships. Some others though allow beaming to an allied ship, or separating saucer (and other, if available) sections during combat.

Actually, I have to confess I've never played the "normal" game; it's always been Quick Battle with mods. It's a great tactical game using capital ships that move like the monsters they are.

Bridge Commander becomes a lot more than okay when you start adding free mods that enhance the Quick Battle mode.

Start with NanoFX--among other things, damage to warp engines now appear as plasma trails instead of "smoke in space."

Granted, many mods are visual improvments to stock ship models and effects, or add new ships. Some others though allow beaming to an allied ship, or separating saucer (and other, if available) sections during combat.

Actually, I have to confess I've never played the "normal" game; it's always been Quick Battle with mods. It's a great tactical game using capital ships that move like the monsters they are.

Demo version? End of October?

How about now?

I suspect the demo version is simply the retail version without a key - the emergency-download-mirrors email I was sent by Introversion a few minutes ago has FileFront as one of the mirrors. Download from there if you like - I guess the other mirrors are equally public...

It's kinda been done as a mod for Prey.

With the right mods, players can "do" portals to levels in Prey too.

The full 15 minute version of the trailer is even better.
(Still not worth 600+ though ;))

Currently, Dawn of War has some single player problems, I'll admit. Which is a pity, because graphically and thematically it is a great game. I haven't had a chance to play with the AI mod lately so I'm not sure how much improved it is from a previous build I played.

Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul

Does a bunch of good stuff, but most importantly it gets rid of that stupid level scaling thing.

I've been involved in some debates over that, and I still maintain its dumb, mostly as it provides no sense of accomplishment to leveling or getting better items or anything.

I was one of the lucky thousand or so attendees there. It was pretty exhilerating seeing the future plans for this game. I uploaded all my pictures in a zipped file to my FileFront account:
http://files.filefront.com/Fan_Festival_Pictureszi p/;4887263;;/fileinfo.html

You can also browse some pictures uploaded to my xs.to account:
http://xs.to/albums/114206161816073712224927.html

Finally, I have a commentary I was updating semi-live on Allakhazam:
http://ffxi.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=10;mid =1141871674105963075;num=524;page=1

Actually their being sued by Konami because they made In the Groove 1 installable on DDR cabinents.

Also iamchris4life is every bit as good at arrow stompy games as Kevbo (can't find a single video site for him) is.