Preview of id Software's Rage

id Software's upcoming shooter Rage is nearing its Oct. 4 release, and the company recently provided some hands-on time with the game in its current state. GiantBomb described it thus: "In those three hours, I discovered a first-person shooter. Also, a racing game. And a car combat game. And an open-world adventure. A collectible card came, too. Lastly, it's practically every piece of apocalyptic science fiction we have known to date tossed into a blender, set to puree, poured onto a disc, and spread evenly over a seemingly lengthy and elaborate single-player adventure. In short, Rage is a kitchen sink kind of game, the kind so often labeled as 'missed potential' due to a lack of focus on any one particular aspect. I don't think Rage will garner any such labels." Rock, Paper, Shotgun's write-up is a bit more poetic, providing a first-person preview of the first-person shooter.

Comments

id color palette

[derGoldstein]

From the in-game videos released so far, the game looks fantastic. But it still has the same color scheme that id (and many other companies) have decided must haunt FPSs since the early 90's: grey, brown, beige, and some chrome. I get that it's part of the environment, but at least some departure would have been nice.

Re:id color palette

[ledow]

Really? That's like complaining that horror movies take place mostly at night, or cartoons aimed at young girls are mostly pink.

Even since the original Quake, I never understood the concern - those who were playing it at the time never complained about the palette until much later, if at all - and still don't know. It's a post-apocalyptic, dust-track racer. What colour did you *EXPECT* to see? Even if you had the ruins of something-or-other-colourful, it would be dust-covered and aged by the time the game is set.

If the biggest complaint you have is a steampunk colour scheme (because that's exactly what it is), then I really pity you for not seeing through atmospheric environments like that.

What, exactly, would you suggest you see in a post-apocalyptic world that would be colourful? Who's got time to paint the fence-posts when you're being shot at and chasing food / energy and NOBODY is making paint?

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed, but brownbloom is what many console users especially have come to expect from FPS' so there is considerable inertia behind it. Also it's probably a speed optimisation, particularly important since Rage runs on iOS - it looks like using such a restricted washed-out palette would allow you to get away with 16-bit textures and lighting. (Quake is almost entirely grey and brown because it gets by with a mere 8 bits.)

Re:id color palette

[derGoldstein]

Maybe I should re-word my complaint that FPSs tend to take place where the brown-grey-beige color scheme is prevalent. I realize that Portal isn't technically an FPS, but in Portal 2 you have (at least) two separate aesthetics. For an exceptional example of creative environment design, check out the trailers/videos for BioShock Infinite.

The brown-grey palette just gets boring after a while. You'd think that it would *especially* get boring for the developers, who sometimes have to spend years in that environment. This is a game in which you can strap a bomb on an RC car, throw a boomerang-like weapon, or upgrade your weapons in countless ways. It's not like they lack creativity. And yet so far the only environments within the game (that I've seen, anyway) are the same dust-dirt-rust that's typical of the genre.

Even if it's post-apocalyptic, you could find excuses that some structures survived. Possibly underground. I'm not looking for a rainforest, but there's no reason for all the indoor environments to look the same.

Re:id color palette

[PC and Sony Fanboy]

The brown-grey palette just gets boring after a while.

Good thing X-com is being rebooted (as Xcom) ... in the cheery 1950s.

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

it looks like using such a restricted washed-out palette would allow you to get away with 16 color textures and lighting.

There, fixed that for you.

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

Really? That's like complaining that horror movies take place mostly at night, or cartoons aimed at young girls are mostly pink.

Those are perfectly cromulent complaints.

Re:id color palette

[c0mpliant]

UFO Alien Invasion is probably a better reboot of Xcom in fairness

Re:id color palette

[Lumpy]

I am guessing he wants a FPS world that is like the Eye bleeding that you got with the Speed Racer movie...

Re:id color palette

[spearsjc]

The soothing palette of World of Padman awaits you.

Re:id color palette

[derGoldstein]

Actually, I'm willing to make the opposite complaint about Nintendo games. Like PaRappa the Rapper. How much LSD were the people who designed that on? It's like they omitted the saturation dimension from the the hue/saturation/lightness space.

Re:id color palette

[derGoldstein]

Like I said above -- see BioShock Infinite.
The Speed Racer movie is best watched under the influence (of all sorts of things...).

Re:id color palette

[YojimboJango]

The "Mostly brown and grey" argument always bothered me, so I'd like you to run a one man experiment for me. Stop reading and look around you. Count the instances of grey, and browns around you. When you get back compare with my results.

I sit at a wood desk (brown) with a hutch that has grey tack board. The walls are beige (grey and brown mixed), the carpet here is brown and beige patterned. There is wood coloured (brown) trim on the walls. My keyboard and monitor are black, so there's a difference, but not towards the direction of adding colour.

Now I want you to compare your results, and imagine how a developer at ID software, perpetually locked in their cubicle, would do. Think on that.

Now consider: Id is based in Mesquite, Texas. I'm not familiar with Mesquite personally, but the last time I drove through Texas even the grass was brown. When the creative talent at Id are allowed to leave their brown and grey boxes, they walk outside to a world where grass is also brown and the concrete is grey. It being Texas I'm sure that there is a high probability for guns and ammo crates to be found littered around the landscape.

You see it's not that they lack the creative talent to do colour. It's that after years of being locked in a brown and grey cube, with only brief access to a brown and grey world outside, it's the only two colours they can comprehend. It's a disability, and making fun of them for it is intolerance.

You intolerant jerk.

Re:id color palette

[kvezach]

Even since the original Quake, I never understood the concern - those who were playing it at the time never complained about the palette until much later, if at all - and still don't know. It's a post-apocalyptic, dust-track racer. What colour did you *EXPECT* to see? Even if you had the ruins of something-or-other-colourful, it would be dust-covered and aged by the time the game is set.

First there was Quake. Quake was brown because of technology limitations. Then there was Unreal. Unreal wasn't brown: it even played on the "dank environment" trope by making the first level dark and machine-like, then surprising the player once he got out of there. Half-Life was less brown than Quake, too. So why does every modern FPS have to have the same limited postapocalyptic palette?

Oh well. Hopefully there will be some non-brown areas - like the place with the mutant in Fallout 3.

Re:id color palette

[drinkypoo]

If you live in Texas you can still find color. You're never far from a Hooters. Or some kind of ethnic fair...

Re:id color palette

[GameboyRMH]

Apart from id's own games that color scheme is not that prevalent. I think we all just had more than our fill of it in the '90s so that when we see it come back in Doom 3 or Dead Space or something we immediately say "Oh not this shit again!"

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know... Bulletstorm is pretty bright and colorful.

Re:id color palette

[PopeRatzo]

What colour did you *EXPECT* to see?

Do you really believe that in a post-apocalyptic world the sun never shines? That every day will be dark and cloudy? Even in a nuclear winter, there will be the occasional sunny day.

At least Fallout 3 New Vegas didn't fall into that trap. Stuff might look a little broken and neglected, but it doesn't have to look so dinghy.

Re:id color palette

[Hsien-Ko]

It's mostly due to colormapping. Quake's palette was arranged in a 16x16 fashion. Try doing atmospheric lighting with 15 gradients of colors + a row of non-shaded colors. It's also kind of a lost cause for colored lighting in that limitation too. Believe me, I tried - the only good color lighting shades on 8bpp come in piss yellow and period red. (This would have sent Pentiums to hell by the way, even if you send that wizard Abrash to knock out x86 asm surfmipblocks for colored lighting)

Also there's been colorless games before Quake's released existence. MechWarrior 2's a good one. Entire palettes are dedicated to rendering the whole level a certain shade of color. No one ever called them out on it though...

Serious Sam is even dropping its trademark color for the third game.

Re:id color palette

[ledow]

A post-apocalyptic world caused by an asteroid strike powerful enough to wipe out 80% of the population (as culled from the "plot" section of the game on Wikipedia)? Yes. It's what we think killed the dinosaurs, for instance, dust-clouds that blocked the sun and covered the planet for millennia.

And, failing that, just because there might be some place that's colourful in real life, it doesn't mean that every fecking game has to use it's HDR to the full and represent every colour "just because" when they are going for a particular look / feel. Hell, no game should use a feature "just because we can". Do you complain that Aliens was dark (because LV426, you know, "would have had" discos and bars and neon lights and strip joints, etc.) or that Predator was "green" (because jungles have coloured plants, and the alien could be multi-coloured....)? It's a ridiculous assertion to make.

It's *still* the point that you expect it "just because", whereas the game is designed from the ground up to represent one particular kind of atmospheric surrounding. Hell, even on the trailers it's no more bland than any other game (and Quake had lava, doncherknow, and stained glass). Putting something colourful in just because you haven't seen a lot of colour yet is not the way to design a game - that's called crowbarring in things that people think "should" be in a game when, actually, if you weren't looking for them NOBODY would have noticed.

Re:id color palette

[Ephemeriis]

Really? That's like complaining that horror movies take place mostly at night, or cartoons aimed at young girls are mostly pink.

Worse still is the fact that it doesn't really apply.

I mean... I guess maybe ID does like browns and greys. I can't say I've ever really noticed the color palette that much. But they aren't the only folks making first-person shooters.

The Unreal games have always had a fairly vibrant color scheme. Hell, the original Unreal game had some downright psychedelic vistas. And, depending on the map you had loaded, the Unreal Tournament games were similarly vibrant.

Then there were titles like Serious Sam, and Far Cry, and Crysis that all had pretty vibrant color schemes.

Games like Half-Life and Duke Nukem weren't exactly vibrant... But I wouldn't call them predominantly grey/brown either.

Re:id color palette

[parlancex]

That's a compelling argument, but a lot of people play games to escape reality. That said, if anyone gets to own the dark brown/grey/chrome atmosphere it's ID and they can do whatever they want, and maybe that is the atmosphere of their game, however, to say too many games have (pointlessly) copied that atmosphere is a legitimate complaint.

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you really that fscking stupid?

Re:id color palette

[scubamage]

There have been a number of colorful FPS's: No One Lives Forever, Far Cry, Half Life (the XEN levels), just to name a few. There are a lot that stick with the dingy color scheme but typically they tend to be post-apocolyptic or space styled games which find the player in dingy, uncared for environments.

Re:id color palette

[Kell Bengal]

Quake was brown because of technology limitations.

That's rubbish. In the 90s we have 16-something million colours to play with - from every part of the spectrum. There was absolutely nothing stopping them from using different colours with their engine, as exemplified by the original Team Fortress. They simply chose to go with the same decrepit sci fi-fantasy theme that has been Id's bread and butter since Doom. And yes, Doom had colour too, occasionally, but still mostly brown. The predominant use of brown was a stylistic decision entirely removed from limitations of technology.

Re:id color palette

[morari]

Portal, seriously? You'd rather have a color scheme of white, silver, and blue? Portal is about as bland as you can get as far as color palettes go. I suppose the sequel added in some green and brown though, didn't it? Of course, Portal is supposed to be bland looking. I assume that's why they had to add in the ruined areas in the second... to be able to add details of some kind.

Bioshock Infinite does appear to have a very wide color palette. But you know what? The game also looks quite cartoony from a stylistic standpoint. I don't think that cartoony would go over as well for Rage given the tone. It may be post-apocalyptic, but it's not Borderlands.

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

*whoosh*

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

The original Quake 1 release needed to use VGA palette ranges for lighting and animation performance, dumbass. Read some Abrash, then post.

Re:id color palette

[Kell Bengal]

Then explain all the colourful mods that use that engine. Really. I'd like to know why third party developers can have colour, but the original engine developers can't.

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

Even since the original Quake, I never understood the concern - those who were playing it at the time never complained about the palette until much later, if at all

You must not have been around to hear me complain that Quake had fewer colors than my monochrome Game Boy. Quake looked like crap compared to the colorful worlds of Duke3d, Doom, Wolf3d, Ken's Labyrinth, and even Catacomb Abyss. Ultima Underworld could get away with everything looking like dirt and stone because you spent the entire game in an underground dungeon, but even it brightened up the environment with color in places. Quake's limited color palette was awful compared to its competition at the time. I assumed it was a limitation of the new 3-D technology, but it's a solved problem by now. Late '90s 3-D shooters Sin and Half-Life had colorful worlds.

Re:id color palette

[cheekyjohnson]

That's like complaining that horror movies take place mostly at night, or cartoons aimed at young girls are mostly pink.

That's like expressing a particular opinion. I don't see the problem with any of them.

What, exactly, would you suggest you see in a post-apocalyptic world that would be colourful?

That depends on who you ask.

Re:id color palette

[IrquiM]

It takes place in Arizona!

Re:id color palette

[Artifakt]

To be fair, the lava was red, the acid, acid green (or that was very mean algae in those ponds). I seem to remember some very brightly hued things, all of which killed your character quite efficiently. And there were some levels where a bluish gray predominated. One fourth of Q1 was the Medieval style levels, and by all accounts that whole era in the real world was brown all the time, so maybe they can claim historical accuracy. ;-) Quake 2 actually was better - there were levels where the Stroggs had things lit up with a thousand points of blue white laser communications grids, throbbing power-plants, and display screens to where it was often quite pretty. All too many fans criticized that, in effect demanding more brown whether that's what they meant or not. In the same way, there were reviewers and players who criticized the stained glass windows in Hexen.
        Just as a guestimate, a quarter of the posts on this thread will involve somebody complaining in such a way that, if the company actually listens to those complaints and does exactly what they imply should be done, the complainer will still end up very disappointed that they got exactly what they asked for.

Re:id color palette

[Reapman]

Quake matured quite a bit over the years. From what I remember the original wasn't even 3D Accelerated - there were ports of the engine to various techs such as what 3DFX was using at the time. By the time Half Life came around (it was using Quake 1 I think, maybe Quake 2's engine..) the engine was probably far advanced beyond the original one.

Quake 1 to me stands as one of the UGLIEST games ever but also a very important game for the industry. I still remember playing the demo and thinking the weapons were probably just stand in's, never expecting that those WERE the final weapons. It's part of the reason why to this day I still fire up Doom from time to time but never Quake 1..

Re:id color palette

[scumdamn]

Ethnic people are usually a shade of brown.

Re:id color palette

[drinkypoo]

Yes, but brown people who have more than mud to work with like to paint things in bright colors. Viva Mexico!

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

In Texas they tolerate two kinds of ethnicities: Country AND Western.

Re:id color palette

[ildon]

Everyone who calls Portal/Portal 2 a first person shooter is an idiot. There, I said it.

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

What I don't understand is the complete fixation on desert landscapes with nothing BUT stark desert landscapes. Even in pretty harsh deserts the people and settlements are clustered around oases with bits of vegetation and a water supply. Deserts vary a lot in character. When humans live in desert areas they cause the landscape to vary even more (they build dams, channels, and other irrigation systems). Putting a town in the middle of fricking nowhere with no water or plants other than a few cactus isn't realistic. But I guess it is an easy-to-construct 3D model if you put a town on a plain with tumbleweed and a few hills in the background.

Hell, if you've ever been to a desert after a rainstorm, it can be positively positively brilliant with colorful flowers. There are dunes. There are playas. There are even lakes (although the water might be too salty to be drinkable). There's so much diversity to desert terrain and vegetation that there's no excuse for making it 100% brown, grey, and boring. Same for the settlements. Somewhere like Petra in its heyday would be cool to walk around in. I swear, these people need to get out and see more of the real world before trying to model it.

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

You haven't seen some of the underground environments then. There's a city lit in brilliantly colored neon lights, for one.

As for me, me and my money will wait 'till there's a linux port.

Re:id color palette

[CharlyFoxtrot]

Man, I used to love "UFO: Enemy Unknown" on my Amiga. What's this version like, is it feature complete ?

Re:id color palette

[PopeRatzo]

Putting something colourful in just because you haven't seen a lot of colour yet is not the way to design a game

I disagree. The most impressive and enjoyable thing about FPS game design is when a sense of space is conveyed. Open space, with varied light. One of the best games I've ever seen in this regard is the first Far Cry, which actually made the player feel like his character existed in real space. One of the worst games in this regard is the entire Mass Effect series, in which everything is lit like a shopping mall where every other bulb is burned out. You never feel like there is a sky above you. I realize the game takes place mostly inside a ship, but that's even more reason why the outdoor scenes needed to have light and space.

Fallout 3 is a good series in this regard. Also, Burnout Paradise was excellent in conveying the passage of time though the use of sunlight. When you've gone through 8 hours of gameplay, the light should look different. Reflections should look different. Colors look a lot different. Afternoon does not look like morning. Morning does not look like midnight. It's not enough just to change the gamma value when day turns to night.

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

90's? Have you not played Fallout 3?

Re:id color palette

[leathered]

Agreed. Quake II (the game resposible for the loss of 2 years of my life) took quite a bit of flak for the dirty brown look but I loved it. Stroggos was supposed to be a dirty, opressive environment and the color scheme helped captured it perfectly.

Re:id color palette

[nschubach]

Actually the ruins in Portal 2 are more of the fact that the core was shutdown and nobody maintained the equipment. Also, you "blew the place up" in the Portal 1.

As far as adding color... look at the outcry on Diablo3. Some people hate the "cartoony look" of it and want it to be more "grim/dark" I recently watched a ton of videos and I personally don't think it's that bad, but it hurts me to go back and play Diablo2 because of the graininess of the pixels and lack of color contrast at times. (I'm not getting into a rant on how your memory of an experience will always be better than playing it again... I don't retro-game for that reason.)

Re:id color palette

[nschubach]

I see you make comments on how lighting should reflect the time of day... and it makes me curious what your standpoint is for games that make nighttime like a "blue day" instead of making the world dark.

Re:id color palette

[nschubach]

Well, there's one thing we actually don't know: What a post apocalyptic world looks like. Developers/Designers take creative license to the look and feel of it.

On the contrary, we do know that a field that was just burnt looks like. We also know that it will sprout up a green lush field of grass (if there was grass in the field beforehand...) after a few weeks feeding off the debris of the fire. If there was no grass, you're going to get a bleak looking grey/brown/tan look.

This is why that palette is chosen, if you ask me. It portrays massive loss of life to the player. If the fields were all populated with lush green grasses the player may think that the world will be alright if they just let nature do it's thing. Earth tones make the player think they need to correct this problem before it spreads and more.

Re:id color palette

[EsbenMoseHansen]

UFO: AI feels ... different. I'd say in a good way, but don't expect an exact copy.

Re:id color palette

[cheekyjohnson]

Not everyone plays games for realism (or think that it improves the game). I don't really have a problem with the palette, but not everyone agrees, and they aren't necessarily wrong for doing so.

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see any brown, beige or grey in this, do you?

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/images/11/aug/rage/rage5.jpg

Some people love to bitch about anything.

Re:id color palette

[I(rispee_I(reme]

PaRappa the Rapper was not a Nintendo Game. It was a PlayStation game published by Sony Computer Entertainment.

Perhaps you meant to use the Super Mario Bros. series for your example?

Re:id color palette

[PopeRatzo]

and it makes me curious what your standpoint is for games that make nighttime like a "blue day" instead of making the world dark.

It's sort of like the way film directors in the black and white era used to make "night" by putting a filter over the lens. It didn't look anything like night time, but it was at least a bit of a change to cue the viewer to the time of day.

As beautiful as Assassin's Creed 2 and AC Brotherhood have been made, when night falls, it just looks like an overcase day at best. No change in shadows, very little in the way of artificial light (like lanterns, candles, etc which were used in that period extensively).

I think it's probably pretty hard to create a convincing computer graphics representation of night time, but one would think that a better job could be done. F.E.A.R. 3 isn't bad in this regard, but I can't think of many games that do a good job in this.

Re:id color palette

[scumdamn]

I'm just going to leave this here. http://www.brookwoodconstruction.net/what-are-adobe-houses-and-where-are-these-suitable/

Re:id color palette

[Internetuser1248]

From the in-game videos released so far, the game looks fantastic. But it still has the same color scheme that id (and many other companies) have decided must haunt FPSs since the early 90's: grey, brown, beige, and some chrome. I get that it's part of the environment, but at least some departure would have been nice. -- Entomologically speaking, the spider is not a bug, it's a feature.

Two things: firstly, if you damage your graphics card in just the right way, or unpack the game's archives and mess with the texture files, you can have psychedelic rainbow colours. Would that suit you better?

Secondly, entomology is the study of insects, spiders are not insects. Possible corrections to the sig: "Arthropodologically/Arachnidologically Speaking..." or "Entomologically speaking, the spider is not a subject worthy of study."

Please excuse my pedantry

Re:id color palette

[c0mpliant]

Oh man PaRappa the Rapper! I played the shit out of the demo of that...

Kick punch its all in the mind, if you want to test me, I'm sure you'll find, the things I teach ya, are sure to beat ya, never the less you'll get a lesson from teacher now Kick!

Re:id color palette

[camazotz]

For an example of post apocalypse with some color that works quite well, I offer you Enslaved: Journey to the West. That said, I am in total agreement with you: keep yer damn "colors" out of my Fallouts and Rages and Borderlands. And get off my damn lawn!

Re:id color palette

[Anonymous Coward]

lol it's a valid complaint, numb-nuts

Bethesda has competition?

[Aladrin]

I've played Bethesda's last few games (and the one licensed to a third party, but using their engine) for 200+ hours each.

Rage sounds a lot of like the last couple Fallout games, but without the VATS system. I am SO hoping that's the case... And if they manage to make it even better, I'm going to be in heaven. (I actually like the VATS system, but only use it about 1/3 of the time in combat, so it's not like I'll miss it horribly.)

I'm a little sad that it's coming out only a month before Skyrim, though. If I get 200+ hours from it, that'll mean that both games are competing for my attention at some point.

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[rbrausse]

as I never heart of VATS (and I'm sure I'm not alone):

VATS is "Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System", where you can pause the game and target specific enemy body parts.

PS the first Googlöe result page is full of articles about lobectomy, in this case the abbreviation means "video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery"

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[c0mpliant]

I don't heart VATS either, much prefer to aim myself

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[Aladrin]

My mistake. I didn't feel like trying to explain it, and I assumed everyone would know what it was.

That is indeed correct. VATS was an attempt to hold over the strategy aspect of Fallout 1 & 2 while still having a first person shooter-style game.

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[Assmasher]

Personally, I live the slow-mo head shots... :)

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[c0mpliant]

I did initially, but it slowed the pace of combat too much for my liking. Maybe if the last enemy in a group of enemies was to have a slow-mo that would be ok, but it was way too often for my liking. Even the use of VATS I found intrusive. In the middle of a mad epic gun fight and then suddenly "... pause... ok I'll select that guy... shoot twice... and go.." Didn't feel right

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[yahwotqa]

Nobody forced you to use VATS. A friend of mine finished the game without ever using it (at least that's what he says, I didn't stand behind him all the time :) ).

"Oh no, there is a completely optional feature that I do not have use at all, but it completely ruins the game for me." - I don't get you people.

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[c0mpliant]

Nobody said anything about it ruining the game, I simply said I didn't like VATS and prefered not to use it

"Oh no a comment on slashdot, I wont bother reading the full contents of it, I'll just look at some individual words and jump to whatever conclusion/subject I want to rant about" - I don't get you people

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[MattSausage]

You do realize that if they had left VATS out they would have been completely eviscerated by the Fallout community right?

Fallout 1 and 2 weren't FPSs, but VATS was a HUGE part of the fiction, and the fact they were able to incorporate it into a FPS was one of the most impressive things about Fallout 3 when it came out.

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[randizzle3000]

What do you mean, you people?

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[Osgeld]

how do you even play fallout3 without vats, you can dump 6 clips into a super mutant and still not take him down, but it might be 5 shots in vats with a souped up SMG

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[Sorny]

Try using the right weapon weapon; no, an SMG is not the right weapon to use against the super-mutants.

Use the right tool for the job. To kill super-mutants, you want a long rifle of some sort (hunting rifle, sniper rifle, etc.), or energy weapons (Plasma/LASER), or a gatling gun. Missile launchers and mini-nukes also work well. Me, I just went to the plasma rifles and turned the muties into piles of goo with 1 or 2 headshots, VASTS or not.

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[chonglibloodsport]

Huh? There is no mention of VATS whatsoever prior to Fallout 3. It was retroactively inserted into the fiction by Bethesda.

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[WuphonsReach]

VATS issues were more one of "sometimes it glitches and takes forever to play the animation" or "sometimes it glitches and buries the body in the terrain".

I used it a lot at first, but over time started using it less and less and just started aiming for the center of mass and squeezing off a burst of automatic fire. Or dug out the trusty sniper rifle and did it the easy way.

(One thing that Fallout New Vegas got right was the notch in weapon condition where your weapon would perform exactly as expected above that level of condition. In FO:3, you constantly had to carry spare sniper rifles and spare assault rifles to deal with a weapon that became incredibly ineffective below 75% condition.)

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[WuphonsReach]

Weapon skills, a weapon near prefect condition and aiming at the weak points.

Regular super mutants die easily, the brutes are a bit harder but a well maintained Chinese Assault Rifle still slices them up.

Overlords and behemoths require tenderizing first with the use of frag mines, grenades, bottlecap mines.

(Things were actually better balanced in New Vegas - the sad thing is that Obsidian doesn't grasp the concept of "open world" so New Vegas was extremely linear.)

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[MattSausage]

Not sure if serious....

Very well, it may not have had a name.. but the functionality was there. I've played both games in the last year thanks to GOG.com... and they were just as fun as I remember them.

Re:Bethesda has competition?

[Osgeld]

good to know I had not played new Vegas yet, I am kind of slow getting these things done

iD software is Bethesda now

[Sycraft-fu]

ZeniMax Media, Bethesda's parent shell company, purchased iD back in 2009. While Rage was for sure developed by iD, and likely without a lot of Bethesda input (dates aside, iD is in Texas, Bethesda is in Maryland as the name implies) it is now all the same company so not really competition.

I would imagine Rage, or rather the engine behind it, is the reason Bethesda wanted to buy iD. Bethesda has been using Gamebryo for their games but development on that has more or less stopped and of course it isn't their engine so they have to pay license fees on it. I image they liked what they saw of iD Tech 5 in Rage and decided it would be good to have that engine as their own, along with the development staff for it.

If the game is also their kind of open world games, well makes all the more sense.

Re:iD software is Bethesda now

[Aladrin]

Ah, interesting. I've heard rumors that they're ditching Gamebryo for Skyrim... I wonder if it's the same engine as Rage? That would give me even more hope for Rage being a game I'll love.

As glitchy as Gamebryo was, Bethesda did a great job of using it. The game was also so good that I was willing to forgive glitches and crashes.

Re:iD software is Bethesda now

[sparrowhead]

No, it isn't. I am quite certain, that in an interview (think it was on Gametrailers.com's E3 coverage) they said the engine for Skyrim was developped in house. For now Rage is the only game using the engine called "id Tech 5".

Re:iD software is Bethesda now

[gman003]

Bethesda is not "really" ditching Gamebryo. They are saying that it's a "new engine", but also that it's directly evolved from Oblivion's engine. So they're really just going from Gamebryo X.0 to Gamebryo X.1 (or maybe Gamebryo (X+1).0).

They have said that using Rage's engine for Skyrim would be impossible. Level sizes are too small.

Re:iD software is Bethesda now

[morari]

I would imagine Rage, or rather the engine behind it, is the reason Bethesda wanted to buy iD.

We can only hope. With an iD engine behind them, I have high hopes for future Fallout and Elder Scrolls titles.

Re:iD software is Bethesda now

[ildon]

I recall reading an interview where they specifically said Skyrim was not based on Gamebryo. Although I supposed it could be like a Quake engine -> Source engine type of deal. Take a licensed engine as your base, and slowly replace every facet of it until you can claim it's your own.

Re:iD software is Bethesda now

[LingNoi]

I think you're getting confused here. Bethesda Game Studios that makes Fallout and Oblivion isn't Bethesda Softworks that bought Id software.

Bethesda Softworks is a game publisher. Bethesda Game Studios is a game studio. Both are separate companies that share a similar name, so although Bethesda Softworks may license their technology out to Bethesda Game Studios they didn't purchase Id software to give to Bethesda Game Studios it's technology.

I just hope it works well on ATi cards

[Sycraft-fu]

Rage is, of course, iD Tech 5 and one big complaint I have about iD Tech 4 is that it does not work so well on ATi cards. I don't mean it doesn't function, I mean it tends to be much slower than on nVidia cards.

This isn't only self interest as right now I have an ATi card, though historically I tend to own nVidia cards, I like them better and will probably move back, but in terms of seeing more games using it. ATi cards are quite popular these days and no wonder why, they've had some real good performance for the money offerings. Thus if iD Tech 5 doesn't run well on them, developers may give it a miss.in favour of other engines (like, say Unreal Engine) that work well on both.

Re:I just hope it works well on ATi cards

[Anonymous Coward]

I've always found ATI Rage chips work well on servers, but before I stopped buying ATI stuff 10 years ago, there was never any certainty tha recent ATI hardware would actually work at all. I can't count how many hours/days I've lost, over the years, trying to configure ATI products. I still have a capture card that, for all I know, never actually received functional Windows drives. Having migrated to Linux over a decade ago has not improved ATI's chances of ending up in any of my workstations.
nVidia has shone through, in this respect, for a long time. Even when I dual boot, their cards are configured with a minimal amount of effort, in either Win or Lin.

Re:I just hope it works well on ATi cards

[Anonymous Coward]

why would your server need a graphics card?

Re:I just hope it works well on ATi cards

[PC and Sony Fanboy]

why would your server need a graphics card?

Yes, why would your server need a cheap but massively powerful parallel computing platform?

Re:I just hope it works well on ATi cards

[zget]

Because it's much faster to calculate certain things with GPU than with CPU. Servers also do other stuff than just host websites, you know.

Re:I just hope it works well on ATi cards

[Anonymous Coward]

He specifically said ATI Rage chips 10 years ago. I somehow doubt he was using it as a GPGPU.

Re:I just hope it works well on ATi cards

[tepples]

why would your server need a graphics card?

Because not all machines will finish POST when configured headless.

Re:I just hope it works well on ATi cards

[Lumpy]

Late night Quake tournaments DUH!

Re:I just hope it works well on ATi cards

[Narishma]

That's because id Tech engines use OpenGL, and nVidia has better OpenGL drivers.

RPS writeup was nice but...

[Anonymous Coward]

But it's far too literary to work as a game review.

As a game preview, it feels like a commercial you see on TV. Flashy and exciting, but rarely reflecting of actual gameplay. Or to put it in an RPS manner...

My eyes flicker at the screen, the dark green border imprinted with Slashdot reflecting on my eyes. I notice, here, a fresh article. A preview of id Software's Rage I hesitate. I hem and haw, but give in to my weakness. I click it and the summary grows outward, like a flood of word upon the heathens, and I, Noah upon my ark adrift in this ocean of cyberspace can do naught more than watch...and read.

A poetic write-up from Rock, Paper, Shotgun. In this there was no hesitation in me, clicking rapidly with my middle mouse button, my hands sweaty with excitement. What wondrous words will I read, what literary masterpiece that would describe this, an FPS? There is a momentary lapse in stimulation as the information superhighway drives this package filled with data through my modem, transformed once into a language I can but hope to comprehend, then through my ethernet cable, finally descending into the near mystic tool which could translate these precise signals that no human could truly understand. My screen flickers, and then I am graced with images, images of an apocalyptic world and words describing it.

Ah! What wondrous words! A delight for my soul! They speak lovingly of a world which would soon be made available for me! A world that exists with pain and doubt and fear, yet also with strength, with passion, and with chaotic order! The world described filled my blood with fervor, with a desire, with a HOPE, that such a world could be true. That I, with this pinnacle of technology and science, could revel as an avatar, as some demigod upon the world of these creatures. To cut, to shoot, to kill, to change the fate of their world. To SAVE! These words described to me such a wonderful world, one that I could truly enjoy...however.

The words ended. The stage darkened. The curtain was drawn. And I was left wondering. What was this? What was this shadow puppetry, this dark reflection which revealed nothing? The words given were brilliant, but empty. What did I learn of this world, what did I hear of how I could interact with them? There was nothing. All that it contained was story, were words. Not a game. This was not a wonder of a GAME, but of a STORY. This author, this writer, may have some form of brilliance in his authorship, but I could not view that which he was playing. There was no substance, merely style. A fleeting brilliance with no heat. And I was left...freezing in the cold.

Re:RPS writeup was nice but...

[jp10558]

That, was quite good. And I agree, the review works better as a sort of short story then the game.

Multiplayer Mode

[RivenAleem]

I have been waiting for this game a while now because it was described to me as "Similar to Borderlands". I loved this game because it had a very simple and enjoyable multiplayer mode. It was complicated enoug (a shooter with talents, mods and many weapons to chose from) but also simple enough to just get in and play. It isn't like Army of Two where you have to use cover all the time, distract and set up crossfires and have the coordination of a navy SEAL team just to progress through the first few levels.

There has been very little information as to how the multiplayer will work, I'm hoping that the character will be customisable enough in terms of skills that 2 people playing together can have different and complimenting abilities, and not just be clones of eachother. I hope that there isn't a number of missions that are solely designed for single player and make no sense when there's 2 or more. I hope that there's a useful passenger/gunner seat in the cars. All these things have been left out of the reviews I've seen, which is pretty poor reporting. Sure he says they didn't get a chance to try multiplayer, but he didn't seem bothered to even ask how it would work.

I'm somewhat disappointed with the PS3 lack of split-screen multiplayer games (Borderlands, Overlord & Hunted being the only decent ones I've found) that give quick enjoyment. Yes, there's many fighting and racing games, but that's no good when I'm a much better player than my fiancée.

Does anyone know of a preview report that goes into any depth on the multiplayability of Rage?

Re:Multiplayer Mode

[Dexter Herbivore]

Does anyone know of a preview report that goes into any depth on the multiplayability of Rage?

I'm sure there'll be one as soon as a version with multiplayer is released to reviewers... you're jumping the gun a bit on that one.

Re:Multiplayer Mode

[Anonymous Coward]

there are co-op specific 'prequel' side missions that are, as far as i know, playable in splitscreen as well as online. the main campaign is single player only. http://www.co-optimus.com/article/6248/e3-2011-rage-hands-on-preview.html there might be some details somewhere about versus multiplayer

Re:Multiplayer Mode

[RivenAleem]

Thanks for that link. This has just downgraded the game from "Buy new on release day" to "See if I can pick it up second hand" Possibly not even worth buying on the PS3 at all.

If it only has as much Co-op play as modern warfare, then it's not for me.

Re:Multiplayer Mode

[Rennt]

ID hasn't demo'd multiplayer to anyone. Not that there isn't a MP mode (there is), but this is a solo game first and foremost.

Re:Multiplayer Mode

[The Moof]

Multiplayer details over at 1UP.

There's no co-op, so the charm that Borderlands had running around in the wastes with a friend is pretty much not here. Personally, I think any time you cite the story as the primary reason you left out co-op, you need to reevaluate what players really want. Even more so when they're drawing parallels to between your game and one of the best co-op games in recent years. If I'm looking for co-op, I'm willing to accept the suspension of disbelief about my loner badass wandering around in the wastes with a second person of equal loner badassery.

Re:Multiplayer Mode

[Narishma]

Killzone 3 supports split-screen multiplayer. The upcoming Resistance 3 as well.

As for Rage, last I heard, the only competitive multiplayer it will have will only involve vehicules. There will be a co-op mode where you play some missions (different from the single player ones) on foot though.

tl;

[m.ducharme]

dr. ;-)

Re:tl;

[ildon]

tl;dr

Which was exactly the AC's point. Which is why you should have been modded up rather than down, IMO.

Only interested

[Anonymous Coward]

If id software does the right thing and releases a linux client... after all their main audience are geeky types who marvel at Carmack's code.

Re:Only interested

[Tridus]

No, their main audience is the millions of people who play FPS games. A few guys who marvel at Carmack and really want to run stuff in Linux aren't that.

Re:Only interested

[Anonymous Coward]

Well what I see however is that FPS games are not exactly rare, and so they'd have to do something different. A linux audience is a sure way to sell a reasonable amount of the product.
Brink and Wolfenstein did quite poorly in sales, and I think it is in part because they didn't go after the right platform and stuck rigidly to Windows and consoles, like everyone else in the industry, how original... It is even more retarded in this particular case because the engine is extremely portable, so its not like they can justify by saying "but it is DirectX!!! can't port DirectX!"
What I see is that generally in the industry (except most indie devs) needs to stop listening to MBAs so much and concetrate on what makes sense technically. Going for the stuff that already works is hardly groundbreaking and it is starting to make gamers generally very very bored.
Time for game developers to have some balls and intuition and less Powerpoints.
Yes I work in said industry.

Re:Only interested

[Anonymous Coward]

Well for what it's worth, I can have an engine up and running fairly quickly with XNA. There is nothing as simple and robust on Linux, and OpenGL is garbage compared to XNA + D3D (the D3D is hidden by the XNA layer).

I think Carmack has also switch to D3D for everything because it's simply a better API and exposes more features of the graphics card. It's also more consistent, as you don't query a giant string and parse it for a random assortment of features on the card. You just have a card that supports a version of D3D. Simple.

Re:Only interested

[yahwotqa]

Alas, as long as drooling teenage boys (teenage either physically or mentally) keep on shelling out money for Latest Popular Generic Shooter 16 and Assassin's Cliche 8, this will never happen, because executives will be too busy rubbing the $100 notes on their flabby bodies.

Re:Only interested

[houstonbofh]

Perhaps, but Linux can generate more money than Mac. http://www.humblebundle.com/ I too will only buy it when the Linux client is released.

Re:Only interested

[Narishma]

No, they only use D3D on the Xbox version. The Windows and Mac versions use OpenGL, the PS3 version whatever the PS3 uses.

Re:Only interested

[LingNoi]

There is nothing as simple and robust on Linux, and OpenGL is garbage compared to XNA + D3D (the D3D is hidden by the XNA layer).

That might be so, but if you ever want to get more sales you wouldn't write your game in XNA because it makes it impossible to port over to anything non-microsoft related. Even Mono has been abandoned on linux making C# microsoft only language. Writing your game in C++ and openGL you can possibly get away at porting it to xbox, windows, osx, linux, PS3, Wii, android (via NDK), iOS and i'm sure there are more.

If you look at portable game engines that already exist such as the open source MIT licensed OGRE 3D engine it completely abstracts away direct calls to openGL and D3D allowing you to be extremely portable. You can choose at run time if you wish to use openGL or D3D or you can force it in code to pick one. You can even implement your own renderer if support isn't there for it already in one of it's render plugins.

My point with this is, you don't have to implement your own 3D engine and complain that openGL is hard. Others have already done the hard work for you, all you need to do is stand on their shoulders and make some cool games which give you the freedom to port to other platforms if you so desire.

HEAVY DRM !!

[Anonymous Coward]

As it should be !! More power to the man !!

Shinin', shinin', shinin'

[tepples]

That's like complaining that horror movies take place mostly at night

That or complaining "Kubrick's The Shining is well lit. Why can't I have more horror films like Kubrick's The Shining?"

Re:Shinin', shinin', shinin'

[loopitup]

We're all out of Kubrick, that's why. And we can't make another, because it's the 21st century and there are environmental laws now that forbid it.

Re:Shinin', shinin', shinin'

[TheLink]

Wasn't "The Shining" a romantic comedy? ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmkVWuP_sO0

p.s. Watch the Top Gun recut too...

Buy more than one PC

[tepples]

I'm somewhat disappointed with the PS3 lack of split-screen multiplayer games

From my previous discussions on Slashdot about the lack of split-screen multiplayer games on various platforms, apparently the prevailing groupthink is that one is expected to buy two to four PCs for the household and put them in a LAN in order to play multiplayer. But I'd love to read solid evidence as to why this is impractical.

Re:Buy more than one PC

[RivenAleem]

How is having multiple PCs going to allow me to sit on a couch with my friends and play my PS3 cooperatively?

Re:Buy more than one PC

[nschubach]

I had a TV at one time that allowed me to split the screen between inputs (I haven't seen any of the newer TVs with this feature... but I haven't really looked hard.) I only used it once, and that was for a pseudo split screen game where the inputs were from two PCs. It worked out well enough, but it required special hardware...

Re:Buy more than one PC

[tepples]

My Vizio VX32L has picture-in-picture, and setting the inset window to the biggest size causes the "main" picture to shrink to the left half of the screen. I can run one PC on VGA and the other on HDMI this way. So why don't PC games include this as a built-in feature? Probably greed.

Yaaaaaawn

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

"In those three hours, I discovered a first-person shooter. Also, a racing game. And a car combat game. And an open-world adventure. A collectible card came, too. Lastly, it's practically every piece of apocalyptic science fiction we have known to date tossed into a blender, set to puree, poured onto a disc, and spread evenly over a seemingly lengthy and elaborate single-player adventure. In short, Rage is a kitchen sink kind of game...

In short, you can play every single genre PC Gaming has in one game. Well done.

Re:Fuck yoiu all

[PopeRatzo]

Now hold on. I don't think you're giving the above comment a chance. It's easy to lay a "-1 troll" or "-1 offtopic" on something like this, but I believe there may actually be something to this one.

Perhaps we have in that simple "Fuck off" the most appropriate reaction to this obvious marketing campaign by id software. Now, it is their right to market their game, which I'm sure cost a whole lot of money (though never as much as claimed) and there are a lot of middle management positions (maybe 3 or 4) riding on the success of this game.

But it doesn't belong on the front page of Slashdot unless money has changed hands, in which case its fine because I imagine that not that many readers subscribe and it takes money to keep the lights on at a big website like /. If money has not changed hands, however, the most appropriate response to a front page article that is basically, "Get ready to buy this, you're going to want it and its not going to suck as bad as our last game, promise" is definitely "Fuck off". Especially since the probability is .872 that this game will be another shitty port of a console game that tells you to press the "x" key but doesn't mean the "x" key on my computer keyboard. Where trying to take cover behind a low wall (there are always lots of low walls in these games for some reason) is nearly impossible because your character keeps wanting to climb the wall or jump over the wall and the camera does something funny because the game can't figure out whether to climb, jump or take cover because the same fucking control does all three actions. Excuse me. That language wasn't called for, even though the more I think about it the first poster's simple and elegant "Fuck off" really is the appropriate response to the advert masquerading as a story to sell some DRM-laden turd that will cost $59 for 3 1/2 hours of buggy gameplay.

I know that was my response, but I wasn't quick enough to say it first and I don't like when a comments section chews its cabbage more than once.

The groupthink in more detail

[tepples]

I agree with you; I'm just stating my perception of the consensus opinion held by vocal regulars on Slashdot. I'm arguing a position with which I disagree as a thought experiment, and I'd love if someone could put into words exactly why this groupthink is untenable so that I can use the ideas in an article describing my own position.

sit on a couch with my friends

Consensus is that sitting on a couch with friends to play a video game is overrated and that you should be sitting in separate chairs.

and play my PS3

Consensus is that Sony products are overrated, especially since the XCP and Hotz scandals. Groupthink is also that you should be playing PC games instead. FPS and RTS handle better with a mouse, and consensus is that genres outside of FPS and RTS matter little.

cooperatively

You got them there. Consensus is that multiplayer means all other players are your opponents. But even in a cooperative game, there appears not to be enough space on the screen for two players' views in an RTS.

Re:The groupthink in more detail

[RivenAleem]

I came from a generation of playing the SEGA with my brothers, Golden Axe, Streets of Rage, "lives and levels" of Kid Chamelon/Sonic/Strider. They liked games, but I was a natural nerd/geek and far better than them. So when Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat came along, the fun rapidly disappated as they got beaten a lot. Eventually I was left (post it's release) playing my PS1, and Tekken, alone as they wouldn't play me anymore :(

So now I know not to try to play head-to-head games at home anymore, sticking to games where we both finish the session happy. I play competitively online on my PC instead, where I can trash and be trashed by anonymous people.

There are so many 'vocal regulars' that say the same thing over and over again. Sony BAD, they tuk ur linux. My PS3 is brilliant. I can play games on it AND plug in a USB Stick/Drive and watch my downloaded TV/Movies. Sony never took away something from me that I never would have used.

I tried for a while to get my Fiancee to paly WoW with me, but the other PC is in another room, so we actually had to skype eachother to talk, and if there was something she didn't understand with the UI, I had to get up and walk over to sort her out. I resolved to only play co-op games where she could be right beside me, under my watchful eye :P

This is where consoles with capability for more than one controller come in. They are one machine, plugged into one TV with 2-4 input devices. If I felt that the X-Box had better co-op titles, I'd sell up in a blink and get one. But, as many games are coming up across platforms now, there's little to distinguish between them. (I'd like to avoid bringing the Wii into this debate, as I've played one and don't like the controls)

I really like playing with people in the same room. It's more social when the person you are playing with it right there. It's also very nice to get some post hard boss physical contact, which is impossible when you are across or in another room.

So it's possible that I have the wrong system, perhaps the PS3, with it's removal of other OS also removed all the co-op splitscreen games. Perhaps it's evil Sony's plan that people never get to play and have fun together. Perhaps it's their intention that all games be confrontational, where all other players are your opponents.

Perhaps there just isn't a way to make another Borderlands. It could be there there is no working formula for split screen games, and I should instead play the Sims.

Perhaps my working parameters are far too narrow.
1) Must be full campaign co-op mode
2) Must be complicated enough to interest a pro-gamer, but simple enough for a casual.

Are these games just so unpopular that the designers don't consider it profitable making them? Why make a game that 2 people will share, when you can try to make one that each has to buy individually?

Is making PC co-op games more profitable, as you have to have one disk per machine (legally playing). Am I being naive thinking that games companies are trying to make games for the fun and enjoyment of consumers or just for profit?

Re:The groupthink in more detail

[Stormwatch]

playing the SEGA

Which one?

Re:The groupthink in more detail

[RivenAleem]

Master System and then Megadrive.

Re:The groupthink in more detail

[LingNoi]

Consensus is that sitting on a couch with friends to play a video game is overrated and that you should be sitting in separate chairs.

Consensus is that sitting on a couch with friends to play a video game is still possible with a PC and that it's a lame excuse to use.

FTFY

Re:The groupthink in more detail

[tepples]

Consensus is that sitting on a couch with friends to play a video game is still possible with a PC

With a PC or with two PCs? Video games designed for home theater PCs are rare (and I don't mean Microsoft Studios Twycross either), and Slashdot users such as CronoCloud claim that this is because statistically nobody wants to hook up a PC to a TV. I can link to previous posts about this if you want.

Reads as if it's Fallout 3...

[madhatter256]

From the article, you, the avatar, start out by awakening from an "ark" (fallout 3: Vault 101) created to protect mankind from an asteroid (fallout3: nuclear bombs) and you come out and are greated with wastelanders.

Reading the article simply makes it out to be just like any other mundane post-apocalyptic FPS game, but wait you can play cards now and do other mundane shit you couldn't before... you can drive a car (borderlands) and race it or fight in it.... it's just like any other game... nothing new.

I ain't holding my breath on this game...

Re:Reads as if it's Fallout 3...

[shish]

just like any other mundane post-apocalyptic FPS game, but wait you can play cards now

You could play cards in Fallout: New Vegas already :-P

Re:Reads as if it's Fallout 3...

[Zan Lynx]

And if it had an in-game Ping Pong table you would say it was nothing new, Pong did it before...

The groupthink is self-contradictory

[tepples]

You make good points. Now to help make your argument stronger, I'd like to discuss a few.

So now I know not to try to play head-to-head games at home anymore, sticking to games where we both finish the session happy.

Thank you for the insight that local multiplayer can allow for stronger group cohesion in a cooperative game.

My PS3 is brilliant. I can play games on it AND plug in a USB Stick/Drive and watch my downloaded TV/Movies.

But can you play anything homemade? I'd look up Sony's qualifications for licensed development of indie games for PS3, but the web site in question has been down for nearly four months. (I found this link in a Sony press release and have been checking occasionally since April 10.) Or if not for the PS3, then for which platform should indie co-op split-screen games be developed?

I tried for a while to get my Fiancee to [play some PC MMORPG] with me, but the other PC is in another room

Consensus is that gaming PCs can be easily moved from room to room. Perhaps some people are used to having laptops or small-form-factor desktop PCs designed for easy transport to and from a LAN party.

This is where consoles with capability for more than one controller come in.

And, ideally, where PCs with capability for more than one controller come in. PCs since about 1999 have had USB ports that allow for four gamepads and more. And TVs made since about 2006 have had inputs to show PC video: VGA ports for VGA video and HDMI ports for DVI-D video. So why don't people make use of that?

They are one machine, plugged into one TV with 2-4 input devices.

As are home theater PCs. But consensus is that home theater PCs don't exist. Consensus is that PCs can't be moved from room to room. Yes, this means the consensus is self-contradictory: people are willing to move a PC for a LAN party but not move it next to a TV.

Why make a game that 2 people will share, when you can try to make one that each has to buy individually?

David Wong, columnist for Cracked, agrees with you. But Slashdot consensus is that PC games are so much cheaper than PS3 games that it's just as cheap for a player to buy two copies of a $30 PC game that doesn't support split-screen as it is to buy one copy of a $60 PS3 game that does support split-screen.

2) Must be complicated enough to interest a pro-gamer, but simple enough for a casual.

Sounds like Super Mario Galaxy for Wii: player 1 controls Mario and player 2 shoots candy at the enemies to get them to stop.

Re:The groupthink is self-contradictory

[RivenAleem]

Consensus is that gaming PCs can be easily moved from room to room. Perhaps some people are used to having laptops or small-form-factor desktop PCs designed for easy transport to and from a LAN party.

The occasions where we would play games together would be regular, but not prolonged, say one night a week. Moving the second gaming PC about like this would be inconvenient, especially if something would come up and we have to stop. A gaming 'session' might only be 20 minutes long. For this, a console, with game in the drive and ready to go in under 1 minute comes out to me as the only realistic choice.

But can you play anything homemade? Or if not for the PS3, then for which platform should indie co-op split-screen games be developed?

And, ideally, where PCs with capability for more than one controller come in. PCs since about 1999 have had USB ports that allow for four gamepads and more. And TVs made since about 2006 have had inputs to show PC video: VGA ports for VGA video and HDMI ports for DVI-D video. So why don't people make use of that?

As are home theater PCs. But consensus is that home theater PCs don't exist. Consensus is that PCs can't be moved from room to room. Yes, this means the consensus is self-contradictory: people are willing to move a PC for a LAN party but not move it next to a TV.

This is definitely something that I would quiesce to, If there are good Indie games on the PC, that would justify the investment in controllers and cabling to allow my primary PC to connect to my 37" HD TV. I'm not as tech savvy as the average /. reader (I'm a scientist/chemist by profession) so for me it has just been the convenience of having separate PC and Console set-up in my living room. I own all 3 Humble Bundles, but none of them has the multiplayer co-op I'm looking for. I do regular googles, and I look here for reviews, but I can't find any quality Indy campaign driven splitscreen co-op game for the PC.

But Slashdot consensus is that PC games are so much cheaper than PS3 games that it's just as cheap for a player to buy two copies of a $30 PC game that doesn't support split-screen as it is to buy one copy of a $60 PS3 game that does support split-screen.

The Slashdot consensus is that PC games should be free. Or at the very least, you should be able to crack your own version to allow install on more than one PC

Sounds like Super Mario Galaxy for Wii: player 1 controls Mario and player 2 shoots candy at the enemies to get them to stop.

I don't like the controls of the Wii, but that aside, I'd definitely enjoy adventure games like you describe.

The end result is that I know only a small handful of games that were/are enjoyable in splitscreen mode. Borderlands, Hunted & Overlord 2. These have all been on the PS3 and I enjoyed them immensely with my fiancee. I've supported these developers by buying the games fullprice, and I avoid PS3 titles that only support single player (I have a gaming rig, so why block use of the TV while leaving my PC idle?).

I understand from your article that you would like to see more PC multiplayer splitscreen games, but you can see the flaws with FPS/RTS games on one screen. That I would consider to be out of the scope of this conversation, as I'm only interested in co-op games. Co-op FPS works (as seen in Borderlands) and RTS might be too slow and boring for her, taking too long to get a single session going and completed.

I even tried Untold legends Dark Kingdom, a co-op shared screen (not split) but that didn't work where one player controlled the pace of movement, often leaving someone stuck on the edge somewhere.

I wouldn't have any issue with the platform, be it PS3 of PC, but there just doesn't seem to be games out there (or incoming) that really play well splitscreen. Where is the Final Fantasy or Elder Scrolls co-op game? Where is the team racing game? Where is the Diablo game?

Re:The groupthink is self-contradictory

[nschubach]

This is definitely something that I would quiesce to, If there are good Indie games on the PC, that would justify the investment in controllers and cabling to allow my primary PC to connect to my 37" HD TV. I'm not as tech savvy as the average /. reader (I'm a scientist/chemist by profession) so for me it has just been the convenience of having separate PC and Console set-up in my living room. I own all 3 Humble Bundles, but none of them has the multiplayer co-op I'm looking for. I do regular googles, and I look here for reviews, but I can't find any quality Indy campaign driven splitscreen co-op game for the PC.

There's a small list of PC games that allow it:
http://www.co-optimus.com/system.php?id=4&page=0&playerComp=%3E%3D&playerNum=2&esrb=%25&released=Y&couch=on

It's not "indie" per say, but they do specialize in the co-op ranking/rating.

(not affiliated with co-optimus, but I find it an awesome site for the co-op gamer. For instance, I selected "couch co-op" for this list. It lists splitscreen/multi-controller on same screen games. Although looking at it, they should include Worms on the list. I was playing Worms from Steam with my friends and multiple controllers.)

Re:The groupthink is self-contradictory

[tepples]

There's a small list of PC games that allow it

Thank you. I added the link in my own recommendations page.

Why are there no grass or trees in the future?

[elrous0]

Why is it that videogames always seem to presume that a post-apocalyptic future will have no green? You know, even in the worst case scenario (and all-out nuclear war) there would still be plenty of plant life (unless you live in the desert or something). Hell, look at Chernobyl. That place got dumped with fallout and there is still a lovely forest there. Is it because everyone has seen Mad Max 2 and assumes that the Australian outback is what a post-apocalyptic future is SUPPOSED to look like?

Re:Why are there no grass or trees in the future?

[demonbug]

Why is it that videogames always seem to presume that a post-apocalyptic future will have no green? You know, even in the worst case scenario (and all-out nuclear war) there would still be plenty of plant life (unless you live in the desert or something). Hell, look at Chernobyl. That place got dumped with fallout and there is still a lovely forest there. Is it because everyone has seen Mad Max 2 and assumes that the Australian outback is what a post-apocalyptic future is SUPPOSED to look like?

I always assumed that the post-apocalyptic setting was favored for video games because it made the environments a lot easier to draw - sort of a built-in excuse for blandness and lack of creativity, with the desert or Outback-esque theme chosen so you don't have to worry about things like trees.

Why the bland post-apocalyptic setting is still favored I can only assume is due to inertia. People are used to it, so probably wouldn't find a vibrant green Chernobyl or Fukushima-esque environment believable.

Re:Why are there no grass or trees in the future?

[blahplusplus]

"Why is it that videogames always seem to presume that a post-apocalyptic future will have no green?"

Many videogames are about conflict and war, and many do it to create a sense of barren wasteland. Most games center around conflict vs monsters/enemies. You wouldn't exactly want smurf village. Also Crisis and Far cry have done the green/tree thing just fine and so has Modern Warfare series, do you not remember the snow/mountain levels, or the jungle levels? I think many gamers have a bad memory. CoD 5 was jungle/trees for a long time.

Re:Why are there no grass or trees in the future?

[Anonymous Coward]

Enslaved was a nice departure from the drag colour scheme.

Re:Why are there no grass or trees in the future?

[stms]

If you understood ecosystems you'd understand that if there were a good amount of green (unless it was almost exclusively evergreen) it very likely wouldn't be post-apocalyptic. But you're right they could make a fictional post-apocalyptic universe/world where there was a lot of green.

Re:Why are there no grass or trees in the future?

[Dutch Gun]

I'd say it's likely a deliberate choice, likely done for technical, artistic, and psychological reasons.

Obviously, it's easier to render a relatively barren landscape. Drawing large vistas filled with trees is still somewhat of a challenge, even for today's systems. But the largest reason is probably psychological. Green worlds feel alive, warm, inviting, and healthy. Brown barren landscapes are bleak and depressing, and this is the mood the game developers are trying to convey. Technically speaking, yes, the world should be overgrown and lush with vegetation in a post-apocalyptic world, but I think it doesn't create the correct mood for the game.

Epic article ending

[Anonymous Coward]

I wanted to keep playing, to experience more. In fact, a week later, I'm still anxious to do so. I'd take that as a positive sign. Wouldn't you?

Sounds like a nice sentence straight from the mouth of a drug addict!

Yeah... but

[Anonymous Coward]

Will it be released complete and working or require a patch?
How many crapware items will need to be running to play the game?
Will it be chock full of stupid ass annoying drm?
Will it require an always on connection?
Will it require some bizarre activation that fails on day 1 due to overload?
Is this some shitty console port that will lack basic pc control functionality?
Will half the game be missing and sold back to us as DLC?
Will this be YET ANOTHER quake clone?

It says the publisher is EA games. I'm not hopefull about the above........
EA GAMES - we fuckup everything

iOS Version

[bedouin]

Does this differ in any way other than beefier graphics?

I'll have to remember that

[Quila]

It being Texas I'm sure that there is a high probability for guns and ammo crates to be found littered around the landscape.

Next time I drive through Texas. Unfortunately, I'll have to dump all the cool stuff before I hit California due to some pretty dumb gun laws.

For some reason it's in the psyche

[Quila]

that a post-apocalyptic world will be barren.

You're right, for the most part it would be a big forest, or at least prairie, as nature reclaims land. Some places would revert to desert though, California's lush Imperial Valley for example.

A patch? Of course!

[Quila]

The last several console games I bought from various publishers downloaded a patch on first run, and this includes games bought on the first day available.

Ahhh, the days of cartridges ... plug and run, forever.