That was my biggest pet peeve of Doom 3. Every other enemy was locked in a closet somewhere. No wonder they were all pissed off and snarling.
"Hey Bob, how ya been? I heard you took a vacation on Mars."
"It was horrible Sal, once I got there, I got stuck in a closet for 10 hours. So I'm screaming and beating on the door like crazy, trying to get out. Finally, this guy let's me out. I go to thank him and then all of a sudden, he blows my head off with a shotgun. What the hell man?"
"That really sucks Bob. I'm glad I skipped out and stayed in Hell."
"Yeah, I've got such a kink in the neck... holy crap, it's that guy! I'm gonna go have a word with him. HEY YOU!"
BLAM BLAM!!!
"Bob?!!!!!! Noooooo!"
BLAM BLAM!!!
Seriously, try not to pack every single enemy in a fricking, hidden closet. Mix it up a little. Use a nook here, a cranny there, maybe even a crevice. Hopefully, Quake 4 will be better than that.
They should just release Halo 3: the Rest of Halo 2. That was pretty much the only reason XBox really did well. Heck, that's why I bought the XBox. I still haven't found another game that I would want to buy for it.
It's true that using the mouse automatically starts an attack, however, you can cancel it out just by pressing the spacebar. Also, you can target enemies by using tab, [, ], or whatever you define in the options. By doing it this way, you select the enemy without engaging them. To begin attacking, just press the spacebar.
As for humans being the only race, Arena.net has stated that other races will become available in the expansions. Some ideas include the Charr and dwarves which are both already NPCs.
The character design choices might be limited for the beta (doubt it) but will most likely also increase as an expansion.
I've played all the betas since the E3 release last year. It's a pretty fun game. I was a big fan of Diablo and the similarities are striking. I wouldn't consider this an MMOG. Though the towns contain many people, they are more like virtual chatrooms with your character as an avatar. Each town has districts which could be considered "channels".
I did find that you can almost explore the entire map without dying by grabbing a party full of computer players and then making a run for it. Your computer players take the brunt of the attack and you can run on to new areas.
If you are looking for a good single player experience, I wouldn't get this game. It's primary focus is PvP. The PvE will get old quick as it's the same as any other RPG type game. Find this and deliver here. Fight this boss and come back. Still, it is a pretty good game.
That's true but you're not required to purchase the expansion packs to get to the areas contained in them. Basically, if a friend is in that area and wants to quest with you, they can "invite" you to the area and you'll get a streamed download. Now, if the expansions contain new characters, classes and races, well, then I suppose you might want to buy it.
I think the problem there was that the developers used the game engine in order to render those cut scenes. Since the gameplay models don't speak, there is no animation for it. I agree, it is a harsh visual break but it's still only beta. They may fix that in the final (unlikely though).
They have some of the best animation studios around. If any of you ever watched Kill Bill, the animated scene with O-ren in it was done by Production I.G. Top notch stuff there.
You might want to give Guild Wars a try. Sure the big draw will be the no monthly fees but one thing I found interesting is they are trying to get rid of all the time-wasters.
Instant free waypoints from place to place (no more gryphon riding) The max level cap is (currently in beta) 20. If you don't feel like building up to level 20, you can start with a prebuilt level 20 character.
The way combat is set up is almost like a card game (ala Magic). You can earn a hundred skills but only have 8 or so slots to fill. Before each battle, you have to pick and choose what you want to use.
Most of your battles will be party battles so choosing your skills depends on your role in the party (ie. healer, tank, support, etc.).
In the end, this allows those who work 40 hours a week and go to night school 10 hours a week plus take karate to compete with those 14 year olds who spend 90+ hours a week playing the game.
If your tired of getting on a marine team that sucks, learn how to command. Seriously. I used to get the dumbest commanders who would hop in the chair, drop what they want and they go run out and get killed. Not many people want to command. I finally got sick of it and learned how to comm. Just the other night, I was the first one in and we practically devastated the alien team in a 12v12 match. They couldn't even grab an extra resource node the whole game. Learn how to comm.
If all you want to do is kill things, stick to combat maps.
As far as crashes go, I suggest you take a look at your computer. I play 4-5 hour sessions without a single hitch. This is one of the most stable, computer friendly modifications I have ever played.
Now, with all that said, keep playing, it really is a great game. The more you play, the more others will too. As the general population increases, so will experience levels. In the end, it will balance the game.
ICO made you drag the princess everywhere while holding her hand. It worked well to develop an emotional attachment to the characters. Of course, I think the idea in this particular case is a little different. I don't see it working quite as well.
I know that there was recent speculation into Longhorn that would take advantage of DirectX 9 compatible cards and Shader 2.0. There was a blurb on Slashdot as well.
You beat me to it. I love ICO. I'd wager it's one of the best games ever made. I've never had a game that got me so deeply involved in the story.
Sure, I've played things like Doom 3, Half-Life 2, Metal Gear Solid and the like. Sure they are impressive graphically and the action is sometimes intense. But I always felt I was on the outside looking in.
With ICO, I definitely felt as if I were there in person. Even though dragging that princess around was annoying sometimes, you actually began to feel an attachment to the character and even began to worry about her if you had to leave her by herself.
I can't wait for Wanda and the Colossus, the next game from the same team that made ICO.
Hahaha, that game is great. The best plot ever. Not only is the CIA, FBI and military not qualified enough to save the prez, you have to question the "badness" of some "dudes" in order to get them to participate in the rescue mission.
I tried to like it, I really did. But then, no one likes to watch someone else play a game. Sure, a game review might be nice once in a while but I'm not going to watch a television show for about 30 minutes where it's just a bunch of guys playing a game and not really saying anything of worth such as, "Suck it, punk b*tch!" to each other. Why watch them play a game when you could turn on your own machine and play.
At least with TechTV, they had decent shows like the ScreenSavers.
Hey, I'm with you there. I would rather get all my friends online with Half-Life 2, Natural-Selection or Warcraft 3 but the problem is that many of them are illiterate when it comes to computers. Convincing them to install something would frighten them for weeks. With a console, it's all been simplified. Drop in a disk and go. For those mature games, PS2 and Xbox is the place to be. For FPS, it's Halo 2 or nothing. That's as close to a PC FPS as you can get.
... this Christmas. I tried to hold out as long as I could. However, all my other friends had XBoxes with Halo 2 and Live. It's hard to compete against that. I was the only the one with a GameCube and one of few to have a PS2. I believe the Gamecube is a really good system but the problems lies with the fact that, as many have mentioned before me, the other systems have more features, more variety in games and more high-profile titles such as GTA:San Andreas and Halo 2 (which caught me). Sure, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes should have been a selling point but the marketing just wasn't there. I've seen countless ads for GTA and Halo 2 on the tv but only once did I see a Metroid ad. As for features:
PS2: Backwards compatibility DVD Playback Audio CD Playback With proper software, streaming video and music Online Play
XBox: DVD Playback Audio CD Playback Audio Storage (WMA files) and Playback With hacking, emulators, media player, etc. Online Play
Change the length of a second and propagate up.
1 second
1 minutes = 10 seconds
1 hour = 10 minutes
1 day = 10 hours
1 week = 10 days
1 month = 10 weeks
1 year = 10 months
We can keep decades, centuries and milleniums.
Just make sure that the length of a second corresponds to 1000000 seconds per year.
For more precise timekeeping, we can use
1/10 seconds = decisecond
1/100 seconds = centiseconds
And so on and so forth.
Voila, nice and easy to use. The only problem is that it would be expensive to convert to and I'm sure religious zealots would have a fit.
Don't mind me, I'm retarded.
Slashdot Mirror
That was my biggest pet peeve of Doom 3. Every other enemy was locked in a closet somewhere. No wonder they were all pissed off and snarling.
"Hey Bob, how ya been? I heard you took a vacation on Mars."
"It was horrible Sal, once I got there, I got stuck in a closet for 10 hours. So I'm screaming and beating on the door like crazy, trying to get out. Finally, this guy let's me out. I go to thank him and then all of a sudden, he blows my head off with a shotgun. What the hell man?"
"That really sucks Bob. I'm glad I skipped out and stayed in Hell."
"Yeah, I've got such a kink in the neck... holy crap, it's that guy! I'm gonna go have a word with him. HEY YOU!"
BLAM BLAM!!!
"Bob?!!!!!! Noooooo!"
BLAM BLAM!!!
Seriously, try not to pack every single enemy in a fricking, hidden closet. Mix it up a little. Use a nook here, a cranny there, maybe even a crevice. Hopefully, Quake 4 will be better than that.
They should just release Halo 3: the Rest of Halo 2. That was pretty much the only reason XBox really did well. Heck, that's why I bought the XBox. I still haven't found another game that I would want to buy for it.
It's true that using the mouse automatically starts an attack, however, you can cancel it out just by pressing the spacebar. Also, you can target enemies by using tab, [, ], or whatever you define in the options. By doing it this way, you select the enemy without engaging them. To begin attacking, just press the spacebar.
As for humans being the only race, Arena.net has stated that other races will become available in the expansions. Some ideas include the Charr and dwarves which are both already NPCs.
The character design choices might be limited for the beta (doubt it) but will most likely also increase as an expansion.
I've played all the betas since the E3 release last year. It's a pretty fun game. I was a big fan of Diablo and the similarities are striking. I wouldn't consider this an MMOG. Though the towns contain many people, they are more like virtual chatrooms with your character as an avatar. Each town has districts which could be considered "channels".
I did find that you can almost explore the entire map without dying by grabbing a party full of computer players and then making a run for it. Your computer players take the brunt of the attack and you can run on to new areas.
If you are looking for a good single player experience, I wouldn't get this game. It's primary focus is PvP. The PvE will get old quick as it's the same as any other RPG type game. Find this and deliver here. Fight this boss and come back. Still, it is a pretty good game.
That's true but you're not required to purchase the expansion packs to get to the areas contained in them. Basically, if a friend is in that area and wants to quest with you, they can "invite" you to the area and you'll get a streamed download. Now, if the expansions contain new characters, classes and races, well, then I suppose you might want to buy it.
The best is when you throw a hail mary the length of the field in Tecmo Bowl with New York.
If I remember correctly, they did move. They bobbed up and down a tiny bit.
I think the problem there was that the developers used the game engine in order to render those cut scenes. Since the gameplay models don't speak, there is no animation for it. I agree, it is a harsh visual break but it's still only beta. They may fix that in the final (unlikely though).
They have some of the best animation studios around. If any of you ever watched Kill Bill, the animated scene with O-ren in it was done by Production I.G. Top notch stuff there.
Gee... I played the game all the way through and didn't "finish" it either. Still, it did provide 10 hours of entertainment.
Bah weep granna weep ninny bah! (errrr... not responsible for bad memory, bad pronunciation or bad anything else, but you get the idea.)
You might want to give Guild Wars a try. Sure the big draw will be the no monthly fees but one thing I found interesting is they are trying to get rid of all the time-wasters.
Instant free waypoints from place to place (no more gryphon riding)
The max level cap is (currently in beta) 20.
If you don't feel like building up to level 20, you can start with a prebuilt level 20 character.
The way combat is set up is almost like a card game (ala Magic). You can earn a hundred skills but only have 8 or so slots to fill. Before each battle, you have to pick and choose what you want to use.
Most of your battles will be party battles so choosing your skills depends on your role in the party (ie. healer, tank, support, etc.).
In the end, this allows those who work 40 hours a week and go to night school 10 hours a week plus take karate to compete with those 14 year olds who spend 90+ hours a week playing the game.
If your tired of getting on a marine team that sucks, learn how to command. Seriously. I used to get the dumbest commanders who would hop in the chair, drop what they want and they go run out and get killed. Not many people want to command. I finally got sick of it and learned how to comm. Just the other night, I was the first one in and we practically devastated the alien team in a 12v12 match. They couldn't even grab an extra resource node the whole game. Learn how to comm.
If all you want to do is kill things, stick to combat maps.
As far as crashes go, I suggest you take a look at your computer. I play 4-5 hour sessions without a single hitch. This is one of the most stable, computer friendly modifications I have ever played.
Now, with all that said, keep playing, it really is a great game. The more you play, the more others will too. As the general population increases, so will experience levels. In the end, it will balance the game.
ICO made you drag the princess everywhere while holding her hand. It worked well to develop an emotional attachment to the characters. Of course, I think the idea in this particular case is a little different. I don't see it working quite as well.
Schoooompfff....
Message for you sir...
"Oh My God, it's *not* so full of stars!!!"
Hopefully, with all that power, I'll finally be able to run Half-Life 2, Doom 3 and Far Cry at full speeds...
I know that there was recent speculation into Longhorn that would take advantage of DirectX 9 compatible cards and Shader 2.0. There was a blurb on Slashdot as well.
This seems really interesting but I have no Mac to run it on. Is there something similar available in the Win32 or Linux flavors?
to buy a new Xbox this Christmas just for Halo 2 but everywhere I went it was sold out, even used. I wasn't able to get one until January.
You beat me to it. I love ICO. I'd wager it's one of the best games ever made. I've never had a game that got me so deeply involved in the story.
Sure, I've played things like Doom 3, Half-Life 2, Metal Gear Solid and the like. Sure they are impressive graphically and the action is sometimes intense. But I always felt I was on the outside looking in.
With ICO, I definitely felt as if I were there in person. Even though dragging that princess around was annoying sometimes, you actually began to feel an attachment to the character and even began to worry about her if you had to leave her by herself.
I can't wait for Wanda and the Colossus, the next game from the same team that made ICO.
Hahaha, that game is great. The best plot ever. Not only is the CIA, FBI and military not qualified enough to save the prez, you have to question the "badness" of some "dudes" in order to get them to participate in the rescue mission.
I tried to like it, I really did. But then, no one likes to watch someone else play a game. Sure, a game review might be nice once in a while but I'm not going to watch a television show for about 30 minutes where it's just a bunch of guys playing a game and not really saying anything of worth such as, "Suck it, punk b*tch!" to each other. Why watch them play a game when you could turn on your own machine and play.
At least with TechTV, they had decent shows like the ScreenSavers.
Hey, I'm with you there. I would rather get all my friends online with Half-Life 2, Natural-Selection or Warcraft 3 but the problem is that many of them are illiterate when it comes to computers. Convincing them to install something would frighten them for weeks. With a console, it's all been simplified. Drop in a disk and go. For those mature games, PS2 and Xbox is the place to be. For FPS, it's Halo 2 or nothing. That's as close to a PC FPS as you can get.
... this Christmas. I tried to hold out as long as I could. However, all my other friends had XBoxes with Halo 2 and Live. It's hard to compete against that. I was the only the one with a GameCube and one of few to have a PS2. I believe the Gamecube is a really good system but the problems lies with the fact that, as many have mentioned before me, the other systems have more features, more variety in games and more high-profile titles such as GTA:San Andreas and Halo 2 (which caught me). Sure, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes should have been a selling point but the marketing just wasn't there. I've seen countless ads for GTA and Halo 2 on the tv but only once did I see a Metroid ad. As for features:
PS2:
Backwards compatibility
DVD Playback
Audio CD Playback
With proper software, streaming video and music
Online Play
XBox:
DVD Playback
Audio CD Playback
Audio Storage (WMA files) and Playback
With hacking, emulators, media player, etc.
Online Play
Gamecube pretty much lacks all these features.
Change the length of a second and propagate up. 1 second 1 minutes = 10 seconds 1 hour = 10 minutes 1 day = 10 hours 1 week = 10 days 1 month = 10 weeks 1 year = 10 months We can keep decades, centuries and milleniums. Just make sure that the length of a second corresponds to 1000000 seconds per year. For more precise timekeeping, we can use 1/10 seconds = decisecond 1/100 seconds = centiseconds And so on and so forth. Voila, nice and easy to use. The only problem is that it would be expensive to convert to and I'm sure religious zealots would have a fit. Don't mind me, I'm retarded.