[Khellendros]

Aptorius, on 12 February 2013 - 03:11 PM, said:

Yeah but Duke was a special case. We all knew that Gearbox simply bought the carcass of the game, stuffed it full of formaldehyde and shinied up its coat. It was going to suck no matter what. Gearbox bought that game for cheap and earned a ton of cash from the investment leaving them room to make a new Duke, modern/proper old school game some day in the future.

Colonial Marines doesn't really have any excuses. It's just bad all the way through. Old engine, bad graphics, bad story, bad controls, bad gunplay. It's just bad.

Can't wait to buy it for 5 euro in half a year and play it.

Kotaku has done a pretty good investigative article about what happened with Colonial Marines. http://kotaku.com/59...olonial-marines

In short, when Gearbox hit it big with Borderlands, they decided they couldn't be arsed with Colonial Marines anymore and wanted to work on Borderlands 2 instead, so outsourced development to TimeGate.

TimeGate and Gearbox then both seem to blame each other for not having done enough work on it. In the meantime, Sega is asking where the fracking game is after 6 years and buckets of money thrown at Gearbox. In essence, the game was actually made in the last nine months when Gearbox didn't feel they could ask for yet another extension, and not over the last 6 years.

For me, it's Gearbox's screw-up through and through. It's not even that they took on too much - they had five previous years to work on it but apparently did almost nothing, preferring to concentrate on other projects. Not that Sega are blameless, they certainly should have been more stringent in their checking of what was going on.




In other news, Tomb Raider's reviews are looking very sweet.

[Khellendros]

EA announces that microtransations will feature in ALL their games from now on. Now, I'm not an EA hater, but sometimes I wonder if they're just asking for it.

http://uk.ign.com/ar...ll-future-games

[amphibian]

Dark Souls is a friggin' maniacal game. I'm a level 20 pyro and trying to beat the dude with the giant dragon tooth who can one hit kill you with ease. I am having a hell of a time timing the rolls behind. All the other minor zombies beforehand I can beat with only taking a couple scratches.

Also, I don't have Xbox Live so I am in effect playing this solo.

[Morgoth]

amphibian, on 28 February 2013 - 03:22 AM, said:

Dark Souls is a friggin' maniacal game. I'm a level 20 pyro and trying to beat the dude with the giant dragon tooth who can one hit kill you with ease. I am having a hell of a time timing the rolls behind. All the other minor zombies beforehand I can beat with only taking a couple scratches.

Also, I don't have Xbox Live so I am in effect playing this solo.

Real men solo the bosses, although I can think of a few instances where it would be forgiveable to do otherwise.

Fantastic game though. It's genuinly brilliant, and I dream of the day Dark Souls 2 will be released.

I finally got to play Far Cry 3, which was great too. The sneak mechanic is very well done, the environment lush and beautiful and the story surprisingly engaging. Voice acting next to perfect. IT's pleasant to see a shooter actively trying to explore what the sort of plot shooters typically throw at you would do to a normal person. There's a part where you're fleeing from a bunch of pirates. Your girlfriend is driving while you're blowing up trucks with a grenade launcher from the back. She's screaming in fear while you're cackling manically every time a car goes up in flame. The contrast was fantastic, I thought.

[Defiance]

Hmm, girlfriend is going to buy me any game I want since my birthday is coming up, but honestly I have no idea what to get.

Typically, I enjoy RPGs, but I'll play games of pretty much any genre as long as they're well done. Also, going to say no RTSs since I'm going to be getting Heart of the Swarm in two weeks when it's released.

Far Cry 3 seems like a possibility. I don't know anything about it, but it seems like it got some great reviews.

[Mentalist]

Khellendros, on 27 February 2013 - 08:50 PM, said:

EA announces that microtransations will feature in ALL their games from now on. Now, I'm not an EA hater, but sometimes I wonder if they're just asking for it.

http://uk.ign.com/ar...ll-future-games

what is wrong with you? EA are scum of the industry!

Defiance, on 28 February 2013 - 11:35 PM, said:

Hmm, girlfriend is going to buy me any game I want since my birthday is coming up, but honestly I have no idea what to get.

Typically, I enjoy RPGs, but I'll play games of pretty much any genre as long as they're well done. Also, going to say no RTSs since I'm going to be getting Heart of the Swarm in two weeks when it's released.

Far Cry 3 seems like a possibility. I don't know anything about it, but it seems like it got some great reviews.

pre-order Bioshock: Infinite ?

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 28 February 2013 - 11:40 PM

[Defiance]

I would, but my girlfriend loves Bioshock more than I do so she's already planning on purchasing it.

EDIT: It's between Ni No Kuni and Far Cry 3 at this point. Going to download the demo for the former to try it out.

This post has been edited by Defiance: 01 March 2013 - 12:08 AM

[Mentalist]

Khellendros, on 27 February 2013 - 08:50 PM, said:

EA announces that microtransations will feature in ALL their games from now on. Now, I'm not an EA hater, but sometimes I wonder if they're just asking for it.

http://uk.ign.com/ar...ll-future-games

Following this up, Crytek thinks "offline single player has to go away"

http://ca.ign.com/ar...f-free-to-play?


I say, go fuck yourself, Crytek.

[Khellendros]

Mentalist, on 01 March 2013 - 08:47 PM, said:

Khellendros, on 27 February 2013 - 08:50 PM, said:

EA announces that microtransations will feature in ALL their games from now on. Now, I'm not an EA hater, but sometimes I wonder if they're just asking for it.

http://uk.ign.com/ar...ll-future-games

Following this up, Crytek thinks "offline single player has to go away"

http://ca.ign.com/ar...f-free-to-play?


I say, go fuck yourself, Crytek.

I agree wholeheartedly. I always got a bad vibe from Crytek, the Crysis games always felt more to me like technical demos than actual games (not to say that they're all bad, however). I know it's their USP, but the focus on graphics over all else, including, it seems, gameplay, hurts their games badly in my opinion.

And now they've come up with a statement saying that the generally mediocre reaction to Crysis 3 is down to 'console generation fatigue.' Really? So why did Metal Gear Rising and Tomb Raider, released almost exactly the same time, both get such a positive reception. Let me think...

[Coco with marshmallows]

Morgoth, on 28 February 2013 - 02:26 PM, said:

I finally got to play Far Cry 3, which was great too. The sneak mechanic is very well done, the environment lush and beautiful and the story surprisingly engaging. Voice acting next to perfect. IT's pleasant to see a shooter actively trying to explore what the sort of plot shooters typically throw at you would do to a normal person. There's a part where you're fleeing from a bunch of pirates. Your girlfriend is driving while you're blowing up trucks with a grenade launcher from the back. She's screaming in fear while you're cackling manically every time a car goes up in flame. The contrast was fantastic, I thought.

Sounds like an exact lift of a level from Unchartd: Drake's Fortune

[Khellendros]

Mentalist, on 28 February 2013 - 11:38 PM, said:

Khellendros, on 27 February 2013 - 08:50 PM, said:

EA announces that microtransations will feature in ALL their games from now on. Now, I'm not an EA hater, but sometimes I wonder if they're just asking for it.

http://uk.ign.com/ar...ll-future-games

what is wrong with you? EA are scum of the industry!

Following on from this in timely fashion, Cliffy B posts a defence of EA (and other things). http://kotaku.com/59...es-and-quarters

[Defiance]

Playing Path of Exile. For a free-to-play game, it's wonderful. I'm not far enough in yet to give it a review, but this feels like what Diablo 3 should have been. The passive skill tree is overwhelming at first, but once you take a few minutes to examine it it's true lovely. It forces you to actually spend some time thinking about how you're going to build your character, and allows you to do pretty much whatever you want (a witch who stacks strength as a stat? Go ahead!). I'm sure some players have come up with ridiculous - and effective - combinations. And while it's not casual-friendly, there's only a limited number of respecs, so you truly have to plan out your character. This is great, as it encourages me to actually create new characters to test things out. For example, I'm playing a Witch who specializes in lightning spells, but that's just one of four immediate routes I could have gone (fire and ice, and then summoning which is a completely different tree).

The skill gem system is where things really shine, though. All of your abilities come from gems, which level up as you gain experience as long as they're equipped. Some gems exist just to supplement abilities, and you can make some pretty wicked combinations (your fireball spell could be modified into a totem that shoots fireballs, and going even further it could shoot three fireballs at once that make even more fireballs when enemies are hit).

I doubt the game has any real kind of balance, but that's fine by me. Balance ruins too many games in my opinion, as it generally just leads to homogenization (look at World of Warcraft for a prime example). As long as abilities aren't allowed to be godly, I welcome a range of effectiveness.

The story reminds me of Diablo 2: it's simple, but it adds to the atmosphere and doesn't get in the way of gameplay at all (as opposed to Diablo 3's cringe-worthy crapfest). The music is great, and so fire the environments have been beautiful; the game goes for a more realistic style as opposed to the cartoony style that Torchlight and Diablo 3 have.

Like I said, it's free-to-play, and the developers are adamant about it never being pay-to-win; all of the stuff in the online store is aesthetic, ranging from pets to different visual effects for spells/armor/weapons to extra character slots and stash tabs. It's definitely worth a try if you like games such as Torchlight and Diablo.

[Studlock]

Got a 50 dollar prepaid credit card for my birthday and decided to use it on games I hadn't played before yet have heard really good things about. Bought Metro 2033, the Longest Journey (I hope I can run it, it's really old) and Dreamfall: the Longest Journey. So many games and so little time.

[Morgoth]

So I just played Dear Esther. It's a pretty short game, so it didn't take long. It was a very intriguing experience, and definitely a game I would advise everyone to try out. Although, game might be a poor description. An interactive short story, maybe. There are no puzzles, or tasks or action. You explore this incredible island and the story that goes along with it. The scenery is beautiful and the sound effects fantastic.

[Satan]

This post has been edited by Satan: 04 March 2013 - 07:46 PM

[Lucifer's Heaven]

Morgoth, on 03 March 2013 - 09:41 AM, said:

So I just played Dear Esther. It's a pretty short game, so it didn't take long. It was a very intriguing experience, and definitely a game I would advise everyone to try out. Although, game might be a poor description. An interactive short story, maybe. There are no puzzles, or tasks or action. You explore this incredible island and the story that goes along with it. The scenery is beautiful and the sound effects fantastic.

I'd also describe it as interactive short story. Or maybe interactive journey? Either way, I liked it. And I look forward to seeing what they can do when teamed up with the insane minds behind Amnesia

[Morgoth]

I'm still no more than 20 minutes into that game. It terrifies me.

[Gothos]

Amnesia was pretty fun but I must say I don't agree with the hype around its scariness. It was pretty awesome for the most part but at the end I started to lose the feeling. I still maintain that the single most creepy thing in videogaming is the Shalebridge Cradle from Thief: Deadly Shadows, followed by Return to the Cathedral from Thief: The Dark Project. But hey, I'm a Thief maniac, so...

[Mentalist]

Shadowrun Returns Alpha footage:

http://www.youtube.c...d&v=9MiMjQwd2VE

I want this game now. Looks sooo good.

[worry]

Quick question: Never played Mass Effect, saw that there's a Mass Effect Trilogy release with all three games. Is this the version to get?