LadyCrimson

I'm on PC. There was a thread on the topic during the demo release but I can't find it now (probably need new glasses...) There were better pics of the issue in the thread (it wasn't just me) but this was the only one I put up: http://crimsonkeep.com/wallpapers/data/med...DS3-0000013.jpg It's a bit like the colors you see on top of an oil slick, in straight lines. Upper left corner where the fence is. Sometimes you can't see it in-game because of colors/backgrounds but other times it's fairly obvious (like a lot of the dialogue screens if you can see 'sky' behind NPC's) and causes the image to look like it's under a dirty lens or something. Edit: Found the thread: http://forums.obsidian.net/index.php?s=&am...t&p=1122170 And it is probably intentional effect, but something is wrong with the effect that causes banding. It's possible one may not initially notice but once you notice it it's hard to stop noticing it.

I keep watching the Diablo3 gameplay & Arena vids. The action looks great, I just hope the skills/game mechanics match.

I have idly wasted every minute of the past 38 hours or so and have loved every minute of it. Caffeine helped.

Ozzy's 'Crazy Train' on the bagpipes:

I need to move to the UK. And I'm definitely hoping for DLC for DS3.

Yeah, I wish they'd put in high res slides and downsize them for smaller screens instead of the other way around. :/

I played DS1 & DS2 and I still like DS3. But I realized it was going to be different from the beginning...so I went trying not to have expectations. I find expectations tend to be a bit like having blinders on. Even w/Diablo3 I'm trying hard not to have expectations, because the direction Blizzard has been going in lately has me thinking D3 is going to be a bit different than a lot of ppl are thinking...not as dramatic as DS3, but we'll see.

I'm not an expert on judging a game engine from playing a game, but I certainly liked what I saw. Also, tho I only have this one game to judge it by, it seems stable. Still the issue of the way one of the lighting/fog or some effect causes those weird soft lines in the background at times but other than that...

Not a bad point. Some of those same ppl I know couldn't give a flying hoot about new graphics/physics. I guess I was wondering (in terms of sales at least) if the fact most aRPG's were, in the past, aimed at the PC market had something to do with it. They don't seem to port over well to consoles (at least not to the original aRPG fans minds) while shooters went there easily. That was my impression from the get-go as well.

Blizzard and most MMO's would like to disagree with you. DS3 just isn't the "popular" form of aRPG's as most think of them, since Ob's went for something a bit different. But I do agree that there doesn't seem to be tons of room for a plethora of Diablo's, say, vs. a plethora of 1st person shooters. I often wonder why that is... 1st person shooters - you run around shooting at stuff. aRPG's - you toss fireballs/whack your sword at stuff. eg, what makes shooter fans keep buying all these new shooters, while aRPG fans just say "I'll wait for D3 to come out", when the formula for either doesn't change that much (I know they change a little/try for new things at times, I'm just saying....). I know so many who won't even try a new aRPG because something in the game isn't like Diablo & it irks them.

It's nothing special, just helps the pocketbook a little mostly. One of the chests in the Foundry, closer to the start then the end. On the other hand, while mucking about with that, a random monster in one of the small 'mobs' I killed to get there dropped the Unique Halo One Eye or something, during one run. Surprised me because the enemy wasn't a boss, mini-boss or anything of that sort.

Hm. Now I'll have to pay more attention to that. Must admit I haven't been very observant with dmg stuff this game. Hasn't been my focus. I can't recall ever seeing any poison effect either, tho...at least nothing on the scope of glowing green gas aura or some such. But then I haven't noticed anything from Lightning either, outside of the graphic effect on the weapon/fist. There's usually too much chaos going on for me to gauge what dmg is causing what during a fight or even hear specific sounds. Only one I notice is Fire, because well, they're on fire.

I've watched my older brother with my niece over the years (who, while able to be independent, is somewhat learning disabled in an unusual fashion, it's complicated) and I came to the conclusion he's one of the best dads there could possibly be. My brother is just....awesome.

In my case, at least, it's probably the later. Just never wanted kids. Can't remember a moment in my entire life where I did. Ppl would tell me I'd change my mind when I grew up, but never happened. The desire to procreate is missing from my genetic makeup or something. The caretaker-mothering instinct is still there a bit tho, else I probably wouldn't go gaga over kittens.

Re-reading Howl's Moving Castle. Which made me watch the movie again too. I love Howl.

Just putting in my own comment about how fun Divine Divinity was to play. :D I'm still playing DS3, altho I haven't been in much of a gaming mood in general the past few days, so not exactly a lot of time spent doing so.

Well everyone is entitled to express themselves....but I'm going to choose to reply to only a specific part: I don't like the Auto-targeting either. The key seems to be that you have to be facing what you want to aim at. So if you're dodging/rolling or teleporting like mad, you can't stop and just hit the attack button...you have to make sure you're facing the enemy you want to hit. The problem with this of course is often something else is between you and what you actually want to attack...During boss fights I guess they tried to mitigate this by making the boss always be the highlighted name, but doesn't always quite work, and you still have to make sure you're facing in the right direction. Short version: just clicking the mouse on a monster does not work if you're facing in the wrong direction.

That's exactly what happened to me, level/end game wise, on Hardcore difficulty. I haven't looked at actual XP numbers but it doesn't seem to me that difficulty does anything to the XP gained. You don't have to grind "a bunch of levels" tho...only a few. And it doesn't take very long as long as you're killing enemies that give you some ok exp, of course. You can't go back to the start area at lvl 25 and get any exp, haha. But leveling is so fast in this game.

I have yet to play an aRPG that didn't have this mechanic in some form or another. Sure Diablo was his own guy, but to get to him you had to break those seals and fight all those minions first. Same thing with Baal. It was the minions that were a pain sometimes, not the boss himself. Darkstone, Torchlight, original DS's games...they all have some variation of huge mobs + boss. So claiming Obsidian "resorting" to this tactic is somehow uncommon or a poor design on their part feels a bit silly to me. I did find Normal too easy in general however. But then I also found FNV too easy even on the hardest difficulty, and that was only after a few hours of playing that game...luckily that game has mods. Companies aren't going to design difficulty around what the hardcore/obsessive/experienced gamer thinks should be really hard for fear of alienating potential masses. I think it's time they did, however, start offering more difficulty level options than "Easy/Normal/Hard". The game player is becoming more savvy and more experienced as a whole (perhaps) and in order to keep replayability the difficulty should be more scalable & customizable. imo.

Except for the first few bosses (the first time I played) I haven't found HC terribly difficult. Which isn't to say I don't sometimes take a lot of damage, or never ever die, and it's not to say I'm personally really fast. Still takes me a long time on boss fights because I must spend more than half the fight-time teleporting/dodging instead of attacking. Average time tends to be 5-6 mins. for me on HC (2nd playthrough, it was longer on the 1st). I find it interesting that there aren't more boss-fight videos of DS on YT. Hardly any. Which is either a bad sign re: interest, or a sign that it's difficult to get a video where you look cool/uber/fast. I actually agree with Greylord w/the notion that it's likely many players who buy the game may find the boss fights (first playthru) pretty difficult on Normal. Especially if they were hoping for a click-Diablo type combat game (the dodging etc. on PC can have a bad adjustment period). One has to remember that a lot of people who like to come on gaming forums to discuss the ins and outs and stats of games tend to be ... more hardcore, or more experienced w/difficulty mechanics/varied controls, or just plain stubborn, etc ... than the average, perhaps. Maybe. At any rate, imo games are generally designed to be difficult the first time or two through it. I rarely encounter a game that remains combat-difficult with several replays. By then you're yawning & if combat is the only feature you like about a game, you tend to move on. I didn't stick w/Diablo2 for 4 years because of combat (it was item hunting). And yeah, I've been finding it fun to just kill stuff in one area until they give hardly any exp. before moving on. My pocketbook is a lot fatter & it's been nice to experiment w/some things because of it. I even found one regenerating chest (it respawns upon save reload). Which is probably a mistake, but I'm exploiting it while it's there. haha

This reminds me of Diablo1, where certain ppl spent a long time figuring out all the math for the spell & attribute effects....good times. I'd guess Sannom is probably closest....judging from the numbers on the items anyway. I rarely (yet) see Ice as a very high stat (2,3,6, etc) per individual item, while Doom can be very high (I've seen 127 at least). Lightning seems to have moderately high possible number, Fire maybe a little less so...not sure about Poison, haven't paid much attention to that, but seems like it's usually lower Fire/Lightning. Bloodletting is typically fairly low too - not as low as Ice but pretty low stat.

-Rajani was free to go -left Heart of N alone but destroyed it/freed the ghost after the fight. -Kept mansion for Legion -Left the Krug in jail -Sided with the Baron in the land dispute -Helped Cyclops -Dapper Gent w/the Legion -Spared Jane/she had to make amends (not w/the Queen) -Sided w/the Queen morally that the trap in the mines seemed dishonorable. (but in RL sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do) ....I'm sure there were at least a few other minor influence/mini-decisions made but can't think of them offhand.

One of the few times I've seen attacks from a different level "plane". (Reinhart on bridge & goblin on ground below - poor giant had to take the stairs) I like the cutscene art. Especially with subtitles off. My personal fave shot of the cutscene confronting Mr. God.

I don't have an answer, but semi-related, I was playing a couple days ago and found myself idly wondering if there were any resistance factors in the game. If there are, they must be hidden, because none of the skills/items seem to reference any. Anyway, outside of a resistance concept, the only thing I can think of offhand as a possible answer to your question is...that it might be that poison as a whole does less damage per second than the others, so heavy damage over 9 seconds is actually about an equal total damage as, say, moderate lightning over 6 seconds. Meaning they'd be about the same. Dunno tho...just a guess possibility.