LadyCrimson

So....late 2012 sounds like a good time to pull most of our money out of the computerized/electronic banking/investment system & start stuffing both cash and bricks of gold in the mattress. Snail mail might become popular again! Pony Express comeback? And imagine...a world without working ATM's for long periods. THE HORROR!

I really liked the system in Titan Quest, where there were not pre-built classes in the Diablo sense, but rather the skill mastery tree/s you chose to put your points in would define what you were. Probably because it allowed you to dual-class and I've always liked being able to dual-class. Even if dual-classing makes you "weaker" than a single class, I find it more fun/more flexible. Altho this may be influenced in part because I also like to solo/single play so much, vs. multiplayer where you can rely on other ppl to back you up. Also, such skill/class systems mean I don't end up with two or more character of those "classes" that I never play because I don't like them. ie I don't want to be a hulking muscle-bound Barbarian warrior so I'll never use him. Again, in Titan Quest, their system gave me a lot of re-playability because I could spend so much time experimenting not only within a Mastery tree (ala Diablo2), but by combining all the different Masteries together. Dungeon Siege1 was different than TQ, but its system did allow me to dualclass, in a fashion. But having to remember to switch skills all the time to level them up efficiently was a pain, so a different method than that would be desirable.

Most 'how to build a pc' stuff out there is going to focus on what's the best hardware for your buck & then how to connect pieces together. For the average person, what you're going to want to be more knowledgeable in are the features of the hardware that make them desirable. For example, why more RAM is useful than less, or why you need 64-bit operating systems if you want over a certain amount of RAM, or which graphic card has better performance benchmarks for the uses you're going to be doing. Unless you're a serious tech curious sort, don't worry much about what physical part makes something go...just look at performance. Think of it like buying a car. Most people barely know how an engine & its surroundings works...but they do look at brand reliability, performance, & features when buying an auto. Don't have much to add to what mkreku & Spider are saying...although I will mention that, in terms of the computer case, make sure it's going to be "long" enough inside to fit the graphic card you want to put into it. Some current cards are really long and won't fit into certain cases, sometimes even when the case seems biggish on the outside. Can depend how they have the drive bay section/motherboard area set up inside. Oh and in terms of Xbox/monitor....it can work, but I think if the monitor itself has no built-in speakers or an audio-out jack for external speakers, you may not get any sound. Many pc monitors don't have audio ports on them, since they assume you're using soundcards....solvable, but may require a bit more than plugging in the HDMI cable. That's just what I read tho, I have no actual experience with Xbox's whatsoever.

The first one was awesome and imo still stands up today. Of course, it can lose a lot if you don't have awesome speakers at home, tho. The sequels were...uh...well, they were sequels.

I have nothing to say beyond "nothing is failsafe" and "the world loves oil." Someday maybe we can get all our gluttonous power desires served directly from some contraption shot into the sun, ala sci-fi. That would be nice. Until it burned out the sun too early. Hahahaha. Sadly, so far at least, there's a price for everything.

All the swkotor2.ini stuff never worked for me, either. Or some others. But it does for some. Why this is, I couldn't tell you. So, yeah, what Deadly Nightshade said. KSE rocked.

The description is too vague for me to be convinced....it wouldn't be that hard, for example, to envision DS1 or DSII core gameplay being the same, with some surface npc alliance stuff added in. I'm not saying I wouldn't like that...I would...but only saying that it doesn't necessarily mean it's going to feel very different from the hack n slash so many here dislike. But it is good to hear that they're going to make some changes in chr-driven direction. Time will tell how far it goes. ...however, since one of the things I liked about DS/Diablo etc is a fast pace game rather than lots of story immersion, I'm also hoping there won't be too many convo menu's/cutscenes for me to clickclickclick my way through. I know I'm probably in the minority there, here, tho. ;p

@Draganta --I've become more & more annoyed at the overuse of "Diablo-clone" term given to all action-rpg's too, but I do understand it. Since Diablo's are so recognizable it's easy to call every hack n slash that has similar game style by that and be sure that people know what you mean. Also...Divine Divinity is pretty cool. It's a bit tougher than Diablo2 ever was in a few ways, but very free-form. It has the old fashioned black fog-of-war as well. The one thing I didn't like was the item looting, that can be so addicting, is sort of missing. At least, I mean, there's loot, but it wasn't all that interesting to me. You can get it on Gog.com now...works on Win7.

I don't have much to discuss in this area since I don't usually make mods...but I would be all for it, so I could use the mods others would make. I got a lot of mileage from some mods for DS1 - most were very simple function or cosmetic, but I liked being able to customize the game more. And a few mods were fairly complex/ambitious.

@hurlshot - my husband's situation is similar, with mild dyslexia or something. I don't think he's ever had it diagnosed so it could be something else. Kind of runs in his family I think. *shrug* Regardless, for him it's mild & you'd likely never notice/realize day to day and it's never hampered him jobwise etc...but he's a very very slow reader and thus...subtitles are like torture, even when he can keep up with them. On the bright side, his slow reading seems to enable him to remember a lot more of what he reads than I do. heh I'm not fond of subtitles because I feel like I have to watch the movie twice...once to read, and once to be able to sit back & relax/enjoy the visuals more. But I also don't like dubbing so I can live with it...but it better be a good movie.

@213374U -- I'm still waiting for a game that meets somewhere in the middle between pure hack slash (particularly the loot hunting aspect, for me) and plot/chr. driven. I have yet to find one.

That's kinda what I figured. Each their own and all that. Yea, the SP campaign was very linear pathed like that...so was DS2. I still liked goofing off with the party NPC's and such tho. But in DS1, the MP had an entirely different, very open & huge playing field with (simple) quests & such. No party npc's/donkeys either. I liked it a lot more than the campaign actually & played it solo a lot. IIRC DS2 didn't have that sort of thing, which annoyed me greatly. So Obsidian, try to either make DS3 a bit less "you must follow this narrow path" or at least make a separate world environment for MP ala the first game. I rarely pay attention to stories in any game so doesn't matter to me. Even in BG, npc's told me to go somewhere & kill/find something, so I did...I couldn't tell you what the story was in that game for the life of me. All I remember was there was this sad little Elf mage... That said....again agree, DS in-game, there was no story in terms of your character having any choices that really affected anything. It's all in the booklore, ala Diablo, as mentioned by someone else. But that's the nature of the genre most of the time, so...imo...who cares. Actually, playing a mage I used a lot more buttons. Or rather, I used a lot more skills. And since you only had two spell slots, I had to constantly switch spells and multiple spellbooks. So whatever interface they create, I want it to have a much better system for dealing with that. And more than "hit button A to cycle through your 50 spells".

Since I haven't been into many new games, I've been playing a little bit of everything when it comes to old games. Funny enough, I installed DungeonSiege1 in early May & played some of it because a friend had bought it recently & her comments made me nostalgic....bought Outcast from GOG, played a bit of that (graphics aren't nearly as cool as I remember...ah, time & tech, lol). DungeonKeeper1 still, of course. Majesty1 (until I lost my CD...)...going to get Prince of Persia Sands of Time from GOG now. I've never played it...dunno how far I'll get but it does look fun. Sigh. I have such a short game attention span.

I'm not on Steam, otherwise I'd start a new character w/you. Course, while I can stomp my husband into the ground, I'm not a super fast player compared to most of you, most likely, so I'd probably drive you nuts anyway. Nice to see some are still playing now and then tho. Btw, did you ever buy any of the expansions? I thought Zombie was worth it...so was Knoxx, except the increased level cap ruined the after-winning gameplay since nothing scaled to the new cap...but the initial increased difficulty was refreshing.

The punchline is that it doesn't really have a setting beyond "generic fantasy" so if they want to make something out of it, they will pretty much have to make it from scratch. @Slowtrain: I'm not really complaining about the DS setting, other than it being yet another generic fantasy world, but about the baggage that the DS IP has. There are two mediocre Diablo clones, one horrible spin-off in space and a horrible movie attached to it. The name doesn't really have any positive connotations associated with it, the best you can hope is that no one will remember those any more. Having the Obsidian name on it will probably help a bit, but most people don't know/care who Obsidian is. I'm curious what's wrong with a 'generic fantasy world/setting' anyway? To some it seems like a dirty word now or something. Does everything have to be some sci-fi or post apocalyptic or zombie or magical GIJoe fantasy setting now? I like different settings too, but I still like the 'generic magic/kingdom/knights fantasy' setting and always will. Besides...almost nothing is non-generic now anyway & hasn't been for a long time...imo it's more to do with execution of gameplay than what type of 'setting' the world is put in. ps...I recall the goblin/robot enemies/areas in DS, plopped into the middle of this magical setting...which for me at the time was unexpected and jarring but at the same time kinda cool. pps...or am I misunderstanding and by 'setting' you really mean plot/story?

Considering that some consider Alpha Protocol's PC version a disaster port, I'd say this is sadly a very likely possibility. Yeah, that part made me a bit nervous too. That makes me think of...well, Borderlands or Overlord interfaces, which were ok for those games, but I dunno...hard to picture the original DS games with such simple interfaces at least...depends what they do with the game, as always.

This would be my opinion as well. Sure the 1st two were hack n slash Diablo clones, but they were fun. Just because you may not like/respect a genre of a game they're making doesn't mean it's a company disaster. They might alter it just enough to make it something more interesting too (but probably still hack n slash, I'd guess) and in this economy, a job is a job. Obsidian can be pickier about projects, if they wish to be, when the economy becomes more robust again.

But it would help some with the aerobic fitness at least. And unlike pedaling, you wouldn't get the huge leg/skinny upper effect. Yeah, I've thought about a set up like that myself. It'd be great for when I watch 3 hour ballgames/twitter. But you'd need something to lower the table/keyboard for when you did want to sit down. lol

My hope dashing needs a bit more work if I want to be truly Evil. I love this level. Wall off & let the tunnelers multiply till reach the games sprite limit, then crush them all with boulders.

I apparently misplaced my original Majesty CD sometime in the last month...I've reached the point where I'm looking in improbable places for it. If I accidentally threw it in the trash or something I'm going to one unhappy camper. Sure I can buy a new disc, but it'll probably be one that's already patched. I liked playing the non-patched original game now & then....

Not pedals....treadmills!

I guess pro-gamers need to start playing competitive Wii-Fit?

I wanted to input that I'd never even heard of the comic but I enjoyed the film, as a film, quite a lot. Was it perfect? No. Was it all action all the time? No. Was it occasionally a bit plodding or over the top? Sure. Did it have one of the best film actor-characterizations in Jackie Earle Haley/Rorschach? Oh yes. --I saw "Seven Pounds" the other day because it was on free Encore. I'd never seen it but did recall the ads, which made it look like some kind of inspirational drama. I was in a cranky mood & could've used some inspiration so I tried it. Two hours later, I was depressed as hell. Good lord, what a desolate, sad movie. imo. I know it's supposed to have some altruistic hope out of the dark theme or whatnot, but inspirational or feel-good it is definitely not. Blargh.

I see a lot of fun villains in there (I only skimmed, 100 separate-click pages on IGN is migraine-inducing). Saw some I'd agree with, some I didn't, and many I've never heard of/seen before. Long live the Pac-Man ghosts.

Holiday weekends....they're long so you want to go somewhere, but all reasonable destinations are super crowded, because everyone else wants to go somewhere too. Get off my lawn.