Maria Caliban

For 90% of the games I buy, I don't really think about the DRM. I'm of the opinion that most PC gamers are indifferent to whatever DRM is used. Like many things, people only care when it causes them trouble, and even then, if you're a PC gamer, you're probably used to some amount of trouble when it comes to playing games. Keeping my drivers up to date, making sure my hardware is suitable, turning off post-processing for the Kingdoms of Alumar: Reckoning demo, playing Batman: AC in Direct X 9 because Direct X 10 was broken, opening up my audio devices and changing from Quadraphonic to 5.1 for my 'speakers' for Skyrim, and keeping up with patches to see if I want to use them or they'll break something... for me, it's all part of the overhead of PC gaming. DRM tends to be one more thing on a pile of things.

I'm looking at Steam and wondering if I should pay $9.99 for X3: Albian Prelude or $19.99 for a thirty day subscription to EVE. I wish I could get into EVE. I've done 14-day trial accounts twice now. Each time, I feel really into it at first, and then I quit about a week in because it feels like I'm just treading water. The idea of the game appeals to me but I think I'm hooked on XP systems. And I wish the PC vs NPC fights were a bit more interesting.

The first time I played ME, I did it at a computer that hit 15 FPS at max and slowed down to 3-5 FPS during combat. I had to do the Conduit Run thirty-five times, and only managed it at 640x800, lowest possible settings, with the camera zoomed in on the ground. But I loved the game. I'm replaying it right now on my 1920x1080 screen with my 8 gigs of ram and a GTX 560. I'm noticing for the first time that people have red veins in the whites of their eyes and getting annoyed that some of the lines on women's uniforms are a bit pixelated. Enjoyment is based on expectation. If you know your computer is crap, you play on the minimum settings and are glad that you can play that awesome new title all your friends are talking about without melting your motherboard.

Yes, a retail copy of the game only had a disk check while the Steam copy used Steam. The DLC you had to download from their site, which required you have a EA/BioWare social account, and then it had to authenticate once. While I liked Shale, I'd hardly call her an important part of the game. Actually, most of DA:O's DLC wasn't that great. I thought Liar of the Shadow Broker was the first really good DLC.

Tale had a snarky reply up for all of two minutes. It's a sign of his maturity that he changed it, and a sign of my immaturity that I miss it. Keyboard and mouse. I've played so many console ports, I think I'm used to a bit of clunkiness. I wanted to rebind a few keys, but couldn't. I'd like to stick health potions on my hotbar, but couldn't. I prefer Batman:AC's scheme where you double tap a key to use an ability ([1][1] to quick through a batarang) over using the hotbar to select an ability and then RMouse to use it. It's not bad, and it's easy to adjust to, but I would have liked a pit more optimization. Replayed with a rogue character. Had to hop around much more.

*notices can of worms* What DRM? Do you mean Shale?

Yes. In fact, the premise of Reckoning - that you're the first person to come back from the dead - is basically an explanation for a common MMO mechanic. That being the ability to die and then run back to a shrine to be resurrected. 2,000 years in the future, when Copernicus happens, it's a standardized technology, so thousands of adventurers will be able to die and come back.

I like it. It was exactly what I expect it to be save for the sound being a bit off. The tutorial character is behind you several times while you're running around the first dungeon and I had to swing my camera around to understand him when he started talking. There was also a time when I was in a fight with dramatic fight music playing, right afterward, a character began a conversation with me. The dramatic fight music boomed and blasted while he spoke, drowning out his words. I went Might, got a Smoldering Longsword, and sliced my way through everything.

I'll likely pick up the Steam edition. As many games as I have on Steam, I'm sure one day the company will go belly up or someone will hack into their servers or aliens will melt Gabe Newell down to make an art sculpture. It's bound to happen. I wish the demo were available without another program attached. I'm at work, and I'd hope to D/L it to a flash drive so I could play it as soon as I got home.

Commandos are a great starting class.

Where's the demo?

That's amazingly little content in a 30 minute preview. Going on killing sprees don't interest me though, and it seems that the majority of preview was assaulting random people. Hopefully, in the PC version, you don't have to pause to quaff a potion. It's still appealing to me though. A wide open world to play around in, lots of stuff to do, and I like action gameplay just fine. Also, from the game forum... Even as someone who doesn't like Lord of the Rings, this makes me said. This german video shows PC gameplay.

Why are you anti-dwarf? Role-playing games bring out the best in humanity.

They have gnomes and four flavors of elves. I bet they have orcs.

You must have some oddly shaped sex toys.

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The average book has better writing than the average video game. I admit that I hold novelists to higher standards than video game writers, but I think that's fair as they have far more control of their work. No novelist has ever been told they couldn't describe a character taking off his shirt because it wasn't in the budget. Okay, okay, I'm going to try to be positive... Yes, RA Salvadore tends to have a sort of generic fantasy vibe, but he is working in an existing property. He didn't come up with the DnD setting, the fact that all of his characters have to adhere to a pre-existing class structure, moral alignment (barbarians must be chaotic!), or the idea that you only gain experience via killing and that the more powerful the character, the more powerful/magical the loot they must have. And while it

I'm guessing you haven't watched "A Clockwork Orange"? I have. I get how it's a reference to a film. Now, how is it satire?

Beating someone with a giant sex toy is satire?

Don't get shot. To win that part, all you have to do is take out Two Face. I knocked out two of his patrolling goons and when no one was around him, I swooped down and smacked him around. He dropped before anyone could get close enough to shoot me. Todd McFarline might have done the concept art, but it looks more like Fable than Spawn. If RA Salvadore wrote the setting, it will be generic fantasy land. That said, it's supposed to be a fairly large world that you get to explore with lots of skills like the Elder Scrolls, so I'll be picking it up.

And you think that 75% of a game will sell fine? Can't say I agree. Quite so. Imagine if Blizzard had cut Starcraft II into three parts and made people pay full price for each of them. That would have never sold. I'm sure that such an unknown and unanticipated game like Diablo III could never sell well on consoles.

Didn't they already do that. Called it 'the Witcher' or somesuch. I play more than fantasy crpgs so the fact that it's a fantasy crpg isn't quite enough to make me enthusiastic.

I can understand wanting a game set in Warhammer 40k, but the regular Warhammer fantasy universe? I'm not sure what that would bring to the table.

Picked up the Magika bundle for $7 when it was on sale on STEAM. It's rather difficult for a SP game.