Tigranes

No, because you can play a new character from Level 1 along with your friend as well? I don't think there's ever been a game where you can't do that. I'm not sure what has led you to think it would be otherwise? The only thing that changes in DS3 is that now, you don't have to worry about your friend being higher level than you.

Just finished my first Shogun 2 TW campaign. Very satisfying but its greatest strength is also its greatest weakness; focusing on Japan helped them actually make a rather polished product that works well out of the box for once, but I think I'll get tired of it soon unless the mod scene does it again. It was quite enjoyable having Oda Nobunaga rampage around the place, but even on Hard/Hard you win 90% of the battles you choose to fight. Perhaps a higher difficulty, but not a fan of extra AI bonuses that effectively mean more spams of units to fight.

You'd think that they would be as closely aligned as possible to ensure efficiency, but in reality it just is not the case - it ties into things like how shelfspace in physical stores are 'bought' and allocated, how distributors and the publishers estimate demand (based on preorders, etc), etc. It's really hard to get enough 100% numbers to verify suspicions outside the industry but theres enough to suggest that we can't assume 1:1 shipped-sold. I don't want to go on and on about VGChartz since it's one of those eternal internet debates, but if we just ask the question, can we use its current estimates as a ballpark figure for DA2's sales, I'm skeptical. They currently have roughtly 600k (360) + 300k (PS3) + 200k (PC), but those are pretty low figures and the margin of error will impact the data more. We know that they often use a limited sample (e.g. calling 5% of US stores) and extrapolate from there, so a general margin of error of 15-20% is to not unreasonable; but in this case that would be the difference between, say, under a million total (which would be seen by Bio/EA as Very Bad) or approaching 1.5mil with digital PC sales (which would be seen by Bio/EA as pretty good...I think?). There's also no basis to double PC figures toa ccount for digital sales, since nobody really knows - digital sales could be way more than physical, or less, or whatever. Factoring everything in, what we could say is that based on VGChartz' data, we can argue DA2 most likely sold between, say, 0.75-1.5 million. Which really just tells us, "it sold more than Planescape: Torment but less than Call of Duty". For reference, a fairly decent review of VGChartz' advantages and flaws. Without judging its merits as a whole, for the question of whether we can take its estimates on a game released under a month ago, I feel that the influence of extrapolation and educated guessing is too high.

Generally, (1) Often reports of "x sold" actually means "x shipped", i.e. how many copies they shipped off to distributors. You could have 1 mjillion shipped and only half that sold - it happens a fair amount of times. (2) VGChartz, well, Volo is actually right here, it's fantasy. They really have no 'inside information' per se and don't know a lot more than we do, and in addition they have some big problems such as failing to count any digital sales of PC games, or often confusing (1) themselves. At this point I really don't care much about DA franchise at all, but it'd be interesting to get some good info on sales figures if we ever get them.

AP was left to rot for 6 months for no reason in particular.

Never understood the appeal of alcohol. 1) A lot of it tastes like crap. 2) It's hideously expensive. 3) My idea of a 'good time' doesn't coincide with how people generally appear to enjoy drunkenness. 4) Often you must go to pubs. Pubs are bloody loud. 5) Oh, and I guess the health.

I only watched one long Duke gameplay trailer, which was I think just before the original incarnation died, and while it's definitely not cutting-edge, I thought it looked fantastic and unique, because (1) it was clearly an old school FPS, but (2) they were throwing ina whole lot of things and adding all sorts of crazy things in a way not many old school FPSes could do. Who cares if it doesn't have a cover system (which is pretty **** most of the time anyway) when they've taken an old school fun formula and added in driving crap out of high windows and whatnot?

What the hell are you people doing to my beloved TW2 thread? Get out! Just LEAVE ME ALONE! re: Gaider quote, I do feel that it's nice he sometimes tells you what he really thinks about stuff like that, though putting up with 10+ years of internet wars about romances of every sort and type has turned him into a rather jaded let the chips fall where they may sort. I don't think anything he says there is truly problematic and that it's not really constructive to nitpick it so much, proving another example to devso ut there why they shouldn't communicate with fans.

Chill, people. Obs devs do read some/most of the boards, but I'm sure there were a variety of reasons. Now, if they didn't plan to have full MP other than coop, I doubt a month will change much. Putting in multiplayer is a lot of work. It's not just adjusting the game itself - it's the servers, the front-end for matchmaking, etc, and requires a lot more than devs just doing a 'bit more work'. It's a different beast. To be honest I'd be perfectly happy with a very good polished SP & coop experience. There are other games out there (Torchlight, D3, etc) that do/will do the classic MP thing very well. There are pretty much no good coop RPGs out there at the moment and I much prefer that DS3 fill this gap.

Impossible to know for sure yet, but the graphics cards in particular on both computers are pretty awful and I'm surprised Bioshock 2 runs. You might get lucky and manage to run it but it probably won't meet the minimum requirements as stated by the company.

1) Game is now apparently delayed to mid-June. 2) 5 weeks is not 'near', at least for demos - especially these days, when very few companies release demos at all, and half the time demos come out a long time after the actual game. We'll need to wait and see. A pre-release demo is always good, but unfortunately it is a rare thing in the industry now so hopefully we will get one.

Sure, but it definitely doesn't make it any more likely. THe destructoid article has nothing to do about the delay unless other information suggests so. Anyway, I'm fine with delay, anything to make the game better.

Does HOMM3 work like the later Age of Wonders series in that you're not only travelling with your heroes with RPG items and fighting turn based battles, but you're also navigating an overland map and dealing with strategic city-grabbing elements too? I found I love games that do the former (FF Tactics, Shining Force 2, etc) but never really enjoyed the latter.

Question remains whether the license will be worth anything by then, we're lucky that Arcania decided to push its own name. To be honest though, PB have made the exact same game 4 times now, perhaps 5 with R2, and they should really move on.

I found Eschalon II to be fun but limited - after one playthrough there wasn't much point going through the humdrum story and silly press-once-to-move-one-tile controls. Still worth it, IMO, very fun in that on eplaythrough in good ol' dungeon crawlin'. KOTC looks fun but I'm afraid I won't be able to handle the graphics/UI, not so much that it's too old as... just really gets on my nerves.

If you buy DA2 now, you don't get free ME2?

Never ever heard of this but apparently it's the hot stuff and I should not miss it?

Yep. Thankfully several games still have a big modding scene - the next Elder Scrolls will, FNV has a fair one, Total War has a fair one even though CA are actively making it harder for fans to fix their broken games... now that they're finally making it playable out of the box. Vaguely heard about various offers. Interesting to hear about 1mil but know that in some places, e.g. UK, DA2 is being sold for half price. How can you cut a game's price as fast as / faster than Alpha Protocol then claim it's a huge success? Confusing. Sadly, after the intiial temptation I'm not interested in DA2 much anymore, and ME2 is a big meh.

My guess is that like most modern dungeon crawlers, loot is reserved - you no longer have people grabbing in a free for all who clicks fastest, drops are already reserved for certain players. I'm personally not a fan of it but it seems to be the trend, which would fit into the general design.

I actually identify with characters better in third person view because I can see them and position them within the world, and in any case, very rarely are worlds good enough to make me feel even for a moment that I'm actually in them. It's much more immersive for me when I can see my character and how he/she fits into that world. That kind of thing is always 'learnt' as you play various video games - there is no 'inherent' disposition towards greater immersion or identification in a first person camera or a WSAD movement system. It's a personal thing that is most likely the result of your familiarity with such schemes in your formative gaming experiences. Case in point, very few people that have played a fair bit of games across genres would ever say D2 feels clunky. edit: btw, I wonder if 2 controllers is possible? Is that usually doable?

It does sound fun, I'm interested - just afraid it'll be too simple and get boring quickly. Hrm.

Fairly twitchy but not too twitchy, and it's fun enough. I say it works pretty well, though too simple, and it can be challenging. Anyway, just get the game.

I'm perfectly fine with Chosen One vs. The Return of the Dragons if the story does not advertise its greatest illogicalities and its worst gameplay elements as the primary plot mechanisms. At worst it would be Gothic 2's dragon hunting (which as a plot arc was pretty retarded grinding, but at least you got some cool dragon fights).

I'm.... stuck on the first room

Klingon.