alanschu

I agree. Tanking on purpose is bad for the sport in general IMO. I think I actually prefer the NBA's lottery. Only teams that did not make the playoffs are eligible, and the teams with worse records have a better chance of getting a higher pick. Go Oilers! I need sleep...still awake!

The thing is, if you look at the picture on the right I can STILL point see where the pixels are. It's a bit more difficult to notice though, unless you are stopped and analyzing the screen, practically looking for them. Sure I can notice them, but while in a game playing them my eyes probably interpolate the aliasing to be a smooth edge. Maybe it's all my years of being forced to play at low resolutions. Or maybe the visual cortex of my brain has evolved to the point where it knows how to manipulate the signals detected so that I interpret more naturally (actually probably not THAT unreasonable, since I've been playing computer games in some way shape or form since I was 2, almost 23 years ago). And yeah, I like anisotropic filtering because it gives much better clarity for objects still in the distance. The biggest improvment I noticed this on was the original Half-Life game, which had a very abrupt mip-mapping line break where textures went from clear to blurry. Hell Kitty's picture does a pretty good job, and THAT is the type of detail I like seeing in video games. It's why I don't care if I can't play at 1600x1200 with 23542x FSAA at 252 fps in FEAR. I feel the shaders and the rest of the engine add so much more graphically that I'm not going to lose sleep over mere pixels. The funny thing is...how much of a performance hit is that with 6x FSAA? I won't dispute that FSAA at the same resolution is better...but is it really better than just upping the resolution, which also has additional benefits such as increased precision, at less of a performance increase?

Which one is the Gman?? The one on the right maybe, but I'm not so sure.

The funny thing is that that picture you posted is apparently completely unacceptable to play a video game at. I can't imagine how people can honestly notice (especially to the point where it becomes annoying) that, on animated (i.e. moving) creatures in a video game. To me, a hand like that would be perfectly acceptable in a video game. As I said earlier, to each his own I guess.

You are my alter-ego! I think it's mostly a habit that started back in the day when interfaces didn't scale with resolution. I remember playing Quake 2 at 1600x1200, and the health and console and everything were absolutely miniscule. I wonder if aliasing is more prevalent on an LCD screen.

Agreed, and I do play on a 1280-native flat panel. Also, I absolutely cannot tolerate even the slightest amount of aliasing. I don't know why. It just gets on my nerves. Any resolution other than the native 1280 looks like garbage on my monitor, so I'm stuck at that resolution. In fact, when I was hunting for a monitor, the only reason I chose my 19" PVA to a superior 20" S-IPS was because the 20" had a 1600 native resolution, and I was sure I couldn't get a lot of games games to run smooth at that resolution with any amount of AA. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> To be honest sounds like more of a limitation of your flat panel monitor. Questionable resolution support is why I still haven't made the progression away from CRT.

It's clear you're not in the programming part of your programming school. You couldn't possibly make any of your claims without recognizing what parts of the code are still being utilized.

I agree that the Source engine rocks. Though it is rather silly that their shadowing cuts through walls. Makes everyone a wallhacker on some maps in CS:Source. I still feel that FEAR's engine blows it out of the water, even at poorer video settings. As for your video card purchase, I don't think it gives you the right to anything. You can still play the game with much better graphical options than people who own inferior options. That's the only priviledge you were given when forking over $600 for a video card. IMO the engine looks nicer at 800x600 with no FSAA or AF than most games at higher resolution with those features. I guess I just have lesser standards for resolutions and FSAA and AF. I'd much rather spend my resources on increasing the shaders, and polygon counts, with normal mapping etc. etc. etc. It's those reasons why Half-Life 2 looks so good. The character models have so much detail, and the animations (which is not really dependent on graphics card performance) create the visual feast that is Half-Life IMO. FSAA, particularly at higher resolutions, is an absolute waste IMO. Far too much performance hit for the "gain" in graphical integrity. Exceptions being games with long distance viewing like a flight sim. The biggest advantage of FSAA comes with resolution limitations. Such as flatpanel or widescreen monitors. I'd rather just play a game at 1600x1200 with 0x FSAA. I get increased precision (more pixels actually existing on the screen), negigible graphical quality difference (particularly if aren't stopping to squint an inch away from your screen actually LOOKING for flaws, rather than playing the game), and much, much better performance. I do like AF though, as it does wonders to eliminate the blurring of mip-mapping (well, at least it did in the original Half-Life engine), and creates a nice crispness to a game. But I still wouldn't consider FEAR to be graphically inferior to Quake 4 or Half-Life 2, even if FEAR had no AF enabled and the other two had full 16x enabled. Give me the stuff that makes the world look more immersive and detailed. Pixels are a wash, and only really noticed if looking at them. And this comes from experience playing games at all resolutions. As long as it doesn't get too low (I played through the original Half-Life at 320x240...now THAT was pixelation) I really couldn't care less about the pixel count. I'd much rather have a nice shiny engine otherwise. Though I guess it must be a bit of a piss off to buy something with the expectations of having certain settings all the time (although your card IS over half a year old now...it's reaching middle age graphics card age). I suspect this bitterness unfairly affects your opinion of FEAR's graphical capabilities. I'd much rather have beautiful, realistic looking shadows rather than shadows that cut through walls (Half-Life 2) or shadows that aren't actually cast on other creatures (Doom 3). I also like the fact that the game character is actually rendered in engine, meaning that HE actually casts a shadow. I haven't played Quake IV, so maybe they changed this, for that version (in addition to no shadows on character models). To each his own I guess. I'd much rather play at a lower resolution with much better graphical standards elsewhere, rather than they take anything out of the game simply so you can have small pixels.

Historically, the lottery only applied to the bottom 3 teams though. This year was an exception because of the lockout

I just installed the game today, so I haven't played online yet. I have a bit too much on the plate at the moment, but I'll likely log in a few minutes or so in MP at some point.

Meh. I'm a PC gamer that enjoys PC games. If I can play through it a slightly different way (even if it's miniscule), I have no problems with it. When compounded with a game like Fallout, it makes it all the more enjoyable. The thing I like about all that you said is it makes the world infinitely more believable and immersive. It's WHY I like Fallout.

It's GURPS origin is not irrelevant. You're too busy stuck on rules bub. THe game setting and game experience is all that matters, especially in a gameworld where the rules are much more transparent than say a game of DnD.

Lock yourself out? How so? I for one like the fact that the game doesn't let you do whatever the heck you want with no worry about the consequences of your inaction. Though perhaps the game could have let you continue playing after Vault 13 gets annihilated, but for as open-ended as people like to champion Fallout, it still has a set story that you still have to at least half-assed attempt to complete. I feel they did better with Fallout 2 for "just letting you play."

The British ones were much better this time around. Less lonesome SAS type experience. I didn't like the ending as much though....the final level was meh compared to CoD's ending. I remember getting goosebumps down the stretch when we were storming the Reichstag as the Soviets. Overall I enjoyed it, but not as much as the original. Probably because it was less "wow" because I had already received a CoD experience before

Yes, people aren't up with just playing "run and shoot" type games cleaning level after level. That would explain why games like Halo, Half-Life 2 (and the original) and all that were not very popular... As good as Deus Ex was, and financially successful, it still doesn't touch the success of those games that have just mere clearing out of the levels. Just like Half-Life's AI didn't matter much because it was just a cleaning level after level type game, or Halo's.

To be honest, I think the engine for FEAR kicks the living crap out of the Doom 3 engine, which is probably why you can run Quake IV so much faster. I was able to run the FEAR demo pretty good with my Athlon64 3500+ and Radeon 9800 Pro at 1024x768. Though I'm not someone that needs to have Anisotropic filtering, and I never use FSAA either (unless I'm looking for them, I have zero problem not noticing the aliasing). I'm still planning on picking this up, now that Christmas has passed and I didn't get it (got Civ4 and CoD2, which were higher up on the list)

Hehehe. I'll remain cautiously optimistic about Bethesda and Fallout 3. Sure it's possible that it might not be much of a "Fallout" experience, but on the other hand, as mkreku mentioned, at least it's being made. If Bethesda wasn't making it, would the chances of a Fallout 3 be zero percent? Given the interviews, it sounded like Bethesda has a ton of Fallout fans working for them. This would lend me to believe that it will be more than just Morrowind with guns. Ultimately though, as long as the game is fun, I doubt I'll really care a whole lot if some concessions are made with the setting (though sticking to the setting is what made Fallout so much fun, so it can't be completely unrelated ).

My biggest "beef" with the game so far is that my parents got me the CD version...all 6 of them. I don't know if there was a DVD version out there or not, but they might as well have just tossed a DVD in there as I can't imagine it having that much of an impact on the cost anyways! Still installing :D

Apparently Troika isn't irrelevant, as this entire thread was basically a complaint that they aren't doing it, and blaming Bethesda for Troika's fall. I also agree that Fallout is just a setting. It could use the OMFGZ0rZ system instead of SPECIAL, and as long as it has a setting that is cool and similar to Fallout 1 & 2, I'm not going to care.

You might have had him confused with I think Alexander Semin. I don't know how good he is or anything, but I know he's a Russian prospect for the Caps.

I think it's a bit of a stretch to assume: 1) That Troika would still be around today had they gotten their hands on the Fallout license because suddenly a publisher will agree to give them some money. If the idea that they had developed for a post-apocolyptic game wasn't worth sponsorship without the Fallout license, I doubt that adding that license would suddenly make it a good investment. Troika made games that didn't particularly sell well, and were riddled with all sorts of other problems. I wonder how much the license would have actually helped. Furthermore, to blame Bethesda for this is asinine. 2) The previous games of Troika, all had issues with them. Whether it be gameplay balancing, bugs, etc. They didn't have a solid track record with their games. As a result, what assurances are there that THEY wouldn't bugger up Fallout something fierce? In my opinion, they were still cashing in on their original Fallout fame (and only Fallout 1 AFAIK....I don't believe Tim Cain was around for the second one), and hadn't really done anything that made me think they could duplicate the success. Would it be better for Troika to make a crappy Fallout 3 rather than Bethesda making a crappy Fallout 3?

But DnD is turn-based.

yup yup. Gooo Oil!

Yup. THough I wouldn't be surprised to see Malkin playing with Ovechkin in the Olympics.

If you're looking for a story, then this game is not for you. My roommate has been playing it, and has made some pretty hilarious videos. An interesting thing is that the game doesn't seem to care about homosexuality. This is probably done to protect themselves, but it was kind of funny watching a movie that featured (by accident too!) two men in a very intimate relationship.....in 1930.....and it was the highest rated film of all time! He made a hilarious action movie too, that was all over the place. It got 1 star, but damn was it funny to watch.