Everything posted by Pop
-
S.t.a.l.k.e.r.: Shadow of Chernobyl (impressions video inside)
Reached the bar and the area beyond, which switches out the military and bandits with Freedom and Duty. I helped the Duty guys raid the big Freedom base, but it was my job to take out all the snipers, and damn it all if I didn't have time. I got one down before the entire Duty force got killed, and I became a sitting duck. So I charged the building at the center of the map and dug in, while the Freedom guys regrouped. Switched out my rapid-shot AK-74 for a GP 37 (finally, a scoped gun) and the sawed-off for the Chaser 13. Luckily enough for me, the Freedom leader was in my building on a different floor, so I killed him and picked off the rest of the guys as they climbed the stairs. I killed enough people that I could effectively replace my AK-74 with the superior gun, with +500 bullets. The nice thing about the game now is that most of the enemies that you fight take 4 or 5 bullets to kill, and carry 20-30 bullets on them, so it's no longer the case that you leak ammo as you fight. I think I may have hit the point where the game becomes easy. I have found out that there is eventually a point at which the enemy respawns weaken to such an extent that they are no longer able to overrun any encampments in an area. You just have to kill a lot of them. I killed about 60 or 70 bandits before the Garbage / train station area stopped respawning bandits in groups of over 5 people. Now the only encampment that's not in neutral hands is the one that doesn't spawn neutrals, towards the southern end of the map. btw, does anyone know how to use the attachable grenade launcher on that assault rifle? It's not an alternate fire mode, so I'm lost.
-
S.t.a.l.k.e.r.: Shadow of Chernobyl (impressions video inside)
I had a nice little experience with the game so far, as difficult as it is. I was scavenging at the old farm house where you complete your first mission, and I went up to the attic, where I looked out of the hole in the roof and saw a group of about 10 bandits running across the countryside, 2 of them getting annihilated by anomalies. They were moving towards the stalker camp I was ultimately heading to. So I follow them, and find out that they're camping out under a bridge, and they don't see me. So I sneak up near them and throw a grenade into their little camp. I killed about 7 bandits, and the eighth fell quickly to my pistol. It was glorious.
-
He's Back!
How can he be back? He was never really there in the first place.
-
S.t.a.l.k.e.r.: Shadow of Chernobyl (impressions video inside)
Find some good cover. I usually take the first opportunity to sprint forwards to the right side of the train cars and double back so you have a clear shot of the military from behind, they probably won't even notice you till you start taking pot shots at them. Lean and do the zoom-in thing with the right mouse button, crouch behind the big concrete platform. Your best bet gun-wise is the AK-74. For some reason none of the other guns I've tried do much against the military (it's not impossible, but it's certainly difficult) Also, this is a highly tactical game, so don't skimp on the grenades. They also **** up military dudes. But save most of those for the catacombs, because you'll really wish you had some then. Also, once you're done cleaning up the first wave of military ****s in the trainyard, loot bodies and heal your buddies, or what's left of them. The second military wave will kill them easily, but you'll distract the enemies enough to maybe get a good defensible point. But yeah, get the AK and start stockpiling ammo.
-
Games you are looking forward to
How darkly ironic that she's wearing women's clothes in that rendering.
-
How was your day?
Went down to Denver for a NIN listening party. Basically I stood around in a theater and listened to the new album over the sound system. It was quite impressive, definitely music meant for systems with thick bottom ends. After that we walked down to the 16th Street PF Chang's and ate exorbinantly overpriced food. But the waitress was cute. So that was a good day, I'd say.
-
Baldur's Gate - whole series for ten quid
A dozen hours? That many?
-
Icewind Dale Revisited - GameBanshee Feature
Awesome offensive spells and wildshape forms. I'll give it a whirl, then.
-
Icewind Dale Revisited - GameBanshee Feature
A druid and a cleric, eh? That never occurred to me. being an avid BG2 player, it is a common practice for me because i always keep jaheira. no way in IWD2, however. taks When I kept Jaheira on, she was my cleric. She had all the relevant healing spells ( - restoration, but + negative protection) and her super special Harper raise dead. I'm just not quite sure what the definite benefits are in regard to druids and IWD2.
-
The Music Thread
More leaks, diff'rent artiste. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - Took Out a Loan Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - Berlin Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - All You Do Is Talk The whole album's out on the torrent sites, I don't want to eat up the Gallery by hosting it all. Speaking of which, I need to clean up all my pictures.
-
S.t.a.l.k.e.r.: Shadow of Chernobyl (impressions video inside)
Got it, and maybe it's just me being an American, but with the accents and all I can't help but feel like every time I come across a group of bandits I'm being ambushed by Borat. I hit a bug healing up an NPC, and my game crashed. Honestly, I'm finding it hard to start it back up again. It's not that it's a bad game, on the contrary, for all the time this game's been in development hell it turned out okay. I'm just a bit confused. The kids over at NMA and DAC are going to point at this and say this is what Fallout 3 is going to be, because it's quite a bit like Oblivion + guns. But the problem is that even as Oblivion-y as it is, it doesn't lend itself to looting, what with the 50 kg carry limit, which allows you to carry about 3 guns + ammo before overloading yourself. The traders are few and far between, and you'll walk a long way, avoiding mutants and anomalies, to get to your next objective, which up to the point I'm at has been "kill things > secure loot / heal NPC > get cash". The combat is certainly not your average FPS twitch fighting. It reminds me of the old Jurassic Park:Lost World FPS, where you had to line up the sights on your guns manually and all of your shots were way off target (it's not that difficult in STALKER, obviously, but it feels just as tedious). Most of the time the enemies don't seem to notice when they've been shot, however the enemy tactical AI is pretty decent, especially that of the animals I've seen so far. It was a neat trick to put coordinates to stashes of loot on random baddies. Hope it gets better as it goes on. The story seems to be unfolding very slowly, and the combat isn't good enough to support the game on its own.
-
Icewind Dale Revisited - GameBanshee Feature
A druid and a cleric, eh? That never occurred to me. I usually had (fighter / monk / cleric / thief / arcane / bard) or (fighter / fighter / cleric / thief / arcane / bard). Perhaps I should cut down on the bard.
-
What is your all-time favourite...?
Band: Ministry Movie: Princess Mononoke TV Series: Three-way tie between The Shield, Homicide: Life on the Street and Arrested Development. Seasons 4-7 of The Simpsons, as well. Cartoon: The Venture Brothers Book: Maybe The Shining, maybe A Wrinkle in Time PC Video Game: Fallout Console Video Game: Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence or Resident Evil Games Console: Xbox 360
-
What other forums and chat rooms are you a member of?
Echoingthesound, a Nine Inch Nails forum Piss Army, a Ministry forum Used to post on some of the Fallout fansites, but I wasn't nearly as spiteful towards Bethesda as ettiquette required, so I was more or less run off.
-
Icewind Dale Revisited - GameBanshee Feature
So I'm going to try IWD2 again here. My main weakness playing the game has been a lack of foresight in regard to party creation. So I thought I'd ask what the best party configuration is. Any recommendations?
-
What's your primary motivation
My ideal game would be an interactive novel kind of thing. I like narrative. But I play games for fun, and can enjoy games that have no narrative.
-
The Smiley Top Eight
Pssh, the Big Cheese comes back for the smileys. Nice to see you, Feargus. 7 3 8 5 6 11 2 4
-
Top 25 PC Games of All Time
If something is important in that sense, that usually means it is good though, right? People still talk Doom because while HL and so forth may have refined the gameplay, they still aren't appreciably different. They certainly do look better, no doubt, but graphics are really of no consequence in this sense because newer games will always look better due to the advancing technology. The physics implementations that are possible now are also cool, but that is still a refinement of the core gameplay. It means it was good, not that it still is. A newer game that refines the gameplay still improves upon the game and is inherently a better game for that improvement. This, plus newer features, constitutes an appreciable difference. Scripted events, friendly AI, puzzles, are all things not even included in Doom that help make Half-Life "appreciably" different and a better game than Doom is. And this is beside the fact that what you are trying to attribute to Doom actually belongs to Wolfenstein 3D and the main reason people mentioned Doom instead of Wolfenstein 3D is that Doom is considered a better game. Wolfenstein 3D is the greatest game ever for one simple reason: ROBOT HITLER. Beat that, Valve.
-
Top 25 PC Games of All Time
I've got one of those too. It's modeled after those "city guide" books or pamphlets you'd get at an airport, and outlines all the stuff in the game through that guise. It's creative. All of Rockstar's manuals are like that. I remember Manhunt had a nifty manual too, and the GTA:Vice City Stories book is a tabloid.
-
300
Gerard Butler will never, ever outlive Phantom of the Opera in my eyes. He will forever suck.
-
What properties would you like to see games made from?
That's "suspend your disbelief", gah. Well, okay, the Great Old Ones can be fazed. But who knows how they die? I thought Cthulu was practically already dead in R'ileyh (did I spell that right?) and just waiting to be resurrected when the stars were right. Besides, there are plenty of Cthulu stories that deal with imprisoning the Great Old Ones instead of killing them. I think that's all you can really do, so long as you've got a big rock with an elder sign on it.
-
What properties would you like to see games made from?
If you're referring to the city in the Mountains of Madness, I was under the impression (maybe I got an abridged version?) that it was located not in Antarctica but on some other plane that one enters when crossing the mountains, possibly a dreamscape. Then again, Lovecraft was always a bit thick. That's what I love about him. This is a bit off topic, but Guillermo del Toro has reportedly been angling for the rights to the Mountains of Madness in film form. I would kill for that. But I digress. Well, you're going to have to suspend your belief a bit. Maybe the Great Old Ones are beyond nuclear weapons. They are supposed to be invincible, right?
-
The Finnish parlamentary elections
So your liberals are libertarians, eh? Wild. btw, Guard Dog, the Social Contract is a conservative ideal, it doesn't tolerate a welfare state (those who don't keep their end of the contract are not privy to its benefits). Liberals by and large tend to be utilitarian.
-
Top 25 PC Games of All Time
God, you're all bringing me back through the advertisement pages of the PC Gamers I used to steal when I was a kid. I remember when they had Doom II on the cover...
-
The Finnish parlamentary elections
Always found it kind of odd that America was the only developed democracy without a socialist element / party. No wait, that makes perfect sense. It's also odd that we seem to be the only country with overwhelming 2-party rule. What's your rate of incumbency?