DemonKing

"I am your father." Tore my little 10 year old heart out in the cinema. Also loved any scene with the imperial march blaring away (Vader surveying his fleet in ESB, first scene of ROTJ when he arrives at the new Death Star etc). The emperor is ROTJ was great too - wizened and twisted with evil but also immense power. In the prequels I guess I enjoyed the Maul/Qui Gon/Obi Wan fight and the Yoda/Dooku fight - although I found the fights at the end of ROTS a little underwhelming. I also really liked the last 30 minutes or so of AOTC - it was just pure visceral action.

That's my biggest criticism of the Doom3 engine - it just can't handle more than a few enemies/corpses on screen simultaneously. The whole "Strogg bodies disappear into green vapour" situation is lame - Q4 just can't match titles like FEAR for pure gory visceral joy. I hope they fix the disappearing corpses issue before the next Wolfenstein game - nazis disintergrating in a puff of green dust would suck.

Try this... Interesting Direct X 10 Article Seems Miscrosoft are trying to bully the graphics vendors a bit and make Open GL a thing of the past...no surprises there then!

Well, to be fair KOTOR2 was more a console port than a true PC CRPG, and it's not up to Obsidian to decide on releasing any additional patches or even finishing the game properly in the first place - that call lies with Lucasarts. I guess they could release an "unofficial" patch but I doubt their resources stretch that far so I wouldn't hold my breath. As for Vista, I guess we have to wait and see whether it is the next XP - or the next ME! I am going to buy a new PC shortly when I get back to Oz but will just be using my current copy of XP Home until around the time Vista comes out - if it gets good reviews and there are more 64bit apps on the market, I might upgrade then.

From one of your humble colonial servants... Well done England. The best team won.

This was one of the extras that came with the second generation of IE games, such as having quivers that could hold 40 arrows and being able to switch to an overhead map while your characters moved around. As others have said, you need a mod to get this to function in the original game.

Well in the later Ultima series (which I asume you are referring to, rather than the early stat-driven non-Avatar) games, you have the fortune card mechanic at the beginning of the game that has some bearing on your character, and of course, you are able to modify your character as it develops, so I would call it a CRPG...except maybe Ultima 8, of course! PST is a unique case. In some ways I would not call it a CRPG as the storyline is essentially linear and pre-determined, albeit with many non-consequential sidequests. The ultimate fate of your character and his identity is pre-determined, however the game does employ a surface layer of CRPG standards (eg stats, choice of progression, party recruitment etc). Frankly I've always considered a unique genre-blending mish mash more like an interactive novel than felt the need to bracket it solely as a CRPG or adventure game or whatever.

For me a CRPG is any game where you can create/select your character(s) and make meaningful decisions that determine the development of said character(s). Half-Life, Doom, Thief etc are not CRPGs because you have no choice in the character played or their development over the course of the game, which is all predetermined. I would argue that early games like Wizardry, Bard's Tale, Phantasie etc are CRPGs because you can choose the make-up of your party, the manner of their career progression throughout the game, and their equipment. In many ways IWD, for example, was an extension of this format. Whether or not a game is non-linear, has alternative endings, branching dialog options, good-evil subquests, opening vignets etc is irrelevant so long as the core dynamic of freedom in creation/selection & progression/development is present, IMHO.

Sarevok in BG - he just looked powerful and evil, plus the intro cutscene rocked my boat.

From Microsoft customer service: "Do not dispair. This behaviour is normal as all current XBoxes will break down to their atomic components in November 2005. However, by adding our exciting new "XBox360" product to your exisiting setup at that time, you will discover that all your problems have been rectified. Unless you really like the hard disk in your XBox of course, in which case an additional cash injection of a further $100 will suffice to restore your system to normality."

Yeah but at least he looks pretty good doing martial arts moves. I wouldn never buy Sean Connery pulling off that stuff. I enjoyed the first film and will probably see the second, although the female hit chick who has to strip down to her underwear before she opens fire looked a bit OTT.

Why not play him as his enemies described him: "Caeser is every woman's man, and every man's woman!".

He sounded pretty grumpy throughout the whole thing. I'm with him re: the X-Box having 2 versions, 1 with HD and 1 without. It makes development very difficult - do I develop 2 different versions? Do I just develop for 1 version and hope that's enough to cover my costs? Do I make everything usable without a HD meaning my games are less complicated/updateable than they would be otherwise? I like his idea of self-updating video/display drivers. I imagine a lot of the end users for his products don't have a clue how to update their drivers and even for people who are used to doing it, it's a pain in the ass.

Where do you live? I'm not sure if you can buy HOW by itself anymore, but here in Europe I have seen an IE engine pack with BG1/2 + IWD1/2 + all expansions still for sale.

500 000 units sold is a relative figure at best. If the developer cut from each unit sold @ $50US is, say $7.50 (eg 15%, the industry standard), then Bio would make $3 750 000. If JE cost $3million to develop, then Bio are making a profit, albeit not a monster profit. If however, JE cost $5-10million to make, the current industry standard for a AAA title, then it's a flop, and no amount of Volo going on about how 500 000 units sold is in no way a flop will make it otherwise. Game Over. (PS. For an interesting read here's an article supporting the above figures: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/issue/8/4)

We never said you were #1 poster - just #1 spammer. I win. ROOfles! (I need it after Bioboard debating debacle recently)

You do realise you can save before any battle and reload, don't you? "

Hard to believe there was ever a forum where magical Volo wasn't the #1 spammer!

Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord I used to go every afternoon after school to the house of a guy I didn't even like that much just so I could play with him (he had an Apple II). We each used to control 3 characters...ahh the memories!

I copied a hell of a lot of Commodore 64 games illegally back in the day!

I'm just playing through the adventuring side at the moment (I'm yet to delve into PVP). It's not a traditional MMPORPG like WOW - instead there are city/town non-combat areas where you an chat, trade, buy skills etc and then all of the adventuring areas are "instances" (ie exist only for you and your party). You can solo using henchmen if you don't want to form a party with other players. The combat is pretty mindless and repetitive, but the graphics are so lush and the desire to "just do one more quest" so compelling that I haven't really noticed. Plus not paying to play rocks, as you can leave it aside for a while and come back without any fear of losing a character.

Actually that gameplay movie has awakened my interest a bit...it's not a genuine CRPG by any stretch but it does appear to be the equivalent of a fantasy HL2, which wouldn't be half bad! Is it just me, or does Gabe look like a horror movie special effect?

He's already tried that...and reinstalling windows can clear up a little of issues, plus your system will run a lot faster afterwards.

Then how do you explain the recent "test" match between Zimbabwe and New Zealand that lasted less than 2 days?