RPGmasterBoo

Are you talking about Drakensang? BTW the camera works great with the WASD keys + right mouse button. I dont see why people are moaning about it. I also like how the camera doesnt allow you to zoom out in underground/enclosed areas . The NWN2 camera which shows all the walls and corridors totally breaks my immersion and feels like playing a lab rat.

That is because you see it as such. The tentflaps are tentflaps, the catfish a catfish and the tree is a tree. It is your mind that is drawing these conclusions. I never even saw it that way before you pointed it out, and that is because I look at the beautiful side of it, the apparent softness of the elf's skin, the dreamy expression on the lady of the lake, and the wild natural look of the dryad. You look only at the sexual and hence you see vaginas and penises everywhere, because in essence that's all you want to see. Is this also suggestive? Sexual gratification goes both ways last time I checked BTW.

Of course you see it that way. It prevents your cognitive dissonance. To not see that the artist who drew these pictures did so lovingly and tried to bring out in each one beauty appropriate to the theme is at best ignorance, at worst a complete lack of good taste. "Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault. Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope." - Oscar Wilde

To call the Witcher misogynist is ignorance of the highest order. All I see here is a is a total worship of female beauty.

Ok. Diablo ceased to be fun for me a long time ago. Difference of opinion.

The desire to "correct" other people comes when you presume that you "know the right way" , the "correct behaviour" and that other people don't. Its a crusader sort of mentality, no matter how mildly you put it.

Yes I am. I'm also excited about HL2: Episode 3, because there's a good chance that they will be super special awesome. And out of curiosity, what are you going to do in Diablo III that you havent done a million times before?

Youre excited about Diablo III?

Lol, Alpha Protocol. Multiple choices, conspiracy as a theme, action, similar hub structure, modern setting, strong rpg elements. Its staring you in the face all along

I think this has gone beyond off topic and well into the realm of pointless discussion. The classic problem when inherently simple things are skyrocketed into the realm of pseudo philosophy. - 97% of people are heterosexual. The rest are as insignificant as any 3% anywhere. I lived in an African country as a part of a 3-4% white minority. It was clear where everyone stood. It was a country of black people run by black people, and we were irrelevant because we were strangers. I'm not complaining, as the same would apply in reverse. I could hardly expect them to treat me as equals of any sort when in fact we are not equal. Same goes for gays/transsexuals etc etc - they are a minority in a heterosexual world and they should adapt to it as best they can and the best way to do that is to go quietly about your business and keep your choices in life private. I've known plenty of gay people who do this and they are genuinely happy, as much as any of us. - gender roles are there for a reason. They have served society well for thousands of years. - men are not superior to women. however they are physically stronger and ultimately when asserting dominance that's all that counts. And when you strip away the civilized icing of society dominance is what all relations hinge upon. That will not change anytime soon, if at all. So there is no reason to philosophize over things that are essentially set in stone. Sure the foundation rocks slightly every now an then but it never collapses or changes in any truly significant, long lasting manner. Its a wonder the mods havent locked this one up yet.

I was surprised as well and not exactly thrilled, but the proof is in eating the pudding. Games that have done this have ranged from fantastic (Thief, plus it doesnt even have a real central hub) to horrible (Assasins Creed). But, honestly, I didn't like it either mainly because it was removed from my usual RPG expectations - same as you were. It just shows contemporary games are being just as bad, nothing more - it was directed more at the article which places unrealistic expectations on a very resource intensive genre. If AP had as much dialog as the usual action/spy game, there would have been a pile of cash for fancier graphics. No I was just commenting. I noticed all the points raised in that article and while most are genuine some are misplaced, like the facial animation thing. It just bugs me that everyone in the PC gaming press world says Dragons Age (for example) looks great and yet are so quick to point out flaws in Alpha Protocol. Now pointing out flaws is a good thing, and that is their job, but neglecting to mention just as obvious flaws in other cases is really really cheap.

It just clicked in my head how similar AP is to Deus Ex. Weird how I didnt notice that before

@Bos: I noticed all of that as well but none of it has any significant impact on my expectations, because in essence it might be a role playing game in dialog and character advancement but in others its a standard mission based stealth/shooter. The non linearity as I see it comes from being able to choose to play the three hubs in any order and all the missions in the hubs in any order, which supposedly makes up for a different story each time. How they pull this off is another matter. Characters facial animations are obviously stiff even in the movies, but the voice acting should make up for that. Facial animation done well is the pink elephant of the games industry, everyone says they've seen it but no one can point an example out. (okay to be fair a game comes along every so often that does it well, but most fail). On that topic Dragons Age and Risen look just as bad, and one can only criticize AP if you criticize them all. The bugs arent really explained, it could be anything from a random clipping to a crash the way he describes it.

Apparently no playing Beyond Good & Evil is a sin. So I'm starting it now..

Okay this might seem like an obnoxious filler topic but I think since AP is a genuinely different hybrid genre game there are an actual number of different reasons to be excited about it. First of all its a action/stealth/RPG game which are really three different crowds of gamers and I wonder what most of you are going to play the game for: the action, the stealth gameplay, the RPG choices, the modern day setting (almost non existent in RPGs), the apparently colorful and interesting characters or something else? For me its above all the dialog system, I want to see how far forward and how much it will affect the outcome of the game. Also I really want to find out how many substiantially different playthroughs are possible and whether the C&C system really works.

Here i thought that i was the only one who thought that way about FFXII and FFX. How wrong i was. You forgot to add that they successfully managed to create an incredibly well and thought-out culture(s) around Yevon as well. No other game have achieved that of such high quality (except Torment). In theory FFXII should be more fun to play - the battles are faster, the world better suited to roaming, but the story and characters dont suck you in, because for all the great design - you've seen them a thousand times. That the FFXII came at the end of the PS2's life didn't help. Yes, FFX has this otherworldly quality and even though it has its fair share of cliches the world is pretty unique and very well fleshed out. The scene where you step through a portal in Guadosalam into the Farplane gives you the aesthetic equivalent of having a brick thrown in your face. My jaw promptly smacked to the ground. This is from an FMV in that same scene, but the in game scene looks exactly the same because it is an FMV loop running in the background while your PC stands on a regular 3D rock outcropping. The low res of the TV blends them together and it looks amazing, plus the water is so well animated you can just sit and gawk at the tranquility of the scene. This was 2002, or even 2001 - before NWN and Morrowind, which incidentally today look like crap.

Well its an assumption on my part that she is a fem/les. No matter. As for the rest, I agree.

Essentially one is effectively a ****ty expanison pack, and the other is one of the best games ever made. Enough said.

Actually the graphics are pretty pleasant and colorful - even today. I had no problem playing it for the first time, something like a year ago.

The text on Kotaku is an abbreviation (my brackets):

Its a woman, to make matters worse. In fact, in depth reading of the article leads me to the conclusion that she is a feminist lesbian and: 1. angry that the main character is a male who can bed several women 2. angry that the main character wont be turned down in a humiliating manner by an openly gay woman The first offends her feminist sensibilities, the latter her lesbian side. I can't stress enough how ridiculous this article is.

Well he can, but I think you want a she. I cant get the hang of what gender you people are trying to be. the Trotsky is a woman, and the Crashgirl is a man. Its like watching anime for christs sakes.

Didn't think anyone cared about military shooters and the Halo games anymore.

Narcissu isn't interactive though; the viewer really has no active role in what the Protagonist is doing. It's also entirely about two characters who literally have nothing to do but wait around to die. Dunno why you wasted your time replying to that Gamecritics article - its an obvious flame bait, nothing more. Oh, it was apparently written by a woman, and the first reply sums it up pretty much even if it is heavy handed: And a more balanced opinion by a guy named Mike

Just as long as its not too hardware intensive and optimized well, thats all I ask.