Monte Carlo

There is access to the CoH closed beta on the CoHO website. I'm currently downloading it, but in the meantime if anybody else feels like participating then I'll give you my raptr details and we can play. CoHO is free, is scheduled to be released next month and is, naturally, beyond completely awesome. Cheers MC Edit: Read the NDA!

Elves now have lineage style horizontal pointy ears, I see.

Given these changes, can somebody point out to me or rebut the DA2 = ME2 with swords? For the record I haven't played ME2 so an explanation of the argument would be helpful. In any case, this looks like a slam-dunk© console action RPG with a ponderous storyline bolted to it. It will sell well, I'm sure, but it belies the myth that Bio now make CRPGs as we know them.

Like I say, I wasn't buying it anyway but the removal of the tactical view is A Bridge Too Far and signals that the barbarians are indeed at the gates. Fix bayonets!

Again, I think you are spot on. I spend a small fortune on books. Recently I read a militart history title that had interactive web-links, i.e. a URL on a page here and there that unlocked new content on the publisher's website about the book, the author and the material - i.e. videos / interviews etc. Basically making the special features of a DVD free into a book via the web. It's very neat, I like it and eventually people will see stuff like that as industry standard.

Am inclined to agree. Company of Heroes online (free) will have micro-transactional content (paid for) which you could win if you had time to grind and earn it. It's an ingenious way of increasing the longevity of a four-five year old game, and MMORPGs will go the same way. Core game = free. Modules / premium content = paid. It's entirely fair you can't complain as the consumer. My personal beef is the trend / effort to segue gaming with social networking (I can see the suits in meetings cracking whips to get the devs to squeeze a cent from the false synergy between WoW and Facebook). As a social networking hater, who sees it as nothing but cynical data harvesting industry, I don't want gaming to become a wing of it. Cheers MC

The Book of Eli OK, it's Fallout with a mysterious book rather than a water chip. I liked the look and feel of PA California, the crazy warrior-monk Denzil Washington plays (it's Man on Fire with a geiger counter), Gary Oldman's dependable bad guy and the cameo with Michael Gambon as a well tooled-up pensioner. I didn't see the twist coming at the end and overall I thought it was an interesting movie that adds something solid to the painfully small end of the world genre.

And should result in the death penalty, well in any truly civilized society anyhow.

OK. I also suppose it depends on what you want to do with your degree. If you want to work in media then go to London. End of. Period. My wife worked in the industry for fifteen years, London is to Uk media what the West Midlands used to be to UK manufacturing industry. If you are serious I will provide advice as to where to live etc, within a modest scholarly stipend.

It worked for Alpha Protocol. But hey, if "I know a part of the ending" is equivalent to "there's no choice in the game at all" then that's your perogative. Maybe you've had your blinders on for a while now, but you do realize that in every BioWare game (and arguably any game), any choices you get to make are just the ones that the designers let you make. Stop being so smug, look at what I said in context as opposed to scoring points.

I agree that the industry killed itself with intrusive, hostile DRM schemes and failed to tackle piracy in any meaningful way. Having said that, by the time gaming 'dies' (although there will always be a niche and one that I suspect I will happily dwell in) a console will appear that will run all the games I like to play. Again, it might be a niche product within the console canon but it will be there. The market is king, and the market for the games I like is there.

Westminster - slap bang in the middle of London, it's probably a funky place to be an under-graduate student but as a deadly serious scholar actually seeking to work? Uh-oh. Plus, hideously expensive. on the plus side, it's where I live and I will happily buy you a beer. Warwick - a pretty town in a pleasant part of the country but for me a tad provincial and I can't comment too much on the Uni, but it is seen as a credible academic institution. LSE - Seen as a hot-bed of shouty, radical student politics, our friend Lord of Flies would be very happy here. Extremely credible academically, it's still slap-bang in the middle of London thus humungously expensive in terms of living costs. Then again, if you are going to live in the Uk for a couple of years why not reach for the stars and live in one of the world's genuinely bat**** crazy 21st century metropolis? What subject are you studying? British university cities are generally provincial but having said that I don't know anybody who went to Manchester who didn't absolutely love it. Personally, if I had to study again tomorrow I'd be heading West (Bath, Exeter, Bristol) for the scenery and chiled out vibe or to York (fabulous walled city, historic, scenic, lots of friendly and attractive local chicks). Cheers MC

As big fan of Caine's I will defend him against this lazy slur. Apropos his wife the following anecdote is true. Caine was sharing digs with fellow actor Terence Stamp in the mid-1960's. Caine saw a coffee advert set in Rio starring a beautiful girl. "Terry," said Caine, "that girl is beautiful, I have to go out with her." "How?" replied Stamp. "We'll fly to Rio tomorrow and find her!" said Caine, with the arrogance and optimism of a newly successful and wealthy actor. The two men made their way to the famous Mayfair nightclub Tramp for an evening of groovy carousing, the plan being that they would head off to the airport the following morning. The owner of Tramp, Johnny Gold, had a drink with the two actors who explained that they were about to fly off to Brazil to track down the beautiflu girl in the new Maxwell coffee ad. Gold told them that they were wasting their time, as the model (who would visit the club now and then) lived in London! Caine cadged her telephone number and bagged himself a date. Her name was Shakira. They married in 1973 and have been together ever since. So there is no alimony and no abandoned kids.

You are Gary Gygax and I claim my ten electrum pieces.

Ancient TSR RPG called Top Secret is floating about out there... check it out.

Diablo 3 will destroy my life I know it and there's nothing I can do against it. Am I really that weak? I'm hearing you, I'm actually glad they haven't announced a release date.

I've learnt the hard way that online RTS games are only really much fun with friends, competitive online play is tough for the non-obsessive. Hot-keying ninja-skillz, clicks-per-minute and precise build orders are the sort of thing you need to be Rain Man to figure out and I can't be doing with it. It isn't fun, it's stripping the game down to maths. I'm sure SC2 isn't any different.

The dwarves rescue the DA setting from mediocrity and are the best thing about the game. Part Medici, part 16th Century India tied up with heavily-tattoed mafiosi with Brooklyn accents. Honestly, fair play to the writers, DA's dwarves are the best twist on conventional high-fantasy races since the Drow take on elves. No hyperbole, either.

So we all stop posting, right? Unless we are Bio shills.

He might be strange, and a little scary, but I think he's got a point.

My guess, as before, is that there will be hub-quests on a pre-defined timeline (I'd like to see the timeline on the design document) where only certain critical path events trigger dialogue. These must be completed to progress, they will pad these out with some side-quests to create a sense of space / freedom. But the critical path, in a narrative like this, will need to be locked down the way I see it. Listen to that interview. This is exactly where you are, as long as you can tinker with a few minor outcomes and 'win' a different cut-scene then apparently Bio Tamagotchis are happy buying into this interactive novel style game. This equals = battle / 'choice' / cutscene rinse and repeat. I liked Dragon Age, I thought Bio was making it up to the people who were still sick of them after NWN1. However, the Ferelden brand ain't that good to launch a different, Mass Effect type game off the back of it. Is the ME engine transferable, assets-wise, into DA2? That would make even more sense, you are in effect using the ME model to make different genre games that are all basically the same: the 'Mass Effect with Swords" criticism that emerged earlier. Cheers MC

I know I only speak for myself, but Bio are trying to be too clever by half, finding new ways to present us with what is in effect a fixed, linear experience. It's like going to a restaurant when all you want is a burger. The burger comes, and it's OK but the chef can't help but put a fried egg and a slice of beetroot on top. And the chips have been dusted with Paprika. And all I wanted was a burger. A shame, because that restaurant did really good ones. Why, Bio? Why?

Edit: LOL one of them actually referenced Verbal's storytelling style in The Usual Suspects. Seriously, LOL!

In that interview Mike Laidlaw says that you find out that the country is on the brink of war, and we find out what choices your character made to get there. So, whatever choices you make at the end the country is at the brink of war. QED, Bioware's concept of choice.

^ What's this guy up to?