cronicler

C2B: I don't have a problem with cellar being built into a cave. I just wish there were some (more) indicators for it, like a "brick walls -> rough stone walls -> stone cave" kind of transition before the said part. And mate, I have been around a burning building, there is no bloody way I would go that deep into a burning building. Ever. That said it is not the looking for survivors that bothers me. "The building is on fire" aspect just seems ham handed to me. If it had been something like: You enter the ruined building, you link up with the bloke then during the next fights sequence a fire breaks out and the bloke says "No, they are waiting for us outside, lets go trough the cellars!", it would have been mighty fine. As it stands now, it feels irritating to me. The camera; yea I did jump in the game with just a cursory look at the keyboard layout. Didn't check the options deeply.

I just downloaded and tried the demo. And to be honest, my first impressions are not good. Now the story and the writing is nice but the voice-over and the map logic (not design) are absolutely rubbish. I mean, come on, you arrive at a rural estate and the place is under attack. And you don't see any bad guys around the Estate trying to stop people running away or going in. And then you enter the burning building. errr what?. You face a couple of waves of enemies inside a burning building in the cellars. You meet a survivor and guess what? you calmly chat with the bloke. I don't think anyone could have provided such a jarring voice-over. There is no excitement, no panic, just stoic nonsense... Map logic is also a poor point. At the end of Estate, you light the fuse to some gunpowder barrels to blow a bridge in the cellars. In the cellars... I mean would it be too much to transition into a cave system from the cellars then have the bridge in the caves or something? Not to mention entering a burning building in the first place... I only played the Warrior so far and I want to ask Obsidian; whose idea was it to omit strafe and back-pedalling? You can run forward, roll forward and backwards and that's it. The whole sword-play is just a chaos especially when your guy starts to auto-face to nearest target and your camera starts to swing with him. What bothers me most is the feeling of wasted potential. The game looks and plays nice, the effects are solid. The writing is good. The story is unimaginative but usable. The whole things feels like a broken bike with loose bolts. If the controls were a bit more precise, if the voice actors were acting a bit, If the maps were a bit more logical... It could have been such a better game.

J.E. Sawyer: I want to ask you a question from the other side of the AI spectrum; we all know that AI is going to be wonky and problematic no matter how much you work on it, so why not go for the other way? Why not give the player more control on the companions? From most recent to oldest ME, Brothers in Arms, HL2 and Freedom Fighters have shown us that even the dumbest off the shelf aimbot can add to the players experience with just 4 commands (Attack and Hold, Hold, Come to Me, Fall Back to safe place) I know there would be issues (doorways and melee ambushes / characters come to mind) but wouldn't giving more control to the player make it better? On a similar vein, on your next game, I hope you give the player more options to customise his/her game. It would have been nice to have an advanced mode where you could tinker with the settings for the game independently (enemy damage, hp, awareness; player dam, hp, sneakiness, awareness; difficulty sliders for combat, non-combat, tech, thief; deadly headshots, killable (or not) quest npcs and so on) I know you can use the mod tools to do all of these but it would have been nice to have a straight in game or (JA2 1.13 like) external config to simply tweak the game...

MC: Compared to specialised urban police vehicles, older generation APCs are actually quite cheaper to obtain and maintain thanks to surplus prices and interchangeability of spares with military gear. The funny thing is, you can't actually buy such vehicles with liquid throwers as default weapon. Liquid throwers are listed/thought as "easy to convert to flame throwers" and for "humane" reasons, it is harder to buy them. You need to buy your own pressure assembly separately and field modify it for water cannon if you want to have one. (Hell, it is even a bureaucratic nightmare to buy armoured fire-fighting vehicles for airports...)

I know it is an oxymoron but on paper, a megacity seems easier to run on electricity alone as elevators and extremely robust grid makes it possible to use dinky electrical engines without the limitations of capacitors. Its just that... it would become a rat warren in a generation at most. underhive and all...

Just a short 5-6 minute massage, the kind that feels like kneading dough, applied to shoulders, back of the neck and upper back is usually enough to relax and de-stress people. you should get your hubby to help you a bit. Edit: on a naughty note, if you know what you are doing, a light massage has a 50-50 chance for getting laid . or having your target falling asleep

If you have anyone with a good hand and knowledge for it, get a massage. neck / upper shoulder pains are really hard to shake off with just resting.

Orogun01: the topic has gone for the ground pounders and other specialities of grunts (more or less) as it is the hardest branch for women. I don't think anyone would argue that females can't manage it in (any) airforce or navy. (Well except for subs I guess... and that's more of a "can't mix genders" than what we are discussing here.)

Venetica

The most of the psi powers were either outright useless or barely cost effective compared to the alternatives. However the 5th tier powers are all game breakers. You can finish most of the game with just hack+wrench+tier 1 psi attack. Ironically this also gives you a lot of space for inventory too :D

On female soldiers in infantry positions; personally I don't have much knowledge in the issue however There are a couple of right wing mil / mil-sf writers that I enjoy reading. Tom Kratman is one of them. He recently wrote a novel about females in army, granted his "army" is a far cry from the current day militaries but it does a realistic job on the whys: inferiority of females vs males in infantry positions. (You can find the first 6 chapters here ) To put his observations into bullet points, a female infantry has the following problems compared to a male infantry: -Less carry capacity (it takes about 3 females to carry the load of 2 soldier teams like m.gun, At, Radio, etc.) -Less endurance (Can't march as far) -Less strategical speed (Marches slower) -Needs specialised and dedicated support (Dedicated Childcare to begin with) -Needs more R&R per year (Again childcare, also some other internal problems males don't have) -Has a lot of negative social conditioning that slows training -Totally different starting mindset and priorities that require different training -Needs specialised gear. Even if you give them the same basic gear (gun, armor, fatigues) for most slots to avoid supply issues, you still need different, specialised gear for certain "slots": boots, backpacks, cleaning supplies... -Their effects on males when wounded. You can say that male soldiers do not like to see female units get wiped out. I know that there have been a lot of thinking on how female soldiers would make excellent fixed position soldiers (which does eliminate most of their problems) but most militaries can't really accept the loss of mobility (and the option to use in other unsuited jobs; see how to mis-use rangers and paratroopers: ww2, vietnam...) and overspecialisation. There is no shortage of male cannon fodder after all.

Not Science Fiction at all but I hated when Veronica Mars was cancelled. Then again the execs did manage to butcher the 3rd seasion pretty badly so no wonder...

I've been fiddling with the game mechanics a lot and I found a few nice tidbits that provide some nice gameplay changes; -You can assign multiple skills to any item but normally only 1 governs an attribute (decay rate, damage, spread etc). However you can force 2 skills to the same pool by adding a little bit of chooser code to the beginning. Example: Use Meele or Survial (whichever is higher) for combat knife. Use rifles or Close combat for certain shotguns (my modpile in progress) -adding a couple of new explosives to the crafting list (pipe bomb(fuse), satchel charge (fuse,remote, prox), claymore (remote,prox), Molotov coctail) makes the explosives skill a viable choice for front line combat.

Social stigmata is the only effective way to control substances. It is actually similar to the segregration or gay or smoking issue. The unless the public is ready to accept or reject it, artificial controls just have the opposite effect. Sure maybe there will be more suffering in the short term but once the recreational drugs are in the open, it will loose it's mystique and most of it's appeal. *I do however agree that the line should be drawn at the syntethics. Designer drugs are made to frack you up, no disputing on that. Hate to sound darwinian but soft living lets the rot set in. If you choose to throw your life away (gambling, drinking, drugs or any other recreational thing taken too far) then you should suffer the consequences. Another aspect of drugs is their role in financing the unlawful groups (terrorists, organised crime, rogue nations) by the artificially inflated prices on these weeds. (and most of them are weeds. they are bloody hard to destroy)Probably about 1/3 of the crime in the world stems from them. Wouldn't some direct hands on control be better than leaving it to "naked capitalist scum" ?

How could you like a game that features a Planet (on the run from creditors) as a companion??!? Ps: I'ts ultimate weapon is found on itself?!

Ah yes, thanks for reminding me . The Original War by Altar Evil Genius Spellbound's commandos rips were mostly bland (desperados, d2, d3, Robin Hood, the gangster one) but I did like them. Shame no one makes any more rts puzzle games anymore UFO:A I agree that the game has truckloads of problems yet, it still manages to capture my attention and answer my preferences; Small team, Tactical combat, Secret (ish.... ok not secret in any way but still it's an upgredable) base, A story.

Silent Storm (S2), Silent Storm Sentinels (S3) by Nival (TB Tactical Combat) UFO: Afterlight by Altar (Tactical + 4x) Albion by Blue Byte (RPG) Venetica (3rd Person Action) So Blonde (Adventure) Ceville (Adventure) Jack Keane (Adventure) Aquaria (Platformerish...) The Fall Last Days of Gaia (RT-TC, not that it was officially released in English) Nexus - The Jupiter Incident (3D, Tactical Spaceship Command) Gorky 17 (TBS) Anno (Althoug I do agree that it is more than a bit light for serious traders) Port Royale ( would give it a 7) Commander: Conquest of the Americas

Krezack: I am not an eloquent speaker that can wrap an audience with whitewash. Blunt I am. Iran (Fars) has always been separate from the middle east. After the events of the last century (the moderate and civilized Arabian population, (ie the traders and the coastal pops) came under the rule of Beduin Chefs thanks to the idiotic after Ottoman policies of Churchill.) the classic "crusades era" Arabian culture all but vanished and the chasm between Beduin and the non beduin in the region increased immensely. Today there is only feudal and theocratic states that rival current day China (that you so passionately and correctly oppose) that . The BAs are the supporting pillar for nearly every terrorist organisation on the planet, while at the same time, they provide fat positions for the decision makers when they go into the civilian sector. They are profiting from the deaths and no one even want's to talk about it. It is quite hard for me to speak about BAs without swearing like a US soldier talking about Taliban so if you think it is immature, there isn't much I can do. Zoraptor: the ruling families make a huge profit from oil then use their earnings to "invest" in western corps. They own a lot. The funny thing is, according to Islam, you are not supposed to coast on "interest" but instead work your own money. It is technically illegal in SA, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, UAE to earn from bank interest if you are an average Joe but every bigwig has a fat offshore account. Their other biggest income sources are Tourism (Haj in particular), Certain regional exports like dates and spices, foreign base rents, fees from western pharmacological companies, black markets, limited scale weapon production.

virumor: Oni was indeed a very good game with decent mechanics and a good story. Sure it copied GITS lock, stock and barrel in some places but GITS wasn't such a big cult then. Shame about Bungie thou

Explosives isn't effective enough to be your primary combat skill. The main reasons are the lack of "death" and craft-able options. As a Demoman, you generally have 2 options for combat, sapper or grenadier (or a combination). However you can't craft any mine bigger than a powder charge (you have to buy or scavenge them and compared to bullets they are indeed rare and expensive) and you can't craft any pipe-bombs (grenades) Enemies generally come in two flavors for a demoman: the ones that are a waste to use explosives and the ones that soak a lot of explosives. Add the little fact that explosives are indeed rare (for the most part) and you will use other weapons to compensate even if you don't want to. You also lack the crafting options to sustain your weapon usage and need. You can't craft pipe-bombs (homemade grenades) of any size or medium or heavy ieds (mines and claymores) from the common materials which means you are unable to recycle conventional ammo. If you play with a Exp-Ew build (recycler rifle and pistol!) you get a ton of useless conventional ammo. It would have been really nice to convert them into pipe bombs of various strengths. Explosives have a lot potential but unless someone mods in a lot of new homemade recipes that scale in power, the skill will be just a window dressing.

Not that poor sod again. Lara has an interesting place in my gaming heart (next to Duke I guess ) None of her games were very good (even for her time) and yet it managed to hit some high points in nearly every game. She was always a medicore character yet her news still manage to draw my interest. Who knows, maybe she will have a good romp this time. (Hah, who am I kidding )

Explanation; the news in the link is not actually the really self stabbing aspect. The Invincible is an old and obsolete design, the scrapping of Ark Royal is actually the serious blow to English power, as they don't have anything to replace it.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/12/01/3081074.htm (The other bit about HMS Ark Royal) Just found about this. My condolences to you Walsh, old chap.

There are some areas where deathclaw and tankscorpion spawns are very near. Scorpion venom (or any poison for that matter) is extremely lethal to deathclaws as it saps a lot of life (compared to ineefective weapons like 10mm and so on) You probably came across a survivor of such an encounter. OR you might have gotten lucky. If Rex's trip attack succeeds, every other hit on the fallen mob is done with bonus -dt and damage untill it gets back up. a few bites to the head can easily kill a deathclaw at any level, provided that Rex can reach the head .

RiP Funnyman.