cronicler

Solve what? Look, human kind has been kicking on this planet for how long? 3000 years or so? We still haven't been able to solve the most basic problems (Woman, Food, Woman) for all these times, What makes one so Arrogant to think they can "solve", "put an end" to an issue based on being human. "We" are flawed so all our issues have fundemental flaws too. The best we can do is to find a compromise that no one is truly satisfied with but can accept without creating a feud. Woo me with your attention and gifts and I can overlook your intrusion to my (gaming life). Try to be arrogant and ill rip your head and spit down your neck.

The current DRM issues are not really about pirates anyway. Most of the newer DRMs are aimed to eliminate the second hand trading not pirating. From Steam like internet based services to Bioware's newest free DLC schemes, the focus has shifted from stopping pirates (which is pretty much impossible) to generating new "game buyer"s out of second hand / rental gamers. Steam/GoG/D2D does this by using honey and feathers while Ubi seems to be set on using vinegar and hammers. Sure everyone has a different tolerance levels some are fine with 3rd party programs while others rant about basic disc checks, but ham handed strong arm tactics only make the situation worse. And about the pirating for spite thing. Being an anonimus face on the net already brings out the worst in most people. Are you really that naive to believe that if s/he could get away with it, your average Joe, Jane wouldn't stop from hurting the guy/gal/company s/he is angry/furious/pissed with in real life, let alone in the obscurity of the internet?

I am not sure if this is a distrubution only agreement or more but Namco's own DLC policy makes me a bit worried:

Are you set on him being evil? No taht came out wrong... Ok let me put it this way, how did you or the player decide on the characters background? Is he (The Devotee of Khaine) the only soul / personality in there? Besides, "worships Khaine" is a bit open ended. Chaos Marauders worship him and so do the sadistic dark elves do too but the "good" elves call upon his might too. You can probably use this duality to force the player to choose between the easy and slaughterfest path (the road to dammnation) or wartorn, barbed poath that is not too different from a slayers path. Other than worshipping the primal aspect instead of chaos aspect, I can't see how you can put him into a "good side" questline

Can't answer for being a law-abiding citizen but I can aswer the question in context of being a paying gamer if you want. You get to be treated like a potential criminal. You are guilty as long as not proven innocent. You are supposed to have an IQ of 90 and memory of 3 weeks. And a very low education level. You are not supposed to be able to enjoy complexity, enjoy finer points, stimulate your brain. You can not understand anything that is not fed to you in bite sized pieces.

Ubi seems to have become the flagship of idiotic and invasive DRM ideas. Yes, if I'm playing a MMO or MP game then I can accept being watched, being under surveliance to a certain degree but when I'm at my own home, trying to take a break, escape from reality, unwind, whatever reasion I play the particular game, I don't want some idiot to watch me. Hell I use ad blockers for a similar reasion. I don't want some crap algorithm to tailor an advertisement package for me, thank you. Despite not being an American, this reminds me of one of the... Founding Fathers' (?) remark about (French ?) state constricting people's liberties in the name of security. Ironic.

Hurls: Beth's Post-Apocalyptic Oblivion mod was nice. I just wish it had fixed some of the problems like ape-physics, skating movement, dodgy close quarters combat. Also those bugs from Oblivion's unofficial combat overhaul mod were still there. While there, I would be happy if the game had a complete story instead of bits and pieces that are scattered around unconnected. Sandbox/Exploration games are generally nice to play. I just want some substance and polish on top of the basics. Is it really that much to ask?

Dig up Outpost 2 and finished it again, pretty old and clunky RTS/Colony management game but nevertheless I love it's story.

I thought this entire forum gets it's lifeforce from the guttercrapfeed? Only the NMA contingent(and Volo) Thank you...

Probably becouse it is hard to combine them in a meaningful and good way. it is easy to create basic parts but it gets messy when you try to make a complex product. Hell, even a basic fight scene where the map, the props and the enemy mesh well is pretty non-existent so we get the "speed" and "horde" sections to stop us noticing the dificient parts. Do you really expect a whole product when each 1/3 of it can be made "barely passable" grade?

I prefer the combat armor myself (preferably the BoS version )

The game felt like it was made for human noble origin. Every other origin except for dwarf casteless, sorry commoner, felt glued on as an after thought. The heir that was kicked out a month or so ago returns after dad's death (Dwarf Noble), where are the political factions that want to use me as a puppet head? Playing as untermensh (Elf) where every other elf in the settlement is a slave or laborer and no one notices my race behind the neon signb that says Grey Warden? Don't get me wrong the game is still a solid 8 to 8.5 with its combat (which only had 1 big flaw, why the hell can't I say stay put to single char instead of party wide orders?) backstory, char system (even with tons of uncertanities and flaws thet come with being the untested) but it could have been a much much fullfilling experience if Non-Human parts of the game were given the same amount of work, alternative questlines for origins were presented (Being a dorf or an elf should have resulted in similar but different questlines in their respective areas) Also the grindfest sections (tunnels and some of the fights after the landsmeet) could have been handled better with some cutscene moments, vistas, little puzzles mixed with the fights to break the monotomy of those areas. As I said, it is a solid and enjoyable game but it has its own legion of flaws.

I also like having a base. In my PnP campaign (that went fairly well for a year or so untill my players had serious scheduling problems and we had to call it "fin") I used a mobile home like thing. Imagine a traditional European gypsy caravan image and mate it with an all terrain truck (like construct). If presented in a correct way; like with a long chain quests in the area after the initial introduction phase that gets you a basic truck, then upgrading it as you progress in the story with new parts like liquid storage tanks so you can carry water and gas you need to cross the desert to next story quest, a basic workbench, upgraded bench, Ham Radio to stay in contact, Sattalite dish, Lockers... A mobile base also allows foır a trading options (caravan trade) somewhat like the the poor SoZ tried. The base would also allow you to collect NPCs of different flavor, no more partys of only combat monkeys; a mechanic (preferably redhead and female), A doctor (preferably with brown-black hair, russian accent and rolling "o"s in Laboorootooriyy, A witchdoctor (Preferably Cajun heritage) and other oddsa and mads Then again I am pretty sure this is a bad pipe dream...

I would also like if it had some free roam aspects but judging by the story and geography (of the actual tunnels) so far, I think its going to be mostly linear like HL Purkake: What can I say? I am a sucker for the genre. Compared to the mess 7.62 and Jazz:Hired guns (and other newer releases in the genre) Altar is(was) actually moving in the right direction to create a good game before the crisis hit them. I think they are partnering with another (or 2) dev. studio as coders on their (other studios') games to stay solvent.

The Fall: Last Days of Gaia was a "playable" squad based rts(with pause). It was nice enough to spend some time if you liked the genre but the lack of English release killed it. I played the German release with English subtitles patch and the VO was really bad. Still it is a worth a 6 or so Ufo: Afterlight (3rd of the serie after "UFO: Aftermath" and "UFO: Aftershock") was another squad based strategy game. Strategic combat was RTS (with pause). Your goal was to terraform mars for the sleeping 10.000 colonists after Earth's biosfhere was royally shot to hell in the previous 2 games. The game played similar to the basic X-Com with one catch, you only had a limited pool of 20 to 25 warm bodies and robots you can build. It has its own share of shortcomings (idiotic diplomacy, problematic research blocks) but still I would give it a 7.

At the moment I don't recall m/any official WW3 stories but there were more than a few fanfic stories and "meanwhile in other parts of the world" type of fan stories and speculations. In no specific order The Vault (Fallout Bible?), NMA fanfic section and ş boards are probably the first place to dig for such stories

You can't say it was a perfect moment for a RickRoll

Volo, I don't beleve you can honestly take a "look around" and deny that a lot of games with good potentials were pushed half baked and "steamlined"out of the door due to insistence of the publishers. I know and I actually do agree that the publishers are in the business of moneymaking not charity but there is a line between cutting losses (ala Ion storm, DNF) and wrong choices (Kotor 2, VtM:B, Nexus 2, Exigo, Lost Planet PC, X game PC port...). Despite its primary strenghts, A game is as good as its final polish. I have said this openly before, Oblivion was a turd but it was such a shinny and polished turd that you spent at least 5,10 hours before you started noticing the problems. How many games that had more potential were victims of publisher pressure (JoWood for example?) I agree that most gamers are selfish but as long as the games "have to" include the regular idiot sauce and "must" stay away from using "complex things" like several interlinked stories instead of an easy "big bad, save world, get girl" fast food stories, long time gamers will not think of any publisher as good. %5 to %10 from each sale to developers rest for the publisher, Demands on content, demands and control on release time, demands of making the game more steamlined which usually boils down to "dumber, faster, more showy". Can you dispute that the teams that put out the most creative content are either big enough that they are their own bublishers or unknown wildcards that have more freedom to be creative, or gamble in corpspeak?

Actually the cell (PS3 cpu) is better. On paper. However except for a handfull of studios that know how to use the architecture (Like Naughty Dog and it's Uncharted 2) most studios cannot use the full potential of the platform. (When you try to get the cell to work your code using the way traditional cpus process data, you run into memory and bandwith bottlenecks, which translates to the game being able to use something like less then 25% of the available processing power. This is as much as I can explain being a layman) XBox games on the other hand can access %100 processing power as the platform is basically a pc platform with standartised parts, in fact the system always works at least %100 during the gaming and redlines during busy sequences, resulting in overheating that goes on to create hardware problems. (Edit: What I meant here is the fact that most devs are familiar with the architectures ins and outs and quirks and soft points, they are familiar with it so it is easier to use) In the end it all comes down to the games. The PS3 games are usually more smoother because it can compute whatever is in the game (that the devs were able to feed through the weird architecture) but except a few exceptional titles, most of the games are either ports or made with the intention of being portable from/to weaker systems. Unless you play Uncharted 2, you won't believe how complex, detailed and beautiful scenes and background sounds (music, effects, far away sounds, the ambiance, all those parts) cell can create while still having a smooth gameplay and dynamic sounds I am not going to touch how xbrick blows sony away in online segment in any way.

(Disclaimer: not sure if cross-site quoting of a user is ok. If it isn't feel free to delete this post) This thing is really becoming a ping pong ball, I am not savvy enough to decipher the legal speech but over at the NMA, user orionquest was explaining the stance of Interplay in somewhat layman's terms some time ago; Now, I am not sure how strong this kind of defence would be but I found this to be a completely different take/angle on the situation. Also I am not sure what you mean by saying "Interplay lives on to fake develop a Fallout MMO", Mkreku. Granted I like neither of the 2 corporations (?, Firms? whatever they are defined) but calling either of them false is a moot point at this moment. The whole franchise has already been sacrificed to the altar of lowest common denominator. On a semi related note, I find it really comic and ironic to see some new and completely unrelated titles like Borderlands, Uncharted 2, (Edit:) Assasins Creed 2 that either have more in common with the general feel and humor of the old game or are just plainly superior in the gameplay department in a time where the bar has been so lowered that you can basically turn out an average game by using a stock 2006-2008 engine and random map generator

They can start by naming it right then. "The Lightning Unleashed" With even more force lightning variations this time! You can even use "Lighning Push" and "Lighning Pull" and most importantly "Force Lightning Jump" this time. It also has . so I guess it only lacks the part. (and ...) I am soo excited about this new lightning show, I mean game...

Volo: Sorry for the confusion there. The Dwarfs themselves were not cliche, I quite liked them in fact but the way they were presented (the quests, the story (especially the non-interactive part if you are a noble dwarf) felt a bit cliche, if you can understand what Im trying to express. Lawful evil power plays, the general feel of dirty politics 101 with the most basic explanations and so on felt a bit too basic and too fast. I generally felt the dwarf parts could have been better with some more lenght in the quest part via some more setup steps, slowing the story but explaining and detailing it more (and with more limited/encounter like battles in some private residances and old tunnels) and less grinding at the deep roads part. Elves, and most of the dalish elven parts felt too generic compared to the level of detail that you could find in the rest of the game. Why would helping 1 clan give me the support of all the elven clans in Ferelden? Why were the elves that much civilised? From the source background material they were supposed to be a mix between the gypsies and celts or lapplanders or ucboys or cossasks or any fringe semi-barbarian, semi civilised, semi nomadic, semi settled people (that have a lot of halves that mesh weirdly) you can find in the history. The Dalish parts felt that devs begun with such a vision but then turned around and slapped a more conventional (and easier) story on the elven parts.

Personally I hate the comic like tie ins between the universes. Alien is a good universe. Predator (besides Predator himself being a very good character with potential) universe is a bit on the average side. Mixing them (and adding every other marvel or dc character to them or "them" to the marvel or dc stories) was just another dumb "lets sell more crap" move. The original Alien movie was very enjoyable. As it was said above it was a genre defining film. Aliens (the second film) was even better as it managed to line up really nasty barbs to the unchecked capitalism, American whoopers (edit: slang term the outright lies fed to the masses regardless of nationality or country.) , "mega" "multiplanet" corporations in a logical fashion and use those barbs to create a bed of thorns for the story. 3rd film was a bit too forced (not that the story was implausible or anything); the story and acting and etc was good but it started to feel that they were just going on and on and on... I hate the "resurrection" btw. I would like to add my own voice to the people who were saddened by the opportunity to play something a bit more deeper in the "Alien" universe.

As others have pointed out, you might need to research a bit (edit:) for each seperate title. Some games (generally the ones with heavy online side) are better with steam (no idea about impulse) as it regulates the patches and anti cheats equally. However if you want to mod or tinker with your games, then steam is not a good option with some of the non valve titles. I personally prefer GoG but both GoG and D2D offer services that are much like buying a regular boxed game. no other extra stuff. As much as I would like to defend them, if the game you bought has problems that is based on developers or the publishers (or from the ms / sony aspects) your 3rd party steam bought game can stay broken for quite some time untill the idiots get their backsides off the sofa. Cursing steam does not work on this scenario.

To be frank, the worst part of the game for me was the origins in the later chapters. I know that it would have been a lot more work but I would have liked to see your race and origin affecting the story more. (For example: Being the dwarf noble, I would have liked to see a different Orzammar questline, maybe involving some 3rd party that wants you on the throne as a puppet and so on.) Sure I understand that they had to make most of the game go through 1 main line but more variations would have been a lot better. As it stands now, the origin&race aspect is a bit wasted in the game. Also the elves.... The dwarfs were cliche yes but they were different from the usual cookie cutters and were belivable. And their part of the game was good (repetitive anm grindy but not too bad) On the other hand, elf parts of the game were just not good enough. Where is the part, when the clans gather and you try to get them to help you? Where were the bigot humans that tried to lord over you every other sentence (when playing an elf)? Where was the feral, chaotic and deadly part of the Dalish society? Where were the guerilla fights agains Loghains (and/or Hove's) men? The elven parts of the game felt sub par.