Chippy

It's got enough reasons to warrant a purchase for me (with Todd McFarlene and R.A. Salvatore involved). I'm not that jaded that I can't appreciate their work. My only concern how cohesive these talents are in the final product. Not too keen on the Oblivion manager, but yeah, I'll buy it.

Witcher 2 spoilers ahead. Tutorial: "I wonder if this huge golem creature takes damage from all these traps I've laid down?". *Geralt takes x200% damage from behind, gets pumelled to the ground, can't get back up and dies*. The Dragon is back: "I can do this QTE stuff - did it in darksiders". *Presses E twice at the last event instead of once*. "Ok, I think that was a -10HP death". Burning tower: "Now I better be quick or this tower might burn me to death". *Targets ladder (because of crappy targetting system) instead of woman next to it, Geralt decends ladder, Geralt ascends ladder, Geralt burns to death ... player watches silently*. Sneak through camp: "Can't go that way as I hit the invisible wall around the tent ropes (was actually the right way) I'll go the other way instead. *Multiple arrows appear in Geralt's chest*. Geralt gets caught on purpose to save damsel in distress: "Now I've turned off hard QTE's so I can't die here - how do I burn through these ropes?, E does something but I don't want to press the button twice or might die". Unknown to me the instructions to rapidly press E were hidden behind a balzing special effect onscreen. *Guard lunges forward and stabs Geralt through the heart. Geralt dies. Again*. - At this point I have to admit that if there was a QTE to take control of the guard and twist the blade I would be pressing it until a fingernail snapped. Final end game scene: "Just drink the vodka and get the hell outta here". So that game inspired nerd rage in me like no other. End Spoilers.

Arcanum - and getting my ass kicked. You see game from a decade ago were ....

I recently read that long-term bioware employees have been resigning after the direction games like ME2 and DA2 have gone in. I'm just speculating, but that's normally a sign that people don't have the luxury of being released into their roles/are being told to perform their job a certain way. So that's why I'm a bit sceptical when people talk about different teams doing different jobs. I suppose Bioware could be growing and newer people are making decisions that a smaller team wouldn't have made years ago - like constantly exploding enemies - but if a series like DA does not develop but replaces what it has built with it's first game (and in my oppinion for the worst) then I won't be pre-ordering MA3 or any other Bioware title again.

It isn't inclusive to use the term dumb as we all have different ways of solving problems (you could say I was testing the limits of that giant radscorpion when I charged it at level 1), but as I'm getting older and crankier, I get incredibly annoyed when I die in games. So for the sake of a laugh thought people could submit a few examples - heres my latest: After over 400 hours of playing New Vegas without dying, of carefully skirting high level enemies, planting traps bombs against them even at high levels, climbing mountains to get at optimal sniping range, buffing with pre-planned chems and having the skill to sneak into a certain dead wind cavern and emerge victorious in melee. Knowing that I could die at any moment but respecting this great example of a game that rewards such planning - I found my way to the last 2 speakers in dead money.... I was seconds away from escaping their radius of influence (running back at full pelt) when my character hit this BLOODY TRAFFIC CONE SOMEONE LEFT BY THE DOOR - and my character goes flying up into the air (project nevada installed, seems to carry momentum) and I get jammed head first into the frame -of course the head first thing didn't last very long. Not exactly the heroic ironman ending I had expected.

For a great DnD alternative read Talislanta, its on the top 20 best RPGs ever made on rpg.net and its free now! http://talislanta.com/?page_id=5 Every single edition and all supplements released for download by author. I suggest you start with the 4th edition as it has everything in one book. The rules are barely 20 pages long! D&D may be omnipresent but its far from killed off everything. In fact I'd be willing to bet that DnD is on a steady decline ever since fourth editon and the rise of Pathfinder. Now I'm no great fan of Pathfinder as its a re skinned DnD and I had just about enough of the latter to last me a lifetime. However I won't shed any tears over D&D's eventual fall into obscurity. If you wan't something sci fi gothic space opera like WH40k try Fading Suns. I bet you'd like it. Thank you, much appreciated.

I really need to start ordering some books based on this universe. I might as well start reading about another one as 4th edition D&D seems to have killed off everyone / everything.

The traditional problem with Warhammer games is getting the license. GW are complete asses as far as this is concerned and also rather dim about which game to support and which to skip. Apart from the story that Starcraft designers approached GW and were denied license (thus skipping on one of the most lucrative games in history) a more recent case are Cyanide Studios and their "Chaos League". Only after the game was released did GW give Cyanide the license to make a Bloodbowl game. Similar things have been said about Wizards of the Coast and White Wolf and it basically goes for any large IP. The owners of the IP are often annoyingly hard to work with as they interfere and/or make unreasonable demands, plus the license often costs a lot of money driving up the already high cost of development. On top of that, sadly, RPG's in their pure form are not a popular genre any more and are not viewed as a good opportunity to make money by anyone other than already established giants like Bioware and Bethesda. This is why you shouldn't expect a WH game any time soon, although it is not altogether impossible. - Damn shame though, I suppose if games like Arcanum had sold better it would have made a strong argument to these reactive licence holders. How did you arrive at *that* conclusion? If anything, the Emperor is your "practical incarnation" from PS:T... anything, literally, that it takes to get the job done is considered acceptable. - This was just based on a 15min wiki reading in the past, but I latched onto this quote: "Over the many millennia of his life, he travelled among the different peoples of Mankind, using his ancient wisdom to help where he could in the guise of many different benevolent persons from human myth, religion and history". I don't know the history, so he could be responsible for snatching psyker children from their families for 'the greater good', but from a skim read it seemed he had a strong belief humans creating their own flag from their belief in themselves. I'll just pretend I didn't notice this bit: "The Imperial Truth also held that humanity was the species which should rightfully rule the galaxy since its physical form was both the most pure and all of the other intelligent alien races, such as the Eldar, had already tried and failed to maintain galaxy-spanning civilisations".

I'm still new to WH, and the 'Old World' Battle March game was very D&D drow-like (quite enjoyable), but I would hope that Obsidians writers would make a WH RPG as comparable to D&D as BG was to PS:T. Having just completed the excellent Lonesome Road, I can see a similiar humanist strive to create a tolerant society (which I think the immortal emperor represented despite eventually being revered as a god) and failed through humans being at war with themselves/at odds with chaos. Throw into that the over-the-top characterizations of the races and their relations with each other, and I'm sure the result would not be (at least) an average fantasy storyline. I hope. I remember an interview with Chris Avellone stating he wanted to kill Elminster ... well I hope he/Obsidian still get the chance, but at least each WH setting provides that very Arcanum intro style insecurity over the power of magic.

Thanks for the welcome, I suppose I have to start posting incessantly to get my status up. Southpark: The game? Might be interesting, hope it raises Obsidians profile further - I wonder if there's any chance the characters can start screaming WAAAGH! and catapulting each other into THQ's offices as a subtle hint...

With recent RPG disapontments I've been moving into areas I haven't bothered with before - and hello Warhammer universe! I can believe how ignorant I was of it's existance (because I'm a bloke that doesn't multitask games), but how can it have been going for so long without a crpg to it's name?.

Not always Never made it past the prologue. It was all action and nothing interesting going on. Dead Island is more fun, because you expect it to be all action and little else. With Witcher 2 I expected something different. ...Very true... that summarizes it right there really. I was also hoping for a witcher 1 type game - slight denial I suppose. Engaging the gamer was a moment in new vegas where I chose not to steal La Longue Carabine from corporal sterling, and later read that he could have died in his trip across the wastelands if I had. Don't think I will get any of those moments here, and what it has instead is poor.

Hi Thought I'd add a brief oppinion of the witcher 2: I know I sound like a narcissistic gamer here - but I can't stand dying unfairly. I died in the tutorial because I was trying to dodge the golem and see what damage my pre-laid traps did and learned that once knocked over, 200% damage from multiple enemies will kill you quick. It recommended I play on hard (I didn't). I died somewhere else because I clicked on a ladder instead of a character next to it and the game instantly killed me because of the events that were occuring at the time (it did make sense, but targetting items is as difficult as auto target in combat). And I died because I was sneaking somewhere and was unable to walk past a rope (turned out it was the right way) and tried to go the other way and suffered another instant scripted death. The game has got quite a few problems, but it does more or less draw you into the story - and the above frustations do a pretty good job of drawing me out of it. It seems the gamer is expected to be pinpoint perfect, but the game itself is allowed to be innacurate. I'm just gonna rush to the end for the sake of the story and get back to New Vegas.