Drowsy Emperor

His whole attitude is just... disappointing. Purposefully implementing the sort of abuse rampant in online experiences is sure to make everyone's experience better. What sort of satisfaction am I supposed to glean from teabagging a paying player? That's a high point in the universe he's creating? And I was actually looking forward to this.

We will blame Serbia if the world enters another Cold War, which is not unreasonable as they have already been the catalyst for one World War? Wouldn't be surprised, shifting ones own guilt to another is a very human coping mechanism

I think the key question of the next few decades is: will the policy makers in Washingon reach? They have a huge army and a strong economy, but the economy is not as powerful as it once was and the competition is slowly but steadily rising. Down the line the army will suffer from these reduction in the economy as well. They're in the typical tempting scenario of an empire on a decline. A lot of potent power that begs to be used to secure as much as it can, as fast as it can - because its on a timer. The conquest of Iraq's oil is a typical example of this. But the inherent danger is one of not adjusting one's greed and ambitions on one hand to the capabilities and reactions of ones opponents. If they do not reach (militarily) and readjust their position and give up world ambitions like the British empire did, then the outcome for the rest of the world is bright. The other outcome is horrible. What is very likely is a cold war scenario (that the US and China are practically engaging in now) leading to an increase in tensions. Where those tensions will lead us is the million dollar question.

Don't be silly there is absolutely NO chance of a Third World War. I can't believe you actually think this is even a remote outcome? Not as things currently stand, no. But a decade or two down the line, a conflict between China and the US (referred to here as a world war only because of scope, not necessarily because it would involve a lot of countries) is not unthinkable, if the US keeps the same policies it has now on one hand and if China isn't brought down by its internal problems on the other. The policy of surrounding Russia with NATO countries and nuclear warheads in eastern Europe has a similar result but how far the Russians would go to counter that is anybody's guess. Realistically Russia can only engage in nuclear war with the US and that's only likely to happen in the most extreme of situations.

The reason the rebels never had a chance without foreign intervention is that Syria has a pretty good army by middle eastern standards. Arms and instructors can only do so much. If the US keeps on intervening more and more towards the east, a third world war scenario becomes more and more likely. Not allowing Russia, China Iran, and certain other countries to have space to project their own interests leads down the path to an inevitable conflict.

Heh, same here. I actually never finished the game. I loved what I played through...the atmosphere, the graphic/gameplay design. But after awhile I just couldn't take the constant tension anymore. I usually prefer games for relaxation or stress relief, not to increase my stress. So it's become another of those games that I mean to get back to "one day." During a bright sunny day, perhaps. Me too. It was too stressful so I quit about half way through. I don't generally enjoy survival horror much anyway but Amnesia was particularly terrifying compared to Resident Evil, Silent Hill etc.

You might as well try Devil May Cry 3 then, for the PS2 which is absolute torture on the standard difficulty.

Exactly.

It does undermine his argument, but the argument on the whole is relatively correct. The anti-male (generally only white males) shtick so popular in today's media does go hand in hand with the whole pro-gay thing. Chaz, or any of us, are perfectly entitled to liking big breasted bombshells in our games (if we so choose) and not to be criticized for that choice... ...and at the same time to be unimpressed and uninterested when anyone espouses the virtues of having homosexual relationships in their games. Its not like someone is likely to push you into a gay bar in real life, unless you want to go there yourself. So if you're not into that you can't but be annoyed that someone is pointing that out as a virtue of a game you might otherwise want to play. In short: you can sell a banana all you want but don't criticize me for liking melons. And not wanting your banana.

I don't see the reason to get all riled up, if anything worthwhile hits the XBone we're 90% likely to play it on the PC too. Considering its price point, and how expensive console games are - its actually worse value for money than a PC now (all the cheap PC game sales more than make up for the monitor & hardware cost in the long run) Buying it is like a broken pencil. Pointless.

Woohoo Dylan Moran, I love that guy!

I doubt its going to make the game much better. The core of the problem is 1UPT, every problem Civ V leads to it, from the economy, research to warfare. By Shafer's own admission the concept is broken in Civ V and can't (really) be fixed. Typically Firaxis expansions are a bunch of useful fixes and also commonly feature bloat.

That's a bunch of really glowing reviews of the hands-off demo. Hopefully that level of quality reflects on the final product, and throughout, not just in one area or act. They're making a MASSIVE world that, from all accounts, dwarfs Skyrim, so it will be a tall task to populate the whole area with interesting things to do and encounter. Hopefully CD Projekt RED can pull it off. I have faith in them. There is no way it can dwarf Skyrim in size considering that CDP content is much more carefully designed than Bethesda's.

Is the game keyboard friendly? No?

Before you reply Chaz you must know that alan works at Bioware and they hold "surprise buttsex" very close to their hearts. So stop being "inappropriate" before you incur the wrath of the BSN hive mind.

You're at CDP now? Cool Working on W3 or Cyberpunk?

Nice graphics, they really worked their asses off. Does the PS3 have anti aliasing capability? Quite a few jagged edges there.

Well those that have rigs that can run Crytek games are generally hardcore gamers. The filthy rich with the best gear that are in it for a casual experience are not exactly a big market.

The thing with Steam is that its the absolute worst place to get new games. Yeah you get great discounts, 6 months, a year or even more down the road, but otherwise its horribly expensive. I could have preordered CoH2 for 30 euros retail or bought it on Steam for 60. The retail is still half the price of digital! We all want to get our hands on certain games the day they're released. So if MS implements a digital only service who's to say they won't price gouge for new games like Steam does? The current status quo is better for a gamer. At least a PC gamer. PC games are more affordable now than they've ever been. We need these people at each other throats to get the best deals. What we don't need is Microsoft with a vertical monopoly. Controlling the developers, being the publisher/sole seller and the hardware seller at the same time. Economic theory says that scenario would be cheaper for the consumer, but lets get real - the moment they control the whole process they can set the price to whatever they damn please.

Not likely. There was no one to back Libya which is why it fell so quickly, but Syria is of vital importance to Iran and to a lesser extent Russia and China. If it could have had its way the US would have already toppled Assad, its obviously not working out.

Because its not about Syria but about driving Russia, China and Iran out of the middle east. In the case of Iran its a win either way, because the US backed rebels win, Iran loses an ally and its borders are threatened, if they lose Iran still has to waste resources in that fight to reestablish its influence. Syria is just another battleground of even less importance than some other, recent ones. The EU is a joke, only the US can play that game with Russia/China/Iran, the EU countries know it which is why they don't dare act on their own, and the US knows it but it lets them on the boat so they can feel influential (and to use their resources in the fight obviously). Israel wants a more aggressive approach because they're interested in busting up Iran and their nuclear program but the US is hesitant to deploy troops because they're already weakening Iran and fulfilling their goals and there is little to gain from having US troops return in body bags in the process.

If any of them win we lose so I wouldn't rejoice just yet, if I was the pc gaming master race. I had great faith in Sony to back a few "artistic" projects like they did with Ueda's SoC back in the day, which really gave credit to the notion that console gaming has more potential to deliver a unique experience than its usually given. But that just didn't happen with the PS3. Even after so many years, truly great games on the PS3 are very few and the overall catalog diversity still is nowhere near the PS2. No Ueda game either. Still, I respect Sony more, because if you look at the XBox catalog for both XB consoles over the years, there is an overwhelming number of shooters relative to everything else. The north american audience has a much narrower taste on the whole and the developers are much less prone to experimentation than japanese ones, so my interests in the XBone were never high to begin with.

Played a bit of Devil May Cry on the PS2. I realized how much I suck with the gamepad. It takes 15 minutes for my thumbs to start hurting from these types of games and I'm not even playing all that well.

Don't you think your generalized opinion of the people who frequent BSN is a little insulting and fatuous? Tsk, tsk, Bruce... are you trying to out-troll the troll? Okay, I don't really get trolling when people do it. I generally believe people mean what they say when they post something so I respond accordingly. I need to work on that Oh I do mean it I just don't hold it against them. :D ^See what I did there. As for the half serious part of the discussion, people occasionally complain (me among them obviously) that Bioware does more to cater to particular niche groups than its core audience. Much of it is the result of aggressive lobbying on BSN forums that Bioware allows. The problem with minority groups is not in their otherwise legitimate claim for some features or others (like gay romance for example) its in the "holier than thou" attitude that is utterly hostile to any opposing opinion that shows up. Bioware employees back them in this regard openly on the forums leading to an unhealthy "only head nodding allowed" mentality. My way of expressing my opinions couldn't be described as mild, but I've seen respectful people on BSN terrorized by other forum goers for making "dissenting opinions" with the silent approval of BW staff and this soured the whole experience for me.

Don't you think your generalized opinion of the people who frequent BSN is a little insulting and fatuous? Tsk, tsk, Bruce... are you trying to out-troll the troll?