Rhomal

Just to add fuel into the heat According to Sony, PS3 will last you 7 more years http://games.techwhack.com/557-playstation...o-last-a-decade Sure and look like Atari 2600 lvl gfx vs PCs by then.. *shrugs* if that floats your boat all the power to you. I like my mouse, kb and ability to do other things, thank you.

Every 12-18 months I do a cpu, mobo, ram and video card upgrade. While I never buy the latest bleeding edge (I buy about one generation behind the newest, most cost effective price vs performance) the upgrades certainly cost much less then a new ps3 and easily last me over a year. If I wanted to my current AMD X2 5200+ 2gigs ram and 8800GT 512meg prob could last me until 2010 if I desired with very acceptable gameplay still.

Funny thats the card I have... *insert x-files theme music here* Indeed its a great card and I can play most all games on max or not that far from such.

Until its on the shelves hope for the best, expect the worse. Both nwn1 and nwn2 got pushed back at least once. It happens in PC dev to every game. I can't recall any recent game that was released on the initial target date. Hells sims3 was just pushed back from this month to june! lol

Basically, and more to the point, of what I implied to him via PM.. none the less we shall agree to disagree and move forward as he choose to apply 'homebrew' rules (or ultra-liberal view of the forum policies/wording); none the less it is what it is. While I don't agree with his opinion for the reasons you stated I will accept it as anything else is futile anyways. Moving on... Another well I am not sure if 'bug' is the correct word, but it seems as if pathfinding has taken a hit since this xp. Not sure if this is my imagination, simply a baking issue or just the way some of the areas were designed. With the much smaller areas within most of this module perhaps it has always been this way but the small area just brings out some of the 'quirks' of the pathfinding mechanics. Nothing close to game breaking just ocasional oddities. Another AI issue, again perhaps this is no a 'bug' just the way it is, but it seems the 'use dispel magic' option either does not fire at times or its sensitivity needs to be upped. I found I have to micro manage having my spell caster (warlock in this case) use said spell about 50% (at best) of the time where said spell would be applied to other casters. Seems sometimes she does other times she does not. I am not sure if there is some common variable that triggers it that I am simply not noticing. And while not a bug per se (unless its more then they planned) but must echo others... the random encounter frequency needs to be lowered to about half of the current amount. They really are out of hand.

Curious.. what exact rule was violated here in this thread? After reviewing the forums rules I am failing to see where me talking about my time as a bioware mod violates any of them. Clarification appreciated.

But on topic, thanks for reminding me of that shield bug I encountered that issue as well... Should have added that to my list as well. Not sure how that slipped my mind. Old age I suppose... haha As for the QA issue I would bet a $20 spot they had a VERY small QA budget. Does that forgive them missing some obvious bugs (at least to you or I?) no. However that would explain these nagging bugs that didn't take too long to pop up for us. However according to the manual most all the QA folks, about a half dozen, have french names. Which implies to me, Atari handled the QA.. was not internal. And that would explain a fair amount.

I really think the whole steampunk concept is overrated and except for a small vocal spliter group of the gaming community would not sell well enough for a publisher today to invest in. All they would do is look at sales of arcanium (last AAA steampunk game IIRC) and be turned off from investing millions in such a project. Bioshock says otherwise. All I'm saying is a lot can be done with a steampunk setting. Its severely underused so there's a lot of originality left in it. It also tends to have a lot of style. Never played BS but 'steampunk' was not the impression I got from the screenshots. But I certainly may be wrong. As for the rest of your comments, I totally agree, except I apply your views to the cyberpunk, shadowrun style setting. Nothing like having your elf cast a mana ball then having your troll pump some fragger on full auto while the human street sam chopped some guards up with his katana and colt manhunter pistol... ahh those were the days...

As far as I can see they visit these forums far more then the 'official' forums now a days. Plus, I am not very welcome over there anymore.

First patch fixed nothing for me (and many other according to GTA forums), have not tried the second that was just released as I need to reinstall it. And they nerf the settings, you actually have to hack a file or two to 'unlock' the ability to fully change the settings. Otherwise it decides upon your hardware what it thinks the optimal setting are and what is too high for you. Ironically I have seen many reports that folks stay the game plays better on the higher settings after they unlock them... go figure.

Just cuz current machines can't max it out, doesn't mean poor coding. It's just waiting for cards with 1.5-2GB RAM to finish it off. Don't mistake future proofing with bad coding. The Xbox 360 does not play it at the maximum PC settings believe it or not and it's sliders are actually set in the 15's and 20's. GTA 4 runs really smooth for me @ 2560 res with everything set to very high and sliders set on slightly above xbox 360 settings. Have you played the port? Clearly not, unless you consider objects stop rendering after 40 mins of playing and memory leaks 'good' coding.

Anything is possible... probable is another matter.

I really think the whole steampunk concept is overrated and except for a small vocal spliter group of the gaming community would not sell well enough for a publisher today to invest in. All they would do is look at sales of arcanium (last AAA steampunk game IIRC) and be turned off from investing millions in such a project.

To finish off this topic and wash my hands of it as its clearly going no where fast; Sony is considering killing off the PS3 according to various tech site reports I have read such as on the inquirer. And if I recall the xbox is still a money sink hole for MS, has been in the red since its release. The problem with consoles is the business plan of selling the hardware at a loss but make up for it in games. The problem with that plan is you need to sell a LOT of games. And unless you have a few 'killer games' at once it's going to be tough to make money as sony realizes and, eventually MS, will come around to see as well unless things change on a core level. With the economy as it is it will be interesting if that speeds up the process of these folks exiting the console market. Frankly 12 months from now it wouldn't surprise me if sony is either out of the console market or at least made massive cut backs to its PS3 division and MS rethinking its xbox strat making cuts or/and reorginizing. While not a big fan I think nintendo will be the only one to come out of this more or less intact. Unless they are having issues as well and simply better and keeping the lid on it then the others but I have a feeling they are in a good position and know it. Thus are taking a subtle war of attrition approach.. simply wait and let the other guys finally cave in and then swoop in and scoop up the market share left by the void. If they play their cards right and the insider reports are correct, I can see the wii becoming the dominant console by the end of the year by a solid majority of market share.

Yet you make some leaps and assumptions to what I said (or didn't say). That aside buggy ports is another matter entirely. Again you are mix and matching the topics and tossing anything and everything into it to try to make some point which I think is lost to everyone but yourself. heh

Since I don't own a laptop I can't tell you. However if I bought a laptop for gaming I would thus get one geared for that. However most PC gamers have boxes not laptops so your point is moot. As for the games you listed, again NO ONE can play GTA4 on a PC with everything maxed out and his it run smoothly. Get that though your head. It is BUGGY so that argument of your is moot at well. As for the others I am talking about current tech not back then this or that. Anyone can look back in time, cherry pick certain variables then bring them to the current time frame and 'prove' a point. Clearly you are tossing everything and the sink at the wall hoping something sticks in your convoluted argument. *shrugs*

just four words... Grand Theft Auto Four or another two... Assasin's Creed or another one... Crysis i could pull more words out of my ass aswell, but cba... Did I say play on max settings? No. And GTA4 is a poor example and you know it (and if you don't then frankly you are too uneducated to be involded with this topic). As even a top of the line box struggles with it. Poor coding <> a fair benchmark.

You are saying the above example can not play modern games? You do NOT need bleeding edge tech to play modern games, this is 2009 not 1999 As far as my box its a AMD X2 5200+ w/ a 8800GT video card with 2gig RAM. Look up those prices and I play everything to max to near max levels. *shrugs* With that said you make it sound like building your own box is some massive task, it a lot easier then most people think. But yes they do buy mostly premade systems, all one needs to do in that case is upgrade the video card and most of todays systems out of the box have a good CPU and ram to play games. Assuming you didn't buy a bottom level e-machine level of such box.

PC's dead... again? *looks at his watch* That makes about the 10th time the console industry has said that since I have been alive. Fact is its overall cheaper to be a PC gamer then a console these days, the myth its more expensive is just that... a myth. For example... Newegg.com: CPU - AMD Dual-core, 2.1GHz 65W ($59.99) Motherboard - ASUS, 8GB DDR2 1066, 2600MHz ($99.99) Hard Drive - 500GB Seagate, 32MB Cache ($119.99) Power Supply - 600W, Cooler Master ($34.99) Case - Cooler Master ($34.99) RAM - Patriot gaming, 2GB ($26.99) Grand total: $376.94. 500 gigs of space and it will do other things than just gaming. If you're interested in extremely high-end gaming: Video Card - eVGA 512MB 256-bit ($239.99) Or if you just want games to run but don't require them to blow your mind: Video Card - eVGA 256MB 128-bit ($37.99) Grand Total (with insane video card): $616.93 Grand Total (with normal video card): $414.93 I'm confused. How is this so much more expensive than when the PS3 debuted at $599.99? And if I'm not mistaken, that machine only provided 80 gigs, not to mention a fraction of the library PC gaming provides. Moving on from yet another doom and gloom PC is dead drama thread.. heh

a. The quest from West Harbor where you need to rescue the mayors son from the cult. After killing all the big bads in the area and talking to the son he keeps on repeating I need to talk to the cult leader. Seems the script does not fire off letting him know the fight ended already/leader is dead. b. For some odd reason NPC's ingame that join my party feel the need to heal using heal kits other non-hostile NPCs. For example merchants and his guards when I join a caravan battle. Chars I created at the start of the game do not seem to exhibit this behavior. c. With all party scripts to use healing items on the chars will ONLY use heal kits and not heal pots. Which in effect makes them almost useless unless one wants to micromanage in battle. d. When trying to find the temple of umberlee quest I have traveled up and down the coast many times (where I was told to look for it) and the temple does not appear at all. My search skill in the teens. Thanks!

If you refer the traditional meaning of the word, perhaps. If you mean the modern meaning of the word I don't think so. A guy who cared about universal heath care (or close to it), civil liberties and public transit all go against the grain of modern GOP/conservatism mentality. As for his impeachment; while it seems there was some kind of wash my hand & i'll wash yours going on a few things bother me; a. Watched some of the interviews of those who voted to oust him and I have yet to hear one, dem or rep say 'yes he broke this law and why I voted the way I did'. No one that I saw went on record to claim a specific law he broke it was all 'well hes corrupt' and yet couldn't name any specifics beyond generalizations. b. Rather then innocent until proven guity it really seemed the other way around, at least my understanding of the way the rules of the hearing went. And that IMO I have to say does play into some of the claims he made saying how it was fixed against him. c. In the end it seemed this was a convient excuse by the leg. branch to oust him becasue they simply didn't like him. I am not claiming he smells like roses, I certainly do think he did some underhand dealings, but the way they approached it certainly worries me. So anytime the leg branch does not like their gov it's ok to inpeach him without a fair hearing and rights one gets at a trial? d. Sadly the public in general don't want to know how 2 things are made, sasuages and laws. This is, to our dismay, how the political system works, backroom dealings. Now he went over the top I feel but generally the only difference between what happened here and the other 49 states is the curtain was pulled back in this case for the public to look.

For the PW I ran I had a over reaching metaplot/storyline. I was thinking of taking my custom setting and the plot and turning it into a series of modules. Somewhat like the BG series but certainly smaller scope/scale.

Since they had no budget to hire voice actors from my understanding (especially the same ones as in the OC who prob do that for a living and want a payday worth their time) its not surprising. I don't disagree with your assement quality wise but they did the best they had to work with is my point.

I found most, not all, of the NPCs in the NWN2 OC and a few in MotB far superior to any CRPG NPC in recent times. In fact I found them all superior to the NPCs in BG series except for aerie (I enjoyed her unique background) and the drow (forget her name but she was a kick arse, bad arse and you got to respect and like that). Sorry but I found all the other NPCs annoying and grated on my nerves. Yes that includes Boo and his pet.. or the other way around I forget. Now I am not saying the NPCs in BG series were bad by any means, most were well written but their personalities simply either rubbed me the wrong way or I didn't feel a large connection expect for those 2 I mentioned. NWN1 on the other hand was simply badly developed and poorly written. Either case I was drawn in much deeper to the NPCs in the NWN2 OC then any in NWN1 and most in BG.

I have some questions for anyone who has background in the admin of this field, thanks!