Slowtrain

Good point, I had forgotten about that one. A little unbalanced there, especially given how easy it is to stealth up behind people and whack them with it.

The entire weapon balance thing could have been done much better simply by doing what Deus Ex did: making the pc skill have a really profound effect on weapon effectiveness. In other words, even if a level 1 pc has a plasma rifle or the Blackhawk, their crappy 25 weapon skill means the weapon wil still be nigh useless. If you recall Deus Ex handed you most of the best weapons in the game on the FIRST LEVEL in the FIRST CONVERSATION, and gave you the last couple on the next level with one exception. But you didn't have the skills to make them uber so it didn't matter. COnversely, if you built your pistol skill to master level you could go through the whole game with nothing but the basic 10mm handgun. Fallout 3 skills were a) too easy to raise and b) didn't have nearly enough effect on the ability to use weapons.

He was the Imperial Male voice in Oblivion and there were several quests in which you could listen as he talked to himself, such as the Save the Farm from Goblins quest outside Chorrol, where he does the voices of both brothers. He actually does the father as well, so you can listen as he has a three way conversation going with himself. When you listen to him in that context, you can see he does have pretty good ability to make subtle alterations to his voice. I think the guy has a lot of talent and Beth must as well, because he gets a lot of the more potentially interesting characters in their games. But yes, I totally agree that Beth really needs to bring in more voice talent for their games. I would say it doesn't even have to be good voice talent. Just different voices.

Post-Morrowind Bethesda, yep. I agree that MW was the pinnacle of Beth's writing ability, almost surprisingly so, since then it's just been eeewwww. I still enjoy Fallout 3, because Fallout 3 doesn't need good writing to be fun, but that doesn't alter the fact that the writing is almost completely inept. Whether through a lack of effort or lack of ability, I couldn't say. MW indicates that possibly Beth could do better in the writing departmkent if they tried harder, but that wa some years ago, so who knows.

Isn't that the point? If you don't want to bother with the main quest, don't. The same goes for all Beth's RPGs. Fine. But that's not really good writing then, is it? It's just a token crap story to hang the game on. Which is fine. But that's different from saying it's good writing. I mean, it's a hard thing to even debate, Beth's writing is so horrible. Dont' get me wrong, Beth has some things they do well, but writing isn't one of them. They make freaking Bioware look like Shakespeare.

While I will agree that the main stories of Fallout 1 and 2 are not particularly riveting, the main quest in Fallout 3 is a freaking joke. Mostly because Fallout 3 uses the pc's "relationship" with the father as the lynchpin for most of the MQ, yet NEVER makes any attempt to develop the relationship between the two. There's some brief interaction at the start, then he disappears, but there's be no reason established why I, as the pc, would go waste any time finding my father. Bethesda just assumes that labeling an NPC "father" means the relationship needs no actual development and they don't have to strain themselves trying to write something meaningful. Its the epitome of really lazy and inept writing. edit: spelling

Wes Johnson is the best voice actor Bethesda has used over the last few games. It's just too bad he has to do so many different NPCs.

Next up Gone with the Wind as a survival horror game complete with blowtorches, spiked clubs, and zombies. Lots of zombies.

I'm trying to imagine some kid playing the game, loving it, then going out and getting the book...

That was about how far I got my first time. It takes some replays to get a feel for the system. Eventually I made it all the way through. Except for the champion whom I still haven't beaten.

Now someone's going to say "But this is just a video game!" And then I am going to say: It's a video game forum. That's what we talk about here. The things that one focuses on while on a video game forum are not neccessarily the things that are focused on in other times and areas of one's life.

Wait, are still talking about Troika and Sierra here?

I never had any great desire to try the mods for STALKER (I know there are a lot) for this exact reason. But I've played it through quite a few times now and am a little curious in just possibly trying a few of the more popular mods to see what they do.

I didn't get that impression from the preview, but who knows. If you are right that would be great.

*shrugs* It doesn't bother me. It's in the nature of people to focus on and repeat the things that are important to them. Having emotional attachments and commitments to things, ideas, desires, beliefs, is what make people interesting. And just looking at things a bit more philosphically: nobody who was satisfied with the status quo ever changed the world.

At this point, without knowing anymore about the game, it looks more like a straight shooter than STALKER by a lot.

I would expect a group of industry professionals with previous experience and backed by a major publisher to produce better crpg combat than a non-professional tream working in their spare time while they keep going to their day jobs to pay the bills. IMO, it shows a lot about both developers.

I agree with Hurlie and am actually more looking forward to the non-combat aspects of the game than the combat part. ALthough the combat is certainly solid. And if no one else is going to say it, I will: The combat demo is better than the combat in Arcanum, which reflects pretty poorly on Troika. Anyway, I am hoping AoD will have a sort of Arcanum feel to the worldbuilding and role playing, without the tech of course.

That's true, but it's almost always the case isn't it? In American football the best player on the team is always the backup quaterback, until he actually has to play...

Well, the STALKER Complete mod adds some serious eye-candy. Check it out: http://www.moddb.com/mods/stalker-complete...te-2009-release Anyway, what am I playing? Nothing really. I tried Daggerfall this afternoon, but I don't feel like I can commit to such a long game right now. Really, I'm more in the mood for some action game. Hey, maybe I'll even reinstall STALKER. DOes that mod change anything other than making the game graphically better?

There are deathclaws in Mass Effect 2? Hot purple ones?

Very true. Its' hard to fight a deathclaw if an ass is in your line of fire.

Lincoln's Repeater is definitely my favorite weapon in FO3. I love the low-tech aspect of it. I hope there is a lot more low-tech in FO:NV than there is high tech. Power Armor, stealth armor, plasma rifles and stuff leave me fairly meh. Otoh, shotguns, six shooters and leather jackets are ftw. edit: spelling

I'm a grotesque STALKER fanboy so I only ever say good things about it. Except for the bugs. But it's the atmosphere mostly that I love about the game. So if this one can duplicate that, I'm sold. Right now just waiting for Call of Pripyat

Yay!