zero_or_more

That's ok... for me what's weird is when people want to defend these businesses on moral grounds.

Just to be clear, I specifically meant Cedric's views on the 'old' and the 'new' Scoia'tael. In fact his perceived lack of motivation may stem from a belief that not too dissimilar to humans, Iorveth's elves also lost the ability to 'appreciate' the lost elven culture. Also Cedric is not in the town - so somewhat independent - and he sort of protects people from monsters, so he's a kind of an elven witcher.

I didn't realized it actually mattered which button you push in Dreamfall tbh... but I won't comment on the story, the setting was nice though. Oh wait, it had some really, really terrible combat, too, unlike TLJ. So one was a point&click adventure and the other... was in the same setting. Play Grim Fandango. It has terrible controls too (with boring text though) but sits atop on my Adventure list still.

I think the only real reason they've pushed so hard for the perma-online is their perceived ability to generate money with their 'global random generator', when real money transfers kick in... Koreans were right when they said it's gambling. It is. Btw, making money by creating content is no longer viable? Or economical? Or enough?

The Longest Journey was a nice point&click (right?) adventure game back then with an original setting. And I don't remember a lot about Dreamfall, but wasn't that the game with a drive-cam third person view and buttons like TRUTH and LIE instead of... boring text I guess..? So it was a massively disappointing sequel for a nice game.

Well I don't really get what you're trying to say... but the devs do have limited resources. And of course you get to know Geralt best, he's the PC. But the game does have memorable NPCs imho and really, not everyone is 'evil' or something. Here's Cedric for example, he provides a nice contrast to Iorveth's ideologies...

Oh yeah, regarding Wesnoth, it's nice to see the overall progress they've made through out the years. (And from a gpl project.) It's a turn-based strategy, one 'mission' per map, recruit units, earn XP, defeat foes. Haven't played multiplayer, so can't comment on that. I liked the variety of the different races and units, and their different skills and traits gave the game an extra strategic layer. Seemed like a well balanced game altogether.

What about gw2 then?

You have it backwards. Nowadays it's more like "I bought the game on Disk, and everything's on it, but I have to pay some more to 'unlock' the content."

As it turns out it should have been more like: 'Our motives are too stupid to understand.'

Some time ago when I was using Ubuntu more I really enjoyed Wesnoth and OpenTTD. (Yes, they're sprite based not fancy 3D, I know.)

I know this will probably cast a bad light on me, but I tend to play games just 'for fun'... And I was surprised how fun the beta was, because I mostly favor single player games. While I understand the 'generic' remarks I don't really care if it manages to hit an acceptable level - and gw2 is well beyond that imho - since a game most defining element should be the gameplay. Events can be hectic especially at first, but they seem like a good idea to me. Anyway what stood out for me that exploration did worth the effort even if at times you got caught up in some random events started by someone else. Altogether while some things still 'felt' beta the overall gameplay was pretty smooth, though sometimes I did feel that it would be better with a few friends, eg. for crafting.

Maybe I did something wrong as the greatsword I used looked like this:

Lol @ 1:08

Yeah, I thought that my limited interest in other classes - other than the bowazon that is - might have something to do with how I remembered these things. So even more impressive that I feel they nailed the demon hunter gameplay. To each his own I guess, and having that kind of diversity in mechanics is actually nice. Still won't be able to afford it, so doesn't matter anyway.

Exactly.

So it's some kind of option? So there's a no hand-holding mode? Wow, that's lame... and I'm a noob then. Still my overall impression remains the same. Yeah, Diablo 2 had cooldown on some skills, but I don't remember that it was actively defining my gameplay. Take the assassin for example, it had a charge-up mechanic and instead of waiting for a cooldown I remember counting the charges for phoenix strike and the like. That mechanic involves the player, uses his actions and not his 'non-actions'. That's what I found annoying.

Well if iirc they said that it will be possible to play through only 'your story' which consists of separate instances fwiw. But despite playing solo I'm surprisingly sticking to events and overlooked the personal part so far. But the skill mechanics are very different from GW1. More action, less 'trying to come up with the best chain'. Not that you can't optimize your skill usage, but it's less forefront. It's more 'streamlined' I guess.

Sorry, open in the sense that there's no NDA and it's not press-only, it's for everyone who pre-ordered. I actually ended up buying it, so I'm in today. Yesterday I couldn't get in, there was some serious login problem with the European server as I heard - lot of people couldn't get in, but today I managed to put in quite a few hours and it's fun. I played solo for now, absolutely doable. You have a private story which has instanced maps like GW1 but outside of that it's really is an MMO. But mobs seem to scale to the number of people around and there are some funny moments when strangers actually want to revive you and stuff. I didn't like MMOs so far, mainly because of the subscription model - and the lot of running around... And there's still a lot of running around, but this 'event' system does feel more interesting then the 'standard' questing thing and I don't know if it would be possible to do in a single player game/experience. jmo

So anybody playing the open beta? Beside Oner obviously...

Hmm, I forgot to post my experience with the beta... so if anyone cares: I was a bit disappointed to be honest. I played d2 with a bowazon almost exclusively, from all the other characters only a double-claw assassin got to hell. Also I never played on battle.net - only lan/direct ip games with friends. So I tried the demon hunter and the monk, and while the monk did feel 'powerful and fast' like the assassin did, it felt weird that I had to wait on a time-out with the blinding skill - like in an MMO, srsly... I also played a bit with the wizard, and this was even more accentuated with that class. Luckily the dual-mana-pool of the DH was a lot better solution if not as straightforward at first. Also the frantic gameplay like in diablo 2 seemed to be there - but I share the views on the beta being too easy so it's a bit hard to gauge. Anyway the DH played just like how I like to play - kiting, positioning, CC - so I have to give credit there and if I ever bought the game I quite possibly could always play that class - just like the bowazon. Still the nerfing of the skill system was apparent right at the beginning as I couldn't use X and Y skills together because they were both grouped under one 'tab'... compared to d2 it's sad. Also the 'runes' are a joke, it's just leveling up skills and that's it, calling them runes just gives a feeling of 'cut content' to the whole thing. Lastly I think the 'console level' zoom does a disservice to the game, and overall I had a feeling that in retrospect Dungeon Siege 3 compares really favorably - only with the exception of random maps. So to sum up I think I could get the same enjoyment out of Torchlight 2 lot cheaper.

Is the air being properly filtered in the new place? Mold? Allergens? Maybe you just feel more anxious in your new place try roaring while beating your chest So... you do that often? But I second that, less stressful environments are more healthy naturally.

Rage by who exactly?

I didn't care much about the continuity between the two games - although I did think Triss was a more fitting partner - and thought the TW1 ending was pretty 'general' anyway. The import felt more like an 'import the sword and armor' reward for the owners of the first game. Some TW2 in-game things bothered me a lot more than these continuity things. But anyway, I was far more interested in the new engine and what they did with it...

Through sick and thin, huh? Also how can anyone like someone being sick?