Rosbjerg

On my system they are about 1/3 of the demo. But if I've been alt-tabbing in and out + I've played a game before I start Empire, the load time gets a little laggy.

Failing that - drink half a bottle of gin or something.. I cured most infections I got in India that way.

Yeah me too.. I sneaked up and played for an hour after my gf fell asleep. It's great fun, sure the AI makes some huge mistakes every now and then - but I've been more suprised by the cool moves it sometimes comes up with. I was attacking a Pirate town and I didn't have any cannons, so they all went into building and it became a shootout in the streets. I then reloaded to see if their strategy would change if I had guns and sure enough they tried to hide behind houses instead going inside. but Tigranes, there will be battles and moments that will frustrate you - the pathfinding is as ridiculous as ever and sometimes your troops will face the wrong way.. It's just that the AI isn't as stupid as in previous games, it's just not entirely great yet either.

I saw it a while ago, I was suprised that Oliver Stone chose to go gentle with Bush. Or at least he didn't really seem to wanna bash him in particular. I got the feel through the movie that George W. Bush was just a simple guy from Texas, not particularly bright, but not outright stupid either. And I felt kinda sorry for him in the end, because the movie potrays his failing abilities as a consequence of the enormous responsibility and being pulled/manipulated in every direction, by advisors who do think he's an idiot and want to push their own agenda through. So I think it's good, but mostly because I knew nothing of the guy except what he said and did as president.

RAARGH, I forgot about that.. I was so mad.. I was really thinking, "yes - now this is getting really interesting - THIS is what the game have been building up to".. and "THE END" - I went online immediatly to figure out what just happened - I never been so dissapointed before, how can you make a game like that without having begun on the sequel!?

that's not true - I had a full stack vs full stack siege against a fort where the AI defended it very actively. Like moving melee units to where I was climbing up and musketeers on each arm (it was a star fort) so they could shoot at me at the same time. Actually I was very close to losing because of that. When most of my men were on the walls, they send their cavalry out to kill the guys who'd been waiting for their turn to climb. And that's on medium.. Still there were some obvious mistakes, like choosing to hold 2-3 infantry units at the center of the fort instead of reinforcing those that were being killed on the walls, or not really using the cavalry at all inside the walls.

I know what you mean MC, I had the same feeling with that Rockstar Social Clud thing.. But I think steam is actually one of the most useful programs on my computer.. my games are easy to manage, I can find my friends and play with them online without a fuss - that said, being forced to use it should be out of the question, no matter how good a program is.

I'm more concerned about how he found that page.. and saying that you did a search for Obsidian won't convince me!!

So far the AI is pretty much like it's been in the previous games - a bit stupid.. But they do tend to use strategy alot in these games. Like sending cavalry after an isolated unit instead of right in the middle of your forces and the try to flank you. But that's it, they don't really react much beyond that. If you kill their cannons they won't send units back to help them etc etc.

Got it from Steam last night too. I took the day off from work to play it. It's quite interesting how they've decided to tone down the number of provinces and make villages and towns (under the influence of the regional capital) instead. I didn't quite like that at first, but after getting used to it I think it works better than the old system.

Empire Total War.. I've only been able to play a few hours so far (I took the day off from work to do so heh) and I must say that it's a pretty cool game - there are some minor things that I don't like, but they are very superficial compared to what I do like. The game feels polished, and thought-out - and the very new way of handling provinces and cities takes some getting used to, but is imo a much more logical way of handling buildings. Instead of having everyting in one city or castle, now all barracks, workshops etc. are spread out in villages and towns, who are governed by a regional capital (which also has a lot of building in it). So in effect you have fewer provinces (France for instance is just one province), but now your assest are spread out on the map - which means they can be destroyed without laying siege to the main city. If you are fan of the series you should seriously consider buying this, if you haven't already! A small setback; they've gone back to the "clone-armies" of Rome, your soldiers have very limited variation. Backpacks etc are different, but their faces and uniform (even their hats) are all the same for each unit.

I'm so happy I'm on a 100mb internet connection.. average speed is 1,5 mb/s and I'm already at 15% wohoo! No sleep for me tonight though..

I bought the Total War Mega pack over Steam, so I can get Empire as soon as it's available, and now I'm playing both a campaign as Egypt in Medieval 2 Grand campaign mod) and one as Rome in the Realism mod.. My interest in Rome total war was rekindled after watching most of the first season of Rome, a great series and it's really cool to play a game on the side.. the game feels much more alive now.

Had both a great weekend and a horrible weekend.. all really confusing.. My employee asked me to participate in an Internet Expo, which was actually quite interesting.. more so personally though. I had my eyes opened to a pluthoria of different educations, one of which as a Game Designer. So now I have a good plan for my future (yay). The flip side of this luck came when the Danish IRS decided to screw me over and take almost 1000$ from my pay, because of an error (one which they can't correct until April), then my power supply breaks down and I have to buy a new one and I get 5 year old bill from my former(x3) internet supplier with added interest. So my economy absolutely stinks now..

All I need is my Dragunov and my knife .. Backup is a silenced gun or, if it's a small map, a M4A1 Carbine. Man I love sniping in CoD4..

I love how everyone by default is secretive .. like Ceasar hiding the gun he found.. In the Lost universe everyone must suffer from a mild (or severe) case of paranoia.

It's also a fairly straight forward marketing stunt - it's an easy way of ensuring that the fans dicuss and hype the game. Then they can always change the plans and say that he was assumed KIA.

Yeah the Medieval setting is overused - so is WW2 and Veitnam.. Still some of the best games I've played were placed in those time periods (except Vietnam). My biggest grief with the 17th-18th century is that the combat is fairly straight forward .. While in the medieval periods you had wild experimentation with combat techniques and technologies, it was like warfare was evolving - in the imperial age it had reached it's peak efficiency (before armoured vehicles entered the fray). As such I think it's a very uninteresting age, combat wise.. But I'll still love it, I'm sure - because I haven't been dissapointed by a TW game yet.

Just saw Man from Earth the other day.. It's actually one of the better Sci-fi films I've seen in a very long time - it's entirely dialouge driven, no CG effects or anything like that.. it's just a bunch of people in a house.. talking.. The film is a return to old school sci-fi literature .. the kind that's more about ideas and concepts than fancy aliens etc. I wouldn't have been suprised if it was written by Isaac Asimov, in his early days. It has his "feel" to it. I was really astonished when I found this news - apparently the movie became famous because it was pirated.

Yeah loading times were horrible .. I have a rather annoying problem with flickering graphics as well, it stops whenever I change my resolution, but combined with the time it takes to change anything, it's like 25 minutes for me, from the time I double click the exe files, to the time I'm actually playing. I'm not a big fan of this era either, I would prefer to play Shogun in an updated engine.. but I have to say that the ship battles were really fun, which I didn't think .. they are much harder to do, because the ships are so slow and big, but once you shred and gut a ship-of-the-line with 4 full volleys from both sides - you feel really good.

SOMEONE has never played Call of Duty 4 I think the Call of Duty series is a great example of how a good health regen system works. But that has much more to the with the genre and style of the game.. Health regeneration in Baldurs Gate would be silly and really take a big bite of the challenge, while CoD is so intense that stopping to patch up would disturb the flow of the game. A good example of precious health packs that become a strategic part of the game; is L4D, here ammo and medpacs are the extremely important items. More so than in any other game I've played.

^ I was really wondering about that too.. no way did that seem believable. I thought they were going in an interesting direction, which they did explore a little in this episode, with the human/cylon integration .. Humans and Cylons having to accept that they somewhat need each other to survive... But Gorgon has a point, it really does feel like the actors of the final five seems to lack grounding for their characters..

You should try the 100 hundred year mod.. You ally with either France or England in the ongoing battle of France.. Or you could just be a bandit (like the original game) .. I personally think it's better than the original, because the setting really fits 11th century Europe.

That's actually a very interesting twist and I have to say that I'm pleasently suprised that Bioware takes such a "risk" - I would prefer playing Shephard, but I respect that they have a different story to tell.

That sucks, but you are right - it can get way too serious in a game where you are so depended on other people.