What are you playing now?

[Zoraptor]

Tried going back to CKII and try out Wiz's mod. Got bored very quickly, same old issues. Somewhat baffled as to why I like the original so much and now find the sequel to be quite so tepid and unremarkable.

 

Have been slowly going through StalkerSOC over the past couple of weeks, just completed X18. I think the game goes up in my estimation every time I play it which considering how much I liked it originally is really saying something. It's got more sheer atmosphere than a year's worth of standard titles.

[WorstUsernameEver]

Been playing a few hours of Dragon's Dogma. It's one the clunkiest games I've played this year, but it has a lot of good ideas, and it's rightly challenging. I'll have to play it more to get a real feel of the gameplay and progression though. Ah, also, yeah, writing is terrible.

[Morgoth]

Got a free LA Noire in my Steam list popping up thanks to my Max Payne 3 pre-order. It's also the first game that runs smoother in DX11 than in DX9.

[pmp10]

Been playing a few hours of Dragon's Dogma. It's one the clunkiest games I've played this year, but it has a lot of good ideas, and it's rightly challenging. I'll have to play it more to get a real feel of the gameplay and progression though. Ah, also, yeah, writing is terrible.

So how is the combat?

The demo made it look fun but somewhat of a mess meant more for an mmo.

I really don't want to fall-back on the tank-nuker-healbot holy trinity in a single player game.

 

 

On topic:I'm slowly making my way through Witcher 2.

It's certainly has great production values but it has quite a few issues that seriously irritate me.

In particular - the combat system that looks like a ballet and the overdone political-cynicism.

So far they really drag the game down from 'very-good' to the 'above-average'.

Edited May 26, 2012 by pmp10

[Syraxis]

Hey can anyone chime in on the PC version of L.A. noire? I'm tempted to buy the complete edition off steam but I heard the port is less than stellar.

[Starwars]

Would be interested in getting feedback on that as well.

 

Meanwhile, been playing some Fable 3... Yeeeeah. Man it pisses me off that such a crappy game garnered pretty great scores (if memory serves at least). Even the "mess-around" factor isn't nearly as fun as it should be and the game goes to such great lengths to simplify absolutely everything that it almost does itself a disservice at times and things actually get more obtuse. Too bad since the industrial feel to Bowerstone for example is pretty nice.

 

But yeah... crappy story, crappy "sandbox", crappy gameplay (if you can even call it that). Awful.

[GhostofAnakin]

I'm about 6 chapters into Game of Thrones. It's not very far in, really. Each "chapter" is basically one quest. The story is actually pretty good so far, but the stuff in between story cutscenes is lacking. Probably because you spend most of your time running around places with doors that don't open, people you can't interact with, and maybe one or two fight sequences between beginning and end cutscenes that move the story along.

[Monte Carlo]

Taking a short break from Diablo 3, I played a game of Company of Heroes today, a 4 v 4 on The Hochwald Gap. I played Wehr, which on my main account I'm a paltry level 8 (I'm level 12 Panzer Elite, which is my favoured faction in CoH). It was a mid-level game, the other side were level 8 - 14 (3 x Ami, one higher level Brit).

 

The Hoch is a bit of a cheesy almost-mirror-map with two main entry / exits onto the battlefield from the main base areas. There is an island on the east of the map which is resource-heavy and I was on slot 5, i.e. the dude who has to (a) support mid map expansion (b) block the foot route onto the battlefield for the other side and © help take the resource island.

 

The pre-game lobby banter was priceless. One guy was mouthing off about how badly we were going to be whipped.

 

Anyhoo, the game starts. Now I'm OK at CoH... nothing special but I'm definitely not a noob. It was one of those high starting resource games so I made 4 pio squads, 2 MGs and a sniper and made my way to the island and foot-crossing. The guy in the base next to me was also wehr and pio-spammed a bit more than me, but it was no big deal. The Amis facing us, OTOH, engie-spammed like mewling infants and rushed the island. OK, they took it but then they stated dropping paras which is a complete waste of manpower and they soon fell to flamers, snipers and MG42 teams. Meanwhile, I flammenwerfed the footbridge and decided to go Blitzkrieg doctrine FTW. On the other side of the map the two PE players were doing well against the fairly skilful Brit player who was clearly trying to establish a sim city, as well as try to early-game dominate with Bren Catrrier spam.

 

We secured the island, the enemy drained by MGs, mortars and snipers. I realised that we were up against even bigger noobs than I suspected when they started pissing MP and fuel away on MG bunkers in strange places. The really mouthy guy was the worst offender and badly let down the decent players on the other side of the map.

 

Halfway in and the Axis have about 70% map control. I'm building good Vet 2 infantry and StuHs, Tier 2 spamming my way to victory.

 

Then the dropping starts. Some people think that the AI that replaces droppers is better than bad players ---- I beg to differ. I routinely comp stomp Expert CPU and would rather deal with it any day than a reasonably good human. The PE guy drops and all of a sudden his well considered tank destroyer strategy heads south as the CPU spams pointless units and hurtles them into the maw of Brit seventeen-pounders.

 

Me and my other Wehr teammate consolidate the island and head east, curving up and around the woods southeast of the main bridge that marks their entrance onto the battlefield. We hold the line and I get the Blitz war machine boost that allows me to trade munis for MP... this allows me to make flakpanzers and panthers and then it's GG. Mouthy Ami player says nothing as he drops like the big wet girl he most surely is.

 

Just another day on CoH but after six years it's still brilliant MP fun. It's $3.99 on Steam this weekend. FFS buy it.

 

Cheers

MC

[WorstUsernameEver]

So how is the combat?

The demo made it look fun but somewhat of a mess meant more for an mmo.

I really don't want to fall-back on the tank-nuker-healbot holy trinity in a single player game.

 

Not sure how the comparison with MMOs works exactly to be honest, but you can customize your party pretty much how you want, your main pawn's skill selection, vocation, appearance, etc. depends on you, while the other two are "bought" at a rift crystal from other players. I haven't tried many party combinations yet because I just started, but I would say that mages are more useful to buff your weapons rather than heal you since healing items are plentiful and healing spells can't heal you completely.

 

And uh, apparently, going by Twitter, Mike Laidlaw is playing it. Rejoice Maria Caliban, maybe this time BioWare will have capes in Dragon Age!

[Rosbjerg]

Hey can anyone chime in on the PC version of L.A. noire?

Would be interested in getting feedback on that as well.

 

I bought it back when it was released, first it was buggy as hell (still is actually) - a super annoying feature is that it takes around 2-5 minutes to actually launch the game because it always searches for new downloadable content.

 

The game mechanics are pretty bland and standard nothing bad nothing good. The story goes back and forth from stellar to horrible a few times, but usually stay around mediocre quality. At first you feel really engaged and it's nice when you figure out how to solve a case, but you soon see that it's just a pretty mirror show where no matter how you approach a case you solve it, it's only a few selected ones you can truly fail (and then you start over) - the acting is unfortunately the weakest and since you have to rely on facial clues to tell if a suspect is lying or telling the thruth it quickly gets frustrating when they overact so much that you actually can't tell what they are doing - they just look awkward and weird instead of what emotion they were told to portray.

 

And the dialouge options are really loopy .. you choose between truth, doubt or lie when someone talks - and there is no consistency to how Phelps (the main character) reacts - you can have a pleasant conversation and then you choose doubt, because the suspect seems a little aversive and then Phelps will go "MOTHER*****!!! DON'T LIE!!!!"

 

In short, not worth it unless under 10

[Morgoth]

About LA Noire: The PC port runs adequately reasonable, I think it's 30 fps locked thanks to the botched engine. But it's not unplayable, and frankly, it doesn't need more frames per second. Graphics style overall is very nice, facial expression are cool, acting is very professional.

 

Gameplay is rather bland and repetitive, but the game lives from the excellent dialogs and atmosphere. Since I got it for free with my Max Payne 3 pre-order, I can't complain.

[Morgoth]

Brandon McNamara might me a Tyrann when it comes to pushing through his vision by exhausting his staff, but the guy certainly does not lack ego and talent - something the game industry is in desperate need in the Creative Directing/Writing department.

Edited May 27, 2012 by Morgoth

[GhostofAnakin]

Game of Thrones' story is actually pretty good so far ... but that's the only part of the game that's been entertaining for me.

 

The combat is kind of ... reminscent of KOTOR combat, where you queue up orders. But the problem is, at least for me, most of the special attacks take so much energy that you can't do them often. So it's basically a bunch of normal attacks the majority of the fight. It's also not so fun because you sometimes face hordes of enemies against you, or you and a companion, and they just overwhelm you.

 

The exploration is non-existent. You walk around a certain area (ie. a village, a castle, a city) but a lot of the doors are inaccesible. They're just there for show, or until a quest requires that door to be accessible. And you can't really interact with many people, other than quest-related NPCs and shopkeepers. So while some cities, like King's Landing, are actually quite large, they feel small since there's not much to actually do in them other than run down the streets to get from Point A to Point B in your questline.

 

There are barely any quests. Each "chapter" has 1 main questline, and then ranging from zero to 3 or 4 sidequests. The main quest takes up the bulk of your time, since it's the only one that has any real substance to. The sidequests aren't necessarily your typical fetch quests, but they're short and don't have much substance to them.

 

The characters are decent enough, though not overly memorable. The voice acting also seems like a lot of the performances were mailed in.

 

Basically, if I wasn't a fan of the A Song of Ice and Fire series, and if the story wasn't at least decent, I'd have given up long ago.

[Blodhemn]

Hey can anyone chime in on the PC version of L.A. noire?

Would be interested in getting feedback on that as well.

 

I bought it back when it was released, first it was buggy as hell (still is actually) - a super annoying feature is that it takes around 2-5 minutes to actually launch the game because it always searches for new downloadable content.

 

The game mechanics are pretty bland and standard nothing bad nothing good. The story goes back and forth from stellar to horrible a few times, but usually stay around mediocre quality. At first you feel really engaged and it's nice when you figure out how to solve a case, but you soon see that it's just a pretty mirror show where no matter how you approach a case you solve it, it's only a few selected ones you can truly fail (and then you start over) - the acting is unfortunately the weakest and since you have to rely on facial clues to tell if a suspect is lying or telling the thruth it quickly gets frustrating when they overact so much that you actually can't tell what they are doing - they just look awkward and weird instead of what emotion they were told to portray.

 

And the dialouge options are really loopy .. you choose between truth, doubt or lie when someone talks - and there is no consistency to how Phelps (the main character) reacts - you can have a pleasant conversation and then you choose doubt, because the suspect seems a little aversive and then Phelps will go "MOTHER*****!!! DON'T LIE!!!!"

 

In short, not worth it unless under 10

[Tale]

Still loving Dragon's Dogma.

 

Hit max in Mage and Sorcerer, so doing Mystic Knight. And wow am I feeling overpowered. Do about the same single target damage with no charging up. And take almost no damage.

[Majek]

Freespace 2 with a mouse, of course with FSO goodies. Don't know where my joystick is, but the mouse actually performs okay.

[Guest Slinky]

Freespace 2 with a mouse, of course with FSO goodies. Don't know where my joystick is, but the mouse actually performs okay.

 

I have never even tried the game with a joystick because mouse works just fine. Luckily it doesn't need airfield sized mousepad like x-wing or tie fighter did.

[Oner]

Pre-purchased Sleeping Dogs.

Which means it'll be another game that will turn out to be great but will bomb/be a small success.

[Syraxis]

Thanks for the input everyone, steam summer sale it is then.

[Morgoth]

Pre-purchased Sleeping Dogs.

Which means it'll be another game that will turn out to be great but will bomb/be a small success.

 

Nah. It means that it looks great but turns out to be utter crap.

 

Thanks again. You can always count on the Oner.

[Malcador]

Freespace 2 with a mouse, of course with FSO goodies. Don't know where my joystick is, but the mouse actually performs okay.

 

I have never even tried the game with a joystick because mouse works just fine. Luckily it doesn't need airfield sized mousepad like x-wing or tie fighter did.

 

Heh, never tried it. But good to know, X-Wing/TIE was annoying as hell for me with a mouse.

[Orogun01]

Pre-purchased Sleeping Dogs.

Which means it'll be another game that will turn out to be great but will bomb/be a small success.

Why? I mean, there's enough GTA fans that will likely buy into the hype if they market it as another "crime simulator"

[Oner]

Pre-purchased Sleeping Dogs.

Which means it'll be another game that will turn out to be great but will bomb/be a small success.

Why? I mean, there's enough GTA fans that will likely buy into the hype if they market it as another "crime simulator"

Dunno, games I buy these days tend to perform poorly. 'Sides, Binary Domain was a sci-fi cover based shooter, still bombed regardless.

At least my hunches regarding quality are still spot on.

Edited May 28, 2012 by Oner

[Labadal]

Pre-purchased Sleeping Dogs.

Which means it'll be another game that will turn out to be great but will bomb/be a small success.

Why? I mean, there's enough GTA fans that will likely buy into the hype if they market it as another "crime simulator"

Dunno, games I buy these days tend to perform poorly. 'Sides, Binary Domain was a sci-fi cover based shooter, still bombed regardless.

At least my hunches regarding quality are still spot on.

 

Blame SEGA for that one. No marketing at all, just like most of their games. Then they wonder why they are in a poor financial situation like they are in now. Square Enix tend to at least try to market their products.

[Morgoth]

Yes, but who really wants to play some kinky, full-body tattooed Jackie Tiger-fist Hohhh-Huh-Hah Kun-Fu jerk?

 

No marketing can save such a game if you can't play with a real tough-ass.