What are you playing now?

[Mamoulian War]

This game ... will kick ass. All night, Friday night. hhunnnnnnggh!!

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rBAkj5Egok

 

Not if it would get the same treating as Killzone 3 --- 5GB patch on release day

[Labadal]

I've only played Call of Duty 2. I remember enjoying it while playing it at a friends' house. That's the only experience I have with the series.

[Keyrock]

CoD was a truly good game once upon a time.  The series peaked around CoD 2-4, then has been going steadily downhill.  Since that peak it has become more and more about spectacular setpieces and bigger and bigger SPLOSHUNS!  As the setpieces got more and more spectacular and bombastic both the gameplay and the writing devolved into a more and more on-rails and nonsensical conveyor belt.  The developers, wanting to show off their Michael Bay-esque SPLOSHUNS!, and from just the right angle for maximum flashiness, stopped caring whether anything made sense story-wise, and took more and more control away from the player, because giving the player too much freedom might cause problems with triggering the next setpiece just right.  Everything became about them trying to outbadass themselves with each installment, regardless of whether any of it was coherent or plausible in the slightest bit.  It's somewhat similar, in a way, to what happens with Kojima games, where, in an effort to introduce more and more shocking twists and turns to his plot, he paints himself into a corner, and to get out of said corner he has to introduce even more convoluted plot twists or some ridiculous MacGuffin.  In the case of CoD, in an effort to continue raising the heroism and badassery level they continually paint themselves into a corner by putting the character into more and more ridiculous situations.  Treyarch and Infinity Ward's solution is even less graceful than Kojima's, they simply increase the body count and explosion levels and have the heroes blast their way out anyway.  The problem with that is that the "ultimate victory" at the end is hollow and meaningless when you and your squad are invincible, unstoppable killing machines.

Edited November 13, 2013 by Keyrock

[Rosbjerg]

I loved their WW2 games, they were a lot better than the Medal of Honor series - some of the set piece battles there were really good, like Stalingrad, The Hill and the battle of Berlin.. but the "sploshuns!", as you put it, become the main focus point from Modern Warfare. They did ok in World at War (probably because they outsourced it) and then it went back to stupidity and beyond. Stopped playing completely at Modern Warfare 2 I think.

 

They should probably have gone the route Battlefield Bad Company did, making it humorous and a little over the top cliche - that way they could easily get away with all those deus ex machina they try to pull off all the time.

[Majek]

Call of Duty peaked in United Offensive. After that it just doesn't matter anymore.

[alanschu]

and to think they started out as a more serious  contender to the generic FPS shooters. That Stalingrad map... and now this.

 

Pavlov's House was amazing.  I actually really enjoyed the whole Soviet campaign (and parts of the US campaign too).

[GhostofAnakin]

Finished Call of Boredom - Ghosts. It even had Inception ZOOOMMMMSSS at the end.

 

I cannot understand how this POS can make millions of dollars. In fact, this is one of the worst shooter games I've played in the past few years. Not even the graphics can save the game this time. Washed out textures everywhere, recycled animations everywhere,... The only good thing was the dog scenes and that's what... 20 minutes in the whole game.

 

The story was so dumb, I think it really happened: Monkeys can use typewriters now.

 

It's not even a MURICA F* YEAH! thing, but this whole we so Ghosts, we so cool, we so badass, we so stealthy (wipes out enemy base with hundreds of enemy soldiers with huge explosions, guns blazing), GHOSTS! GHOSTS! GHOSTS! + all the people who die as heroes (of course) in a stupid mission, for absolutely nothing.

 

 

Ehw. I need to delete this game and never ever touch it again.

 

The problem is you're basing its popularity on your experience with the single player campaign.  I'd bet that the vast majority of those billion sales are due to folks who play it for the multiplayer exclusively.

[Calax]

I loved their WW2 games, they were a lot better than the Medal of Honor series - some of the set piece battles there were really good, like Stalingrad, The Hill and the battle of Berlin.. but the "sploshuns!", as you put it, become the main focus point from Modern Warfare. They did ok in World at War (probably because they outsourced it) and then it went back to stupidity and beyond. Stopped playing completely at Modern Warfare 2 I think.

 

They should probably have gone the route Battlefield Bad Company did, making it humorous and a little over the top cliche - that way they could easily get away with all those deus ex machina they try to pull off all the time.

Technically Treyarch did the World At War, Black Ops and Blops 2. The games even connect story wise.

[Keyrock]

 

 

The problem is you're basing its popularity on your experience with the single player campaign.  I'd bet that the vast majority of those billion sales are due to folks who play it for the multiplayer exclusively.

 

If multi-player was what sold the games more than anything else, shouldn't Battlefield be the top dog franchise rather than CoD?  Battlefield has always, in my view, been the superior multi-player game, while CoD always had the superior single-player campaign (or one at all), though these days "superior" isn't saying much for the single-player campaign.

[Labadal]

Bravely Default demo.

 

[mkreku]

I cannot understand how this POS can make millions of dollars.

 

Because idiots keep buying them. And then they go on game boards and whine about how bad these games are and wonder how they make millions.

 

Next year they do it again.

[Tale]

Finished Call of Boredom - Ghosts. It even had Inception ZOOOMMMMSSS at the end.

 

I cannot understand how this POS can make millions of dollars.

Because everybody expects tons of people to play it. So they play it too. And now it has a large online community.

 

Why did you play it to begin with?

[Keyrock]

 

I cannot understand how this POS can make millions of dollars.

 

Because idiots keep buying them. And then they go on game boards and whine about how bad these games are and wonder how they make millions.

 

Next year they do it again.

 

It's true.  I remember a while back there was a rather pathetic story of a bunch of CoD addicts making a pact to really show Activision their displeasure at how the game was basically a carbon copy of the previous game and some fixes/adjustments that hadn't yet been implemented and that this was SRS BSNS by banding together and vowing to all quit playing the game...

 

...

 

wait for it..

 

...

 

wait for it...

 

...

 

FOR ONE WHOLE DAY!   *DUN! DUN! DUUUUUUUN!!!*

 

They even made an equally pathetic Youtube video whining about it.  I think the called it "Blackout" or some such nonsense.  How much do you want to bet 99% of those people bought the next CoD game?

 

They will keep making these games as long as the sheeple keep buying them.

Edited November 13, 2013 by Keyrock

[Bartimaeus]

Poker Night 2. This game almost seems like a stepdown, in some ways, from the previous. No difficulty options, no way to skip dialogues, no way to tone down the amounts of dialogue, seems like there's LESS dialogue in general...occasional bugs, (crashed three or four times in the span of four hours; had pocket sevens and there was a pair of sixes and another seven in the window/community cards, but I was beat by someone with two pair while it reported me as having a mere pair of sevens, ). There are some improvements, but...all in all, thank God, once again, for Cheat Engine - what would've taken probably ten hours to unlock everything and get all the silly achievements for only took me about two normal speed and two 3-5x speed. 

Edited November 13, 2013 by Bartimaeus

[Lexx]

 

I cannot understand how this POS can make millions of dollars.

 

Because idiots keep buying them. And then they go on game boards and whine about how bad these games are and wonder how they make millions.

 

Next year they do it again.

 

 

Yep, call me an idiot for playing my first CoD game in years. The last one I played was Modern Warfare 2 and this was still kind of acceptable. At least the combat encounter had a better pacing.

[entrerix]

the last cod i played was modern warfare 2, and i was tempted to get ghosts since it had been a while since i'd played a cod style shooter, but the bad reviews kept me away.  if im going to play an on-rails game, i want it to be a great one.

[GhostofAnakin]

CoD used to have better variety of maps, so you could play whichever play style you wanted to.  Are you someone who likes to sneak around with silenced weapons?  No problem!  There are maps with tunnels and high grass and somesuch you can sneak around in.  Are you someone who has little patience and just likes to run and gun?  No problem!  Some maps cater to this, while even the bigger maps allow movement through buildings to get you to where you want to be.  Are you a player that likes playing the sniper role?  No problem!  There is tall grass to hide in, or building to set up shop.

 

Now?  I gave up on the game because the maps, IMO, seemed to focus more and more on basically playing run-n-gun style.  The sniper class, especially, was hampered because of the maps having 8 million entry points (thus you couldn't set up claymores/traps to give you a chance to not be snuck up on) and the maps themselves have very short sightlines -- so there's no longer even a benefit of using a sniper scope since a rifle scope allows you to see everyone as well.

[Oner]

Playing Long live the Queen!
..Aaaand I suck at it. Though the game isn't helping me much. Most of the tests I get are for disciplines I can't train because of the penalties to it, but I don't know which mood combinations give the penalties. Well, time, practice and possible dead Elodies will teach me. >.>

[melkathi]

Let us know how the game works out, Oner. I'd be interested in some opinions.

[GhostofAnakin]

Scanning these Anarky symbols is a pain, largely because they're placed in odd places and there's no way to mark them on the map (as opposed to the Riddler files that show up on the map when you interrogate his thugs).

[Oner]

Let us know how the game works out, Oner. I'd be interested in some opinions.

Will do. Juggling the moodswing is starting to annoy me a little, but I'm determined!

Also, restarted because yesterday was a catastrophe. I think I passed 3 tests out of two dozen?

The fact that game starts you with penalties on the first two skills it uses (one of which seems to be the most commonly tested in the early parts), and it's easy to accidentally penalize them again is a biiit dickish.

[Katphood]

Wasteland 1. Can't believe how much fun I am having with this game, despite the crashes that happen every 10 minutes.

Edited November 14, 2013 by Astiaks

[BruceVC]

I just finished playing Icewind Dale for the first time. Its an excellent game. As mentioned by most its  your classic IE dungeon romping RPG. It deserves a solid 75/100

 

What I liked about it is

• The usage of spells and tactics in combat
• The length of the game, I must have spent 100 hours playing it
• The usage of the AD&D ruleset
• The exploration of the various dungeons and the different main enemies you had to fight

What I didn't like about it was

• no real interaction with your party
• No Romance options

But apart from that I highly recommend this game.

 

Now I am going to play the Walking Dead, I have heard its an evocative game and I'm excited 

Edited November 14, 2013 by BruceVC

[alanschu]

I really like it.  The main character, Lee, is written really well IMO and the group in general was well done I thought.

[melkathi]

Wolf Among Us is far better than Walking Dead...