NOW what are you playing?

[clearing]

Re-playing Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee.

[dexterward]

Mass Effect 2 (360) Although the game is all about Miranda`s ass hilariously dumbed down from the original (which wasn`t all that complex to start with), it`s still good fun. I`d actually like Bioware to completely stop pretending they care about serious RPGs and just concentrate on this kind of stuff.

I`m curious if there`s actually any point to space exploration - apart from, uh, "scanning"? In the first one at least you got some distress signal or renegade base upon checking new planets... here I`m just zooming from one plot point to another because tedium of the scanner is too much. (I`m pretty sure I could even skip most of the lol-upgrades and still win all the battles anyway)

[henke]

How is ME2 dumbed down from the original? And yes, you can still stumble on distress beacons and renegade bases while scanning.

[Avalon]

I went kind of crazy with the scanning and got EVERY SINGLE DROP of everything off every planet I found until somewhere near the very end. Then I realized there is nothing whatsoever to do with all the resources I pulled up - your ship upgrades can be bought with a sliver of a fraction of what you can find, leaving the rest as nothing but a reminder of how much time you wasted

[faetal]

Playing DE:HR + Titan Quest Immortal Throne.

DEHR is aces. Really stunned by how faithful they were with it. Correct me if I am wrong, but are they using awful sky box textures / city background to re-capture the DEus Ex feel? Because I can't think of any other reason to use '90s style sky textures.

[Eldron]

Playing DE:HR + Titan Quest Immortal Throne.

DEHR is aces. Really stunned by how faithful they were with it. Correct me if I am wrong, but are they using awful sky box textures / city background to re-capture the DEus Ex feel? Because I can't think of any other reason to use '90s style sky textures.

A mixture of models and backdrops depending on what scene, most of the further back stuff is backdrop painting though with a pixel-density aimed towards 720p or so, so you'll notice the texels way more when playing on pc.

Still, it's been a sound way of handling scenery since the 90's.

[Malleus]

I made it to the last level of Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines (I mean after finishing DXHR, obviously), or rather I would have, but the game told me I wasn't awesome enough until that point, so it's game over. I beg your pardon? Anyone who finished 19 missions of this madness is awesome enough to take on the 20th if you ask me. So I cheated myself in and on to it (EDIT: just to clarify, the game doesn't let you play the 20th mission if you didn't get a good enough score in the previous missions).
The game itself it pretty awesome though. I didn't make it past the fourth level back when it came out, but now I got into it seriously. Interesting 'doesn't fit into any genre' game (strange but great combination of strategy, action, stealth and puzzle), that's definitely worth playing if one has the time (patience, sweat and blood) for it. Bought the whole series on GOG, so there's no stopping now - after this, it's time for the expansion, which is supposedly even harder. Gah!

[Nameless Voice]

The Commandos games are great in decreasing order. The first game (and its expansion) is the best, the second is still very good though has some bad points, and the third... meh, for some reason I could only bear to play a few levels into it. Too much action and a horrible interface.
(Oddly, the interface also got WORSE with each instalment.)

[Ringwraith]

The World Ends With You

Trying to focus on two screens during combat is bullshit, but I'm still enjoying this.

[The Alchemist]

Ringy! o_O

[Matthew]

The Commandos games are great in decreasing order. The first game (and its expansion) is the best, the second is still very good though has some bad points, and the third... meh, for some reason I could only bear to play a few levels into it. Too much action and a horrible interface.
(Oddly, the interface also got WORSE with each instalment.)

Desperadoes is a similar sort of thing albeit by a different firm, isn't it? If you've played it, how would that rate compared to Commandos?

Also wtf the developers of Desperadoes made a sequel to Great Giana Sisters - for the DS?!

The World Ends With You

Trying to focus on two screens during combat is bullshit, but I'm still enjoying this.

Agreed, I generally end up not bothering with the top screen and just spam attacks on the touchscreen.

[MrDuck]

Ringy! o_O

HE IS REAL!!!

[CCCToad]

Installing Human Revolution on STEAM now.

I had to go through some hoops to get it working out in here the middle of buttfucking(literally, in this place) nowhere but it seems done. Now to launch it and go back into offline mode.

[Pemptus]

Desperadoes is a similar sort of thing albeit by a different firm, isn't it? If you've played it, how would that rate compared to Commandos?

I liked Desperados much more. It's Commandos, but with better everything (interface, graphics, story, characters, enemies etc.) AND with a cowboy theme. Can't go wrong with that.

[inselaffe]

I made it to the last level of Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines (I mean after finishing DXHR, obviously), or rather I would have, but the game told me I wasn't awesome enough until that point, so it's game over.

Hahahahah, that's brilliant! i really need to find time to get them set up and working - although i heard at least the first one (and so you would expect the expansion too) have speed issues on modern systems.

An amusing amazon review:

I wish I could have known how bad the graphics were on this game before purchase
and its not really suitable for the over 10s as far as I am concerned
its not a good quality game and I shall try and give it to someone younger
for free

[Pemptus]

Hahahahah, that's brilliant! i really need to find time to get them set up and working - although i heard at least the first one (and so you would expect the expansion too) have speed issues on modern systems.

It ran super fast for me, but this baby fixed it: http://forums.eidosgames.com/showthread.php?t=91001
The expansion doesn't have speed issues, strangely enough.

[CCCToad]

PLAYING Human Revolution. Its as good as advertised.

In order to get this running, I had to get a disc sent from home with the data then wait until I was at a base large enough to have internet. Most larger ones have Hajj-run satellite service set up. Was able to activate and patch the game on STEAM, and so far I'm impressed. It actually lives up to Deus Ex, especially in the sense that your choices are rarely obvious so far. None of the "Press X to spare, press B to kill" bioware bullshit.

[CCCToad]

I`m curious if there`s actually any point to space exploration - apart from, uh, "scanning"? In the first one at least you got some distress signal or renegade base upon checking new planets... here I`m just zooming from one plot point to another because tedium of the scanner is too much. (I`m pretty sure I could even skip most of the lol-upgrades and still win all the battles anyway)

There's a couple side-quest lines that you start by finding distress signals.

[Jason Moyer]

Finished DXHR. I'll give a mini, hopefully spoiler-free review:

The good:

1.) It feels like Deus Ex. It feels like Deus Ex in the way you interact with things/people, the experience points, the lethality of most of your enemies, the large/quasi-nonlinear hub and mission design, the total awkwardness of the human animations (aside from maybe 4 or 5 people who seem to have gotten extra attention), the sifting through emails looking for passwords or clues on where people are and what they're up to. The constant scavenging for ammo (which is surprisingly scarce) and discarding of weapons/ammo/supplies you don't need/can't use/don't have room for. Inventory tetris, yay!

2.) It feels like the good parts of Invisible War. I'm talking about the overall, consistent cyberpunk-influenced art style. I love the gritty realism of the first DX, but I'm not going to complain about the stylish atmosphere on either IW or HR. Of course, unlike IW, the levels are massive. Also, the gameplay isn't stripped down for retards (I love IW, but still).

3.) The overarching theme of humanity vs technology is great, if not explored as much as it could have been. Jensen's own personal story is also interesting, but really it's just an excuse to explore this world that's on the verge of massive social change. And nick credits from people's apartments.

4.) The stealthing about is fantabulous. The blowing stuff up could be a good time as well, but I was too busy getting my sneak on to notice. All in first person and not that CHEATER ASS COVER VIEW (which I didn't really find useful, tbh).

5.) The third-person cut scenes were neither good nor bad. Tapping someone on the shoulder and punching them in the jaw never really gets old, and there was a single time where I did a double takedown and one of the guards swung at me, missed, and knocked out his buddy. At the same time, after 150 silent takedowns, I'm pretty sure I had seen every takedown cut scene at least 30 times. I also don't really need to see a cut scene every time I jump off of a high building. Yes, I know it's awesome that I have an aug that lets me do that, and I'm sure the first time it's used it would be neat to see that cut scene, but I don't need to see it after that.

The bad:

1.) Some ham-fisted attempts at throwing in characters from later DX games, one in particular who WASN'T BORN YET (I'm assuming that's just an honest mistake, and it would be an easy fix in a patch if they care about continuity). To be fair, some of the references elicited a smile ("I guess that diversion wasn't just for me"), and some of them were just completely unnecessary and didn't add anything to the story.

2.) The boss fights. Not so much because there were boss fights, but because the last one was the only one that resembled a decent boss fight (and felt like it fit with the rest of the game - hacking/wall-smashing/sneaking around security). I'm also not complaining because of the difficulty - I beat all but the last two bosses without taking any damage whatsoever, or even allowing them to get a shot off. What I am complaining about is that the encounters just don't seem very inspired, and the bosses you fight only basically exist for the purpose of those battles - other than the last one, I couldn't even tell you who they were aside from random henchmen who someone else used to try to kill you.

3.) While the game throws tons of choices at you (both with the narrative and gameplay) there are very, very few real consequences. There are 2 instances where something I did affected something later, and they both stand out as highlights of the game for me, but overall the only difference between playing lethal/non-lethal or helping this person/fucking them over seemed to be a few lines of dialog (which is admittedly well written) and a slight change to the ending narration. I don't think the other DX games were much different in that regards (even the OH MY GOD JC, WHAT ARE YOU DOING stuff was just flavor text, really), but if immersive sims are going to be a popular genre I'd like to see the simulated world and characters melded with some real C&C. Again, DXHR is no worse than the other games here, just the standard "if you fucked this person over they'll kill you, if you helped this person they'll help you later" stuff, but I want more. If I immediately go on a rampage in detroit, I want my company to disown me, altering the entire course of the main plot (a rogue agent trying to find whatever with no assets besides a secretive, less-than-virtuous group who inquires about my services as a killing machine). I want real gameplay-driven narrative changes. It's 2011, let's do this.

4.) You can experience all of the endings in about 5 minutes. I realize DX/DXIW were all about suddenly choosing who you sided with at the end, but DXHR takes it to a RIDICULOUS extreme. I won't go into more detail, because I might spoil something, but I guarantee that you will laugh out loud when you reach the point of no return. It's that ridiculous.

Overall, this is a fantastic, lengthy (took me 40+ hours) game and a real surprise coming from a first-time dev studio. It seems like it's reviewing/selling well so far, which is a good thing - I'd really like to see these guys do a similar game in the future (whether that's Deux Ex The Sequel To The Prequel or something unrelated).

[Mingan]

I'm currently playing Bioshock for the first time, and fuck me sideways with a rusted rake, but fuck that smog. There's fucking clouds of shit hanging everywhere. And the guns are severly underpowered when you're holding them, but the mobs don't seem to have that problem. Also. Why are there so many enemies and so few ammo? It's not like you can sneak around them anyways.

Good game, pisses me off.

[Matthew]

Portal! My god, I just finished Portal for the first time. And heard the song for the first time ever.

I can't stop playing it. Help me.

[Renzatic]

I liked Desperados much more. It's Commandos, but with better everything (interface, graphics, story, characters, enemies etc.) AND with a cowboy theme. Can't go wrong with that.

Well shit. Now I wish I bought Desperados instead of the Ammo Pack.

[dexterward]

How is ME2 dumbed down from the original?

No planet exploration - ok, I was the only one on in the world who loved Mako (srsly, it took 5 minutes to learn how to handle it, maybe not on KB+M though) - but they could just simplify it, not get rid of it altogether - it opened up the game a lot. All the rpg-ish bits are now just for decoration, like when you level up after every mission. Smaller locations, across-the-room quests. Mission structure. But, anyway.
Based on what y`all saying I`ll pass on scanning though...

I`m glad you guys reminded me The World Ends With You is not another Bond clone which I keep thinking ;)

Commandos, could never get into this. Found this Robin Hood game from Desperados` dev in some bargain bin recently...still not for me though.

[dethtoll]

No, I loved the Mako too. It was like a skateboard with balloons for wheels. And the one planet you visit for a sidequest that's about to crash into another planet within a hundred years, and it's all desolate and red and dark, and the only human installations have long been abandoned... brrr.

[PigLick]

Portal! My god, I just finished Portal for the first time. And heard the song for the first time ever.

I can't stop playing it. Help me.

God yes! Finishing Portal and then having the 'Still Alive" song play through was one of those awesome sublime gaming moments that you never forget. I was singing that damn song for days.