Thrik

I love how different MGS games can feel when you go from normal to hard difficulty. The enemies feel extremely realistic in hard, with their sight and hearing improved dramatically; it pretty much necessitates using all the shit in your inventory like playboys and stuff, whereas in normal I rarely did to be honest. They also love to put extra enemies here and there where you aren't expecting them. Of particular greatness is that during the Europe chapter you're taken through a whole area you don't even go near when tailing the game in normal, adding quite a bit of gameplay to the chapter. Combined with the goodies and little targets you can go for (no non-tranquilliser kills), the replayability of these games is superb. Highly recommended to play on hard. :tup:

Yes, I was quite surprised when I replayed MGS4 and realised there were large areas of the South America chapter I hadn't even encountered the first time through (I generally replay MGS games completely thoroughly the second time). The 'Follow Naomi!' bit alone had a whole bunch of little areas/traps I hadn't seen with some extra gameplay to enjoy, including a mother fuckin' UFO landing site(?!). I like the iPod pick-ups, incidentally. They're a good incentive to take the unnecessary routes and go through all that hell. And shit me, I've just gotten through the Europe chapter on hard mode and that is an earnest bastard when you're trying to find the music pick-ups too.

Yes, I think Idle Thumbs and its venerable community can be best summarised with this emoticon: In all seriousness though, welcome!

To be fair, Lost is an example of a programme that recovered from this. The second series did drag things out for far too long and even the writers have repeatedly acknowledged this, but the subsequent two series have been fantastic and very much recaptured the magic of the first series. They've also committed to stopping it after a couple more series, and supposedly have a definitive end planned — something a lot of shows don't do, especially ones as successful as Lost. Anyway, I agree to an extent that it is lame when something you love is basically bled dry. I've seen this happen to a good few things, but then I've also seen things start off good, go a bit poor, and then become superb — I've also seen things go on and on, maintaining their quality consistently. I find it's best to just fuck off what other people are saying, discard your presumptions, and just rate it for yourself. Don't allow yourself to think that because something might go sour, it's not worth investing time in. Who cares if Monkey Island 4 is shit when its predecessors are so brilliant? Would you recommend someone not play them because MI4 basically reduces the fate of the characters and universe to a joke? Is it not worth falling in love with them for the first three games, even if you know a collapse is coming? Yeah it's a bit lame that they might go for five BioShock sequels, but who's to say they can't actually deliver five amazing titles which completely surpass themselves and shatter all expectations? Or that at least the first two sequels will? We're all just making presumptions. I still think the quote is hilarious, though.

http://www.lionhead.com/fable2/KnotholeIsland.aspx

Yes, I had to get them to enter one of the demon doors — amongst other ridiculous things.

I think that was Zaarin.

You should definitely do all the tutorials if you haven't as it's the only way to access many of the materials and whatnot. It's a bit of a pain as there're so many, but they did the best they could have really when it comes to getting across so much information (in a way that even kids can just about grasp).

I had the same level creativity problem at first, and decided to think of awesome themes and concepts rather than specific levels and gameplay. For example my first (and favourite) is an abandoned mine in the middle of the jungle, with you starting above ground and going deeper and deeper. I seem to find it easier if I let myself be guided by a cool idea/backstory. I'm actually really proud of it because I got the lighting and such working quite well, with inspiration taken from the mine levels in Donkey Kong Country. Unfortunately it is now part of my new problem, which is having five awesome ideas I haven't yet got time to finish. :~

Check out the demon door between Oakvale () and Bloodstone. It's probably the easiest door in the whole game to get through, requiring nothing more than one object from a general store.

Just to even the balance a bit, I want to add that I got Fable 2 just before my Christmas holiday and having sank at least 20 hours into it thus far (and still having many quests left, including the main storyline) I can honestly say it's one of the most enjoyable games I've played all year. In fact, the only game I can say I've been more happy I bought is Metal Gear Solid 4. I seriously love Fable 2, and have genuine difficulty empathising with the negative discourse about it on here in any way. I love the action (there is more depth to it than mashing buttons), I love the way the story and world unfolds, I love the atmosphere, I love the dialogue, I love the music, I love all the peripheral/social stuff. I won't deny it does have some issues, for example the job mini-games really are as mundane as they sound. Also the dog can be a bit annoying with regards to how dumb it is sometimes, sometimes refusing to find the right way around an obstacle to a treasure spot or whatever and basically getting stuck until you help it out. But game breaking or even massively significant? Not at all. For me, the pros outweigh the cons so much there's not even a dispute. I think the main thing that Fable 2 does to cuddle my happy side is the atmosphere. It has a very unique and quaint feel, yet is also significantly darker than Fable 1. It's made me literally jump a few times (That fucking winter lodge!), which is something the original didn't have a hope in hell of doing to me. Also good is that it has a quality sense of humour, which likewise has the dark touch applied to it. My view? Don't let yourself be steered and not actually try it. I very nearly didn't buy it because of the various Idle Thumbs members' opinions, and that would have been a fucking mistake.

Yes, no, and yes.

I'd argue that we haven't seen enough of the action to say anything quantifiable about it, Ginger. Despite being a gameplay trailer, the total amount of in-game action we saw came to less than 10 seconds. I don't know how you can make assertions like the action looking "piss poor" and that it "seemed to mirror the worst aspects of mid-late 90s gaming" based on such a minuscule amount of footage. Seems more like the words of someone with a predisposition against Schafer to me! It's not blind faith; it's making a prediction based on past evidence and intuition. While I get the impression you don't share this opinion, I actually loved Psychonauts on pretty much every level — including the gameplay.

To quote myself from BRUTAL!: One thing I have gotten the impression of from a lot of chatter during the past month or so is that the game is overwhelmingly unfinished, so I think it's a safe bet it'll move on from whatever we're seeing now during the next year of development. Me? I don't think this'll turn out to be my first Schafer disappointment — particularly seeing as I'm generally into metal anyway. I guess we'll see!

Has there been any word on the image import feature they were banging on about? Or has that been quietly sidelined to aid selling stickers in packs or whatever?

The trailer quite literally turns me on. But not as much as the actual pack contents! http://blog.us.playstation.com/2008/12/19/lbp-premium-level-packs-costume-packs-metal-gear-solid-edition-on-the-ps-store-1223/#more-4422 I really like the fact we're getting four new music tracks, three of which are iMusic. This is setting a very good precedent for what LBP DLC should really be all about!

While it's not outstanding, I don't think I could give it a full-blown thumbs down. I'd say it's something with potential that fails some pretty basic TV principles and is mildly up its own arse (Ideal for Idle Thumbs readers, then!), but delivers worthwhile content.

Even higher quality here, just in case you want the pre-GameTrailers version: http://www.brutallegend.net/trailers-and-commercials/gameplay-trailer-hd/

I've linked to a really ass-quality version of the introduction here, which was truly fucking awesome on pretty much every level. If anyone knows of a better recording let me know.

Being streamed after all: http://www.spike.com/event/vga/page/live-camera

Yeah, it does seem odd that there's been so much web marketing if there's going to be no stream. But then, I think their revenue will come from getting as many people watching the show on TV as possible — the aggressive web marketing could be nothing more than a (pretty smart) way of catching the attention of gamers, who I'd imagine in many cases pay more attention to their favourite gaming sites than TV ads. Hopefully someone who sees my news post will actually record it and hook us up if it isn't streamed. Or maybe someone here could do it.

I don't believe there's a live stream, although the pre-show is being streamed an hour before the real thing. I can't find anything on the site indicating there'll be a web stream of the proper programme. They will have the Brutal Legend segment itself up for download after the whole show, though. http://www.brutallegend.net/news/dont-forget-to-tune-in-to-spike-tonight/

Haha, Ballmer is indeed the most mental CEO of all time. I actually had that first video you posted as my screensaver at work (with subtitles) for ages, Nappi. This is another quality Ballmer clip: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=tGvHNNOLnCk Incidentally, this is my new screensaver: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=rfqNXADl3kU&fmt=18 Entirely irrelevant but it's such a superb video I feel obligated to post it. ;