Ninja Dodo

Phaedrus' Street Crew
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Content count

    233

  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by Ninja Dodo

  2. Posted

    You know, the Communist Manifesto was an awesome piece of writing, unfortunately it spawned communists. You can't blame all them people's dogma and lack of creativity, faculty, understanding on Marx.

    I don't know. I think the idea that somehow this time revolution would break the cycle of hierarchical society and result in a proletarian paradise is absurd. Communism is a charming idea in theory but in practice it just spawns another aristocracy... just like capitalism.

    I don't think Marx had any more of a clue than Lenin or Stalin, only better intentions.

    Oh and as nod to staying on topic... I thought that original article was quite good. I don't even really read reviews anymore (most of them are bought by the publishers anyway). I just rely on word of mouth. Intelligent discussion about games is all the journalists have left.

  4. Posted

    CTRL is by default the universal action button, you use it in combination with the arrow keys to do basically anything.

    For example, if you have your sword drawn:

    CTRL + up = slash

    CTRL + left = slash left

    CTRL + right = slash right

    CTRL + down = block

    ... and when you want to interact with an object you usually press CTRL + up, or in some cases + left or right.

    Although I think I remember that in Gothic 2 you don't always need to use the arrow keys...

  5. Posted

    You'd think so. I almost never played it cause the first time I came across this game it, er, didn't have a manual and I spent ages trying in vain to figure out how to play the damn thing until the friend who had recommended the game pointed out that you want to hold down CTRL and then use the arrow keys to do stuff.

  7. Posted

    I disagree that the combat is crap. It's not great when you're fighting many enemies at the same time and they should figure out some way of dealing with that for nr 3, but otherwise it's fine... even really good. For example, you fight better if you time your slashes right, as a result you can sometimes beat enemies that would statistically kick your ass. I really like the way you can basically directly control the slash by holding down control and using the arrow buttons. You can block too in case you didn't know.

    And you can run away from a fight, just quit holding down the action button (usually CTRL). In fact, running is great. I've floored massive trolls by running between their legs and stabbing them in the heels. :erm:

    I do remember not being able to learn magic as a mercenary, but you can become a mage and still be good at combat... or you could become a Paladin. They do both, I believe.

  8. Posted

    I agree with you though, Kingz, that there's a time and a place for grand artistic visions and that's probably narrative games moreso than games like this... but even then I think a healthy combination of creative material and flexible interactive systems is a good thing.

  9. Posted

    Don't get me wrong. When I say 'not convincing' I'm not saying Endorphin is not a seriously impressive system. I'm just saying the end result does not look to me like a person doing stuff. It looks like a robot that's been taught to walk like a human. It's moving, but it's not alive.

    You can code a program that understands the mechanics of a walk, but you can't make a piece of software that understands emotion. The same is true of all procedural things. They may be scientifically accurate, they may even look nice... but at the end of the day it can't compare to something that was deliberately created a certain way by a person with an idea.

    Looking at the screenshots of Spore I'm going to guess they are using some handmade artwork as well as procedural stuff - which I think is the way to go, really... combining the strengths of both.

    What's interesting though is that in a way the gamer becomes the artist, sculpting his vision of the world. My point is, without an artist, be it the designer or the player, procedures can do nothing but sit there and generate random stuff.

  10. Posted

    I have my doubts about procedural content. Computers are not artists, animators, writers or designers... If you look at something like Endorphin which is supposed to replace motion capture and even animation by simply generating character movement through algorithms, the results are not actually that convincing. It's cool and could be used for some stuff, but I don't see a computer coming up with The Incredibles or Grim Fandango.

    Having said that, the game definitely looks and sounds promising.

  17. Posted

    ... or stifled creativity.

    I just read this in Develop magazine...

    It's up to developers to solve this delicate equation, Ancel says, by fitting their innovative work within the constraints of the demands of the wider public. "We learnt a lot of things with Beyond Good & Evil with regards to this, but that doesn't mean we'll stop thinking along those lines. It's just that we'll now consider this issue far more seriously than previously, by saying, 'Okay, let's innovate, but how do we do it with a mainstream project?'"

    Is that not a frustrating situation for a creator? "Yes that's true," admits the father of Rayman. "But I think you have to accept that aspect. You have to accept that you can't do the game that you would love to make. From the moment you want to develop for thousands or millions of people, you are obliged to think of them and not only of you."

    Dammit.

  21. Posted

    It happened with film, it will happen with games, sooner or later technology will hit a plateau. Already, you can't really sell a game on graphics technology anymore. Visual aesthetics help to be sure, but "Now with normal maps and realtime shadows!" is not going to sell a game.

    As the article describes though, if game developers just play their cards right and continue developing for older hardware in the early stages of the next generation, a lot of smaller developers may be saved from going under.

  22. Posted

    Not really you so much, anyway...

    Point is, maybe it would do the games industry good if they froze hardware development and allowed people the time to just really experiment with the tools that are available now.