LOPcagney

Did you ever figure this out? I just started playing King's Bounty and it's overheating my laptop like crazy. Apparently it's a common issue that no one knows how to solve. It's so good that I've been alt-tabbing out every 5 minutes to let it calm down, but it's a pain in the ass.

True, true. Maybe I exaggerated a bit.

I just think there's an inherent logical disconnect between playing games and romantic relationships. I'm going to go ahead and say I respect (in concept) phone sex hotlines over this service. Maybe it's just me, but aren't the people you play with online only important in the context of whatever virtual thing you're doing?

I wonder if games like L4D2 will be rereleased as they were originally intended...

I've been playing for a while. Over 1000 times. Still haven't gotten past the 5th world.

I LOVE Spelunky. On an unrelated note, I find it amusing to look at screen shots of peoples desktops because my impression is people make conscious decisions what icons and tabs should be visible. Not universally true, but it's funny to think about.

And I guess no PC version at launch? What happened to us being the platform of indie devs?

And, of course, Lode Runner.

Prince of Persia and Power Pete and a few other games including Spectre Supreme for my old PowerPC that I didn't play as often.

Chains By: 2DEngine.com Available: Steam, and probably other sites as well Synopsis: A color-connecting game with physics that reinvents itself every level. More: http://www.2dengine.com/chains/ More: http://store.steampowered.com/app/11360/

Granted I've only played the first few minutes, but I'm really disappointed by the visual style. I miss the old, colorful pixel art. This is about as close as you can get to falling in uncanny valley with side-scrollers, with the bloom-y, washed-out background looking slightly like a bad photograph. I dunno. Call me shallow, but I couldn't get past it.

Haha. And then there are the massive open areas where the music kicks in and you start to see dark pixels miles off on the horizon flocking towards you. It's so good. And really pretty, too. The crazy scale to everything make the environments more memorable than many more technically advanced games.

Even though I just beat the game over the summer, I can't imagine playing with updated graphics. So much of the appeal for me was how much of a pure game it was. There was something so imaginatively abstract about the chunky old graphics, and I can't imagine how adding "realism" to that could improve the formula. That said, Serious Sam, especially The Second Encounter, was one of the most mind-blowingly awesome games I've ever played. Anyone who hasn't played yet and can't find a copy of the original anywhere should pick this up.

Yeah, if this were 2D, it would look like a crappy Zelda clone, but the point of this game clearly isn't the story or the character design. I remember someone mentioned Who Framed Roger Rabbit on the Epic Mickey thread, and I see this as the same thing: A company using characters that border of copyright infringement as a template to show us something completely original and bizarre. Whether or not you like the art direction is another issue altogether, but this game won't be Zelda, no matter how much appears to be ripped right from that game.

"Beatrice!"

Why not FF8? I have no basis for comparison, since it's the only one I ever played, but I definitely enjoyed it.

Glad someone mentioned this. It's just at the brink of the price limit for games that I'd buy on a whim, so I needed someone who could tell me what it was all about. I may pick it up. I love the idea.

Yes. There are plenty of games that look as good in screen shots as in action: I feel like there must be some that even look better. It's not that this looks bad, necessarily. It's that this isn't this.

The best is yet to come.

Speaking of arcade machines... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmTxsLW9XQE I randomly found on in a Boston arcade once. Best cabinet ever.

Favorite: Grim Fandango Best: Half-Life 2 Desert Island- Team Fortress 2 if I have the internet, Deus Ex is I don't

Amazon's "Used and New" has a new copy for $8.

Yeah! I remember 2 being quite easy, and definitely one of the most entertaining games I've ever played.

My vote is Serious Sam. The only real overarching learning curve with FPSs is getting used to the aim-and-shoot interface, and Serious Sam definitely trains you in this regard while providing enough humor to keep you interested.

My impression was that it applied only to the multiplayer battles. Either way, sound's like it works well.