Cigol

Apparently there is talk of it being delayed, in Europe? Please tell me it ain't so

Maybe they can put some of that pretentious crap everyone bangs on about in the game this time. /runs away before the internet assaults him

I don't have a 360, I have a PC and PS3, so I rarely if ever have to consider this question. The only time it might pop up is with something like Fallout 3 or Call of Duty 4 as I inherently dislike playing first person shooters on a console, and can't understand why people do it. Yes, that might have been a poor attempt at a shit multi-layered joke. Thanks. Not to say the criticism isn't valid, but I've played and bought several multiplatform titles which are supposedly worse than their XBOX 360 equivalents and it never once dawned on me. I imagine in many cases it'd be like telling someone who's playing Oblivion on a console how the PC experience is 500x better due to the addition of hundreds of brilliant user-made modifications. It's true, but it doesn't necessarily diminish the experience they are having.

Is that limited to those who use the official headset? ...but actually what I meant was in terms of presentation. Do the little sackpeople move their mouths or have speech bubbles, or something like that. I've not noticed any visual indicators in any of the youtube videos which makes me wonder whether it's completely transparent?

Granted, but he gave the impression they get inundated with what are initially ambiguous problems that are then found to be caused by 'piracy'. That's what I don't get. What problems? It's like when Sports Interactive said that they intentionally produced bad cracks and released them into the wild with bugs. It later turned out that the people being accused of using cracks, with bad bugs, were actually honest retail purchasers and the bug was in fact notlimited to the crack. Scaremongering and scapegoating.

You can communicate using interpretive dance - don't forget the sackboy is poseable. Does LBP actually support headsets btw? How are they implemented, anything fancy?

Unfortunately, no. It's around $52 including tax in the UK, and that works out around £30 - you can actually find it cheaper in the shops for once. Still, I'm sure it'll justify the price tag and Valve have great after-release support which means new maps, maybe even features - but that's complete speculation

A fairly recent interview with Pete Hines is amusing as it was conducted before the 360 leak and discusses the difficulties they face with piracy on the PC. There's no talk of restrictive DRM or jumping ship from the PC, thankfully, and he also name-checks Remo and his article on Penny Arcade. What I didn't understand, and maybe you guys can fill me in on, was how they lose money from tech-support issues relating to piracy. It's not like it's a freephone service, we do have to pay to use it and I find it hard to believe they don't make a profit. "The amount of money we spend supporting people who didn’t pay us for the game in the first place…it’s f–ing ludicrous. We talk to other developers, guys who are [like] ‘Yeah, it’s a third, it’s 50% of our [customer] support'." ...besides which, what problems are they referring to? I've used all manner of no-cd cracks in my time and encountered very few game specific problems. In fact, they've actually been very useful in overcoming 'faulty' DRM which won't work in spite of purchasing the game! Obviously; you download from the wrong sources and you run a severely high risk of being infected - but that's a general tech support issue, nothing to do with the game. It sounds like the sort of scapegoating which might eventually culminate in them turning their back on the PC, I mean it's just one small step to the other side and there doesn't seem to be a lot of love for the PC right now. full article here

Pre-orders can now be taken on Toblix's favourite digital distribution platform; STEAM according to RPS the price, if you pre-order, is $44.99 plus tax (which in the UK would be about £30 I guess?). No word on any juicy extras like a 'beta' period to sweeten the deal just yet. from; RPS

Regarding the subtle mockery it's apparently back to just plain old PlayStation now (?) and shamelessly drawing attention to it's great legacy in order to remind those ship jumping, money grabbing, third-party whores that there is more to life than multi-platform gaming GODAMNIT! So anyway, games. Metal Gear Solid 4 In spite of the negativity (born from jealousy) MGS4 is absolutely frikkin awesome. A goosebumps inducing, nostalgic roller-coaster ride with sumptuous graphics, innovative gameplay, long cut-scenes, attractive ladies, heroic old men and gadgets galore. It's got it all, and it's just so tragic to know the only people who will ever appreciate it are existing fans! I'd rather play MGS4 blindfolded using a keyboard whilst nailed to a cross and being anally probed by my family than actually sit down and play the Force Unleashed properly, like Rodi. Uncharted Drakes Fortune Thoroughly entertaining action/adventure game which taps into the whole Indiana Jones shtick. My only complaint is that it's a little formulaic and combat heavy, but it moves along at such a quick pace you never really have time to dwell on it. Its very slick and the games cinematic overtones are probably even more effective than Metal Gear Solid. No Ewoks regrettably. LittleBigPlanet Alright, I've not played it, and I actually have some reservations in spite of all the glowing reviews, but it's bound to be good, and I dare say it's going to be great because other (better) people have already done just that! Imagine if you will, Rodi, LBP reconstructions of various Star Wars moments... can we say; 'instant classic'? Gran Turismo 5 Prologue Miffy likes it so that should be praise high enough. In fact I'm always surprised when people tell me they enjoy GT5 because whilst it's not a full on 'sim' it doesn't do the obvious 'game' thing either. I get annoyed actually at how accepting of GT people can be whilst simultaneously turning their noses up at PC sims. Must be the graphics - which are awesome btw, and makes collecting the lavishly detailed cars highly addictive. Ratchet & Clank Okay I'm not a huge fan of these, I liked the platforming elements, but I'm not taken with the combat. That said it's harmless, cutesy, fun with genuinely delightful graphics. Didn't really hold my attention truth be told but for those of you who like this sort of thing... WipEout HD We already discussed this in its separate thread. Sure it's cheap, and yeah it might reuse assets from a couple of PSP titles but it's still a fully fledged game in its own right with single and multiplayer components worth playing, and replaying. Formula One Championship Edition Hah, alright. I'm making no friends with this but it's a very entertaining F1 game with good graphics and most importantly; a fun, and semi-realistic F1 career mode. I mean they really put some effort into it - which I personally found surprising. I play a lot of PC sim racers (nerrrrrd alert) and I enjoyed this. [...] I've never played WarHawk, I'm waiting for the demo to hit the European PSN store. It doesn't look all that enticing from a PC gamers perspective but considering there's a raft of addons and people are still playing it I guess it's worth checking out. Motorstorm was average, I didn't find it particularly fun or innovative, 'wow, different paths?Really?' Heavenly Sword was interesting as I had the same response to that as Yahtzee (not good), but some people swear by it so download the demo and see for yourself. I've not tried Siren, the episodic PSN survival horror title, but heard (mostly) positive thoughts from those who like that sort of thing. Resistance always looked like your average console FPS elevated to a higher status simply because it's not on the PC, hence why I never bothered with it and why its upcoming sequel doesn't exactly pique my interest. I've never played Singstar, and I'm not a teenage girl (with perky breasts) so it might be good but I wouldn't know. [...] Burnout Paradise is a multiplatform title, but the fact you can buy it directly off of PSN and install it to your hard-drive grants it some PS3 exclusivity bonus points. Shit, it's nice to have full (proper) games you can start up on a whim without grasping for the disc - and Burnout Paradise is just one of many in a growing trend the PlayStation network is embracing. Yeah, yeah, yadda yadda. I don't care about XBL. Some cool PSN titles; Super Stardust HD Echochrome FL0W PixelJunk Eden PixelJunk Monsters PixelJunk Racers Everyday Shooter To keep the PS3 company I suppose?

Actually, I wasn't aware of some of StarCraft II's singleplayer elements like dialogue choices now you mention it. They should definitely push that, as I imagine it would make the whole 'monetizing' thing a lot easier to swallow. I Liked the section on LittleBigPlanet, thought you missed a trick on the World of Goo hype train (one sentence?), and maybe, just maybe, the Tekken song was a little long. I felt - and this is constructive criticism, not berating - that it took you out of the podcast due to its length - but other than that, well done - I enjoyed it

The Hitman Series can feel a little like that.

For what it's worth, IGN have rated it 9.5 Eurogamer have rated it 9

I never really understood it either - all the stats are in the game itself, are they not - but if I remember rightly it's main use is actually for the tagging of in-game music. It stores your tagged results on the site and lets you buy it from Amazon directly, something like that anyway, I never tried it personally.

Speech recognition, in games, who'd of thunk it! I actually like to don my cap and do a bit of that in the excellent Silent Hunter games and Bridge Commander, ("DIVE, DIVE, DIVE", "MAKE IT SO!"), but I've never, ever, felt the need to dictate to my units in an RTS game so you'll forgive me if I think this whole thing sounds a bit gimmicky (?) and, in light of their PC piracy complaints and the staggered release; a bit, console'y.

My post was just a thinly veiled "HEY LOOK, I LISTENED TO THE WHOLE THING. LET ME PROVE IT BY POINTING OUT SOME STUFF I REMEMBER". It wasn't meant to be taken negatively, and I wasn't passing judgement. I mean I haven't played Super Mario Galaxy, or Katamari Da-umm (?) and various other supposedly wonderful titles so I'm hardly one to talk (for shame). Regarding the PLAYSTATION; is that not, like the game soundtrack, merely a consequence of the CD-ROM and its obvious iteration of the 'multimedia' phenomenon? I mean that's at least one pre-defined path for games, right. I don't know, the eBay guy kinda made it for me, but we'll see. I remember how the SEGA Master System was looked down upon, in that way kids compartmentalise clothing brands, but I never recall anyone ever reinforcing this mythical 'console war'. They were just systems you went round, uninvited, to your friends house to use.

I haven't played Fallout 2 I didn't have an N64 I didn't have a NES. We like taking pot shots at PLAYSTATION. Gears of War 2 is going to be I never played Blade Runner. Crushing. I think the guy who did that ebay soundbyte should be invited on as a special guest next week. Look forward to future podcasts, assuming he's a recurring special guest.

I went through the entire first level of Deus Ex and thought it was rubbish. It wasn't until some years later when I borrowed it from a friend that wouldn't stop harping on about it that I quickly changed my mind and now thought it was the best game I'd ever played As another example, many pirates download a lot of games but have a lessened sense of appreciation because they didn't go to the trouble of buying it. ...still I'm not going to force you to enjoy the game. That would be difficult You hate Wipeout, and by extension me. I get it.

I'm pretty sure they do if it's a film of any stature.

Damn, I didn't enjoy the singleplayer that much Mind you, I hadn't played it since the crashes started so it won't affect me. Did you put your heart into it, give it the time of day, or did you just fumble your way through a couple of laps and think this isn't for me and hard-wired your brain to hitting the reset button.

From RPS;

You're not serious? Ignoring the 'almost impossible' comment; look at any public torrenting website and read the comments for some PC releases. Half are from people who don't know what .rar files are, how to mount an .iso, what a crack is, how to find it, or indeed where to put it and so forth. There are difficulties to overcome on every platform (re; piracy) but once you've got over that hurdle it's as easy as stealing candy from a baby (and a lot less harrowing).

Reading the page source unearths this polite nugget of information; "Nail your penis to the wall"

Back on topic, the XBOX 360 version of this has been leaked to the internet. As far as I'm aware Bethesda don't feed into the whole piracy is killing the PC rumour, so a missed opportunity to sit here feeling smug, but it's still nice to be reminded it's not just the PC which has problems with piracy. Still, I'll give it a wry smile - they couldn't be bothered adding trophies to the PS3 release even when the XBOX release comes with them as standard. The PS3 of course is free from piracy... but lacks the install base and support to take advantage of it