thl

wow. It's always great to be reminded that even though they seem silent, Valve has actually still been working on the single player games. Couldn't be more excited and hey! This just gave me an excuse to play Portal again!

I too got this for xmas and have really been enjoying it. I finally got around to playing the first one just before the holidays and probably don't need to get into my problems with it but I liked it enough to finish it and am glad I did because the second is very much a sequel in cinematic terms where the story picks right up and offers no help to newcomers. The reason for my post is that I think it's really interesting how the devs spend so much time and energy trying to explain things that are already accepted gaming conventions. The whole menu concept with memories instead of missions and synchronization and all that... and how in the first game you can exit the animus at any time and get a completely different pause menu... The story - no matter how ridiculous you find it - seems to be a real priority in these games which I find refreshing. In the second game, I really love the database and presentation of DNA strand or whatever. Although the writing is not great, I respected it enough to read all the database entries and codex pages (and how they basically wrote an ending to Altair instead of dropping the character indiscriminately like any other VG protagonist) and at the same time appreciate how all of the side missions and collection stuff is made much less frustrating by making the numbers very transparent. It's like the exact opposite of the flags from the first game, which is really nice. I think the moments that really made me realize that this game was great was the Fable 2 moment where you realize you now have a stronghold to pour your money into and when I noticed that the different memory blocks progress through years. The passage of time really gave me a sense of progression in character with Ezio that I didn't feel anything about with Altair. Been really caught up in this. I urge anyone who was remotely interested in the first to give this a try; it's really living up to the premise's full potential this time around.

fuck. yes. that latest video with the History Channel narration has completely won me over. They seem to be stressing the size of the world and terrain and freedom and random coyote bites and whatnot, the story sounds cliche but not too tired, the euphoria animations look fantastic, the atmosphere suitably beautiful. I REALLY hope there's more depth of gameplay here than GUN but it certainly looks hopeful!!!

A good friend of mine finally broke down and bought a 360. He asked me for a list of must-have picks. Since I've only had my console for about a year and have still only played a handful of titles, I am having a hard time coming up with anything that feels authoritative. can the thumbs help!? Here's the context: my buddy has no ps3 and doesn't play games on his PC but does have a wii and did have an original xbox. Here's my current list of recommendations: -Orange Box -Fallout 3 -Shadow Complex -GTA IV -X-Men Origins: Wolverine What do you guys think?

Thanks everybody! A few things: -so I have a few votes for Halo ODST. Is that better than Halo 3 in halo fans' eyes? -Scrobbs: why Burnout Revenge over Paradise? I have to say that I'm not much of a racing game fan but have enjoyed the variety of Burnout Paradise. I haven't tried Revenge though. Is it basically the same without the open world? -mikemariano: I played Bioshock on PC. I heard (I think on one of the idle casts) that the plumbing minigame is basically impossible in later levels on consoles. I can definitely see that since it seems designed with the mouse in mind. I also feel that game is a tad overrated but the multiple inclusion in this thread has convinced me to pass it on to my buddy. -is Far Cry 2 good on console? Again, I have it for the PC so I'm not sure how the xbox version plays. Thanks again for all your inputZ!

Hearing the thumbs geek out about this got me to buy it despite never once playing a Diablo game (i'm with ya, jake!). Usually I like a ton more story in my games than this (and still prefer to pour hours into a meticulously authored world such as a Bethesda game doing the same exact thing as I do in torchlight just because i know that grocery store was put there by someone who wants me to go in it and it's not just dumb luck that I can find the sword that I heard about on the internet) but I'm pleasantly surprised with how much I'm enjoying this. Perhaps it's because i'm so new to the action role playing game genre, but I see this closer to solitaire or puzzle quest than a deeper RPG. The time that I spend playing it is very fun but after a while gets to seem hollow and meaningless to me. The story is non-existent in my eyes because the procedural elements are so exposed. Still, it's very fun in small increments (which, according to torchlight-time, are anywhere from 1-4 hours)

There's a flash game on andkon called Pit Sweeper that's basically a RPG version of minesweeper. It's actually pretty awesome and my only complaint is that it's too short. I played through it perhaps a dozen times before my work blocked the site.

I'm re-listening to episode 1 just to make it sadder. Fallout 3 y'all!

this was supposed to be terrible right? And Rockstar North didn't develop it? And even the original controversy died pretty quickly when the game came out? Eh. I enjoyed the first one probably more than most. In my opinion, the whole Saw franchise owes a lot to the game. But Gabbo's right, it did get pretty boring after you've seen all the death animations.

I had that experience with Duke Nukem 3D. Yay i can talk to strippers and flush urinals. I kinda see that "interactivity" as unfortunate historical relics in Half-Life. maybe things they felt pressed to put in just because it was the soup du jour.

It's indeed interesting to hear several people not getting into a series of games that stands in my list of top all-time games, but you know... games, whether they are art or entertainment or both, are subjective. It's not like math where you can say that 1 + 1 definitely and unequivocally does not equal 3. To some people, the movie Crash is the best movie ever made. To others, it's Terminator 2. Who's to say who's right (except in that case, the Crash people are definitely wrong). I don't know if this will help anyone but these are the points of each game that I loved the most: HL1 : This has to do more with historical context at this point and I can definitely see this game as too long and basic for people approaching it for the first time today. But at the time, after games like Doom, Quake, Heretic, etc. Half-Life WAS a quantum shift within the FPS genre. I remember playing it the day it came out (well actually... i got my hands on "Half-Life: Day One" early but... whatever) and even though there were loading screens, they were definitely shorter than the other games of the time (anyone play Sin?) and moreso, they were continuous, so the segmentation of the game really was more about chapters or areas than maps. That gave the game a general sense of progression in terms of story rather than game, which was awesome. And the original AI was top-notch. I remember re-loading over and over just to deal with the squad tactics differently and see how they'd react. They try to flank you, flush you out with grenades, they commnicate with a set of vocab that you can overhear... all very awesome. NOTE: Half-Life: Source has the same AI as HL2, namely, it sucks. All the people do is: if you're shooting them, try to get out of your line of sight. ugh. I also appreciated the length (i believe it's a full 24 hour game rather than the 6-12 we're used to today) and the abrupt shift of Xen. HL2: I really love how the gameplay consistently changes throughout the game. The game constantly introduces new weaponry or dynamics that change the way you progress. It certainly kept me from ever getting bored but I can see how if there's a section (like Ravenholm) that you don't like, you can take comfort in the fact that it will change after you make it through. I remember when it came out the main criticisms were that the two travel sequences (airboat and buggy) were too long. Eh, to me that just establishes the distance that you travel. It would be nowhere near as effective to have some fade out/in cutscene with you driving off to the sunset then arriving at your destination. Those two sequences are critical to the scope of the game. Episode 1: Yeah, I generally agree with previous comments. This is the weakest of the series (if you don't count the original's expansion packs). It's basically a distilled re-telling of HL2 in reverse order. That said, there's still a few interesting pieces that generally makes it enjoyable, but there's nothing new here. In my opinion the best thing about it is the ending. Episode 2: I will also agree with previous comments on this one. It's the best of the series in terms of pace and tone. You never feel like you're doing anything for too long but you do a hell of a lot of different things. There's some new elements, a new character or two, yet another update to the engine (man those massive particle effects are amazing) and an honest tearjerker of an ending. Hopefully that maybe makes people curious to give them another try, but I understand if they're just not for you. whether you like them or not though, I don't think anyone can call them bad games.

I got my ass handed to me when I tried the dry ice mines on Brutal. I tried it again and realized my mistake. It's all about aggression with the AI. Keep pushing ahead and demolish the AI's merch stands as fast as possible, don't be afraid of swooping in and killing dudes whenever possible. If you sit back and try to build up your army before making a push forward, the AI will beat you down. When I tried it again doing a quick push, I won easily. Also, don't forget about your Call of the Wild solo. Nothing like a Hextadon helping you out

About to finish it again on Brutal (thankfully the unlocked concept art carries over), I'm still having a feeling similar to when I first played Half-Life 2. Basically, I've been looking forward to the game for so long and know they've been working on it for so long... is this it? I remember the Art of Half-Life 2 having all sorts of stuff that never came close to making the final game and feeling a bit jipped by that because... really? every evil soldier I fight has nearly the exact same uniform on? What happened to the little vinyl-clad ninja assassin chicks from the first one... what happened to the alien food cycle where the bullshark would fight the headcrab before he'd fight me, what happened to that amazing initial E3 video action... It took a decent amount of time before I lost all of that baggage and accepted the game for what it was. With Legend, I have very similar thoughts regarding the length of the single player story and the variety of secondary missions. They had like 5 years right? They couldn't come up with more than 5 ideas for secondary missions? They couldn't do more than 3 full-out stage battles in single player? They couldn't develop the war between human and tainted coil a little further? But then again, all of this stuff... kinda seems intentional. So it is what it is. I still think the story is pretty great and clearly the world itself is amazing... Just a shame it's hitting a vague dead zone where the gameplay is too complicated for brawler fans and not deep enough for RTS fans.

I had that sweet ass house mod with the basement that had like everything and even a small quest line that gave you a Mary Poppins umbrella that made you fly. I really loved that mod the most. Little jars with pictures of each ingredient, a hall of armor with mannequins for showing off your look. and a bunch of tools for levelling your skills. I'm still surprised that there isn't an equivalent or more house mods for Oblivion and Fallout 3. Pimping your house is one of the funnest things to do in those games. But yeah, I'm with you with the pillow fort (take that, shipwreck!) and all the house stuff. Except I squatted in that one mansion in Balmora where the house Hlaalu guy was murdered and I couldn't do anything to his corpse so i had to leave him laying in the middle of the living room. oh well! Collecting every standing lamp you see to make your rooms brighter was also great fun. Gave me way more of a sense of ownership than buying some deed or theme pack ever did.

From what I'm reading and Nick's comments, the story sounds very light. Is there still a discrete plotline or progression that arrives at an ending or is it just procedural forever?

ahhhhh now i need to play it all again

After beating it on Normal difficulty last night, I have a few thoughts: -I think it's a bit crap to include the unlocking of concept art as part of 100% completion. Unless you get very hung up on the battle portions of the campaign, you will need to either play mutliplayer or against the AI in order to get 100% completion (i had something like 7 out of 17 Ironheade unlocked when I found my last serpent). I dig that there's so much concept art in the game (and generally like everything i've unlocked so far), but shouldn't it be a bonus not a necessity? -I also think that maybe this game is easier for people who have never played RTSs. I am not a RTS fan at all (I hate how I can't concentrate on any one thing at a time and constantly feel stress that I have no control over losing a long and painful game) but I felt like I just ran through all the battles in the single player game. Maybe because I spent most of my time on the battlefield itself, only spawning units when it occured to me (I used the rally flag a lot but never ever used any of the other battle-based solos) but mostly on the aggressive sending all my dudes toward the next resource point. I never had any problems with this strategy and think that maybe if I was more versed wit h this type of gameplay, I'd try to play it deeper and get frustrated (because it generally was a chaotic dash). There was only one point in the campaign where I remember having to address a single unit and by that point I had control over all the resources anyway so I had enough time to clumsily give my orders (which were definitely clumsy). Also, I really don't want to play against Brutal AI because I can definitely see how being on the losing end would frustrate the hell out of me. -More importantly with the battle stuff though, I actually thought it fit the story and the world very well! fast, loose, and bloody seem like perfect descriptors for a rock n roll army to me and I actually enjoyed the rolling dustcloud of awesome that my dudes represented. -The story is kind of embedded. I wasn't surprised because a lot of Psychonauts' story was the same way, where you can run across the whole map after every level and talk to all the kids and get these developing mini-threads between them. Seeking out the Legends plays a huge part in filling in all the stuff that seems wonky in the cut-scenes, but hey... does it have to make complete sense? I totally agree with the previous posters' comments about Eddie and Ophelia's fight scene being weak and the ending being unexpectedly brief however. I REALLY wanted to somehow feels like a lost opportunity. -the side missions are another missed opportunity for me. i found all of the formats to be fun the first time, but all of them were needlessly repetitive. The was a great example of small one-off quests that could've populated the entire world, but instead they become a tedious task to clear out before moving on. I know it's weird to complain about a lack of diverse story design in a game where I feel its strongest suit is its story-driven design, but that just makes the side missions all the more sadder that they could've been a lot more. -I know multiplayer games want to have plenty of multiplayer achievements, but it seems like they're pretty boring. I don't plan on playing the multiplayer with real people, but figuring a way to trick the AI into letting me surround 15 of their dudes in a ring of fire doesn't sound fun to me. Enough griping. I really really enjoyed the game a lot. I guess I haven't been affected by the RTS shortcomings as much as others. I still don't really know how to do the power slide but everything else is pretty great I think. I'm not really into metal but my inner highschool industrial child was surpremely happy to hear Thieves, Stigmata, and KMFDM come on the radio. I think there should be some Led Zep on there but have repeatedly heard how reticent they are to grant permission for anything (except Cadillac ahem) so its a shame that we can't jam out to them while rolling through the hills (although the Bring It On Home solo makes quite a fitting homage to their influence). Overall the soundtrack is admirably huge and helps the games immersion quite a bit. Great game! Not perfect, which is sad because it could've been!

Favorite: Grim Fandango. My high water mark for art, story, music, setting, characters, dialogue, "cool factor" and level of polish are all set with this game. I don't think I've ever played a "cooler" game than this. Best: Half-Life. I was really into Doom and Quake and all the clones but Half-Life completely changed the genre. it not only injected story but storytelling and completely changes the structure and elevates the purpose of the genre itself. I remember reading an interview where Gabe Newell was asked how many "levels" the game had. his answer was "well, we're not really doing it that way but if you're asking how many .bsp files are in the game, it's about a hundred." Completely unheard of. Desert Island: GTA: San Andreas. In my opinion, this is the pinnacle of the series. The mix between epic, character, freedom, and humor hit my palate just right here where other entries taste just a bit off to me. In particular, I love their ability to distill landmarks, atmosphere, music, geography, and artwork of a place perfectly to small areas that evoke much larger ones. Every street has something going on but there are vast expanses of country to ride your hog through with Freebird blazing if you want to. I've already played through 100% three or four times so I can see myself revisiting this from here to eternity.

am I crazy or does Lita Halford have a little Morgan Webb thrown into her design? I'm crazy, right?

on xbox360, my girlfriend enjoyed playing through the original DOOM with me on co-op. She now eagerly anticipates DOOM 2's release, which is pretty sweet. If she can get over the graphics, the map design and gameplay still hold up IMO.

that song was great. i think i still like the theme song to Joysticks more though. TOTALLY AWESOME VIDEO GAMES! I love that movie. I forget where but just the other day I even saw a for-real version of the gigantic joystick the characters in the movie use to play their final play-off... made me think: TOTALLY AWESOME VIDEO GAMES!! it's crazy that respected and semi-well-known character actors like John Diehl (The Shield) and Jon Gries (Napoleon Dynamite) are in there, along with Joe Don Baker of course. Greydon Clark was really one of the "funnest" b-movie directors of the 80s. TOTALLY AWESOME VIDEO GAMES!!!

Yeah I'm only a couple main missions in but spent most the night exploring the first area of the map. Even if the exploration was all there was to the game, I'd love it. I'm blown away by the world design of this game. There is so much to look and marvel at... every nook and cranny oozes with creativity. And although all the heavy metal iconography is familiar, it's not straight replicas. It feels inspired rather than lifted. This is the first open world game where I really don't mind looking around for 120 collectibles (at least not so far). Every tree, hill, monument, sky tone, and weather effect really really impresses me.

the UPS website says my copy was left at my apartment office at 1:52pm. The next two hours will be reeeeeaaaalllllllyyyyyyyy sssssslllllooooooowwwwww...

Just had to throw my ticket in the Anachronox camp. I'm very happy to see a handful of fellow lovers-of-good-and-funny! That's aybe the only RPG that's intentionally made me laugh. HALF-SPOILER THAT'S TOTALLY NOT A SPOILER IF YOU REMEMBER WHEN IT CAME OUT:

digging this up, I'm finally playing through this and really enjoying myself. I'm particularly enjoying the quality of voice-over work here. Even with Murray's... casual engagement, Ackroyd, Ramis, and Hudson all do fantastic jobs. really points out how lacking most voice acting is in games (even with the wonky models in this game, I am still engaged enough to chuckle at the jokes and feel immersed when tracking down freaky shit with my PKE meter while hearing radio chatter). I also appreciate that the non-funny portions of the game are actually somewhat creepy! The game consistently hits the Ghostbusters line of funny and this-shit-just-got-real for me as the first movie did. Talk about this seemed to die down pretty quickly so I thought it would be much more of a chore to play through this. Happily surprised!