racingfreak92

So wait, only ONE person gets whats in the cube? What is this, a Price is Right Showroom? And you have to purchase crap to get to the "center" faster? This sounds like the stupidest and shallow cash grab. I suggest he calls it Cow Clicker 2.

Ive seen multiple people mention this. The obviously problem I see with that is then how to you quickly see if a player is friendly or an enemy? Yes the enemies are robots, but if they are far away you have to spend that extra half second looking. Thats much more annoying to me then just being one color. At the end of the day, its not like playing as two groups in a temporary peace will really make it more fun. I do see major balance issues with classes. Scout and Medic seem pretty shite and def need some help. Sniper and Spy also seem to be a little weak, but ive also seen some good performance with those classes with skilled players.

What confuses me is that there are still so many major bugs and problems in the game that havent been worked out, or are introduced with each patch. Just a couple that I can think of off the top of my head is a new bug where mortar shots can clip right through the geometry and just fly off the map, the really finicky way you lock on tactical/orbital strikes, the way chat messages are displayed if they are longer then a tweet, performance drops on more then adequate machines, and a handful of balance and major matchmaking problems. I also think they are in desperate need of an option to have friendly and enemy projectiles be different colors. If I am in a fight with 5-6 players, and I see a fractal grenade about to go off, how the hell do I know if its my teams or the enemies? Same goes with when a mortar is dropped close range, or a sticky. ---------------------- I used to enjoy playing INF but now its just so difficult to do so if you come up against 1-2 good base defenders. A Doom and Tech working together can make it almost impossible to get anything done. if they are equipped right they have two turrets to drop, mines, forcefields, and then TCNGs/Quickfuse, the Thumper, and the Titan Missile. How the fuck is a INF supposed to fight that with only 1k health, especially when you need ALL of your sticky mines to do just enough to take out a level 4 gen, so you cant even use those to fight the defenders or their equipment. Even if you were the fastest skier ever, you couldnt use your stickies to kill them, and then re-spawn and get back to the base in time to take out the gen before they can repair/set up again. I guess if you had the Jackal it could help alot but I dont have 75k XP to get it. Even worse is that some bases are so horribly unbalanced. Sunstar (desert map with the tall temples) is INSANELY easy to attack as INF and only the best team of defenders can do anything to stop you. On the other side of the spectrum is Tartarus (the swamp with the big trees and plateaus), its so easy to lock down that you might as well not even try. Not to mention if some dick brings a tank inside the gen womb (which I cant believe hasent been patched out yet) ----------------------- I bought the Steam Starter Pack and the Raider Pack which were both 50% off, so I only spent $17.50 and got 800 gold (which is $10 worth), EVERYTHING for the Raider class, and a bunch of basic unlocks from the starter pack. Those unlocks would have probably cost somewhere in the ballpark of 300k XP. The 800 gold helped me get probably another 200K XP, I used it only for items on discount and for a 3 day boost. The boosts are really good to buy because it helps you net a lot of extra, plus every day you have boost you get 1200XP even if you dont play. When you factor in the 1200XP 1st win daily bonus you are raking in at least 2400XP just from winning one match a day. At a rate like that you can get stuff pretty fast, but without any of the XP bonuses it really slows down. (The deal of the day is randomly picked from items you havent purchased, for up to an 80% discount. Of course the discount only applies to the Gold Price but it can be a major help towards unlocking.) Whats frustrating is that some unlocks are pretty meh, like alternate rifle or thumper for soldier, or quickfuse/regular grenade for Tech or Soldier, or Vanilla/Holdout shotgun for Path. They are good and might fit your play style better, but if you cant afford them its no big deal. But other unlocks are KEY to playing a class efficiently. Doom mines, and any of the Raider and INF weapons are good examples of this, and most of those are 50-75k XP. I would say on average, you should be getting 1200-1500xp per match if you have the VIP bonus. So you are looking at around 50 matches to get just one item. Even if you are doing really good or have boost and are gaining XP at twice the rate that is still 25 matches, which at 20 minutes per match, takes an entire work day of playing to get. ---------------------------- Now that Ive gotten to the higher skill matches the games balance problems become apparent. There is just too much ability for 2-3 players to dominate a match, and while that sounds like something that wouldnt be so common, it happens at least half the time. When I check the scoreboard it usually looks something like this at the end of the round: Blood Eagle: Diamond Sword: 1. 35,000 pts 1. 20,000 pts 2. 28,000pts 2. 15,000 pts 3. 18,000pts 3. 12,000 pts 4. 15,000pts 4. 10,000pts 5. 10,000pts 5. 8,000pts From there the drop off is even more severe, with the entire bottom half of the team having maybe 10-15k as a whole. The winning team usually has 1-3 players that absolutely decimate and have 10k or more then the next highest player. Even worse is that when you compare each team, the top player on the losing team usually has around the same score as the 3rd or 4th player on the winning team. Some people argue that pts dont mean anything, but thats bull because the winning team always has the highest total number of points. I think the real morale here, is that in any multiplayer game, the people who are "hardcore/competitive" make it not fun for everyone else.

They came out with an update yesterday that added some new Tech stuff. It costs an arm and a leg of XP. Unlike Raff, who is not good at video games, but also a god at video games, I manage to die a lot in public matches. I kinda drained all the fun I can out of this game by now, getting too high of a ranking just makes it not as fun for me because I am not a fan of competitive games. I regularly get into matches now where I am constantly thwarted by sentinels, or really good doombringers, or something else. I jump in every once in a while for a match or two, but it dosent hold my attention anymore, especially since weapon unlocks are getting so expensive if you dont buy gold. Colourful, I think its fine to stick with a role. Teams always need Paths/Soldiers to cap. The only time I would advise switching is if for some reason a majority of the team moves to that class, like when you get a game of idiots and there are like 5 or 6 INFs.

This is insanely hilarious to me: http://www.theverge.com/2012/8/23/3262385/peter-molyneux-curiosity-has-to-change-its-name-suggestions-welcome

Ill save everyone 34 seconds. This is a TEASER, not a trailer. It has 0 content. I can only based off the "what is in the cube" tagline that this is a sequel to the 2009 film The Box, but since its a cube this time there is a whole nother dimension of human empathy, and pain. I think we should just go ahead and give this an Oscar now, instead of waiting for the inevitable.

Trailer looks cool... art style looks amazing... Im getting excited... Its on THE MOON!... FLOPPY DISKS!... PERMA-DEATH * SCREECH* I will most likely never buy or play this game. I hate this mechanic so so so so so much. It was awful in Reciever and it will be awful here too. It is a cheap and artificial way to create tension, and I have literally 0 interest in replaying the same content over and over because my reflexes werent fast enough or I cant shoot/run away quick enough. I hate games that do this, I think its the complete opposite direction of where games should be going.

Yes. I also found that the "Warrior" was quite skillful. I might even say adept. However I took all Wizards, the reason why should be quite obvious. I didnt know this when I set out on my quest (I might even say it was an adventure!) but; not only did they prove to be worthy in combat, but the lessons of the Wizard inspired me with their magic to pursue the career I always dreamed of, to become Neo from The Matrix. They also made me ask the question: What is Game?

Yeah... who knows which one. If they reveal how much they need for that then I would consider putting in a few bucks. Also, I didnt read their page that closely, but are they putting any of their own money into the production? I dont like when established companies come to Kickstarter for 100% of their budget. I like what Double Fine did using it as just a partial source.

Interesting looking, but as other people mentioned, RTS games are not as rewarding as say an FPS. You either win or lose, and its a big time investment. If they add a single player mode I would probably back it.

In case anyone was wondering, if you think regular TF2 is stupid, you will also think this mode is stupid.

Exactly. I always expected more then that crap from Valve as well. And I feel the same way about paying per match/for limited time items. I much rather pay up front then each time, even if it is more expensive. Im just gonna stop talking to you because you are ridiculous.

So... Spore?

I agree. I think that there was potential here. But yeah, he totally failed to be perceptive to todays audience and marketing. He came off as so dismissive of anything that didnt mean the original pitch. Every time someone suggested better visuals or some sort of graphics-related comment he would ramble on about how this game wont have any "dancing dolphins" (which in itself is a strange and dated metaphor for the games seriousness). Someone recently commented on his most recent update, saying "Are you completely underestimating the value of good presentation?" But coming from a guy whose only major project in recent years is that Storytron engine, its not that surprising that he has trouble staying modern. He needs to majorly modify his pitch, redo the video, and drop the goal a huge amount. I would say 30k is doable, but anything past that is just too much for this project. At this point he has put so much time into it that it would seem to be worth getting even that small of an amount, instead of getting nothing at all. And once its launched there is always the potential of making money of it in other ways (ads, donations, maybe something akin to expansion packs).

Its exploiting people who are invested in the game. Valve makes a lot, its not like they are fighting to survive. I think if the hats were $1-2 each they would still make plenty of money.

I will agree that the FAQ is unclear, but Valves downright douchy monitization of TF2 is nothing new. $12 hats? New weapons constantly with all sorts of random effects? Items that are ONE USE that cost $3? Its one of the most immoral and least consumer-friendly F2P games Ive ever seen. It may be mostly cosmetic items, but in my eyes that only makes it worse. The servers are getting pounded, patch took me over an hour to download.

It dosent seem to be out just yet, Im thinking maybe in 30 minutes when its noon PST it might drop. Im in the US. My steam name is racingfreak92, ill be online to play.

I backed the project so I could comment on it. I wrote a couple comments back and forth, and the problem is that Chris just dosent want to listen. I addressed issues of the pitch, how its misleading, and the look of the game. He just blew off all the comments and stuck by his guns. I know its always difficult to take criticism on your own content, but you need to. If everyone is telling you something, then you need to realize that maybe they are right. He has yet to concede to any criticism that people have posted. At best he skirts around the issue, and usually just continues to talk about how he thinks people need to adapt their expectations.

I guess. But with other consoles, those exclusive games are multi million dollar blockbusters that are either insanely entertaining, unqiue, or memorable. The best Android game just hopes to be a really well polished time waster. If you never got a chance to play Angry Birds, are you really missing anything? But I would argue missing out on a game like Bioshock (which was a Microsoft exclusive at release) is much more significant.

Are you aware of that many android games that are actually worth buying a system to play, and arent available on PC or another platform? Ive had a Android phone for 2yrs and never even play games on it, much less think it has any must haves. there is a x86 port of Android for select laptop chipsets, and there is that Bluestacks program that supposedly emulates well.

Okay I just need to take a minute to rant about this, because I think most of you are being insane. I like the new dashboard in comparison to the old one. I have also NEVER accidentally clicked an ad. In fact, I hardly ever notice them. Half the ads seem to be for games, the other half for movies or shows. Right now the main square tile to the right of the home tab is cycling ads for only games and movies. Some about new game/DLC releases, which, seems pretty relevant since its a gaming console after all. In fact, if its a game I already own, its basically a notification telling me that there is more content for it to enjoy. Steam does those annoying ass popups when a game you own has new DLC. To me thats way worse then a passive picture. As soon as you move off the home tab, the ads become stupider. Right now I see one for the Lorax on Blu Ray, and some shit about Adele. I guess thats like, 1% annoying, but I also almost move off the home tab maybe 1/50 times I use my Xbox. The only time I use any function on the dashboard, besides the two buttons immediately under the home tab, is when I want to download an XBLA game. Since all XBLA games cost like $15 now, and are usually buggy and shite, I rarely do that anymore. When I do, its a quick flick over to the games tab, then a few more button presses to get to "New Releases". Even Splunky, which isnt really a new release anymore, is still listed on there and I could find it with 15 seconds. Sure its not streamlined for usability. Its like 10 clicks/thmbstick movements to get from the start page to clicking on the newest XBLA release. But the menu is so fluid and quick, and the content loads way faster and is easier to spot compared to the old dashboard.They show you huge pictures of the box art and you can scroll through them without any loading. The old dashboard was always slow as fuck for me, and you only got a list of text and a small icon. There is also the option of using the Bing search, which even with just the controller, is super easy to use and removes all the navigating. The only spots that are explicitly labeled "advertising" are mostly videos smaller then the size of a playing card that dont even make any noise or anything unless I hover over them, and since they are in the corner Im not sure how you would ever accidentally get there. You would have to purposefully move your thumbstick past everything else to get there for it to make any noise, and then even if you click it you can instantly back out, its not like you are forced to watch it. I will admit that this is the first time Ive ever been to the Music page on my Xbox dashboard, and I was about to say that it was awesome that I could click one of the ads and instantly see the music video for a new song. But then it actually turned out that it wanted me to pay $2 for a 480p version of the music video. So that was lame, and flabbergasting. Especially since not only is every music video available for free in 1080p on Youtube, but you can watch Youtube on your Xbox. But besides that... I see no problem with how they do advertising on the Xbox dashboard, from the standpoint of a user. This shows a short clip of the old dashboard. Half the fucking UI is taken up with borders and embossing, and comparatively ads take up just as much, or even more space per page (even though there are less ads overall). (skip to 0:45, i guess embedding dosent support autojumping to a time) Scrolling through tiny text listings with little icons seems like a much bigger bitch, especially since for me, scrolling through the list quickly always meant waiting about 5 seconds for them to load. Now I get to see more preview content, and it quicker. I think people are forgetting how the old dashboard wasent that good either. I am even pretty active when it comes to looking at advertising. If im on the Subway I look at every ad. If im on Facebook I look at the ads at least every other day, and even click them occasionally. But I have NEVER ever accidentally clicked an ad on the 360 dashboard or found them distracting. Not once. Now, I agree its a rook to charge the user so much if they are also supported by advertising. And if I was a company I would be blown away by the price of these ads (really, a 15-30% fee to target your advertising, thats just about a standard thing everywhere else). 300k to control an ad spot for the day is a lot, but not a bad deal. If MS is telling you that there a few million people going to that page, and that the only ad in rotation in that spot is yours, you are getting pretty decent exposure. Id also like to say that in comparison, PSN is SHIT for finding anything. I have had times when I knew what I was looking for and I couldnt even find it, and they barely even have ads in the way. This to me is so much more annoying. I much rather see ads that I can gloss over, then have to navigate an entire fucking UI EVERYTIME I click a game and then go back to the listing. That is shit. Also shit: -Steam asking you for your birthdate when you click certain game pages - you have my account info, you know my god damn age. -When the Steam store just dosent work for no reason until you restart or click about for a minute. -How shit the Steam Store gets EVERY year during the big sales. -Getting spam invites to game groups called "HardC0re COD Playerz" on a weekly basis. (and no option to disable that afaik) So dont forget that other competitors have problems as well.

I think that he went around all wrong with the pitch. He is asking for 150k, less then most game Kickstarters, but still a hefty sum. For that much, people expect professional grade. This is not professional grade: This is a picture I could make with Powerpoint. Ive never played a Chris Crawford game, and while Im not doubting his talents as a designer. Im really doubting his presentation. The whole shtick of not being heard of is sort of a turn off. I get what he is trying to do, but it paints the picture of a dated product; of a crotchety old man who is trying to get back into the business. Once you see the logo and game art, and the fact that he couldnt even be bothered to get a real domain, and instead links you with a jumble of numbers to have you play the game, that picture is just about painted FOR you. Also, saying that all this money will only keep the site around for 5yrs seems like a poor message. No one wants to invest in a product that already has an expiration date. If you are gonna take 5yrs of operating costs up front (and it actually sounds like 150k should provide 10yrs of operating costs, and half the money will go towards advertising) then do something smart with it. Dont advertise something that has no ability to make money back, monetize the game in some way. Also, what is the benefit of running this off a website? Its not like this game is doing WolfRamAlpha levels of simulation, im sure anything with a CPU faster than 100mhz could crunch the spreadsheet numbers here. Why not make the game downloadable? This game has no textures, no music, no 3d models. Its 99% text and 1% crappy stock images. I bet that would compress down to a 5mb RAR file. Last time I checked that are tons of ways to distribute a game like that for next to free. And if he isnt doing any sort of advertising/monetizing/account based add-ons, then why not make it downloadable. And where is he getting these numbers? Id love to see any sort of detail into the costs. Is he expecting a million people to play this game every year? 100,000? 10,000? To be honest a realistic number of players could be quite low. I think a deep simulation about the environment could be something really useful, if you could get people to play it (people that arent already onboard the save-the-planet train). But I think he just went the wrong direction completely with the business decisions here.

Thats probably a very popular feature in dorms and apartments.

Yeah if you want to take advantage of the other capabilities its probably worth it. Personally I would have no use for media streaming or OnLive; and I think most people are seeing those as "bonuses" and are still putting their main hopes on the games. I mean jeez its $100. Thats less than 2 games, and most people buy at least 2 shit games a year. So its not like people are really losing out if this sucks once it comes out.

haha, indeed, it was. but if i recall it only supports some sort of ridiculous proprietary format? or it was like a WMP file or something.