Twig

Phaedrus' Street Crew
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Posts posted by Twig

  2. Posted

    Although, I gotta type, If all the pre-order bonuses for games on Steam were just TF2 decorative items that I could easily ignore without losing gameplay, I'd be a happy camper!

    Valve will never do otherwise. One could argue that the L4D2 baseball bat preorder bonus is an example of the bad sort of bonus, but it really is just a graphical replacement for other weapons. And everyone can use it if even only one person has it.

    I'd apologize for going too far off-topic but it's not like we know what the hell this is about and we have no new info so OH WELLLLL.

  4. Posted

    IT WOULD STILL BE TIC TAC TOE!

    It's still the kind of game that should be just a mini game within a game and not a whole game by itself... IT'S TIC TAC TOE! (Of Towers of Hanoi, Match 3, you should know what I mean):shifty:

    I know what you mean. But you're wrong.

    Look, I hate poker, but even I know that "just a mini game within a game" almost always turns out shit. A dedicated poker game would likely be a million times better. And many people like poker.

    It's gonna be a Super Smash Bros. clone.

    That's what I guessed Irrational's game was on their voicemail thing, but it didn't turn out to be true. And I replied to TTG's tweetthing with the same, so I expect this to be untrue as well.):

  6. Posted

    which you should know is one more than one does in Texas Hold 'em

    I did say "sequel" which implies things change!

    It would be like getting Godzilla, Gamera, King Kong, King Ghidorah and Mazinger Z together and make a tic tac toe game with them...

    Not true at all! The potential for hilarious banter in a poker game is endless. And since they're all known for the hilarious things they say... Poker is a great avenue for this kind of mashup.

    But I still hold out hope for more.

  9. Posted

    There are people who like games stringing them along a direct path (no doubt the majority), and there are people who like games that open the world and allow for real creativity, both in gameplay and story.

    There are also people who seem, for whatever reason, incapable of seeing the sandbox when it's right in front of their face, and then there are people who see the sandbox when it was never even intended.

    I don't think it's a matter as simple as "people don't want to play around" anymore. You've just got dudes who prefer different things.

    Also, while I agree that cheesemints might encourage some people to try new things, killing X dudes in 20 seconds is not a good example of that. A really good example is the Left 4 Dead cheesemints, where you get rewarded for things like killing people with cars as the tank, or dragging people through spit as the smoker, etc.

  10. Posted

    I caught on pretty quick that there was something wrong in that Mass Effect thing. It was pretty obvious, especially once you meet the crazy dude. If anything, I thought it was too obvious.

    Hmmm, let me rephrase my comment.

    That is a much more sensible position, and I can empathize with your situation, even if I don't agree. Floating city, sunken city, it's all the same to me. Self-contained awesomeness. As long as what happens WITHIN the city makes sense, then I don't give a rat's behind what happens below, as long as it looks pretty (or doesn't look ugly).

    I feel like I'm one of the only people that wasn't blown away by Bioshock.

    I can't imagine why, as it seems like the majority of the people in this thread have stated that they share your opinion.

  11. Posted

    Also, as far as isolation goes, I think that being alone in empty space -- where seemingly no matter how far/fast you move, the things you can see around you aren't moving because they're so far away -- can be as isolating as being in a confined/constraining space.

    One of my biggest fears when I was a kid was of eventually becoming an astronaut (never happened, obviously ;_;) and getting stuck floating in the middle of space without anyone around. I'm pretty sure I had recurring nightmares about this (and also getting lost out on the ocean, again by myself).

    So, I agree.

    But this game, from the trailer and the interviews/demo-writeups, doesn't look/sound like it will be as much about isolation. Which is perfectly fine for me.

    Also: RPS interview up: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010/08/13/the-bioshock-infinite-ken-levine-interview/

    Definitely sounds like it is indeed a game with Bioshock mechanics in a fantastical, but different world. It also sounds like there will be SOME sort of connection, but who knows what at this point.

  12. Posted

    However, I don't think Infinite is going to be as atmospheric as Bioshock 1. Being in a dark, wet, underwater city that is falling apart is by far my favorite video game environment ever, you have an immense feeling of isolation at all times. Being in the sky just seems like it can't have this same feeling of isolation, it was cool in the trailer, until I saw the ground. And even though its impossible to survive a fall like that it still seemed not as scary as being underwater. Although I am sure Infinite will have a night time level that will be pretty creepy. Oh, look at me comparing the two games.

    I completely disagree with the implication that games have to invoke a feeling of isolation in order to be "atmospheric."

  13. Posted

    I wouldn't mind if the "BioShock" name from here on out was applied like a (far) cooler version of the "Final Fantasy" name. Eg, I hope that this game actually has nothing to do with the first two BioShocks other than the ideas behind the core design, and the idea of there being a strong central theme manifested as a physical space.

    Unless something super brilliant and unexpected happens, I don't know if, as a fan of the world of the first two games, I'd want these realities to be connected. That would imply that Andrew Ryan was aware of this huge other amazing ideology-as-city when he built Rapture. Takes some of the thrill out of that for me, for sure.

    I completely agree with this. I suspect this is probably the case, anyway, but who really knows at this point. One of the interviews (naturally, I completely forget which one) has Ken Levine specifically mention Final Fantasy.

    Even if there is a connection, it will probably be a rather small one (hopefully), and I can safely ignore it if I find it unsatisfactory. I have a special talent of being able to ignore things I don't like.

  14. Posted

    Well, I'm pretty excited.

    I also don't give two shits about the name. Wasn't System Shock essentially the same thing, just set in a dystopian future instead of a dystopian past? (I never played it or its sequel, but that's the impression I've developed over the years.) Whatever call it Shit in a Can and I'd still be interested based on the trailer and the developer.

  15. Posted

    I think it would be interesting to create a framework in your game to have community driven events/notes. So if anybody ever experienced something crazy, they could lock in some information and when other people did something similar an achievement style popup would spawn the note. I guess sort of like Demon's Souls, but more for open world events.

    A friend and I have been pondering a dynamic cheesemint generation system for a few years now. Neither of us has any idea how to really go about it (despite both being CS majors - so either it's actually a hard thing to do or we're both dumb! probably the latter!), but we both think it would make cheesemints about a million times more interesting than they currently are.

    I have nothing against them as they are in their current state, though. Just for the record.

  16. Posted

    Didn't Ken Levine get all angry and leave 2K, and now they can't make any more Shock! games or something I dunno. Whatever it is it will, like Bioshock!, be announced way too early so that I have to spend two years scouring the internet for trailers, leaked clips and tech demos. Also, it'll probably be sweet.

    AFAIK, Irrational is owned by 2K. D: They used to be called "2K [something]" after they got bought out but changed back to Irrational after Bioshock.

  18. Posted

    I can't imagine that a company like Double Fine, whose releases thus far shine perhaps best in the visuals department, would consider that GUI a final thing.

    Also: art style already growing on me. U: I think the only thing really bothering me (aside from GUI) is how bright the player models are compared to the backgrounds.

  19. Posted

    I'm not big on the art, but I love the concept. Things tends to grow on me over time, anyway, unless I outright despise them (and this art does not inspire hatred, just ambivalence).

    Guess we'll see.

    Of course, I can't play it anyway. Don't have a 360 or a PS3. U:

  21. Posted

    There's quite a bit of zug-zug going on in Warhammer. It's just not called zug-zug. It's also, at the same time, quite a bit more than "slightly more serious" than Warcraft. There's some dark shit in Warhammer. Meanwhile, there are some bad guys who do bad things in Warcraft. Addendum: there's some dark shit in expanded universe Warcraft. Addendum's addendum: to be fair, Warhammer Online is basically expanded universe from the table-top game which I mean who even gave two shits about the story when those little miniatures first appeared.

    My above post is a point-by-point observation. Unfortunately, I am not particularly talented at eloquently expressing exactly why Warhammer feels different to me. All I can say is that it does.

    To sum: They're both games first, story later. I enjoy them for their gameplay (well I didn't enjoy Warhammer Online beyond a couple months, but that's not the point here!), and sometimes the story enhances or detracts from my experience. I find that, in the past, Warcraft enhanced far more than it detracted. Now? Not so much.

    Maybe it's just because I'm just older than I used to be. But Warhammer's world and story did NOT detract.

    To sum the sum: Derp. Also, herp.

  22. Posted

    There are surely people better equipped to explain this than me, but:

    Most of it lies in the humans, I think. The "good" humans (Empire) have this fucked up religion that accepts no deviation from the norm. Witch hunters constantly persecute and discipline (i.e., straight up murder in this bitch) people on the tiniest suspicion of corruption. The "bad" humans (Chaos) spend all their time trying to corrupt the good ol' boys from their oh-so-righteous ways and into the self-serving, pleasure-seeking, freedom-granting powers of The Dark Side. It's not exactly groundbreaking stuff, but these themes show up constantly in the Warhammer MMO. Also, in general I think the Chaos dudes are always at war with each other over whose god is the best but in the MMO at least they are all teamed up, for obvious reasons.

    I think the dwarves have something going on, too, but I never played one. Wanted to (dwarves rock), just never got around to it. They hate orcs, or something. And I think they're like always angry or some shit. Orcs hate everyone (and goblins are cowards).

    The elves are kind of stereotypical "oh no we had this civil war and it split us forever" so the dark elves are just pure evil and the high elves are noble and proud and beautiful and oh don't you just want to marry him, etc.

    And that's about all I know!

  23. Posted

    Agree. ........just realized that now Moonshock is actually posible.

    Also, Irational aperantly has it's own podcast, which will probably get some more unexpected folowers.

    Do you think they could fire a man for being a reason that their podcast mailbag sudenly got a bunch of wizard related quotes?(don't do it kids, wizard is acctualy old now)

    Irrational Behavior is really really good. One of the best (possibly the best) game development studio podcasts around. Irrational Interviews, a newer thing where Shawn Elliot/Ken Levine (at least that's all it was for the first one) interview dudes from other developers, is also really good.

    ...

    Congratulations, Mr. Chris Remo. I am hilariously excited that two of my favorite games press members, both of whom always sounded, at least, like they knew their shit, are now working at the same company as one of my favorite game designers.

  24. Posted

    I feel a little disenfranchised by Warcraft too nowadays, but I wouldn't say it's the overt goofiness. Warcraft always had some small bit of humor in it: a case could be made that percentage-wise it's still the same. World of Warcraft is just so big that the humor plays a bigger role too.

    But rather than the comedy, in my case what happened was what happens with all fictional universes at some point: it just became too big to register. With the old Warcraft (as with the old Star Wars, for instance, or Dune) it was possible to know everything about it. But there's this point in which especially the expanded universe (books, comics, etc) gets so big and important that it becomes impossible to know everything. This is why Blizzard has dedicated loremasters who do nothing but check if everything is according to canon. When a job like that is created, it's no longer fun to follow it as a hobby.

    So with Star Wars my reaction was to only take the core canon into account. With Warcraft (where the game itself is so huge), my instinctive reaction was unfortunately just to give up on the lore. I just can't be bothered to know everything about every unique dragon aspect and faction anymore. Doesn't mean I can't enjoy the fiction, but I don't feel the way towards it I did when I knew FUCKING EVERYTHING about it around the time of War2.

    Actually, I'd say that my favorite part of the Warcraft lore is the expanded universe stuff. O: But then I am a huge nerdork.

    Maybe you are right re: humor, but I would disagree. I think there is a definite relative increase in the goofy crap that goes on. Before WoW, almost all the goofiness was relegated to "click on the peasant twenty times!" Now it's BAM in your face.

    I know people on the internet harp on this too often, but that particular treatment of goblins is 100% directly taken from the Warhammer universe. Orcs & Goblins are a combined army in Warhammer but I used to play a Goblin-only army full of all their wacky contraptions and units.

    Yeah, actually, I'm aware of this. I was never an old tabletop Warhammer player (always wanted to be - never had the money/parents willing to spend money/friends to play with/etc.), BUT I did play Warhammer Online for a few months so you could say I'm an expert.

    I had two characters when I played WAR. A goblin uh... yeah I forget... shaman thing! And a chaos uh... man. What a terrible memory I have. Melee dude of sorts.

    Anyway, the difference in tone between the two was even more jarring than it can be in WoW. The Orcs/Gobbos were all about "SMASHES DA HUMIES oops we blowed up" and the Chaos humans were all about "Grimdark Darkgrim has been SUCCESSFULLY CORRUPTED we are so awesome."

    But it didn't really bother me in Warhammer. I dunno why. Maybe it is as you say: it has the interesting subtext.

    Shame the game sucked.

    One of the big things that really makes me increasingly disinterested in the WarCraft world and story is that they seem to be taking more and more and more of the superficial elements from Warhammer, but none of the interesting subtext. It's just a bunch of STUFF all piled on top of itself, with no unifying tone or theme. I suppose that makes sense for an MMO, because it allows Blizzard to create races and locations that appeal to very different people, but I feel like it should be possible to do that within a more coherent world.

    Yeah, I dunno. I think the idea of just throwing in playable races for the sake of having playable races is stupid. Sometimes I'd rather they strengthen the lore/nerdstuffs of the existing content rather than shoehorn in some werewolves. And, yes, I know Gilneas has been an important part of Warcraft for a long time, and I've been wondering what was going on in there for a long time, but yeah.

    Classes are another story entirely as at least they offer distinctly different play-styles, when done right. I still want my originally rumored Archdruid hero class. ):

    Warcraft always looked like an unofficial Warhammer game to me. I even heard that a bunch of the artist were ex Games Workshop employees. In fact stuff like the sympathetic orcs I took as an attempt at distancing itself from the major influence. Warcraft goblins are definitely more intelligent than Warhammer's.

    FOr me the downturn in the Warcraft lore appeal is still the Burning Crusade Dranei. It was at that point that their lore became so convoluted that their own writers began tying themselves in knots and forgetting stuff. Their answer? Any retcon is justified in the name of marketing. I know I know, I'm incredibly geeky for caring about retcons. I just can't help but view it as a sign of lazy and/or careless writing.

    Maybe the change in tone didn't help. I don't like planetary fantasy all that much. WotlK rectified that a lot and kept me going for quite a while longer, but still.

    Ultimately though the biggest turn-off to play is the amount of content that is only available to high tier raiders. By content I don't mean the best gear - I am more than happy for hardcore raiders to pick up all the best equipment. I mean story. With each expansion I have had to skip so many conclusions to storylines. Bits of lore that I only know from hearsay. The world acts like I have completed every raid instance appropriate to my level, but I haven't and I doubt the majority of players have either.

    WotLK made a big improvement with it's 10 man and 5 man versions of raids - lesser rewards but you still get the sights and the sounds and the story. I can see how they might not want to make that content solo, in order to encourage teamwork. But the teamwork is just not inherently enjoyable - it has to be overcome in order to access the content. It's an obstacle. That's why I hate raids and guilds and all the bullshit that comes with them, most of the time. I have been in guilds and gone on raids and had fun but it always made me feel marginalised in some way. The game needs softer and more baked-in incentives to team up and co-operate fully rather than factionalise and compete. Co-operation needs to be fun.

    I'm okay with the retcons (in that they don't drive me batsonuts) and actually really enjoyed the overall TBC story. Would I have preferred no retcon? Absolutely. But hey, whatever! I got over it quick enough. Years of watching movies based on books has conditioned me to stop being such a stickler for story consistency.

    But I definitely agree about the raids and missing story content. I'll never see that stuff and it's really disappointing, because that's some of the BEST story stuff in WoW.

    I would argue, however, that the problem doesn't lie with requiring teamwork. The problem lies with the fact that people who are GOOD at teamwork tend to already be in the Good Guilds or whatever and refuse to play with us lesser beings, even if we might be an asset. We're just not hardcore enough.

    That's my experience, anyway. I know I'm not a bad player. I just don't have the time they do, and so I get stuck with the dungo players who have no idea what they're doing.