K-bohls!

Yeah, the only thing that caught my eye was the underwater subway, that could be pretty interesting but I would rather not pay $60 for a 15 minute interactive movie. Also COD:UO was the bomb, I used to play the shit out of a 24/7 Foy server.

So after playing through the first 15 hours of the Witcher 1, losing the save, starting over and playing the first 4-7hours before stopping again. I have finally picked it back up last week and blasted through a solid 25 more hours of great hilarious eastern European weirdness and a mesmerizing story. The Witcher is an amazing game. But seeing as 2 clearly has a lot more polish behind it does any of the "so bad its good" parts of 1 come through?

I am pleased by that giant robot. I am not pleased by the lack of a Mexican with a balloon-head.

Mount and Blade was one of those series that always interested me but I never got around to playing. So I was actually pretty interested in seeing how FaS would turn out, and now I am wondering if I will ever buy one of these games. It really seems like all they did was splinter the community, especially because there already is a gun mod for Warband. So now I am left sitting on the sidelines waiting to see which game ultimately takes over as the version you should get.

Coincidentally after finishing Portal 2 I also had the same urge. Luckily I had picked up the Half-Life complete pack during a sale and have been replaying through the Half-Life 2 story arc. I previously played Half-Life 1 when I got it and played normally until that part with the stupid rocket chamber green claw thing at which point I turned on god mode and bound my "g" key to give revolver ammo. PC games. So anyway, I have been playing through the Half-Life 2 games and it is just amazing how good they are. The only problems I encountered were after storming the Combine headquarters during the up-rising I could not find where to go and got incredibly frustrated for about half an hour as I walked around an empty battlefield. And episode one feels too much like an incredibly action packed bit of content and the puzzles in the game don't really standout as much as in Half-Life 2. But episode one was still a lot of fun, and that hospital level in particular was a high point due to the three way battle between the Combine, zombies, and me. So during the rest of this week I will hopefully make it through episode two and maybe Blue Shift, because Barney is so incredibly cool, and report back.

Oh man I loved the speedboat section, once you get that gun you know the Combine is in for some serious shit. And that helicopter battle at sunset is one of my favorite parts in the game. Also when it say's "isolated single-player experience" do you think they mean a single player experience with very limited to none character interactions? the Aperture Science facility is a pretty isolating place, where as in Half Life 2 you meet plenty of named characters as well as an ordinary rebel dude on the ground and explore a variety of places.

I was fine with that part, while it was blatantly obvious what was going on in the story Chell can't talk (which is explained perfectly) and it felt like GLaDOS instantly knew what was up but wanted time to collect/confirm her thoughts. I remember the first time she hears she replies then instantly goes "Oh my god" in realization of what had happened which conveys that she knows.

So I just finished Portal 2 in possibly due to the problem Orvidos described but whatever. It is amazing. I did find it to be fairly easy, to many times the test chamber would give the surfaces you needed and nothing else which led to about 2 minutes of thinking and 3 minutes of doing. I would blow through the puzzles and I wish there were challenge test chambers, but I can image the community will defiantly add hard as hell chamber which will make this game one of my favorites of all time. I still have yet to start co-op so if anyone wants to start from the beginning and have a pleasant chat while we play that would be rad.

So if you check out the Team Fortress 2 blug you will notice they jokingly said they snuck hats into Portal 2, obviously this is just that, a joke. But it seems that if you own certain hats in Team Fortress 2 then you get them in Portal 2, which is very exciting if you think about it. Could Valve implement all the TF2 hats into Portal 2? Could Valve set up some sort of cloud system that would store your hats for future Valve games? Hmmmm? I am talking about a system wide mass hat repository for all Valve games (with an option to turn hats off, of course).

This game is actually really funny to me, I very rarely laugh at jokes in games but I find my self actually laughing beyond a chuckle of acknowledgement. Also this might be lame but I think Portal 2 has one of the best graphics auto-detectors in video games, most of the time if you computer meets recommended specs you get everything on high, Portal 2 is able to choose the exact settings in order to have it look good and run beautifully. Lastly, I will totally be down for some co-op once I finish single player.

Yeah now that you point it out I can see why the reflex bosses could bother someone. Also, I really liked the Portal level, it was short and made to a very good song, I am just afraid if I hear it enough I will like it less and less and then be underwhelmed when I finally hear it in the game.

I thought the first one was the most boring, its basically like the rest of the level except you see the dots clumped up. Playing Breakout and Pong was a lot of fun and very challenging. Also I absolutely love how a random house pops up behind you during the Pong fight sometimes.

So did anyone even notice the TF2 update? When I got home on Friday I found out about that and was incredibly pumped, logged onto Steam and knew where my weekend was going instantly and have dumped countless more hours into Super Meat Boy (95.7 now) and have fallen in love with Bit Trip Beat. I also love how we are now part of the Half-Life universe, someones gotta reboot GLaDOS it just so happens that the biggest dorks over Half-Life will have the pleasure. Also I like the theory that this shit will go live at 50% (currently at 49.6) because apparently we have seen GLaDOS at half power in trailers, I have been avoiding all Portal 2 related stuff in order to have my mind completely blown. Either way video games are goddamn cool!

Was I implying something else?

Do you guys ever get that thing when you listen to someone for a long time and then see them in real life?

Wait a minute, are you saying his name is Girp? That's hilarious! I just thought it was named that because its Grip mixed up; ya know, like gripping the rings. I think its much better if we go with the climber actually being called Girp.

Even if there is one map I am fine with it as long as it is a good map. I played roughly 600 hours of TF2, 300-400 hours of that time was in tc_hydro I love learning every intricate detail and layout of a map. And the one map we have seen seems to have detail in droves with plenty of high and low spots for ambush. Also more built in hud in games is a good thing.

Anyone else think that the rings look like they are out of the SNES version of Aladdin? That is were I get the majority of my entertainment out of this game. Also the idea of having to jump from one ring to another is about insane as the idea of jumping in QWOP.

I think it is only local co-op which is a bit of a disappointment, but that is the only way to do multi-player for this type of game. It would stink for someone to use up your artillery shells or dynamite without you knowing in advance.

I would totally be down for some ArmA II, I have the original and love it even though I never got into the co-op side of things. I have been meaning to get Operation Arrowhead because it looks rad but the life of a poor student doesn't let me shell out chucks of money very often. So if anyone wants to run through a nice looking forest and then get shot at by someone we cant see, fumble around on the keyboard and throw a grenade at the ground and blow up (how most ArmA II related things go for me) hit me up!

I am currently doing another run through of The Saboteur (goty.cx of the year, all years) going for 100% because I am crazy, but after that I plan on going back to the zone with Complete. It's hopefully going to make me care to learn what the hell to do with those artifacts. Are you actually supposed to equip them? This question and more will hopefully be answered.

Nice! Was hoping for a GDC cast when I saw Chris mention going to San Francisco, glad to see it happen.

Is it bad that I just spent more money on the soundtrack then I did on the actual game? Either way Super Meat Boy is by far my favorite game of the past few years. Many a night has been spent getting my beautiful 106% and now I'm still going for Iron Man runs (of which I have done the first four light worlds). Super Meat Boy has some great music and I suggest everyone give it a listen here and maybe pick up a copy of the new CD. The man who did Super Meat Boy's music also did the fantastic Canabalt theme as well so I am happy to support him. So, just dropping in to continue supporting one of the best games and hopefully spur some conversation.

Oh man are these remixes great! I was hurting for some Idle Thumbs songs and these fill the void very nicely. Keep up the great work

Hey Idle Thumbs! Because this is a community of amazing people I want to support it by giving out our favorite thing, video games. I have chosen two games that will be given out to anyone who follows Squid Division's conditions. First off is one of my favorite little games Time Gentlemen, Please! I think it is a hilarious adventure game that deals with Nazis, Dinosaurs, and Magnum P.I. It is the sequel to Ben There, Dan That which is free at Zombie Cow's website. Now, if you are not into adventure games I also am giving away Zombie Driver. While I have not played it myself it looks pretty neat if you like cars and blood. Probably of the opposite side of the gaming spectrum when compared to an adventure game. Like I mentioned previously I'm trying to minimize my Steam Wallet and it was on sale and I thought someone might want it. So, why not give it away? If you want either of these games you can contact me through a PM or add me on Steam here. If you contact me through Steam please be a part of the radical Idle Thumbs Steam group so I can quickly tell why I have a new friend request. Thanks and have a wonderful holiday!