Gwardinen

Wait, how does geology factor in to eugenics?

Yeah I wouldn't agree that it's poorly optimised at all. I had most settings on high (including texture quality, despite the VRAM warnings) with a few on medium and it ran at 60 for the whole game on my GTX 670. That's way better performance than I've had out of any recent Ubisoft game, for example. Also better than Thief and Hitman Absolution, and maybe equivalent to Tomb Raider because for some reason Square Enix managed to get that one going ok. There are a few settings in this game that are meant for future proofing rather than actual current use (such as supersampling and 6GB VRAM ultra textures), but I haven't heard from anyone that hasn't been able to get decent performance with reasonable tweaks for their hardware. This isn't really a spoiler because if you've played a game or watched a film in the last ten years you're sort of expecting it, but the end of the game does leave open the possibility of a sequel. Honestly, that disappointed me a little. As you said, I would prefer something that has similar systems and concepts without it needing to be a direct sequel. That said, who knows what will actually happen down the line?

Yeah, I was so sold by that performance that I didn't realise it wasn't him until I looked at the list of voice actors on IMDB later. Some of the others are a bit more middle of the road - Troy Baker as Talion is competent and I'm never bothered by his performance but I'm also never awed by it, and Hirgon is similar. Celebrimbor, on the other hand, I actually quite like.

I don't know that "incredibly simplistic combat" is fair. It is simpler than the Arkham combat system only in that there are fewer "gadgets" that can be thrown into the mix. In every other way it it almost identical. While I am a big fan of the way the Arkham series incentivises deliberate use of as many different methods of attack as possible, I can see how a grading system for combat in this game would probably be too much given the complexity of the scenarios. What I mean by this is in Batman you can focus on trying to use your Batarangs, grappling gun, explosive gel, etc. all in one fight to get the best score because you're always in a very contained combat area that only includes yourself, enemies and maybe a couple of environmental objects (fire extinguishers and the like). In Shadow of Mordor, you may be in the middle of an enemy fortress which includes archers firing down on you, reinforcements coming in from any conceivable direction and enemies running for alarms. Then you add in the fact that wildlife may be involved (caragors and ghuls, most notably), that you may be RIDING a caragor, that there may be a captain involved with particular strengths and weaknesses, and that environmental objects exist in this game too (fires, bee hives). Also, that at any time you can start climbing and parkouring Assassin's Creed style, and that you can use the bow at any moment as well. For all of these reasons, I can certainly forgive the team for not quite making it to the Arkham level of gadgetary complexity + scoring system. It's certainly already more complex than Assassin's Creed's combat system, and I'm not sure I can think of another game in recent times that exceeds its combination of open world systemic interaction + combat complexity + fluid and unusual encounter design. I would also caution against making judgements about systems within the game while early in it. I'm getting the impression that some in this thread are not actually too deep into the game (especially the story quests), which is fine as it only came out yesterday, but this is definitely a game that reveals systems gradually. Branding changed almost everything about how I played, and as you unlock more rune slots and runes to put in them you may find your playstyle changing as well. My bow has suddenly jumped to the top of my most effective weapons due to acquiring a rune that has a chance to restore focus upon successful kills.

It does open up more. Don't be afraid to do some story missions, not just for that reason but also because they open up some neat abilities. You haven't even seen the beauty of the Nemesis/army system until you've unlocked Branding.

That was my favourite contextual prompt as well. Yeah, the difficulty can really ramp up occasionally. Particularly if a given captain happens to luck into some nasty traits. I was trying desperately to fight one with the Combat Master trait who was Immune to Ranged and Fearless and a bunch of other horrible stuff. I just absolutely could not take him down and he eventually defeated me, becoming even stronger as a result. So as you said, I then got some information on him and really planned things out, managing to stealthily murder him after discovering that was his one weakness. Sweet revenge.

While playing Dark Souls with a friend, I was a phantom in his world on what was both of our first playthroughs. We had no idea where we were going in the Depths, and I ended up falling through a hole I hadn't noticed, directly into a huge swarm of enemies that curse you (a horrible affliction that persists through death). Despite the fact that my friend had much more to lose in this situation than I did, he didn't hesitate for a second before deliberately jumping down after me. What followed was a tense, chaotic brawl through a claustrophobic series of chambers in which we desperately attempted to fend these creatures off and watch each others' backs. It wasn't just a great gaming moment, it was actually a great moment in our friendship.

I wish I had had a teacher like you, Miffy. I didn't realise that smart people still needed to work occasionally until I was 19 or 20.

I admit to some surprise as well. Although for the record, the Bat family is DC, not Marvel.

Holy crap! That is a lot of video memory! I have a pretty decent video card but that suggests I could only put this on medium. Even the new GTX 980 doesn't have 6GB!

I am also pleased because I have been getting surprisingly excited for this. Looks like Destructoid is not on board, though!

I must admit that I'm much more interested in Don't Starve now that there's going to be a multiplayer element. Is there any word yet on when it's likely to be enabled?

Yeah when I moved recently, I didn't have a working fridge for about two and a half weeks and it SUCKED. You either have to eat ramen noodles and soup, or spend even more money on takeaways. It's basically impossible to have fresh food without a fridge unless you have the time and money to go to markets - which since you have no fridge, you almost certainly don't.

I'm #61,192 because I foolishly had to sleep. Anyone want to trade?

Unreasonably adorable creature.

Congrats Miffy! (Fuck Miffy)

I definitely see myself as a Kappa.

Yeah I just read the entirety of Nimona and now I'm freaking out about the ending. DAMMIT TEG.

This makes me think more critical discourse should be delivered in song form.

That is a pretty large and detailed tattoo. How long were you in for?

I watched a game this morning. The whole production of the event seems pretty neat, and it's always fun to see people at the top of their game doing stuff I never could.

Honestly, this kind of freaks me out. I've been thoroughly unhappy with most of the decisions of this Conservative government, but as you said, Labour doesn't seem like a viable choice either anymore. And after the insane flipflop of the Liberal Democrats upon forming this coalition... well, it's hard to imagine most people trusting them again for quite some time. Now some may say "well now you finally have license to vote for someone other than the big three!". That's true, and from a certain perspective it's appealing. But considering that there are still more than enough party diehards to really fuck things up by never pausing for a moment to consider their vote, I can't help but foresee a huge mess during the next election, and fringe groups like UKIP and the BNP growing stronger for it. It's genuinely kind of worrying.

Well... I guess I know when I'm finally going to try Spacebase. Sad to see it "released" like this, though.

I'd probably do Boogie Nights first, not just because it was made first because it's also set first. It's very much about the time it's in during some scenes.