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Video Games - a general discussion thread — Page 189

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xhonzi said:



doubleofive said:

... I just wish we could play together without buying another xbox and hooking it to the other TV.


 Me too.  But I would buy another xbox in a second if it also didn't mean I had to own 2 copies of every game I wanted to play this way.  If they used the install to HDD option to allow you to play it on multiple boxes on a LAN, I'd be all over it.

Now THAT is a good idea.

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Even if you could

1. Install to the HDD
2. Start the game with the disc in the drive
3. Remove the disc and leave the game running

I think you could provide this function AND curb piracy at the same time.  The only practical application would be to play LAN games.  I'm sure there are 6 copies of Halo in every dorm room, and that might change if they added this feature, but I can't see it resulting in too many lost sales.

IT'S MY TRILOGY, AND I WANT IT NOW!

"[George Lucas] rebooted the franchise in 1997 without telling anyone." -skyjedi2005

"Yeah, well, George says a lot of things..." a young 1997 xhonzi on RASSM

"They're my movies." -George Lucas. 19 people won oscars for their work on Star Wars (1977) and George Lucas wasn't one of them.

Rewrite the Prequels!

 

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Some people would see this problem as a reason to pirate games. I see it as a sad sign of what piracy has made companies do.

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 (Edited)

So I finished Uncharted 2 this week. Here comes my stream of consciousness...

I was surprised that it wasn't better than it was. It's probably that whole "uncanny valley" problem... it's sooo good in places that in the places it's not so good, it really sticks out.

Uncharted 1 was a really good game, but I found the combat to be really boring. I was getting into the gymnastic navigation and the puzzle solving and then the room would fill with bad guys and I'd say, "*Grumble and moan*... I guess I have to shoot these guys so I can go back to playing the game." I'm not sure what was wrong with the combat, but it was more of a chore than it was "fun." Whatever it was, they seem to have fixed it in Uncharted 2 (throwing grenades is very different, and better, but I can't put my finger on what else). The combat, the navigation and the puzzle solving seem to be equally engaging. I played on "Normal" and found the game to be engaging and to provide a challenging firefight every now and then. I probably could have handled "Hard" well enough, but with more dying. The game took me about 10 hours as it was, so I'm pretty content with my choice.

The biggest two issues I had were these:
#1: The more a 'game world' ressembles a 'real world' the more it needs to offer 'real world' options, I think. In one part of the game, I was stuck in a courtyard and allegedly supposed to climb to a second story window and continue on my way. In real life, Nathan Drake could have climbed to the second window in 6 or 7 different spots. In the easiest/most obvious spot, there was some 'debris' that 'blocked' Drake's ability to climb. In actuality, the debris formed a since ramp of things to walk up/climb to get to the top... but debris is a videogame staple of "you shall not pass" so I knew not to try too hard. In the end, I spent an actual 10 minutes trying not to figure out how Drake could get to the 2nd story window, but where the game developers intended for me to get up there. There was only one path up there, and it was mostly arbitrary and pretty well hidden. I do want the game to engage the logical part of my brain and not just hand everything to me on a platter... but I don't want to play "guess what the developer was thinking?!?!?" either. This happened to me maybe 5 times in the game.

#2: The story is really front and center in Uncharted 2... And it's not confusing, at least, not from a "who's the bad guy, what's the point, and what are we doing now?" kind of perspective... But it's really just a series of scenes and a slow progression towards the ending rather than a "story-story." Now, I'm slightly torn on the issue I'm about to bring up here...

Does every story have to confine itself to the 3 Act structure?

I'm not sure. I think there can be stories so interesting, so well told, or so avant garde that they can get away from the standard structure, and not only survive, but succeed. I'm not sure the story in Uncharted 2 is this way. Uncharted 1 suffered from a similar fate, I think. The storytelling didn't do a good job of communicating to me, the audience, what it was ultimately all about, and therefore what was required to let the story end. It felt like a series of scenes that were all in the pursuit of some magic artifact and that the story could have existed with any subset of the scenes.

Maybe this isn't a problem particular to Uncharted. I guess you could summarize Raiders of the Lost Ark in similar way. No doubt, due to the fact that much of Uncharted 2 seems to be based off of Raiders. I think BioShock 1, also, seemed to have this "problem" as well, but I didn't mind it as much in BioShock. In BioShock, the protagonist seems to be eternally just around the next corner from his objective: to escape. One more task, you think to yourself, and I'm out of here. Then the ceiling caves in and you spend an hour looking for a way around it. Now I'm free, you think. And then some poison gas goes off and you have to switch it off before you can continue. That takes another hour and it's time to get out of Dodge, you think. And then something else happens. 20 obstacles and 20 hours later, you manage to find your escape.

But it bothered me in Uncharted, for some reason.

This is somewhat minor, and more to do with my preference for the 360, but I was also annoyed by the controls. Why PS3 games still insist that you shoot with the smallish button above the "trigger" like button is Beyond me. (see what I did there?) I have a Shadow 6 controller for my PS3 so it is more consistent with the Xbox controller, and that helps... But you still have to shoot with the top button! Uncharted allows you to switch R1 with L1 and R2 with L2, but not R1 with R2 and L1 with L2. I found myself mashing the wrong buttons all of the time.

All in all, I was frankly just 'whelmed' by a game I expected to overwhelm me. It was the clear winner of the gaming press's game of the year and I'm not sure it made my list of top 10 games I played last year. People told me it was worth $460 it cost to buy this game new and the PS3 to play it on. I borrowed it from a friend and I can say I'd have been happy to spend $30 on it, but not much more. But I'm also a cheapskate and wouldn't be happy paying more than $30 for much of anything.

Next: BioShock2.

IT'S MY TRILOGY, AND I WANT IT NOW!

"[George Lucas] rebooted the franchise in 1997 without telling anyone." -skyjedi2005

"Yeah, well, George says a lot of things..." a young 1997 xhonzi on RASSM

"They're my movies." -George Lucas. 19 people won oscars for their work on Star Wars (1977) and George Lucas wasn't one of them.

Rewrite the Prequels!

 

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Well, after months of playing Modern Warfare 2 exclusively in special ops and multiplayer, I found myself with some extra free time and decided it was time to give the campaign a go. Since I had beaten nearly all the spec ops on the hardest difficulty with my friend already, I decided to try tackling the campaign on the hardest difficulty. Usually I am a pansy and shy away from the hardest difficulty, playing on either regular or whatever comes between regular and hardest if the game has such a thing, so this is not normal for me. I am by no means a hardcore video game player, and I pretty much suck at them.

Upon starting a game and trying to select the hardest difficulty, the dumb game warned me that I might be making a mistake because it is REALLY hard. I told it that I understood that and was okay with it. Then it asked me if I was sure about that. I told it I was. Then it asked me again if I was really sure about that. And again, now in frustration, I told it I was. I then proceeded to breeze through the entire game on the hardest difficulty with no problems at all. The most difficult and frustrating part of playing it on Veteran was convincing the game to let me play on Veteran and having to click "Okay" through THREE freakin' warning screens!!!

"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape

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Really? I tried parts of COD2 on Veteran and maybe some parts of COD4... and I found Veteran to be way too tough for me. Do you think it's different on MW2, or are you just all sorts of awesome?

IT'S MY TRILOGY, AND I WANT IT NOW!

"[George Lucas] rebooted the franchise in 1997 without telling anyone." -skyjedi2005

"Yeah, well, George says a lot of things..." a young 1997 xhonzi on RASSM

"They're my movies." -George Lucas. 19 people won oscars for their work on Star Wars (1977) and George Lucas wasn't one of them.

Rewrite the Prequels!

 

Author
Time

My first experience with any COD game was MW2's special ops. I bought the game because I wanted to play the spec ops with a friend of mine. To get three stars in a spec ops mission, you have to beat it on Veteran. On most missions we'd start off on regular or hardened and then do it again on Veteran. In spec ops every time you die you have to do the entire mission over again from the very start. In the campaign there are frequent check points, so in the event you run into something pretty difficult, you get to reply that bit over and over again making it a walk in the park in comparison to the spec ops. I still don't think I am that good at the game, and I still get knocked around by small children while playing online. I am surprised myself how little of a challenge I found it.

"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape

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L4D2 Saturday night?

IT'S MY TRILOGY, AND I WANT IT NOW!

"[George Lucas] rebooted the franchise in 1997 without telling anyone." -skyjedi2005

"Yeah, well, George says a lot of things..." a young 1997 xhonzi on RASSM

"They're my movies." -George Lucas. 19 people won oscars for their work on Star Wars (1977) and George Lucas wasn't one of them.

Rewrite the Prequels!

 

Author
Time

I will try, but probably not.

I am moving, and I will be at stages inbetween existence on Saturday. But, I will be staying with a friend who has an Xbox and L4D2, so maybe I can import my gamertag to their Xbox and... anyway, suffice to say it is not out of the realm of possibility for me.

"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape

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Moving again?  I thought you just moved.  Might as well tell me you're washing your blue, blue hair.

I've moved my gamertag over the internet before, and it took forever.  It's really quick if you happen to have a memory card.  I think you can use USB memory sticks over 1GB now, but I haven't tried that yet.

IT'S MY TRILOGY, AND I WANT IT NOW!

"[George Lucas] rebooted the franchise in 1997 without telling anyone." -skyjedi2005

"Yeah, well, George says a lot of things..." a young 1997 xhonzi on RASSM

"They're my movies." -George Lucas. 19 people won oscars for their work on Star Wars (1977) and George Lucas wasn't one of them.

Rewrite the Prequels!

 

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Time

xhonzi said:

Might as well tell me you're washing your blue, blue hair.

http://soundpolitics.com/MichaelScott.jpg

See?  I knew it wasn't a hat!  Suck it, C3PX.

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Suck it, with!

IT'S MY TRILOGY, AND I WANT IT NOW!

"[George Lucas] rebooted the franchise in 1997 without telling anyone." -skyjedi2005

"Yeah, well, George says a lot of things..." a young 1997 xhonzi on RASSM

"They're my movies." -George Lucas. 19 people won oscars for their work on Star Wars (1977) and George Lucas wasn't one of them.

Rewrite the Prequels!

 

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Time

Don't think We can play tomorrow night. Actually made plans to ge out of the house!

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doubleofive said:

Actually made plans to ge out of the house!

Is this some strange variant of "get" in the same way that Chaz Solo says "ye?"

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http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/avatars/custom/avatar-2162.png

Hey doube05, up fer some Solid Metl Haylide 2 tonight?  Ill bring the lickor.

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renewed faith in Nintendo.  MGS 3?  SNAKE EATER?  PORTABLE?!?

...You have my money.  AGAIN.  Massive launch list guys.

A Goon in a Gaggle of 'em

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I'm shitting bricks here... Ocarina of Time 3D.  I really need to finish the real thing now.

A Goon in a Gaggle of 'em

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Ric Olie said:

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/avatars/custom/avatar-2162.png

Hey doube05, up fer some Solid Metl Haylide 2 tonight?  Ill bring the lickor.

Hey, drunk 3PX is a really good speller. You're mocking me inaccurately.

"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape

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Tons of XBLA games on sale currently.  First and foremost: Shadow Complex is on sale at 560 MS Pts (1200 normally) which I highly recommend to anyone, especially if you're a Metroid or Castlevania fan, and especially at that price. 

http://www.cheapassgamer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=264333

June 14th - June 20th: "Summer '09 Redux" GOLD MEMBERS ONLY
-Marvel vs Capcom 2 - 560 Microsoft Points
-Shadow Complex - 560 Microsoft Points
-Splosion Man - 400 Microsoft Points
-TMNT: Turtles in Time Re-Shelled - 400 Microsoft Points
-Trials HD - 560 Microsoft Points

June 16th - June 22nd: "E3 Inventory Blowout" THIS SALE IS FOR GOLD AND SILVER MEMBERS
-A Kingdom for Keflings - 400 Microsoft Points
-Alien Hominid HD - 400 Microsoft Points
-Banjo Tooie - 800 Microsoft Points
-Bionic Commando Rearmed - 400 Microsoft Points
-Bomberman LIVE - 400 Microsoft Points
-Castle Crashers - 800 Microsoft Points
-Castlevania Symphony of the Night - 400 Microsoft Points
-Contra - 240 Microsoft Points
-Crystal Defenders - 400 Microsoft Points
-Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2 - 400 Microsoft Points
-Magic the Gathering - 400 Microsoft Points
-N+ - 400 Microsoft Points
-Panzer General - 400 Microsoft Points
-Portal - 800 Microsoft Points
-TMNT: 1989 Arcade - 240 Microsoft Points
-Uno Rush - 400 Microsoft Points
-Vandal Hearts: Flames of Judgment - 800 Microsoft Points
-Zombie Apocalypse - 400 Microsoft Points

IT'S MY TRILOGY, AND I WANT IT NOW!

"[George Lucas] rebooted the franchise in 1997 without telling anyone." -skyjedi2005

"Yeah, well, George says a lot of things..." a young 1997 xhonzi on RASSM

"They're my movies." -George Lucas. 19 people won oscars for their work on Star Wars (1977) and George Lucas wasn't one of them.

Rewrite the Prequels!

 

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Time

W85H says :

W85H

"Gold and Silver members?....Oh my!"

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C3PX said:

Ric Olie said:

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/avatars/custom/avatar-2162.png

Hey doube05, up fer some Solid Metl Haylide 2 tonight?  Ill bring the lickor.

Hey, drunk 3PX is a really good speller.

Maybe compared to sober CP3S.

ZING!!!

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June 14th - June 20th: "Summer '09 Redux" GOLD MEMBERS ONLY
-Marvel vs Capcom 2 - 560 Microsoft Points
-Shadow Complex - 560 Microsoft Points
-Splosion Man - 400 Microsoft Points
-TMNT: Turtles in Time Re-Shelled - 400 Microsoft Points
-Trials HD - 560 Microsoft Points

June 16th - June 22nd: "E3 Inventory Blowout" THIS SALE IS FOR GOLD AND SILVER MEMBERS
-A Kingdom for Keflings - 400 Microsoft Points
-Alien Hominid HD - 400 Microsoft Points
-Banjo Tooie - 800 Microsoft Points
-Bionic Commando Rearmed - 400 Microsoft Points
-Bomberman LIVE - 400 Microsoft Points
-Castle Crashers - 800 Microsoft Points
-Castlevania Symphony of the Night - 400 Microsoft Points
-Contra - 240 Microsoft Points
-Crystal Defenders - 400 Microsoft Points
-Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2 - 400 Microsoft Points
-Magic the Gathering - 400 Microsoft Points
-N+ - 400 Microsoft Points
-Panzer General - 400 Microsoft Points
-Portal - 800 Microsoft Points
-TMNT: 1989 Arcade - 240 Microsoft Points
-Uno Rush - 400 Microsoft Points
-Vandal Hearts: Flames of Judgment - 800 Microsoft Points
-Zombie Apocalypse - 400 Microsoft Points

 

Those are some very good deals. Quite tempting. Been wanting to try out Shadow Complex, but not sure if I really need it. Marvel vs. Capcom is pretty tempting too.

I am pretty broke though and don't need to be spending the money. Not like I have a shortage of games or anything. Also I have been quite tempted to buy the two DLC campaigns for Resident Evil 5 for 400 MSP each. Earth Worm Jim HD is another big temptation. Monkey Island 2 is coming out soon. And I have also been thinking about buying Boarderlands as of late. Don't want to spent much money on games, so I am going to have to pick and choose what of these things I want to get very carefully.

Any suggestions on all of this. Boarderlands, worth it or not? The DLC for RE5, any good? Shadow Complex, really as great as everyone says?

"Every time Warb sighs, an angel falls into a vat of mapel syrup." - Gaffer Tape