Playing other games

[volsung]

Well I finished the campaign of Dawn of War 1 and played through Winter Assault with the Order/Imperial Guardsmen. I thought about redoing mission 4 with the Eldar and playing the different mission 5, as well as playing both sides of the Disorder. Is it worth it? Will it just be repetitive?

I really had a lot of fun with both games. I felt like I needed to use deeper strategies for Winter Assault, and it felt just overall better scripted. I am ready to move on to real-time tactics and not have to worry about not having enough requisition or power to create units.

So, what do you think? Should I play Winter Assault again? Or just move on to DoW II?

 

[Blothulfur]

Go for DOW 2, it kind of follows on from a Blood Ravens victory in the Dark Crusade expansion (and a loss in Soulstorm), but it doesn't overly reference those expansions and neither of them match Winter Assault in my opinion.

 

[Garrison72]

I finally beat Hard Reset: Exile. Jesus is that game hard. I had it on hard setting most of the way, but fucked up my upgrades and had to drop it to medium at times. I'll not rest till I've beat it on insane. Plan to take a year off work to do it... The new addition was quite long, and has some wonderful level art. Interesting thing: at the end credits, Adam Scorupa was listed under sound design. Maybe the sounds of Hard Reset will be a preview of things to come in CyberPunk.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sv1SvWmKhbs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dte4WxDkxQA&feature=relmfu

 

[seekerpat]

Sleeping dogs looks promising.

http://www.gamingexaminer.com/sleeping-dogs-mrs-chus-revenge-gameplay-walkthrough-video/17270/

It does look good-a GTA clone set in Hong Kong, with gameplay right out of a John Woo movie. Don't get me wrong, clones can be a lot of fun to play, they often improve on the original-I actually enjoyed Titan Quest and Divine Divinity more than Diablo. And Saints Row 3 was hoot an a half.

This weekend I've been dipping into some games I got on sale recently: The Chronicles of Riddick(been wanting to check it out for awhile-so far it hasn't dissapointed), The Darkness II(over the top and very comic bookish, but pretty fun) Microsoft Flight(don't laugh, the Steam sale price was hard to pass up-its a solid flight sim and I find it very relaxing just to buzz around Hawaii & Alaska and not be running, shooting, slashing or blowing things up)

Also sunk a few hours into The Path of Exile's open beta. Its not a bad action RPG, nice art design, some interesting gameplay. Not keen at all on the online only part though. But they seem to be less money grubbing than Blizzard so I'll keep an eye on it. Really looking forward to Grim Dawn and Age of Decadence, but that should probably be the subject of a different thread

 

[volsung]

Go for DOW 2, it kind of follows on from a Blood Ravens victory in the Dark Crusade expansion (and a loss in Soulstorm), but it doesn't overly reference those expansions and neither of them match Winter Assault in my opinion.

Downloaded DoW 2 today and played for a bit. Still doing the first missions that were also in the demo.

Any advice on how to distribute the skill points for squad leaders? Is there a chance of breaking things up if I don't know what I'm doing?

My GPU reached temps in the 70's Celcius. Wasn't expecting that from a three year old game!

 

[phamvan94]

Any advice on how to distribute the skill points for squad leaders? Is there a chance of breaking things up if I don't know what I'm doing?

This is how I built them. Other build are also powerful but this is my personal favorite. FC can also go ranged but I like having a bruiser in the front lines. Cyrus is very tricky as all his trees are quite powerful. Build him according to your playstyle.

 

[daddy300]

Orcs Must Die 2 and Endless Space. Both very good!

 

[Dona.794]

I finally beat Hard Reset: Exile. Jesus is that game hard. I had it on hard setting most of the way, but fucked up my upgrades and had to drop it to medium at times. I'll not rest till I've beat it on insane. Plan to take a year off work to do it... The new addition was quite long, and has some wonderful level art. Interesting thing: at the end credits, Adam Scorupa was listed under sound design. Maybe the sounds of Hard Reset will be a preview of things to come in CyberPunk.

[epic music]

Damn, that's awesome I can definitely hear TW2-ish music... subtle, but it's there. It would be awesome if Cyberpunk took a similar spin on folk music. TBH I'll be sad if they remove Slavic influences from any of their games.

As for me... I finished watching a pretty good Assassin's Creed LP. I tried the game myself, but man, it was so repetitive I gave up after two cities :/ Luckily, the guy who did the LP had done a TON of research and focused on historical facts, interesting info like name origins, even pointed out some mistakes/inconsistencies. Definitely more fun than actually playing that game. It was boring up until the end, and even though 99% of it was predictable to the bone, I think I'll watch his AC2 LP as well. It's so nice to have someone point out all the fun things for you

Channel in case anyone's interested: http://www.youtube.com/user/GeopLP/videos?view=1

But honestly... how does such a shoddy game get a sequel (I can understand the series' success after AC2, but not how a sequel got greenlighted), and legit awesome games like Beyond Good & Evil get overlooked? Shame on you, Ubisoft.

 

[DeargRuadhri]

As for me... I finished watching a pretty good Assassin's Creed LP. I tried the game myself, but man, it was so repetitive I gave up after two cities :/ Luckily, the guy who did the LP had done a TON of research and focused on historical facts, interesting info like name origins, even pointed out some mistakes/inconsistencies. Definitely more fun than actually playing that game. It was boring up until the end, and even though 99% of it was predictable to the bone, I think I'll watch his AC2 LP as well. It's so nice to have someone point out all the fun things for you

Channel in case anyone's interested: http://www.youtube.com/user/GeopLP/videos?view=1

But honestly... how does such a shoddy game get a sequel (I can understand the series' success after AC2, but not how a sequel got greenlighted), and legit awesome games like Beyond Good & Evil get overlooked? Shame on you, Ubisoft.

Yes, it was very repetitive after a while, even though I managed to finish it. The original idea of the game wasn't bad, but the execution was poor. The second AC game at least tried to introduce some gameplay variety, with some success, so that was a decent game. I don't know about Brotherhood or Revelations though, I haven't played them yet.

I'll cast a glance at that LP.

 

[227]

The second AC game at least tried to introduce some gameplay variety, with some success, so that was a decent game.

Maybe it's my love of stories and characters above all else, but I hated AC2 with a burning passion. Ezio is a terrible, one-dimensional character compared to Altair. Even today I can't get past an hour in Brotherhood; the thought of having to slog through another game where he doesn't grow or change in any significant way is absolutely agonizing. AC1 may be tedious, but at least I wasn't actively wishing for the protagonist to trip and fall on a bed of spikes.

Mini-rant aside, I've been playing The Longest Journey for the first time. Also picked up Dreamfall on GOG during the weekend sale, so I figure I'll play through them back-to-back and get all pissed off since Dreamfall is apparently missing an ending or closure or something. Kind of wondering if it'll take the trophy for most cliffhanger-related rage away from HL2:E2 (one day I'll actually succeed in making Gabe Newell explode with my mind).

TLJ is surprisingly good. I never really got into those kinds of games because my thinking tends to be too abstract, as evidenced by me spending something like 30 minutes trying to convince the game to let me put chewed candy on a piece of french bread so that I could use the stickiness to grab a key from some subway tracks (which it didn't, despite the fact that it totally makes the same amount of sense as the actual way to get the key), but I'm still finding it one of those games that I can't wait to get back to playing. Always a good sign.

 

[DeargRuadhri]

Maybe it's my love of stories and characters above all else, but I hated AC2 with a burning passion. Ezio is a terrible, one-dimensional character compared to Altair. Even today I can't get past an hour in Brotherhood; the thought of having to slog through another game where he doesn't grow or change in any significant way is absolutely agonizing. AC1 may be tedious, but at least I wasn't actively wishing for the protagonist to trip and fall on a bed of spikes.

I didn't say that I like Ezio more than Altair. Altair had some kind of personality, he changed during the game, from a hotheaded, arrogant kid to a master assassin, which was great. But gameplay-wise AC2 was more enjoyable, because they introduced new gameplay mechanics throughout the game, in order to prevent the game from being repetitive.

 

[Dona.794]

I love The Longest Journey

 

[volsung]

I love The Longest Journey

 

[227]

Okay, finished The Longest Journey. Definitely one of the top ten games I've ever played.

But seriously, screw that underwater altar.

 

[KnightofPhoenix]

Maybe it's my love of stories and characters above all else, but I hated AC2 with a burning passion. Ezio is a terrible, one-dimensional character compared to Altair. Even today I can't get past an hour in Brotherhood; the thought of having to slog through another game where he doesn't grow or change in any significant way is absolutely agonizing. AC1 may be tedious, but at least I wasn't actively wishing for the protagonist to trip and fall on a bed of spikes.

While I agree that AC2's story is bad compared to AC1, which I found very good, repetitive gameplay notwithstanding (still played it 5 times and finished it every time, while doing every single thing minus the collectibles), I disagree on Ezio.

He does change, quite a bit in AC2. Brotherhood takes that further. And Revelations concludes his journey excellently. Not only does his personality and perspective evolve throughout all 3 games, so do his mannerisms and tone of voice.

Altair is more philosophical than Ezio, it is true (though its really the codices of AC2 that delve deeply into that). But that doesn't mean he is one-dimensional. He starts off that way (so does Altair), but grows as a character.
I am the kin of person who gets pissed off at most protagonists, so me loving Ezio is very high praise coming from me.


I am now hooked by Dishonored, it looks very promising.

 

[Aditya]

The AC franchise is one of the best out there. AC1 was good but very repetitive, but I LOVE the setting! same goes for AC2 which is sort of like a origin story or something (for say Batman Begins) Brotherhood is the best so far, and we see Ezio at his prime (sort of) Revelations was good and a excellent conclusion to Ezio (and Altair for that matter) but I still feel Brotherhood was the best among them all. Not saying its bad, ACR just a bit behind it but looks gorgeous nonetheless. I'm very storked for AC3, and also Dishonored which I'm going to pre-order soon enough. Just trying to save up and do something to pre-order Dishonored (and Dawnguard) on steam. Guess "Assassins" should have a genre of its own

 

[volsung]

Just wanted to say I've been playing Dawn of War 2 and I'm really enjoying it. I really liked both games (so far) even though, or maybe because, they are so different.

Also is it just me or DoW 2 makes the GPU run pretty hot? It reaches temperatures I only see with The Witcher 2. But I have to admit the graphics are pretty damn good.

 

[Blothulfur]

Not just yours Volsung, mine used to chug away like an asthmatics only marathon. Strange considering that there's a lot less going on (on screen) than in the original Dawn of War.

Indulging in a little bit of the Punisher, by god this game's raw, i've just thrown a mook into a car crusher. Bit sick.

 

[whatatwist]

Playing Skyrim with a new character this week, wanted to try to do the College of Winterhold and Dark Brotherhood questlines at least once before I install Dawnguard and start another character for that.

I finally beat Hard Reset: Exile. Jesus is that game hard. I had it on hard setting most of the way, but fucked up my upgrades and had to drop it to medium at times. I'll not rest till I've beat it on insane. Plan to take a year off work to do it... The new addition was quite long, and has some wonderful level art. Interesting thing: at the end credits, Adam Scorupa was listed under sound design. Maybe the sounds of Hard Reset will be a preview of things to come in CyberPunk.

I've only played it on Insane setting and I absolutely loved the game, but I got stuck last year at a really hard checkpoint where there are 3 gorillas in a courtyard and some of those shooty robots throwing missiles at you from a balcony. I could never get past that checkpoint, probably reloaded 30 or 40 times and finally gave up.

 

[phamvan94]

Right now I am alternating 2 MineCraft worlds (one semi-survival, one creative), STALKER Call of Pripyat (fantastic game, artifact hunting is great fun, bloodsuckers not so much) and Skyrim in "preparation" for Dawnguard (lvl 46 char with the best gear possible except enchants. Still need a few perks and levels in that). I'm actually having a lot of fun with Skyrim again now that I switched from Dual Wielding daggers to a Sword and Shield combo.

I should really start reading Analogue: A Hate Story sometime though lol.