The Last Content Space Marine

So, I just finished a second play through of Deus Ex: Human Revolution. It really is a lot more enjoyable on the second round- and given how good it was the first time that is saying a lot. With a firmer idea of the game's mechanics and what you can and can't do it's much more enjoyable. Strangely enough I also found myself mixing up my play style a little more as I was wasting less augs on things I knew I didn't want, and so could try playing with other ideas. The end result was less stealthy and non lethal and a little closer to how Splinter Cell: Conviction is played, I.E stealth backed up with tactical combat. The Boss fights are also less of a grind as you can actually prepare for them, I visited Barret with a rocket launcher handy and the others got a dose of fully levelled up Typhoon. The ending set up still sucks, but hey, it's just a small nasty barb on the end of a fantastic game.

I also grabbed the DLC package ‘The Missing Link’. It was meh. Reasonably well executed, but it falls into the same mechanical traps as a lot of DLC (I.E stripping you of your kit and skills to balance to the game, as opposed to just... balancing the game). It certainly isn’t bad, but it’s just so unnecessary. It doesn’t square up with the rest of the plot- which is fine in basic principle (Fallout 3 and New Vegas used DLC to tell their own self contained stories)- but given that the DLC is billed as filling in a gap in the story it does a pretty crap of job it. This is especially true when you consider the gap was left in (or more accurately alluded to) specifically for the DLC. All in all, at £8.99 I don’t think it’s worth it.

Removing your augs is also a bit of a shitter. Deus Ex: Human Revolution really comes into its own once you’ve found the play style you like and the augments to make it work. Taking away the augments and your gear is just a lazy way to make you improvise. I get the idea; I really do- force the player out of their comfort zone and create a new challenge in doing so. My complaint is that we’ve already faced these challenges before- at the start of the game when we were finding our feet. Wouldn’t some new enemies, or new obstacles (no, those spinning lasers don’t count) be a much better way to create a challenge? It would be fresh and new as opposed to just treading over the same ground again.

But again the level design remains complex with multiple routes and ways to play, the acting is still pretty good and the artistic direction (while very reminiscent of Doom III), is quite imposing. It’s good, it just feels a little lazy and could’ve been as good as the main game.

The Missing Link is about four hours of extra gameplay, nothing more and nothing less. If you’re willing to pay the better part of a tenner for that then you’ll have a blast. If you wanted something a little more though, you will be disappointed.

2011 has not been a good year for me. But it has had its upsides! One of those has been the release of some pretty awesome games. So, today’s post is dedicated to my personal favourite games of 2011. Note that I say *my* personal favourites- I’m not claiming these to be the very best of the year in a complete sense, but they are the best that I played. If you feel a game deserves a mention then head to the comments section and by all means have your say- I’d love to hear what you think!

So, with flame proof wards in place, let us jump to the award ceremony of the Evi’s 2011! Only slightly less unprofessional the Spike VGA awards.


Best Graphics:

Runner up: Skyrim.
Skyrim is a bloody gorgeous game. I love the visual design, I love the almost authentic Nordic styling, the rolling plains, the craggy mountains, the weather effects and I especially love the design of the dragons. But I can’t help but feel that Bethesda didn’t quite get the game looking as good as they could. With a few beautification mods such as a graphics post processor though, it looks stunning. I’m relegating it to second place though because one other game really did take me by surprise with the quality of its visuals...

Winner: Battlefield 3.
Shame about Origin, but this title just looks stunning. Now, it’s sad that such immense quality is being used in a grey brown shooter, but the lightning effects, textures and particle behaviour are second to none. I’d love to see what people do with the engine in the future. It’s unfortunate that I’ve not had the time to play much of the game itself, but It is without a doubt the best looking game of 2011, its sheer quality making up for the drab ‘realistic’ styling.

Best soundtrack.

Runner up: Child of Eden.
A legitimate attempt to make a game specifically for the Kinect, Child of Eden is a fun, hyper stylized rail shooter from the creators of Rez. While in many regards it leaves a lot to be desired (it’s more of an experience than a game), the soundtrack is top notch. Sometimes this accolade is given for music that just sounds good, but Child of Eden’s soundtrack is not only of the highest quality, but also manages to complement the graphics and even the gameplay flawlessly. How do you even manage to make music ‘sound’ like a gameplay mechanic? I don’t know, but Child of Eden did it.

Winner: Bastion.
Darren Korb is a name to remember. He’s the man behind the soundtrack of Bastion, and is without a doubt the composer of the best soundtrack of 2011. He captures the scenes his music plays over beautifully, and the production values are top notch. Best of all, they even sound great outside of the game. You can buy the soundtrack on Steam and I would strongly recommend that you do so. Korb has a unique sound and style, and I can’t wait to hear what he comes up with next.

Best Voice Acting

Runner up: Stephen Merchant as Wheatley (Portal 2)
Merchant narrowly beat out Danny Wallace as Shaun Hastings (Assassin’s Creed) for this spot. I think they are both about equal, delivering great off the cuff performances and providing some much needed comedy relief in both of their titles. However I can’t help but feel that Wheatley’s stronger presence in Portal 2 gave him an edge. His character was ‘more interactive’ and as such it’s easier to appreciate his performance. He nailed every line, and was an immensely fun addition to the franchise. I’d love to see Wheatley again, and I can’t wait to see what Merchant does next in the videogames industry.

Winner: Mark Hamill as Joker (Arkham City)
When people talk about the Joker these days they often refer to him as a different character depending on who is writing/playing him. In much the same way that people may talk of ‘X’s Mark Antony’ or ‘Y’s Mickey Johnstone’. It’s a testament to the depth, versatility and complexity of the character that people differentiate between the different portrayals far more than Batman. While Heath Ledger remains my favourite Joker, Mark Hamill’s portrayal in both Batman: The Animated Series, and the Arkham games is a close second. He’s got the perfect mix of menace, dark humour and sheer insanity that make the character so fantastic. It was easily the most memorable performance of 2011; creepy, compelling and creative. A well deserved win. A special mention also needs to go to Tara Strong who played Harley Quinn. She and Hamill worked exceptionally well off each other. Oh, and Spike? YOU DO NOT STICK LUKE FUCKING SKYWALKER IN THE BLEACHERS AT YOUR AWARD CEREMONY.

Best Storytelling

Runner Up: Gears of War 3...?
Yes, you read that right. And no, I’m not being a jackass just to drum up controversy! I honestly really enjoy the Gears storyline. It’s extremely basic, but it’s well told with only a few plot holes (fewer than most games anyway) and it has some great moments. I can’t really give away too much without spoilers for people who haven’t played it, but there was one moment in GoW3 that honestly nearly had me in tears. Yeah I’m man enough to admit it. I love to lose myself in games and Gears makes it very easy to do that. It may not be challenging or deep, but it’s easy to get attached to the characters and the occasional dramatic moments are well done. Plus it was a breath of fresh air to see a male and female lead in a platonic relationship. It’s rare to see that in any media, let alone videogames. It may not be everyone’s choice for runner up, but it is mine.

Winner: Bastion.
The Kid takes home another trophy! Storytelling in videogames is often done in a very hamfisted way, typically through endless cut scenes or walls of text (I’m looking at you FFXIII). In some cases this works well. Hideo Kojima has elevated the endless cut scene to the status of a genre in and of itself. But for the most part when they want to tell a story most developers forget that they are making a game that is designed to be played. Enter Bastion. No cut scenes, no lengthy dialogue sequences, no walls of text. Bastion’s use of constant narration, while initially annoying until you get used to it, is a hugely innovative step in videogame story telling. It won’t work for every game, however as an experiment it was a fantastic way to maintain constant gameplay and combine it with a well told yarn. A sure spot for number one.

Best Gameplay

Runner up: Arkham City
Arkham Asylum is one of the best games ever made. I hold this truth to be self evident, and therefore do not need to justify myself to you philistines! It’s was even down in the Guinness book of world records as game with the highest number of perfect score reviews. Arkham City makes it even better, opening the game out a little, adding more content and even managing to improve the already fantastic combat system. It’s simple, intuitive and hugely rewarding. I wouldn’t be surprised if this was most people’s number one spot for this category.

Winner: Tropico 4.
Another controversial decision. Tropico 4, like Tropico 3, has a flawless complexity curve. It’s fairly simple to pick up the basics, and once you have that the entire island is your oyster. As you get better and better at the game you start to notice more and more ways to tweak the world and your city. After a few hours you’ll be knee deep in ‘socio-political engineering’ I.E, brainwashing everyone into loyalists. Through dozens of subtle methods you can achieve a massive array of results and very different styles of society. The best part is at no point do you feel you ‘need’ to learn more. You go from beginner to master without ever actually realising that your game is improving- all thanks to the way that new concepts and ideas are introduced at a pace you set, without even realising it.

Best Smartphone Game

Runner up: Zen Pinball.
Mainly for Teraga equipped tablets, Zen Pinball is a port of Pinball FX which most of you will know from the Xbox Live Arcade marketplace. It uses some of the same tables and is every bit as good as its 360 counterpart. Zen has great, realistic physics, oodles of style and a compulsive element that borders on Civilization levels. The only drawback is that it won’t work well on all Android devices, so remember that if it doesn’t work you can claim a refund within 15 minutes of purchase. Try to beat my highscores! I’m Evis03!

Winner: Grand Prix Story
The ‘Story’ games are basically business management titles. Don’t let their simplistic graphics fool you though! These are very high quality, well thought out, deep and complex games with loads of replay value. Grand Prix story devoured hours of my life as I lay in bed fine tuning my vehicles, training my staff and researching new technology. A light version is available as a demo and well worth a look. It is available on both Apple and Android stores.

Wooden Spoon- Because some things are just S###

Runner up: Duke Nukem Forever.
Awful graphics, horrible presentation, crap gameplay, abysmal music and frankly far more fun as a running joke. It wasn’t the worst game I’ve ever played, but it was certainly one of the worst purchases I made in 2011. More thoughts here.

‘Winner’: The 3DS.
Here comes the stampede of Nintendo fanboys! I got a 3DS on release date (hell, I went to the midnight launch) and my thoughts on it have been made eminently clear elsewhere on this blog for those who care to read the drunken ramblings of a madman. The long story short though is that while the console itself is fine (I’m one of those strange people who don’t hate 3D on principle- but I do acknowledge that no one seems to use it properly at the moment), the launch line up and subsequent releases were atrocious. What wasn’t just outright crap was either meagre, or rereleases of old games. I already have Ocarina of time. I can play it any time I like on a 36” screen. I don’t give a shit about paying another £40 to play it in 3D.

To cap it off, all my mobile gaming these days is done on my phone or tablet anyway. Games on these platforms are far cheaper and far more suited for quick, pick up-play-put down, style gaming that is so important on a commute. Easily the biggest waste of money this year- and that’s saying a lot from someone who bought both DN:F and Dragon Age 2.

Game of the Year

Runner up: Skyrim
A game with the compulsive nature of crack and the eeked out rewards of the crack dealer. It strings you along and keeps you playing for just one more quest, one more item, one last cleared dungeon- then you can go to bed. You awake four hours later, your face plastered to the keyboard, drool gumming up the keys and the gentle smell of urine from your trousers.

This is Skyrim’s greatest asset and yet also why it isn’t my GOTY. I can’t stop playing the bloody thing. I honestly can’t. But the thing is I can’t figure out why. Everything about it is very well executed, the combat works, the skills are cool, and the world is nice and so on. The stories are a little lacklustre but that’s par for the course with Bethesda games. But that’s just it. Nothing individual is outstanding, but when you put everything together it metamorphoses into something that you just can’t put the fuck down.

Skyrim is a fantastic time sink. I’ve played it for nearly 70 hours, and you know what? I barely remember any of it. Most of the time I have the game turned down low and I’m also listening to an audio book. Yet despite the fact that it leaves so little impression, I keep finding myself throwing hour and hours and hours into it. That alone has to be worth massive kudos, so I offer it the runner up space.

And the Game of 2011 is....

Arkham City.

Arkham Asylum is- as I have previously intimated- one of the finest games ever made. Arkham City is even better. I’ve touched on the improvements made before, but much like Assassin’s Creed 2 to AC1, Arkham City builds on the strongest points and shuffles the weaker ones around or does away with them entirely. Everything about this game is fantastic. The graphics are of the highest quality and also wonderfully moody and atmospheric. The sound is well done, the story is well told if a little pat, the villains are wonderfully imagined and the entire thing has been completed to a level of polish and excellence that brings a manly tear to my eye. It does everything right. What more can I say except it’s my favourite game of 2011, and Rocksteady are the best thing to arrive in the gaming community since Felicia Day.

Noteworthy mentions

Deus Ex Human Revolution
What happened to this game? It hit the community with the force of a category five tornado wielding Thor’s hammer and then vanished. I know that there was some DLC, but for a title so hotly anticipated and so well received (even Yahtzee praised it) it passed in the blink of an eye. It’s a strange conundrum!

Sonic Generations
A shout out needs to go to everyone’s favourite woodland mammal. He’s had a hard time of it the last ten or so years, but Generations shows that Sonic can still be good. A return to the basic values of the franchise was just what the Dr Eggman ordered, and Generations delivered. A hugely enjoyable platformer, and a welcome return to excellence for the speedy hero with the blue dreads.

LA Noire
My review of this title is elsewhere on this blog. I’ve come to the conclusion that it was a fairly poor game. I’ll praise Team Bondi (well I would if they still existed) for their willingness to take a risk and try something new, but much like Mirror’s Edge the end result was less than promising. Fair dues to you for trying people, but a lot of us were hyped for this release and ended up disappointed.

Dragon Age 2
I’ve ranted, raged, cried, sacrificed goats and called down the wrath of any God who will listen on/against this game. But I do need to make one point very, VERY clear as I breezed over it in my video review.

It isn’t a bad game.

It was a crushing disappointment, and a clear message from EA that it didn’t care about the Classic CRPG crowd that DA:O was aimed at. But it wasn’t a bad game. It worked, it had some nice characters and at the very least I played it through the (bitter) end. While I loathe and detest it with every fibre of my being, do not let it be said I declared it to be bad in ‘overall’ terms.

So that’s 2011 sorted. On to a new year, new games, maybe some new consoles and more potential than you can shake a wii-mote at! Love and peace y’all!

-Evis T.

Alright, so for the last 10 hours or so I’ve been playing The Witcher. This game has come more highly recommended from the gaming community as a whole than Jesus from a Jehovah’s witness.

Honestly? I’m disappointed. Very few games can ever really live up to the hype that surrounds them, but by and large I’ve managed to find gaming communities that are mostly aligned with my own views on the hobby, and as such when they get excited about something it’s usually something I’d enjoy. In these cases, over hyped games usually come out as ‘good, but not excellent’.

The Witcher doesn’t even really make it into the realms of ‘good’. Now don’t get me wrong, it isn’t a bad game by any stretch of the imagination- the graphics are pretty good, the world is well realised, the music is top notch and the gameplay has a few really good ideas under the bonnet. Where it fails is the fact that the really good ideas at the core of the game are packed around with mounds of sloppy voice acting, utterly atrocious quest design and (thus far at least) piss poor characterization and a no brainer plot.

First off though, let’s be positive and take a look at the things that The Witcher does right.

The combat is pretty fun. The fact that The Witcher is played with only one character instead of a party like most RPGs opens up new options and styles I haven’t previously seen in a videogame. You can chain attacks together with careful timing, and spells can also be used to turn the tide of a battle in a meaningful way. Your spell casting is limited just enough that you don’t fire off spells willy nilly, but free enough that you’re never too worried about ‘waiting until you really need it’.

You can also adopt a variety of stances in combat, but to be honest I don’t really regard this as anything other than busy work made to make the game feel more tactical than it really is. Reason being that each enemy is essentially ‘weak’ to one stance. Using the wrong one will either result in you doing piss all damage, or the enemy dodging entirely. It’s no more tactical than ‘use fire on the ice monster’.

The alchemy and potions mechanics are very well balanced and allow for a variety of options. Unlike most RPGs, potions in The Witcher are not simple ‘fire and forget’ consumables that you occasionally use to heal when your mage has hit the dirt- they are a core element of your combat strategy. Potions have wide ranging, noticeable effects, and they last for hours. If you pop a healing potion then for quite a while you are going to be very hard to kill as your health regenerates so quickly that most enemies can’t even hurt you. Likewise, pop a Tawny Owl potion and your endurance will regen so quickly that you can fire off spells left right and centre.

There is a price though- every time you consume a potion, it adds to your toxicity level and as that climbs various effects kick in. They start with little graphical effects, but then quickly climb to health penalties, and eventually if you max the gauge out- death. There are of course many ways to lower toxicity, but if you’re in a dungeon then you’ll want to be careful which potions you are taking. The more powerful potions such as Blizzard can add quite a bit to your toxicity level and don’t last anywhere near as long as other potions. Keep popping them and you’ll be seeing stars.

The setting is very atmospheric and dark, with a grim overtone to everything. It manages to achieve dark fantasy in a very real way, yet also manages to maintain an air of authentic medievalism at the same time.

So then you might ask what the problem is. First off this game has masses- and I mean absolutely masses- of dead time. Out of the 10 hours I’ve spent with the game, I’d say about 50-60% of that (at least) was spent simply running from one place to another. Eventually I got so utterly bored I started travelling at night just so I could at least get some fights. Sadly this just meant that I was spending even longer completing quests, and I was essentially just driving my wheels deeper into the mud. The game begs for a fast travel system. It’s not even like there’s any reward for exploration, the game is just wasting your time, padding itself out.

The quest design is terrible. Irredeemably terrible. Most quests are just ‘go here, kill X, come back’ or even the oft abused ‘Collect X many monster bits and come back’. Seriously? This crap is played out and dead in World of Warcraft and these clowns think they can get away with it? I know when you get down to it there are only so many quests in RPGs, but the difference is in how you dress them up and make them interesting again. Literally no effort has gone into doing this with The Witcher.

Combine that with the amount of dead time and you can see why I’m getting frustrated with this game. That’s not even including the bloody research. I like the idea of research in principle, it adds a level of immersion. However when you need to do this research just to be able to harvest parts from the monsters it gets a mite frustrating. Why can’t we do extra damage or stuff like that? Even Alpha Protocol managed to get that right. Factor in that even figuring out how you’re supposed to do this research can take an age (typically one NPC in the area will have a book on the monster), and the amount of dead time in the game is further increased.

Let me put it this way, it took me over eight hours to get out of the first area after the tutorial section. A level not much larger than the New Vegas strip- and with far less content.

The voice acting is terrible. Doug Cockle as Geralt gives a totally bland, level, unemotional and utterly boring performance. He finds not one trace of emotion or soul in the character, delivering every line in the same coma inducing monotone. I’m not kidding, every line from flirtation to rage is like listening to... well... This. In fact one could argue this performance is at least varied.

Not that Cockle is alone in giving a terrible performance- pretty much everyone has a hard time finding so much as an inflection in their speech.

I hate to rag on the plot, but there’s no excuse for a game to develop at this utterly tortuous pace. Think of everything that happened in the first 10 hours of Final Fantasy Seven. Think of everything that happened in the first 10 hours of Dragon Age: Origins. What happens in the first 10 hours of the Witcher? You’re order of monster slayers has their stash nicked, and you kill a demon dog. I’ve got no problem with a slow burning plot, but this isn’t even smouldering.

Oh, and you’ve visited a grand total of TWO locations. And that’s including the tutorial area.

If anything is going to stop me playing (and believe me I’m considering it), it will be this. I know many people feel that it’s wrong to write off a game’s plot without actually seeing the whole thing, and for the most part you’d be right. But when the way the plot is developing (or rather not developing) is the main thing that’s driven you away- I’d say that’s damning criticism in and of itself. To put in a parallel, if a movie is so bad you walk out of the theatre people don’t say “well you can’t judge the movie, you didn’t see it all”, they ask “was it really that bad?”

Geralt as a lead character is painful. I complain about Cockle’s performance, but really the writing sucks too. It takes a skilled writer to use the amnesia plot device well, and whoever adapted this game just can’t cut the mustard. Geralt has no personality, no motivation (beyond fucking anything that moves) and is just... well... boring. Amnesia doesn’t mean your character doesn’t have any sense of self- it just means they can’t remember anything. It’s also worth noting that this ‘total amnesia’ is complete balls. The complete loss of every single life experience simply does not happen. I can forgive it if it’s used well or built up (E.G Namelss One, Planescape:Torment), but here it just comes across as an excuse to avoid giving the character any actual character.

So ultimately I need to come down hard on The Witcher. It has some really nice ideas, and if the sequel sorted out the problems I’ve outlined above, I think it would be one hell of a good RPG. As it stands though, The Witcher is a few shining nuggets of gold floating in an ocean of filth. I can’t be too hard on it though, as at least it’s trying to innovate within the genre, and that is always worth kudos. As a score, I’d call it a 6/10. There’s some great potential here, but it’s buried under mounds of problems that stop it ever really shining.

###############


I’d like to make one final note. It’s not really related to the game, but more an observation. The people who are singing the praises of The Witcher, are the same people who have been lampooning Dragon Age 2. And I know people are going to crucify me for saying this, but honestly? They’re very, very similar games. Both are action RPGs with crappy plots and an emphasis on action and killing things over any alternative style of play. Both have underdeveloped, poorly defined leads, both have an oversimplified inventory management system and both force you to keep running back and forth over the same tiny areas.

To be honest, speaking totally objectively- I think Dragon Age 2 is the superior game. I honestly can’t believe I’m saying it myself, but the design remit was to create a no brainer action RPG, and they delivered. The only thing that The Witcher does better is the alchemy system, but DA2 counters that by using powers, stances and companions. Plus the combat is at least more entertaining to watch. I feel dirty admitting it, but Dragon Age 2 was more of a bitter disappointment than an actual really bad game, and I honestly think that if it had been released as a totally new franchise, people would rate it over The Witcher.

DA:O Still wipes the floor with both of them though.

I’ve just finished Portal 2 and looking around the interwebs, there seem to be a considerable amount of bullshit flying around about it. I’d like to take this chance to talk briefly about my feelings on the game, and to clear up some of the bollocks people are saying about it.

First off, it’s a good game, lacks the impact of the first (to be expected, as we will discuss below), but it’s still fun. I'd happily give it 8 out of 10, marks lost only for being very short. That said, what was present was of high quality, and I’d rather a short excellent game than a long bad one. This brings us neatly to the first allegation, that Portal 2 is only 4 hours long. This is, quite simply- wrong. It took me 6 hours on my first run through, and from what I've heard that's fairly fast. I’d imagine you might be able to trim it down to 5 if you really powered your way through and didn’t need to think, but no less than that. And that isn’t including the co op levels. I’d be lying if I said I was happy with the length, but it certainly isn’t criminal.

People are complaining about the day one DLC. Why they’re doing this eludes me. It's a purely cosmetic difference; there are no new levels, no extra content or anything like that, just some stupid gubbins for your co op character. That is not worth complaining about- if you want an example of day one DLC that is taking the piss, look at DA2. If Valve expected you to pay for new levels and so on, I’d be right there with you fanning the flames, but when it’s just a hat for your robot (that anyone with a half a brain wouldn’t shell out for anyway), is this really that big of an issue?

Allegations of porting. Even if Portal 2 is a port, the control is excellent, the graphics are strong and if it wasn't for that one message when you save, I doubt anyone would ever have known. There is nothing wrong with ports. There has never been anything wrong with ports. When something is BADLY ported, then you have something to complain about as a bad port can fuck a game up entirely. Portal 2 on PC plays fine. It’s a good port.

'Living up to expectations'- Portal 1 was a groundbreaking proof of concept game that was unlike anything that had come before (well almost. If I don’t mention Narbacular Drop, Styg will kill me). Portal 2 was never going to have that same impact as it's not entirely new. There are certainly new elements to the game, but if you're expecting to be as amazed as you were before, then you're an idiot. Go and find a new game to play, and you can be amazed all over again. There are plenty of indie titles pushing the boundaries and offering new ideas.

The ARG- Valve announced the release date of Portal 2 as April 19th. Yes, they could have released the game earlier, but instead they went with the ARG, and I for one had a blast with it. Being part of a large group working towards a common goal was a great experience, watching people piece together different pieces of the puzzle was interesting, and overall I think the entire idea was very well executed. It also accompanied a sale of games. And for those of you who didn't want to be in the ARG, as I said, you DIDN'T LOSE ANYTHING. It was announced for April 19th and it released on April 19th. The ARG was certainly a way to make money first and foremost, but it offered a potential bonus for playing, as opposed to taking something off you for not playing.

And really, if we’re talking about Portal 2 itself, should the ARG really enter into it? I suppose there’s an argument for it on both sides, but personally I feel it’s not fair to condemn a game just because you disagreed with the advertising surrounding it.

So there we go, initial thoughts on Portal 2 and the foul air that has begun to surround it. A video review will be on the way.

Peace.

Evis T.

So, I made a bad decision. I guess I used up all my pot luck when I got my kinect. This post will be short and bitter as I am still stewing.

I decided to buy StarCraft II. Several people have now told me that the single player mode isn't a pile of horse shit and actually has some effort behind it. So I decided to buy it. Big. Fucking. Mistake.

Every half hour or so the client pops up with this wonderful little error message that reads “Your Download could not be authenticated. Start a new download.” And requires me to go to the Blizzard website, download a new instance of the same client, and then carry on where I left off- if I'm lucky. One time It just removed all the extra stuff I'd downloaded from that batch.

For a 7 gig file, this is beyond a joke. Oh and to add insult to injury, it's not even a download, it's a torrent.

So basically I can't even leave my PC running overnight to download this shit storm as every so often it just decides a whole new instance of the client needs to be installed.

Fan fucking-tastic.

My advice is simple. You want this game? Bbuy a hard copy. Don't be a sucker like I did and hand over £50 when they can't even make the installer work.

Anyone else having these problems or is it just me?

Update:
Now had to redownload the installer client 5 times.

Here you are peeps.

Long story short, excellent game, loving it to bits.

So, I saw a news post concerning an attack in 0.0 on EVE online. The attacks destroyed over 300 billion isk (isk being EVE’s in game currency) in hardware, materials and capital ships under construction. The interesting part of the news post though, was that the isk lost was valued at $15,000. Basically, if they’d sold those materials for the isk value and then sold the isk for dollars, someone would be $15k richer.

That’s a sobering thought. A potential $15,000 up in smoke. That got me thinking, how much ‘real money’ is lost in EVE by people playing? I mean this was a huge chunk but there are wars raging in EVE all the time.

To date, I’ve taken out 1,922,994,235 isk of hardware. That’s a really small figure, but I’ve only flirted with PvP, so it’s not expected to be that high. Still, using the above figure as a rough guide:

15 000 / 300 000 000 000 = 5X10^-08.

(Anyone know if that 300 billion is metric or imperial? I’m assuming metric but may be wrong.)

This means that, assuming one isk = 0.00000005 dollars, I’ve destroyed a hair over $96 of hardware. That’s pretty pathetic, especially when the head of my corp is responsible for about $5,000 – personally.

Imagine what we could do with that money of it was actually sold? How long can you feed a family for on that money?

Of course, the reality is that selling isk is illegal under the games ToS. A legal alternative for people looking to buy isk was introduced a while back, the plex system whereby people can sell subscriptions for in game money, thus allowing people who can’t afford to play the game to play the game, and giving people who want a quick pile of cash a means to indirectly buy isk in a way that CCP (the company who built and run EVE) can monitor. Directly selling isk for money though, is still forbidden.

Still, it’s something to think about.

My thoughts and opinions are pretty much summed up here on reddit.

I really don't know what to make of Civilization 5. There's so much of it that I enjoy, the hex based system, the fact the stack has been removed, the addition of ranged attacks, the way cities can defend themselves, the simplified happiness and economy system, the new way strategic resources work, the way units can cross water on their own... it's all really good. But you know what? I think I actually prefer Civilization 4.

Before reporting to the comment section and flaming me for 'hating on the new' please allow me to explain. I've been playing Civilization since Civ 2. I loved it. I played civ 3, I loved it. I played civ 4 and I ADORED it. For me, Civilization 4 has everything that makes the Civ games so good. It had very well thought out diplomacy, the culture mechanic was excellent, the religion mechanic was difficult to learn but very powerful, and culture flipping meant it was possible to capture cities without ever needing to fire a single shot.

Civilization 5 has stripped most of that down and put all it's extra effort into one particular theatre- war.

Warfare in Civilization 5 is excellent, it can compete with the best of turn based strategy games in that regard. War has always been a central element to the Civ series, pick up any Civ game and you'll notice how most of the units are combat units. But I just feel that Civilization 5 takes this too far. You can still get culture, diplomatic and scientific victories too, but many of the diplomatic options have been stripped down, and many of the features of culture (such as flipping) have also been removed. Espionage is also strangely absent. Nothing has been put in to replace them either.

It's quite sad really. So many brilliant new features have been packed into Civilization 5, and yet the removal of just a few little bits from Civ 4 totally changes the feel of the game.

I think if you're looking for a turn based wargame, Civ 5 is certainly a worthy purchase. But if you're actually looking for a true Civilization game, I'd wait until these features are added in the inevitable expansion packs or fan mods. I've completed a game, and to be honest I just don't feel like going back and playing another one. At all. When there's something I can do with/to other civs besides blowing their heads off, I'll come back to it. Until then though Civ 5 will be collecting dust on my hard drive.

Incidentally, if anyone knows of a good mod that adds all this stuff I'm whining about back in, please let me know. Civ 4's features + the changes listed above would equal total, unequivocal, win.

In a nut shell- go and buy World in Conflict instead.

http://www.bukisa.com/articles/355789_ruse-review

Here it is for you, one alpha protocol video review. Share and enjoy!

I bought chaos rising last weekend in a special offer on steam, and I finished it a few hours ago. I have to say that I'm Petty impressed. I do really like DoW II, it reminded a lot of the old commandos series- squad based tactical warfare, minus the heavy emphasis on stealth. Speaking of stealth though I think my favourite unit in the game is Cyrus. It's odd because my lineup nearly always consists of My commander, Tarkus, Avitus and option 4 alternates depending on the mission, Cyrus if I think I'm going to need to take down enemy buildings, and Thule if its going to be a straight up slugfest.

Despite the fact he's not in my permenant line up, Cyrus represents the best tactical unit in any RTS I 've played- he works like a special ops unit should- sneaking ahead of the main force and tearing down the enemy's defences before the main strike finishes them off. Sure he needs micro managing, but plop the rest of your strike team nearby and somewhere out of the way, and that isn't an issue. If the shit hits the fan, they can come in and rescue him.

He gets even more fun as his level goes up. sneak in at full speed, chuck a demo pack into a bunker and then sneak off without being seen, saving the main strike team a whole lot of hurt from a hardened firebase. the inflintration skill is reliable unlike commandos in many other RTS titles, and with the correct wargear and a few levels he can cripple an enemy line before you attack. Brilliantly done.

The story is solid, basic, but very well executed and very much in keeping with 40K as a mythos, the controls are pretty good, but squads can sometimes ignore your orders entirely. The game crashed a few times, but that might be my PC overheating in this hot weather. All in all, Chaos rising was a very good expansion pack, but being the puritan that I am, I didn't use any of the chaos wargear, so I think I missed a trick there. But the wargear I had worked fine, so it's not like I NEEDED to use it.

Metro 2033 on the other hand is proving to be a dissapointment. It has a lot of the same problems that STALKER had, somewhat ironically. To be fair to it though, I don't generally like FPS games anyway, so the chips where stacked against it to begin with. There's nothing in it to really keep me playing, and now the training wheels have coem off, I'm just finding the game too hard. This isn't metro's fault though, it's becuase I don't play many FPS games, and so consequently suck at them. I've already talked about my likes and dislikes of metro in my last post, but to be honest I think I'm going to give it back to Betamax, who was kind enough to lend it to me.

It's not a bad game, it's just not for me. That said though, I would very much like to read the novel.

Nothing is comming out for a month or two that even vaugley interests me, so I'm going to buy red dead redemption on payday and take that for a spin. Sounds like it's got some real potential.