What games are you playing now?

I'm playing the second episode of On the Rain Slick Precipice of Darkness, not normally my kind of thing but the humour is (rarely for computer games) spot on.
 
Joined
Feb 2, 2007
Messages
2,351
Location
London
Since I am back in my studies I once again found myself in a situation where studies takes up most of my time. Still there are room for short games that are easy to play. With that in mind I have decided to go back to a few titles that I skipped for one reason or another.

First up is Clive Barker's Jericho. I had several reasons to skip this. It got awful reviews. My computer was not up to speed to handle the graphics back then. Also, the game is tied in to Christian-Judeo mythology which 2006 was way too touchy for me. Ironically the whole scenario is extremely close to a campaign idea I once had. Well, times have changed and it was time to load it up again. So far the game have felt a bit weird due to having neither Jump nor Run. Hopefully I will be able to get something from it, the story at least seems top notch. I decided to play the game on Easy to save me from the frustration that is often mentioned in reviews.

The second game was Gears of War that ironically ceased to work the 29nth of January 2009. Yes, seriously! Here's an official statement in Epic Games forum. Imagine deciding to pick up Gears of War at the very day it ceased to work!
I originally dropped GoW for having too much action, but in times of few good releases I have lowered my bar enough to give the game a second chance.

I have also investigated Turok, but I am not sure I will bother about it yet.
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
6,027
i got jericho for a reasonable 20 soon after its release. the story wasn't why i bought it but i tried the demo and liked the squad combat. its kind of (very)distrubing and a bit linear but it keeps a good pace with only a few frustrating spots. overall a decent enough game for 20 bucks or under and the squad combat/dialogue reminds a lot of the interactions of the varied marines in aliens which is one of my favourite movies. the main reason i bought it though is because mercury steam, the creators of blade of darkness, made it.
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
1,386
Location
California
I am about 20% through and so far I haven't had any real issues with the game. Indeed, I am playing the game on easy, and I have still experienced the "revive-buddies-all-the-time" gameplay. The dialogue is sometimes laughably bad and out of place but at least the game have a story.
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
6,027
Just getting around to playing the Galactrix demo. Looks like Galactrix will be to Puzzle Quest what heroin is to an opium poppy leaf. I'm in major trouble when they release this game. :)
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
7,834
I'm not even going to download that demo until I've finished my Bioshock run. I know danger when I see it.
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
13,535
Location
Illinois, USA
Danger, Will Robinson, danger! You can't fool me. Mind like a steel trap (pay no attention to the rust)...
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
13,535
Location
Illinois, USA
First up is Clive Barker's Jericho.

The second game was Gears of War

I have also investigated Turok, but I am not sure I will bother about it yet.

I have all 3 of those games. I thought Jericho was very mediocre, so much that I stopped playing after the 2nd chapter. Even on normal difficulty it was too easy given the fact you can instantly revive your squad members at any time. The parts where you have to enter a combination of button presses to initiate an action scene felt very awkward and out of place in a FPS. I was glad I only paid $10 for it.

GoW is decent, I haven't finished it, but what I played was pretty fun. My only gripe is that you can't enable anti-aliasing unless you're running it under Direct X 10. That caused me to put it aside until I install my copy of Vista.

Turok is terrible, there isn't really much more I can say about it. I got it cheap off Ebay, and I would have been highly pissed off if I had paid full price for it.
 
Joined
Oct 21, 2006
Messages
39,136
Location
Florida, US
Counting all the FPS's I played in my days, I would probably rate Jericho mid-range. It's not a game I would play if I had a large amount of great games to play, but it does the job when I barely have anything left to play. The gameplay is nothing spectacular and I feel like I am just along for the ride in a ok story with good graphics, and gameplay that at least try to be different. I mean, I have tried games like Übersoldier and You Are EMPTY so I know what a mediocre FPS is. I am half through Chapter 3 and I will probably finish the game considering the pace I get through each level.


Since I run all games in 2048x1536 these days, I rarely bother with antialiasing. I have a 22" CRT and I have been wondering if I should switch to a huge TFT instead, but the lower resolutions which would force me to rely on AA keeps me away until Windows 7 is available and proven good enough for me.
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
6,027
... but have you tried Ubersoldier 2!!! (yes, I have ... ;) )
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
14,932
jericho is not really a fps. its more of a squad action adventure game in my opinion so the action sequences do fit, despite being frustrating, in my view.

JDR theres many parts of the game that despite being able to revive your comrades its very difficult to do while getting torn to shreds so its really not all the benificial for many scenarios. can't vouch for easy but they game throws lots of challenges at you that have you controling various members and strategic employment of their skills. in a shooter you could just mow things down or snipe away but the variedness of this game along with some 3rd person control make it much more a action adventure hybrid like their other 2 games. scrapland was action adventure which also game you different charcters with skills to you, and a cool racing/flying game (the better part in my opinion). blade of darkness which was release i mind-blowing 8 years ago and still looks great combined action adventure with some basic rpg touches--still to this day there is not a game out that has better melee combat.
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
1,386
Location
California
JDR theres many parts of the game that despite being able to revive your comrades its very difficult to do while getting torn to shreds so its really not all the benificial for many scenarios. can't vouch for easy but they game throws lots of challenges at you that have you controling various members and strategic employment of their skills. in a shooter you could just mow things down or snipe away but the variedness of this game along with some 3rd person control make it much more a action adventure hybrid like their other 2 games. scrapland was action adventure which also game you different charcters with skills to you, and a cool racing/flying game (the better part in my opinion). blade of darkness which was release i mind-blowing 8 years ago and still looks great combined action adventure with some basic rpg touches--still to this day there is not a game out that has better melee combat.


The game is bad, any way you try to rationalize about it. Even IGN, a site that is infamous for it's generous review scores, gave it a 5.6. I'm glad you were able to enjoy it though.
 
Joined
Oct 21, 2006
Messages
39,136
Location
Florida, US
sites like ign and gamespot give plenty of bad scores to good games that are often 2-3 or more points below what users rate the game so i'm not sure that's a valid arguement. i can understand people not liking it, but it by no means a 'bad' game. not really a 'good' one either so its an easy one to skip for most people. the fact that you bought it though, i would suggest giving it another go if you have the time as its still a quality developed game from a technical perspective even if the gameplay or story aren't for everyone.

ubersoldier on the other hand which i paid less than $5 for got little more than that in minutes of playtime from me...phewwy.

also i started playing tomb raider: underworld ($20) a few weeks ago and lost interest after little more than an hour. granted i've played every tomb raider game within a year of each release ( though i never finished last revelation or chronicles), but i guess i've tired of crystal dymanics take on the franchise as their a console centric developer (look no further than project snowblind which is deus ex's offspring but with an extra chromosome and a macy's giftcard). their first 2 attempts (one being a less than difficult task of a remake) were worthy and better than some of the later attempts by core design but i really miss the vast feeling of being in a quiet tomb which was more about finding where to go then trying to do some tricked out move. who knows it might be fun if i get sick this season and have to take cold medicine...
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
1,386
Location
California
... but have you tried Ubersoldier 2!!! (yes, I have ... ;) )

:D

Normally I finish games if I managed to get more than a few levels into it, but übersoldier is one of the few exceptions to that rule. I just couldn't find anything to like about it. :\
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
6,027
Being a story first, gameplay second kind of person, I am not always in tune with mainstream reviews, but I tend to use gamerankings for a hint. I confess that when I already finished the good games on the market, a game that at least offer me a few hours of good graphics and a decent storyline can be entertaining enough. I have finished plenty of games that got awful reviews (Infernal, Alone in the Dark, Gothic 3 etc), and I have stopped to play games that got good/great reviews (Gears of War, Morrowind, Titan Quest) out of boredom.

I wouldn't say Jericho is "mediocre" though. It's average. In many ways it's like games like Infernal that have some good graphics, have the basics of a shooter, some unique features, but then doesn't really stand out and also have some kind of frustrating mechanic that doesn't really work as well as it could.
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
6,027
I'm not even going to download that demo until I've finished my Bioshock run. I know danger when I see it.

Wise--you might want to wait til the kids have grown up and Mrs. dte is off on vacation somewhere.

Edit: Though the demo is kind of self-limiting; you can't do a whole lot before you max out. It might be safe. :)
 
Last edited:
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
7,834
I had a brief test of Turok and found the controls to be annoying and unresponsive. Even if the characters looks great (Unreal 3 Engine), the nature looks like an old relic, like it was downscaled on purpose to work fine on an XBox 360. I'll have a second look at it later.

I gave another reviewscore bomb a chance though; Blacksite: Area 51. So far I haven't had any issues with it, but that might ofcourse change later on. The in-squad debates are pretty fun to listen to. It also uses the Unreal 3 engine and oddly, while characters looks great, the mountains around the levels look like a bad case of quick polygon work with some textures slapped upon them. Maybe this is a problem with the Unreal engine?
 
Joined
Oct 26, 2006
Messages
6,027
I just bought and installed and started playing OVERLORD the friday.

Damn I enjoy killing those Hobbits and destroying every little thing possible

Go minion go plunder and destroy mwhoahahahaha
 
Joined
Oct 18, 2006
Messages
1,086
Location
belgium-genk
Back
Top Bottom