What games are you playing now?

curiously undead said:

hey xSamhainx did you ever play the high quality fan made antioch chronicles? they were seriously almost as good as the original campaign. its ashame part 3 never got made though. but at least starcraft 2 is coming up.

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nope, never played antioch. Actually, I'm already at the end of my foray into SC, did the Terran missions and some MP. It's fun at times, but I just cant help but be bored with it, it's just all too familiar for it's own good. I feel like I'm wasting my time. It's like breaking out a cd on your home stereo that youve played to death in your vehicle for months. It's lustre is just gone for good. To quote the late Alice in Chains: "Ive eaten the sun, so my tongue has been burned of the taste"

Or something like that.

Ive got so much other rts stuff on my hard drive anyway like Spellforce II that I need to finish and play out. I havent even played WH40K: Dark Crusade yet, and I'm like 5 missions into Age of Empires III. So it was fun to play SC it for a couple days, but it's going to be coming off the drive pretty soon. Like now.

Death to StarCraft. Bring on it's successor..

Speaking of RTS games, I finally started playing Supreme Commander this week.

I'm currently replaying Sudeki (XBox). It hasn't changed a bit since I first played it, which makes it a tad easier not to get lost in places.

Okay I'm starting Warhammer: Mark of Chaos. I'm going to play that while I decide what my next CRPG will be. I've got the Geneforge games waiting (all four of 'em), Jade Empire: Special Edition, and Gothic 3. I'm kinda torn as to which one to focus on next. But the Warhammer game should allow me time to make a decision.

do report back with what you think of WH:MOC, narpet. The demo ran like crap on my machine so I never went far with it!

Forgot to mention, I'm replaying Soldier of Fortune 2 and Dark Messiah Might & Magic as well. SoF2 because of the 5th anniversary of release, and Dark Messiah because I felt like it and someone asked why my review was so harsh ...

I went cheap and got a new DVD-ROM (no writing capability). Hated to do it, but I'm enjoying the heck out of UFO:ET now.

xSamhainx said:

do report back with what you think of WH:MOC, narpet. The demo ran like crap on my machine so I never went far with it!

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Okay... I've played about half-way through the first chapter so far. Please keep in mind that I really love RTS games, but that I absolutely suck at them

The game runs smoothly on my rig (P4 3.73ghz, 3gig RAM, 2x 80gig HD in RAID 1, PNY GeForce 8800GTX, Sound Blaster Audigy 2zs, XP Pro). It looks quite nice and captures the feel of the tabletop game.

So far there's a story... but who cares. It's basically - move from one battle to the next with stops in towns in between to replace lost units, buy new units, equipment, upgrades, etc. I personally like this since part of the reason that I've always sucked at RTS games is that I just can't seem to manage resource gathering with unit management. So this game is a bit more my speed since there really is no resource management.

It's very much like the tabletop game in that before a battle you place your armies where you want them (within a pre-determined area). But unlike the tabletop game, you don't always know where your enemies will be coming from, so it's hard to guess the best placement. But that doesn't seem to matter (so far) because once the action begins you can easily move your units where you need them.

Other than that, it's pretty standard RTS fare. I'm sure it will become more difficult and strategic as the game progresses, but so far I win my battles by sheer attrition. I haven't had to think very strategically yet.

With that said, I do like the game. It has a gritty feel and it's easy to learn. I don't usually stick with RTS games very long because they become more than my poor mind can handle... but if this game progresses as it should I can see actually finishing it.

Thanks for the detailed report, Commander Narpet!

Attn: Commander Narpet!
How would you rate the game in comparison to Medieval II: total war? Are the battles as fun? Do they offer similar challenges? Is the camera and interface comparable?
Like you, I couldn't care less if there's a story or not. I mean, if I want story, then I'll play an RPG or something. I'm just concerned with the rest of what's there, as I've heard very mixed feelings. I love MTWII, and if this game offers similar battle experiences, then I'm all over it. I'm just hesitant based on other not-so-glamourous reviews.

I've been playing a lot of The Sims 2 lately. I just finished Splinter Cell 3 again, and I'm gonna jump back into Rome: Total War as soon as I get my hard drive reformatted.

Tomb Raider: Anniversary demo

Played pretty good, there's some additional puzzles and stuff to the demo level that I played, which is the big waterfall level right before the Lost Valley. You get to the valley, fight two waves of raptors, then the T Rex shows up! Unfortunately the demo ends there.

I liked what I saw, apart from some small graphical anomalies here and there, it looks and sounds great. The PC controls feel a little off to me but they seem to get the trick done, Ive always preferred using a gamepad for TR games. Goes without saying (but I'll say it anyway) Lara definitely looks better than ever!

True that . I played the demo this weekend as well and ordered the English version of the game online afterwards. Should be great fun. The only gripe I have is the trial & error gameplay. It's pretty hard to tell sometimes if Lara will or will not make a jump. The engine is not really good at giving you an accurate feel for distances and the -at times- clunky camera controls don't help much either. Also, I think it's a bit of a pity that they still don't have a 'save anywhere' feature but if the checkpoints are placed as close together as they are in the demo then it's no real big deal either. Still, it would be nice if you could save right before attempting a jump and then reload if it failed instead of being reset to the last checkpoint and having to repeat a tedious climbing part before getting to the jump part again.
Overall it should provide some challenging (more challenging than TRL from what the first reviews are saying anyway) gameplay that might even require some serious thinking to solve the various puzzles. Should be fun so I'm really looking forward to getting the game in a couple days.

Until then, it's back to Gothic III which I have finally seriously started now that it is 99.999999...% certain that there will not be another patch *sigh*.

actually, this might kinda sound insane, but I kinda like the uncertainty of some of the jumps/grapples, it boosts the adreneline level (and yes occasionally the frustration level). I liked Legend, but it got just too dang cut and dry and obvious. I always knew exactly where to jump or grab, and that I was pretty much going to make it, bar maybe not getting the jump off right. There might as well have been big red arrows and "jump" cues appear above Lara's head! it was too easy.

To me, Tomb Raider really shines when youre leaping from ledge to ledge, teeth (among other things) clenched, hoping that youre going to make it. Hoping that you really did pick the right avenue. This (in the demo so far at least) seems to be harkening back a little to the original, where there was some uncertainty and chance involved.

OK, to clarify: I don't mind the trial and error per se but what I meant is that in combination with the checkpoint save system it leads to some unnecessary frustration IMHO because when you have to do a fairly long climb over and over again from the last checkpoint then that gets a little tiring after a couple tries.
It would just be much more convenient if you were able to save anywhere to repeat a jump instantly. The thrill is still there in my opinion. I HATE seeing Lara fall to her death .
I don't think, however, that the "dammit, if I don't make this jump I'm going to have to do this climbing part all over again" tedium enhances the thrill in any way. It's just an inconvenience and not really a necessary one in my opinion but who knows if this is actually intended per game design or only a matter of the game's (or the whole series') console heritage. Probably the latter.

I'm playing Jade Empire: Special Edition now (I'm still playing Warhammer: MoC but I have to have my CRPG fix at least every other day).

I've played about 5 hours so far and I have one word to say (okay... two words)....

Cut scenes

(If you're a MST3K fan you can relate this as being the same as if I had said "Rock Climbing").

It seems as if there is a cut scene about every 5 minutes, and that's not much of an exaggeration. I like the game so far... but, man... cut scenes.

Playing Arx Fatalis.

I'm off to the Ylsides bunker.
Killed one guard and am about to descend deeper in that damned lair.

Took me forever to solve the Crypts puzzle with the stones.
Even with the walkthrough.
Used the one that was available at the Dot to finally solve it.
The other one I had was not properly done for that part.

Just for fun, I attacked the King to see if I'd be able to kill him and survive.
He fell down like a feather. Afterwards, I killed everyone in the city...
I didn't save the game of course. Just wanted to see how powerfull I was.
If only the Ylsides were that easy.
With 2 fireballs and a few hits of my Meteor Saber they fall.

Anyway, enough said.
I'm off to the bunker.

I've started the demo to Spaceforce Rogue Universe a couple of times. I just can't tell if it's worth getting or not. I guess I'm just so desperate for a good space-combat sim. The biggest negative i see so far is the voice acting and script. OMG! The narrative dialogue found in the demo is SO over the top theatrical in vocabulary, that it is completely laughable! You can tell that someone put a lot of thought into those words, and must have read a lot of dime-novels to get them. The voice acting is horrible - on par with the X games. Of course, I shouldn't have expected much in that department from a game with a cheesy title like "Spaceforce Rogue Universe." What kind of a generic name is "Spaceforce"? And what exactly is a "Rogue Universe" anyway?

Okay, the pluses: I like the flight physics a lot. They actually feel like you're flying as opposed to your ship being on rails, e.g. X3 and Darkstar One. Combat seems to be a little tricky, and the demo at least suffers from the same lack of accessiblitly that the X games do. Translation: Can somebody please tell me how the heck the game works? I would probably be able to hold my own in combat if I was just given a little bit of direction, as it stands there is not much to go on in terms of how to load missiles, lock on targets, and fully understanding the HUD.
Graphics are nowhere near the visual treat of X3 imho, but it's simply a difference more of style than technical merit. Ship models are definitely attractive and imaginative.
Anyway, that's my take. Again... I can't decide if the good outweighs the bad yet..

The PS2 is back so I can continue with my FF X game. We'll see. At least Tidus is cute.

Stubbs the Zombie and Barrow Hill. I'm about to finish Serious Sam The Second Encounter, and I found a used copy of Tron 2.0. I'm about to uninstall Lord of the Rings Online; nice game, but everything about it is just your typical MMORPG. I kept finding myself doing quests where I said to myself "Oh this quest is just like that one in World of Warcraft, Everquest, etc." Boring. I've been looking at buying Spellforce 2 for a while, I'm just afraid it will be too much RTS and not enough CRPG.