What game are you playing?

[Fatso]

With my internet on the fritz and too unstable to reliably play games online these days (3-400 ms ping spikes every 4-5 seconds, and I'm too lazy to check it out) I've been playing a lot of old games (TIE Fighter and Monkey Island games mostly) AND finally got around to finishing Cave Story.



Amazing.



Now that I have beaten it once the normal way without help I consider myself in the right to consult guides and do a 100% run for all the wonderful bonus stuff. Which I am about to continue right now because I just got back from work and am in no condition to sleep. But yeah I wish I'd played it five years ago when I first heard of it but I guess now is good enough.

[Vinchenz Rock]

I managed to do all the bonus stuff and activate "hard mode" without using any guides on my first try. I just got lucky, I suppose.

Beating that extra dungeon felt really awesome. I'll download the game the second it comes out on WiiWare.

[Johncarllos]

The extra stuff in that game is HARD.

[MOX]

I really like Bioshock's art design and concept, have not yet playe dit. Your guys' low expectations better make it sweeter when I find the game fun!

I quite enjoyed the InFamous demo but I can see how it would get repetetive. Prototype I look foward to seeing a demo release of that.

Vinchez, how's Uncharted Drake's Fortune? Even though I need more rpg's than shooters (but Uncharted seems more like a platformer if that counts) I really want to play that game next. The story seems the most interesting.

[Mikero]

I really like Bioshock's art design and concept, have not yet playe dit. Your guys' low expectations better make it sweeter when I find the game fun!

No one really seems to have low expectations of it...

[TheOnly]

Am like really hooked with ToV at the moment.

[Vinchenz Rock]

Vinchez, how's Uncharted Drake's Fortune? Even though I need more rpg's than shooters (but Uncharted seems more like a platformer if that counts) I really want to play that game next. The story seems the most interesting.

It was my brother's, he played it on my PS3 before he got his own.

He found it amazing but to me it just looked like a pretty platformer/3rd person shooter.

[NovaMan XP]

You ever played the Jak & Daxter games? I bet they'd play similar to that, right? Since I think it was made by the same company...

[ASR]

Oh, wow, really? I loved Jak & Daxter for some reason. I used to play 'em at my friend's house. I might have to give these Uncharted games a try.

[NovaMan XP]

BUT THEY'RE PS3 ONLY ASR



(i think)

[ASR]

Fuuuuuuuuuucdge.

[Mikero]

Sooooo I took a couple days off Mass Effect because... Well, I needed to get to bed now and then. I played a bit of the free with my 360 Kung-Fu Panda game.

Wow, it's boring. It's not even BAD, it's just really easy and boring. I only got through three levels before I wanted to golf instead. Golf. Weirdly, it's not at ALL glitchy like you expect such tie-in games to be. It runs perfect. Too bad I don't care at all about it. At least Lego Indy had that magical factor of "this is something to occupy meantime" or "something for my hands to do while I'm actually watching TV on my computer". At least it was, as Lego games are, a bit charming.

[Johncarllos]

I AM NOW PLAYING PROTOTYPE.
Just the ENTRY level is funner than helk.

[NovaMan XP]

"Funner than helk"?

...what?

And Mike, that Kung-fu Panda game came with the 360, right?

[Mikero]

Yesaroony.

[Johncarllos]

"Funner than helk"?

...what?

And Mike, that Kung-fu Panda game came with the 360, right?

After beating about 1/5 of the game and doing an ABSURD amount of side quests, I'm very happy I bought this game.

[Vinchenz Rock]

Today I turned on Pokemon Silver to see if my save file still worked. I've heard that a lot of people's games don't save anymore because of the in-game clock constantly draining the battery's energy.

But my game is still fine.

MEMORIES

First thing I noticed was that the time for the game was ??:??.

Yep, it's been so long that my game forgot what time it is.

I have a level 93 Feraligatr. I didn't even remember which Pokemon I chose.
Then I check my Pokedex and re-learn that I caught all starters for this generation, and I really don't know how.

I also started right beside Red. I remember Red, and I remember kicking his ass, so I tried again. Sweeped his entire team with Feraligatr.

Awesome.

Edit: Also, I have a Mew.

...HOW!?

[Johncarllos]

Maybe you did a lot of trading?

[Speed Racer]

I'm currently playing SoulCalibur IV at my apartment, and Unreal Tournament 3's campaign over at my buddy's apartment. I'm really hating the campaign for UT3...

[Fatso]

Some of the levels are annoying, but that should be expected from a deathmatch game. I still love UT3 to bits and am genuinely saddened by how poorly it's done sales-wise.

[NovaMan XP]

Today I turned on Pokemon Silver to see if my save file still worked. I've heard that a lot of people's games don't save anymore because of the in-game clock constantly draining the battery's energy.

But my game is still fine.

Same here. I think Silver has a better battery than Gold... I got Silver first, and then Gold months later or a year later (can't remember) and Gold managed to die first... I went and opened it up last year and replaced the battery, but now it doesn't remember the time anymore either... but Silver is still working perfectly.

Also, you could've gotten a Mew from one of your friends that had a Gameshark, or from the Mew glitch in R/B/Y.

[Edgecrusher]

Finished Prototype earlier today.
Very fun game, but not the type of game you pick up if you like downtime between missions. This game can be relentless.
Between Prototype and inFamous, I still prefer inFamous, though I really wish it had Prototype's speed.

[ASR]

My friend bought Prototype and we popped it into my 360. I started a file on my hard drive.

Holy hell is it fun!

I might have to buy this game.

I hated how after the intro level, I didn't have hardly any of those crazy-awesome abilities anymore. Though, I guess that's incentive to keep playing, though! Otherwise, it'd be just like Skate 2: I would just dick around and not actually progress through the game.

And you guys know how much I love dicking around.

[Johncarllos]

I dicked around for hours to upgrade everything, then found out it was like 6 more missions until I unlocked more upgrades.
I had 5 Million EP.
I have almost every upgrade now, obviously.

[Mikero]

I'll have to rent it. Later.

[Johncarllos]

I had a whole message here.
Firefox crashed when I finished it.
It was like 500 words.
#####.
This will do.

[NovaMan XP]

How to compress 500 words: Just type #####.

[Johncarllos]

We have an awesome local (Maine) music store called Bull Moose.
It has maybe 10 locations.
They sell brand new games 10% off.
They had used 360 games for 15 bucks!
for 15, I could have the Orange Box (used), or Dead Rising, or a plethora of other games.
I ended up getting Burnout Paradise because I need a driving game.
15 bucks.

man I love that place.

[ASR]

Goddamnit I really want to play Burnout Paradise.

Burnout is the coolest racing game ever.

[Majikn]

I'm STILL playing Fallout 3.

I also started a new game on Very Hard but it's not actually Very Hard at all, because I'm better at the game than when I started playing it on normal, I still die a lot less.

It's interesting because the last game I've played with this sort of style, action/fighting-wise, was FFVII: Dirge of Cerberus. (It's not a game I paid for so I didn't mind giving it a try. I didn't finish it.) And despite the fact that it was an absolutely #####ty game. I LIKED that part of it. Going from first to third person and levelling up and such. And this game, with that battle system (plus the VATS) made it a much more enjoyable experience overall.

[NovaMan XP]

I'm playing the new Punch-Out!! game. Man, I knew it was going to be great, but holy #####. The main game is short, but afterwards you get some new challenges that are pretty nice. And the game was pretty funny at a lot of the fights...

[spoiler]When you're fighting Soda Popinski, if you KO him, the Ref will start counting, and he'll pull out his vodka soda in an attempt to give himself energy to get up, but he realizes its empty... and then he's all like "ARRGGH". Best KO in the game, in my opinion.[/spoiler]

[Mikero]

The only Burnout I played was the first one, it was cool looking but it got boring just seeing car damage all the time. But I'm into only a few actual racing games anyway.

And yeah, Fallout 3 is pretty cool once you get past the initial portion where it's hard to do anything, which for me took up the whole week I had rented the game for. I'm eager to play it again though, like for real.

[Johncarllos]

SO.
ANYONE who has a 360 and even slightly like driving games, Burnout Paradise is a MUST.

It's absolutely fantastic. I can't even begin to describe how much I like it.


Also, screw the Zune social and XBL being down today.
They're ONLY becoming the same thing.

[Mikero]

OK good. I was worried m internet was being a bitchnaut again, Live went down for me last night and I just turned on my 360 now and it's still not working.

[ASR]

Everyone who gets Burnout Paradise tells me how awesome it is! I don't really like racing games but I've always loved Burnout. It's like ridiculously unrealistic in the disguise of mild realism. For some reason I just really enjoy it.

Someone said they saw it in a bargain bin for $15 and almost got it for me, but didn't.

[Johncarllos]

BTW, Burnout Paradise can be had for 20 bucks new.

Example.

Not to mention how one can instantly and seamlessly start playing online (which I have yet to experience with Live being dead).

Posted on: June 16, 2009, 04:21:25 PM

And it's totally worth the money just to drive fast and screw around.
The game is beautiful and it makes everything feel awesome.

[ASR]

Okay, cool, so I don't even have to specifically look in bargain bins.

I decided I want to play more of Prototype, but not buy it. So I'll just borrow it from my friend when he beats it.

Right now I just finished replaying Mario Galaxy and now I'm starting Mario Sunshine.

Sunshine is by far my favorite.

[Majikn]

And yeah, Fallout 3 is pretty cool once you get past the initial portion where it's hard to do anything, which for me took up the whole week I had rented the game for. I'm eager to play it again though, like for real.

It was sort of the same for me. When I first played I died a lot. When I restarted in very hard mode I was dropping raiders with a 10mm pistol and a baseball bat. Which subsequently got me better weapons very quickly.

I did go out of my way to get a certain powerful flaming melee weapon early on, though.

[Johncarllos]

I was excited for Live to be back up at midnight, I wanted to see how the new things they added worked, and I wanted to play Burnout online.

When it wasn't up at midnight, I had to go look at stuff, and it's going to be back by midnight PST.

Bah. 3 hours longer than I anticipated.
I'll have to play tomorrow....

[Edgecrusher]

I got tired of slow motion crashed in Burnout Paradise.

Also, it's kind of BS that Prototype isn't going to be getting any expansions added to it.
Particularly when they have a cheat input screen and only one code.
The hell?

[Johncarllos]

There will be no expansions?

I really hope that isn't the case.

And yeah, I'd rather just crash and GO, but it's also like a respawn time, so I can get over it.

[Mikero]

Tonight my friend said Prototype is like the coolest thing ever. I don't really put a lot of weight in his opinion anyway, but now I'm definitely gonna rent it to shut him up. But it was just annoying.

Plus when I said I was busy with Mass Effect for now he said he didn't want to read a lot or hear people talking so I can't put any stock in what he thinks is a good game since it clearly doesn't include story.

But yeah I'm so renting Prototype soon, it looks fun to dick around at least and I'll need that when I'm done Mass Effect which is heavyeavy.

[Majikn]

Oh. Right, I was going to say something.

Main issue with Fallout 3 is the glitchyness causing freezing and making certain items difficult or near impossible to get. I remember once coming across a skill book under a dead body. I didn't kill the person, it was actually just there like that. I actually had to bomb the dead body out of the way to get at the skill book.

And today when I was hunting for them, I didn't know the specific location of one, and as I approached the raider camp with the item, the government dropped soldiers right on them. Their sentry bot actually fired a missile rather unnecessarily and having heard the explosion I knew that the book I was looking for probably flew FAR from its original spot. So I had to guess where the thing originally was and where it might have flown. I ended up just reloading a different state and finding the book exactly where I had guessed it was originally, but if I hadn't known there was anything there, I never would have found that book, basically. But I guess that's okay because skill books are fairly abundant and not really necessary, and everything else you may need is much MORE abundant if not unlimited.

I don't think I've ever encountered a glitch that caused me to be unable to continue the game anyway, aside from random ones that freeze the game, which I don't mind all that much.

And Mike, there's actually no time limit on the Blood Ties quest. I haven't tried every option possible in that quest but I know that the only one I HAVE tried that caused me to fail the quest was to attack the town, and that's why they were hostile to me in return.

[Johncarllos]

So Fallout 3 is worth buying I assume?

[Edgecrusher]

If you enjoy Bethesda's Elder Scrolls series, yes.

[ChaosVortex]

Plus when I said I was busy with Mass Effect for now he said he didn't want to read a lot or hear people talking so I can't put any stock in what he thinks is a good game since it clearly doesn't include story.

I really hate that. I had a couple of "friends" at work who were talking about their FPS games and I mentioned I'd rather just wait for the New Super Mario Bros. Wii. They laughed and somehow related that to storylines (Mario isn't the type of game to have a story but okay).

They asked me if I liked them and when I said yeah, one of them said, "See, there's no point to a game unless you're blowing #### up."

That's right. Apparently, Phoenix Wright was such a rancid game, it gave me the illusion I was having a blast. I hate that mentality.

[Edgecrusher]

Video games are like any other form of entertainment. The larger the demand is, the more they try to cater to all tastes.

Much like the crowds that pack the theatre opening night at the latest mindless action film, there are gamers out there who prefer to "do" rather than to "think".

There is certainly merit to entertainment of that nature, there's great catharsis to be had in the name of madcap mayhem, but folks who only enjoy a steady stream of hecatomb are usually as shallow as their tastes.

[Mikero]

And Mike, there's actually no time limit on the Blood Ties quest. I haven't tried every option possible in that quest but I know that the only one I HAVE tried that caused me to fail the quest was to attack the town, and that's why they were hostile to me in return.

That's just what it said online. Like, not that there's an actual counter time limit, but if you start the sidequest and then go off and do other things instead of getting to the town, then after too long the whole town is dead or something. I'm not sure. It doesn't matter, I completely finished it anyway and got it so the town traded blood packs for protection., which is the best option in my opinion.



Anyway I haven't really read, watched, or played through a new story (so not counting Hitchhiker's) that's managed to keep me from predicting the big plot points too early in.. Like years. But last night I was pretty impressed 'cause Mass Effect managed to do it.

I realize I haven't shut up about this game for like two solid weeks, but it's the only game I'm playing right now and I'm really floored by it. There's a lot of work put into it, and it was actually done well! For instance aside from gameplay and story, recorded dialogue for a male character and female character. At least two to TEN dialogue options per sentence in conversation, which is all the time. Responses to those from other characters, responses based on you characters sex, decisions, backstory, etc. It's a lot before you even start talking about playing the game.

A lot of sidequests are unique enough from each other (unlike crap like Fable II, which has loads of "Slave Rescue" over and over) and, at least to me, they're all fun. I've completed every sidequest you can possibly do in a single playthrough except one, because I wasn't aware that a location I needed to go would get cut off from me completely by continuing the story. It will always show unfinished in my assignments, annoying but no big deal. But out of all the sidequests, I didn't feel like any of them actually took me out of the story or were tiresome. Sometimes you're doing sidequests in a game, and you're very aware you're not playing the main game. This time I've felt like everything I was doing, while not weighing a lot on the main storyline, was all at least a bit important to the story and maybe Mass Effect 2 (since your save carries over (!!!)).

Or rather, that the whole game is this package, like a gift basket where the sidequests are the little cheeses, glasses, paté that make the main thing, the ultra expensive wine, all that much better. For instance, Fable II sidequests never felt at all like they mattered, they were a lot more of a chore. Like Mass Effect, Fallout 3 sidequests feel like part of it all, but in a different way. You just sort of never know with Fallout 3 what quest is part of the main story or isn't, and that's really cool too.

An big part of Mass Effect revolves around information, which is something there is in spades if you do the sidequests. Of course, the most important thing doing the sidequests gives you is money, experience, and items, but there's a lot of codex entries you get out of it. Which I actually love reading. I love the boring read-y parts of the game as much as the action. And with the amount of stuff there is to read about things like the physics of mass accelerators in guns, or Asari culture, or the First Contact War, etc, is enough to make a pretty decent sized Wiki for the game. Which there is. Like there's a write up for everything, every brand, every race, every planet.

... I don't know why I haven't calmed down about it yet, it's not like it's the best thing ever, I just wasn't really sure they put this much into games anymore. I feel like they were passionate about it and appreciate it.

I'm about to start the last planet in the game. I might try to finish the game tonight. I don't know if I'm going to go through New Game+ mainly because I borrowed the game and I want to go into Mass Effect which this character and the decisions he made.

After this I'm probably gonna rent Prototype if my friend is still too sucky at his game to be done Fallout 3 I'll have to rent that again. But I have some games I own to finish still so I don't know... Banjo-Kazooie Nuts & Bolts... deBlob... even MM9. They're good but I'm not so in the mood.

[ChaosVortex]

Video games are like any other form of entertainment. The larger the demand is, the more they try to cater to all tastes.

Much like the crowds that pack the theatre opening night at the latest mindless action film, there are gamers out there who prefer to "do" rather than to "think".

There is certainly merit to entertainment of that nature, there's great catharsis to be had in the name of madcap mayhem, but folks who only enjoy a steady stream of hecatomb are usually as shallow as their tastes.

Right, that sounds respectable. I just hate it when someone absolutely adores something like Halo and then calls something like Mario garbage. Not in any way in a form of an opinion, because I might understand that. I'm talking about when someone says, "Mario sucks because it's nothing like Halo." I don't really expect someone to say something like that though, because it's stupid...

It's almost like saying, "I love chocolate, but I hate potato chips because it doesn't taste anything like chocolate."

[Edgecrusher]

I understand what you're saying, and have met more than a few folks like that.

There's a strangely strong correlation between that kind of pretense and being a business major.

Go figure.