Posts by Erratic

  • Max Payne [movie]

    Quote from Sentura

    anyone knows who the band behind is?

    If you haven't already found it:

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  • Gearbox Rumored to be Working on Halo 4

    I guess I just find it weird to discuss these things on the basis of generalizations of who bought what, when, and why. I mean, thinking about it, the PC was probably the most 'casual' centric platform for the longest time. When you look at games like Civilization, The Sims, Combat Mission, and the flight sims of the mid to late 90's, you have games that probably weren't being played by your average gamer. But again, that's a generalization in itself.

    There's just so many unknowns in trying to determine things about certain groups of gamers that leaves room for a lot of interpretation and guessing that I distrust.

  • Gearbox Rumored to be Working on Halo 4

    Quote from Furyo

    I've seen CS mentioned, but even that, when it came out even officially, wasn't anywhere near as mainstream as Halo's marketing campaign. And in pure practical terms, before Steam, playing Valve multiplayer games still belonged to the Stone Age of video gaming. Again, as far away from mainstream as you can possibly get. It took dedicated hardcore fans and players to even care downloading that new patch and that new update every so often. As a reminder, steam only came out in 2003, two years after Halo was already rocking the xbox world.

    I dunno, I wouldn't call the most played PC game of its time far from the mainstream. Chances are if you played PC games at all, you knew what CS was. A lot has changed in the last 8 years with all the 'hardcore 'casual' non sense that gets thrown around. Most PC gamers in general were dedicated to it, downloading patches was as normal as anything else. There wasn't really a 'mainstream' or 'underground' that I can remember, it was just gaming.

  • Gearbox Rumored to be Working on Halo 4

    I think all the theories and reasoning being brought up for its success are all noise, really. When you have to start theorizing why something is successful you're probably just over thinking things. The fact is it's probably just a really good game.

    I share similar sentiments towards the Metal Gear series as of recent, 4 really didn't do anything for me, but it doesn't stop me from understanding why others like the game and what makes it such a huge success.

    Though I still hold the original game in very high regard, so maybe I'm partial to it.

  • Gearbox Rumored to be Working on Halo 4

    Quote from Thrik

    I just want to clarify that I was praising Halo

    Not enough.

    I can see your points I'm just not sure they're all accurate. On the surface level it makes sense, but in my experience playing the game, especially on Legendary, you fully realize just how brilliant it can be. It's one of the few games where difficulty levels aren't just added hitpoints and fewer med kits, the AI provides a whole different set of behaviors and the pacing is perfect.

    Not to sound too much like a dick, but by saying 'examine those individual components (using vehicles, enemy encounters, weaponry, etc) and they're not so great' kinda rings of a cursory assessment of the game. I don't expect anyone to play through the game 3+ times to hold a true or opinion or some bullshit like that, but there is a lot more to the game passed the Normal mode.

    And maybe you have played it more than I'm assuming but I just find it hard to call the way all those elements work together derivative or mediocre. Like I said, on the surface Halo doesn't appaer to offer much new, but it's how all those small things work together that make it something more.

  • Gearbox Rumored to be Working on Halo 4

    Quote from Thrik

    To put it another way, Halo was a pretty good whole but the individual parts weren't so good. Earlier PC games did its various components better, including vehicles. This is why I suspect many PC games abhor Halo, because they recognise that most of the elements are mediocre implementations of what they've seen in other games before (albeit not all in the same game) and cannot comprehend its immense popularity.

    What game specifically did vehicles to the same level as Halo? I think you have to make a clear distinction between games with 'vehicle missions' and Halo's implementation, with is absolute integration of vehicles into the gameplay, none of these specialized levels crafted specifically for some on rails scripted shoot out.

    Quote from Thrik

    To this day I still think the levels were very repetitive and bland, and it certainly wasn't a particularly outstanding or unique art style at the time (although FPS games have since become very dark and brown). The gameplay wasn't overwhelmingly original or varied either, although the regenerating health and equipment limits — neither of which Halo premiered — were implemented well and are deservedly quite popular now.

    Who pioneered them? I'm sure weapon limits and health regen have been done in other games, in some form, OpFlash certainly had a 2 weapon loadout, but that's a military sim, and a totally different context and approach. They aren't wholly original ideas on their own, but when put into an arcade FPS, it really does have a huge impact on how you play the game, which I think is understated by a lot of people.

    Quote from Thrik

    From a completely objective perspective, Halo wasn't an outstanding game. I believe its popularity came from it doing a bunch of things at once that console gamers hadn't seen to any real degree of quality before, showing that all the crazy stuff seen on the PC could be done on a last-gen console too. I also believe its popularity was a good thing because it encouraged many other console developers to step up their game and finally stop producing FPS games that're shit in 99% of cases (the likes of games like GoldenEye were very rare occasions).

    I dunno, I think it's dismissive to right off its success because 'a lot of console gamers liked it'. Which is a bit of hand-waving in itself, assuming there's this gorge between PC Gamers and console gamers with no cross over between the 'groups' - I've been both for as long as I can remember, and Halo took me by surprise while I was still playing Quake 3 and UT.

  • Gearbox Rumored to be Working on Halo 4

    Quote from Jetsetlemming

    On a related note, can someone tell my why the hell Halo got so popular? It was a mediocre game at best, and Timesplitters was far and away the better console FPS all around.

    Popularized/introduced 2 weapon carry limit and regenerating health, both innovations have changed the fundamentals of games since and have been cribbed extensively since Halo was released. Vehicle integration was perfect, vehicle physics was beyond anything else at the time and vehicle controls are still the best of any action game, period. Visual design is original and still kicks the shit out of most everything; simple broad strokes with no problem using bright colour wherever it sees fit (everywhere). Huge environments with self-preserving enemy AI that make every encounter unique from the last. Music is basically instant nostalgia.

    All this, and it was still 2001.

    To say you don't like the game is perfectly fine, to deny it's a landmark in games is a whole other situation that will be met with swift resistance from myself.

    And I don't even know where to go with that Timesplitters comparison, that shit's throwing me off :megaman: I like Goldeneye as much as anyone, but...shit.

  • Wrath of the Lich King Cinematic

    Quote from Thrik

    I think it's fair to say that's some absolutely fantastic CGI and atmosphere. Then you get the real thing and it's all...

    That's something I've always found odd about Blizzard's games in the last few years, the disparity between the in game atmosphere and the cinematics. Guess it's sort of a result of the direction the art has taken

    Quote

    oh shit I went there

  • Watershed Arena

    Where do you go when you wanna feel bad about your lazy mapping habits? Mapcore.

    I kinda like the Arena mode for some reason, could be more interesting with some crazier designs, I found the maps in the update a little flat layout wise. Look forward to seeing something new for it.

  • What have you purchased recently?

    I'm enjoying it. The demo definitely grew on me after a few play throughs and I figured the combat/loot was enough to to convince me to grab it. I'm only about 3 hours or so in on my first character but it's fun. You won't necessarily get the depth of combat you'd find in Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden but I think the combat itself is a great translation of the Diablo click-fest ARPG's for the console, even though it does comes off as a little effortless at first, I'm hoping the difficulty ramps up a bit as I go further.

    Also the music kicks ass, easily one of it's biggest highlights, it really picks up for where the story and dialogue fall short, which is this weird combination of Sci-Fi camp and Norse Mythology god-name droping. I like the environments and the idea of the universe, I'm just not completely sold on how they pulled it off.

    I can see why the game's been so polarizing for people, but I think it's worth the time. It does some interesting stuff, the demo is worth a whirl at the very least.