🚀 go-pugleaf

>What Have You Been Playing... IN OCTOBER 2016?

Resident Evil 6
Quantum Break

Resident Evil 6
Taken in isolation, this is a deeply flawed game.  By no means is RE6 a 'bad 
game'; I enjoyed it more and more with each succeeding character campaign, 
ultimately becoming very satisfied with the experience and wanting more 
Resident Evil:  That is one definition of a successful game -- and I harken 
back to _The Thing_ videogame; deeply flawed and incomplete in execution, 
yet it left me with the desire to see Carpenter's movie once more, and I 
recall fondly that game's attempt to recapture the film's cold horror and 
menace.

But the transition from a tank-controlled slow-moving RE0/1 to this hectic, 
globe-trotting, run & gun, 3rd-person cover-shooter is jarring and 
confusing, especially at first.  I'll try separating my thoughts into Plot 
and Gameplay.

Plot
A big issue for the designers of RE6 had to simply be the *quantity* of 
material to attempt to organize and somehow present to the player.  With 
only a passing familiarity with the series, the flurry of characters, shell 
companies and acronyms, shifting relationships, and frequent, often obscure, 
references to gameworld events spanning 20yrs of releases is bewildering. 
They chose separate inter-locking campaigns to express this material, which 
in itself introduces additional complexity and deliberate plot holes --  
meant to be filled in via the other campaigns -- and requires additional 
player mental involvement in keeping track of both the action and plot 
details, both low- and high-level, and filling in missing information.

For example:  One scene drops you into eastern europe with various zombies, 
some of which can mutate, when a giant monster zombie is air-lifted in out 
of nowhere, and the BSAA suddenly appears.  In the ensuing chaotic battle 
keeping track of plot details is important to overall enjoyment:  Why is my 
character here and where am I trying to get to?  Why the variations in 
zombie mutations?  Why is a giant monster being air-lifted in?  BSAA?  Many 
games would take the time to explain to the player in-game, often more than 
once -- I'm thinking of RE4, and being able to click on an object and seeing 
an informational popup.  RE6 assumes the player has both played past games, 
and is willing to read related material, e.g., _RE6: Marhawa Desire_, a 
prequel Manga series, published before the game came out (I was unaware of 
this manga).  The result is a fragmentary experience that doesn't gell 
*while playing the game for the first time*.

The designers did add one hand-holding concession, and a very important one: 
Emblems tucked away in remote corners of level maps, that unlock explanatory 
blurbs in an Extras sub-menu, including important ones summarizing the 
background for the preceding action, or detailing characteristics of 
protagonists and enemies and their genesis.  But head-shakingly, these 
emblems are both easy to pass by unawares, and their unlocked plot blurbs 
hidden away in the UI.  I was unaware that emblems unlocked plot information 
for almost the entire game :), having assumed they were simple collectibles 
as in RE4, and only found a handful in any case.

So, to summarize:  A pretty deep and involved plot; many characters, with 
history between them; told in a highly fragmented and convolved manner, with 
abrupt transitions, that requires way more investment in the franchise to 
fully tease out enjoyment from than the average gamer is willing to put in, 
but which after completing all the campaigns and reading both wiki plot 
articles and reading all the Emblem blurbs (they are collected for each 
campaign in youtube videos), I'm very impressed.  The Chris campaign in 
particular told a good story.

Now, let me add one GLARING WTF eye-roll comment about the direction of the 
Leon campaign, that I still find jaw-droppingly incomprehensible in the 
release of a AAA title.  And that is the verbatim re-use of the entire 
opening scenario of the campaign -- with a distinctive helicopter ride and 
crash -- much later on in the same campaign.  This was so jarring, that it 
had me pausing and questioning if I'd missed something:  Was this a 
flashback somehow?  Nope:  They'd just cut-and-pasted a complete 
15-minute-long plot segment.  Unbelievable.  Thankfully I saw nothing like 
that done in the other campaigns.

Gameplay
The 1) somewhat awkward control scheme, of this 2) 3rd-person-cover-shooter, 
probably comprise most players initial complaints about RE6:  "This Is Not A 
Resident Evil Game!!"  Heehee.  No, it's not survival horror, certainly.  I 
got over that, is about all I can respond to that criticism.  But it most 
definitely is a RE title, deeply imbedded in the lore of the series.  They 
wanted to tell their story in a different manner this time and that's fine 
by me.

I was still fumbling with the control scheme in this game, even after 20hrs 
of play.  In particular my heavy-handedness on the R stick and it's builtin 
button kept shifting my over-the-shoulder perspective back and forth in 
tense encounters.  It never occurred to me to try m+kb, as....RE games are 
built for controllers, right?  But playing on Amateur difficulty I didn't 
have any enduring issues.  Oh, one annoying problem did crop up:  My Elite 
xbox controller would disconnect in tense gameplay moments:  I'm not clear 
if this is a windows issue or game issue, but I've turned off all USB 
power-saving settings to no avail.

The game looks good, with many different environments and non-repetitive 
gameplay, and ran fine at 1440p.  I enjoyed it, and look forward to playing 
the few back titles in this series I've missed.


Quantum Break
Wow!  Forget the pre-release hype, post-release let-down, UWP outrage, 
floaty mouse and stuttering complaints:  Just let it all go!  Quantum Break 
today is a smooth-performing, great-looking, incredibly fun shooter, with 
high production quality, A-list actors, and a story that enthralled me from 
start to finish.

I hadn't touched it since buying a code soon after release, when a wandering 
mouse, delayed action controls, and a frustrating low framerate -- even 
after fooling with the useless settings -- left me shaking my head and 
disinclined to even leave the starting area.  And so it sat for 6 months, 
until a friend said he'd played and enjoyed it.  I reinstalled -- with no 
hardware changes except for a larger faster SSD, but of course dozens of 
patches & drivers & win10 updates later -- and immediately it clicked.

Panning was smooth, controls responsive.  The slightly blurry look --  
in-game scaled to 1080p on a 1440p monitor -- inconsequential, especially 
given the highly detailed facial expressions and animations.  It even 
accepted bumping up some detail levels without complaint.  And with 
performance complaints behind, I was free to enjoy the story and gameplay.

Both of which are wonderful.  The shooting is fast-paced and immersive, with 
good-feeling standard projectile weapons and an array of time-manipulation 
powers which are meted out and upgradable as the game progresses.  Battles 
are short but intense, with objects flying and shimmering graphics effects, 
and never play out the same way.  Between battles are simple traversal and 
time-manipulation puzzles, for some variety.  And then there's the movies.

The first of these 15-20min(?) live-action film segments hit me with a bit 
of a shock:  They want me sit here and watch a movie in the middle of a 
videogame?? Come on I want to shoot something!  They are well-shot and 
acted, the props believable.  But the neatest thing about these clips is the 
effect of the transition back to the game:  First you see the real actors 
playing the game roles, then a short game-engine clip with these same -- now 
mocapped -- actors to introduce the next act, followed with the 
near-seamless transition to the player-controlled character; I find it very 
effective in involving me with the plot and making me care about the 
characters.

So if you're still holding a grudge against Remedy for not churning out a 
comicbook Max Payne sequel, my advice is:  Just let it all go!  Enjoy it! 
Quantum Break is highly recommended

rms 

>What Have You Been Playing... IN OCTOBER 2016?

    I'll add my impressions of a few VR games I fired up on the Vive:
ADR1FT
    This is a 'port' from the Oculus Rift version, which uses a gamepad, and 
imho it's poorly done.  I felt like there was next to no controls 
explanation for the Vive controllers, and in my short time with it never did 
figure out how to move around.  I'll have to come back to it later, after I 
figure out how to switch it to gamepad control.

Audioshield
    Less interesting than I thought it would be.  It defaulted to playing 
songs from youtube (I guess they have no licensed songs) which was awkward 
at best.  After a couple songs it petered out and I gave up.  Guess I'm not 
very musically inclined :(

theBlu
    This places you in a small area on the sea floor, with schools of 
colorful fish, anemones, and jellyfish swaying around you, in about a 
15min-long experience (there are a few additional scenarios I'm saving for 
later).  I found it pleasant and peaceful, and exited with a smile on my 
face.  I'll be coming back to this one!

Raw Data
    Now this is what I'm talkin' 'bout!  A full-on FPS robot shooter! 
Within minutes I was head-shotting implacable-looking robots, teleporting 
back-and-forth, ducking behind crates, throwing full punches, scanning the 
ceiling for hostile drones.  You look down to your left hip and see a clip 
holster; to your right a pistol holster; you have to reach down and 'grab' a 
clip with one hand, then 'load' it into the pistol in your other hand.  Just 
the act of doing this, seeing the 'gun' in your hand, then having to line up 
the sights to aim, is incredibly satisfying.  The default graphics settings 
are fairly pixelated, but this sort of game on next-generation devices will 
be pretty darn amazing.

rms 

Mickey Mouse Castle of Illusions

I basically bought this game for my kids and because it was going out of 
print and expected nothing. Boy what a surprise, the game is an 
excellent platformer (done by Sega for the Dreamcast I think originally 
later the PC got an updated version)
And it is really hard compared to other platformers. Definitely to hard 
for my kids (although i am not sure anymore they have become really good 
at platformers lately)

Highly recommendable if you want to play excellent 2d platformers (and 
if you still can get it, it currently is in IP limbo))

Werner




Am 01.11.16 um 04:28 schrieb Spalls Hurgenson:
> Happy Halloween! I come not to offer you treats and candies, but
> instead an opportunity to share opinions about what games we've all
> played over the last 30 days; that's just as good, right? Hey, stop
> that; why are you all egging my house?
>
> It's been a month and I doubt you've forgotten the drill, but just in
> case you are new or amnesiac, here it is anyway. Play the games, then
> tell us all what games you played here. Optionally, share a few
> thoughts about them. But just in case you still don't get it, I'll
> show you all how it's done... again ;-)
>
>
> --------------------
> Short and Sweet
> --------------------
> * Halo: Reach (replay)
> * Eurotruck Simulator 2 (replay)
> * Duke Nukem Forever (replay)
> * Flashback (2013) (new)
> * Crysis 2 (replay)
> * State of Decay (replay)
> * D/Generation HD (new)
> * Skyrim Special Edition (new)
>
> TL; DR
> ----------
>
> * Halo: Reach (XBox360) (replay)
> The main games of the Halo series are - at their best - a mediocre
> experience more notable for their innovative control scheme than
> anything else, but I've always had a bit of a soft spot for the side
> titles: Halo Wars, ODST or Reach are all far more memorable to me than
> Halo 2 or Halo 3. Reach was Bungie's swan song with the franchise, and
> it shows; it has the best characters, set-pieces and graphics. Again,
> that's not too high a bar to pass given how average all the rest of
> the games were, but it's still a step up.
>
> Okay, in truth Halo: Reach is still fairly average, with a humdrum
> story and gameplay gimmicks of questionable value. But the backdrop of
> an invaded planet sets a terrific mood that is well supported by the
> excellent music and saturated graphics. Some of the gunplay remains
> tedious - it wouldn't be a Bungie game if some sequences didn't
> overstay their welcome - but in general there is enough variety and
> change of pace to keep things from becoming too bogged down. Reach may
> not be a great FPS, but it is possibly the best of the Halo series and
> a enjoyable enough romp through the battlefields of the future.
>
>
>
> * Eurotruck Simulator 2 (replay)
> I have very little new to say about this game; for all that it's
> difficult to explain its appeal, I find Eurotruck Simulator 2 to be
> one of the most relaxing games I own. But I'm at a loss for anything
> else to say about it.
>
> The biggest problem I had with the game this month had less to do with
> the title itself and more to do with Steam and its idiotic and
> gamer-hostile policy of forcing updates on players. ETS2 has a
> significant modding community despite the fact that updates to the
> base program frequently break the mods, and this problem is
> exacerbated by the fact that you can't prevent Steam from applying
> patches. This stupidity hit me hard this month, as just as soon as I
> had finished downloading and installing the latest versions of my
> favorite mod, Steam patched the game and I had to start all over. Long
> story short, it was two frustrating days before I could play a game I
> usually rely on to bring me zen tranquility. This resulted in a rant
> of which this is a blessedly edited and shortened version. But damned
> if I don't hate Steam.
>
> And that's all I have to say about that.
>
>
> * Duke Nukem Forever (replay)
> Ah, Duke Nukem Forever, the running punch-line of game development. I
> decided to give the game another try just to see how bad it really
> was. And it was really bad; terrible enough that I gave up on it after
> five or six levels.
>
> A lot of reviews claimed it failed because its humor and attitude -
> Duke's gross sexism and dated pop-culture references - just didn't fit
> in well with modern sensibilities. Personally, I disagree. I think
> that Duke's hyper-masculinity and love-affair with memes-from-the-80s
> would have been quite enjoyable HAD THEY BEEN DONE WELL. But
> everything about DNF was awful. Its levels were cramped, linear and
> uninteresting to look at. It's weapons were boring. It's monsters
> lacked threat and character. The controls were stiff, the graphics
> were unappealing. The dialog too was tedious, but not because of its
> subject matter; it was just badly written. It felt like an amateur
> effort rushed to market. Personally, I'd love to see Duke make a
> comeback, with all his hoary quips and politically incorrect opinions
> intact. I just want him in a game developed by a team with talent.
>
>
>
> * Flashback (2013) (new)
> The reviews for the Flashback remake game were all negative, but
> nostalgia - and a sharply discounted price - convinced me to give it a
> chance. And you know what, it wasn't half bad. My biggest complaint
> would have to be with its voice-acting, which was just awful.
> Otherwise I felt the game was a decent-enough remake. I think a lot of
> the problems other reviewers had with the title was that the original
> game wasn't all that great to begin with, and the remake did little to
> fix the original's gameplay or narrative problems. Then again, the
> reviewers would also have cried foul had the remake strayed too far
> from the original, leaving the developers in a no-win situation.
>
> Flashback HD isn't a great game, but it's a good remake of an average
> title. It gave me a chance to play a title of yesteryear that I
> semi-fondly remembered with modern graphics that worked on a modern
> system. Not expecting more than that, I came away pleased with my
> miniscule investment of time and money.
>
>
> * Crysis 2 (replay)
> Crytek - the developers of Crysis 2 - were such a marvel when they
> burst upon the gaming scene in 2004. Seemingly coming out of nowhere,
> their first two games were graphical powerhouses backed up with
> impressive - albeit not flawless - gameplay. And then it all went
> wrong with Crysis 2. That game is such a far cry (ha!) from its
> predecessors; linear maps, brain dead enemies, and unexciting gunplay.
> It's almost a chore to play to the end of the game. This time, I set
> myself the self-imposed challenge of only killing aliens just because
> I was bored of the usual grind. I wasn't fully successful at this goal
> - there are several set-pieces where you have to kill some human
> opponents to progress - and sadly the game and plot took no notice of
> my attempted heroism (I was still frequently accused of murdering
> fellow soldiers even though I'd done no such thing). Even so,  this
> didn't make the game a jot more difficult; the AI was so stupid that
> sneaking by them was effortless, and even when I was forced into
> combat, the computer-controlled opponents rarely put up much of a
> fight. The levels were rarely interesting to play through either - too
> linear to offer much in the way of tactical maneuvering, and not very
> interesting to look at either. Crysis 2 suffered from the ultimate sin
> of computer gaming: it was dull.
>
>
>
> * State of Decay (replay)
> In many ways, State of Decay feels like a prototype for a bigger,
> better game. It's not so much a game that focuses on what it does have
> - an open world, hordes of zombies, bases, recruitable NPCs, crafting
> - as what it doesn't, but feels like it should. Like co-op, or a
> story, or being able to have more than twenty monsters on-screen at
> once. I was constantly running into the game's limitations and wishing
> for more features or decrying some of its amateur game-design
> elements. It felt like the developers planned to have more in the game
> but - either because of lack of resources or talent - were unable to
> follow up on those ideas. Nonetheless, the core of the game remained
> enjoyable and I enjoyed wandering the wilderness bashing zeds even if
> the specific nuances could have used improvement.
>
>
> * D/Generation HD (new)
> I have a story about the original D/Generation, of which this is a
> remake. Back in the day, I purchased this game from an Egghead
> computer store (remember them?); upon taking it home, I discovered
> that not only was the box missing a disk, it also had half a pencil
> incongruously stuck into the carton. Upon taking it back to the store,
> the manager there refused me an exchange or refund, savagely accusing
> me of attempting to pirate the game and trying to rip me off. He later
> went bankrupt and I still laugh at his misfortune every time I pass
> the storefront that once housed his business.
>
> It's not a very interesting story, I know, but neither is D/Generation
> HD a very interesting game. The original had an appealing look, but
> suffered from loose controls that contrasted poorly with the accuracy
> required by its puzzles. The remake is slightly more forgiving - it,
> at least, allows you to use a gamepad while the original didn't even
> support a joystick - but suffers from a range of other issues. The
> graphics are atrocious, even compared to the twenty-year old pixelated
> artwork of the original; it looks like it uses the graphics engine
> from the Sims, but with worse animation. The use of a "lives" system
> while also allowing unlimited saves is a poor choice, however, and
> forces tedious save-scumming. The game is insufferably buggy:
> important clues don't show up, dialog boxes get stuck on the screen,
> the graphics mess up if you change the default settings, and the game
> locks up if you access certain computer terminals. It's embarrassingly
> bad.
>
> The core gameplay, however, is identical to that of the original and
> that alone saves the game from being completely terrible; it is an
> interesting blend of shooter-action and puzzles and I played it until
> - inevitably - the game broke and I could progress no further. But I
> probably would have just been better off playing the original.
>
>
> * Skyrim Special Edition (new)
> I didn't so much play this game as give it a brief look-over. Kudos to
> Bethesda for offering the "Special Edition" as a free upgrade to
> anyone who owned the original game. Having said that, I have to say I
> was pretty disappointed with the end result, even if I wasn't
> surprised. Having heavily modded the original, the Special Edition was
> a significant step backwards not only in graphics but also in
> interface and features. Honestly, until the modders get up to speed
> and port all their fixes and upgrades to the new version, there is
> absolutely no reason to even look at the special edition and -
> although the original has remained on my hard-drive since its release
> - the remake barely lasted an hour. Maybe in a year or two I'll give
> it another chance; until then, I'm satisfied with the six-year old
> version.
>
>
> --------------------
>
> So, that's what kept me busy over the past month. How about you guys?
>
>
> What Have You Been Playing... IN OCTOBER 2016?
>

Ah ok and I forgot.
I also started with my 7 year old son recently Super Mario Galaxy (on 
the PC)
the advantage using the pc over the Wii for this excellent entry of the 
Super Mario series (some say it is the best even better than the Super 
Mario 64) is you can play it in full hd. The game really scales well
to 1080p thanks to its cell shaded graphics.
My setup to play this one basically is (since the original disk along 
with the wii already is in the basement)
Wii-U controller
Dolpin bar
Dolpin emulator

and a Raspberry PI to basically stream the controls back to the PC
while the frontent itself is a Steam Link which streams the game to the 
TV. The connection between the rasperry and the pc is done with a 
program called virtual here which can basically map remote controllers 
to a local pc.
The same also would be possible with the Steam Link alone, however the 
link itself lacks a multicore processor and basially runs 100% in 
streaming mode anyways, so it lacks the horsepower to stream the Wii-U 
controller properly back to the PC.

The game on the Dolphin emulator pretty much plays perfectly with some 
slight stuttering (seldomly) on my PC setup (an aging core i5 with an 
NVidia 970 and 8 Gigs of Ram)



Am 01.11.16 um 16:17 schrieb Werner Punz:
> Mickey Mouse Castle of Illusions
>
> I basically bought this game for my kids and because it was going out of
> print and expected nothing. Boy what a surprise, the game is an
> excellent platformer (done by Sega for the Dreamcast I think originally
> later the PC got an updated version)
> And it is really hard compared to other platformers. Definitely to hard
> for my kids (although i am not sure anymore they have become really good
> at platformers lately)
>
> Highly recommendable if you want to play excellent 2d platformers (and
> if you still can get it, it currently is in IP limbo))
>
> Werner
>
>
>
>
> Am 01.11.16 um 04:28 schrieb Spalls Hurgenson:
>> Happy Halloween! I come not to offer you treats and candies, but
>> instead an opportunity to share opinions about what games we've all
>> played over the last 30 days; that's just as good, right? Hey, stop
>> that; why are you all egging my house?
>>
>> It's been a month and I doubt you've forgotten the drill, but just in
>> case you are new or amnesiac, here it is anyway. Play the games, then
>> tell us all what games you played here. Optionally, share a few
>> thoughts about them. But just in case you still don't get it, I'll
>> show you all how it's done... again ;-)
>>
>>
>> --------------------
>> Short and Sweet
>> --------------------
>> * Halo: Reach (replay)
>> * Eurotruck Simulator 2 (replay)
>> * Duke Nukem Forever (replay)
>> * Flashback (2013) (new)
>> * Crysis 2 (replay)
>> * State of Decay (replay)
>> * D/Generation HD (new)
>> * Skyrim Special Edition (new)
>>
>> TL; DR
>> ----------
>>
>> * Halo: Reach (XBox360) (replay)
>> The main games of the Halo series are - at their best - a mediocre
>> experience more notable for their innovative control scheme than
>> anything else, but I've always had a bit of a soft spot for the side
>> titles: Halo Wars, ODST or Reach are all far more memorable to me than
>> Halo 2 or Halo 3. Reach was Bungie's swan song with the franchise, and
>> it shows; it has the best characters, set-pieces and graphics. Again,
>> that's not too high a bar to pass given how average all the rest of
>> the games were, but it's still a step up.
>>
>> Okay, in truth Halo: Reach is still fairly average, with a humdrum
>> story and gameplay gimmicks of questionable value. But the backdrop of
>> an invaded planet sets a terrific mood that is well supported by the
>> excellent music and saturated graphics. Some of the gunplay remains
>> tedious - it wouldn't be a Bungie game if some sequences didn't
>> overstay their welcome - but in general there is enough variety and
>> change of pace to keep things from becoming too bogged down. Reach may
>> not be a great FPS, but it is possibly the best of the Halo series and
>> a enjoyable enough romp through the battlefields of the future.
>>
>>
>>
>> * Eurotruck Simulator 2 (replay)
>> I have very little new to say about this game; for all that it's
>> difficult to explain its appeal, I find Eurotruck Simulator 2 to be
>> one of the most relaxing games I own. But I'm at a loss for anything
>> else to say about it.
>>
>> The biggest problem I had with the game this month had less to do with
>> the title itself and more to do with Steam and its idiotic and
>> gamer-hostile policy of forcing updates on players. ETS2 has a
>> significant modding community despite the fact that updates to the
>> base program frequently break the mods, and this problem is
>> exacerbated by the fact that you can't prevent Steam from applying
>> patches. This stupidity hit me hard this month, as just as soon as I
>> had finished downloading and installing the latest versions of my
>> favorite mod, Steam patched the game and I had to start all over. Long
>> story short, it was two frustrating days before I could play a game I
>> usually rely on to bring me zen tranquility. This resulted in a rant
>> of which this is a blessedly edited and shortened version. But damned
>> if I don't hate Steam.
>>
>> And that's all I have to say about that.
>>
>>
>> * Duke Nukem Forever (replay)
>> Ah, Duke Nukem Forever, the running punch-line of game development. I
>> decided to give the game another try just to see how bad it really
>> was. And it was really bad; terrible enough that I gave up on it after
>> five or six levels.
>>
>> A lot of reviews claimed it failed because its humor and attitude -
>> Duke's gross sexism and dated pop-culture references - just didn't fit
>> in well with modern sensibilities. Personally, I disagree. I think
>> that Duke's hyper-masculinity and love-affair with memes-from-the-80s
>> would have been quite enjoyable HAD THEY BEEN DONE WELL. But
>> everything about DNF was awful. Its levels were cramped, linear and
>> uninteresting to look at. It's weapons were boring. It's monsters
>> lacked threat and character. The controls were stiff, the graphics
>> were unappealing. The dialog too was tedious, but not because of its
>> subject matter; it was just badly written. It felt like an amateur
>> effort rushed to market. Personally, I'd love to see Duke make a
>> comeback, with all his hoary quips and politically incorrect opinions
>> intact. I just want him in a game developed by a team with talent.
>>
>>
>>
>> * Flashback (2013) (new)
>> The reviews for the Flashback remake game were all negative, but
>> nostalgia - and a sharply discounted price - convinced me to give it a
>> chance. And you know what, it wasn't half bad. My biggest complaint
>> would have to be with its voice-acting, which was just awful.
>> Otherwise I felt the game was a decent-enough remake. I think a lot of
>> the problems other reviewers had with the title was that the original
>> game wasn't all that great to begin with, and the remake did little to
>> fix the original's gameplay or narrative problems. Then again, the
>> reviewers would also have cried foul had the remake strayed too far
>> from the original, leaving the developers in a no-win situation.
>>
>> Flashback HD isn't a great game, but it's a good remake of an average
>> title. It gave me a chance to play a title of yesteryear that I
>> semi-fondly remembered with modern graphics that worked on a modern
>> system. Not expecting more than that, I came away pleased with my
>> miniscule investment of time and money.
>>
>>
>> * Crysis 2 (replay)
>> Crytek - the developers of Crysis 2 - were such a marvel when they
>> burst upon the gaming scene in 2004. Seemingly coming out of nowhere,
>> their first two games were graphical powerhouses backed up with
>> impressive - albeit not flawless - gameplay. And then it all went
>> wrong with Crysis 2. That game is such a far cry (ha!) from its
>> predecessors; linear maps, brain dead enemies, and unexciting gunplay.
>> It's almost a chore to play to the end of the game. This time, I set
>> myself the self-imposed challenge of only killing aliens just because
>> I was bored of the usual grind. I wasn't fully successful at this goal
>> - there are several set-pieces where you have to kill some human
>> opponents to progress - and sadly the game and plot took no notice of
>> my attempted heroism (I was still frequently accused of murdering
>> fellow soldiers even though I'd done no such thing). Even so,  this
>> didn't make the game a jot more difficult; the AI was so stupid that
>> sneaking by them was effortless, and even when I was forced into
>> combat, the computer-controlled opponents rarely put up much of a
>> fight. The levels were rarely interesting to play through either - too
>> linear to offer much in the way of tactical maneuvering, and not very
>> interesting to look at either. Crysis 2 suffered from the ultimate sin
>> of computer gaming: it was dull.
>>
>>
>>
>> * State of Decay (replay)
>> In many ways, State of Decay feels like a prototype for a bigger,
>> better game. It's not so much a game that focuses on what it does have
>> - an open world, hordes of zombies, bases, recruitable NPCs, crafting
>> - as what it doesn't, but feels like it should. Like co-op, or a
>> story, or being able to have more than twenty monsters on-screen at
>> once. I was constantly running into the game's limitations and wishing
>> for more features or decrying some of its amateur game-design
>> elements. It felt like the developers planned to have more in the game
>> but - either because of lack of resources or talent - were unable to
>> follow up on those ideas. Nonetheless, the core of the game remained
>> enjoyable and I enjoyed wandering the wilderness bashing zeds even if
>> the specific nuances could have used improvement.
>>
>>
>> * D/Generation HD (new)
>> I have a story about the original D/Generation, of which this is a
>> remake. Back in the day, I purchased this game from an Egghead
>> computer store (remember them?); upon taking it home, I discovered
>> that not only was the box missing a disk, it also had half a pencil
>> incongruously stuck into the carton. Upon taking it back to the store,
>> the manager there refused me an exchange or refund, savagely accusing
>> me of attempting to pirate the game and trying to rip me off. He later
>> went bankrupt and I still laugh at his misfortune every time I pass
>> the storefront that once housed his business.
>>
>> It's not a very interesting story, I know, but neither is D/Generation
>> HD a very interesting game. The original had an appealing look, but
>> suffered from loose controls that contrasted poorly with the accuracy
>> required by its puzzles. The remake is slightly more forgiving - it,
>> at least, allows you to use a gamepad while the original didn't even
>> support a joystick - but suffers from a range of other issues. The
>> graphics are atrocious, even compared to the twenty-year old pixelated
>> artwork of the original; it looks like it uses the graphics engine
>> from the Sims, but with worse animation. The use of a "lives" system
>> while also allowing unlimited saves is a poor choice, however, and
>> forces tedious save-scumming. The game is insufferably buggy:
>> important clues don't show up, dialog boxes get stuck on the screen,
>> the graphics mess up if you change the default settings, and the game
>> locks up if you access certain computer terminals. It's embarrassingly
>> bad.
>>
>> The core gameplay, however, is identical to that of the original and
>> that alone saves the game from being completely terrible; it is an
>> interesting blend of shooter-action and puzzles and I played it until
>> - inevitably - the game broke and I could progress no further. But I
>> probably would have just been better off playing the original.
>>
>>
>> * Skyrim Special Edition (new)
>> I didn't so much play this game as give it a brief look-over. Kudos to
>> Bethesda for offering the "Special Edition" as a free upgrade to
>> anyone who owned the original game. Having said that, I have to say I
>> was pretty disappointed with the end result, even if I wasn't
>> surprised. Having heavily modded the original, the Special Edition was
>> a significant step backwards not only in graphics but also in
>> interface and features. Honestly, until the modders get up to speed
>> and port all their fixes and upgrades to the new version, there is
>> absolutely no reason to even look at the special edition and -
>> although the original has remained on my hard-drive since its release
>> - the remake barely lasted an hour. Maybe in a year or two I'll give
>> it another chance; until then, I'm satisfied with the six-year old
>> version.
>>
>>
>> --------------------
>>
>> So, that's what kept me busy over the past month. How about you guys?
>>
>>
>> What Have You Been Playing... IN OCTOBER 2016?
>>
>

On Tue, 1 Nov 2016 16:17:41 +0100, Werner Punz <we...@gmx.at> wrote:

>Mickey Mouse Castle of Illusions
>
>I basically bought this game for my kids and because it was going out of 
>print and expected nothing. Boy what a surprise, the game is an 
>excellent platformer (done by Sega for the Dreamcast I think originally 
>later the PC got an updated version)
>And it is really hard compared to other platformers. Definitely to hard 
>for my kids (although i am not sure anymore they have become really good 
>at platformers lately)
>
>Highly recommendable if you want to play excellent 2d platformers (and 
>if you still can get it, it currently is in IP limbo))

The original was a Sega Genesis title.  I remember picking it up
thinking the Mickey Mouse theme would pretty much make it impossible
for me to enjoy, but I was very wrong, it was an excellent and
addictive platformer with great production values throughout.  

I seem to remember it getting spectacular reviews, and I often hear it
come up as one of the top handful of titles people remember when they
think about their old Genesis systems.  It was up there with Sonic the
Hedgehog, and Mario on Nintendo.

Montana Manholers.

Its a terrible game where the goal
is to get as much shit on your dick
from other men's asses as possible.
Sounds like something PW would like.

Spalls Hurgenson <spallsh...@gmail.com> writes:

> Flashback HD isn't a great game, but it's a good remake of an average
> title.

Interesting, I have fond if vague memories of the original
Flashback. Worth a look I think.

> * D/Generation HD (new)

Again, I had no idea this had been remade. I (vaguely) remember
completing the original and I also remember wondering why Crusader: No
Remorse had some similarity to it, same kinds of traps. But I guess I
won't be playing this remake after your review :)

> What Have You Been Playing... IN OCTOBER 2016?

Only Deus Ex: Mankind Divided. I'm around half way through I think,
mostly playing stealthy and enjoying sneaking around. Got deadly with
some criminal gang and some crooked police though. Also managed my old
favorite from the original as well as Human Revolution, turned a bot
against its friends. Really handy and saves a lot of bullets :) Combat
in general seems pretty hard.

The main story isn't much but the side missions have been better I
think. Problem is finding them though. I don't want to comb through
every corner and every sewer.

Amusingly the game is a little buggy. For example, I stunned this
weapons dealer guy and his two bodyguards, hacked the door into his
storeroom and then there was an alarm and someone came in and roused the
people I'd stunned. But no problem, the alarm was silenced and I came
out of the closet I'd been hiding in and sold the guy the rifles he had
in storage :) And it's not like I was using the cloak or bothered to
sneak up on him and his guys, I just walked up to them and punched their
lights out. Easy money, too bad there's not much use for money in the
game.

On Mon, 31 Oct 2016 23:28:36 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote: 

>Happy Halloween! I come not to offer you treats and candies, but
>instead an opportunity to share opinions about what games we've all
>played over the last 30 days; that's just as good, right? Hey, stop
>that; why are you all egging my house?
>
>It's been a month and I doubt you've forgotten the drill, but just in
>case you are new or amnesiac, here it is anyway. Play the games, then
>tell us all what games you played here. Optionally, share a few
>thoughts about them. But just in case you still don't get it, I'll
>show you all how it's done... again ;-)
>
I have been playing a hell of a lot of Fallout Shelter and Fallout 4
(with my new VATS enhanced character build).

Fallout Shelter just hits that "gotta get 'em all" collection game itch
that I tend to develop. It's fun for me to gradually possess all the
weapons, outfits, pets, and rare settlers in the game. Most normal people
would consider it grind-o-mania, however. I like playing "Where's Waldo?"
with the mysterious stranger, too. It is not a deep gaming experience,
however, and I can't recommend the game to anyone who doesn't share my
collector's prerogative.

In Fallout 4, I started up a female character, Diane, this time with the
unofficial patch mod and Vault 1080, and I am putting lots of points into
luck and perception to make her a VATS killer. I also grabbed the "idiot
savant" perk, as she only has enough INT to get her terminal hacking. The
game plays very differently when you don't treat it like an FPS, and I am
enjoying the variety. And with the occasional "idiot" sequence
punctuating the gameplay, it's really quite funny. There goes another 100
hours of my life.

I recently grabbed the FO4 "season pass" on sale, and intend to play the
DLCs with my previous character, Duane, without mods so I can rack up
those achievements. If the DLC is any good, I'll try it with Diane, too.

I also purchased Firewatch, Mount & Blade: Warband, and the entire
F.E.A.R. collection. Onto the backlog they go!

So that and schoolwork. Lots and lots of schoolwork.

-- 
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

>I have been playing a hell of a lot of Fallout Shelter and Fallout 4

    The many reports of a dumbed-down storyline and pruned conversation 
trees has wilted any boner I had to try FO4.  Any thoughts on that, how it 
compares to FO3?

rms 

Spalls Horrendous <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote in 
news:5u1g1cdein218r...@4ax.com:



> Happy Halloween! I come not to offer you treats and candies, but

> instead an opportunity to share opinions about what games we've all

> played over the last 30 days; that's just as good, right? Hey, stop

> that; why are you all egging my house?

> 

> It's been a month and I doubt you've forgotten the drill, but just in

> case you are new or amnesiac, here it is anyway. Play the games, then

> tell us all what games you played here. Optionally, share a few

> thoughts about them. But just in case you still don't get it, I'll

> show you all how it's done... Again ;-)



My boot drive crashed on 10-31, Windows had been warning me about it having 
issues for a couple weeks, but I checked drive manager and it said 
'healthy' so I thought it might have been a fake pop-up from some site.  
Fortunately I had most of my data on separate drives.  I'm not sure if I 
lost anything important.  I probably lost my son's lego game saves again 
though.  I'm up and running, and just got xnews up (which I thought had 
some sort of spellcheck but doesn't seem to, might have to try something 
else).  I was going to try windows live reader, but couldn't find how to 
set it up for newsgroups, it only seems to have a search and no tools menu 
I can find as one instruction suggested going to.



Last month was really bad for stuff breaking, besides my boot drive, my 
xbox 360 controller developed a break in the cord and keeps cutting out 
every time I move, I switched to the logitech one I bought to try with 
Injustice: Gods Among us, but found the buttons too hard and very 
fatiguing, so I bought a cheap knock-off @play from gamestop which is o.k. 
but not as good as the real thing.  My disposal also broke Friday.  



> 

> * Eurotruck Simulator 2 (replay)



I saw this on sale on steam, I was tempted but didn't buy it.



> 

> What Have You Been Playing... IN OCTOBER 2016?



-------------------------------------------

(PC)

* The Crew

* Gas Guzzlers Extreme

* Flatout 2

* Trackmania Nations

* SPAZ (Space Pirates and Zombies)

* Beyond Good and Evil

* Injustice: Gods Among Us

* Mini Ninjas



(Xbox)

* Sleeping Dogs

* Phantasy Star II



(Wii)

* Sonic All-Star Racing



(Android)

* Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes

* Fallout Shelter

* Kingturn lite

* Trials Fronteer

* FFEXVIUS (Final Fantasy Brave Exodus)

* Pogo Piggle Can't Stop

* Need for Speed: No Limits

-------------------------------------------



** (PC) -----

** The Crew (PC, racing MMO)with Wild Run DLC

    	I wish I could quit you!  I've quit this game at least 4 times in the 
last month and a half, which never lasted more than a day or two.  I might 
be a masochist.  I suck at PVP races, it's partly my computer, which isn't 
up to running this, like many of the console games, the CPU is used more 
than the Graphics card.  I need a CPU upgrade badly, but money is way too 
tight right now, as that entails a new MB & Memory as well and adds up to 
about $450 with the parts I'd want to get, and carries the risk I'd have to 
buy a new Windows license. Currently after every fix I can find and run I'm 
running about 15 fps in cities and 22 in the wilderness.  (My favorite part 
of the game is the wilderness races in raid spec.) It's also probably at 
least partly me being bad.  On the few occasions I get a wilderness PVP map 
I sometimes do well, the last time it was just me and some newbie to the 
game I felt sorry for him and almost waited at the finish line for him to 
win, I'm just not cut out for PVP, but it's the best thing about this game 
and I can't seem to quit.  

    	Wild Run DLC:  This adds Monster Trucks, Drift & Drag specs as well 
as motorcycles, 'The Summit' and freeplay challenges & stunts.  I like the 
motorcycles, they're really only good for freeplay stunts, and some very 
specific PVP maps with loose turns, but they are fun.  The Monster Trucks 
are fun, but there's not really much you can do with them.  You can't use 
any of the new specs in normal PVP, which pretty much kills their appeal to 
me, and really can only be used in solo/crew challenges - and I haven't 
been able to get a crew together of people that have them.  The freeplay 
stunts and challenges are so-so, and The Summit PVP makes you all use given 
cars not your own.  I want to use my own cars after spending so much time 
getting and upgrading them.  Overall kind of meh for the DLC especially at 
the price, I paid $20 for it.

    	Slightly out of last month I did break down and order the xbox 360 
version which arrived 11-1 to see if I could play PVP without, I installed 
it and boy the video looks absolutely horrible compared to the PC version, 
it looks more like a 10 year old game than a 2 year old one, it looks worse 
than Flatout 2 does on my PC.  (Note- everything at minimum in game on the 
PC, but maxed out where I can override it with the NVIDIA settings as those 
setting make no difference to FPS for this game). I also still see 
stutters, but mostly in the cut-scenes, and load times are way longer, and 
they're pretty bad on the PC version.  I do seem to be doing better in the 
story races, but I'm not sure if that's the fact I had to start over and 
have a month and a half experience, or the fps differences. It'll have to 
wait until I get to 50 and get some maxed out cars and can PVP to tell for 
sure, if I can stand the horrible video that long.  The other downside of 
the Xbox 360 version is the Wild Run DLC isn't available for it, apparently 
that's only on the Xbox One.



**** Gas Guzzlers Extreme (PC, racing with weapons, Indy)

    	I mentioned this last month, while I technically didn't finish it 
(I'm not sure there's a finish), I did get one of the last two cars, I 
didn't find anything else really interesting to do at that point.  I do 
recommend it, it's well worth the cheap price on Steam. This one did break 
me out of The crew for a bit, but I was hopping back and forth between them 
as I got too frustrated with one or the other.



*** Flatout 2 (PC, racing) 

    	Another game I bought to try to break me of The Crew, didn't work.  
It plays fine, and the difficulty is about right, but the nitro being 
dependent on hitting things is a bit gamey for me, Gas Guzzlers is far 
better, with weapons if you want that sort of thing.  Still not a bad game, 
and it's growing on me.  



* Trackmania: Nations (PC, racing MMO)

    	Another free racing MMO, I only played a few races, I couldn't 
understand the appeal of this.  Everything is very gamey looking and 
feeling, and I wasn't even sure what was part of the race track.  Whatever 
it is that The Crew has that keeps me interested this didn't have it. 



** SPAZ (Space Pirates and Zombies)(PC, Indy, 2d space ships)

    	This is an interesting little Indy game. There's 2 factions civs and 
feds (not sure where the pirates and zombies come in?), and you have to 
choose a side in each system, and do missions for them, while having 2d 
space battles with the other side and collecting loot and blueprints to 
upgrade your ships.  You start out with 2 ships one can follow you around 
with rts type AI commands, it does fairly well, it looks like you can end 
up with at least 4 at a time.  Not quite as good as the old 2d type space 
battles like my favorite Star Control 2.  Unfortunately this was another 
one that just wasn't quite up to distracting me from The Crew.  If I hadn't 
been so into that other game, I probably would've played through for quite 
some time, and it's on my list to go back to when I finally can put down 
The Crew



* Beyond Good and Evil (PC)

    	Free from U-play for October.  I played very little.  It was a bit 
too cartoony and felt aimed at children, and the view and controls are bad.  
When It took me a really long time to find the camera in the house I gave 
up on it.



* Injustice: Gods Among US (PC, DC universe fighter)

    	I got my logitech controller which I'd found instances of people 
saying they could get the combos off easily with.  It didn't work for me, I 
did find it slightly easier, perhaps 10% and was able to get a couple 
combos off once or twice that I couldn't before after trying a hundred 
times or so, that wasn't enough to keep me playing.  I really didn't like 
the logitech controller though, it was too small for my hands (I'd guess my 
hands are slightly small for a man even) compared to the official xbox one.  
I also found the trigger buttons to require considerably more effort to 
press, and completely unusable for other games where you need to hold them 
down for any period (like all the racing games).  I even had my son try the 
controller as I thought it might be easier for him, but it had the d-pad 
and thumb stick in different positions and he found it confusing.



* Mini Ninjas (PC adventure)

    	I mentioned this last month, I didn't really play more than another 
hour or so, just wasn't really in the mood for a game that reminds me of 
all the ASS adventure type games I used to play like Ratchet and Clank.  



** (Oxbow 360) -----

*** Sleeping Dogs (Xbox 360, GTAG clone-sis)

    	You're an undercover cop infiltrating a gang in China.  Nice game, I 
was into it quite a bit to start, I like the fighting system - it reminds 
me a bit of Mad Max - although Mad Max I'm sure is after this quite a bit, 
it's not quite that good though.  The play otherwise reminds me a bit of 
GTAG III, different enough to not really be a clone, and I prefer playing 
the good guy here too.  Oddly it looks way better than The Crew on the Xbox 
360, which this was another attempt to get me away from.  I had this just 
sitting there unplaced as part of the package when I bought the Xbox, so I 
thought I'd try it.  I eventually gave it up, some way through the 2nd city 
as it started to seem a bit too much fetch quest and running down armored 
cars, and the fighting had graduated to shootouts which were really poor 
compared to the street fighting it started with.  I may go back and try to 
finish this at some point after The Crew releases it's hold on me.



* Phantasy Star II (Xbox 360, Genesis Port)

    	I'm loth to mention this at all, as I really didn't get very far.  I 
decided to check out one of the games from my son's Sonic Genesis 
Collection, he told me to play this one and when it was taking me forever 
to get through all the text in the beginning, told me he wanted to play 
something else on it.  So all I did was read some text and wander around 
the start town a couple minutes.  I'm not sure I have the patience for 
these types of games anymore either, and frankly have no idea what this 
game actually is.



* (Wii) -----

* Sonic All-Star Racing (Wii, cart-racing)

    	My son suddenly picked this up again, and has been playing it quite a 
bit.  I decided to try it with him after a bit as he kept trying to get his 
sister to play it but she didn't want to.  Apparently there's some 
unlockables that you need multilayer for.  I still absolutely hate the Wii 
controllers, but the racing games can use it sort of like a wheel, if the 
controllers weren't so bad this would be an improvement over the xbox 
controller.  It might be the game though, I don't know.  One of the maps 
was like a haunted estate and I couldn't even see where the track was.  One 
jungle one had lots of sharp turns which the controls were too bad to do.  
The other tracks we did were o.k. but winning seemed to have everything to 
do with getting lucky hitting the powerups, which also turned me off.  I'd 
give this a miss.



* (Android) -----

* Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes (Android, freemium turn based.)

    I finally gave this up this month.  The fact you pretty much have to be 
in a guild and you have put in about 5 hours on Tues-Wed to stay in a guild 
and do stuff after 5pm every day really killed it for me.  This was a great 
game before they made those changes a few months ago, but it just got to be 
too much.  If I'm at home after work I'd rather be playing a computer game, 
not a phone game.  But now I've got a problem, I used to play this on 
breaks and walk around the park to get some exercise.  This is the only 
thing I've ever found that kept me going.  I just otherwise can't keep it 
up as I find it too boring.  This game struck a perfect balance with it's 
turn based play to do this, just requiring enough attention to keep my mind 
occupied but no so much I can't pay attention to what's going on around me.  
So I've been looking for something else to play that hits that sweet spot. 



* Fallout Shelter (Android, freemium)

    	I remembered that I liked this, so was trying this for the walks.  
Unfortunately I quickly remembered why I stopped playing this.  Difficult 
controls for picking up and dropping people, and my vault had gotten to an 
unmanageable size.  Also didn't work for my walks as all that dragging and 
dropping and can't pause/finish the game if there's an invasion going on. 



* Kingturn lite (Android, demo)

    	A 8-bit turn based strategy game, It's o.k.  but it just didn't pull 
me in at all. 



* Trials Fronteer (Android, freemium)

    	Another Ubisoft game.  It's a side-scrolling platform motorcycle 
puzzle game set in some sort of post apocalyptic world.  This one is kind 
of fun, the characters have character.  I found pulling off the required 
tricks to progress too difficult while walking though.  



* FFEXVIUS (Final Fantasy Brave Exodus) (Android, freemium, JRPG)

    	This one had some promise, It looks like it might be a bit too 
complicated for what I'm looking for in a walk-break game, it's also got a 
bit too much reading for that so far too.



* Pogo Piggle Can't Stop (Android, free-ads, boardgame/puzzle)

    It's turn based dice/board game against AI or another.  You roll dice 
and place pigs on branches numbered with a combination of 2 dice out of 4 
that eat apples with the goal to get to the center of the tree and eat all 
the golden apples.  Its a bit slow and cerebral.  It seems even the 2d 
board slows my Note 4 down for some reason.  I tried it only twice, and the 
AI won both times.



* Need for Speed: No Limits (Android, freemium, racing)

    	This is pretty good for an Android game.  The controls are odd 
though, it's just left or right turn buttons, and swipe up for nitro.  
There's no throttle or brakes.  I remember playing, what I think was a Need 
for Speed game years ago on my iPhone 4, which used the tilt for steering 
and had a brake & throttle buttons, which makes more sense to me, not sure 
why they did it this way.  I like this game, but it's definitely way too 
interactive for a walk-break, I found myself weaving like a drunk person 
while walking, I'd probably end up running into someone or falling into a 
ditch playing this.  A fun game if I'm stationary though.

>I was going to try windows live reader, but couldn't find how to
>set it up for newsgroups,

    You mean Windows Live Essentials 2012 I assume?  You download, choose to 
install just the newsgroup/mail reader if that's all you want, cancel out of 
any initial email setup (I don't use that, anyway), then click on 
Accounts/Newsgroup and fill it in.  I'd suggest the free 
news.eternal-september.org site, which requires a free account to use.

WLE2012 is supposed to be reaching end-of-support in Jan2017, so I'd 
download and save the package now.  I've always liked it for the simple 
interface.

rms 

Justisaur  <just...@gmail.com> wrote:
>My boot drive crashed on 10-31, Windows had been warning me about it having 
>issues for a couple weeks, but I checked drive manager and it said 
>'healthy' so I thought it might have been a fake pop-up from some site.  

That "healthy" status doesn't mean anything useful on a typical home PC.
It means that all the drives of that make up a volume are currently
online.  Since you probably only have one drive making up the volume
(ie. you're not using Windows's built-in RAID support, which requires a
"Professional" edition or better) it will either say "healthy" or nothing
at all because the drive is completely broken to the point where Windows
wasn't able to read it.

Even SMART diagnostics, the health report given by the drive itself,
aren't that useful.  The last few drives that have failed on me all have
passing grades according to SMART.

Once you start getting errors on a drive, ignore everything else and buy
a new drive.  This is the most dependable message you'll ever get that
the drive is about to fail completely, and you're lucky if you even get
that warning.

>** SPAZ (Space Pirates and Zombies)(PC, Indy, 2d space ships)
>
>    	This is an interesting little Indy game. There's 2 factions civs and 
>feds (not sure where the pirates and zombies come in?),....

Oh, they'll show up soon enough once you get to the core worlds.
They're a third faction although one that you can't ally with them.

					Ross Ridge

-- 
 l/  //	  Ross Ridge -- The Great HTMU
[oo][oo]  rri...@csclub.uwaterloo.ca
-()-/()/  http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca/~rridge/ 
 db  //	  

Spalls Hurgenson  <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>The biggest problem I had with the game this month had less to do with
>the title itself and more to do with Steam and its idiotic and
>gamer-hostile policy of forcing updates on players. ETS2 has a
>significant modding community despite the fact that updates to the
>base program frequently break the mods, and this problem is
>exacerbated by the fact that you can't prevent Steam from applying
>patches. This stupidity hit me hard this month, as just as soon as I
>had finished downloading and installing the latest versions of my
>favorite mod, Steam patched the game and I had to start all over. Long
>story short, it was two frustrating days before I could play a game I
>usually rely on to bring me zen tranquility. This resulted in a rant
>of which this is a blessedly edited and shortened version. But damned
>if I don't hate Steam.

I haven't tried it but there is actually one way you should be able to
stop Steam from updating the game and breaking compatibility with mods.
If you bring up the property page for the game and select the BETAS
tab, you should see a drop down box where you can select from various
"beta" versions of the game.  Most of them are actually old versions
of the game, namely the ones prefixed with "temporary".  Select the
version that your mods work with and you should stay at that version.
If you pick the latest one  you might still get minor updates, but you
shouldn't get any major mod breaking ones.

					Ross Ridge

-- 
 l/  //	  Ross Ridge -- The Great HTMU
[oo][oo]  rri...@csclub.uwaterloo.ca
-()-/()/  http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca/~rridge/ 
 db  //	  

On Wed, 2 Nov 2016 10:34:16 -0600, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action, rms
wrote: 

>>I have been playing a hell of a lot of Fallout Shelter and Fallout 4
>
>    The many reports of a dumbed-down storyline and pruned conversation 
>trees has wilted any boner I had to try FO4.  Any thoughts on that, how it 
>compares to FO3?
>

THIS REPLY CONTAINS MILD SPOILERS. JUST SAYIN'.


Well, I always felt a dialogue tree was a bit of a contrivance to begin
with, cumbersome and only an illusory veneer of the portrayal of choice,
but it is true that there are no real dialogue options in FO4. The
choices you are given only seem to affect the immediate reaction of the
character being spoken with, before s/he lumbers on with the fixed plot
points. It is "yes," "yes, but I'm being funny," "no, but you're going to
make me anyway," and "fuck you I'm in this for myself but will end up
doing what you want anyway."

FO4 is *not* a deep roleplaying experience in terms of dialogue.

As for direct comparison to FO3, there is much more political allegiance
in FO4. Which faction you choose to side with changes how other factions
react to you, who lives or dies, and how you will ultimately decide the
fate of the Commonwealth. In comparison to FO3, where the Enclave is a
static and monolithic enemy and you are presumed to be your father's
child throughout with a monolithic agenda, there is a great deal more
political freedom, similar, but not as complex, to the factions in FO:NV.
You can literally wipe out entire factions the moment you meet them if
you have the skill and inclination, and you will probably be asked to
wipe them out later if you don't side with them. You can behave like a
bastard, but ultimately there is no "bastard" plot line. This has been
the fact of RPG since BG II, however, so I can't fault FO4.

This freedom comes with limits. Many of the plot lines converge in simply
doing the same plot quests but with different factional approaches, IOW
you approach the same plot point with a different agenda. There's a trip
to a power facility that doesn't change one iota, only whose lights
you're going to be turning on. Nothing really groundbreaking in terms of
choice is being presented, other than the storyline departure that the
Institute faction takes at endgame. So if you play any one of the
factions except the Institute, and you also then play the Institute line,
you've pretty much exhausted all the possibilities.

I found the Brotherhood of Steel faction to have the most satisfying
conclusion, though it was not my first choice of faction. This is
probably because I cannot get enough of "Liberty Prime," who makes his
own amusingly hilarious appearance when you side with the Brotherhood.
Getting the mini-nukes for Liberty Prime is also a fun quest.

Essentially, there are points of no return in each factional allegiance,
and you make save games before those points in order to play "what if?"
It isn't really worth replaying the entire game. I spent 100 hours going
through every single faction excepting the Minutemen conclusion. I
couldn't stomach doing the Minutemen conclusion, and it just ended the
same as all the non-Institute plot lines.

There is no weapon degradation; there are no skills, but you don't have
the situation of having a 100 skill in small firearms and missing half
the time point-blank with a pistol. Your actual gun skill is your gun
skill, FPS style, with perks that increase damage and strategy in using
VATS if you aren't into twitch all that much.

Also, the new power armor mechanic in FO4 is absolutely brilliant, and
though you don't have to train in power armor as in FO3, and get the
first suit of power armor within the first hours of the game, it is a
wholly different suit of armor, not just another, higher-DR wearable item
that also looks cool. You have to manage your fusion cores and decide
when to use it and when to go without it and deploy with your
conventional armor.

Towards the end-game, it gets ridiculously easy. Especially if you take
increased damage perks for one of the weapon types. Enemies scale with
level. There is no unbeatable enemy in the game where you can get in over
your head at low-level play. Super mutants are not unstoppable for a low
level character, and the most dangerous enemy is a bloodbug, because it
is small and difficult to hit, flies around like mad, and does poison
damage that cuts through any armor. Deathclaws are mostly laughable, and
you get to put one down in the first hour of the game. Maybe the sentry
bots and assaultrons are a bit of a challenge. That's it.

There is a nice sequence at the museum of witchcraft however, and the
fight with the boss in securing the Minutemen stronghold is really quite
epic. Basically, the difficulty curve goes vertical-like-a-cliff at
unpredictable points in the game, and then you are, very occasionally,
really in over your head.

So the answer is in comparison to FO3, FO4 is *different*. Its aims and
mechanics are a departure from the previous Fallout. It becomes more of
an action game. It has better faction management. The plot could be
something you find more interesting than the "quest for Dad" of FO3.

I will warn that one thing that annoyed the hell out of me in my first
playthrough was the interminable Minutemen Radiant quests that would
regularly crop up and the Minecraft-like settlement building that was a
requirement of that gameflow. You can easily avoid this grinding/building
mechanic by not completing the first quest with Preston Garvey. Simply
don't follow him to Sanctuary, or refuse to end the inital Minuteman
quest by agreeing to help him in Sanctuary in securing another
settlement, and he will STFU. Or at least he has so far in my second
playthrough.

If you avoid Garvey like this, however, you will miss out on that epic
battle in the course of the Minuteman story line which might make it
worth playing once. Problem is, you simply have to commit a lot of time
to get to it. There is no pressure point where you can save. You have to
go all-in on settlement building. If you actually enjoy the gameflow of
settlement building and crafting, you can go nuts. Lots of people have,
just Google it. I didn't, so in my second run, I am avoiding that smug
asshole entirely after I've got my power armor from him.

I would recommend FO4. I say that as a person who thinks Planescape:
Torment is a monumental classic. I enjoy FPS though, and that is a
requirement of FO4 gameflow. If you don't go in expecting FO3, and you
refrain from idealizing FO3's design choices, FO4 has many charms of its
own.

Hopefully, my overview will help you decide if it's worth your $$. I
think it is a good game, and I felt compelled to put many more hours into
*it* than I did FO3 and FO:NV. Like 3 times the hours.

-- 
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

On Tue, 1 Nov 2016 08:31:39 -0600, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action, rms
wrote: 

>So if you're still holding a grudge against Remedy for not churning out a 
>comicbook Max Payne sequel, my advice is:  Just let it all go!  Enjoy it! 
>Quantum Break is highly recommended

That's something I might pick up if I don't have to buy it from the
Windows Store (I understand it's also released on Steam).

I tried reCore in a trial and was completely underwhelmed with that one.
It is also a pain in the ass to set app installs to my platter hard disk
to install it, and then set it back to C: for all the other apps on SSD.
Choice of drive should be in the installer, per-app, not some Windows
setting that you can only toggle.

-- 
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

On Tue, 1 Nov 2016 16:17:41 +0100, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Werner Punz wrote: 

>Mickey Mouse Castle of Illusions
>
>I basically bought this game for my kids and because it was going out of 
>print and expected nothing. Boy what a surprise, the game is an 
>excellent platformer (done by Sega for the Dreamcast I think originally 
>later the PC got an updated version)
>And it is really hard compared to other platformers. Definitely to hard 
>for my kids (although i am not sure anymore they have become really good 
>at platformers lately)
>
>Highly recommendable if you want to play excellent 2d platformers (and 
>if you still can get it, it currently is in IP limbo))
>

You might try "Epic Mickey" on the Wii. It has "Castle of Illusions"
style platforming and interesting 3D gameplay.

It wasn't my cuppa, but it was very well done.

-- 
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

Mmm... what have I been playing? Let me think... Oh yes, an embarrassing amount of Diablo3, that's what!

I know I'm on a gaming treadmill, farming bigger and bigger numbers, but I still can't stop. It's a disease, but thankfully I think the love affair is starting to come to an end as it takes longer and longer to get another number fix.

At the moment the thing that keeps me going is the 'gaming god' sensation I get when I find a Conduit Shrine in a Rift, hopefully stacked with Frenzy, and can rush about for a few precious seconds dealing death on a *massive* scale. It is... intoxicating.

I'm ashamed to say that even though my circumstances mean I ought to get as much sleep as I can, whenever I can, Diablo's 'one more quick reward cycle' has lured me into the early hours more times than I care to confess. 

I look forward to getting back to a bit of gentle Bejewelled and the occasional dabble in my Steam library. But not yet... I have to level up this legendary jewel a few more times go electrocute some pixels.

Andrew 'Diabolical Disease' McP

Spalls Hurgenson schrieb:
> --------------------
> Short and Sweet
> --------------------
> * Halo: Reach (replay)
> * Eurotruck Simulator 2 (replay)
> * Duke Nukem Forever (replay)
> * Flashback (2013) (new)
> * Crysis 2 (replay)
> * State of Decay (replay)
> * D/Generation HD (new)
> * Skyrim Special Edition (new)

I played

- Enderal: A total conversion of Skyrim.
The best mod I ever played. Finished about
75 % of the game in 130 hours.

- Dragons Dogma Dark Arisen: A party RPG
with Dark Souls Design, but different gameplay.
60 hours for 50% of the game and still playing.
-- 
Ciao, Ned.

>Choice of drive should be in the installer, per-app, not some Windows
>setting that you can only toggle.

    I think it is an option now!  On the Library tab it will ask you for 
each title where to download it to.

rms 

On Wednesday, November 2, 2016 at 11:56:57 AM UTC-7, rms wrote:
> >I was going to try windows live reader, but couldn't find how to
> >set it up for newsgroups,
> 
>     You mean Windows Live Essentials 2012 I assume?  You download, choose to 
> install just the newsgroup/mail reader if that's all you want, cancel out of 
> any initial email setup (I don't use that, anyway), then click on 
> Accounts/Newsgroup and fill it in.  I'd suggest the free 
> news.eternal-september.org site, which requires a free account to use.
> 
> WLE2012 is supposed to be reaching end-of-support in Jan2017, so I'd 
> download and save the package now.  I've always liked it for the simple 
> interface.

Someone had mentioned Windows Live reader, which I was trying.  I downloaded WLE2012 now, and it won't let me continue without an MS email.  I'm thinking i'll probably end up going back to Seamonkey, though I remember that was a nightmare to set up.  Unless I can figure out how to get spellcheck working in Xnews - you can call an external editor, but trying to figure out how.

Back to GG until I get that sorted out.

- Justisaur

On Thu, 3 Nov 2016 01:48:29 -0700 (PDT), Andrew McP
<mcp.a...@gmail.com> wrote:


> But not yet... I have to level up this legendary jewel a few more times go electrocute some pixels.
>
>Andrew 'Diabolical Disease' McP


I have so been there.

With Borderlands 1, Hellgate :London, Hellgate: Global, Diablo III,
Van Helsing, and Grim Dawn.

I'm sure there are more too.
-- 
Rob

Forgot to say I still despise always online gaming. Pause for too long... and it's gone. Internet goes out for a minute... and an hour's progress to a Horadric bonus is gone.

Blizzard are bastards for making a game so addictive that I still play despite that.

Andrew McP

Justisaur  <just...@gmail.com> wrote:
>Someone had mentioned Windows Live reader, which I was trying.  I
>downloaded WLE2012 now, and it won't let me continue without an MS
>email. 

You might want to check to see whether you need a Microsoft e-mail
account or just a Microsoft account.  With the later you can an email
address you want, and if you have an Xbox Live or Game for Windows Live
account you already have a Microsoft account.

					Ross Ridge

-- 
 l/  //	  Ross Ridge -- The Great HTMU
[oo][oo]  rri...@csclub.uwaterloo.ca
-()-/()/  http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca/~rridge/ 
 db  //	  

On 2016-11-01, rms <rsqui...@MOOyossmanMOO.net> wrote:
>>What Have You Been Playing... IN OCTOBER 2016?
> ADR1FT
>     This is a 'port' from the Oculus Rift version, which uses a gamepad, and 
> imho it's poorly done.  I felt like there was next to no controls 
> explanation for the Vive controllers, and in my short time with it never did 
> figure out how to move around.  I'll have to come back to it later, after I 
> figure out how to switch it to gamepad control.

I had to uninstall Adr1ft. Navigating in microgravity is hard enough,
but with the game automatically yanking me towards oxygen
canisters, breaking my bearings, I had no chance. Disorienting and
nauseating. Shame, because I'd have liked to have finished it and that
would be a simple thing to turn off in the options.

> Raw Data
>     Now this is what I'm talkin' 'bout!  A full-on FPS robot shooter! 
> Within minutes I was head-shotting implacable-looking robots, teleporting 
> back-and-forth, ducking behind crates, throwing full punches, scanning the 
> ceiling for hostile drones.  You look down to your left hip and see a clip 
> holster; to your right a pistol holster; you have to reach down and 'grab' a 
> clip with one hand, then 'load' it into the pistol in your other hand.  Just 
> the act of doing this, seeing the 'gun' in your hand, then having to line up 
> the sights to aim, is incredibly satisfying.  The default graphics settings 
> are fairly pixelated, but this sort of game on next-generation devices will 
> be pretty darn amazing.

I much prefer Budget Cuts, Space Pirate Trainer, Zombie training
simulator. I couldn't get on with the sword in Raw Data, it had the
fell of a Wii waggle game. Give me throwing knives like in Budget Cuts
and I'm happy.

-- 
-Toby
Add the word afiduluminag to the subject to circumvent my email filters.

On 2016-11-02, Zaghadka <zagh...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 1 Nov 2016 16:17:41 +0100, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
> Werner Punz wrote: 
>
>>Mickey Mouse Castle of Illusions
>>
>>I basically bought this game for my kids and because it was going out of 
>>print and expected nothing. Boy what a surprise, the game is an 
>>excellent platformer (done by Sega for the Dreamcast I think originally 
>>later the PC got an updated version)
>>And it is really hard compared to other platformers. Definitely to hard 
>>for my kids (although i am not sure anymore they have become really good 
>>at platformers lately)
>>
>>Highly recommendable if you want to play excellent 2d platformers (and 
>>if you still can get it, it currently is in IP limbo))
>>
>
> You might try "Epic Mickey" on the Wii. It has "Castle of Illusions"
> style platforming and interesting 3D gameplay.
>
> It wasn't my cuppa, but it was very well done.

It's a Warren Spector game; I've always been interested to try it but
never have.

-- 
-Toby
Add the word afiduluminag to the subject to circumvent my email filters.

Am 04.11.16 um 10:39 schrieb Toby Newman:
> On 2016-11-02, Zaghadka <zagh...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> On Tue, 1 Nov 2016 16:17:41 +0100, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
>> Werner Punz wrote:
>>
>>> Mickey Mouse Castle of Illusions
>>>
>>> I basically bought this game for my kids and because it was going out of
>>> print and expected nothing. Boy what a surprise, the game is an
>>> excellent platformer (done by Sega for the Dreamcast I think originally
>>> later the PC got an updated version)
>>> And it is really hard compared to other platformers. Definitely to hard
>>> for my kids (although i am not sure anymore they have become really good
>>> at platformers lately)
>>>
>>> Highly recommendable if you want to play excellent 2d platformers (and
>>> if you still can get it, it currently is in IP limbo))
>>>
>>
>> You might try "Epic Mickey" on the Wii. It has "Castle of Illusions"
>> style platforming and interesting 3D gameplay.
>>
>> It wasn't my cuppa, but it was very well done.
>
> It's a Warren Spector game; I've always been interested to try it but
> never have.
>
Well its high on my must play list. Apparently the game is supposed to 
be really good, but the sequel is not.

It fell through because probably

a) It had the name Disney on top of it, and basically scared away 
potential hardcore players

b) It was for the Wii only

c) It basically was scary for children (or at least some of the parent 
buyers thought so), because it was not the usual disneyesque setting of 
modern cartoons but more along the lines of old 20s/30s cartoons which 
are less modern age parents compatible.

I am not sure if Spector had a hand in the bad sequel, but he definitely 
was the designer for the first game and I think after the first game the 
studio got closed because the game bombed.

Thanks rms muchly for those two detailed reviews  
Resident Evil 6
Quantum Break

I cant stand the RE games - you've confirmed my dislike.

Quantum Break has intrigued me since its early days .
Good to hear its Bugs are sorted
Your description of it as a shooter encourages my interest .
All the other reviews I've seen present an impression of a 
odd puzzle adventure Movie thing.
You've raised my interest.
(\__/)
(='.'=)
(")_(")  mouse (At Older Age Interest Does Not Raise Readily)

>- Enderal: A total conversion of Skyrim.
>The best mod I ever played. 

    I looked this up, looks amazing.  Maybe after skyrim itself :)

rms