Messages

46

Game Reviews / Re: Game Reviews

« on: January 12, 2013, 11:47:51 PM »

I think search engine wise it would be better to have a forum with separate threads for reviews, or at least a thread per game. Having them all in one thread makes them harder for search engines to index and also makes it harder to comment on individual reviews.

47

General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up V - And a happy new year!

« on: January 09, 2013, 09:28:04 AM »

The premise with pokemon is collecting them and that's about it. In all the games I've played, the plot is pretty shallow and consists of a kid starting out in a strange new world, discovering things and proving himself against gym leaders, and at some point in the middle you have the protagonist defeating a plot by some overtly evil criminals. Eventually he fights the very best and triumphs, and that's about it. Beyond battling other trainers and proving how wonderful you are, it's about trading and collecting as many pokemon as you can. The reason it gets away with it I think is that the original premise is quite an enjoyable one on its own merits, so no matter how shallow the tacked on plot is, it still works. Tbh, the plot is merely a vehicle for collecting and battling pokemon. There's an interesting bit in the first game when you find this abandoned building and through scraps of notes, you learn about the horrific creation of Mewtwo, but when it comes down to it, it's just another pokemon. Nobody expects it have a deep plot, they expect more pokemon to collect, battle and brag about. Sounds pretty shallow, but Nintendo have proved that latching on to a good idea and milking it for all its worth makes an awful lot of money, so I doubt they're going to stop soon.

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Mount and Blade Discussion - Sargoth Town Square / Re: Mount&Blade 2: Bannerlord

« on: January 08, 2013, 08:18:39 PM »

Ok, the knight will have better training etc, but a peasant with a halberd could dismount a knight and kill him with enough vicious conviction. But my point still stands, if you can't see what you're doing, you're helpless, unless you happen to have jedi powers, which I don't think many knights had back then.

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General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up V - And a happy new year!

« on: January 08, 2013, 06:42:35 PM »

What were you doing with it that makes you a very annoyed person? And do you have the latest version?

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Mount and Blade Discussion - Sargoth Town Square / Re: Mount&Blade 2: Bannerlord

« on: January 08, 2013, 02:04:06 PM »

Skull, what I mean is as the FOV is already restricted due to your view point being a single monitor, rather than your eyes, as it would be in RL, an additional viewpoint restriction would be unnecessary and prohibitive, except in the cases of bucket helms and similar, where your FOV is more restricted than it is by the monitor, and that could be done with depictions of eyeholes etc. I agree with the option of lifting the helmet, which works for helmets with visors, and I believe it was common practice for many soldiers with those helmets to have their visors up most of the time anyway, unless it was seriously hairy, just so they could see. Having a well protected head is pointless if you can't see the peasant with the spear poking into the chink in your armour.

51

Mount and Blade Discussion - Sargoth Town Square / Re: Mount&Blade 2: Bannerlord

« on: January 08, 2013, 02:08:05 AM »

Yeah, part of it is blurry peripheral vision, but you'd be amazed how useful that is in RL. The only time I could see a FOV restriction being realistic is when you're wearing a bucket helm or similar with only eyeholes to see out of.

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General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Playlist

« on: January 08, 2013, 01:53:30 AM »

This is wonderful music to drive through picturesque countryside to:

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Mount and Blade Discussion - Sargoth Town Square / Re: Mount&Blade 2: Bannerlord

« on: January 08, 2013, 01:48:39 AM »

The only thing with helmets obstructing your view is that on a standard pc monitor you already have a limited FOV, so in my view making it worse is not necessary.

54

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: In the News

« on: January 06, 2013, 01:08:33 PM »

Find it rather amusing that Wegelin & Co are closing due to US fines, yet they transferred most of their staff and operations to another bank, so the closure will do sweet F.A. to their operations, except the loss of a name, which in that business probably isn't too damaging.

55

The Great Forum - Rome II Discussion / Re: Rome II - Your hopes, your fears, and your expectations?

« on: January 04, 2013, 01:37:33 AM »

I can't remember much that was wrong with RTW, except the cartoonishness of the units and the poor AI. M2TW brought in some nice little refinements like multiple unit training, so we will have to see what R2 will be like. I just hope it won't be full of bugs on release like ETW was. And I also hope that R2 has plenty of modding options, judging by CA's recent comments, they appear to be swinging in the pro-mod direction, rather than cutting it all out just so they can flog DLC, they seem to think that the two can happily co-exist, which is a plus.

56

Forum Games - The Beer Cellar! / Re: Would you rather?

« on: January 01, 2013, 11:53:23 PM »

No chocolate, cheese is too useful.

No internet or no phones (of any sort, landline, mobile etc.)?

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General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up V - Merry Exilian Christmas!

« on: December 30, 2012, 09:41:44 PM »

I gathered that, in which case that path is very poorly made. Or badly in need of re-laying.

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General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up V - Merry Exilian Christmas!

« on: December 30, 2012, 09:31:15 PM »

Just makes that path look even more uncomfortable to walk on.

59

Mount and Blade Discussion - Sargoth Town Square / Re: Mount&Blade 2: Bannerlord

« on: December 30, 2012, 09:27:13 PM »

I think giving you too many paths would dilute the game somewhat, and you could end up with lots of options that aren't very well thought out, opposed to a few that are. Mount&Blade has always primarily been about combat, and I think it should stay that way. Any other path should be primarily combat oriented, so arena champion, assassin, captain of the guard etc. Would work, but farmer or innkeeper would divert the attention too much from the focus of the game, and we want them to make a good game, don't we? Besides, if it's as moddable as its ancestor, then we should be able to add that in ourselves. I think the worse mistake they could make is to remove moddability, as it is that which gives M&B the variety it has today.

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General Gaming - The Arcade / Civilization Series (Civ 5 for £4.99 and other deals on Steam)

« on: December 29, 2012, 09:32:56 PM »

If anyone's interested, Civ 5 is just £4.99 on Steam, alongside many other games with ridiculous price reductions, some of which have less than an hour to go.

I've never played a Civilisation game until now, and when I saw the price tag on Civ 5, along with decent reviews, I went for it. Being used to Total War and AoE type strategy games before, it's an interesting change to have everything on the turn based map, with no RTS involved at all, quite nice as it gives you time to think about what to do next. Currently got a game running as the Songhai Empire and have very nearly wiped out the French. There are other nations, but they appear to be on other islands and my naval technology isn't good enough to reach them yet. Still having a roaring good time and discovered I'd played almost 10 hours solid last night, which would be why I'm currently nocturnal.

Anyone else into the Civ games and wish to comment? I will admit it was the mention of Jubal's mod for Civ 2 that got me going for the idea of actually getting a Civ game.