The "Madden Curse" is fucking stupid nonsense and if you believe in it, you're dumb, and probably think ghosts exist and aliens built the pyramids. The actual idea of allowing players to vote on the cover is terrific PR, though. Final Fantasy Tactics 1 and 2 are essentially the only tRPGs in that series, but in that regard, they're pretty run-of-the-mill. If they were your favorite in a series that is mostly just JRPGS, there's an entire genre of games you should investigate, from Heroes 3 to Panzer Dragoon.
While it isn't on the PC, I've always really enjoyed the Fire Emblem series as a tactical, turn based RPG. Recently they've only been on Nintendo systems though. I got some time to play Crysis 2 for a bit last night. It's fun, but really nothing special (yet), mostly just your standard shooter fare. That's okay of course, I had fun playing it last night and from reviews I get the impression that it really picks up after the first couple hours. I will say though that it looks fucking gorgeous. I'm playing it on PC on the 'extreme' graphics settings on my 42" LCD and it runs smooth as silk and just looks really damned good. Apparently though it is only running on DX9 right now and they plan to patch in DX11 support soon, so hopefully that will make it look even better.
The Socom 4 Multiplayer Beta goes live today for those who purchased Killzone 3, who's gonna be on tonight?
Not sure if this goes in this thread or the drug thread, but trying to play League of Legends high is possibly the hardest thing I've ever done. I played Nunu who does pretty much 2 things (Ice Ball and his ult) and I could barely handle it, going 5-7. Then I play Kat (who I'd never played as before) against COMPUTERS and went 4-7. No good. Nocturne is insane, I've been playing him roughly 60% of my matches since he came out, and have gotten relatively proficient at him. Having 2 spell shields (with a Banshee's Veil) makes you a boss against traditionally hard to deal with champions like Karthus, Malphite, Anivia, etc. He's incredibly fragile (even with a BV I barely break 2k hp at level 18) and can be mana hungry, but the payoff is worth it. Tomorrow's patch won't nerf him and for that I'm glad, because I don't think he's OP, he just happens to punish idiots incredibly well. After a stream of weak-on-release champs (LeBlanc, Lux, Irelia, Trundle) they've gotten on point with the last few (Renekton, Jarvan, Nocturne), making solid out of the gate T2 contributors. I'm excited for their April Fools prank. They've been hyping this new champion that everyone thinks is fake now because of the champ spotlight. I think they might pull a double fake out and have him actually be real, and only available on April 1st. I've got my RP ready.
Well I didn't know Kubla Khan was in China, so I've got an extra beta code. So if there's any TiB'er who wants to get down on some intense tactical 3rd person action then PM, rep or reply for it, first come first serve.
My wife got me Starcraft 2 last week which I've wanted for awhile and I've been staying up late playing the campaign ever since. This is a beautiful and fun game. I'm not a huge multiplayer guy, I really like a solid *long* single player game which this has, though I suspect I'll probably play some multiplayer eventually. From what I hear they're releasing each race's single player story separately or something? If so, I cannot wait for the rest of them.
http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/independent/13assassins/ I've been waiting for a good samurai film for a while now (lol The Last Samurai). Takashii Miike does have a track record of ery gory films, but I hope this is at least somewhat serious.
I'm with you on that, here is a bit from what I researched back before. I rather not have my favorite player on the cover of Madden.
I'm with KI on this one: the Madden Curse is a bunch of bullshit. Spooky coincidence? Sure. But flip a coin 10 times and get 10 heads, and you'll still have only 50-50 odds on flip #11. Looking at both sides of that bracket, I'm thinking it'll come down to Rodgers vs. Rivers. I'd be cool with either of those guys making the cover, but my nod would probably go to Rodgers. I actually said going into the 2010 season that while I thought Rivers was the better QB, I had a feeling that Rogers would (in my mind) surpass him at some point in the season. Then he went bonkers in the postseason and won a ring. Many people would still say that Rivers is better, but even among hardcore NFL fans, it's highly debatable who the better QB is right now. Plus, from EA's standpoint, a reigning Super Bowl MVP is much more marketable than not. So there's that.
Couple of questions for those of you who have played Dragon Age II. I am playing on the ps3 and have noticed a few weird bugs. I am in act III, i am spoiler tagging it encase someone hasn't finished it yet. Spoiler In act III when you go back to the "Bone Pit" you have "the massacre" and the "the high dragon" plot/quest there. After i complete them, and go back to the bone pit, the markers are still on the map. Spoiler In act III, when you work for the "noble" to go find a thief/assassin, when you get to the end and if you save the elf and have isabbela in your party and she wants to have sex with the elf, and if you have good enough standing you can tell her no, and then she says she wants sex later. When you go back to your mansion, she is standing in front of were you get letters, with the yellow exclaimation mark above her head indicating there is a new plot/quest from her, but when you talk to her nothing happens. Anyone know what is going on, or have anything like this happen?
I get the phantom quest icons sometimes. Make sure you loot the bodies, as they drop items that you can use for other quests. Also, for the second one, she has a personal mission, but it may not be unlocked yet, as you have to do a few main plot quests before doing her final companion quest. I recommend a backup save. Do a storyline quest or two, then talk to her again, and see if she gives you the quest. If she does, good. If not, go back to th backup save and make sure you didn't miss anything else. I have a lot of backup saves for that game. Edit: fuck the iPhone autocorrect.
Damn, I wish someone could have told me about the solid 30 minute SOCOM download/update. Jesus F. Christ. So much for playing tonight.
So, I played with a 3DS display at Best Buy today, and I must say it was pretty cool. The 3D works surprisingly well, especially since you can adjust it to fit your eye's just right. Now I really kind of want one, but I'll still probably wait until a few more games worth playing are released. Also played some Tiger Woods PGA Tour '12 today. I haven't played a Tiger Woods game since the Gamecube/PS2 days, so I figured the inclusion of the masters was a good time to get back into it. It's definitely just as fun as I expected, and the inclusion of a caddy is a nice touch. For some reason, though, when playing with a 360 controller I all but forget about the D-Pad, so I had to read the manual to figure out that you had to use it to aim your shot. Didn't really matter on most shots since I had the caddy suggestions, but not knowing how to aim destroyed my putting.
It took 7 hours to get SOCOM up and running for me, though I suspect that's because my roommate and I were both downloading/updating at the same time. These are my initial thoughts, but keep in mind that this is based on <10 games played. I do do a lot of comparisons to the first two SOCOM games, mainly because I played them so much and consider them some of the best online console games ever. Maps: The two maps they've included both seem alright overall but nothing special. I've only played Assault & Battery once since everyone always votes for Port Authority, but I neither love nor hate either of them based on my very limited play time. One thing that concerns me: playing the classic SOCOM style (no respawns) seems like it will be fairly difficult. Assuming these two maps are indicative of the size of the other maps to be included with the game, I feel like they're going to be too big with too much going on when it comes down to 2v1 or 1v1 situations. In the first two iterations of the game, it was possible to sweep the map and check most of the hiding spots on most maps within about 2 minutes, but there are just so many places to conceal yourself that I don't think that'll be possible in this game. Not a huge deal though since suppression games will be the only time that this is really an issue. Network: Haven't had any lag or server issues at all. Graphics/Sound: Graphics are solid and present no serious issues. I'm probably spoiled from the little "ft-ft-ft" sound CoD makes when you shoot someone, but I wish it was a little more clear when you were hitting someone. There is a bit of blood splatter, but short of the xp flash at the end when you drop them, there really isn't any other visual or auditory clue that you're actually hitting them. The only complaint (and it's a minor one) I have pertaining to graphics is about the name plates for teammates. I've had several times where I'll run into a building, see someone in the corner, start shooting, and it isn't until they are in the perfect position that the name plate shows up. The diamonds are kind of annoying at a distance, and I wouldn't be opposed to losing those completely and just tweaking the name plates so that they show up for any teammates within x meters of you. Guns: Haven't played enough to get a sense of balance. One thing that is funny though: I've had instances where in a close-mid range fight, I've completely unloaded on someone and thought they should be dead, only to have them turn around and kill me. However, in a game on port authority, I had 3 different instances where right at the start of the game, a guy from the other team would be standing in a doorway and I'd be behind a crate on pretty much opposite ends of the map. I had a machine gun (forget which one) all 3 times, and 2 of the times I dropped him using exactly 1 bullet, with the third time requiring all of 3 bullets. I don't know if I just got shit lucky with headshots, but it seemed odd to be that I was hitting massive longshots with pretty much no bullets using an LMG, and was having a hard time at mid range with an assault rifle. Guns in general seem like they require more bullets to kill someone than in any other previous iteration of the game. General Gameplay: The default settings for sensitivity and speed are wwwaaayyy too low, and I wound up jacking mine up completely. Even then it still seems kind of slow, but not too bad. I don't like how there is a bit of acceleration before you're turning at full speed and preferred the old way of just one constant speed that the reticle/your character would move at. On the issue of movement speed too, I feel like having everyone move just a little bit faster would help compensate for the larger maps without really turning it into some high speed CoD-like environment. The aiming over the shoulder isn't an issue at all, mostly since I'm used to it from Gears of War. I kind of like it, but I can definitely see why some people wouldn't. One thing thing I do hate though: when you aim over the shoulder and press R3, you can get into a scoped view and use the red dot or reflex sight, whatever it is. The whole system is kind of annoying, especially since it takes you straight into the scoped view right away the next time you hit L1 if you had been in the scoped view before zooming out in a previous encounter. Leave the scopes to sniper rifles, please. As for game modes, I love all the new modes that I've played. One thing that confuses me: do they randomly just set four game modes that are available to play? I played a round of suppression with my roommate, but then after the game was over we weren't able to pick suppression from the game mode list. It was just Uplink (the one where you need to get the data) and then the one where you need to capture 3 control points to reveal the enemy HQ. I know it wouldn't be like that in the full version of the game, but I'm just wondering whether it glitched on me, whether I was just missing something, or whether they just randomly change the available game modes. I'm also not sure yet on how I'm supposed to upgrade my guns or get access to claymores/PMN mines. Is there a way to buy the extra gear or does it just unlock at higher levels? Overall: A good beta and a solid game overall. It seems like I did nothing but piss and moan, but all my gripes are relatively small things that are based on personal preference. I'd give it a 7/10 now, but assuming the maps they include are great and they make a few tweaks to the gameplay, it could be a solid 8/10, or 8.5 if they bring back the lobby system with chat/mics/armory in the lobby. Again, I know I compare it to the old games quite a bit, but if you're reading this review then you probably played the old games too, and the old games are the only reason you're even touching this game after the abortions that were SOCOM 3 and SOCOM: Confrontation. It still feels like classic SOCOM, albeit a heavily modified version. I'll post more thoughts after a week or so with it.
They rotate the game modes available each day. They usually have they schedule for the day's modes on <a class="postlink" href="http://www.socom.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">www.socom.com</a> but for some reason they haven't updated it this week. Typically it's two modes with respawn and classic modes along with two custom settings, so far I've seen Sniper Alley, Run N Gun, Scrum and Community Day which is basically a round robin of all game varieties. You should get access to Claymores, PMN's and Nova Gas grenades somewhere around level 15 I think, might be 20.
12 minute BF3 gameplay trailer coming out April 17th. From what I've seen, this game has a legit shot at dethroning CoD.