I need to give the game another whirl which I'll do tonight and Sunday. I'm a little iffy on the character movements, I feel like I should be wow'd by the graphics more.
What do you mean when you say "change viewpoints?" I'd love the ability to zoom in and out, but I'd fucking hate it if they allowed rotating the camera. There has never been an action game that does it well.
That's not Diablo. Speaking of this game. I've been trying to get in and play all weekend. I just got in a second time and played for all of 20 minutes before they shut the servers down for something.
Spoiler I got to play Diablo 3 a lot this weekend. At first I was disappointed in the graphics because they weren't making my jaw drop, but let's face it that's not what makes a game. I thought they'd have more than 5 characters to pick from, or maybe you could customize them a bit. Nope. I realised they let you choose the sex which although is a basic thing it still was nice. I then spent a good 6-8 hours playing over the weekend and nothing other games keep trying to outdo each other on (graphics, crazy camera angles, customizing characters) came into my mind after that. It felt like playing an older arcade game, in a good way. It was addictive and fun. I completely lost track of time until my friend said he had to stop because it was 4 AM. There's new interesting features like item/gold dropping only appearing for you (it's somehow evenly divided maybe?) so you don't have to get mad at your friends for taking the items you need. I used to hate the necromancer, amazon, and sorceress because I didn't like sitting back or running away from enemies constantly, but every new character in this one was really fun. Diablo 3 will be successful, it does what it does well and I think even without all the customizing of Skyrim you'll have fun with it. And don't get me wrong about the graphics they don't suck at all but after playing Skyrim and Assassin's Creed I realised how spoiled I was graphics-wise (What do you mean I can't zoom in on Cain's beard?! This is bullshit!). Even in those games I'm not constantly amazed at how good the graphics are. This stuff really is wasted on the shittiest generation. Anyways in summary: DIABLO 3! CAIN! STAB SKELETONS IN THE FACE!
Spent all weekend neglecting my end-of-senior-year paper responsibilities to beat the beta with all the classes (about 9 hours total, 1 run-through each with no grinding), and goddamn I'm pumped for this game. Although it feels a bit more like Torchlight than I think most hardcore D2 fans will be comfortable with, I loved Torchlight and really really like the way D3 is looking. Lack of customization sucks (and I'm stunned that we don't get to allocate our own attributes), but I actually really like what they've done with skill trees. Respeccing at will seems like it may make things too easy, but I'll be honest and say that investing 40 hours into a build that can't handle the endgame because of a handful of misspent points is a shitty, shitty trope of this genre that I'm glad to see go. I don't understand the graphical complaints. Of course it's no Skyrim, and I don't think that a Diablo game has every been on the graphical cutting edge, but anyone who says this game isn't damn good looking must be running on a sub-par rig, because the particle effects in this shit are fantastic. Wizard's orb thing is damn awesome looking, as are the gore explosions that greet critical hits (and all of the barbarian skills). All the classes are fun, all have interesting and unique mechanics, and I like that the more supporty classes, like the monk, still have a shit ton of ass-kicking, face-fisting, telepunching power. Seriously, every class is fun to play, and there's enough variety through runes, passives, and so on to customize to your heart's content - do you want to build your Witch Doctor for AoE disruption, DPS, or pets/summons? Your monk as a support/punching aura bot, disabler, massive AoE damage dealer, or healer? Barbarians mostly just beat the shit out of things (en masse with heroic and satisfying cleaves or single-target), and Demon Hunters mostly shoot the shit out of individuals, but even they have CC options, runes, etc to handle most situations (in the beta, at least). And of course, loot is plentiful, and if you're like me and half the reason you play these games is to horde all the cool shit, this is Diablo and there's guaranteed to be a metric fuckton of sweet shit to collect, horde, and sell for real live money on the auction house. Also, they got rid of stupid Identify and Town Portal scrolls, which is awesome because those things suck ass.
I'm sure I read somewhere that they introduced a system to discourage that and just doing boss runs. Namely, you get a +magic find buff every time you kill a group of one of the more elite baddies and you lose that buff once you leave the game or respec.
Also, I just went ahead and booted up good ole D2 LoD, which I never played seriously because when I played through it was before there were 100 million sites devoted to builds, high-tier gear, boss farming, and whatnot. Just started a trap assassin, which seems almost unfairly powerful so far, if by some chance anyone still has/plays that game and wants to, I dunno, hang out or whatever and kill some shit in powerful 800x600 resolution.
Not sure if there are many Crysis fans here, but a trailer for Crysis 3 has been released. The video takes place in a jungle, but there will be 7 distinct environents in the campaign. Crytek is trying to delivering a sandbox experience more similar to the first game after being criticized for how linear Crysis 2 was. I never played the first game, but had a lot of fun with the second, so this isn't a huge deal for me. There are no details on the multiplayer yet, but this is where I'm hoping to see the most improvements. Crysis 2's multiplayer had a lot of potential, but a few flaws held it back. A major issue was the imbalance of perks like stealth enhance and energy transfer. Combining these allowed players to stay cloaked longer and instantly recharge their energy meter with each kill. Cloaking was also annoying, so I hope they give it some kind of drawback like -50% health when activated. The lag and limited arsenal were some other problems with the game. However, the parkour abilities fit very nicely with the vertical elements of maps. Maps like Skyline and the Parking Garage are some of my favourite in any shooter. The spotting system was also a nice touch as it allowed you to mark enemies on the map for teammates to see. I'm excited to see what these guys have planned for the multiplayer.
Does anyone here not register their Nintendo products for Club Nintendo, and not mind giving me the codes?
I was excited to see Command & Conquer for the Ipad. I thought the touchscreen interface would excel where the controller failed on the console versions. So much potential and it's a slow pile of shit.
I've had a lot of gaming time recently, mostly when the baby is sleeping on my lap. I've decided to break out Final Fantasy IX again, just because I've only finished it once (whereas I've finished almost every other FF title multiple times). Once I get past the incredibly boring early stages, that game got really good. I forgot how underrated it was. I have to play something that won't make me angry (i.e. Dark Souls) so I don't wake the kid while playing. This is all just killing time, though, until Game of Thrones comes out and I test that game out. Considering the source material, I feel like it COULD be an awesome game, pending they don't fuck it up.
For anyone that's seen it, The Walking Dead game is out and available of Steam, and I took the leap and bought it. It's nothing like a traditional game I've played since something vaguely like Monkey Island back in the day, but it's good. That's a terrible comparison, but I only mean it in the sense that it's not a super fast paced mind blast like MW3, BF3, ME3, etc. Is it $25.00 good? So far, it seems like it. It's literally all making choices and watching cut scenes play out based upon those choices. Sounds boring, but the story is pretty alright so far, and certain moments are just as disturbing as you'd like if you're into the series. If anyone cares to know before they commit, I'll update with further impressions as I go along. If you've been itching to play something different until other big titles come out though (D3), I'd say this is a good place to throw your hard earned dollars.
It's always hilarious to see attempts at appealing to girls in video games. These people know way less than the movie industry in terms of speaking to women.
Yeah, this game is definitely made for guys. Also, this is hardly a unique or underdeveloped genre; at first, it looked like a carbon copy of the Onechanbara series, except with an American cheerleader wielding a chainsaw instead of a Japanese bikini cowgirl swinging a katana. The only thing that made me perk up was seeing the game was made by Suda51, the same mad genius behind Killer 7 and No More Heroes. Then again, as much as I liked NMH, the combat kind of sucked. Speaking of cool upcoming games, while it's in pre-alpha, this title looks REALLY awesome;