What game are you wasting time on?

[Doctor Sbaitso]

Playing MGS5, Battlefront, DCS and Falcon BMS 4.33 right now. On a bit of a SIM kick again so doing a lot of flying F16s and A-10C right now. Battlefront is a ripoff but still fun at this point (5 hours in).

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

I tried to give Dragonfall another chance a few weeks ago, and boy, it's a mixed bag.
Played a few runs on 'Very Hard' and hoped to see some AI improvements, but AI is on par with Crispy's UT performance.
Except if Crispy had 15x HP, maxed armor and spammed grenades in every direction.
Also higher difficulty nerfs your characters, which is kinda retarded.

Also, still playing Arx Fatalis from time to time, but I get the feeling that I killed some plot-important characters (Or they're unkillable? Gotta go back to Arx to test that).

 

[Sjukob]

Are you playing with any other Codex members? No one has posted a comment on the thread in a couple weeks. What level/faction are you?

Nope , I am not playing with codex users . Current progression is level 34 troll warrior .

 

[Sceptic]

Many years ago I promised DraQ and the other Half-Life-fags that I'd replay the game and confirm that my criticism of it in those threads still holds. Took me a while but I'm finally doing it. I'll probably write in more detail when I'm done, but so far, I can say that parts of it are better than I remember... but the bad parts are even worse.

 

[Siveon]

Many years ago I promised DraQ and the other Half-Life-fags that I'd replay the game and confirm that my criticism of it in those threads still holds. Took me a while but I'm finally doing it. I'll probably write in more detail when I'm done, but so far, I can say that parts of it are better than I remember... but the bad parts are even worse.

Are you talking about the Xen levels? Nobody liked the Xen levels.

 

[Sceptic]

Are you talking about the Xen levels? Nobody liked the Xen levels.

DraQ does!

I'm not even at Xen, it's some of the earlier jumping that's already made me rage. I don't even want to imagine what Xen will be like with my even-slower-than-in-1998 reflexes.

 

[DraQ]

Are you talking about the Xen levels? Nobody liked the Xen levels.

DraQ does!

I'm not even at Xen, it's some of the earlier jumping that's already made me rage. I don't even want to imagine what Xen will be like with my even-slower-than-in-1998 reflexes.

Xen platforming has nothing on Residue Processing.

 

[spekkio]

Gave up on Sublevel Zero

Pros:
- Descent reincarnated + rouguelite mechanics.
- Graphics are nice.
- Very hard, too bad that weird design / bugs add to difficulty to the point of the game being unplayable.

Cons:
- Savegame only after completed mission. Generally understandable - to avoid "quit and reload" spam. Unfortunately, inventory changes randomly when loading the game (not sure if bug or design decision). Had perfect setup of backup guns and missile launchers? Well, enjoy 4 useless types of engine after loading the game.
- Performance is horrible (Unity), which isn't justified by such basic graphics.
- Recovery items drop way too rarely plus they take inventory space. I know the game is intentionally hard, but you can loose 1/2 of HP just by being ambushed by 1/2 enemies. Maybe I'm not a target demographics, but gameplay ends up way too random.
- Too many drops, with most of them being usless (inferior in every aspect to current equipment). I end up skipping 90% of drops.
- Crafting is fucking pointless, regular drops are much better than 90% of shit you can craft.
- Bugs / weird things. For example, after loading the game my Plasma weapon went missing and no such type of weapon appeared later in drops. Effect: run out of ammo for Energy & Bullet weapons, died despite having full Plasma ammo. Etc. etc.

tl;dr

Has potential but it's way too buggy ATM.

Currently:
If/ When they fix it:

 

[SerratedBiz]

Thea: The Awakening. It's been described as something like a 4x meets KoDP. You manage a single village in its attempt to survive its hostile surroundings, micromanaging its resources, villagers and production. Gameplay consists of an overhead map you explore for said resources, killing enemies and searching ruins / quest points. Upon finding an enemy or a "challenge", which comes in a variety of flavors such as tactical, social, magical, etc, for which every stat a villager has aids you in a different way, you engage in this little card game that's got the easy to learn, hard to master thing going on.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/378720/

Currently on 20% sale. DLC has been promised (at no cost, they say). All in all, a fun game with a lot of interesting ideas, others not so much, but definitely worth the buy for me.

 

[United Nations]

Skyrim with the Requiem mod.
Its surprisingly better, but its still not an RPG; adding bullshit enemies and grinding does not a RPG make.

yeah, i am waiting for the Skyrim whole conversion Enderal http://sureai.net/games/enderal/?lang=en for so long now, hope those lazy unpaid bastards that dedicate dem freetime to i will hurry up

Gothic + TES. Hopefully this will add much more detail to the empty vanilla Skyrim.

 

[spekkio]

Gave up on Wing Commander despite being (slightly) hooked.

Pros:
- There's a good concept / idea deep down.
- I guess graphics were top notch in 1990.

Cons:
- Serious problems with speed under DosBox (slowdowns when there's multiple enemies on screen). Requires constant tweaking of CPU cycles. Win9x version (Kilrathi Saga) works at proper speed, but people report that it has problems with controls (treats all joysticks as digital ones).
- 2D objects were a deal-breaker for me. I don't want to spend my time trying to hit an object which is a 2D sprite only to:
a) miss it, despite it being clearly in range,
b) ram into it, dying myself.
I LOLed hard after encountering my first "big" ship - attacking it from a certain direction is close to impossible since all you'll get is a constantly-changing sprite. 3D or GTFO.
- 2D asteroids and mines = extremely hard to avoid / require pure luck. Get the fuck out with this shit.
- Cockpit takes half of the screen and can't be disabled (in the Dos version).
- No ship customization.
- No control over ship subsystems (shields, etc.).
- Rockets are nearly useless (unguided are only useful in close range, guided take forever to lock on target).
- Combat is totally random due to shitty 2D collision detection, bad enemy and allied AI, boring design.
- This entire "space saga" thing is actually p. shit: "talk" to fags (read their lines), watch the briefing, fight, watch the "medal awarded" clip, repeat.

From what I've read, WC2 is p. much the same:

http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/w...ce-of-the-kilrathi/reviews/reviewerId,103841/

tl;dr

Aged badly.



Installed X-Wing instead.

 

[SirSingAlot]

NBA 2k13

have sunk moar time into this than into most rpgs i play

great controls, no button smashing or whatsoever.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Jumped on the FO4 band wagon.
Its...good, actually. Probably the best thing beth made so far in terms of mechanics.
The gameplay is considerably better than FO3's, at least.
Still not a fallout game though. Or a RPG for that matter.
It reminds me of a cross between Borderlands and Rage. Except without Borderlands' "humor"
So its already a huge improvement.

Its also pretty stable; I haven't encountered any bugs or crashes so far.

What's very interesting to note is that my computer, going by the system requirements, shouldn't be able to play it, and yet I can run it at medium settings without too many problems.
I do suffer some FPS drops now and then, and I noticed a considerable drop in performance if I play it for more than 5 hours, but otherwise its doable.
Which makes sense, as the game certainly doesn't look too demanding. I mean, its nice, but I've seen better.
Shitty optimization is vogue atm I geuss.

 

[octavius]

Many years ago I promised DraQ and the other Half-Life-fags that I'd replay the game and confirm that my criticism of it in those threads still holds. Took me a while but I'm finally doing it. I'll probably write in more detail when I'm done, but so far, I can say that parts of it are better than I remember... but the bad parts are even worse.

Are you talking about the Xen levels? Nobody liked the Xen levels.

Xen levels were not so bad; after all they had a unique atmosphere and different gravity.
What I personally hated in HL1 was the non-Xen platform jumping sequences that partly ruined the pace and fun of the game.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Many years ago I promised DraQ and the other Half-Life-fags that I'd replay the game and confirm that my criticism of it in those threads still holds. Took me a while but I'm finally doing it. I'll probably write in more detail when I'm done, but so far, I can say that parts of it are better than I remember... but the bad parts are even worse.

Are you talking about the Xen levels? Nobody liked the Xen levels.

Xen levels were not so bad; after all they had a unique atmosphere and different gravity.
What I personally hated in HL1 was the non-Xen platform jumping sequences that partly ruined the pace and fun of the game.

I liked the Xen levels

 

[sexbad?]

I did Crysis Warhead and it is excellent.

 

[DramaticPopcorn]

I did Crysis Warhead and it is excellent.

how did you like those cutscenes man

 

[sexbad?]

I did Crysis Warhead and it is excellent.

how did you like those cutscenes man

They were so bad.

 

[Chef_Hathaway]

Crysis 1 + Warhead are great, I replay them every now and again.

Been playing FO4, which is what it is, which isn't bad but isn't amazing either, just sort of there.

Also, playing through Dark Souls 2: Still Fucking 50$ on Steam Edition, and I like all the changes and DLCs. I can't wait til April for part 3.

Oh, and some occasional CoH2, which is surprisingly good now, after all this time. I'm legitimately surprised at how good it is now.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Disclaimer: I'm not a Wing Commander fan.

Gave up on Wing Commander despite being (slightly) hooked.

...- I guess graphics were top notch in 1990.

They were. In fact, Wing Commander was top of the line in graphics if I recall correctly, and also came with Origin's trademark of top of the line system requirements.

Serious problems with speed under DosBox (slowdowns when there's multiple enemies on screen). Requires constant tweaking of CPU cycles.

You can blame this on hardware capabilities of the time. I've been mucking about with Amstrad CPC games lately, and even the addition of as much as ONE extra enemy could result in a 40% slowdown of the game's speed - and we're talking about 2-dimensial platformers here!

2D objects were a deal-breaker for me. I don't want to spend my time trying to hit an object which is a 2D sprite only to:
a) miss it, despite it being clearly in range,
b) ram into it, dying myself.
I LOLed hard after encountering my first "big" ship - attacking it from a certain direction is close to impossible since all you'll get is a constantly-changing sprite. 3D or GTFO.
- 2D asteroids and mines = extremely hard to avoid / require pure luck. Get the fuck out with this shit.

I'm torn between responding with "I hear you" and "No, YOU get the fuck out with your shit." Games of this complexity were very VERY hard to pull off up and until 1992 or -93, due to hardware and software limitiations. While 3D engines existed 3 years prior to WC's release, they were both very primitive and VERY slow (we're talking "turn-based" levels of slow here). Decent 3D engines were still on the drawing board in 1990. They did the best they could back then.

For modern-era gamers to take the time to play the old games like WC, only to watch them scoff and recoil in horror like this, makes me feel both smug and sad at the same time. Many of the old games have aged badly. But we gritted our teeth and bore with it you "young'un" just run away to your popamole shooters.

*Incessant old man rambling sounds for 5 minutes*

But there's MUCH worse out there than Wing Commander to walk away from.

Cockpit takes half of the screen and can't be disabled (in the Dos version).

This is how they covered up the fact that they ran the game in windowed mode: Fill the screen with needless, static graphics and sprinkle the HUD in it to force people to look at it. Sometimes this was as much as 33% of wasted screen real estate.

Rockets are nearly useless (unguided are only useful in close range, guided take forever to lock on target).

I spent most of my "Wing Commander" gaming on Privateer, a 1993 game based on the same engine as the original WC. And yes, I remember rockets/torpedoes being absolutely useless. Did you have to do any escort missions? Count your blessings if you didn't.

This entire "space saga" thing is actually p. shit: "talk" to fags (read their lines), watch the briefing, fight, watch the "medal awarded" clip, repeat. From what I've read, WC2 is p. much the same

WC2 added a plot worth following, but didn't do much better than this. WC3 just shamelessly became a FMV game to try to cope with this.

tl;dr Old man yells at cloud as the gaming youth of today is too soft to handle the tough games of yesteryear.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Disclaimer: I'm not a Wing Commander fan.

YES YOU ARE

 

[spekkio]

@ Wing Commander

TBH the only game from this genre I've played so far is Archimedean Dynasty (+ shitty sequels) and some Freespace 1.
Compared to these, WC1 is a simple shooter (no advanced control over the ship, no parts management, etc.) with very irritating shooting mechanics (due to 2D engine).
Today I've started X-Wing and I immediately recognized the concept later used in AD (and various space sims). I mapped my entire Gaypad (2 axes, 14 buttons) and covered maybe ~50% of the game keys. Maybe it's not a real simulator, but at least you have much more to fuck around with. Plus the engine is (still basic) 3D, so I finally see where I'm flying.

It's surprising that only few games / series use this awesome formula of mixing regular campaign (Wing Commander, X-wing) with money management / sidemissions / improving your ship (Elite, Privateer). Plus almost all of them (X series, Aquanox series, Independence War, Lancer series) are criticized due to various reasons.

*Edit:

But we gritted our teeth and bore with it you "young'un" just run away to your popamole shooters

If these "popamole shooters" have better gameplay and mechanics than old games, why shouldn't we pick them over the oldshit? Some games were simply surpassed not only in graphics, but also other elements.

modern-era gamers

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I would Brofist, except DU took that privilege away from me because I dared support a demand to fix a broken forum function.

ANYWAY, my "fandom" of Wing Commander was thus:

# Ignore WC1 altogether.
# Play WC2 with cheats on (ALT+somekey to kill targeted enemy + God mode).
# Watch others play parts of WC3.
# Play Privateer extensively until forced to do the Escort mission around Oxford.
# Flip table, give up on series.

If anything, I'm an "old game" fanboy, and this triggered me slightly because of the old OLD games I've been playing lately, nothing more.

 

[Mustawd]

I remember playing WC1 or WC2 on consoles and having less trouble playing that than the DOSbox version I tried playing last year. It was just a horrible experience to try and get it to work smoothly. Maybe it's time to fire up an emulator and see how it fares against the DOS version?

 

[spekkio]

^
Just skip the DOS versions (GoG sells these) and find the Win9x versions included in Wing Commander - The Kilrathi Saga (it's CD#1, discs 2-5 contain WC3). They work fine on Win7 x64. You'll probably need to use a mouse, though:

Let us continue with the Controls. Now in the Original DOS version you could fly easily with keyboard or joystick. In the Saga version these controls are almost useless. The keyboard is too slow, because its speed in the beginning is zero, and it’s need time to accelerate to a good speed, but if you stop holding any of the direction keys it's starts over again from 0. And the game detects any joysticks as digital. So if you push it any of the directions the ship begin to move instantly in that way's maximum point; and finally the mouse. So one need to get used to it, but if you already know the way, there is not much trouble with it.