The PC Thread (Games, Viruses, BSOD etc).....................

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Well Titan Quest has been quite enjoyable.  It's filled the gap while waiting for other games to come along and I'm happy with that.  I plan on returning to it at a later date, but I've said that about loads of games in the past and never have 

Recommended though.

[fog]

Has the penny finally dropped with regards to anti-piracy measures?

Mariam Sughayer, who is working for the corporate communications
department of EA, says that “Stepping aside from the whole issue of DRM, people need to recognize that every BitTorrent download doesn’t represent a successful copy of a game, let alone a lost sale”. Understanding this, the company is getting ready to shift its approach so that it rewards the customer rather than punishing everyone for the sins of pirates.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/EA-Admits-Pirated-Copies-Do-Not-Equal-Lost-Sales-94516.shtml

Nothing to do with the backlash and relatively poor sales of Spore I assume 

I also read recently that EA had admitted the reason for the DRM measures in Spore weren't to stop people pirating, but were mainly to kill the second hand games market.....which is otherwise a genuine sale they get no money from.

[EricT]

Has the penny finally dropped with regards to anti-piracy measures?

Mariam Sughayer, who is working for the corporate communications
department of EA, says that “Stepping aside from the whole issue of DRM, people need to recognize that every BitTorrent download doesn’t represent a successful copy of a game, let alone a lost sale”. Understanding this, the company is getting ready to shift its approach so that it rewards the customer rather than punishing everyone for the sins of pirates.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/EA-Admits-Pirated-Copies-Do-Not-Equal-Lost-Sales-94516.shtml

Nothing to do with the backlash and relatively poor sales of Spore I assume 

I also read recently that EA had admitted the reason for the DRM measures in Spore weren't to stop people pirating, but were mainly to kill the second hand games market.....which is otherwise a genuine sale they get no money from.

I regret buying spore. It really wasn't worth the money. I've played through till space twice now and I just get so bored in the space age it isn't even funny. They were seriously hurting for gameplay length when they made the section, I suppose.

The sporapedia doesn't even seem to me like a selling point, since everything I've seen off of it so far is just... awful. It's the same crap with the same bad names over and over again.

I wish this game would have just built off of the first sections of the game, forgetting about making space so damn big. Making a larger planet, for instance, with many other races and tribes, and stuff evolving around you. Building new technology, going to space for short mining runs and tech surveys, coming back, managing the planet you're on, entering a space race with the other civilizations, etc. As opposed to "heres a large chunk of space with too much shit and little direction... have fun!"

[fog]

Has the penny finally dropped with regards to anti-piracy measures?

Mariam Sughayer, who is working for the corporate communications
department of EA, says that “Stepping aside from the whole issue of DRM, people need to recognize that every BitTorrent download doesn’t represent a successful copy of a game, let alone a lost sale”. Understanding this, the company is getting ready to shift its approach so that it rewards the customer rather than punishing everyone for the sins of pirates.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/EA-Admits-Pirated-Copies-Do-Not-Equal-Lost-Sales-94516.shtml

Nothing to do with the backlash and relatively poor sales of Spore I assume

I also read recently that EA had admitted the reason for the DRM measures in Spore weren't to stop people pirating, but were mainly to kill the second hand games market.....which is otherwise a genuine sale they get no money from.

I regret buying spore. It really wasn't worth the money. I've played through till space twice now and I just get so bored in the space age it isn't even funny. They were seriously hurting for gameplay length when they made the section, I suppose.

The sporapedia doesn't even seem to me like a selling point, since everything I've seen off of it so far is just... awful. It's the same crap with the same bad names over and over again.

I wish this game would have just built off of the first sections of the game, forgetting about making space so damn big. Making a larger planet, for instance, with many other races and tribes, and stuff evolving around you. Building new technology, going to space for short mining runs and tech surveys, coming back, managing the planet you're on, entering a space race with the other civilizations, etc. As opposed to "heres a large chunk of space with too much shit and little direction... have fun!"

Yeah I still haven't bothered with Spore.  The more recent comments I've read have all said, in retrospect, that it was something of a disappointment.

Much like you Eric I would have much preferred a game that concentrated more on one area. I'd have loved an updated Sim Life where you could create your own creatures and watch them interact, trying to keep a happy balance between plants, omnivores and carnivores and their DNA slightly mutates over time.

I hope this isn't a sign of things to come from Will Wright. Unlike Peter Molyneux he's normally kept his games quite focused and more often than not delivered on his promises.

[EricT]

Been playing the hell out of Far Cry 2... problems coming up now, it's starting to have the problem that most open FPS have, which is that it just starts to get repetitively boring with the whole "ok, go kill this guy who's 18km across the map, and comeback and report to me". So it takes about 30 minutes to get across the map, about 30 minutes to fight your way through a bunch of the same ol roadblocks you could have sworn you cleared on the last mission you did, and then about 40 minutes to get back to the guy who gave you the mission, whom rewards you with essentially nothing of use.

Up until this "Boiling Point" in the game for me (DID YOU SEE WHAT I DID THERE?!), it was an excellent adventure. I just have no will to continue at the moment.

Fallout 3 is preordered on steam and I cancelled my outlet store preorder. 2 days... SO EXCITED!

[fog]

Been playing the hell out of Far Cry 2... problems coming up now, it's starting to have the problem that most open FPS have, which is that it just starts to get repetitively boring with the whole "ok, go kill this guy who's 18km across the map, and comeback and report to me". So it takes about 30 minutes to get across the map, about 30 minutes to fight your way through a bunch of the same ol roadblocks you could have sworn you cleared on the last mission you did, and then about 40 minutes to get back to the guy who gave you the mission, whom rewards you with essentially nothing of use.

I must say I didn't fancy Far Cry 2 at all until I read about the open world nature of it, but then I've heard a few people moan about re spawning enemies and the like.

The way Mercenaries 2 (which I loved) handled it was about as good as we can get in a mission based open world game.  Everyone you killed, buildings you destroyed etc stayed that way until you switched off.  During a lengthly play session you could flatten huge swathes of the map and driving back through all that destruction made the world seem a lot more persistent (which is still a problem most open world games haven't found a fix for yet)

[las6]

Been playing the hell out of Far Cry 2... problems coming up now, it's starting to have the problem that most open FPS have, which is that it just starts to get repetitively boring with the whole "ok, go kill this guy who's 18km across the map, and comeback and report to me". So it takes about 30 minutes to get across the map, about 30 minutes to fight your way through a bunch of the same ol roadblocks you could have sworn you cleared on the last mission you did, and then about 40 minutes to get back to the guy who gave you the mission, whom rewards you with essentially nothing of use.

Up until this "Boiling Point" in the game for me (DID YOU SEE WHAT I DID THERE?!), it was an excellent adventure. I just have no will to continue at the moment.

I take it that there's no way to do multiple missions on one trip?

[EricT]

Been playing the hell out of Far Cry 2... problems coming up now, it's starting to have the problem that most open FPS have, which is that it just starts to get repetitively boring with the whole "ok, go kill this guy who's 18km across the map, and comeback and report to me". So it takes about 30 minutes to get across the map, about 30 minutes to fight your way through a bunch of the same ol roadblocks you could have sworn you cleared on the last mission you did, and then about 40 minutes to get back to the guy who gave you the mission, whom rewards you with essentially nothing of use.

Up until this "Boiling Point" in the game for me (DID YOU SEE WHAT I DID THERE?!), it was an excellent adventure. I just have no will to continue at the moment.

I take it that there's no way to do multiple missions on one trip?

The missions are so spread out sometimes that it's just... ridiculous. It's a pain in the ass sometimes to find 2-3 missions that are in the same 3km area, let alone same area. And then of course, your cell phone rings when you get to the area and you get an offer from someone "hey, go kill this guy instead and i'll give you more money" and of course, he's all the way back where you got the mission. f**k.

Fallout 3 is whats spinning in my drive right now. It's decent, but has problems. Not perfect like so many reviews insist on saying. For instance: The same exact inventory system as Oblivion. It doesn't sound so bad till you have good equipment that needs 2000 caps of repair and you can't carry much loot to sell at a time. And why the hell can I carry unlimited ammo with no weight, but some small items like a peice of paper sometimes have a weight of 1 or 2? I think 200 rounds of 9mm ammo weighs quite a bit, and the only reason I can see this decision carrying any weight (2 posts in a row with a PUN) is that the console fags would whine if they actually had to do some management.

[las6]

Fallout 3 is whats spinning in my drive right now. It's decent, but has problems. Not perfect like so many reviews insist on saying. For instance: The same exact inventory system as Oblivion. It doesn't sound so bad till you have good equipment that needs 2000 caps of repair and you can't carry much loot to sell at a time. And why the hell can I carry unlimited ammo with no weight, but some small items like a peice of paper sometimes have a weight of 1 or 2? I think 200 rounds of 9mm ammo weighs quite a bit, and the only reason I can see this decision carrying any weight (2 posts in a row with a PUN) is that the console fags would whine if they actually had to do some management.

I just got to Megaton but overall the game feels a lot like Oblivion. They simply did not fix any of the issues I had with oblivion. And you really know that you're not playing a fallout game when visiting a town is the least fun thing to do.

And the Ammo thing; Guess why we had a car with a big ol trunk in it in Fallout 2?

That doesn't mean that it's a bad game. Just not as good as it could've been.
I'm personally taking precautions and playing it on hard (bethesda makes rather easy games if you ask me), as a mostly INT/PER/LK kind of a guy. With additional bonus to Speech, Science and Small Guns.

that said, one of the perks offered at level 2, the "Lady Killer" sure sounded interesting...

[fog]

I've just got the 360 version of Fallout 3 so I'm really looking forward to getting lost in that for a month or several.

[las6]

I'm getting my ass handed to me in the game. Had to resort to quick travelling back from a the town I travelled on foot because I ran out of ammo on all my guns and I was very low on stimpacks as well. That, and all the quests there required someone with much higher skills.

Despite all that, I've already managed to gather quite the arsenal. Leveling up and finding items seems way too fast - so I'm avoiding all the easy perks and such. Although I hate the fact that nobody told me about the bobbleheads before - You see, I *almost* picked up the medicine one but then decided against it because I only wanted things of some value... oh well.

at least the game has more scripted stuff than Oblivion...

[fog]

I'm getting my ass handed to me in the game. Had to resort to quick travelling back from a the town I travelled on foot because I ran out of ammo on all my guns and I was very low on stimpacks as well. That, and all the quests there required someone with much higher skills.

Yeah but you did say you were playing it on "hard" so what do you expect?   No chance of me attempting that 

If you want an easy game try Fable 2.  I've completed it and didn't die or have to use a resurection potion once.  It's insultingly easy.  I need to have a rant about Fable 2 somewhere 

[EricT]

Well, I think I've done pretty much everything in Fallout 3. Gotta say, wasn't the best game in the world, but it was definitely solid. Now we await Fallout 4 and the Fallout MMO.

[fog]

Well, I think I've done pretty much everything in Fallout 3. Gotta say, wasn't the best game in the world, but it was definitely solid. Now we await Fallout 4 and the Fallout MMO.

Everything?  Christ I spent over 140 hours on Oblivion and still had loads left to do.  Do you mean you've just finished the main story or you have actually done everything and it's a much smaller game than Obliv?

Anyhoo I've just done the intro bit and thought the way that was handled from childbirth up to leaving the vault was great.  Very clever stuff.

[las6]

Well, I think I've done pretty much everything in Fallout 3. Gotta say, wasn't the best game in the world, but it was definitely solid. Now we await Fallout 4 and the Fallout MMO.

Everything?  Christ I spent over 140 hours on Oblivion and still had loads left to do.  Do you mean you've just finished the main story or you have actually done everything and it's a much smaller game than Obliv?

I agree, I also spent 150+ hours (+alt characters) on Oblivion and I didn't even do the whole dark brotherhood questline.

I spent probably double that time on Morrowind, and managed to find nice new artifacts when I had gone past the 200+ hour mark.

I suspect EricT has done the main quest (which is quite short, or so I've heard) and leveled up to level 20. That shouldn't take long... unless you're playing like I am (=doing my best NOT to level up that fast).