The Gamer's Quarter

[Dracko]

Black is the polar opposite of impressive.

I mean, it's supposed to be gun porn, yet my weapons are weak and barely representative of their real life counterparts at all.

What a waste.
_________________
"This is the most fun I've ever had without being drenched in the blood of my enemies!"

[Shapermc]

Considering that I expected Black to be awful, it was better than I thought. Low expectations helped that. I almost thought I liked it once when playing with a friend, but you know that you don't actually like the game when you've said to yourself for a long time "I should pick that up when it's dirt cheap," and you're still passing it up for $5 because it's too expensive.
_________________
“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

[Dracko]

Why do the enemies soak up so much damage anyway? Why are there so many of them in the first place?

I mean, you've got decent, but underexploited settings, and the way the story is told is fairly elegant, as is the whole package, but the gameplay itself is just painful, not the splatterfest promised by such a sales pitch.

Maybe I should play it on Easy instead?

I half-liked Black. There were several things I thought it did right (the rampant carnage, the impressive visuals), and a lot I thought it did wrong. My biggest beef with it was that many levels were set up as playgrounds with the occasional enemy spawning vat; you'd be pushed into an area (a house in a field, for instance), and then you'd play Hogan's Alley while wave after wave of identical solider came spewing out of one or two pre-defined areas.

In a lot of games, you can get away with this, but this technique was so consistent and predictable in Black that the game spiraled into tedium just when I thought it was going to start surprising me.

And yes, I agree that most enemies took far, far too much damage. Really, three point-blank blasts with a combat shotgun are two shots too many.
_________________
"This is the most fun I've ever had without being drenched in the blood of my enemies!"

[Cycle]

I'd be down for Serious Sam co-op. I just have to find my copy. I hope the lag isn't bad.

How about HIRED GUNS, anyone know about this (apparently) CYBERGOTH Dungeon Master clone? It's one of the best games on the AMIGA, in my opinion, back when Rockstar were known as DMA Design.

The game was very different from the other glut of Dungeon Master clones since it actually tried to be a bit original, the main difference is that each member of your party had their own section of the screen and could be controlled independently (though you could of course get people to follow other people to save time and effort), the levels were "real 3D" meaning there were elevators and stairs that you use to reach higher elevations (which you could fall off), and monsters can follow you up them unlike DM, but perhaps the best feature of all was multiplayer! Up to four people could play co-op (but games often turned into deathmatches), controlling one person each. It's one of my earliest multiplayer memories and I still think it's one of the best ones. It was just awesome.



Gameplay was streamlined compared to DM, which is a good thing since the squad management and 3D levels added other complexities which fit better with the game design. It was basically a case of blasting enemies, exploring the level, solving puzzles and getting to the exit. You could make a team of four from a selection of 12 mercs, each with their own stats, abilities and starting inventory. There was a swell tutorial that eased you into the game, an ACTION mode which focused on simply getting your team to the exit before time ran out, while fending off hordes of enemies. The other game mode is the RPG mode, a long campaign across a planet, where you have to save hostages and deal with four nuclear reactors. This mode was much more steadily paced and involved much heavier use of the brain.

But what REALLY made the game was the atmosphere. It was set in a dark, desolate future (nice change from fantasy) and the ambient sounds were fucking perfect. This game terrified me when I was a child and I loved it. The music is also rad and a half.

Here are two videos, one of the first RPG level (which can be finished in one minute, the guy playing does a bunch of optional exploration... I always try to stay out of water) and the other video is the main theme.

theme:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZVh3U23L_0

first level:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmi2GXAEgik

There is a DOS version of the game, but it sucks. Well, the game is basically the same, but it doesn't look as good, most of the audio is gone and it can only support three players. The only advantage it has is that it's easy to get going in DOSbox and it doesn't have copy protection like the Amiga version. Oh, and no disk swapping, but that's not a problem in amiga emulators.

So yeah, classic game.

ANYWAY, the real reason I bought it up is because all this talk of betas reminded me that I have a copy of the HIRED GUNS remake pre-release beta. It's from 2000, developed by some guys called VR-1 (Psygnosis owns the trademark or whatever), uses the first Unreal engine and was apparently cancelled because Psygnosis moved out of the PC market.

This game is pretty much HIRED GUNS in name only. Ok, not quite. It also has the whole COMMAND FOUR PEOPLE AT ONCE AND SEE WHAT THEY'RE SEEING stuff going on, and the four mercs you command are all from the original game, but that's it.

That said, it's actually not too bad. The game is clearly a beta, but it's a very polished and near-complete one. There are cutscenes and voice acting and I haven't encountered too many bugs (but there are still way too many for it to be considered finished). The game looks and feels like Unreal which is either a good or bad thing depending on your persuasion. The main menu is actually a little level you can walk around which is neat!

Switching between characters, controlling them and commanding them is all done easily, it's very playable. Your squad mates actually seem to have brains, though naturally you do have to do a little babysitting here and there but for the most part they can handle themselves fine and won't constantly run into walls. I like how the camera sways when you watch them move about in the lower screens.

Each character has a special ability (or two). One guy can recharge his own health, making him perfect for leading the charges and only he can survive in hazardous areas. Another guy has special night vision, another has SUPER STRENGTH which basically means he can use certain objects no one else can, and the chick can enter cyberspace (which looks pretty cool, see picture below) and - get this - CRAWL AMAZINGLY LOW TO THE GROUND. Cybernetic crouch it's called. What a lame special ability.

As you may have guessed, these abilities all have specific uses through the levels so the game is a bit like Lost Vikings meets a FPS. This actually seems like a cool idea to me. The level and mission design is pretty good, there are some good puzzles. There is actually a really rad level later one where you have to assassinate someone, so all of the team are separated at the start (to avoid suspicion). The level is set in this big city area, full of NPCs, some harmless, some dangerous. If you don't pull out a gun in front of anyone, it's all good. After meeting up, you plan an escape route, place your team how you want them, go to assassinate the guy, and get out. So yeah, that was a fun mission, but it could have been executed a bit better.

Oh, also they have this cool device that shoots these transparent barriers. It can spawn them vertically, creating shields, or they can be spawned horizontal, making little bridges. Neat!

So yeah, this game is not too bad, bit of a shame it got canned really. I mean, it certainly could have been better (though it IS a beta), but it would have stood out in the cluttered FPS scene at the time, I think… though perhaps the (supposedly) 2000 release would have been a little too late. GUESS WE’LL NEVER KNOW.



_________________

[Wall of Beef]

Whats the opinion on Doom 64?

I am playing it right now, and I am really loving it. But that may also because its the first time I have played a Doom game properly and with focus. When I was a kid I never had a PC that could play any games, so if I ever got the chance to play Doom/Doom II it was always with God mode on, and all the keys etc. I just wanted to see the weapons/enemies and BLOOD! So now that I am sitting down with a sequal, and playing it how its supposed to be, I am having a blast. I know there are people out there who say Doom 64 is a solid representation of Doom, but what do you "experts" have to say.

Oh and supposedly Turok 3 is a LOT better than Turok 2.

[jjsimpso]

Hired Guns looks AMAZING. I'm seriously tempted to take the time to set up UAE in order to emulate it. Haven't looked at UAE in years, but it seemed pretty annoying to set up when last I did, what with finding kickstart roms and all.

[kirkjerk]

[Shapermc]

I remember renting it, thinking everything looked really weird, and not liking the controls. This obviously says nothing about the game Doom 64 at all, but by that time I'd played so much Doom in general I was more interested in seeing what the novelty of playing it on the N64 would be like. I still have a 32X copy of Doom that I've yet to play, but am tempted anyways.
_________________
“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

[Cycle]

I really enjoyed DooM 64, it was a pretty good take on the series. The ambient noise and new sound effects were frickin' great and some of the new sprites looked amazing, while other ones looked better in the original game. I loved the use of lighting, I'm impressed that they used some odd bright colours like green, blue and purple but used them in ways to make the environment more scary. The level design is also very high quality, though they went too crazy with the architecutre sometimes and you'd get stuck on walls because of it.

There is actually a mod that ports the 64 game to PC, but unfortunately it lacks the sound effects which is like the best part of the game.
_________________

[dessgeega]

my impression is it's a game about scary monsters in darkness, which isn't at all what doom is about, though it may be what doom 3 is about?
_________________

[Winged Assassins (1984)]

[Wall of Beef]

Played some of the Original Doom on 360 today, and its certainly creates a different atmosphere from Doom 64. Doom 64 is a lot more dark and scary, but I get the impression that may have to do with the limitations of when Doom came out. Doom has plenty of dark rooms, with flickering lights etc.

I think whoever the level designers were making Doom 64 were trying to take the environment stylings of Doom, and giving them more variety of light and ambiance. The biggest difference is that Doom 64 has spooky atmospheric music / sound scapes, while Doom has shredding guitars and Midi drum fills.

Im loving both., although I really don't like the redrawn Imp. They made him all fleshy and alien looking. When I always thought he was hairy, like chewbacca.

[Cycle]

[dessgeega]

[ryan]

I was playing Doom on the Jaguar a few minutes ago and found that I don't think I would've missed the soundtrack, had I never heard the music before; having heard it, of course, I did miss it. But it also got me thinking, are the only complete ports of the original the Live Arcade version and the one included in Doom 3 Collector's Edition on the Xbox? It seems as though the other versions - 32x, SNES, Jaguar, 3DO, PSX, Saturn ... er... I think that's all - are either missing music, levels, enemies, or a combination of such.

The leeway given with the firing radius certainly helps with non analog controllers, but holy hell my thumb is killing me.
_________________
Come to me, Mordel. We shall depart.

[Wall of Beef]

[Cycle]

So I've been playing Duke with a more critical eye, and it's not as good as I remember. I'm too tired to go into detail, but yeah, the gameplay is very ordinary.
_________________

[sediment]

the most entertaining thing about Duke is the shrink ray.
_________________

[Cycle]

ok so i still think the level design is pretty good. they have a nice natural flow, aided by clever lock and key placement, plus the destructable environments lets them get around some of the problems REAL LOCATIONS present. i also still think the soundscape is meant to be creepy, since i don't think they wanted it to be too wacky. they were probably aiming for an evil dead 2 thing - a dark comedy that even gets a little disturbing at times. there aren't as many chicks as i remember too. i mean there are heaps in the first two levels, but after that they rarely appear in the first episode, apart from the ones in green goo and one or two in secret places. same with the second episode.

as i said, the problem is the gameplay. the weapons are a mixed bag with either completely useless (tripmines though they are fun in multiplayer. also that new expander ray is shit) to the over-pwoered (shrink ray). there aren't that many interesting setpieces but the worst part are the enemies which are just sloppily designed and not fun or interesting to fight. well, they're fun to fight when you have the more entertaining weapons.
_________________

[Harveyjames]

Cycle can you post some hawt screenshots of Duke Nukem goes to Penthouse or whatever it's called?

[Cycle]

Actually, I *was* going to post some screens, but I thought it wouldn't be cool to make this thread NSFW. Maybe if I add censor bars? What do the mods think.

I've been playing through Duke with my main man BLEAK, who's playing episode four for the first time. I quite enjoy the little narrative of the first episode. The first two levels are set in the red light district (fun!), but then Duke gets captured and put in an electric chair, escaps from prison on a submarine that's booby trapped and fights his way to the San Andreas fault, only to find a crashed alien ship with the boss inside. Neat!

The second episode really shows how much the game relies on things that aren't related to the core gameplay. It's set in space, which just isn't terribly interesting due to all the Space Dungeons seen in FPS games already, even though the level design is still pretty tight. Many of the things that make the other episodes and the game itself fun are missing from this one. Pop culture references are much more minimal, the environments aren't as interactive and interesting and blasting through a space station just isn't as fun as blasting through a burger joint.

The third episode is back in form, all set in a city, chock full of all the stuff that makes Duke great. So yeah, it doesn't have great gameplay, but it's not terrible too, and all the other things the game has makes up for it, I feel. I still find it fun to play, even if it's more of a guilty pleasure these days. It's like the game every adolescent boy wanted to make. I guess I have a soft spot for it, it hit at a big time in my life plus it really just blew my mind.

Oh, and I don't think the game is as saturated with women as HJ says... ok, the first two levels are, but after that the women you find are covered in alien goo (not sexy) or in secret places. The second episode has hardly any at all, too... another reason it was so bland compared to the other eps because, let's face it, half naked women were part of the fun.

When are we going to SERIOUS SAM?
_________________

[Winged Assassins (1984)]

[Cycle]

Yeah, the penthouse models are all poorly digitised, but still! Taking a picture right up close would be boring.

I actually think the third episode is my favourite, simply because it sticks to the city theme. I don't enjoy the dark atmosphere of the levels following the strip club as much as the brighter city levels featured throughout episode 3, but I appreciate the narrative thing they had going.

Also I can't get the Starship Troopers TC to work

Also yes, I found my disc!
_________________

[Harveyjames]

[D-A-I-S]

[Dracko]

"I'll be honest with you; my parents do not care for it."
_________________
"This is the most fun I've ever had without being drenched in the blood of my enemies!"

[Harveyjames]

That's my favorite of the Team Fortress 2 promos!

[Dracko]

Definitely. I want that mug.
_________________
"This is the most fun I've ever had without being drenched in the blood of my enemies!"

[Shapermc]

[Cycle]

[Shapermc]

So I've kind of been curious about all these notes and patches that have been being noted on the Steam main page for the game Day of Defeat: Source Beta. I figured this was a closed thing or a different game because my copy of DoD:S wasn't being updated ever. Well I just looked today in my "Not Installed" list (which I keep minimized) and ... THERE IT IS. The additions and balances sound quite interesting, and I'm actually pretty psyched. It's downloading right now, and after I finish writing something I'm going to test it out. After I got DoD:S I found myself actually going back and playing the older HL1 mod rather than the source game. Anyways, strangely enough, I'm pretty psyched. It seems like they're learning a lot from TF2, which is a good thing.

Also, Dess, are you ever going to pick up TF2 on Steam?
_________________
“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

[Harveyjames]

[Shapermc]

So, I decided to play some TF2 and totally forgot about the new Pyro achievements and unlockable weapons. When I first loaded up five pyros ran past me and I instantly remembered that the patch was already released and that HALF of my team was pyros. It's pretty irritating.

Anyways, FREE TF2 this weekend. Give me a shout if i'm online through steam and I'll see if we can play. You can already start downloading for the free weekend btw.
_________________
“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932

"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!"

[Cycle]

I'll get in on that. If I'm around.
_________________

[Harveyjames]

That's pretty cool that special events occur that change the way everyone plays, if only for a few weeks. Keeps it from getting stale, no?

[Shapermc]

[Six]

Shapes, that's nothing. I tried joining a 24-player achievement box -- that's all players, incidentally, no bots -- and every last one of them was playing as a Pyro. And achievement box maps are tiny.

It was total pandemonium.

[Harveyjames]

[helicopterp]

I'm loving the one random heavy lying dead on the ground--and is that a medic on fire behind him?


Also: that's a 24-player map? What's the player limit on PC? On the 360 it caps at 16, which I think is great because it forces you, at best, to pick which 8 of the 9 classes you want on the map.
_________________
Like you thought you'd seen copter perverts before. They were nothing compared to this one.

[Shapermc]

[Harveyjames]

I remember Team Fortress 1 used to go up to like 50 players, and the days of dial-up. It was stupid.

[sediment]

yeah, that's pretty hardcore.

the biggest match I was ever in on dialup was eight players in ROTT.
_________________

[Cycle]

I've been playing Serious Sam! It's seriously a great game. It knows exactly what it wants to do, and pulls it off almost perfectly. We should co-op sometime, seriously!
_________________

[Winged Assassins (1984)]

The other great thing about the game is having all the graphics options in a menu instead of forcing you to use console commands.
_________________

[Winged Assassins (1984)]

[Cycle]

I'm on the last level in Serious Sam. I still think it's great, though there are a couple difficulty brickwalls that frustrate, and it could have benefitted from modern ideas such as an auto-replenishing health system and such. Right now I'm stuck at the bit before the great pyramid, with about twenty thousand bulls. After this bit I get to do the EPIC PYRAMID RUN which is definitely the highlight of the game.

I really hope Croteam go back to basics with Serious Sam 3.
_________________

[Winged Assassins (1984)]

Back-to-basics should mean that they bring back all the old enemies, the ones in SS 2 were lame.
_________________

[Cycle]

Yeah, the cartooninification of Serious Sam really went too far in three. They also tried too hard to be comedic. Plus everything else wrong with the game.

Second Encounter listened to the critics too much. It's one of those games that the critics didn't know what they were talking about. OH WE WANT MORE VARIETY, ADD JUMP PADS OR SOMETHING. The worst thing did was add the sniper rifle. Serious Sam is all about having enemies charge at you and miss by mere millimetres, not shooting from the distance like a little girl! Sam's to serious for that shit.
_________________

[parkbench]

For years I'd heard about Serious Sam and played it a little while ago at school. It's the most unimpressive "FPS" I've ever played. Completely hollow.
_________________
ich bin aber eine mensch maschine

[Cycle]

well ok then, what exactly are your complaints?

it's a little slow to pick up the pace. it doesn't start rolling until the oasis level, really.
_________________