We played the original in DOSBox when I was in college. We played it too much.

I was too hungover to do homework (or even read the instructions on my bottle of Aleve) this Sunday, so I dug out FFX and popped it into my suitemates PS2.

I've played through to Thunder Plains before, but never beaten the game. This second time around it was a real bitch to be unable to skip super lengthy cutscenes. I honestly spent more time mashing the X button trying to skip dialogue than in actively playing. I mean, the story is the major selling point of FF games, but when you actually already know what's happened and you just want to catch up to where you were before, having the narrative forced on you is a real bitch.

But anyway, playing FFX whetted my appetite and considering FFXII just came out I figured I'd do some research. Gamespot gave it a 9.0, and IGN gave it a 9.5 and I watched a fair amount of youtube gameplay videos and browsed through some screenshots, as well as watched the trailer on the official site.

So yeah, I don't know when I'll have the time to play the game (I'm thinking Thanksgiving break which is 5 days of freedom) but I just ordered FFXII.

Anyone else grab it or plan to? I'm not a die hard fan by any means, having played about halfway through FFVII, FFIX and FFX and never finishing any of them, but I'm attracted by the new real time battles and the gambit system. Not to mention the fact that this game is set in the same universe as Vagrant Story, and has the same art direction. Additionally, British and Scottish voice acting seems like a nice touch :smile:



Yeah, I'm a little excited about it.

It's amazing what they're still squeezing out of the PS2.

I've thought about getting FFXII sometime, because generally the FF games are, at the least, enjoyable RPGs. But the playable MOVIE that was FFX was ridiculous. I didn't make it past the opening, and no, I don't care what happens. If it has anything like that, then no, I'm not getting it.

Also, be wary of people's ratings on FF games, critics tend to thing overly long dramatic-unskipable-cinematics are an "involving" thing. Take a look at their review of MGS2, they think it's the best one yet. (The plot is good ... but too many cinematics!)

So, be wary. I am. That and I'll probably wait until it's everywhere used for like $8. :biggrin:

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

I've been playing FFXII the last two days, and I love it (so far).

I was annoyed with FFX for the same reasons, I didn't touch X-2 fearing it was more of the same. There are some cutscenes here but they aren't as long and drawn out, and you can skip most of them if you want. The story in XII is involving. This one is much darker, alot of death and sorrow, alot of twists. Boring at times, think star wars episode I-III... diplomacy, treachery and then fighting. Oh, and the voice acting is MUCH better here, it would have to be.

The combat system is well done, no more random encounters, because you see the enemy well ahead of time. The licensing system is kind of annoying, but once you get used to it, there's alot of options for each character to pursue. Its like the "sphere grid" from X in many ways.

The "gambit" system is a new innovation, but you can always turn them off completely and fight oldschool. Essentially its like an AI code, telling one character to automatically cure or give potion to someone if their HP is below say 70%, auto-attacking the leader's target, giving eyedrops to someone that is blinded etc, and you control the setup on each character. I usually turn them off in boss battles, just in case.

I loved FFVII for the freedom after you get to the surface, I'm still waiting for that freedom in this game. I want to fly an airship and go where I want... I don't know the possibilities yet. So far I'm pleased with it, but that may change.

Negatives>
Some of the dungeons go on forever before getting to a save point.
The graphics (in-game) aren't quite what I was hoping for.
The same linear play for the most part.

I hadn't heard anything about FFXII being in the same universe as Vagrant Story until quite recently. I mean, obviously the art direction is more VS than typical Final Fantasy, and quite a few of the key team members worked on VS, but it wasn't until a recent interview that I read one of the developers clearly state it is in the same universe.

To be honest, I'm not really happy about hearing that. While the art style is very reminiscent and I'm very happy about that, nothing about the world shown in the trailers made me think VS. Flying Airships? Chocobo Knights? I'm "down with that" as far as an FF game is concerned, but for me, the VS universe was all about traditional fantasy - swords and sorcery, dungeons and dragons - not the sci-fi fantasy of the FF series. Really, I'd rather the two stayed very very seperate.

That said, I'm really looking forward to FFXII. Rule of thumb; I enjoy Final Fantasy games, and while those I have played have entertained me to varying degrees, they have always stood out as some of the best and most memorable games I've played.

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[img]http://card.mygamercard.net/sig/Default/reno84.png[/img]
Designer @ Haiku Interactive | ReNo-vation.net

I started playing it last night, enjoyed it a lot so far. (FFXII)

I haven't kept up with this thread since... Too long.

Anyway, if its been asked already, just forget I asked and point me to where.

Has anyone played that demo yet that uses the Unreal 3 engine?

Opinions?

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Yeah. RoboBlitz.

RoboBlitz doesn't utilize the engine. There's no options for AA or AF, I haven't done any searching for the commands either. Other than that, the game looks okay. I imagine the engine looks better than what that game portrays.

As for RoboBlitz it self. It's a "eh" sort of game. It's got a simple concept and could be heaps of fun, but there's too many clunky game mechanics (it's rather difficult to hit the enemies without using any sort of projectile.) Controls are also kind of sluggish it takes your character a couple moments to really move. It seems to be heavily reliant on physics (though it uses the software PhysX suite for people who don't have a PhysX card).

In other words: go download it and see for yourself. Taking your tastes, you probably wont like it too much. It is a bit on the boring side in a lot of sections.

Overall, this isn't an adequate representation of the engine's abilities. Chances are they just grabbed rights cause it was "the next big one".

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Gears of War - Excellent.

Guitar Hero 2 - Godlike.

Okami - (haven't really played it yet, but very charming)

NeverWinter Nights 2 - Better than the first, IMO.

What will be a card to use the Unreal 3 engine capabilieties to it's fullest? From what I know the game should come out soon and I always thought it would be a milestone for graphics card updating.

I know I won't be able to afford a proper one anytime soon but I'd be interested in what I have to expect...

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Why snark works.

Unreal 3 doesn't seem as monstrous as it once.. seemed. I think, readying your computer for something like Crysis or CellFactor will be more difficult.

But, there's a bunch of games coming out on Unreal 3 engine to find out (MoH:Airborne, UT2K7, otherstuff)

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Twilight Princess (Wii) is fantastic. Big surprise, right?

Also, the game is visually beautiful. I don't think people are giving the system or the game enough credit on the visual front. It isn't Crysis type graphics or anything like that, but that doesn't mean they are "bad". The only real flaws I see in the game graphically is that some textures could use some cleaning up (AF) and if a higher level of AA was used, just to get less jagged edges.

There's little problem with controls. Though, slashing the controller to attack as a wolf is a bit coordination-disorienting.

The game is also well worth the money in regards to play time. There's ten temples in the game, I'm contributed about 3 hours so far and I just reached the first temple (as in, I'm about to go back through the forest and enter it)

It's really a fantastic game with a nice "dark" storyline. It's top notch in every aspect, except, maybe, some of the dialog and sound effects for people.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

FFXII is great.

I'm not going to upgrade for Unreal Engine 3 unless I get UT2007 and the performance isn't acceptable. I have a 2.6GHz single core AMD and a 6800 Ultra (and no problem with running a game on medium-low settings)

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o

Been watching me son play Prey.

Looks stunning. :eek:

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Been watching me son play Prey.
Looks stunning. :eek:

As cool as that game is. It's completely forgettable and pass-worthy ... unless you want some badass MP gameplay.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Starcraft FTW.

Crono said:
<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quote:</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>Been watching me son play Prey.
Looks stunning. :eek:

As cool as that game is. It's completely forgettable and pass-worthy ... unless you want some badass MP gameplay.</div></div>

I can only watch for minutes at a time, but the visuals look great. Someone took some time in several of the maps.

I have yet to actually play the game so I will not comment on that.

Starcraft blows, Dark Reign FTW. :heee:

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The best things in life, aren't things.

:eek:
I love Starcraft.
My brother never let me play Dark Reign.. the cd is around here somewhere, though.

Dark Reign was a fantastic game. You should dig it out and play. I promise you'll like it.. At least as much as any other RTS.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

I'll have to check it out. I had forgotten all about it until I saw you mention it. I'll get around to looking for it sometime today.

Dark Reign 1 ( just in case there is a 2 )

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The best things in life, aren't things.

maybe I'll check that out when I'm done with Brood War. And the original Zelda on emulator.

why the hell did I built a massive gaming system again?!

I played the Prey demo. The intro was great, but by the end of the demo I was already sick of the gameplay.

Well, Orph.. you got me curious enough to look already.
I managed to find it. Now, I don't know when I'll get around to installing it. :razz:

Yes, there is a Dark Reign 2 and it's better. We've had this discussion before.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Crono said:
Yes, there is a Dark Reign 2 and it's better. We've had this discussion before.

Before we discussed there was a before we discussed it.

Yeah, I vaguely remember we discussed things.

Listen to Crono. He has a better memory for the inane than I.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

I found this great little independent game called Amardillo Run that lets you build simple but full functional Rube Goldberg devices. I love physics gameplay. The demo is only 2 MB.

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Why snark works.

Ah, that game. Quite funny, in the same spirit of those train bridge building games, but better imho. :smile:

I just picked up Splinter Cell: Pandorra Tomorrow. Not really my style of gameplay but it plays fine so far. Only (big) issue I've got with the game is the non-immersive AI behaviour: they look pretty dumbed down compared to real people. It's also pretty odd that you can't spot a 3 glowing lights in a shaded environment... I assume that was a designers choice to let players know where Sam is, but it's annoying to keep reminding myself they aren't really on for the enemies... That, and the somewhat irky movement. But I guess a stealth shooter doesn't need the fluid movement a FPS needs.
All in all, fine game, but with a few flaws here and there.

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Create-ivity - a game development blog

Fools, Dawn of War ftw.

I suppose I'll put this here

I got my bluetooth connector today and the first thing I did with it was hook up my wiimote.

I dabbled in glove pie for awhile and found out that the scripts out there are VERY rough and need immense work-overs or re-writing. They're just too sensitive. The wiimote is, probably, the most sensitive input device I've ever used, it picks up the smallest twitches in your hand, so when making a script you need to keep that in mind if you're allowing motion control.

So, FPS was pretty much out, because I didn't feel like messing with IR stuff (and burning candles under my monitor isn't a very good idea, I need to make a couple IR transmitter circuits ... or slap a couple old remotes down with rocks.)

I went to my next choice, which was Need For Speed. At first, I was only using keyboard mappings, because, that's all that is natively supported in GlovePIE. I had tilting left and right past some value turning. But it was a pain in the ass because it's an on or off thing. What I really wanted was analog control.

For that I had to use another program (which Glove PIE creators made their tool work with very well) PPJoy. It allows you to create virtual joysticks in your computer. As far as the computer is concerned, there really is another joystick hooked up. You can define all the axis you want as well as up to 128 buttons! and some other junk.

So, I set up a pretty default joystick there and started manipulating things in GP. I came up with this.

I still need to work on making some thresholds for the steering as it's still too sensitive, but it's playable now.

If you're curious what all this means, this is how I'm controlling Need For Speed:

Wiimote, on its side, right handed style.

The D pad takes care of menu navigation. The B button is mapped to Q (since that's the only goddamned button that NFS allows you to exit with: LAME) A is mapped to enter. Button 1 acts as Brake and Reverse, Button 2 is acceleration.
+ is the crew thing, - is nitro and home is escape, which is used as back in the menus. It all works pretty well.

Tilt the controller down left or right to turn left or right, it's analog. Then, tilt the controller towards yourself (pull up on airplane controls style) for the emergency brake.

I wanted to use buttons 1 and 2 for Nitro, which also would give a 50 ms rumble in the wiimote. But, NFS is very picky and would only read in one of the keys ... the remote still rumbled though!

Sadly you can't send audio back to the Wiimote yet.

The only thing I really don't like about glovepie is that you can't make controller profiles. I mean, if you invented a controller you couldn't make it work with the program. It'd be nice if it would allow you to read in and edit hex values. If I could do that, then I could use the classic controller and nunchuck attachment with the program and make all my own function mappings.

Anyway, it's still cool in any case. The program has some functions built in for complex movement too, which is really cool if you can figure out the mathematical representation of a specific motion. This stuff will be supported sometime, I suppose.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Quoting Crono "So, FPS was pretty much out..."

Found this video the other day:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asY_I8y6C0M

Does'nt look like too much fun to me but I guess it works.

That's the default "Wiimouse accel" script that you can get. It just does a very basic mouse control and no accuracy on screen. It's actually not that bad and is more controllable than two analog sticks.

It'll be much better when I get a proper IR script going

Edit:
I'm almost done with the script. It works far better than it did. Now, you tilt the controller forward and backward to shift and pull up to em. brake.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Has anyone played this yet?

Any opinions if you have?

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Doom III

Boy, this game is good. Wow. I had no idea. I was a victim of the stereotype of Doom III being all about mediocre gameplay hidden behind lighting effects. Now, finally, I played the whole thing and all the concerns about gameplay have no justification at all. There?s some great leveldesign, interesting and memorable scenes behind every corner and a story that goes much deeper than I could have imagined. It learned its lessons from HL1 and System Shock 2 while still keeping the "Doom" style which is quite an amazing accomplishment.

I think Doom III was the most positive surprise in gaming I had in years. I totally missed it because of the bad reputation.

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Why snark works.

It's got good level design, memorable scenes, and a story.

But in the end, the gameplay was still monotonous and poor.

I guess you really have to be a Doom fan to see the game for what it is. I loved Doom III and find it rather difficult to read any negative comments about it. I think that many people have gotten spoiled to the more modern single player adventures and Doom is definitely from another generation of playing style. I found the dark areas to be more normal, than annoying.

If you aren't into flashlights and spooky, you are in for a disappointment. I admit that there were no flashlights in Doom 1 or 2, but it fit for 3..

The repetitiveness of certain goals however felt a bit tedious, but I can live with it.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

I'm not even much of a doom fan, I just really didn't enjoy it.

Playing Evil Genius right now though, that's heaps of fun.

Orpheus said:
Dark Reign 1 ( just in case there is a 2 )

Yeah there is. And it's got a 3rd dimesion...

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Just Kidding

Just Kidding

was in the big town of Springfield, Missouri and decided to stop by Vintage Stock in case of any good used games and i came out with these:
Max Payne: $5
Lego Star Wars: $16
Final Fantasy X: $15
all good, but so far I've been playing FFX the most, i'm quite impressed with it so far

Just finished Twilight Princess. Unbelievable game. 45 hrs, 4 weeks. Quite a journey. During credits when it went over all the places you had been to, it felt almost like a nostalgia trip its been that long. When you consider most games can be done in a few days..<br style="color: white;">

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Hello there.

Ghost Recon 2 on PS2 - linear crappy crap.

Breakdown of my experience:
Select 'Training' from the menu
Wait for the unreasonably long load time
Get told how to look and move around
Get to shoot things - seems like this game could be cool
Get to order squad around - seems like this game could be very cool

Start first mission
Attempt to tell squad to move 'over there'
Two people get stuck
Shoot some people - cool
Tell someone to go forward and recon the area, get "Area clear"
Run out from behind cover
Get shot by the bad guys my recon guy missed
Realize that telling your squad to do stuff is pretty much useless
Start the mission over
Play the game like I have no squad
Beat the mission easily - one squadmate died

Playing through some more missions, the game revealed itself to be painfully linear, which is a shame cause the first one was so nicely non-linear. Same bad guys and same scripted sequences every time, made worse by the fact that if you die or otherwise fail the mission, you have to start over from the beginning. You get familiar with where each guy stands, where he runs for cover, and what exact sequence of actions the designers had in mind for you to finish this mission.

Lame.

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o

http://www.gamerankings.com/itemrankings/itemsearch.asp?itemname=ghost+recon+2&extsearch=0&sourceid=Mozilla-search

The PS2 version of the game, and the Gamecube version, were apparently utterly terrible and completely different to the Xbox one. I played the Xbox version and found it was really enjoyable. It's still quite linear - more so than the demo I played of the original Ghost Recon - but it does give you some degree of freedom and I felt it was quite important to use your squad mates. I hear the Xbox addon Summit Strike went back to offering more freedom again, so if you have access to an Xbox you might wanna try GR2 and Summit Strike out on that instead.

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[img]http://card.mygamercard.net/sig/Default/reno84.png[/img]
Designer @ Haiku Interactive | ReNo-vation.net

I recently played Gears Of War again. Yeah It was alright. But come on, you know, Halo. Do I need to say anything furher.

Here is a random List of My al time frevourite games. Sorta in order:

//

Halo 2

Halo: Combat Evolved

Half-life 2

Goldeneye (nintendo 64)

Banjo Kazooie/Banjo Tooie

Gears of War

Zelda Ocerina of Time (omg how sad is that)

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Aaron's Stuff

not sad at all, i count Ocarina of Time as one of the best games I've ever played

Yes it is. Twilight Princess is a step up from it though it at least ties.

I game Supreme Commander a shot and overall I really like it. There are things that bug me about the game, mostly to do with control of attacks and things like that. I think there are aspects I haven't even looked at yet so there could be more abilities that I don't know of.

Overall, it's not a bad game, it just takes awhile. I can't even imagine how long it would take to actually build several factions of armies and plan full scale attacks even with accelerated game time.

I also gave a couple Wii games a try. Sonic and Medal of Honor Vanguard. Sonic is pretty good. Finally there's a 3D sonic that focuses on speed. I'd go as far as saying, control and execution-wise, it's the best 3D Sonic, that isn't exactly saying much, but the game is fun, at the least. The multi-player is pretty fun also with a party game like structure.

Vanguard impressed me. It looks alright, I still have a standard definition TV, so I'm not complaining about anything as far as looks go yet, but as far as I can see it looks good. The game is standard MoH. Take down Jerry in various towns. Thankfully, the game has less of a linear feel. The level design is more open than previous games. The openness is sort of like the openness in Pacific Assault, but there are more paths.
Something new is the ability to upgrade your weapon. Around levels you find various upgrade parts, I'm not sure how the feature effects your weapons though-out the game, though. Overall, it's pretty good. I hear Call of Duty 3 on the Wii has better controls, but still these aren't half bad. I personally think these controls are far better than Red Steel, just for the simple fact that you can change the dead zone and turning zones. To note, I don't think Red Steel has bad controls. All of these FPS games have controls that are incredibly better than dual analog sticks. Though, the accuracy doesn't beat a mouse ... yet.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

I recently played Fortress Forever.

!!!!!!!

The mods site is here for those who don't know: http://www.fortress-forever.com

Easily one of the nicest and most anticipated HL2 mods, and I got offered a spot on the beta. /giggles like a schoolgirl

Man... I played it for 5 hours from midnight to 5 AM this morning. Great stuff.

Just bought Stalker.

Will let y'all know what I be thinkin. :razz:

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The best things in life, aren't things.

http://toblo.csnation.net/

Winner of many awards at the GDC - Toblo + Everyday shooter + ES was all I played at the Independence Game Festival. Download and enjoy.

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Posting And You

IceWind Dale, and Icewind Dale 2, if you're into DnD at all :razz: .

Also i just picked up homeworld 2 recently. Super hard to play, but quite fun :razz: .

Just finished SWAT 4 - The Stetchkov Syndicate which is the expansion for SWAT 4. It was more of the same, so anyone that liked SWAT 4 will like this one as well. It had seven new missions, a few new features and items.

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What the Snarkpitters listen to!

I recently played my Xbox 360. Very recently in fact, just earlier today. But sadly I won't be playing it again for a while at least, as my turn has come at last for the ring of death :sad: Was quite lucky though, as I only had 2 weeks left on my warranty :eek: Hopefully it won't be gone for too long - Forza 2 hits soon!

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[img]http://card.mygamercard.net/sig/Default/reno84.png[/img]
Designer @ Haiku Interactive | ReNo-vation.net