Video Games

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Tue Mar 10, 2009 4:02 pm

Roy wrote:Mostly, when items get turned on it just turns into a contest of who can loot the fastest... regardless of how well the items actually work. It's annoying. And no, I don't play professionally. Still don't like items.

If I want to set items for a 'serious' match, I pick and choose them carefully (as much as I love them, no Pokeballs). Then set the item occurance rate to low.

I kinda like Smashbats, Beam Swords, Freezies, Motion-Sensors...Or whatever I feel like.

Avoraciopoctules · Post by **Avoraciopoctules** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 7:01 pm

Whenever someone tells me that items are lame and that real gamers don't use them, I inform them that I specialize in items (specifically, throwing items and environmental hazards like bumpers and shells) instead of particular characters. I tell them to pick which character I play each round, selecting a different one each time.

Ganbare Gincun · Post by **Ganbare Gincun** » Thu Mar 12, 2009 1:57 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote:
Koumei wrote:I enjoy playing against the CPU, personally. But people should learn the game, then play competitively. So at the arcades, either get a friend to school you, or just play through 1P mode a few times. At home, well, it's really easy, especially with Survival mode and various Practice options (as well as the story modes). Personally I don't want a "noob" to even have a chance against an experienced player, and learning the game should provide such rewards as "Obliterating people of lesser skill and making for crazy-awesome looking high-end competitive matches".
Why, exactly? Why do you need to feel completely superior to anyone else who plays the game? This isn't like Chess or Halo where groups are self-selecting. We're talking about arcade games here and if they weren't designed to appeal to as many people as possible then they'll just shrivel up to a small audience of 'hardcore' people.

Not all arcade games are like that. But I believe it's generally understood by most video game players by now that if you choose to play any kind of competitive video game - in an arcade, on XBox Live, whatever - you had best have honed your skills beforehand and come to terms with the fact that you may very well end up on the receiving end of a red-ass beatdown. But even if you lose against an opponent, it's not a complete loss so long as you've learned something from the experience that makes you a better player. And the fact of the matter is that unless you have an abundance of natural fighting game talent, you're probably going to be smacked around a bit until you know what you're doing.

The real issue is that most people don't know how to be either gracious winners or losers anymore and act like fuckwads after a match. This is why I don't use a mic on XBox Live, and neither should you.

But I am enjoying Street Fighter 4 despite the fact that Sagat and the "throwing" characters are a bit on the unbalanced side. And if I get tired of it, I can always go back to Street Fighter 2 HD Remix.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 5:29 am

So...

Bioshock 2's getting previews.

10 years after the events of the first one. The official story is that Jack saved all the Sisters and left with them.

Leaving Rapture in total chaos as the ADAM supply dried up.

Except one of the Sisters returned, and she's now an unholy terror, being much more powerful with plasmids than anyone ever was.

You play as a Big Daddy. Not just any Big Daddy--the prototype, the first one. You're a bit more agile than the production BDs, but are strong enough to use Big Daddy weaponry--and you can use plasmids to a much higher degree than Jack could.

But, still, the Big Sister can easily kick your ass, and if you start making too much trouble, apparently she'll hunt your ass down.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Mon Mar 16, 2009 12:59 am

I'm vaugely aware of bioshock's story and...

Ow.

Avoraciopoctules · Post by **Avoraciopoctules** » Thu Mar 19, 2009 3:32 am

Old adventure games were mentioned recently.

That reminded me of the freeware Quest for Glory II remake:
http://www.agdinteractive.com/games/qfg ... epage.html

There was another freeware adventure game I am trying to remember the link to, but the name currently escapes me. I know it was set around medieval times in a fictional fantasy world. The story involved some level of politics between 2 fey courts and the protagonist already had significant past experience. You start out with a girdle that makes you immune to physical harm but you get framed for murder before you can put it to any practical use. If I can remember how to find it before someone else figures it out from my vague recollections, I'll post the link.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 3:08 am

I dug through my ancient computer stuff and found Quest for Glory 1 and installed it.

I'm having a blast, although I can't get the sound to work.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 3:20 am

Strangely, I can run those games on my iMac. With sound, which was my favorite part.

But gosh if I know how to get through some of the copy protection; if I ever lose disk 1 I'm sol, you know?

-Crissa

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 4:29 am

Well yes, they'd be state of the art latest releases for the Mac.

trollface.jpg

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 7:20 am

That's funny, I can't run them on my PC.

-Crissa

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 8:22 am

Yes, because PCs have moved with the times and the games are old and outdated - frankly you should be ashamed of a PC that can run it without an emulator.

But I was trolling you anyway. Which is remarkably easy.

Draco_Argentum · Post by **Draco_Argentum** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 8:54 am

Well how about you not troll? There isn't much point reading posts that are possibly troll posts and the only reason TGD works is everybody assumes sincerity. Even when people are being rude and shouting we still have to be able to assume sincerity.

Having you troll even as a joke undermines the basic assumption of the board.

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 8:59 am

Draco_Argentum wrote:Well how about you not troll? There isn't much point reading posts that are possibly troll posts and the only reason TGD works is everybody assumes sincerity. Even when people are being rude and shouting we still have to be able to assume sincerity.

Having you troll even as a joke undermines the basic assumption of the board.

As much as I hate Mac fandom, plus fvcking one: it's not always that 2 wrongs make a right.

Though to be fair, sincerity wasn't really breached: she said she was trolling:

Koumei wrote:trollface.jpg

Fvck.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 9:40 am

I like to make an exception for Crissa, because it's so easy to get a rise out of her. And I think she knows there's no malice behind it.

Incidentally, on the topic of games, has anyone noticed just how many zombie-shooting flash games there are, these days?

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 9:45 am

Koumei wrote:And I think she knows there's no malice behind it.

I didn't - in fact, I feel forced to assume it's more trolling. And, if there really isn't ... I'm fairly sure that's stupid (in the sense of her appreciating it).

And I prefer Cat-A-Pult.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 10:28 am

Oh, there are quite a few Cat-A-Pult type games out too, and they're a lot of fun. I just noticed another zombie-shooter yesterday though, and realised there are way too many.

Once upon a time, Flash games were this innovative thing for all kinds of crazy shit. Now it's become the regular gaming industry, except instead of everyone making FPS games based on WWII, and RTS games, it's zombie-shooters and Tower Defence.

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 10:39 am

Koumei wrote:Once upon a time, Flash games were this innovative thing for all kinds of crazy shit. Now it's become the regular gaming industry, except instead of everyone making FPS games based on WWII, and RTS games, it's zombie-shooters and Tower Defence.

At least they beat basketball clicking by a lot. But I do miss Cow Maze.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 2:28 pm

Crissa wrote:Strangely, I can run those games on my iMac. With sound, which was my favorite part.

But gosh if I know how to get through some of the copy protection; if I ever lose disk 1 I'm sol, you know?

-Crissa

Well, I just got sound working. I had to download an old MS-DOS emulator and then...

...Actually, I doubt anyone would really want to know. I can't even exactly remember what I did, either.

Avoraciopoctules · Post by **Avoraciopoctules** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 5:41 pm

I remember old MS-DOS games. It was very disappointing when I discovered that MS-DOS had been phased out in newer computers. It meant that playing things like Genie's Curse and Shattered Lands became considerably trickier. Several old shooters still work perfectly in every way, but crash when you move into water.

Crissa · Post by **Crissa** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 12:21 am

I had been keeping a PC around with the exact purpose of playing old games. But getting spare parts for it was starting to get trying. I fried the KB interface on my 486, which I couldn't track down the exact surface mount which had broken, and the Pentium wouldn't run everything.

And the AMD K-3 just up and died one day, no idea why, the board was just inert, with nary a mark on it, no logic probe would get a peep out of it.

It just seemed funny that I could open a window now and play some of my favorite games... If only I could break their copy protection, which I can't, which makes many very hard to play.

In Taiwan there's even a GBA cart that runs the Sierra games.

-Crissa

I have a pile of old keyboards, too, all a bit mushy, but my preference, based off the famous 101. I love surplus stores ^-^

Count Arioch the 28th · Sun Mar 22, 2009 12:29 am

I've been having issues running things with Linux.

I installed my 2E rules CDs into my computer, and the programs run fairly well, except I can't open the books from inside the program, I can only do that by finding the RTF files of the books and doing that. Which is better than nothing, but I can't figure out how to get that work. [EDIT: I got it to work now. However, now I can't figure out how to print out maps from the program.]

And my Rosetta Stone software? Forget it. In theory, it's supposed to work, except it simply won't install for me. It goes through pre-install and quits.

I find that frustrating, because I've been trying to teach myself Swedish and that was what I was using.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:57 pm

I've been playing the Quest for Glory II remake, now that I have completed QfG1 files for all three types.

I'm really impressed by combat system. It's keyboard-based rather than moused-based, but now that I have my hotkeys set so my hands aren't tripping over each other, I'm having a blast with my Fighter, being able to do a number of tricks--counterattacks, combo routines (swing, reverse swing, overhead), and knocking things on their ass. Not only that, the enemies can fight back whereas in the QfG1, once you land a hit, you can land several more while the enemy's reeling--often to the point of being able to drop the enemy (I didn't take any hits from the minotaur, for example.)

The social system is actually pretty nice, too. You can, for example, click the Talk icon on yourself to bring up an option like "Greet, Thank, Make Purchase, Say Goodbye" and so on. And being polite to people earns you Honor points. Apparently, so does giving flowers to women and money to beggars.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 11:18 pm

Why do people like Chrono Cross?

It's an aimless, pointlessly frustrating game with a plot that thinks that it's clever but is just convoluted and trite. The 'game' has as little characterization as it can get away with, and tries to be all DARKE and ANGSTEE to force its embarassingly maudlin moral of 'humans are sooooo evil and are raping the environment!' down our tender throats. The dimension travelling thing was a fine enough idea, but when the only environs to explore is a fucking tropical island it wears thin really fast. The main villain in this piece took an already servicably omnipotent villain and godmoded it just so it can further cram its message of emo wristslitting and YOU'RE ONLY MAKING IT WORSE moral down our throats. And the five dragons. The frozen flame. STARKY. What the fuck? Where the fuck did that come from? What fucking purpose do those things serve? How did they fit in with the previous games?

Also, they killed off the Chrono Trigger characters and undid the happy ending just so they can be fucking edgy. I really hate this game. I tried really hard to give it a chance even though it was so fucking hard to put up with Kid and the game parading uselessness and sorrow and that fucking combat system that literally did nothing but waste your time.

See, if they left the Chrono Trigger characters alone, the game would just be a mediocre piece of teenage wanktrash that Xenogears would tell it to turn down a little. But since they had to defile a genuinely great game just to sell their unfinished misanthrophic fanfic I despise it. It's not the worst game I've ever played but it's the game I most wish was never invented.

Fuck Chrono Cross.

Ganbare Gincun · Post by **Ganbare Gincun** » Tue Mar 24, 2009 12:37 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote:Why do people like Chrono Cross?

Because they are filled with fail. Chrono Cross is an absolute train wreck that should have never been released. Aside from producing a remix or two of the original Chrono Trigger BGM, it gives nothing of value back to the universe. It's one of those games that allows people to instantly assess the character of a fellow gamer - if someone reveals that Chrono Cross is one of their favorite RPGs, it's a good sign that their judgment shouldn't be trusted.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Tue Mar 24, 2009 5:43 am

So. Apollo Justice, Ace Attorney.

Is this the weakest entry in the series? I think the first one is, but I can understand it if you say this one is. The third case gets really ridiculously stupid at points (even stupider than case 2-2) and the fourth one ended in an anticlimax.

I like Apollo as a character better than Phoenix, though, but I realize that a franchise based on him is doomed to fail because they inflicted the biggest sin of the series: they turned the hero of the last three games into a jerk and made everyone who was cool completely abandon him except for Emma Skye. Who also got derailed into a jerk. So I can completely understand if they want to ditch Apollo altogether.

The fetishized loli assistants needs to fucking go away, though. At least Maya was old enough by the second game.