The Steam sale made it hard to sit down and focus on one game, but Grimrock finally sucked me in. I sampled it for about 15 minutes a month ago and didn't find it immediately compelling, but after buying it and investing just a couple minutes longer it's become a pretty compulsive experience.
The entire area under the Graveyard District gets changed when you go there to confront Bodhi for the first time, but that's about it.Originally Posted by NathanH
Now I'm glad that I finished Saints Row: The Third running Windows XP. The performance with Windows 7 is horrible, no matter what settings or DirectX mode, whereas with XP I got a solid framerate well above the somewhat critical 40 - 45 fps.
On the other hand I was very pleased to discover that my dated hardware is able to run Max Payne 3 with Max(ed) out settings, considering all that fancy tessellation and HDAO stuff.
It runs perfect on my Windows 7, no problems whats so ever.
Steam | Origin: xRavelle | Skype: TheRavelle | PSN: Voltburn | Watch me struggle through my backlog
I'm sure it does. As I've said, my hardware is quite dated, so I'm expecting no wonders here. But from the looks of it I could swear I get 10 - 15 fps less than before. I just can't see why ...
DirectX version? No idea if it even has support for DirectX 11 (or 10) though...
See that's where your extra XP is mainly coming from. The +1000xp you get for learning a single level 1 spell is comparatively a lot in BG1, and there are a lot of 1st level spells. And if you happen to have more than 1 mage then...
Disarming traps and unlocking things gives less XP per time but there's loads of them in the game, so that's another whole load which the game never accounted for.
It'll all balance out later though, and Sarevok will still be a dick and a half to take down.
Grimrock still stands has my best RPG experience this year. So awesome.
(and I did like Mass Effect 3 quite a lot)
Is "Luis_Magalhães" on the RPS comment threads.
My games-related blog: http://gamingmarmite.blogspot.com/
Make fun of me for all the games I own and haven't finished: http://backloggery.com/ash_firelord
Feel free to add me on twitter if you want to know my semi-regular opinions on game stuff: @luis_maga
Something that has an NDA.
KotoR's biggest evil moment is gaming legend and made me feel monstrous, but some of the stuff I've done in KotoR 2 is horrifying. I used Visas, force choking my 'lover' to the brink of death in order to weaken her former master. After the battle was over Visas still praised my name, begging me to stay with her as she took her last breaths. I walked off in silence, content that she had served her purpose, and her cries became more desperate as my footsteps faded from the room...
In KotoR I did evil stuff for evil's sake. In KotoR there is more purpose behind the evil, and that's fucking scary.
Plus I never get tired of seeing the Sith Lords on the main menu screen replaced by me!
I am pondering if I want to submit myself to the agony of collecting the last 26 feathers in Assassin's Creed 2.
Or if I'll just get on with beating it and start another one from the pile of shame.
Is "Luis_Magalhães" on the RPS comment threads.
My games-related blog: http://gamingmarmite.blogspot.com/
Make fun of me for all the games I own and haven't finished: http://backloggery.com/ash_firelord
Feel free to add me on twitter if you want to know my semi-regular opinions on game stuff: @luis_maga
Just started Dead Island. I'm really liking the tropcial setting; I don't think I've ever played a game set in a holiday resort so it feels very refreshing. The melee combat is interesting too and the open-worldy-ness of it came as a surprise to me. Very enjoyable so far.
Nearly finished Quantum Conundrum too. The comparisons with Portal are justified, but the setting feels completely different and I really like it for that. Some decent puzzles, but there's a lot of precision platforming in there too;. which doesn't bother me personally, but I can see why it could annoy others.
Apropos poorly defined moral system. Jade Empire keeps being mediocre, sadly. I have condemned the ghosts of orphans to eternal suffering, had innocent men executed for cash, stole from children, murdered slaves for being in the way, robbed graves, sentenced a village to a slow death, not to mention the uncountable occasions of casual and unprovoked murder, thievery, torture, debauchery, betrayal and jaywalking.
The lesson here is being a complete monster comes easy to you while listening to
"I was one of those. I meddled with dark powers. I summoned demons. I ate the entire little cheese, including the rind."
~Kvothe, The Wise Man's Fear
Screw the feathers... ALWAYS.
I'm failing to writing a blog, specifically about playing games the wrong way
http://playingitwrong.wordpress.com/
Beaten Sequence 100% at medium. Then started over at hard, which now seems totally approachable. Timer's past 20 hours now!
Half-Life 2, should be halfway through, but at this rate it'll probably take twice the average time or, in other words, I might set the new record for the longest time taken to finish it. Nonetheless, the bridge was a very cool setting, and I just realized it was totally effortless for me to find a battery (for the three batteries puzzle) that was in the least likely place, totally missing the one that was in the most logical place. I guess that says something about me, now I only have to figure out what.
I'm having a really hard time getting myself to play Stacking, I'll be likely dropping the completionist approach in favor of just get me to the end ASAP.
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"You take the Klingon's detached hand"
I just finished Jade Empire. Well, that was sudden. After chapter 3 the game gives completely up on side quests and every chapter after that only took me about an hour to finish.
What has Jade Empire taught me? Every problem can be solved through the application of martial arts and people will love you even if you make the main villain look like a humanist in comparison.
That said, Jade Empire is also incredibly buggy and I couldn't finish multiple quests or had to re-do a couple of battles.
"I was one of those. I meddled with dark powers. I summoned demons. I ate the entire little cheese, including the rind."
~Kvothe, The Wise Man's Fear
Fallout New Vegas is paced so strangely. I'm about to confront Benny (right after this is where I stopped last time, due to technical issues) and the game makes it sound like I'm near the end of the main plot. That makes no sense, of course, as I've barely seen the game world and barely been much of anywhere. It's all rather odd, and kind of off-putting, and generally makes me want to blow the main plot off and go do something more interesting.
Miles to go yet!
Well it's the typical open-world game thing; the main quest is only a small portion of the game. You're technically a good portion of the way through (not as far as it sounds like you think, but still), but you're not "supposed to" just finish things off. IMO it has slightly better ways of prodding you into doing that other stuff than eg. Skyrim. It still does make the main quest experience a bit odd when you do the "and now for something completely different" thing.
Standard Bioware, and most linear RPGs. And to be honest I prefer being able to get some momentum going with the story towards the end rather than getting to hub-after-hub and having more sidequests to clear out (ultimate example of this: The Witcher 1)
Don't remember ever hitting many bugs myself, but it has been a while. I get more annoyed by certain fights where you either can't avoid taking damage (Horse Demons) or the later boss fights where taking several hits is game over (spoiler:Master Li).What has Jade Empire taught me? Every problem can be solved through the application of martial arts and people will love you even if you make the main villain look like a humanist in comparison.
That said, Jade Empire is also incredibly buggy and I couldn't finish multiple quests or had to re-do a couple of battles.
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