| Rant time |
[20 Nov 2009|02:37am] |
This has really been getting on my nerves, especially in this packed release quarter where I've been playing a lot of new games.
What the HELL is up with analog inverting? Its a really simple concept to me, especially in third person games. You're controlling a character from a floating camera perspective.. go ahead and picture a floating camera following your character. How would you look at the ground while keeping the character centered? By raising the camera up above, up = look down. How would you get the camera to pan to the right while again keeping the character centered? By panning to the left, left = right.
Visualization!
That's what's natural to me. If its not setup this way by default, ill be running into walls until its changed. But I get the other sides (stupid) argument for the opposite, that's not what this is about. Seriously, can game devs decide which is default and which is inverted? I've only recently noticed that it varys from game to game, each preloaded with whatever the fuck settings it wants and usually with a simple invert toggle in settings. One games invert is another games default and its getting on my nerves.
I never know if I'm setup correctly until that first instinct turn where I run off a fucking cliff. There's got to be a better way :(
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| Bad Company 2 |
[12 Nov 2009|07:08pm] |
If there's one positive thing I could say about Modern Warfare 2, it's that it made me look forward to the new Bad Company even more. I've always been a fan of the Battlefield games, and the new one is looking pretty solid and making actual gameplay innovations in its sequel. Yeah, go figure.
Now if you were around at all this afternoon, I probably dropped you a line at some point to let you know when fileplanet opened up their beta keys to the public. I had been F5ing intermittently for the better part of the day, so I felt obligated to share its popping with anybody who would listen. Unfortunately this beta is for the Ps3(PC comes later), and even though console FPSs aren't really my thing I'm still stoked to give it a try. Was pretty lucky I saw the page go up when it did, especially since it lasted no more then 20 minutes total before going into subscriber-only mode again.
Have a Ps3? Interested, but weren't around this afternoon during the public window? Well, I used Ita's fileplanet account to scoop up a second key just for you. First come first serve, if you want it let me know. The beta opens up on November 19th and will last the better part of the holidays. Code is redeemed on the PSN after that date. Here's a little teaser to wet your whistle, showing off some squad action and environment destruction goodness.
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| Oh |
[11 Nov 2009|01:41am] |
So SE updated their FF13 faq. My Japanese sucks, but it looks like the FFXIV campaign code with the FFXIII purchase is for an in-game item, not the beta. I don't know whether to be happy that I'm back in the running for the first wave, or disappointed that a first wave doesn't exist yet.
[edit]confirmed by a better translator on Eorzeapedia
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| Covert OP |
[09 Nov 2009|09:09pm] |
Operation: PIRATE THE SHIT OUT OF MODERN WARFARE 2, underway.
All for naught since it won't even be played due to the fact that it doesn't have Dedicated Servers(lol, seriously?), but still. Stick to the guns, fight the power.
Fuck Activision.
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| FKIN BOGUS |
[06 Nov 2009|12:31pm] |
WHY YOU DO THIS TO ME. (XIV beta key with Japanese version of FF13)
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| Dragon Age: Origins |
[03 Nov 2009|07:17pm] |
It's no Baldur's Gate, but its not bad. Give it a shot if thats your kind of game.
Nothing new at Micromania, as you may have imagined since you know I would've updated sooner if there was. Beta signup was the newsletter we all already had access to. It's been a while since we heard anything new, hope we get something soon!
That's all. Now if you'll excuse me, Demon's Souls NG+4 is calling. Almost platinum~
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| Convention |
[22 Oct 2009|06:12am] |
Days late on this one, but here it is in case you didn't hear. Next weekend(30th) Square Enix will be at the Micromania convention in France, and XIV will be present.
There wasn't anything new at TGS, but thats probably on account of it being so close to Gamescom where they hit us with playable demos and a boatload of info. Maybe we'll get a bone thrown this weekend? Cross your fingers.
Update that isnt days late: French website breaks news that Micromania participates will be able to sign up for Beta. Perhaps we'll get a date?
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| I am game, hear me roar |
[16 Oct 2009|07:59am] |
Warning: Grainy cellphone pictures incoming, proceed at your own risk.
Finally beat it, and wow that was one hell of a game. Ending was plenty satisfying, if for nothing else but the difficulty of the journey. The story is what it is, nothing too deep and just keeps the action flowing(and flowing it is). Took the good ending to go in line with most of my decisions throughout the first playthrough, planned on saving the darker side for the first NG+ file which I haven't yet started. Kind of scared to do so tbh, as I have a feeling 1-1 of NG+ is going to be prime invasion territory since I'm sitting on like 200,000 souls from the end of the first playthrough... yikes. That'd be one hell of a gank if anybody got me.
So how did it fare the first time around you ask?
Mmm baby, why you so good to me. Surely there can't be much left to explore in the NG+ file with that kind of action in the first go.
Oh my :D Not even halfway through the goodies, with lots of evil story stuff to partake and endless phantom invading? 60 dollars well spent.
Very minor non-story spoilers incoming as I want to gush about something(two bosses), so stop reading here if you want some surprises with boss encounters later on. Some of these bosses, wow. I mean they're all well scripted encounters in their own ways, but some of them are exceptionally unique. Take the end of 5-3 for example. Every boss thus far has been prototypically evil where you don't really need to an explanation for going in and slaughtering them for their souls.. not this one. You have a pretty little Maiden in white along with her bodyguard, who immediately makes you feel like a dick as soon as you enter the level. 'Theres nothing to plunder here, for this is the sanctuary of the doomed. Leave here in peace blah blah.' Paraphrasing what I can remember of course, but really playing up the fact that they've been turned, victims if you will, and just want to be left alone to rot in their little hole here and not hurting anybody. Ok, well.. you have a boss HP bar, so you have to die so I can have your Demon Soul. Now, there's numerous ways to go into this fight vs. the both of them. However, if you kill the pesky bodyguard before touching the maiden (she has the boss hp bar, bodyguard is more of a distraction) she becomes unhostile and you can talk to her. She mourns the bodyguards death, and kills herself. And to top if off, from then on the music in the Nexus is this really gloomy funeral-esque organ music(which I'm told coincides with a certain amount of bosses being killed and not necessarily this fight, quite the coincidence). Ive never felt like more of a dick in a videogame before, lol.
But this next boss really takes the cake. Now, let me run you through a basic gameplay premise for the entire game if you haven't played. If you die you're in soul form. If you're in soul form(50% of your max hp and no footsteps, otherwise same as body form), you can get your body back by either a rare resurrection item or by defeating a boss. You can also chose put down a soul sign and chose to be summoned by another player and help them defeat their level in co-op, and get your body back that way if you succeed(though your own file won't get credit for that level). Ok now fast forward to world 3. You put down a soul sign in this world, BEWARE. Sure, you may get summoned.. but it may not be by the friendly co-op player you're expecting. If someone is in that world and about to proceed to the 3-3 boss(Old Monk), theres a chance he will pick up your sign and summon you. Yes, THE BOSS SUMMONED YOU. You play as the Black Phantom boss AGAINST the player. Talk about a dynamic encounter. If you die, well grats to the player who defeated you as he just beat the last boss of world 3 and you're sent back to your own world empty handed. But if you win and send the poor player to his doom? Oh man.. let's just say the Old Monk shows his appreciation with a very unique looking garment. A crown for the victor, if you will.
It fit his 50-foot body slightly better than my own. Nothing else needs to be said, it will be in my inventory at all times :D
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| Game of the Year |
[08 Oct 2009|09:57pm] |
I cannot even begin to gush about this game, so hopefully that title in a year this packed with goodies will get the point across. It's been such a long time since I've experienced such a genuinely hard/satisfying game. And I'm not talking about Ninja Gaiden(probably the last game I remember thinking was tough) hard, which was pretty difficult in its own right. This is a completely different ballpark. There are no reloads, there are no checkpoints, there are no saves. You die(a lot), and the game pisses on your corpse and then rapes your mother before forcing you back to the beginning of the level. With half the hitpoints you started at. With everything respawned. With every death from body form pushing you towards Black World Tendency, which further BUFFS the HP/Damage of the enemies in the level.
It is hard. Hard enough that it would be an injustice to try to describe it without shoving a controller in your hand and forcing you to play. Which, by the way, you should do. I'm pushing ~9 hours playtime since yesterday, 2% complete. I may go for platinum.
Random google images picture to round out the entry:
This guy made me regret my sword&board decision so much... arghhh
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| Demon's Souls |
[05 Oct 2009|06:37am] |
Servers up tomorrow, who's down? And if I don't have your PSN ID, give it!
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| Video only |
[26 Sep 2009|08:56pm] |
Alright, so SE said that TGS was going to be video only for FFXIV. And we got a video, so I was expecting that to be it. But wait, what's this!
OH MAN, HOW DID I MISS THIS?! WHAT DO I DO, WHO DO I TELL, WHA- oh.. it's just a page long article on the teaser message at the end of the trailer. Motherfuck, that should be illegal.
It's the end of convention season, and so far no beta announcement. This is where it gets ugly, the waiting game. Nothing to look forward to except this announcement now and who knows how long that will be, so its time to shift gears: to XIV preparation! ATI released their DX11 cards last week, and theyre by far the strongest single GPU available and even rival the dual GPU 295 in some cases. nVidia replies by releasing their DX11 cards before the end of the year, november to be exact. Good news for me as I would never buy an ATI card. Better news because the ATI card does not saturate a PCIe x16 1.1 slot, so I can upgrade without the need for a new mobo. Now to hope that XIV will actually use dx11 deliciousness.
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| It's been a while |
[21 Sep 2009|08:57am] |
J-E-T-S JETS JETS JETS
Had to be done, kids a star. Sorry Viv.
Far too long without a post! In the XIV era anyway. Nothing really to say, TGS is coming up so hopefully thats awesome and not just 'video only' for XIV as its been advertised. Will talk more about that when it starts. Found this buried in some Famitsu article, worth sharing I guess just because it hasn't been mentioned before and is something id be interested in finding out the specifics of:
"While some abilities will be linked to weapons, there is a possibility that certain abilities will be usable across multiple classes. Komoto referenced the way in which FFXI allows players to use sub-jobs to access skills learned from different jobs. This will make its way into FFXIV, but in a different form. A character using an axe may still have access to magic, but it may not be as effective in battle as using the axe. As an example, Komoto says a Marauder may be able to use Steal, an ability not native to the class, but the success rate would be lower than normal."
But other than that, not much to report. I've been playing a lot of HoN in down/bored time(Rage quit annoucements in the last patch are hilarious). Still pretty bad and don't have a go-to hero, but at least I'm not trying to figure out how to build barracks anymore! (never played dota and thought it was like wc3 initially ;x)
See you after TGS~
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| Eyefinity is the stupidest thing I've ever seen |
[10 Sep 2009|10:06pm] |
Ok, not really.. that honor probably goes to the Wii Vitality Sensor. But it's still pretty stupid!
ATI released some specs for their new (and the first) DX11 cards today, and along with it unveiled this Eyefinity technology. Cool.. I guess? Sure, all of that is powered by a single GPU card at 7680x3200, we get it. Technically, it's impressive. But it's completely impractical, and they're not using it to show off the cards power.. they're touting it as actual technology. Who would ever stretch a single display over multiple monitors like that if you're not looking to multitask? This is their answer to 3D vision, something nobody in their right mind would ever use? Dumbbbbbbbbbbbbbb.
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| I has decided things |
[07 Sep 2009|10:33am] |
First decision: there will be no Aion. I know there's a few of you(two?) out there who I was going to touch base with about some shiny new WoW-clone action, but I've flip-flopped and decided not to get it at all. The last few beta weekends didn't get played too much, and when they did it wasn't for long. It was fun to try out, but too shallow beyond that. Its original purpose was only to be a time-sink to bigger and better things, but I don't even think it could do that properly. And at the end of the day, if I wanted to play WoW I'd go back and play WoW. Which I certainly don't want to do at this point, not with what it's become.
Second decision: The Secret World is going to suck. Remember this entry I made a few months back? Forget all that. Failcom was at PAX and did some interviews for the game, and I don't think it would be possible for Erling(communications director) to say more of the wrong things. It was so pathetic that I didn't even want to waste the effort to get you the link, but sorta had to if I wanted to have any kind of an argument.
P.S. I hate Erling
Awesome premise is still awesome. Awesome premise butchered by being nothing more then a 3-faction traditional PvP MMO? Not so awesome. Conan engine, Conan factions, Conan zoning, Fight over resources(FKING CONAN). No. Preemptive decision making on my part? Perhaps. I stand by it until something else changes my mind. But yeah, this could just be my massive disappointment speaking out since there was a lot of promise around its story/lore/gameplay at the time of my other entry. I want a story-based mystery out of this, not Conan2.
And just to not be completely bias, their PAX trailer is pretty awesome. Nothing gameplay, but yeah, neat.
Third decision: Left 4 Dead 2/Halo ODST: Cashcows. Milked for all their worth. Carbon copies of their respective predecessors, that you get the thrill of buying all over again. Except L4D2 has clowns, and Halo has... well, a less awesome character to play. Shame on bungie especially, as I'm a fan of the Halos. Never bought much into the slightly above-average multiplayer hype(yes fun, but nothing special), but the campaigns were good(even if short) and Master Chief is legendary. It's not like theyre just making shit up as with L4D, as all of this was published in the Halo novels from the beginning.. but come on. I can see Halo: Reach, but there is no need for this game. Playing some random soldier isn't Halo.
Fourth decision: Championship inc! Year 4 of the Blue Gartr Fantasy league~ Coming off a failed repeat attempt last year, had a post-championship rut and finished in the cellar. Time to go 2 out of 3! 12 team Auction draft, made out pretty well I think.
Assuming the Old-Man Knee of my Quarterback can hold out :D Leon Washington MVP was too long a team name :(
Fifth decision: Ps3 > 360 > Wii. Didn't have a preference with the first two for the longest time, and in fact 360 was probably my favorite initially. But I'm now going to be on my THIRD Xbox live account due to Microsoft. First was from original xbox that they wouldnt let me transfer over to 360, after an hour being on the phone with Pakistan trying to figure out what was up. Second was the 360 account, which they now won't let me transfer the gamertag over to 360 currently in my apartment (as opposed to the one I let my brothers have when I moved out of my parents after my post-graduation mooching). Why? Because I can't remember what bullshit I typed in for the required Windows Live account. I have the account, I have the password. They say to go on the other 360 with that information and you can see the Windows Live ID in account information, its blank for me. There's nothing they can do. Fuck you and your red rings.
Oh, and PSN is free and better than Live anyway, fgts.
Sixth decision: I discovered this over the weekend with all the PAX news. I think a 4 hour drive up to Boston is more then reasonable, so barring any work-related setbacks the mrs. and I should be attending. East Coast finally gets a Convention, who else is down! Represent~
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| Wow, fkin crazy |
[03 Sep 2009|03:56am] |
Its been a steadfast rule for everybody for years. DONT USE WINDOWS UPDATE DRIVERS. Usually downgrades, always a headache.
No more. If you're an nVidia user, you owe it to yourself to go pick up Microsofts 186.82 WHQL drivers released earlier in the week. I was using variations of 186.18 from nVidia for the longest time, but recently updated to 190.32 due to decent performance boosts and the fact that I dont play Fallout3 anymore(which doesn't play nice with 190.xx for whatever reason). Usually I'd have to turn on some kind of benchmark to note improvements, but when I went to test these.. it was immediately a noticeable upgrade from 190.32.
Take my word for it as I don't feel like posting proper benchmarks, but I gained several hundred points in Vantage and double digit FPS in multiple games. Coupled with the fact that they dont suffer from the downclocking/fan speed issues of some of the latest nVidia versions.. I definitely think you should give them a shot.
- Windows Vista x86, Windows 7 x86: Download link (32 bit)
- Windows Vista x64, Windows 7 x64: Download link (64 bit)
They aren't compatible with XP, welcome to being officially outdated. Extract and run the setup, and as always use Driver Sweeper prior to installation. If you don't know what driver sweeper is, you dont deserve the performance upgrade anyway ;p (Install, run in safemode, Clean 'Nvidia Display Drivers' and reboot before installing the above links. Thats it)
If you're upgrading from an nVidia version your digital variance may be reset to a higher default, which you can change back to 0% in the nVidia Control Panel under 'Adjust Desktop Color Settings' by either just moving its slidebar to 0% or restoring defaults(upper right corner). Or just leave it that way if you prefer the brighter colors ;x
You're welcome.
High everything, Load->Screenshot->Reboot+DriverSweeper+186.82->Load->Screenshot. Different times of day but w/e, since the higher FPS version looks better anyway :D
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| 3.00 Firmware for Ps3 |
[01 Sep 2009|07:39pm] |
Does anybody know what filetype & filename(need both!) are used for the backrounds in the dynamic themes? I like to compile my own .p3t's, but not sure how to go about creating the dynamic wallpaper. I'd imagine some kind of flash, but would need to filename as well so it can be compiled properly.
Google-fu thus far has been unsuccessful, might be a bit too soon to find out :/ And I'd hate to go make a flash or something in preparation and have it be a completely different format.
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| Customizeeee |
[27 Aug 2009|04:46am] |
It's getting a little crazy now ;x
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| Day 4 |
[22 Aug 2009|07:22pm] |
New LJ backround, sorry Deckard! Had to be done, you were delayed until 2011.
FFXIV: Nothing new despite a supposed Saturday announcement. Who can complain, we've gotten more than enough the first two days :D
Blizzcon: Nothing really interesting came out of any of todays Diablo3 panels, but the integration of Battle.net 2.0 into WoW is pretty neat... for reasons other than its uses in WoW. Cross server-cross game friends list will bring bnet up to steams level and do a lot of good for all the games involved.
Ghetto coverage over. Even though Blizzcon/D3 information was kind of a bust (nothing too interesting other than Monk, and a delay announcement :(), the plentiful FFXIV information definitely puts the weekend as a whole into the positive. Lived up to the hype for sure.
What now? Well, the Tokyo Game Show is only a month away... :D It never ends~
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| Day 3 |
[21 Aug 2009|09:02pm] |
FFXIV: Couple new videos showing the same things on gametrailers. Nothing really new today, but who can complain since weve been bombarded with information from the word go. Waiting for saturdays announcement, fingers crossed!
Blizzcon: Bust. Monk class announced and looks awesome, but thats about it so far. Delayed till 2011, boo. Casualclysm expansion for wow leaked 2 weeks ago(aka odl), and reeks of laziness in my eyes. Dont really care.
Heavy Rain: Looking more awesome by the day! Can't wait for this.
And seriously, dont uncross those fingers until saturdays over :D OPTIMISM
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