Adam Ryland

With a patch coming momentarily

Gah, 399/400 Riddler challenges completed. The only thing I have left to do is the physical challenge of bataranging an explosive weapon before a thug throws it. I've completed the story & side missions, anyone have any suggestions about where to go to have this happen?

One of the group that is found slightly in front the Monarch Theatre will pick up a fire extinguisher that you can blow up. Or it may be one street down, I forget. It's definitely in that area, and happens every time if you allow them time to go for it.

If this is the final game for the whole Arkham thing, I am SORT OF disappointed.

It's unlikely to be the final one in this series - one of the side missions seems to exist almost entirely to set up a specific villain to be a major threat in the next game. On top of that, the finale and the dialogue immediately after did establish a strong motive for Ra's to return seeking revenge, Harley has an obvious storyline set up, and several other characters are left in a position to return too - so they've set up plenty of scope for the storyline(s) to continue. I imagine it'll be the last one with Arkham in the title though, as there are several hints in the dialogue that the next one will be in Gotham itself.

Well aware of that, but since you guys get this negative "well fuck that. how are you going to do this, eh smart guy?" attitude it probably means that you guys WANT this game to be made. So I don't understand the negativity if someone is trying to give it to you.

I think a lot of the negativity is because of the inconsistencies in the project - five days ago you said it was going to be about updating and adding to the 'open source' EWR code, so you must still have been at a conceptual stage or you'd have known the code you were planning to build the game on didn't exist. Today you've got a 'great deal' of code written despite the entire premise of the project changing less than a week ago. Given the long history of hoax games, it's only natural that people are going to be suspicious when the information you're posting doesn't quite fit.

Read the first post saying he borrows code from EWR.

Again, he is NOT using any code from EWR. Not only is the code not open source, it's not even available, so he couldn't even if he wanted to. Those aren't screen shots he posted, they're screen designs - the only reason "EWR style" numbers are there are because he's copy and pasted them using Photoshop, it does not mean he is using my code (or indeed ANY code - as he said, it's a screen mock up, you do them using paint packages not by writing the code itself).

It isn't open source.

To be blunt, I'm not really sure how anyone would get that impression as the term "open source" is pretty literal; it means the source code has been made freely available for editing, which clearly the EWR code never has, otherwise there'd be hundreds of slightly-edited versions floating around.

If a "computer programming professor" doesn't know what open source means, you may want to check his qualifications.

I actually think tag team MMA might work. Provided you used a ring and didn't allow double teaming, that is. But I wouldn't want to see it as anything other than an exhibition. Tag teaming in MMA would suck as a regular thing.

Tag team MMA has been done - the ZST promotion, for one, have done several bouts. It's set up so that you can double team for a 5 count after tagging, and if there is no winner after a set amount of rounds then it's sudden death with all four fighters in the ring at the same time. It's just an absolute mess though. There are a few on Youtube.

The first two reviews are up: Edge Online and GamePro; 9\10 and 5\5 respectively.

So is Batman: Hush any good. I bought it on a whim and it turned out I had bought Volume 2 so I'm awaiting my vol 1 through ebay so I havent read it yet. Thoughts?

It's superb IMO, possibly my favourite ever modern Batman story; the artwork is gorgeous throughout, there's a ton of great moments, and the plot is strong (save for a couple of tiny niggles).

It seems like this is just some bad \ incorrect use of terminology by Lukie - "fixing" means influencing the end result by doing something outside the rules of the sport in question. You're influencing the outcome by using favourable match-making in MMA, but it isn't fixing as it isn't against the rules.

I'm surprised that there's been such a positive reaction to that review, I thought it was pretty clearly saying that the presentation has been upgraded but that the gameplay has had only minor alterations (with the huge warning sign that one of them, the new physics engine, introduces new problematic issues...sounds like yet another new feature that will look good when written on the box but will actually make the game worse) - the exact opposite of what the series needed.

I also really don't understand how the reviewer came to the conclusion that the previous games have failed because of their presentation...that was always the saving grace of the game, it's the atrocious and out-dated gameplay that ruins it. The review seemed to make it obvious that THQ have done their usual job of ignoring the real issues, so it's make me far less enthusiastic about picking it up.

Just reinstall the game over the top of your existing copy.

You can use a different database, but as the demo is locked to a specific month (January 1996 I believe) it cannot be a database designed for many years in the future or past as otherwise all the fighters will be too old or young. It does say this on-screen when you attempt to start a new game with a different database.

but this isn't a generalised argument. He is/was speaking directly about the video blog and Dana White.

OK, I think we'll have to agree to disagree there - my reading of his post is the exact opposite of that, I think he went out of his way to make it clear that he was making a general point and Dana's situation just happened to be the trigger \ illustration behind it, which is why I thought it was unfair that he was getting ripped into about something that was fairly incidental to what he was actually saying; which is a shame, as I thought his central point was actually interesting, in that it does seem to be the case (as evidenced by Gabrial's post above) that anybody who actually disagrees with White's constant bad language seems to get instantly labeled as being old fashioned or out of touch.

But most of what you have said is false or misinformed to the character of the person you are talking about. As I stated in my first reply, you complaining about Dana "Fucking" White is extremely laughable.

It seems to me that you misinterpreted a lot of what Jayzon actually said. The entire thrust of his argument seemed to be that anyone who acts as a spokesperson for a company should behave in a certain way regarding what language they use - which is a valid point. You can disagree or find it old fashioned to say that somebody who fronts a large company should not swear, but it's certainly not "laughable" to suggest it. Attacking him because "that's not who Dana is" seems to miss the point - maybe I'm totally misreading it, but I thought he was pretty clear that the entire point was that it would apply to anybody in that position; whether he knows everything or absolutely nothing about Dana White is totally irrelevant to the point he was making. The fact White is known for his bad language doesn't mean it still can't be seen as inappropriate - at worst it's laughable to think he's likely to change, but not to believe that someone in his position should.

Again, maybe I misread it, but it just seemed that you were ripping into the guy for stuff he wasn't actually saying.

It's the ongoing temporary patch, you apply it afterward and should check back often to see if it's been updated - it allows me to make sure that everyone has the most up-to-date version possible without needing to upload a 100MB+ file every day.

There's also an IGN preview here.

I was looking forward to the game a lot, but from reading the previews so far I've got a really bad feeling that this is going to be a "classic THQ" game where they've focused so hard on presentation that they've forgotten to actually include decent gameplay. (The bit where they mentioned managers getting involved and ramming a wrestler's head into the turnbuckle sounds like exactly the sort of dumb decision they've done in past Smackdown games - something that probably sounded cool in a development meeting, but doesn't actually happen in reality.)

I think it's telling that IGN were not exactly enthusiastic about it - due to their relationship with THQ, and judging from how they've responded to previous Smackdown games, it has to be a pretty poor game for them not to be being super-positive about it.

The official site says there will be "more than 40" on the roster, plus managers. There's only 28 wrestlers on the list so far, so there should be a minimum of 10 or more still to come. Given who else is in, I'd imagine King Kong Bundy, Big Boss Man, Rick Martel, Bad News Brown, Demolition and Hercules would be seven of them, with Jannetty and Neidhart for the tag team ranks too.

I like the roster so far, but I'm disappointed that it looks like there will be so few people in the final game....with more than two decades of wrestlers to choose from, I was hoping for more like 70 or 80 so that they could have some of the more obscure guys like Koko B Ware and Akeem.

Oh and I've heard this apparent RUMOR, that when DLC comes out there may possibly be more RTW storylines added, one including Michaels. Anybody got any news or info on this or is it just a pile of shit rumor again that I've got excited about?

Downloadable RTW storylines sounds unlikely - whereas new characters \ arenas can be plugged in pretty easily, any new storyline would require them to animate several entirely new sequences and then organise new voice over sessions for the wrestlers and announcers involved to go along with it. That seems like a lot of work and hassle for them for something that they have no obligation to provide and probably wouldn't make a great deal of money off, especially as they're actively working on other titles now. It just seems wishful thinking to expect them to go to that much extra effort?

Seeing as we're talking countering and it's not covered in the manual, I'll ask here - how are you meant to reverse ultimate control moves? Are you meant to try and press counter when the opponent goes to actually do a move? Or do you use the right stick? I've countered a few, but it seems to have been entirely through fluke button-mashing...

Couple of random questions:

1 - Is MITB intentionally meant to be so hard or am I missing something? I've tried it twice and both matches have gone over 45 minutes before I quit, and I don't think the briefcase meter was even down by 10%.

2 - I remember in the old games that during submission matches the pinfall button would automatically do a generic submission...is there anything like that in this game? I had a match between two guys without submission finishers and there seemed to be no way of actually ending the match?

I didn't realise there were proper counters to top rope moves, but I just had a match where Undertaker (while standing) countered a moonsault by catching it into an Ultimate Control Powerslam, and then did it again by turning a flying rana into an Ultimate Control Powerbomb. That's a pretty cool feature. Does anyone know the timing to do those reversals though? I thought it was to press just before impact, but that doesn't seem to work....is it when they leap nowadays?

BTW - Not sure if it's a well known feature as I haven't played a Smackdown game in a while, but holding X while carrying a chair next to a fallen opponent's legs sets up a Pillman-izing move, and a similar one on the head. That's another nice little touch.

There seems to be a lot of things that aren't covered in the manual \ tutorial, can anyone help me with these:

1 - How do you grab weapons from the crowd?

2 - Is there a way to tip over a ladder when there's only one person on it? I've seen the CPU do it during MITB matches, but not in normal ladder bouts.

3 - Is there a special way to do grapple moves of the ladder without out-punching them first? The CPU seems to be able to suplexes off it at any point, without throwing any punches first.

I don't think she's just a future prop - if they were going in that direction then they would have left things very vague so that they have plenty of wiggle room to write her into future stories, but they made plenty of pretty specific references to her role and place in the timeline. It could be a red herring, but I thought the hints were pretty clear that she's The Doctor's future wife (the only reason to give her his real name), with their marriage happening after Donna leaves but before his next regeneration.

Speaking of which, near the end there was the third (fourth?) little reference this season to The Doctor possibly not being able to regenerate...that could tie in with "his song ending", it could be foreshadowing that he finds out that he is on his final regeneration (or loses the ability for some reason) and so not only is he the final time lord, he's also the final incarnation of the final time lord.

Fab episode, I think children everywhere will be counting shadows now though.

I have three ideas on River Song could be:

1) Rose, but I don't think she went to the end of the universe with Doc, like she said in the trailer for Part Dos.

2) A time lord, like Benjirino said. This is the probably the most likely.

And my third, but weirdest:

3) Captain Jack! It may seem strange, but think about it. Who has a sonic square thing? Jack. Who went to the end of the universe with Doctor? Jack. Who could be around at that point in time. Jack...

I think Rose and Jack are eliminated because River had only seen The Doctor when he looked older than he does now, so it has to be someone he hasn't met before but will meet before his next regeneration. If it was a time lord he should have been able to sense them based on previous continuity?

My guess is that she's a future companion - that'd explain why she's been places with him. Possibly with a romantic connection, which would explain some of the comments. The blue book could be her diary of their travels together? That would make them spoilers to future adventures. It also fits around one of the themes of this season being the companions.

If there's some sort of time shift \ change in the season finale they could then write out the character by having the future where she became his companion eliminated...or this future version of the doctor could be part of the finale, and this is the set up.

Great episode though, lots of great little hints and foreshadowing.