Vilge Duin

BAH! I work my way up to level 3 again... And then the game I was in hit a snag and I was exited to a never ending "Starting Game..." loading screen. And now my connection keeps quitting out. Pfft.

So the European Playstation Day was today and according to various sources... Home's delayed indefinately until Kaz Hirai thinks it's done. Is anyone here even interested in it? Maybe I'm not up on the info but it looks rather... uninteresting. LittleBigPlanet has been delayed until October. Killzone 2 is slated for February 2009. Resistance 2 will have a Facebook like website for matchmaking and other such things. The Online will have people playing in 5-6 player squads (within the upwards of 60 people playing) that will have their own unique objectives to accomplish against a similar squad with a similar goal. Motorstorm 2 is titled Motorstorm: Pacific Rift. Twice as many tracks (16), with 4 player split screen available and new vehicles (like a monster truck). A new SOCOM game is coming out sometime this year. With Secret Agent Clank for the PSP coming out June 17. GT Academy accounced. A competition over 7 months with the prize being a 4 month racing training program to get a license. And then race in the 24 hour Dubai race in 2009 for Nissan's team. And some other random crap was mentioned and/or happened that isn't really important... Next week is supposed to be the Tokyo Playstation Day.

I really can't wait to see this movie. It's one of the first movie's in years to get me giddy with excitement. The trailer just makes it look absolutely fantastic. And even now just going by trailer footage, I already wish Ledger could appear in another one as Joker.

Most games have sixaxis control in at least one way or another no matter how small. Very few really use it for much though. There's Lair obviously, Motorstorm allows it with the bikes if I'm not mistaken, Warhawk can be used to great effect with it but I prefer not to, Godfather actually is a bit interesting with it. Most other stuff I can think of is just little touches (tossing grenades in Uncharted, shaking enemies off in Resistance, etc.) [Edit:] And as for the games... I don't know much at all about PES, Condemned is a fairly typical melee concentrated FPS with a dark atmosphere and some kooky (ie. retarded) twists in it, while GT5 Prologue is nothing but a glorified overpriced demo. The real game will be out within a year anyways.

VilgeDuin

Same here. Especially when a lot of whispering goes on. And it's nigh impossible at times for me to hear them talking while outside or in the car (like on the phone) due to the sound effects over powering everything else. I often have to stop in a quiet place to listen otherwise the revving of the car's engine drowns it out. Wish there was a toggle or bar to adjust the different settings (music, sound effects and voice) like other games.

I hated the Black Cave, hah. The increase in enemy toughness was startling. Was thoroughly trounced a couple times. And the lay out was a touch confusing. Then I met the boss... >_< Very satisfying to get out of there.

It mostly occurred near the end. When you can often get up to three different "screens" going. Wasn't egregious to the games quality, just noticeable. Unless you've seen it it's hard to describe... Like a slight muting and darkening of the screen. It all happened in that game for me with the picture in picture style stuff. Never any other time, when it was often vibrant and pretty. Thus why I noticed. Anyways... How are you liking Lost Odyssey anyways? Not many people seemingly know about it unfortunately or just don't wish to play it. I thought it was a fairly standard if a bit bland RPG with a decent feel to it. The graphics are great as is some of the music, and the story starts out incredibly strong but tapers off into cliche near the end. And gameplay is typical.

Yeah, just quit to the dashboard. I find it depends on the game, but yeah I have encountered it. It's one reason I didn't enjoy Mass Effect. The game was overall just dark looking regardless of changing in game or TV settings. It occurred especially with Lost Odyssey in odd places. When the game was running just regularly it was perfectly fine, but the moment a cut scene did the picture in picture thing it all went dark and ugly looking. Thinking about it I've only ever run into it with games using the Unreal engine. Other stuff like Halo, Dead Rising, Oblivion and so on all look perfectly fine if not vibrant (especially something like Viva Pinata).

Yeah, at the bottom left after any game round. Not sure if it's anywhere else though. And guys with the PS3 version need to arrange a time to play. No one's ever on.

I don't think they'll drop the price for the console company wide. But there has been rumblings that a European 'drop' may happen. It's entirely SCEE's choice, and they seemingly don't like you guys. If it does drop, it won't be until summer or fall until after the current crop of games are out (with MGS 4 all that really remains) and likely before Christmas time. But if Microsoft drops the 360's price at all, which is more likely, you can bet Sony will follow in kind shortly thereafter.

I actually saved right before that (well a few missions), so I'll go check it out right now actually as I've been curious too. I assume it'll be similar with just it being Derrick's funeral. But I shall see. [Edit:] Bah, wow, already answered... Shouldn't leave tabs open.

Slight spoilers in regards to your first mission from Derrick... Spoiler: Click here to viewSame here honestly. I did that too, even walked out as quickly and calmly as I could. The moment I got to the doors I had 3 stars instantly. I didn't target anyone, attack anyone, have a weapon out, run or anything. I'm pretty sure that most missions regardless of how they end or you finish them give you an instant wanted level. I mostly proved this to myself with the Derrick. When he sends you to off his friend Bucky. I did the mission as told and followed him in the police car. I got to the house and was promptly shot at by people in it. Having grown a bit tired of the walk in and annihilate everyone method, I decided a different tactic. I stood across the street and whipped out my phone and called 911. Kept doing so and soon a lot of police were swarming the area and they all went in and took out every last guy in the building. I just stood there watching. When I got the autosave message up and the mission was over I started walking away and instantly was hit with 2 stars. Don't know why either. Same kind of goes for missions that have you "taking someone out" by following them but no matter what you do they live until a cut scene. Spoiler: Click here to viewI concur whole heartedly. I dislike both endings and they feel tacked on and not properly built up to. And considering the one ending effectively eliminates one of your special abilities with phoning someone, it's almost punishing you for choosing that way. I get why as it's heavily implied throughout the game the other choice is the right way to go, but the entire lead up regardless of choice feels arbitrary and as you said, cliche. And aside from the set piece of the bike to chopper jump, this game's ending missions don't remotely fit the enjoyability or scope of Vice City or San Andreas which is unfortunate.

Don't put any sort of external cooling unit on your 360. They are actually prone to blocking the proper vents and not expelling the air properly, and they don't even really have much of an effect in the first place. People adding internal cooling hasn't even been proven effective. The 360 just needs room around it to let air out properly. And as said, design wise all of the 360 models are generally the same. Albeit models made after August of last year have different components inside that allow it to work better and are supposed to help prevent the RRoD further. You have to check the packaging as they are very slightly different from older models (namely the Premiums that are now HDMI enabled). The Arcade though already has the new stuff.

Yeah, Kate never has sex with you or gives you anything relevant aside from her storyline purposes. Of the online women, only the stripper and the law chick will date you and give benefits (call to refill health and lower wanted levels respectively) with a third, through the ads, giving clothing discounts. But yeah... Decided to fuck around for a bit to finish up whatever i felt like in the game. It isn't nearly as fun to go rampaging about in this one. I took a chopper up onto a building in Star Junction and used rockets and grenades on random shit after sniping and rifling people to get my wanted level up. It can be quite awe inspiring to see multiple cars/trucks blowing up with people flying away from them with all the lights about and such. Also went into the one hospital you can go in with some molotovs and made the entire building my own personal burn ward. Wound up setting myself on fire by having one of the last people run right into me. Picked up three separate prostitutes after noticing you can do different things. Hand job, blow job and sex. Quite surprised and a bit weirded out to see the chick climb on top and just go at Niko. Yeah, that stuff is in but other stuff is obscured or obliquely referenced (strippers, girlfriend sex, etc.) Learned of this heart in the statue so I got myself a chopper and tried making it onto the area you have to be. Failed miserably multiple times. Then figured, to do it solo, just angle yourself at a corner and be perfectly level with where you want to land, fly straight in and the moment the blades hit exit the helicopter. You wind up flinging Niko right out. Was interesting, that's about it. Watching Niko die by falling though gave me a rather amusing idea. So I went up the Empire State building and jumped off. Then got a helicopter and flew as high as possible over star junction and jumped out. Fell right into an oncoming car. Then tried it in middle park onto the big fountain there. Takes some skill to line up the landing, but it's quite fun. But I really wish Rockstar (and other companies too) would add a replay feature or something so I can go and play missions whenever I want without having to save prior. I have a hankering to play some of the missions but don't feel like playing through the game over again. And the cheats this time around aren't as fun to just piss about with anymore.

That sounds fascinating. Seriously. I played some more of the online stuff tonight. It was rather ho-hum. This GTA's design doesn't seem to suit online too much. Almost all modes wind up being deathmatches, and a lot of what was cool in San Andreas that would have been immense has been removed (tanks, different locales, airplanes and parachutes, etc.) Do I have to save in my actual game after playing online for my 'rank' to stick? Yesterday I was level 3, but today going on I was level 0 again.

I pretty much strictly stuck to the story missions (so very little of anything extra, stunt jumps, pigeons, etc.) and I have exactly 68% with 94 missions passed.

I've noticed this, too. Eh, well. Signing in from the phone's not THAT big an inconvenience, I guess. Fucking cunt freezes when I do that too. Do any other online games ya got do that? I've been playing fine the past few hours (didn't even notice) without much problem. The co-op shit pretty decent. Hangman's NOOSE is easy as all shit, with Bomb Da Base II being quite fun and Deal Breaker being equally as cool. No one ever seems to be online though whenever I check (PS3 that is).

I'll likely be playing multi-player and that over the next few days if anyone's up for it with a PS3. Don't really care about the time since I barely sleep. I'm more interested in getting some of the co-op stuff out of the way an such before hitting up the more generic 'everyone kill each other' type stuff.

Well I beat the game... Major spoilers therein. Spoiler: Click here to viewI beat it over 10 minutes ago and still the credits are running... right now a long as fuck list about TV voice actors... Holy fuck is the last mission frustrating. Mainly if you fuck up it becomes rather tiresome to repeat an entire long section. But yeah, apparently there's two endings (more like mission strands). One if you go and take revenge on Dimitri or if you agree to work with Dimitri. So going with my prior decision I went and killed the scum. Which results in Kate's death at Roman and Mallorie's wedding due to Pegarino being pissed. Supposedly the other ending is almost a carbon copy of that one. Dimitri fucks the deal over and Roman is instead killed by an assassin at his wedding (as Kate doesn't go). Dimitri is apparently working with Jimmy... and the last missions play out the same but Dimitri kills Jimmy and then Niko takes him out at the Statue of Happiness. Bleh. Not even remotely as good as the other games. I like neither, not due to characters dying, but through the whole anti-climactic feel. It doesn't help that the characters shift in and out of the story at a ridiculous clip and I honestly lost track of how I got to know certain guys through others. And there's dick all for closure... Dick fucking all. Gerry's story kind of just ends when it seems like there's more to it, same for Derrick. Dwayne is non existent after killing Playboy. I don't know what the fuck happened to Elizabeta. That U L Paper Fed dude's involvement is fucking just left hanging, as is the entirety of anything close to closure in regards to Michelle. And the biggest annoyance I had, Bulgarin. The guy shows up very early on to instigate the Dimitri turn, is the reason why Niko's even in Liberty City (running from him after all) and is a catalyst for later events... But the moment he crashes Packie's diamond theft.... that's it. Where the fuck does he go? And neither ending is satisfying... Dimitri is bult up like a prick early on with kidnapping Roman and such, but then not much aside from a random phone call or a shitty "he was involved somehow". And Jimmy goes from your buddy to "big bad" awfully fucking quick and it just feels empty... But this all leads to one thing I'm certain of... The DLC that the 360 version is getting to 'finish' the story. And if that's the case, ugh. The game is great though. A lot of the missions were fun, but nothing really as memorable as stuff from the others. This one didn't hook me like the others for whatever reason. The story, albeit decent enough, kind of flew by with a lot of missions having no relevance (stuff in Vice City and San Andreas in particular generally always felt like it was furthering the overall plot of goal). All the new additions and that are just superb as everyone already knows, and I'm sure once I plow into online now I'll have a blast with it. Just the main game's story seems rather meandering and poorly placed if not poorly executed. And it seems blatantly obvious, just from my own opinion really, that the next game will take place in Vice City and then we'll see San Andreas realized again. Just a hunch.

I think the soundtrack is very poor compared to the last two games and the lack of in game custom station just seems like an excuse to get people to listen to the music they picked. That said... I find myself listening to The Journey on the way to a lot of missions now. Some of the tracks add a nice sense of epicness to it all and are a bit ominous.

Ugh... more decisions... Spoilers for what I think is the end of the game. Spoiler: Click here to viewSo yeah, after all this time and shit... I let Darko Brevic go. He was just to pathetic to kill. But I do have a save to see how things work out if you do kill him. But the decision now is... Kill Dimitri and retain Niko's honour and make Kate happy while pissing Jimmy off and disappointing Roman or go do a deal with the Russians making Roman happy, make Kate hate Niko, likely please Jimmy and completely obliterate any sense of Niko's honour... Hmmm... Honour and Irish chick it is...

Bah... more decisions... In regards to the McReary's... again, fairly major spoilers. Spoiler: Click here to viewSo, choosing between Derick and Francis... Smack headed druggy or asshole dirty cop... I offed Francis. The whole funeral shootout and then escape with his hearse afterwords was brilliant. I saved to specifically see if anything happens with Derick getting offed. I actually love that Rockstar's added stuff like this, it ups the replay value up quite a bit.

All over. Just look at street corners and such, usually at night. You'll even see hookers getting picked up by other guys.

Yeah, I ran into Brian twice and then that Hossan fellow in Algonquin. Not sure if there are any more. Would be cool if you could just wander around and encounter some people like that. Kind of like the favours and such in Bully. The icon is only noticeable if you're in the area they're already in, looks like a little greyed out men's room icon.