| 26 SEP 2005 at 2:08am |
SusanGuild Master
Posts : 5485
Joined: 13 OCT 2002
Location: 0
Status : Offline | Hmm, I don't know that there's much I can rant about, as I'm replaying the Broken Sword series right now while waiting for the newest Nancy Drew game to hit the shelves at a store near me.
Oh I know!
*muttering* Cursed games, why did they have to stop after three?
PAUSE
Oh wait, the announcement came that a fourth Broken Sword game is in the works to be released next year.
PAUSE
*muttering* Cursed games, why can't that fourth one get here faster?
Guess I'm not in a ranting mood tonight. :
I miss my Bubba: 1986 - 2006.
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 2:14am |
Lady KestrelGuild Master
Posts : 4035
Joined: 27 SEP 2004
Location: US, NJ
Status : Offline | Heh, heh. I know the answer to some of those, PD, but since it's only a rant, I won't respond (unless you beg).
I don't have a single thing to rant about except for the fact that my copy of Myst 5 hasn't arrived yet, but all will be forgiven if it shows up tomorrow as promised.
"Where is the fountain that throws up these flowers in a ceaseless outbreak of ecstasy?"
-Rabindranath Tagore
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 7:26am |
AntoinettaIntergalactic Janitor
Posts : 89
Joined: 22 OCT 2002
Status : Online | As far as Chemicus is concerned, could it be that there is a bug in the game? It's been some time since I tried this game, but as I recall, I made decent progress until I came to what, if I remember correctly, appeared to be a workshop of some kind. Here I got stuck, so finally gave up and resorted to a walkthru. This told me that at this point I needed to pick something up, but when I tried clicking on it, nothing happened. Figuring I might have screwed up earlier in the game, I restarted it anew, this time faithfully following the walkthru, mouseclick by mouseclick, but when I returned to the workroom, I again could not interact with the item the walkthru instructed me to do.
So the game sits on my shelf with a fair number of other games I haven't been able either to play at all, or to complete, due to what appears to be TECHNICAL PROBLEMS.
And as for my own rant, it is that I have recently purchased Nancy Drew XII, Return to Mysterious Island, Echo, URU, and Shady Brook. All of these games loaded up on my machine, but were unplayable; URU would crash to desktop within five minutes, and the other games, while they appeared to load up all right, wouldn't play at all.
Antoinetta
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 9:32am |
snowtimeJourneyman
Posts : 1014
Joined: 28 JUN 2005
Status : Online | Actually, I've not got too much to rant about at the moment.
I'm just playing Broken Sword II and a couple of days ago I would have ranted about being stuck in Quaramonte having to go round talking to everyone about everything until a new topic appeared, but I've just been banged up in jail so I'm looking forward to not having to talk to the locals as much!
Last week I was playing Zork Grand Inquisitor. Nothing to rant about there - I was too busy laughing.
A few weeks ago I would have ranted about having to go backwards and forwards in Alida looking for scattered bits of information and listening to animal noises - but once I discovered I could do a full install to avoid CD-swapping and could hold down the Alt key to avoid transportation videos, I was happier about this.
*
I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 9:59am |
MorgausePrivate Detective
Posts : 687
Joined: 2 SEP 2004
Status : Online | Rants! Rants! Rants! I tried getting back into Broken Sword (I) not long ago, but it still didn't work out: the game works fine enough, but George simply makes me feel like taking a nap.
He walks relatively slowly, but what really bothers me is the speed at which he talks: That. Is. Real. Slow. Of course, reading will always go quicker than hearing someone speaking, but I would like him to be done by the time I've read three times his line. I guess the other characters in the game have the same sort of speech, but they don't appear nearly as often.
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 11:12am |
MikekellyPrivate Detective
Posts : 612
Joined: 25 JUN 2004
Status : Offline |
I'm playing "Pharaoh's Curse" - a pretty good game - not great but OK.
I am looking forward to my next A++ title - but I've a few of these so-so games to play first.
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 11:41am |
snowtimeJourneyman
Posts : 1014
Joined: 28 JUN 2005
Status : Online | Originally Posted By Alneyan (26 SEP 2005 9:58am)
Rants! Rants! Rants! I tried getting back into Broken Sword (I) not long ago, but it still didn't work out: the game works fine enough, but George simply makes me feel like taking a nap.
He walks relatively slowly, but what really bothers me is the speed at which he talks: That. Is. Real. Slow. Of course, reading will always go quicker than hearing someone speaking, but I would like him to be done by the time I've read three times his line. I guess the other characters in the game have the same sort of speech, but they don't appear nearly as often.
I know exactly what you mean! [smiley=yawn.gif]
You can always skip the voice acting once you've read the lines by right-clicking. I haven't found anything that makes him walk more quickly though!
*
I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 11:59am |
CrapstormJourneyman
Posts : 829
Joined: 18 FEB 2004
Status : Online | I right-clicked the whole way through Broken Sword 1. I think if you let every bit of recorded speech play out, the game lasts about 20 hours. Which seems a bit much for a game with only half a dozen puzzles. It's an interactive video, really.
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 1:04pm |
Pastor DisasterJourneyman
Posts : 1056
Joined: 14 DEC 2004
Status : Online | Originally Posted By Lady Kestrel (26 SEP 2005 2:14am)
Heh, heh. I know the answer to some of those, PD, but since it's only a rant, I won't respond (unless you beg).
You're spot on, Lady K. This isn't a hints thread, otherwise I would have posted it in the Hints & Tips forum. This is just a place to blow off steam.
Antoinetta--you may be right, but I haven't given the game enough time to be proven buggy. It's mostly just frustrating not having more clearly explained sub-goals. I am doing various things simply because I can.
Now THAT would make for a frustrating game. Have a bunch of "rabbit trails"--items you can use, steps you can take in order to accomplish something, etc., but which have no practical value in the game! Let the player go through a six-stage process to create, say, a crossbow, only to find out that you never need a crossbow in the rest of the game. It would certainly cut down on the amount of random p&c and inventory-applying that goes on in most games...
Dyslexics wonder why there isn't a word that means the same thing as "cinnamon."
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 1:41pm |
AlGrooverIntergalactic Janitor
Posts : 40
Joined: 11 SEP 2005
Status : Online | OK, my rant for the day. Suspension of disbelief goes with gameplay, but so many authors of otherwise excellent games include grating impossibilities. Examples? Riddle of the Sphinx - you swim through an underground river with a backpack containing 300kg of stone tablets. The Black Mirror - the ancient looking solar system puzzle cabinet has 9 planets. Pluto wasn't discovered until the 1930's. Even Kate Walker seems to turn into a kleptomaniac in Syberia 2, in order to fill the inventory. I would feel better about it if she paid for some of that stuff. Expecting too much? Most of these sort of things could be fixed at an early stage with a bit of proofreading and suggestions. Surely almost nothing compared to the enormous amount of work and effort to get these games built, funded and marketed.
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| 26 SEP 2005 at 4:22pm |
MorgausePrivate Detective
Posts : 687
Joined: 2 SEP 2004
Status : Online | Originally Posted By snowtime (26 SEP 2005 11:41am)
I know exactly what you mean! [smiley=yawn.gif]
You can always skip the voice acting once you've read the lines by right-clicking. I haven't found anything that makes him walk more quickly though!
*
I guess that's the only sensible way of dealing with him. I really dislike graphical games that don't have voice-acting though, since they have no tone or description of how a character speaks. But that would be the topic for another rant.
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| 28 SEP 2005 at 3:23pm |
Chris.Schattenjger
Posts : 1842
Joined: 8 MAR 2005
Status : Online | ...and yet you play text adventures?
My rant is at Fahrenheit...I'm supposed to navigate this stupid bitch around a basement by pressing the up arrow key to move forwards and holding down the right mouse button and moving the mouse to turn around, and keep tapping the left and right arrow keys to make sure she's breathing at the right speed? This game is on its way out the window...
...not to be confused with Keira Knightley
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| 28 SEP 2005 at 3:31pm |
BazzaLBPrivate Detective
Posts : 512
Joined: 27 AUG 2005
Location: AU
Status : Offline | Originally Posted By chris156 (28 SEP 2005 3:23pm)
...and yet you play text adventures?
My rant is at Fahrenheit...I'm supposed to navigate this stupid bitch around a basement by pressing the up arrow key to move forwards and holding down the right mouse button and moving the mouse to turn around, and keep tapping the left and right arrow keys to make sure she's breathing at the right speed? This game is on its way out the window...
Woah! and I struggled with the demo! Might have to give this one a miss... my dexterity isn't what it used to be.
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| 28 SEP 2005 at 6:36pm |
WhimsicalIntergalactic Janitor
Posts : 18
Joined: 20 SEP 2005
Status : Online | Farenheit becomes much easier with a decent game pad.
I'm playing the xbox version.
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| 28 SEP 2005 at 6:43pm |
Chris.Schattenjger
Posts : 1842
Joined: 8 MAR 2005
Status : Online | I would have much preferred the PS2 version, but the PS2 is at home and I'm not
Also I'm on a laptop, which makes the controls even more difficult (no mouse or number pad)
...not to be confused with Keira Knightley
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| 28 SEP 2005 at 7:55pm |
MorgausePrivate Detective
Posts : 687
Joined: 2 SEP 2004
Status : Online | Originally Posted By chris156 (28 SEP 2005 3:23pm)
...and yet you play text adventures?
They are meant to be played without voice acting (for now, at least), so it works well enough for me. Graphical games that don't have voice acting (or sound/music for that matter) seem a waste to me, and a lot less enjoyable: it simply isn't the whole package. Am I rational here?
Well, I know I wouldn't watch a movie without any sort of voice acting, whereas it is perfectly fine for a book, so different media and all that. I can't say I really liked those graphical adventures that didn't come with voice acting either: graphics alone weren't worth losing all the good things with text-based games.
Kendall!
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| 28 SEP 2005 at 8:25pm |
Chris.Schattenjger
Posts : 1842
Joined: 8 MAR 2005
Status : Online | Originally Posted By Alneyan (28 SEP 2005 7:55pm)
Kendall!
???
[img]http://www.confluence.org/uk/en/n55w003v3/pic9.jpg[/img]
...not to be confused with Keira Knightley
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| 28 SEP 2005 at 8:35pm |
MorgausePrivate Detective
Posts : 687
Joined: 2 SEP 2004
Status : Online | Kendall is a handy Zorkian spell that allows to simplify instructions and, arguably, posts. Mind the spelling though (it ends with two Limas at the end), so it cannot be the same thing as your lovely picture. There seems to be a lot of Kendall thingies not related to Zork, though.
A *mint* cake? I heard many horror stories about English cooking, but I didn't know about that one. Of course, having questionable recipes wouldn't be a problem, if there was *something* to make up for it. :
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| 28 SEP 2005 at 8:48pm |
Chris.Schattenjger
Posts : 1842
Joined: 8 MAR 2005
Status : Online | Kendal mint cake is made with a very complicated list of ingredients: sugar and peppermint oil. It's very nice but it contains roughly 44,000 calories per bar.
...not to be confused with Keira Knightley
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| 29 SEP 2005 at 10:44am |
snowtimeJourneyman
Posts : 1014
Joined: 28 JUN 2005
Status : Online | Back on topic.
I'm going to have to have another rant about George Stobbart walking so slowly. I'm on Zombie Island in BS2. In the time it takes George to walk from one side of the screen to the other I can prepare a three course meal, mow the lawn and still have time to watch the extended version of The Return of the King! Grrrr!
Perhaps I should give him some Kendal Mint Cake for the energy boost!
*
I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.
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| 29 SEP 2005 at 4:38pm |
Pastor DisasterJourneyman
Posts : 1056
Joined: 14 DEC 2004
Status : Online | New rant about Chemicus:
Okay, so I finally found a book of instructions (rant #1: nodes that you can only enter from one direction, even though you can see it from multiple sides and have no obstacles preventing you). So now I have a better idea of the sorts of things I can create. But I'm still struggling with that rascally question, "Why would I want to??"
But hey, I'm not giving up on this game! And I'm doing my best not to resort to a walkthrough this time. I figure at least once in my life I should finish an AG without WT or hints.
Dyslexics wonder why there isn't a word that means the same thing as "cinnamon."
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| 29 SEP 2005 at 7:25pm |
jalexSchattenjger
Posts : 2503
Joined: 5 MAR 2003
Status : Offline | Originally Posted By Antoinetta (26 SEP 2005 7:26am)
As far as Chemicus is concerned, could it be that there is a bug in the game? It's been some time since I tried this game, but as I recall, I made decent progress until I came to what, if I remember correctly, appeared to be a workshop of some kind. Here I got stuck, so finally gave up and resorted to a walkthru. This told me that at this point I needed to pick something up, but when I tried clicking on it, nothing happened. Figuring I might have screwed up earlier in the game, I restarted it anew, this time faithfully following the walkthru, mouseclick by mouseclick, but when I returned to the workroom, I again could not interact with the item the walkthru instructed me to do.
So the game sits on my shelf with a fair number of other games I haven't been able either to play at all, or to complete, due to what appears to be TECHNICAL PROBLEMS.
And as for my own rant, it is that I have recently purchased Nancy Drew XII, Return to Mysterious Island, Echo, URU, and Shady Brook. All of these games loaded up on my machine, but were unplayable; URU would crash to desktop within five minutes, and the other games, while they appeared to load up all right, wouldn't play at all.
Antoinetta
I did the same in Chemicus. I wonder what's going on here. It makes we wonder what I did wrong because how could they write a walkthrough if it wasn't possible to get past this point.? If I knew what the problem was I might try it again.
I have had no problems with any Nancy Drew games on any of my computers. The other games you mentioned do require a good Video card and new drivers so you might look into that. I have the others but so far I have only played Shadow Brook an Return to Myserious Island witch both ran fine.
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