| 23 SEP 2009 at 11:40pm |
RaySorcerer Apprentice
Posts : 362
Joined: 21 OCT 2002
Location: US, CA
Status : Offline | This was clearly a mistake on my part. Between work and my sad World of Warcraft addiction, not to mention the impending release of Dragon Age, when will I have the time to play this game?!?
Remember, procrastinate now. Don't put it off!!
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| 24 SEP 2009 at 1:14am |
CrisGerSchattenjger
Posts : 2548
Joined: 28 APR 2007
Location: US
Status : Offline | this game will be a great healing form WOW. it has much more quality, story and depth, and is a lot of fun too.
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| 24 SEP 2009 at 7:07am |
| Deleted User | Originally Posted By Ray (23 SEP 2009 11:40pm)
This was clearly a mistake on my part. Between work and [highlight]my sad World of Warcraft addiction[/highlight], not to mention the impending release of Dragon Age, when will I have the time to play this game?!?
That is sad indeed. :'( My heart bleeds for you...
I was wise enough to keep my distance from Blizzard's online delights.
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| 24 SEP 2009 at 3:16pm |
CrisGerSchattenjger
Posts : 2548
Joined: 28 APR 2007
Location: US
Status : Offline | Me too, get thee behind me Blizzard. I peeked and tested but got tired of the repetition in the challenges and the quality of the community was not what i am comfy with. Online MMORPG's are still in evolution and hopefully someday the makers of one will install decent filters and have good Game Masters to referee the quallity of the exprience. Without that, it is usually soon a repetition of the real world and not the best parts.
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| 24 SEP 2009 at 3:55pm |
RaySorcerer Apprentice
Posts : 362
Joined: 21 OCT 2002
Location: US, CA
Status : Offline | Actually I was joking. World of Warcraft is without a doubt the greatest gaming experience of my life. Soon it will be FIVE YEARS that I've been playing (I started launch day). Blizzard does a phenomenal job of reinventing the game and keeping us interested. They're great at "fan service" also.
And speaking of the evolution of MMOs, well, Blizzard is primarily responsible for MMOs crawling out of the grindfest malaise that they were in during the Everquest days. WoW has really raised the bar, and all new MMOs are benefiting from that. In other words, they have a much better model (WoW) to copy and compete with than they uses to (Everquest).
Remember, procrastinate now. Don't put it off!!
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| 25 SEP 2009 at 2:57pm |
| Deleted User | [smiley=hijacked.gif] Just be, in true JA+ style, completely off topic here : - It's time that Blizzard starts spending a little less time on WOW and a little more on getting Diablo 3 and Starcraft 2 out the door now....
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| 26 SEP 2009 at 6:03am |
CrisGerSchattenjger
Posts : 2548
Joined: 28 APR 2007
Location: US
Status : Offline | [smiley=indie.gif] [smiley=jumping.gif] [smiley=raise_eyebrow.gif] [smiley=offtopic.gif]
i agree. ARGGG [smiley=skull_laugh.gif]
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| 26 SEP 2009 at 10:25am |
InesrocksPrivate Detective
Posts : 682
Joined: 16 OCT 2008
Location: PT
Status : Offline | Originally Posted By Ray (24 SEP 2009 3:54pm)
Actually I was joking. World of Warcraft is without a doubt the greatest gaming experience of my life. Soon it will be FIVE YEARS that I've been playing (I started launch day). Blizzard does a phenomenal job of reinventing the game and keeping us interested. They're great at "fan service" also.
As I think ive said it here once, I played WoW for a year... then I had to quit... my studies where getting behind and I was getting kinda psycho about it:
8pm- mother: "the dinner is ready!"
8pm- ines: "ill be right there... let me just finish a quest!"
12am: ines keeps playing, and is now waiting for a priest to show up in order to finally finish a dungeon that was supposed to be finished two hours ago
hehe
but anyway, WoW itself is not only addictive (remember you cannot save obviously, you are advised to let your character to rest in an inn, and sometimes they're not quite near where you are, and then the mounts take hours to move so you can get quest requests from friends while mounting and so on...) but its also a great game. The experience of playing and needing help, and someone showing up to give you a hand is really precious. Good memories!
Playing: Skyrim (ongoing)
Last Finished: can't recall, been too long.
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| 26 SEP 2009 at 10:28pm |
StilerJourneyman
Posts : 1477
Joined: 27 SEP 2004
Location: US, TN
Status : Offline | Though it's off topic from the thread post.
World of Warcraft, where do I begin.
Perhaps it's better understanding that my experience with mmo's started in the UO/EQ days. I played both but loved UO more.
To me, UO was the pinnacle of mmo's, mainly because it wasn't restricted, you weren't bound to this class/that class, the world didn't revolve around specific lv's and "zones" a la EQ. It felt like an uncensored open sandbox style rpg where you could really play your character how you wished.
Sadly, after EQ came on the market almost all the mmo's following took it's type of gameplay formula, the "theme park" style of world.
This is exactly what WoW is, it didn't offer anything new or reinvent anything, it just came with Blizzard's nametag and usual polish galore and people flocked to it like anything Blizzard makes.
I even did so myself, for around 2 months and then came back after the first expansion to try it again but that didn't last even the first month.
I've just grown so tired of that style of mmo. Once you realize that it's basically work, that's literally what the gameplay entails, Work.
I don't know about oyu all, but I play games for Fun, and to me WoW felt more like doing a job then having fun/being entertained. HAving to do mundane boring quests and grinding out crap, all in order to get uber loot so I could kill bigger things for even more uber-er loot then before.
It's just a simple carrot on a stick routine, you hit the lv cap, get bored because the game revolves so heavily around an item fest that there's not much else to do when this happens. Thus you wait for the expansion and people keep coming back.
I want an old UO style of mmo, where the game doesn't revolve around items or grinding crap, rather it revolves around the players. Allowing them to do what they want and play how they want, no hand holding, no restrictions.
Most mmo players of this generation of mmo's started with WoW, and to them it's special because it was their first. However once they go forward a few they'll grow to find the faults as well.
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| 26 SEP 2009 at 10:56pm |
ThaumaturgeJourneyman
Posts : 999
Joined: 11 MAY 2006
Status : Offline | Stiler, have you ever looked at Urban Dead?
It's pretty low-tech, does have a level cap, and seems to have a fairly limited number of available actions (when last I played, at least), but there are, as I recall, no specific "quests"; the world is more or less the players' playground, I think.
Let me elaborate:
First of all, a brief description: Urban Dead is a low-tech zombie apocalypse game, in which there are, as I recall, no NPCs: both survivors and zombies are human players (and there seemed to be plenty of them when last I was there!).
The game is played in a large city, divided up into suburbs, each of a number of "blocks" big (again, as I recall). Players can talk to each other, use various skills, fight other players (I don't think that there are any game-level rules against griefing or the like, but I do think that there are player-level measures), and, for the survivors, at least, generally survive. There are also various groups, I think, both amongst zombies and players, with various aims.
One note that I find interesting is that two mini-languages/dialects have apparently formed amongst the zombie players to get around the restrictions placed on zombie speech.
Overall, I think that it's a pretty good MMO - albeit admittedly one of the few that I've played. I'll also admit that I did get bored eventually, but that may simply be more related to my own tendencies.
If you're interested, you should be able to find it here: http://www.urbandead.com
(If you use Firefox, I also remember a graphical- and toolbar- upgrade available as a plugin.)
MWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
*ahem*
Sorry.
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| 28 SEP 2009 at 2:56am |
CrisGerSchattenjger
Posts : 2548
Joined: 28 APR 2007
Location: US
Status : Offline | Dragging the topic back to the original..
Gothic III actualy has a lot of best features of a good MMORPG and with the fully voiced NPC's and characters, it really is like playing live.
Can't beat the gameworld either. Awesome.
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| 5 OCT 2009 at 1:14pm |
CrisGerSchattenjger
Posts : 2548
Joined: 28 APR 2007
Location: US
Status : Offline | Gothic III is now patched to community patch version 1.73 as of September 2009. This latest patch fixes many new things, and if yoiu dont mind losing access to save games previous to community patch 1.6 you will enjoy all of them.
Download direct from here:
http://www.cdprojekt.pl/files/get/724/Patch
and complete details on all the community patches is here:
http://snorre.jowood.de/~community/Gothic3/CP_Changelog_en.txt
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 7:10am |
XerNosamSorcerer Apprentice
Posts : 339
Joined: 3 SEP 2007
Location: US, California
Status : Offline | I finally did it.
With months of going back and forth, watching videos, looking at screen shots, hearing the pros and cons, adding it to my cart and then removing it...
I bought Gothic 3.
The forumites talked up Community Patch 1.7 to me so well, I couldn't resist. And a HUGE plus is that it's on Steam this very moment for a measly $7.50 USD, so it made it nearly impossible to say no yet again.
So now I'm deeper in a bind than I ever was: Once I finish up here with Jade Empire (Yes I'm still plugging along with JE - Fallout 3 and Torchlight whisked me away for a spell) do I play Dragon Age: Origins? Gothic 3? Dark Messiah & Magic? Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines? The Witcher? (I saved the best for last on my list, just for you Traveler!)
'Tis a bind, truly, but ahhhh what a blessed bind it be! [smiley=grin.gif]
I promise at this moment that Fallout 3, Oblivion, WoW, Bioshock, Half Life 2, nor L4D will NOT get in my way this time!
But look out! Once Risen comes down in price, once Bioshock 2 is released, once Mass Effect 2 is released... well, I don't even want to think about that right now...
Here's to one hell of a great year of gaming in 2010!!
Playing: Skyrim: Dragonborn/Dawnguard; Torchlight 2; To The Moon; Far Cry 3
Finished: HomeFront; Far Cry 3; Dishonored
Always Playing: Half Life 2
Looking Forward To: BioShock: Infinite
Reading: BioShock: Rapture; SW: Revan
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 8:06am |
| Deleted User | XERNOSAM: here is my honest and heartfelt advice to you.
1) Take a coin out of your pocket.
2) Call the head Witcher and call the tail DA Origins
3) Flip the coin.
If you are not happy with whichever side comes up, flip the coin again, until you feel the coin has done you justice; then take whichever of those 2 games out of its cover, install- and ...cheers, friend - I hope you'll still remember us... 8-)
Oh, what a luckly, lucky man - whose worst gaming choice in the world is between 2 such divine [smiley=love.gif] games..
On the other hand... - what a terrible choice to have to make..... [smiley=shudder.gif]
PS:
Tell you what: if your choice be DAO, I might just restart alongside you.
If you choice be Witcher (which I've already done almost twice, with all the DLC), or if the other forum members manage to seduce you to something else, I'll just merrily continue with Divinity 2, which I'm finally starting to actually enjoy. :
A note about Gothic 3: Since you are the kind of person who can maintain a playthrough for a long time in the background, I suggest that this become one of your next "always playing" games, since it is so long.
I tend to be a more intense gamer, and I like to focus my attention on one game at a time, but I see no reason why Gothic 3 cannot be savoured liked a good wine that you slowly sip while you consume your main meal (being another, more intense game).
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 5:22pm |
CrisGerSchattenjger
Posts : 2548
Joined: 28 APR 2007
Location: US
Status : Offline | Gothic III is a wonderful world to adventure in as if it WERE your world. It has all the detail and complexity and mystery and mythos of an idealized real human world, and has magic and much more as well. As Traveller advises, it can be savoured over a long time and enjoyed as you have the inclination. Just enjoy the journey and as I have advised others from my own experinece of having to start over 1/3 of the way thru, dont conquer too many Orc towns even though the story may seem to invite that, if you conquer more than a certain small number 3 o 4 i think it i 4, they turn against you and you cant conplete many of the quests. Enjoy.
A word of thought about the Witcher and about Dragon Age. the Witcher uses a delayed response combat system, so you wont have the normal full action feeling of most other action and combat games, i have no idea why they used it, but they did. Otherwise the game is quite qonderful and the music and graphics are amazing. Dragon Age is a game filled with combat, often huge numbers of foes that you must slog thru, using the complex companion command system, where the only way to advance is to use your party members special abiliteis, so there is a lot of micromanagment to it.unlike other RPG games that use parties but dont force you to constantly adjust and direct your party .... those two words being said, both games have much to enjoy and i am sure you will find your path fulfiling no matter what you choose.
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 5:42pm |
| Deleted User | I really appreciated the combat in The Witcher, because not only does it look spectacular, (especially later when the combos become more complex), it saves you from get carpal tunnel syndrome.
(Caution: don't try and do the game on hard for your first playthrough, since it is easier to get into the rythm because of visual cues on the 2 easier settings.)
How it works is so: Geralt, your hero, does combos, which increase in complexity as you level up. You need only click once for every two or so swings - which really saves you from a lot of clicking. Neat, huh?
Regarding DAO combat: I have not enjoyed party based combat this much EVER in any RPG I have ever played!
If you enjoy tactical combat, and you enjoy playing around with spells and tactics and special abilities, DAO will make you squeal with glee like a little girl who found the Island where lost dollies go on holiday.
Finally an RPG where combat does not simply consist of hack 'em and 'slash em and *yawn* -let's just hope this gets over with quickly...
Finally an RPG where you can use you grey cells not only with character builds, but in actual combat as well. [smiley=cool.gif] [smiley=cool.gif] [smiley=cool.gif] [smiley=cool.gif]
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 5:48pm |
JKingSchattenjger
Posts : 2350
Joined: 4 MAY 2008
Location: 0
Status : Offline | Originally Posted By TheTraveler (29 DEC 2009 5:41pm)
Finally an RPG where combat does not simply consist of hack 'em and 'slash em and *yawn* -let's just hope this gets over with quickly...
Indeed. In a lot of other roleplaying games there's very little in way of tactics involved. In Dragon Age, however, one well-considered decision can mean the difference between life and death. I liked that.
Also, I didn't find the hordes all that large, to be honest. I remember playing Neverwinter Nights and having real hordes of enemies, and it was about as interesting as watching bread mould. ragon Age struck a good balance most of the time.
You can't kill someone in a studio.
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 5:55pm |
| Deleted User | Originally Posted By JKing (29 DEC 2009 5:48pm)
Also, I didn't find the hordes all that large, to be honest. I remember playing Neverwinter Nights and having real hordes of enemies, and it was about as interesting as watching bread mould. Dragon Age struck a good balance most of the time.
Gee, you want to see hordes? Give Silverfall a whirl... [smiley=zombie.gif] [smiley=zombie.gif]
Ahem! ..and yours truly actually waded through them all and finished that game....
*buffs nails on collar*
[smiley=whistle.gif]
I did have carpal tunnel syndrome for a week after, though...
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 5:56pm |
CrisGerSchattenjger
Posts : 2548
Joined: 28 APR 2007
Location: US
Status : Offline | My problem with Dragon Age was the story just did not in the end justify the effort it took to get the plot to move along, and by a lot of enemies i mean having to batlle over 50 or 60 individual foes to get through one area with repeated but idential battles with each variety. It just is boring to one who enjoys exploring and sees fighting as a necessary evil to advance the plot. I would prefer a RPG with very little of the mass conbat that seems to be the contemporary favoured style i suspect to try to draw in the First person shooter and hyper active crowd. For me, and this is my opinion only, Dragon Age was a waste of effort by Bioware and will fade quicly from the higher ranks of games over time as people realize that it just does not deliver on the hype and the promotion and the imagery. Most of the landscape is really just stage sets that you get tantalizing glimpses of but never really can experience so you are on a scripted ride like at Disney world whre you are supposed to feel the thrill but just really dont.
All the above is one opinion and yours may vary. In the end, i much prefer the Gothic style world and approach that allows you to truly be immersed in the world and free to progress or withdraw as you wish.
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 6:34pm |
| Deleted User | May I say in defense of Dragon Age, that I found satisfaction from it on two levels:
1) Story: The characterisation was excellently done, and the dialogue is superb. There is just so much care and detail put into every one of your companions, that it takes your breath away.
Yes, perhaps the main plot is a bit...epic, but there were a large amount of sub-plots, many of them pretty nice.
Even seeing how the different origins fit into the main story is very nice. It's also nice that care was taken to give each area its own atmosphere; - I really loved the Brecilian woods, for instance, and all the little substories that led up to the bigger story there were all interesting, and I even almost pecked away a little tear at the end of the area story there.
The way that you have difficult decisions that you have to make, was also handled very well. There are seldom black or white, 'good or evil' type of decisions, many of them are grey, but some are indeed either really either good or evil - just like in the real world where you have the extremes of the spectrum, but also a lot of grey decisions inbetween.
2) Combat: Well, since RPG’s are mainly combat oriented games, it sort of logically follows that there would be a lot of combat, otherwise it wouldn’t be an RPG…
Would one purchase a strategy game if you knew it didn’t have any combat in it? Perhaps yes – but then it would have become a Sim rather, or a Citybuilder.
I must say, that I had found the balance between combat and story and simply just chatting and hob-knobbing with your companions, extremely well balanced.
The devs were clever in that most of the additional chatting could be initiated by the player, -at any time that he/she so wishes - a large part of the dialogue was not forced upon the player.
I remember how cross I felt when I saw gamers complaining about the "chattiness" in ROTA... -imagine how they would have squealed if there was even more dialogue in DAO.
Oh! And let us not forget the huge mountains of lore to be found in the game. I admit that, much as I enjoy reading in a game (I had read almost all the books in Morrowind); I just simply didn't have the time to read through every single Codex entry in DAO... I gave it a good bash and got through most of it, though...
In any case in DA, combatwise, your type of enemy did vary a lot – so you had to use different strategies on each type; and in my game, I never faced more than around 10 foes at a time except at the very end, and there it is not just a simple “party –based” situation anymore – the combat mechanics change a bit.
The funnest part of combat was surely magic - I just couldn’t wait for my mages to level up so that I could see what effect the next spells would have. In fact I am planning a replay soon, as a mage this time around .
Oh, and the spells and the fact that you had a party, would have been a complete waste if you had to battle one foe at a time. The whole idea is organising your entire group in an efficient manner against a multiple foe, and using your stun and area effect spells of your mages, to quell the crowd. If it was only one or two enemies at a time - there would be no point in the combat structure that the game employs. It's almost like a little mini-RTS, so to speak... : 8-) 8-)
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 7:44pm |
FnordSchattenjger
Posts : 2759
Joined: 15 SEP 2008
Location: SE, Stockholm
Status : Offline | You all forgot about Bloodlines *shakes head*, such an amazing game, and in my opinion probably the best of the lot that you have to chose from. It has such a deep & interesting setting (there is a lot of things going on that you need to be quite observant to notice), great characters and a very interesting story that stays very faithful to it's source material. If anything, I think that you should play that game first. It's also shorter than Dragon Age or The Witcher, so you won't have to spend an eternity feeling that "I should have played that other game" (not that you will do that when playing Bloodlines ).
It's also very different from the others in that it does not have a heavy combat focus. There is combat in it, but there is also a lot of character interaction (and you can even talk to a stop sign if you are from the right clan...), and most of the combat make sense. It's also a game that does not reward you for grinding, instead it rewards you for doing quests and talking to people.
Might I add that it's probably the game on the list with most replay value? Not only is there a difference between the different clans, but there will also be details that you never noticed on your first, second or third play trough, that you will notice when you replay the game.
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 7:49pm |
| Deleted User | To my incredibly deep shame I have not played Bloodlines yet... :-[ :-[ [smiley=blush.gif] [smiley=blush.gif] [smiley=blush.gif] [smiley=blush.gif] [smiley=embarassed.gif] [smiley=embarassed.gif] [smiley=embarassed.gif]
I do own it, which makes it even worse, I guess... [smiley=embarassed.gif]
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| 29 DEC 2009 at 11:41pm |
XerNosamSorcerer Apprentice
Posts : 339
Joined: 3 SEP 2007
Location: US, California
Status : Offline | Wow... some passionate, albeit expected, cases for each game! I love it!
And Fnord out of nowhere with the Bloodlines push! Awesome.
Thank you much Traveler (your first reply was one of my favorite forum posts ever ) and CrisGer with some love for G3. (Surely as the sun rises in the east, I knew Traveler was going to come in guns blazing for The Witcher)
I'm finishing up the second book from Gaider for Dragon Age (The Calling) so since I'm already knee deep in the lore, I may just follow it through with the game...
I've got a few more days with Jade Empire, so that's a few more days to agonize even more with my decision
And I'm really contemplating the whole "play G3 in bite sized chunks" approach... that sounds intriguing!
Playing: Skyrim: Dragonborn/Dawnguard; Torchlight 2; To The Moon; Far Cry 3
Finished: HomeFront; Far Cry 3; Dishonored
Always Playing: Half Life 2
Looking Forward To: BioShock: Infinite
Reading: BioShock: Rapture; SW: Revan
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| 30 DEC 2009 at 4:32am |
CrisGerSchattenjger
Posts : 2548
Joined: 28 APR 2007
Location: US
Status : Offline | Vamipre the Masquerade Bloodlines is one of the unique games that is simply beyond the majority of most games and always will be no matter how the technology of new graphcis may keep improving. Once in a while, a game really shows what can be done with CGI interactive stories and games and VtMB is one of those unique classics. It can be played over and over from what I can see of the system that it entails and there are wonderful things to see in the beautifully created world of it all. There maybe a few problems to overcome in installing and getting it to run and I have created a fix pack for it if anyone has any troubles. There are also some very important and much improved mod packages that greatly enhance and fix the game. I also have the info on those but will start a thread when i am a bit more into the game, among other things, in my research on VtMB i found that the developers who were rushed in the release of the game has stashed away quite a bit of content that was not used in the initial release...but faithful and hard working community members have restored it in the latest of a series of restoration patches. I am looking forward to seeing this.
for now, since this was about Gothic III, i return us to our regularly scheduled program and say...
play Gothic III and you wont regret it.
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