The "What are you playing?" topic.

**CountArach** · 06-10-2009, 00:42

Originally Posted by Shinseikhaan

My interest is piqued. I think I'm gonna buy it. Do I need buy both the simulator and the upgrade, or do I just buy the upgrade?

I dunno, I just got the basic game. I would assume you have to get both, but you might want to ask here:
http://geopoliticalsimulator.freefor...eneral-f1.html

EDIT: After a curosyr glance at their website, you do in fact need both.

**Fragony** · 06-10-2009, 07:01

Yep it's official, I can't play Siren it's too scary, up to the point where scary just isn't fun anymore but pure torture. geez.

congratulations on a job too well done.

**CountArach** · 06-11-2009, 13:43

Been playing EUIII with MMP again. Playing as Piedmont, trying to build up to control most of Northern Italy, but it seems Venice has vassalised Milan and as such controls 90% of Northern Italy on its own... brilliant...

**Monk** · 06-11-2009, 15:09

After 45 hours of gameplay I've finally reached level 60 in Mass Effect (the level cap) and earned the Exteme Power Gamer achievement. I've also beaten the game on Hardcore and unlocked Insanity difficulty.

I have to say that even for me, a veteran of numerous completions, hardcore really strained my abilities. Even with my biotic juggling team! my 50/Adept/Renegade Shepard had plowed through everything on veteran, but once i knocked things up to Hardcore, the game basically realized that I dared to play and threw everything at me. I couldn't just rush enemy positions anymore, and I had to utilize every power my squad had. Something that was very new. For the first time since i first picked up a controller, real tactical considerations had to be taken.

I had begun to think Mass Effect was a great game, but far too easy when you neared the level cap. Hardcore has shown me otherwise, and I look forward to hitting Insanity difficulty once I've had a few days to catch my breath.

**frogbeastegg** · 06-12-2009, 21:36

Originally Posted by Monk

I had begun to think Mass Effect was a great game, but far too easy when you neared the level cap. Hardcore has shown me otherwise, and I look forward to hitting Insanity difficulty once I've had a few days to catch my breath.

Hardcore is the difficulty where the game shines. At that level you need to use all of your party's skills to survive, think tactically, and work to win each battle. It transformed the game's battles from having nice but slightly dull to being very fun.

Insanity lives up to its name. It piles on the enemy immunities, damage reduction and hitpoints to the point where most fights are drawn out slogs. Lots of instances can kill your character in a single hit (I played insanity as a level 60 soldier with maxed immunity, aka the toughest type in the game) so make sure you save early, often and obsessively! Certain battles took me several goes; you will definitely earn your passage and reaching that final cutscene feels great. Oh - and never fight in the mako! Get out and do it on foot unless you have a death wish. As you've probably already noticed the vehicles' stats don't change between difficulties, and on insanity it's made out of tinfoil coated in dynamite.

**Aemilius Paulus** · 06-13-2009, 00:46

Alternating between EB and Rise of Nations lately. Maybe I will give Opposing Fronts (Company of Hero stand-alone expansion) a shot this week. I had it for a while, but never got to it really.

Oh, and of course, I am looking to get into the world of grand strategy, such as Europa Universalis and Hearts of Iron. It is a big step for me though, as I have always been an RTS/RTT guy. (and TW was the only RTT I have played).

**Hooahguy** · 06-16-2009, 05:24

officially the hardest game ive ever played. well first of all, theres only 2 difficulty levels: normal and realistic. and realistic is really hard. usually i only die on normal difficulties with first try about 1-3 times by the end of the first few missions.
well, not with this one. lets see.... ive died about 6-8 times in the first 1/3 of the first part of the first mission. and that is sad. having beated Ghost recon advanced warfighter, i thoguht that this would be a breeze, but i was wrong.

anyhow, the graphics are actually very nice, and the fact that its set in the neon on vegas goesnt hurt, but needs anti-aliasing. ah, the curse of a game from 2006.

multiplayer is good, but there arent a lot of servers, nor very many people online. ill probably do better with R6V2.

**frogbeastegg** · 06-20-2009, 15:31

I'm done with Infinite Undiscovery. Right near the end and I cannot take any more! It's not up to TriAce's usual standards, not close.

It's a flawed game; lots of good ideas, lots of silly things which should have been caught during playtesting. In battle your attacks don't stun an enemy but theirs stun you, so it's easy to get stuck in a situation where you're being beaten to death with no chance to save yourself. There's very little variety in battle. The game doesn't pause when you access the menu so using healing items etc is an utter nightmare in battle, and there are no hotkeys, no shortcuts, and no other ways to reduce the lengthy and fiddly menu process in order to get and use a healing potion sometime before you drop dead. Your AI party members are mostly decent but when they have an AI breakdown they have a major breakdown which gets your entire party wiped out more often then not. You can use 3 AI members in your party, yet you're given a massive parade of people who barely get to do anything. Something like 18 party members, maybe more. At various points you will be forced to use certain characters, or have others taken away. Trying to keep everyone equipped with good gear is ridiculous. Characters not in your party only gain 50% XP so they get left behind in no time unless you give them an expensive accessory.

The flaw which finally made me give up is the appalling lack of information regarding where to go next and how to get there. I don't like having my hand held in a game. I'm fine with exploring. I like to need to think a bit. This game is wilfully cryptic. Either they don't tell you where to go at all, or they tell you a place name with no idea of where it is or even on which continent it's on. Or, as at the point where I gave up, they tell you what to do and it doesn't work, leaving you stranded and frustrated with no idea what's wrong or why. I'm sick of wandering clueless for hours until I stumble across a cutscene trigger which advances things, and I'm sick of consulting the guide on gamefaqs. And as for subquests! There's no way to track what you have found, let alone what you should do. There are loads of side quests in this game. Assuming you can find them - the game expects you to hunt around town until you find a specific party member, and then drag them around the entire place talking to every last person. Repeat with all the other party members. Because most quests are only triggered by character X talking to the quest giver and there's no way to find out who to use until you try successfully! Gah! There's not even a way to find out where a specific party member is in a town - you have to search all over until you find them.

It's a shame because the game is nice when it's not trying to make you hate it. The item creation system is fun and detailed, the world's expansive, there are no loading times, and there's loads to do if you have the patience. The plot is much better than the usual fare.

But ... yeah. "Take the castle teleporter to Cassandra." is where I bow out. The teleporter is there. It doesn't work. I don't know why. I've talked to everyone in this massive town several times, and wasted an hour searching for another teleporter or cutscene trigger. There isn't one. This after 3 extremely rubbish boss battles in a row where the party AI couldn’t cope and got itself killed repeatedly, after a stupidly confusing dungeon, after forcing me to slog around an area seemingly designed to make the player commit murder out of sheer frustration thanks to stupid random warp points. I've had enough.

**Meneldil** · 06-21-2009, 00:50

Currently playing Bioshock, and long story short story, it's a blast. Probably the best game I've played since FF7.

For a FPS, the gameplay, while staying FPS-ish, is quite original. Plasmides (spells) are quite cool and offers a lot of possibilities: burn people alive, froze them, throw huge chairs and tables in their faces, use electricity and water to kill a dozen of them.
The guns feel like you're actually shooting at people (unlike some other FPS in which using gun makes you yawn), too bad some of them are mostly useless (the flamethrower and the crossbow), and the upgrades are kind of "meh", but well, I guess that's better than nothing.

So, gameplay is all kind of great. But what makes the game beyond complete awesomeness is the setting and the plot.
A secret, utopian city built underwater that slowly turns into a orwellian hellish nighthmare? Deal. The game is creppy, and when I say creppy, I mean, really freaking damn creppy. By creppy, I don't mean scary or terrifying (although it is quite often), but disturbing.
I'm not going to spoil much, but I can't help but feel sad when by the sight of this former wonderful city that turned into a deadly labyrinth inhabited by a bunch of psychotic maniacs.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

Now the game has some downsides, or at least is not always perfect. The moral choice regarding little sisters is a bit too much simplistic for me. Save them, you're the good guy. Kill them, and you're the bad dude.
The whole 'ammo distributors' thingy is a bit too much far fetched IMO, even for Rapture society. I mean, you find those all over the place, and it kind of kills the immersion: "Oh, and abandonned plaza with people lying dead on the floor and a machine selling ammunitions and food". IT's fun at first, but it kind of get old.
Furtermore, it makes plasmids more or less useless. Using them is fun, but it's slower and more complicated than cutting through people with a shotgun.

The pirating mini-game is also fun at first, but it quickly because tedious. After a few levels, pirating becomes so hard that you most of the time rely solely on luck to succeed. Some enhancements make it (a tad) easier, but it still is quite annoying IMO. I hope they'll scrap that part in Bioshock 2.

I mention these little details merely because I refuse to admit that the game is perfect. In any case, it's damn awesome and I can't wait for Bioshock 2 (though I also fear a sequel will never be as good as the original).

**Dutch_guy** · 06-21-2009, 16:58

Originally Posted by Meneldil

The guns feel like you're actually shooting at people (unlike some other FPS in which using gun makes you yawn), too bad some of them are mostly useless (the flamethrower and the crossbow), and the upgrades are kind of "meh", but well, I guess that's better than nothing.

The crossbow is pretty devastating, setting electrical traps is one of the best ways to destroy the big daddies and the same goes for explosive bolts. Just saying this because I didn't immediately figure out how to use those electric crossbow traps, let alone realise how usefull they could be. Didn't use the flamethrower a lot I admit, but the liquid nitrogen on the other hand is well...fantastic against pretty much any zombie you can find.

Oh and yes I do agree, bioshock has to be one of the best games I've played in a while.

**Monk** · 06-23-2009, 13:03

I have given up on Mass Effect's insanity difficulty, and for that matter i've also given up on Gears of war 2's Insane difficulty for the exact same reasons. I was playing through both games in an attempt to try and get some extra gamerscore (worthless really) and to challenge myself in a new way. I also had my eye on the N7 gamer pic that comes with completing ME on Insanity. Well, after countless hours of shouting creative curses that has my family worried about my sanity, i can safely say I never want to play either of these games above Hardcore EVER AGAIN.

In fact, i would rather write a contrived post listing the outlandish things I would rather do than play insanity difficulty. It's. Just. Impossible. I fancy myself a damn good ME player, but even my Biotic jugglers who made Sarren into a kitty ~~kat~~ cat on Hardcore could not even get passed Feros on Insanity. I run into enemies who are walking refrigerators with the regen powers of wolverine and they can two shot me with their shot guns. The amount of times I stood up and made obscene gestures toward my TV... I just couldn't count.

And do not even get me started on Gears 2's insane setting. I've never contemplated throwing things at my TV before... but wow. I've defeated both games on their respective hardcore setting, and frankly i believe that is my limit. I just can't take this anymore, i need to have fun again.

Froggy, I salute you. For being able to defeat ME on Insanity you are truly more gamer than I. *takes off his hat*

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