Video Games Thread

[Late]

Yeah, I remember you struggled to get into Witcher 2.
Looks good and I figured it's gotta be worth a punt at nine quid though.

So many games I want to play, lately, and no time to play them. Doesn't help that I've always done most of my gaming between 11pm (when the wife heads off to bed) and 3.30am (when I usually go to bed) but this last 2 months or so I keep falling asleep about midnight. Suddenly I've lost about three quarters of my gaming time.
Hopefully it's a temporary glitch and I'll get back to my insomniac ways soon...

COD MW3 (played about 8 hours - usually get about 300 hours from COD games. Definitely deserves more play than it's had. However I have none of the map packs, so would probably be booted from the lobby regularly if I tried to play. Probably won't play it again if I'm honest with myself.)
Battlefield 3 (again, had about 8 hours out of this, and it deserves so much more. Probably won't play it again.)
Lost Odyssey (in progress, again, finally - should get this finished in the next week, fingers crossed. Good game but I won't be playing through it again.)
Red Alert 3 (definitely enjoyed it a lot more than the other C&C game I tried a couple months back, and have done one of the campaigns plus the first mission from each of the other two campaigns - but it's not likely to get much of a look in again, now.)
Darksiders 2 (thoroughly enjoyed the first game a few months back, and got this fairly cheap - but it's just sat on the shelf for a month now, and could've been had cheaper had I waited. Will get it played next, I think.)
Witcher 2 (Ordered today, will probably play it soon - but to be honest it's cheap enough that I won't feel bad about putting it in the pile and playing it after I've shifted a few other games.)
Final Fantasy XIII-2 (Been in the pile for a couple months now, I need to give it a proper go some time. Unfortunately that means putting some serious hours aside, and aside from a week off at xmas I don't really have any days off until next February.)
Halo 4 (I'm not fanatical about them, but I've definitely enjoyed every Halo game I've played, so will need to get this - but I'm in no rush.)
Sleeping Dogs (Need to buy. Looks great, got great reviews, and it's price is plummeting. Will pick it up cheap, soon.)
Dishonoured (Need to buy.)
Black Ops 2 (Need to buy.)
XCOM (Need to buy, and soon. LOVED the original...)
DOA5 (Need to buy.)
AC3 (Need to buy - but happy to wait six months and pick it up cheap.)
Max Payne 3 (Haven't played a Max Payne game before but I've seen this cheap a few times lately, and it's highly rated - got to give it a try.)


And that's just 2012 games - I also need Bioshock Infinite, Sim City, Tomb Raider, Metal Gear, Colonial Marines, Grand Theft Auto V...

[ancelotti]

Absolutely gutted... Had to infiltrate an alien base on XCOM and didn't realise how hard it would be. Went in with 6 of my best troops and came out with 1 - and he's out of action for 2 weeks!

Back to square one basically, have to train up a whole new batch of troops before I can launch another assault on that damn base! Wasted at least an hour in there too.

[Late]

Massive losses at Nintendo, again. Lost £219m in the first six months of the 2012/2013 year.
To be fair, that's a massive improvement over the same period last year (£551m loss) but it's very very bad.



Preordered COD Blops 2 yesterday. £32.99 Delivered @ Greenman Gaming (they usually just do pc downloads, but have got into physical disks for pc/ps3/360 in recent months).
Not an outstanding price, but it'll do - and saves on the panicky feeling when it gets to launch day and there isn't a decent deal anywhere...
Looking forward to zombie modes in particular, but if you want Nuketown Zombies you need to fork out for a collector's edition of the game (not gonna happen) - though I imagine they'll release it as DLC for about a fiver.

[harv]

It's actually not that bad. Mostly down to the strong Yen and financing a new home console. There's an investor's meeting tomorrow. The 3DS has been making a profit since August, that combined with sales over Christmas should mean they're going to have a profitable financial year. The 3DS is selling between 800,000 and 1m units a month and software sales are strong.

Going to be interesting to hear if they're selling the U at a loss, break even or making a profit from the start. Think they should be breaking even given the price of it.

Edit: Scrub that idea, they've just announced they're selling the Wii U at a loss

Interesting, looks like they're relying on software sales to make them a profit the way that Sony and Microsoft have done these last two gens. Mind you, sales of NSMB U, Nintendo Land and ZombiU should earn them a few quid!

[harv]

Looks like SmartGlass is going to be an epic failure at launch. For some reason known only to themselves Microsoft have decided to release it without Android or iOS compatibility at launch. What the fuck are they thinking..?

Not too sure what sort of percentage of mobile phones out there are Windows 8 phones but it can't be more than 1%, surely..?

[Late]

That was always to be expected tbh. Disappointing, but not surprising.
IOS and Android "early 2013".

[jman]

Theres only 2 SmartGlass enabled games so far anyway... was hardly going to be a crowd puller at launch!!

Have to say, I do like the new dashboard update this year.. glad they fixed the annoying slowness that quickplay had as well.. (called Recent now)

[harv]

A new Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge trailer, showing dismemberment. And a bit of trivia here, the Wii U is going to be the first console to release in Japan with a launch title that's the equivalent of an 18 rating. So much for the supposed 'kiddy' console.

And a video preview from IGN of ZombiU which confirms that the game is going to be seven shades of Awesome

[harv]

Best. Youtube. Video. Ever.

lololol

[jman]

One or two 18 rated games doesnt stop a console being kiddy all of a sudden lol.. you seemed to think it did when the Wii had Manhunt 2 and HOTD:Overkill for instance.. yet the Wii was very much a kiddy console....

...the fact is, nintendo consoles will always be seen as babyish because of nintendo past stance on violent games (cutting out fatalities and blood from Mortal Kombat for instance).. plus the fact all of nintendos 1st party software are family orientated..... if you wanted a console with loads of mature content.. you wouldnt be buying a Wii U - you'd be mad to think otherwise.

[harv]

True, a great deal of Nintendo's first party stuff is family oriented/suitable for all ages and a fair amount is also aimed at the casual demographic - but there are certain franchises that are aimed at the core/hardcore demographic too. Metroid Prime Trilogy, Zelda Twilight Princess, Zelda Skyward Sword, Pikmin 1 and 2, Xenoblade Chronicles, The Last Story, Pandora's Tower (although I think those latter two are second party titles). And there'll be plenty of titles aimed at those people next gen too.

The Quote of The Week:

Fuck 1080p at 60fps. Give me 60p at 1080fps.

From someone on Gaf lololol

Edit: Someone else has come up with a really cool name for the ZombiU Official Thread:

ZombiU |OT| London Bitches Falling Down

Brilliant!!! 

Some major hype building up for this game now, the level design in particular is very impressive, as is the lighting. Great stuff!

Edit: More ZombiU news, apparently the fastest Ubisoft tester has taken 12 and a half hours to reach level 14 out of 17 Maybe their 15-20 hours playthrough time estimate needs a wee bit of time added to it lol. Shit, if someone that's been playing the game from 9 to 6 at least 5 days per week takes that long to get just over 75% of the game completed then we could be looking at an estimated playthrough time of 20 hours plus! I'm gonna need a bigger boat lol.

[jman]

Your gonna need a lengthy singleplayer with a game that has no multiplayer though... and do you think ubisoft are honestly going to say the game only lasts about 6-8 hours if it did ?? I usually subtract about 4-6 hours off any given estimate... I like to think it means I have more skill than most people at games 


Started playing Enchanted Arms on sunday... unsure whether I want to continue.. first off, the story and graphics are pretty bland so far.. there are also some very annoying characters - theres one character in particular (Makoto) who is openly gay and very camp... not that theres anything wrong with that if it floats your boat.. but the character is just irritating..

The combat is quite interesting.. its like a chessboard grid, move your pieces into position, attack with various moves and with element forces too... all great... does take a while to do each little battle which is annoying... but the worst thing they have done is give the user an "auto" button... which auto moves and auto fights... and I have pretty much used this in every single battle so far because of the high frequency of random battles and how long it takes to do them manually... and whilst it is very handy having the auto button, it also makes the game kinda not worth playing... coupled with the fact you get all your HP and EP (magic) back at the end of each battle and the fact you can save anywhere.. the game is far too easy at the moment..

Some of the game is also unfriendly in its user interface.. when you want to learn a new skill for example, you have to go through 4 or 5 menu options to learn it.. and then through the same 4 or 5 menu options again to equip it after you've learnt it.. just little bits like that make the game slightly frustrating to play at times...

Will probably give it another chance on Tuesday, hopefully it will improve, or I can see it staying on my shelf for quite a while..

[harv]

The best thing about it is that every game is going to be different, amount of zombies, locations of zombies, times and locations of stingers, so there's plenty of replay value too. And the first time you complete the game you unlock Survivor Mode which only gives you one life...and that's going to be bloody insane lololol.

And when your character gets killed all of his skill levels and experience dies with him. All of his equipment and weapons are in his backpack. So when you're given a new character he/she has a revolver, 6 bullets and a cricket bat. And that's it lol. And every time you die you increase the number of zombies by 1. This game is going to be a real challenge for once. A welcome return of a proper survival horror game as opposed to these action horror games that the genre seems to have morphed into since Resident Evil 4.

And what's even worse is that a headshot doesn't kill these buggers with one hit lol. I'm going to have a closer look at some of the demo footage, I think you may need to sever the brain stem...much harder shot

[Late]

If ZombiU came out on ps3/360 it'd be £15 within a couple of months - like almost all games without any multiplayer.
No idea what the pre-owned market will be like on the U, of course. Probably weak as it's a new console, so prices probably won't drop that fast.

Bought another game on impulse today - or rather a collection of three:
Ubisoft Triple Pack: Xbox 360 Beyond Good & Evil HD / From Dust / Outland £9.99 PLAY.COM
It'll go in the pile, and get played eventually...

[harv]

It wouldn't be feasible on the PS3 or 360 given the core mechanics (the GamePad functionality) that make the game what it is. And they'll need to tone down the dynamic lighting and shadows or have it in sub-HD.

It could be a surprise contender for a few Game Of The Year awards the way that the overwhelmingly positive feedback has gone so far. The only complaints I've heard were regarding the controls on earlier builds and going by the IGN report they've sorted that out now.

And the best news of all comes from a moderator on the Ubisoft forums who was kind enough to ask the dev team for me if there was an option to turn off the crosshairs. Going to make it like a true zombie apocalypse simulator without an annoying crosshair on the screen...although it's going to make an already difficult game insanely difficult when in stressful situations lol.

The Survivor Mode is going to be bloody mental lololol

I'm also expecting the inevitable sequel to look a great deal better and have online multiplayer too, although I wouldn't want them to sacrifice another 15-20 hour single player campaign in favour of the average 5-6 hour campaigns we get these days for it though.

And I want the sequel set in Paris, too many Brits getting killed in Ubisoft games lately...I want to kill a few Frogs just to make a change.

I also want them to bring back Killer Freaks too, that game's humour was right up my street.