Yup, just looking through the manual, apparently it does...

shit, it's still selling....#9 in april according to npdtechworld..

This demo is out almost two months before the game is set to be released, so you have to figure the devs are still working on it. If it's true that this was an inadvertant leak through a mag, then their build is probably at least a month older (figure it takes time to get the game to the the mag, get it pressed and back in time to be inserted).

It's not like UT 2k3 where the demo came out after the game went gold, or NOLF 2 where it came out after release, so maybe they intended it to be more of a mp beta than a demo...

as for myself, I didn't notice much lag on the disk game. I'd like to see them slow the disk down a touch, but the mp certainly has potential, particularly since it is different than anything else out there...

lastly, I'm pretty impressed with the timing of this. You figure they had to have been thinking this for awhile, but when did they leave? Just after a major project is complete...if that's true, and that did motivate their timing, that's a real sign of class - not to screw up a project, or your fan's expectations because you are personally unhappy with your situation..

Talented group of guys form game studio. Make massive hit titles, and oodles of cash. Sign up with big corporate shark publisher. Make more cash. Complain about lack of freedom to build the games they want. Leave original company with a group of talented guys, to form a game studio.

It happens in just about every industry...It's the way most corporations evolve. Typical small company grows to a point, and needs an infusion of capital in order to get bigger - and maybe do a better job at what they do. That capital doesn't come free: to get it they give up some control of their firm, to the deak brokers and to the investors. If the cards aren't played right (and yes, frequently the deck is stacked so as they can't help but fail: the broker business is to make the deal and make money on it, not to be a charity for people with visions) the company gets controlled by someone else.

someone mentioned that he believes blizzard is bigger than the four people: maybe, i don't know it or them well enough. But i do believe that all successful business entities have at their heart a core of talented individuals - the loss of which cannot be replaced. People are interesting that way....you can have a group of people, and if you replace just one, the dynamic changes and the group changes.

1) Reviews. I think that there SHOULD be reviews of a MMORPG when it comes out. Not everybody is lucky enough to get into a beta, and I'm glad there are some sites out there warning people that right now this particular "game" is a piece of crap. However, it would be fair if they reviewed the game again in three months, when the beta is really over.

I'm all for reviewing the game, but I don't care for reviews of betas because alot MAY have changed between the beta and retail versions. I'll agree that likely things HAVEN'T changed in this case, BUT the reviewers wouldn't know that. The retail game was available June 26th, and the servers were down/inaccessable for all/large portions of that day. A review that went up on the 26th or 27th couldn't possibly take into consideration any late fixes. Even if the reviewers got a retail version of the game before it was available to the public, because of the nature of MMORPGs, the reviewer could never be certain of the actual state of the game until they logged in and checked it themselves.

These reviews are no better(or worse) than forum posts, and the sites should have the balls to label them as beta reviews...

and we want to reiterate that because of these issues, we will not be counting yesterday against anyone's subscription.

This statement bugs the hell out of me....If this happened in 'reality' as opposed to a virtual world, there would be hell to pay. It's like they think that people devoted enough to buy the game on its release date, tried it once for five minutes and then said "Oh well, maybe tomorrow". Their arrogance, and the way they seem to just shrug it off, infuriates me..

onto other things...

There are no "official" reviews...Of a game that's been out for one motherfugging day.

lol....I was reading and thinking the same thing. They have every right to voice their opinions, I just wish they'd say the version # they are reviewing at the top of their article. Of course they don't cause then everyone would be onto their charade..

either SoE seriously has a flaw in their systems architecture that is a result of poor design or they're using it as a cop-out.

if it was a flaw in the architecture, it'd take more than a day or two to correct. Still, there's little excuse. What, was stress testing not planned in the beta, or was that sched for Jul 1?

One other thing to consider in the MMORPG launch history is the fact that DAoC is all Redhat linux server side on Dell servers and their relatively painless launch

in their defence, we have no idea about the difference in synchronous users between these two games. It wouldnt surprise me if SWG had one or two orders of magnitude on DAoC here...

made a character on Tatooine and realized that the smuggling profession won't look or be as fun as it is in the movies because there are no vehicles.

Never thought of that....How the hell are you supposed to be a 'professional' smuggler without vehicles? "Didn't you hear? In his prime, I heard Jabba smuggled in 25 POUNDS of illegal drugs! That slug is incredible!"

This comment was edited on Jun 28, 05:17.

I was trying to think of the phrase that fits my emotions best right now, and suddenly thought of schadenfreude. That doesn't quite get it all, 'cause there's a fair amount of pity there too for you people that are so eager to play it on the first day of release.

Don't get me wrong, I've been there too. The anticipation, and the excitement slowly blending with frustration and anger....just glad it's not me.

This time...:) Here's hoping you guys get it working soon.

..and just shaking my head at SOE: undiscovered database errors? Not working with Creative? Not working with IE? WTF?!

Prices at gas stations work completely off of supply and demand. What would indicate otherwise to you? Try to put aside conspiracy theories regarding "big oil" and the "Bush dynasty" that's been force fed to you by the lying liberal socialist machine.

Little OT here; never intended it to become a discussion in itself, but...

Experience pretty well indicates it to me otherwise. Long ago, used to pump gas in a full-service station. I worked alot of graveyard shifts - we'd get a truck in to fill the tanks on wednesday....friday (noon, usually), price would go up. Week after week. Station kitty-corner to us would rise/lower to match whatever we did within about a half hour. It's better here(CA) than when I was living in Canada. I've seen price jump $0.10/l ($0.40 a gallon) just because it was a long weekend. But they got a whole other problem because of the dominance of Petro Canada...

anyways, you might call it supply and demand, I call it collusion...and no matter what else, It has NOT ONE THING to do with SOE or SWG

...but it does pass the time...

...and only listen to the conservative, blue-blood, industrilaist here. Fuck liberals and fuck you too. Only a complete fucking moron would compare the SWG pricing to gas prices or bring in politics. You are both paragons of retardation. Game on.

lol....I never made a comparision, I made a glib remark. The hemorrhage in your brain must have made you read paragraphs within my 6 words.

There's no price concpiracy. Price concpiracies don't work in a free unregulated market that contains competition.

Right, just look at gas stations...X|

The "movie" argument is perfectly valid, you are paying for entertainment, you get one month free which offers more gameplay than any singleplayer game including epics like morrowind, then you have the option of paying for more. Lots of movies are not ready for release or should never have been released to begin with. Frankly I'd much rather pay $15 for a game that might not be up to scratch than watch something like friggen tombraider.

Your 'free' month is costing you $50.

Tombraider was crap, so I didn't pay to see it (I did eventually see it on an inflight movie). My gaming budget is finite: I get more bang for that $15 by checking out bargain bins.

Let's just say it takes them 6 months to fix things up - stability patches, hack patches, balance patches - you would have paid $125 ($50 + 5 * $15). That's quite a bit to pay to be a beta...

$15/month really isn't the big issue for me: My issue is another game being released in beta form...and that they're going to get away with it because it's Star Wars. Would you pay $15 to see a half hour composite of Terminator 3 and then $5/month to allow you to keep watching it as they gradually add a few minutes to it each month - with no guarantee that they'll even ever finish the movie?

See, now that's the problem. Whining WILL change something. We're the consumers. We have the power. Unfortunately, most people will just shut up and pay it rather than take a stand and force them to lower the price

Whining has far less power than economic success. If they don't hit their target amount of sales/monthly subscriptions, I think you'll see them drop that price quickly.

Unfortunately, i don't think it will happen: they'll get enough subscribers to keep them going till they patch the game enough to get the others onboard.

Yeah, but we're talking Duke here...

...that won't ever see the light of day


didn't care that much for diablo ii when it came out, but several months ago got the LOD expansion (EB offered it for free) and enjoyed it quite a bit. I'll get the new patch just to see the changes to the horadric recipes.

I love Fallout for it's free-form nature, the fact that your actions have reprecussions and you feel them, quests that have multiple solutions based upon your play-style and *GASP* some actual role-playing through dialogue.

...i'd add to that list it's sense of humor.

FO 1 & 2 are great CRPGs, only slightly hampered by the interface. The problem with the interface though, is really a matter of aesthetics - it's still perfectly functional.

In contrast, Arcanum is a really good CRPG, but the interface is a struggle. There are times I felt I spent more time battling Aracnum's interface than creatures within the game world. To add to that, I think players accept the dated graphics in FO because it was released in 97(?). Arcanum had similar graphics despite being released 4 years later.

I still stand by Arcanum, it's one of the best(if not the best) CRPGs I've played in the last few years, but I can certainly understand why people took a dislike to it - particularly the 'style over substance' crowd.

I don't buy all the stuff about games making you a killer, like I don't think DooM had anything to do with Columbine, but games, films, books, WHATEVER will influence a child. Games should be restricted in the same way that films are, but not more restricted. That would be stupid.

It's amusing that these forms of expression are often blamed for the downfall of American society and not the easy access to guns or decline in parental responsibility. Just waiting for the report about someone being bludgeoned to death by a copy of GTA:VC...

Mirrors have started hosted it, you can get it now at

Filefront:
http://web.filefront.com/iron-bin/ff/root.p_bin_/;page__category_list;filepath__/gamingfiles/Americas_Army/Official_Releases/Full_Install;category__0;

Fileplanet:
http://www.fileplanet.com/download.aspx?f=89806

and i'm sure others will have it shortly.

Personally, I cut them a huge amount of slack, because the game is, well, free...

I like the game, and it's been the game i play the most for the past couple of months now. They've made alot of improvements since 1.0 and 1.1. I think the biggest outstanding issue, and I'm not sure it has been corrected in the patch or not, is the servers crashing every few hours. As far as nade teamkilling: haven't seen any of it in the past three months or so. If you stick to the official servers, and use the ones with min 9 honor, i don't think you'll see alot of that tactic because the penalties are too harsh...

"Commercially Op4 was a success as was blue shift. as a player i hated op4 (for reasons i won't go into) and blue shit was decent i guess, if not short. "

5speed,

Now you have me interested. For me it was the other way around. I quite enjoyed Op4, but found blue shift tired and wanting (hey what's next, seeing it through the eyes of a vending machine stocker. Or maybe as a janitor!) For me, the only redeeming thing with blue shift was the graphics upgrade..

"And as for HARM... it might be the first FPS where the player fails and is constantly frustrated by his enemies. THAT would be different "

I think the difficulty is in who your enemies are and how you portray them. Almost all games try to stay clear from beating on the good guys, if only for the sake of sending the appropriate ethical message...GTA3 included. You spent most of your time working for and combating the criminal element. While you could go after humanity, there really was no point or challenge in it, so there was little reason to continue to do so. And as far as the law, the quickly escalating wanted level ensured you didn't spend most of your time beating them down.

My guess is they wouldn't let you meet Archer for the same reason you can never meet freeman....it wouldn't be prudent to allow you to kill the hero(ine)

However, that being said, i still think the game could be a lot of fun playing as HARM. Maybe it could be something where you are trying to increase your status and prestige despite the glowing ineptitude of your fellow villains (the boss sent us down here to watch the bee. AGH, the bee bit my bottom and now my bottom's big!)