I picked up my CE version today and I've been having a blast with it. As far as CE's go, it's a bit half arsed. Then again, it cost the same as the normal version so I can't complain.

To Valve's credit, they did manage to produce Alcatraz for the party;P

Having visited Trafalgar Square, I can assure you those damn pigeons drop more than a few packets of their own;P

I don't think you'll be upset with your choice Warhawk. I've got a XFX 8800GTS OC Extreme something or other 640MB card in this machine, which I run with everything maxxed and at 1600 x 1200. I was so pleased with the general picture quality in everything, that I grabbed the cheapest 320MB GTS I could find for the better half, which was the Asus EN80GTS 320MB. Out of curiosity, I tossed her 320MB card into my machine and I can't tell the difference. Since there may be some difference, I naturally took my bigger memory card back after playing around! I'm sure those benchmarking programs make the smaller card look bad, but it's not. I'd rather have saved the money and got that card for myself, but I just assumed the 640MB had to be much better.

Load times are painfully long. As far as I can see, there is no menu driven bots like in UT or ETQW. I've not tried starting my own server and doing bots that way. With the developer commentary turned on, one of them talks about the maps. I think he said 12.

The Character models look really good. The sound skips allover the place on my system for some reason, much like it did when Valve introduced that bug not long after the release of HL2. The maps themselves have some cool light/shadow features.

Forgetting the performance factor of the 8800's for a moment. I just upgraded my pc and went from a 7900GT to an 8800GTS. The improvement in picture quality alone made that card worthwhile. I was so taken with how good it was, I went out the next day and got the better half the cheaper 320MB GTS for her pc. Either card flys along with any games we've got.

I got the same offer last week in both my msn and hotmail accounts. I think it's probably gone out to everyone.

PGR3 was my fave 360 game of the lot, so I've been looking really forward to this one. I do hope the roadsters this time are all like the Cadillac XLR and have the tops down sdo you hear the wind and engine more.

No BMW M3 and M6 is a bit of a shame. I wonder if that M3 Challenge Game has anything to do with the lack of M3? It's not at all bad for a free game. Not at all bad for one you'd pay for, either.

Lot of cars I'd like to see in there are missing, though. Why no SRT 300C, or Charger? Why no AMG CL63/65, E/CLS63, C63 or SL65? Why no Hennessy Viper? The Australian Ford GT or Typhoon? No V Series Cadillacs I can fathom, they're probably waiting for the new CTS before releasing another free pack. Way to go GM, btw:)

Lots to look forward to and enjoy. I do hope they add some of my wishlist it later Speedpacks again.

Hey! Quit your complaining! You'll probably get some extra bugs in the PC version, too. That's gotta be worth something.

I never did any real research on ATA Vs. SATA. I just read that SATA was faster and grabbed them.

Back when the AMD XP2800 was the latest thing, I got my first Seagate 80GB sate drives and ran them RAID 0. They're still going. Back when the AMD 4600 X2 was the latest thing, I grabbed a couple of WD 250GB SATA-11 drives and one of them recently failed, then the other. So! For my latest upgrade, I grabbed 4 Seagate 320GB SATA-11 drives which seem to be working as they should. But do consider this, they are the loudest, oddest sounding drives I've ever had. I kid you not! They sometimes sound like birds chirping. Apparently this is normal. Well, normal for these drives.

I never benchmark my machine because I really don't care about all that, so I don't really know how much faster, if at all, these SATA-11 drives are. What I do know is, my Asus SATA DVD burner is a lot faster than my IDE Sony and they're both the same speed drives. That could be the SATA or could be anything at all.

I think you should have another look at that image:)

Oh, come on now Flo. They proved Iraq had WMD in the end. Sure, the acronym was a little off with Weapons of Minor Disturbance.

And with all those stipulations, he's certainly not going to be a big spender!

I downloaded the demo on the 360 when it first came out. And I didn't mind the controller for most of the exploration, but once I'd accidentally set off those security bots, I just couldn't take them out fast enough with the controller. So, it was always going to be a PC game for me.
On the other hand, my kids are used to using the controllers for all their games and it's second nature to them. I think you'd find a lot of young kids would be as fast with a controller as most of us are with mice and keyboards.

When I used that link you gave me and tried to purchase it, Steam sent me to a page explaining why I couldn't and listed a bunch of other games that were restricted to certain regions. I think Stalker was the only one concerning me. So far, Steam has been a real treasure for bargain games, so I can't complain too much.

I responded to your email.

I think it detects IP origin. No biggie. I'll wait for it to hit the bargain bins here and give it a look then. There are more than enough good games around at the moment to tide me over.

Thanks for the Link.

Seems I live in a country where the sale of Stalker is restricted. Can't win them all and at least that explains why I couldn't find it.

I've fired off an email to you Enahs.

No success with restarting Steam to get Stalker happening. I think I'll fire off an email to Valve support and be sure not to use the 'F' word;P

What's your current system spec Enahs?

Also, has anyone with Steam got STALKER showing up as something they can actually buy? I can find a trailer for it, but not the game itself.
This comment was edited on Sep 1, 22:12.

It's one thing to have the courage to acknowledge you have a problem, inasmuch as you're quite obviously a repeat offender. But the more you keep trying to twist this around in your favor, the more obvious it becomes you're too damn stupid to learn from your mistakes and forever will be a repeat offender.