ZeroPike1 wrote on Sep 14, 2015, 15:47:

As a subsidiary of Sony Computer Entertainment, Naughty Dog are best known for developing games for the PlayStation family of consoles, including the Crash Bandicoot series for the original PlayStation, Jak and Daxter on PlayStation 2, and Uncharted and The Last of Us on PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4. Prior to this, they also developed games including Dream Zone, Keef the Thief, Rings of Power and Way of the Warrior.

From the Naughty Dog Wiki. You really want these guys doing HL3. You are nuts. No. Just No. Leave it to Valve, even if it comes out a mess, or the second coming version of gaming. Leave it where it belongs.

I loved Rings of Power on my Genesis. There was this one spell, Frenzy I think is was that was so bad ass I'd speed though the game until I was able to pick just that one spell up.

ItBurn wrote on May 28, 2015, 15:15:
New vid from Mac about the combat in Witcher 3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIeEZeKN8JE

I think that's the same Worth a Buy video from a week ago. Yep, he still hates the combat.

I struggled with the combat controls for a while. I tried KB+M and Xbox controller but never was satisfied with either. The fight with the Griffin though was the turning point in my game. I tried about eight times with KB+M and just couldn't get out of the way of my stupid fingers. I even tried rebinding attack keys so that strong attack was on the middle and then later the right mouse buttons but I never could get the right combo that worked for me. I think a large part of it is how the dodge and roll functionality works on a keyboard.

I went back to my Xbox controller and downed him in two tries, the second time I hardly broke a sweat. Since then, I've been using a mix of keyboard and controller. Keyboard and mouse for the menus, inventory and crafting and controller for exploring and combat.

Then I was browsing the CDP forums and came across this vid of a guy that plays defensively and it's a cool look at how combat plays for him. In his game, it's a fluid dance of motion and momentum that I can totally get into. My game plays like disjointed button mashing compared. That solidified it for me. Since then I've totally adjusted to how the game moves and plays and am having a ball. It's not quite how this dude plays, but it certainly borrows heavily from it.

The combat video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d01jyfonn94
From this thread: http://forums.cdprojektred.com

Wow, Mack skewered W3 and I agree to a certain extent. The movement and controls are twitchy as hell. I'm currently playing with a controller on my PC since I struggle with the KBM. For reference, I tried to play Witcher 2 a couple of times and kept giving up after a few hours because the controls with keyboard and mouse sucked so badly. I finally tried it with an Xbox controller as a last result and ended up finishing the game using it (and got partway into playthrough two before finally stopping).

In this game though, the controls are nowhere near as tight as W2. It also seems like each new Witcher game makes the combat a little less interesting. Loved the combat in the first Witcher the most though I think I ended up modding it for more interesting combat so I may not be remembering it correctly.

I like the story and game world in Witcher 3 so I'm continuing to play, but I cant wait for some kind of combat rebalance mod to come out.

Still waiting on my GOG key from Green Man

Can't wait! Steam pre-loads are happening now too. 15GB in size.

Thanks Talutha and Rigs, I'll check out iRacing again. I remember looking into it a while back but now I can't remember why I didn't jump on it. Appreciate it!

Argh, that totally sucks. After the last delay I was hoping they'd come back with, "We're freakin' ready!" I'm jonesing for a good driver but can't find one at the moment. I just can't get into Assetto Corsa like I thought I would and was hoping pcars would do the trick. I was looking at Dirt 3 to tide me over but it's still tied to GFWL. Really Codemasters?

I'd love to try Driveclub on my PS4 but Sony doesn't support my Logitech G27 anymore and I'm not interested in buying another wheel.

whine whine whine

jacobvandy wrote on Feb 27, 2015, 13:53:
Here's a thought:

Who gives a flying fuck? What is wrong with you people?!

When I see your name I see Jacob Vandy. But get this, my friend sees Jacob v. Andy and he can't unsee it now! WTF?

For what it's worth, I see blue and black on my computer screen and on my phone. Here in my office, showing the pic from my phone, one person sees blue/black, two see white/gold and one sees blue/gold.

I love this mindfuck stuff, it's fascinating!

The Crew is a mixed bag for me and I’ve probably put 20 hours into it so far. I am a pretty big driving game fan starting in the old Xbox days and continuing today. I though the original Test Drive Unlimited was one of the slickest games to come out in a long time and the exploration side of things and the feel of just tooling along on the coast weaving in and out of traffic was sweet. It didn’t have the best handling with the Xbox wheel, but on my Xbox controller is rocked.

The good:
The Crew definitely has that cool TDU feel to it and definitely tickles the exploration itch. The “just drive around and admire the world” side of things is really well done too and I’ve spend hours just messing around in the world. The map and GPS stuff is very very similar to TDU as well and is easy to use and understand.

The bad:
Now onto the less than stellar side of things. The game doesn’t have to handle like Assetto Corsa to make me happy (and it’s doesn’t), but the handling is not quite as good as I would have liked. I am using a Logitech G27 and while serviceable, there is slop in the middle I don’t like that makes me feel like the wheel isn’t working at all until I turn enough for the force feedback to kick in again. It’s ok, but could be better. The clutch and H-Gate are done pretty well too though some cars have 7 gears and the shifter only goes to 6. I ended up switching to sequential shifting and it’s all good.

The force feedback is strange and overpowering when off-road and when hitting curbs. When off-road, I almost couldn’t handle the car at all and ended up tweaking my settings so that the in game FF is maxed and reduced the force to 60% in my Logitech Profiler. So the handling is ok, but not spectacular.

The gameplay:
The game itself is a mix of awesome and terrible. I mentioned the coolness of just driving and exploring but on the downside, the traffic isn’t so hot. The AI cars never switch lanes so you can barrel up the center lane or between lanes and almost never hit anything, making it less of a “plan your route through the next throng of traffic” thing and more of a “try not to drift outside this little corridor of space” thing. The latter can get a little difficult with the aforementioned slop in the wheel especially on the really high end exotics. Maybe this improves as I level up the cars but I haven’t seen anything yet. I’m still pretty low level though.

On the racing side of things, they are decent and the storyline is decent though a lot of the races are simple checkpoint races so far. The issue that I absolutely hate is the rubber-banding AI. It doesn’t matter how far behind they fall, they will catch up no problem when I slip up. It’s aggravating to know that I’ve driven the race almost perfectly and take the last corner really badly only for the #2 guy to be all over me. Additionally, when I screw up early in a race and expect to get last, I usually end up in first or second as they let me play catch up. It makes the racing part almost a deal breaker for me.

There are not a lot of cars to select from. I chose a starter Nissan 370Z and it’s fine but I am damn bored of it now and all the next cars I want to buy like the Corvette ZR1 and Ruf 3400K are too expensive. So 20 hours in the same car is weary. Plus the Viper SRT-10 is Uplay unlocked only so I have no idea when I’ll be able to get that ride. You need 100 Uplay points or whatever to unlock it.

Online:
It also sucks that the game is 100% online. Unlike TDU that you can still play to this day, when they shut down the Crew servers, you are done. Otherwise it’s ok. I’ve raced a couple of times in co-op and it’s neither here nor there. I had a couple of idiots try to grief but it’s super easy to quick travel to another location so they can’t do much. I don’t think I’ve ever seen more than 6 or 8 other players in a game with me, so it’s pretty limited in how many other players you see. I’d personally like to shut off all multiplayer, but that isn’t an option in game.

I am really looking forward to this. I haven't paid much attention to it except for the basics on what it's about but after seeing a vid of some player driving from Seattle to San Fran during the beta, it gave me that Test Drive Unlimited feeling...and even with that game's shortcomings, that was a really fun driving/exploration game that hasn't seen its like since.

Let's hope.

Thank you both for the recommendations. Those two sites are exactly what I am looking for. Appreciate it!

Can anyone recommend a good "Build your own gaming PC" site? I used to use the old Sharky Extreme site when I was ready to build a new machine and they generally had solid and up to date components in their builds I could copy. At least I had a good starting point and didn't have to spend hours and hours spec'ing individual components from scratch.

TIA

Happy Birthday Blue! Here's to the best site on the net.

Yes, Happy Birthday bluesnews.com! I'm ok with a redesign and look forward to seeing what you come up with.

For the love of all that is holy though, if you add a mobile-friendly design, please let me pinch and zoom on my phone. I can't stand the sites that lock the view and I end up squinting to see what the hell is onscreen.

I'm disappointed that my Logitech G27 wheel doesn't work on the PS4. Last two generations, I went all in on the Xbox side of things and only jumped over to Playstation this go-round. I got so sick of Microsoft forcing me to buy their proprietary stuff like the racing wheel while the PS3 people got to use the PC-centric devices like the G27. Now that I have a nice wheel for my PC, I find out that Sony and Logitech can’t get their act together and get the wheel working with the PS4. It’s freakin ridiculous that if I want to race with a wheel on my PS4, that I have to buy a Thrustmaster T80 or T300RS. #$%@

Anything for the site that's been my homepage for, like ever. At least with Amazon I can participate. Otherwise, me clicking on the other ads on this site for stuff I'll never buy feels pointless.

Done! I just grabbed a TrackIR 5 since I can't get enough of Elite. I was looking as some of my other titles like Asseto Corsa and Grid and they all seem to support TrackIR. Can't wait!

Anyone using TrackIR now?

Dark Souls 2 is excellent and a worthy successor to DS1. Though I think I liked DS1 better, DS2 is quite brilliant in its own right. I think it's easier than DS1 since it's a no-brainer to summon help (for the boss fights or just to get through a level) and there are no really frustrating (or inspired) bosses like Ornstein and Smough but other aspects of it are excellent. Duel wielding is pretty cool and even gives you a unique stance if you use similar weapons. I respec'd into a sorcerer and was dual wielding two swords that also acted as a catalyst allowing me to swing at close enemies and light them up with spells at range. It was quite satisfying.

I liked the ability to respec if I screw up or just don't like where my character is headed, something I was unable to do in the first game and caused me hours of frustration and do overs. You can't respec over and over, but it's at least possible now. DS2's world isn't as amazing as DS1's interconnected style, but each area has its own feel that I really like.

I avoided multiplayer in DS1 as much as I could, but in DS2 I really got into the sunbros. It was easy to summon and be summoned to help others. Awesome! Plus if you are hollow and you help someone kill a boss, you turn human again. Negating the need to use an item that was always in short supply.

I put in about 100 hours on my PS3 and another 60 on the PC version before moving on to other games, but I plan to jump on the DLC when it hits. The PC version is much much better than the PS3 in both resolution and framerate and is really the only way to play. I used an Xbox controller by the way.

Good deal! I was wondering when we'd hear anything about PB's next game. Risen 1 and 2 were excellent even with the strange play mechanics of Risen 2 on release (blocking in particular). Gothic 1 and 2 were also outstanding and PB always does such a great job of encouraging exploration. Can't wait!

Edit: Man, every time I post, the subject line is some old byline from months and months ago.