Evening Reading: Rights Management Training

Ubisoft fired the latest salvo in the war on piracy today with the announcement of its new digital rights management system that requires an always on Internet connection. While they downplayed this requirement saying that most people are connected all the time anyway, it has broad ramifications of which I'm sure they're aware. Sure, for a fixed desktop machine it might be relatively safe to say a lot of people have a dedicated connection but most? Broadband penetration continues to improve but a large number of users still connect by dialup -- users who are hard to count because while they obviously wouldn't be playing online multiplayer games on that connection they could perfectly well enjoy single-player games.

Then there's the case of gaming on the go with laptops. One of the cases made for the continuing strength of PC gaming is its massive installed base. Laptops make up a substantial part of that and as someone who's traveled for work I can say being able to pop on a game wherever I happened to be was definitely part of the appeal. Sure, you can buy mobile hotspot access at the airport and hotel, and in-flight Internet access is becoming more common but this requirement makes those connections mandatory for playing my game.

On the other hand, for the core PC gamer with a good gaming rig setup this system sounds pretty tolerable on paper. It doesn't run resource hogging services and enables running the game without a disk in the drive. Even with these benefits it shows how damaging the impact of piracy has grown to be on Ubisoft's PC business that they would put in place such a potentially controversial solution. Sounds like it's time to revisit the subject with some PC developers to get their refreshed take on the subject.

Here's a little refresher on our takes for the day:

And not that it comes as a shock but it was pretty funny to see/hear the McGraw Hill exec blow the "offical" announcement of the Apple tablet.

Televised car chases are all the rage in LA but this one tops any I've seen yet.

Not that I don't have enough eye strain from staring at the screen all day but these 10 optical illusions are pretty rad

From The Chatty
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    January 26, 2010 6:00 PM

    Woot Mass Effect!

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      January 26, 2010 6:01 PM

      god damn at 98% on steam. it feels like a logarithmic climb that's never gonna finish.

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        January 26, 2010 6:42 PM

        I started playing at 3:00 pm, and only now realized how much time had passed.

        It's been awhile since a game sucked me into it's universe like that.

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      January 26, 2010 6:02 PM

      I gotta say, the opening sequences and first 30 minutes of ME2 were probably the most awesome shit I've played in a game. My jaw was on the ground.

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        January 26, 2010 11:32 PM

        Yeah right from the start its amazing

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      January 26, 2010 6:02 PM

      [deleted]

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        January 26, 2010 11:38 PM

        You can always install that shit later cant you?

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      January 26, 2010 6:05 PM

      decrypting!!

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      January 26, 2010 6:08 PM

      mine won't launch! it decrypts then nothing over and over :(

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        January 26, 2010 6:23 PM

        restart steam!!!!

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          January 26, 2010 6:24 PM

          tried it

          ended up verifying integrity of cache, it downloaded eight files again, works like a CHARM now

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      January 26, 2010 6:10 PM

      Is Mass Effect 2 a multiplayer game?

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      January 26, 2010 6:10 PM

      Has anyone noticed that when Shepard is out of uniform on the Normandy he runs exactly like a retarded person?

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      January 26, 2010 6:10 PM

      Looks like someone figured out how to disable mousesmoothing and tweak sensitivity further than low / mid / high.

      http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/106/index/765942
      you need to edit the file with notepad++ or the game will crash on launch, haven't tested this myself so backup the file first / use at your own risk!

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        January 26, 2010 6:39 PM

        I can confirm this works for MouseSensitivity=1.0 (which is "low", I changed it to 0.5 and the game runs fine) but trying to disable mouse smoothing with bEnableMouseSmoothing=false crashes the game on load :(

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      January 26, 2010 6:13 PM

      Bastard has been downloading for the past 3 hours and is only at 28%. Knew I wasn't going to get to play it tonight. :-(

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      January 26, 2010 6:16 PM

      [deleted]

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      January 26, 2010 6:19 PM

      [deleted]

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      January 26, 2010 6:19 PM

      so much PWN so far. working from my level 58 uber lesbo renegade !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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        January 26, 2010 6:21 PM

        I installed the 3 DLCs before launching as well!!!!!!!!!!1111

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          January 26, 2010 6:34 PM

          lolling at the blood dragon armor!!! :D hahaha

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            January 26, 2010 9:03 PM

            Yeah the blood dragon and pre order armies are kind of shitty because you can't go with no helmet graphic

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      January 26, 2010 6:22 PM

      If I've got a helmet that covers my face... is there some button i can toggle so that the helmet is off during conversations? Also, at any point can I trick out / get new armor for my squad?

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        January 26, 2010 6:28 PM

        No, and no. :(

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        January 26, 2010 6:28 PM

        yeah, i'm curious about this too. I'm wearing the Dragon Age Armor, and at some points, it just looks weird in conversations sometimes.

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        January 26, 2010 6:37 PM

        [deleted]

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          January 26, 2010 6:41 PM

          No the DLC armours don't have a "remove helmet" option...

          HUUUGE oversight in my opinion :(

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          January 26, 2010 7:41 PM

          No they have stats, check them out in your captain's cabin.

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        January 26, 2010 6:41 PM

        You can get different helmets/visor later on and doing the personnal quest for each of your teammates unlocks a darker color scheme uniform for each.

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        January 26, 2010 9:30 PM

        No armor for your squad at all, which I think was a great decision.

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          January 26, 2010 11:40 PM

          I dunno about GREAT. I like how that all have a signature look but cmon 2 reskins? Thats weak shit.

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      January 26, 2010 6:24 PM

      We can't even pre-load it :(

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      January 26, 2010 6:27 PM

      [deleted]

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      January 26, 2010 6:29 PM

      anyone able to get anti-aliasing working? fuck you UE3 :(

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        January 26, 2010 6:40 PM

        Bugged me too...

        I guess it looks ok at 1920x1080... I haven't tried forcing it in CCC...

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          January 26, 2010 6:46 PM

          I tried nhancer with no luck :(

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            January 26, 2010 6:59 PM

            Make sure the AA compatibility is set to 0000045 and not 0000145.

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        January 26, 2010 6:46 PM

        [deleted]

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        January 26, 2010 6:49 PM

        On Nvidia, yes. I heard for ATI that renaming the game works unless you bought the Steam version.

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          January 26, 2010 6:59 PM

          you are saying it should work through the control panel?

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        January 26, 2010 9:23 PM

        UE3 = worst fucked up engine of all time

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      January 26, 2010 6:42 PM

      [deleted]

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        January 26, 2010 6:44 PM

        Haha, I noticed the eyeball thing too.

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        January 26, 2010 6:45 PM

        ME1 had the same issues. Female Shepard's long hair has some weird stuff happening too. LIke z-buffer fighting.

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        January 26, 2010 6:47 PM

        I can confirm the eye bug is present in the PC version as well.

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      January 26, 2010 6:43 PM

      AAARGH!

      Can't get it yet, can't order replacement 360 drive till next week... so lonely

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      January 26, 2010 6:45 PM

      I mentioned it already but seriously Bioware:

      No option to remove the helmet on DLC armour?

      WTF were they thinking :(

      It basically ruins my DLC armour because I don't like running around talking to people with the faggoty helmets on...

      A toggle like the first game would be so easy to implement :(

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      January 26, 2010 6:50 PM

      I hope Renegade Sheppard gets to throw his assault rifle into the glass, and break his tiny ships.

      Also, I really want a model of the Normandy 1 and 2, along with that Turian cruiser.

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      January 26, 2010 6:51 PM

      Fucking Steam. "Preparing to launch Mass Effect 2..." for 5 minutes now.

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      January 26, 2010 6:59 PM

      This game is fucking awesome, but there's still some "Huh?" moments.

      Like, discovering that your piecemeal armor choices have in-game effects, and that having a helmet of some sort is better from a gameplay perspective...but that the helmet stays on during conversations so you never see your own face. And further, that for some absurd reason, they realized that it was nice to let you easily swap weapons at points throughout a mission but didn't think to let you do the same with armor.

      Or coming fresh out of Dragon Age and expecting lots of hilarious inter-character banter and getting almost none. In fact, aside from doing the character specific quests and talking to them on the Normandy, it feels like their personalities vanish entirely as soon as they're recruited.

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        January 26, 2010 7:31 PM

        Equipping the helmet gives you a combat advantage? I thought that shit was just for appearance sake.

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          January 26, 2010 7:31 PM

          Also - is there any way to look at weapon specs?

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            January 26, 2010 8:33 PM

            Nope, no way to look at weapon specs, you just have to go by what the descriptions say, although I get the impression that barring a few things (heavy weapons, for one) it's pretty much a given that a new weapon is an upgrade.

            And yeah, each piece of armor has a particular advantage to it, most are things like 5% extra health, or shields, some boost your damage, but having no helmet gives you nothing.

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          January 26, 2010 9:07 PM

          Each piece of armor (helmet, chest, gloves, greaves, shoulders) has attributes

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      January 26, 2010 7:35 PM

      Man this DLC shit has me all confused

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      January 26, 2010 8:04 PM

      Steam says 'preload complete, unreleased' for me and I am in the US. It verified, and still says it. What the fuck steam.

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        January 26, 2010 8:06 PM

        I am going to choke a bitch soon give it to me now

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          January 26, 2010 11:38 PM

          i think i had to restart steam once or twice

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      January 26, 2010 8:05 PM

      [deleted]

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      January 26, 2010 8:05 PM

      definitely liking the new hacking/bypassing stuff, good to see a change. the new galaxy map is fun too. scanning planets and launching probes for materials is A++++++ instead of hunting them down for no fucking reason. lol

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        January 26, 2010 8:17 PM

        The little scanner thing is slow as hell though. I wish they made it a little easier to pinpoint stuff. Unless I'm doing it wrong.

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          January 26, 2010 8:47 PM

          I fucking LOVE the "real time" renegade/paragon shit

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            January 26, 2010 8:48 PM

            What do you mean by "real time"?

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              January 26, 2010 9:01 PM

              [deleted]

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              January 26, 2010 9:03 PM

              You can interrupt lines in conversations now depending on your Renegade/Paragon score.

              Sometimes, an icon will appear - Left Mouse Button on the left-bottom side of the screen or Right Mouse Button on the right-bottom side of the screen - and if you press the button before it goes away, your character will cut the person you're talking to off and interject with something tailored to your Renegade/Paragon score.

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                January 26, 2010 9:05 PM

                Specially, it appears in red on the left side when you can renegade interrupt, and in blue on the right side when you can paragon interrupt.

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                January 26, 2010 9:09 PM

                oh.. okay. I did that once.

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          January 26, 2010 9:01 PM

          You can purchase a speed upgrade for it later on.

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      January 26, 2010 8:12 PM

      loving it so far. i don't want to stop playing, but i must. cursed 8am classes.

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      January 26, 2010 8:31 PM

      Question: I was doing a Mass Effect 1 playthrough, but I'm gettin lazy. Is there a way to get a full complete playthrough and wil it let me change the name in ME2, or do I need to beat it as my char and itll use the same name?

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      January 26, 2010 8:37 PM

      Fuck, this planet scanning is tedious. Is this how you find settlements and places to land on the planets or is it just for resources?

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        January 26, 2010 8:46 PM

        Well... the DLC Normandy Crash Site (which was an awesome spoiler thanks to Bioware being retarded) you gotta scan the planet to find it. But.. there's a little white bar on the scanner so it's much easier to find.

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          January 26, 2010 8:52 PM

          Okay thanks. I did that one already and scanned half a dozen planets but no other landing sites yet so I wasn't sure.

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        January 26, 2010 8:49 PM

        When you go into scan mode, it'll say "Anomaly Detected" if there's a mission there, and then provide a little tracking line to follow to where it is.

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        January 26, 2010 9:26 PM

        Y{Protip}y: press left (or right) with both the LS & RS while holding the LT down to double the scan speed. While doing this start at the top of the planet and spin it around while slowly working down the planet--its like shaving the skin off an apple...but bigger.

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        January 26, 2010 11:44 PM

        I think thats how it is for side missions but I didnt do many of those

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      January 26, 2010 8:38 PM

      [deleted]

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      January 26, 2010 8:43 PM

      this game rules

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        January 26, 2010 8:47 PM

        I got my first crew member right before I quit and it made me all :D

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      January 26, 2010 8:55 PM

      Couldn't really get into the first game. But I'm willing to try it again since the shackhype is building.

      Are people playing on 360, or PC?

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        January 26, 2010 8:58 PM

        If i were to guess, I would say both.

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          January 26, 2010 8:58 PM

          but that's just a guess! i could be wrong!

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            January 26, 2010 9:00 PM

            alright i'll bite, which would be the preferred platform?

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              January 26, 2010 9:06 PM

              PC looks and runs better if you have a decent system (in fact, it runs significantly better than ME1 on PC)

              I can't speak to how ME2 compares to ME1 on 360, but I wager it works just fine.

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                January 26, 2010 9:09 PM

                360 version of me2 is much improved and looks great.

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                January 26, 2010 9:11 PM

                Yeah, the PC version looks and runs great.

    • reply
      January 26, 2010 9:00 PM

      [deleted]

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      January 26, 2010 9:01 PM

      Anybody else running into a bug where you randomly float up into the ceiling making you unable to do anything?

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        January 26, 2010 10:07 PM

        I remember reviving Mordin with Unity in one mission and he was floating a head off the ground.

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      January 26, 2010 9:20 PM

      [deleted]

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      January 26, 2010 9:22 PM

      lol wtf is some of this marketplace shit!

      Fornax, a Titillating Alien magazine lmao is there a gift system like dragon age????

      man I'm saving like a mother fucker before doing anything lol

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        January 26, 2010 9:23 PM

        No, there's no gift system. I'm not sure what that magazine is for, but a lot of the other things you can buy go up in your quarters (like the ship models, and the fish)

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      January 26, 2010 11:34 PM

      and all the sudden it's 2:30am

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        January 26, 2010 11:36 PM

        does anybody else have the extensive facial scarring? am i right in thinking that this is a result of being way over to renegade?

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          January 27, 2010 12:49 AM

          As you go Renegade it gets worse. As you go Paragon, it heals. Or buy the Medic upgrade and heal them completely regardless of faction.

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      January 26, 2010 11:36 PM

      mass effect 1.

      done all the side quests i have available. done numeria, feros, and finding liara t'soni.

      i think this leaves virmie and the race against time quests left before i have this finished and can join everyone in mass effect 2.

      20 hours dumped into this in a matter of 4 days. O.o

      I wish I had stuck it out beyond the first couple of "side missions" during my first attempt.

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        January 26, 2010 11:37 PM

        also i have 750,000 credits. i don't think i have bought a single thing in the game and i far outgun everything i am fighting. lol

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          January 26, 2010 11:40 PM

          [deleted]

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            January 26, 2010 11:46 PM

            what i have now seems to have made everything easy. i'm already level 36 and shit just dies. yay vanguard w/ sniper + pistols maxed out.

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        January 26, 2010 11:45 PM

        I've been trying to get my guy up to level 50. So far I'm at level 46 and I have two more side missions and the final planet to go. Over 18 hours in 3 days... w00t.

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      January 26, 2010 11:41 PM

      ME2 question:
      Did they fix the extremely poor enemy AI (bum rushing you like zombies as soon as you enter the room), equally poor ally AI, horrible Mako exploration side tasks, and the awful inventory UI?

      I enjoyed the story in the first one and to a lesser extent the combat, but I don't want to deal with any of the bullshit caused by those factors again.

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        January 26, 2010 11:44 PM

        No much AI rushing, Mako is gone, and theres no "inventory" really anymore

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          January 26, 2010 11:44 PM

          no mako, but scanning, and no inventory, but research

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        January 27, 2010 12:16 AM

        Yeah, enemies duck behind cover a lot now. You really have to move around to get to them sometimes.

        As for rushing, the only enemies that I've ever had the rushing thing with is the Krogans, but really they're fucking Krograns. Krogans are huge, badass aliens. Of course they're going to rush your ass.

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      January 26, 2010 11:45 PM

      We neeeeeeeeeeed a ME1 save game editor!

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      January 26, 2010 11:46 PM

      What the shit is this? I don't have a game saved? I just played for 3 1/2 hours, had auto saved checked and watched the game save itself regularly, yet now when I get to the main menu, there is no "load" or "resume" option?!?!? The "Save" tab was greyed out during my play so I figured I was in an unsaveable area, but apparently I can't save the game? I rented it so I didn't unlock the Ceberus Network thing. Is that really required to even save the game?

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        January 27, 2010 12:03 AM

        I assume to load a game you guys see a "Load" option at the main menu?

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        January 27, 2010 12:17 AM

        The network shouldn't be required to save. I have turned it on and I save fine. I do have it set to log into my EA account though, but that should be separate.

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      January 27, 2010 12:06 AM

      Just played it for 4 hours. I'm definitely liking it so far, but am a bit apprehensive to the 'less RPG and more action' changes. It feels too fast and frantic and the squad AI is really bad :(

      Could be me just settling into the new mechanics though. Everything else so far is top notch though!

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        January 27, 2010 12:19 AM

        You get used to it pretty quick. The game has a definite setup where you know if you're going into a combat area or an "RPG" area. In that sense, it's lot less restrictive than the first in terms of where you can go and when.

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        January 27, 2010 1:33 AM

        I'm only a couple hours in but it hasn't felt more actiony to me so much as the action doesn't feel off. The combat is sooo much better, but you still get to do all the nice pause and assign attacks stuff (I don't know why people play this and don't micro their squad abilities)

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          January 27, 2010 1:47 AM

          One thing I really like is that you can target without pausing and tap Q or E to have them attack that target.

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            January 27, 2010 2:20 AM

            yeah, the PC controls are slick. I rarely directed my squad like that in ME1 on 360 but between Q/E and the hotbar for real time skill use it makes things really nice. Plus just moving around in cover and shooting is so much more satisfying.

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        January 27, 2010 2:09 AM

        is there actually an inventory system this time?? ME1's system was pathetic

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        January 27, 2010 2:14 AM

        [deleted]

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      January 27, 2010 1:39 AM

      [deleted]

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