New video game releases of 2/13-2/19
Indie Jeff's Weekly Pick: Gunpoint
Daily Filter: Mass Effect 3, Alan Wake's American Nightmare
Blizzard files opposition to Valve's Dota trademark
Twisted Metal promotion blows up Sweet Tooth's truck
Demon's Souls 'underestimated' by Sony
Shack PSA: Skyrim PS3 players should create new manual save
Star Trek to be co-published by Namco Bandai in 2013
MobyGames Classic: Syndicate community stories
Steam hack exposed 2004-2008 transactions
Evening Reading: Now He Only Eats Guitars
by Garnett Lee, Feb 09, 2010 6:00pm PSTI read a comment earlier today from someone lamenting that Bioshock 2 felt like fan fiction to them because Ken Levine hadn't worked on it. As a huge a fan of both Levine's work and Bioshock, I get where that comes from. Hey, I fully admit to being cautiously skeptical of the game in large part for that very reason. This comment, though, touches on the psych-out phenomenon that can turn what should be a game's biggest fans into its most critical.
It's funny how our own passion can wind up working against us like that. If it helps any, my remaining doubts dissolved within the first few steps of my return to Rapture. It was both as I remembered it, and not. The world retains its period atmosphere but with an added layer of decrepitude. The best sign is that both these first two nights I've spent there the experience retained the original's intensity that requires me to leave Rapture thirty minutes or so before I want to go to bed so I have time enough to settle down. If you're curious for more, along with the comments below we started a BioShock 2 chat thread and discussion first thing this morning.
And for something completely different, there was the rest of today's news:
- No PC version of Dead Space 2 for you (or me)
- Ghost Recon 4 named 'Future Soldier', out this fall
- Diablo 3 female monk character revealed
- Ubi plans greater push on sequels
Google has struck again. This time with some sort of social aggregating Gmail widgit. You can check it out at buzz.google.com
Polish newspaper slips, includes pedobear as an official 2010 Vancouver Olympic mascot
Along with eating while snowed in, DC residents also evidently showing a spike in condom demand
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http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?id=22099479
i've played the game a lot more and had some more thoughts, in reply;
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I need to make a directory of files into an iso
Tell me your favorite tool for doing this.
Thanks
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I found out because a relative of mine saw my name listed on the New York State Unclaimed Funds website.
http://www.osc.state.ny.us/ouf/index.htm
I filled out the forms and sent them in last week, but I have no idea who she was, and how much money I have coming to me... weird. Pennies from heaven, I guess.
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It's like twitter updates... but people can FIND you.
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"NVIDIA has uploaded an official video trailer for the PhysX Rocket Sled Demo to YouTube.In the video Alex Sakhartchouck an “NVIDIA Demo Engineer†explains how the demo was built for the next generation of NVIDIA video cards to show off the latest and greatest technology NVIDIA has such as CUDA and PhysX along with DirectX 11 Tessellation. "
check it out, pretty awesome stuff here: http://www.gamephys.com/2010/02/09/official-nvidia-physx-rocket-sled-demo-trailer-video/
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I've been trying REALLY HARD to give this game a chance and I just can't get into it. I just got past the part where you have to choose between rescuing or harvesting the little sister for the first time. I want to give this game a chance, since it's got rave reviews and I'm even a fan of Atlas Shrugged.
Back in 1998 or something, I played the demo of System Shock 2 and got the shit scared out of me. Maybe my glasses are rose-colored, but I vaguely remember caring more about NOT DYING and was more sucked-into the atmosphere, even though the graphics weren't that good even by the meager standards of that day.
The fact that I was more affected by the fifteen minutes of SS2 over the first hour of Bioshock is troubling. What is it about Bioshock that I don't like? Maybe it's the weird controls (PC): the mouse sensitivity is bizarre and fast. and the run/crouch are toggles not hold-to-crouch/run. The view seems to bob a lot, and it makes me a bit nauseous. The crosshair is really vague about where my bullets/magic will go.
I'm not terribly frightened of the enemies in this game. They're relatively stupid, VERY redundant, and they won't shut the hell up. I'm not super scared even when they ambush me because I've played Doom 3 before. I try to get immersed by listening to the PDAs recorded diary journals, but again, it all felt familiar because I had played Doom 3 before.
Most of all, the graphics seem to be a sticking issue. They're good and bad at the same time. I'm really impressed with what they've been doing with normal maps and the water effects. Overall, I'd say the environments look good and carry likable bits of detail. The CHARACTERS on the other hand totally shatter my suspension of disbelief. There's something cartoony about the way they look and act, and it seems like even their animations are choppy. When they die they ragdoll like styrofoam meat. Looking at them is meeting an uncanny valley that I can't cross. I didn't have that problem with SS2 because it was "half-life 1" era graphics. Hard to explain, but whatever.
It probably doesn't help that basically everyone on the internet spoiled the huge twist in the game for me already, and I already watched both the endings on YouTube. Maybe then it's my own damn fault. Or maybe I'm just "getting old" and don't care about videogames as much as I used to... (broken).
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I have always been shit at managing my emails. I always have thousands of messages in my inbox with little to no organisation. I'll sometimes tag stuff with a red flag if it's REALLY important.
I'm starting a new job in a couple of weeks. Brand spanking new email account. Anyone got any tutorials or tips on email/inbox management? I don't want to get into the state that I'm in now where it takes days to open Outlook.
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This is not normal. I was never like this.
I feel like there's so much pressure inside my head that I want to punch everything and smash and destroy everything. I work with my dad and I can't stand him no more, and he's being normal, I'm the one who's getting annoyed/mad at everything.
I was very rude to my mom yesterday and I went to sleep hoping it would go away, but today I'm angrier and madder than yesterday.
WTF is this shit? some hormonal imbalance? I'm 27 and have never felt this. It's like my brains are expanding and my skull doesn't allow it so everything makes me want to smash stuff.
What's wrong with me?
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so it would be pretty cool to use my controller to fly the damn heli. but controller support sucks right now. i tried using xpadder but im just not getting it right. maybe ill load up gta4 and see how i have it set up there
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is one way appke could shut a lot of its distractors up instantly.
approving apps that duplicate their own app functionality
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What is up with the screen and my view shaking every 5 seconds? I've been playing all weekend, and it's still annoying. I can understand if a bomb goes off near you but it doesn't seem to correlate with bombs going off. It's just every 5 seconds regardless. Maybe they should reduce the radius if a bomb goes off in your area it will then shake your screen.
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1. When 3DR "closed" and it became quite likely I would never see DNF, I looked for a reason to continue gaming. Of course, L4D blindsided me and gave me a reason to live, but before then, what I immediately came up with was id's Rage, and this was just based on the keynotes at QuakeCon and the little awesome trailer that made its way to The Shack. What struck me was not so much the open-worldness of it, nor the driving parts (which could be cool, I am an old-school Carmageddon fan), but the way the characters looked so REAL. I swore that during parts of it, I thought I was watching live-action footage and not graphic engine rendering. I am still looking forward to this. id is one of the dev houses left that I still totally respect. And you do too. I can't imagine a game looking better.
2. Last night I relaxed and played through the first leg of L4D1 No Mercy campaign in developer commentary mode. It was cool! I learned about the subtleties and intricacies of the design process while casually picking off zombies, and I think that rather than destroying the magic, as one Shacker had warned me about, it heightened my appreciation. I will probably do leg 2 of No Mercy tonight. Anyone here complete all of the campaigns this way? Does it stay awesome? Or do they eventually run out of cool stuff to talk about and revert to commenting on the selection of the items in the vending machines at work? I really like how the commentary is not forced, but you can choose to hear it via floating word balloons, like the pointers in Yoshi's Island.
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I ran some the futuremark benchmark on the same system across most major browsers.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/26301/bench.JPG
Lol at ie.
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http://www.shackpics.com/viewer.x?file=awesomePNG_hauuwosigw11dqb886oz.png
This is on the bottom of that awesome resume that I saw on the internet. I assume he made it in some artsy fartsy application, but maybe spreadsheets can win the game?
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http://www.pcgames.de/aid,704658/Fallout-New-Vegas-Magazin-Scans-zeigen-erste-Screenshots-und-neue-Infos/PC/Bildergalerie/?menu=browser&mode=article&entity_id=231321&image_id=1246705&browsersize=fullscreen
It contains screenshots, gameplay and PS3 information.
And yes, the power seen in the trailer is generated by the Hoover Dam.
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"Miss me yet?"
Me, fuck no and I can't wait for the fall midterms to have most of congress and the house get the shit kicked out of them.
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i actually miss practical effects.
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Seeing Omar arrested and locked up just doesn't seem right. They did a really good job of making a criminal and murderer likeable. Fuck, I want to let him loose and the streets and let him walk around with a shotgun, doing his own thing
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My two are Winrar http://www.rarlab.com/
and Flexible Renamer http://hp.vector.co.jp/authors/VA014830/english/FlexRena/
I use both on a daily basis at this point, Winrar because I'm so familiar with it, and FR, since it works!
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http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198004187823
13.7 hours per day over the last 2 weeks; 12.5 hours each and every day since the game was released mid-November
o_O
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The SC2 fans are getting desperate now, clinging on to anything for a shred of the beta.
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While the story was pretty good, I still feel that the original Bioshock had a better story overall. The twist in the original game was better whereas the 2nd game has no special revelations . It feels like stuff you've already done before but in a smaller, less important story. Put simply, there is no shock in Bioshock 2. Should the game be avoided? I don't think so, it's still much better than most shooters out there.
I guess it's normal to see that all the powers, guns and baddies are mostly the same with a few variations since this is basically the same (or close to it) city/time frame from the first game but it's still disappointing nonetheless.
The ending I've got was basically the Goody good one: ENDING SPOILERS the one where I save all those cute little sisters and get my memories transfered to Elena . I still feel we didn't have enough interaction with Elena to bond emotionally with her and feel affected by the ending. Bioshock 1 did it better with the rescue and subsequent montage of the little sisters living out their lifes .
Overall 7.5 with most points lost for lack of originality and lack of boldness to try something new.
I hope my tags work!
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