War for the Overworld: The Democorn.

_{I kind of want them to put it in the game for real now...}

I think gems on the auction house ruined the game more than anything else for my group of regulars.  One of my friends would just buy a huge stack of flawless gems and hand them out to us.  They were so cheap and common that we never even bothered to recover them from an item before selling it.  They also made crappy items with sockets better than any of the named items we found in the game.

1075-0742-5539

I'm willing to give it a try.  My only experience with multiplayer on the 3DS was a few rounds of Mario Kart against random people though...

-Added you as a friend-

Oh and I guess the new Wii U "pro" controller is like this too. Well, Nintendo used to understand this anyway.

Eh?  The WiiU pro is like a 360 with the right side inverted.  It's actually pretty comfy.

Just finished the game.  I stand by my complaints but the last third of the game is brilliant enough that I would still recommend the game whole heartedly. 

The tonal shifts that occur around the halfway point make me wonder if they went with the intro section as it was because they were afraid of scaring people off.  The Patriotic ideology really doesn’t fit with the rest of the game and if they had gone with a pure religious tone I think the game would have been stronger for it.

I had actually been expecting the ending revelation for quite a while.  They still handled it in a clever and satisfying fashion so high marks to them for that.

Are you dead set on a 360?  This seems like an odd time to be picking one up.  Even if you don’t care about next gen the price of the system is bound to drop in a few months.  My personal opinion is also that the PS3 beats the 360 in almost every way.

As for the size, mine has a 120GB and it’s about half full from light usage and the occasional downloadable game.  If you intend to use the marketplace at all I would go with the larger hard drive.  The price difference isn’t much and you never regret having too much space but if you ever run out you will be kicking yourself.

Looks like the closed beta will start next week.

I know I’m overthinking an Independence Day sequel but wasn’t the point of the aliens in the first one that they are like locust and move their entire civilization from planet to planet, use everything up, then move on?  If we committed mass genocide on their race who is responding to the distress call? 

Backed.  I was really looking forward to this one. 

I picked this up during the $30 sale.  Only made it through one mission but my first impressions are very good!  My only real complaint isn’t the games fault so much as the system and that is the number of jaggies on characters and the environment is a bit distracting.  Zelda did something where turning off the 3D applied a sort of anti-aliasing that I wish they had done here.

That is a very minor complaint though; if you own a 3DS go buy this now!

just out of curiosity, are you using the 'alternative' post processing setting?  I hear that one is screwing up the details on close-up objects.

That one I'm not sure.  Will have to look into it when I get done with work today.

I'm not using alternative and some of the textures are pretty bad.  The roses are a good example.  It's like 95% beautiful and 5% bad.

Running at Ultra Settings, 2560x1440 resolution.

I didn't have alternative turned on but I was curious what it would do so I just tried turning it on. Doing so broke even more textures!  The door texture next to where I was standing wouldn't have looked out of place in a 10 year old game.

Actually, I remember news about a tasting robot  that reported that humans taste like pork...

just out of curiosity, are you using the 'alternative' post processing setting?  I hear that one is screwing up the details on close-up objects.

That one I'm not sure.  Will have to look into it when I get done with work today.

[Spoiler]

L9, do you have everything set on ultra? Because while the rosebushes while I'm playing aren't high detail, they definitely look better than that.

Yep, just doubled checked and everything is set to ultra.  Certain things just seem to have really crappy textures. 

Another shot of the rare and blurry Pixel Roses.  Open the image full screen for the full effect.

Spoiler for Hiden:

long intro, but man it's purty on the PC.

Pretty until you play spot the bad texture.   Or in that case, the GOOD texture. 

Check point only save earns the game a pretty bad black mark from me.

Ender could see better if he turned his helmet around.

Total Biscuit did a video on this yesterday.  You can see the tactical combat engine in action as well as hear the glorious return of the narrator! 

Scrooge's voice actor is now 94 years old but he still came into the studio and did his thing like a pro. The voice work really adds a lot to the package.

That is just awesome.

I'd totally eat a dog, cat, or horse if given the opportunity.  Not sure why these three animals are offlimits when we eat other animals we domesticate.

It’s the cute factor.  People don’t like to eat animals that remain in a state of cuteness for the majority of their life.

Would also recommend Once Upon a Time.  I though the first couple episodes were a bit weak but it picked up fast after that.  My only real complaint beyond that is I wish they had a slightly larger budget.  Anytime they try to go too epic the special effects can’t quite pull it off.

Not sure separating the handhelds from consoles was such a good idea; this seems to be where threads go to die.  Maybe it should have been Apps and Analog?

Anyways, the Giant Bomb quick look sold me completely on this one.  The level of interactivity in the levels actually surprised me.  This is probably going to be the system seller that finally gets a lot of people to pick up the 3DS.

Yeah, the load times really kill this thing.

The driving isn't as bad as I was fearing, but that aspect clearly needed just a little bit more time in the oven.

Is it possible to install to an external hard drive or even something they may look at?

Ahem. 

After doing some digging I did find some comparison people have had between the start-up load times and in game load times.  There is some variance based on the quality of external drive you use but most people experience 15-20 second faster boot up times and 5-8 second faster in game load times when using the downloaded version versus the disk version.  Not exactly a huge difference but it might be enough to sway people towards the download version if you have a HD handy.

March 18th was the release date, at-least in the US.  Apparently there is a shipping shortage a lot of places are experiencing though.  Nintendo also priced the eshop version incorrectly on release.  Anyone who purchased on release day is getting a $10 refund.

After doing some digging I did find some comparison people have had between the start-up load times and in game load times.  There is some variance based on the quality of external drive you use but most people experience 15-20 second faster boot up times and 5-8 second faster in game load times when using the downloaded version versus the disk version.  Not exactly a huge difference but it might be enough to sway people towards the download version if you have a HD handy.

Can you use an SSDÉ

Is that solid state drive?  You can use any hard drive (2TB and under) that uses a dedicated power supply.  The hard drive has to be formatted for the Wii U though, meaning you can’t use the device for any other purpose after format it.  Also, the WiiU is USB2.0 only.

March 18th was the release date, at-least in the US.  Apparently there is a shipping shortage a lot of places are experiencing though.  Nintendo also priced the eshop version incorrectly on release.  Anyone who purchased on release day is getting a $10 refund.

After doing some digging I did find some comparison people have had between the start-up load times and in game load times.  There is some variance based on the quality of external drive you use but most people experience 15-20 second faster boot up times and 5-8 second faster in game load times when using the downloaded version versus the disk version.  Not exactly a huge difference but it might be enough to sway people towards the download version if you have a HD handy.

So did anyone pick this up?  I ended up holding off after learning that I wouldn’t be able to download it without an add-on hard drive. 

Took me a minute to realize what I was looking at.  My state doesn't even allow billboards...

What? How do you know what to buy?

We only buy practical things here!  Like fur hats and chainsaws to cut down trees and build houses!

Cross posted with OO because I love Bastion.

Super Giant Games just announced their second game, Transistor. 

Trailer

Looks like they are going a bit more science fiction than fantasy this time around.  Gameplay is looks similar to bastion except maybe with a bit more planning involved. 



Bastion was my favorite game of 2011 so I’m definitely excited for this one.  An early build is supposed to be playable at PAX East; anyone going who would like to report back impressions?   

I enjoyed the first a lot but my group of friends never got past the 2nd level of the DLC.  Just got too grindy to move on.  I hope they do something about that with this one but I somehow doubt it if they are moving twords a dota style mode for it.

Took me a minute to realize what I was looking at.  My state doesn't even allow billboards...

Um, I hope this is a stupid question but have you tried interacting with the game pad?  If I recall the initial setup only displays on the handheld screen.

If it’s running its update don’t turn it off.  If you do you will brick it.

This is the list I found for Pro Controller compatibility.

Assassin's Creed III
Ben 10: Omniverse
Call of Duty: Black Ops II
FIFA 13
Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage 2
Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate
Nano Assault (Multiplayer only)
Skylanders Giants
Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed
Tank! Tank! Tank!
Tekken Tag Tournament 2
Trine 2: Director's Cut
Warriors Orochi 3 Hyper
ZombiU (Multiplayer only)
Darksiders II

The only ones I know from experience are Trine 2, Tekken and ZombiU multiplayer.  ZombiU is a special case since you cant use it in single-player.  It does however offer a very interesting multiplayer mode.  The person with the WiiU pad gets an overworld view and gets to place zombies with the touch screen.  The person with the pro controller plays a survivor and has to complete objectives.

Unfortunately, very little is compatible with the procontroller.  Even a lot of WiiU games don’t support it. *glares at Mario U*

[ZombiU]

If the idea of true survival horror interests you then definitely give ZombiU a look.  This is not a game about run and gun combat, most of the time a straight up attack will get you killed.  On top of that, ammo is limited and the atmosphere is the most tense I’ve experienced since Amnesia.

New Super Mario Bros U has the feel of Super Mario World from the SNES, which makes it my favorite new Mario title by far.  There are also a ton of secrets hidden in the over world map which gives it good longevity.

If your system didn’t come with it, Nintendo Land is a great party game.  A warning though, a couple of the games require a ton of add ons (Motion Plus + Nunchucks).

Don’t have a gaming PC?  Look into Trine 2.  It’s a beautiful (up to) three player puzzle platformer.  And for something a bit different and more casual, Little Inferno offers a unique non-game experience.  Both of these titles are on the eshop.

Also, Monster Hunter comes out tomorrow.  It did NOTHING for me but you can at least check out the demo on the eshop.

Wii U sounds more and more of a complete clusterfuck as weeks go by

I think people who have it enjoy it for what it is and ignore those that slam it but dont have it.

Pretty much this.  The system has its problems but it offers an experience you can’t get elsewhere.   Take ZombiU for instance, it borrows many of the ideas from Dark Souls but the way the controller touch screen interacts with the game is something a person won’t understand unless they experience it themselves.

 The system has a chach-22 problem going for it right now.  It needs more exclusives to sell the system but no developers will sign up to do it because the system isn’t selling that well.  The other problem is because there are so few exclusives people are judging the system based on ports which do little to sell the unique features of the system. 

I would estimate the last of the AAA tiles arrive around August next year.   There will still be smaller publishes working on titles after that but anything in development that hasn’t already been announced is almost surely going to be bumped to the next gen just to promote sales.

I think people complaining over the new look of have some rose colored glasses for the old game. Even back then, he was still a generic black clad hood, and later a hood with a mechanical eye. It was many things beyond it that helped make him a character.

This new design does look like some bad design out of a teen to 20 something vampire romance flick. But if they can get the character right, and remove some eye shadow from him, it should turn out okay.

I'll take "generic" over emo ninja.   




I'll withhold judgement for now since they did good with Deus Ex but almost everything they have said has me worried, especially the line about modernizing the game.  If they put quick time events in Thief I'm going to lead a riot...

I have a feeling that is only for people with the basic version.  If the install takes more than 32GB I think they did something wrong....

This is probably the best you will find before E3.

Deluxe Console which comes with Nintendo Land
+
ZombiU
Pro-controller  
-----
$390

You save about $50 assuming you wanted ZombiU and a Pro-controller.

I’m fairly convinced I will pick it up now. 

Just a reminder for anyone who purchased the WiiU deluxe edition; a digital copy purchased on the eshop will grant you a $5 eshop credit on your next purchase. 

I have noticed faster load times for games downloaded as opposed to playing off from CDs.  Given that many of the complaints seem to be with load times this might be a good title to try it out with.