Erm, the number of cores and the number of bits aren't related. 

Generally speaking, the only benefit you're going to get from 64-bits is the ability to address more than 4GB of RAM.  Whether or not your quad-core CPU is fully utilized is a different issue entirely.

A 64-bit application would also suffer a performance hit and would use more RAM in the first place, which makes 64-bit little suited to games for the time being. When 32-bit versions of Windows are no longer available it might be a good idea for game developers to go 64-bit. Until then though, it's a waste of time.

I think MS have said that W7 will be the last Windows that supports 32-bit.

I hope this is true. I think it's bullshit game developers aren't making their games 64 bit advantage. wtf is the point of a quad core if i can't use it? Maybe 64 bit takes more to develop I don't know, but I hope this forces the industry to get with the times already and use our hardware.

Heh, 64-bit isn't all that easy to wrap one's head around. Your post is proof of this, as you don't seem to understand what the point of 64-bit is or what it is able to offer you.

Windows 7 is faster, smaller, uses less memory, and is component-based (which means you can uninstall pretty much anything in it that you don't like, up to and including IE). It's also less annoying (pop-ups in the corner have been dealt with and UAC is simpler) and works much better with devices you may plug into it (like cell phones, external HDs, printers, etc).

Is it worth going from Vista 64 to W7 64? Are there any drastic enhancements to how games play? Or how Windows itself runs? In short - is it worth spending the $100 for the upgrade edition (I use the advanced networking features, so the $50 upgrade won't work for me) at the current (reasonable) prices?

Yes, I'd say it's definitely worth it. It's a much more pleasurable experience than Vista ever was, and it's both faster and better looking. It also has a new version of Direct3D (not sure if it's going to get included with Vista). Windows 7 is getting massive praise, even from Mac fanatics.

I thought the movie did a great job of recreating 47's personality (absolutely ruthless, not willing to compromise) without holding back. I didn't think Olyphant was a good casting choice though. Without the beard he just looks too... soft. This was supposed to be Vin Diesel's role, and one he'd fit like a glove. It's nice to hear that they're doing a sequel.

I'm still very worried that this miniseries will never be able to live up to the standards set by BoB simply because this one isn't a true story (only loosely based on actual events, with fictional characters). It's harder to relate to a war movie when you know the particular event you're watching didn't really happen that way in the real world, and that a person you're supposed to care for never existed in the first place.

Well, don't complain that the game is difficult if you don't use the most powerful tools at your disposal.

You can use up to three devastators in a row at max health if you're fully upgraded. It doesn't take long to pull off (about 2 seconds) and once it starts, it can't be interrupted (though you can take damage). You can also execute a single devastator when you're about to die if you have purchased that particular upgrade. If you're having trouble holding two buttons at the same time, try not to use your thumb for it. Use your index- and middle fingers.

[Spoiler]

Razgon:

Spoiler for Hiden:

Come on, don't give up that quickly! Think! What's your most damaging power? It's the Critical Pain Devastator. Use it, and use it often! Save up at least two doses of it for when the timer kicks in, and you should be able to finish him off with about 30 seconds left on the clock.

You can already get full downloadable games on all PSP models from the PSN Store.

Yeah I know that. I was asking mainly because the article linked to above mentions the PSPgo specifically.

I'm interested in this, but only if I can get the downloadable version for my regular PSP 2000. Will downloadable games be locked to the PSPgo?

anyways, its been the plan for quite some time now to let them govern themselves. Funny thing is, everything danish is now bad up there, despite the fact that we pay a LOT of money to them in generel help.

That's because you keep asking them to kiss your royal pinky ring.

Those danish bastards deserve to lose Greenland, considering they stole it from Norway in the first place.

I can see a reduction of about $100 from the current price. Many places are already selling the PS3 at that price level.

Oh? Do tell.

I'm referring to local prices here in Norway. I've seen several PS3 packages sold at that price lately.

Anyone who thinks Sony will reduce the price to $199 needs to take some classes in basic economics.

I can see a reduction of about $100 from the current price. Many places are already selling the PS3 at that price level. The game lineup (both exclusives and non-exclusives) looks way better on the PS3 than the 360 this year, so the positive press from a price reduction combined with the new games could (notice the emphasis) make Sony regain at least some of the lost revenue.

At this point, I honestly think they aren't really trying to win the console war. They're just trying to survive. In the current economy and with the losses Sony has suffered over the past few years, they aren't going to be willing to take massive losses just for the small chance that they'll regain the throne of the console wars this late in the current generation. If you think otherwise, you're way more optimistic than me (and probably deluding yourself, but that's open to debate).

I like the theory that Sony is trying to get rid of the current PS3 stock before introducing a PS3 Lite. It sounds plausible, mostly because it's become a common tactic for consoles recently, and also because this would allow them to reduce price (thanks to reduced manufacturing costs), gain positive momentum in the news, and appear as a very strong underdog with an increasingly solid game library.

i think the parkour implementation should be the de-facto standard for all similar games.  so much better than ass creed's implementation.  here it felt like i was in control of how i scaled a building vs AC was about finding the path lined out by the designers

Oh god, no! The "parkour" implementation in this game was easily the worst part of it. You get stuck in the terrain half the time because the game decides you want to land on something in particular (which you might not even see). A careful estimate is that 9 out of 10 deaths I suffered during my inFAMOUS playthrough were because of the controls (ie. I'd get stuck while trying to flank an enemy/get to cover/run away from combat/etc.).

Have you tried Prototype? Now THAT is how to handle parkour-like movemet in a game like this.

The promised post-release "multiplayer campaign" feature has still not arrived.

Does anyone still believe the devs when they promise this? They've promised us multiplayer campaign in patches ever since Shogun, but they've never delivered.

The whipfist is actually really useful for many things, and was one of the two combat powers I used the most (the other being the blade). It does reasonable damage against single targets, but can also be used (when upgraded) to take out any human foes within a respectable radius in one hit. It also lets you keep your distance in boss fights, something that can be tremendously important. You can just jump around while taking shots at the boss, leaving it hard for it to hit you back since you keep moving at a distance. You can also use it to grab a target at a distance and get it close so you can consume it without having to chase it down. It's a simple way of taking down choppers, either by grabbing them and dragging yourself up to them to be hijacked, or just to destroy them at a distance (takes 1-2 hits). Using the whip, you can keep yourself airborne indefinitely as long as there is a chopper nearby to hijack, and even if you are falling from an exploding chopper you were just sitting in.

There's probably more stuff you can do with it as well, but I either don't remember it or I've never attempted it. The powers in this game are really flexible.

Empty words. Activision knows that if they cut support for the PS3 and the PSP, the only ones that are going to be blamed are themselves, not Sony. Of course, given the rest of the things the company has been doing lately, they might not think public support is a worthwhile concern.

It's just one of their standard threats. They couldn't hit Hawaii even if they wanted to, since their long-distance rockets can't reach that far (yet).

I can't wait to get me some of that free health care. 

I love arguing with stubborn, near-sighted people. Whoever said anything about free? It's just paid for in a scaling way through regular taxes (that will become larger. There's really no way around that without cutting other things. As I said, it's not free). And since it's a tax, it's distributed more evenly among the income scale, allowing even the poorest of the poor or the unluckiest of the unlucky to enjoy the benefits of health care without becoming personally bankrupt.

Next time I recommend at least pretending to have listened to the argument that has been going on before your post before, you know, posting?  

I can understand game companies struggling to release games of similar quality on both the 360 and the PS3 when this generation was new, as the PS3 was a bitch to learn to code for. At this point however, there's no excuse (particularly since the PS3 has become much easier to code for and has received a lot more documentation). If the PS3 version looks worse, that's only because of laziness.

Sounds like they might have realized that they bit over more than they could chew with their promise to add one expansion per year. At the moment they can barely even release patches every three months. By releasing a larger book in the fall, they're hoping to give us some of the expansion experience without actually releasing an expansion (I guess this is where their promised level cap increase will show up. Perhaps it'll only be 5 levels this time).

Let's just hope this doesn't mean we have to wait until fall 2010 to get to Rohan.

Why do you have to turn on the shield, or do you?  Is there a reason to not have it on?

I haven't seen anything conclusive, but I've been getting the impression that Blackwatch soldiers will open fire on you if they see you wearing any kind of obvious mutation.

Have you noticed that there is no way to gently put a civilian back down and apologize for the inconvenience?  I'm just going to say, with the club-hands enabled, "Y" is not that button.

I've noticed. It's a great and harsh way of telling you that this isn't a game for nice people. If you happen to pick up the wrong person by accident... well, too bad. Guess that person dies.

I agree that change won't happen this time (but the seed of revolution has been sown), but there have been demonstrations and rioting in several different cities, not just in the capital.

Leaning towards Fallout 2, so I fired it up this afternoon to test out my hi-res mods and ran through the first temple area.  When I missed the Lesser Scorpion for about the 20th time and it killed me (again), I found myself wondering if I have the patience for something like this right now.  Will have to ponder a bit...

Fallout 2 is infamous for its horrible opening section. Just force yourself through it, and you'll find the rest of the game isn't like that at all.

Before I started playing, a guy at work was complaining about that first hunter fight, saying that you had to throw ammo crates at the tanks, which sucked because of all the hunters.  Knowing this, I was apprehensive going into it.  I tried to throw a crate or two, and said to hell with that.  Tried to claw them to no avail.  Then I remembered the rocket launchers, which did the job nicely.

The next day I told him how I'd done it, and he said that grabbing the launchers was too much of a pain.   

I went through that fight and thought the same thing- the Hunters seemed to pounce and knock them out of my hands just as would pick one up, plus I wasn't use to the controls yet and it seemed like I was always overshooting them.  alos, with the auto parkour the indoor combat portions (2 so far- the one mentioned and one later on inside a hive) are a pain in the ass as you may find yourself accidentally running up a wall, making yourself an easy target as you try to keep a lock on a target and move at the same time.

You can deal with the tanks by running on top of them while slashing. That's what I did, at least. Just do a few passes, and the tanks will be gone, and you don't have to let the hunters catch up with you this way.

that actually pleases me that there are so few,i had a hard time with a mission at the beginning,where i had to destroy 6 gas cylinders or something(inside a military base) while lots of Hunters were raining down on me(i remember it going slow motion on me at points in that fight as well)...i don't think that was a boss fight,so if i am having a hard time with that part...the few main bosses are a blessing

Actually, that IS the first boss fight. You'll know you've been through a boss fight when you get a trophy/achievement for it (and they specifically mention that it was a boss fight as well). It was pretty brutal at the time as you didn't really have any room to calm down your nerves, but other boss fights sometimes let you retreat to areas of relative and temporary safety so that you can get some health back and plan your next move. You'll have an easier time with the next boss, but the one after that is probably going to kick your ass at first.

A small tip: If you find yourself getting overwhelmed with enemies during a boss fight (and in any other fight, for that matter, though in a boss fight it is way more important that you focus on the boss instead of the mooks), pull out a devastator attack. Those usually clear the immediate playfield of smaller enemies and take a large chunk out of the boss as well if you're lucky.

I'd say you should definitely play Fallout 2. The others you mention are great games, but they just can't measure up to the glory that is Fallout. The first few hours are rough to get through, but stick with it and you'll suddenly realize why everyone becomes so enthusiastic when the game is brought up.

Man, this game just keeps pushing the right buttons with me. I had to stop playing for the day (after about 8 hours of near constant gameplay) when I hit a particularly hard mission that requires some patience, but the game is never frustrating. Even when you come across really dangerous opposition, you're so powerful that you can just find a bunch of weaker enemies and really destroy them. I've walked into military bases and killed about a hundred people inside without even breaking into a run, just casually walking up to them and tearing them apart slowly and carefully, letting their friends witness the whole gruesome deal while they barely even dent my armor. Satisfying!

You sometimes get into situations where you have to help one faction against the other, which gets complicated once you realize that even though you're trying to help, your "allies" will still try their hardest to kill you. One particularly fun situation had me infiltrating a defensive operation in the military, defending a vehicle standing still at an intersection while wave after wave of mutant hunters jumped over the walls. I quickly had to abandon my costume, instead opting for heavy armor and a blade for an arm. We pushed back about two waves of hunters before one of the soldiers called out over the radio: "What the fuck is that? That isn't one of ours! Open fire!". I managed to slaughter a few soldiers who fired at me until they got too distracted by another wave of hunters and decided to leave me alone for the time being. You're never quite safe in this game, and the pacing is relentless and fun.

There are only five or so boss battles in Prototype, but they're incredibly intense with an insane amount of stuff going on all at once. Because the game goes into slow-motion for a second or two every time you target an enemy or bring up the radial menu, the battles also tend to get very cinematic.

I'm sure you can tell by now that I really like this game. This is everything inFamous should have been but wasn't.

There's only one way you can be "nice" and get rewarded for it in the game. There's a trophy/achievement called Nice Guy, with the text: "Complete the game while consuming 10 Civilians or fewer". I definitely won't qualify for that one. I regularly pick up 3-5 civilians as a snack between battles.

I'm enjoying this game a lot. It just clicks with me. Where in inFamous I went from frustration to annoyance to frustration, I'm just having fun all the time in Prototype. I think I'm about halfway through the story, but I've got tons of side missions to do. So far I've been having a lot of fun just attacking or infiltrating military bases and destroying hives. I just got the ability to hijack helicopters as well, which is also very fun.

Rolling down a busy street with a tank while dozens of cars drive around on the screen, desperately trying to steer away from you, and hundreds of people run away in panic, is just awesome! The lack of detail in the graphics is more than made up for in the sheer amount of stuff going on at any one time. The place really feels like a city.

If you're ever in a situation where you're unsure whether the site you're on should be asking for your username or password for something else, try logging in with completely random data. If the site accepts your login, it's a scam site (for obvious reasons). If it doesn't accept the data, that doesn't necessarily mean that it's safe though, as it might be rerouting your login info to the actual system after storing it for its own purposes.

Never played it but I know it has quite a following in my city. BTW Isn't this the world that the Warhammer Online MMO is set in?

Well... sort of. The devs will tell you that yes, this is the world their game is set in. The truth is slightly more complex.

Warhammer has always consisted of two systems: Warhammer Fantasy Battle (WHFB, the miniatures game with massive armies clashing against each other) and Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (WHFRP, the roleplaying game). Traditionally, the settings for these two games have been different. In WHFB, the world was brighter and more heroic, with the leaders of great nations heroically leading charges into enemy formations while riding on griphons, dragons, or similar creatures. In WHFRP, the world was darker and more corrupt. The same leaders that were heroic in WHFB were probably corrupt and in league with chaos here, and if they tried to go anywhere near a griphon it would probably bite their arms off (and dragons are pretty much extinct).

Then WHFRP 2nd edition came along and mixed things up a bit. It took elements from both settings and attempted to merge them without removing too much of the essence of either. It was generally considered a success, particularly because it left things open enough that fans of either setting could ignore most of the other one and retain the tone of the game they wanted.

Still, even with the merging taking place in 2nd edition, the setting used in the MMORPG has little in common with WHFRP, either edition. It's almost exclusively based on WHFB, something that is particularly evident in the way everyone is a hero (for their faction) of great power even at the beginning, the world is (mostly) black and white, and magic and monsters are very high-fantasy (flashy and powerful) where WHFRP is decidedly low-fantasy (or dark fantasy, a sub-genre of low-fantasy that is hotly debated by some).

Just so that I don't confuse you too much though: Geographically, the two settings are pretty much identical (with a few minor changes). Many of the same NPCs are present in both settings (though they may be dramatically different from their counterpart).

I also predict that someone is going to charge into this thread and accuse this post of being hopelessly wrong. That's a problem with Warhammer: The fans can't really agree about what the setting really is. It's too muddled in its own complexities and editions by now. The explanation I've typed above is simplified.

okay i have printed up the page that it takes you to

imagine this:
a friend sends you a url in an xbox live message...you trust this friend or you have no fears about the actual message being fake

you go to the url
you get this page
[snip...]

after you see that page,would it put you off?...sure you can see there are differences but would you stop and examine it all?..it even has a advert for Avatars!!

Yes, it would put me off. Not because there's anything wrong with the layout (that's not what you should be looking for. Scammers are good at copying other sites' layouts.), but because you're on a non-Microsoft site that asks for your Xbox login name and password. Any time this happens, the chance that it is a scam is EXACTLY 100%. I would be slightly more understanding if the url was cloaked, but it isn't.

Yes, everyone can make mistakes on the internet. I mean, the place can be damned confusing. Still, the tricks used for phishing have been well documented in the media, and this particular one is right at the top of the list of common ways to do it.

There is a reason why most sites these days will inform you that they'll never ask for your password under any circumstances (except for logging into the main site, of course. Even then, you should type in the url yourself instead of following a link).

My conclusion for a danish mag (it's translated from danish so dont bother pointing out spelling mistakes )

After spending nearly 20 hours together with inFamous it's physically strenuous to change to Prototype. While Sucker Punch's game offered a sharp setup, awesome story, great presentation and most importantly fantastic controls - Radical's slow competitor is instead a mushy mish-mash of rotten ingredients. Prototype is ugly, stiff, boring and oftentimes irritating. The controls are lacking, the enemies are unimaginative and the graphics are extremely mediocre. Compared to Crackdown and the above-mentioned inFamous, this game is a joke.


As you can read i didnt like this at all. It's like the old spiderman games just worse and with a uninteresting main character.

That's funny, it's like you're describing inFamous. It's ugly and stiff (particularly when it comes to animations), it's oftentimes irritating (more than 50% of the time, I'd say). The controls aren't just lacking, they're atrocious. Because there's no context detection for your actions, you'll usually struggle to actually accomplish the moves you're trying to do. About 9 in 10 deaths I suffered in inFamous happened because the controls wouldn't cooperate. The enemies are unimaginative, and I can hardly even remember what they look like now that I think back on them. The graphics are extremely mediocre, with fog that obscures anything more than a few buildings away and jaggies that make it hard to discern any kind of fine detail.

I'm actually amazed that people are still being fooled by these simple phishing scams. If someone sends you a link to a site that requires some kind of login information from you, this should trigger every alarm bell in your head. If it doesn't, then perhaps being scammed is just what the doctor ordered.

I can hear Max Payne's inner monologue already:

"Outside the sun was shining, mocking the dark, wet hole where my heart used to be."
"Pale blue waves crashed against the shore in a desperate attempt to escape the monotony of the ocean, but were pulled back within moments. The deathly white sand would have none of it."

Man, noir is so easy to write, yet it always becomes so cheesy. I can't wait. 

Wow, I have no idea why I missed that. I didn't even catch it on my second read through your post, and had to use Find in Page. 

and I haven't logged into LotrO for about a week...
Ugh.

And why is that a bad thing? As I mentioned earlier in this thread, I think we all collectively need to get out of the mindset that a MMORPG needs to be played all the time. Taking a break (even for months at a time) is healthy. LOTRO is also great at supporting this kind of playstyle (well, except for a change that's coming to housing in the next patch which means that if you go for weeks at a time without paying upkeep, you'll end up having to pay 90% of your house's value to get it back. That's a lot of gold).