onnel#1137

Yes and yes.  May just be my favorite paradox game.  If you enjoyed the original, get this.  The family stuff is such a nice addition and really adds a great roleplaying/storytelling element to the game.  My brother and i have also been having great luck with pretty much rock solid 2 player multiplayer (both on broadband) which is fantastic.  4 thumbs up (2 being my brother's).

Is a fifteen minute wait from launch to main menu normal, or an indication the game isn't playing nicely with my system?

On my laptop, I find I have to set the affinity of the program to a single CPU and then it is *much* happier.

To do this, right click the ck2.exe process in Task Manager or use the windows "start" app - http://blog.tune-up.com/windows-insights/assign-processor-affinity-to-improve-performance/.  Not sure how well "start" plays with steam shortcuts, however.

Agreed..I really wish they'd finally update their technical work (the multiplayer setup is horrific - straight from the 80s), but the actual game play is oh so sweet.

Feeling a bit stalled...I'm up to the butterfly boss in the garden, but don't feel confident taking it alone and also working my way in to blight town, but it's still pretty nasty for me (I'm level 28).

I'd love to get some help for the butterfly, but even as human I don't find any summon signs around (and the NPC one is now gone...can you only access NPC summons once?).

Any thoughts on where I should go/what I should do?

What server?  Is the guild active?

A

Forget about having backbone and join OO's carebear guild.

It's all good...I kind of expected it because we were already so thin in people.  I'll see if I find another group to run with, but will definitely stick around until then.

Seems like the guild is about dead with only two of us logging in lately. 

I guess I'll start looking for another guild.

You gotta problem with guys playing healers? 

One of those girls cracks me up because she plays a tank and her husband is the healer. 

Any of the skinners (I believe that's Hark and Onnel) have light leather to spare?

My alt skins..when I play her again I'll snag you some.

A

Yeah...game is a thousand times more enjoyable with a full guild group.  We need reinforcements who play regularly.

I'll try to enlist my brother.

Saw you on earlier Hark, but didn't notice any chat.  apologies if I seemed to be ignoring you.

Every time I talk in guildchat, nobody responds!

I'm in...a cleric named Malyvern.

What's the cheapest way to get everything for a new player?  Would I even need "everything"?

Search for the info on how internet connection speeds (especially upstream) effect performance in this game...it's likely the culprit anfd has nothing to do with the horsepower of your box.

A

Anyone got a tweak guide for this game? I got a pretty nice system and it runs everything else i play maxed out smooth. But this one is giving my system fits. theres tons and tons of choppy jerky in this game. Sound will lag and pop and the video stutters. Is there something in particular that i could turn down or turn off to fix it? Im getting through it but its frustrating. It's almost as if something is hogging all the computer's resources.

Sounds like the performance issues are definitely network related (low upload bandwidth specifically).

I'm going PC on this, is there a GT group I can get in on?

Any reason I should be swayed one way or the other?  I own both consoles but mostly use the PS3.  My laptop is pretty oomphy (fine for F4D2, for example), but I usually prefer action games on the console just for convenience.

Any great deciders one way or the other aside from price (much cheaper on the PC, yes?)?

trackIR is used to track head motion in racing games and flight sims (primarily) on the PC...it is fantastic in both.  when you drive for example, you don't look straight ahead, but rather in to the curve.

If this thing functions like a trackIR, then that will be a huge improvement for realistic console racing.

I mean, TrackIR functionality in Forza? That's awesome.

Not sure that would work for racing, but I could see it being good for something like boxing maybe. It could sense your movement to the side and adjust the view accordingly. But it would have to be more for lateral motion than something where you want to turn your head (car racing). Now motorcycles or jet skis might work.

Yeah..we're on PS.  We'd have to logoff/in and restart the game every time.  Silly design decision.  Don't they think people are likely to play together?

Loving DJ Hero but my wife wants to play on medium and I want to play on hard/expert.  I thought these kinds of games usually had a way of tracking which user was playing and keeping our progress & preferences separate...are we missing something?

Also, am I right that you can 5 star every song on easy and it counts the same as 5 starring it on expert as far as unlocking stuff?  What's the reward for playing the harder levels (other than self-satisfaction)?

Kick @ss..the wife and I are both enjoying it muchly after one night.  anything above medium is well..hard!

Is the sale over?  I see it listed at 189.  Boo!

Edit: Nevermind, that was for the normal not renegade edition.  IN!

Can we hide spoilers please (like treasure locations)

Anyways, its just sad that sex is the ONLY thing that sells these days...it screws up peoples minds as I see it

I'd MUCH rather have my children excited by sex than by violence.  Wish most of the US agreed, sadly.

As my trainer reminds me whenever I complain about not being strong enough:

More push ups, eat more meat, take more steroids!

In the case of MLB:The Show, I'm pretty sure it's just the sliders I'm use.  

Are you sure it's not because you are feeling too strong and thus dropping too low on your back leg  causing you to push the ball?  Have you been dogging it on the outfield sprints?  Slacking on the HGH?

I think I figured out the cause: I'm using a sliders set ("realistic"), and I think it lowers pitch speeds across the board.  The speeds listed in the scouting report are based on the default sliders and don't take user mods in to account.

This would certainly explain the "issue".

Behaviour seems to be the same whether you click and hold 9as you do) or "click...click" as I do.

I don't think that's it.  Thanks tho.

Aaron

EDIT: For the record, I seem to be doing it exactly as they suggest under "pitcghing tips" in the game.

I have a LR/starter and in their spiel at the beginning of a game they list my fastball speed at 91-97(!), yet i can never throw one above 90.  My pitch process is:

1. Select pitch then location.
2.  hit X to begin the pitch.
3.  hit X again when the slider is somewhere in the orange or so.
4.  hit X a last time when the slider is in the yellow "sweet spot"

Am I missing something?  how do I hit the pitch velocities they expect from me?  even maxing out to the red with the slider never has me throwing nearly that fast.

"Want some rye?  coure you do!"

kudos for the old Zork reference.  it was the4 first game my ex-wife and I played together and for years we would bandy those words about.  Good memories!

How do online leagues work?

My brother and I still dream of a game delivery a good online franchise mode and NONE of the modern era sports games delivers (for any sport from any developer). 

And for a lot of us who own both PS3s and 360s but are getting marginal value from our gold memberships (I only really play online with my brother who only owns a PS3), we'll be happy to no longer need a 360 gold membership!

Apologies, I've not used the PS3 version, because the 360 version I have now does exactly what I need it to.  I was going off of a brief skim of an article I saw about it.

I'm glad you're perfectly happy with your disc-based variant.  I'll be perfectly happy with not having to deal with that.

[Spoiler]

Was that HARD fight the

Spoiler for Hiden:

ogre near the top of the tower?  If so, any hints on how to beat it on HARD (by anyone who has) would be very welcome!

Does it perchance include all of the original levels along with the new ones?  Would be nice to have them available with the new features.

From what you wrote, it sounds like your friends are are the problem and not achievements.

In retrospect, that sounds much harsher than it was meant (sorry!)

I don't do them, but I've often seen some friends who are pretty obsessed with getting the achievements to the point of obvious frustration in their voices.  Playing a game for hours after they are obviously past the 'fun' point and trying desperately to get those last few points.  The concept of trophies and achievements is amazing and sometimes works very well.  More often than not though they are horribly designed and either pointless to get (see Avatar) or ridiculously unfun (too many to mention).

I love the ones that are slightly different and give you something interesting to do, like jumping on a critters head.  That one was simple, fun and didn't require great changes in the way I play.  One of my least favorite is games that have different achievements for different difficulty levels, and even worse when playing on Hard doesn't unlock the Normal achievements.

I'm not really anti-achievement, though I don't try to get them as a general rule.  I do get tired of friends who won't play a game with me because they are grinding out an achievement though, I be selfish like that

I assume the typo in the skin was intentional, no?

And another bit of fun....

Perhaps this will also add some pressure on microsoft to eliminate gold membership costs.  They certainly shan't see any more of my money.

I too shall not be renewing my gold subscription.  Goodbye MS!  I foresee my 360 getting a lot less use in the next year.

A

Any thoughts on the issue of EA having no sliders for online play?  How bad is it with no sliders?  Does 2K allow sliders to work online?

FWIW, I love sliders and generally vastly prefer sports games after they've been tweaked.

Umm..4 teams of 4 (1 PC + 3 AI) per side is 16  versus 16 = 32 total entities...same as on PC, only less real players and more AI.

according to Wiki:Multiplayer is 16 Vs 16 on PC...and only 4 Vs 4 on 360...however each online person gets 3 AI people as well,so what does that work out as?..3 x 8 is it?...24 players(AI and Human)..not bad i suppose

So can my brother and I play a franchise online - either playing together (both playing on the same team) or against one another (managing separate teams and only playing our games against one another online, playing other games offline)?  How about a BAP franchise shared online?

Can anyone give a hands on comparison of online leagues in EA and 2K this year? 

A