Pete, the head of Arkham is now the mayor of Gotham and it's three months and change later. Aside from that and multiple references to the overall plot of the original (Titan drug), you're good to go picking this up.

I'm slowly getting back into the cobat routine and increasing my skills. It's absolutely vital to up your melee defense right from the start so you can last longer. Bullets can wait, but melee is important. I've also upped the critical hits skills and now I'm just wailing on the criminals. Overall, I'm enjoying the heck out of it.

But...

The go anywhere aspect is, surprisingly, not well suited to this story. Part of the greatness of Arkham Asylum was the go anywhere aspect because it was confined to a limited space. Blow that up to the size of this game and you lose one of AA's greatest strengths - focus. You always knew where you were going and what you had to do. Beating criminals to a pulp while en route to your goals was icing on the cake. But in AC, if you want to chase down Zasz you can do that. Oh look, Riddler prize! Hey, what's that over there? WHEEEEE!!! It's a case of focus versus a case of ADD. Again, I'm really liking AC but the mass expansion is, ironically, not working in its favor.

Also, a guy online calling himself Film Crit Hulk (great in character film writer) did a scathing critique of the gross sexism in the game. I have to agree with him and I guess the other game journos are so numbed to that aspect of gaming that they just ignored it. But Hulk made several good points, namely that this was nowhere to be found in AA but it's everywhere in AC. What's the point?

Regardless, I'm enjoying the game for the most part but not grabbing me quite the way AA did.

on 360

This.

Played through both games Pete. Crysis 2 is a basic on the rails shooter with some cool atmospherics whereas Crysis allows for far more improvising on the fly. It's more fun too overall.

Awesome.

I agree with Tilt. The Delta difficulty is just awesome on several levels. Also Crysis is far more focused than Far Cry 2 was. I loooooooved Far Cry 2 but you could go just about anywhere in it and do something. Crysis does confine you to specific areas that open up as the story advances. For example, you can't get to where the tanks are right at the start. I'm seriously thinking about DLing this now.

My dad and I got the chance to see and hear Ken Burns last month when he came to town promoting this. We heard some insights into his process as well as a lot of golden stories of the era. The tale of the Washingtonians alone is going to knock you guys out. Also the punchline on what happened to the lady who actually enforced Prohibition is a howler.

I may have a solid amount of free time tonight so I'm going to try to light up the last section or so of Dead Island. Wound up in an impromptu game with three others about two nights ago and we blew through so many quests I didn't even know where I was at by the time we finished. We had soooo much fun it was ridiculous. Still totally loving on this game and it will absolutely be the only thing I play between now and Arkham City... which its the week after I come back from a long vacation to the east coast. Booyah.

Pretty much playing Dead Island until Arkham City hits.

Alright so my PC has started crashing lately. Boots up fine and I get to the desktop no worries. Then a black screen with the normal startup text only this time it says Disk Boot Failure. Please insert system disk and press enter. WTF?

Who's down for some zombie slaying on 360? If you're on, join me. My mic doesn't work so I'm not being rude or ignoring you.

Ok, so the first two were great and this one is... a rip-off of Man on Fire?

A couple of missions are like that. For example, Nolan wants two gas cans from the southern station. You don't have to fill them up, just pick them up and you're GTG. Didn't realize that at first.

I agree that this was rushed. It's like it was 75 to 80% of the way there (maybe even 85%) but they had to get it out because people were demanding it based on that trailer. The trailer was so freaking good that people had to play the game right now. I think if they'd held the trailer until just before E3 (or released it during) then they'd still have enough of a window to push the release to this coming February or even March. I think then the game would be mush stronger and tighter as a result.

Oddly, I have less of a problem with this is they do go the Deus Ex route. But if they go the God of War route FPS-style then yeah, fail. But if the main character has ballpoint pens strapped to his arms that he swirls around and kills people with while screaming "ACQUIRE!" I think I'd love it.

Has anyone started over to try a different build?  I'm playing with Xian, but I think my build sucks.  Is there a way to reset talents?

I'm playing the rapper guy and no there is no respec option. I'm fine with the skills I've chosen thus far, and just got the option to death-stomp zombies when they're on the ground. You aim for the head and crush it with a stomp and it RULES. Also, there's no shortage of blunt instruments around which are this guy's specialty and beating a zombie to death with a shovel is just awesome. But it WAS great throwing a sickle into a zombie's face, then as the zombie charged me again I ripped the sickle out and decapitated him with it.

Yeah, I'm going to be playing this one for a loooooong time.

You're completing challenges and achievements for starters. For others, it costs money to repair your equipment, not to mention upgrade and enhance things. Completing quests nets you way more cash, and every so often if you really look for them you can find cash registers with a couple hundred in them. Should be fine for everything, though I have no idea how expensive the bigger upgrades are later in the game.

Personally, I'm just having too much fun exploring and hunting for people to rescue while dodging zombies. But I find it interesting that as the rapper (heavy, blunt weapons) I can spam the kick move and take out a group of zombies without much effort. It may take longer but it a) doesn't draw from your stamina which is an odd choice, and b) saves wear/tear on your weapons for when you need them (thugs for example).

It's an interesting game. Some wonky design moves, not a lot of ways to guide you, some glaring bugs (see above), but overall I really like the immersion and the atmosphere. Everyone in the game feels appropriately desperate, several are trapped and need help, and you never know when a zombie is going to attack from behind. The addition of the weapon mods and degradation demand a cautious strategy, and I'm not even close to going into the city yet. The game may lose steam after a while but for right now I'm totally digging it.

FYI - If you haven't already solved it, the guy who needs "just one more bottle of alcohol" in the center of the bungalos takes like 15 bottles and the game never tells you that. Something to consider - he is a raging alcoholic.

I also don't like how it's tough to find the people who call in on the radios. Then again that may just be because so many games have coddled us for so long that I can no longer think for myself and work the problem intelligently. Hold my hand dammit!!!!

Alright slight problem. In the early going you can go down some sets of stairs to restrooms. When you try to come back up you hit an invisible wall and can't climb out. The only way I've found around that is to go right up to where the "wall" is then crouch and try to force your way up. Grrr.

Planning on really focusing on Dead Island tonight. After raiding luggage for an hour like a TSA agent I moved on and explored some. I really want to devote three or four hours in a row to it. It seems like Dead Rising combined with Fallout only wonkier.

I'm playing this on 360 and I've now raided so much luggage that I feel comfortable working for the TSA. 

Didn't game a heck of a lot but what I got in was wrapup on LA Noire. Going for the film canisters now and once I've got those I'm done with it. After that I may take a gaming break for two to three weeks until Dead Island hits. Maybe I'll read a book or something. I heard those were good timesinks.

Win.

Dead Island on PC will be my next purchase. Then Arkham City for 360, followed by AssCred Revelations-But-Not-Really.

Im halfway through Ch. 4 now on PC and I like it. Much better and faster paced than the first one. Also while there are some fetch quests, it's not as blatant as the first game. I loved the opening in the straight jacket as all hell breaks loose and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. Also the ending of Ch. 2 on the train is more exciting than anything in the first game.

Well played EA. Well played.

My two favorites were The Unnatural (which showed off such a pure love of baseball and of life itself that it should be required viewing for all would be tv writers) and Triangle which I consider one of the best episodes of anything ever.

It'd be hilarious if the DK Returns skin also had a lower stamina attached to it. Also it be funny as hell watching a bunch of fatass Batmen in MP wailing on each other.

I just restarted this and I never realized how many small details they throw out right at the beginning which pay off later. Like the low voltage potato.

This is also the only movie probably ever where I realized that I missed Megan Fox.

Saw it this weekend. Wow. I was amazed at the level to which you need to retard yourself to enjoy this as some online critics have. While I immediately discount AICN for the shills/hacks/buffoons they are, there are other critics I like who seem to have fallen under Bay's spell. I can appreciate how Bay's reality is that the world of Victoria's Secret ads apparently has giant robots in it. I also can appreciate how the man has completely given up on subtlety. There's zero present here. People are either good or bad, cars are either $200K a pop or the shittiest ride ever, all the women are VS model quality save for Sam's mother, etc. It's just beyond ridiculous which is saying a lot considering the standards Bay sets.

That being said, here's what I liked:

- Shockwave was scary as hell and done absolutely right. I love how he basically speaks Cybertronian the whole film and is easily the best villain they've had in the series.
- Soundwave looked awesome too and it was nice having his original voice too.
- Laserbeak was one of the freakiest, scariest images in the series and if there are little kids in the audience (and we saw several) there's no way they aren't seeing that thing in their dreams for at least a week.
- Sentinal Prime - say what you will about the character, but Nimoy put in his all and gave a genuinely good performance.
- The scale of the action was, as noted above, ridiculous. Bay also held the shots for longer than usual and staged the action much better than in part two. As a result, the action was no longer confusing despite running way too long.

What I didn't:
- Everything else.
- Why the hell do the Autobots only have Scottish assholes on their side? Between the Wreckers and the plane from part 2 (you know, the one in the National Flight Museum in the middle of DC that also backs up to an open field somehow) I'm convinced they have no other nationality.
- That is until the ninja and old scientist Autobots showed up and by that point I just accepted that Bay was being an asshole to the audience on purpose. No one can accidentally be that stupid.
- Prime getting caught up in the wires at the end and needing the Wreckers to cut him loose DESPITE THE FACT THAT HE'S GOT AN ENERGY AXE IN ONE HAND AND A FREAKING LAZER SWORD IN THE OTHER!!!
- The endless talking between characters I don't care about until they got to the plot about an hour in.
- John Malkovich. What. The. Hell. "WHY IS SHE USING A CUP FROM THE RED FLOOR?!?!" 

Jesus wept, this film was stupid. Here's hoping Captain America rules.

Happy birthday amigo!

Got Dungeon Siege 3 to review but with family here who knows?

Probably going to try to burn off Crysis 2. I'm halfway through and still have no idea what the Hell the point is. Maybe throw in some LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean which is actually really damn good.

Rittchard, you now have a challenge from moi at Prose with Bros! HAVE AT THEE, KNAVE!

This seriously looks like way more fun than WWF. I'm on there as whiteboyskim if anyone else wants to have a go.

Plan to finish off Fable 3 ASAP then dive into Crysis 2. Might do another case in LA Noire or I might just wait on that for a bit.

I'm surprised nobody posted in this thread about the Far Cry 3 footage that was shown during UBI's press conference on Monday. The game looks great and the gameplay seems to be seriously bad ass if not seriously brutal. I liked FC2 and this looks to be using the same game engine. Definitely a game I'll at least be renting when its released.

I agree. I raved about Far Cry 2, probably more than I should given the relatively simplistic primary story, but that game did immersion well. This one looks to be the same, although I still believe that Ubi couldn't write convincing dialogue for this series if someone held guns to their heads. But the visuals look astounding, and I'm hoping it's as fun as it looks.

Watched the launch trailer. This would have been awesome five years ago. Now it looks like it's been on the shelf for that long. Eh. I'm curious to see the achievement list more than anything else.

Personally, I think the first trilogy sucked hard enough that a second is unwarranted. I realize that mine is the minority opinion in this regard.

I have no idea as I've been dealing with a vomiting two year old for a few days now. Diagnosed this afternoon by the doc as having strep. He got a shot for the infection and some meds for the vomiting so in theory he should be fine to sleep through the night tonight. Good timing on having plenty of time this weekend to get healthy. Bad news?

The likelihood of me getting any significant gaming in ain't great. Ahh well.

since MO isn't keeping up on his topics here's some gameplay: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05i3cOY51tw&feature=player_embedded 

LOL. One of the achievements is "Cardio." Hahahahaha.

I'm still not even through year two in the original.