Leaves on the wind

[sigma7]

Ah, the November gaming rush. Brilliant time of year. I'm going to give Modern Warfare 2 and the finally-released-for-PC Force Unlimited a pass for a while, opting instead for Dragon Age: Origins -- which I'm enjoying the hell out of so far. If you've read anything about it, odds are they've been raves, so let me just nod in assent: it's from BioWare, the people who brought us some of the best CRPGs out there, and the closest analogue one can find to describe this would be that it's a Baldur's Gate -- with all the story and gameplay and richness that implies -- for the modern gaming market. And if the idea with that fills you with joy (or just intrigue), get it now. Its mechanics and systems and conventions will all seem familiar, but pleasantly so, and that's what you need to know most.

On the other side of the killer-rig stick, I found myself playing Gratuitous Space Battles and...you know, this game snuck up on me and infiltrated my mind in a hurry. Simple premise: you build a fleet of ships to defend after waves of incoming attacks, you configure and allocate and deploy the ships, give them orders, then allow them to engage -- at which point you're powerless, forced to just sit back and watch the AI crews do the best they can with what you've given them. And as you watch you start bouncing between Serenity's Operative yelling "Somebody fire!" and Star Trek's Nero: "Fire everything!" It's a bit of the digital addictiveness of a tower-defense game and a ton of customizability and eye-candy, and with enough real strategy that I'm still...not as far along in the campaign as I'd like to be, let's just say that. (And the automatic ship names are customizable -- I've replaced them with a thousand names from the NaNoWriMo generator, so a good number of ships are named after Space Mutiny protagonists and theoretical members of the Wu-Tang Clan.) Like Dragon Age: Origins, if this is the sorta thing you think you might like, you'll probably love it (I'm looking at you, kansel01). But don't take my word for it. Try the demo.

In other news, today cannot end soon enough. And tomorrow can wait a while.

Comments

[lady-findel.livejournal.com]

We got Dragon Age: Origins the day it was released here, mostly for me. I really dig it, though I have only been able to play it for an hour. As it is installed on Roy's laptop, I don't have access to it all the time, but I hear Roy has been enjoying it as well.

[daethkow.livejournal.com]

That game looks brilliant. Did you grab Blood Bowl? I can't remember?

[sigma7.livejournal.com]

Yup. Haven't played it in a while -- I'm getting attached to my players again, and that's always the kiss o'death. And real-time mode is about a thousand times easier than turn-based mode. But it can get downright hilarious.

[daethkow.livejournal.com]

I'm contemplating a new laptop, and for some reason the thought of playing Civ IV or GSB on a tablet appeals to me. It seems so very ... Star Trek ... or maybe Battle of Endor. It's, very likely, a trap.

Problem is none, and I mean NONE of the tablet PCs is really worth a damn for gaming. The closest is the HP with the dual core Turion that Best Buy online is carrying, but the Radeon has no (significant) onboard memory. There's another HP with the i7 processor and a GB of dedicated video RAM which is probably the front-runner right now.

[sigma7.livejournal.com]

The only thing that detracts from the space-tablet feeling is the inability to give orders mid-battle. Me, I enjoy that part -- keeps me from micromanaging, which is a very powerful moral, I think; it makes the game a good potential leadership tool. But I do need to install it on one (or all...) of the touch-screens at work to give it a real run for its money. I get the feeling there are a ton of tactical-level games that'd really benefit from the more tactile interface. Probably not great for, say, Modern Warfare 2.

But I'm finding the touch-screens are spoiling me -- I move from that lab to another and I immediately start wanting to poooooke the screen. In fact, it's slowly starting to become my default method of interacting with the world. It's a good thing I don't spend time with people much anymore.

[kansel01.livejournal.com]

I might get around to either of those. I just finished Dark Star One (cheap bundle on Steam). It was... anticlimactic. There were some killer missions but the end was just so much meh.

I actually had to build a 2nd killer rig over the summer because I got addicted to the Steam games which won't run (or even install properly) on my main rig. Very inexpensive AMD X2 2.5 (or .6?) with 2gb of good ram and a midsize 250gb hdd. The video courtesy of my main rig's inability to render more than 3' of real estate from Liberty City... so it'll play pretty much anything except for GTAIV.

Anything, as it turns out, is Torchlight. The problem with Steam is that after each play session it shows me all the cool new specials. Some at ridiculous prices. Some at ridiculously low prices (DS1 and pretty much all the indie games out there). Some with such a damned compelling demo that I just have to throw $20 at the monitor. Torchlight takes all the good of Diablo (and other action RPGs) and tosses almost all the bad away. WOW it's fun. Only three classes, but instant action and semi-random level generation, outstanding (though cartoonish) graphics, and sound by the maestro from Diablo. The sweet thing about Torchlight? It runs reasonably well on almost any modern hardware. They even included a 'netbook mode' (basically shuts down all the graphic bells and whistles).

It seems to be some kind of sequel to the Fate franchise. I never played Fate so I tracked down a demo and it refused to install on my laptop because apparently a newer version of Fate was already installed? Fate does share a lot of the same principles as Torchlight (or I guess that should be the other way round), though Fate feels more Rogue-like in its dungeon creation whereas Torchlight is more like Diablo.

[sigma7.livejournal.com]

Torchlight, eh? I enjoyed Sacred -- never got around to the sequel, and that seemed to be the closest we've come to a sequel so far, though I know D3's worming its way down the pipe. I did install D2 a while back and, ungh, it hasn't held up very well. I may look into Torchlight, though....

[endersgame3.livejournal.com]

one of these days, i'll have to buy a current system. so i can game up to date.

although i do love getting games for only $20 all the time since i'm a generation behind. decisions decisions...

[sigma7.livejournal.com]

You see, if I were closer, I'd offer to assemble a system for you, then leave it on your doorstep with a little red bow on it or something. At least take the labor out of the equation.

But I'm getting disgruntled, especially in terms of sports games for PC...no more licensed college sports games at all, Madden's on indefinite hiatus, other features are getting conveniently omitted...the PC's best for real-time strategy and graphics-intensive first-person shooters, but past that, it's getting marginalized, and that saddens me. Seems like it'd be more cost efficient to get a netbook and an Xbox 360, and that's a depressing thing to admit....

But yeah, back to the topic, I think GSB should run on an older machine. Lemme see if I can...appropriate a similar machine. For testing purposes, of course.