The Video Game Thread

[Mary1966]

My level 46 (out of 50) Sith Sorcerer in Star Wars: The Old Republic:



It reminds me of variations of this:

[Mary1966]

http://venturebeat.com/2012/06/04/swtow ... semi-free/

During Electronic Arts’ media briefing at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), BioWare announced a handful of new features coming to Star Wars: The Old Republic, a massively-multiplayer online game based in the Star Wars universe.

BioWare co-founder Ray Muzyka took the stage to announce a handful of new features coming to the game, including the a new difficulty mode, a level cap increase, a new planet named Makeb, and a new species called Cathar. In addition, fan-favorite HK-51 will be available as companion.

“Over 1 million players logged in on day one,” said Muzyka, which made it the biggest MMO launch in history. No doubt the first month was a success, but the game has been through some rocky times since launch. They lost about 400,000 subscribers in roughly three months, and BioWare Austin, the studio behind the title, laid off staff in May.

In a move that may increase subscriber base, starting in July, SWTOR will be free-to-play until players reach level 15.

Ruh roh. Level 15 is not that far into the game. My Empire guild is dead, I am the only one left when I go online. They are promising server transfers, so I can switch to a new guild eventually. I'm guessing a lot of people left to go play Diablo 3.

[Maclowery]

Diablo 3 is a broken piece of garbage. So many major flaws. They clearly made it fun and accessible to the masses, not just all us millions of D2 addicts. I can't deny that it was very fun my first playthrough on normal difficulty.

Without going into paragraphs of hate, ill just say that I'm going back to the amazing MedianXL mod of d2, which is way more entertaining than D3. The fact that MedianXL is a fan mod of a 11 year old game, and is much more compelling, entertaining, and replayable than this giant dead rotting fish that is Diablo 3, is really a bummer.

I've been a Blizzard fanboy for fifteen years, and I'm done. They got tons of my money, they're happy. I got thousands of hours of fun from them (d1, d2, and wow, not so much d3). Ta ta for now Blizz, enjoy your pandas in wow and stupidly boring itemization in d3. While you're all swimming in money Duck Tales style.

[cards2468]

Bummer. Maybe it's bc I'm more of a casual gamer (played D3 twice in the past week), but I've really enjoyed the game thus far.

[TimeForGuinness]

http://www.humblebundle.com/

Bastion and Limbo are great, so far.

[Maclowery]

Both those games are awesome, hell ya. Love the bastion narrator. YouTube Bastion Narrator and you'll find a video where he narrates other games.

My drunk rant about d3 is pretty true to my feelings. They made an awesome accessible game that millionaof d2 lovers are already giving up on. Its terrific for casual gaming, for sure. But d2 took up literally thousands of hours of my gaming for 11 years. D3 I'm giving up on after 70. That's bad.

[TimeForGuinness]

I'm really scared to start playing Amnesia.

[JackofDiamonds]

I'm really scared to start playing Amnesia.

You'll forget about it quickly enough.

[TimeForGuinness]

http://www.humblebundle.com/

Bastion and Limbo are great, so far.

Updated to include Braid, Lone Survivor, and Super Meat Boy...plus you get all the music soundtracks.

[Swirls]

I hadn't played the new Batman games yet, so I traded in some older PS3 games that I no longer touched (CoD: BO, FF XIII, Catherine, etc) and got the GOTY editions of both the original Arkham Asylum and the new Arkham City. I finished the playthrough of Arkham Asylum this morning after I got home from work, and thought it was overall an excellent game. Obviously I'm nowhere near 100% complete after having only played it for a few days, but I'm like 70% or thereabouts.

I fired up the new Arkham City for a couple hours before I came in tonight, I have to say that it's absolutely terrific so far. The designers managed to keep all the cool things from the original game and make it even better for the sequel. I'm digging that the city appears to be completely open right from the beginning (at least so far) and having side missions that you can do. Plus having all of the Riddler Trophies actually require solving some sort of puzzle in order to pick up the trophy was a pretty neat addition as well.

Big fan so far.