Now Gaming: ... Created 13 years ago2010-12-11 02:04:50 UTC by AJ

I have been attempting to start an evil character in Fallout 4 and it just cannot be done! The voice actor, Brian T Delaney, is just too nice a guy to pull it off. My character looks evil as absolute sin thanks to the in-depth character creation, covered in scars and markings with sunken, dead eyes. However, he sounds like my GOOD character woke up on the wrong side of the bed...

So I fired up Fallout New Vegas and modded the crap out of it to take the edge of the graphics, specifically the horrendous character models. Within minutes, it was so much easier to be a real nasty bloke.

Come on Bethesda. If you're not going to let Obsidian make another Fallout game, at least learn by their example!

Don't get me wrong, I love Fallout 4. I just can't replay as a new character. I'm just going to need to scour the entire map with my initial build.

I've been re-playing Fallout 3 using Tale of Two Wastelands. There were a few bugs involving missing voice lines, I got attacked when I went to Tenpenny Tower because I defused a bomb earlier in my playthrough (Maybe not the best use of the factions system from NV) and the combat was brutally hard at earlier levels (Don't even think about going to DC until you're level 12 and have plenty of ammo!) but I'm really having fun now that I've gotten my repair up enough for handcrafted ammo.

They also made a minor change to Operation: Anchorage that really opens up your possibilities during the DLC.

Might be worth looking into. Just the graphics overhaul alone has made New Vegas seem fresh again, not to mention that J Sawyer released a directors cut mod which I'm meaning to get hold of.

Obsidian Entertainment just seems to care a lot more for their projects and the true nature of RPGs. I must try out Pillars of Eternity at some point.

Been replaying recently RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 and it's extensions through OpenRCT2. The open-source implementation is well made and even feature a cooperative mode (imagine a TWHL amusement park managed by the whole TWHL community).

I finished Resident Evil 7 last weekend, I'm glad Capcom went back to the saga's root instead of releasing another tactical shooter.

Still haven't finished Dishonored 2 so I'm gonna to finish that too.

My son and I have been playing Astroneer. It's a hybrid between Minecraft and No Man's Sky. It's also known as "Yes Man's Sky" for that reason.

It's quite fun, if you are into exploration games.

Trailer

Finished Betrayal at Krondor last week, wonderful game despite its age. Lovely music as well, couldn't stop humming most of them for the longest time. Sad that the proper (Thief of Dreams) sequel never come to light.

Also going through the Doom mod ALT combined with WildWeasel's Police Brutality mod, so far so good, though some maps get REALLY confusing sometimes, with small buttons or obscure solutions. The gameplay mod on the other hand is all fun despite the lack of gibs, always fun to blast kinda-Wesker with a .50 cal sniper rifle that explodes on contact.

EDIT:

Been playing MoHAA with its expansions, modded it with some sound mods and MRW's weapon models, on Hard. Reached Breakthrough's Sicily part.

AA is still quite fun, the occasional stealth section breaks up the shooting monotony, Sniper Town was painful (despite that, I still managed to get atleast 6 guys alive), the Bazooka-Med minigame is fun when you're not cheating by going under the arch, Behind Enemy Lines is moody (though the Command Post map got REALLY tedious), Schmerzen forest was load-save city with how the fog covers half the aimbotting snipers, ending was sudden and not that great (seeing Schmerzen in flames was alright).

Spearhead is alright, the addition of leaning was a blessing, the sound mod that I'm using got me to overuse the Lee Enfield in the first mission (finding out that it combined with the leaning makes for a deadly weapon in ranges above CQC). Bastogne got a lil' bit hairy with the turret section, mostly since I'm supposed to not only cover the supply truck but also myself while the truck I'm on seem to really like juggling around throwing off my aim. Berlin is fun, it's basically Sniper Town if it doesn't suck.

Currently storming through Breakthrough, whoever thought it was a good idea to have enemies not drop ammo needs to get shot.

Shadow of Mordor

Picked it up again after a year and having a lot of fun with it. Cannot remember the plot or anything about the main characters at all. Somewhat forgettable.

What I do remember is Ogrush the Literate One, an Uruk who had killed me many times in the past, usually by calling in a bunch of his mates. He had grown to a ridiculously high power level that was causing me no end of trouble. I finally levelled up a bunch and unlocked a whole load of abilities that allowed me to carve through his entourage and lob off his ugly head.

The Uruk hierarchy is easily the highlight of the game and something I hope other RPGs implement in the future. It doesn't end the game when you die, but it does punish you in a pretty brutal way.

"Hey! You just tried to kill an Uruk captain who was way too powerful for you. Well guess what? He killed YOU. Now he's MORE powerful! Ha! BUT WAIT. Now that he is more powerful, he's taken out his superior in a dual and has gone up ANOTHER level! ...Boy you really fucked up, huh?"

Yeah... thanks game.

I played through that game mid-late last year for the first time. Was entertaining enough. I think I liked the Uruk hierarchy stuff, but everything else around it was a little dull.

And hey, there'll be a new one out soon enough.

Killed my nemesis from when I just started the game. He's now been replaced by a guy that's a hundred times more annoying...

I nipped back in there for a while just before and reaquainted myself with the controls and so forth. Discovered the only warchief I hadn't branded was one that was immune to combat and stealth finishers, and ranged attacks. So basically everything I could possibly do to him. After a little thought, I realized that I could (and pretty much had to) get another of the warchiefs to attack him with me, so he could do the dirty work for me.

Yeah. That game is pretty alright. I don't recall enjoying the story and progression of the game itself a whole lot, but this post-game mucking about is solid.

Urby and myself are channeling HL's HECU in Ghost Recon: Wildlands.

They actually added a face mask that looks a lot like the HECU gas mask:

It's a shame there's not one that has the solo filter on the left of the mask.

Sometimes I kind of miss Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine. With its wildly out of proportion and terribly polygonal level geometry.

That mask looks to be an M17 gas mask with an NBC hood, the HECU mask is most likely an M40.

I'm feeling really torn at the moment in terms of what to pick up. The more I hear about Mass Effect Andromeda and the general "cool to hate" attitude that seems to be the way these days, it sounds bad.

However, most of the critic reviews seem to rate it favourably, saying it gets much better as the story progresses. A lot of users are posting negative reviews as soon as the game unlocks in their region. This means they either haven't played it at all or are basing it off the first two missions from the trial.

(These same people scoff at paying for the game so as not to support EA / Bioware, though must be using EA Access to get access to said trial, so they're dropping monthly payments to EA regardless... derp?)

On the other hand, Tyranny / Pillars of Eternity have gotten a ton of praise and were developed by Obsidian with crowdfunding money. They actually care about their games and offer a proper CRPG experience where your choices impact the game world...

Gah!

Why do AAA game developers suck so much these days!?

One more hour and i get off work to play Mass Effect.

Like... the first one? Good choice.

Shepard. Wrex.

@Archie, whoever that shotgun guy is, I applaud them. It's pretty much a dead ringer for that guy.

Compliment accepted!

Ok so got about 10 hours of ME:Andromeda gameplay accumulated already.
So far i can't believe how no one in Bioware could have not noticed that the face animations are that horrible, like seriously guys has no one playtested the game before release?
The mechanics are more complex compared to previous games, but its probably for the best since i am not a person that likes tinkering around so much compared to what this game is targeted towards.
Nevertheless I am really enjoying it, the only 2 things that could be fixed are the eyes, the movement and the rendering feel unnatural and the skin in some areas looks pale and in some my character looks sunburned

Despite the fact that i don't play Andromeda i think the faces are avatar worthy

I've heard very mixed things. Enough to put me off paying full price for it. I've seen some conversations that look perfectly natural, nothing amazing in terms of facial animation but not bad enough that you notice. Then... there are other moments. The quality of the story and dialogue also seem to have taken a nose dive, again only in certain places.

But yeah, for the most part, the eyes... They really fouled up with the eyes. Far too large, the pupils are way too prominent and the upper eyelid just doesn't sit in the right place. Everyone looks constantly surprised and it's downright creepy.

Just look at this shit...

If I cared enough about Mass Effect to have a chance of playing it anyway (which I don't), I see and hear enough... weird things going on in these videos alone to make me want to observe from a distance.
https://www.giantbomb.com/videos/we-streamed-some-mass-effect-andromeda/2300-11931/
https://www.giantbomb.com/videos/quick-look-mass-effect-andromeda/2300-11936/

I think when they moved from UE3 to Frostbite this is the consequence we were left with

I dont know why they jumped ship on engines. UE3 to UE4 is pretty seamless

Probably because their publisher owns Frostbite and doesn't want any of their studios using anything else that might be an additional cost.

From what I've seen and heard, the issue with ME:A's animation seems like a mix of rushed development due to EA's business practices, a less experienced staff than the one that created ME1-3 (Being IIRC the first title from the Bioware Montreal office) and animation tech that doesn't quite act the way it's meant to when blending stuff together ingame.

Decided to take some before/after shots of Morrowind in regards to MGSO.

I'm waiting for Skywind so I can experience Morrowind for myself.

In the meantime, I fired up Duke Nukem 3D last night. Still an awesome game.

I've been playing Bloodborne! It's basically a faster paced version of Dark Souls. It's pretty good.

Dark Souls is one of those series of games I hear about but is of absolutely no interest to me... I assume they're good.

They can be very frustrating and punishing at times but that just makes it all the more satisfying when you make progress!

Still powering through Duke Nukem 3D. It's like catching up with an old friend ... and old abusive friend who kicks you in the nuts when you make a mistake. This game is tough!

Completed Nuclear Winter (Christmas expansion), Life's a Beach (Caribbean expansion), Duke it out in D.C. (Generic expansion) and two of the four chapters in the original game.

I think I always preferred Duke to Doom because it was set on Earth (mostly) and had a much lighter and pretty ridiculous tone.

I mean just LOOK at this shit. Haha!EDIT: Just fired my way through the third chapter of the main game. Only one left. I'm about to run out of Duke Nukem

Morrowind is still the bomb, even without mods! All you kids who started on Oblivion and Skyrim without ever playing Morrowind don't know what you missed...

I started on Oblivion, but never really got into it

Having looked at Morrowind, the combat looks too frustrating. This is why I am waiting for Skywind and though I've played Oblivion, Skyblivion just looks awesome as well.

Enjoying The Talos Principle. Good stuff.Egypt. Again. I have Serious Sam's voice as Elohim, and even he complained about it. I don't mind, I love the Egyptian look. No Gnaars or Kleers though... Serious Sam 4 pls?

Also, Penguinboy:The QR code next to Penguinboy is from someone named Strideh. What.

I was the first person of the people on my friends list to play The Talos Principle, so I wasn't even aware of the social stuff that shows up on my first playthrough ><
It's one of those great puzzle games though, up there with Portal and The Witness and such.

I don't think I've seen your name pop up on QR codes though, at least not 'Jessie'.

This is neat stuff. ^^

Also:Seems appropriate. Well played, game. ^^

Happy Easter!

Well, I just took the plunge and bought PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, and uh, this happened...

First try, no less! I hope I haven't ruined this for myself now, because I doubt it'll ever go that well again =P

Started off by heading a good way south of the starting plane's path hoping I'd be a good long way away from anyone else, to give some time to loot and acquaint myself with the controls. Worked a little too well, really. I moved inland a little and hunkered down between a wall and a sharp rise right next to it, and picked off a couple of people I saw running around. A nice, safe introduction to how the guns handled. First play area restriction, I was just inside on the south side, but the second moved it about as far north as it could possibly be, forcing me to just book it north as fast as I could and hope no-one would see me in the process. Luckily, I made it, and traded some suppressing fire with a fellow on top of a nearby hill. Fastforward a few minutes and another play area contraction and I see a fellow tearing up the hill I'm on in a small truck, quite possibly the same fellow from before. Shot him through the windshield a couple of times, and as he pulled around to get me, he got out of his car while it was going too fast and ran himself over. A little while later, it came down to me running from cover to cover (and getting shot at surprisingly little... not at all, really) in a increasingly small area. Walked almost on top of two people on separate occasions, took some hits both times but didn't go down. The second was in front of the tree I'm behind in the screenshot, but I'd heard some shots coming my way as I was running behind it. Came to a showdown between me and the fellow up the hill, and I got my shots first. So yeah. Good fun. The formula really works for this one.

If anyone picks this up, maybe shoot me a message. I'd like to experience this in a group.

I'm definitely interested in PUBG

Update: That first game win was definitely beginner's luck.

Update: That first game win was definitely beginner's luck.

Pahahaha

In other news, I see that people are now playing STRAFE. I've got to say, it looks like the most repetitive, bland game I've ever seen. If it's trying to emulate the shooters of the 90s... I'm not sure which shooters they were playing back then... None of the good ones, that's for damn sure.

Got to replaying Witcher 1 again, this time with an added challenge - use only torch as my weapon and use signs on stronger threats. Got halfway through act 3, Yrden turned out to be quite helpful in many fights, but not game breaking. Can't wait to deal with final bosses smashing a torch at their faces.

Already got an idea for Witcher 2 play through - use shovel as weapon, either on dark or sudden death difficulty.

Then do W3 with the wooden sword

Leave wooden sword for kids, real man fights with his bare fists! (pretty much doable in 2 too, but it's difficulty level is much more brutal than DeathMarch in 3, at least for me)

Edit: Also, an NG+ character in Dark Souls 3 waits to meet Soul of Cinder again. Man, that was a really memorable battle and hard battle. To think that I beaten the bastard 1on1...

Lots more Wildlands.

Is it a good game? Hell no.

Is it hilarious with 3 mates? Helllllllll yes.

Is it gorgeous? Yeaahhhh....

Top Clancy games seem to have a trend of being unbearable to play alone and impossible to take seriously with mates.

For that reason alone, they get a pass.

Cocaine.