Videogames: The Official Thread

[Locke]

gehrig someone at neogaf stole your identity

[WHITEBOYWASTED]

the vanilla is surprisingly complicated on its own and you can have a lot of fun but far and away the best (free) mod out there is prophecy of pendor. keeps enough of the base game while adding so, so much to it.

you can start as a penniless robber and basically can only ambush small small forces or kill farmers while running away from big armies, cultists and bigger thugs. from there you hire captured men, go to local villages and recruit, that kind of thing. if you get noticed by a faction or ask a leader with enough clout you can join with them on a mercenary basis, they'll pay you for killing their enemies and eventually you can become a full member with a small fief. you can build things in that fief too, to a more or less complicated degree depending on the mod. you can also buy stores in the big cities you'll be selling your loot to/finding cheap luxuries like wool or fur to sell for much more in southern locations.

eventually you can ask for more holdings, assault castles, then the huge cities and get a sizeable holding that you have to defend. if you feel like it you can usurp your faction leadership or start your own, convincing some of the other lords to come with you (who may or may not like you based on your noble or peasant upbringing).

PoP has some elveny crap going on but it's pretty smalltime in one forest and for the most part you don't fuck with them, you maybe once in awhile see a nice piece of their armor for sale or see a couple of their godly horsemen in a rival lord's army he has captured by chance. even with several hundred of the most well trained knights at your back you can get slaughtered by those bowy assholes.

but a large chunk of the game is riding around on a horse slicing people. it's a lot more fun than it looks, and I still don't know why. but yeah it can get more complicated certainly

almost all of this is in the basic game, though, isn't it?

like, i definitely started out as a penniless chump who could only tangle with tiny groups of bandits, recruited from captives and villages, got my reputation up to the point where i could work for a brain-damaged king, got a shitty fief from him that i can build improvements in, help him assault castles, etc.

what exactly are the advancements made in the mods? don't be afraid to be overwhelmingly specific -- i kind of want to decide whether i should stop playing the vanilla version immediately and install a mod (if the bonuses are worth it) before i get bored of the limited-but-still-awesome gameplay

and i agree there's something special about the battles. particularly when you're on horseback and using a polearm instead of a striking weapon. it feels so different from something like Dynasty Warriors, since the combat system breaks it down into dozens of one-on-one encounters instead of a typical button-mashing, area-effect damage, hackfest[/quote]

pierrot is right, most/all of what I described is vanilla. maybe not the elven part but I could be wrong.

It's been a while quite honestly. but from what I remember prophesy of pendor has always been a needed mod. It's not as much of an overhall as the napoleonic mod or fire and sword (I think, though I still believe it to be better than the version of fire and sword I played) but it adds more weapons, armor, better AI to the factions (and it changes the factions of the game). The goal of the mod is the same as vanilla (the only way to "win" is by making your own faction and beating all the other factions).

The thing is there are plenty of mods to add longevity and novelty to the original game, I remember one I had fun with for a month that was a simulation of china in the 20s that was a lot of fun. But prophesy of pendor is like a gold or extended edition of the original game. It adds more of everything that is in the original game. If you already have a lengthy game in the vanilla version I can understand it being difficult to switch over but if you do it's largely worthwhile. The companions are completely redone with better inter-party politics and the battle commands give more weight to your word.

There are times in vanilla where I felt that ordering my archers to take a certain hill and fire from there meant very little whereas with PoP this never occurred. The tactics of being a commander meant a lot more. Plus they add a good deal of end-game stuff (there are things called Qualis Gems that are notoriously difficult to get, you use and trade them for the best weapons). If you're just playing vanilla and not one of the complete overhaul mods I would recommend it. this is what the makers of it say in regards to their difference from vanilla, some is BS, some is legit


Well thought out cultures, armies, and conflicts
Unique Backstory - The World of Pendor
New battle AI System
Enhanced Goals -
Detailed Economy -
Deep Immersion -
Knighthood Orders -
Minor Factions -
More Events - and quests
Dymanic Conversation System
All new and unique items
Expanded victory conditions.
Special Items
Speciality Enemy Heroes
Designed to be a Challenge to Play - ONLY recommended for experienced players.

[a-10 warthog champion]

i burned and looted so many villages last night

i mean just absolute rampaging even though i only had like 30 dudes

finally got attacked by an army of 225 with full armor, i held out for a while just circling and swiping from my horse but 225 vs. 30 is obv impossible

so much fun though

absolutely love this game

was really tired at work today but i think it was probably worth it

[Gehrig Industries]

gehrig someone at neogaf stole your identity

link?

[ifear]

child of eden is going to give me an embolism. there's so much about it that really pisses me off, but i just can't stop playing. it is rather compelling.

[a-10 warthog champion]

child of eden is going to give me an embolism. there's so much about it that really pisses me off, but i just can't stop playing. it is rather compelling.

are you playing w/ a kinect? can you play this w/o a kinect?

[ifear]

sans kinect, as i don't have one. a friend who was really into rez tells me playing it with kinect is even more frustrating, which bodes ill

[a-10 warthog champion]

ok cool

ive wanted to try it but no way im getting kinect

[ifear]

do bear in mind that everything i say is empirically wrong

[Locke]

gehrig someone at neogaf stole your identity

link?

http://neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p= ... count=1515

it's curt schilling haha

[chairkicker]

i never made the baseball connection to gehrig's username until just now

[chairkicker]

always figured it was just the most "i don't give a shit" name he could come up with

[Locke]

same here

[tex porneau]

i'd say having any interest in walking dead warrants buying the game. mechanics are pretty simple but engaging enough

[chairkicker]

based on the gamersyde quick look, it seems decent, but i don't know why telltale is reluctant to give their games real controls. it's as if they fear scaring off the traditional adventure game purists too much. better controls would introduce bugs and protract development, but not so much that the project would grow beyond their capability. and they've gotta have some decent money by now

[tex porneau]

that is a really accurate description. The controls of the game are very "safe" but at the price and overall style the game is pretty enjoyable.

[splasm]

what's a good place on the internet for game news that isn't just veiled advertising?

[tex porneau]

i like http://n4g.com/ because it aggregates information and effectively ranks them.

but i think its pretty hard to avoid marketing within video game news cause its literally reporting on an industry.

[banquo]

edit* nevermind

[silverapples]

man FUCK mondo mole

[-☭-]

anyone play that lock on game

i wanna fly a warthog

[chairkicker]

there's this ridiculous portable radio puzzle in the walking dead i have to tell you guys about. there's this hard edged reporter with a heart of gold that you meet halfway through. she's messing with the radio at one point, but can't get it working, so you ask to take a look. turns out it's out of batteries. later, once you find her the batteries, she tells you she still can't figure it out. you take a look again and the batteries are in backward, so you correct it, extend the antenna, roll up the volume and turn the thing on.

it's the most oblivious sexism i've seen in a video game. i'd give them the benefit of the doubt that it wasn't quite the unconscious projection of a misogynist, but if it wasn't i don't know how no one addressed it during development. it blew my mind. but anyway, even when the writing gets in the way, i'd consider episode one a modest success. episode 2 looks fucking great, to boot

[ifear]

what's a good place on the internet for game news that isn't just veiled advertising?

gamesindustry is pretty good on the business side of things and eurogamer is my main source of news, but occasionally slips into veiled advertising (also they have a eurocentric slant which is ideal for me but unlikely to appeal to anyone stateside).

[iambic]

what's a good place on the internet for game news that isn't just veiled advertising?

there's probably some good blogs but I've never taken the time to look properly

Rock Paper Shotgun is pretty good for PC stuff

when I think too much about videogame journalism I get annoyed

[tex porneau]

there's this ridiculous portable radio puzzle in the walking dead i have to tell you guys about. there's this hard edged reporter with a heart of gold that you meet halfway through. she's messing with the radio at one point, but can't get it working, so you ask to take a look. turns out it's out of batteries. later, once you find her the batteries, she tells you she still can't figure it out. you take a look again and the batteries are in backward, so you correct it, extend the antenna, roll up the volume and turn the thing on.

it's the most oblivious sexism i've seen in a video game. i'd give them the benefit of the doubt that it wasn't quite the unconscious projection of a misogynist, but if it wasn't i don't know how no one addressed it during development. it blew my mind. but anyway, even when the writing gets in the way, i'd consider episode one a modest success. episode 2 looks fucking great, to boot

me and my friend were laughing about exactly this last night. "silly women, of course you wouldn't understand that electronics need batteries. and OF COURSE you wouldn't know which direction to put them in. you are soooo lost without us men"

[Baby Museum]

[Jake]

so this new nintendo system looks terrible right?

[Locke]

I dunno I think it looks cool

[Locke]

then again I think pacman vs. is the best multiplayer game of all time

[Jake]

I've historically liked nintendo a lot and the mario games are always my most anticipated things in video games but they've squandered a lot of goodwill

forced hardware 'innovation', particularly if you're as lazy as they were with the wiimote, is not gonna make up for not having anyone who wants to develop for your system