• I made a list.
• Bought Borderlands on console, which made me waste the $44 I spent on PC, but that game is bad ass
• Ballad of Gay Tony continues to be awesome
• Been Starcraft LANing, its great
• Here's the latest podcast

 
Hopefully that was short enough for everyone.

Did I forget? Was I discouraged by lack of feedback? No. I wanted to play Borderlands so I had something to say in this blog, and oh boy...
 

Borderlands

Fuck. Gearbox. Fuck. Steam. Fuck. The video game industry. I waited for Borderlands on the PC because it seemed like a good decision in my mind. I also bought Fallout 3 for the PC because I was afraid the controls would be better, and there'd be an easier streamlined system for the game, in addition to the access to mods. I also got Left4Dead on PC because I knew it would look better, have better online support, and again better controls. I've never had a PC game with bad controls, that's always more of a console thing. Games like Modern Warfare or Halo never had these problems, but play something like Far Cry 2 on console and you'll see what I mean. I decided I'd go with PC for borderlands because of the controls, if I couldn't use the controls, I wouldn't be able to play the game, thus money wasted.
 
Big mistake.
 
But I'm not going to attribute the mistake to myself for poor judgment, instead I'm going to say that Gearbox is a totally irresponsible developer. First of all, the PC version was delayed by a week. The pirated version of the game was available day one of release, what the fuck was the hold up? You wanna lower piracy rates? Don't disregard an audience especially one that you complain about stealing your game, when its fucking available day one and you delay it for no reason. In addition to this steam released the game at 4pm EST time the day of release. What the fuck is that bullshit? Not midnight. Not 6am, not "10am because that's when we get to work" 4pm. When the day is nearing an end. This isn't a major complaint, but it made me angry already that I had to wait the whole day that I didn't have classes for virtually no reason. All of this so far, and I haven't even gotten to the game yet.
 
This game was obvious console developed. Which you know, fine. I wasn't expecting that to be the case, it seemed equally developed for sort of like Fallout 3 or Left4Dead, you have to press enter to start the game and what not, so it seems pretty clear the main platform was a console. However that also means the PC optimization is complete shit. My laptop can run Crysis at High setting, Borderlands struggles on Medium/Low. This is unacceptable. The game isn't graphically demanding, or contains a lot of spiffy effects. You might say, "well the cel-shading makes it hard to tell how good the game actually looks" but my point is proven by the fact that the play quality decays as you continue to progress. I've played the game for about four hours now, in 45 minute bursts. The reason for this is because as you keep playing, the frame rate gets worse and worse, it might start off at 40FPS, working fine, but five minutes in itll go back down to 30FPS. And then stay there until about another forty minutes when it gets unplayable.
 
I don't know what lazy way of coding they decided to stick with, but its destroying the play experience. Speaking of which, for a four player co-op game, I've never seen such abysmal support for online play. There's mic chat, cool, but you can't turn off mic chat. So when mic chat begins to make demonic screeching sounds because of the unbearable lag I'd like the option turn off the mic, or at least mute another player. Or turn off my mic, or for fuck's sake, be able to do any audio settings besides music and sound effects volume. Apparently there's no surround sound, mic sensitivity testing, input and output levels. Which is stupid for a PC game not to have that. But it doesn't evne matter, because you can't even join games. Every game times out within seconds (15 to be exact) and its impossible to play with one player, let alone four. The one instance I was able to get into a game after trying eleven or twelve times, the game lagged so badly I could literally press space bar, walk out of the room and back, and then after a few seconds my character would jump. We're talking about six-seven seconds of delay. That's terrible.
 
Yeah its launch day, but you know what? Gearbox isn't a fucking baby developer. They've done launches before, hey, the god damn game has been running on Xbox Live and PSN for a full week, the can't figure out how to handle server loads and bandwidth? What the fuck are they doing? It's 2009, shitty servers on the first day is unacceptable in this day and age. This entire experience makes me want to ask Steam how to get a refund, and just buy the Xbox version, I'd rather not deal with the hassle since it seems obvious that the platform isn't going to have any support for it, and I'd be surprised if a patch comes out to fix any of these problems.
 
As for the game itself? Who cares. I won't speak about a game I can't play. Yeah I've played single player, sure I could say my opinion on that, but if they can't get fucking online to work in 2009, i'm not going to bother. The game might as well not even load.
 

TalkGames 10/26/09 - Bombs and Zingers

Download, RSS, iTunes. Show not  Late show, internet outage delayed it-- sorry. Machinariuam (2:33), Killing Floor New Stuff (7:50), Fallout 3 (14:30), Resident Evil (17:50), Most depressing break music ever (29:00). Break

Previews and games we're looking forward to (29:50), Tekken 6 (31:00), Modern Warfare 2 (33:00), Assassin's Creed II (39:00), Borderlands (45:45), Other Shit (49:00), Ballad of Gay Tony (51:45), Break.

News, Kotaku Addiction Article (57:22), Games That Died at Retail (1:05:00), Molyneux picks five revolutionary games (1:14:15), Things we hate about video games (1:26:15), Origins of Dinosaur Pizza (1:33:00), Do we like Sim games? (1:34:00), Do we think the ESRB has flaws (1:37:10), Violence in vidoe games (1:41:00), Trivia/end (1:46:50). Hidden clip at the end. Trivia this week is: "In the Fallout Universe, the Brotherhood of Steel's mission is to... what?"
 
 
That's all I got for today. This fucking game wore me out.

Time for another blog that nobody will read!
 
I went to Massachusetts over the weekend. I'm attending college in New York, but I live in Massachusetts, so anyone who lives in that area will know that the drive back on Sunday afternoon was tons of fun. Rain, snow, darkness, lightning, the best! Nothing makes you appreciate your life than driving for two hours thinking you're going to die at any second. I especially enjoyed the raged truck drivers who flashed their high beams and honked when I was going 60MPH in the right lane. Because passing me is so difficult to do? As for games:
 

Uncharted 2

Game of the year so far. I beat the game the same day in came out (got it at midnight, played it for ten hours throughout the day). But its really a 12-15 hour single player experience when you don't rush through it trying to beat it in a day. Once I beat the game the first time on normal I instantly started playing through Hard the next day, and now I'm thinking about taking on the Crushing difficulty. The entire game has such great pace and flow of excitement throughout the story you just want to keep playing it over and over again.
 
There's some great set pieces throughout the story, and I don't want to ruin all of them because they're so special. But I'm sure most people have seen the train sequence where you're fighting guys on a moving train, climbing along the sides, and running from a helicopter. Gears of War did something similar but Uncharted does it so much better. The one complaint everyone has had about Uncharted 2 is that it lacks originality. I respond with: FUCK YOU. It's a great game from beginning to end, expertly designed, always fun, always engaging, but people always find a way to bring a game down. Not every game has to be the "greatest thing ever." There's no way I would ever call Uncharted 2 the greatest game of all time, so why are people putting down the game when its not even trying to be what they think.
 
Multiplayer is very fun, single player is a good length and great, definitely a purchase for any Ps3 owners.
 

TalkGames 10/18/09 - "MRAWHEAHH"

Other than Uncharted 2, I haven't played much. So here's a plug for my podcast. And here are the show notes:
 
  Thy TalkGamith Podcastath (0:00) Monster Call of Duty version (1:50), DJ Hero (5:00), Uncharted 2 (11:50), Demon's Souls (23:20), Dreamkiller (35:15), Half a Minute Hero (39:00), Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 (43:00), Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising (53:20), Machinarium (1:01:40), Break

NEWS! (1:07:20), Immersion is Bullshit article (1:12:10), Annoying Joke that I think is funny (1:20:00), Unbearable Shit (1:21:00), Modern Warfare 2 PC version will not have dedicated servers (1:21:40), Left4Dead 2 Boycott disbanded (1:23:40), Email - Why is every game action related (1:27:40), Will Mundane ever be fun? (1:33:50), Email - Casual Will become Hardcore? (1:39:30), Trivia Stuff (1:47:00)

Trivia Question this week: What is the least amount of stars you can have in order to fight the 2nd bowser encounter in Super Mario 64 

Another day passes, but I wish it was Tuesday instead of Monday. Why you ask? Because there's this little game you may have heard of called
 

Uncharted 2

I was a big fan of the first game, but it had some obvious flaws. The gunplay wasn't as smooth as it could be, enemies took way too much damage so any possibility of fun was stripped away instantly, and overall the game focused a tad too much on the combat instead of going through the jungle environments and structures.
 
Despite all that, it was a good-ole time and was the only Ps3 game I owned for around six-seven months. None of the other games for the system particularly interested me, but of course I went on to get the Sig mas, KIllzone, LittleBigPlanet, InFamous, etc. Regardless, I loved Uncharted, and from what I hear Uncharted 2 is going to end up being even more amazing than the first. I usually don't like games that build up as being the greatest game ever, or a game with "zero complaints" but I have a feeling its going to be true in this case.
 
I've been playing the Multiplayer Beta on PSN for Uncharted 2, and what's surprising is... I'm actually loving it. It retains the Uncharted feel of jumping around and exploring the pretty landscape, while still managing to be fun for competitive multiplayer. There's also a co-op campaign that I believe is separate from the real campaign, but that's another reason to spend more time with the game. I'm looking forward to the story, pacing, and general design on the game that's out in less than 24 hours. I might even call GameStop and ask if they're having a midnight sale, cause I'd totally be there if they do. But that's still a few hours away. Which in the mean time I could listen to...
 

TalkGames "You Are Dead" 10/11/09

Latest episode of TalkGames is out now! It comes out every Sunday and if you were subscribed to us on iTunes you'd know that, and already have listened/downloaded the show. The title for this show comes from Resident Evil's death screen. Most games have a passive "You died" or "Game Over" and in some cases "Character X has died." But Resident Evil was much more in your face about it. There's something about "You Are Dead" that's so much more brutal and demoralizing. Of course this episode earned that title due to the amount we talk about Resident Evil, and Survival Horror games as a whole. We still talk a good bulk about Demon's Souls, possible Death of Single Player Gaming, and more, but check out the show notes for the specifics:
 
 Slade got a new mic, it goes in an out of alright quality to great quality. Shows notes:

Left4Dead Crash Course Maps (2:10) Zombie Apocalypse (6:45) Shadow Complex briefly (9:10) Demon's Soul - Kinda long, very interesting (12:45) SAW (27:45) Bayonetta (32:20) Uncharted 2 Multiplayer Beta (37:40) Knights of the Old Republic (44:45) BREAK!

Artie Gets Schooled Part 1: Jedi Knight 2 (46:50) Part 2: Resident Evil (58:30) BREAK AGAIN!

News (1:24:00) Email: Scary Survival Horror Games (1:25:20) Email: Modern Warfare 2 - American Locales (1:42:00) Different Types of Storytelling in games (1:46:50) What's with completionists and achievement whores (1:53:00) Is single player going to die (2:03:50) Email: What controller do we prefer (2:11:00)

Email into the show for Artie Gets Schooled or any question you have at (artie --at-- talkxbox --dot-- com). I can't put the actual address because then spam bots send me emails. Remember the trivia for this week is: Why did Capcom change Biohazard's name to Resident Evil for the US and Europe release? 
 
And yes, we do have trivia for the podcast now. As of right now, its just for fun, but it could amount to some wonderful prizes? Participate, and maybe something good will turn up for you. It'd be a shame if you had to start all the way from the beginning again...
 

Demon's Souls

So I bought Demon's Souls. And I'm sensing that this game is going to follow a similar trajectory of Dead Rising. For those of you who never played Dead Rising. Here's a general chart of emotions as you get further and further into the game: 

T his is great >> Hmm these survivors aren't the smartest >> Wtf these convicts are retarded >> WHAT THE FUCK WHY DO THEY COME BACK AFTER I KILLED THEM?!?! >> Holy shit i just missed a fucking mission cause of a time limit? >> this shitty game is making me start over >> Fuck this game >> OH MY GOD THIS IS FUCKING RETARDED >> JESUS CHRIST I HATE EVERYONE AT CAPCOM >> I AM GOING TO DESTROY THIS FUCKING DISC AND SLIT THE THROATS OF THE DEVELOPERS WITH IT >> AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH >> Hey this game is pretty awesome.
 
So far I'm at about stage 3 "Wtf this is retarded" for Demon's Souls. The game started out beautifully. A lot of people complained about starting from the beginning whenever you died, but the first level isn't too bad to grind through a few times, and you get the hang of it pretty quickly. Eventually these enemies end up becoming good drinking pals cause you've seen them so frequently. And the first level ends with a cool boss fight. Its not incredible epic, difficult, or overwhelmingly entertaining, but it was just cool. I really felt like I was a hero in medieval times taking down a terrible monster.
 
The second level I completed without even dying once. The grand finale was against a gargantuan Knight who was a few stories tall (aptly named the "Tower Knight") as half a dozen archers fired at me. I had hired another "lost soul" to help me at this point, so as he took down the archers on the right I went to the left, then we took turns distracting the Knight while the other person hit his feet and ran away before he could attack. It was really tense, exciting and fun. But after that I wasn't sure where to go since that world had stopped me from progressing and I had to start somewhere else. 
 
I ended up picking the worst next world to visit, but I only found that out a few hours ago. In that world though, I was shouting a lot at things like cheap fire spears, plague, poisons, getting knocked off cliffs, and other terrible things that frustrated me. With my new knowledge I'm going to go back into the game, and I'd suggest other people check it out, but its very hardcore. Its not a very difficult game, but any mistake you can make over a 20 minute level will send you back to the beginning again. Its for a special kind of niche, but if you really like medieval RPGs where you feel like the hero, this is a perfect game for you. Also the online is very interesting (and explained in our podcast).
 
 
 
That's going to be it for MawnDae today because this is already ridiculously long. Listen to the podcast, leave a comment or send an email to contribute to the show, anyone else play Demon's Souls? Thoughts? Lemme know.

!MawnDaze!

 
What's up GiantBomb. I realize I haven't been contributing a lot to this blog unless I want to plug something. So in a way to revert that bad habit you'll just get weekly plugs!!!!!!!!!1111  No. I've decided to start "MawnDaze" that will come out every week on Monday (pronounce the name and you'll get it). So every week I'll try to recap what I've done gaming related, and maybe a little outside of that as well. This blog post is brought to you by...
 
Me having a migraine all day. I woke up at 1:30pm like an average college student and I had the biggest throbbing headache in the world. But alas this was not a regular headache that Motrin could battle back, this was a full blown migraine. Which if you've never had, it's like if you broke a bone, but the bone is your skull/brain and you can't wrap it up or heal it quickly, you just sit around all day. So here I am at 5:00am typing this out. But enough of that. 
 

Ninja Gaiden

 
Gaming related I picked up Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, which is a confusing title since it makes it seem like this is the 2nd Special Edition of the first Sigma, as opposed to Ninja Gaiden 2 Sigma... It's like if I said Metal Gear Sold Special Edition 3. Uh what? But regardless I purchased that game and here's some bulleted thoughts: 

• Still difficult, playing on the Warrior difficulty and I've died a few times already, it's totally Ninja Gaiden
• Not as good as the first NG for a few reasons:
• The color palette isn't distinguished, Ryu is black, the enemies are black, a lot of the time you can't tell who you are on screen since you look so similar, very frustrating
• I think the combat doesn't allow a lot of agility in comparison to the previous one, I liked the L1 button being a roll instead of dash it seems more fluid in the animation and flow of combat as opposed to the dash in NG2
• Doesn't really have the charm of the first game, everything is totally nuts and retarded, a giant stone statue in Tokyo? Wtf? CIA? What the hell.
• Made me buy Ninja Gaiden Sigma for $20 dollars

 
So since I didn't like NGS2 so much, I played the NGS demo for a few hours and decided to finally buy that. However I got it from GameStop, and they have the most retarded price tagging system ever. I used to be angry at Best Buy for locking games in impenetrable plastic and seals, but at least the price tag didn't smudge the box art. GameStop had not one, not two, but three price tags all pasted onto one another, so after I got rid of the first one, I had two more, and the last one was on the boxart graphic paper itself! What the fuck! I thought I bought a new copy but it might as well be used with all this shit on it.
 
Ninja Gaiden Sigma has given me a better view on the Ninja Gaiden series again though since it was just better designed on every front, although a few people seem to disagree with me. Which by the way.
 

TalkGames - "Hurt Me Plenty"

The new TalkGames podcast is out. On this episode we talk about the difficulty of video games in general, as well as talking about what games we've been playing, and news etc. You guys can download the show directly, from the RSS feed, or subscribe on iTunes and the episodes will download automatically. Feel free to leave some feedback about the show in the comments section, we're trying to evolve the show to make it more listenable and interesting, feel free to suggest ideas for segments or Artie Gets Schooled segment. Here are the show notes.
 
Epic Intro (00:00) Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 / Ninja Gaiden Sigma (02:15) Difficulty in video games (21:00) Checkpoints and Quick Saves ruin game difficulty (28:30) Different ways of making games difficult (33:30) PSP Games that Slade is playing (35:15) Dead Space (37:00)

NEWS!!! (42:00) Where are all the next gen games? Are games this generation not improving as much as the previous ones? (45:00) Microsoft says Motion Control is the new Online Multiplayer (55:40) Activision sucks (1:01:10) Why are games $60 dollars? (1:05:30) SF4 Special Edition and RE5 Director's Cut (1:16:30) Show ending notes (1:21:00) 
 
Email us artie --at-- talkxbox --dot-- com. Learn some facts about video games next week when we give you all trivia questions! 
 

I Am Poor

 
So as many of you know I am in college these days and man if college didn't clear me out quick. I left my house with six hundred dollars in the bank, and after two months I've been brought down to $30. Skype call recorder, video games, textbooks, lunch, gas, and dorm shopping has really crushed my account balance. I can't even buy Uncharted 2 next week or any of these other big games coming out soon. I've applied to a movie theater of the same brand that I used to work for, as well as a few GameStops. GameStop seems super shady already, I don't really want to work there but I'd get a discount on video games and I'd be able to rent used ones which would be great for some archival research, but I don't know if I can wait a week to find out if I'll even get the job.
 
Anyone got some job suggestions? Maybe there's a brand of store that's awesome to work for that I'm not thinking of. There's this Pizza place called "Dinosaur Pizza" the food sucks, but its the greatest name ever so I was thinking of working there since its literal the same guy every time. There's also another store called "Hot Bagels" they both seem super small and relaxed, which means I won't have to worry about working hard, but not a lot of benefits.
 
 
 
Anyway, that was today's MawnDae. I don't know if I'll write that much every time. But if I do, well, I'll be a hypocrite because I hate reading long blogs. Tell me who read it all. I'll add some pictures to sooth everyone's eyeballs and refrain from a block of text. See you next week.