Dyram

@Giantstalker said:

The F16 is a beautiful aircraft, really dig them using a real design

EDIT: Whoa, I was wrong. The back end is from an... F18? Think the air intake is different, too. Ah, well.

You were only wrong in that you were right both times. It's clearly a double-tailed aircraft, with potential space for a second engine exhaust there (though it does seem more shaped to one large one instead), as following a similar scheme of the beloved F-18, but the cockpit canopy, as well as main intake under the fuselage, and even the curvature of the forward wing sections on the side of the fuselage all point to the F-16. I think it's only fair to say that Rockstar's satirical nature in game design (including their vehicles and pseudo branding) has held through the design of that aircraft, and made a very interesting F-16/18 hybrid. It's just different enough to avoid legal troubles.

On the topic of the game's much-awaited release, I hope Rockstar steps up soon and decides to make a proper PC version for this game that clearly deserves it. Not that I won't double down again if necessary, but it would be nice keeping all of my fun in that game contained to a single platform from the start, instead of splitting my literally hundreds of hours fucking around in that world between two.

Edit: For additional F-16 markings, note the position of the tail section, seated full back instead of slightly ahead as on the F-18, as well as the downward-angled horizontal flight surfaces of the tail, and see similar small fins on upper and lower fuselage towards the rear of the aircraft. The sensor spike on the nose is also a rare addition to the F-18, which houses most of its sensors under the nose cone and on the tips of its various flight surfaces.

Disregarding financial and business reasons for the use of internet-connected multiplayer, there's nothing wrong with games moving towards being a multiplayer-focused medium.

You like singleplayer, so you see multiplayer development as crippling your singleplayer experience. While there may be some truth to the shared resources of money and developers to produce that side content, more singleplayer would take those same resources as well. I've never really been someone that has played games singleplayer very often. I've grown up playing games in multiplayer, be it on a couch, hotseat-style, or now over the internet as we all do day to day. I don't mind playing games alone, but I don't like to play singleplayer. This coming from someone who lives practically like a hermit and hates most people and social contact. That said, playing games singleplayer is just so... lacking to me. That sense of fulfillment that I'm sure you have, I simply do not share when playing on my own. I can appreciate a game for what it is in its singleplayer, but that does not mean I have fun playing it. The only way for me to reason with enjoying a game solo is by having people next to me on the couch watching, or if it's in preparation for later multiplayer activities.

To take a recent game as an example, though, of where I have been disappointed, Assassin's Creed 3 has been a blast to play. I've been playing it in the living room for everyone to watch and enjoy together, and it's made for a much more fun and intimate experience with friends and family. My friends and I, throughout the game's development, have hoped for a cooperative mode for the story, even so limited as only working in the Animus when at the appropriate time in the story (say, when you have your compatriots to call on). Their multiplayer in Brotherhood was a great step, and the assumption was that the numbered sequel would see great improvement and iteration and expansion on the ideals of multiplayer Assassin's Creed, especially considering it had proven itself to be so fun. Instead, they have done little with it and still that huge open world feels so empty because no matter what I do, I'm not doing it with anyone.

Open-world games are especially at fault for this, with the success of GTA4 and Red Dead free roam modes being great examples of the fun to be had in those worlds. Everyone knows of the crazy stories of stunts pulled, or stupid things done because they were hilarious. If you're doing that only in service of your own eyes seeing it, though, it is so much emptier to me than sharing those moments, sometimes unforgettable for a lifetime, with others who might rejoice in the fun as well, only amplifying the happiness and fun to be had.

When I see games coming out with only singleplayer components, I do not demand that they remove all of that and focus on multiplayer, as some who don't enjoy multiplayer seem to do in the hopes of "saving" singleplayer. My hopes, instead, are for the developers to implement a way for me to enjoy the game with my friends through multiplayer, adding to them and making something better in the end. Just because you want your fun doesn't mean that we shouldn't have ours. We want something added to the game, something that is a new bonus in the game's favor and well thought out. Guess what? We don't like half-baked multiplayer setups, either. A bad design is simply bad, and appeases no one.

You talk about multiplayer through a very narrow view of both its potential and its impact on gamers. Just because I love multiplayer doesn't make me someone who will always jump on a cooperative mode, or serially buys Call of Duty, Battlefield, and Halo games so I can "pwn some n00bs." My friends and I that play multiplayer enjoy the same experiences that you do, only we like to go through them together and come up with new ways to enjoy the game that the developers may not have even intended. There are good cooperative games out there that tell amazing, impactful stories. There are open-world games that immerse us in a whole new place and time. There are competitive games that bring finely-honed balance and design to the fore in heated matches against one another or as a team.

tl;dr Just because you don't like a feature doesn't mean it should be excised from a game developer's litmus of what makes a game. Broaden your horizons and you may find, like I have, that multiplayer can be just as substantial and deep as singleplayer, and can bring people a whole lot closer together.

@Laurentech: Sorry to take so long to respond. I haven't been logged in for weeks!

Anyway, as for your question, the series of the Ghosts is a long one. The series as a whole has starts and stops, small series of books that are battle after battle, but then another that has battles on a different scale with much greater emphasis on characterization. The first five or so books are pretty heavy on the combat, but a story narrative is threaded throughout, following different characters within the regiment, as well as the regiment as a whole across their opening salvo of battles, establishing who the Ghosts are and what they are so skilled at doing. The quiet moments in between the larger battles (up to books in size) can be a little dull if you get a thrill from the combat, and the battles are quite constant... however, Dan Abnett is a fantastic writer and keeps each encounter unique even in visual setting, something quite difficult to establish in a book.

Overall, the series flows fairly well and has been picking up steam again more recently, but even the duller of the individual stories are still really good reads. Plus, it's a book series about a regiment of Imperial Guard soldiers. What would it be if not full of battle sequences? Some of them are even specifically defining to the Ghosts, themselves, and leave a real, lasting impact on both the characters and narrative. If you're looking to read the battles, stick to some of the earlier titles, and perhaps the more recent couple. The character development does still happen even while the bullets are flying, but the majority of it is in (what is currently) the middle of the series in much longer and more drawn out sequences.

The 40k books are a good way to relax and enjoy some fiction without the classical fantasy tropes (though their analogues do exist). Hope this helped.

@Vonocourt: The beginning of the Horus Heresy series starts at a very small scope, focusing on the slow turn of Horus himself and those Legions around him. It takes a few books to get through, but it ascribes an important shift in thinking that, otherwise missing, would make Horus' turn seem like a snap judgement without any real purpose behind it. At least for those books, the action is fairly good so it contains the building tension while being in general a handful of good 40k novella. Later on the stories become much more individual in nature, focusing on very specific aspects of the Heresy as it unfolds, and touching on events happening throughout that are common for all of the books. It's a long story to be told, with many individual facets that each have their part to play in the bigger picture. If you feel like the story is bloated at this point, I'd partly agree with you, but also say that you are probably missing some of the finer details that may only come to light with further insight into the Heresy itself, which can mostly be acquired through further reading of the series.

Anyway, to chip in my two cents to an old-ass thread, if you are going to start with the Warhammer 40,000 books, I would recommend either reading the Gaunt's Ghosts series (from the beginning!), or picking up any of the Ciaphas Cain books. Most will say the Horus Heresy or Eisenhorn, but those can be both dense and perhaps too specific for a newcomer. The magic of the Cain series is that Commissar Ciaphas Cain is, first and foremost, a human being with all of the selfish and conceited traits that you'd expect. The Cain books contain great characterization and are a good way to slowly ease into things, as they involve much of the 40k universe without burying you in terminology and story that you have neither a connection to nor understanding of. Hope this helps.

@AhmadMetallic said:

It's a massive MMO world to be fought over by two huge factions, FPS-style. God damn. Most impressive piece of info: The world has EIGHTY. DIFFERENT. CAPTURE POINTS.

Three factions, actually, and they are all brought into the same continents to try to seize control from the other two. This may actually end up being a bad thing with the way the game is currently designed differently from the original, but I won't bore everyone with the grumpy thoughts of an old PlanetSide veteran. Three continents so far, each 64 square kilometers or so according to the latest info.

Since I know you are new to PlanetSide, welcome to the best game that mostly everyone ignored and then continued to wish existed while it has been running for 9 years in the background, constantly pushing forward FPS design with some of the most innovative and forward-thinking gameplay from 2003.

For everyone who continues to be interested in watching the streams, the recorded versions will eventually be available on TotalBiscuit's YouTube channel, and they will continue to stream out the game tomorrow, both during the theater showing at 11am PST, and then again livecasting at 3pm PST.

Well... that's real bad. Not that something like this wasn't already seen coming, but damn. Here's to hoping that the skilled folk out of jobs find themselves someone else willing (and able) to pay them and soon.

@chan05: Reading all of the Horus Heresy series is a decent goal for reading, but you're going to likely reach a point of waiting for the next in the series to come out. They space releases fairly regularly throughout the year, but, while the series may be drawing ever closer to the grand clash that closes this eponymous period of Warhammer 40k lore, there are still some books to go and it's likely you'll catch up to the fore quickly.

This is why I, personally, read almost every series out there and still end up waiting for more. The Gaunt's Ghosts series is long, and if you can find the original books (or an omnibus thereof), a nice ride alongside characters that span a large timeframe and countless battles. I would also suggest getting into the Ciaphas Cain series by Sandy Mitchell. As long as you don't dislike characters that are somewhat self-serving and narcissistic, the characterization is fantastic and gives a real view of just how much everything sucks in the 40k universe, from the perspective of a man out to really just save his own skin, whilst stumbling into somewhat-unearned famed (though his modesty is great).

I still don't understand why people think that Eisenhorn is a good entry point into the universe, but glad it didn't turn you off, at least. Keep reading and you'll find some great stuff in one of the best and most expansive sci-fi settings out there.

Thanks for sharing this video. While I may not own every game of the Battlefield franchise (Modern Combat and Bad Company never really felt like it controlled right on the consoles), I have played all of them, right from the start with the Battlefield 1942 demo. While the documentary brought up no new information for me as someone who lived through the expansions, it certainly was very interesting and brought back a lot of fun memories. This video was definitely a good use of 45 minutes.

All of the trailers, and the soundtrack remixes, ending with Battlefield 3's signature static-y bass/percussion, has me pumped to get back into the game whenever my friends are around tonight. It's been a good decade.

If you have no friend ties to either console (or rather don't mind playing alone, I suppose, as you said you have friends on both platforms...), and have a computer that at least meets minimum specs, I would honestly recommend the PC version. With only 24 players online, the maps feel empty and you lose the classic Battlefield feel of crazy/awesome/crazy-awesome random shit happening everywhere all around you. That is, of course, not to mention the installation stuff (which, with a small harddrive or a busy one could be problematic) or potential disc swapping, though those can be minor annoyances rather than damaging the gameplay.

Even if you are looking to play with the gamepad, I would still suggest PC since you can map your buttons to a gamepad and play that way, anyway. The PC version is reportedly a tad buggy on that, but there are ways to get around direct binding in-game.

As much as it will sound like an elitist thing to say, the PC is the platform of choice here. DICE made a game for the PC and then hacked it up into pieces to fit/work on consoles. While I know there are some crazy fanboys on this website for BF3 that will tell you that the game is lacking many "PC game" features (and will be partially right), it's still very blatantly made for that platform. Even if the hardware requirements seem super high, they really aren't. Due to money issues, I'm getting by just fine (albeit on low settings - still better looking than the consoles, I should add) with an XFX GeForce 8800 GTX, which is a card that is 5 or 6 generations old. Anything below that may have problems with the game, but I run it fine, with the addition of a modest quad-core CPU and 6GB of 1600Mhz DDR3 RAM. If you don't understand the mumbo jumbo, I'll just say that I have a very humble rig now, due to age, and I am playing the PC version of BF3 mostly without a hitch.

If you still REALLY want/need to get it on a console, I would put forth that the Xbox 360 tends to have the larger online crowd, but they also have more options to communicate with you, which can be a bad thing at times. Also, personally, I would look at which controller you are more comfortable with holding. It is a personal preference, but my hands feel uncomfortable playing on a Dual Shock due to the stick layout. If you have similar troubles and know you will be playing long stretches, buy accordingly.

I hadn't discovered it through HIB, but as someone not much into playing games singleplayer (I just don't derive the same kind of enjoyment out of them), I hadn't really been willing to put down $15 for it. I saw it originally when it was being released on Steam, and then again when a friend purchased and was playing it.

I was actually on the fence about getting the Frozen Synapse bundle because I already had the game myself, and the other game they added didn't look super interesting to me (refer to my earlier singleplayer comment...), but as soon as SpaceChem was added, and I saw some YouTube videos of people's solutions to some of the crazy later puzzles, I decided I wanted it. I ended up getting a Frozen Synapse key for a friend, as well as an extra FrozenByte bundle key, and I haven't been able to get SpaceChem out of my head since. It's strangely addictive, and the music is so good that I constantly find myself humming it in my head. The way they roll the story into laying out the additional puzzle elements is really well done, and the gameplay itself is fascinating, at both the macro and micro levels.