Lamashtu

I'd love to see one on the Void/Turgor even though it's a pretty damn new game in the grand scheme of things. But after having done a Quick Look of Cargo! The Quest for Gravity, I think the sheer mood whiplash is going to be entertainment enough.

I just take five seconds and mod that part out for the pc version. Although I've not come anywhere close actually beating the game.

It really does bug me that the Giant Bombsquad and even the guys at Rebel FM are so put off by the fact that you can't play the game past the official ending. I can totally understand why Obsidian would think it's not worth the time and effort to make a DLC pack a la Broken Steel for the reasons that there's a fuckton more variables that the expansion would have to factor in with a game engine that's infamous for its blunders in causality.

And, they do tell you before the end-game sequence in 300 foot tall neon letters "THIS IS THE ENDING OF THE GAME." Is it really that big of an issue to save before that point and not play that sequence until all the DLC packs come out? For god's sake, what excuse is that to not free-roam in that time?

Yeah, it's a minor bummer you can't see the consequences of your actions at Hoover Dam, but to do a DLC pack about that would mean rendering half of the sidequests you may not have already completed and maybe even completely wiping them all out.

Surprised at the incredulous responses to the total stealth, pacifist achievements. Seemed to me in the first and third Splinter Cells as well as with most of the Metal Gear games that this was very possible. I've even managed to do this with the leaked beta (which convinced me to preorder it). 

@imsh_pl: And I prefer my RPG to be just that - an RPG. Finally sometihng that isn't a swordswingen badass and some magic chick in the background, finally a RPG that works as an shooter and lets me get deep down into the mechanics of killing various enemies.   Sure, the itemsystem could be far better, true, it can get tedious to switch from time to time but hey - Mass Effect feels like an space RPG. Mass Effect 2 doesn't even give you any real options on weapons, they don't bother fleshing out the differences between what weapon to use (other than some info on ammotype and firerate) and the game focuses on the shooting - shooting that doesnæt really work that well with it's near broken coversystem, lame skillsystem (come on, 15 seconds of cooldown after activating my shield? I'm supposed to use these skills, hence the removal of most weapons except revolver and SMG). ME 2 doesnæt do the RPG-part any good, and it fails on the shooter-part too. Just so it can be a little bit more "accessible".    I'm not saying Mass Effect 2 is a bad game, compared to most games it still shines - but compared to Mass Effect, it's shit. 

For me, Mass Effect 2 was a case of three steps forward, then three steps back right to where Bioware started. I welcome slightly improved shooting mechanics, but at the cost of taking the focus away from the individual abilities of the classes? In Mass Effect 1, you got a much better sense of the abilities being the difference between coming out on top of an encounter and getting taken apart. Characterization was awesome in Mass Effect 2, but compared to Mass Effect 1, the overall story arc was plain awful.

Then there's the issue of planet-scanning. Bioware did admit that the Mako sections had problems (okay), but then they replaced it with a system that was by magnitudes more tedious (not okay). This is something I'm seriously angry about with Bioware, but if these were the same playtesters who thought this gameplay mechanic was good enough stand-in for planetary exploration in Mass Effect 2 who were giving feedback for Dragon Age 2, then at least now we have an explanation for all the busted stuff in that game (the fetch-quests that fly in the face of causality, the enemies that spawn out of nowhere, and the less-than triumphant return of the Fade section).

Now this article perfectly encapsulates where I think the direction developers at large are going:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/06/08/new-gaming-system-revealed-at-e3/

@Lamashtu said:

I'm going to use another example, bear with me here...

Take a history teacher trying to teach WWI history to his students. Does he skip over the nuanced facts about trench warfare, then just tells us that a lot of people died at Verdun and at the Somme? Absolutely not. He finds a creative solution to make his students want to learn that fact and make sure they remember that. This is an example I take from my years in high school. My teacher had us arrange the desks in our classroom on opposite sides to portray the trench-lines, then had us throw balls of crumpled up paper at the guys who tried to cross the classroom to the "opposing trench." The same goes with Algebra. A good teacher doesn't gloss over concepts like finding the focus of a parabola or imaginary numbers, he integrates charisma and humour into his lectures.

I'm pointing out a fact that developers these days are going about with streamlining games in the wrong ways, like completely omitting mechanics rather than trying to improve them. In my mind, it's devs like Bioware who are beginning to embody this trend in games.

Dude....  I want to play a game where I decide what my guy does in a living world to fight dragons.  Anything that impedes that is a nuisance.  I don't play Elder scrolls to run into a wall to increase my speed....  Do you see that actual relevant example I just made? That's what Bethesda is trying to fix with their games. Bioware did indeed fuck up with Dragon Age 2, but Mass Effect 2 turned out pretty well and it looks like Mass Effect 3's leveling system is deeper than even Mass Effect 1. So they might go through it the right way after all.

I'm going to use another example, bear with me here...

Take a history teacher trying to teach WWI history to his students. Does he skip over the nuanced facts about trench warfare, then just tells us that a lot of people died at Verdun and at the Somme? Absolutely not. He finds a creative solution to make his students want to learn that fact and make sure they remember that. This is an example I take from my years in high school. My teacher had us arrange the desks in our classroom on opposite sides to portray the trench-lines, then had us throw balls of crumpled up paper at the guys who tried to cross the classroom to the "opposing trench." The same goes with Algebra. A good teacher doesn't gloss over concepts like finding the focus of a parabola or imaginary numbers, he integrates charisma and humour into his lectures. If something's taught WELL, then people will be willing to put up with complexity. The Witcher 2 was a complicated game, but the players who manned up to that experience had the time of their lives. Yes, the systems weren't explained very well, but if CD Projekt had made a well-designed tutorial, I guarantee you there would be absolutely no-one out there complaining about that game.

I'm pointing out a fact that developers these days are going about with streamlining games in the wrong ways, like completely omitting mechanics rather than trying to improve them. In my mind, it's devs like Bioware who are beginning to embody this trend in games.

Well hold on. Really Accessible Doesn't completely mean it's gonna be like hitting a bunny with a shotgun. I think they are going on about the points like the fact that Now weapons are divided into One handed and two handed mastery.  So you can use a one handed sword just as well as a mace, so on and so forth. Also maybe take a little que from Fallout 1 2 3 and New Vegas with having your first stats actually have much more meaning then Oblivion where you had to do a  lot of math to maximize your character.

http://www.gamersmint.com/bethesda-consoles-to-be-the-lead-platform-for-skyrim-aim-to-make-it-really-accessible
 
First, they tell us that it's going to be made for consoles first and foremost. Okay, fair enough. A lot of those players don't think that their PC won't have the horses to get the best possible experience out of it, so Bethesda is going to think they'll get the most sales out of that.
 
But then, they tell us it's going to me made "really accessible." Now, even though I'm a hardcore PC gamer at heart, I still think console gamers are going to be suffering as much as us PC gamers with this development (well, consoles even more so since TESNexus will undoubtedly fix that within a few weeks), and I'll tell you why.
 
Developers these days don't seem to quite understand that most all gamers out there, both core and casual, are willing to put up with a remarkable amount of complexity. Case in point, WoW isn't exactly the most accessible game out there all things considered (hardcore MMO players from the Everquest, Dark Ages of Camelot, and Lineage II tradition like myself would usually argue otherwise, but that's an entirely different matter). A game where you have to monitor aggro levels and coming up with different equipment builds for PvP and PvE is by magnitudes a more complex game than your run-of-the-mill straight up shooter, and yet WoW is Blizzard's bread and butter.
 
Yes, there are exceptions. Yes, a game like Digital Combat Simulator: A-10C isn't going to be setting the NPD charts alight anytime soon. But that's a case of a developer knowing the audience they're selling to and being satisfied with that niche, especially when a company like Eagle Dynamics gets most of its revenue from military contracts. Still, complex games like Dawn of War II and ArmA II a lot of people love because those are games that are taught to the player WELL and the rewards are made evident and tangible. While the in-game tutorials aren't totally helpful, ArmA and Dawn of War does have a mature and accepting community that is willing to sit down and help new players learn the game.
 
I guess what I'm trying to say is: "Console gamers, most of you are reasonably intelligent. Demand a game from developers and publishers that respect that fact."