Patman99

Hopefully this guy's bad behaviour does not adversely affect the rest of the dev team. His final statement shows, however, that he has learned nothing from this ordeal.

Some people lack so much common sense. It's one thing to criticize Steam but why on earth would you take it a step further and issue a death threat, however sarcastic/unrealistic as it may be? Especially considering the other, much more crazy shit that has been going on lately. Just keep your mouth shut.

I believe the in criticisms that have been levied against the video game industry. I believe these are something that should always be discussed regardless of your field (it's also a huge problem in academia).

What I don't believe in is the solutions that have been proposed for fixing the aforementioned criticisms. One solution that I do agree with is that there should be a greater influx of new faces. However, this is not something that is fixed overnight. It is something that will take years to fix (as not every company can just snap their fingers and hire a new employee).

In conclusion, the recent events should give something for everyone to think about. Something should be done but it will take some time before the issue is truly resolved. I agree with the issues that have been brought up but not with the solutions proposed.

Yup... It's just kinda sad... Damn it, Coonce!

I enjoyed this article. I think death is best served almost when it helps develop the story and game world. The Souls games, Spelunky, and Mordor all use death as a means of augmenting the game and almost creating purpose. Personal player stories are created because of death. In that sense, dying is an experience that both affects and is affected by the game itself.

While I did not have the same experience with Mordor as most people (I did not die often and did not really have a nemesis), I still see the potential for that system to create a player story. I think that is what excites me the most about the games mentioned in the article.

My thoughts exactly.

Thank you to the Giant Bomb staff and Jeff for taking the time to craft a statement that clearly states your point of view but does so in a very thoughtful manner. This is the way discourse should happen. I am not familiar with the details of GamerGate. I do think that every facet of our lives, be it journalism, academics, politics, or whatever else should be critiqued. People should be held accountable. In saying that, GamerGate is not doing this. It is not a critique of video game journalism. Regardless of the noblest intentions of some of its followers, the "movement" has spun into something very negative.

Discourse and critique need to be balanced and thoughtful. The vast majority of the bullshit I have heard from this whole issue has been neither. Giant Bomb's statement should be a model not an exception.

Disagreeing with a person's point of view is fine. In fact, that is the foundation of human existence. We should be able to debate issues. The FemFreq videos are a fine example. I have commented before on these forums voicing my criticism for Anita's thesis. In many cases it was underdeveloped and did not fully argue her premise. That is not to say she shouldn't make those videos. They didn't provide the answer but they certainly started a conversation. Unfortunately, a large amount of people did not choose to join in the conversation but rather decided to make as much noise as they could. This is the problem.

Let's continue to critique the way things are done but let's not do so in a radical manner. We can disagree with each other but let's use our brains to debate not our ass.

Thank you again to the Giant Bomb staff and those who have decided to take part in this dialogue in a balanced and thoughtful manner.

@jimbo: Yup. I only have one flurry kill heal rune but it does something like 9%. So I just jump-stun and then flurry when I'm in trouble. Worst case scenario is that I have to counter before I get my flurry finished but that's not a big deal as my original target stays stunned. I target the defenders first because they can't be countered with a simply press of the counter button.

If it's a real heavy wave then I just shoot out 12 arrows which usually results in 10-12 kills. That thins the herd extremely effectively.

Another way to beat the orcs that do not take damage from melee, range, or stealth is to brand other orcs and get them to attack him. They do damage regardless of his invulnerabilities. While I ended up just killing the guy when I was in a similar situation, I am sure that you would be able to grab him at one point to brand him.

I beat the game last night and feel like I never had that true nemesis moment as some have had. There was only one enemy that seemed to respawn consistently and even then, he was not that hard. So I never really had the opportunity to hear a captain recount our last meeting. I wish the difficulty was higher. I think I may have just gotten lucky with my warchiefs/captains. I found the jump-stun into flurry into execution to be far too effective. If I couldn't stun the captain/warchief I just built up a combo on the underlings and then used my executions on him. Not to mention the pin to the ground ability solved a lot of those "I'm overwhelmed" instances. I had the same issue with the Arkham games. The melee combat is fun but it does not force me to employ a range of tactics. I just simply mash the fuck out of the attack button, quickly slam on the counter button when needed and then finish it off with an execution once my combo is built up. It's fun, just not as engaging as I would have liked.

Framerate is fairly important to me. I mean, gameplay is, of course, more important but it cannot be a slideshow. I don't really mind minor dips in framerate just as long as I am on average getting 30+. In saying that, a smooth 60 is fantastic.

Resolution, for me, is less of a matter. Of course, I would like 1080p but if it is 720p, I don't really mind.

I've only just now been introduced to the war chiefs but I've been actively targeting captains as I play. I haven't had that sort of "wow" moment yet with the system. I've been killed a few times but I generally get revenge fairly quickly. None of the slain captains have comeback.

I will say that I really like the idea that when a no-name grunt kills me, he gets some street cred and becomes a captain. My strongest nemesis so far (barring war chiefs) was a no-name that was promoted. If I recall correctly his name was "Brogg the Dark". His armour was cool as hell and he was way into dueling other captains. But alas, he has been put down. I hope he does come back though.

That was incredibly funny. Dan is equally the best and worst thing to happen to this website. Well done to Drew and Jason for the excellent editing as well. Fantastic all around.