Sunday, April 03, 2011

post://6353084424591360918/

Stub for letter to ea games.

[there are the points - I shall flush out the letter henceforth to forthwith, vis a vie.]

So I was very excited for two new recent game releases for PC. Both happened to be sequels and both were Electronic Arts (EA). I have never been a fan of companies that get so large they depend on formulas, plans, and financials to fuel their game decisions rather then ideals. I had seen it happen before, but couldn't directly relate an actual example when prompted. No longer need I search -- Crysis 2 and NFS Shift 2 are both prime examples of what happens when money makes the decisions.

They are actually two very good examples of game play, the engines themselves control and function very well but I think I need to go back and make sure that Shift 2 is actually DX 10/11, as I know that Crysis 2 was not. My problem is not necessarily with what the games are, Crysis is quite fun and lays out a decent story with some additional twists, but before EA bought them, they put out a phenomenal first game, and Far Cry before that (now that I think of it, Far Cry 2 was probably a warning sign). While waiting for Crysis 2 I had purchased Crysis Warhead since I had never played through it. On the official games explorer icon you have the gamut of DX 9, 10, and 32 or 64 bit mode for each. That is how it should be. You write on graphic engine that renders X accordingly, with additional effects and / or acceleration if your system supports it.

The problem is that consoles were the driving force with these gMes. You can see where they developed textures in both games at 1920 x 1080 and called it a day (who plays anything above that? -- those with PCs worth a goddamn). I like to use GTA 4 as an example, though they did take almost a year to get IV to PC but it was well worth the wait. It has enough detail to keep systems going at max for another couple years. All the textures are 2560 x 1600 native, with lower quality versions of those textures making up the lower detail levels (texture quality low, med, etc). You can see the difference, and you can set it all anywhere in-between.

computer games is where it started

not going to include piracy in this letter - it's for another discussion

I have lately purchased both the limited edition for both Crysis 2 and NFS Shift 2

I believe both games cut corners to meet release date.

It appears as you developed for console and ported those textures to PC 1:1
You SHOULD have developed (graphically, talking just textures here) for PC 2560 x 1600 max and then saved them lower resolution for console / pc lower texture settings. Otherwise you get something that's developed blurry, vs something that's developed perfectly sharp and exactly how you want it, and then shrunk, maintaining the sharpness at a lower resolution. Even if you are only developing for console, you need to have the quality there before you shrink it, otherwise you're needlessly cheapening the presentation of your game.

Textures doesn't matter so much in NFS - you're supposedly flying by the background.
Look for Forza, and that's 360. They had a fabulous match of textures, near / far, cars, backgrounds. GT couldn't touch it console / console, but I digress - we're talking PC here. I don't care what else you develop it for. I WANT to buy it for PC, I want to give you money, I want to activate and register, and legally own my game for computer. I recognize the effort that the developers have put into it, and where I am never a fan of big business - I recognize it's the presence of a giant company like EA that allows these "big budget" games to be possible. However - take a little less money for the "talent" of big name drivers in video format telling me how they can see I have talent and give the developers an extra month or two to finish it... or at least let them patch it up after the release date you've branded into their foreheads.

neither of these titles are games for windows, what's the deal? x64? no time?

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posted @ 00:30

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Wednesday, March 23, 2011

post://2350774821227249358/

I got my hands on Crysis 2 for PC yesterday. I was very excited having seen it and played it on multiple machines at PAX East several weekends ago. It came on one disk, which was good in regards to time to install, but I'm still impressed by GTA IVs 2 DVDs / 18G worth of textures and data.

I started it up and it was 4:3 by default... no one plays in 4:3 anymore, so straight to the options I went. The first thing I noticed was the lack of settings, though with some further reading I have heard that the display config file is editable. You can change the resolution, and the quality, so Low, Medium, High, and Ultra - though they all have their own special names like "Gamer" and "Extreme" for the top two.

I went realistic and set to 1920 x 1200 (basic 1080p at 16:10 aspect ratio) and Extreme, figuring I'd need to set it down once the game started. I have an AMD Phenom II x4 @ 3.2ghz, Dual Channel DDR3 @ 1600mhz (don't get me started on available SLi / TriChannel ram options for AMD chipsets) and 2 x EVGA 285GTX FTW 2G cards so based on the previous games (Crysis, Warhead) I assumed I'd still be a little behind the curve. That was not the case, all in all the game worked at a steady 60+ fps, no vsynch at 1920 x 1200 and a good 45fps at 2560 x 1600 in the Extreme setting.

I started the game and was treated to a phenomenal opening sequence, followed by a brief gameplay escape which cut to the intro credits and the initial introduction video. It set the scene for an ominous situation in the NY of the future (complete with completed Freedom Tower, I noticed) plagued by a widespread alien infection.

You start inside, murky warehouse windows, moderate light shining through. No light beams, and moderate grimy textures, nothing specifically too impressive, though it all looked good. You get outside pretty quickly and realize you've emerged onto a seaside warehouse roof with the city skyline in front of you. The ocean, trees, and ship in the dock is all obscured by heavy ansiotropic filtered light, a major part of the effects.

Another point I want to note was my test of the artifacts, the bullet holes and debris left by explosions. I shot a car, I didn't see any bullet holes, I got a bit closer... they appeared in strategic locations, not in others - there was nothing on the car window, or the back of the mirror, but there was several in the door. I shot them again close up, some appeared but as I backed up to (a virtual) 5 feet away, they went away. I shot the tire, it popped, stayed popped. I shot the hood with a smiley face pattern I didn't even get to half the smile before the eyes disapeared. This is on Extreme quality, mind you - that sort of stuff should be no problem to leave, especially for me with 2G of video RAM (with SLi you only get the video ram of 1 card since it uses the same amount for both cards). I then shot at an awning that was swaying in the breeze. I was impressed that the bullet holes appeared, cloth ripping is not really new, but physx is normally an afterthought - Batman uses it well with the cape, cloth tearing and uses it for some immersion. This was no physx. The awning moved again in the breeze and the bullet holes went away, as soon as the "cloth" breezed back to the 0 degree Y plane, the bullet holes appeared, and disappeared again as it breezed past it. I know I'm being picky, and this may pass on consoles but not for PC, especially with many other games that show it can be done well.

All I keep reading regarding the PC reviews about this game is "what do you mean, this is the best looking game to date!" Maybe for a console, but this is on PC - we're used to ports on PC, we put up with them, but this was originally a PC game and more is expected. EA bought it, pushed it for the money maker and this is what we get. My only hope is the hubbub about the DX 10/11 post-release patch. I don't know as that's going to do anything for the textures, but it seems silly that they'd limit the textures as (I'll use GTA IV in this example) other games have 2560 x 1600 textures to start, and they're reduced in size for the console version, and even the lower quality texture tiers on PC. This results in a better image overall because if you design the detail, reducing it actually smooths it out as well as saves GPU power / memory.

The story is cool so far, the gameplay is cool - nowhere else can you get a FPS that plays like this. It's truly gratifying to run up on someone in cloak and slit their throat, break their neck, or kick them in the back... sneaking, cloaking, shooting, and cloaking again is a little harder as it's designed so your energy has not regenerated enough in most cases so you still need to have some cover. Speaking of cover, there is a new method of cover I have not seen in any other game, counters and corners allow you to hold a key (or a mouse button) and move the mouse to "look" around the corner, it's more of an arc around / over the obstruction, which is very very tactical.

Story: Excellent
Sound: Amazing
Gameplay: Impressive
Graphics: Excellent for DX 9 / a year ago, low quality textures (above 1920 x 1080)
Technology: No x64 (yet?) no DX 10 / 11 (yet?)
Multiplayer: Broken (not available on launch day) - EA - Estimated Availability

All in all I have to fault it for the graphical shortcomings but I'll be playing the shit out of this game.

Here's some movies / screenshots:
































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posted @ 10:19

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Wednesday, December 16, 2009

post://624288174965906696/





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posted @ 10:18

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Tuesday, December 08, 2009

post://2179114379212042377/







I had downloaded Battlefield 1942 for the PS3 a while back, shelled out the $15 and it's relatively good. Destructable environments basic gameplay on what Battlefield should be (not Bad Company) and decent graphics for a console.

I was especially excited about the prospect of battling cross-platform. PS3, XBOX, and PC all in the same realm? Sign me up to scalp them with my mouse! In any case the PC version was still forthcoming, but after trying the demo I am abhorred by what they provided for the PC version.

No widescreen resolutions, vile texture quality, simplistic scenes, it's like playing original Battlefield 1942, stunted! I don't even think it looks as good on the PC as the original Battlefield would look if I installed it right now, but enough of me hemming and hawing, let the pictures speak for themselves:

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posted @ 20:21

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Saturday, September 19, 2009

post://1549686946649553205/

PhysX has been added to the PC version of Batman with the v1.1 update. It does not ship with PhysX settings out of the box. Once installed you are provided several options for PhysX - Off, Normal, or High with various card recommendations.

The nVidia drivers allow you to change the PhysX settings - turning optimization on or off as well as the ability to choose which card handles the PhysX acceleration. I had thought offloading PhysX from my 2 x 285GTX2G cards working in SLi to the built-in 980a/780a would make things faster:



However, after applying the v1.1 w/ patch PhysX Batman, Normal PhysX was enabled. I was suddenly getting very low framerates (15fps). I turned on the "Show SLI Indicators" in the 3D settings menu so I could see how hard each of the video cards were working. They were both very low, indicating the cards were not working up to their ability, yet things were still slow. CPU usage hadn't spiked high enough to be a bottleneck and memory was free and clear.

It appeared having the PhysX on the older (and slower) chipset was slowing everything down. To test the theory I turned off PhysX and was getting framerates in the high 50s. It certainly was PhysX related.

I turned PhysX back on, normal setting and in the nVidia control panel I changed the setting to enable PhysX on the 285s instead of the 980a/780a. When I tried it again PhysX was visibily running, fallen leaves moving under your feet accompanied by smooth framerates between 55 to 60fps.

Based on this experience it appears that having PhysX enabled on an older chipsets may actually decrease performance over having PhysX enabled on the same video card(s) doing the graphics processing.

Here is a video of Batman running @ 2560 x 1600, Very High Detail, comparing PhysX - Normal to PhysX - High

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posted @ 19:49

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Monday, September 14, 2009

post://2466185940127249611/

Here are some pics of GTA before and after.
Both are playable at 40 to 45fps.

Vista is overclocked video chip / mem ~ 745mhz / 1265mhz
Win7 is stock video chip / mem ~ 705mhz / 1215mhz

Vista .5
-----------------------
Vista 1
Win7 1
-----------------------
Vista 2
Win7 2
-----------------------
Vista 3
Win7 3
-----------------------
Vista 4
Win7 4

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posted @ 14:20

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Saturday, September 12, 2009

post://2987336471837986745/

6 installations later I have a working copy of Windows 7 with valid RAID, SATA, Chipset, Video, and Sound drivers. I was very careful this time, doing only one thing at a time and restarting after a change to confirm. I was a bit more cavileer when I was under the impression my errors could be undone. The restore feature was not able to handle the driver change for vital components so keep that in mind when you're upgrading. Vista had similar problems, I wasn't able to install it until SP1.

My first step once getting SLi working was to test the performace of games. I was able to test a couple DEMOs as is but GTA required a reinstall since it has so many background requirements. All in all I saw HUGE gains visually, everything ran better, something I'm not used to seeing from new (PC) OSs.

To further put this into perspective - in Vista my video cards are overclocked a good 40mhz higher, the video cards are running at stock speeds in Win 7.

Here are the numbers from GTA:
Windows 7 - GTA v1
Average FPS: 40.12
Duration: 37.37 sec
CPU Usage: 74%
System memory usage: 37%
Video memory usage: 50%

Graphics Settings
Video Mode: 2560 x 1600 (60 Hz)
Texture Quality: High
Render Quality: Highest
View Distance: 32
Detail Distance: 70

Windows 7 - GTA updated
Average FPS: 43.98
Duration: 37.45 sec
CPU Usage: 78%
System memory usage: 39%
Video memory usage: 53%

Graphics Settings
Video Mode: 2560 x 1600 (60 Hz)
Texture Quality: High
Texture Filter Quality: High
View Distance: 32
Detail Distance: 70

Vista - GTA updated 1920 x 1200
Average FPS: 37.65
Duration: 37.61 sec
CPU Usage: 81%
System memory usage: 44%
Video memory usage: 57%

Graphics Settings
Video Mode: 1920 x 1200 (60 Hz)
Texture Quality: High
Texture Filter Quality: High
View Distance: 75

Vista - GTA updated 2560 x 1600
Average FPS: 32.02
Duration: 37.72 sec
CPU Usage: 74%
System memory usage: 43%
Video memory usage: 59%

Graphics Settings
Video Mode: 2560 x 1600 (60 Hz)
Texture Quality: High
Texture Filter Quality: Very High
View Distance: 100
Detail Distance: 50

*update* Futuremark Vantage Score: 14100!
Direct Link

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posted @ 09:54

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Saturday, August 15, 2009

post://3422656839146403744/

Batman Arkham Asylum DEMO doesn't launch correctly on 64 bit versions of Windows. You get an int32 error when launching which appears to be a misdeclared variable in the HTTP based launcher. The developers are aware of it but if you're looking to play the DEMO now here's a work around:

You may need to change your INI files around a bit, I tried to crank it with a 10 for the quality and a 5 for the effects, I don't like too much motion blur, I appreciate the cinematic effects but also like to see what's going on even when there is high motion.

In any case here are the files, you'll need to place them in your [Batman Demo]\BmGame\Config folder:

From what I've gathered UserEngine is your main INI:

[Configuration]
BasedOn=..\BmGame\Config\DefaultEngine.ini

[SystemSettings]
Fullscreen=True
UseVsync=True
AllowD3D10=True <- needed if you are running VISTA
ResX=2560
ResY=1600 <- this is your resolution, X by Y
EffectsLevel=5 <- I am not sure how high this goes, it might go to 10?
MaxMultisamples=1 <- this might be AA
DynamicLights=True
DepthOfField=True
LensFlares=True
Bloom=True
DynamicShadows=True
MotionBlur=True
Distortion=True
FogVolumes=True
DisableSphericalHarmonicLights=False
AmbientOcclusion=True
DetailMode=10 <- again, not sure how high this goes, I set to 10
MaxShadowResolution=1024 <- this was originally set to 512, I set higher to improve performance
IniVersion=5.8

[Engine.Engine]
PhysXLevel=1 <- I am not sure if a higher number (5? 10?) might improve PhysX, runs well as is but I didn't find much for a physics in the demo
Language=int

[DevOptions.Shaders]
bAllowMultiThreadedShaderCompile=True <- this appears to be only a debug option but I set to True to possibly increase multi-threaded performance

Here is the first pass I did with the default INI from the boards:


...and then with my current INI available for download:

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posted @ 18:36

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Tuesday, June 30, 2009

post://4306510762466182006/

I received my EVGA 295 GTX Co-Op today and here are the results!

17:45 - Card installed, powered on
18:00 - Drivers Updated, restarted
21:06 - done with benchmarking

Initial observations:
Compared to the 280 GTX:
- same length
- feels heavier
- a tad thinner

Hardware installation included 2 devices (GTX 295)
I left a 280 in there for strictly PhysX for now but going to do try benchmarks both with and without it on both cards.

Test: -/+ for decreased / increased performance

3DMark Vantage (Ambient Occlusion: ON | PhysX: ON): +
Score: 16209
CPU: 33477
Graphics: 13831

3DMark 2006 (Ambient Occlusion: ON | PhysX: ON): =
Score: 13260
SM 2.0: 4953
SM 3.0: 6965
CPU: 3268

3DMark Vantage (Ambient Occlusion: OFF | PhysX: OFF): +
Score: 12415
CPU: 8610
Graphics: 14560

3DMark 2006 (Ambient Occlusion: OFF | PhysX: OFF): -
Score: 13126
SM 2.0: 4830
SM 3.0: 6935
CPU: 3263

GTA IV: -
Benchark @ 1920 x 1200
Texture Quality High
Texture Filter Quality: Very High
View Distance: 25
Detail Distance: 30

Previous (2 x 280 GTX):
Average FPS: 52.01
Duration: 37.55 Sec
CPU Usage: 77%
System Memory Usage: 36%
Video Memory usage 92%

Current (1 x 295 GTX Co-Op):
Average FPS: 48.96
Duration: 37.72 sec
CPU Usage: 78%
System Memory Usage: 38%
Video Memory Usage: 99%

Crysis: -
I was a custom mix of Very High and High with a lower view distance with the previous cards but durring hectic battles I'd notice everything getting really choppy.

With the new card autodetect chose all High
1920 x 1200 was too much for it at first, but after it settled in and had the textures loaded it went relatively smooth and playable. I turned down to 1280 x 800, the next lowest 16:10 resolution in the list but the quality wasn't worth it. The text was way too blocky, and the trees all had squares where light shone in-between the leaves. I turned it up to 2560 x 1600 and it looked really good but and still had similar performance as the other resolutions. Overall I'd say this is an improvement as I can eek up the shaders and the physics with little to no impact in framerate... too bad said framerate is a steady 30 fps or so. I have the latest version and drivers but I remember a past bug in Crysis where it would run worse if you changed the resolution in game so I'll try this one again tomorrow.

NFS Undercover: +
I had it at 1920 x 1200 previously - with medium world effects (I hate the motion blur) all detail set to highest and 6x AA. I had turned off VSynch previously because it was pulling it down to 30 when I was probably getting about 40 or so, but I HAD to enable it with the new card. I was getting at least 60fps easy and even when I turned it up to 2560 x 1600 I had to turn on VSynch to make it not look like everything was in Fast Forward.

Benchmarks really don't gain much over my 2 x 280s and even go down in the game test. That's partly because the new card actually reduces my available video RAM. The RAM is what I had originally targeted as my bottleneck for draw distance in GTA and this isn't going to help at all, I even need to bring it down a little.

I'm not super impressed, especially since I could get the same performance and even better high resolution performance from my 2 (and now much cheaper) 280s. All in all I'm sure if you're running lower resolution you could kick some ass running 2 of these, but good luck with that.

Rendering is faster due to the increased clocks and there is a noticebly higher quality to the image but as far as sheer frame rates go - this card isn't going to cut it for anyone running higher then 1920 x 1200.

My recommendation is that if you're looking for high performance AND high resolution - stick with the 295 GTX 1g+ cards. I'll be waiting for the higher memory cards to come out, and praying my 90 days for the step up program is enough time.

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posted @ 18:03

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Sunday, May 24, 2009

post://6427700829808250218/

You may have played "Peggle" on PopCap before, but now you can get it on your iPod - I just found Peggle on iTunes for $4.99

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posted @ 09:43

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Tuesday, April 07, 2009

post://7853510666201610976/

more to follow, teaser:



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posted @ 21:05

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Sunday, February 22, 2009

post://8133353976599970085/

I had my main system drive in RAID striping (no data protection) and sure enough one of the drives went screwy. I had a system backup that I made with Vista Ultimate so I wasn't that wary of reinstalling. I could pop in the new drive, insert the windows disk and restore, one of the bennefits of Ultimate!

It wasn't like that, not at all - in order to restore off of one of those Windows Image Backups you need to have the same drive configuration as before. My drives were different - so no go.

I finally reinstalled fresh to a new drive (no RAID on the system drive this time) then I got all the files I needed off the original RAID setup which was still limping along good enough for me to get my data. I was sure I had everything but I was about to find out otherwise.

I started up GTA and it asked me to activate. Ok I can activate, I clicked ok - nada, some error with infrastructure and all that. I realized I needed to reinstall so that got me thinking of my savegames and how I should probably go back them up in case the reinstall tried to overwrite them. I made a backup of my Rockstar Games folder in Documents but as I poked around in there I didn't see any savegame files. I also didn't see anything in the new Vista c:\Users\X3\Saved Games folder.

I did some research and realized I had lost them. I needed the files in c:\Users\X3\Local Settings\Application Data\Rockstar Games\... and since I was using XBox Live for Windows and it encrypts the savegames (to prevent people from cheating) I also needed the files in c:\Program Files(x86)\XLive
I've lost save games before and I know there are sites around that have a save at virtually every misssion in the game, but how would that work in this case?

After some more searching I found something that would let me load the save files into the reinstalled version:
HowTo for Savegame "wrapper"

Original Site

I'm going to go look for savegame collections now. If I can't reply my game with all my carefully molded relationsihips I can at least play out the missions and get the rest of the story.

Damn it!

[Update - 2/23/2009] - I found them! I'll post the link once I get home, but I've found a site with all the missions, and the link for the wrapper above works. Now I can get as close as I can to where I left off - of course the relationships, the races, the pidgeons, the stunt jumps, who knows how they did with those but I can only hope for the best and try and finish the game, albeit from someone else's skin.

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posted @ 14:02

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Saturday, February 14, 2009

post://5313472958211376515/

I just downloaded the largest demo ever: 2.9 gigs, and it turns out that's because it also has the full game in it. When you go to install it you are presented with 2 buttons: Install Trial or Install Full Game, naturally I chose Install Full Game where it presented me with a spot to put in a registration code from EA. I didn't have one but I did see that it's $39 at the EA store so you can download the demo and turn it into the full game.

I thought game companies did away with this sort of thing. Isn't it a little too tantalizing to have a carrot dangled in front of a hackers face of being able to download the full game right out the box or are they confident that their downloadable game technology is safe?

In either case it's kinda cool to be able to download the demo, figure out if you like it and then click a button and input a code to get the full thing. Also cool if you know how to crack I suppose. If it's good I might just consider paying them the $39 though, I like to support good ventures and there's a shortage of racing games in the PC world that don't have hokey dialog (now that they've turned NFS into a bad 2Fast movie).

[Buy the Game]
[Download the Demo & See Screenshots]

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posted @ 08:16

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Saturday, January 03, 2009

post://6990541718987691637/

I beat Fallout 3 today - tried it ever which way to survive. Unfortunately the ending comes out almost the same, with a few changes here and there. I did it right the first time and then reloaded and went back to it. I reached level 20 and Max XP well before I got involved in the last battles of the game. All told it was great, story got even better and though it was slightly more linear towards the end I still really enjoyed it.

I just heard the latest on the DLC which is coming out for both the 360 and PC. 3 installments, they'll be coming out one a month for January - March 2009. The first installment "Battle of Anchorage" lets you play the first battle of the war via simulation, much like "Tranquility Lane". The second installment "The Pitt" is a morality quest into a slave town in Pittsburg. The third and final DLC is the big one, it lets you use all you've gained in the main plot and resumes from where you left off (and lets you advance past level 20).

The first 2 DLCs don't seem like they'd do much good to me from a character expansion point until the third one is out. I may just wait for the multipack to come out in March as I'm sure they'll package them in a disc version once they're all released.

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posted @ 14:40

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Wednesday, December 10, 2008

post://1480953871889639729/

So this shows a few issues with Rockstar's "video editor" in GTA IV for PC.
You'll notice you don't see any fire after the first clip or two yet some vehicles tend to blow up for no reason. I'm a little disssapointed considering it took me over 40 minutes to encode this "web quality" video. Other options are 720p and 1080p. Last time I tried 1080p I crashed. Go fig.

Anyhow, take a look at my GTA 'fire storm' video here.

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posted @ 23:23

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Thursday, December 04, 2008

post://1960250936291300007/

Ya know... sometimes I hate PC gaming and then other times.

I looooove it:
[ 1st Try, beloved MMA10 ERROR ]
[ GTAIV 01 ]
[ GTAIV 02 ]
[ GTAIV 03 ] *
[ GTAIV 04 ]
[ GTAIV 05 ]

* = driver upgrade mmmm hmmm

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posted @ 21:44

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Wednesday, December 03, 2008

post://8605665130117686757/

Rockstar apparently wanted their little foot in the online pool. GTA IV for PC may be exclusive to XBOX Live (Windows) but since they have it all centralized via their Rockstar Social Club - it all depends on their servers having the stones to support everyone logging in at once.

I guess they didn't expect such a rush. I called support:

Wait, you called before?
No... I don't think so.
Yeah, for PS3 - not showing 1080p.
Oh yeah, yeah I did.
So why'd you buy it for the PC too? I had it for PS3, I wasn't going to go buy it for PC too.
Well... I guess the graphics, and really liked the achievements in Fallout 3
Oh, Fallout 3 - brilliant game
Yeah, I love it

Chatter aside, it turned out their server wasn't prepared.
Rookie mistake, Rockstar.

So if you're playing GTA IV for PC and you're getting an error after the copyright screen in GTA (fatal error MMA10), just pull the network cable, start in "offline" mode and boom - you'll be up and happy in single player.

I guess no one was online making recordings in Multiplayer last night, maybe they'll have it fixed later today. When I called it was 3am their time in the UK, with expected rollout to their masses in about 5 hours so it doesn't look good unless they can get some serious stones, real fast.

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posted @ 09:47

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Tuesday, December 02, 2008

post://441443711170341468/

Yeah... I got it.

I couldn't help myself. I looked at the screenshots, I pondered, and after finding there was no demo to quench my thirst, I ventured to go get it before the stores closed.

It's installing now, and I'm enjoying the extra items in the box. I've got plenty of time to read it all - the game is 18g over 2 DVDs. I wonder if they're dual layer. I guess they'd have to be, even compressed it would be at least 12 to 16g and that's more then 2 4g DVDs could handle.

The new social club feature is kind of odd. Apparently someone had already taken my handle?? I don't quite understand but now my PS3 Social Club, PC Social Club, and XBOX Live (Windows) is now all linked up. I've enjoyed the achievements in Fallout 3, and I guess that was another reason I was eager to get this version. I know I've seen most of the missions already, but I can play it really down and dirty and probably get pretty far.

I was all about the DLC, wondering if it will be out for PC too - and I guess I'll get my answer, but if Fallout can do it (coming in January for both XBOX & PC users) I at least know it's possible, and since it's all LIVE - it ought to come to fruition soon enough.

[update 21:44] Apparently there is a newer version of Games for Windows LIVE. I was just playing Fallout 3 yesterday on LIVE so I expected I'd have the latest release. I didn't play it today though, so there must be a new version just for GTA's release. So on the upside to it still not being installed completely - coolness. Also, because I has x64 VISTA I needed to install x64 specific video encoding engine for the game to start, I guess the video editor and encoding is integral.

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posted @ 21:10

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Wednesday, November 05, 2008

post://601768146272237493/

I was surprised to hear that Michael Crichton died today.
He's probably my favorite author, followed closely by Douglas Adams who died just a few years ago. I think I need some new authors, but I'm afraid they might die on me. At the very least there are a still of Michael Crichton's books that I have not read and remain on my bookshelf. There's just so much I loved about how he created a picture with his words that my mind just ran off with. I was able to picture them much more vivid then any movie could convey, and in the case of Timeline actors could portray.

I was actually inspired to write my first computer program based on Jurassic Park. With my TI80, a black and white TV, and book in hand - I set out to recreate the computer system in the book. From the main menu and submenus you could do an array of things from jump-starting the generators (to get the fences back online) to recycling the door locks. I also made it into a game by creating different scenarios and error messages based on what you had already done, and with certain dependencies that had to be met before you were allowed to proceed.

I'm really sad to see him go, one of the only people that could get me reading like you hear about - nonstop until it's done. He touched on cancer quite a bit in his novels and even in ER - which ironically enough even with his money and knowledge, he was still unable to overcome.

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posted @ 20:46

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Monday, November 03, 2008

post://3136412013318335276/

Hummina humina - Fallout 3 is fabulous. It's everything I wanted it to be. It plays similarly to Oblivion with all the awesomeness of Oblivion & Fallout combined.

The combat system is your run of the mill point and shoot... until you activate VATS which stops the action and allows you to choose which body part of which target you want to shoot, with a very RPG % likeliness of hitting each body part.

You can shoot the gun out of their hand - or blow the arm off completely - and to accompany these shots is an awesome (VERY bloody) camera shot in bullet time. Slice their head with a knife, break their leg with the bat, or shoot off their gun hand - it's great.

Here are some screenshots:

Here is a video montage (sans music?) I made of a few attempts at VATS:

Fallout3 Screenshot 01
Fallout3 Screenshot 02

I was limited to 30 sec with trial version of FRAPs but only took me like 10 takes, so here are the 3 best sequences :)
Fallout3 VATS System Preview Video

**UPDATE** I gave in and got the full version of FRAPs and it was TOTALLY worth it, check it out: Video: VATS Killshot

Coming soon - "killing in the name of" soundtrack

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posted @ 12:29

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