Video Games: A (Sonic 3D) Blast From The Past

[Eggegg]

3 minutes ago, Werthead said:

I  played the Empire first time round, didn't think much of them either.

I think it's less the setting and fantasy aspects and more just how they've streamlined things since older games. Not having to bother garrisoning towns because soldiers magically spring out of the woodwork, not having to send diplomats to seek out new factions, you can just ring them up (or something), stuff like that. I do like armies being able to recruit and replenish on the move through friendly territory, that's a good improvement, but everything else feels overly simplified (apart from the lords, who now require insane micro-management instead).

I agree there is simplification, and much of the empire management has been scaled back to the point of irrelevance. It’s more of a war game now than anything else.

however the points you’d mentioned I would definitely put into the improvement category. Not having a bunch of diplomats running around is better and makes diplomacy much easier ( for the Ai especially ) I definitely prefer garrisons , otherwise the game becomes a slog where nobody moves armies 

[Corvinus85]

4 hours ago, Eggegg said:

I think the dwarves are simply the most boring faction. Their battle style is so simple, just turtle up and bombard the approaching enemy. Plus their campaign is pretty dull with no really different mechanics.

Personally I prefer that kind of strategy, and thanks to the grudge mechanic, the campaign isn't that boring, as you are often forced to go out of your territory.

For a better challenge, I recommend Clan Angrund, not the main Dwarf faction.

[Eggegg]

23 minutes ago, Corvinus said:

Personally I prefer that kind of strategy, and thanks to the grudge mechanic, the campaign isn't that boring, as you are often forced to go out of your territory.

For a better challenge, I recommend Clan Angrund, not the main Dwarf faction.

I really enjoy undead as it’s kind of the opposite, they have no ranged units so it’s all about mobility and manoeuvre. 

Yeah agree on Angrund, they are interesting. Same goes for the goblin faction as well 

[Corvinus85]

21 minutes ago, Eggegg said:

I really enjoy undead as it’s kind of the opposite, they have no ranged units so it’s all about mobility and manoeuvre. 

Yeah agree on Angrund, they are interesting. Same goes for the goblin faction as well 

I've always liked having range units in my armies, so that's why I don't like the VC. I'm curious how the Tomb Kings will be made for Warhammer II.

[Werthead]

The Rome II expansion is called Empire Divided and will chronicle the Crisis of the Third Century, when the Roman Empire was splintered into three factions (the Gallic Empire, Rome and the Palmyran Empire) and nearly disintegrated altogether in the face of threats from barbarians and the Sassanids.

It'll be out surprisingly soon, on 30 November. The game also completely revamps diplomacy and politics in the base game and most of the DLC as well.

[Corvinus85]

Time to go back to Rome II. Between all the Warhammer releases, I haven't played any other game, but Total War this fall.

[Jace, Extat]

1 hour ago, Werthead said:

The Rome II expansion is called Empire Divided and will chronicle the Crisis of the Third Century, when the Roman Empire was splintered into three factions (the Gallic Empire, Rome and the Palmyran Empire) and nearly disintegrated altogether in the face of threats from barbarians and the Sassanids.

It'll be out surprisingly soon, on 30 November. The game also completely revamps diplomacy and politics in the base game and most of the DLC as well.

AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Kisses! Kisses for all! All give kisses!

[Kalbear]

8 hours ago, Tongue Stuck to Wall said:

 

Hey Kalbear, are you currently subbed?  If not, would you resub for access to the legacy server(s)?  I've been playing since Vanilla and am completely stoked.  I miss how dangerous the world used to feel and grinding for rep, weapon skill improvement, and even cash, etc., never felt that onerous, but rather challenging and rewarding.

I'm not subbed, and I wouldn't do vanilla if my life depended on it. People forget how completely shitty that game was. 

[Rhom]

9 hours ago, Tongue Stuck to Wall said:

 

Hey Kalbear, are you currently subbed?  If not, would you resub for access to the legacy server(s)?  I've been playing since Vanilla and am completely stoked.  I miss how dangerous the world used to feel and grinding for rep, weapon skill improvement, and even cash, etc., never felt that onerous, but rather challenging and rewarding.

 

21 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I'm not subbed, and I wouldn't do vanilla if my life depended on it. People forget how completely shitty that game was. 

My subscription is still active.  (Mainly because I had it set for six months and that came up before I realized it and I got charged. )

On the one hand, I'm with Tongue to the Wall... I miss some of that nostalgia.  On the other, Kal is right... Vanilla was pointlessly grindy at times.

What I really miss is the wonder that went with the game in those early months of play for me.  I will never forget the first time I wandered into the tram in Stormwind.  Some sort of raid had come through the night before and there were skeletons everywhere.  Not knowing any better, I assumed that my own death was imminent and I remember my heart racing.  No matter how many weapon skills I have to grind or how many times I spam "LF1M Rogue Mara.  Princess run.  Need Imp Sap" in Ironforge, I'll never get that initial sense of wonder back.    

[Slurktan]

52 minutes ago, Rhom said:

 

My subscription is still active.  (Mainly because I had it set for six months and that came up before I realized it and I got charged. )

On the one hand, I'm with Tongue to the Wall... I miss some of that nostalgia.  On the other, Kal is right... Vanilla was pointlessly grindy at times.

What I really miss is the wonder that went with the game in those early months of play for me.  I will never forget the first time I wandered into the tram in Stormwind.  Some sort of raid had come through the night before and there were skeletons everywhere.  Not knowing any better, I assumed that my own death was imminent and I remember my heart racing.  No matter how many weapon skills I have to grind or how many times I spam "LF1M Rogue Mara.  Princess run.  Need Imp Sap" in Ironforge, I'll never get that initial sense of wonder back.    

The only thing I would look forward to for classic is cc actually means something again in dungeons.

[Rhom]

1 minute ago, Slurktan said:

The only thing I would look forward to for classic is cc actually means something again in dungeons.

Or just that dungeons require some thought at all...

Of course, I turn 40 in March.  My life is drastically different from the 26 year old that stepped into Azeroth for the first time with time to kill.  I don't have time to spend four hours running Sunken Temple.  So as much as I'd like to play some Vanilla servers... I just don't see it happening for me.

 

[Rhom]

I'll never forget the night I got my Thunderfury...  (by God, if @Pony Queen Jace can regale us with stories of the Mongol hordes breaking upon the shield wall of her mighty armies, I can tell a tale of Azeroth in days gone by)

I was the third tank in our regular raid group.  The main tank had gotten the first ever Bindings of the Windseeker that dropped and some rogue got the next.  The third binding dropped for our second tank and then he was the only one on when the matching pair dropped weeks later.  He had all the materials to forge the sword by then and our guild planned a run out to Tanaris (Is that the right featureless desert?) to kill Thunderaan the Windseeker.  Soon after that, a binding dropped and I was the most logical person to give it to.  I didn't worry too much about getting the mats together because I knew that it could takes months if ever for the matching binding to drop.  Plus, our guild did not have all the Elementium needed to forge the bars.  We had just finished spending a month bashing our heads against the guild-breaker... Vaelstrasz.  Because back then it took weeks if not months to get everyone enough fire resistance gear to survive that fight.  Because we weren't all that far into Black Wing Lair, a normal week of raids might net us 3 elementium ore on a good night.

MC and BWL reset and we were ready to step into our regular raid schedule for the week.  We clear MC early in the week and on that run, the matching binding of the Windseeker drops.  That was back to back weeks!  We'd never seen that.  So now I've got both bindings and need to get other mats together while waiting for our guild to get more elementium.  We had 4 in the bank and I needed 10.  Probably a good two weeks at least if not three.  

Friday gets here.  The internet went down at our apartment.  My now ex-wife and I were in a virtual panic on what to do.  I had just started my own office a couple months earlier.  I had WoW installed on the computer in my office, so we pack up her computer and take it across town to my office.  Its BWL night.  I need 10 elementium.  We had 4 in the bank.  On the way into Vael, a couple of those goblins that run dropped two.  We down the insane dragon and press on... another elementium drops.  Then as we near the three drakes, a fourth drops.  The guild supply is now up to 8... one guy in the raid says he has one in the bank he was planning to sell and another person said they saw one on the auction house earlier.  The raid leader says through Vent. "No one gets offline tonight until Rae gets his Thunderfury!"  

My dwarf's name was Raeghar... but oddly enough not named for Rhaegar Targaryen.  Although as ASoIaF gained popularity over the years many conversations started that way.  There was a human rogue on Laughing Skull named Davos who I had plenty of conversations with over the years.  At some point when playing Phantasy Star Online, I came up with the name Raef for my HUmar.  Star Wars: Galaxies came out and my Bounty Hunter was named Raeph Felix.  I started a paladin on WoW named Raeph.  Then my ex-wife started playing on that account and I bought a new account to play together.  In those days, you couldn't transfer characters between accounts.  My dwarf was actually named after Flint Fireforge's father Reghar from Dragonlance combined with the Raeph name.    But I digress...

So now I've got the 10 Elementium Ore and I need to go around and get the other stuff together to forge the Elementium Bars for the sword.  All the raid members stay online while I do this and forge the items in Ironforge.  We all run out there to aforementioned desert and around 3:30 AM, we defeated the rogue elemental prince of wind and I had my Legendary sword.  Then we logged out and went home to sleep so I could get some rest before coming in to see patients at 9... 

I stood around afk in Ironforge for hours while logged in doing other things just to show off that sword.  I still consider it one of my favorite moments in gaming in my whole life.

While my nostalgia for Classic WoW will always be there, I also know that I will never have a moment like that again were I to play on those servers.   

[The Anti-Targ]

21 hours ago, Werthead said:

6 hours into a Dwarves campaign on Total Warhammer and I'm still not feeling it. I've put thousands of hours into Medieval I and II and Rome I (plus mods) and loved those games, but the Warscape Total Wars really don't gel with me. I think it's the very fast, arcadey feel of the battles, which just feels off, but I enjoyed Shogun 2 and even Rome II (well, more or less) more than Warhammer. It just feels very micro-management focused and too much emphasis on the heroes over the rest of the army. And I've never been a fan of the "you can only have an army if you have a general" paradigm they introduced with Rome II. I get they tried to take away the busywork from the game, but it ends up with you having quite an impressive and substantial empire but you only have one army because you've only got one decent lord, which is weird.

I'm determined to crack on with this campaign to try to finally nail it though.

 

15 hours ago, Eggegg said:

I think the dwarves are simply the most boring faction. Their battle style is so simple, just turtle up and bombard the approaching enemy. Plus their campaign is pretty dull with no really different mechanics.

id suggest playing another faction. I really enjoyed empire as it’s got some diplomacy, you have to deal with enemies on all sides and they have a really interesting roster. 

I was initially sceptical of warhammer as well , didn’t think I’d like its siliness. But actually I now prefer it. I realised how boring most battles in Rome 2 were. So many identikit spear units marching into each other and very little in the way of tactics.

id stick with it, warhammer is probably the best total war game ever , with the most scope as well 

I started with Greenskins, then did Bretonnia, had a go at Dwarves, did Von Carstein, and now Wood Elves (yeah, I caved and bought the DLC, but I think it was a shit move putting Woodies behind the DLC pay wall. I did notice that after buying the Woodies DLC there was no actual download. So it wasn't a DLC but rather a paid unlock. Shit birds!)

It's only Dwarves I stopped playing really early on. I completed the short campaign for Greenskins, completed the long campaign for Bretonnia and Von Carstein, and still working through Wood Elves.

I probably auto-resolve 90% of battles. I find it very tedious to go through the motions of fighting a battle for which I have overwhelming odds of winning (or losing). And even when it's more like a 50-60% winning chance I sometimes autoresolve if losing is not all that consequential, though 90% of the time the game auto-resolves 50/50 splits in your favour (at least on normal difficulty). I do enjoy the challenge of fighting and winning a battle where the odds are somewhat against me. But I typically make sure I follow one of the basic rules of war, engage with superior force.

[The Drunkard]

18 hours ago, Werthead said:

The Rome II expansion is called Empire Divided and will chronicle the Crisis of the Third Century, when the Roman Empire was splintered into three factions (the Gallic Empire, Rome and the Palmyran Empire) and nearly disintegrated altogether in the face of threats from barbarians and the Sassanids.

That looks good, Aurelian in particular seems like he'd have a really good campaign.

Although I'd need to pay 75 USD to play it, which is annoying for a four year old game. 

[Werthead]

1 hour ago, The Drunkard said:

That looks good, Aurelian in particular seems like he'd have a really good campaign.

Although I'd need to pay 75 USD to play it, which is annoying for a four year old game. 

Have you not got Rome II already? I'd hold fire and see how the new patch fixes up the game. The original release was monstrously bugged and although the Emperor Edition fixed the technical issues, it didn't fix other issues. In particular I want to see if they've fixed the ludicrous map size. Taking a dozen turns just to walk up the coast of Italy was not fun.

[Eggegg]

1 minute ago, Werthead said:

Have you not got Rome II already? I'd hold fire and see how the new patch fixes up the game. The original release was monstrously bugged and although the Emperor Edition fixed the technical issues, it didn't fix other issues. In particular I want to see if they've fixed the ludicrous map size. Taking a dozen turns just to walk up the coast of Italy was not fun.

That was something fans of the series wanted though, a massive map with hundreds of regions. Personally i found it overwhelming and quite tedious to try and create any sort of empire when there are so many cities to take over. 

[Werthead]

I find the map on the original Rome to be quite a lot better, as it was still pretty epic and time-consuming to fight your way across Gaul or (especially) North Africa. Not sure I can go back to the simplistic battle maps again though. Medieval II does hold up a fair bit better than Rome I, despite being on the same engine.

[The Drunkard]

1 hour ago, Werthead said:

Have you not got Rome II already? I'd hold fire and see how the new patch fixes up the game. The original release was monstrously bugged and although the Emperor Edition fixed the technical issues, it didn't fix other issues. In particular I want to see if they've fixed the ludicrous map size. Taking a dozen turns just to walk up the coast of Italy was not fun.

No, only Med 2, Attila and the Warhammer games. All the talk about Rome II's issues is actually what motivated me to pick Attila after I had moved on from Med 2. I don't think I'll get it until there's a sale because I feel I'm spending too much money on this series. 

[Werthead]

Got bored to tears again of Total Warhammer so jacked it in. Maybe third time lucky? Started playing Empire: Total War again on the Road to Independence campaign and got quite a lot further. It's more of a halfway house between the Rome I/Medieval II paradigm and the later games and that mix seems to work a lot better. The only problem is that the AI is pretty braindead even on the harder difficulty settings. Had a dangerous-looking battle where the enemy had a ton of artillery set up to bombard me, but for some reason they deployed it behind their own fortress and decided to blast their own walls down for me whilst my army sat on and watched.

Will finish this off and try a Grand Campaign as England. Will probably be in the mood to play something else then.

 

This looks interesting. Seven: The Days Long Gone is a stealth game with more than a whiff of Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun to it, but there's more variety in how to approach missions and your character is more versatile and capable of jumping up walls and free-running. Out next month. Will keep an eye on this, could be worth a go.

[Jace, Extat]

How dare ye insipid fools allow the video game thread to fall from the first page.

Been playing a lot of Skyrim lately, thought I'd share.