Thanks for the heads up, downloading now. Wasn't super=impressed with the trailer, huge weapons and too much fancy lighting, but will be keen to give it a try. 

How many of those 17 minutes are waiting for the stupid menu system to dick around back and forth with it's "novelty wears off and boredom sets in in about 30 seconds" graphic???? 

So it's like a 2006 era Daikatana meets Blade Runner, with naff hints of Bulletstorm. Uh huh. Kinda fun tho. The city above you is rather cool. 

...and it was Syndicate as everyone thought.

At least I assume our Norwegian friend has mapped for it. 

That'll be awesome seeing what CZG can do a modern game. Can't wait for that one. 

lol as if individual efforts have any place in a production like this.

The coop will own tho... 

fucking adjustable fov in the pc version ffs! ;)

Screens look interesting, hoping you can level city blocks like in syndicate wars <3 

czg just tell the other "artists" to piss off, and that you're making the levels from start to finish. I won't have it any other way :D 

"Populous 4: The Hand" Details Leak from Swedish Gaming Magazine 

Through DART 6 bio-chip technology implanted in their head, players can slow down time and breach the digital world around them to take down their foes using a variety of upgradable hacking mechanics. Syndicate�s blend of fast-paced, futuristic, action shooter settings and story combined with innovative chip breach gameplay instantly immerses players in a unique digital world.

Unique eh. So nothing like the Veil in Wolfenstein nor the time gimmicks in Timeshift and Singularity. I bet the atmosphere and setting is worlds away from Deus Ex too. Yup screams UNIQUE out of every orifice to me.

Still it's existence as an FPS shooter seems to annoy some fanbois, so I might buy it for that alone. 

Populous becomes a first person shooter?! WTF? Why bother even wasting the Populous franchise name, just call it something different ffs. I never liked the Populous games, and if I saw the name "populous" in a video game store I'll completely overlook it thinking it's another god game. Next they'll be making a Need 4 Speed war shooter. 

Digital Extremes is well known for it's hand in the Unreal franchise, particularly the multiplayer games Unreal Tournament. By 2005 they developed their own new IP; Pariah, which was an average game at best. Warpath followed a year later and I didn't have the heart to play it since Pariah was a skippable title and Warpath was critically received as even worse.

So it's not a far stretch to assume their next IP; Dark Sector, might fail as well. It's an early-2008 game although it didn't get a PC port until 2009. Fortunately Digital Extremes have developed their own engine for Dark Sector instead of re-using the aging Unreal Engine 2.5, or at least aging in their hands.

The engine, named Evolution, does a pretty good job of making the game look appealing. My only complaint is that they went way overboard on the post-processing and visual effects. The amount of blurring on anything that isn't direcly in the centre of the screen and up close, is ridiculous. But the lighting all looks good. It looks about what you'd expect for a 2007/2008 gaming engine with all the visual effects hammed up to the max. Very, very similar looking to Infernal.

The art is also satisfying with tonnes of details on the textures throughout the game. Most of the levels look solidly good all throughout the game; there's nothing dull here. But there's also nothing awe-inspiring. The levels are all tight and claustraphoic, with a slow walking speed so you don't really notice that between each level load there's really only a few rooms sometimes. It's a corridor crawler basically, although with plenty of outdoor areas as well, they're still very linear and tight with random, unrealistic barriers used for cover everyone. There's no treking off the beaten path for exploration in Dark Sector, so expect linearity at it's hardcore.

The gameplay is where Dark Sector fails for me. Crystal Dynamics introduced a variety of unique features into the game, most notable the spinning blade you launch at enemies while holding a handgun in your left hand. So you can shoot and blade at the same time, which is great for a while. The first half of the game has you up against humans with guns; nothing different to every other shooter, but at least it's fun. Then a little past halfway they change into the infected, which are basically Doom 3 Imp's that fire yellow or blue crap at you. Two good shots from this fast projectile stuff and your dead. The health is regenerating but once the screen goes red it's several painstaking seconds before your health has returned to normal. Furthermore the infected are launched at you in spawns of 3, 4, 5 at a time and as soon as they're dead more keep spawning. As you get further into the game and different types of monsters are introduced, they have more and more health to the point where you need to hit one four or five times with the blade to kill it. Four or five times?! I might as well be using saucer than a hardcore three-edged blade!

This all wouldn't be so bad if there were quicksaves, but of course Crystal Dynamics doesn't care about PC standards, they're all about consoles, so you'll be replaying many of the checkpoints two or three times till you get through. It feels like sometimes getting through a fight is more luck than skill in Dark Sector. If you just happen to run the wrong way and there's an infected imp spoofing you, and you miss the powerhit, then you won't get away because the damn player moves too slowly.

It's a lot easier if you're able to use your guns and blade 50/50, but there's not quite enough ammo for that, so you'll spend a lot of time hiding behind cover picking things off slowly. Most of the game isn't too bad, but it's just some scenes where you have monsters spawning over and over again and it can get quite overwhelming in the later stages.

What they need to do to fix it was make the blade FAR more powerful. Sure you can do a more lethal hit if you hold the blade key down and release it at the perfect time, but it's hard to get the timing right so you'll only get the powerhit 40-50% of the time. The blade should have been an awesome weapon of destruction ripping through enemies. Along with a faster player and perhaps less reliance on the Gear Of War-ripoff cover gameplay and a faster regenerating health system, and Dark Sector would have been a much more enjoyable game. Either that or include a damn difficulty selection instead of just one difficulty.

And the boss battles were some of the worst I've ever played without any quicksaving or checkpoints during the battles - they're hardly worth wasting your time on without putting a cheat on to get through it.

Overall a good looking game, despite there not being anything too epic, but the gameplay could have been a lot more fun but just became monotonous and annoying by the last quarter of the game.

Rating: 6.0/10 

Kona becomes someone without an irony meter?! WTF? Why bother even wasting time going on SomethingAwful, just stick to a serious gaming news site ffs. 

Still it's existence as an FPS shooter seems to annoy some fanbois, so I might buy it for that alone.

You won't be so smug when Quake is remade as a third person cover based gears knock off.

Okay Fallout worked very well as an FPS, but a more strategic game with the squad elements and stuff of Syndicate? I dunno... too many games are getting sucked through either being first person or third person shooters.
I love shooters, but I don't want quite the volume of them that we now have :E 

OH haha was that a joke? I thought it might have been but it wasn't april! Didn't notice what site I was on. What a douche! lol 

With the changes made with Fallout, X-COM and Syndicate in FPS over the years, even I almost fell for it.

Not that I found Fallout 3 bad. I've enjoyed it and the game surpassed my expectations. Never played the first Fallout until the third got announced and that was an interesting experience.

XCOM just looks underwhelming. Never played the UFO Defense either until sometime before this new game's announcement. And I love the hell out of it. Very atmospheric and the turned-based strategy aspects are refreshing, including all the management and taking care of your troops while out on the field.

Syndicate? I have fond memories of Syndicate Wars on the PSX many years ago, despite being terrible at the game. But another FPS? 

Why bother even wasting time going on SomethingAwful, just stick to a serious gaming news site ffs.

Is this sarcasm?

Because, well... 

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/09/16/portal-free/ 

First I'll cover John Woo, acclaimed Hong Kong action movie director who is behind Stranglehold. Now I've seen most of his top movies; Hard Boiled, The Killer, Bullet In The Head, Police Story, and his western movies Hard Target, Broken Arrow, Face/Off. I like a good action movie or a good crime/drama, but none of his movies have been very memorable for me. In fact I can barely remember a thing about Hard Boiled, and it's only been a couple years since I saw it! Stranglehold is the video game sequel to Hard Boiled. I'm not sure that it really features much of the plot, it's really just the same guy (Tequila, voiced/played by Chow Yun-Fat) in a completely different story.

The story in Stranglehold follows Tequila as he tries to get his long lost love and child back from a gang, who are using them to blackmail another gang. So Tequila sides with both gangs at some stage in order to get his family back. The story is okay - plenty of action movie cliches and rather predictable, but at least there is a story going on with cut-scenes throughout. I would have hoped the game would have featured something a little more interesting coming from John Woo; I could have thought up this plot in five minutes, but a game with a good story is rare. But the player model looks just like Chow Yun-Fat, which is great.

The gameplay in Stranglehold is straight-up action mixed with Timeshift and Max Payne. Bullet-time is important and used constantly during battle. There is a cover system, but it's not necessary, thank god, but jumping is missing. You also have special abilities which build up over time as you kill bad guys - simple health boosts, precise slow motion sniping, a fury mode where you can't be hurt and don't lose ammo and a spinning attack. They were good little features, in particular the sniping and fury were very helpful during boss fights. But I ended up using the health boost the most.

Weapons are all okay. You have only two weapon slots so I mostly stuck with the few machine guns and pistols. You do go through ammo quick and have to switch weapons often, but there are plenty around. Only the shotgun I didn't like - it was a bit useless unless at very close range. Overall the combat was fun and quite constant. Sometimes it felt a bit Painkiller-esque as you seem to enter one arena and have a set number of spawning enemies before you can continue to the next arena, but other parts of the game were more flowing so Midway didn't overdo the arena feel. Nor did they make the common mistake of endless spawns until the player moves forward - I really hate games that do that.

Stranglehold does feature a checkpoint system, so marks down for that as always. But it's not so bad here as the game won't have you dying over and over. I played on the lowest skill setting because I hate checkpoint replays, so I only died several times during the game at the most (mostly boss fights), but it wasn't stupidly easy either. There was still some challenge and strategic gameplay involved. The final level was suitably tough.

Stranglehold uses Unreal Engine 3.0, so it's no surprise that the game looks good. Unfortunately Midway really struggle with the structure of the levels from an aesthetic viewpoint, instead relying on lots of debris and detail instead of fantastic open levels. The levels are often very small and tight. When I got to the Slums level it started out with a great looking scene over a run-down city, but before I knew it the level had turned into trekking through tiny rooms, sewers and corridors. You also get to play through a museum, a penthouse building, a massive restaurant, even the Hong Kong marketplace, but while they all look really good, they're also quite small. Only the Tai O island opens up a little, filled with wooden huts and walkways through the island bays.

Strangehold may not do islands as pretty as Crysis or restaurants and casinos as impressive as Rainbow 6, but there's nothing to really complain about with the design.

The only major bug forced me to change the resolution every time I started the game or I'd just get a black screen. A minor annoyance though since I completed the game almost in a single sitting.

Usually after playing a game I know exactly what it did wrong and what to complain about. But in Stranglehold, to be honest, there's nothing really that bad here. It's just a good, action-packed game to add to the collection. Decent design, fun gameplay. Perhaps it's only big flaw is it's very short length and only seven levels.

Rating: 7.5/10 

First I'll cover John Woo, acclaimed Hong Kong action movie director who is behind Stranglehold. Now I've seen most of his top movies; Hard Boiled, The Killer, Bullet In The Head, Police Story, and his western movies Hard Target, Broken Arrow, Face/Off. I like a good action movie or a good crime/drama, but none of his movies have been very memorable for me. In fact I can barely remember a thing about Hard Boiled, and it's only been a couple years since I saw it! Stranglehold is the video game sequel to Hard Boiled. I'm not sure that it really features much of the plot, it's really just the same guy (Tequila, voiced/played by Chow Yun-Fat) in a completely different story.

The story in Stranglehold follows Tequila as he tries to get his long lost love and child back from a gang, who are using them to blackmail another gang. So Tequila sides with both gangs at some stage in order to get his family back. The story is okay - plenty of action movie cliches and rather predictable, but at least there is a story going on with cut-scenes throughout. I would have hoped the game would have featured something a little more interesting coming from John Woo; I could have thought up this plot in five minutes, but a game with a good story is rare. But the player model looks just like Chow Yun-Fat, which is great.

The gameplay in Stranglehold is straight-up action mixed with Timeshift and Max Payne. Bullet-time is important and used constantly during battle. There is a cover system, but it's not necessary, thank god, but jumping is missing. You also have special abilities which build up over time as you kill bad guys - simple health boosts, precise slow motion sniping, a fury mode where you can't be hurt and don't lose ammo and a spinning attack. They were good little features, in particular the sniping and fury were very helpful during boss fights. But I ended up using the health boost the most.

Weapons are all okay. You have only two weapon slots so I mostly stuck with the few machine guns and pistols. You do go through ammo quick and have to switch weapons often, but there are plenty around. Only the shotgun I didn't like - it was a bit useless unless at very close range. Overall the combat was fun and quite constant. Sometimes it felt a bit Painkiller-esque as you seem to enter one arena and have a set number of spawning enemies before you can continue to the next arena, but other parts of the game were more flowing so Midway didn't overdo the arena feel. Nor did they make the common mistake of endless spawns until the player moves forward - I really hate games that do that.

Stranglehold does feature a checkpoint system, so marks down for that as always. But it's not so bad here as the game won't have you dying over and over. I played on the lowest skill setting because I hate checkpoint replays, so I only died several times during the game at the most (mostly boss fights), but it wasn't stupidly easy either. There was still some challenge and strategic gameplay involved. The final level was suitably tough.

Stranglehold uses Unreal Engine 3.0, so it's no surprise that the game looks good. Unfortunately Midway really struggle with the structure of the levels from an aesthetic viewpoint, instead relying on lots of debris and detail instead of fantastic open levels. The levels are often very small and tight. When I got to the Slums level it started out with a great looking scene over a run-down city, but before I knew it the level had turned into trekking through tiny rooms, sewers and corridors. You also get to play through a museum, a penthouse building, a massive restaurant, even the Hong Kong marketplace, but while they all look really good, they're also quite small. Only the Tai O island opens up a little, filled with wooden huts and walkways through the island bays.

Strangehold may not do islands as pretty as Crysis or restaurants and casinos as impressive as Rainbow 6, but there's nothing to really complain about with the design.

The only major bug forced me to change the resolution every time I started the game or I'd just get a black screen. A minor annoyance though since I completed the game almost in a single sitting.

Usually after playing a game I know exactly what it did wrong and what to complain about. But in Stranglehold, to be honest, there's nothing really that bad here. It's just a good, action-packed game to add to the collection. Decent design, fun gameplay. Perhaps it's only big flaw is it's very short length and only seven levels.

Rating: 7.5/10 

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/09/22/how-diablo-iiis-drm-will-affect-you/ 

 

diablo 3's drm already affected me and i wont buy it. where i live, internet is kind of weird. while the connections are stable, the problem lies on summer. strong winds and thunderstorms make it into a nice place to live, sure, but in turn the power goes out for hours.

whenever i see the shadows of the glowing eye of the universe standing besides the weak, shimmering toe nails of humanity, i wonder why, and only why, i haven't yet seen with my own two ears out of my rotten teeth.

p.s - i'll probably buy diablo3 anyway, but i dont know, a game with always online drm doesnt deserve any sales.

the end 

i forgot to say, i'm actually way more exited about torchlight 2 than diablo3. and when i wrote that i'll buy d3, i mean in battlechest form. like i did with diablo2 and the original starcraft [which i dont like at all! hehe].

the end 2 

But wtf was that in the second paragraph?!