Well my latest post is pretty much all the news I gots
If you want fresh off the press stuff I went shooting handguns this afternoon, had suchi for supper and am watching the Van game and this all wilts nursing one wicked hangover
Nothing as momentous as a new job. My life at the moment is in a sort of "ticking along according to plan" mode. Very satisfactory, but not too many red-letter days to single out.
This afternoon a sulphur-crested cockatoo as long as my forearm landed on my balcony rail and screeched at me. Does that count?
Rad. My news is minimal and mostly involving the last two posts on my journal: hair and concert both rad. However, I've a query! Is there a time I could come down and get you to dread my hair between the 13th and 18th of April?
Hmmm...gameplay...I think malkav11 outlined it pretty well here in the gamers group. It does have the feel of a fairly open ended world, like Gothic, broken into various smaller, but still sizeable zones. There's a somewhat linear route available through all of them by following the primary quest, but you miss out on interaction with some of the residents, creatures, side quests, and odd loot. It's sort of like HL2 for the adventurer. Not as action packed, but so much more to explore and learn along the way. And you are at risk from the environment just as much, if not more, as the critters and enemies you come across.
With the various factions and their ideals and codes of service, it feels very much like a MMORPG. Only the other folks are all NPCs. You've got primary traders spread quite a ways apart who will buy most anything and have unlimited funds. They also dole out the most quests or 'jobs'. Within each zone, there are at least two to four (that I've found) other faction leaders or folks of interest who can give you work. You can trade any non-weapon/ammo/armor items - that is, food, artifacts, health kits, mutated animal parts - with just about anyone who isn't a trader, although they have limited cash. But thus far, money isn't an issue at all. Unless I've got to pay serious dough for items or information later in the game, it doesn't appear to be balanced too well. Also, you rarely have to buy anything at all since you can acquire virtually everything you need in abundant quantities from enemies you kill. And they keep showing up. You may clear out a particular abandoned site of bandits or mercs, but the next time you come through, they may well have reestablished themselves there. Adds to the feel that life is going on throughout the gameplay area whether you are there to witness it or not. I've even seen places where I've 'completed' the task of helping a faction fend off an attack by bandits only to have another group of bandits attack before I've finished looting all of the bodies.
Inventory management, as malkav11 mentioned, is realistic, but a little frustrating for those of us who try to keep something on us for any given situation. You just can't carry that much weight. Thankfully, I've gotten so much money through completed jobs, that I no longer take anything but ammo, more powerful artifacts, and the occasional health kits, food, or bandages. It's about surviving at this point, not gaining wealth. New weapons are still a challenge, however. They are all based on real-world weapons with design advantages and flaws. Some have better range, some do more damage, some are more accurate, some jam more than others. And they all have a quality indicator telling you how worn the weapon is, which will affect all of the above. The further into the zone you go, the more powerful and higher quality or unique the weapons appear to get. But some less powerful weapons can be fitted with a scope. Do you keep the one that may allow you to snipe from a distance and avoid a firefight or take the more powerful weapon? Do you keep the double barrel shotgun that can kill with one or two shots at close range, but is slow to reload, or take the assault rifle that works on more distant targets, but plows through ammo? What do you take with you if you are traveling over open terrain to get to a particular location, that will then be close-quarter fighting within a building or underground facility? Decisions...decisions...
I'm playing on the easy setting because I'm more into the exploration aspects. But the AI sometimes is not too good. As in flawed. I've left areas in one direction, that had enemies remaining, then come back to that area the next day from behind them only to see them still watching in the direction I left. And they were completely oblivious to me as I walked up (not snuck up) behind them and took them out. Even after killing the first, his buddy just 25 yards away never responded and was just as easy to kill from behind. So, there are areas where their logic appeared to be written to assume the player would finish everyone in an area before returning. I've also found one instance where I fled up to higher floors in a building, worked my way to the other end, down the stairs and back to the main entrance only to find some of the enemies 'frozen' with their guns pointing up at the windows of the upper floors where I had been. Which of course, made it easy to take them out. But overall, it does seem to work fairly well. Most of the time, they take cover, crouch, retreat to safer positions, etc..., and some of them will attempt to flank you while you are distracted with the enemies in front.
I'm hoping they'll release a patch that will work with existing saved games at some point. I restarted the game after about 5 hours of play and was about 10 hours into the second one when the first patch was released. Just didn't want to start it all over again. But, I think there may be some replay value.
I absolutely will be posting pics...if not here, then I'll let you know where to find them! Thanks!
The way it's gonna go, I'll be doing the shoot in 35 mm black and white...I need to find the right, gothic kind of location for this, though. Either that, or drain much-needed cash on studio time and then find help from someone who knows Photoshop...
What I wanted to do was something similar to what Luis Royo does with women with swords...that's the only hint you're gonna get at what I'm going to try to accomplish, by the way!
Glad to hear it counts, because the only other really interesting thing that's happened to me is leaving two-thirds of a bag of dark chocolate coated coffee beans in a city halfway across the continent because I was racing to meet my plane. Dammit. I hope whoever in that office found them is enjoying them.
Oh, and with one thing and another I was sweating so much that by the time I boarded said plane I had these weird white streaks down the front of my black shirt. The only explanation I can think of is that I was pumping out so much sweat (I'm talking curtains of water coming off my face here) that these are where droplets splatted onto my shirtfront and left a salt trail when they dried. That's sort of interesting, I guess.
Jomei