Halororor

I apologize in advance for resurrecting an old thread, but a link to this thread popped up in a discussion of the Nexus family of sites on Reddit recently and I would like to chime in with how I feel about the issue. The Nexus was the first forum I ever joined and for a long time I considered it a sort of online 'home.' I eventually decided to stop posting here because I simply could not deal with the atmosphere the moderators were causing around here. I am really saddened that instead of doing some introspection, the moderators chose to simply write all these complaints off as the whining of butthurt people who got banned. The fact that I'm posting this message proves that I, at least, am not just 'whining' because I got banned. There is (was) a bit of a problem with the way moderators carried themselves around here. The way users would trick other users into doing things to get themselves banned, moderators pouncing at the slightest sign of a misdeed and the general snarkiness of many of the staff just did not create a very pleasant atmosphere. This most often manifested itself in the staff's moderation where they would post incredibly inflammatory messages inside banned users' posts when simple, to the point messages would have sufficed. Meanwhile the user is no longer there to defend themself and the other users are too scared to call out the moderator's gloating for fear of getting banned themselves. That was in incredibly poor taste. You can choose to ignore what I posted and write all the complaints off as disgruntled users who couldn't stick within the rules and are now butthurt, but I think all of us know that usually where there's this much smoke, there's bound to be a fire. Maybe do a bit of introspection and consider that there are some things that could be done better. Many people complain, and yes, maybe many of them are just butthurt. But there are also many people who complain only because they care. Not everyone has a vendetta against the moderators. The problem is just that DU's policy of nobody being allowed to question the moderators' actions makes it a bit difficult for most of us to complain where the feedback is most effective- the Nexus forums. Heck, I would be surprised if I woke up tomorrow morning to find this account still active.

Be that as it may, that's what the business lead for Microsoft South Africa told us, and that's the information I was working on. Windows 8 only available as upgrade at retail It was confirmed in Australia as well. I didn't really have much reason to doubt something coming directly out of Microsoft's mouths. Windows 8 is only available as an upgrade

Also, Dark0ne, I think it's pretty insulting that you resort to insinuating that those of us who are fans of Steam ejaculate all over our PCs every time Steam or GabeN is mention. I actually expect a bit better than that of you. Especially considering that you seem to be arguing from a position of complete ignorance (and I say that with all due respect). Steam is by no means perfect, and god knows some days I spend as much time trying to get it running as I spend actually using it, but it is undeniable that Steam is one of the best things to happen to PC gaming in years. A few years back the PC gaming market was in a pretty bad state. Have a look at Russia. It was one of the countries with one of the highest piracy rates in the world. Valve sees unserved customers, whereas most other PC gaming companies just sees a bunch of thieves. People advise Valve against opening up the service in the Russian region, Valve does it anyway. And hey, whaddaya know, today Russia is one of Steam's biggest sources of revenue. You can say what you will about Steam, but they managed to become top-dog in the PC gaming market because they know how to do business and they know what customers want. They don't see pirates as thieves, they see it for what it is; a service delivery issue. They also don't try to nickle and dime every last cent out of their customers like just about every other major gaming corporation out there. You're welcome to your opinion, obviously, probably more so considering that this is your site, but I reckon I'm also allow to comment on your opinion and say that I think you painting those of us who are Steam fans as if we're a bunch of gushing fanbois ejaculating all over the place is pretty naive and ignorant on your part. There's a damn good reason why so many of us love the service. Steam has brought us a long way from where we were 5 years ago, when everyone was sitting around talking in hushed voices and wondering what's happening to PC gaming.

Wow, the F2P limitations are terrible, as can be expected from an EA game. It's even worse than Turbine's notoriously rubbish F2P models.

You are aware it's the brick & mortar shops that are essentially forcing digital prices to stay high, right? If digital games are cheaper than their retail counterparts, the retail market would all but die off. Who's going to drive out to a brick & mortar shop to buy a game for $50/$60 if you can buy it for much cheaper online and just wait a few hours for it to download? Also, you seem very misinformed as to how digital distribution actually works, which I find odd. Valve doesn't control the prices on Steam. Game prices are determined entirely by the publisher and/or developer. That's because Windows 8 is only available as an upgrade. You have to own a previous version of Windows in order to install Win8.

Have you considered that that 30% is probably roughly the equivalent of what publishers would be paying if they had to buy and print discs, jewel cases, jewel case covers as well as the game manual, plus had to pay for shipping and distribution costs? Oh, and brick and mortar shops don't sell videogames for free either, they also need their cut. When you consider all the extra costs for retail games, I honestly don't think a 30% cut from Valve is as bad as people want to make it out to be. And it's pretty ironic that you slam Valve for being 'greedy' by not wanting to host Steam on what is going to be an insanely, ridiculously overpriced OS from Microsoft, a company with a history of overcharging for pretty much anything. :P I'm pretty glad that Steam is focusing on Linux, because the only reason I fork out ridiculous amounts of cash for Windows every time is because most games require it. If I can play games on Linux I'm moving over there and I won't ever look back at Windows again. Overpriced rubbish is what it is.

Hehe, I guess there's no accounting for taste. Give players the option and they'll put virtual breasts on just about anything. :P But really, if you can get your hands on the old Doom 3, there are some absolutely amazing mods for it. The Dark Mod is actually aiming to go standalone at some point. It's just such a pity that Bethesda basically screwed over 9 years of modding with the release of BFG. They're apparently going to opensource the new Doom 3 BFG, so most modders should be able to port their mods to the new engine, but the problem lies with the older mods whose modders have possibly retired or don't have the time to port it over. It's especially sad considering that the few graphical enhancements that idtech 5 brings to Doom 3 doesn't even compare to what mods such as Sikkmod did.

You're kidding, right? Doom 3 was a modders heaven. It contains some of the best mods I've seen in PC gaming yet, such as the Dark Mod, which basically turns it into Thief, and another good mod I played on it (can't remember the name) turned the entire game into an RPG, complete with quests, merchants, equipment, character attributes and dungeon crawling. Then there's entire graphic overhauls such as the Sikkmod which improved textures, lighting and much, much more. Some of the Doom 3 mods are really well worth checking out. Sadly, none of those mods work on Doom 3 BFG because id changed the entire filesystem to the new idtech 5 engine.

Mostly because when installing the mods you often copy the readmes into the folder as well, and if all readmes are name 'readme' they're just going to overwrite each other.

Yeah, 20 hours is a decent length, but it's still a bit shorter than I like. Might just wait for a 25% or 50% off sale on Steam before getting it.

Nice! This looks awesome. Might just be the first Kickstarter project I back up.

Apparently you can get about 20 hours out of it if you don't rush things and go exploring.

As far as I know, trainers only inject code into certain parts of the memory, so it's not really comparable to modding.

Rage released in a much worse state than any of the TES or Fallout games, imo, bar maybe New Vegas. The first thing I noticed when I stepped out into the world in Rage was horrendous texture pop-ups that totally ruined the entire game. It still hasn't been fixed properly up to today. Say what you will, but a publisher also plays a large role in the development of a game. As the one backing the project financially, it is their responsibility to ensure that the dev team does their job properly, has enough time to do it properly and not to greenlight a game for release if it isn't in good shape.

Well, he's kinda right. Rage released in a really bad shape, as did Skyrim.

Patch up to 1.3?

Nah, I think the X-Com FPS will be made. They won't just drop it. Now that there's a turn-based X-Com coming out I don't have such a big issue with the FPS also coming out. I'm just a bit worried about Enemy Unknown, because a lot of people seem to be complaining about it being streamlined and dumbed down.

Well, you have to understand, if a company takes one of the absolute best strategic, turn-based games ever and turns it into an FPS, people aren't going to be happy. Same as what happened to Syndicate. Seriously though. I didn't understand the hate for the X-Com FPS either. And then I played Xenonauts and realised just how awesome the X-Com franchise was.

There's quite a bit of negativity on the net surrounding the new X-com, so I've decided to make this thread on what is possibly the truest X-com remake out there. Take note I haven't actually played the original X-com, so I can't compare them, but do note that Xenonauts is my first contact with the genre, and I fell in love with it. Before Xenonauts, I had no idea why people were getting so angry at the fact that X-com was being turned into an FPS. Now I understand. Anyway, seeing as a pic is better than a thousand words, I've decided to use pics to show you why this game is worth your time. This right here is your Geo map. Nothing fancy, certainly not able to rival the AAA X-com in graphics, but it serves its purpose. http://i45.tinypic.com/2070ubq.jpg This is the options you get for engaging alien aircraft. I didn't screencap the actual engagement, but you actually engage them in real-time and have tactical commands you can issue to your aircraft, such as tactical manoeuvres that allow you to evade enemy fire, etc. You can also activate and deactivate weapons on your aircraft during the engagement. Not sure if any of this was in the original X-com, so bear with me. http://i50.tinypic.com/2s1assi.jpg So you've shot down the ufo, now you send your team in their chopper to head out to the crash site. http://i45.tinypic.com/idrriq.jpg That's right, isometric 2D. Looks awesome in my opinion, but I've got a soft-spot for isometric 2D games. Just two notes that you can see on that screen; 1 - You can set how many movement points should be held out so that your units can retaliate during the enemy's turn. 2 - Movement is grid-based. You get a set amount of movement points per character and you choose whether to leave any over or use them all up. Oh, and if you wanted to have a peek at what the enemy is doing during their turn, think again. This screen pops up when it's their turn to move. http://i48.tinypic.com/30ddr4o.jpg Then, as an extra, this is what the soldier screen looks like, where you equip your people. Vehicle and aircraft screens look much the same. http://i47.tinypic.com/301knc5.jpg And then last, but not least, there's a full xenopedia for those who love to read up on the lore of the aliens, weapons, UFOs, vehicles, etc. http://i47.tinypic.com/2uiw775.jpg So, that's pretty much it. Just thought that for those guys who aren't quite happy with what they're seeing in X-com: Enemy Unknown I'd post this so they know there's an X-com remake out there that's apparently a lot more true to the original game's roots. It's only about $20 over at Desura, which is a bit expensive, but still a lot cheaper than the AAA remake. It's still in alpha, but as of two days ago it's only 2 builds away from going into beta. They're still adding a ton of stuff and are planning a lot of improvements. For now, though, the game is pretty solid. It's been eating away at the hours in which I'm supposed to be studying. A true 'just 10 more minutes' game. Oh, and it's pretty challenging. I keep getting decimated about an hour into each game. On Easy difficulty.

Hoof, you should do what I did. I bought an old laptop with Win XP on. Got mine for around $70 off someone, which was an absolute steal. You might have trouble getting one for the same price, but it's the easiest way I've found to be able to play older games.

I love the respec guy. Games that allow you to respec entirely when you're 90% through the game are just weird. Totally defies the point of an RPG.

Wow, thanks TheReverendTholomewPlague and Bess. Really brings back memories. Look at how few forums there were back in 2007! :P Also, yeah, the old theme was dang ugly. I'm pretty glad we got the new one.

Does anyone still have pics of what the old forum used to look like before it got changed to what it looks like now? I can't even remember what it looked like and I'd just like to see it again for nostalgia's sake. :P

You know what this is? EA wants to try its hand at making a F2P MMORTS to see if it's profitable, but they know if they do it with a new IP nobody will end up caring about it and it will almost definitely tank. So, what do they do? They mutilate one of the best franchises in gaming history because they know they'll be able to rope people in that way. Standard fare for EA, really.

Yeah, that's the correct one. It ties in to the story in the main game, but is launched separately from the main game.