Will Doom 3 revive the struggling PC Gaming Industry?

CNN:Money ^ | July 14, 2004 | Chris Morris

[COEXERJ145]

Yeah, Andenne was an interesting town. I'd go to bed thinking we had secured it and the next morning you guys had capped it back. Sometimes that town, along with Namur, would take weeks to finally suppress and move past. Usually it would require us to move two army groups into the area in order to cap it but that always was a risk because it left other areas wide open.

My favorite areas were either central (Vireaux southward) the deep south (Verdun area) or up north near BOZ you could almost always find me down south. Since I wasn't in a squad, I'd go where ever defenders were needed. My favorite weapons were the Flak-36 or the Stug-III. I can't even remember how many precamps I busted up or at least disrupted with a Stug-III. I never got to use the Panzer-IIIH since I was gone long before it came out.

As for the Frenchies, they were the side most of the Axis detested. That is one reason they usually got stomped first. We'd throw everything at them and wipe them off the map just to tick them off and watch them whine about how the Char wasn't "uber" enough or the Panhard (Panchar as we liked to call it) died too easily. They also had TGIF as one of their main squads and anyone who was around from Day-1 remembers why the Axis hated them.

[spodefly]

That's my name ... don't wear it out ... :)

[wolficatZ]

WW2O has an interesting website, never seen it before. Can one download the software and run it offline with no players to get a feel for the controls and graphics? Might try it out; the concept is very interesting..

http://www5.playnet.com/bv/wwiiol/index.jsp

[Texaggie79]

clan = team. you know, y play in tournaments, ect. There are even professional clans that earn their living playing games.

[yhwhsman]

Diablo II is my favorite - it's "obsolete" by today's graphical standards, but the playability is such that I still play it all the time.

Me too.

[yhwhsman]

I just started playing it a few weeks ago -- still can't kill Duriel with my 26th-level assassin.

I think Assassins are probably the most powerful character in Diablo II. Druids get pretty nasty too.

To take out Duriel, I have the right-click (f9-f12) buttons set up with f9 having the throwing blades (shuriken) and f12 the double image (or is it the mirror image). Run around till Duriel attacks the double image, then you can stand back and attack him with the throwing blades. Keep one hand on the f9-f12 buttons, and when he kills your image, quickly throw up another one and then continue with the shuriken attack.

It's also a good idea to hire a henchman from Lut Gholen, and make sure he regenerates health for you.

I you'd like help getting past Duriel, I'm good for a game just about anytime. :)

[broadsword]

Hehe. I miss the goron, he was too much fun.

Geeez! There's just no escaping the Torquemada Club, is there?

[this_ol_patriot]

I did not know the PC gaming industry was doing bad...

It's a lack of gaming goodness. That thing that kept you up all night for one more level, kill or conquest. There haven't been many Empire Deluxe, Civs, Ultimas up to 7, MOO's, X-Com's, Populous's, Doom-Quake-UT's, Might and Magic's, Fallouts, Diablo's, Baldur's Gates and such lately.

Maybe it just because good things can only be invented once and there is only so much to go around or maybe big multimedia doesn't want to take a chance anymore. Most of those great games of the past came out of garages or upstart indies. Once the big guys get hold of some of these franchises they suck them dry and make utter crap out of genius because they market but don't play and then wonder why they flop.

Gaming is about fun and forgetting. Even crap graphics and sounds don't matter if the game is good. I just got done playing another round of Angband and that uses ASCII or simple tilesets. I'm playing Diablo 2 again now because even though it could be called simple and mindless it's damn fun. That's what it's all about.

[yhwhsman]

Oops, my bad. The two skills are Blade Fury and Shadow Warrior. Just played a quick game to make sure.

[this_ol_patriot]

I just started a pally Freezealot, my first game with the 1.10 patch and synergies. Do you play SP or on the ladder? I play SP, got disgusted with the ladder crap and don't play enough hours to get anywhere. I'm using ATMA for the unlimited stash to mule out stuff to other characters I'll start.

[Mr. Jeeves]

I play SP - didn't like all the obnoxious kids on the ladder. I still have to download ATMA - Diablo II has an annoying habit of making the best items drop for characters who can't use them.

[Foxfire4]

Though, it was fun to play BG2 as a spellcaster, THAT was fun at the final battle where chaos ensued.

So far the absolute most fun I've had with any D&Dish computer game was taking my rogue character through Hordes of the Underdark by Bioware. Well-fortified and armed drow camp? Snuck up, killed anybody who didn't have backup nearby, and laid traps around all the little groups before calling in the henchcritters to start the carnage. There's a big battle midgame, and I just trapped the heck out of the battlefield and watched 'em drop. (Can you tell I like playing sneaky?)

Of course, there was the time I went through Morrowind as a werewolf...subtlety kinda went out the window on that one. :-)

[Foxfire4]

Yeah, I adored KotOR, but can't bring myself to play darkside...I like my NPCs too much. Great storyline and voice acting, though. (and you're right about the Light Side options...howtheheck am I supposed to play a convincing scoundrel when all the options are sweetness-n-light or "Bad Jedi! Bad!" :-)

[Moose4]

I think you can grab the download and mess with it offline. There's nothing to shoot but some static targets on a firing range, but you can walk/drive/fly around and get used to the controls.

WWIIOL is a hell of a concept, and actually a pretty good game. It's never really recovered from the total disaster of its launch three years ago...their publisher basically forced them to take the game public long before it was ready, and the result was a total disaster. Only now, 3 years later, is it starting to get good press.

Plus, everything's modeled pretty realistically, it's not an arcade-style shoot-em-up at all. You have to use team tactics to win. And admittedly, it's hard for a lot of gamers to get excited about running around in 1940-era army uniforms with a bolt-action Lee-Enfield or Mauser K98 instead of a railgun or BFG 9000. The graphics aren't cutting-edge anymore, but they'll do. It's more about the gameplay than the eye candy anyway.

Try it out, jump online for a month. You'll die a lot and maybe get frustrated, but you'll also find that when WWIIOL works, it's a VERY immersive experience. It's different enough from the BF1942-style killkillkill fragfest that it's refreshing.

}:-)4

[BrooklynGOP]

Ugh, I know what clans are. I am talking about details. Like how much time does spend, what's the clan structure like, etc.

[Moose4]

3CD was actually shuffled up to the north end of the map as part of the British Royal Marines just before I left. So instead of Namur, we were going to be fighting on those islands that CRS added a few releases back, then over toward BoZ and parts east. That's where I started out back in December '02, getting steamrolled by Deadlock and 94 every day. Remember ol' Capslock? :)

When they introduced the Pz IIIH, and "research and development," everybody knew what would happen...after 3-4 weeks of a map it would be Hordes of IIIH vs. Hordes of Crusaders or Daimlers, with the French kind of screwed because they didn't have a second-generation tank to research. Recently they got the M3 Stuart, which finally gave them a piece of armor with speed *and* firepower...and surprise, people actually started playing for the French again. But the nice thing as an Allied player was that most German players dropped 40 IQ points when they got in a IIIH. Seriously. They thought it was some kind of uber Tiger and would do some incredibly stupid stuff with it.

StuGs scared me. Virtually impossible to kill from the front, hard to even see in underbrush, with a gun that could shred soft targets (I was a terrible tanker, I mostly played infantry and anti-tank guns). Whenever I saw one, I figured that it had to be either (a) a newbie who grabbed it because it looked cool, (b) somebody who took it because it was the last piece of armor on the spawnlist, or (c) a total badass. I hope they can someday make the terrain and buildings more "deformable," so assault guns actually have a bombardment role instead of just being crappy turretless tanks.

I never knew any of the history behind TGIF and doc9. Those of us 3CD who briefly played Planetside ran with the TGIF crew over there, that's where they all disappeared to. Care to enlighten me? I can say, though, that the true hardcore players that played French were pretty good. They had to endure smaller player numbers, slow tanks, crappy guns, a constant barrage of French-bashing carried over from real life (and who doesn't enjoy bashing the French now and then, they deserve it)...and they kept playing on.

(Is this a small world or what?)

}:-)4

[altura]

bump for games

[this_ol_patriot]

I found this rune wizard on Diabl0ii.net a great to help for sorting out runes and not missing runewords. It has all the new ones except for the 4 that are ladder only. It does not include anything from the second ladder season just started a few days ago. Nobody knows what they are yet, 23 new runewords I hear but since that's server side, a patch will be needed for SP games to activate them.

http://www.diabloii.net/files/runewizard.shtml

[Badeye]

"Though it looks like GR2 which is coming out this NOV is going to be a real bust - (somewhat like RVS is to the Rainbow Six ) - the new GR2 seems to be more of a run around and shoot game....much less realism."

I've heard the same. Right now, I'm just waiting for my other "addiction" to be released, Madden NFL 2004.

[jamz]

Some of us still have lurker Ids Hellcatz...hehe.