Just a thought! [Archive] - Beyond3D Forum

Fuz

29-Jul-2002, 22:22

While the 3d hardware and technology forum is quite busy, I think we are all missing the whole point. Why do you want faster/better cards? Well, if you are anything like me, its because you want to play games. I mean its the gaming industry that pushes hardware to the limit, lets face it.... there is no need for a super pc if you are not going to play games (unless you are a graphics professional).

Whats my point you ask? Well... I am woundering how many of the regulars here actually play games? I mean really play games, not just load up a game after a new driver release to see if there is an increase in the FPS! It seems the games forums don't get used much cause most people aren't playing them.

Any way, I am playing Warcraft III and Grand Prix 4 at the moment. Grand Prix 4 has the potential to be the best driving sim ever, next to TOCA 2, if they friggin release a patch soon!!! Its the buggiest game ever, by far. I have played beta builds of games that are way more stable than GP4. But the gameplay! Man, its so rewarding to put together a fast lap with all the aids turned off.

So, to every one here, particularly the regulars that spend so much time discussing the hardware.... are you guys using the hardware the way it was meant to be used? I would be interested to know what games you are playing at the moment?

Fuz

Rodéric

29-Jul-2002, 22:33

I finished WarCraft III that I liked very much.

Morrowind looks nice but its slow and I don't find it interesting.

I finished Jedi Knight II : Jedi Outcat a few weeks ago, it was cool. :)

I play NeverWinter Nights in single player mode, it's nice, but not what I thought; I hope it to be nice in multiplayer.

I've a RadeOn 8500 and only Morrowind use it a bit with the water rendering.

Fuz

29-Jul-2002, 22:53

Yeah, I like Jedi Knight 2. Play it alot, mulitplayer though. Never got into it for the singlplayer game. In Sydney, there are heaps of lan-gaming places, so I go with a few mates about 2-3 times a week and play all sorts of lan games. I just wish those gaming places would buy some steering wheels! It would be so fun to load up a racing game with a few mates over a lan.

Call me strange, but I never really like Morrowind or NeverWinter Nights. I am racing fan at heart. Any one know if Microsoft will release Motorcross Maddness 3? I loved 2 so much.

I just downloaded Battlefield 1942 demo... minimum pc spec 800Mhz Cpu. Getting ever so close to the 1Ghz minimum requirement.

pascal

30-Jul-2002, 01:14

I am in the middle of JK II.
I will come back to it soon.

WOOFLE

25-Aug-2002, 09:57

OK I admit it I've been known to fire up solitaire on occasion. Has anyone who's doen any sort of administration not? ;)
Seriosly Yeah I do play games. Mainly Strategy and FPSes in that order. Lately the ones that have actually been fired up are:
Q3A: corkscrew mod, deathmatch at it's absolute purest.
CS, well you kind of have to don't you?
Warcraft3, which I'm not particulary impressed with. The strategy game that isn't, still it can be fun at times.
Space empires3, all time classic turn based strategy. Requires a 486DX2/66, but can cause modern systems a decent load.
Heroes4, the buggy review code i recieved, but didn't review because of serious problems that STILL haven't been resolved. It could have been a good game

alexsok

25-Aug-2002, 10:41

I recently finished JK2 & SOF II and liked them both.

I'm currently playing RTCW (I finished it some time ago, but now i'm playing it with secrets).

Also, MotoGP is a very fine motorcycle game, utilizing all the latest capabilities of the latest generation of cards (except R300 of course).

Murakami

25-Aug-2002, 13:00

malcolm

25-Aug-2002, 17:46

Any one know if Microsoft will release Motorcross Maddness 3? I loved 2 so much.

I dont understand this...
If you love motocross madness 2 so much, then why dont you play it?
Its still the same game as it was when it came out...
Seems most people just quit a game after a while for some reason.

Nite_Hawk

25-Aug-2002, 19:10

WOOFLE

26-Aug-2002, 02:26

Nite_hawk this eve online looks very nice. Privateer2 was the second game I got and it was old then. I absolutely loved it. I'm going to watch this one closely.

BoddoZerg

27-Aug-2002, 18:33

Warcraft III is awesome at 1600*1200 with 2x FSAA and high framerates.

Visit Warcraftiii.net (http://www.warcraftiii.net)!

WOOFLE

28-Aug-2002, 04:33

I played Warcraft3 at 1600*1200 with aniso and noAA. I found it rather unimpressive graphically, though certainly not bad. The thing that killed it for me was the gameplay. It really strikes me as a psuedo strategy game designed to gather RPGers like diablo fanatics.

The fact that most people seem to play the game at high speed highlights this. Available sucessful strategies are very limited and it ultimately comes down to who can click hot-keys the fastest. That's what quake is for. Warcraft 3 might look like a strategy game, but it doesn't play like one... :)

Saem

28-Aug-2002, 05:30

LoL, blizzard makes some of the worst RTS'. They make a relatively addictive, click fest, which claims to take strategy.

Playing Kohan, one really figures out what an RTS is. Project moon, Earth 2150 and all that really shows you what RTS' are all about.

Silent_One

28-Aug-2002, 15:52

Presently playing Dungeon Siege - about half way through...
last game completed was Soldier of Fortune II - stressed the PC badly..
Previously played Jedi Knight 2, Alied Assult, RTCW, all which stessed my machine.....

Time to upgrade.....

BoddoZerg

28-Aug-2002, 18:28

Blizzard RTS's combine strategy with micromanagement, something that no other RTS successfully does. If you think that micro is just "mindless click festing like Quake", then don't play 'Craft RTSs.

If I wanted to spend all my time designing vehicle chassis, researching my way down a massive tech tree, managing energy flow, and switching between ground level and underground level, I would play a Turn Based Strategy game. HOMM4 and AoW2 are really fun, but RTS's ought to explore the Real Time aspect of a strategy game, which is what 'Crafts do.

Saem

29-Aug-2002, 00:06

Blizzard RTS's combine strategy with micromanagement, something that no other RTS successfully does. If you think that micro is just "mindless click festing like Quake", then don't play 'Craft RTSs.

I think not, their building queuing system still doesn't work well. Mircomanagment in the game is a necessity and made out to be a feature, it's merely smoke and mirrors to hide bad path finding and AI. Besides how the heck are you giving orders to people in WC3? In Starcraft it made sense. So yes, most of these games are build units as fast as you can attack and the game is over quickly, rarely does the game last more than the initial fight. I've found that if it does, it's usually due to weak plays.

BTW, I only play because unfortunately, my friends are all mainstream and like the security it offers. Yes, I make a lot of fun of them on those grounds.

If I wanted to spend all my time designing vehicle chassis, researching my way down a massive tech tree, managing energy flow, and switching between ground level and underground level, I would play a Turn Based Strategy game. HOMM4 and AoW2 are really fun, but RTS's ought to explore the Real Time aspect of a strategy game, which is what 'Crafts do.

Chassising vehicles and all the rest you mentioned take very little time, is micromanagment and requires significant amount of thought before you screw up. That in and of itself is strategy.

What you allude to but fail to address is that you're going for small scale real-time strategy. WC3 is still too large due to it's unintelligent units/interface. Controlling things on such a large scale is moronic in the game. The units in WC3 are sooooo stupid, they have to be instructed on how to break down from the group of 12 and to attack, because otherwise, they go of in twos and threes and get killed. All the while, due to the poor queuing system one can't queue another army AND tech up all that easily.

WC3 is and it's predecessors are NOT well thought out. Besides, which do you have any idea what wars truely are like at the low-level? Do your realize how minimal the level of strategy is, save of course in hollywood?

Having played a lot of WC3, I can assure you, WC3 has a lot of obvious mistakes, it is a rather cook book strategy game and for neophites who are new to the genre -in terms of mental capabilities rather than number of years playing the games- it may seem to be well done. I'm of the thinking like Diablo, this game will die out all the same. Which is it's the best thing sliced bread for a year or so, then you don't hear about it ever again.

WOOFLE

29-Aug-2002, 06:09

Glad to see someone that finally shares my opinion of strategy games. Strategy is all about out-thinking your opponent. Something all blizzard games have never achieved an adequate platform for.
As I see it there are 3 levels of control each with their own dependencies:
Tactical, requires fast thinking, fast acting and particulary unwavering obedience of troops
Strategic, requires powerful thinking rather that fast, requires the ability to take a critical pathway into consideration while allowing contingencies incase your troops happen to in some way suck.
Logistical, requires immensense quantity of thinking, taking into account of inumerable variables and multitudes of potential actions/consequences, troop control can become almost automatic if well executed.

Warcraft3 with an obvious lack of strategic or logistical control is mainly a tactical excercise utilising a greatly limited set of variables, heck even maps are few and not random. It fails however to allow one of the most important aspects needed for a commander to successfully operate a tactical operation: obedience of troops. They pretty much just do as they wish in terms of combat. Where their tendancy to simply attempt to do on foot "burn-outs" combined with a generally high level of incompetance at basic decision making means a load of trouble unless you can aford time to hand hold each one every single step of the way. Which unfortunately you can't afford to do, because order queing is exceedingly limited and often doesn't work properly for myriad reasons. This kills your time.
Kind of leaves it out of any "king of strategy" comps wouldn't you think?

Not to say that it can't occasionally be a little bit of fun, at least in the short term. Like a paddock basher with 2 gears and 3 cylinders working. It might be fun, but I doubt it's going to last and there's no way it's a race car ;)

Saem

29-Aug-2002, 07:35

WOOLFE,

great breakdown. I agree with you, though it's got a lot of flaws, it's fun to play a few rounds. I just wish it didn't get all the credit it so rightly doesn't deserve.

BoddoZerg

29-Aug-2002, 15:09

ROTFL. You guys are looking for the wrong type of strategy game. Your definition of a strategy game applies to Warcraft III like Unreal Championship is a realistic squad-based counterterrorism simulation.

Please don't diss a game series that you don't understand at all.

Saem

29-Aug-2002, 22:41

BoddoZerg,

take your childish arguements elsewhere. The number of fallacies littering your posts is exceptionally high. If you wish to make a reasonable reply, then do so. But your arguements have been cleary addressed and proven to be incorrect.

BoddoZerg

30-Aug-2002, 16:12

I think not, their building queuing system still doesn't work well. Mircomanagment in the game is a necessity and made out to be a feature, it's merely smoke and mirrors to hide bad path finding and AI. Besides how the heck are you giving orders to people in WC3? In Starcraft it made sense.

Let's see... according to your argument I could say:

"Chess is such a crappy strategy game. The map is always the same non-random square grid. You're forced to move units one by one, and you can't even move two units in the same turn. There's not even any path finding; if my Pawn is in front of my Rook, I can't move him at all! Besides, how the heck are you giving orders to your guys anyways?"

I'm sorry, but your argument is what is "smoke and mirrors".

So yes, most of these games are build units as fast as you can attack and the game is over quickly, rarely does the game last more than the initial fight. I've found that if it does, it's usually due to weak plays.

Have you ever played War3 at a high skill level? Have you ever watched replays of pro players? Apparently you haven't, because most games are certainly not a matter of "attack and the game is over quickly"! Again, don't talk about games you don't understand.

What you allude to but fail to address is that you're going for small scale real-time strategy. WC3 is still too large due to it's unintelligent units/interface. Controlling things on such a large scale is moronic in the game. The units in WC3 are sooooo stupid, they have to be instructed on how to break down from the group of 12 and to attack, because otherwise, they go of in twos and threes and get killed. All the while, due to the poor queuing system one can't queue another army AND tech up all that easily.

WC3 is and it's predecessors are NOT well thought out. Besides, which do you have any idea what wars truely are like at the low-level? Do your realize how minimal the level of strategy is, save of course in hollywood?

You repeatedly state that War3's units are "unintelligent", "moronic", "bad AI", etc. What do you expect, do you want your units to fight the battle for you? Units in 'Craft games behave exactly the way they are ordered, and they will counterattack if they are attacked. The pathfinding works; if there is a clear path from point A to point B, a unit will go there. I don't think you want them to be any more intelligent than that. In early versions of Battle Realms, units were highly independent and would make combat decisions independently from the user, even moving out of the way of other units to solve pathfinding issues. People complained - their units were doing too many things without being ordered, sometimes screwing up - so they patched the game to make unit AI less intelligent.

The queuing system for 'Craft games has been highly controversial since Starcraft. Bottom line is, some people prefer the Command&Conquer/Total Annihilation style "spend as you go" queues, others (myself included) prefer the Age of Empires/Craft "pay before you build" queue. Still, the queue in War3 is not a major issue; the numbers of units you build are so low you really don't need queues. (Unlike Starcraft)

Warcraft3 with an obvious lack of strategic or logistical control is mainly a tactical excercise utilising a greatly limited set of variables, heck even maps are few and not random. It fails however to allow one of the most important aspects needed for a commander to successfully operate a tactical operation: obedience of troops. They pretty much just do as they wish in terms of combat. Where their tendancy to simply attempt to do on foot "burn-outs" combined with a generally high level of incompetance at basic decision making means a load of trouble unless you can aford time to hand hold each one every single step of the way. Which unfortunately you can't afford to do, because order queing is exceedingly limited and often doesn't work properly for myriad reasons. This kills your time.

I fail to understand why both of you emphasize how "stupid" 'Craft units are. What makes units in Starcraft or War3 so stupid? Are units in Age of Empires or Command&Conquer any more intelligent? Do you want the units under your command to have a mind of their own? Based on the experience of Battle Realms, I'd say that most gamers do not.

Also, what do you mean by "obedience of troops"? This really puzzles me. When was the last time you saw an Orc Grunt disobey your "Hold Position" order and start chasing an Archer, or a Necromancer suddenly decide to Raise Dead even though you have it turned off? If you see such a thing, please report it, it's a bug!

Warcraft 3 and other games in that style (AoE, C&C, Homeworld) are not meant to be detailed strategic simulations. They are a very stylized form of strategy game, no more aimed at realism than Chess is. Just because a game is simplified does not make it brainless; the Japanese game of Go has only one game piece and very simple rules, yet it is one of the most complicated board games in terms of strategy. Although Warcraft 3 has very simple rules of gameplay, and relatively few units, it is highly successful at blending some degree of Starcraft-style strategy with a very large degree of Micromanagement.

The thing you two don't seem to understand is the Micromanagement focus. Ordering your units to focus fire, dancing spellcasters and Heros, and manually targeting siege units is not "babysitting" your units, it is a display of skill. Your units will fight just fine without your mangement, but a skilled player can make their units do truly amazing things; look at some of the old Zileas reaver drop schemes in Starcraft.

Unlike Diablo 2, Starcraft and Warcraft deserve every heap of praise they have recieved. If you happen to dislike the genre, go and play some other game, stop complaining about WC3.

Saem

30-Aug-2002, 23:43

BoddoZerg,

Chess uses abstract representation. And if you knew anything about how battles used to be carried out, you'd understand why terrian isn't of much concern.

Have you ever played War3 at a high skill level? Have you ever watched replays of pro players? Apparently you haven't, because most games are certainly not a matter of "attack and the game is over quickly"! Again, don't talk about games you don't understand.

Ah, talk about a fallacy. I've heard such weak arguments from women, who say, you don't know what it's like to have to do this and that... as they try and prove their point. It's a cheap trick to try and "win" and argument but it doesn't prove a point.

You repeatedly state that War3's units are "unintelligent", "moronic", "bad AI", etc. What do you expect, do you want your units to fight the battle for you?

So far, it seems you fail to understand anything outside your realm of thinking. The reason the units are stupid in my eyes, is because they do really moronic things in battle. They scatter to easily. They don't do any team work based on the squad/group they've been assigned to. They break from formations easily and rarely maintain them when moving from point to point. The path finding is poor. If it's a simple path, big deal if it can be found. Simple paths are not a problem. It's the even moderately difficult ones that cause it to break down.

The queuing system for 'Craft games has been highly controversial since Starcraft. Bottom line is, some people prefer the Command&Conquer/Total Annihilation style "spend as you go" queues, others (myself included) prefer the Age of Empires/Craft "pay before you build" queue. Still, the queue in War3 is not a major issue; the numbers of units you build are so low you really don't need queues. (Unlike Starcraft)

I don't mind the queuing system that much in some ways it's better than the C&C system, except for the fact that it has dumb restrictions. For instance, one can't queue up units to build while research upgrades. I should be able to queue up the command but it doesn't. As for the commiting of resources, that should either be done as needed OR if you've queued multiple units and have paid the cost upfront there should be some extra return on initial investment.

Also, what do you mean by "obedience of troops"? This really puzzles me. When was the last time you saw an Orc Grunt disobey your "Hold Position" order and start chasing an Archer, or a Necromancer suddenly decide to Raise Dead even though you have it turned off? If you see such a thing, please report it, it's a bug!

It's called morale.

The thing you two don't seem to understand is the Micromanagement focus. Ordering your units to focus fire, dancing spellcasters and Heros, and manually targeting siege units is not "babysitting" your units, it is a display of skill.

That's great, if you didn't have to trip over the interface all the time. It's rather poor in a lot of respects. I wish there was a simple scripting language that I could use to repair it. There are some obvious places for improvement in inter-group selection and ordering.

Micromanagment can be great, but when there are obvious failings of the interface with which to micromange that's another thing.

diarrhea_splatter

31-Aug-2002, 01:27

Boy did this topic go to crap.

K.I.L.E.R

31-Aug-2002, 07:51

I like W3 even though the ai is quite crap and sometimes a SP game gets boring because the ai takes only 10-15 units to attack a heavily fortified base. The ai's units die out so quick because it doesn't recognise what strat to use against the strat I'm using.

Reverend

02-Sep-2002, 05:18

Play games? Who's got time to play games nowadays?!?

Seriously though...

The last game I actually started and finished was MOHAA. I never finished JK2, F1 2002, Morrowind, SSam:SE among a few others... can't remember which ones were bought prior to MOHAA.

ATM the game that I usually find time to play is Tiger Woods 2002 with F1 2002 occupying a bit of my time as well.

Riptides

02-Sep-2002, 19:05

LOL Rev you sound just like me..
Tend to go purchase alot of games just to put them on the back burner after a few days/weeks of tinkering around in them.

One game i keep coming back to play tho is IL-2 Sturmovik, i am constantly amazed with this game and the level of support the dev's are giving it. In fact i believe there is a new patch with new planes due out today. I think this makes the 5th patch this year for it, which mainly is to add planes and tweak some of the gameplay, otherwise a great game and nearly flawless. And again, i am AMAZED at the level of Dev support, some companies should look at how UbiSoft and Maddox Games handle their gaming community, and learn from it.

others:
JK II - great graphics, love the MP, but the SP experience got too old too fast.. one day i hope to see a game that isnt just running around flipping switch's. I couldn't force myself to finish the SP game if i had to.

GTA3 - well it was a good idea, and great on the PS2, so i heard, but.. with the lack of support from Dev's, not being optimised for PC, tendency to start to chug after a certain amount of time playing, and NO MP, i find myself not as enthusiastic as the kiddies over this one. I wish i would have waited after the inital PC release period before picking this one up, as i usually do these days, i might not have been so disappointed.

SSam: SE - er.. i love the graphics, open spaces, humor and such but.. alas.. it got to be too much of the same thing.. for me..

Day of Defeat and TFC mods for Half-Life..
I am still very addicted to both, tho i hate that they decided to start including some CS type game elements into DoD-Mod, as in, timed games with rounds.. But Valve took over, and i guess they wanted it to be a WWII version of CS, sadly. And i cannot stay away from TFC, it just seems to be some all around fun at times.

BF-1942 MP Demo - This is one of those i didn't expect much from, but when i started playing, i could see they had something here.. From what i have read it was supposed to be more.. erm.. Realistic.. but for what it is, and what it offers, it does very well, and has pretty tight net code to boot. Only complaint has to do with the kiddies who camp the planes and constantly TK.

Spanner

14-Sep-2002, 00:34

heh, for all the new games that are out, I'm playing....

FALLOUT2!!!!

:)

I'm waiting for eve-online to come out (www.eve-online.com). I *hope* this is going to be on the same level as WC: privateer. That imho was probably one of if not the best game to ever come out. I wish I could get it to play under win2k. :(

Nite_Hawk

Ah, Fallout 2, I bring that with me to work, seeing as how I work on boats, it works on my laptop :)

I'm with you on the Privateer. No other game even comes close to it for the sheer enjoyment of upgrading your vessel, blasting pirates, selling stuff, heck, even the story line is pretty good for a space sim. I've been waiting for something to replace it, IW2, Tachyon, and others, but they just don't seem to get it right. They aren't freeform enough, I guess.

Fuz

23-Sep-2002, 22:08

I can't get enough of racing sims.

I stopped playing GP4, started F12002. Atleast now I can play more than half an hour at a time with out rebooting my machine!

I am looking to upgrade my wheel, I would like to make the jump to force feedback. If you guys know of any good wheels, let me know please. Rev, what are you using for F12002?

Thanks,

Fuz.

Kriosym

30-Sep-2002, 23:34

Lets see. Passed NFS5 - Porche Unleashed.
Couldn't pass JKII single player, too boring, but still to this day play on MP dueling servers. 1v1 with no Force Powers (except jump and/or throw) is perfect entertainment. That or a quick round of Q3 RA feed my need for a quick kill or two to fill in the time now and then.
MOHAA is more of a "sit down for a couple of hours and play" game.
I also play DAOC still, sold my 44 sorcerer, then quit for a couple months, then came back (bought a friends account) and made a new char, got him to level 25 (eldritch) on the PVP server (Mordrid), but think I'm about finished with DAOC now.
Can't wait for AC2, SWG, and DOOM3.
Yeah. I play games.

AMD ATHLON 1700+
ASUS A7V133 (KT133 chipset)
Enermax 350w PSU
1GB Crucial PC133 SDRAM
ATI Radeon 9700 PRO 128MB DDR
SBLIVE

P.S. - Craft games get old fast, and there is no way to ultimately outsmart and win based on intelligence, its all speed and memorization of patterns and use of cheap tactics. Which is strategic, but its not neccesarily fun for very long.