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Borecast 27: A Piece of Yourself (with special guest Fragamemnon!)

E

Eel O'Brian

Member
direct download: http://media.libsyn.com/media/borecast/Borecast27.mp3

Doug and Kevin welcome back special guest Robert (better known on these boards as Fragamemnon) to talk about Holiday hardware & software, do a PC RPG roundup, and alienate fans of the largest-launching game in history!

SEGMENT ONE: HOLIDAY HARDWARE/SOFTWARE

We clue you in on the few good console/PC gaming deals out there for Black Friday, and tell you what to avoid (or at least be aware of). Doug talks a little about the HP Mini 311 ION netbook, and gives some tips on using all your gift cards to assemble a reasonably priced gaming PC.

SEGMENT TWO: PC RPG ROUNDUP, PLAYLIST

(46:00) Left 4 Dead 2, and a sidetrack into Borderlands

(59:20) Assassin's Creed 2

(1:07:30) King's Bounty: Armored Princess

(1:18:00) Gyromancer

(1:19:30) Adventures to Go! (PSP)

(1:22:10) Dragon Age

(1:50:25) Risen

(1:57:45) Divine Divinity 2

(2:00:00) Lord of the Rings Online: Siege of Mirkwood

SEGMENT THREE: POSTMODERN WARFARE

(2:07:10) Here's your warning: If you're a huge fan of Modern Warfare 2, or you don't want to be spoiled, then you should probably just pretend the show ends here. We come not to praise Captain Price, but to bury him.

We'll talk to you again on December 9th!
 
F

Freedom = $1.05

Banned
Price is one of the only things that makes MW2's single player decent. There will be 15 million copies of this game sold, and each and every copy will have his awesomely textured facial hair within it. That alone justifies all the fuckups this game has going against it. If anything, it has at least 500% more facial hair than the Magna Carta franchise has in its entirety.
 
D

Doytch

Member
Will listen, but a combined three minutes on Divine Divinity and King's Bounty makes me sad. Though to be expected given when this was recorded I guess.
 
E

Eel O'Brian

Member
We don't really talk about the multiplayer, that's its own thing.

Doytch said:
Will listen, but a combined three minutes on Divine Divinity and King's Bounty makes me sad. Though to be expected given when this was recorded I guess.
Click to expand...

Ten minutes on King's Bounty!
 
F

Fragamemnon

Member
Doytch said:
Will listen, but a combined three minutes on Divine Divinity and King's Bounty makes me sad. Though to be expected given when this was recorded I guess.
Click to expand...

I wanted to do way more with both, but the US release for Ego Draconis isn't until January (I thought it was last week!) and Impulse were bastards and unlocked the game a day later so I couldn't give an early impression of KB:AP, which I am playing now and do definitely adore, though I do think that they might have tuned the game just a slight bit more against powergaming than they should of. It's very much a classic-style expansion pack-more robust and balanced in almost every measure, and brutally difficult at times, designed with the expert player in mind.

Hopefully some of you RPG fans will check out Risen, if you haven't done so already. That's a really solid game (at least on the PC, I hear the 360 version has weaker graphics) that I enjoyed quite a bit this fall. Not as much as I adored Dragon Age (and I gush on that big time), but it's a quality game for genre fans.
 
F

Fragamemnon

Member
Yeah they had me on and I don't think I talked at all about strategy games. :lol

( I was going to talk AI War, Eufloria, Gratuitous Space Battles, and some smattering of Paradox/1C stuff. Mostly a lot of praise for AI War, though.)
 
D

Doytch

Member
Fragamemnon said:
I wanted to do way more with both, but the US release for Ego Draconis isn't until January (I thought it was last week!) and Impulse were bastards and unlocked the game a day later so I couldn't give an early impression of KB:AP, which I am playing now and do definitely adore, though I do think that they might have tuned the game just a slight bit more against powergaming than they should of. It's very much a classic-style expansion pack-more robust and balanced in almost every measure, and brutally difficult at times, designed with the expert player in mind.

Hopefully some of you RPG fans will check out Risen, if you haven't done so already. That's a really solid game (at least on the PC, I hear the 360 version has weaker graphics) that I enjoyed quite a bit this fall. Not as much as I adored Dragon Age (and I gush on that big time), but it's a quality game for genre fans.
Click to expand...
Really enjoyed the Dragon Age talk, and the Risen bits. I'll pick up Risen during the Christmas sale, and King's Bounty: AP soon since I loved the first one.
 
F

Fragamemnon

Member
Acid08 said:
People are still playing LOTRO? Who knew.
Click to expand...

It's pretty awesome. One of the few MMOs out there that actually knows its place in the MMO ecosystem and is thriving by taking a different tack from WoW instead of mindlessly trying (and failing) to ape it.
 
D

Danne-Danger

Member
Good discussions all around.

There was something in there about DA having better characters than MotB, but I know I must've heard that wrong.
 
F

Fragamemnon

Member
Danne-Danger said:
There was something in there about DA having better characters than MotB, but I know I must've heard that wrong.
Click to expand...

Better than Baldur's Gate 2, yes. Better than Mask? No (in respect to the quality of character designs).
 
F

Fragamemnon

Member
Joseph Merrick said:
very good

ah the strateger talk will come at a later time?

btw, frag do you know anything about this http://www.matrixgames.com/products/376/details/Armada.2526 ? I'm thinking about just picking it up blind
Click to expand...

There was a great interview on last week's Three Moves Ahead with the lead designer. I'm holding out on it until I get some more player feedback from the game, though it certainly sounded pretty promising (though anyone who namedrops "old Avalon Hill" as an influence will get lots of credit from me).
 
P

Peronthious

Member
Armada 2526 certainly sounds interesting, hearing the Three Moves Ahead podcast the other week the developer sounded really old school. Given that I'd generally be concerned about over complexity, but the way the game was described in the podcast made it sound quite user friendly. I might give it a look, but Solium Infernum may have the strategy part of my head occupied for some time.

Great episode, though I don't think you guys give MW2 enough credit in a few areas, janky story notwithstanding. Only halfway through that part of the discussion though. I really do need to check out Risen, but that's taken a back seat to all of the other stellar PC games that have come out this past month or so.
 
F

Fragamemnon

Member
Peronthious said:
Great episode, though I don't think you guys give MW2 enough credit in a few areas, janky story notwithstanding. Only halfway through that part of the discussion though. I really do need to check out Risen, but that's taken a back seat to all of the other stellar PC games that have come out this past month or so.
Click to expand...

Spec-ops is neat. My not liking the multiplayer is really a matter of taste thing, though I don't think that I conveyed that well. I'm not into the 'bro shooter' online experience very much.

The single player-what we ranted on and on about-is in my estimation indefensible. The core values of Call of Duty single player gameplay are there, certainly, but they are draped in such ridiculous (and clumsy) bombast and noise that it seems the story and setting actually mock the base COD experience.
 
D

Deleted member 30609

Unconfirmed Member
like the cast, guys.

for the sake of full disclosure, I played a whole lot of the single-player campaign in MW2 (once through, then again on Vet in an effort to wring as much life from my $120AU as I could before it hit the shelf again), but am ultimately very much in the "oh, is that... it?" camp. I don't have strong feeling one way or the other, basically.

To me, the MW2 discussion came off to me like a group of lit enthusiasts sitting around bemoaning the existence of Twilight, or a group of movie aficionados doing the same for Transformers. I was confused as to what the point of the giant MW2 bitchathon was. It's not like the release of MW2 is going to stifle the, in Frag's own words, healthy PC enthusiast development environment. Those games will continue to be made, regardless, correct?

I guess I would have just rathered that strategy game talk or something, rather than an at-length discussion on MW2 which no one really seemed to like or care about. Hearing a group of guys in an echo-chamber come down brutally on a developer and [more than one] community of people came off as a bit ugly, it would have been nice to have someone representing the opposition, if only for the sake of an interesting discussion. And yeah, it would be inconceivably dumb to invite someone on the show for that purpose, so, like I said, that strat game talk could have been fun! ;)

But look, I'm just splitting hairs. You guys can be as jaded as you'd like, it makes for good listening as I, coincidentally, play Borderlands. Keep up the good work (despite your forsaking of the OT).
 
F

Fragamemnon

Member
Joseph Merrick said:
evil islands is a nival game!
Click to expand...

It's weird, I know this but it's like hard-wired to my brain that it was a Phenomic production because it always felt like a precursor to Spellforce. Heck, even at the time when it came out Doug and I were making fun of Nival for it.

Of course then Silent Storm (and later HoMMV) happened and now they are one of the A-class (not S-class!) strategy developers. :lol

Glad people enjoyed the podcast.
 
A

Archie

Second-rate Anihawk
Rez said:
like the cast, guys.

for the sake of full disclosure, I played a whole lot of the single-player campaign in MW2 (once through, then again on Vet in an effort to wring as much life from my $120AU as I could before it hit the shelf again), but am ultimately very much in the "oh, is that... it?" camp. I don't have strong feeling one way or the other, basically.

To me, the MW2 discussion came off to me like a group of lit enthusiasts sitting around bemoaning the existence of Twilight, or a group of movie aficionados doing the same for Transformers. I was confused as to what the point of the giant MW2 bitchathon was. It's not like the release of MW2 is going to stifle the, in Frag's own words, healthy PC enthusiast development environment. Those games will continue to be made, regardless, correct?

I guess I would have just rathered that strategy game talk or something, rather than an at-length discussion on MW2 which no one really seemed to like or care about. Hearing a group of guys in an echo-chamber come down brutally on a developer and [more than one] community of people came off as a bit ugly, it would have been nice to have someone representing the opposition, if only for the sake of an interesting discussion. And yeah, it would be inconceivably dumb to invite someone on the show for that purpose, so, like I said, that strat game talk could have been fun! ;)

But look, I'm just splitting hairs. You guys can be as jaded as you'd like, it makes for good listening as I, coincidentally, play Borderlands. Keep up the good work (despite your forsaking of the OT).
Click to expand...
They weren't being jaded, they were just calling a spade a spade and called MW2 out for being inane war porn. They gushed over several games earlier in the podcast.
 
D

Deleted member 30609

Unconfirmed Member
that was a playful jab, not an insult. I wasn't looking for random gushing, but maybe I didn't articulate myself correctly.
 
E

Eel O'Brian

Member
Bad news - found out that OfficeMax $150 Black Friday Acer Netbook I mentioned was part of a "dummy" ad that leaked, so it's not gonna be happening. The $199 Acer at Target is still a go, though.

I'm sort of the instigator for the MW2 discussion. I kept getting angrier while playing through the SP campaign, asking myself "Do they think I'm too stupid to notice the goatse-wide plot holes and inconsistencies here?" The COD series has its silly moments, but has always managed to keep one foot in reality. This one tossed reality out the window, along with a great deal of logic and believability. I just felt like I was either being made fun of or condescended towards, and by the end I'm surprised the stinkeye I was giving it wasn't permanently affixed to my face.

And I couldn't, for the life of me, understand why this storyline was either being outright praised or at the very least being given a free pass, regardless of the multiplayer quality. As I said on the show, had it been any other game by any other developer the SP would have been shit on from all directions. It's an ugly game, cynical and manipulative in the worst ways possible, and it didn't even have the backbone to stand behind its own self-created controversy.

I really enjoyed mangling that accent, though!
 
F

Fragamemnon

Member
Newegg has a Gateway Red 10.1" N270 netbook for $199, and a Acer Aspire One Black for $189. If you don't live in CA you can get out of sales tax and the shipping is free.
 
A

Alex Connolly

Member
Good podcast, gents. Really enjoyed it. While the MW2 ramble could have been curbed a little shorter in favour of more talk about the games Frag listed he would have liked to yarn about (AI Wars and Gratuitous Space Battles need pimping!), it is sometimes nice to hear venom and legitimate concern mixed into a cocktail and presented for all and sundry.

I'm a console peasant, too, part-timing in the Master Race with a crapped out old laptop with a dreaded 945GM Express card...but goddamn, doing my part.
 
D

diarrhea_pangs

Member
Just started listening to the podcast a few episodes ago. Enjoying it alot. Keep it up fellas.

I hope that hardware talk pops in frequently as I enjoyed the discussions in this episode.
 
D3RANG3D

D3RANG3D

Member
Drinky why do embossed horse nipples enthrall you so much? I had a marathon run for pretty much all the podcasts for the last week or two, your meltdown/rant on podcast 24 about how wii music was made was epic lulz!
 
F

Fragamemnon

Member
_tetsuo_ said:
Disrepeccin' Planescape: Torment. Not feeling it :mad:
Click to expand...

The game has no equal for what it does best, and honestly likely never will. It's what I sort of endearingly refer to as "lighting strike" games, productions of great power and intensity that are so perfect in some regard it's just not likely anything will hit their magnificence ever again. It is, however, an uneven game, with some parts being tremendous and others only being merely good to somewhat middling.

If I disrespect the game compared to, say, BG2, it's because I feel that BG2 is the quintessential CRPG package-it's a comprehensive, huge game of a scale and scope that we'll probably also never see again. What engages me in CRPGs is crazy encounter design, solid combat, and tons of skills, spells, and cool items to customize my character and party with. So it's no surprise that I hold BG2 in such high regard and voice some criticisms with Torment that often don't get mentioned (because the people who like Torment get invested in it due to it's setting, characters, and storyline moreso than the things I mentioned).

Different strokes for different folks. Anyway thanks for listening. I do hope to come back at some point and deliver the goods on some of the recent strategy releases, which have for the most part been good, if at the same time each with their own bizzare traits.
 
T

The Take Out Bandit

Member
Finished up today. Good show fellows.

Glad to see more folks transmitting the message that this generation of consoles is mostly shit. If this generation of consoles were an era of comics, this would be the 90's.
 
A

Alex Connolly

Member
The Take Out Bandit said:
Finished up today. Good show fellows.

Glad to see more folks transmitting the message that this generation of consoles is mostly shit. If this generation of consoles were an era of comics, this would be the 90's.
Click to expand...

I don't believe much of this so-called "shit-causing consolitis" has affected PC games to any great extent at all. As Frag said, it's always a good year for PC gaming. Frankly, it's a little tiring to hear the same old rhetoric getting spewed. It's a bit sad it has to be "either or" for a lot of people, PC snobs included. I enjoy the PC games that my laptop can run, but also enjoy games on PS3. What's the vested interest and decrying all about?
 
H

Hitokage

Setec Astronomer
In the absence of other submissions why PC gaming will never die, I'd like to offer my well-reasoned and insightful argument:

Because.
 
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