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Gaming

I'm obsessed with Team Fortress 2, and play way too much computer games now. It's starting to invade my blog posts now. So, this is where all my gaming talk and screenshots go.

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Xbox Live

Days without alcohol/soft drinks: 7
Sit-ups: 17
Push-ups: 12

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I’ve been considering getting a wireless adapter for my Xbox 360 and investing in a subscription to Xbox Live. The idea of online multiplayer, extra content and games is an alluring one. My girlfriend has a membership and it seems pretty solid; she has a good variety of games purchased from Xbox Live, and she gets access to videos, other games and the like.

However, I was wondering if as a PC gamer it would really get used. I mean, I play the odd game on there (I’m playing Alan Wake right now; I took a break to write this), but it doesn’t really get as much action as Steam games do on my computer. Would I be able to afford to buy games off of Xbox Live? Will it rape my download quota for the month? And so on¹.

What this post boils down to is, if you use Xbox Live, what do you think of it? Is it worth the money? Do you get enjoyment out of it? If you can, share a tale or two in the comments below and help me make a decision, it all helps in the decision making process².

1. and so forth.
2. Of which I’m really bad at.

Worms Reloaded Contest…thingy

Last night I tried having a competition over Twitter, where to win a copy of Worms Reloaded all you had to do was submit a 100 word story featuring a zombie to some capacity. Well, I got a whopping two entries (Two more than I expected, to be completely honest with you), and have put it down to a vote. The two stories are below, voting ends at 6pm tonight, have at it.

A very very long time ago there was a worm. But not that casual worm, no!… Well, he was normal earlier, but once he woke up infected! Infected by an unknown virus! At least he did not know anything about that before. Then he slowly started changing to something. Something horrible… All this happened like a nightmare. But it was real! He slowly changed to a zombie!… A zombie worm of course! He loved to play on his computer before. But now… he had to give up his favorite pastime cause zombies are not really interested in games. Poor worm!! :|

The man struggled into the bar. Well, anyone without a leg would. The bartender took a step back.

“Good lord, what happened to you?!” the old man asked.

The now disable man could only moan. The bartender rushed into the back to get some first aid. As soon as he was gone, the man missing his leg licked his lips. For he was a zombie.

He thought, “This geezer hasn’t heard about the zombie outbreak yet. Delicious.”

The bartender came back, but not with first aid. Luckily enough, he had seen the news about the zombies on his TV at the back of the bar. Instead of first aid, he had a pea shooter.

“Eat peas.” It was the last thing the zombie ever heard.

It is great day for Valve fan boy.

Oh wow, did you hear that Robin Walker has confirmed that an update for TF2 will be out by the end of next month, and will include not only the Polycount Winners that were announced, but one unannounced winner, trading, AND a new game mode.

Also, the Left 4 Dead team have said they’re announcing progress on the MAC version of the game and it’s sequel, the DLC for L4D that joins it to L4D2, and if there’s going to be any more DLC for L4D2.

I am so fucking excited.

Hammer Romance

My girlfriend decided to send me a message utilizing Hammer, the editor used for making maps in games.

 

The girl is awesome.

Alien Swarm – A free Valve game

Valve made an announcement which as far as I can tell, is little more than a footnote at the bottom of a blog post on the Left 4 Dead website, that they are releasing a free game on Monday the 19th. Not only that, but it will come with everything needed to create your own mods for the game.

The game itself is called Alien Swarm, adapted from what was originally a mod of Unreal Tournament 2004. The creators were apparently hired by Valve a couple of years ago¹, and have made an official version of the game on the Source engine.

Alien Swarm is a four player co-op game based in the future. You play as one of four classes (Medic, Officer, Tech or Special Weapons) and fight through different maps full of alien creatures. Unlike other Valve games, it’s played with a top down view so you can see your team and the area around you, and judging from the screenshots seems quite stunning graphically.

Valve boasts a levelling system that gives the player “persistent items” in the game, meaning anything you unlock will carry to any game you play, regardless of map or server. As is traditional, we can assume experience is given for killing various enemies, and probably for performing acts like healing teammates.

It looks really well made, and like it would be addictive as hell with friends. The game being released with the game code and complete mod tools indicates that the developers wanted to create a game with lots of user made content, to give the game more replay value. I have to say that if it catches on, which given Valve’s vast fan base it should to some degree, the results should be amazing. I myself will probably even give the mod tools a look.

As a final note…

The game makes me think of the history of Team Fortress; it started as a game mod that got the mod makers hired by Valve. Then the game got ported into the companies engine of the time, and was followed up years later with the game that I and many others obsess over; Team Fortress 2. That is pretty much what has happened with Alien Swarm. Except that instead of then spending years making a sequel, the game itself appears to be the end product they worked to².

I can’t wait to play it.

1. I say apparently because I’d never heard of them
2. Also, no hats.

Brute Force Gaming #1 (Poll)

I wrote a few months ago about all the different games I’ve started between Team Fortress 2 sessions and life. It turns out the list is a bit bigger than that again. Anyway, I’ve come to decide that when I’m not playing TF2, I should try focussing my gaming in the direction of one specific game to finish it. Eliminate them one at a time.

Anyway, I figured I’d pass it to my many adoring fans as to what game I should do first. So, I’ve got the handy poll you can see above, with a selection of 4 games to choose from. If you could be so kind as to vote, and even leave a comment as to why you think that particular game deserves my attention, it would be most appreciated.

The poll runs for seven days, at which point hopefully there will be enough votes for the choice to be made. Thank you.

TF2 Game Update for July 8th, 2010

As I wrote earlier, the official Engineer Update was released today. Along with the things spoken about that were revealed over the past few days, some additional and hinted at things were added. One of the major ones was that Engineers can pickup and move their buildings around. This is an interesting game changing mechanic, as up until now they have had to deal with quickly demolishing and then building elsewhere. Now they can just jump up with the team’s push and not worry about that. The Engineer also has his own theme music on the main menu, and a community CP map called ColdFront has been added into the game.

Along with that, some notable tweaks that alter gameplay:

• The sandvich has a cooldown similar to the Bonk! Atomic Punch and Jarate.
• The Gunboats have had their damage reduction changed from 75% to 60%.
• The bleed time on the Shiv has been reduced to only 6 seconds, and it’s damage decrease brought up to 50% from 35%. This makes it less effective, which is good for spies who keep getting the sharp end in their face.

There are some additional things you can read on the official news page, but this is the interesting stuff.

Git Along!

Here we are kids, the final day of the Engineer Update. I cannot wait until I finally get a chance to get in game and try all the new weapons, feast on the little bug fixes that will be slipped in, and play all three of the new maps.
The third Payload map was revealed today; Thunder Mountain. The caption “Really long track” suggests that it is a multi-stage map, but apart from that that is all that is known.

The name of the community contributed wrench has been revealed as being called Southern Hospitality too. It has a bleed effect, which is slightly shorter than that of the Tribalman’s Shiv, has no critical hits, and makes the user more vulnerable to fire.

The official weapon release today is an interesting one. Entitled The Gunslinger, this robotic hand (and not a guitar like I expected) replaces the wrench, and does a few things. First up, it grants the user 25% additional health (which will no doubt be subject to buffs and nerfs as time goes on), and every third punch in a series of attacks is guaranteed to be a critical.
In addition, it “Lets the Engineer drop mini-sentries instead of normal sentries”. These mini-sentries look similar to normal sentries with a blue light on their top. The differences being:

• It only costs 100 metal to build
• Cannot be upgraded or repaired
• Builds four times faster
• Deals half the normal damage

The gun is designed for the offensive engineer who builds and rebuilds in random places to try and catch the enemy off guard. The low cost means it’s not detrimental if the Engineer planned on building something elsewhere, and the fact it cannot be repaired, while a negative, means the Engineer doesn’t have to concern himself with coming back and repairing it, or guarding it.
Unfortunately, because of the negatives this isn’t a viable option for classic defensive engineers, which explains the addition of the Southern Hospitality in the update.

The update is out today, and you can read all the extras that were added on the official patch notes, or in this blog post I’ve conveniently written here.

Best Little Slaughterhouse in Texas

I woke up today, and the first thing I did apart from check my twitter account was to check the number of wrenches found. This has become a daily routine for me this week, and a particularly thrilling one at that, which shows just how dull my life can be.

However, apart from the fact that when I woke up 74 (!) wrenches had been found, something else had happened. Apparently there was a reason that the TF2-famous Drunken F00l managed to get the 58th wrench; it wasn’t chance. Apparently the wrenches weren’t random as Valve had led us to believe, but were instead dropped at predetermined times, and whoever crafted first after the drop got it. Several people got when the drops were going to be, and crafted at exactly the right time. That, along with some crafting scripts, resulted in people, including F00l being VAC-banned and their Golden Wrench removed and recycled back into the system.

Today no official weapons were released, but a new map was revealed; a second official Payload Race called Hightower. This is interesting because the screenshot supplied seems to indicate that the cart actually goes on an elevator. This is an interesting aspect if it’s actually what it looks like; do you need to stay on the cart for the elevator to work, and if there is no-one on it the elevator goes back down? Interesting gameplay mechanic there. Hopefully this proves popular and makes Payload Race a more played game mode.

It was also hinted that along with the official melee weapon (which judging by the achievements page is most likely his acoustic guitar), we’re also getting a community made melee item for the Engineer too. That gives the Engineer three alternative melee weapons to choose from (if you count the Golden Wrench).

I can’t wait to see what the choices in melee are and what their abilities are, as they are the ones that normally result in an overpowered “upgrade” instead of an alternative.

As a final note, what does this look like to you? It looks like movable sentries to me.

The Wrench Connection

50 more wrenches have been found¹, which means the next day of the Engineer Update has been released. This one introduces more than just a new weapon; a new map and the achievements have been revealed. But for now, we’ll start with the weapon, which replaces the pistol.

The Wrangler does no damage outright, instead allowing you to aim your Sentry Gun at the target of your choice. This forces the Engineer to camp with his buildings, but opens up a whole new world to how he works with them. Sentry Guns have always had that weakness of being tricked into attacking the scout under the effect of Bonk! or an Ubercharged heavy, while a Demoman takes advantage of the distraction and destroys it. I can see it being used cleverly to force the gun to attack the medic in a combo, for example.
In addition, when an Engineer has The Wrangler equipped, his sentry gun has a “shield” around it that absorbs 60% of damage it receives, and makes it fire faster². As a negative, when the Engineer swaps to another weapon from The Wrangler the Sentry Gun goes inactive for three seconds, presumably while it switches to “autopilot” targeting. Not sure how this will work if say, a spy is disguised; could an Engineer use the sentry to spy check?
It’s interesting that while the Frontier Justice is seemingly designed and balanced for both defensive and offensive Engineer play styles, while the Wrangler requires the Engineer to be defensive only.

With this update also comes a new Payload map made entirely by Valve, titled Upward. Not much is known apart from what you can see in screenshots, but the full wiki page is available here, complete with description and screenshots! Make your judgements.

And last but not least, today the achievements were revealed³. While how to get them was not, I’ve been having fun guessing how each is obtained. Take a look at them via this cleverly placed link, and post here if you think you know what one is about. The first few are obvious (Search Engine suggests it’s earned by using the Wrangler to kill a Spy), but what do you think?

1. 59 at the time of posting this article, only 16 until the next update page!
2. Doubled firing rate for the guns, and an increased rocket rate.
3. One of those achievements became the name of this blog post. Isn’t that just neat?

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