If a bit epileptic. 

You're onto something there, even if you were just trying to be glib. If you pay attention to the marketing copy of CoD games, they only talk within the scope of the franchise. They don't care if other games have done X feature or used Y tech, they care if a CoD game has. CoD has a distinct player base in games, namely, they have a lot of players who don't otherwise play games. They have the metrics on this and know that their primary competitor is themselves. They need each release to be different enough from previous ones to justify a purchase, but not so different that it doesn't appeal to their unique column of players, the ones who only play their game.

This is part of why other companies, especially EA, are so silly in trying to make a CoD Killer. How do you convince people who typically don't play Other Games, to play Your Other Game which doesn't look that different from what they've already got, but it is on untested grounds? As one YouTuber put it, the CoD Killer is the game that is nothing like it but appeals to CoD players. Minecraft thus far is the only thing which has posed a threat.

Now as for "unique weapons", that depends on the goal you have in implementing weapons. I wrote this almost two years ago, but it still applies: http://scar3crow.com/2013/04/am-gun-will-travel/

Now, I wouldn't call myself "excited" for Black Ops 3. But I will keep an eye on it, because Black Ops 2 was by far the strongest entry in the franchise, and this is the first time that development team has had a three year cycle to work with. It will still be Call of Duty, with all the faults that implies, but I've always found it interesting to observe how these teams balance the demands for change and the requirement of familiarity.

I will say though, if you play Black Ops 2's multiplayer for a few hours, and you don't feel the difference between the weapons - to the extent that you develop particular favorites, and find your play style adjusting to them - then I would argue that CoD is actually too involved for you. It isn't a good game, but it is, when on point, a game about focused differences and applying them correctly. 

I would love to know how the game modes of Campaign Multiplayer and Zombies are radically different to all the other previous CODs that includes Campaign Multiplayer and Zombies (the latter in DLC), and how the cutting-edge military robotics are a huge conceptual progression over the previous COD:AW's cutting-edge military robotics.

Basically, they are cocks. 

Quake is just another Doom clone. 

As would I, since Treyarch has developed a good track record for this. Black Ops 2 in particular was noteworthy for its branching storyline which shifted between the 2020s, and the 1980s. Sixteen different endings, many of which are seeded by non-obvious events, with levels that you can fail and have the game continue (there is one particular chase sequence... yeah, you want to catch him, he can actually get away, and it makes a big difference in the end). There are the RTS side missions where you instruct multiple squads on routes to take in order to flank enemies and secure safehouses, with the ability to possess any of them. Their addition of numerous side areas and unique items per level were enjoyable, as well as the easter eggs, and the level unique deaths. I liked that because I performed well enough to earn the trust of the Chinese in one mission, that I got air cover from them in another mission to take out snipers. I liked that my failure to veer far enough left to avoid a burst gas pipeline, in a mission where I had chosen to drive, resulted in a friendly NPC's face getting disfigured, and that being brought up in later missions. I liked that I played through the campaign like mister badass, and got... the worst possible ending because I didn't take it seriously. I sowed the seeds of a very bad conclusion.

I liked the fact that in Black Ops 2 they rebuilt the entire class creation system around a card game mechanic (supposedly they developed actual card games in-house, and had employees play them - the most popular one became the structure for class building), eschewing the franchise's tradition of 1 Primary, 1 Secondary, 3 Perks, 1 Lethal Throwable, 1 Tactical Equipment. I liked their replacement of killstreaks with scorestreaks, meaning that you no longer begrudged an assist, that destroying enemy equipment had a longer term payoff, that capturing flags - especially taking one by force because it had additive bonuses - was a lucrative activity. That kills from rewards were worth fewer points, so you bypassed the issue of rewards feeding into rewards. I liked their inclusion of meaningful non-violent equipment to assist teammates and stymie enemies.

Was it a perfect game? Hardly. It was a 5.5-6/10 in my book, but it changed up a lot, and continually shifted the expectations of CoD players toward meaningful changes, while still anchored to the CoD base gameplay.

I'm not a Zombies player, I liked it in World at War when it was a stinger at the end credits, with a rather spooky tone and a dash of camp, but they took it in a weird camp-comic direction that I don't enjoy, so I've not bothered with it.

As for the cutting-edge military robotics, well, Black Ops 2 went the route of a national defense being reliant on drones, but becoming vulnerable to what was essentially DDOSing to gain control, through the breakthrough of major computing power. Ghosts went into the subject of developing a singular super weapon, which was of such power that once successfully taken, was able to lay waste to much of America in short order, leaving it vulnerable. Advanced Warfare focused on technology as it could improve personal mobility without a vehicle, as well as awareness and a dash of augmented reality visualization. The leaked marketing materials for Black Ops 3 suggests that they are going the route of further individual integration with technology. The classic science fiction dilemma of blurred lines between the technology and the person. But this is speculation.

The only real stipulation here is that phrase "unique", which would be better replaced by "distinct". Each CoD is generally three games. You've got the campaign by the main studio on that release, the cooperative function (be it Spec Ops, Zombies, or Extinction) by another team in that studio, receiving assistance, and Multiplayer which is generally designed in-house, cooperating with the themes and tone of the campaign, with maps provided largely by third party studios, typically Raven and Nerve. So yeah, distinct would be much more appropriate. But who knows, maybe Treyarch is going to pull another Black Ops 2 where they shift up major chunks of the formula. It certainly paid dividends in 2012. 

scare3crow's posts: very informative, a++

shambler's posts: exactly what we expect, a++ 

Finished Half-Life. It got worse towards the end and while I had thought everyone was shitting on Xen for no good reason, Xen *is* shit. Ugly as hell, changing gameplay and the boss fight is just annoying. I managed to throw a grenade in there, killing it and i died in the same moment so the outro played with me laying on my side, that was good. The teleporter puzzle in the reactor right before Xen was just annoying as well. I like the G-Man much more than its HL2 version.

Overall a damn good game with an anti-climatic ending (regardless of your final choice).

I played the whole game without ever seeing my HUD which somehow felt interesting. Wasn't a problem until Xen (no more health machines to fill up/know I am full). Quicksaving is a great thing and due to many death traps you really need to employ it. HL also silently autosaves at new levels which are not big, so even noobs should have no troubles.

Not sure if my experience with FPS or improved spatial awareness, er, higher resolution and higher framerate are the reason, but the game was much easier than I remembered. Especially "seeing" how to progress. A major part was that I now actually understood what NPCs and signs were saying, back then my engrish was not good. Compared to HL2 the "in-game cutscenes" were *very* much not annoying as they were short.

Now, what is the sign on G-Man's briefcase? 

is the logo for Black Mesa Research Facility. Doesn't make too much sense from a story perspective really as I always considered him to be an antagonist.

You're right about HL, the xen levels were a pain (and they're long too). You shouldn't have had no HUD throughout the game, that's probably a bug. 

The HUD was just cut off because I was playing in a virtual desktop with Wine and was too lazy to resize it. I considered it a challenge and it made it more fun imo. 

 

What do you like so much about it? 

Change of scenery, change of pace, godlike atmosphere, properly alien and hostile, and overall it's just a lot of fun. 

BRB DOWNLOADING IT NOW 

trying to remember my original impressions of half life.

- hitscan enemies pissed me off
- hated how much health the army dudes had, i remember turning on god mode, walking point black and emptying almost an entire clip from the smg before an army guy died, and thinking it was absolutely ridiculous
- liked how it felt like some long journey from start to finish, the passage of time shown with varying outdoor sunlight.
- got lost several times due to 90's mazelike map design.

that's it for now... 

headshots matter :) You can take the marines down pretty quick if you keep that in mind. 

Headshots do matter indeed. One revolver round or crossbow bolt to the head takes down any soldier. But otherwise they do feel spongy and unsatisfying to fight. It's rather incongruent because of how much effort went into the big alien soldiers with their armor plates, including that gap in the spine for a bolt to hit.

I can understand being spongy on torso shots as a basis of armor, but they also have helmets, so really face and neck shots should matter more, skull shots less - and the beret bearing ones could've been better armed or had better aim, but would have taken tons of damage from any head shot. The soldiers were definitely the PR focus, but they needed more attention in the actual mechanics. 

i think at the time, i didn't know headshots did extra damage. up till then, i had only played games like quake where it was just a hitbox. 

I've always aimed for the head in games if there was mouselook. I sometimes aim for the head in Quake, even though I know it does nothing - granted, I did play a metric ton of TF back when it was fun.

But I had also played a lot of Unreal before HL came out, a game I find to be massively superior, and since it focused more on 1v1 fights with high health monsters, and did have hit location, prioritizing headshots could end the fight a lot faster, so it was really ingrained into me come 6 months later. I was also conditioned by that awesome SiN demo. 

I played these games in the order above and found Half-life to be the superior of the two. Story-wise, at least. 

Story, Half-Life is... ...a first person shooter. Dudes poked with a teleporter, oh shit things that eat our faces, lets kill them first, oh shit dudes with guns for us to shoot with our guns, travel to the homeworld and kill something symbolizing a family structure. Other than the introduction order of dudes with guns, pretty Doomish. Yeah Half-Life tells the story better, but, it wasn't exactly riveting stuff.

Now moving beyond story and into the things which video games can do separately from other art forms: Unreal's AI, alien world, sense of wonder and exploration, unique weapons, and the most empathetic NPC this side of an RPG... I got a lot more out of Unreal than HL. The story wasn't astounding, but it also wasn't hammering me over the head with it. Like that time HL makes you plainly walk into an ambush so they can turn out the lights and take your guns away to pad the content feed. 

You're not giving Half-Life enough credit. 

Half Life being the prototype for the current day "interactive movie" form of games, Unreal being a great example of the oldskool lose yourself in this world and explore type of game (that wasnt a sandbox). 

I tried playing Unreal several times in the past and always got bored/annoyed. The weapons feel much less than HLs and the enemies' float skating is ridiculous. The world felt very sterile and plain. 

I disagree on the notion that HL is the prototype of interactive movie games. It is a linear game, that is true, but it has only one cutscene when you have no control over the character (when you are dragged by the two soldiers to the trash compactor). All the other story exposition cutscenes or scripted sequences still allow the player to be in absolute control, something that almost never happens in interactive movie games nowadays (see Bioshock Infinite for instance). In any case I'd argue that CoD 1 is a lot more to blame than HL, and I see HL more like a continuation of System Shock 1 without the sim elements with a pinch of Quake thrown in. 

"All the other story exposition cutscenes or scripted sequences still allow the player to be in absolute control, something that almost never happens in interactive movie games nowadays"

I think that gets a little overstated IMO ... Yes, you are in control of your character but 9 times out of 10, you're stuck in a small room or corridor. So what's the difference?

You can look around freely at these four walls. Oh ... great.