Menchise

quote: does anyone know of any games (that they think are actually good) that will even remotely have the scope and magnitude of BCM? Scope? No. Magnitude? Depends. You don't have to look to the future to find games that have equal or higher magnitude when compared to BCM; you don't need a lot of scope to achieve magnitude either. Some recent (sort of) examples are Freespace 2, System Shock 2, and SWAT 3. None of these games have the scope of BCM, but they provide a lot of magnitude in different ways. Freespace 2 does it with fast yet engaging combat against an awe-inspiring and relentless adversary, driving the player to continue fighting even when the situation feels hopeless. System Shock 2 does it with an engaging storyline and a genuinely scary atmosphere. "I see you! Run. Run!" *shiver*. SWAT 3 does it with old fashioned suspense, knowing that one careless mistake could lead to a tragic bloodbath. The magnitude of BCM has less to do with its scope and more to do with its level of interactivity; the original Elite has more space regions than BCM (100 times as many) but it doesn't have the same level of interactivity. Even if BCM's universe was only the size of the Instant Action area (5 space regions), it would have more magnitude than Elite. quote: I have heard that David Braben is in the process of creating Elite 4, but there has been exactly ZERO developement news on it. Elite 4 isn't the only one that's been quiet. I haven't been able to find any information on Loose Cannon either, except that Neumann left the team to work on Freelancer. [ 07-28-2001: Message edited by: Menchise ]

quote: P3's only go up to 1ghz (currently) and my mobo does support it. I did not think that extra 133mhz would up my performance that much. Apart from the clock speed, the P3 1GHz CPUs also have a 256kb L2 cache, which makes it even faster than some of the low end P4s.

quote: Go to the Fleet Database and sign up for Bishamon fleet. Akira is your fleet commander, however, once you sign up let me know. Huh? I thought Ballinger (Du Sandau) was commanding Bishamon. ???

Still need hints. REALLY need hints. Help!

ATVs don't have shields.

I've started playing the second scenario and it's pissing me off. Here is a typical situation that I encounter in this scenario: Scenario begins --> I set the throttle to maximum --> Three Insurgent aircraft attack me --> I take evasive action --> I am blown to bits. Average playing time: 15 seconds. I've tried taking cover, but the enemy guns go straight through. I've tried zigging and zagging, but I'm still bombarded by rockets. I've tried bombarding them with Radix missiles, but their guns keep ripping me up before the missiles hit. As soon as their guns start hitting me, it's game over; no matter what evasive maneuvers I make, they stay on me. I need some hints. I REALLY need some hints. [ 07-26-2001: Message edited by: Menchise ]

LOL!

quote: Strike Commander....is it the one where you fly f-16's? Yes. quote: that might be the best news yet i heard for freelancer. If you have the time, there is a video clip available for download at Lancer's Reactor from a website called Gamestar. It shows about two minutes of in-game footage.

I like it.

quote: However I've given up on Freelancer. It's been delayed so many time The development of Freelancer, namely its length and numerous delays, is very similar to what happened with another Chris Roberts game: Strike Commander. Soon after Wing Commander's release, Roberts started developing Strike Commander and producing Wing Commander 2 simultaneously; working on two games at the same time is bound to slow things down. Then Origin was bought out by Electronic Arts, which led to restructuring and more delays. The game was finally released in 1993, and it turned out good (I think it was the first game where you could choose your own wingman). Roberts started developing Freelancer soon after he founded Digital Anvil. While he was developing Freelancer, he was also producing two other games simultaneously (Starlancer and Conquest: Frontier Wars), not to mention working as a CEO. Then Digital Anvil was bought out by Microsoft and the release date was pushed back to 2002. That was when Roberts quit his position as lead designer and became a creative consultant, which meant that DA had to find a new lead designer. Thus, it's no wonder that Freelancer has been delayed so many times. quote: and I also heard from somewhere that it's gonna be an X- Box exclusive (yeeesh!) I don't know where you heard that, Fendi, but it doesn't appear to be true. The Microsoft Games website lists Freelancer as a PC exclusive.

Ahh. Well then, I agree with you.

I did some more checking in the rest of the Commanders' Village in response to a post made by Jaguar in the Active Worlds thread. Everything that I have seen indicates that he is correct: The base was not deleted by a vandal, it was deleted by a cleanup of the AW server, which removes all tourist structures. After considering this among several other factors, I have decided not to rebuild the base.

quote: A lot of time the servers actually come in and do a clean-up of the servers in order to make more room for actual registered users. So, it may not be a person that is trying to anger you, but the server doing cleanup. Hmm...that would explain a lot of things, like the complete disappearance of every single tourist object in the entire area. It's a good thing that a few builders registered when they did or everything in the new village would have been lost.

Mine too.

quote: I wonder if Looking Glass will make a sequel to System Shock 2....that series was awesome. Unfortunately, Looking Glass doesn't exist anymore. It closed down in June 2000. Their last game was Thief 2. I spent three weeks playing System Shock 2 and I was hooked all the way through. It's not as good as the original System Shock (my favourite game ever), but it's still brilliant. I haven't played Deus Ex, but I am curious about it. I'm very curious about The Sims as well. I've been cutting down on my spending habits this year since I have quite a few games that I haven't started let alone finished. This year, I'm waiting for BCM and Conquest: Frontier Wars. Next year, Freelancer.

Luc, the whole point of reviews is to inform people who haven't played the game if it's worth getting. For example, I haven't played Starlancer, but one of the writers at Adrenaline Vault has played it. Therefore, the opinions in Avault's review are more valid than my own, since any opinions I may have on the quality of the game would be based on fiction.

Hehe. Makes me wonder why GameSpot gave 7.6/10 to Anarchy Online, spewing euphemisms about the bugs and the generally broken state of the game. It's becoming a bad habit among game review mags and sites to 'cushion' the ratings they give to games in anticipation of upcoming patches (that's one of the reasons why GameSpot's AO review gave a "Good" rating). IMO, these people need to make up their minds; they should either write a brutally honest review about the state of the game out of the box or they wait till the patches are released and review the game then.

Starlancer was not a Chris Roberts game, it was an Erin Roberts game. I haven't played it, but as far as I know, it got 'good but not great' reviews from the mags (75% from PC Gamer, 7.7/10 from GameSpot, 3.5/5 from Avault).

UPDATE: New Commanders' Village Wreckage. It turns out that my buildings were not the only targets. The vandal that deleted my office and my secret base also deleted every single tourist building in the new village. All of the buildings created by Keenan, Spuzzum, Jansen, Pkzip, and Mikel were deleted. Due to the relentless nature of these attacks, I have decided not to rebuild my office (I'm still considering a new secret base). I have also decided that the Directory will no longer list the coordinates of structures that have been built by tourists. Speaking of the Directory, I need some suggestions regarding a new method of application (the signs from my office are not coming back).

More bad news: The secret base is gone. Someone has deleted everything that I have built in AW. I don't know how this person got the coordinates, and I find it very hard to believe that the few people who received the coordinates from me would do this. In any case, I need some time to consider whether I'm going to rebuild my stuff or not.

Someone has deleted everything that I've built. There is nothing left of my office or the Insurgent Secret Base. To say the least, I am not happy about this.

If you think that's strange, I used the CC's tractor beam on the Insurgent carrier and we went on a trip over dry land at 30,000 feet. When I released the tractor beam, I expected the carrier to free fall at high speed and smash into the ground. Instead, the carrier free fell at a not-so-high speed and went 'through' the land, gradually sinking underground without damage.

Has the hyperjump.avi file been implemented in the demo? It runs in Media Player and Creative Playcenter, but I can't see it in-game.

Hmm...it's been a week since the last post here. Is anyone still using Active Worlds?

quote: Well, i just had one question. My computer is kinda screwy, and i read that I need a 3dFX card to play Millenium. You don't need a 3dfx card to play BCM. You just need a 3D card that's compatible with DirectX 8. quote: I have looked all over my harddrive, and I can't figure out if I have a 3DFX card or not. There are at least three ways to find out. 1) Open the Display window in Control Panel. If you have 3dfx Glide drivers installed, you should see a 3dfx tab. Also, go to the Settings tab in the Display window and press the 'Advanced...' button (if available) to see if there are any 3dfx tabs in the Advanced Settings window. 2) Open the System window in Control Panel. Go to the Device Manager tab and check the device names listed under "Display adapters" and "Sound, video and game controllers". If the computer is so screwy that you can't do either of those two things, there is always the last resort that never fails. 3) Open up your computer and look at the chips on the card. If the card uses the 3dfx chipset, then the 3dfx logo will be printed on the chips.