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The Podcats: PC Games in the Back Room

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Online Gaming Survival Guide

With the explosion of Multiplayer gaming these days, sometimes the old hands forget what it is like to be the new guy. So if you’re new to the world of online gaming, or have been away for a while, here’s what you need to know.

1. You are a n00b. Whatever you do, you are a n00b, even if you’ve been playing the game for years, you are a n00b. You are a n00b if you die a lot, a n00b if you win and a n00b and if you do anything that results in beating another player with a higher ranking fairly and squarely, you are a n00b.
See also nub, newb, noob, just got the game, huh?

2. You use hax. If you play the game using elements placed there for use by the developers of the game, you hax. If you use last stand, you are hax. If you use a scope on an AK47, you are hax. If you use anything at all other than hip firing a bolt action rifle, you are hax. See also get some skill, grow a dick, etc

3. You are cheating. If you use a rocket launcher against another player, or a grenade launcher, you are cheating. Even if they just used the same tactic against you, YOU my friend, are the cheat, you cheater. Mr Cheater C Cheaterton III (really you’re the IV, but you’re such a cheater).

4. You are gay. Even if you’re married with six kids and had more tail than everyone else in the game (which wouldn’t need to be all that much), you are gay. See also: gh3y, WoW

5. You are of colour, Mr Albino from Sweden

6. You are lagging. Even though you’re not. See glitching

7. You are glitching. Despite the fact that network communication iver the internet is quite a complicated and marvelous thing, you are the reason the connection is poor and that they are losing. See also lagging

8. You are camping. This means you have found a quiet spot to fire off a sniper rifle and that your opponents are too lazy to come around behind you to take you out.

9. Bullshit. Whenever someone thinks they are better than you and you kill them, it is obviously bullshit. See also: hax, n00b, lagging, glitching

10. You should develop an interest in the thoughts of 12 year old children. Otherwise you will fail to appreciate the rich social commentary that is only possible from players of this age. Children say the darnest things such as “fuck you, you black jew fag hax nub lagger.” It’s so cute. They think they’re people.

11. If the child in question is headset enabled, you are in for a treat. Not only will you get an aural Live Journal update, but you may also experience the joy that is the favourite music of this child either through an MP3 playing while the child plays, or if you’re really lucky, a live rendition of said child’s favourite song or songs (though it’s usually just the same song over and over again. Actually it’s usually only the first verse over and over).

12. Fuck IWNet. See also Fuck Kotick, Fuck Activision, Fuck Infinity Ward and Fuck Bowling up his Fat Pipe.

So there you have it. The reasons why I never plugged in my headset to my consoles or PC, the reasons to keep out of team chat and the reasons why single player games will never die.

MODERN WARFARE WARFARE

The PC master race is up in arms with Infinity Ward over certain specs of the PC version of Modern Warfare 2. These basically bring the PC in-line with the console versions in terms of networking much to the consternation of the tweak everything crowd.

So if you run the PC version you now have:

a maximum multiplayer game of 9 on 9 (same as 360 and PS3)

no ability to lean in MP (same as 360 and PS3)

having to connect to a master server to authenticate (same as 360 and PS3)

no dedicated servers, but peer to peer networking (same as 360 and PS3)

matchmaking rather than server browser (same as 360 and PS3)

I am not rabidly going to rant about these changes, but by the same token I am not particularly pleased. The thing that made me buy the PC versions of WaW and CoD4 was the fact the P2P networking of the 360 versions was just not up to scratch compared to Halo 3. There was almost always a very noticeable lag between firing a weapon and the hit being registered on the 360 version of both CoD games. Yes, Valve’s p2p code is far worse but there was one reason why I was looking forward to the PC version. Also, where I live, we have pretty low internet quotas from ISP’s mitigated by the fact that if I play on servers hosted by my ISP- that is ‘free’ bandwidth. So, poo.

On the other hand, there seem to be many issues with CoD games of people ‘hacking’ the game. Though most calls of hacking are against people using ordinary in-game perk combos that the 1337 players are apparently above using (unless they’re losing). Oh dear. So you will connect to IWnet and then the matchmaking will begin. This is what I dread most as the thing that made WaW particularly bad in this regard was the fact that I would end up playing in games with a host who was in another country, leading to a frustrating time playing a game I knew could be good with good pings.

Some developers will see the reaction and make concessions. IW seem loathe to do this based on the time it has taken them to patch their games in the past. Do I think there’s a chance there will be something in the future? Yes and no. After all, PC players made such a small proportion of the overall CoD4 and WaW population that I think IW may just ignore them. Thing is, the thing that I used to love about CoD1 and CoD2 was that the ‘hardcore’ PC players stayed away from the game in favour of CS, Unreal and Battlefield, meaning it was pretty easy to get into. CoD4 becoming a hardcore as well as mainstream hit kinda killed the fun for anyone not in a clan.

John Carmack has also hinted at Rage not supported dedicated servers as well. DICE, however are using this as a wedge to drive PC players to Bad Company 2, which is not a bad thing since for everyone since BC was a really great game and would be great on PC.

So do you listen to your player base or do you use your extraordinary power to enforce your will? Let’s see how this plays out this week when the game is released

USELESS THING OF THE DAY: L4D2 Petition

The recent E3 show revealed the existence of several games to be released later in 2009. One of these was the sequel to 2008′s smash hit PC/ Xbox 360 shooter, Left 4 Dead.
Rather than fans of the original jumping for joy at the prospect of a full-blown sequel (these are Valve fans- they’re used to a more deliberate timeline for releases), the many fans of L4D are in fact running a petition to focus their anger on what they see is Valve’s ditching of L4D1 so soon after release.
There are two ways you can look at this…
The first way is how the fans are seeing this. LFD is not even cold in its undead grave, with only a few minor DLC releases and here’s Valve trotting a full (priced) sequel in a year. It means they’re either pulling an EA/Activision and moving to yearly updates to franchises- which rarely has an upside to quality whilst at the same time inducing gamer fatigue faster- and going from the altruistic company that many PC gamers imagine Valve to be into another money hungry company.
It took 10 years to go from Team Fortress to TF2. In 2009, we are still waiting for HL2: Episode 3 (more than 18 months after episode 2). TF2 is still getting updates (free ones) two years after release). Hell, even Day of Defeat is still getting updates alongside TF2. So people feel Valve will abandon the free stuff and long term support of their titles.
The other beef is the splitting of the community between those playing L4D and LFD2. One thing online games need in order to thrive is a lot of people. Its what makes TF2 memes more recognisable than Quake Wars: Enemy Territory. Well, if you split the L4D community between those playing the sequel and those playing the original- they will have less people to play with. The problem with that argument is L4D is not a game that requires a lot of people to play, and in a smaller, more dedicated gaming community, you’re more likely to find people more serious gamers, better games, etc. Did TF2 players start a petition of the original L4D pilfering their player base?
The other way you can look at this is : COOL! More LFD! Yippee!
If it were an Activision title, I would be worried about the quality. I still have enough trust in Valve that L4D2 will be worth the price.

Read C1.com’s review of Left 4 Dead
Focus Test for L4D

REVIEW: Eversion

Lisvender sent us a review of a free PC game. After a week of E3 shenanigans, something slightly insane is just what we need to restore our sanity.
If your idea of wrapping yourself in cosmic wonder is reading The Call of Cthulhu, here’s a free PC game that’s worth your while. Eversion is a platform game whose hero, who resembles a daisy with legs, has the ability to move between dimensions. The process is called eversion, and each dimension he passes through is darker and more dangerous than the previous one, so Daisyman’s search for The Princess starts in Super Happy Cute Land, and finishes in Psycho Bloody Demon Hell.

Players move Daisyman from left to right, jumping over pits, stomping on enemies, and collecting gems. Super Mario Bros. is channeled with the flagpoles at the end of each stage, and the smiling blocks that produce gems when jumped into from below. What’s not so Mario-like are the mysterious Eversion Points: tiny spots in each level where the background colors and music will change a bit when Daisyman stands in them. Press the Evert button while in one of these points, and the world changes, usually for the worse. Plants that flowered and flourished a moment earlier are now withered and weak. Brick platforms that were once solid and sturdy are now fragile, and will crumble beneath Daisyman’s feet. The smiling enemies that skipped along the grass before are now slow, slithery creatures. The music takes on a more somber tone. The sky darkens.

If I go into any more detail than this, I’ll spoil the experience. I’ll just say that there are some tough jumps, a lot of puzzles that require players to exploit the rules of each dimension, and even a few postmodern surprises. By the end of the game, players will have been chased, torn apart, and taunted.

My only complaint about Eversion is that you cannot evert at will; you can only do so at the predetermined Eversion Points. Such an ability would add a ton of potential for exploration and secrets. It would also make finding all of the game’s gems easier than it is now. I realize that the current design is what makes the game’s progression so unique, but hunting for Eversion Points, and then maneuvering through each of the game’s dimensions in proper order, just to grab some collectibles, gets tiresome fast. You’ll have do it, though, if you want to see the game’s “good” ending.

What really makes the game interesting is that so much about it is nebulous. There are no cutscenes to explain what’s going on, so I had to think about it myself. The chief question I pondered while playing it was whether Daisyman was actually changing the world when he everts, or moving from one universe to an alternate one. Does he have the power to alter the creatures around him, or do they occur in their worlds naturally? If so, how do those one-eyed, staring slug-things in Dimension 4 eat or find shelter? Do they just lay there all day, drawing nutrients from the rocks? I realize it’s a silly thing to think about, but it’s also fun, and hey: any video game that gets me to think earns a special place in my heart.

I recommend Eversion to any gamer who likes a little thrill and curiosity. It’s fun, challenging, and free, so you can at least give it a try. Check it out at the link below.

Final Rating: 2/3

Download it here: http://zarat.us/tra/offline-games/eversion.html

Reviewed by Lisvender

REVIEW- FALLOUT 3: OPERATION ANCHORAGE

Reviewed on Xbox 360. DLC also available on PC. Fallout 3 game required. Fallout 3 also on PS3, but without DLC.
Developed and published by Bethesda.

Our first DLC review on c1 and its Fallout 3′s first piece of DLC, Operation Anchorage. F3:OA is a side mission for the game based around the Outcasts you may have seen around the map. You agree to use your Pip Boy to interface with an old Virtual Reality pod and voila, you’re transported virtually back to the campaign to oust Chinese Army occupation of Alaska before the Balloon went up.

The DLC is a lot more linear than the rest of the game and more action oriented. Its  more Mass Effect than Fallout. You take nothing in and take nothing out, so you can’t loot corpses since your vanquished foes vanish along with any weapons and ammo. You have ammo dispensers and health dispenses dotted around the map, not always where you need one and since you can’t carry meds, it does change how you play fairly significantly. You can’t go into a fight, shoot, heal, shoot heal. You have to heal when you see the dispenser and hope you can make it through the few throttled areas with enemies aplenty without dieing.
There’s a boss encounter at the end but if your speech stats are high enough, you may able to avoid altogether in a rather bizarre way. At the end of the simulation, you unlock some booty that you can return to at any point (though i’m not sure if items respawn- i’d doubt it). There’s nothing in the booty that you can’t get elsewhere but its nice to have it all in once place.

The other thing the DLC does is remove the level cap, so its definitely worth doing if you plan to do everything in the game. The actual F3:OA mission is not all that great and made me stop playing F3 once I was done. I would say its essential only if you are planning on doing EVERYTHING. There two more F3 DLC packs scheduled in the next few months but I think I’m done with this game. The levels here should take around 3-4 hours which is not bad for the price but you just need to know that it doesn’t play like the rest of the game.

Controller1.com rating 2/3

RETRO: DAY OF DEFEAT SOURCE

Reviewed on PC. Developed and published by Valve

The original Day of Defeat was a free WWII mod for Half Life and after Counterstrike was one of the few mods to be successful enough to be bought up by the makers of the originating game (as happened with Counterstrike and Left 4 Dead). In 2005, the game was ported with semi upgraded graphics to the Source Engine, though with only 4 maps at launch though others were added intermittently. At some point, spurned on by the success of Team Fortress 2, DoD: S received a mini makeover with a film grain effect and killcams straight out of TF2 (yes Call of Duty did them first but these are literally the same as TF2′s down to the sound effects and the ability to take screenshots). Now you have nemeses and can gain revenge on those who kill you too much.

The game is a really simple class-based game with two teams  (one German,  one American). Most maps are simple capture the flag deals, but with a very fast paced capturing system compared to the eternity it takes to capture a control point in a  Battlefield game. Other maps involve demolishing enemy installations (tanks, anti aircraft guns, etc) but basically its a “shoot and respawn until the map runs out of time” game. There’s a simple, yet deep game here that’s been keeping a loyal band of people still playing in this PC shooter environment ruled by the trio of CoD4, TF2 and L4D. People use grenade launchers and there’s no nasty n00btube comments like there would be in CoD4.

It doesn’t hurt that the Source-engined version of this game is over four years old and will run on almost any PC still in circulation. On a modern machine it looks ok but you may be missing the graphical OMFG you get with Crysis. Call of Duty 1 and 2 were bigger sales successes yet I can’t find a game on my ISP’s servers. There’s that typical Valve feel to the way it works and sounds, with the nasty touch that when you lose a round, the winners have about 10-15 seconds where they can kill any enemies still alive with impunity. Ouch!
So here’s the question- why has there never been a sequel to this and why not a console port? CoD WaW’s success proves there’s still a large market for good shooters, even WWII ones. I guess the new Wolfenstein will just have that Nazi-hunting FPS market to itself this year.

The Game You Play After the Best Game in the World

For those who can’t let go, I have some advice- Let go. Where I work, people regularly use their PC’s to play multiplayer games at lunch and after work at the end of the week. Because the place is so big and stuffed with geeks there are several different games going on around the  building. There’s the WoW fraternity, TF2 players (whose ranks have been thinned recently), Left 4 Dead and CoD4 Modern Warfare. Yesterday we had some interesting conversations on our private CoD4 mailing list and it highlights a problem when you play a good multiplayer game for a long time and tire of, but have no immediate successor lined up.

So these guys have basically played Call of Duty modern Warfare at lunchtimes for over a year. They don’t like CS or TF2 or LEft 4 Dead, they love CoD4. They are very good at it and most are ranked level 55. They also play a mod, so they’ve levelled up using this bot mod only with the bots turned off so they’re basically playing standard CoD4 but one where they can only play against each other if they want to preserve their rankings). This is why its hard to tear away the TF2 guys from their game or WoW players to a new MMO. They’ve invested so much time in the game but are so sick of it but they’ve invested so much time in it but they are so sick of it but, well, you can guess the rest.

So back to this group of CoD lovers. One guy, who’s one of the better players, and the one who wrote the bot mod we played, has basically had enough. I know because I’ve played him on the 360 version as well as the PC- He’s spent more time on that one game than I have on sleeping in the past year by the looks of things. you know the type, complaining about others using the grenade launcher (the n00b tube) So he’s trying to rally the troops into playing something else. So what about Call of Duty World at War? Nope- WWII, buggy, yada yada. Which is funny because he hasn’t played it. Ok, then what?

Operation flashpoint was suggested. The group was all excited but apparently was a colossal let down. I could have told them that. Then Codename:Eagle, apparently a pre EA DICE made this before BF1942. Apparently buggy too so that went down in flames. Its funny, but I’m sure many games have this same dilemma. What do you play when you’re sick of something. I recall years ago, when we played Medal of Honor Allied Assault multiplayer, we moved straight onto Call of Duty (the original). When that grew stale, there was no immediate successor until the UT2004 demo came out. Battlefield Vietnam came out and filled the void for a while but that didn’t last. Eventually someone suggested the original Counterstrike and they went back to that (without me for the most part since CS has never gelled for me). WoW kind of killed the LAN gaming network for a few years (that and some other loopholes being closed by the IT department). Counterstrike source came and went a few times, lots of RTSes and MMo’s and then new FPSes becoming fashionable again amongst theses fairly PC-centric types with CoD4 and TF2 (and then Left 4 Dead).

But the habits are hard to kick. Left 4 Dead took away some of the TF2 players (not all), but CoD WaW has not pulled the CoD4 guys away. I’m guessing that either these dudes will be bringing in CoD2 next week or Battlefield 1942 or BF2. And it won’t last. I reckon give it a month before thy come back to Modern Warfare.

I myself played Left 4 Dead but i found the online wasn’t more fun than SP for me and I kind of lost interest after writing the review. Then I saw on steam my Day of Defeat Source needed an update so I patched it and tried it having not played it since CoD2 came out in late 2005. Well, you can see the TF2/influence now. Film grain effect and killcams straight out of TF2 (same sound effects) but that aside, this is still one of the better fast paced shooters. It has changed so little that I can’t help wondering if these guyus will ever get bored with playing these same maps over and over.

What makes guys play this sort of game over and over so much, even years later? CoD WaW has come out and sold very well, but I find the PC community to be quite small. My ISP is one of the larger server providers and there are only two normal TDM servers for CoD WaW compared to about six to eight for Modern Warfare. Hey, people are still playing Quake III somewhere.

Its hard to let go.

Call of Duty: World at War review

Reviewed on PC (Single Player), Xbox 360 (multiplayer). Also on PS3, PS2, Wii, DS, PSP.  Developed by Treyarch. Published by Activision.

So, despite the dire predictions of Call of Duty World at War being a total disappointment compared to Call of Duty 4: Modern Combat, Treyarch have surprised us all and delivered a worthy successor to the most popular CoD game of all time.

CoD WaW follows a US soldier in the Pacific being led by the hand by 24’s Keifer Sutherland interspersed with playing a Russian soldier in the final assault on Berlin. It doesn’t try to out do CoD4’s sniper mission or the Gunship level. It has its own slants to those CoD4 signatures and adds a tank level and flying boat level. The shooting is EXACTLY the same as that in CoD4, which is what everyone who loved CoD4 but wanted more asked for.

Keifer’s gravelly tones tell you to shoot that. You shoot it. He tells you to shoot that, you shoot. “Those Jap bastards,” he says and you aim and open fire. Flames are a big part of this game. You wield a deadly flame thrower in some levels, including one level where it subs for the machine gun on a Russian tank. The flame thrower is a really nice weapon- much more usable than the one in Gears 2. The weapons are typical WWII fare with KAR98, M1 Garand, Thompson SMG, etc but they handle very nicely. There are a few large battles where progress is a little more difficult since Treyarch love their “infinitely re-spawning enemies until you cross a threshold” trick but overall the level designs are solid and fun to play. You may not have been to these locales, but if you’ve played previous CoD4 games, you have played them.

You can play the campaign either by yourself or in coop mode and once you’ve beaten it you get the Zombie mode “Nacht der Untoten,” which is basically a short version of Left 4 Dead. It is awesomely fun and highly recommended to give it a go. Pity there aren’t more levels but I guarantee this will be expanded upon at some stage. I’ve found that I’m unable to get online in the PC version so I’ve been playing a few rounds of this before I boot up CoD4 every night. I love it.

Multiplayer offers the usual modes, Search and Destroy (CS), Capture the Flag and Deathmatch modes. I mainly play Team Deathmatch but it compares quite favorably with CoD 4 and CoD3 multiplayer (CoD3, also by Treyarch did feature excellent Multiplayer modes). If you’ve played CoD4 MP, then you know what to expect. Just substitute Recon plane for UAV, Artillery for Airstrike and Dogs for choppers. That’s right, get to 7 kills without dieing and you can unleash the dogs. So long as you have no problems shooting digital dogs in the head, you’ll have a blast. Think of it as retribution for all the times in Nintendogs when your Alsatian took a crap when you were walking it. One thing that makes me think of CoD3 is the fact you can drive tanks in multiplayer. Overall, highly enjoyable. They even used Keifer to announce “Team Deathmatch” when you play as an American.

Graphics are excellent. I mean, they are jaw droppingly gorgeous on PC and console versions. Even in multiplayer, the 360 version ran at a  smooth as butter 60 frames per second. Sound is also excellent though the weapon are a bit weedier sounding than CoD4 (but at least the sounds are different). The Flash cutscenes opening each level are also interesting and different from what you’d expect in a WWII-set game.

Since FPS WWII games set in the Pacific are pretty thin on the ground, the only competition is really the two rather poor EA Medal of Honor games (Pacific Assault and Rising Sun) and this game just wipes away all memories of those travesties.  So, no it isn’t better than CoD4. It is close in many respects and doesn’t fail in any one particular area. That said, its an entertaining game in its own right

controller1.com rating 2/3 (or 3/3 if you love Call of Duty games and can’t face any more CoD4 MW) As Keifer says when the Marines win a multiplayer game “Out-fucking-standing!”

Now Playing (NOT): Call of Duty World at War

Well, I would be telling you how awesome this game is (PC version tested). But I can only tell you how awesome the Single Player is. It is an excellent single player campaign so banish thoughts that Treyarch couldn’t deliver in the wake of the juggernaught that is Inifnity Ward’s CoD4.

Except the multiplayer (which is by all accounts, awesome for those who can play it) is busted. I cannot get as far as making an online profile so I can play. Instead the game continuously cycles between trying to connect and make an online profile and error messages. I patched the game but it made no difference. Googling found it was a common issue in the Beta and others have had problems with retail. I then stopped worrying and tried to continue the SP, but the patching meant I had to restart the level rather than continue where I had gotten up to (This should never happen in a retail release BTW). I even had my machine just shut down twice whilst playing.

So my first PC game that I’ve bought on ages that I wasn’t also planning on buying again for console or play on my iMac (Spore) is likely to be the last. I want to play the Multi so much and this is highly frustrating.

Treyarch. You nearly pulled it off. You almost laid to rest the spectre of Call of Duty 3 (which at least had great MP). Instead I will make a pinata in the shape of your logo. I will dip it in petrol and set it alight before I start beating it with a flaming baseball bat. I will then douse the flames of the Treyarch Logo Pinata by pouring a bucket of Horse Urine on it and then offering the smoking remains to some very large and cynical hogs.