unr3al

Released in December of 2012, Far Cry 3 was a game that seemed to have success written all over it even before it was released. A beautiful, fully explorable island, an open world approach to it's questing system and a phenomenal graphics foundation were confirmed at various video game conventions, and according to many website reviews, it lived up to the hype. Does it live up to the hype for your resident average gamer? Before we get into it, I want to talk about where this game came from. First, a bit of a history lesson: In 2004, Far Cry was originally developed by Crytek, the company that now continues to pump out computer-melting shooter games via the Crysis series, raising the graphical bar each time a new one is released. The first game was set on a remote island where your mission as a special ops veteran is to protect your VIP and escape the island. It was a hit. In 2007, the first Crysis game came out, at which point Crytek decided to give the franchise to its publisher, Ubisoft, so they could better concentrate on the Crysis franchise. Far Cry 2 was indeed developed in-house by Ubisoft, using a new, modified version of the Crytek engine called the 'Dunia' Engine. Released towards the tail end of 2008, Far Cry 2 switched settings to the open plains of Africa where you can choose from a hand full of main characters to play as with slightly differing origins. The setting change was certainly welcome, and one of most impressive things about that game in my opinion, was that the graphics quality was so comparable to that of Crysis, but didn't require nearly as much muscle. Far Cry 2 was also a big hit upon its release, and plans for a third game were confirmed shortly after. Now, back to the Far Cry 3 review: Story: Rather than being able to select who you are as you did in Far Cry 2, you are placed in the shoes of Jason Brody, a young man who had an ideal American life. He had two brothers, a group of friends whom he traveled with, and a fiance who was going on to become a great Hollywood actress. Jason recently became interested in sky diving, and had convinced all of the people mentioned above to come with him on a trip sky diving in the Pacific. Unfortunately for them, the last jump they take doesn't end well. Rather than things going as planned, they end up on a remote jungle island chain, the main one being called 'Rook Island', where there is more than just snakes and spiders that threaten you. "There is more than just snakes and spiders that threaten you." Jason and company are almost immediately ambushed by a group of pirates who take them hostage and are supposed to sell them on a slave labor market. Jason's brother hatches a plan to escape with you, as he was in the U.S. Army Reserve, but once again; things don't go as planned. Rather than spoil the game by telling you the whole story, I'll leave you with this; your primary goal is to recover all of your friends and family members and get them to safety so you can leave the island, but as Jason finds out throughout the game, it's difficult to focus with revenge on your mind. "Things don't go as planned." The story is indeed linear (with the exception of being able to choose different endings), and objectives do have to be achieved in a certain order, and in some cases have time limits, but the story itself is extremely well written. I have said it before, and I'll say it again; writing that evokes emotion from you is what makes the difference in any kind of story. Far Cry 3's storyline does just that. It helps put you in the shoes of Jason, and feel empathy for him and his friends, while also wanting the same kind of revenge he wants on those responsible. There are also a good share of surprises that kept me on my toes, which makes the story enjoyably unpredictable. "Writing that evokes emotion from you is what makes the difference in any kind of story." Score: 9/10 Graphics: Much like Far Cry 2 before it, Far Cry 3 is based on the latest version of the 'Dunia' Engine, in this case; 'Dunia Engine 2'. It is somewhat similar to the Crytek engine, but performs far better than the latest Crysis game on equal hardware. Vegetation effects are different, along with small effects like motion blur and polygon count of some models. But this is largely not going to be noticed by the player because you'll be concentrating so hard on what dangers the jungle has in store for you, or what kind of and how many enemies are patrolling the roads. While this may not be a major selling point for some people, it impresses the hell out of me, because it gives Crytek a serious run for their money (although Crysis is still the ultimate pinnacle of graphical innovation), and shows them why handing the series and some of its staffing off to another company was a bad idea instead of just hiring more staff. Bottom line is the graphics are gorgeous and it performs well. 9/10 Sound: Jungle effects are appropriate without being overwhelming. The Amazon is actually extremely loud at night due to all the insects and small mammals coming out when it's dark. The jungle of Rook Island is definitely alive during both day and night, but it doesn't drown out other things, so being stealthy is still important. "Being stealthy is still important." Weapon effects are hit or miss in terms of accuracy compared to their real life counterparts. Some guns that should have a huge boom seem to have sort of a dull crack, such as the .44 Magnum or Desert Eagle. Others are right where they should be such as the R700 bolt action rifle or the AK47. Because of the variety of people, places and things on the island, there's a lot to hear. "Because of the variety of people, places and things on the island, there's a lot to hear." Music is a little stereotypical, but it fits with the location you're in, so no major complaints there. Voice over work is actually very good, surprisingly. You won't see a star studded cast like you might in Bethesda games, but the people who were hired know what they're doing. 8/10 Gameplay & Lasting Appeal: After you character manages to escape from his captors, all of Rook Island is immediately explorable, but much like in Far Cry 2, you can't see all of it on the map. The primary way to discover new areas is to attempt to find radio towers scattered across the map. Each tower has a jumping puzzle associated with it (with increasing difficulty for more “advanced” areas) with a small reward at the top in the form of a treasure chest, and a cut scene showing a few “vistas” a'la Guild wars 2, and a block of the map now being completely visible. Myself, I hate jumping puzzles, and they should have absolutely nothing to do with a paper map. I also dislike that the feature of being able to look at a mini version of the map in your hand while driving has been removed (from what I can tell). I hate pausing my game every 5 seconds to make sure I take the correct dirt road when I'm flying across the desert in an old hatchback at 70 miles per hour under a time limited mission. "The primary way to discover new areas is to attempt to find radio towers scattered across the map." Shooting mechanics are solid as far as where you shoot vs. what connects. I do think that it takes too many bullets to kill some certain enemies. There is a “heavy” enemy that you have to face that has as ton of Kevlar and a helmet on, but none of that wouldn't stop a .50 caliber Barrett sniper bullet or a .50 caliber Desert Eagle bullet at point blank range. Oddly enough, a few swipes from a machete will take those guys out no problem. There are also skinny, fast running enemies that attempt to light you on fire that wear absolutely no Kevlar and can take nearly a clip of assault rifle ammo to take down. Lastly, certain animals take way too much gunfire to kill. Even if a Grizzly Bear is big and has thick skin, an assault rifle can easily penetrate it and take it out with a few shots. I shouldn't have to empty practically everything I have into it. These issues aside, I'm happy with the shooting mechanics and physics. "Issues aside, I'm happy with the shooting mechanics and physics." Enemies in Jeeps who you ambush while they're driving have a chance of going off-road and flipping their Jeep over killing everyone inside which is entertaining to watch and somewhat realistic, and civilian non-combatants run like crazy when fighting erupts. There are a few melee features such as “take-downs” which are nice, you have a chance to counter animals and humans that attack you at close range, and stealth is an important part of the game in some scenarios. The game path itself is linear with the exception of the ending, but there are plenty of side missions and other activities to take part in to pass the time. I was anxious to see what happened in the story, so I blew through the storyline quickly without doing many of these first or alongside the main missions, so I'll be returning to do these after to kill some time. "I was anxious to see what happened in the story." There is also a co-op and a multiplayer mode that do add to re-playability to an extent. The multiplayer, predictably, has an unlock system similar to that of big name multiplayer shooters such as Call of Duty or Battlefield. The actual multiplayer itself is indeed fun, but it doesn't stack up to the likes of the aforementioned multiplayer giants. When you play it you can feel that multiplayer wasn't the number one focus, and for me; that's a good thing. Not many games engage me in a story as well as Far Cry 3 does anymore. Really only the likes of a Max Payne or an Elder Scrolls game would give this any real competition from a single player quality standpoint. The game does feature a crafting system, a skill system, a weapon upgrade system and an inventory system, speaking of Elder Scrolls, but I found it to be more of a bother than something that enriches the game. Unless you actively hunt the various animals on the island, you don't get things you need to expand your inventory or gain more holsters for weapons and ammo. Plant life however, is on the complete other end of the spectrum. Plants are so readily available for you that I never once had less than a hand full of medicine syringes on me with more “green leaves” ready to make some more at the drop of a hat. Weapon upgrades are earned with money which you can get by selling stuff you hunt, harvest or pick up off of your fallen enemies or allies. The further you are along in the game, the more money you'll get from dropped items. I find this most useful for upgrades such as extended clips or silencers since guns can be picked up from dead enemies for free, or “purchased permanently” by scaling a radio tower. The skill system makes a little more sense to have in this game since your character is not a born warrior (unless you ask the local tribes-people, who think you're a god among men). So you have to learn how to effectively take out people with your melee weapon, sneak around, shoot properly and be an effective self healer. There are three skill tress, and from what I can tell, you can unlock all skills in all three trees, rather than having to be picky about what you get. As stated earlier, I did almost exclusively the storyline quests, and I had nearly every skill unlocked by the time I finished the game. The storyline itself will likely last you longer than a Call of Duty game since there is some actual traveling involved in the game unless you rely solely on waypoints to warp around the map, and there will be multiple approaches to each objective. Taking all of those things into consideration, Far Cry 3 stacks up to be everything the developers and reviewers said it would be. It features competent multiplayer, a great storyline, a beautiful, sprawling environment with its own fake history and solid shooter mechanics mixed with some RPG goodness that give you a reason to buy something other than your yearly Call of Duty or Battlefield game. Score: 8/10 Overall: 8.5/10 The Good: -Great story. -Effective voice acting. -Fantastic graphics and performance. -Lots to do on the map and multiplayer when you're done with that. The Bad: -Bullet damage realism is hit or miss (no pun intended). -Nobody seems to be able to hand you a normal paper map, so you have to do jumping puzzles instead. -Little point in having a weapons dealer or the radio towers if you can just grab the gun you want off of a dead enemy. -Some aspects of the inventory and crafting system seem like a waste of time. Far Cry 3 is definitely one of the best shooters I've played in a while. It makes me miss Far Cry 2, and excited for a Far Cry 4 which I'm sure Ubisoft is hoping to do after the great reception this latest game received. *All screenshots shown taken by me using the normal game engine, no CGI cut scenes.*

What was wrong with that, if you don't mind me asking? It looked and performed the same as GTA III and Vice city, supported car mods without difficulty and it came out without as much PC port drama as GTA V is having.

Rivals is a fantastic game if you can get it to work. I reviewed it here, and I'd recommend it to people who ask.

There's no such thing as GTA IV Liberty City Stories. Do you mean Episodes From Liberty City? And just because Windows lets you install a program doesn't mean it's going to work or run well.

Danger sign Another danger sign A third danger sign What all the danger was about Lunch One police related photo for you all.

Yup. You meet the minimum requirements to run Windows 7, that's it.

The Resident Evil games are made by Capcom which is not the first name I think of when I think PC games. In fact it's one of the last names I'd think of. They're great at making arcade games and that's about it. The Resident Evil games are terrible in the first place, if you ask me, but in terms of how it plays on PC, badly. When you move the mouse around and look at the default mappings of some of the keys, it's clear that the people "developing" it have little PC gaming experience. Every movement your character makes feels sloppy. It's not a single thing you can put your finger on, but it just doesn't feel like a quality product compared to the likes of Left 4 Dead 2. And they've made no attempt to clean up any of the animation and various other graphical issues from the console versions. Need For Speed was originally developed on PC first and it showed. You could play the game without an actual 3D graphics card. You were able to use 'software rendering' if you didn't have a computer geared up for gaming, and it was extremely accepting of mods such as new cars and tracks. This was only really true up until 'Porsche Unleashed', but even still it performed very well. And Need For Speed Motor City was a great idea that unfortunately went wrong. Need For Speed World sort of picks up where that left off, but doesn't have the retro cars. I think Motor City's biggest issues was dial up, honestly. Today's titles are console ports, and you can tell because they've taken away any semblance of customization or making the PC version unique. Not only can you not mod the game in any real way, but graphical performance is terrible in many of the games (I'm looking at you Most Wanted 2012 and NFS Undercover) despite not having much of a difference in terms of looks. And while Rivals solved the graphical lag issues, it introduced a different problem; forcibly capped frame rates. As mentioned earlier, this is something you can modify with a .ini file edit, but only under a certain circumstance: In order to get the 60FPS setting working properly, your computer must constantly be able to perform at 60FPS or higher at all times, otherwise your games speed will be doubled, meaning that instead of going around a corner at 200mph barely able to see what you're doing, you'll end up going around that corner at what is essentially 400mph which will put you face first into a tree, at best. All of the games leading up to Rivals have been an absolute mess in one way or another barring the reboot of 'Hot Pursuit' and 'Rivals'. I love the NFS franchise, and I'm a big advocate of what the folks at EA are doing with it. I've probably been playing the franchise longer than any of you, as I started with Need For Speed II. It would have been Need For Speed I or Need For Speed I SE but my computer couldn't support it, and I didn't hit double digits in my age at the time. So make no mistake, I'm not saying I hate Need For Speed. I have all of the games that were tolerable enough for me (in terms of quality) to play over the years since the console porting began (Underground, Underground 2, Hot Pursuit 2, Shift, Most Wanted, Carbon, Hot Pursuit Reboot, Undercover, Most Wanted Reboot, Rivals).

A few more: -Soldier of Fortune III -Project Snowblind -Turok -Any Tomb Raider game after Tomb Raider 4, except the latest one. -All Splinter Cell games -All recent Ghost Recon games That's all I can think of for now, again.

You butchered my name, horribly. And Battlefield 4 isn't a port from a console, sorry to disappoint. DICE is still developing their games on PC first and then moving it over to consoles. They just did a bad job in general designing Battlefield 4. I've had almost no technical issues at all, it was more stable at launch than Battlefield 3, but game design issues like hit boxes, net code, etc. are what ruin it for me.

What are we basing this off of? Gameplay? Performance? Graphics? Multiplayer? If we're going unspecified, I'll build a list since it's hard to pick just one: -Grand Theft Auto IV / EFLC -Deus Ex Invisible War -Theif III: Deadly Shadows -Gears of War -Halo -All James Bond games -All EA Sports or 2K games -Rainbow Six Vegas and Vegas 2 -All Call of Juarez games -All Resident Evil games -All Need For Speed games since 'NFS Underground' -All Call of Duty games after 'World at War' That's all the painful memories I can dig up right now. There's a ton more, but those are the ones I can think off of the top of my head. I've had first hand experience with all of the games I listed too.

Honestly building houses is a lot more complicated, man. lol Almost everything in the world of computers is color coded (when it comes to desktops anyway), and parts are "keyed" so you can't fit them into the wrong slot. I'd suggest watching some videos on YouTube about it, or using another desktop as a reference while building your new one. But honestly there really aren't that many parts to worry about.

No, it was made to take a shot at specifically at Americans by a European who's uninformed in European history and politics. Nothing he said educated anybody, only reply posts like those from NickieB and some of the other G17 staff members actually had any historical facts in them that somebody could learn something from.

Thanks for the reminder. Mentioning the genocide that was going on there and other countries besides the U.S. cooperating in the fight would have been helpful to give perspective to people who weren't aware of it, but you don't care about that, right? If you don't like America, that's cool, but you're views most likely won't be very popular here, even from people who live in other parts of the world. Your previous posts make you sound an awful lot like a holocaust denier. But if you're not that type of person, then I'll be looking forward to your post marking the anniversary of the first mass executions of Jews by the Germans in 1941 during the Soviet campaign, and another post by you marking the anniversary of the mass executions of Armenian civilians during their war, along with some sh*t talking about each offending country. Because that's what you'll need to do in order to be fair and unbiased. Seriously dude, quit while you're behind.

I'm aware of what an APU is, thank you. I said he doesn't have a graphics card, which is true. APU's are great for laptops because they conserve power and combine two normally separate devices into one chip, but they are not for performance computing. GTA IV without mods will run poorly, nevermind with any graphical mods. And due to the game requiring dedicated memory for graphical purposes, he DOES NOT meet the minimum requirements. That doesn't mean the installer won't let the game extract to his hard drive, or even prevent him from starting and playing the game, as some integrated Intel chipsets reportedly work, but it's going to run very, very poorly in comparison to any impressive YouTube videos he may have watched.

Depends on the state. Technically there's nothing preventing you two from spending time together, but if the parents of the underage party want to press charges on the older party for 'Deprivation of Custody', they can do so. If there is intercourse, it's most likely considered 'Statutory Rape' unless the state permits it under parental consent, and both of your parents actually do consent to it. If you're the older one, I'd forget it. If you're the younger one, it's up to her whether she wants to risk it or not.

You don't meet the minimum requirements, there's no graphics card.

They're all ugly, they're all not much faster than the CVPI in the real world, they're all too expensive, Ford was the obvious winner even before the episode came out. They have the most contracts, and just look around the towns near you and the ones you live in. Almost all Fords.

Depends on if you want fancy graphics mods or not. If you do, it's not really gonna work out for you, definitely not for 250 pounds. You can probably get the game to run half-assed with no mods at 350 pounds, but maybe not even that since you don't have anything, even a monitor or speakers. A lot of money that could go into the actual PC will have to go towards that other stuff. I'd double the money first, then buy the PC once you do.

Guild Wars 2 has been around for a while now. It was released August 28th, 2012 after a lengthy but worthwhile wait after the original Guild Wars (along with its three expansions). Most major review companies gave it great scores for its amount of content, varied ways to play different classes, vast and diverse environments and elaborate PVP and crafting. But more than a year later, how does an average player view the game? You're about to find out. I was an early adopter of the first Guild Wars game, which came out April 26th, 2005. I picked up that game instead of World of Warcraft because I wanted an MMO experience, but couldn't afford the monthly subscription since I was in my teens at the time. I still maintain that it's one of the best video games I've played. When Guild Wars 2 came out, I was on the fence as to whether I should get it or not since there were many changes made to the Guild Wars 1 formula, and it features drastically altered characters and classes. I ended up buying it the day it came out, and I immediately started aggressively leveling my warrior all the way to around level 40, at which point I had stopped dead. At the time, I was running a Battlefield 3 clan that cried for attention, so I dropped what I was doing and never looked back, until recently. Shooters have gone a bit stale for me as of late, and I longed for some of the old adventures I've had in great past MMO's such as Guild Wars, Age of Conan, Warhammer, Champions Online, AION and RIFT. But as said earlier, Guild Wars has a special place in my heart, and since Guild Wars 2 is subscription free, I thought I'd go back and finish what I started; attempting to get a character to level 80. This was the status of my character when I left for Battlefield 3 mere weeks after getting Guild Wars 2. In a way, I do have regrets about leaving when I did. I reached level 80 on my first character, a Warrior about four days ago. In nearly every MMO I've played, a Warrior has almost always been my first character. I'm not sure how to best describe it, but if I had to put myself back in the 1400's, choosing a combat profession, I most definitely would have been the guy to pick up the sword & board and go slash stuff with it up close and personal. I think it's that feeling of action, that I'm constantly doing something and knowing that I'm big and bad that makes me love the Warrior class. That being said, I do have several characters in every MMO, but I'll talk about that later on. "I most definitely would have been the guy to pick up the sword & board and go slash stuff with it up close and personal." Story: I hate to say it but the story doesn't piece together as well as it does in Guild Wars 1 for several reasons. But there are a few main ones: 1.) Humans were the only race available in the first game, meaning the story was linear no matter who you were. 2.) You had to come out of the same starting area no matter what, in Guild Wars 2 you can go anywhere you please provided you have the know-how, so you'll end up doing human quests as an example, even if you're a Charr that's coming out of another part of the continent. 3.) The storyline itself is completely optional. You can and will level simply by doing region quests for random NPCs, crafting, fighting in PvP matches and grinding monsters if you're into that. The world story is fairly basic; the continent of Tyria is plagued by many evils, some old some new. It is 250 years after the first Guild Wars game, and some people who are in the story line (and technically even your characters themselves) can be direct descendants of those in the previous game. Races who can live to be old enough can even be from the last game itself, such as one of the last surviving Dwarves; Ogden Stonehealer. The rest of the Dwarves are assumed to be extinct (as is the case in other old-world lore for some reason), which would eliminate one of the threats in the previous game. New threats would include races such as the Dredge, a type of underground mole people, and dragons who taint the land with their breath and threaten players from above regularly depending on where you are and the 'Risen', mainly in the area of the Temples of Orr (a reference to the Scepter of Orr from the first game). The Charr and Humans are now negotiating a peace treaty as opposed to their war of attrition in the previous game and some other factions like the Mursat and White Mantle are nowhere to be found. That being said, some places on the map aren't fully explorable, so this may change in future content updates. There are also references to places like Cantha and Elonia (other continents in the Guild Wars 1 world that showed up with new expansion packs) so players may eventually be able to return there. ”The Charr and Humans are now negotiating a peace treaty as opposed to their war of attrition in the previous game.” New races have emerged after being briefly explained or at least hinted at by the last expansion pack in Guild Wars 1, such as the new 'Sylvari' race, people born from the trees who are created as adults with a fully functional English vocabulary (complete with British accent) and basic working knowledge of the world and its inhabitants apparently. Only the smallest of hint of the tree that spawns the Sylvari was mentioned up until GW2. Also noteworthy are the Asura and Norns, races that were introduced in the final expansion pack that you actually got to see and work with. The Asura seem to be a small race that are comparable to dwarves. They prefer to live underground, they are very short in stature but are highly intelligent and have very advanced technology at their disposal. The Norns are essentially very, very large humans. Basically equivalent to the 'Nord' race in the Elder Scrolls series. They are born in the freezing Shiverpeaks region of Tyria, and are known for their strength, size and skills in hand to hand combat. Story: 7/10 Graphics: MMO's today have been taking different approaches as to how their games should be designed when it comes to visuals. World of Warcraft took a new direction when it was designed to use low polygon count character models and objects in order to improve performance on computers with poor hardware specs, and instead focused on brilliant and vivid art design to take your attention away from the dated game engine as it got older over the years. Other MMO's such as Age of Conan held absolutely nothing back and used the latest and greatest technology to produce some spectacular visuals, but ended up leaving a lot of people unable to play the game. Guild Wars 1 and Guild Wars 2 both have taken somewhat of a hybrid approach. Guild Wars 1 scaled very well on lots of computers. Not to the extent that World of Warcraft did, but enough to where Guild Wars 1 was playable at around 20 frames per second on a Celeron laptop with 256MB of memory. Guild Wars 2 has taken a leap forward in both player model and object quality, and also taken a new direction in its art design. While I wouldn't necessarily call every weapon or armor piece in Guild Wars 1 'realistic' or 'authentic' those items are fairly similar to their real life counterparts and it was tough to find some extremes. World of Warcraft features some very “wacky” armor and weapons as end-game content which kept players going, giving them something to look forward to even after hitting the level cap. Guild Wars has now become a bit more similar to World of Warcraft in this respect because they've kept the great looking character models and environments (and have infact improved things such as lighting and shadowing), but have some things in the game that are a little more bonkers and fun. As an example, I'll show you my current main weapon for my Warrior, 'The Crystal Guardian': ”Some things in the game are a little more bonkers and fun.” The thought of a large great-sword being made out of giant crystal fragments and pure light is absolutely ridiculous, but it makes me smile. “Eat your heart out, 'Hungering Cold.” I said as I first equipped it. For those wondering, the 'The Hungering Cold' is a weapon in World of Warcraft that was used in a South Park Episode. It's also a bright blue, oversized bonkers weapon, but it now looks docile in comparison to the similar Guild Wars 2 weapon. Here it is: I know which of the two I'd rather slung over my back. Armor is a similar story in some cases. Underneath is a screenshot of my character, taken a few days ago after he hit the level cap (80). He is wearing a custom set of 'Exotic' armor. It's called 'Primeval' armor, a skin that was lifted from Guild Wars 1 and modified to be a little more terrifying, moved over to the new game, and it can be applied to any armor set you like, that way you can have any stats you like with any look you like. My set is colored black and gold, and with the sword pictured above on my characters back, he'd look like an opponent you'd want to stay away from in any MMO game. Although similar sets in World of Warcraft exist; They don't have they intimidation or 'cool factor' due to the limitation of the graphics engine for the game. The game runs very well on my PC (Core i7, 6GB RAM, GTX 670, Windows 8.1) at maximum settings, and can eve record smoothly at full resolution using FRAPS which is more than I can say for many video games today. The game can also reportedly scale pretty well on lower end computers. This game, unlike World of Warcraft, is not playable on virtually every PC, which was Blizzards goal in designing their game the way they did, but Guild Wars 2 has a solid population despite being prettier. Art design isn't as bonkers until you get to places like the Maguma Jungle area or 'The Grove' where the Sylvari are born. But when you do, World of Warcraft has a contender that gives it a run for its money in originality. Magic spells look gorgeous and compliment the sleek looking mele characters mixing it up at close range and somehow don't bring the frame rate down much, even in abundance. Graphics: 8/10 Sound: Sound in games of these type come down to a few basic, but important things, which I'll outline for you: 1.) In-game dialogue. 2.) Weapon sound effects. 3.) Spell or magic sound effects. 4.) Ambient music. 5.) Monster noises. In order, I find the in-game dialogue to be up and down. Some lines during cut scenes are flat and read without any emotion, while the very next sentence from the same character sounds like it was delivered with heart. Character voices during battle can get irritating quick if you're alone or you don't have other things turned up. You'll constantly hear Rangers say “Urge to kill rising!” (a nod to a Simpsons episode) or Warriors say “My strength, increases!” This is triggered when performing certain actions like building adrenaline or casting spells. These can be masked however by the ferocity of combat or other noises such as music or spell casts. Weapon sound effects are about the same across the board when it comes to item types (all bows sound the same, all slashing weapons sound the same). Magic sound effects are pleasant and don't get irritating unlike the dialogue, but there seem to be so few skills (which I will get into later) that variation is hard to come by. Ambient music is good, as it is well composed. But a lot of the same music covers different areas of Tyria. I think it should be more varried depending on what zone you're in, and change more with the pace of what's going on around you. Age of Conan did this very well, and I still regard it today as one of the best game soundtracks ever. Monster noises are about what you'd expect them to be. Basically what you'd hear in your head if you were to think of that creature attacking you in real life. The only problem is that some of these sounds are ripped off from the previous Guild Wars, rather than being re-created. Growl... Sound 7/10 Gameplay & Lasting Appeal: The big thing with MMOs is that it's not enough to have people buy the game. They need to keep their customers playing to continue their funding of day to day operations. The servers you play on will not stay up unless you pay for them, and most MMO games accomplish this with a monthly subscription fee, usually around $15 per month. Guild Wars 2, like it's predecessor is compltely free of subscription fees. You are only required to pay the price of the game itself ($60 when it was brand new, it may be less now). In order to offset this, the developer, ArenaNet, has included a cash shop built into the game where you can perform 'micro-transactions' for various items. These can be anything from character boosts, to cosmetic modifications, name changes, visual changes and even (in a round about way) buying gold, which reduces the use of the ever-persistent Chinese gold farmers. This formula is being adopted by several MMO games that previously existed with subscription fees. Some of these include Age of Conan, Star Wars The Old Republic, APB, The Secret World and RIFT. It works, and there are rumors of other games switching in the future as well. Lasting appeal will have to be earned through new content updates, whether its via quests, new items such as weapons & armor, new character classes or complete expansion packs. Currently Guild Wars 2 has stayed fresh with storyline “events” that change the game world slightly until players take a few weeks to “defeat” whatever caused the event. As said before, some areas of the map are not explorable thus far, and this may allow ArenaNet to add new content without necessarily having to make a whole new expansion pack, but time will tell. I spent a couple of weeks getting to 80 using a combination of normal play as well as grinding high level NPCs. Now that I have reached it, I'm supposed to be able to further make use of my Warrior by looking into 'Ascended' armor sets (that have stat boosts and must be crafted by hand), 'Legendary' weapons (again, supposed to be self crafted and have better stats), run level 80 and 'Ascended' specific dungeons for loot and new storyline elements, and PvP against other servers in large scale battles as opposed to normal guild vs. guild matches. You will need a decent 'Exotic' armor set to be competetive in World vs. World PvP, but luckily I can tell everyone that these are very easy to obtain. You can either get them through a 'Karma Merchant' with unspent Karma points you've collected by completing quests, you can get them as drops in dungeons, or you can buy them very inexpensively on the auction house, which is what I did. You are then well protected enough to mix it up with other people who have high level gear, or run in dungeons with bosses that hit hard. The trick to actually winning these events is making a competent build of skills and then knowing how to use it. This is universally true of MMO's today. Every game is different in regards to how both classes and skills are used and re-used. Guild Wars 1 was unique because it features many, many, many skills and revolved around being clever with your builds. Every character had a primary class, with a secondary class skill set you could also have on your character, making for some odd, but clever combinations that even spawned gimmick builds to be used to completely solo high end bosses, or wipe out scores of PvP opponents until a counter build was made, or it was patched. Guild Wars 2 unfortunately, is a lot less varied. You are given a set of 5 non-swappable skills per character that absolutely do not change unless you switch the weapon type you are using, and you are then left with 5 skills to alter to your liking. One of these must be a healing skill, as there is no dedicated healer class in Guild Wars 2. This was intentional, since finding a healer for a group of people proves difficult in many MMOs, and soloing an MMO can be challenging if you are a class other than a Priest/Monk/Tempest, whatever you want to call it. The final skill you get is called an Elite Skill, which in Guild Wars 1 was a knock out punch in many cases, and something you built your character around. In Guild Wars 2, the elite skills are largely watered down and serve specific purposes for specific situations. There are also a whole hell of a lot less of them. There are racial skills, specific to what race you choose (Norn, Human, Asura, Sylvari, etc.) and a few that are based on what class you pick. Unlike Guild Wars 1, there is no secondary class you get to choose, so this helps to restrict what Elite Skills you can use even further. While I won't say that these Elite Skills aren't helpful, they are not the knock-out punch that Guild Wars 1 elite skills were, and many players besides myself hope that ArenaNet changes that some day, along with giving us more choices. ” While I won't say that these Elite Skills aren't helpful, they are not the knock-out punch that Guild Wars 1 elite skills were” Skills aside however, there is a distinct feel to each class available in the game, and from my experience, I think there's something for everyone. Warriors, Guardians and Thieves lead up the mele front, while Elementalists (mages), Necromancers, Memsers, Rangers and Engineers head up the back line. Luckily, many of these back line classes can be played effectively up close because you can equip several of them with mele weapons with a unique skill set designed for it. Overall, it's the variety of gameplay that will keep people addicted. The desire to make and level more characters to 80 is there shortly after (if not before) you finish the first one. As of this writing I have a 35 Necromancer, 38 Mesmer, 23 Elementalist and a 20 Ranger. The Necromancer, Elementalist and Mesmer builds I find much more 'relaxing' while the Ranger allows me to take enemy focus off of me while still being able to go in closer if I like. Ultimately, the more you put into this game, the more you get out of it. Variety truly is the spice of life here. ”Vairety truly is the spice of life” The only other thing I'd like changed is the way players move around. Due to the previously mentioned Asura race, you can fast-travel across maps by using 'waypoints'. I however prefer to be able to ride across them on horseback (or some other creature if that catches your fancy) which in Guild Wars 2 you still cannot do despite the map size. Let's hope they reconsider if an expansion comes out and it introduces a new continent. Gameplay & Lasting Appeal: 9/10 Overall: 8 The Good: -Inspired Map Design. -Fantastic Graphics. -No subscription fee. -Varied play style between classes. -Story optional. -No Healer Class. The Bad: -Story optional. -No Healer Class. -No mounts despite large maps. -Elite skills lack “wow-factor” from previous game. -Player dialogue can be boring or annoying. ***All screen shots shown taken by me.***

The combination of the extra map and vehicle mods are probably crashing your PC because it can't handle all of the polygons and texture drawing. Ditch the car mods if you want to use the map, or ditch the map if you want to use the car mods.

It's a law in the state of Massachusetts, as well in other states. It's new in many of them, it only went into effect here a year ago. And one for being ticketed for not removing snow off the top of your car or truck went into effect a few months ago.

The first song you actually hear in the video:

To all the above, I suppose it's a matter of perception. Reform of sources of energy, politics and alternative materials for manufacturing are all good steps to take, but the people need to want it badly enough. I don't think enough people know what's at risk. Yes, we are running low on natural resources, and we don't want to run out, believe me. To try and create an atmosphere on mars along with plant life, water, etc will be a daunting task. But that's another story. As far as pollution being something we can live with, effects of that are all around us. People in cities full of it tend to live shorter life spans, like Bejing, China. Factory workers in China also tend to be exposed to harsh chemicals in the products they make for the rest of the world because of convenience and cost, not necessarily because it's the ethical material to use that's best for everyone. I think one of the council members in the movie 'The Matrix Reloaded' said it best: "People don't care how it works so long as it works." People need to care more. Regarding Italy, they got scared of the effects of a radiation disaster after Chernobyl in 1986 and made it a point to tear down all nuclear energy plants in their country and ban the technology for that specific use. To say their judgement may be clouded is an understatement. That being said, nuclear energy isn't something humans understand 100%, so it's not as though their caution is unwarranted.

Sounds like you're earning your pay. And there's plenty of stuff wrong with people. Ignorance due to poor education, bad parenting affecting their sense of right and wrong, etc.

Creating all that energy for all of these newly manufactured devices creates waste. Green PCs are fine, but are not the impact maker. Pollution is the immediate threat the way I see it due to things like global warming coming to the forefront of world politics. The two can go hand in hand, because pollution is often created by power companies themselves. The best compromise between our two visions? Target the power companies and sources of energy. Renewable sources of energy are a good thing to work towards in all aspects of day to day life, not just computing. Nuclear energy and hydrogen fuel may be good solutions, I just hope we can test them and implement them properly before it's too late. I don't have to have future generations living on Mars.