Jalicos

I am going to have to think about this. My sole objection to Steam has always been that it allows another party to control whether I can access my games.

Never thought I'd see the day when a Stardock game required Steam. This is very disappointing. Some have made the case that Steam has improved a lot over time, and I admit that it has been a few years since I last had anything to do with it, so I would like to ask the following: 1. Would I be required to authenticate for anything beyond updates, the initial client download, and the use of features that would have required internet access regardless of the game's distri

[quote who="Lonemessiah" reply="211" id="3174404"]cool two more to add to the list of reasons Steam is evil, It makes the graphics of games worse It bans people from playing single player games... [/quote] Maybe "ban people from playing single player games" wasn't the best choice of words, but would that not be a consequence of losing one's Steam account? Let's say I buy Civ5 through Steam and

I can't seem to log in to do the survey, so I'll just post my answer here: I do not use Steam, and will not buy any game that requires it. Valve is a wonderful game developer with some really great games, but Steam's DRM still goes too far. For online-only games it's not bad, but banning people from singleplayer is a dick move. Even if I trust Valve not to abuse that little feature, there's no guarantee they won't ever sell my account to someone who would. It w

[quote who="joasoze" reply="35" id="3114601"] Gamersgate.com is a good option that I use quite a bit. [/quote] I've actually been using Desura lately, as several of the Humble Bundles came with keys for it. No DRM, no need to run anything in the background, easy to find updates... They only seem to have old and/or small indie stuff, though. I love indie games and classics, but I also like the occasional big AAA title, and it looks like all of those are being tied t

The digital distribution chart worries me. I don't trust Gamestop, EA is worse, everyone loves Steam but it won't let you play anything without asking for Valve's permission... Am I still going to be able to buy games in the future? It's starting to feel like no one wants me as a customer anymore.

Started up FE for the first time about an hour ago. The new menus, splash screens, and such are very pretty, though I sort of miss the brighter tone of EWoM. It just seemed more open and "Let's have an adventure!", but now it's all dark and "Struggle harder, mortal!" That's not really the kind of atmosphere I wanted in a new fantasy TBS. I'll take it if it gets us a good game, though. The music is very nice. I clicked on "Tutorials" and started reading the pop-up descr

I only read the first two pages, so sorry if I post something that was already suggested. [quote quoting="post"] Still Needed: Unit Abilities: ?- Unit starts at 2nd level [/quote] There are a lot of ways you can go with this. Noble (Implying they had access to better teachers and training facilities due to their high status.) Astute Cool-Headed (They don't panic like the rookies do)

[quote who="SPMaverick" reply="206" id="2918743"] I used to think Stardock/Brad cared about their customers. [/quote] I think they still do. They may have screwed up in some very big ways lately, but I've never seen a company respond to its own mistakes with the amount of maturity and respect that Stardock showed after the Elemental fiasco. I believe I can still trust them to enforce a certain minimum standard of quality for their games. That doesn't me

I was going to ask how I can trust Gamestop to respect my rights as a consumer in the same way that I trust Stardock to respect them, but after a while the question kind of answered itself.

[quote] As a game developer, I can tell you that this is pretty exciting stuff. Consider the challenges other strategy game franchises have. Some players would have liked to see Civilization V be more along the lines of Civilization IV. Others would have preferred it to be far more complex and others would have preferred to have it streamlined. Elemental: RPG games[/quote] So does this mean that the people who wanted a complex economy can have on

I got a cookbook and a breadmaker from my parents, much to the delight of my friends. My little brother also gave me the Scott Pilgrim movie on DVD because I happened to mention it once and he really wanted to see it. So much so that he made me open it a month early, in fact. Fortunately for him, it was entertaining enough to overlook his obviously selfish gifting practices. [e digicons]^_^[/e] It was also my birthday a few days ago, so there was a second batch of pres

I think Nurture Beloved would be interesting if, instead of simply using up lots of mana, you instead cast it on a single shard to trade its benefits for the spell's child stat growth. Which stats grow and how much would be determined by the type of shard. That way, you have to balance mana regen and spell power now against progeny growth and stronger champions later, much like Rift Shard.

[quote who="Bingjack" reply="17" id="2819627"] Quoting cephalo, reply 15 Colored Blob of Doom? [/quote] We've already got a Blob of Doom.

I was going to post something earlier, but it's hard to stay on topic when your main "positive" is something like, "The basic skeleton of the game has a lot of potential and I can tell it will be really awesome if we can just get a little tweaking and content and balance and..." However, I just remembered something a little more specific. In a game not long after release, I was wandering around completing quests with my sovereign. Most of the huts I needed to visit were in my own or n

[quote who="Werewindlefr" reply="95" id="2755962"] As for the AI, have you considered (let's be very ambitious) to implement the very beginning of a true computer AI? No, I'm not talking about Skynet here . I'm talking about Creatures' Norns. As in, minor learning abilities. It could give something very, very interesting.[/quote] Procipinee: Karavox! The time has come for you to pay for your treason against the kingdoms of men! Karavox: em bibble?

[quote who="Gravedancer" reply="77" id="2755813"] I'm interested in what the advantages / disadvantages were in pursuing the home grown engine vs. licensing something like Gamebryo. Aside from the issues that have come up, what were the primary factors? Flexibility, feature set, cost?[/quote] If I remember correctly, Kumquat was actually developed for an even more ambitious game called Society . I think they made Ele

I'm starting to like the shared mana pool idea, but I'm not so sure about moving elemental spellbooks into the tech tree. I didn't much like it when they gave each channeller all the books, either. Unfortunately, you need to have all the books because you have no way to know which types of shards you'll have available. So what if shards weren't associated with particular elements? If they were generic, it wouldn't matter which spellbooks you had because you could use the shards anyway

I believe the tech tree, like everything else in the game right now, is just a framework for Stardock and modders to add awesome things to later. It works, but there isn't much to see yet. The semi-random tech availability will be incredible once we get a big enough pool of techs to unlock, but right now it's useless as you just end up seeing everything anyway. One thing that might help a lot with the other issues in this thread would be a quotation or message whenever you cho

[quote who="Stanley Tarrant" reply="42" id="2732905"]I have to ask, how do retailers break the street date? Are they doing this just to be evil and ruin an indie developer or are these people just morons, or did you not spell it out in a contract? Can you sue these a holes? Something tells me that if anyone broke the street date of Starcraft 2, Blizzard would have made absolute mince meat out of the poor retailer like a zerg just going berserk on a cow just sitting there...[

[quote quoting="post"] Subway Wednesday At Stardock, Wednesday is usually “Subway Wednesday”. We go to the local subway together and talk gaming. I substitute the potato chips with cookies. We usually talk about all manner of things (nerd talk). [/quote] Subway? Eww... Go here instead. The food is much better, and I know for a fact that the cookies are delicious. Oh look, there's a location <

[quote who="Baleurion" reply="38" id="2725267"] Quoting GW Swicord, reply 32 Worldly knowledge renamed to “Tech Knowledge” to be consistent with the manual. Sigh. The manual was the broken bit, prose-wise. Well Tech is a much better word than "Worldly", in terms of ingame readability.[/quote] Perhaps, but it's also a much worse word in terms of immersion. Even using "technology" instead of just "tech" would have

[quote who="Star20" reply="8" id="2716603"] Also, I just realized that I have been mispronouncing Hiergamenon. [/quote] So I wasn't the only one calling it the "higher-gamma-non"?

I like the "updated DVD copy in the mail" idea. Being able to archive games with Impulse is nice, but it would be less hassle to just pop in a disc. Any idea what this would cost? Will the discs have labels printed on them? I may get one for GC2, as it would be nice to have a hard copy of what appears to be the "final" version. However, the LAN thing worries me. I have decent internet access at home, but there's only one broadband provider in town and they're determined

I encourage everyone to go read the Penny Arcade thread . It's 9 pages full of Firgof answering questions and people saying, "You can do what with WHAT?" [e digicons]:grin:[/e] You know, lately I've been wondering what the sci-fi equivalent of Dwarf Fortress would be like, and I think these guys may be about to show us.