Halo 2, Half Life 2 Or Doom 3

[Mosch]

As far as the whole "you've opened the box so we won't give you your money back" thing that people are getting from shops, in the UK at least they arn't alowed to do that. If you disagree with the EULA you are able to return it under the "not fit for purpose" clause in one of the consumer protection laws. The same law covers knackered CDs and other stuff like that... Unless of course they've changed the laws in the last five years and not told anyone... :unsure:

​

afaik, the shop does not have to take it back, but the producer has to. Don't quote me on this one though.

 

[Zayfod]

As far as the whole "you've opened the box so we won't give you your money back" thing that people are getting from shops, in the UK at least they arn't alowed to do that. If you disagree with the EULA you are able to return it under the "not fit for purpose" clause in one of the consumer protection laws. The same law covers knackered CDs and other stuff like that... Unless of course they've changed the laws in the last five years and not told anyone... :unsure:

​

afaik, the shop does not have to take it back, but the producer has to. Don't quote me on this one though.

​

Done a bit of checking, seems the law is still the same as I remember. Heres the distilled version from the BBC's watchdog site. LINKY

 

[Klown]

HL2 is brilliant, but I *hate* steam. It take a few minutes to even begin loading, and if your net connection is down, stretch that to about 5 - 6 minutes as you can't enable offline mode yourself.

Also, your HL2 cd-key is associated with your steam account, and can't be associated with another or they both get blocked (from what I've read, anyway), so this prevents some piracy (probably about 1%), but it also means you can't lend it to your mates or sell it, which sucks.

​

Wah wah wah wah wah wah wah wah wah wah wah wah. Steam did a good job of banning 20,000 fucktards who thought they could pirate HL2 and it's now a half decent sysem.

I'm sick of this "STEAM IS A WAY OF VALVE FUCKING US OVER AND ITS SLOW AHHAHA LOL" crap.

 

[Rico]

Read the agreement, they CAN fuck us over in a multitude of ways. Having to start steam before HL2 (especially as it keeps running afterwards, so you have to shut it down each time if you don't want it in the background) is annoying.

I have also experienced the PURE THRILL of having my net connection go down, then starting Steam and waiting for who knows how long until it gives up and lets me play offline. Would be easier, since you're guaranteed to be able to play it either way, to do its authentication and upgrade crap in the background after I've started my goddamn game.

 

[Klown]

What are the chances of a large company fucking us over like that though?

Very Slim.

 

[Rico]

They already are. Very few other game companies require you to authenticate your purchase online, run a program in the background that tries to phone home every time you start your computer, show occasional adverts, and have a totally unequipped server backend for the rush of gamers logging in to authenticate their game. Because it's HL2 most put up with it. Valve are leveraging their awesome product's influence into Steam and it's both a bless and a curse to us.

If the delivery system actually works, then it might be useful... if it's solely for HL mods then I don't really have an interest in it. At the moment there is simply no advantage over the old HL system other than automatic patching... and patches shouldn't be coming out often enough for this to be needed.

 

[declaration]

I know that if Microsoft did half the stuff Valve are doing to protect their software, you'd all be in uproar.

 

[Swiss_Cheeseman]

Half Life 2 is awesome.
Halo 2 is just a little less awesome.
Doom 3 is crap.

I know that if Microsoft did half the stuff Valve are doing to protect their software, you'd all be in uproar.

Thats because there is a large difference between an Operating System and a video game.

 

[Huxley]

They already are. Very few other game companies require you to authenticate your purchase online, run a program in the background that tries to phone home every time you start your computer, show occasional adverts, and have a totally unequipped server backend for the rush of gamers logging in to authenticate their game.

​

And how is this fucking us over? The first few points you make are part & parcel of steam. The last was to be expected. Small penance to pay for one of the best games of the decade.

 

[Fishbong]

And how is this fucking us over? The first few points you make are part & parcel of steam. The last was to be expected. Small penance to pay for one of the best games of the decade.

​

I ´ve payed 43€ for Halflife 2. That´s enough. I´ve played better games (Gothic; WarcraftIII) for similar prices and WITHOUT bullshitty distribution systems such as steam.

And all i hear from you steam defenders is " :huh: steam isnt´t that bad :huh: ". Instead i´d like to hear what´s actually *good* about steam, and don´t mention the 20000 fellas whose accounts have been disabled because of piracy, because it´s still easy enough to get a pirated version that works (without steam oc.). Regarding the fact that cheat-protection doesn´t apply to solo HL2, your list will be *really* short...

 

[Goity]

what is that steam anyhow? it takes aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagggggggggggggggggggesssssssssssssssssss to load

 

[GP32MAD]

Half Life 2 is the greatest game on earth at the moment as it is sumprely life-like and is funny when you set a zombie on fire                       

​

How do you know what a burning zombie looks like?? :blink:

​

Well if you set a zombie on fire in Half Life 2 they run around and start screaming something like "Why do you hate me?" and set a poisonious head crab on fire and they pass it to the nearest head crab

 

[Rico]

And how is this fucking us over? The first few points you make are part & parcel of steam. The last was to be expected. Small penance to pay for one of the best games of the decade.

​

So basically, because it's a good game you'll lay down and take anything Valve penetrates you with. Good consumer judgement there, pal. Luckily I stopped Steam from starting automatically so I only have to put up with a small delay while it boots up, oh, and the 20+ minutes extra when I first installed it. But there are a lot of gamers who now have Steam as yet another background process that they don't need, perhaps even after finishing the game.

'Best game of the decade' is an entirely different discussion, but let's just say that Ravenholm sucked (and will suck more now the set-pieces have been seen once) and Highway 17, which I'm currently on, has not instilled me into playing HL2 for about a week. I've been playing Warcraft III instead, and it's a far better game IMHO.

As Fishbong puts it, what's actually good about Steam? Accepting online authentication and a 'helper' program in the background simply because 'it's part and parcel of Steam' is no real excuse for them. Pretty much every non-Valve game ever made since gaming began has been just fine without this ridiculous system, designed predominantly to automatically fix patches to make up for their shoddy b-b-b-beta-testing (whoops, I stuttered) and beat piracy - which is a laughing stock in the face of the dozens of torrents and server patches.

 

[PinkSpider]

I've been playing Warcraft III instead, and it's a far better game IMHO.

Yessss!

moc-moc-a-moc

 

[thebluenewt]

Warcraft III?

That's crazy talk!

 

[PinkSpider]

Warcraft III?

That's crazy talk!

​

Warcraft 3 is better than sex!

And erm, you can level up and stuff.

moc-moc-a-moc?

 

[Fishbong]

Warcraft III?

That's crazy talk!

​

Warcraft 3 is better than sex!

And erm, you can level up and stuff.

moc-moc-a-moc?

​

Yeah, but Gothic is, by my opinion just a very little, barely noticeable bit better.
Anyhow, probably only 200 non- germans have played it .

 

[Huxley]

Just a quick question: has anyone had framerate issues with Nvidia cards? I'm talking stuttering every few second here, really unplayable. My machine is a 2.4 P4, 128Mb Geforce 4 and 512Mb RAM. I'd blame it on my lack of RAM but the stuttering is at such a regular pace it really doesn't make any sense.

 

[bast525]

Gameplay wise it's ALL about Halo 2.


People who aren't impressed by either Halo, aren't looking in the right places.

Halo has FANTASTIC enemy AI... so good that you almost feel you are playing online against live people even when you're not. On Legendary difficulty every firefight turns to all out war, and forces you to think tactical.

Second, it really is like starring in a movie, when you play that game, it really draws you in.


Doom 3 LOOKED fantastic but played way too basic for my taste... it really wasn't anything new AT ALL. It was definately over hyped, as well, about how 'scary' it was going to be.


Half life 2 is great, but I think they also overhyped the damn grav gun... yeah it's fun, but it's still a gimmick. I think HL2 has the most amazing physics in a game though. But... still I think Halo 2 is more involving because of the enemy AI. I thought HL2 was going to really emphasize open ended gameplay, with lots of different ways to solve puzzles and such, and completely open ended interactivity with the environment, but really, each puzzle seems to have only one solution to me.

 

[Mosch]

People who aren't impressed by either Halo, aren't looking in the right places.

Halo has FANTASTIC enemy AI... so good that you almost feel you are playing online against live people even when you're not. On Legendary difficulty every firefight turns to all out war, and forces you to think tactical.

Second, it really is like starring in a movie, when you play that game, it really draws you in.

​

Please tell me where the right place would be. I never felt like I was playing online and I never felt that the game draws me in.