Friday, February 06, 2009
#
In keeping with the rather exotic weaponry available, I was thinking that a laser net would not be too far fetched. Here's the idea: The gun's primary fire shoots out a set of laser-shooting devices such that a laser grid can be formed. The devices are held together via a flexible wire of sorts. On contact with an object, the apparatus will attempt to enclose it and begin contraction. Secondary fire will set the devices to attach to a wall forming a trap of sorts.
Background on the device: It was primarily used in mining to disintegrate particularly large boulders. The secondary function was as a makeshift stationary disintegrator at the bottom of a shaft hole whereby falling debris will be cut into pieces for collection and easier transport. Upgrading the device will increase duration of the lasers and cutting strength. Limited ammunition.
--------------------------
Would like to see:
- some enemies roam the level for more random encounters. On replays, the pop-up monsters are predictable and not as scary anymore.
- tentacle encounters that are randomly activated in a particular area for subsequent play throughs. Pass by the place where you know the tentacle pops up, but let the game choose at random whether or not to initiate the quick timed event. That does not mean it should not happen at all, but if the player passes through the same area again (back track or what have you) then activate it then if it was not the first time.
- hallucinations that make you think that there is an enemy attacking you, and it turns out to be an innocent civilian after you've sliced and diced. More random voices talking to you.
- just more grotesque scripted moments. :D Enemies eating dead bodies... crazy person torturing another... People getting owned by machines or giant crates etc accidentally in their panic.
- More use of the environment like the freezer and firing up the engines. How about knocking enemies into molten pools or replacing water line in quarantined showers with an acid. Meat grinder?
- overheating assault rifle - upgrades to reduce cooldown time or reduce heating
- jungle environment, necromorphed animals.
- customizable armours
- dead space novels pls!
I've been playing a lot of the game lately. It is just so Awesome and fun. I am on my 4th run of the game (achievements yada yada), and it is not too difficult to see some things that could use improvement to make the game have more depth to it.
One of the things I felt was too simple was the power node usage to unlock doors. The game is not particularly punishing with respect to the amount of cash and items you can collect (except on the impossible difficulty). So here's my idea for a mini-game alternative to using up those precious power nodes for upgrades.
A set of capacitors need to be charged to different levels to unlock the door. I was thinking of regular keys and locks and how they work by pushing the metal bits to a certain height. So this by-pass key in sci-fi does something similar but with energy. 
In the game, your character hooks up his suit to the door to provide this power or whatever gadget an engineer in the future might carry around. So on screen would be a number of columns depicting the charge level of a particular capacitor and an indicator of how much charge is needed for each. The player can do them in any order. Press button to start charging, and press button to stop charging in order to charge a different one.
The player is able to overshoot the target but must not reach the maximum for fear of overloading. Overshooting the target below the maximum is fine because the capacitors will actually begin to discharge when you move on to another capacitor; by the time you get to the "last" capacitor, the first one you did might have fallen below the target level. Imagine that the character can only hook up to one cap at a time and this is for security reasons, exactly why you would be doing this. So timing is important.
If you hit the maximum charge, there is a general overload and the circuit panel blows. No more chances. That's your trade-off for a power node I guess. If a prior capacitor falls below the allowable charge, you have to start over. More difficult locks will have more bars to charge or varying rates of charging/discharging.
Other thoughts regarding more complex stuff (pun intended 
): Resistors could be used to slow down rates of discharge or even slow down the rate of an unwieldy charging rate. Inductors in this system could be used to produce magnetic fields to induce charge in a neighbouring capacitor for charge management... Let's say the player overshoots the target, place an inductor. As the charge decreases, it induces a charge in the next-door capacitor which might have a faster rate of discharge... so the upshot is that while one is discharging, it's helping to keep another charged appropriately or slow down that discharge indirectly.
Anyone following? Maybe too complex... lol
Just to be explicit, all of the bars need to be in the target charge zone in order to unlock.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
#
Disclaimer: This will be heavily laden with spoilers, so FU if I spoil a >1yr old story line.
As I was reading the Mass Effect novels, a rather small point brought up by the author held a rather interesting implication regarding the event that humans of all races eventually made nice with one another as some global community. Specifically, it related to genetic variability in a population. But first of all, there exists the concept of genetic isolation, where some fraction of the population is unable to mingle genes with the greater population for whatever reason, be it geographical or other. Now, with a global community where all populations will eventually share genes, it is not unreasonable to suggest that genetic variability would eventually become solely dependent upon random mutations rather than the obvious racial variability. This is simply an extension of the genetic isolation concept to a species-wide scope.
This is the point brought up when one of the main characters notices how other species in the galaxy do not appear to have much physical variability as we can observe. Within these alien species, the individuals are all of similar height, similar colours etc. Common to these space-faring species is that they are not as divided as humans have been in the past, and the main character speculates that there was once a time when these aliens had just as much distinction between one another as we currently have. In the Mass Effect universe, the humans are beginning to approach that homogeneity.
There also exists the Ring Species concept whereby there are a number of species that are genetically compatible through some indirect sequence of matings, but species far enough apart are yet directly incompatible. I bring this up because of the apparent ability of one of the Mass Effect species to mate with completely different species altogether, including humans - the blue and rather female-appearing Asari, “space alien babes“. On a wild tangent, it would be possible to extend the concept of genetic homegeneity to the entire galaxy... When juxtaposed with the mysterious and seemingly artificially constructed Reapers, they would appear to be their biological equivalent.
And what next? The complete exhaustion of all galactic resources?
The true intent of the Reapers is said to be incomprehensible, but observe the effects of their actions - wiping out space-faring species who have based their technologies on the Mass Relays, Reaper technology. They eliminate species who have begun to stagnate from a genetic standpoint. They eliminate species that could exhaust time-consuming regenerative resources. They make way for the next round of developing species to rise.
Are the Reapers the construct of an extinct, extra-galactic species that was allowed to reach galactic-wide homogeneity? An extra-galactic species that killed themselves from complete resource consumption? Growing in power consumption requiring that which serves as the ultimate source of life (stars)? And so realizing such a problem, constructed the Reapers to ensure that that level of dis-speciation no longer occurs? The galactic judge and enforcer.
It's a paradox of sorts, destroying life so that other life may continue in cycles - it recognizes the selfishness of species and their inability to stop growing until the means for life is no longer available.
Then again, this homogeneity concept could just be a plot device to reduce the work of artists and account for limited hardware resources.
Friday, September 12, 2008
#
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
#
+inge says (11:43 AM):
STROKE IT GODDAMN IT
+inge says (11:43 AM):
hahaha
+inge says (11:43 AM):
wow that sounded bad
+inge says (11:43 AM):
aaaanywho
+inge says (11:43 AM):
Al, i'm gonna go have a shower
+inge says (11:43 AM):
i feel like a bear raped me
Monday, October 29, 2007
#
The router is dead. Darkness ensues.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
#
“Constipation is like Ryu Hayabusa shoving a giant
arcane scythe through and out your anus.”
Thursday, September 06, 2007
#
*edit* I actually wrote this up before crashing last night, so if it reads very unstructured and unorganized, that's because I've been getting home later than usual the last few weeks and crashing just after dinner.
After having a look at all that money I spent, I should probably go into the “Why”. I was introduced to that game back around Christmas 2001, just after the game and the system came out. At that point I hadn't played seriously on a console since SNES. I did have a go with the N64 a few times but I wasn't really interested in consoles over the years. Simply put, Halo got a lot of things right that many other games pioneered, and it was all in one package. Co-op, cinematic story, fairly decent framerate, four player splitscreen, soundtrack, vehicles, reloading, two-weapon carry... a bunch of things. Of course, they got some terrible things like Library, but I didn't care. What kept me going was the little tidbits that Guilty Spark was revealing or rather, hinting about the species that built this giant hula hoop, ten thousand kilometers in diameter with an Earth-like atmosphere and gravity.
The concept of a giant ring structure isn't new and goes back to hypotheses and sci-fi stories from the mid to late 20th century. It's really just another story alongside others before it. However, as we do find out in the dialogue, this particular ring, Halo, is a true weapon of mass genocide, being able to wipe out all life in the galaxy “with sufficient biomass”. In subsequent expanding of the story, that is further clarified to be all life with sufficient calcium stores - the necessary component needed for the viral species known as the Flood to infect, re-write and take control of life forms. In the alternate reality game known as IRIS, just completed a couple weeks ago, it is revealed that even the Forerunner do not know the origin of the Flood, speculating that it is different enough to be extra-galactic.
The Flood is first shown to the player half-way through Halo: Combat Evolved as a bunch of little popcorn creatures that... pop, but then you see these zombie-like creatures. You get no idea what the hell is going on, but if you stop and look at those incapacitated zombies, you see they're actually mutated Elites of the Covenant empire or worse yet, mutated UNSC soldiers. In later levels they appear to be getting more intelligent in their use of weapons and vehicles and even the Elite cloaking technology. By Halo 2, you can see combat Flood forms making use of not only cloaking technology, but also shielding, and by way of game design, you see that the little popcorn Flood can revive fallen combat forms. The player is also introduced to a rather big Flood creature on the bridge of the Covenant cruiser, The Truth and Reconciliation, with your Captain Keyes absorbed into it. In Halo 2, it is implied that that creature would have become something similar to Grave Mind given time; the Grave Mind looks like a giant Piranha Plant from Little Shop of Horrors or Super Mario Brothers, just 100 000 years old and apparently a wise guy too.
So the deal is, the Forerunner builds this giant ring as a mass suicide device. No food, no Flood. They apparently just die off. The little popcorn guys and Grave Mind went into a hibernation state of sorts. I assume Grave Mind sustained himself by absorbing all the Flood forms into himself over the years. There was a mass outbreak of the Flood and plenty of Forerunner were affected. Simple ya? You're just a cybernetically enhanced soldier with the rank of Master Chief fighting a war alongside some artificial intelligence going by the name of Cortana.
Things get a little stranger when the monitor of Installation 04 (the Halo in the first game) refers to you as The Reclaimer. What's that supposed to mean? How many Halo structures are there? Humans = Forerunner? Halo has an effective blast radius of 25000 light years. Fans later deduced that it would take 7 to wipe out the galaxy. And just what are those structures in the second level firing giant plasma bolts to the center of the ring? Simulation test-firing? Halo 2 gives credence to that early hypothesis when the Delta Halo is set off.
Oddly enough, Installation 04 = Alpha Halo, whereas Installation 05 = Delta Halo.
How is it that Cortana calls the planet and moon surrounding Halo, Threshold and Basis when that system was supposedly new to humans? Someone's been there before and put them in the database... She would have mentioned assigning names... Questions... questions...
At the time of the first game, it wasn't known exactly how old Halo was, but if you actually do play through the game you get the idea that it's been around for a very long time. Take the Silent Cartographer level for instance. It's an island in the middle of nowhere but you see evidence of long-term erosion, receding water levels, new foliage near the beach areas... this place has been around long time but without the love.
And just how does the Master Chief know how to use the Forerunner tech-panels? The second and third novels tell that these Spartan II soldiers don't know either. They're just somehow familiar. Mystery...
Guilty Spark's own insane monologues raise many questions themselves, referring to the Master Chief as hesitating to activate the rings when he's already done it before, advising to upgrade to a level 12 combat suit, saying how ineffictive his weapons are.... referring to the covenant as some other species on the ring, and more curiously, snooping around in the UNSC database aboard the Pillar of Autumn - trying to classify it as “our lost history”. Say what?
There are lots of questions raised in Halo: Combat Evolved. The background of the Master Chief, the Spartan II program, Cortana, Captain Keyes, and the events leading to the beginning of the game are elaborated in the Fall of Reach novel by Eric Nylund. Other parallel story events are described in the second novel, The Flood, written by William C. Dietz, dealing more with the marines, and also giving an idea of what the Covenant's side of the story is like. More questions are raised, but there is more info revealed - The flood is more than just zombification, there's a sort of communal intelligence like the Borg, there's a Sgt. that was also referred to as a Reclaimer... bunch of things. There's also a lot more insight into secret agencies on the human side, references to assassinations in the Covenant hierarchy.
The books just reveal a lot of what is going on in the background, giving a better idea of the Halo universe while also focusing on several groups of characters. You get to understand just how shitty it's going for the human race and how desperate times call for desperate measures - moral questions are raised again with the existance of the Spartan III program training children as pseudo-Spartan IIs to become more effective cannon fodder. And of course, there is more to the Forerunner than just the rings.
With all this talk about Spartan IIs and IIIs... what about the first program? Expect the fifth novel, Contact Harvest, to elaborate on good ol' Sgt. Johnson...
Friday, August 31, 2007
#
In response to a blog post by fellow-Halo community member, Tex, I have calculated how much “Halo” has cost me over the years. I've gone into as much depth as possible with taxes and shipping & handling (the handling part blows ass) as well as distinguishing American and Canadian fees. This also happens to include the Xbox hardware because let's face it, the only reason Microsoft is convincing me of getting the stuff is because the game is on the console. Hence, I do not include PC upgrades, which would probably not be that significant given my um... profession.
WHAT IS MY PROFESSION?! AWHOOO AWHOOO AWHOOO! er... ya... great answer.
The GST actually changed in July 2006 from 7% to 6%. It's certainly a nice savings for larger-cost items. I don't attach a monetary value to items which I received as a gift. Weird-looking prices are due to some wacky discount at the time. For now, I include the current price of the Xbox 360 Elite because I don't expect another price drop within the time-frame that I am looking at acquiring one. I'm actually waiting on a particular revision of the 360 hardware.
As much as I would love to get the Halo 3 Edition Xbox 360, I'm a somewhat more practical individual and the 120GB HDD in the Elite is more important in the long run than some army/puke-green Xbox 360. Of course, then you see that I've got the Legendary Edition of Halo 3 listed there... Let me be clear, I am getting that because the marketing assholes at Microsoft decided to include the second bonus DVD (way cool content) only with the Legendary Edition, which itself is a limited run item and pre-order only.
Surely there are enough hardcore fans to want to buy that helmet-case separately. It would have been win-win if they included both DVDs in the Limited Collector's Edition, and had the helmet-case as a separate item with the same availability conditions (pre-order, offered at various stores). The LCE includes a printed booklet that is included and expanded upon digitally on the second bonus DVD in the Legendary Edition. Give the finger to the printed booklet and mass-manufacture the second bonus DVD. Does it cancel out in long term costs? It's possibly even cheaper due to all the new trees that get annihilated and ink used versus existing DVDs + ink stamp. Hardcore fans will buy up that helmet immediately anyway. Everyone who wants the bonus content gets everything, and the helmet-case gets sold out by the crazy hardcore fans who collect useless paraphernalia. I need to chainsaw someone badly, in marketing, to the tune of Hip to Be Square.
So while I wait for the particular 360 hardware revision, plenty of people I know have or will have Xbox 360s by the time Halo 3 arrives (soon!) so I shouldn't be missing out on the campaign unless they decide to be bitches. Who knows, I might even extend that wait until Gears of War goes down in price (in 10 million years). I'm not exactly in a rush to get the console or even Xbox Live Gold for that matter. Time is limited these days for gaming...
These were bought through Bungie's online store. I wasn't particularly in a rush to get any of these items, hence the first shipment being sent to a sibling who lives in the States. Because we're all on good terms, the items would just be brought along during any visits. The second shipment however... well, let's just say that peer pressure and impatience led to a disaster with the border fees, for which there was no (monetary) apology from said friend. ;)
Now my eye is twitching.
Friday, June 01, 2007
#
Tycho @ Penny-Arcade regarding Shadowrun:
When I spoke with the studio head over at FASA about what was next for the team, he laughed and said "Nothing." The people around him also laughed, but it felt more nervous. I thought he might have meant vacation, maybe - but I'd heard the rumors too. When he said "nothing," maybe he was referring to the studio. Maybe he actually meant "oblivion."
What utter waste.