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I would say that's pretty standard unless you've got a newish quad core and power-hungry graphics card, to be honest. I doubt if I'd be able to get brilliant frame-rates on it myself.

Thinking about it, that's probably what people mean by GTA on PC being a lazy port - It should have been better optimized. Still gets 9/10 on Gamespot, though, but the 'lazy' word gets mentioned.

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"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how the Tatty 100 is done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves." - Brendan Behan

Im not amussed at all and this is the reason why...

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~In the event of a Zombie Uprising, remember to sever the head or destroy the brain!~

Still playing MW2, taking my time with the campaign until I can savor it. Good stuff so far. To this point I like the first MW a bit more; it did a better job of being challenging without being so chaotic. A few times in this game I've just found things to be really muddled. I realize it's a war simulator, so you're not always going to know what's going on, but I think it's been surprisingly difficult to get your bearings in a few levels, and some of the more sudden onslaught of enemies has seemed a little odd.

Mainly, it just doesn't suit my style of gameplay, which is to take my time, attack methodically, and really clean out each area before moving on. The pace has increased here and it seems to reward more sprinting through the levels, which just isn't my thing.

Still, these are quibbles. I'm still loving the cinematic moments and the gameplay is challenging without being overly frustrating most of the time. The story's a bit absurd at times so far (and I expect it will be far more absurd very shortly), but I'm still sorta buying into it, albeit not as thoroughly as last time. Maybe you can't duplicate that first "wow, I feel like I'm playing a movie" vibe, anyway. Anything after that first experience is going to be tempered a bit.

One thing I am a bit concerned about is that I think I'm over halfway through the game already; looks like there's only 8-10 levels...something like that? Seems quick, though that's probably just because the time flies by and I've broken my gameplay up into chunks. I'm sure some of the last few levels are pretty long, though.

Just about to start "The Only Easy Day...Was Yesterday." Looks like a blast, with the covert-ness and the underwater stuff. Very exciting. Should make a run at finishing it tonight.

Word has it MW2 is only 4-6 hours long. Shorter than the last one. I doubt I will get the game for a long time, until it is around 20 dollars or so.

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Yeah, I can buy that. Longer for me because I really take my time, but I guess I really am through the majority of it already. I can understand that, given how intense and orchestrated it all is, and how it still pales in importance compared to the multiplayer for most people.

Yeah - I don't need another multiplayer addiction at the moment, which is another reason I am holding off

Does anybody here play the football manager franchise ? What do you think of the new 2010 version ? I`m a big fan of FM, played it since 99/00 series. My favorite is still 2008, because of the arrows system, but the new tactics system is good, effective with new, and old players. But, the game still is not 100% (as it would never be). Still it reminds me of the infamous 9.3 patch on the 2009 version that I hate, but it`s better than that.

I'm just waiting for November 17th for the arrival of....

Been playing footie manager games since Football Manager on the Spectrum in, and now I feel very old, 1982 and got FM2010 on release day. Haven't played it much, to be honest, and the latest patch caused my mild-mannered team to get a player sent off every other match (but I suspect I need to start a new game for it to work properly).

I played FM Live for a bit over the summer but got bored of it when I was still in the free trial - it just wasn't deep enough.

Deeper than this, though.

Unlucky man, have you gone on the site and put in your serial to se if it's covered by the 3 year warrenty?

https://service.xbox.com/register.aspx

Modern Warfare 2

Single Player : A much more steam-lined better experience than CoD4 and how about this, the difficulty (veteran) where you get all the achievements actually feels like it was part of the game - rather than CoD4 where veteran was only beatable by exploiting how the A.I. works and hoping to god you survived from one point to another. They're both obviously made for the two lower difficulties though and you're missions here are much more inventive and full of scripted moments.

Also, if you're easily offended the game lets you skip an OFFENSIVE mission in the game , although it's not nearly as offensive as CoD4's veteran mode anyway.



Spec-Ops (co-op) : These cooperative missions start out pretty awesome and descend back into the unplayability of CoD4. The 4/5 act is near impossible, than the 5/5 IS impossible. It's unfortunate IW wasn't as consistent with this mode as they were with the single player. A brief distraction from the multiplayer.



Multiplayer : The real deal, although it unfortunately gives campers the upper hand - there are many more ways to play than CoD4. The maps are overall much bigger, more vertical, and well designed to suit the different gametypes. Although the most popular type TDM takes another camping hit from the maps being so big. More killstreaks, more customization, much better maps, and most importantly the grenade nerfing, IW maintains their title as the essential multiplayer FPS.

if you haven't bought it already, I don't know what to do for you

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Well, I did buy it.

Sorry, but the Campaign MW2 just isn't as impressive to me. Sure, some of the scripted moments are better, but overall, it's just too unbelievable. The snow level was bad-ass, but was really just a re-do of the snow level in Goldeneye, so, nothing new there at all. The blood splatter system is a silly idea, and is quite distracting. I would really like to turn it off and go back to CoD4's flash system.

The enemy AI is definitely better, so that's a nice change. The graphics look nice and the Rio level was damn fun to play, and the music was stellar. I just wish the story mode was as well done as the previous Modern Warfare. The pacing was better, and it really felt authentic the entire time. This feels a bit more sci-fi, so suspension of disbelief becomes a factor.

All things considered, I do think MW2 is the superior game, but just barely, and not because of the story mode. That said, I still need to dig into the Co-op stuff, which Lisa and I are looking forward to - and then there is the multi-player, which I am sure is severely addicting.

Meat - when i get going online, you can come and teach me a thing or two...

A little investment arrived this morning. I managed to pick up the Xbox edition of the Morrowind GOTY for under a tenner (from the website of a pawn shop in Bolton, no less! ) when even ropey copies without packaging are going for up to £30 on eBay.

The Google Shopping section is excellent.

I was busy with a side project for work last night, but I did get a chance to play MW2 a bit more. Really had a blast playing the level Wolverines, by the by. I think I am on to the next one after that.

I agree with most of what Sedai's said. I think the campaign is a step-up in cinematic moments (some of them are pretty inventive), but a step-down in believability and, frankly, coherency. I have no problem with the shape of most of the story, but they don't make much effort to impress upon you the enormity of what you're being asked to believe, and some of the stuff in the third act (I'll avoid elaboration since Seds is still playing through it) is baffling.

That said, some of the twists and shocks really do work, and the mechanics of the game are almost universally better. Completely agree with Sedai about the splatter, though; definitely distracting. Preferred the old method quite a bit.

I've played through a handful of the Special Ops; they're not bad, but so far I'm finding them fairly frustrating at points. Now that I hear they're insanely difficult at higher levels, I doubt I'll muster much effort to finish them.

Totally agree with meatwad about the MP. I've played it a bit and am still only so-so, but had a very good round the other day, so I think I'm easing into it (I'd gotten quite good at the COD4 PC multiplayer, but there's still a curve with maps and weapons, obviously). Camping does seem to work annoyingly well, though, which is lame.

It's weird because the developers were touting the fact that they had minimized camping with this one. I thought MW1 was pretty tough to camp on most maps. A couple had decent camp spots, but for the most part, it didn't seem to work that well.

Yeah, in the first MW I was pretty happy with the layout. People always found them, and on really busy boards (35-40 players at a time or more) they could pretty safely hang out at the far end of a level without much fear of someone getting all the way down there. But for the most part it was still a crappy strategy. I've only logged an hour or so in the new MP, but there were a couple of maps that did seem particularly camper-friendly.

This is without being sniper-friendly, mind you. I draw a distinction between the two; got no problem with maps that are clearly designed for sniping. They can be pretty fun, actually.

Yeah, I was just getting into the sniper play when I sort of put MW1 down for a while. A couple of the maps are really geared for it...

I like sniper campaign levels more; playing online is just never what I quite want a sniper battle to be, you know? Never lives up to the theatricality I'd expect from it.

There were some good boards on the first Call of Duty's MP, though, which I played for awhile and got very good at years ago (around the time CoD 3 was out, I think). There was one in particular, a Russian board, in the snow, with four abandoned buildings near each other, that was a nice mix of rifles (though not sniper rifles, usually) and action. I was pretty fond of that one, though I forget the name.

Nothing came close to Carentan, though. I had that thing completely memorized and probably averaged nearly a 4-1 ratio every game by the time I stopped playing. That was a blast.

Rented L4D2 and horrible lag as I expected, completly unplayable online - nice job Valve.