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<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0><script> (function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){i['GoogleAnalyticsObject']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){ (i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o), m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m) })(window,document,'script','//www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js','ga'); ga('create', 'UA-47423994-1', 'fortunecity.ws'); ga('send', 'pageview'); </script> <center> <br> <div> <script language="javascript" type="text/javascript" src="http://ad.broadcaststation.net/ads/show_ad.php?width=728&height=90"></script> </div> </center> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" height=170 BGCOLOR="#000000" TEXT="#F7F7FF"> <div> <B> <TABLE BORDER="2" CELLPADDING="2" CELLSPACING="1" WIDTH="83" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#C0C0C0" BORDERCOLORDARK="#808080" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" > <tR> <tD VALIGN=TOP HEIGHT= 14 WIDTH="71"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="14" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="71" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></tD> </tR> </TABLE></B></div> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#CC3300" FACE="Arial" ><B>my strangness</B></FONT><B> | </B><A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="my strangness"><U><B>home</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id17.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="About Me"><U>About Me</U></A> | <A HREF="id18.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="likes and Hates"><U>likes and Hates</U></A> | <A HREF="id19.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="My Favorite Links"><U>My Favorite Links</U></A> | <A HREF="id20.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="My Hobbies"><U>My Hobbies</U></A> | <A HREF="id33.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="My tight wheelchair"><U>My tight wheelchair</U></A> | <A HREF="id21.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Contact Me"><U>Contact Me</U></A> | <A HREF="id22.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="My art"><U>My art</U></A> | <A HREF="id23.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="stuff"><U>stuff</U></A> | <A HREF="id32.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="my computer stats"><U>my computer stats</U></A> | <A HREF="id25.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="poetry"><U>poetry</U></A> | <A HREF="id26.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="my weiredness"><U>my weiredness</U></A> | <B>video games</B> | <A HREF="id31.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="technology"><U>technology</U></A></div> <div> <B><IMG SRC="07258020.gif" border=0 width="600" height="2" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <div> video games</div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" height=310 BGCOLOR="#000000" TEXT="#F7F7FF" background="0dfd1553.jpg"> <bR> <bR> <div> Half-life</div> <div> <IMG SRC="0e0b5480.jpg" border=0 width="437" height="328" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"><IMG SRC="0e1b3460.jpg" border=0 width="435" height="326" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> <IMG SRC="0e2aa3f0.jpg" border=0 width="426" height="319" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> <TABLE BORDER="2" CELLPADDING="2" CELLSPACING="1" WIDTH="1000" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#BF0000" BORDERCOLORDARK="#BF0000" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" BGCOLOR=#000000 > <tR> <tD VALIGN=TOP HEIGHT= 475 WIDTH="988"><div> The world of <I>Half-Life</I> is completely believable, the AI astonishing, and the action intense beyond belief. Combined, they create a totally seamless gaming experience. Needless to say, this is a must-have for anyone calling themselves a gamer. </div> <div> You assume the role of theoretical physicist Gordon Freeman, who's a half-hour late for work at the Black Mesa Compound, a top-secret military complex similar to the U.S.'s Cheyenne Mountain. The game begins as Gordon takes the transit train to work, in one of the most enveloping intro sequences ever achieved--it's just like a ride at Epcot Center. The train chugs its way deep into the mesa, giving you an intriguing view of nuclear warheads, toxic spills, and scientists making their daily rounds. </div> <div> Once you make it into the compound and begin exploring your surroundings, you'll notice that you don't have a gun. In fact, everything seems normal for the first half-hour of gameplay; Gordon is simply another suit-and-tie government researcher, and it's just another day at the office. After locating his HEV (Hazardous Environment Suit), Gordon chats with several scientists about the daily experiment, and heads into the test chamber to earn his paycheck. </div> <div> And then the crapola hits the fan. In a botched attempt to create a "resonance cascade," Gordon is partly responsible for opening an interdimensional gate to <I>somewhere</I>--where the denizens are anything but friendly. After a delightfully disorienting disaster sequence, Gordon gains consciousness in the ruins of the test chamber, his comrades slaughtered by the extraterrestrial horrors that jumped through the gate and spread to every corner of the Black Mesa. </div> <div> What follows is a harrowing experience as Gordon tries to find a way out of the Black Mesa Compound. A skeleton crew of scientists and security guards have survived the initial onslaught; if you can coax them out of hiding, they'll assist you by opening doors, healing wounds, or joining you in a firefight. The AI for these NPCs is incredible, and really adds to the richness and complexity of the game. </div> <div> As <I>Half-Life</I> progresses, the scientists keep hinting about the Lambda lab, where a disaster response team is ready to counterattack. A team of U.S. Rangers, also known as "cleaners", have been given orders to execute everything on site, including "innocent" scientists who now know far too much. These guys are absolute professionals, conforming to military squad tactics, scouting for recon, and tossing grenades as they shout orders to each other in an attempt to cleanse the facility. </div> <div> Graphically, you couldn't ask for much more. <I>Half-Life</I> features all the eye-candy you'd expect, with vivid 16-bit textures, colored lighting that looks better than <I>Quake II</I>, and chrome-mapping that gives characters an amazing sheen. The skeletal animation system used in the game is the way to go the movement is nearly flawless, right down to the swiveling of the characters' heads. </div> <div> (From daily radar)</div> </tD> </tR> </TABLE></div> <bR> <div> Unreal tournament</div> <div> I like this game more than half-life by far.</div> <div> <IMG SRC="0e3a0380.jpg" border=0 width="416" height="312" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"><IMG SRC="0e4a0380.jpg" border=0 width="416" height="312" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> <IMG SRC="0e5da630.jpg" border=0 width="474" height="355" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <bR> <bR> <div> <I> <TABLE BORDER="2" CELLPADDING="2" CELLSPACING="1" WIDTH="861" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#BF0000" BORDERCOLORDARK="#BF0000" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" BGCOLOR=#000000 > <tR> <tD VALIGN=TOP HEIGHT= 1258 WIDTH="849"><div> <I>Unreal Tournament</I> is everything expected: fast, well-balanced and pretty, with ingenious bot AI, nasty weapons and funky levels. For a game with zero plot or character development, it's wildly entertaining, but it's definitely not a deep, engrossing game. Good for quick fixes of intense carnage, <I>UT</I> is a perfect stepping-stone for those beginning to play games online for the first time or to take their skills to the next level. <I>UT</I> is more complex than an arcade game, but with the selectable bot AI, even strangers to the world of FPS can learn how to play. </div> <div> Innovation. Design. Balance. Speed. Graphics. Story. These are the elements that players have come to expect, if not demand, from First Person Shooters (FPS) over the past two years. <I>Unreal Tournament</I> succeeds on most of these levels, but it suffers from the recent decision by the development community to create either a multiplayer game or a single-player game but not both. The original <I>Unreal</I> had at least some semblance of story, as slim as it might have been, but <I>UT</I> doesn't even bother. <I>UT</I> is <I>The Running Man</I>'s game show format crossed with <I>Mad Max</I>'s <I>Thunderdome</I> ideals. Six men enter, one man leaves, while millions of boob-toobers watch the dismemberment from the comfort of their homes. Post-modern sci-fi entertainment for the jaded masses, with an extra helping of blood 'n guts. Thanks, Epic! </div> <div> While there ain't much of a story, there's enough bullet-whizzing, missile-dodging, cannon-firing, leap-of-faith action to make up for that omission. <I>UT</I> takes the fast fragging action of online FPS combat and drops it into players' laps, making it easy both to travel out onto the net to whomp noggins or to play against scalable bots in the privacy of a home system. <I>Unreal</I>'s porky net play has been fixed, for the most part. 56K modem players can join games and play, but <I>UT</I> still skews to favor those with faster connections (bite the bullet and get a DSL connection or cable modem already). </div> <div> In a single-player game, bot intelligence is a beautiful thing. There are multiple levels of skill to assign them to help players learn the level layouts and increase their overall playing skills. On the smarter settings, the bots are devilishly hard to deal with. Even deathmatch masters will have a hard time with four bots set on "Masterful", and there are two more higher skill settings. Most of the time, making bots "smarter" means that they're just better cheaters, able to sense where you are and aim their weapons with deadly, inhuman accuracy. <I>UT</I>'s smart bots are vicious fighters but maintain the illusion of playing against human opponents. We did notice that they were taking almost the exact same path every time they'd run through certain areas. In a CTF match on the Facing Worlds map, we were able to train the sights of the sniper rifle a little to the right of the enemy structure and nail head shots every time a bot appeared without having to move the cursor. </div> <div> Joining a multiplayer game is a snap. The entire <I>UT</I> interface is based on a Windows model, providing instant ease of use and familiarity for gamers and non-gamers alike. Run the cursor over the Multiplayer tab at the top, choose Find New Internet Game, and <I>UT</I> begins pinging servers from its master list and arranging them in order of fastest to slowest connection. Find a fast server, double-click on it and get on with the killin'. It's that easy. The <I>UT</I> Server Browser has multiple tabs for Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, Domination, Assault, Team Deathmatch and LAN servers. Simplicity at its finest. Even starting a server is mercifully uncomplicated, with plenty of flexibility for types of games, number and smartness of bots, maps etc. </div> <div> Standard deathmatch and Capture the Flag (CTF) modes have been included (couldn't really have a multiplayer game without them), but Epic has also created (more or less) two new types of innovative multiplayer frenzy: Assault and Domination. <I>Tribes</I> players will recognize these team-oriented modes, but it's unusual to see them included in a straight action FPS, and they are a welcome addition. In Assault, one team attempts to invade a base and take out certain objectives, while the other team defends the structure from attack. Domination pits two teams against each other for control of three areas; the longer the team holds them, the more points they get. These new approaches to team play provide relief for gamers tired of running in circles, playing endless series of deathmatches. </div> <div> The level design is over the top, as we knew it would be from the demo. Each level has a theme that makes it instantly recognizable when you pop into a multiplayer game (also, the multiplayer search tool will show a small graphic of the level in a little window to help cut down on confusion). Castles, pirate ships, floating pyramids, conveyor belts and low-gravity cityscapes are just some of the excellent maps available within the game. Even the usual loops of techno-tunnels show a serious commitment to level creation and flow that we don't see in most multiplayer maps. There are spots within levels that are simply perfect for camping, but those very same spots are usually exposed to incoming fire, or they're hard to reach, making campers work for their slacker kills. Some levels have sneaky traps built into them, such as a tempting room full of weapons and armor that turns out to be a gas chamber or a shield belt that sits over a trap door to nothingness. </div> <div> The weapons have been seriously retooled from the first go-round, thankfully. <I>Unreal</I>'s weapons, while showing flashes of uniqueness, were hampered by wimpy sounds and ineffectual damage. The original minigun, for instance, sounded as intimidating as a hedge clipper and didn't hammer nearly enough pain on the intended target. The eleven weapons found in <I>UT</I> are a lot of fun and mostly well-balanced, but we found the Flak Cannon to be a bit overpowered, firing a killer shotgun spray of shrapnel in normal fire and a devastating grenade of flak as its secondary mode. Dropping an opponent armed only with the starting Enforcer pistol will usually net a second Enforcer for John Woo double-fisted drama; the combined fire of the two guns is almost as devastating as the minigun. New additions to the <I>Unreal</I> arsenal include the huge Reedemer rocket (imagine a guided BFG blast); the Impact Hammer, a jackhammer melee weapon; and the M-16-styled sniper rifle. Epic's also made across-the-board improvements to the original arsenal, tightening up the secondary abilities and altering rates of fire. There are also powerups for invisibility, extra damage, bonus health, armor and force field belts. </div> <div> We love <I>UT</I>. Much thought has been put into this game, both from the design and the technology perspective. It's obvious that Epic had the desire to innovate with this product, not just release a series of <I>Unreal</I> add-on deathmatch maps with some new technology. Internet play is faster, easier and less flaky than <I>Unreal</I> was when it was released. The levels are great; we can't say enough good things about the majority of the maps within the game. Assault and Domination are welcome additions to the team multiplayer genre, and we expect to see many games in the future adding these modes. The lack of any sort of storyline is lamentable, but the pure adrenaline buzz generated by the serious bot competition is almost enough to make us overlook this minor annoyance. </div> <div> (From daily radar)</div> <bR> </tD> </tR> </TABLE></I></div> <bR> <div> Tribes 2</div> <div> <IMG SRC="0f1a53c0.jpg" border=0 width="421" height="316" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"><IMG SRC="0f2a73d0.jpg" border=0 width="423" height="317" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> <IMG SRC="0f3ac410.jpg" border=0 width="428" height="321" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>