I bit the bullet and bought Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, which was only $19.99 at my local Best Buy (much to my delight). So far, I haven't seen any tell-tale signs of the StarForce copy protection system, and I hope things remain that way.

The game itself is phenomenal. It came loaded on a single DVD (as all games should) and included an automatic updater, which patched me to the latest release. Chaos Theory is leaps and bounds ahead of the original Splinter Cell and its sequel Pandora Tomorrow, both graphically and in terms of game play. The movement mechanics have been greatly improved, especially in terms of sneaking through crawlspaces (such a great visual effect). As with most Tom Clancy titles I've played, the story is unnecessarily complex, and seems rather uninspired. But the game itself more than makes up for this rather lean narrative. I'm only about half-way through it, but I've enjoyed every minute so far. Oh, and the game is way less buggy than the second title. Which makes it all the more enjoyable.

Out of what was mostly boredom, I recently loaded up two of my games from years ago: No One Lives Forever 2 (NOLF 2) and Quake (that's Quake 1 for you kids out there). And I have to say that I've had a tremendous amount of fun running through them again. I had forgotten how nice the NOLF 2 engine looked (especially at a high resolution), but I did have it crash on me a number of times. I'm not sure what that was all about, but I got through those hiccups and finished the game just a few days ago. The game combines two playing style genres: sneaker style (like Thief or Splinter Cell) and full fledged action. Both styles complement one another nicely, and make for an incredible experience. And I had forgotten how hilarious the dialogue is throughout the game; clearly this game has one of the best scripts of all time.

Quake is what I'm plowing through at the moment. So many wonderful memories are flooding back to me as I make my way through each of the four episodes. QuakeWorld was my first experience with online game play, and I got pretty hardcore for a while. Every level I pass through brings back fond memories of late-night capture the flag tournaments. And oh the fun I had with Creeper CTF! For those who don't know, Creeper was a capture the flag variant that added a number of new runes to the game. And each rune gave you a different power: some runes altered the way weapons worked, others altered the amount of health or damage you could take, and yet others would give you new objects (a grappling hook for example). And it was an incredibly fun and addictive mod to play. One particular moment has always stuck out in my mind:

I was playing Creeper CTF and had obtained the Sun rune (which makes the nail-gun ammo super-hot, doing more damage). I also had the double-damage rune (players could carry two runes at once, if I remember correctly) and had loaded up my super-nailgun. With both the double-damage and Sun runes, my nails did four times the damage of the normal nailgun! I then picked up the quad damage in the map we were playing, raising my damage to an incredible 16 times the normal level. Needless to say, in the span of about a minute I scored somewhere from 40 to 60 frags and captured the other team's flag in the process. It was the single greatest online gaming moment I think I've ever had. Wow ... what great times!

An interesting article on games that use the StarForce copy protection scheme showed up on Digg the other day, and it got me thinking about the topic. I'm all for copy protection schemes, but this particular one seems a little fishy to me. All of the negative press behind it has to have some grain of truth, right?

From what little I know about it, StarForce is apparently a low-level driver that gets installed alongside some of today's games (and even game demos!) to prevent software piracy. And a number of complaints about it indicate that said driver can cause a number of problems: from blue screens to disappearing CD or DVD drives. And what's more, StarForce software doesn't get uninstalled when you uninstall the product it came with (sounds a little like spyware to me). So, I was fairly disappointed when I learned that several games I was looking forward to playing (Splinter Cell 3, Silent Hunter 3, and F.E.A.R.) all made use of this new copy protection scheme. But are these rumors of system crashes and instability fact or fiction?

Unfortunately, it's incredibly hard to tell. The vast majority of comments in the Digg article were people voicing their disgust against this scheme. And interestingly enough, most of these posts were laden with vulgar language, egregious misuse of the English language, and the occasional bit of l33t speak. These facts incline me to believe that a number of "kids" were posting their disgust about the system; kids who most likely spend their time downloading cracked versions of games. Since this particular system is turning out to be difficult for hackers to bypass, fewer games that use the system are available as downloads. So, are these people angry at StarForce's questionable install practices, or are they simply frustrated that they'll have to start actually paying for the software they buy? I'm not sure anyone can provide an honest answer to that question.

I have yet to purchase a StarForce protected game, so I don't yet know if it really causes problems or not. Splinter Cell 3 is high up on my list of games to play, so I might bite the bullet and get it - if only to see if these complaints are valid or not. I'd like to believe that this cacophony of opinions is similar to those voiced when Valve's Steam system was introduced. As an owner of Half-Life 2, I only have good things to say about the Steam platform; so might I not be just as pleased with the performance of StarForce? We can certainly hope.

So I did indeed pick up Quake 4, and at quite a bargain price ($30 at Target on Black Friday; there were shockingly fewer people out shopping than I had anticipated). So far, this game has been very enjoyable. The action is fast paced, the story is moderately interesting, and the levels aren't quite as dark as in Doom 3. In short, this is the game that Doom 3 should have been. One of the in-game sequences is incredibly painful to watch. Without giving too much away, let me say that you will most likely wince in pain as you watch what happens. I know I did.

Having run through all of my computer games, it's high time to get a new one. But I'm not quite sure what to get. Splinter Cell 3 looks nice, but the copy protection software Ubisoft used for the game sounds eerily reminiscent of spyware. F.E.A.R. looks cool as well, but the demo was a little sluggish and I hear the game is very short. The top runner for me is currently Quake 4, of which I've read good reviews. Any suggestions for a new game? All genres are welcome (although I'm clearly an action fan).

I've been incredibly busy at work lately, and my programming drive is burned out at the end of the day. As such, I haven't made a great deal of progress on any of my previously mentioned goals. But I have been having a little fun (which is always a good thing).

Two expansion packs were released for the original Half-Life several years ago: Opposing Force and Blue Shift. I never purchased either, but recently decided that I would. While browsing Valve's 'Steam' content delivery system, I found out (by accident) that my original Half-Life CD key enabled me to access both expansion packs for free!

Opposing Force, being the first expansion released, was the one I played first. It was an interesting expansion (several of the new weapons were moderately interesting), but overall felt very empty. You only catch a glimpse of Gordon Freeman once, and the ending is somewhat of a let down (although it will be interesting to see what Valve does with the main character from this expansion).

Blue Shift is the real gem. Although it's incredibly short, there are a ton of "Oh, wow - that was so cool!" moments. Playing as Barney Calhoun, the player relives the Black Mesa incident from a different angle. You run into Gordon a number of times, bringing back a flood of memories from the original game. The connections between the two are incredible, making an already excellent game even better.

It's sad that it's taken me this long to play through these expansions. But they were very interesting and helped fill in some of the details of the Half-Life world in my mind. Hopefully the Aftermath expansion for Half-Life 2 will show up soon. I certainly can't wait to play it!

I recently downloaded the tech-demo level Lost Coast for Half-Life 2, and all I can say is ... wow! This level is a fantastic piece of work. The game play isn't anything new (you fight a few Combine soldiers, those ultra-freaky head-crabs, and a Combine gunship), but the technology behind the level is simply amazing. The high dynamic range (HDR) lighting is stunningly gorgeous; it makes the HDR technology in Serious Sam 2 look like something a child came up with. The effect is surprisingly effective, and it adds an incredible amount of realism to an already excellent game.

Half-Life 2 is one of only two games released in the past several years that really impressed me with its graphics capability (the other game being Far Cry). Half-Life 2 just feels real. And HDR only makes it more so. The wet sand on the beach in the Lost Coast level is truly dramatic, as is the lighting in the monastery. Also, the new character (the old fisherman) is so well done ... you just have to see it to believe it! Be warned that you need some serious horse-power to play the level in all its glory: an ATI x800 or NVIDIA 6800 (or better), 1GB of RAM, and a 2.9 P4 or AMD 3000+. My processor (at 2.8 GHz) is a little under-powered, but got the job done beautifully thanks to my 6800 GT.

The in-game commentary system is also an excellent addition. It was cool to hear the thoughts of the developers, why they chose to do some things and not others, as well as what technical challenges they faced. Hopefully they will include this feature in future games. All I can say is that I simply cannot wait for the Aftermath expansion; I've got to have more HDR!

I picked up Serious Sam 2 yesterday for three reasons: to celebrate my new monitor, to continue the Serious Sam saga, and to support a developer who is willing to do something original. Having only played the game for a few hours, I cannot comment on much. But I would like to comment on what I've seen so far.

First on this discussion list is the graphics engine. I've been impressed with what I've seen for one reason: it's original. No, the locales don't look like something you'd see in real life, but that's the point. This is a fictitious story about a fictitious character in a fictitious universe. The cartoon-like aspect of the game lends itself well to this formula. Everything is well rendered and the enemies are definitely over-the-top (as they should be).

I was glad to see that the humor in the Serious Sam universe has been retained. Several of the early cut-scenes are funny, and a number of jokes occur throughout the early levels. Unfortunately, there a few low-brow jokes, undoubtedly to satiate the teenage demographic. But (at least so far) these have been few and far between. All of the fun-filled secrets are still around (some of which are fairly difficult to locate), as are the Sam one-liners (which certainly provide a laugh).

All of this good comes at a price, however. The game has crashed on me twice (even with the patch installed), the user interface is still too "console oriented," and the weapons don't seem quite as fun as the original. Levels are much smaller than the original (although they are much larger than the demo level), and there don't seem to be as many enemies this time around. I really enjoyed the frantic pace of having to deal with several hundred enemies at once; here we only get a handful (or two) of enemies at a time.

I still have a ways to go in the game, and I'm looking forward to completing it. The human-hamster ball is worth the price of admission alone (best original vehicle ever!) and the humor makes it all the more worthwhile.

The demo for Serious Sam 2 is out, and I finally got a chance to play it last night. For whatever it's worth, here are my impressions:

The Good

• Cool, cartoon-style environments. I've seen a lot of discussion on this point, and virtually everyone thinks the art direction is poorly done. Considering that virtually every computer game today is striving for ultra-realism, I think this is a breath of fresh air. It's something original. What a concept!
• Loads of weapons. The demo showcases a number of really neat weapons, including the parrot bomb (of which you only get one round - so make it count).
• Fast paced action. Just like the Serious Sam days of old.

The Bad

• Can you say "Console Port"? It is blatantly obvious that Serious Sam 2 is being developed for consoles. The user interface with the game menus is horrible, especially when it comes to changing key bindings. If there's anything I hate, it's a poorly done "port".
• The demo is way too short. I certainly hope the other game levels aren't this anemic.
• Cut scenes are really shoddy in quality. Couldn't they have just used the game engine for these cut scenes, instead of this low-resolution pre-rendered crap?
• Sam did virtually no wise-cracking through the entire demo! What have you done with the Sam I once knew?!?

The full game will be released in a few weeks (October 10 is one date I've seen), and I do plan on picking it up. Will it be worth the $30 asking price? I certainly hope so. Perhaps the rough points will have been smoothed down in the final product. Let's just hope they don't mess with the core Serious Sam formula. That would be a crime against nature.

I have just finished playing through Far Cry again (for the fifth or sixth time), and I thoroughly enjoyed the game all over again. Running with all of the extra eye candy made this time around particularly special (although my old Radeon 9700 Pro did a decent job). I had forgotten how difficult the game can be. The final two levels are insanely hard, and the ending (sadly) isn’t worth all the trouble. But the game’s atmosphere makes it all worthwhile. This was the first modern shooter that really floored me with its presentation, and I still consider it to be one of the best action games available today (only Half-Life 2 eclipses it in my book). Loads of fun!

Over the past several weeks, I have spent virtually all of my gaming time in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. As I previously mentioned, the game is so large that it has taken me this long to complete it. And now that I have completed the main story line, I feel I can better point out the game's highs and lows.

What I Liked My main praise for this game is the story line. San Andreas weaves an interesting tale full of twists and surprises. Character development is decent, but it's the voice acting that pushes it over the top. The developers of this game cast each character to a tee (Samuel L. Jackson is excellent as Officer Tenpenny). Likewise, the game environments are impressive. Not only is the game world gigantic, but it's well developed with plenty of detail. The number of vehicles available to the player is much larger than in previous GTA titles. This variety really adds to the overall experience. And finally, the game soundtrack really fits the overall 'gangsta' theme.

What I Disliked San Andreas is far from perfect, however. A few game missions are poorly designed, making them unnecessarily difficult. Several of the racing missions are near impossible, and the various driving schools contain tests that rely on pure luck to result in a perfect score. Enemy AI exhibits some severe flaws; often times during a gang war, the enemies will flee from the war zone. You inevitably have to chase them down, but then get penalized by leaving the war zone. Likewise, recruiting gang members to fight for you is an exercise in futility. They often get in the way of your line of sight, so you end up killing them instead of the rival gang members.

A number of people have slammed San Andreas for its graphics (and they are indeed sub-par). But given that the world is so large, and that there is so much to model, I can see why the developers chose to go with simpler designs. Fortunately, running at 1280 by 1024 with all the eye candy turned on helps in this regard (thank you GeForce 6800 GT).

So do I recommend the game? Absolutely. Just make sure that you are mature enough to play it (the 'M' rating is clearly warranted due to extreme language, intense violence, drug references, and sexual themes). If you are old enough, welcome to San Andreas. Grove Street baby - holla!

Although I disagree with the ESRB's revocation of the Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas rating, I can plainly see that Rockstar Games is at fault. If you aren't going to make use of some material, why leave it in the game? That was data I spent time installing, wasting a few seconds of my oh-so-precious time. But perhaps we are pawns in their grand, evil scheme. Rockstar might have known all along that this would happen, that it would create incredible controversy, and would therefore increase sales. Whatever their reasoning, I think Tycho and Gabe hit the nail on the head about this story. It's fairly clear that the guys at Rockstar aren't thinking at all.

I picked up a copy of the game last weekend, and have been playing it sporadically ever since (I just don't have the time I'd like to devote to it). All I can say is that this is, by far, the best game in the GTA series. Although the graphics don't touch games like Half-Life 2 or Far Cry, the environment is highly detailed. And it's the little things that make the game so interesting. You can play a full game of pool (8-ball) in a number of locations, placing bets on whether you will win or not. Or drop by one of the arcades in town, and play the video games inside (this is one of the weirdest levels of recursion ever: having your video game character play a video game). Or shoot some basketball over at your friends house.

I should also mention that the game map is way bigger than GTA 3 or GTA: Vice City. I have yet to leave the first city (there are a total of 3), and I've barely even scratched the surface in exploring it. Los Santos is the name of the first city and, whether it's inner city slums, high-priced villas in the mountains, or a farm out in the country side, the level of detail of each is incredible. You could quite literally spend hundreds of hours exploring this game. And that's exactly what I plan on doing over the next several weeks.

Over the past few days, I've been playing through the first two Serious Sam games again. I had truly forgotten how much action is packed into these two games. Having to wade through 1000 enemies in the course of only one level is quite a tension-inducing feat. All this action is making me hungry for Serious Sam 2 (an odd title, considering that it's the third game in the series). Fun new items are going to be introduced, my favorite of which so far is what I will call the Ball of Death, essentially a human hamster ball. Running over enemies with that thing has to be incredibly amusing!

Having had a little more time to fully digest the Resurrection of Evil (RoE) expansion pack for Doom 3, I've thought of a few more things worth mentioning. The more I think about it, the more negative points I can see in the expansion. Here is a brief list:

1. Frame Rates: I don't think Nerve paid near enough attention to this during development. There were a number of times when my computer nearly choked, something I never saw in the original game.
2. The Grabber: Countless people have likened the "grabber" in this game to the gravity gun from Half-Life 2. But those comments are a little too kind. The gravity gun in Half-Life 2 was way easier to use from a player's point of view, and it worked way better. RoE's grabber just isn't as fun. While it's cool to catch a demon's fireball and shoot it back, I found the weapon required a level of accuracy that I clearly don't possess.
3. Difficulty: At the "normal" level of difficulty in Doom 3, I never felt overwhelmed. This expansion was quite the opposite. Perhaps the developers chose to make it harder to create the illusion of an increased length. For me, it only resulted in frustration.

I just finished the Doom 3 expansion pack, Resurrection of Evil. The final boss battle was quite frustrating, and I (sadly) had to resort to "god" mode. The level designers simply didn't put enough human souls around the final arena for use with the Artifact. Anyway, besides this disappointing boss battle, I think this expansion pack fixed a few problems with the original Doom 3:

1. The levels are a little more varied this time around (some great new locales were explored).
2. Lighting was way more acceptable; flashlight use was kept to a reasonable level.
3. A double barrelled shotgun was included. Why wasn't this in the original game?

I might play through it one more time, just to check out the environments again. Overall, it's a worthy expansion pack (which wasn't a bad buy for a mere $15). My rating? 4 out of 5.

Just the other day, I got the Doom 3 expansion pack Resurrection of Evil and, although I've only just started it, I must say that I already think the folks at Nerve Software got a bunch of things right. First, the expansion pack comes on one CD. That's right: one. So installation time was minimal. Second is their representation of a female character in the game. The woman doctor leading the expedition back to the UAC base on Mars is downright homely! This comes as a breath of fresh air to a gaming universe where if women aren't supermodel quality, they're just not included in the game. Having only finished one level in this expansion pack, I can't provide a decent overview of the game. But so far, everything seems to have been done right.

My gaming tastes have been all over the place recently. I recently bought Microsoft Train Simulator (MSTS), which represents a fairly drastic departure from my standard gaming fare. As a train enthusiast, I've quite a blast running the BNSF Dash-9 and GP38-2 up the Marias Pass line in Montana. Pulling 40 to 50 mixed freight cars up a 2% grade is a surprisingly difficult endeavor. I've learned a great deal about railroading from this game, so if you enjoy trains and haven't tried this game out, I highly recommend it. The game is not without its problems, but it provides an excellent escape for any rail fan. Also note that the pacing of this game may be too slow for some, so your mileage may vary.

When I get tired of running freight and passengers over the world's rails, I take in a nice game of Assault in Unreal Tournament 2004. It's such a shame that Epic is doing away with this game type in UT 2007. Supposedly the new "Conquest" game type will replace it, but to me it sounds a little too much like the immensely popular Onslaught (which I must admit, is incredibly fun). I guess I want to have my cake and eat it too.

Although UT 2004 and MSTS have been keeping me good company, it's time for something new. I think my next purchase will be the recently released (to the PC) Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. I have both GTA 3 and GTA: Vice City, the latter of which I enjoyed most. From what I've been reading, the game is nothing but a good time, and nearly 3 times as big as Vice City (which was already huge). Unfortunately, the $49.95 price tag is a little more than I'm willing to pay for a game. Unless I can find a hot deal on it, I may have to make due with what I already have for a few more weeks. Which isn't that big of a deal. I still have several empty grain cars that need to be set out at Essex siding #4. :-)