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Messages - Nick DiMola

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1
General Gaming / Re: Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception
« on: November 14, 2011, 10:33:11 AM »
It's also easier to rent than buy. I've read (and heard on podcasts) that the campaign is quite short, so I could probably finish it over a weekend. I wouldn't touch the multiplayer anyway. I do want to play the game--nobody does interactive movies quite like Naughty Dog--but I don't know if buying it is a good option.

If you're not going to play online, go for the rental Zach. It can definitely be finished in a weekend and if you're only slightly interested, multiple playthroughs aren't likely.

In general, it's a fantastic game and the story, I felt, was paced pretty perfectly. The end definitely turns into a heavy set of firefights, but they don't overrun the whole game. Dasmos echoed my sentiments pretty exactly. At this point, it's been ousted as my GOTY by Skyward Sword, but it's still one of the best experiences of the year.

2
General Chat / Re: College Applications
« on: September 30, 2011, 12:00:16 PM »
Whitworth, for example, is offering to pay $19,000 a year if I'm accepted automatically just because of my GPA/SAT/ACT scores (2020 and 32 atm). I shall be taking the SAT for a 4th time this Saturday.

I read that and thought, "Holy ****, how did he get over a 1600?" Then I remembered that it's out of 2400 now. Still a good score regardless. Also, this makes me feel old.

3
General Chat / Re: Who wants to take some stuff off my hand?
« on: August 08, 2011, 10:57:13 PM »
Phew, glad everything's alright. That being said, I'd love Mega Man 5 and 6 :P

4
General Chat / Re: Who wants to take some stuff off my hand?
« on: August 08, 2011, 03:27:36 PM »
what? Terminal? Im more concerned for Easycure then getting bomberman 64. Are you ok?

Damn dude, same question from me; you alright?

5
Nintendo Gaming / Re: Gabrielle's Ghostly Groove 3D
« on: July 12, 2011, 11:15:35 AM »
The DS version I played at E32010 was basically Elite Beat Agents. It seemed decent enough, but was hard to play with all the noise on the show floor. Not sure if its transition to the 3DS has changed it in any way.

6
TalkBack / Re: Hello, My Name is Nick … and I'm an Addict
« on: June 28, 2011, 10:51:27 AM »
Hey, I remember this thread. Good stuff.

I'm at 1378 games as of right now. Looks like roughly 2 years ago I hit 1000, so that means 378 games in two years or 189 games/year, which is roughly a game every other day. Yup, still an addict, though review copies do pad out those numbers pretty significantly at this point.

Also looks like the Backloggery improved their interface some from the last time I was on there. Seems a lot better now.

7
TalkBack / Re: Xenoblade Chronicles Not Coming to North America
« on: June 24, 2011, 10:19:25 AM »
From conversations I've had with various people in the industry, localization is cheap. Since most games these days are made so that text can be easily translated, or translated in tandem with the development of the game, its cost is practically figured into the development costs of the game. With that in mind, to what detriment is it for Nintendo to just localize everything they already pay to develop?

It really makes no sense at all to me. At this point, I want to say of all of the companies out there, Nintendo has the most disparity in offerings across regions. That's absolutely insane. They are the biggest company in the industry, they have the most money, and can easily acquire resources as needed. Arguably, they have the most loyal fan base as well, but that's more speculation than hard fact. Assuming that, you'd think that there's at least some guaranteed sales for some of these games in all regions regardless of what they are.

I understand that even with more resources, at some point the company will be stretched too thin to necessarily handle everything, but right now Nintendo of America has (seemingly) nothing going on. There's no excuse, or even a reasonable explanation, why this, The Last Story, Pandora's Tower, and others aren't on their way to America. Given the thin Wii line up, we should see NoA reaching into the backlog and bringing over anything possible to keep the Wii train going. We've probably got a year to Wii U at this point, and that's way too long to only have a few token games released.

8
Reader Reviews / Re: Rate The Last Game You Played
« on: June 22, 2011, 02:52:47 PM »
I just started with Shadows of the Damned too. Posted my full thoughts in some initial impressions in the usual place.

As a fan of Suda51, I wouldn't say it's his first good game, but it's clearly his most polished game. I haven't played all that much as of this writing, maybe an hour or 2, but the usual rough around the edges stuff you see in his games is totally absent here. Everything looks to have been gone through with a fine toothed comb. Whether that's the work of Mikami or some close monitoring from EA it's hard to say, but hopefully he recognizes how much cleaner this experience is over past ones.

The gameplay in particular has been really great so far, blending some of the concepts of Resident Evil 4 with the style and flair of Suda/Grasshopper Manufacture. I'm really enjoying the dialog between Garcia and Johnson, keeps the game lively and fun, despite the dreary surroundings. The phallic jokes are fantastic and I think Fleming's character design is totally kick ass.

All that being said, I can't wait to play some more after I get my son to bed tonight.

9
Reader Reviews / Re: Rate The Last Game You Played
« on: June 21, 2011, 10:44:14 AM »
I felt that the timer in Dead Rising 2 worked out a whole hell of a lot better than it did in Dead Rising. Most of the time, it came down to more efficiently completing tasks on the first play through. This meant that you had to plan your actions and execute well, which was a fun little restriction that drastically altered how you play the game.

Plus, you aren't meant to get everything on a single play through, so assuming you hit half of the stuff (most of it isn't mandatory), a second play through is practically a second game set in the same area. Dead Rising didn't encourage this type of play, which made it a far less enjoyable experience. Plus escorting the people you rescue was miserable.

I'd suggest checking out Dead Rising 2 in spite of the timer. It's not a mechanic I typically like in games either, but I felt it was done pretty well here.

10
Nintendo Gaming / Re: Club Nintendo OoT CD offer problem
« on: June 20, 2011, 01:21:42 PM »
Alright, I called and they fixed up the order for me over the phone. We're good.

That being said, the game really looks gorgeous. They did a great job and I'm looking forward to taking on the Master Quest once Chessa finishes up with the main quest. I tried to enter my name as Zelda to see if it automatically unlocked the Master Quest, but no such luck. Oh well...

11
Nintendo Gaming / Re: Club Nintendo OoT CD offer problem
« on: June 20, 2011, 09:27:04 AM »
Same happened to me. I sent an email, but still haven't gotten a response. I'll be pretty pissed if I get screwed out of a copy since I bought and registered the game yesterday with the specific intent of getting the soundtrack.

12
TalkBack / Re: Modern Warfare 3 Confirmed for Wii
« on: June 14, 2011, 08:57:26 AM »
can you provide pics in Talkback threads too for further convenience? ;D

It would also help if clicking links in Talkback OP didn't lead you away from the site but instead opened the link in a new tab/window. I can't tell you how many times I've clicked an NWR article link then closed the tab so I can go back to NWR only to realize that it was the same tab.


or does that only happen to me?

I usually read the main site, but I have had that happen other places when I think a link opened a new tab rather than in the same window. Control+Shift+T is my best friend. It reopens closed tabs.

13
I had high hopes for PD, but so far I'm less than half-way through PD on Special Agent and I'm not enjoying the experience much at all.

For what it's worth, the game really comes alive in Perfect Agent mode. So many of the subtleties of the experience are lost in Special Agent mode to make it easier. Fighting the Skedar is a great example of that. In one level, you start with just a knife on a Skedar ship with enemies everywhere. You'll quickly learn that your knife can be thrown into the back of a Skedar's head for a one shot kill. In Perfect Agent, those guys are bullet sponges, so it's a revelation when you learn it. As you work your way through the level, you'll come to realize there is a "right" path through the place and it requires perfect timing and precision to make it through.

The rest of the game is very much the same way in Perfect Agent, though the first few levels aren't the best showcase of it. The game takes a lot more thought and planning than GoldenEye did and that makes it a very different experience. Perfect Dark is more of a stealth game where you should be working your way through levels out of enemy sight, whereas GoldenEye is closer to a run 'n' gun, though some of the stealth stuff is still there (Bunker comes to mind).

I can see why Perfect Dark wouldn't be as appealing to most as GoldenEye in the single player campaign, especially in the lower difficulty segments, but that's largely because they are fairly different experiences that, in my opinion, won't necessarily appeal to the same people.

The only other game that reminds me of Perfect Dark is, surprisingly enough, Hitman 2. While not a first person shooter, the stealth elements, objective-based mission structure, and versatility of the experience make for something extremely memorable. Of course, we needn't forget Perfect Dark's challenge mode and multiplayer modes, which put it in a different league. Spec Ops mode in Modern Warfare 2 did a great job of updating the Challenge Mode concept introduced by Perfect Dark and improving it considerably. And of course, the multiplayer mode of Perfect Dark improves what was introduced in GoldenEye making it a much better choice for bouts with friends.

I can see where people would draw parallels to other first person shooters of the time. Surely Rare was influenced by some of these other experiences, but clearly they are all different and unique games, not the disjointed hodgepodge of concepts I believe you are describing, adadad. I concede to the point that the mission objectives are completely unclear and that provides for some definite frustration. For me, at the time I played through Perfect Dark, I had a whole high school summer of doing nothing to complete the game and part of the experience was discovering what each objective was while playing through the missions. For something like the retrospective, that part of the game is unwelcome because it hinders getting through it for discussion purposes.

If Perfect Dark didn't have its multiplayer component, I think it would be a love it or hate it kind of experience.

14
General Gaming / Re: Duke Nukem Forever
« on: June 12, 2011, 11:30:26 AM »
I'm jealous...
You can still see the stream on justin.tv.  Is it worth your time?  No. The game was miserable. The first half hour or hour was decent, funny, or something like that. The rest? Very dull, unintuitive FPS without any of the humor everyone was expecting.

What Jason said. This game is pretty bad. We almost finished it yesterday morning and it really doesn't get any better. It could've succeeded had it kept its humorous undertones, but once they disappear, so does the fun because the actual gameplay is weak.

15
General Gaming / Re: Duke Nukem Forever
« on: June 10, 2011, 08:22:08 PM »
Duke Nukem Forever Live Stream @ PixlBit!

http://www.pixlbit.com/features?action=showFeature&featureId=503&t=live_stream_of_duke_nukem_forever_at_800pm_est

Review Copy came in today and we're playing as much as we can tonight. Come check it out!

16
TalkBack / Re: Is the Name Really That Bad?
« on: June 09, 2011, 04:15:35 PM »
I think the name is pretty good. It continues the Wii branding, which I figured it would and adds a bit more. It now says that it's not just about "We" as a group, but is about "You" as well. Based on what we saw at E3 there is going to be a convergence on the system between core and casual, which the namely demonstrates tactfully.

We're all used to the Wii name anyway, is this really that much different? Better than Vita, anyhow...

17
Nintendo Gaming / Re: Wii U
« on: June 08, 2011, 02:50:49 PM »
Haha. I guess the guy misunderstood Jason the first 2 times he asked. He went back, to make sure one more time, and the claimed that he thought he was just asking if the system was backwards compatible. Apparently once he realized the real question, the rep said he had no idea and withdrew his previous answer.

If you ask me, it seems plausible enough (hence why I asked Jason to ask them), but yeah, nothing solid still on that. For reference, I'd love to play Brawl on the tablet screen just chilling in bed.

We asked a whole bunch of other questions too, but got nothing out of the reps (apparently just like the NWR guys), so it seems Nintendo is pretty tight lipped right now on the system. Oh well.

18
Nintendo Gaming / Re: Wii U
« on: June 08, 2011, 01:50:00 PM »
Crap, have to kill the story. Apparently, there was a misunderstanding. No confirmation of Wii U controller playing Wii games.

19
Nintendo Gaming / Re: Questions NWR Needs To Ask @ E3
« on: June 08, 2011, 10:29:45 AM »
Interesting. Zap was in the roundtable last night for us and he told me that they didn't want any Wii U questions, so you're probably right. I guess we'll see what happens, more third party stuff for Wii U is of more interest to me any way. Honestly, I'll just import Xenoblade and Last Story if it does go to Europe.

20
Nintendo Gaming / Re: Questions NWR Needs To Ask @ E3
« on: June 08, 2011, 10:11:19 AM »
For what it's worth, there is another roundtable meeting tonight. It's unprecedented for Nintendo to have 2, so who knows what will come out of it.

Last night's didn't have too much info, other than the Pikmin 3 stuff, so I'm hopeful that tonight has a bit more info. The past two years, they announced new games (Skyward Sword and OoT 3D), so I have to imagine something new will come from tonight's.

21
Nintendo Gaming / Re: May be the Proudish owner of 9 DK Bongos
« on: June 03, 2011, 08:53:18 AM »
This may be of use to you guys:

http://www.gamestop.com/gc/accessories/donkey-konga-bongo/35115

I rounded out my collection of bongos thanks to the super cheap ($2) price. Most of them are new in the box too, they just got marked pre-owned after sitting around forever.

22
General Gaming / Re: Game colecting
« on: May 27, 2011, 08:50:11 AM »
Sure, I'll bite:

http://www.pixlbit.com/collections?action=showCollection&userName=Nick%20DiMola

Been collecting games for a long time at this point and I have a pretty eclectic collection. I recently completed my NA Virtual Boy collection and will continue to try and get as many of the Japanese games as I can. I'm not sure I'll be making an attempt to get a full collection of anything else in particular, but I do enjoy grabbing older games when I can. It has been a long time since I've just gotten a big lot of games from eBay, but I wouldn't mind dropping a little cash in the near future to help round out some of my older collections.

23
James and I played the first 10 challenges separately, then teamed up to try 11-14 and were stomped on all of them. Are these events harder to conquer in multiplayer, or is there just a huge difficulty spike starting with Challenge 11? It seems worthwhile to finish them since that's how you unlock a ton of multiplayer content.

I'm not sure what happened with the XBLA re-release, but most of those challenges seem to have been made impossibly hard. Back when it was released I played a few with one of the other guys on PixlBit online and we just got annihilated. I beat 100% of Perfect Dark back in the day, including all of the Perfect Agent missions, cheats, and challenges. Needless to say, I know my way around, and I just couldn't beat the damn sim enemies in the challenges for crap.

It felt like they would instantly headshot and kill you no matter where you were. I know I'm not as good as I used to be at the game, but I'm still plenty proficient with modern shooters (god knows I have to review enough of them). With that being the case, I don't think we made it past Challenge 15 before just giving up on it. That experience adequately soured me on the game in general and I haven't picked it back up since.

24
Nintendo Gaming / Re: Project Cafe & Pre-E3 HYPE Thread
« on: May 23, 2011, 11:27:10 AM »
Last E3 Nintendo of America didn't throw a party like they usually do, but Nintendo of Europe did instead. Seems like the same is happening this year. If it is like last year, it'll be in LA, not in Europe.

25
Nintendo Gaming / Re: Official Club Nintendo Thread
« on: May 23, 2011, 11:21:12 AM »
I'm not seeing any coins from it on mine. I registered my copy back in January 2006.

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