MI-80

Just a quick update following my main Dragon Age DLC article and earlier follow-up. First, the stats for The Edge are in.

The Edge is a one-handed Tier 6 Silverite dagger requiring 26 dexterity. This is an excellent weapon for the rouge in your party. The full stats are:

• Damage: 6.00
  
• Critical chance: 4.50%
  
• Armor penetration: 7.00
  
• Strength modifier: 0.85
  
• +5 damage
  
• +3% melee critical chance
  
• +4 attack
  

To top it all off The Edge has two rune slots, making it one of the better daggers throughout most of the game.

With Dragon Age under a month old, EA/BioWare has announced not one, but two more pieces of downloadable content (DLC) for the game. While one is just an item encouraging users to buy new and join the BioWare Social Network, the other is a full-fledged commercial add-on, making the total three so far.

Though details are scarce about the upcoming downloadable weapon (I cannot find anything except a copy of the newsletter itself and a few BioWare moderator forum posts detailing it as not being released until after 30 November), “The Edge,” subscribers to Dragon Age's newsletter recently got the following advance snippet:

“Those who purchase Dragon Age: Origins before November 30th will automatically receive the in-game item, ‘The Edge.’ The Edge is an extremely sharp blade that is the pinnacle of Ferelden crafting. It adds bonuses to damage, attack, and critical strike chance.”

The Valve Launch Box, used for internal launch parties to get the ball rolling.

Monday at midnight, technically Tuesday morning I suppose, Valve launched their latest blockbuster game, Left 4 Dead 2 (L4D2), a zombie apocalypse thriller/shooter focused on four player cooperative play. As with many large Valve launches, the night was not without incident. After over six years in operation, where is Valve and their digital distribution platform, Steam, still failing?

The first major problem was the actual release time. The game was slated for a release at midnight EST, but did not unlock until 1:10AM. Gamers who had pre-loaded the game (that is having paid for and downloaded an encrypted version prior to the release) expected to play the game only minutes after launch. Unfortunately, for many gamers this was not going to be their launch experience.

Like other four player cooperative (coop) games, Valve is pushing this functionality as a major selling point in Left 4 Dead 2 (L4D2), which launches tonight. This includes a pre-order discount of 10%, and a four pack including its own discount. By planning properly, and some coordination with a few of your gamer friends, you can score a copy of Left 4 Dead 2 for just around $35.

First, let us get a baseline. The game for PC retails for $49.99, so our goal is to shave as much as possible off that. A 10% discount means you only pay $44.99 for pre-ordering it, which will disappear tonight around midnight EST when the game goes live and the price goes to normal retail. So you can save $5 just by buying it ahead of time, so what is the advantage of buying a four pack?

Dragon Age is less than a week old, but there is absolutely no shortage of extra Downloadable Content (DLC). Most of these items are free, but some require work or even cash. However, with a little digging around (and $15), you can unlock plenty of extra content right from the start of the game.

Pre-Order Content:

• All Pre-Orders - Memory Band: +1% experience.
• Amazon.com - Lion’s Paw Boots: Bonus to armor, dodge, and evading missiles.
• Direct2Drive - Dalish Ring: Bonus to healing, Darkspawn damage resistance, and health regeneration.
• EA Store - Band of Fire: Bonus to stamina and fire/spirit resist.
• Game Crazy - Guildmaster’s Belt: Bonus to money drops, cunning, and dodging.
• GameStop - Feral Wolf Charm: Bonus to armor and health regeneration.
• Steam - The Wicked Oath: +1 armor penetration, +1 stamina regeneration in combat, and +10% critical/backstab damage.

(Please note the details for Memory Band and Steam’s The Wicked Oath are exact specifications. All others are rough descriptions.)

Now, most of these offers are gone if you did not pre-order the game. The major exception is retail stores that have physical cards. GameStop especially gets vast numbers of cards in, so try your luck asking an employee if they have any to spare. They are often very friendly and more than willing to hand over a card even if you did not preorder at that store, or even GameStop, depending on the availability of code cards.

Awhile ago I purchased The Witcher: Enhanced Edition on Steam. I have been holding off for awhile on playing because I love hardcore RPG's but seldom complete them. Recently though I've been thinking: with a Metacritic score of 86, several RPG Game of the Year awards under its belt, and the recent free release of the Director's Cut, which uncensors some content previously only legitimately available in Europe, what am I waiting for?

Now, the first thing I do when I start any game is check out the options. I kick the graphics up, adjust the controls, and all that fine tuning ability we PC gamers enjoy. One thing I noticed is that the option to enable EAX was grayed out in the Sound Options menu. This caught me off-guard since The Witcher is so new. I typically see this issue with older games designed for XP (since Vista overhauled the Windows audio subsystem), but The Witcher was released in late 2007, some nine months after Vista hit retail, and nearly a year since it hit RTM and was released to OEM's. A little looking around on Google confirmed it however: The Witcher does not natively support EAX under Vista, or in my case, Windows 7.

The demo for LucasArts’ latest entry into the Star Wars videogame franchise landed on Xbox LIVE yesterday, and fan results are mixed. For anyone who has avoided the recent marketing blitz, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is an action/fighting game developed and published by LucasArts for a number of platforms. Slated for release on September 16th for North America, the demo includes an early level of the game in what is considered its final, or near final, state. The game has been positioned as a darker slice of the classic saga, positioning the player as a secret apprentice to Darth Vader set on eliminating the remaining Jedi. The game itself takes place in the timeline between the third and fourth movies.

Well, it's that time of year again, E3. The biggest and baddest video gaming expo ever certainly appears to be loosing steam though. Booth babes are being cracked down on, and less and less unique or original stuff is appearing each year. The PS3 is coming and it'll be crazy expensive. Nintendo's new console looks great but no one will buy it, and Microsoft is happy in their flight pattern circling rehash valley. What about those games that really deserve new life, back in the days when most games were unique and full of original ideas? Well, let's look at what I call the top 10 of em. First off, why would I want sequels? I'm always bashing them after all. Well to be honest I have nothing against a good sequel that surpasses the original in every way, while remaining true to its roots. What I do have issues with is when someone like Electronic Arts (EA) takes one game engine and starts releasing a slightly rehashed version of a game series every 8-12 months. These games don't excel, improve, or in any way really separate themselves from the pack. It just gets annoying because what was once a great series such as Ghost Recon is just...okay now. O the newer one has slightly higher polygon counts, woohoo! The new one has 3 more weapons, woohoo! I can pay for PREIMUM content on top of the $300+ console and the constant stream of $60 rehashes, huzzah! You get my drift. If a sequel takes 3-5 years, then I'll check out out because in my own experience that's how long it takes to make a truly brilliant game.