Message #307496

[Canama]

61524

sup bro

So anyways, Legodac is banned? what the asterisk

OKAY, in other news:

• I installed Lion because Valve released an update that broke Steam on Snow Leopard. I messed around with the options and made it not suck. Now that it's fine, it's actually got a really slick interface. I like it.
• Began a playthrough of Half-Life. I have not finished the game yet. What follows is my "Xen rant". (Or, "It's kind of amazing how one botched area can make your opinion change from "I wish this game would never end" to "This game cannot end quickly enough".)
  • First off, Xen is the final area in the game. It's the world between dimensions from whence the aliens came. Now that that's out of the way:
    • I feel like they forgot everything that made the rest of the game so special. In Xen there are no setpieces, no scripted events, no NPCs, no puzzles, no new weapons. Nothing. The scenery is just brown rock, the background is brown nebula, and the aliens are all brown, except for the Houndeyes.
    • The soldiers were fun to fight - while every now and then I did go up against an idiot who killed himself with his own grenade, for the most part it felt like I was fighting against thinking enemies. The AI was REALLY impressive for a game from the late nineties. The aliens, on the other hand, are BORING. They aren't tough because they're smart, they're tough because they do a lot of damage. Too much damage, actually - it's hard!
    • Also, the gameplay. The gameplay in Xen consists of three things: First-person jumping, unfair battles (Read: against like 20 aliens at once, each of which can kill you in a few hits on its own), and doing the first two simultaneously. Actually, 4: ammo management. My Glock and SMG, which share ammo, each have 1 clip loaded (17 and 50 bullets, respectively), and about 10 in reserve. My revolver has all 6 loaded, ~15 in reserve. Shotgun with all 8 shells loaded, ~20 in reserve. The energy weapons don't require loading, both taking ammo straight from the reserve of currently ~50 shots. I'm completely out of RPGs. Crossbow is doing fine.
    • As a result, Xen isn't fun. It's frustrating. I won't miss it when it's over.

That said though, there are things I love. Like the crossbow. It's a magazine-loaded crossbow with attached scope. Sound amazing?

#### yeah it does.

-Canama