Did you get it a day early through pre order? Just downloading crysis 2 mp demo from the playstation store. Three and a half hours to download. Poxy connection. My mate just did it in 20 mins on his 16Mbps.

Doh!

Yeah i always get my games on pre/order a day or two early,been playing the multiplayer tonight and i have to say its a great game.

Its very fast paced and you die pretty quick if your reactions are not to good,normal problems associated with this type of game are RANK .......if you have just started playing expect to get owned by the higher Ranks that frequent what must be American servers.................Well those squealing kids sounded just like Americans to me[god i hate consoles and the immature crowd that use headsets]

The games Multiplayer is sweet and its well worth the money and there are quite a few modes that open up after you start ranking up.

Think after tonight there are 6 online modes to choose from after starting with just 3.

Now mrnelster lets talk Crysis 2..........As you probably already know this demo first came out on the 360 6 weeks ago.

As you also probably know i have all the consoles so its time to make my mind up at to what to get it on......................On the pre/order of this game my first thoughts were Playstation 3,then i cancelled and got 360 then back again and so on and so on.

There is not a day goes by when i don't hear or read bad things said about the way Crysis 2 performs on the Playstation compared to the 360...........Lets keep the pc version out of this as we all know it looks the best.

Ign.com have basically said the Playstation 3 version is so inferior to the 360,Graphics not on par,very blurry.frame-rate issues,your typical problem that has been associated with Multiplatform games by thrid party developers.

This has been going on for many years and its clear that when it comes to multi platform games then the 360 wins hands down nearly all of the time.

My mates have Playstation 3 and refuse to pay for xbox live so its a dilema on what should i do..............I so much wanted the Playstation version for many reasons but the sad fact is most gaming sites are telling us its inferior.

Apart from the Crytek developers that are saying there is no difference,that's after lens of truth showed them side by side and the xbox looked miles better than the playstation 3 and i'm Mr Magoo.

So hopefully early next week when the reviews start coming in i will make a rapid decision on the pre/order.............Got until Tuesday i guess to swap once again to another system................Shopto.net must think i'm going round the bend as i have changed this order at least 10 times in the past 4 weeks.

Edited by time2die (Fri 18-Mar-11 08:56:42)

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

Did you get it a day early through pre order? Just downloading crysis 2 mp demo from the playstation store. Three and a half hours to download. Poxy connection. My mate just did it in 20 mins on his 16Mbps.

Doh!

When do you hope to get a better connection then as it sounds like you are on a wireless connection,thats how long it used to take me untill i invested in some Homeplugs.

Now something like that is around the same time if not quicker,be interested to see what you have to say about the Playstation demo of Crysis 2.

I downloaded it earlier and nobody could connect because of server side issues.

You know there�s something wrong with video game journalism when�

Games are weirdly scored. 75% average is considered a poor score, usually one to avoid? A game needs to hit mid 90s to be a no-brainer for buying provided you like the genre.

My long boring ill informed rant follows below... (text needs to be selected to be read clearly. Kept it white to keep the place looking tidy!).

In a nutshell, I reckon the guy writing from techspotlight in the link above might have a point. Anybody else?

Edit. Seems metacritic scores are fluctuating (makes sense really as not all reviews are in) and anyway, another article on the same theme here.

It's getting a little to be the same way in education these days I hear. An A or a 'First' in the old days required 70% or higher. Something just about satisfactory that would get you passed would require at least 40%. 50% would be nothing to shout about whilst 60% plus meant your work was just about worth reading and could be considered quite good. Now things are changing? The boundaries are shifting so higher marks are being awarded and of course the distinction is a good piece of work then must equate to a higher percentage mark - more like 80s and 90s even.

The movie review industry works more like the academic ratings we are all more used to. The game industry stands alone in awarding near perfect scores that result in muddying the waters for those of us who really want to know if a game is still worth getting despite being critically trashed somewhat and only being awarded 76%.

For a company to lose such a large chunk of value on the basis of only scoring 76% is weird and stranger still, as people are suggesting it's the lack of critical acclaim rather than lack of sales from total and projected sales based on pre-orders and the first few days trading.

HomeFront might yet turn out to be an all right game if T2D's latest comments are anything to go by and without even taking into consideration of whether or not the game can be expected to get proper support so it gets better in future. People might yet buy it? It might've become a better title but now THQ's board of directors are bound to be fretting somewhat and thinking of pushing the red 'trash it' and cut all losses button to minimise additional losses.

What the guy writing the short article seems to be saying (linked above) is a game can fail based on early negative and misinformed press views. Games sites rush to form opinions of a game on the barest minimum of hands-on experience and may not often offer fair treatment.

I know many gamers like T2D is a great believer in letting the people (gamers in this case) speak with their wallets and voice their own opinions through actually playing the game themselves and this way we all get a more informed viewpoint. I don't read a lot of games reviews so can't say if the article has much point to it but it's an interesting proposition.

A lot of games (particularly multiplayer) seem to require a fair bit of patching before they are balanced and the main bugs are dealt with so I wonder if after this share value wake up call the likes of EA and Activision et al will finally see it isn't acceptable to just rush a half finished game out to meet release deadlines if it means half their share value is wiped out as a result of putting out anything less than a stellar product.

Well, looking at DICE/EA's partnership and apparent lack of commitment to providing support for the Battlefield franchise over the years you can be forgiven for thinking all they care about is money anyway so perhaps not.

Hopefully we'll see more complete games come to market without the requirements for many of the torturous patching regimes normally necessary just to get a game working properly. Unlikely though.

Edited by deleted (Fri 18-Mar-11 03:49:51)

Review scores are an issue yes, i dislike the era 90/10A++++++++++MUSTBUYGOTYOHLOOKITSACTIVISION reviews, but this is the same era of dodgy review tactics like paid reviews, reviewers receiving incentives and such, reviewer "group thought" where reviewers will discuss the game decide what score it should have before playing it THEN write it up and score it around what they decided, or as whats done the round recently is where devs themselves are padding metacritic scores.

Metacritic is a concept that started good and is now being used as judge and jury, studios can die cause of it.

I don't think this is all on reviews though, i think its on the hype games get (too much in the majority of cases). Obviously if you big things up all over the place and it comes back it isn't that good then it is going to have quite a drastic effect. Also i put it on games these days costing too much to develop, companies have teams of 100's of staff to make a game pop out asap.

T2D might be right that it is an alright game, but to me homefront has several signs it wouldn't do too good, i was going to summarise what made me feel that way but it was just too awkward to put down. I'll just do it by category, if you want elaboration ask for it and ill try and explain how.
1)developer
2)publisher
3)marketing/hype
4)Media put out
5)media reactions
6)what others say (none media prior to release)

Pretty much these reasons build a "house" in my mind on what the game is going to be like, the more that comes out the more the house gets built from the blueprint stage right up to the final product.

When media reports (and reports from else where) come in saying the game is rather lacking then that just makes me back off more, I don't want another CoD multiplayer because thats something im starting to detest, it attracts the wrong breed of people (the type we all loath and detest regularly here) and with its single player campaign being very short its a deal killer for me. Sure if the multiplayer is stellar ill buy it, if its on crazy sale, i'll buy it, etc.But those will have to come from friends, not only friends i speak to, friends who i play and hold their opinion with enough warrant to purchase the game to play with.

But up to release i never saw anything other than the story that would lure me in, to then find that the story is shorter than the majority of other games that pretty much executes it, to find out that the nice preorder bonuses (some tf2 stuff (meh) and metro 2033) on steam aren't available in the UK either, thats it, game over, THQ put themselves out of a sale.

As much as homefront is quoted what about dragon age 2? here we have a game that reviewers are holding in the 80-90 marks, yet for the majority if you really got into the first one is pants in comparison due to the way its dumbed down. I'm sure if you were primarily a console player you might not agree with my thoughts on this. But either way what happened afterwards should raise an eyebrow with any gamer.

Personally I think the whole "vote with your wallet" thing is catch 22, especially with regards to reviews, you ignore the reviews, buy the game, its [censored] then you are out of pocket, what do you do with it next? in most peoples cases its preown it, IMO this is a waste, sure you get SOME of your cash back but you are just putting a game back out there which is going to be marked up by a considerable amount, not to mention the publisher HAS your money from when you bought it, so you have just helped CoD10: modern ops earn its place as a "great" game and reaffirm its apparently 100% game, even if its true score is around 50% and the second you bought it you preowned it. The way to do it would be to wait and buy it preowned or bargain bin, that way the publisher gets little from it. Of course the catch 22 comes with what if it was a solid game?

Also theres the point that even if you do or don't buy it, whos to say the rest of the population won't/will? CoD gets voted for BAFTAs and GOTYs all over, if we are the ones sitting here saying these games are getting weaker and weaker whos voting for them? Theyre scoring millions of votes.

Ultimately regardless of review scores there ARE good games out there, but i dont think theyre lying with the big bucks so called AAA titles for the majority. Regardless of review scores I think homefront was pimped as something it wasn't ready for as a result the house of cards came down on it. I dont think its particularly right THQ are stepping in and throwing a tantrum over retailers discount it either, regardless of how good/bad the game is.

Edited by deleted (Fri 18-Mar-11 06:10:53)

To be honest Spook Homefront is a good game and the only thing wrong with it by today's standards it don't have next generation graphics.

I say now this game will not disappoint even after reading some really negative reviews,after spending a couple of hours with the multiplayer last night its hard to believe this game has scored as low as it has.

I will say that most slammed the single player part of the game and Multiplayer got much better reviews.

Nice Post Spook and well put over and even though i am one of those people that gets put of my lower than expected game scores i was intrigued to plaay the multiplaayer because of what i saw it looked good.

I dont regret buying it as Multiplayer is a lot of fun and it has some really cool Music as the game hangs in the lobby.

Graphically i would compare it to Stalker on a low end pc and that metro game that also bombed.

Edited by time2die (Fri 18-Mar-11 08:32:13)

Informative as ever Falcon and a great read yet once again,i have said what i think regarding Homefront and your points are most valid and i agree with what you say.

Most times i would have listened to reviews and not got this game but Homefront looked good in the multiplayer videos that i watched and thought i would take the gamble and its worth the money.

I love a solid single player game and most times i finish the single player part before i touch the online part,sadly in this case i have only played 1 hour of the single player which by all accounts is not as bad a the reviews have said.

For me Multiplayer is where it had potential and since that is what i spend most of my time playing i had to give this a chance,if it had turned out [censored] then i would have lost a tenner and traded it the following week.

Unfortunately that is the way of the world but if you have just spent good money on a Gaming Disaster then for gamers everywhere trading is a good thing.

Who wants to be lumbered with a game they just spent £40 on or go through the trouble of trying to sell it on ebay for peanuts.

Nothing excites me more than a new game arriving from Mr postman,it helps though that the game in question [Hype or No hype] delivers.

The gaming public have to have something to go on so we have to listen to the media [right or wrong] we watch the videos ,we read the preview,and we get caught up in the hype built up around a certain game.

We want that game to be special,we want that level of realism,we want it to knock the spots of the previous COD games.

Nobody was more concerned about Homefront than me,even when Swanny posted how he was looking forward to the game in one of the first threads i said it was totally uninteresting to me.

Based on single player videos of this game i would not have even bought it for £10 in a bargin bin that's how unimpressive it looked to me ,but after many studies of the online component it looked a different game and looked like it had a lot of potential.

This is how it has turned out and i had quite a few hours of fun with the online component of the game,even the single player is better than even i expected.

I was reading something where someone was saying 75% isn't bad but the reply was that we live in a 70-100 world. Given the cost of games and the amount of time people can devote to playing them anything outside that category are well and truly dead in the water - but 75 is at the low end of the 70-100 scale and if there are other titles all clamouring for your (limited) attention and money then 75% isn't going to cut it.

Might as well just rate games from 1 to 30

In reply to a post by time2die:

When do you hope to get a better connection then as it sounds like you are on a wireless connection,thats how long it used to take me untill i invested in some Homeplugs.

I want to get rid of the wi-fi in my house so I need homeplugs. Which did you get??