[floppydisk]

Woooo, a two grand update? *drools*

Wait, is that US dollars or Australian? I don't know the exchange rate.

[Madam Corvax]

I think Sime thinks australian dollar, about 2/3 of an american dollar - still a lot of cash . I am thinking about the equivalent of maybe 1000 USD for a new machine.
And Sime, how much was your collector's edition? They say here in the shop that the price is "unique", meaning cheaper than in other contries, I wonder is it really so.

And I definitely mean to play Oblivion, although I do have games which I haven't yet touched, but maybe play one day.

[SimeSublime]

Yeah, that's AU$2000. A large chunk of that (nearly $800) will be on an Geforce 7800 grapics card, which seems to be the best in the local stores. Though I'm open to suggestions, only in preliminary planning yet.

My Oblivion special edition was AU$99, I think. That's fairly normal for a new game. The normal edition was AU$79, which is downright cheap for a new game of Oblivion's reputation.

[Madam Corvax]

Right, so they did not lie. My special edition plus delivery is 73 AU$, normal edition 55 AU$.

It's in the upper range here, however cheaper than the Sith Lords, for example, which were at 99 AU$.

And you mean to spend 800 $ for a new video card only?? Tha's a lot of money. I got my Radeon ATI 9500 with 512 MB for about 100$, and the best the shop had were only about twice as much as that. I'll let you know if the game runs with it, I am expecting the delivery any hour now (fingers crossed).

[SimeSublime]

Keep me posted.

I figure if I go all out, it should be fine for awhile.

[floppydisk]

Yeah, that's AU$2000. A large chunk of that (nearly $800) will be on an Geforce 7800 grapics card, which seems to be the best in the local stores. Though I'm open to suggestions, only in preliminary planning yet.

My Oblivion special edition was AU$99, I think. That's fairly normal for a new game. The normal edition was AU$79, which is downright cheap for a new game of Oblivion's reputation.

Sime, don't do it! You can get a 7800, 256MB PCI card for something like $300, and I've got the link. Not sure if they ship to Australia, but they should. Even better, get two and use the PCI (though you might need a new motherboard for that).

http://www.newegg.co...&Subcategory=48

Just realized that they're out of stock, but with a huge company like Newegg, they should be back in stock in a few days.

Right, so they did not lie. My special edition plus delivery is 73 AU$, normal edition 55 AU$.

It's in the upper range here, however cheaper than the Sith Lords, for example, which were at 99 AU$.

And you mean to spend 800 $ for a new video card only?? Tha's a lot of money. I got my Radeon ATI 9500 with 512 MB for about 100$, and the best the shop had were only about twice as much as that. I'll let you know if the game runs with it, I am expecting the delivery any hour now (fingers crossed).

Those are pretty steep prices for new games. $99 Australian = about $70 US. We get new games for $50, Special Editions for $55, and some 360 games reach up to $60.

I remember when the N64 came out. I can hardly believe that games were $60 then.

This post has been edited by floppydisk: 27 March 2006 - 05:07 PM

[SimeSublime]

Ours have always been like that. Kind of explains how the large gaming comics such as Penny Arcade and CAD can afford to play all these games without getting free media versions.

As for the computer update, it turs out a friend of a friend works at a warehouse, so I should be able to buy it at cost. He's emailing me the pricelist, so I'll check it at home.

[Slade]

I reccomend upgrading your graphics card over your ram, as most video lag is due to having trouble displaying everything, which gets stored in your video card's ram, not your processor ram, if I recall.

Oblivion is spectacular in all respects. NPCs are actually a part of the entire world all of the time, rather than just the map they spawn on. I was travelling past an old ruin, and almost got mugged by two orc brigands in full platemail. So I ran for a good two minutes along the highway as they chased me, and I ducked into an inn to hide. They ended up following me in, even though it was a map change. But it turns out the inn was a meeting place for a group of guards with good equipment, so the brigands got killed before they could kill me. You can still become a vampire, and I'm keeping my eyes out for becoming a werewolf. I've also noticed a good deal many books from Morrowind (and especially the Bloodmoon expansion) are around Tamriel this time. I think I also met some PCs that were part of the mining colony that makes up the main quest series in Solstheim, which is cool, and stumbled into the Thieves' Guild meeting entirely on accident. It's a bit more frowned upon than in Morrowind, so you won't have people talking about it, but I managed to get out alright.

Many skills now require minigames that determine your success, such as lock picking - you need to set the tumblers into place yourself - and speech-craft - you click on a rotating wheel, and try to time it so that the big chunks of the wheel are on types of actions that the character reacts well to, and so small chunks are on what he/she doesn't react well to. I admit that they aren't difficult, but as your skill increases the negative penalties decrease for poor actions, and the margin of error increases to depict your increase in skill.

I think my favorite part is when your skills hit certain points (I think they're 25, 50, 75, and 100) you get a special bonus to that skill, like blade skill gives you more attacks and the chance to disarm an opponent, and 50 sneak skill has the game ignore your boot weight for detection while sneaking. I'm looking forward to discovering more as I progress. And not only is the game even more massive than morrowind, but it's more interactive and there's even more to explore. After I got out of the intro dungeon, I snuck into a bandit cave and raided it thoroughly.

Things I hope they have that were in Daggerfall but not Morrowind:

Carts, so you can carry more than your weight capacity - WONDERFUL for dungeon raiding

Werewolves - as aformentioned. Hircine is my homeboy.

CLOAKS - I was severely dissappointed in the lack of cloaks in Morrowind.

And I'm a little dissapointed that you can't seem to wear armor over clothing. It's one or the other. >< I don't know why they changed that.

[floppydisk]

I reccomend upgrading your graphics card over your ram, as most video lag is due to having trouble displaying everything, which gets stored in your video card's ram, not your processor ram, if I recall.

I heard about that. I figure I'll just go for a 256 MB card, but I'm still going to upgrade my RAM.

I was travelling past an old ruin, and almost got mugged by two orc brigands in full platemail. So I ran for a good two minutes along the highway as they chased me, and I ducked into an inn to hide. They ended up following me in, even though it was a map change. But it turns out the inn was a meeting place for a group of guards with good equipment, so the brigands got killed before they could kill me. :D

That is fugging brilliant. Best I've had is the time when bandits wouldn't stop attacking my horse instead of me, so I ran away. Unfortunately, the wolves can run pretty good too. I led it into a friendly encampment and it got beat down by five women using only their fists. :D

I've also noticed a good deal many books from Morrowind (and especially the Bloodmoon expansion) are around Tamriel this time.

I've got about 7 books in my inventory right now that I'm going to read.

I'm looking forward to discovering more as I progress.

All of the stuff is listed in the manual. The bonuses are neat, however.

And I've started playing it again. I just reduced it to the default graphics, and it seems to run fine. The load times are still a problem, though.

[SimeSublime]

Yeah, skill bonus's are in the manual. I read it whilst the game was installing. It just made me cry more when I found it wouldn't run.

[floppydisk]

Just got an upgrade in Heavy Armor. Now it hardly degrades at all, which is great because it's Uber-expensive to repair.

Also, Kyle and I have a running debate about which is better - light armor or heavy armor. I say heavy because it's better at reducing damage, and once you start to progress in skill it doesn't encumber your speed or your carrying capacity (CC) at all.

He likes light because he can move faster and dodge better, but I think that the bonuses you get from it are worse, such as the non-encumberment on your CC, which doesn't really matter because it weighs almost nothing anyways.

What do you guys think?

[SimeSublime]

I lean towards heavy armour in most games anyway, but with the Mastery bonus there seems to be no reason at all to go light armour in the long run. Though it would be more useful in the earlier game for those without much strength, such as archers and mages. But the real question I'm interested in, is whether to go with Blade or Blunt?

[Madam Corvax]

The game has finally arrived.
It works fine with low video setting with my 1.6 GHz and 512 Radeon 9500 card. It stalls just a tiny little bit, much less in fact than KOTOR. I only played it a little, just to check if it is at all possible, since not time for it now.
New controls need getting used to them, why there is no map???I had fun selecting my face, but it did not look particularly pretty.

I usually go for light armour with one-handed long blade don't know why, maybe because I once got killed when I used blunt by those smuggles near Seyda Nen.

[floppydisk]

There's a map. You have to click tab.

I prefer a one handed short sword with a shield. They strike quickly and do more damage than the blunt weapons at my current level.

[SimeSublime]

Well, I don't see much point in using both as you can only use one weapon at a time, so I was curious as to which would make a better major skill. I'm leaning towards blades, and using a longsword with a shield. But I'm not sure if using one handed weapons would be better with blunt(for maces and the like).