HerbertFish
Member
I just popped my GOG cherry. This site is amazing and right up my alley. Problem is, I have no idea where to begin. I like RTS and sims. Any recommendations?
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GOG News and Updates 2011
- Thread starter Minsc
- Start date
Stumpokapow
listen to the mad man
A Black Falcon said:
I don't have the disc to check but presumably the only things actually taking up space in C&C games to begin with were audio (not sure if any of the games used redbook versus digital) and the movies, both of which would be much smaller if encoded with modern techniques / codecs.
Minsc
Gold Member
A Black Falcon said:
C&C: The First Decade is a dual layer DVD, so I guess that's how. Comes in at around just under 8GBs, which is equivalent to what, like 11-12 CDs. Most of the games were 1 or 2 disc releases (the expansions generally all 1 disc), so it's not really as incredible as it seems.
Narag said:
The First Decade is still the way to go. No need for any of that, and the Installer is pretty sweet. It installs everything you want in basically one pass, you get one screen with like 6 key entries at once, I'd have taken a screen cap but I don't feel like uninstalling it to get that screen.
Mr.Awesome said:
It's kinda lacking in the RTS & Sims genre, except for maybe Total Annihilation & IL-2 Sturmovik: 1946. Stuff that's been recommended is bolded in this list of GOG's games. They get new stuff basically every week. you could check the OP for a list of what's been recently released.
Edit:
Stumpokapow said:
I believe they didn't recompress anything beyond how it existed originally... all the releases are exactly how they were. I could be wrong though, but to my eyes, if they did, it looks exactly as I remembered. The audio was never redbook though, C&C used some sort of mp3-like format built in to the game data, it was low quality, but still awesome. Like 8-bit 22khz mono or something, so it doesn't take up much space at all.
HerbertFish
Member
Thanks. Yeah, TA was why I got into GOG. First, and only, thing I have so far from the service.Minsc said:
LocoMrPollock
Banned
Mr.Awesome said:
Empire Earth 2 is pretty awesome. They also have parts 1 and 3, but 2 is my favorite. Evil Genius is awesome as well, though it's more like a Dungeon Keeper type of game, rather than a build up and destroy. Earth 2160 is also pretty good and has some cool ideas. Other than that there is Max 1+2 if you wanna go old school, though it can be played in turn based as well as real time and Dungeons and Dragons Daggerdale is combo rts/rpg that I like.
I got to say Im really impressed with how GoG patches its games. I made my first purchase, Temple of Elemental Evil, and it seems to work fine with the fan made patch right out of the gate.
And whoever has the Dungeons and Dragons licence needs to make a 4th edition game with turn based combat on a grid. Imagining a game like ToEE with that system sounds like the perfect game to me.
And whoever has the Dungeons and Dragons licence needs to make a 4th edition game with turn based combat on a grid. Imagining a game like ToEE with that system sounds like the perfect game to me.
charlequin
Banned
Saige said:
Atari
The ultimate irony is that D&D finally has a combat system that will adapt smoothly to videogame use and yet this is the edition where no one is going to try.
A Black Falcon
Member
C&C was two discs, plus a third disc for the addon.Minsc said:
C&C RA was two discs, plus two discs for the addons.
C&C TS was two discs, plus a disc for the addon.
C&C RA2 was two discs, plus a disc for the addon.
C&C Generals was two discs, plus a disc for the addon.
C&C Renegade was two discs.
That's 18 CDs of stuff, fit into just one DVD. Now it is true that both discs for each game had some duplicate stuff -- units, etc -- but still, the videos are the biggest part of each disc. I wouldn't be surprised if they had to compress things somehow to fit it all on one disc...
Very nice.The First Decade is still the way to go. No need for any of that, and the Installer is pretty sweet. It installs everything you want in basically one pass, you get one screen with like 6 key entries at once, I'd have taken a screen cap but I don't feel like uninstalling it to get that screen.
Yeah, it could use more RTSes... GOG's library is great, though, and does keep improving over time.
I haven't checked, but I very much doubt any of them use redbook audio... with that much video on the CDs, would there be room for redbook audio too?Stumpokapow said:
Yeah, makes sense, had to save space for the movies. But as for compression, 18 CDs onto one DVD, do those discs really have enough duplicate data? At least I'd think they compressed it somehow (used more efficient mechanisms, etc) on the DVD, even if once it's installed maybe it's bigger again.Minsc said:
jaundicejuice
Member
Minsc said:
I wish I had checked back in this thread before re-patching the tweaks but what's done is done. I've played the intro enough times now that I just hammer through the stats in character creation and quickly click all of the conversation options with Morte and Dhall to get the journal entry updates I need and move on.
I abhor losing progress in rpgs so I tend to roll with multiple save states and use/abuse quick save, which is now present in Planescape thanks to these fan patches
Edit: Gonna have to give the D3DWindower program a shot, Planescape looked like it was slowing down on parts of the third floor of the mortuary. Ran fraps and saw it was dropping down to nearly single digits in some parts.
Minsc
Gold Member
A Black Falcon said:
I think a lot of those discs weren't full and/or in the case of expansions, very very small. I'm not even sure Covert Ops has videos at all for example, definitely not full mission briefings like the original game. You're right about the duplicate data, in the case of C&C, you could play out the first mission from either side on both discs iirc, and they obviously had a lot of shared sounds/music/graphics.
Here's how the sizes break down, all folders include their expansions except in the case of Zero Hour being separate.
C&C's movie file is 720MB, RA is 795, and TS is 1.35GB, those games are about 80%+ movies, and 100-200MB music/graphics/game.
Generals is interesting in that it did a lot of it's movies in-game, since it was 3D, so the largest files are the textures and speech files.
RA2 used SVGA artwork, so the ratio is a little lower there, the movie files only look to be around 1GB, and Renegade was another 3D one, so no huge amount of live action movies there either.
water_wendi
Water is not wet!
That reminds me that i still havent played the expansion pack for Shadow Warrior.Teknoman said:
It sorta sucks that filling up your resolution means you can't really scroll with the mouse, but this program works wonders. When I get BG1/2, IWD, TOEE, I guess I should also use it? I thought at first it was PST and the Infinity Engine being like that but after raising the resolution, my god, did the framerate take a dip before using this. There is a compatibility fix but you get stupid cursor trailers.jaundicejuice said:
Haven't gotten to any part where TNO or anyone else can level, or it might just be AD&D (not familiar at all with it; also THAC0 is pretty counter-intuitive from someone coming from 3.5E) but I had the same beef with the first NWN with having hp rolls being so damn low on level. Yeah, I know its part of the tabletop but even back in NWN, it was just me against patience where I would just follow the level up prompts until I rolled a full hp from the die. Sucks to have a d10 roll end up giving you 2 or 3 hp (before CON bonuses), even if NWN combat was a non-issue.Minsc said:
How is 4.0E anyway? I sorta avoided the books like the plague but I heard it's very video-gamey. Besides obvious MMO comparisons I've heard about, what's really changed about combat from 3.5E?
Sober said:
It's changed so much that it really shouldn't be seen as having a basis in the mechanics of older editions. The operational distinction between spellcasters, rogues, and combat classes is mostly erased. Traditionally, casters have a pool of powerful expendable effects, rogues have a collection of reusable but less powerful effects, while combat classes have permanent bonuses to the standard fighting rolls. In 4E, these are all implemented through a set of at-will, per-encounter, and per-day "powers" attainable per each class. Combat roles are more sharply defined: each class has a suggested and highly optimal tactical position, whether it be tanking, doing direct damage, healing, or providing combat bonuses to teammates.
You pretty much have to use miniatures and grids. In 3.5 it was still feasible to kind of half-ass abstract out that element of the combat if you wanted to. How your group plays 3.5 really makes the decision as to whether or not 4e is worthwhile. If you spend the lion's share of your time talking to NPCs, verbally interacting with the DM w/r/t room descriptions and exploration, or otherwise engaging in non-combat elements of the game, you should stick with an older edition--whatever you're running now is probably just fine.
On the other hand, if your play sessions focus on grids, miniatures, and tactical maneuvering, give 4E a shot. It places a much greater emphasis on squad-level wargaming than prior editions, which may or may not interest you. The impression I get from people who've played it more than I have is that it does a pretty good job fulfilling that focus.
Teknoman said:
There were some earlier in the thread. Generally very favourable.
Start from http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=418592&page=7 . The discussion goes on for a couple of pages.
(Hee, from back then
Lafazar said:
Realms of the Haunting is one of my favourite games of all time: great story, good writing, memorable characters, impressive sound design, really creepy atmosphere, epic length and a completely unique gameplay with a mix of adventure, FMV and FPS elements.Teknoman said:
The only flaw is the somewhat labyrinthine level design (which I also like, but many people don't), but you can find maps for almost all the big levels in the game. The game rewards exploration big time.
Make sure to read this before playing:
http://www.gog.com/en/forum/realms_of_the_haunting/tips_for_beginners
http://www.gog.com/en/forum/realms_of_the_haunting/where_to_find_the_brains
It's funny how consistently wrong I was with all of my numerous guesses in this thread.mclem said:(Hee, from back then
Minsc
Gold Member
Sober said:
Yea, use D3DWindower whenever you feel your framerate might be dipping. It may not happen much in BG1 or IWD1, and ToEE is a separate engine that doesn't need it (3D). BG2 and IWD2 definitely need it, it's basically all the spell effects that slow down your speeds.
Are you sure about the scrolling? I never have a problem and I almost always play windowed, so D3DWindower never bothered me one bit. There a few mouse options you can tick off, but the game should scroll like normal iirc.
I personally don't mind windowed. I pretty much copied the settings as in the forum post. I tried setting it to 1280x1024 (my native res), but first I lost parts of the screen to the taskbar and to the bar up top. Even when I switched to 1280x720 windowed, (which I play a ton of games in now), and I can never scroll horizontally for some odd reason, because the window is "offscreen", even when I move it centered. In that case, one side stops being able to be mouse scrolled.Minsc said:
I don't mind playing at 1024x768 windowed anyway. Plus it seems to be a big hassle to reinstall the UI mod if I change the resolution, because it seems to want to uninstall everything else or mess it up.
It's strange, I just built a new computer. High end parts, GTX570. And for the first time in years, Baldur's Gate 2 works perfectly right out of the installer. 3D acceleration works, no sprite issues, no slowdown.Minsc said:
Torment, on the other hand, has occasional slowdown for no reason. I can just walk back and forth in the same area, no combat or anything, and the framerate will drop by ~40% every 30 seconds or so. In trying to fix it, I decided that I'd much rather have mouse trails than run the game in a window. (just in case anyone is interested, I posted my fix on the last page)
LocoMrPollock
Banned
Anything coming out this week?
Minsc
Gold Member
LocoMrPollock said:
Most likely, they broke from their somewhat routine Tuesday morning releases last week. They've done releases on all the weekdays in the past at some point or another, but favor Tue/Thurs morning the most, followed by Wed, then the really rare Mon/Fri release.
Lord British
Member
My favourite thing about Alpha Centauri's recent release (besides the game itself) is the fact that it allowed the opportunity for me to say to a friend "Remember Alph? It's back! In GOG form." in Milhouse's voice.
You don't get chances like that very often. And now, back to Crusader. <3
You don't get chances like that very often. And now, back to Crusader. <3
Anyone have any comments on Restaurant Empire?
I've always liked smaller scale simulation games where I'm focusing on one thing instead of a big city or empire, but I've never really heard of it.
On that note, I'm still hoping and praying for Maxis titles to hit GOG now that EA is in cahoots with CDPR. I probably sound like a broken record about that, but it would be awesome to play those games again.
I dunno, I just feel like buying something from GOG. I might go with Arcanum since I'm playing Bloodlines and interested in Troika's catalog.
I've always liked smaller scale simulation games where I'm focusing on one thing instead of a big city or empire, but I've never really heard of it.
On that note, I'm still hoping and praying for Maxis titles to hit GOG now that EA is in cahoots with CDPR. I probably sound like a broken record about that, but it would be awesome to play those games again.
I dunno, I just feel like buying something from GOG. I might go with Arcanum since I'm playing Bloodlines and interested in Troika's catalog.
viewtifulsub
Member
Daily promo: Duke Nukem: Manhatten Project for $2.39
Snuggler said:
Restaurant Empire was developed by Trevor Chan who did The Capitalism and Hotel Giant games. So if you liked either of those you would probably like RE. He tends to make very detailed realistic sims which are great if that's what you like. But if you prefer lighter and more humorous sims such as Pizza Tycoon you probably wouldn't like RE as much.
Just bought Planescape: Torment and Rayman 2.
I got all the recommended mods working on PT (which was a bit of a pain on W7), just wondering if there's a recommended character stats set for starting the game. I'll mainly play intelligent...fighter. Don't really like playing mage-y (party members for that) or as a sneak/thief.
Here's hoping I like this. It sounds right up my alley, besides the whole super-old part.
Also, anyway to get Rayman 2 to go widescreen?
I got all the recommended mods working on PT (which was a bit of a pain on W7), just wondering if there's a recommended character stats set for starting the game. I'll mainly play intelligent...fighter. Don't really like playing mage-y (party members for that) or as a sneak/thief.
Here's hoping I like this. It sounds right up my alley, besides the whole super-old part.
Also, anyway to get Rayman 2 to go widescreen?
viewtifulsub
Member
To get the most out of Planescape, you'll want to focus on Wisdom, Int, and Charisma. Those 3 key stats open up a lot of conversation options in resolving quests or learning more about the story.gdt5016 said:
Stumpokapow
listen to the mad man
Alpha-Bromega
Member
Been playing Alpha Centaui and loving it, has anyone else? I was going to do a LTTP once i got more play time in
Dog Problems
Banned
Picked up Manhattan Project. Really in the mood for more Duke after Forever.
Also, congrats Minsc!
Also, congrats Minsc!
PepsimanVsJoe
Member
I bought the game but I'm currently buried in a bunch of reviews.Alpha-Bromega said:
I guess I could just make up an excuse and put Alpha Centauri in my review queue but honestly..I don't know the first thing about the game. I just remember playing the shit out of it for several hours a day until I had an awesome army and crushed everyone.
PepsimanVsJoe
Member
I dunno. I always felt like I never really "got it". I always played on the easiest setting just so I could take in all of the atmosphere and feel like a Space-God without the whole worrying about losing thing.HK-47 said:
On the other hand I've read a few LPs and most say it's easy peasy regardless of difficulty.
Never played a Civ game past the first one either.