Finally done with Red Dead Redemption!
Red Dead Redemption 100% Completion
Now, I can still complete the “Undead Nightmare” DLC addon (which seems rather hilarious and like a lot of fun). I still have “Brütal Legend” and “Uncharted 2″ to complete, too.
What should I play first…?
Just read a very interesting blog article about Starcraft 2. Some dude built a java program that finds the optimal build order for Zerg units. It uses genetic algorithms to iteratively find the “best” order of building and while doing so, finds some things that seem very counterintuitive for Starcraft2 players.
This — if optimized and built upon by other developers — might change the state of Starcraft league play a lot. After all, this game (and its predecessor) is one of the most-played competition games worldwide, with five-figure prize money for good players.
I foresee this being the new chess, with fixed openings (i.e. build orders) that are put up against each other. The only difference to chess: You can’t see the opening that your opponent will use and thus can’t react until you make first contact.
There’s also an iPhone app doing something like that: $2.99 in the Appstore.
A lengthy posting in the Bethesda blog reveals more details about the upcoming port of Rage for the iPhone. As seen earlier, John Carmack seems to be really excited about his newest masterpiece and he shares a couple interesting details:
Carmack states that id took a “little slice of RAGE” and focused on the quintessential “shooter values” of shooting, hitting and surviving.
The name of the game: “Mutant Bash TV”. Oh, I’m so looking forward to that game. I so hope it will be in the german AppStore.
The article is full of technical details that show how awkward some of Apple’s OS design decisions seem to be, while others are just great for game development. If you are a game and/or programming geek, go read it here!
So, someone leaked an early alpha version of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm. Everyone’s pretty much in arms about it and weirdly enough, no official statements by Blizzard have been posted yet.
Usually after a such leak, warnings ensue that the downloads will be trojaned, you shouldn’t install untrusted (i.e. pirated) software, that your WoW account might be phished, etc.
In this case, however, it’s quite easy to see if the Alpha is authentic. And from all I can see, it is. The installer is digitally signed by a Thawte Code Signing certificate issued on April 30th, 2010 to… Blizzard.
The installer (which merges new content with a copy of your “normal” WoW installation) downloads files from a CDN that is also used for the official WoW downloads. The included realm list has the “official” testing realms in it. The WoW.exe is probably signed, too (didn’t actually check yet).
So, it’s authentic. But what good is it?
A recent blue post by Blizzard outlines the changes in the rage system that will occur in Cataclysm. It sounds like yet another complete overhaul and I can only guess if it will be for the better.
Basically, the problems with the current rage system are
a) Rage starvation – you have used up all your rage and have to wait for damage to be done by or to you in order to regain rage. This is especially hard if you’re an off tank who has to maintain a constant high threat level in order to be able to pick off a non-tauntable boss or soak up occasional threat-based damage from a special ability (think Patchwerk in Naxxramas).
b) Next-swing attacks that fail to coherently soak up rage when it is there – if you have Heroic Strike off cooldown and hit it for next swing, you might be out of rage by the time that next swing comes. In my DPS spec, I have this problem with my Fury rotation (Whirlwind, Bloodthirst, Slam if free CD, rinse&repeat) whenever I try to squeeze in an extra Heroic Strike or Cleave.
c) Infinite rage: Warriors, especially tanks, don’t need to manage rage in a boss fight, period. There is not a lot of possibilities to run out of rage if you are tanking a current-level Raid boss. I don’t think this is a problem per se, but I acknowlege the fact that this somehow trivializes gameplay and might be perceived as unfair by DKs (who run out of rune power) and mana classes.
Blizzard will address these problems with a number of mechanic changes.
Full blue post after the page break.