FIFE's blog

Mass Effect 3 Review

The release of Mass effect 3 is only 2 weeks away and for all of us, who are a bit impatien, there's the demo, which let's you experience the first mission and also a mission later on in the game.

The demo delivers a good view on the game and gives you a good idea how the final product will look like.

Single player in demo delivers a solid experience and gives you a good insight on the story. The demo also gives you the oportunity to try out the multiplayer of ME3.

Multiplayer curently consists of 2 maps, 1 type of enemies, all player characters, which have to be unlocked through buying power up packs with in-game credits, that you earn from missions, which also give you access to more characters, weapons, mods, etc.

You can play with up to 4 team members and the game type in demo looks like a survival of enemy waves... Meanwhile you don't just defend yourself, but you also have to make objectives - like destroying targets within certain time, defend positions, destroy huge robots...

All characters can wield 2 weapons and class specific powers, such as the biotic charge for the adept and the combat drone for the engineer, etc. Weapons and abilities are upgradeable, but in order to upgrade weapons, you will have to buy power up packs from the store with your in-game credits and to upgrade your skills, you'll have to spend your skill points which you gain through experience.

There are 2 packs available in the demo:

The Recruit pack for 5.000 credits and
The veteran pack for 20.000 credits.

Each of these packs contains random items-so you have to gamble for good equipment and power-ups.

So let’s talk/write about what is going to change or what we can see in Mass effect 3, that wasn't in previous versions of the game.

Game play changes

As stated from the Lead Game play Designers, Mass effect 3 will strive towards richer RPG features, more combat options and more complex enemies.

Also they stated, that they are going to focus on "sense of exploration, intense combat, a deep non-linear story that is affected by your actions ( we experienced this element in the previous versions), rich customization of your armor, weapons and appearance". I have to say, that it was quite disturbing in ME2, where a player had a full inventory all the time, and had to scavenge it for the better items to equip. Luckily, developers noticed this issue and said, that this won’t be the case in ME3.

Combat

As seen in the demo, the basic mechanics changes in the game aren't so dramatic as from ME1 to ME2, however there are a few improvements and capabilities:

-Difficulty will be increased, Normal will be "the new Veteran".

-An increase in overall combat speed of 10-15%.

-Shepard is now more agile in combat. Changes to movement in combat include the ability to roll, leap over ledges or gaps without taking cover first,optimized maneuvering and firing from cover and the removal of fatigue while running.

-Melee plays a larger role, all classes receive improved melee with each one receiving a unique heavy melee attack.

-Enemy AI has been improved. Enemies now perform specific functions on the battlefield and coordinate with other enemies. For example, 'cover buster' enemies, such as Husks, are often paired with a 'suppressor' enemy type, which will try to keep Shepard in cover while the Husks get in close.

 

Weapons

There are several changes, that they made in Mass effect 3, these are:

- All classes can wield any type of weapon. There will be a limit (weight) by the number of weapons they can carry, only the Soldier class will have the luxury to wield every class weapon at once.

- There will be weapon modification options, where players will be able to modify their weapons by their will (barrels, scopes, materials).

- Grenades will count as usable weapon, but in ME3 grenades will have a different appearance and mechanics than those in Mass effect. ME3 grenades are "round and conventional, they are thrown at enemies and detonate after a short time" (PS3.ign.com)

Powers

They also added a larger skill tree for every class and some new additions to the lineup, but I won't write about it, let it be a surprise :)

Different play styles

In ME3, they also added different play styles for people with different tastes of their gameplay (Role playing, Action and Story). Let’s say you are not a fan of the whole story driven agenda, so you can choose action mode, wich will allow you to cut out the scenes, the CPU will basically pre-select random dialogue options, between paragon and renegade choices. The Role playing type, is the standard Mass effect game style as in previous versions, meanwhile the story mode will make the combat easy as sh*t, so you can explore and enjoy the story.

All in all the demo is pretty well done.

It gives you a nice taste of the game without giving to much of the story away.

A little preview:

 

This review will get updated once the full game comes out, so stay tuned :)

Written by: Hakol, FIFE and Kaveek

World of tanks is a MMO where as you already might have guessed by the name the main focus is on tank warfare... The game is set in the WWII era and also includes some minor RPG elements. Like in all MMO's you start off with a "starter" tank, which isn't really that great, but still gets the job done. You can choose from 4 tech trees to advance in. You can choose between the germans, the french, the americans and the russians. 

... more

My top 9 final fantasy songs

From Various Different Artists

9.J E N O V A theme - bLiNd (FF VII Advent Children)

8.To Zanarkand - Nobuo Uematsu (FF X)

7.Freya's theme - Nobuo Uematsu (FF IX)

6.Deliverance of the heart - pixietricks, zircon (FF VII)

5.Crystal Seremon - Trenthian (Multiple FF Games)

4.Celtic Moon - ENJA? (FF IV)

3.Zanarkand Ruins (FF X)

2.Stoney Eyes - Shnabubula (FF VII)

1.Aeris Theme - Nobuo Uematsu (FF VII)

... more

As you all know, there is a serious threat against freedom of using internet as we use it today! Rich people want to become richer and they want to become richer by implementing new law-agreement, Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement or simply or simply called acta!


What is ACTA?

ACTA is an international trade agreement negotiated by the European Union, the United States, Japan, Canada, South Korea, Australia, Mexico, Morocco, Singapore as well as a few other countries, whose aim is to enforce copyright and tackle counterfeited goods.

The main problem with this treaty is that all the negotiations were done secretly, keeping the public and civil organizations out of the table. All the information until 2010 relied on leaks that reveal intentional secrecy to misled the public. ACTA negotiations started on 2007 and finalized in 2010.


CONSEQUENCESWHICH ACTA BRINGS:

-INTERNET CENSORSHIP
-CONTROL OVER OUR INTERNET ACTIVITIES
-LOSS  OF FREEDOMANDLIMITINGCIVILRIGHTS
-PENALTY (such as loss of Internet access)


Check out this easy to understand video what ACTA could bring!




Sadly, Slovenia also signed agreement and today there were protest in 2 cities (Maribor and Ljubljana).


In Maribor weather was awful (from -5 to -9 degrees celsius with a strong wind).
On facebook 2000 people attended the event to protest against ACTA in Maribor, but only around 300 of us came. Shame that many want to live in a better world, but they do not act against ACTA...
PEOPLE! YOU CAN'T START A "REVOLUTION" FROM YOUR BED!


Protest was peaceful-without violence. There was a stage with an open microphone, so anybody could share their thoughts about ACTA.


Here is something I've captured on protests with my mobile phone (sorry about bad quality)




You can sign the petition against ACTA here



Stop ACTA by spreading the word! Tweet it, post it on facebook, digg it! Do anything you can to stop this threat!


Some photos from protest:

In my opinion one of the best games ever made!

You all remember, that there were games that contained map editors with them, when you purchased them! Warcraft 3 is one of those better games that does contain it!

Best thing about map editors is that fans can actually produce new maps, write stories or even make a new game types for the game! In warcraft that's exactly what happened! Even if the game is old almost 10 years (released in 2002) it still lives and has many players around the globe fighting against each other over internet!

Game types that were played in warcraft:

1. Tower defense: One of the most addicting game types ever! Why? Because it has an arcade soul! Mainly your objective is that you have a worker and you build towers around the route where minions travel to your base! The main objective is to destroy all the enemies before they reach your base... You can upgrade your towers select type of the towers and many more! For each enemy you kill you gain gold!

2. Melee: The most typical game type of strategy games! The main thing about this game type is to defeat an enemies base... Completely remove your enemy from the face of the map with the help of your allies or by yourself! Each team starts with a certain amount of gold and workers... Your speed and wisdom depend on your victory (How quickly you manage to build your army)! Special thing about warcraft is that you can have up to 3 heroes to acompany your army with their special skills and spells! They can be trained to level 10!

3. RPG: Some of the game fans just had to much time and made a complete RPG game type from warcraft! The main objective is to complete quests and train your hero! In this game type you focus completely on 1 unit (hero)! It's interesting because RPG types have a story... Which makes a game more fun to play (unlike Melee maps). WORLD OF WARCRAFT WAS BORN

4. Dota (Defense of the ancients): Game type where you control one hero and your main objective is to destroy other teams base... First you have to kill defense towers and many oposite team players with many, many AI minions spawned by enemies base. Each Base spawns minions which travel on certain routes to enemies base... Both team minions are spawned at the same time and are very balanced... The victory completely depends on players actions! This fanmade map was so popular that the creators of the map decided to create their own Online game... League Of Legends! (It is completely free and you can download it here)

5. Other: There were many other maps released with many, many different game types worth of playing! Check out Warcraft 3 with Frozen Throne! You Won't Regret it! From zombie survivals to pokemon... Warcraft has seen it all!

DOWNLOAD WARCRAFT MAPS HERE:

EpicWar

Warcraft-maps

Maps are automatically downloaded from players that host the games!

What do you need to play online (LAN simulators)?

1. Garena is the best LAN simulator and there are many users on it... You can play many games through Garena which simulates LAN connection! Frozen Throne, Left 4 Dead, Borderlands and many more! It is for free and more you play, the higher level you gain! Simple to install and free to use! Yeah... It is true, you don't need cable to play LAN games ;D

3. Tunngle is Good as garena

2. Hamachi was the first... it simulates the LAN but it is way worse than garena... I perfer garena but if you have any problems with it, feel free to try hamachi!

Join the battle now!