Pyramid Head is definitely a letdown, though. He shows up something like 4 times and it's the easiest thing in the world to take absolutely no damage from him.

Guess I WAS just lazy then ;) Still kind of a strange way of presenting the whole thing. Ah, whatever, enough of Silent Hill 2, I´m happy for those who like it. My favorite is still 4 I guess thanks to the awesome feeling of dread it creates. Only Fatal Frame 3 came close to that as far as I remember...

oh shit, I guess they did explain it. That kind of pisses me off >:. That's probably the difference between opinions. I'm not interested in whatever they've concocted to explain the town "It was Alessa, she's psychic!" Hell I don't want anything in the series explained to well. I like that they leave everything disjointed and expect you to put them together.

The games twist is not that big of a surprise. You'd probably have figured it out before it happened even without it being spoiled. What it does is completely change how we see James, everything said and done is thrown into a completely different light. I was 14 when I first played this game which makes it easier to admit I teared up when you walk down that long hallway. You hear how his relationship with Mary was like near the end, James was trapped in a complicated emotional scenario and it did not end well for him. Silent Hill 2 is sadder than it is scary.

You´re right about one thing: It´s hard to appreciate certain games if you play them "later". The classic example would be Final Fantasy 6 and 7. If you never played them back then and play them now, you tend to say "What, THAT´S it?" It´s some kind of you-had-to-be-there-thing.

I´ll try to explain my relation to Silent Hill a little differently:

I really love alternate, twisted realities, compact pockets of chaos, chunks of hell, glimpses of the screaming insanity of the warp, the mind-shattering horror of the void as it thickly drips into our normal reality and brings with it the beauty of total insanity (I can´t describe it much better in english). Maybe that´s why I like the original premise of Silent Hill so much, it has this glimpse of madness in it that Silent Hill 2 lacks. 2 on the other hand HAS a certain comfiness (can you say that?) to it, since James really isn´t phased all that much by anything he encounters. His sadness and denial weigh heavier than Silent Hill itself, which is impressive.

Though I was dissappointed that James was really just a sad slob in denial rather than...I don´t know, I just thought his state had more of an impact to the town, if you know what I´m trying to say.

I think I understand what you're saying, sort of like some immense Lovecraftian horror that once seen cannot be unseen. Personally, I like to think of Silent Hill as more like a phenomenon where a person's psychological disposition has a physical effect on the reality of the town. If a person with a good state of mind came to Silent Hill I imagine they'd find it very pleasant. Basically the town is just an unthinking psychological mirror of those inhabiting it. Everybody in Silent Hill 2 is self-hating so naturally they're treated poorly but notice they don't try to leave. Unlike other Silent Hill's there are no huge gaps in the road, James is free to leave but refuses to do so.

This interpretation breaks down with the other SH's but that's okay. I love all the Silent Hill's except for Homecoming (I haven't played Shattered Memories yet).

The town reflecting the visitor´s mind-thing is about what I think as well. When it´s in its "normal" state at least.

And imagine how much fun "Daisies wonderful vacation in Silent Hill" would be as a game :D

Silent Hill 2 is essentially a non-terrible Halloween 3 of the SH series. Well, it was until SH4. It's just a really solid stand-alone game. The town is the antagonist and everything that James sees is a manifestation of his own guilt. You can even explain the scantily-clad nurses in that way, even though they pop up in every other game in the series. It's all about confronting one's demons, and that's what every character trapped in the town is doing. I agree with Hadas in that it's cool that there's no stupid child-God or anything over the top like that.

While we're on the subject... I didn't mind SH4 as much as some people seem to. It was pretty shitty compared to what I'd played in the series before, but it's not entirely unplayable based on its own merits.

Huh, that's kind of weird. I played some SH2 just the other day. Granted, it was only for an hour or so. After reading some of your comments, I can definitely back up the comment regarding empty buildings with too many doors.
But, as said, I only played a small part of the game.

FUCKING GOT IT! Man, if it weren't for the RPG/grenade loophole, I would have broken my tv out of frustration.

i turned my ps3 on and had a message that said "i was promised hentai" it made me laugh so muh i don't even know the guy

Aaaaand there goes Illusion of Time/Gaia. Piss-easy, stupid story, another on of those games that left a better impression on me when I was a kid. But still quite good entertainment.

:lol

Left 4 Dead.

I like it less than I did when I was playing the demo. If any of you chumps want to hit me up, I haven't played Blood Harvest at all yet.

Versus mode is fucking bad. Playing as the Infected is like being the Spy in TF2 if you couldn't cloak or disguise, and if backstabbing people didn't result in an instant kill. And if you made horrendous amounts of noise while walking everywhere. And could only use the butterfly knife against a team of Soldiers.

yea playing versus kind of requires some sun tzu strategy :(

New version of Brawl Plus came out the other day. Ness got a nice set of tweaks, though his Lightning is a lot faster, so I have to get used to the new timing. Still, he's got way more options now.

Civilizations IV is really kicking my ass. I love strategy games in theory but the problem is I'm fucking awful at them. The highest score I've been able to muster so far is Warren G. Harding.

wat

Is Nintendo re-releasing Brawl with tweaks every year like Street Fighter now, or are you doing some dirty Homebrew shit

Edit: so I looked at Brawl+, and I was intrigued until the "stage freeze" option came up, along with "Rumble Falls is the Online Waiting Room: When picking Rumble Falls in offline VS. mode only, it will be replaced with the Online waiting room stage." Is this backed in any way by Dylan TNGA? :lol

I hope the complete removal of items is present in the changelist, I can't stand Super Smash Bros not being completely free of pesky random elements!

Love this game. Have lost many days to it.

Items are still something you set yourself. Rumble Falls is ass, though. I leave almost all of the stages turned on, but I'll let fucking Electroplankton be turned on before I play that stage. It's just not fun. Stage freeze is also optional, though off by default. Which is good, because Summit fucking rocks :rock

The only major changes to the game are:
-slightly faster. Not immediately noticeable
-no tripping (unless by banana, or Dedede's forward smash, which now shakes the stage)
-you keep momentum after you jump, which was in Melee. In Brawl, jumping slows you down. This is mostly to help Capt. Falcon have more control of the stage and recover better. Helps Yoshi a lot too, actually, since his Up B becomes viable.
-some changes to the move sets (i.e. Ganon's down B in the air gives him his second jump back, Lucario can attack after using his Up B, Mario's Fludd has more knockback for both the opponent and Mario if he's in the Air).
-no bullshit chain grabbing from assholes like Falco.
-custom skins (Teenage Mutant Ninja Squirtle! :rock)
-unlimited time for replays
-the pause camera can go anywhere now

I think it's a lot more fun. Falcon, Ganondorf, Yoshi, Link, and Sonic probably got the biggest improvements. And of course Metaknight got toned down. They really didn't add anything stupid like wavedashing or whatever. And since it runs off of cheat codes, you can still boot up the game normally and play regular Brawl.

At least try it out before you knock it. It's not as retarded as you think. At least, not as retarded as Brawl Minus. But I kinda want to play that...

Rumble Falls is fine, you ninny

Although I play Peach and can KO everyone if I time my final smash with the stage speedup, so that's probably why I don't hate it :lol

Yea, I like jumping for 10 minutes. Give that stage designer a raise! :rolleyes

I guess it's more exciting than Mushroomy Kingdom. At least Rumble Falls has shit happening in it.

so fuck star wars force unleashed. this game looks fucking beautiful and the gameplay is fantastic, but it is impossible to see everything that's going on. the radar really needs to show enemies. and the lightsaber duels make no fucking sense. this faggot i fight jumps around all over the place and i have to dart around like a chicken with its fucking head cut off

i liked the force unleashed it was a good game i really hope they fix the issues in the sequel anyways a friend lend me gta 4 for ps3 so i'm replaying that one

Heh, so I spent around 2 days downloading the Star Trek Open Beta-Client, and Darkvare was nice enough to provide me with a key, thanks again for that :)

But guess what? The key is just for the closed beta, the open beta needs a new one :(

Let´s try this Amazon-preorder-get-the-key-then-cancel-your-order-again-thing...

Apart from that and REALLY wanting Mass Effect 2, I just can´t play much right now somehow...tried Fallen Earth for a few hours but as it seems there´s only one way to play that game and I don´t like MMOs that have one golden way and many inferior ones.

I'm really liking Darksiders. I find it's a cross between Zelda and Ninja Gaiden, which is only a good thing.