40" Samsung LN40A550. It's perfect.

Or if you're feeling more spendy, the newer models are supposedly even nicer, with higher refresh rates and such.

^This. It wasn't a very good demo. It's like they just cut a small chunk out of the game and said 'go!'. Most demos would have suggested that you could shoot the lights or something. But this just throws you in and gives you a gun almost immediately. Not everyone played Butcher Bay. Not everyone is going to get into a Riddick 'mode' without being prompted to. This demo did nothing to introduce the character or his capabilities to new players, unlike the beginning of Butcher Bay, which had you starting out running from gunfire, fistfighting, and sneak attacking, introducing all the other gameplay mechanics and dialogue trees before letting you have at it with the guns. I appreciate them wanting to introduce a new gameplay element, but they skipped over almost everything that made Butcher Bay so interesting, I suppose, for fear of giving the impression that Dark Athena is 'more of the same'.

Can't say I care for the drone thing either. It seems like a way of making the game easier, which further negates the need for the player to use any of Riddick's unique abilities.

I feel bad for the new players who might overlook this game now because of a poorly executed demo.

My impressions:

• The default control sensitivity was AWFUL. I spent about half my play time adjusting this. I found that if you turn the X+Y acceleration speed up all the way, then all you have to do is adjust the sensitivity and you're set. Before I did that, it felt like I was playing drunk.

• I hope the full game lets you turn the motion blur down/off. It's unrealistic and distracting, and it slows down the game's performance. Yes, I actually experienced slowdown. After playing Butcher Bay on the PC, and having it run at mega fast speeds, this is yuck.

• This really doesn't look any better than Butcher Bay, graphically. I'd go so far as to say that the "upgrade" they spoke of is nothing more than scaling up the resolution and adding motion blur. Whatever, it's still a good looking engine today, even if the textures aren't going to be the best on the system.

• WTF is with making the menu completely untextured, as opposed to the gritty mettalic look of the original? I'm dumbfounded. It looks worse. It also seems to change brightness depending on where you're standing. I had to unpause and move once because the menu was too dark. Silly.

• The demo was short, in length and variety. It's not showing off any of the other neat gameplay mechanics of the original. I hope no one gets it in their head that these Riddick games are just average shooters and nothing else. (They will now though.)

All in all, I have a few gripes, but I'm still going to pick this up the day it comes out. I love riddick, and Butcher Bay was incredible. Even if it turns out Dark Athena doesn't top Butcher Bay, it'll still be something new. And if it sells well enough, maybe we'll see a 3rd game, with more improvements!

Turn-based RPGs, and Japanese-style RPGs have gone way downhill since the PS1 days. Every play Final Fantasy 7, 8, 9? Chrono Cross? They just had something that today's games seem to lack. Namely quality and originality. Lost Oddessy gets the closest to being as good as them, but ultimately doesn't quite go there.

That's my opinion anyway.

[QUOTE="iboo01"][QUOTE="Draylorn"]

Agreed. And you know why... it's beacuse most of the jRPGs from that era were all completely different games with good if not excellent original stories and fresh new styles of play. Vagrant Story, Threads of Fate, Legend of Mana, Legend of Legaia, Legend of Dragoon... And now today you get "Oh, it's turned based, BUT, we added (X)!" Great. Thanks. Or "hey, it's also an ACTION game!" - but they fail to mention that the action is nowhere near Devil May Cry or even Dynasty warriors in terms of depth and fun. (There are of course some exceptions; I'm generalizing)

Even a remake/sequel to Vagrant Story would seem fresh at this point (and would be great, too!)

You know what Square Enix should really try their hand at? A first-person RPG, ala Oblivion or King's Field. THAT would be something!

great_rulo

He never mentioned the word "suck", read first, if im not wrong he meant that the action in the "new" JRPGs are advertised as innovative but it doesn't compare to the great action games, like DMC(been a fan of DW for quite some time but it's not that great) or Ninja Gaiden 1, agree on that.

I think all those games you mentioned are nothing compared to the old ones either, the light novels in LO for instance are great and really well done, BUT i'd take the War of the Lions story from Fial Fantasy Tactics over it any day of the year.

I didn't say the action in Dynasty Warriors was good either. That was more of an example of a kinda sucky action game that still beats the new jRPGs in the action department.

and iBoo01, I did say that there are exceptions. I liked FFXII quite a lot actually, and Lost Odessy is a good one too, but even the better of the newer games are still harder to stick with than the older Squaresoft titles.

And to put some reality to that statement, I have recently gone back and played the old greats again, and finished them again. They've still got lasting appeal. (Vagrant Story, Threads of Fate, Legend of Mana...) A lot of the newer games, I will probably not finish or ever go back to. They're just inferior.

So far it's I've only gotten chilled by Bioshock and Condemned.

Sorry, most game devs just aren't very good at making things really scary!

Agreed. And you know why... it's beacuse most of the jRPGs from that era were all completely different games with good if not excellent original stories and fresh new styles of play. Vagrant Story, Threads of Fate, Legend of Mana, Legend of Legaia, Legend of Dragoon... And now today you get "Oh, it's turned based, BUT, we added (X)!" Great. Thanks. Or "hey, it's also an ACTION game!" - but they fail to mention that the action is nowhere near Devil May Cry or even Dynasty warriors in terms of depth and fun. (There are of course some exceptions; I'm generalizing)

Even a remake/sequel to Vagrant Story would seem fresh at this point (and would be great, too!)

You know what Square Enix should really try their hand at? A first-person RPG, ala Oblivion or King's Field. THAT would be something!

I haven't been able to get obsessed with a jRPG since Vagrant Story. That one was so good, everything since then has seemed lacking in richness, mostly settling for repeating environments, convoluted anime style writing and dialogue, and general hollowness. I think the last one I actually finished was Final Fantasy X, and that was mostly for my wife's sake. Man was I disappointed when that one ended.

The only one that came close to sparking my interest again recently was Infinite Undiscovery, but I eventually got sick of how much of a wimp the main character is, and again, the awful dialogue is just grating. Lots of pauses for characters to say each other's names a lot and gasp all the time. Jesus Christ, make some characers that act like PEOPLE.

I think my main beef with these now is that every single one leaves me feeling like I'm watching a crappy anime and playing a game that a team of developers somehow couldn't make consistently fun. The hardcore RPG is dead in Japan.

I got the game yesterday, and managed to finally beat arcade mode after about 5 hours. On easy.

Son of a ****