Rage

[Fiach]

Yes, there is a quake one in Dans car but you cant pick it up unfortunately, lots of nice surprises though, like the guy with the DOOM T Shirt, Crazy Joe :)

[Art Blade]

The enemies remind me of the suicide bombers of Serious Sam.

[Fiach]

The enemies remind me of the suicide bombers of Serious Sam.

You would be surprised at how similar they are to the enemies in Borderlands, I'm surprised that there are no copyright cases between ID and Gearbox, I'm not saying which came first, but its like they were both sitting exams and spent alot of time peeking at each others papers :)

Bobbleheads/Anarchist Symbol/enemy types/music/graphics/buggy racing and combat/the desert plus frontier town ambience...

While playing Rage, I often get the urge to replay Borderlands (not instead of Rage, but after I finish).

[Art Blade]

Borderlands was fun and unique. Releasing Rage now  is not making it appear unique any more. BL was faster, apparently. To me it looks as if iD kind of went like, "hey guys, sorry we're late, but here's our version of all those great games you already played."

[Dweller_Benthos]

Well, I picked it up at Best Buy this afternoon and with my coupons and discounts, it came in under $50 so that wasn't bad, but still more than I would have liked. Closer to $30 would have been nice.

Anyway, installed it on Steam and it took almost an hour just to copy from the DVDs, glad I didn't try to install it online, that would eat up 4 MONTHS of my download alotment. It's still downloading ~400MB+ of updates or something though, so I won't have time to play it tonight.....

But I did get a message from Steam saying my video card drivers are not up to date enough to play the game. Funny, when I go to the nvidia website to check for drivers, they say I am up to date. Then I see the little link for beta drivers and the most recent ones do mention something about Rage compatibilty. Also found this link:

http://www.geforce.com/News/articles/how-to-unlock-rages-high-resolution-textures-with-a-few-simple-tweaks

That might explain some things about why people are having graphics issues. You may want to try those manual settings and see if that helps. They don't mention SLI cards though, since I have two 1GB cards, does that count to get me over the 1.5GB memory barrier to play the game on super high resolution? Hope so.

[Fiach]

I just read some of that and thank christ I use a 360, it looks great and I get to keep my granny :)

[Fiach]

Just a heads up, I added a video to my post on page 18, it shows all the card locations, crikey I missed a bunch of fairly obvious ones.

[Binnatics]

Well, D_B, don't worry about these tweaks. What you're downloading right now is probably the first patch they launched. There you can set the quantity of GPU mem to be used. Well, you can choose between high or low usage of such.
You should be glad you have NVidia in this case; at least you won't have these artifacts, which is VERY annoying.
For me, that is still not fixed; they say AMD should do that >:((

I'm still busy with my first playthrough, and I think it will be my last as well. When I finish it, I'll check some of the MP and then make a final game rating of Rage. The game won't get much points from me. I predict below 6 average ^-^

[Fiach]

I've been playing now for about 8/9 hours and I'm still on the first disc, I just rescued a guy from prison, so I dunno where they got the idea that the game is only 12 hours long. Its enjoyable enough, but not in the same league as Fallout for depth, or Borderlands for shooting.

I have an ATI card Binnatics, I always had Nvidia previously and I have never had a problem with them, but this fecking ATI card is a pile of shite, their support is bloody useless and I would never buy another one of them, lots of people on forums have the same complaints, so I wouldnt blame Rage for an ATI cards deficiencies.

I have tried Rage (PC version) and it played without artifacts but the pop up was annoying but not game breaking. I also had some problems with sound (eg. feet not sounding while running) I played at 1024X768, try that resolution see how it goes (my screen is CRT).

[Binnatics]

My next gfx card will definitely be an Nvidia. I've had far too many problems with ATI cards. I'm sort of done with it.
I saw that Deadman allready completed an entire playthrough in 14 hours. I'm at 19 hours now, and will go for that rescue you just did. But I had the lagging, and restart, which took me time. I play at nightmare settings which makes it go slow sometimes.

[Fiach]

WOW 19 hours and still on disc one! cool!  :-X

Looking forward to Deadmans opnions on the game. :)

[Binnatics]

I'm in trouble with the authority now ;)
Freed the captain, and retrieved my Ark-ID. I went into the hideout where the bandits make their RC robot cars, to get some sort of extra power prototype for my friend back in the settlement. But when I got in another BSoD shook me up. Let's try again :D >:D \:/

[Binnatics]

Well, finally some possitive news: Fiach, did you try the custom made "pop rockets" allready? Damn, I like these bullets/shelves.
They are the extreme type of shotgun ammo, and will turn your shotgun into a grenadelauncher. Well, sort of. The result is that you shoot an enemy and he'll explode into a pool of blood. Should be very effective against mutants, gonna try that now in Dead city. They are quite effective against bandits (even the highly armored ones) but they'll completely destroy any remains of the bandit, including anything lootable.
I also began to like the fatboys. Very nice bullets against Authority soldiers. Headshots do become important there, because you have to shoot their helmets off. Well, that makes them far better killable. After shooting their helmets, (one fatboy needed) another fatboy in the head, sometimes 2, is enough to finish them. With normal bullets you'll need almost a mag to shoot the helmet off  :-\\ but these fatboys make it a good fight >:D

Other things that keep annoying me: All the characters (not even one excluded) take themselves too seriously. I'd rather have seen some more humor there. And the few girls who seem to look good, will only hang against walls telling you some few words every now and then. They don't participate in the gameplay :-\\

[Fiach]

Well I tend to use the pistol mostly, I have over 1000 rounds of mg ammo, I only started using the Fat Boys in the second visit to Dead City, it was just too time consuming using normal bullets.

After 10.5 hours, I have moved to Disc 2, about an hour of that was dicking around looking for cards, I like the game, but only like it, I'm wondering was that 10.5 hours (plus 3.5 that I had to replay) a waste of time, its only now that a storyline is beginning to emerge. The game has no character/charm, the characters are flat and lifeless (RDR had great characters for example), all it has are graphics, it really is a tech demo.

There are no RPG elments as far as I can see, the quests are just plain stupid. The inventory is just annoying to look at. The only thing I craft is the odd grinder for doors, I pick up tons of stuff I have absolutely no idea what its for or will I need it for something later. I have a few grand in money, the only thing to spend it on would be bullets, due to the ridiculous amount of bullets it takes to kill an enemy.

I hope to god there is some payoff at the end, I'm not a great FPS fan, so probably a bad judge, but I have playd tons of much better FPS games, I wont even bother talking about the RPG aspect.

I saw an advert on TV tonight for it, and a review quote flashed across the screen : DESTRUCTOID : UTTERLY BLOODY FANTASTIC! The Destructoid site only gave the game 7/10, so they definately took the word "FANTASTIC" out of context and mis-represented the review, None of those words appear in the review.

http://www.destructoid.com/review-rage-212834.phtml

Check the Advert at 0.25 :

Rage - UK TV Advert Trailer

[PZ]

Thanks for reporting guys - the more you play (and report your experiences), the more I realize I should not get the game until it becomes a bargain shelf item.  It doesn't sound like the kind of game I would like at this time.  ;)

[Fiach]

Yeah mate its very bland, the gfx are awesome, but the rest is shooting and racing that arent particularly great. You wake up in an Ark, get brought to a town, do  a series of totally random quests, then 10 hours later, meet another Ark survivor and go to another town and do a bunch of random quests.

Most dungeons/hideouts are quite banal, the bigger "better" ones are great while you play them, great atmosphere and very creepy, with blood dripping off walls, alien growths on walls, kinda like something in the game Prey, quite scary looking, but its just scenary, it does nothing. But after you get out, you are trying to remember if there was any standout moment, but to no avail.

Some dungeons are re-used in the normal direction, some are the same place, but you go in from what was your last exit and w%&k backwards. I knew they were taking the piss when they sent me back to Dead City and it was the same as the first visit, just in reverse and upon its completion I got an Achievement called  ytiC daeD  :D

It takes ages to kill some enemies for no real reason, just to make you change your bullets. Head Shots and Torso shots for the most part, do the same damage, so accuracy isnt very important .... in a shooting game ffs. :'( On top of that, there is no reward for combat, You kill mutants, you get nothing, their bodies disappear ... maybe I just dreamed I killed them. Other enemies take a more ammo to kill, than you loot off their bodies and tough armoured enemies that take 3X more bullets to kill give the same amount of loot, as the easier ones, You cant take their weapons and you dont even get XP, so it just makes it a pointless excercise to me.
There are a couple of "boss" battles, but the bosses drop nothing, you just get to go through a gate or door and carry on through the dungeon.

You could argue that the thrill of combat is its own reward, but there is no thrill to it, you just hose them with bullets, turtle up when they use grenades, then pop up and hose them again. Even with the pistol, I just hold the trigger when they are in my sights and dont let go until they go into cover mode, I like pistols and consider them a sort of precision weapon, here they are just a gun with a smaller magazine than the MG as head shots are pointless, I try to play most shooters with a pistol where possible, I feel a certain sense of achievement when I do it successfully, but here it was just meh.

The racing, well, I dont play racing games (Forza and TDU is all), so I cant comment, they (to me) were neither good or bad, I think it was ill-judged that for a shooting game, you have to race to progress the story.

[PZ]

That does it for me - from your last description I know I would be disappointed in the game.  I don't particularly like "bosses", aliens, mutants, unpredictable weapon mechanics, etc - basically everything you wrote about except the graphics.

As I was playing FC2 last night I recalled this thread and still marveled at what I saw - FC2 has everything that I like in a game, mostly the realistic landscape, weapons, people, etc.

Thanks for posting your detailed observations, Fiach  :-X

[Binnatics]

As I was playing FC2 last night I recalled this thread and still marveled at what I saw - FC2 has everything that I like in a game, mostly the realistic landscape, weapons, people, etc.

That is exactly what's running through my mind all the time when I think of the numerous disappointments this game has to offer when it comes to graphics. Everything is fake!!!
And you're right Fiach; It does nothing!!

I totally agree on what you say about the challenges / missions in the game. Repetitive waste of bullets, and proceeding to higher 'levels' the only diffenrence is the "extra waste of bullets". You get the same dumb acting enemies, saying the same dumb things, moving the same, with slightly different helmets, and the same quantities. The only difference: The consume much more lead.
I had to unload an entire mag of pistol rounds just to shoot the helmet off a guy. What made that last bullet so special that suddenly the helmet popped off ????

Oh, something else that heavily annoys me: When you're in cover shooting them bastards (cover is necessary on nightmare because of the deadly impact of their bullets which appear the same bullets I'm using, lol) I recognized that very often my bullet gets blocked by a wall that should not be there. I mean, you have to calculate an extra few cm of space from any edge of an object or cover, just to prevent your bullet getting stopped by the "air around the object". Now ain't that incredible for a shooter :o :o :o

The RPG part of the game is pure fiction, same for the 'open world- so called -exploration'. There's no such thing as "free exploration". I thought jumping on top of things in FC2 was problematic; well, don't try to jump on something in Rage; you won't even be able to jump on a chair. Nothing is accessable but the main path.

Some dungeons are re-used in the normal direction, some are the same place, but you go in from what was your last exit and w%&k backwards. I knew they were taking the piss when they sent me back to Dead City and it was the same as the first visit, just in reverse and upon its completion I got an Achievement called  ytiC daeD  :D

That achievement was a bummer indeed Fiach, damn I was so incredibly disappointed by the fact that I had to w@&k my way through that city completely in reverse :o How did they 'dare' to give me an achievement like that. I think that's Steam (or Sony) adding the humor the game does not have :-\\

[PZ]

Too bad really... was looking forward to purchasing the game this afternoon.

[Binnatics]

Glad we could warn you not to ;)

[Fiach]

Yes Binatics, so many times I have headshot a guy only for the hit not to register and that wasnt necessarily near the edge of cover, I'm talking full in the face!  >:(

I just did two Gearhead Hideouts and they were pretty good fights, just the same annoying mechanics, they had these mini boss guys, heavy armour with flamethowers, took about 6 pop rockets to kill them, one of them dropped 2 dollars in loot, hardly paid for one rocket lol :)

Game is just a bunch of pretty mazes strung together, with no particularly compelling reason to visit them. Even the two towns are a pita to navigate, some times I have a brain fart and totally forget what I'm looking for in all the identikit buildings.  :D

[Binnatics]

Game is just a bunch of pretty mazes strung together, with no particularly compelling reason to visit them. Even the two towns are a pita to navigate, some times I have a brain fart and totally forget what I'm looking for in all the identikit buildings.  :D

Have that too. Walking round like 3, 4 times before I find which shop I'm looking for. The subway town feels unpleasant. A safe haven should feel comfortable, but it feels like just another mutant cave.

By the way, the whole fighting with mutants thing reminds me of Doom 3. I remember playing that game I think until half way. Then I put it aside because of the repetitive "moving through the dark, knowing some sort of deamon will pop up any second, and still gettting shocked when he finally shows" :o.
I got to give credits to id though for being able to shock you over and over again. Here they seem to try the same with these mutants, but it only works sometimes.
I've discovered the old "oh s#!t, the door I just went through closed" trick allready more then once. "Now the deamons will come in...brrrrrrrrrrr ??? ???"

[fragger]

Judging by those last few posts it sounds as though all the same old ID stocks-in-trade have been trotted out yet again in Rage. I got sick of Doom 3 for the same reasons Binn mentioned, like the door closing prior to being set upon by a bunch of monsters trick, and critters popping up behind me from out of wall cavities that had opened up after I'd walked past them. It got to the point where every time a monster appeared in front of me, I'd turn and sure enough there'd be another one behind who wasn't there before. I got sick to death of getting clobbered from in front and behind all the freaking time. These done-to-death traps set in a repetitive maze of dark corridors were just cheap and nasty methods of making the game seem "exciting". In the event, it was just plain exasperating.

I get the feeling that Rage would be the name of the game alright if I picked it up >:(( I thought the days of the repetitive corridor shooter in a glorified maze with painted-on graphics were over.

ID must be short for IDentical...

But thanks for the extensive reporting on it, Fiach and Binn :-X Sounds to me like the game's cons outweigh its pros, unfortunately.

[PZ]

ID must be short for IDentical...

...or IDiots to ASSume that open world game aficionados will like a game like that simply because they put in a small open world element.  I would really dislike the kind of game that fragger wrote about.

[Dweller_Benthos]

Well, I've put a few hours into the game and well, all I can say is  ehh, it's OK. Not horrible, not great, but OK. It just seems to be, as mentioned before, a tech demo for what the engine can('t) do. Let's toss in some mini games, sure, and some vehicle stuff, yeah, just because we can.

As far as graphics go, I guess my dual nvidia 460's aren't up to it. Can't set vsync to either on or smart, just goes back to off. Nice, now I get serious tearing artifacts whenever I swing the view around any. Can set graphics to high or whatever it is, but doesn't seem to make a difference, the textures aren't all that much better, and the config file tweak I posted about earlier doens't do anything anymore, at least that I can tell. Most of the textures just seem to be blurry and not very detailed, and wrapped around the object from the wrong direction. I can see the seems in the texture file all over the place. Crysis2 looks way better.

As for the game, well, yeah, I can see how it's going to w@&k out, get mission, drive across map, do mission, drive back across map to report mission done. Yawn. Nice that there's all that great looking ruined city outside, with all those nice abandoned and broken highways that would be a lot of fun to drive along and explore, but you can't because you're stuck in the canyon below it all.

Not to mention the usual gripe of "Why the hell can this guy carry a huge aresenal of weapons and can't jump high enough to clear the curb on the side of the road?" Hmmm... maybe because he's carrying a huge arsenal of weapons is exactly the reason.

If I had to give it a number, maybe 6 out of 10, unless something improves later in the game.