[notbov]

So, along with DS2, military-y shootman/wall-running simulator/Xbone savior Titanfall comes out this Tuesday. For those of you who don't know or don't care (in which case, why are you reading this), Titanfall is the first game from Respawn, formed from the smoldering ashes of the exodus of talent from Infinity Ward after MW2 and the subsequent unpleasantness with Activision (I will not comment on the irony that Zampella and co. ended back up with EA, but it is kinda funny). It's about two groups of people who don't like each other very much and reconcile their differences by shooting each other with guns and giant robots and occasionally chasing each other like squirrels using parkour.

This translates into a multiplayer-only game about 12 people running around and shooting each other in a style very reminiscent of Call of Battlefield games, except for the part where all the players have jetpacks so they can Prince of Persia around the maps and summon giant robots that they can pilot. The other notable difference is that the game is filled with AI troops who are powered by The Cloud (this means dedicated servers) who are so goddamn dumb that they serve almost solely as fodder for getting your Titan on the ground or powered up when they aren't trying their hardest to make maps look filled.

Your robot buddy, the Titan, acts as a sort of replacement to killstreaks by being a giant robot, but still isn't overpowering; rather, Titans are a lateral shift of power and you can really only get it sooner than everyone else instead of shutting everyone else out of their own. You can also tell it to do its own thing and the Titan AI is shockingly competent at times, unlike certain other AI entities.

So anyway, this comes out with a huge, staggering amount of maps (14!) (I feel the need to point out my sarcasm here) and all your favorite game modes represented, like team deathmatch, capture the flag, domination/hardpoint and a new twist on an old favorite, team deathmatch except killing the AI troops gives points too. It also has some campaign multiplayer thing in lieu of any kind of single player (who would ever want to play games by themselves?!) with a story and the reward of the two other pilotable Titans locked behind finishing them up. I'm interested in seeing how this works out, seeing as how well it worked in Brink (;_;) and the leak that the campaign keeps going even if your team loses.

So now that I've typed out a bunch of seemingly hateful bullshit, let me just say that I was lucky enough to get into the PC beta and I am hyped beyond all imaginable belief to play this game for hours on end. The Bone and PC versions go live Tuesday and the 360 version gets in late a couple of weeks later like that poor pilot who isn't killing anything and gets their Titan last. I'll be playing on the PC because I don't have an extra 500 bucks sitting around at the moment to indulge in the Xbone Desperation Pack with free Titanfall. Now that all the boring stuff is out of the way, we can talk about how the game really isn't doing anything different, but does it really well.
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[Felix]

I've never really played a Battlefield-y title (got about halfway through the first MW and never played much of the multiplayer), and the last FPS I really got into for deathmatching was unreal 2004. I sort of don't want to dethrone it because I have like eight computers in the house that can run it at this point and ill-conceived LAN parties are fun. Also, I usually pirate AAA PC titles until they're cheap precisely because I'm not a big online multi guy and I don't mind missing out on this component. Do the console versions have 4-player local MP? I could see myself getting into it in that case -- if I were still in high school.

[notbov]

[ArOne]

I also played the beta and became equivalently hyped as notbov. Just preordered on GMG just so I could feel just that little bit better about myself for saving ten bucks but now I can't get Origin to accept the redeem code fully.

I'm not really feeling the battlefield comparisons due to the more focused map sizes from the beta and lack of showy destruction physics but I'm down with that. I'm looking forward to playing TF2 scout with occasional rockem sockem robot action.
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[Felix]

[another god]

This game sounds like the best F2P shooter.
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interdimensional

[DJ]

I'm getting it on Tuesday!

PC version because lol xbone
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[Rud31]

Guys maybe we'll now see Xbox One's beautiful dream for online all the time.
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My Hawt Blog Vita Games

THERE ARE DEFINITELY WORSE VIDEO GAME PODCASTS

[Drem]

I've been considering picking this up because I just built a new computer after a decade of using business laptops and as such I don't have many graphic intesnive games. A lot of the game's design sensibilities seemed very close to Call of Duty whenever I looked at screenshots and gameplay footage, such as the player momentum, gun handling, and personality. Is that actually the case?

[GcDiaz]

Anybody still play HAWKEN or is that done?
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Steam/PSN/Xbawks: GcDiaz

Let's bring sexy back!

[Pijaibros]

i was pretty ready to jump in to this game after trying it at the MS store, but then heard it was on origin so i'll likely be skipping it.

[Felix]

[notbov]

honestly, it handles like CoD, but you can't play it like CoD because it has verticality and giant robots roaming after 3 minutes

fun fact: the game is out in Korea and Origin is fooled by VPNs
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[CubaLibre]

Yeah it definitely plays like CoD and not like Battlefield, if you can even see the daylight between those franchises any more. (You can, if you actually care about FPSes.)
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Let's Play, starring me.

[notbov]

these other not-featured-in-beta maps are pretty good

Campaign mode in this game is nigh worthless except for the part where you play through them to unlock Titan chasises. bunch of story you can't really care about in game because you're too busy playing it, mostly because it's all audio. but that Stryder Titan.... it's power up is infinite dashing and that makes me hot and bothered.
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[Broco]

Man I'd play this, but I don't know if I can tolerate another round of team deathmatch or control point holding. Every other part of this sounds great but I feel tired even thinking about those game modes.

[CubaLibre]

Yeah. To me, this game is a huge disappointment because I am in a tiny minority of people that think MW1 and 2 were achievements for their campaigns and not for their multiplayer. I just can't play the Default Multi FPS any more, it's more than tired, it's exhausted, it's in a coma.
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Let's Play, starring me.

[Toptube]

[GcDiaz]

[notbov]

[EU03]

[Toptube]

Adam Sessler gave this a 5/5.

[Rud31]

https://twitter.com/zephyritself/status/443301502329700352

I miss the clean look of the BX.
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[meauxdal]

[notbov]

[sponkmonkey]

The beta turned from someone who could never enjoy multiplayer CoD into a believer, so if it weren't for Dark Souls II, Ground Zeroes and life things happening I'd get on this without hesitation
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[nothingxs]

Titanfall made me excited to play an FPS again.
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select button
i've gotta let go. i've gotta get straight. why'd you have to make it so hard? let me get away.
3DSFC 1736-1476-0518

[Gironika]

[CubaLibre]

[OffalAl]

[Talbain]

[notbov]

ah, I see now, Campaign isn't worthless, it's the perfect place to farm tons of XP off of new players when you regenerate and start all over. this is good for people like me who have no shame what so ever. I guess the setting and actual story are interesting, but the problem is that, 95% of the time, the story is happening off-screen or simply around you as opposed to you being a active participant (ignoring that each mission ends the same way regard of which team wins since you stay in the same lobby for all 9 maps and things just can't stop or that'd get in the way of the story and unlocks). more to the point, after the first prestige/regen thing, you have to finish specific challenges to hit the next one, which I won't hate until game makes me get a billion kills with a sniper or 50 kills while wallrunning or hack a turret while the moon is full or something stupid. thankfully, the ones I have now are ones I like (kill people with the shotgun? if you insist....).

the Stryder is the best thing ever and it's way too much fun drifting around corners and dancing around other Titans with the power of limited dash vectoring and then you hit the core ability and get unlimited dash and circle-dash-drifting starts. Respawn also lied when they said quickscoping wasn't in, I did that shit by accident and it made me a little sad.
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[EU03]

[notbov]

my issue with the DMR is once you get enough unlocks, it loses its niche. the Carbine is better in that range in a lot of situations, the single shot rifle is better for CQC and the Krab or whatever the last sniper is way better for actual sniping. as for quickscoping, I'm not a CoD player so it was, to me, when you can ADS and instantly gain 100& accuracy and no spread what so ever, which I guess is equally as ridiculous. I haven't tried too much sniping on pad though, so I can't attest to how much aim assist kicks in.

not that any of it matters, I've seen a lot of PC players bitch and moan in game over the shotgun, which apparently is grossly overpowered or something.
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[ArOne]

I've yet to find a way to make the DMR and single shot rifle work for me when most people are to smart to sit still and alot of the hard points tend to have fairly narrow spots to snipe at. The shotgun and carbine are the only guns I can get anything going with. I've also been having some lag issues where my shots don't register and when I kick but somehow gets overprioritized by another guys kick. Been having some fun with strider. Hit and running and flanking becomes alot of fun once your core ability kicks in. I rarely last long enough in Atlas or Ogre to get my core up.
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[notbov]

[nkcyborg]

I wish this game had Reach's Invasion mode or a similar game type (I think it's called Rush in BF3). There's no sense of pushing back enemy lines - just lone wolves taking and losing points across the map. I really enjoyed the suburban chapter of MW2, Pripyat, etc. and there is none of that here.

It's a pretty good interactive chat room for me and my brother.

@notbov, I'm running it at 1080p with high settings and 8xMSAA (i5 3350p, 2GB 7850). I get dips into the 40s on Lagoon and Demeter, but it's generally pretty smooth.

[notbov]

not having an objective-based gametype usually bums me out (this is why Brink dying 5 minutes after launching was so depressing), but I've not ever touched CoD as an MP game so doing this is really burning me out

i'm still fiddling with my settings and optimizing things, but I'm getting 60 fps @ 1080p 90% of the time on all maps with textures set to med and lighting, effects and shadows turned to low. i5 2500k @ 4.4, GTX 470 with a tiny, tiny overclock. thinking about grabbing a 770 when I get some extra money to throw around but I'm still doing a bit better than the One version, so can't complain too much.
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[Ebrey]

So just how bad is Origin? I've never used it before, and it sounds like a lot of people dislike it?

[EU03]

I personally have no qualms about Origin, and it doesn't deserve all the nerd rage it gets. I think it's mostly "it's DRM/distribution that isn't Steam" and "lol EA".
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[notbov]

for all the qualms I've had and have about Origin, they have a no-nonsense refund policy. at this point, it's an inconveinence to need a separate program just for games from another publisher (as is Blizzard turning battle.net into such a thing and Uisoft with Uplay).
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