Keys, Synths & Samplers

[Leonard_Hatred]

As the title says...

Myself:

Skyrim and (the biggest time-sap of all) Team Fortress 2.

Apologies to my synths, etc....

[MuzikB]

Mainly Skyrim for escapism and Civilization 4 for strategy.

[BonsoWonderDog]

Lego Star Wars 3 with my son.

[Synthaholic]

Who has time for games? I guess I play a bit of 'Harmony-Central' whenever I get a few minutes.

[donaldcrunk]

wargame: european escalation is my new favorite hardcore military strategy game. they really went out of their way to get things right. details like this please me. other than that, i'm really looking forward to getting to play the new Max Payne 3. i played the shit out of 1 and 2 when they came out, such fantastic games. i dont own a console so i must wait for the PC release. other than that, the Civ series, Sim City 4 and Command & Conquer Generals. i pull out a computer game and play it about once a month i think. i have to be in the right mood, and confident that i've gotten everything else important done. computer games do not cause much productivity.

[Gribs]

See the Diablo III thread. I just finished Avernum Escape from th Pit. I loaded Titan Quest onto my newer PC and started playing that again as it is addicting and I own the license already. I am not paying fifty bucks fo D3. Secret War is supposed to go live next month. Otherwise the game of life and building some attenuated for at converters to go from 3.5 mm modular to 1/4". There is a heat wave in MN that is making me feel barfy unless I stay inside in the AC.

[KingVidiot]

I recently went "back in time" to play (not finish, already did that) some classics: Thief 1 & 2, Deus Ex, Die By the Sword, System Shock 2, Half Life, Myth: The Fallen Lords, Soldier of Fortune, Hitman: Codename 47, Giants: Citizen Kabuto, and Redguard (Elder Scrolls spinoff). Lots of good stuff in there.

What happened to the game industry? Everything now is a gimmick or a pale rehash.

[Purity_Control]

Maybe they used up all the good ideas?

[Nismology]

Portal 2 System Shock 2 (snap!) Mobil 1 Rally Championship Oblivion Red Faction Unreal Tournament I also recently acquired a Sega Megadrive, so have been playing a bit of old school Sonic!

[liliththekitten]

Fallout
Disgaea
Team Fortress 2

havea bunch of indie games from various bundles I need to play.

What happened is that most big western devs got too big and focused too much on churning out FPSs and Hollywood-ish graphics - there's a place for that but there's to much focus on that in AAA games. And the big Japanese guys followed suit for the most part and sucked even more.

There's plenty of good, original games though. Most of the good ideas have moved to smaller devs, downloadable games (XBLA, PSN, Steam, whatever Nintendo does) and indies and portable systems. Of the big guys, Nintendo is sticking to making classic Nintendo-y games though the best stuff is only on DS/3DS for the most part, Wii sold a shit-ton of systems but the games mostly were disappoint.

[gregwar]

Maybe they used up all the good ideas?

when it comes to riskier and usually more interesting games its harder to sell the ideas. it takes insane amounts of hours to develop games now and without a guaranteed quick return like madden 2013 or whatever they won't do it. there are some game makers on kickstarter trying to go the diy/idea route instead of flash bang. there's potential but we have yet to see if anything new will come of that space. the remake of leisure suit larry is jokes after high school i rarely played games because i was usually dicking around in my daw, listening to records and soundtracks for samples, etc with the exception of nba ish at my friends houses. the only game i'm interested in is duke nukem forever although diablo 3 and skyrim look amazing i'm obvs into iphone games for commutes and at work. mortal kombat, street fighter, sonic, space invaders infinity gene, tetris, need for speed hot pursuit, gta china town, golden axe, etc. some of them are getting pretty slick on my 4s but they're nothing compared to nano studio 2, xenon, fruity loops (ftw), etc i'd love to develop games i have a few friends that work at ea and they love it. but my fav games are 'productive' ones. i'd always said guitar hero would be amazing if u could use a real guitar and then guitar smith came out. i've been seriously considering getting a console or whatever just for that game lol. a keyboard version would be totally dope with midi or usb input. the only other gaming i do on the side is my black atari 2600. i have synthcart and sometimes fire up pacman or space invaders, even though atari was before my time. my friend had a c64 for sampling back in the 90s and he gave me a bunch of sid chips recently. i'd love to get mssiah and midi nes by wayfar but the cost is kinda prohibitive and whatnot when plogue chipsounds is so dope. on a whim i bought a 'guitar hero' type game for c64 and an adapter for the plastic guitar, for total nerd swag solos

[ClavAnother]

Chrono Trigger.

[girevik]

Final Fantasy Tactics on iPhone.

[Purity_Control]

And the big Japanese guys followed suit for the most part and sucked even more.

iirc the jap domestic 'games' market is predominently doujin(?) or visual novels now, which sadly don't seem to have even aquired an identity in the west.

[liliththekitten]

I think the single biggest franchise in Japan is Monster Hunter. Apart from that people like Capcom, Konami and Square kind of suck. There are a lot of doujin shooters and people like Cave making shooters and Nippon Ichi with RPGs. There is more of that stuff than ever in the US thanks to things like XBLA and portables but its a relatively small market.

[KingVidiot]

the only other gaming i do on the side is my black atari 2600. i have synthcart and sometimes fire up pacman or space invaders, even though atari was before my time. my friend had a c64 for sampling back in the 90s and he gave me a bunch of sid chips recently. i'd love to get mssiah and midi nes by wayfar but the cost is kinda prohibitive and whatnot when plogue chipsounds is so dope.

Ahh, the venerable Atari 2600, a true classic and old friend. I'm not too fond of synthcart, but give me these any day:
Pitfall II
Keystone Kapers
Haunted House
Superman
Riddle of the Sphinx
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Adventure
Berzerk
Venture
Surround (Tron copied it!)
Indy 500
Warlords
Beat 'em and Eat 'em (just kidding)

I always wanted a Colecovision, but later I found out that other than a few good arcade copies it was boring.

[liliththekitten]

Colecovision is fun but it was killed quickly so all it has a few good arcade ports of lesser-known games (and Donkey Kong) and a totally crappy Smurfs game. The stock controllers suck but aren't as bad as Intellivision or Atari 5200. the Coleco Atari 2600 adaptor rocks. NES is totally better however.

[LePera]

Final Fantasy Series.. FF7 anyone ? FF SNES 3 or 4?Can't remember.

[ElectricPuppy]

I challenge anyone to find controllers that sucked as badly as the Intellivision ones! Gawd those were awful, my hands would cramp for days after a session on that thing.

[Yoke]

I picked up Blade Runner and Phantasmagoria 2 at a thrift store, boxed an all, for 50c each.