[Rhamnetin]

  Yeah, one can spent an insane amount of time on some rpgs. I personally have spent around 300 hours on Oblivion with just one character. I have been mainly an rpg player, so I have invested thousands upon thousands of hours into that genre. I actually started off with hack and slash stuff as my father got hooked when the first Diablo came out and respectively me and my brother got hooked too. And after that Baldur's Gate came out and I actually expected it to be like Diablo but it wasn't. I knew nothing about D&D and its rules at the time, so I did A LOT of reading and really got into it and Baldur's Gate took all of my spare time followed by Icewind Dale, Neverwinter Nights, Planescape, Fallout, KOTOR etc. 
Now I'm mostly hyped about Pillars of Eternity coz most people forget that Obsidian is actually created by the devs from the closed Black Isle, so the exactly same devs created Fallout 2, Planescape: Torment and Icewind Dale and also worked on Baldur's Gate. So when people wonder why Bethesda let Obsidian develop New Vegas and bash on them I just find this ridiculous as they were the studio who initially started developing and was supposed to make Fallout 3 before they got closed and the the game was cancelled.

 
I don't think Obsidian has everyone from Black Isle Studios.  inXile has Brian Fargo, the founder of Interplay.  They might have others though I'm not sure.  I wish Obsidian went back to try to advance the RPG genre like they did with Neverwinter Nights 2, KOTOR 2, and even Fallout: New Vegas in some ways.  It looks like they're taking a step back with Pillars of Eternity, making it a 1998 clone instead of something innovative and not dated.  I feel the same way about inXile and Torment: Tides of Numenera.  But we'll see when they come out.

 

[DJScope]

 
holy ****
 
what were you doing for all that time.
 
my most played game Demons souls comes at around 105 hours.

 
It took me a year and a half to finish Final Fantasy 7, who knows how many hours. And I've finished Diablo 2 3 times and played through half of it the 4th time. If you really don't get sick of a game even after you finish it, that's how you know that that game was worth your time and money.
 
 
 

   
Skyrim isn't a story driven game, the campaign isn't the main focus as it is with typical single player games.  No mod provides a world that's as intricately detailed ore content heavy as Solstheim, and Dawnguard is honestly a much better campaign than any mod I've played for it.  Falskaar, Wyrmstooth, Moonpath to Elsweyr, and everything from ThirteenOranges aren't quite that good.  
 
I think Skyrim is more worth the money than any other game by far... I have 750 hours in it and I'm not even close to experiencing everything it has to offer.  Nobody even comes close to Bethesda when it comes to open world level design, except perhaps Obsidian on their one attempt.  Definitely the most lasting appeal and content of any game, my #2 most played game isn't even half this.

 
I guess that's a matter of opinion.
 
There have been many more games out there that were much better in terms of a full package. Like Legend of Zelda: OoT, Golden Eye, Fallout 1 & 2, XCOM (original), Mario series and Mario Kart (original), and there are plenty more games. At the time these games came out, they were much better than what Skyrim was when it came out. The quality of games are kind of declining and plus we're getting spoilt with a plethora of mediocre games with good graphics. It kind of desensitizes us from enjoying games with great stories with bad graphics.

 

[vaibhavp]

   
I don't think Obsidian has everyone from Black Isle Studios.  inXile has Brian Fargo, the founder of Interplay.  They might have others though I'm not sure.  I wish Obsidian went back to try to advance the RPG genre like they did with Neverwinter Nights 2, KOTOR 2, and even Fallout: New Vegas in some ways.  It looks like they're taking a step back with Pillars of Eternity, making it a 1998 clone instead of something innovative and not dated.  I feel the same way about inXile and Torment: Tides of Numenera.  But we'll see when they come out.

 
I would love to play a well polished alpha protocol sequel from them.

 

[kova4a]

   
I don't think Obsidian has everyone from Black Isle Studios.  inXile has Brian Fargo, the founder of Interplay.  They might have others though I'm not sure.  I wish Obsidian went back to try to advance the RPG genre like they did with Neverwinter Nights 2, KOTOR 2, and even Fallout: New Vegas in some ways.  It looks like they're taking a step back with Pillars of Eternity, making it a 1998 clone instead of something innovative and not dated.  I feel the same way about inXile and Torment: Tides of Numenera.  But we'll see when they come out.

Well, a lot of the devs. Interplay was just the main publisher for their games but Black Isle did the development, so Brian Fargo was just a producer. But yeah, some of the devs went to create Troika even earlier than Black Isle was closed and some joined them after but after Troika was closed most of them went to Obsidian AFAIK. 
Anyway, I don't see Pillars of Eternity (because of Path of Exile can't really call it PoE) as a step back. To me it's the genre going back to its roots. It's rpg and it was supposed to be turn-based and heavy on the D&D rules - the whole rpg genre has started turning into action adventure and shooters with rpg elements, so I welcome games that don't try to be a commercial hit for the teenagers nowadays. And did any of you try the new Sacred - it's insanely disappointing and bad.

 

[Rhamnetin]

 
I guess that's a matter of opinion.
 
There have been many more games out there that were much better in terms of a full package. Like Legend of Zelda: OoT, Golden Eye, Fallout 1 & 2, XCOM (original), Mario series and Mario Kart (original), and there are plenty more games. At the time these games came out, they were much better than what Skyrim was when it came out. The quality of games are kind of declining and plus we're getting spoilt with a plethora of mediocre games with good graphics. It kind of desensitizes us from enjoying games with great stories with bad graphics.
 

 
I guess your first sentence nails it, LOL.  Comparing Mario games and Mario Kart, shooters, platformers, to an open world RPG?  Far from an apples to apples comparison.  Aside from Fallout 1 and 2, none of those games mean squat to me.  In the big picture, those other games are microscopic while Skyrim and Fallout are vast and endless and far more ambitious.  A matter of opinion indeed; Skyrim lets me live a virtual life, explore the most detailed and dense open world ever made, interact with a world in many ways and play in over two dozen different styles while Goldeneye lets me... run around corridors and shoot people, Zelda is like a wannabe RPG without anything to actually make it an RPG, Mario games let me jump around, Mario Kart lets me drive around and throw stuff at people.  Yeah, Skyrim is way more of a full package than that.  
 
Overall I agree that the quality of games is declining, just look at CoD, Battlefield, The Witcher, The Last of Us, Uncharted, Metal Gear Solid, Dead Space, Gears of War, Halo, all these other super popular mainstream games.  When playing them, I feel insulted, as if the developers are treating me like a moron.  They're all casual games and the point of them is to get non-gamers to like them.  But that's just really not for me.  Hell, I wrote a longer rant about what I want in games here.  This will also better explain what a "full package" is when it comes to games.    
 
http://www.gnd-tech.com/content/985-What-Makes-the-Greatest-Game-of-All-Time
 
Skyrim however is a beacon of hope for me, even though it's far from perfect and made ten times better with user made modifications.  Compared to Morrowind and Oblivion, Skyrim shows vast mechanical improvements and has an open world that's a million times more detailed and alive, but it's not without its sacrifices (less skills/talents, worse campaign and much less story focus).  Dragon Age (especially the first) shows amazing advancement when it comes to character development and storytelling compared to Baldur's Gate, at the cost of gameplay complexity.  So even in today's best games, we're seeing some sacrifice and nothing that's a clear improvement in every regard.  No game has yet to come close to Planescape: Torment's writing.  We don't see D&D's complexity or versatility anymore. 
 
Gaming has just shifted to a younger audience these days, where complexity and immersion are usually not desired.  Most people want casual action games and most gamers can't appreciate a complex piece of writing like Planescape, or a strategic challenge like XCOM.  Still, when I look at the games I play, it's a handful of older games and a handful of newer games.  Most of the times I prefer the newer ones, I find isometric 2.5D RPGs to lack immersion.  I don't want to be playing a tabletop game, I want to be in the protagonist's shoes, influence others, influence the plot, have conversations with people and not read dialogue boxes.  Though at the same time I do want some of that old school mechanical difficulty and complexity, particularly NWN 2's gameplay.
 
The shooter genre is one of few I see as being infinitely better than 10-15 years ago (the other being the racing genre, with the advancement of racing simulators).  No shooter from back then has Metro's story focus, level of detail, or even gameplay depth which doesn't say much.  None have S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'s freedom.  Especially when it comes to multiplayer... yesterday's MP shooters like Quake, UT, and Goldeneye were about running around tight levels and shooting each other.  They were a test of reaction times.  They involved so little and get stale very fast for me.  While today I have Natural Selection 2, which is a test of your mind; of teamwork and planning, it involves so much more and has far more playstyles so I'm not doing the same thing as often.  Or if I feel like going to war, I have Rising Storm, which has a level of complexity and realism that wasn't attempted back then.  The ArmA franchise is another huge marked improvement in the shooter genre for me... along with Iron Front and OFP, there's nothing like them.
 
Quote:

   
I would love to play a well polished alpha protocol sequel from them.

 
Tell me about it, that game has so much potential but I really don't know what they were doing when designing the mechanics.  They should have teamed up with someone like Eidos Montreal, though I withhold that suggestion now due to their last two games being garbage (Thief and Deus Ex: The Fall, but the latter is a mobile game so it's understandable).
 

  And did any of you try the new Sacred - it's insanely disappointing and bad.
 

 
Thanks for the warning!  PoE (I'm gonna call it this anyway) isn't a step back compared to something like Dark Souls or The Witcher, that's for sure.  It goes back to what I said earlier in this post, with the older RPGs doing some things better, and some of the newer ones (not most) doing other things better.  Though I wonder if PoE will do anything better...

 

[kova4a]

 
Overall I agree that the quality of games is declining, just look at CoD, Battlefield, The Witcher, The Last of Us, Uncharted, Metal Gear Solid, Dead Space, Gears of War, Halo, all these other super popular mainstream games.  When playing them, I feel insulted, as if the developers are treating me like a moron.  They're all casual games and the point of them is to get non-gamers to like them.  But that's just really not for me.  Hell, I wrote a longer rant about what I want in games here.  This will also better explain what a "full package" is when it comes to games.  

Well, it's just because these types of games are meant for a different audience. One can bash on the late CoD, Battlefield, Halo games for being all the same but at their core they are first person shooters, which doesn't make them bad games per se - just a genre in gaming. Whether it's your cup of tea that's another matter. Also MGS has an insane fanbase for a reason and yeah, some people might not like the heavy cinematic experience but the story is sold, the game mechanics are solid and Snake is solid ( pun intended lol). The same goes for games like The last of Us, which at the hardest difficulty provides a pretty decent challenge and while lacking the most polished stealth mechanics it has a pretty decent gameplay. Positive things can be said for pretty much all of the games you've listed both gameplay and story-wise. But, yeah, they are not rpgs. And Zelda is not an rpg - its an action adventure game with some rpg and puzzle elements which evolved into games like Darksiders. 
And Dark Souls were never intended to be pure rpgs but action rpgs based on solid fighting mechanics and kind of an open world. You still can live in a different reality and pretend you're a hero on an epic quest but of course it is more of a linear experience despite the freedom you have to tackle different objectives in the order of your choosing. And the Souls sedries did bring back something I was missing for a while from action rpg games - killing NPCs and merchants 

 

[DJScope]

   
I guess your first sentence nails it, LOL.  Comparing Mario games and Mario Kart, shooters, platformers, to an open world RPG?  Far from an apples to apples comparison.  Aside from Fallout 1 and 2, none of those games mean squat to me.  In the big picture, those other games are microscopic while Skyrim and Fallout are vast and endless and far more ambitious.  A matter of opinion indeed; Skyrim lets me live a virtual life, explore the most detailed and dense open world ever made, interact with a world in many ways and play in over two dozen different styles while Goldeneye lets me... run around corridors and shoot people, Zelda is like a wannabe RPG without anything to actually make it an RPG, Mario games let me jump around, Mario Kart lets me drive around and throw stuff at people.  Yeah, Skyrim is way more of a full package than that.  

 
Well your statement "I think Skyrim is more worth the money than any other game by far..." was a bit ambiguous. Hence why I didn't stick to one genre. 
 
You cannot compare old game to new games directly. It's obvious new games are going to look better, it's just logical that way. The way I compare games is how that game made an impact when it was released using the technology provided to them at the time, how those games made an impact on your enjoyment of that game and how that game made an impact on the future iterations and future games in general. You don't buy a game and say, "HA! This game is terrible because the future games not even announced yet are going to be soooo much better.". That's why I don't agree that Skyrim is more worth the money than any other game. For me Skyrim was worth the money when it came out but it was not worth the following DLCs because the way the game ends kind of leaves a bad taste in your mouth and nothing will really redeem that for me.

 

[kova4a]

   
Well your statement "I think Skyrim is more worth the money than any other game by far..." was a bit ambiguous. Hence why I didn't stick to one genre. 
 
You cannot compare old game to new games directly. It's obvious new games are going to look better, it's just logical that way. The way I compare games is how that game made an impact when it was released using the technology provided to them at the time, how those games made an impact on your enjoyment of that game and how that game made an impact on the future iterations and future games in general. You don't buy a game and say, "HA! This game is terrible because the future games not even announced yet are going to be soooo much better.". That's why I don't agree that Skyrim is more worth the money than any other game. For me Skyrim was worth the money when it came out but it was not worth the following DLCs because the way the game ends kind of leaves a bad taste in your mouth and nothing will really redeem that for me.

Yeah, that's how I treat games also. How much the game had an impact on the gaming world and how much it had an impact on me. There are different genres and different preferences - I personally don't just stick to one thing, I'm the type of games who plays pretty much anything from hardcore rpgs to mindless shooters. Also, different generations have different perspective on gaming and that's why the kids these days like certain games that one might find uninspired. One can consider rpgs having a better value and more worth buying because they provide you with hundreds of hours of adventures but another can say that a mindless shooter like CoD is not so mindless and can spend hundreds and thousands of hours killing people online. I just replayed the first Silent Hill the other day and was thinking how impressive was it when it was released and how 99% of the kids these days will just laugh at the idea of playing it. Or how Skyrim didn't impress me that much while Oblivion did. And Oblivion was the first next gen open world rpgs at the time, so even from graphical standpoint it was very impressive.

 

[ninjapirate9901]

Elite Dangerous Beta 1.03
 
This is shaping up very nicely. The game world has been massively expanded (from 5 star systems up to 50) which has really made trading a lot more interesting. They've also added in the ability to group up with friends now (though last time I tried it didn't really work...) as well as the ability to chat to other players (a feature that had been sorely missing). The other main addition to the game is the introduction of missions. At this time they are all pretty basic, kill x amount of y faction, or transport these goods, etc. Nothing special but it does add a bit more structure to the game (before it was more just randomly kill x for money with no real context).
 
The flight model seems more or less the same, combat is enjoyable and does not boil down to turreting like in Star Citizen (the slow yaw in Elite might not be realistic but it makes for better gameplay imo). There is a high skill factor involved especially when going PvP, ship and weapon types do matter but outmaneuvering your opponent goes a long way towards winning a fight. NPC AI could do with some improvement, as it stands if you get in close with the opponent  you can essentially kill them with little effort as they try to put distance between them and you.
 
The sound in this game is very well done. From the noise of the engine to the sound the UI makes when you connect to a trade stations interface, it all just sounds right. I don't really know how to explain it well but the guys at Frontier Developments have done a fantastic job. Some of the effects might not be realistic (you can hear other ships fly past for instance) though I believe they have kind of explained it as a simulated sound within your cockpit to give you better tactical awareness (or whatever). The visuals are starting to improve as well, space station interiors look much more alive now, and the stars are looking a bit more dynamic with the addition of solar flares. Space itself is still very, er, empty. This makes the FTL travel (called supercruise in game) between planetary bodies a bit dull.
 
Highly recommended if you like free form space 'sims' like Freelancer or X3.

 

[Nugiyen]

BioShock PS3 - 9/10 Bought the game years ago and almost forgot about it. I just started playing it last week lol. 

 

[RestoredSparda]

The Last Of Us ps4 Remastered. 9.6 out of 10.

Even more polished than the ps3 version. Better than a lot of movies I've watched lately and a must own.

 

[Change is Good]

The Last Of Us ps4 Remastered. 9.6 out of 10.

Even more polished than the ps3 version. Better than a lot of movies I've watched lately and a must own.

I actually give it a 9. Yes, very polished and a definite improvement over the ps3 version. All the add ons included was a plus also. My one complaint, however, is that the friendly AI is still stupified. Being that this is next gen, I think they could have implemented co-op play.

 

[thatBeatsguy]

The Last Of Us ps4 Remastered. 9.6 out of 10.

Even more polished than the ps3 version. Better than a lot of movies I've watched lately and a must own.

The Last of Us Remastered looked awesome. Sadly, it's only PS3/4 exclusive, which is a huge NOPE. Sure, I do have a PS3, but I wouldn't want to waste my money on a game I'd probably ragequit on because I can't aim at a zombie right. I admit, I'm horrible when it comes to console shooters.

 

[terance]

  The Last of Us Remastered looked awesome. Sadly, it's only PS3/4 exclusive, which is a huge NOPE. Sure, I do have a PS3, but I wouldn't want to waste my money on a game I'd probably ragequit on because I can't aim at a zombie right. I admit, I'm horrible when it comes to console shooters.

I wouldn't let the skill ceiling sway you away from the game.
 
I played on the easy mode with no aim assists and the game was a blast.
 
There are also multiple assists (aside from changing the difficulty) that allow for people of all skill levels to enjoy the game.
 
Just a heads up!  Don't want you to miss out on this awesome game because you think you'll be bad at it.

 

[thatBeatsguy]

  I wouldn't let the skill ceiling sway you away from the game.
 
I played on the easy mode with no aim assists and the game was a blast.
 
There are also multiple assists (aside from changing the difficulty) that allow for people of all skill levels to enjoy the game.
 
Just a heads up!  Don't want you to miss out on this awesome game because you think you'll be bad at it.

LOL. Well, my PS3 is still in transit (moving to a new house) so I won't be able to play it yet. Thanks for the heads-up, though.