txa1265 Posted March 29, 2010 Share Posted March 29, 2010 As I noted here: Over at GearDiary.com I have a series called 'The Netbook Gamer'. Recently I stepped through the entire Kyle Katarn series on my Lenovo s10 netbook to review for the series: Dark Forces Jedi Knight Mysteries of the Sith Jedi Knight II Jedi Academy The articles look at the games through a historical lens, serving as content reviews, retrospectives, as well as technical reviews regarding running on a low-end netbook. Enjoy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth Avlectus Posted March 30, 2010 Share Posted March 30, 2010 Epic gold plated win. Don't have a netbook or any of those miniature laptops for <$300. Still, yeah, able to play some of the favored treasured classics. Love just after the beginning part of Dark Forces review: At the end of 1993 id Software released Doom as shareware, and the gaming world has never recovered! The shooter was born, links between video game and real violence supported by shaking data were being blamed for everything from murder to bad haircuts, and the age of the ‘computer hardware upgrade treadmill’ began. This part: Perhaps the most interesting thing is that there are no in-level saves. While it is neither then first nor the last game to do this, it was a novel approach for a shooter, especially as Doom used the typical ’save anywhere, die & retry’ method that allows you to advance a little, save, advance some more, and if you die you have only lost a bit of progress. With Dark Forces there is a greater investment from the player, but also greater demands on the game itself. Ah, there he notices something which admittedly I hadn't: The balance for the game's difficulty and the overall game design, the levels, the layout, etc. Hm. Now that I think about it...that's not something often seen anymore. And when it is, the games are better for it. He continues: For the game to succeed each mission needs to be long enough to justify playing but short enough that failure wouldn’t be overly frustrating; hard enough to be challenging but not so hard that it is impossible to pass; and most importantly the level design needs to be good enough that gamers never feel like they have been treated unfairly. Another thing that helps with this is that you select difficulty for each level individually. He hit the nail on the head. QFE and T. Never thought about it, but yeah I'm in agreement with him--not b/c it's a classic SW game but he pretty much outlined the general criteria/standards of that which makes a good game what it is. Though I've probably :parrot:ed enough for now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Samuel Dravis Posted March 30, 2010 Share Posted March 30, 2010 I had just started playing a bit of Jedi Outcast on my EEEPC 1005PE a couple of days ago. It works wonderfully after having to customize the resolution. Although this just makes the lag that Braid has on the same system all the more ridiculous... >_> I do like playing on my netbook. I've played the (original) Half-Life games, Planescape: Torment, the Jedi Knight games, Arcanum, and some of the LA adventures. Anyone who thinks netbooks aren't a gaming platform clearly has a one-track mind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prime Posted March 30, 2010 Share Posted March 30, 2010 Awesome, Mike! After I finished playing TFU, I plan on trying JO and maybe JK again. Still have JO and JA installed after all these years, although I've modded the hell out of them. I miss that aspect in newer games. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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