dogbert Posted September 25, 2003 Report Share Posted September 25, 2003 Playable Demos: Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Freedom Fighters NFL Fever 2004 Conflict Desert Storm II: Back to Baghdad Magic the Gathering:Battlegrounds Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2004 NCAA football 2004 Disney's Extreme Skate Adventure Sounds like a corker of a disc to me! Metal Arms 9.0 Alter Echo 7.5 Starsky and Hutch 7.6 Aquaman 4.1 Roadkill 8.6 Dungeons and Dragons Heroes 9.0 Tiger Woods 2004 9.0 Conflict Desert Storm II 7.0 Dino Crisis 3 6.5 Hunter: The Reckoning-Redeemer 7.4 Syberia 8.4 Dynasty Warriors 4 8.5 Nascar Thunder 8.8 NHL Hitz Pro 8.0 Soul Calibur II 9.2 Finding Nemo 4.4 Scooby Doo! 7.7 Disney's Extreme Skate Adventure 8.2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ColdForged Posted September 25, 2003 Report Share Posted September 25, 2003 Sholy Hit! Prince Of Persia demo?! Weee! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishepa Posted September 25, 2003 Report Share Posted September 25, 2003 Wow, I didn't even see the Prince of Persia demo until you said something. I looked right over it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
heavy liquid Posted September 25, 2003 Report Share Posted September 25, 2003 Sounds like a corker of a disc to me! No kidding! It's nice to see that the xbox demo discs are starting to have some really good content, IMO. Anyone know when this is due on the stands? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Graeme Posted September 25, 2003 Report Share Posted September 25, 2003 Only a month to wait :x We JUST got the current issue in stores here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josh Posted September 25, 2003 Report Share Posted September 25, 2003 Speaking of the current one, did anyone try the Voodoo Vince demo? Looks like it could be a cool new platformer, although it could end up being really bad. The humor is pretty weak and the level design is questionable. The characters, controls, and camera angles, however, look decent, and those are the three things that can make or break a platformer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Graeme Posted September 25, 2003 Report Share Posted September 25, 2003 Voodoo Vince is getting some good to great reviews, so that's nice to see. It's a good price too, even cheaper than Sony published titles here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
General Zot Posted September 25, 2003 Report Share Posted September 25, 2003 Very, very nice. I can't wait to get this in the mail... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogbert Posted September 25, 2003 Author Report Share Posted September 25, 2003 Well, mine arrived today. Of course, I don't have the disc subscription, so I can't judge the demos. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PoisonJam Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 Well, two of the three demos I tried to play didn't work, but happily PoP wasn't one of them. Pretty fun demo--some of the things you can do in this game are amazing (particularly wall-running). Game looks fantastic, too. Just seems to be a bit too much of a platformer for me. Actually, it is quite reminicent of the original Tomb Raider to me, with the emphasis more on exploration, precision jumping, and switch puzzles and less on combat. Not a bad thing, by any means, but not where my interests lie. What really impressed me were the three short Full Spectrum Warrior videos. Wow is this game ever impressive. My hands-on experience with the Army has been limited to a faded army jacket that I wore in high school, but this game strikes me as quite a realistic simulation of urban squad-based combat. My only comment is that the game may be a little too passive for some. Rather than pointing a rifle at an enemy and opening fire (a la Ghost Recon), you issue a "fire" command to your squad and they do the wet work. This seemed like it might get frustrating as your squad can sometimes fire for quite a while at a dug-in foe without getting a hit on him. Even watching the demo I wished I could just pick up a rifle and center the bugger's head in my sights myself. But still, a most-impressive series of shorts, and I'm definitely looking forward to this one. Nice disc this month, I just wish more of the demos worked. Sigh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Graeme Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 with the emphasis more on exploration, precision jumping, and switch puzzles and less on combat That's exactly what POP is, and should be, about. If this is the case then they're doing something right. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy Sheets Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 Originally posted by PoisonJam@Sep 29 2003, 08:50 PM What really impressed me were the three short Full Spectrum Warrior videos. Wow is this game ever impressive. I agree. I watched the long video presentation of the game this past weekend and it looks like it's going to explode people's notions of what squad-based combat games are supposed to be. I can see the point that the game might be a bit too RTS-ish for some people, but there's seems to be so much detail and realism in what they're doing that I think the game might win people over. This is now the game for next year that I'm most looking forward to. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogbert Posted September 30, 2003 Author Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 I can see the point that the game might be a bit too RTS-ish for some people If people buy it expecting Ghost Recon or another fps, they'll be disappointed. The developers have been quite open about it being a 'real time strategy' game - just now the typical "top down" C&C style, instead this is a small team tactics/squad game where you do NOT have "run & gun" controls. I can't wait, looks really interesting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PoisonJam Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 That's exactly what POP is, and should be, about. If this is the case then they're doing something right. Absolutely. Believe me, I played the first one to death, and this iteration looks like a true spiritual successor to that. It may not fit my tastes anymore, but it still looks like a great game. One thing I forgot to mention--the biggest disappointment on the disc for me was the trailer for NFL Street. I loved NBA Street Vol 2, and I was looking forward to seeing how that "street flava" translated over to football. But the trailer was so ugly it almost defied belief. I'm not going to get into an EA bash here; I'll just say that the trailer made the game look like it would have a great Sega Genesis game, or maybe a mid-range PS1 title. The players were so bloated as to be absolutely ridiculous. They looked like those sumo suits that people fight each other in at halftime of basketball games. Gameplay looks to be fairly basic as well--I realize you can't do as many trick moves in football as you can in basketball, but the only concession to the "street" was a stupid and unrealistic flip throw from behind the back of the quarterback. Even the touchdown celebrations were far inferior to the even the understated high-steps and finger-to-the-sky strolls of Madden and ESPN football. What a letdown. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ColdForged Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 Well, two of the three demos I tried to play didn't workJust curious, which ones didn't work? If Freedom Fighters was one of them, I'd suggest disabling 720p checkbox in your dashboard and trying again. The magazine made mention that some of the demos support 720p and if you have it selected in the dashboard but your TV doesn't support it, it "won't work". YMMV. I haven't had a chance to put the demo disc in my Xbox and try any of them out yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PoisonJam Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 Yep, Freedom Fighters was one, and the other was, er, Disney Skating...for the kids, you understand. :oops: I had the same problem with Soul Calibur 2 in a previous month--I wonder if it is 720p related? I'll check that tonight...thanks for the tip! My TV doesn't support 720p natively, but I thought it upconverted it to 1080i. My understanding of all that is hazy, though, and it's easy enough to just uncheck 720p from the dashboard and boot the demo disk up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buck Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 Yep, Freedom Fighters was one, and the other was, er, Disney Skating Yup, both 720p games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PoisonJam Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 Okay, that's interesting (thanks, Scott). So let me ask this then, at the risk of going off on a slight tangent, if I can play other 720p games like Tony Hawk 4 with no problems, what is preventing me from playing the demos at that resolution? As I said, I'm a little fuzzy on all of this resolution stuff and to be honest I was always more concerned with how a game looked and played and less wrapped up in what aspect ratio or resolution it was displaying at, but I had assumed that if I had 720p checked off in my dashboard and I played a game that supported it, my TV would convert the signal to either 1080i or 480p. I believe that Tony Hawk 4 is the only game I own that supports 720p, and the fact that I was able to play that game without making any dashboard adjustments seemed to bear out my hypothesis about my TV doing the conversion. But if that's the case, I wonder why it chokes on these demos? Or maybe I'm on crack and THPS4 isn't 720p after all. In which case, Neversoft is teh suxx0rs and I'm selling the game because goddamit I'm sick of games not in 720p and...whoops, wrong forum. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ColdForged Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 Or maybe I'm on crack and THPS4 isn't 720p after all.Nope, THPS4 does indeed support 720p. You're not on crack (well, at least one can't come to an accurate conclusion about your crack status from this). I have no explanation, other than is it possible you've changed settings to enable 720p after playing THPS4? That's the only thing I could see. Good luck tonight. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buck Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 Now granted I don't have the demo disk, so I don't even know if the demo's are in 720p, but if you can play THPS4 in 720p on your set than there is something wrong with the disk. Some questions that were never asked: Does the Xbox lock when you load the demo's? Do you get no picture, but have sound? Do you feel bad for using your kids as an excuse to hide your obsession to play Disney Skateboarding? What kind of HDTV do you have and if it's over 55" can I have it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PoisonJam Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 I found these answers blowing in the wind... Xbox doesn't lock up, rather I get three or four vertical stripes down my TV with a highly distorted picture of the screen on each. Those of you old enough to remember screwing with the V-Hold on an old TV set; you know how turning it too much would force the picture to splinter across your screen and flicker up and down rapidly? Well that's what it looks like, only without the flickering. Take a picture of the screen, stretch it into a tall, thin rectangle, duplicate it four times across your screen, and add mucho distortion, and there you go. Sound isn't a problem. I can hear the game just fine, it's only the picture that's jacked. Using my kid as an excuse?? Me?? No, no, my six-month-old very clearly enunciated to me that he wanted to see Disney Skateboarding. I believe his exact words were "Eeee, gheee, aaaaaaah, buh buh buh", with a little gurgle at the end. Now how can you argue with THAT? I have a Pioneer Elite PRO610, it's 58", and you know I would do anything for you, Buck. Swing by and pick it up anytime, brother. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PoisonJam Posted September 30, 2003 Report Share Posted September 30, 2003 Ooh, just thought of something. That PRO610 has two component inputs, and it may be that only one of them can handle an HD signal. Right now I've got an HD satellite receiver and an HD digital cable box plugged into that one, but I will try pulling one of them out and plugging in the Xbox. I'm not sure which input I was using when I played THPS4 back in the day, but it may be that I was using input 1 (which can handle HD), and now I am using input 2 (which may not be able to). Long shot, but what the hey. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buck Posted October 1, 2003 Report Share Posted October 1, 2003 Originally posted by PoisonJam@Sep 30 2003, 04:57 PM Ooh, just thought of something. That PRO610 has two component inputs, and it may be that only one of them can handle an HD signal. Sounds like you figured out your problem right there, Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zathras Posted October 1, 2003 Report Share Posted October 1, 2003 Originally posted by PoisonJam@Sep 30 2003, 10:55 AM. . . the other was, er, Disney Skating...for the kids, you understand. :oops: Disney Extreme Skating isn't that bad at all - it is essentially just Tony Hawk 4 with simplified moves (you can even make it closer to TH by turning on Pro mode in the menu). I've got it from Gamefly at the moment and it is a pretty fun game (actually I like it better than TH4 I must say). My main complaint is the "real world" level goes waaaay over the top with product placement. "Hi I'm Mr. Nokia and I've lost the ringtones to my Nokia 5100 cellphone! Can you find them for me!" (yes really.....) Also it is vitally important to use a customized soundtrack with Disney music - why they didn't have any sort of actual Disney music in it confuses me to no end. Ok ok I'm a Disney freak.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ColdForged Posted October 1, 2003 Report Share Posted October 1, 2003 BTW, the Prince Of Persia demo is the shiznit. I LOVE the game mechanics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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