StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty Release  date: July 27, 2010 | Price: 59.99| PC, Mac

Story The Story of StarCraft 2 picks up four years after StarCraft: BroodWar. The player plays the Terran campaign . . . → Read More: Review: StarCraft 2 Wings of Liberty]]>
After more than a decade, StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty was finally released. But can StarCraft 2 reignite the Real Time Strategy genre?

StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty
Release  date: July 27, 2010 | Price: 59.99| PC, Mac

Story
The Story of StarCraft 2 picks up four years after StarCraft: BroodWar. The player plays the Terran campaign from the perspective of Jim Raynor in Wings of Liberty. Jim still felt responsible for what happened to Sarah Kerrigan, and Jim has started a rebellion against Arcturus Mengsk and his dominion. Many of the old cast from StarCraft have returned, but there are also many new characters in Wings of Liberty; the Captain of the Hyperion, Matt Horner, and Jim Raynor’s old friend Tycus Findlay. You play the game mainly from Jim’s Battle cruiser: The Hyperion. There are briefing videos on every mission, and between missions the player can interact with news, laboratory, armory, and other crew members of the Hyperion. The CG cinematics that StarCraft is famous for is still there, but ‘Wings’ also takes some elements from the recent Command and Conquer series. The News crew of UNN is just as corny as the live action film from C and C.  There are 3 minor choices in the game that player can make, but it only changes the enemy that the player will be facing or different units that the player will acquired. There are many epic battles to be fought in Wings of Liberty, and surprisingly the ending is not a cliff hanger, despite having another 2 expansion packs coming out, one for the Zerg (Heart of the Swarm) and one for the Protoss (Legacy of the Void).

Gameplay
The single player lasted around 14-18 hours, depending on which difficulty. The player can complete bonus objectives in single player to get more cash or research material, which can be used to upgrade the player’s units. The player is given a few choices in which mission to play first, but it all leads to the same conclusion. The game play is basically the same as the original StarCraft: gather resources, built units, kill enemies and so on. There are many new units on each faction, such as Viking, a Terran Aircraft that can turn into a battle walker, Mothership, and a Protoss air unit that has multiple abilities and deals massive damage to ground units. The minor change of the game play is mainly in the AI structure, making the trooper easier to control, and StarCraft 2 also added an idle worker button like many other RTS that notifies the player when they have idle workers. The number of units players can select are increased dramatically, now the player can control up to 255 units in one drag of the mouse. making micro managing a lot easier.

Multiplayer
The multiplayer is why people are lining up for hours in front of their local game store to purchase this game. But the amazing thing about StarCraft 2′s multiplayer is its matchmaking system. Each player gets 50 practice games online before they are ranked. The first few games might get you a really tough opponent, but after 5 or 6 games, the opponent will be around your skill level, making the game more interesting and addictive, as players tried to improve their skill level. But for the casual player, there are some amazing StarCraft 2 mods out there already: Tower Defense, or Nexus War. Those mods are just as fun and addictive as the Battlenet quickmatches. With StarCraft 2′s galaxy editor there will be even more mods coming. Although there will not be a LAN option for StarCraft 2, The players can still form parties and join a match together.

Overall, StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty is an amazing experience, and perhaps the one of the best PC games this decade. The single player contains many epic battles and amazing cinematics. The game also concludes with a non-cliff hanger ending, making players such as myself wonder how Blizzard will continue this story in its next two expansions. The multiplayer games are easy to pick up, but hard to master. StarCraft 2 also has a great matchmaking system, making it easy for the beginner to start climbing the StarCraft ladder. There will be tons of user made mods once people get used to the galaxy editor. We could be playing this game for the next decade.

Review Score:   10/10

1. Update Driver Download and update your latest video card drivers. To make sure you successfully install your new driver, make sure you fully delete the old one before installing. For Nvidia, remove the driver from . . . → Read More: StarCraft 2 Crash Solutions]]>
There are reports of many user experienced game freezes, here a list of solutions you can use to try and eliminate freezing from happening.

1. Update Driver
Download and update your latest video card drivers.
To make sure you successfully install your new driver, make sure you fully delete the old one before installing.
For Nvidia, remove the driver from control panel.
For ATI, remove the driver from the ATI software found beside your Catalyst program

2.Reduce Frame Rate
Go to My Documents\StarCraft II Beta\Variables.txt, and add these lines:
frameratecap=30
frameratecapGlue=30

3.Change Compatibility
Right Click on your desktop icon of StarCraft 2.
Then click the Compatibility tab, and change it to either Window NT 4.0 (Service Pack 5) or Window XP (Service Pack 2)

4. Use OpenGL
Right click on your desktop icon of StarCraft 2.
Then click the Shortcut tab, and type -opengl behind the target path.

Hopefully one of these solutions fixes the problem.
If you still have problems when playing StarCraft 2, leave a comment with your computer specs and description of your StarCraft 2 crash.

Hell, it’s about time. Here are some pictures of the StarCraft 2 Midnight launch madness. Minutes before 12:00, people getting anxious to get in.

The first 20 people get special swags, so when 2 douche bags tried to cut the line there are many ragers. After some hostile confrontations, the nerd rage prevails.

There are at least 150 people at this . . . → Read More: StarCraft 2 Midnight Madness]]>

Hell, it’s about time.
Here are some pictures of the StarCraft 2 Midnight launch madness.


Minutes before 12:00, people getting anxious to get in.

The first 20 people get special swags, so when 2 douche bags tried to cut the line there are many ragers.
After some hostile confrontations, the nerd rage prevails.

There are at least 150 people at this midnight launch location, and there are more than 2000 other midnight launch locations across North America.

All the free swags I got as a reward for lining up 3 hours early.

All the stuff that from the Collectors Edition.

This USB drive containing the original StarCraft and its expansion Brood War.

The StarCraft2 Collectors Edition box.

PS. Special Shout-Out to Simon and Jack, 2 chillin’ dudes.

Age of Conan Release  date: May 20, 2008 | New price: $9.99 | Used price: N/A | PC Average review score: . . . → Read More: Worst over-hyped games of this generation]]>
Over-hyped games are not always that great. Every year there are some games that are not nearly as good as they were made out to be.
Here are some truly hideous games that have been over-hyped before their release.

Age of Conan
Release  date: May 20, 2008 | New price: $9.99 | Used price: N/A | PC
Average review score: 80%

Age of Conan, like many other MMORPGs, was supposed to rival the World of Warcraft universe. At first, everyone loved it; the game seemed to have the potential to grab a portion of World of Warcraft’s subscribers. But as soon as people leveled past 20 and left the starting area, one thing became clear: this game was going to be a grind fest. The  environments all look the same, and the number of quests decreases dramatically. The horrible Player vs Player system didn’t help either. However, this game isn’t dead yet, as there is still a group of dedicated players on the merged servers. There is also an expansion coming out soon, so maybe there’s still hope for Conan game to get back on its feet.

Lair
Release  date: August 31, 2007 | New price: $17 | Used price: $5-8 | PS3
Average review score: 53%

When gameplay footage of Lair was shown during E3, every PS3 owners immediately wanted this game. The game looked amazing, and the soundtrack hit the spot. There were tons of enemies on screen, and the developer also promised great Six-axis control. Everything was looking good for Lair…that is until people got their hands on it. The controls were absolutely terrible – flying the dragon in the right direction was difficult in the best of circumstances and when fighting enemies it was near impossible. There are software updates for Lair that allow players to use the normal control scheme instead of the Six-axis, but it is already too little too late for this dud.

Too Human
Release  date: August 19, 2008 | New price: $12 | Used price: $5-8 | Xbox 360
Average review score: 65%

This is a classic example of an over-hyped game. The game would have simply been labeled mediocre, with its annoying camera system, button-mashing combos and long death animation, but the developer Denis Dyack over-hyped this game, constantly telling the press about its amazing features. When negative reviews of the game came out, he is quoted as saying: “If you don’t like this game, you just don’t get it…” If Mr.Dyack just kept his opinions to himself, this game may have sold many more copies. Gamers are not going to buy a game just to be criticized (they’ll play online for that).

Haze
Release  date: May 20, 2008 | New price: $17 | Used price: $3-6 | PS3
Average review score: 55%

From the developers who gave us TimeSplitters and Golden Eye 007 comes this disappointing PS3 exclusive. Free Radical somehow managed to forget how to make a good game after their early successes, and the product of their temporary amnesia is Haze. In the single player, players have to play as both Mantel and Rebels to complete the game. The Mantel can inject themselves with a nectar to improve their accuracy while Rebels use guerrilla tactics and try to get Mantel troopers to overdose on nectar. The Rebels can also play dead when they have received enough damage. True, the game mechanics are interesting, but the whole game is plagued by glitches and bugs. Players will probably be forced to turn off their console a few times before completion.

Two Worlds
Release  date: August 24, 2007 | New price: $15 | Used price: $4-7 | Xbox 360, PC
Average review score: 50%

For a game that was supposed to be better than Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion,  Two Worlds turned out to be a buggy and boring Xbox360 exclusive.  The whole game doesn’t make any sense and uses terrible voice actors that do not know how to speak clearly or pronounce words. This game also has one of the worst endings in video game history. The Two Worlds developers are currently working on Two Worlds 2, and hopefully it will be much better than the first one, which shouldn’t be difficult, as Two Worlds is definitely one of the worst games this generation.

How will these two games work out? No one is really quite . . . → Read More: Street Fighter, Tekken crossover annouced]]>
Street Fighter X Tekken and Tekken X Street Fighter announced at Comic-Con.

Street Fighter X Tekken will be a 2D fighting game similar to Street Fighter 4, while Tekken X Street Fighter will be a 3D fighting game similar to the previous Tekken titles.

How will these two games work out? No one is really quite sure. Since most of the Tekken characters don’t have a projectile attack, won’t all the Street Fighter characters just spam Hadoken or Sonic Boom all day long?

Street Fighter IV producer Yoshinori Ono said the game will not be out anytime soon, so fighting fans should enjoy Marvel vs Capcom in the meantime.

Here is an updated debut trailer

Start up Ventrilo, then press setup. Then press SFX on the top right corner Then select Compressor . . . → Read More: Tutorial – Normalize Ventrilo (Makes everyone have the same output volume)]]>
Let’s face it – there’s always one person in your Ventrilo channel that is really loud or really quiet.
Here is a step-by-step tutorial on how to make everyone have the same volume, without changing each person’s output one by one.

Start up Ventrilo, then press setup.
Then press SFX on the top right corner

Then select Compressor and press Properties. (If Compressor is not in your Current special effects, then select Compressor from the right then add)

Then Setup your Compressor as below

Press OK, then enjoy a normalized Ventrilo!