F.E.A.R.: Extraction Point & Perseus Mandate

F.E.A.R.'s two stand-alone expansions, Extraction Point and Perseus Mandate were oddly enough developed by TimeGate instead of Monolith who made the first and the second game. Maybe that is why they are not considered canon, and their events are ignored in the sequels.

F.E.A.R.

I'm not sure why I bought the Humble WB Bundle. The Batman games hardly interest me. I guess I now have them ready if I ever want to play them, though. They are game-of-the-year editions and were of course really cheap too. So there is that at least.

The Last Threshold

The final volume of The Neverwinter Saga, The Last Threshold, left me with mixed feelings. On one hand, I really liked the character development and the amount of adventuring there was -- probably the best of Salvatore in awhile. But on the other hand, there were really poor parts in the book, and the story as a whole was quite uneven.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution - Director's Cut

The EU release of Deus Ex: Human Revolution - Director's Cut on Steam wasn't the smoothest possible. First, the game's actual release happened 10 hours after Steam's countdown had reached zero. And second, the price reduction for those already owning the game and The Missing Link DLC wasn't as large as promised. That turned out to be a mistake and was fixed fairly quick. Some bought the game right away regardless -- 1€ is hardly a deal changer.

NWN2: Baldur's Gate Reloaded

Baldur's Gate Reloaded is a fan attempt to recreate BioWare's Baldur's Gate in Neverwinter Night 2's engine. Largely a successful one, too, considering the scale of the undertaking. There are various bugs, even in Patch 2, but nothing that prevents finishing the campaign. At least, I did not meet such.

Path of Exile

I wonder if I should give Path of Exile another go. After my quick dip -- about a month ago actually; a week before the beta ended -- I have learned that the game has more depth in its mechanics than I thought. Then again, there are also reasons why I never got beyond Act 1 in the first place.

Charon's Claw

For some reason, the prologue of Charon's Claw, the third book of The Neverwinter Saga, seemed clumsy; like if it had been written by someone with very little experience. I can't really explain it. Could've just been because I had not read a book in awhile. And the feeling did disappear after I got further into the book.

Dungeon Siege III

At some point Square Enix decided to acquire the Dungeon Siege franchise from Gas Powered Games, apparently to fill up a gap of dungeon crawler genre in their portfolio. And thanks to that, we now have Dungeon Siege III, which was released in 2011.

Neverwinter Nights 2: Storm of Zehir

The second expansion to Neverwinter Nights 2, Storm of Zehir, is a bit different from the original campaign and Mask of the Betrayer, as it allows you to create your whole party by yourself, like in the Icewind Dale games. You can also pick up to two cohorts along the way. If you like someone leeching your experience points, that is.

Medal of Honor

I guess Medal of Honor (2010) is one of those brown-palette first person shooters with a linear and heavily scripted single-player campaign I have heard people talking about. I think the four-hour campaign was reasonable entertainment, though, but I definitely wouldn't buy the game solely for that, not at full price.

Sacred 2

I got couple hours into Sacred 2: Fallen Angel before I came to the conclusion that it was basically the same game as the first one -- just with a 3D engine -- and ended up quitting the game for pretty much the same reasons. Why play Sacred 2 when one could instead play Torchlight 2, which is actually fun.

Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer

I had heard bad things about Neverwinter Night 2's first expansion, Mask of the Betrayer. Namely of its hunger clock mechanic that supposedly only manages to be a pain in the ass rather than an interesting feature.

Crysis 2

Crysis 2 continues using the same mold as the previous games with improvements to the gameplay and the engine. The developers evidently thought the CryEngine 3 so impressive that even the lowest graphics setting is 'High'.

Alice: Madness Returns

The death of Alice's family returns to haunt her in Alice: Madness Returns. This time around we get to see the bleak real world as well, though it merely functions as carrying the story forward between chapters. The actual action still happens in the colorful Wonderland.

Crysis Warhead

Not much I can say about Crysis Warhead that I didn't say in the Crysis post. The campaign is pretty much the same thing as the original game with few improvements like couple new weapons and better pacing. It even takes place in the same place and time.

Crysis

Crysis certainly was bit of a change from the lengthy RPGs I have been playing lately – little story and much action. Or at least as much action as you can fit in 10+ hours.

Neverwinter Nights 2

Like Knights of the Republic 2 previously, was Neverwinter Nights 2 as well put into the hands of Obsidian Entertainment when BioWare started focusing on their very own stuff. The Aurora Engine did not quite satisfy the guys at Obsidian, though, and thus, with a whole lot of improvements, Aurora became Electron.

Neverwinter

The second book of the saga bears the name of the series, as well as the MMORPG it's promoting. And of course the city the game is named after. The primordial attack in the first book left the whole Neverwinter in ruins, though, so I guess they're building a new city in there now.

Mass Effect: The Choices and Some Other Stuff

A few things I still wanted to say about the Mass Effect series...

Mass Effect 2 Plays Like a Potato

Mass Effect 2 plays like a potato when compared to the final piece of the trilogy. Mass Effect, too, though gameplay wise the second and third game are much closer to each other than the first one is to either of them.

Dos Equis

After mastering Deus Ex: Human Revolution over three playthroughs, I felt I needed to go back and replay the first two games on the hardest difficulty since I had only played them on Normal previously.

Neverwinter Nights: Hordes of the Underdark

I get the feeling BioWare was given feedback to make the second expansion to Neverwinter Nights give a more Baldur's Gate 2 -like experience. A talking sword, ability to travel between places via a pocket plane, increased party size, and NPC romances (among other things) certainly hint to this.

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning

I reckon a considerable amount of money was involved in the making of Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning to ensure its success. Todd McFarlane (the creator of Spawn) was brought in to watch over the art design and R.A. Salvatore lead the story writing. And as the game's executive designer acted Ken Rolson, who was the lead designer for Elder Scrolls: Morrowind and Oblivion.

Neverwinter Nights: Shadows of Undrentide

The first expansion for Neverwinter Nights adds a new campaign to the game. It is not tied to the original one in any way, though. You start it with a new character (preferably). And it is not even set in the city of Neverwinter but quite a bit inland, to East from The Sword Coast.

The Wheel of Time: A Memory of Light

Over two decades in the making, The Wheel of Time finally sees its end. A book series so long that the original author died before completing it. So long that the cover artist too passed away before finishing the final piece. But finally, it ends.

Deus Ex Redux

In the end, I was unable to resist the urge and found myself playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution again. And then -- even after the farce I had with The Missing Link -- Steam achievements lured me to finish the game yet again. At least this time nothing went wrong and I got all the achievs.

Tyrian 2000

So I installed Tyrian 2000 (and played it through again) to see how it was and how it compares to Jamestown -- was it as good as I recalled.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution

11 years is a very long time in video game graphics. It would have been stupid to not use the available technology in Deus Ex: Human Revolution, though. But as they did, the prequel to Deus Ex and Deus Ex: Invisible War looks way better and the world more advanced than in the first game. Somewhat dubious in a cyberpunk themed game series, I feel.

Top 1 Movie of 2012

I don't know what I had with movies last year, but way too often during one I was just waiting for it to end. There was one exceptional exception, although I might have given it the fourth star partly because there were so few movies I found entertaining.

The Best of YouTube 2012

Last year, I grew even more picky of what I watch on YouTube. Most of the videos in my subscriptions go unwatched these days.

Neverwinter Nights

After Baldur's Gate 2: Throne of Bhaal, BioWare's next Dungeons & Dragons title was Neverwinter Nights, released in 2002. The company developed a new 3D engine for the game, called Aurora, which unfortunately -- unlike the Infinity Engine -- has not endured the test of time very well.