Anyone try that Mad Catz arcade stick? I saw it in Best Buy today. Kinda cool. It has a stick for one of the thumsticks and a rotating dial on the other thumbstick. It might be cool to use with the arcade games. It comes with codes for three games (Astro Bubble Pop, Time Pilot and Frogger). Still it seems pretty pricey for $49.99 and I couldn't see anywhere on the box if it was wireless, so I assume it isn't.

Here's a picture
http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.en...rcadestick.jpg

I've absolutely no interest in multiplayer. If the sigle player portion of the game proper lives up to the fun I had with the demo, this is the game that may finally push me over the edge and make me buy a 360.

Do you have a pottymouth online? :p

I think i have only gotten one ding on my rep - some guy i was just owning on SFII called me for unsporting. He was the tool spamming Honda's hand slap and i countered it with Blanka and somehow i'm unsporting. :lol:

I have a single ding too. I was playing Tiger Woods online with these dudes who thought they were the shit and they were totally making fun of me the whole time. So they're like "Don't shank it" so I purposely duffed it for about 8 shots in a row to piss them off. It was worth the 5% piss off rate.

I have a single ding as well. A guy was trying to cheat in uno, just sitting still until everyone quit. I stayed on for 20 minutes and outlasted him until he quit and he had the balls to leave me a neg. Douchebag.

Single ding here - and no clue why. I don't even use voice chat, so it couldn't be for that? No clue and don't really care.

Crackdown sucks! It got old after about 10 minutes. Horrible controls.

No, 95% of the time I mute my mic and I don't go nuts when it's not muted.

Maybe I didn't explain this right, my "Rep" is clean with full stars with nothing on the right side to show complaints. But apparently 16% have tagged me so they can avoid me. I have a feeling it was one of those things where one guy got pissed because I killed him or because I wasn't as good as him and he got some of his buddies to ding me. Recently a guy went "Nucking Futs" on me because I was in last place and I took him out on Lost Planet...but who knows. I don't think there's a way to find what the who and the why so I just get to have this "ding" on my Gamertag.

It sucks and I shouldn't care because at least now I don't have to deal with jerks who dinged me. :up:

I believe that is what affects the rep. You can normally check to even see what their complaint was by looking at your rep (eg. unsporting conduct, trash talking, etc.).

But like I said, there's nothing on the right side. They're all zero percent.

Huh, that is weird then - i didn't think you could avoid someone unless you named a reason you were avoiding them and they took a rep hit. No idea then.

No, Crackdown does not suck


The controls are actually VERY good for the genre. Driving is better than I could have hoped. Jumping 15+ ft in the air can get pretty addictive

If Crackdown is anything like GTA or Saints Row I'll pass. I have no interest in these kind of games.

yea, it probably wouldn't be for you then

Sorry if this has been discussed but did they lower the point price for the GRAW expansion pack 2? It's 600 now. Wasn't it 800?

Meh, I played the Crackdown demo for about 40 minutes and thought it was pretty mediocre. I have been waiting for this game and it left me disappointed. The controls for driving are absolute crap, very, very floaty. Targeting seems like a complete crapshoot as to who it will select, and even after pressing the target button again it will select the guy you killed 5 seconds ago. Or sometimes it will target a guy 2 miles down the road, it seemed completely random. Also the fact that it seems to take 50 bullets to kill a single guy is lame. I also hated how I was just driving down a street and there were constantly bullets being sprayed at me from every direction at all times.

I'll probably still rent it, but I was definitely hoping it would be better than it is.

I thought the driving was much better than Saints Row. The targetting could be better, but I really didn't have a problem adjusting to it at all.

As far as it taking 50 bullets to kill someone, it really depends if you are using controlled bursts, or just spraying bullets. If its the latter, than it would be like playing R6, and the reticle is so big that your accuracy drops way down. Also, I believe you are neglecting the fact that you have to level up your shooting prowess like anything else in the game. As your shooting skill increases, so does your accuracy.

Yeah, that happened a whle back...I thought it was 1200 points at one point.

As for Crackdown...my D/L was going SO slow...I was about 27% after 1.5 hours.

If it's like Saint's Row, I may enjoy it...although, I still have to play through Saint's Row. I only played about 5 missions so far as I haven't really had time to play.

i owned Saints Row, and after 40 minutes, I would say its superior in every way

You would say Crackdown is superior, or Saints Row?

Crackdown, hands-down, without a doubt

Don't forget the Lumines packs are up today and discounted until Feb 21.

100% of people prefer me. Of course, only 2 people have left me feedback.

Make that 66%!


j/k :D

A few more Crackdown impressions:

I had a chance to play the co-op mode for a couple of hours last night. Despite a few framerate hiccups, it's pretty much as solid as the single player game. I focused on collecting agility orbs while my friend built up his shooting skill. Basically, I would leap into each enemies shooting range and be a jumping decoy while my co-op bud took out the baddies very quickly with the shotty, up close and personal. Taking down the minor gang bosses is a breeze with two competent players.

I do wish co-op partners sitting in the passenger seat could shoot out of the passenger window. Also, I don't like the co-op partner automatically shifting to the other side when the driver bales. It should kick both people out before the car explodes.

FYI, the co-op connection mode stinks for the demo since it knocks you back to the desktop if your connection fails. So you should either host the game or go into custom game and look for the newest entries that pop up.

I'm still amazed the sheer amount of city landscape stays visible at all times. I realize the developer is using pre-rendered artwork for the sections of the city not yet available, but it's still mind-boggling. After leveling up to the final agility level in the demo (30 foot jump), I swam out to the starting police island and climbed the massive structure. There is actually a really fun foot race that requires you to get to the very top of the tower. Anyway, the view from up top is spectacular.

Agility level 4 seems like the equivalent of Spider-Man to me, btw. Leaping from tower to tower is exhilarating. You never know if you will make it, but you always seem to just get close enough to grab the ledge. The running speed kicks ass as well. My co-op partner kept bitching that I was leaving him in the dust and that's when he was driving!

I got much better with the targeting system last night and was pulling off headshots like crazy. I don't care for the sniper rifle's zoom system, but it is a powerful weapon when used correctly. The shotgun seems like the best overall weapon though. Jumping right up into someone's face and unloading that monster is a recipe for success. The starting agency weapons are ok, nothing really special.

:thumbsup: to the demo. I'm even more interested in the game now than when I saw the private showing at E3.

I have a PS3 sitting in a box at home, because I am waiting for the "newer" X-Box 360 to come out - the one with the big hard drive, hdmi etc.

Do you know when this is due out?

No clue.

Personally, I'd just buy an Xbox360 and get a warranty from Best Buy, that way you can just return it and get the new model when it's available.

Curious though, if you have a warranty through BB and send it to MS to get fixed, will BB allow you to update your warranty to match the serial #?

No one does. MS has most recently claimed it was only a "research project". I'm guessing we'll see the cooler processors at some point this year, but who knows. And the HDMI and hard drive... who knows if we'll see them this year at all.

I don't think the serial number is on the receipt, so there's no way for them to tell when you return it.

I made a thread for itself, not realizing there was discussion here. My impressions below:
I ran around on my own, couldn't find a buddy to play with. this game is like GTA meets CoH. The gameplay was decent, maybe its more fun with a friend but I got bored quickly.
I did like the art and I liked how open the world is (you can swim in the river. I found great joy in that). I also had fun doing stupid shit just to see what the voiceover guy would say. (apparently running down civillians with a SUV is frowned upon)
I want this game for H3 beta code but I don't feel this title is worth more than $30

I just gotta believe that the "research project" is the next gen Xbox. It's already nearly a year and a half into it's life cycle and doing some pretty amazing things with just component and USB cables. If Microsoft were to wait another year and a half to launch an upgrade to what we all have, then THAT particular unit only has about 2 years on it's life cycle before the next gen unit is supposed to hit the market (assuming a 5 year life cycle).

Could it happen? Sure... but I think it would be pretty shitty to expect the customer to buy an upgraded unit every 2-3 years. I would hope that Microsoft, of all companies, could anticipate the next wave of technology and incorporate it into the Xbox 720 (or whatever they will call it); unlike what they did with the current 360 by not including HDMI or HD out of the box.

They don't expect you to buy anything. It's an option for those that need an hdmi that badly or an extra reason for anyone that's held off for that long.

The demo was ok. It has a super hero/spiderman2 feel to it. I just hope there is a little more when the full game is released. Take the physical attacks for example, as far as hand to hand combat you're limited to a running kick, roundhouse kick, and hitting a perp with your gun? c'mon, shouldn't these agents have a few more techniques or throws available to them?

Oh if you want to save $10, check the Warioware thread. I posted a coupon for $10 off a $39 and over game at best Buy.

Looks like it was taken down due to bandwidth issues, is it available anywhere else?

LMK if this works:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=UXA6WZHH

Most consoles have a little hole in the box so that stores can scan the serial numbers of consoles directly... and this does go on the receipt. I can only imagine it's so that people don't try to exchange their old consoles for new ones.

correct. kmart, walmart, bb & compusa I know print the serial numbers of consoles on the reciepts. I've purchased something vg related from all those places.

You know, I know the Xbox, PS2, and Gamecube had visible system serial numbers on the box (via a hole), but I haven't noticed them on the newer gen of consoles.

The 360 has a little flap that reveals the serial number.
But when I recently took my Xbox back for credit (to get a DVD-HD for the 360), they definitely didn't scan or check the number, they just made sure everything was there and then they gave me the credit, no hassle at all.

Anyway, my new quandary is : do I buy a $30 replacement plan for the HD-DVD? We all know that this player is sub-optimal, but cheap. I guess it's a gamble. If I think I can buy a much better HD-DVD player in two years for around $200, then the replacement plan is worth it. If they're still $400 or more, it really isn't something I'll be likely to upgrade. So at this point my mind isn't made up either way...

cool! thanks for the heads-up!