Sporknight

Take it easy, bro.

Good luck man! You'll do great!

Basic campaign strategy seems to be spamming the hell out of whatever unit is unlocked for that mission, with a few support units to round out the edges. At least, that's getting me through most of the missions on Hard/Normal. The levels seem to be tailored somewhat to get the most out of that particular unit. Of course, I'm only about halfway through so far, so that could definitely change. And yeah, some of those optionals are pretty upsetting. I'll try for them a couple times, but I'm hardly one to get worked up over achievements, especially the first time through.

Yeah, but Link's Awakening is titled, "Link's Awakening". The idea that this is all the dream of the Wind Fish, and you have to wake him up to leave, is actually brought up a couple of times during the game, so it's not as hardcore of a cop-out as Mario 2.

That makes three. Can't wait to get back home from work and play more. Still on the fence about multiplayer, though. I never tried multiplayer with SCI, and odds are I'll stick my head in once or twice and nearly get it lopped off, but who knows.. I'll probably give it a go after I run the campaign once. Did the first few missions on normal, and quickly switched to hard, seeking a challenge. The escort mission, with the colonists, was way too easy - I was dissapointed when the end-level cinematic had millions of Zerg swarming the landing pad, when I held them off with a bunker and a handful of infantry. I really like the upgrade system they worked into the single player. It scratches that progression 'itch' that so many gamers crave for (and I'm no exception).

This. Plus, I think they met their 'trippy visuals' quota during the spinning hotel fight scene. You guys do realize that they actually built a spinning hotel hallway with a mounted camera and had the actors running around it to film that fight? Totally win.

Playing FFV on zsnes, the Clash on the Big Bridge was sheer epic. Even more so when you hear that theme the second time, when the ship/sub fleet gets attacked. They timed it out so that you get knocked awake belowdecks when the music starts, and right when you reach the deck of the ship and see Gilgamesh standing there laughing, the main guitar riff kicks in and the asskicking starts!

It's probably the PDQ - double build speed, can't upgrade past level 1.

75 wrenches! The next phase of the update is a new map, Hightower, and new wrench at the bottom with a tag on it that says "From Watchmaker|". PDQ much?

The "Stack of Doom" was one of the biggest complaints about earlier CIV titles. In Civ 4 they helped counter it with the way collateral damage works and all that, but I guess they decided to do something completely different. They're also planning on limiting special resources, so a tile of horses will only let you have up to a certain number of mounted units at once. You'll certainly have to make more difficult choices on building your army and moving it around, but like Sid himself is often quoted as saying, games are "a series of interesting choices". I know for a fact I'm going to be buying this one. Normally I like to wait for Steam sales, but in this case I'm willing to make an exception...

Put a PW on RED for a night, set it to Eyelander/Targe Demo only (or just have everyone there play that), and beacon the guy with the most heads?

I just click the "Servers" button on the Steam application itself, then right-click the server and click "View Server Info". You can also right-click on your pal on the friends list and click "View game info". You just need to have Steam running for that.

I like the first one, but it's a little hard to read and there's a lot going on. The second one is quick, offensive and silly - so basically TF2. Also, I heard someone (Fireslash?) mention that the rotation's been changed, but I don't know the specific maplist.

Naturally, I'm going home this weekend until Wednesday, and will be leaving my gaming rig up at school. Maybe I can talk my roommate into idling for me while I'm gone...

The Science of Backstabs: http://technofovea.com/blog/archives/278 Basically, lag compensation sucks. For everyone but spies.