Christmas Game Ideas?

[jgbishop]

It's that time of year to make a Christmas wish list, and I'm not completely up to date on all the games out there. I have two questions:

1. A number of games I'm interested in (Silent Hunter 3, Splinter Cell 3, and F.E.A.R.) all use the StarForce (or whatever it's called) copy protection scheme, of which I have read some pretty scary stuff. I'm completely against software piracy, and I fully understand why such schemes are used, but I've read that StarForce does some weird stuff to some systems. What do people here think about it, especially those who have the aforementioned games?

2. What other PC games do people recommend for holiday wishlists? All genres are welcome.

 

[jgbishop]

bump

 

[microAmp]

Silent Hunter 3 is pretty good, very open game. I got around the StarForce protection by using a no-CD crack and improves inital load time by a mile instead of using the disc. I would imagine that Splinter Cell and Fear could be done the same.

Recommendatins? Civilization 4? Hearts of Iron 2?

Civ 4 turned based game.
HoI2 is a slow real time WWII game, be any country you want. USA, Brazil, Portugal, Germany, Russia, Communist China, Nationalist China, etc.

 

[Fern]

I've got Quake 4 and Call of Duty 2 on my list

 

[QueBert]

I've read a bunch of stuff pertaining to Starforce, a lot of it I would highly questio as pure crap.

it can cause your CD/DVD drives to stop working being the big one. I think personally, the ones who say the worst things about Starforce, are the ones who don't like copy protection. I'm not exactly talking about Pirates, a lot of people want to buy a game, and run a no cd crack, which is understandable. Starforce can be a B!TCH to bypass. Unpluging your CD/DVD drive power cable as part of a work around doesn't sound fun.

If you buy a legit copy of a game that used Starforce, will it b0ff your system? Anything is possible, but I don't see it as being any higher chance then any program b0ffin your system.

Splinter Cell 3 is good
F.E.A.R. is pretty nice, I didn't love it as much as most reviewers seemed too, but I enjoyed it for the most part.

since you say you're not up on games. LOTR: Battle For Middle Earth is a really fun RTS game. I like Lord Of The Rings, and I like a good RTS game. Act Of War is also very good, another RTS. Has a nice story, sweet graphics, just a solid title.

Swat 4 is GREAT! best tactial shooter I've played since Swat 3 killer graphics, missions are a blast, very difficult game at some points. A few of the missions had me pulling hair out. If you want a shoot everything that moves twitch shooter, Swat 4 will be crap. I enjoy the tactial aspect though.

LOTR: Return Of The King, a few years old, but can be found for 10 bucks @ Fry's or most other stores. A good ole Hack-N-Slash. Not much to it besides kill all the baddies, but it has good graphics, and for 10 bucks you can't go wrong.

 

[skace]

I hated Starforce only because it made me reboot my machine 2 times in a row, with a 6 month uptime where no other piece of software had forced me to reboot. Also, the 2 games I've played on X3 and Bet on Soldier both run noticeably slower than other games and I'm starting to wonder if it is Starforce that adds unnecessary overhead (wouldn't be the first time for a copy protection scheme). I don't believe my FEAR has Starforce though.

I recommend CIV4 and BF2 because between the 2 of them you have more than enough gaming possible.

 

[crownjules]

If you want a good WWII RTS, Blitzkrieg 2. Tons of different units, very nice graphics and sounds, not too taxing on the system either. It's a little more strategic then your C&C or Warcraft type RTS where you can just mass rush with unit X, and the missions are generally fun so far. You get to play the Americans in the Pacific, Germans, and Soviets.