Eh, any good will towards the Templars kinda ends at the End of Rogue...

Spoiler

Join or get stabbed through the chest by a badass Swede

In that though, Otso Berg is a fucking beast based off his Wiki Page.

 

Fucking hell, you shouldn't have any good will towards the Templars. That's exactly what I've been complaining about.

 

You shouldn't really actively support one or the other, they're the embodiment of two extremes.

The Assassins are arguably the lesser evil, but that doesn't make them 'right'.

 

...

No, you should be actively supporting the Assassins.

See, this is exactly my point.

 

Why though? Give me exact reasons

 

... the fact that the Assassins only exist to counter the Templars isn't enough to you?

 

The Templar ideology is order through control, creating peace through totalitarianism. In AC the Templar's want the Apple in order to Control the world's masses, vaguely with the noble idea of stopping the 2012, ironically one of the ways the First Civilisation tried to stop their apocalypse but that method failed drastically.

In AC4 you can find data around the place showing they're going to use the Observatory in order to Monitor mankind, collecting blood via 'Ancestry programs', other advertising and undoubtedly through the multitude of companies they control. Essentially under the Templars you get 1984, live your life the way we want you to and you'll be fine if not die.

The Assassins ultimate goal is Total Freedom under the idea that through this freedom peace can be attained. The inherent flaw within the Assassin's Creed is the belief that mankind is 'good' but flawed. Given time mankind can learn from their mistakes and ensure peace through freedom. Except mankind is pretty shitty and inevitably the same cycle of hate which corrupts the society the Assassins currently exist in will repeat itself over time.

Minerva's tale to Desmond in AC3 if he chooses to let the Apocalypse happen only reinforces this. Desmond will become a leader, and in turn become a god to those who survive and even though he preaches the ethos of the assassins in justice and peace, eventually his words will be used to justify war, discrimination and prejudice. The exact things the Assassin's stand against because ultimately people are shit.

Templar = Totalitarian Rule from which there is no escape

Assassins = Create a society of peace that will last for a while before eventually everything fucks itself up again.

Assassins are the lesser evil but ultimately their ideology is flawed.

 

Their ideology can be argued as flawed in their belief in humanity, granted. They're also the only thing standing between humanity and mass subjugation. Their objective is to defend humanity's freedom to choose, even if it leads to mistakes. Also, y'know, stopping the Templars who 90% of the time are lead by nothing but greed.

The fact that you're comparing them to the Templars is insane. There is nothing 'evil' about the Assassin's theory.

You know what, I'll stop here. Enough derail.

 

I support the Assassin's in game so far as stopping the Templar's but not in the length of actively supporting the ideology, because the ideology is in my opinion wrong.

And sure, derail finished.

 

Okay, yeah. After MGS3 is Peace Walker which, despite being a PSP game originally, is actually pretty important to the series. That takes place ten years after Operation Snake Eater, and Big Boss has split away from the US/Cipher (who are the prototype Patriots) to form his own mercenary company, Militaires Sans Frontiers with Kazuhira (Master) Miller. They get caught up in Cold War shit in Central America for the whole game, with Cipher playing around behind the scenes (though the main story has to do with BB getting over The Boss), and MSF winds up becoming a big private military company with their own Metal Gear variant.

Then Ground Zeroes, basically the prologue to The Phantom Pain, starts a few months at most after Peace Walker, with Big Boss going on a mission in what's basically Gitmo to recover some characters from PW who were captured by the US/Cipher. Shit happens, MSF gets fucked up, and Big Boss goes into a coma until The Phantom Pain, which starts another nine years after Peace Walker.

 

Thanks a lot. I may pick up Ground Zeroes in the near future then. Watched some playthroughs. Seems pretty good.

 

I'd recommend it. It's on sale right now on Steam for $5, and I've heard it even runs good on toasters. Though I got it for PS4.

 

Ground Zeroes is free on PS4 this month

 

Would not have even looked, thank god.

 

Exclusives are starting to go the way of DLC. Fuck.

Also, I'm as skeptical as possible about No Man's Sky.

 

Sigh. What are you skeptic about exactly?

 

No Man's Sky looks good if you have realistic expectations and understand that it is in no way story-driven. Sometimes when I play a sandbox game like GTA or Red Dead Redemption, I really enjoy just wandering around and exploring, getting into random fights, and absorbing the sights of a huge open world. This is the essence of No Man's Sky. If you enjoy that kind of thing, you'll enjoy this game. It won't be particularly deep, but its enormous scale will probably make up for that.

 

Oh damn, Everyboy's Gone to the Rapture finally got a release date

August 11th.

 

Okay, I've been following No Man's Sky since the reveal of their first trailer at the VGXs 1.5 years ago, so I'll try dispel any fanciful notions you may have.

At the moment, I'm playing a game called Elite: Dangerous and loving it. It's a different style of space sim that has a similarly sized galaxy but has yet to employ the planetary aspect that NMS is touting. So, if you're first point of incredulity lies in the scope, it's already been done, and done well.

Obviously, the key difference is the planetary exploration, and the procedurally generated nature of each planet meaning it's virtually impossible to encounter two of the eighteen quintillion or so that are identical.

A lot of people are seeing these numbers thrown around and saying, "No, that's impossible. The Witcher is only 'x' big and it takes up 40gb on my console. How could this possibly be real?"

I'm not programmer, but it's been explained to me by citing the procedurally generating systems the game revolves around. The only assets that are ever 'present' on a system level are the ones you can see. Once they're out of view, they disappear on a processing level only for the newly view-able areas to be procedurally generated and presented to you.

The universe is basically created with one big, complicated mathematical equation that determines everything about the game around you, from the elemental composition of the atmosphere you're about to enter, to the sounds the procedurally generated creatures are creating.

Unlike Elite: Dangerous, which is very simulation heavy and focuses on realism, NMS is very arcadey and fantastical. Where ED is essentially empty and dull, constantly surrounded by the endless black void of space populated with dingy, factory created and multiplied space stations NMS foregoes that for wonder. Any screenshot of the game will show you that, not just the planets, but even space is veiled with various neon hues that just make the normally dull look stunning.

Your only 'goal' is, as said, to make it to the center of the galaxy, where it's said 'something' will happen (I fucking hope it's credits and Sean Murray's face yelling 'There! Happy?! YOU BEAT THE GAME!'). If you're not doing that, you're dropping down planetside to explore, mine for resources, or just cause mayhem.

Exploring is done with your scanning tool, which stores all the different flora and fauna you've discovered on a really advanced kind of pokedex. You take what you've discovered and upload it to some galaxy-wide encyclopedia for (possibly) everyone to see. New entries seem to yield credits.

Mining is done by shooting things with your laser in a supposedly very Minecraft way (can't verify that, never played it). The loot magically zooms to you to be traded later at Trade Stations for creds, or used to craft things you've found blueprints for (also procedurally generated XD).

You use credits to buy and resources to craft upgrades to your space suit, ship, gun and jetpack. That's basically the non-violent gameplay loop in a nutshell. Explore, get creds/ materials to make yourself better and venture deeper into the galaxy, where things continuously get more dangerous as you get closer to the center.

The violent aspect is basically 'do whatever you want', but combine that with consequences. If you stumble upon two warring factions duking it out in space, they're both neutral to you. You can then proceed to pick a side and start dogfighting. All good, problem solved. Except next time you stumble upon a war with the faction you shot against, they'll remember you. They'll no longer be neutral by default.

On a planetary level, killing the wildlife is a big no-no. Doing so will alert the space police and up your wanted level (GTA syle). Kill the little probes that come after you, and your wanted level will increase again, prompting the sentries to come and hunt you down (they seem to be AT ST like robot things).

Dying only has the penalty of losing whatever you haven't uploaded to the Atlus (galactic encyclopedia) in your pokedex. Nothing else has been said about that.

The universe isn't the only thing that's huge. Given the nature of the game's procedural nature, planets are equally 'planet-sized' too. Find a planet you like, you can sped days/ weeks/ months exploring it without seeing everything. You can send a planet-wide scan out for points of interest too, and you can just spend an evening going from point-to-point and exploring.

The nature of the game means you'll find just as many ugly Tattooine planets as you may find jaw-droppingly gorgeous ones (and all those in between). If you're incredibly unlucky, it may take you a long time to find a really nice planet.

Finally, procedurally generated doesn't mean 'random'. If I find 'x' planet at these coordinates, so will you. The game's systems generate the assets as you see them, but they're tied in with the coordinates so they generate the same thing at said coordinates for everyone. The systems aren't designed for randomness, but to fill out the impossibly sized universe automatically.

As for online, it's a shared universe. The sheer size though means the odds of you running into someone are incredibly slim to virtually none, but if you do... that'll be something special. A very 'Journey' like moment.

That's basically all I know of the game. It won't be for everyone, but I cannot fucking wait.

Media are getting hands on as we speak, and any 'programming' they're talking about is consisting of bug-fixing, so I'm hoping we'll get a 2015 release. Fingers crossed.