I've been playing Company of Heroes a bunch recently and I'm really getting into it.  I think I finally see what people find so compelling about real-time strategy (RTS) games.  After last night’s game I was just absolutely buzzing; I think I talked to Pancake (my teammate) for a good half an hour about the match after the game too. 

Winning and losing in these games just feels so much more satisfying than winning in a first-person shooter (FPS) game.  Don’t get me wrong; I love FPS games.  Trying to out-flank my opponent, getting that one sweet kill and working together with all my teammates is a lot of fun.  However, matches will typically last about fifteen minutes, and most maps switch after half an hour.  The experience is much shorter, much more condensed.  Last night was forty-five minutes of fun and I had to be on the ball the whole time.

I wasn’t necessarily on the edge of my seat the whole time, but I was always trying to stay aware of what was going on, working to determine what would be the best thing to do, poking and prodding at my enemies’ defences to look for a weakness.  Every firefight was intense, ever time I killed an enemy unit I felt like I was moving ahead, and every loss of mine felt equally hurtful.  Nearly an hour of my brain constantly working (instead of my reflexes) and victory was ours.  It felt great; like all of my hard work finally paid off.  It was a more intellectual win than I’ve ever experienced playing a shooter.

I want to chase that feeling.

For anyone with Company of Heroes.  You can download the replay here .  I'll have a video of the game up tonight or tomorrow.   

Last night was the first organized night of Insurgency on the Mike's Marauders servers.  It was an amazing experience, one of the best I've had with this mod.  The evening started out with some of the more experiences players (myself included) showing everyone the ropes of the game.  Then we got into some scrim matches.  

I recorded a demo of the matches and converted it into something that can be viewed on the internet.  I hope to do this again with this bunch again soon.  

Two new gameplay videos for Left4Dead.  One from E3, the other from a PC Gamer LAN

I found this on YouTube a little while ago, but the users account had been banned.  I found it really funny and very indicative of what it's like playing on public servers with what I call Counter-Strike kiddies.  Fun times.

In case the video gets pulled again, I decided to just host it myself instead.  Beware of foul language, especially the first 45 seconds or so.   

I've whipped myself up a little map so I can get a glance of what the traffic is like for my drive to work and my drive home.  I'm pulling the images of the traffic cameras into a map image and I've even got it so that if you can see bigger versions of the camera pictures by clicking on them.

Check it out if you're interested.  

Here's the Insurgency Trailer (47MB Stream) for anyone who is interested.  I'm trying to record some matches where I actually do well, and you can get an idea of the teamwork involved to play the game.  When I do that I'll put those videos up too.

You can also find a bigger version of this video in the Movies section of my page.  

Insurgency (a mod I'd been waiting on for sometime ) was released earlier this week.  It's incredibly fun. 

Insurgency (INS) is a total conversion modification using Valve Software's Source Engine. Insurgency immerses you, as the player, into an intense and realistic online combat experience.

Set on the modern battlefields, Insurgency simulates modern infantry combat that doesn’t just encourage the use of teamwork and tactics, but makes it a requirement of survival. On the streets of Iraq it is not safe to be alone. Go head to head with guerrillas, insurgents and resistance fighters, simulating the extreme conditions faced on today's battlefields.

Engage in urban warfare where every window, doorway or road block is a potential ambush point and every object on the street needs to be watched with care. Fight against the occupation from behind windows and burned cars, with your finger on the trigger and an unsuspecting patrol down the street getting ever closer. Whatever you choose to do, Insurgency is sure to get your pulse racing and make your breathing feel heavy while you engage in such a unique and original combat experience.

When I played Battlefield 2 I loved the infantry combat. I thought it was fun and varied and had this great intensity with accurate weapons. After a while though, I realized that the weapons weren’t all that accurate, and that a lot of kills were just from luck more than skill. Also, although going around with a good squad capturing points was fun, I felt it was being overshadowed from other parts of the game. The vehicles took a lot of the game’s focus, there were some major balance issues, and things like Support units providing infinite ammo, or Medics providing infinite lives and health started to become annoyances rather than features.

Still, I wanted something that had good infantry combat that was intense. Intense, not because it was fast paced and you had to act quickly (like Day of Defeat Source), but intense because you had to use your head, and your skill to survive and move the game forward.

That’s why I like this mod so much. The guns are accurate and deadly. The levels are pretty well thought out and there’s lots of cover, but sufficient ground to run across to get from cover to cover. It’s that combination that makes it so enduring to me. I have to use my head, my eyes have to stay sharp. And one wrong move could mean I’m dead.

I’ve had some intense firefights in this game that haven’t been duplicated in any other game I’ve ever played. I’ve never had a situation before where myself and my enemy were both trying our hardest to stay behind out cover and peek out as little as possible to take shots at the other. Where I could call on a teammate to lay down some cover fire so that I could move up, otherwise I’d die.

The beta released has some bugs that need fixed.  All-talk is defaulted to ON, which means if you try and use voice communication, both teams can hear you.  There are a few crashes now and then, one of the US guns has trouble reloading and there are some exploits that will crash the server.  However, the development team has already identified these, thanks to the help of the community, and a patch is forthcoming.  With such a dedicated team behind this mod, it can only get more polished from here. 

In the end I wouldn’t call the game fast paced; many other games are faster. But I would call it intense.

And it's incredibly fun. 

Well the finals were tonight, and as everyone probably predicted, Paul Potts won it.  

You can see his final winning performance right here:

and the winning annoucement here as well

Of particular interest to me is Simon telling Paul that by next week he'd be in a recording studio recording his debut album.  (And is it just me or did Simon's eyes look a little misty during that last performance).  This is on top of the 100,000 pounds he won, and being able to perform in front of the queen.

If you're interesting in checking out the other finalist's performances you can do so on YouTube here.

Seriously.  Those two kids were amazing, and great singers.  I don't know how this competition works, but if three people get to sing or perform for the queen, they should be two of them.  But after this guy, I don't think they stand a chance of winning.  

Paul Potts, a cell-phone salesman from Wales who's only ambition is to sing Opera.  My prediction, he'll get to do just that, he'll be on Oprah in September and he'll open the London Olympic games in 2012.