Central Florida Future – More H1N1 vaccines available.

24,000 vaccines requested last week

By Cassie Turner

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Published: Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Updated: Wednesday, November 11, 2009

John Choi

Danny Demoraes’ brother died of pneumonia, a complication of the H1N1 virus. Demorae, a senior at UCF, received his H1N1 vaccine last Thursday.

John Choi

A month after he watched his 27-year-old brother die of complications caused by the H1N1 virus, UCF senior Danny Demoraes entered the second-floor conference room at Health Services to receive the flu vaccine.

David Demoraes was two weeks away from becoming a firefighter in August when he began complaining of a cough, vomiting and body aches. By the end of the month he had been admitted to a hospital suffering from pneumonia, a complication of H1N1.

On Oct. 3, after a month-long battle, a blood clot blocked one of his arteries, causing his blood pressure to drop to zero, Demoraes said.

“I felt his heart take its last couple beats,” Demoraes said. “My brother and I used to do everything together. Now everything has changed.”

Danny Demoraes received his vaccine Thursday — one of the 1,500 doses available to students, faculty and staff delivered to UCF Health Services, 24,000 had been requested.

“It’s worth getting the vaccine because you just don’t know who it’s going to hospitalize…who it’s going to kill,” Demoraes said. “If the school is offering free vaccines why not prevent it beforehand?”

Chad Binette of UCF News & Information said that there have been 35 cases of H1N1 confirmed at UCF. According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

in Atlanta, college-aged people are within a more at-risk category.

“For instance, between ages 5 and 24, the CDC estimates 2,196 cases per 100,000, but only 107 per 100,000 in the 65 and older age group,” Binette said. “UCF is one of the first Florida universities to receive vaccines and getting the vaccine is the best way to stay healthy and protect yourself from the H1N1 virus. The vaccine is safe and effective, and students can get it for free.”

Thomas Sutton, a UCF freshman micro & molecular biology major, agrees. Sutton said he gets his vaccine as a “force of habit” every year, but his grandmother nearly dying of the virus raised his awareness about H1N1.

Claudia Witcher, nursing director for UCF Health Services, began each session with a short presentation explaining to attendees the differences between the two vaccines. The shot is made of dead viral particles, whereas the attenuated nasal vaccine is a live virus that replicates only in the nostril, Witcher said.

“For homework, go out and tell your friends how easy it is, because we need all students to be immunized,” said Pharmacy Manager Sheryl Gamble.  

Anne Schuchat, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, reported Friday that 129 children have died from H1N1.

According to the CDC, Novel influenza A, H1N1, is a new flu virus of swine origin that first caused illness in Mexico and the United States in March and April 2009. It was determined that the virus was spreading from person to person with the infection causing a wide range of flu-like symptoms, including fever, cough, sore throat, body aches, headache, chills and fatigue. In addition, many people also have reported nausea, vomiting and/or diarrhea. On June 11, 2009, the World Health Organization raised the worldwide pandemic alert level to Phase 6 in response to H1N1.

As of Nov. 1, the WHO reported the pandemic has infected 199 countries and overseas territories and caused more than 6,000 deaths.

According to a health alert put out by the CDC on Nov. 6, most people who get H1N1 will have a mild illness and recover in fewer than two weeks. Others, however, are more likely to get flu complications that result in hospitalization and, occasionally, death. Complications can include pneumonia, bronchitis, sinus infections and ear infections, or worsen chronic health problems such as asthma or congestive heart failure. The CDC urges clinicians to begin antiviral treatment of suspected persons based on direct observation as opposed to relying on rapid influenza tests or laboratory confirmation.

It takes about two weeks for the vaccine to become effective in the system, Witcher said.

She recommends maintaining good hand washing practices, not sharing food or drink with others and employing good coughing and sneezing etiquette in the interim.

“My brother was all about helping people,” Demoraes said. “If anything, he would be happy that at least this message can get out there and help other people. That’s what he would have wanted.”

E’ Uscita Finalmente!!!
La mia recensione sul primo libro (una raccolta di racconti) di Andrzej Sapkowski sul witcher Gerald di Rivia.

Il link alla stessa è stato aggiunto nella barra qui a destra!

Secondo me, A. Sapkowki è uno dei migliori autori di Fantasy attualmente in circolazione e in Italia Dobbiamo trovare in libreria anche la sua, profonda, voce!

Having played the superb Batman: Arkham Asylum through to completion recently, I couldn’t help but wonder: Why can’t all games be like this? Not in terms of the gameplay specifics, of course, but with regards to the polish and general professionalism of the thing. It’s the slickest game I’ve played in many a year, whether you’re talking technology or interface or design, and inevitably shines a rather harsh light on the productions of other studios.

Why can’t the unusual, fascinating STALKER have the production values and stability of Batman? Why can’t every role-playing game ever made have a melee combat system this satisfying? Is it asking too much for the daring creators of the likes of ArmA2 to craft an interface as immediate and logical as Rocksteady’s efforts? Why can’t Crytek harness the incredible technology witnessed in Crysis to a game this exhilerating and rewarding? Conversely, when are Valve going to combine their unrivalled level design with something this accessible and sexy?

Which got me thinking: What would be the perfect combination of developer talent? If you were to create a Frankenstein’s monster by kidnapping the best and the brightest from the industry and locking them in a room together, who would those lucky few comprise? Without further ado, my suggestions for the developer most likely to create The Perfect Game would be something like this:

Concepts & art design

Team Ico + Doublefine

Visual design is an area in which the gaming medium excels. While it struggles in other arenas such as writing, acting and often even the all-important gameplay, the visuals are usually astounding, improving exponentially every few years as new technologies enable the artists to realise even wilder fantasies. The two developers most consistently pushing boundaries and exploring new territory are the chaps behind Ico and Shadow of the Colossus and Tim Schafer’s crew over at Doublefine. Team Ico’s PS2 creations were cult hits and pushed both gameplay and visuals to new heights on that platform, with Shadow of the Colossus easily holding its own against many supposed ‘next gen’ launch titles (why haven’t Sony done a high definition re-release for the PS3?) with its unique, towering behemoths that trod a mysterious line between architecture and organism. Meanwhile, Doublefine’s unique creations in Psychonauts and Brutal Legend dare to move away from the generic Space Marine template to conjur entirely magical settings and characters.

Engine

Crytek + Epic

It’s all too easy to dismiss Crytek as a developer that creates awesome engines but subpar games – easy because it’s largely true. Far Cry and Crysis are by no means bad games, as they are both highly enjoyable in a simple, low-budget, European, action b-movie kind of way. It’s the huge disparity between their truly unrivalled technical prowess and debatable design skills that inevitably highlights their shortcomings in the latter department, perhaps unfairly. Nobody can deny their ability to craft a fine explosion, though, and they’re one of the few developers still willing to push cutting edge computer technology to its limits – even if there’s only a handful of potential customers that can witness it first hand.

Meanwhile, Epic have taken the mid-ground, creating a scaleable engine not quite capable of  the finesse seen in Crytek’s offerings but providing a much more solid gaming foundation, resulting in it powering most of the current generation’s major titles. Unreal Engine 3 has its flaws, such as the bizarrely plasticky characters that seem to be unavoidable, but it’s nevertheless versatile and stable. It also achieves some of the more remarkable loading times, whether on console or PC.

World building

CD Projekt & Rocksteady

Perhaps the obvious candidates for this category would be the likes of Bioware and Bethesda, responsible for the sprawling RPGs  that allow players to roam about in a fictional world, whether it be the future (Mass Effect) or Tamriel (Oblivion). They go to great pains to give each item in the world an explanation, every character a backstory, every location a history. It’s all very detailed and all very encyclopaedic, but it never really feels alive. The worlds in those games feel like databases of vaguely interesting information that has no real relevance on your gameplay experience. By focusing so heavily on inconsequential details, often the bigger picture is missed.

Instead my picks would be CD Projekt and Rocksteady, both of whom have proved particularly adept at understanding the essential nature of licensed IPs – in the former’s case the Witcher novels by Andrzej Sapkowski and with the former DC’s iconic Batman superhero. The trick they both demonstrate is an ability to identify the core elements of a characacter or world: they’re not distracted by irrelevances or the obvious spectacle, instead delving into crucial elements that will only be directly recognised by fans, but which even the casual osberver would feel by their absence.

Bioware and Bethesda can create worlds full of detail. CD Projekt and Rocksteady create worlds full of personality.

Level design

Valve & 2K Czech

All the above is meaningless without a good game beneath all the fictional context. These two developers know how to extrapolate a fictional world into a proper game – or perhaps vice versa. The Half Life games have repeteadly shown a deftness of touch in their general design, with a flowing, naturalistic approach to the game space that has proved increasingly influential, with many games now eschewing the basic Doom-style level structure. Their genius particularly lies in integrating the fictional world and story into the architecture itself – Half Life 2 tells its story through incidental details rather than elaborate cut scenes and is all the more involving because of it.

2k Czech are back on the radar at the moment thanks to the forthcoming Mafia 2. Despite the apparent excitement over the sequel, the original game was confined to a niche group of admirers, at the time being rather ignorantly dismissed as ‘GTA with boring cars’ – a shorthand that many lazy journalists and simple gamers will no doubt recycle once the new game is out. What 2k Czech realised is that the free-roaming sandbox design of GTA absolutely does not work in the context of a largely linear, scripted story. The GTA games are at their best when they let you do silly things; every attempt to force you down a gritty, resonant storyline in GTA IV puts a barrier between you and the emergent gameplay possibilties. With Mafia, 2k Czech (then known as Illusion Softworks) knew the story they wanted to tell and they knew  their city. When you’re sent out into the world, it’s with a purpose, the story constantly driving you onwards to different locations and times of day, rather than leaving it up to random chance and the arbitrary, immature whims of the player. Mafia’s harsh police activity prevents you from behaving like a comedy serial killer and the drama soars because of it, avoiding GTA’s uncomfortable blend of daftness anarchy and supposedly important decisions.

Writing

Doublefine

Paul Dini did a pretty damn good job with the Batman: Arkham Asylum script, aided in no small part by the voice talents of Mark Hamill. For a writer from a different medium he showed a remarkable affinity for adapting to a new environment, albeit with an over-reliance on cut-scenes. But Dini is still no match for Tim Schafer, masterful wordmonger behind The Secret of Monkey Island, Full Throttle, Grim Fandango and Psychonauts. They’re not all great games, each with their fair number of flaws, but the writing is unmatched in gaming.

Schafer’s games are fun – Psychonauts is a glorious platform extravaganza – but rarely groundbreaking in their gameplay, while his stories and characters throw more ideas at the player than most games put together. Most of his recent projects have been pursued by tedious studio executives attempting to interfere, with both Psychonauts and Brutal Legend havinv troubled developments. I’d love to see what Schafer could do if he actually had studio support from start to finish, and the kind of budget that World War 2 and Space Marine shooters enjoy.

Interface & QA

Rocksteady & Infinity Ward

Most of the games that attract my attention are ones that try hard but don’t necessarily succeed in all areas. STALKER. Morrowind. Deus Ex. The Path. Darwinia.

Sometimes, though, it’s a pleasure in itself to play something that is so finely tuned, so delicately balance and polished and tested and focus grouped, that it is an entirely effortless experience. Usually this also results in a soulless, dull game, with innovation and production value often seeming mutually exclusive, but sometimes a real gem sneaks through. Batman is one, Call of Duty is another. I’m unaware of Rocksteady’s previous work, but Batman manages to be both blockbuster and sensitive, intelligent comic adpatation at the same time. Call of Duty is a war shooter but one that is always pushing forward with new ideas, often interative but never staying still (as long as you stick to the Infinity Ward ones, that is). Call of Duty 4 introduced a mass of new concepts to the war shooter genre, even managing to create sympathetic, memorable characters and a modicum of satirical elements that dared to highlight the less pleasant aspects of warfare.

Both developers managed to push themselves without sacrificing quality. If only more developers had the time, skill and money to do so.

It’s all a fantasy, of course. Developers will continue to go off in their own isolated directions, specialising in certain areas and ignoring others. I’m fairly sure I’m not the only one that would like to see Half Life 3 using the latest Crytek engine, though.

Several months, a root canal and various games later I remember this slice of eternity I’ve reserved on the web and I’m back to it.

I’ve been trying to get into Fallout 3 again and I’ve seen enough of the route to Megaton to have it memorized. Yet I’m still dithering at Moriarity’s, till it’s become a new end to the game as I stop playing, go back to get more mods, and restart, and repeat. And always there’s no pressing concern/need to see the real end to this story.

On a whim I had fired up The Witcher, and played one of the small adventures included in the Enchanced Ed. pack, and what I had originally planned for a quick, hour long incursion into the gritty world became an interesting, lively tale that I always wanted to flip to the next page to. And when I finished it, the experience seemed entirely foreign in the face of FO3.

Bethesda have always been more focused on world-building rather than tight narratives, so I’m not surprised that the Witcher has stronger writing. But the strength in Beth’s games are that their worlds are far more open and compelling than most, and rather than guiding you into the world with the narrative they leave you with the freedom to grasp the basics yourself. And it’s daunting, especially without a strong narrative, because the onus settles on the player, and a developer must create a world so compelling that it spurs the curiosity inside us. But it’s also exciting, because you literally create your own story, and it’s far more personal and simple and memorable than any grand campaign that stretches you so far you don’t even remember what happened in the beginning.

I want them to be brave again, go back Vivec’s 36 sermons and slit striders instead of Mister Burke (really? really?) and exploding cars.

Witcher 2 trailer:

http://www.joystiq.com/2009/09/18/the-witcher-2-assassins-of-kings-revealed-by-internal-video-lea/

Bioshock 2: Out February 9

The debut trailer for the second installment from the Witcher series.

It comes with a leaked watermark. We all know it leaked by itslef, right?  Trailer after the break.

UPDATE:  CD Projekt boss Adam Kicinsk stated that the “leak” is a result of the publisher-finding process.

“Of course, we can’t and won’t try to deny the facts. The movie that appeared on the various sites yesterday presents our newest project, The Witcher 2, which we’ve been working on for some time. We made something about half year ago, to present the first playable version of the game,” he said.

“Currently we are looking for a potential publisher (or publishers) for this title, and this leak is an uncontrolled side effect of that process. For today, we are not commenting on anything that concerns the game itself.”

It’s a weekend of indie sales, with Steam offering two fantastic packs, and D2D having another. Play-Asia continues their streak of clearing out obscure Japanese DS games. Prototype and The Witcher: Extended Edition Director’s Cut both get discounts at Steam and D2D.

Play-Asia – Shining Force Feather (DS) – $19.90 from $52.90.

Steam Weekend Deals:

These are possibly the best names for bundles ever.

The absolute, autonomous, freewheeling, grassroots, nonaligned, nonpartisan, sovereign, unconstrained, uncontrolled, unregimented games pack – $29.99 (75% off):
Includes Audiosurf, Blueberry Garden, Braid, Crayon Physics Deluxe, Darwinia, Everyday Shooter, Gish, Mr. Robot, The Path, and World of Goo.

The autarchical, self-governing, self-reliant, self-ruling, self-sufficient games pack – $19.99 (67% off):
Includes Blueberry Garden, Braid, Everyday Shooter, The Path, and World of Goo.

Other Steam deals:

Pre-Purchase Red Faction Guerrilla, get Red Faction and Red Faction 2. $39.99 (Or a whopping $69.99 in the AU store. There goes a sale.)
Trackmania United Forever – $19.99 (50% off) -  Until August 10.
The Witcher: EE DC – $27.99 (30% off) – Until August 12. (US only.)
Prototype - $39.99 (20% off) – Until August 13.
Foreign Legion: Buckets of Blood – $5.24 (25% off) – Until August 11.
Death to Spies: Moment of Truth – $26.99 (10% off) – Until August 14.
All Aspect War Pack – $47.99 (20% off) – Until August 10. Includes:

• Angle of Attack - $22.49 (10% off)
• All Aspect Warfare – $35.99 (10% off)

Impulse:

Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood - $34.99 from $49.99
Tropico 3 Pre-order - $35.95 from $39.99
Time of Shadows Pre-order – $35.99 from $39.99
Spectromancer – $9.95 from $19.95
GEOM – $9.95 from $19.95

GOG:

Complete Enlight Software catalogue for $25 this weekend.

• Capitalism Plus – $4.00 (Save $1.99)
• Capitalism 2 – $6.50 (Save $3.49)
• Seven Kingdoms: Ancient Adversaries – $4.00 (Save $1.99)
• Seven Kingdoms 2: The Fryhtan Wars – $4.00 (Save $1.99)
• Warlords Battlecry 3 - $6.50 (Save $3.49)

GamersGate:

Imperium Romanum – $9.95 (50% off)

Direct2Drive:

Fallout 3 - $24.95 (50% off)
Prototype – $39.95 (20% off)
The Witcher: EE DC – $27.95 (30% off)
Death to Spies: Moment of Truth - $23.95 (20% off)
Best of Indie Bundle - $17.75 ($60 off) – Includes Defense Grid: The Awakening, Democracy 2, The Path, Zeno Clash, and Cogs.

What was originally left out.

No, not the depression facing America (well, it’s probably deepened. Wait, is the word depression even still being used? I really need to watch the news), my personal depression. I think it’s hit rock bottom, or it’s gotten sky high, I don’t how these metaphor things work. Either way, it’s not the fact that a Witcher nudity patch was released that depresses me, nay, it’s the mere fact that we consider it news.

Now don’t get me wrong, nudity is one of my favorite past times as long as other people are being nude. And those people are women. And they don’t run away because they can’t see me cause I’m in the bushes… I think I’ve said too much. Ahem, let me try that again. Nudity is just tops in my book. But when actual honest to goodness stories that gamers should care about get overlooked because you can see boobies for the 30th time in one day, I begin to get a little peeved.

Just last Sunday a crazy 7 year old kid (whom I will assume is a crackhead) was caught driving his parents car around town, whilst looking for crack. The little druggies joyride was blamed on Grand Theft Auto because it has DRIVING. I’m sorry, but I couldn’t exactly count the amount of games that feature driving on one hand ergo, I doubt it was GTA. Regardless, more people tuned in for the Witcher story than for the crazy crack headed kid story.

It's a soulless crackhead now. Take it to the incinerator!

Perhaps we’ve all become a little desensitized to the recklessness of children and the retardedness of news anchors. I mean, I can hardly turn on the TV anymore without hearing about a fire at an orphanage I don’t care about. Yup, that’s probably it, we’ve all become desensitized to crazy crack heads, but one thing we can’t become desensitized to is good ole’ fashion boobs. Thank god for that amirite?

Publisher: Atari

Developer: CD Projekt RED

Category: Action

Description

Representing the pinnacle of storytelling in role-playing games, The Witcher: Enhanced Edition Director’s Cut shatters the line between good and evil in a world where moral ambiguity reigns. In a beautiful, rich game universe, the player takes on the role of renowned monster slayer, Geralt of Rivia, in an epic, action-packed narrative in which his decisions have a major impact on how the story plays out. The Witcher emphasizes story and character development in a vibrant world, while incorporating tactically-deep real-time combat like few games before it.

Am facut cateva cercetari si am facut un top 10 al celor mai sexy femei din jocuri , desigur dupa gusturile mele :

Locul 10 : Triss – Witcher

Locul 9 :Ivy – Soul Calibur IV

Locul 8:Sorceress – Warhammer Online Age of Reckoning

Locul 7 :Kasumi – Dead Or Alive 4

Locul 6 :Christie Monteiro – Tekken 6

Locul 5 :Ashe – Final Fantasy XII

Maine veti afla care sunt primele 5 locuri .Part 2 Maine 30 iulie .

I just finished the game recently, so I think I’m going to write a review about The Witcher, which in a nutshell is possibly the best damn RPG I’ve played, only usurped (if at all) by Neverwinter Nights 1.

Expect it when you see it, although if it’s more than a few days after this post and there’s nothing up, something big must have happened.

Update:
Heh, what do you know, but I haven’t gotten anything written yet. Damned “being sick” and all that!

Hi all… I have a Dell XPS M1530 running on Fedora 10. It has got a 2 GHz Intel Centrino Duo processor, 2GB RAM, 256 MB Nvidia GeForce 8600M GT, quite a configuration for decent gaming. But till today I had to boot in Windows Vista to play games. So I have been trying to install and run Windows games in Fedora. There are a few tools for this purpose. The famous and proprietory and non-free Transgaming Cedega, Codeweavers Crossover Games and the all free PlayOnLinux. All these use wine which is a free software for running Windows applications in Linux. Though paid, Cedega and Crossover Games don’t support as many applications as PlayOnLinux. And when you are not sure that whether your games are going to run or not in Linux, wine and PlayOnLinux is the free and good option to stick to.

PlayOnLinux has got a lot of .pol scripts to automate the installation of games, but they require that the game’s installation source is in a cd/DVD ROM. I tried installing from the game ISO mounted or from any local folder, but failed till yesterday. I did a bit google and tried to read the .pol file and found that games can be installed from a source folder of the game without it being on a cdrom. Here’s how to do it:

1. Open playonlinux, its better if you open it from the terminal, it gives many useful information :

$playonlinux

2. Select Install.

3. Then select “Install a .pol package or an unsupported application“.

4. If you don’t have any custom .pol package select “Manual installation” and click “Next” .

5. Do as directed, then under “What do you want to do?” select “Install a program in a new prefix“  in case you are installing the application for the first time. Select “Edit an application already installed” if you have to update your installed application like patching it to a newer version, or installing mods, or other packs, or may be other support softwares like DirectX, etc.

Select “Delete a prefix” if you want to delete an already installed application (wineprefix)

6. Do as directed.

7. “Do you want to confiure your prefix before installing your application?”

If you want to configure wine before installtion, select “Yes”, otherwise “No”

8. “Browse the file to execute”

Browse the setup.exe (or whatever for your game) in the game source folder, and select Forward.

9. Then follow the onscree instructions and finish the installation, and allow creating shortcuts (if you want…)

10. Now you will be able to see the installed game in Playonlinux window. Select the game, and choose “Configure this application“. Use the “Use advanced wine configuration plugin” to do some wine tweaks. You get the options of configuring

• DirectDrawRenderer
• UseGLSL
• VideoMemorySize
• OffscreenRenderingMode
• RenderTargetLockMode
• Multisampling
• MouseWarpOverride

After configuring these based on the hardware abilities on your system, you are almost done.

11. But still we don’t have DirectX installed and without these, the DirectX requiring games will fail to run. You can either Install DirectX manually via PlayOnLinux and choose the concerned prefix of the game which you want to update.

Or you can just copy some dll files from the Windows/System32 folder if you have Windows installed in your system, or you can get from your friend’s computer running Windows and having DirectX 9.

For my system, I did the following stuff:

cp -r /media/disk/Windows/System32/D3D* .PlayOnLinux/wineprefix/TheWitcher/drive_c/windows/system32/

cp -r /media/disk/Windows/System32/d3d* .PlayOnLinux/wineprefix/TheWitcher/drive_c/windows/system32/

cp -r /media/disk/Windows/System32/gdi32.dll .PlayOnLinux/wineprefix/TheWitcher/drive_c/windows/system32/cp -r /media/disk/Windows/System32/xinput1_* .PlayOnLinux/wineprefix/TheWitcher/drive_c/windows/system32/

Playonlinux has got a lot of supported games, and you always have the option of adding new games to the list.

I Cd Projekt hanno finalmente svelato il nuovo sistema di combattimento di The Witcher, autentica sorpresa del 2007 “ruolistico” PC, che dopo aver venduto un numero impressionante di copie su questa piattaforma si appresta a sbarcare su console HD, dove arriverà per la fine del 2009 con un vero e proprio remake, aggiornato nel comparto grafico, ma anche e soprattutto ridisegnato nel sistema di controllo…

Leggi tutto »

Língua: Inglês
Tamanho: ~4,2 GB
Partes: 20

Password: lah

Links:
http://rapidshare.com/files/205057968/witchEE.7z.001
http://rapidshare.com/files/205061300/witchEE.7z.002
http://rapidshare.com/files/205064530/witchEE.7z.003
http://rapidshare.com/files/205067499/witchEE.7z.004
http://rapidshare.com/files/205070595/witchEE.7z.005
http://rapidshare.com/files/205073412/witchEE.7z.006
http://rapidshare.com/files/205076355/witchEE.7z.007
http://rapidshare.com/files/205079225/witchEE.7z.008
http://rapidshare.com/files/205082065/witchEE.7z.009
http://rapidshare.com/files/205084656/witchEE.7z.010
http://rapidshare.com/files/205087232/witchEE.7z.011
http://rapidshare.com/files/205089894/witchEE.7z.012
http://rapidshare.com/files/205092576/witchEE.7z.013
http://rapidshare.com/files/205095187/witchEE.7z.014
http://rapidshare.com/files/205098710/witchEE.7z.015
http://rapidshare.com/files/205101602/witchEE.7z.016
http://rapidshare.com/files/205104458/witchEE.7z.017
http://rapidshare.com/files/205107376/witchEE.7z.018
http://rapidshare.com/files/205110628/witchEE.7z.019
http://rapidshare.com/files/205114088/witchEE.7z.020
http://rapidshare.com/files/205117546/witchEE.7z.021
http://rapidshare.com/files/205120789/witchEE.7z.022

Correto.

Os donos de Xbox360 poderão comprar no próximo dia 17/02 a expansão do controverso, porém muito divetido GTA4.

Basta você, usuario da Xbox Live, ter a cópia original do jogo e comprar 1600 Microsoft Points (U$19.99)  que está apto a downloadear a criança.

Para quem não sabe, Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and Damned conas aventuras de Johnny um motoqueiro da pesada que apronta todas numa super avent…ops, será sobre as gangues The Lost atualmente em guerra com outra gangue motoqueiros chamada The Angels of Death.

O enredo do “update” é interligado ao jogo. Você encontrará Niko e outros personagens do jogo, dá pra jogar novamente algumas missões do jogo original, só que com uma perspectiva diferente.

Imagens:

Boxart

Videos:

Deu vontade de jogar, pena que eu moro numa cidade quente…

Cal

Je vous avais déjà parlé du premier chapitre de The Witcher, et au fil de la plume, j’avais dérivé vers autre chose. Après des heures d’effort, je suis venu à bout du chapitre II, auquel sera consacré ce billet. Au départ en tout cas. Une chose qu’on en retirera pas à The Witcher, c’est son ambiance poisseuse, extrêmement réussie. Le second chapitre se déroule sur deux zones : un quartier populaire de Wyzima, et des marais. Ces derniers sont brumeux à souhait, les locaux ont l’aspect rude de ceux que la vie n’a pas épargnée : des bûcherons en veine de chance, des rebelles elfes, des briquetiers crasseux et incultes qui vénèrent des hommes poissons (clin d’oeil à l’Innsmouth de Lovecraft ?). Ce qu’il y a de certain, c’est que The Witcher, en garçon bien mal élevé, n’hésite jamais à aller patauger dans la boue, et à se crotter dans le fangeux. C’est parfois un peu puéril, mais à dire vrai on se plaît à le suivre dans les égoûts de la fantasy sombre façon Andrzej Sapkowski. D’ailleurs au début du chapitre, Geralt, le héros, est enfermé dans un cachot puant, dont il parvient à sortir en jouant les égoutiers. Le ton est donné.

Le quartier du temple est un lieu fascinant. Jamais peut-être on n’avait exploré une ville médiévale aussi convaincante. Loin de la propreté un peu vide des rues d’Oblivion, Wyzima est tortueuse, sale, vivante. Autant dire qu’il fait bon en fouler les pavés déchaussés, et relever les moindres détails : des mendiants qui vous implorent pour une petite pièce, la fosse commune où refroidissent les corps calcinés à côté de l’hôpital, mais aussi les enfants qui jouent dans le caniveau ou encore les habitants qui commentent le temps et se mettent à l’abri sous les auvents lorsqu’il se met à pleuvoir… Wyzima est une sorte de Lankhmar est-européenne, avec ses gangs de malfaiteurs, ses réseaux de prostitution, ses élites corrompues. Sans grande originalité, mais remarquablement consistante. Autre grande réussite, les scénaristes n’ont pas peur d’emprunter des chemins de traverse, et proposent des situations qui donnent de la consistance aux personnages. Ainsi, lorsqu’un des personnages secondaires organise une petite fête, c’est l’occasion pour Geralt de boire avec ses amis, d’évoquer le passé, d’écouter des chansons et d’aller voler de la nourriture dans le placard de la logeuse… Les dialogues piquants ne manquent pas, grâce à une galerie d’ivrognes, de lâches, de commères ou de jeunes filles provocantes.

La femme, version fantasme adolescent

En jouant à The Witcher, je me retrouve 15 ans en arrière, autour d’une table de jeu de rôles. Non pas que le jeu propose une véritable liberté, mais il reprend sans vergogne les fantasmes qui m’animaient à cette époque. Il a quelque chose de jouissivement adolescent. Certes, la vision de la sensualité proposée par The Witcher n’est jamais loin du sexisme : les jeunes femmes accortes en déshabillé sont à la limite du ridicule. Mais ce n’est pas bien grave, le jeu emporte tout de même notre complicité à peine gênée. CD Projekt Red nous replonge dans les rêves de tavernes louches, de boxons infâmes, de tête à tête hargneux avec des bandits.

Si le bonheur d’explorer l’univers du jeu ne se dément pas, il faut bien avouer que The Witcher propose une expérience ludique assez inégale. Plusieurs problèmes témoignent du manque d’expérience (et peut-être de moyens) des développeurs : The Witcher est un  excellent coup d’essai, pas encore un coup de maître. Si on le compare aux références du genre on peut même s’énerver contre des choix de game-design qui témoignent d’une belle naïveté.

@”#~ù%^$ de marais !

D’abord, la gestion de l’espace est fort maladroite, et force le joueur à de nombreux aller-retours. Comme je l’expliquais plus haut, le chapitre se déroule  cheval entre deux lieux, le marais et la ville. Un bac permet de relier les deux, et assez rapidement, il devient possible de se téléporter depuis un point du marais vers la ville. J’avoue mes réticences face aux possibilités de voyage instantané. Dans Oblivion par exemple, en sautant d’un lieu à l’autre on assistait à une dissolution de l’espace : la géographie devenait insignifiante, le voyage se changeait en écran de chargement. Mais en jouant à The Witcher on comprend la nécessité du choix opéré par Bethesda : au bout d’un temps, les incessants déplacements deviennent plus lassants qu’immersif. Encore heureux que Wyzima soit une ville fascinante ! Vous en battrez le pavé des heures durant. Les marais deviendront vite votre hantise. Alors que la zone est finalement assez petite, des obstacles fort artificiels vous obligeront à d’énervants détours. Le comble est atteint lorsqu’il s’agit de s’adresser au passeur qui assure la liaison entre les deux zones : pas moins de quatre clics de validation sont nécessaires pour accepter d’embarquer : “Je voudrais aller dans les marais”, “je donne de l’argent pour aller dans les marais, c’est bon maintenant ?”, “oui satané jeu, je veux bien payer 5 orins pour aller dans ces fichus marais”…. “évidemment, crétins de développeurs, depuis le temps que je le dis je souhaite réellement traverser cette foutue rivière pour aller m’embourber dans vos &@#¤* de marais de §$¨^# !”. La gestion de l’espace et des déplacements dans un jeu immersif est à la fois complexe et passionnante. Mais Cd Projekt ne semble avoir trouvé la solution miracle. Si l’on ne veut pas se résigner à laisser le joueur sauter d’un bout du monde à l’autre instantanément, on peut s’inspirer de la manière dont World of Warcraft gère son vaste monde. Les solutions de transport sont multiples (téléportation limitée, montures, vol d’une ville à l’autre), mais à partir de l’extension The Burning Crusade, les développeurs de Blizzard se sont surtout efforcés de créer un espace ludique, chaque zone proposant une série de hubs où sont délivrées des quêtes pour les environs, permettant au joueur de minimiser ses déplacements, tout en le plaçant dans un monde gigantesque. Il est vrai que Wow ne vise pas à l’immersion de la même façon que The Witcher, mais il paraît nécessaire d’opérer des compromis entre réalisme et jouabilité, et ne pas attendre du joueur qu’il passe son temps à aller d’un bout à l’autre de la carte.

Wyzima, ses égoûts, ses monstres qui repopent…

Le passage du temps est une nouvelle cause d’énervement. A la manière d’un Ultima VII, ou plus récemment d’un Oblivion, The Witcher gère l’emploi du temps des personnages secondaires : inutile de vous rendre au marché la nuit, vous n’y trouverez que des échoppes closes, inutile d’arriver à une rendez-vous en avance, vous ne trouverez personne. Ce ne serait pas un problème si, comme dans Oblivion, il était possible d’attendre n’importe où. Mais Geralt ne peut attendre que chez un ami, dans une taverne, ou près d’un feu de camp. Les lieux pour se reposer ne manquent pas, mais faire passer le temps est pour le joueur une contrainte de plus.

Ces petites contrariétés ne seraient pas bien méchantes si la structure du scénario elle même ne laissait pas le joueur dans le flou. Thématiquement, les deux zones du chapitre n’ont pas de réel rapport : Le scénario avance surtout à Wyzima, les marais quant à eux permettent d’offrir un espace de combat. On comprend bien la nécessité de laisser au joueur la possibilité d’affronter des monstres (après tout c’est la raison d’être des witchers), mais la manière dont ces combats sont rattachés à la trame principale tient du bricolage. : pour finir le chapitre, il faut ouvrir une tour magique dans les marais, en récoltant au petit bonheur douze Mc Guffins magiques… C’est d’autant plus fâcheux que le journal de quêtes se trouve encombré… Et comme l’intrigue se veut particulièrement complexe (avec en prime un twist digne de Scooby-doo ), on ne sait plus du tout où donner de la tête. En fait, pour peu qu’on ne suive pas l’ordre établi par les développeurs (mais à vrai dire rien ne vient indiquer une réelle urgence), il paraît rigoureusement impossible de débrouiller les fils de l’intrigue. On interroge des personnages sur leur responsabilité dans un épisode dont on a oublié le moindre détail… Cette construction de l’intrigue est d’autant plus maladroite qu’elle cache une certaine linéarité : avant un évènement donné et arbitraire, impossible d’accéder à tel lieu, ou de poser telle question… S’il faut une preuve de cette imperfection structurelle, CD Projekt a trouvé bon de fournir avec l’Enhanced Edition une solution du jeu : c’est bien le moins pour éviter de perdre le joueur.

Un riche système de compétence

Le système de jeu quant à lui, s’il n’est pas inintéressant n’est pas non plus révolutionnaire. En gagnant des niveaux le joueur peut modeler Geralt à sa convenance, et le système d’alchimie est relativement bien pensé : il faut méticuleusement choisir ses potions pour espérer triompher des combats les plus ardus. Mais la répétition guette souvent le joueur, malgré le changement de stances pour profiter des faiblesses de l’adversaire, les combats contre les créatures communes finissent par se ressembler. On a souvent dit que The Witcher avait quelque chose d’un MMO offline : combats en temps réel et répétition. Dans la plus pure tradition everquestienne, certaines quêtes demandent au joueur de collecter dix peaux de loup, ou 5 scrotums de goule. Quêtes évidemment secondaires, mais comme l’argent est relativement rare dans The Witcher à moins de s’adonner au poker (ne nous plaignons pas, cette rareté contribue à l’ambiance), il est difficile de tout à fait les laisser de côté. On peut espérer que la version console en cours de développement, proposant un nouveau système de combat, améliorera un tant soi peu la sauce. Une chose est sûre, les développeurs de Cd Projekt semblent à l’écoute des joueurs, et prêts à remettre l’ouvrage sur le métier.

Si les problèmes de jouabilité sont nombreux et irritants, The Witcher n’en demeure pas moins une expérience à part. Il faut bien avouer que sans l’atmosphère, sans la gueule qu’a ce jeu, on passerait vite à autre chose. Mais cette ambiance est si prenante, si attachante, qu’on en accepte les défauts. Peut-être les développeurs de CD Projekt auraient-ils dû insister plus sur les points forts de leur oeuvre, laissant une place moindre au combat par exemple, évitant d’embrouiller l’intrigue de complexités inutiles. Faire un jeu plus court (sans compter réellement, le chapitre 2 a lui seul m’a bien pris 15 heures), plus resserré. Mais The Witcher regorge d’amour, un amour juvénile mais rafraîchissant, en faisant entendre un ton différent dans le monde policé des RPGs occidentaux. Fans des classiques des années 90, les développeurs ont peut-être encore la mentalité de frontière, l’envie de dépasser le statu quo, de proposer de nouvelles formes. Au diable la cohérence, la mécanique bien huilée, du nouveau !

Correto.

Agora os consolistas poderão jogar essa maravilha, The Witcher Rise Of The White Wolf está sendo produzido para PS3, Xbox e Nintendo Wi… ops, esse não!

O jogo está sendo refeito do Zero para melhor se adaptar aos consoles e a jogabilidade tambem está sendo adaptada para o uso em joysticks. Ao que tudo indica a versão consoles será uma boa pedida, afinal essa é uma obra que DEVE ser apreciada pelo maior numero de pessoas que for possivel.

The Witcher Rise Of The White Wolf é um RPG ocidental e temlançamento previsto para Q3 2009.

Bem…

quando os consoles não forem mais descartáveis eu jogarei essa pérola.

Imagens:

E um video

(a abertura da versão PC é melhor rs)

Cal