[Intrepid Homoludens]

The Painkiller demo is out, and it's great mindless fun if you need a break from all that intellectualist adventure gaming! Think of it as Serious Sam meets Undying. The first thing you'll notice is the stellar graphics, dark flame lit village streets, Romanesque buildings and interiors, and ancient forgotten corridors of skeletons and coffins. Then there's the impressive Havok physics - zombies impaled onto walls when you shoot them, architectural details that come apart near explosions (useful in strategy), and ragdoll effects as enemies hurl bodies at you (the physics alone are worth the download). And the weapons, quite wicked - a primitive yet visceral gun that shoots wooden stakes and doubles as a grenade launcher, a spinning blade that slices and dices up close but can also kill on the range, retrieve, and throw enemies back towards you (as their life force replenishes your health) as well as emit a deadly laser like beam. This game actually demands some strategizing, something Serious Sam didn't offer. Also, excellent sound and awesome spooky atmosphere; if you scare very easily you might want to have someone next to you while playing.

Great fun, don't think too much, and if you're bored, feeling tense, and have an hour or so, the demo is more than worth it.

[Kolzig]

Havok physics and the stakegun was fun for some time, but I got bored of the game after playing it for half hour or so...

But still, I think I'll have to look again when the full version arrives.

And to tell the truth, my mouse has not been working correctly lately, so I couldn't really play the game in a good way.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

It's funny, because the game really does open up to you when you play it the second time (at least the demo did for me). Remember, there's that tarot card power up thingie, too, where you have to collect so many gold coins; and then there's the many possible ways you can strategize to kill the beasties - explosive barrel or single shooting with spike gun?

[Erkki]

Yeah, I played it some today. It seems quite good (especially for a DreamCatcher game), but I'm not really into mindless fun games any more for some reason. I even got bored by the repetitive gameplay in Diablo 2 halfway.

The physics are a nice addition. You can actually push a cart downhill and it's wheels will turn as it rolls down. I wish you could climb walls with those stakes from the stake gun.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Originally Posted by Erkki

I wish you could climb walls with those stakes from the stake gun.

Well, it ain't exactly Deus Ex, baby.

[remixor]

I tried this and had a lot more fun that I think I'd like to admit. The problem is, even with all the graphics options turned all the way down, my paltry 16MB video card buckled under the pressure and whenever there was more than one enemy on screen, the framerate cut to about half of what it should be. It's not even worth mentioning what the boss level was like.

[Erkki]

Originally Posted by Intrepid Homoludens

Well, it ain't exactly Deus Ex, baby.

Yeah, I was kidding with that But it would be fun if the otherwise movable objects would fly just as the bodies with that weird gun that pulls them.

[Huz]

ACE! I wasn't expecting this thing to work, as it's the first game for which my lowly computer is below even the minimum specs. Bah! Surprisingly, it does run rather nicely - even on maximum settings, although it does slow down a bit when there's lots happening on-screen.

I love the atmosphere - unseen voices whispering in my ear really have the ability to set me on edge! It's very pretty too, and the physics are amazing - this is the first Havok game I've tried. I spent ages just throwing grenades at the hanging corpses!

I do enjoy a quick mindless blast from time to time, so this is very appealing. The start of the demo reminded me a lot of the single-player levels in the original Quake, with their slime-throwing zombies and endless swamps - that's a good thing.

Anyway, I haven't completed the demo yet (killed by some dude with a flaming stick or something), so I'll have another go tomorrow. So far so good!

[Pappapisshu]

Argh, I really should get myself a new computer.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Originally Posted by Erkki

Yeah, I was kidding with that But it would be fun if the otherwise movable objects would fly just as the bodies with that weird gun that pulls them.

Sorry, can't have everything. But you can jump onto the wheelbarrows if that's any consolation . Oh, and remember. HL2 is coming, and with it that special anti-gravity weapon that lifts any object in the world and throws it!

Originally Posted by Huz

Anyway, I haven't completed the demo yet (killed by some dude with a flaming stick or something), so I'll have another go tomorrow. So far so good!

Save 5 or 6 of your grenades for each necromancer.

[mycroft]

Originally Posted by Huz

The start of the demo reminded me a lot of the single-player levels in the original Quake, with their slime-throwing zombies and endless swamps - that's a good thing.

For some inexplicable reason, the first level reminded me of Blood. And that's a good thing too.

By the way, Huz...
Since I have approximately the same configuration as yours, I have a query for you. How the HELL can you run the game at 1024x768 with settings to maximum and still get playable frame rates ?

[Erkki]

Originally Posted by mycroft

How the HELL can you run the game at 1024x768 with settings to maximum and still get playable frame rates ?

I have an Athlon XP 2400 (2GHz), 512MB RAM and Radeon 9600 Pro. I can also run it at that resolution and max details, but in a few places it slowed down a lot and funnily not just the frame rate dropped, but the game went slow-motion as well.

[mycroft]

I have a P4 1.7GHz, 256 MB RAM and a (*sigh*) GeForceFX 5200. I can only play at 1024x768 with everything set to medium...and even then the framerates drop at graphic intensive scenes. Oh well...

And there is something fishy going on with that slow-motion thingie. Whether it is a bug or some new gameplay mechanics, I'm not sure.

[Huz]

Originally Posted by Erkki

I have an Athlon XP 2400 (2GHz), 512MB RAM and Radeon 9600 Pro. I can also run it at that resolution and max details, but in a few places it slowed down a lot and funnily not just the frame rate dropped, but the game went slow-motion as well.

Yes, that happened to me as well. Good to know the same thing happens on a machine with almost twice the processing power! Maybe it is intentional... it certainly makes things easier!

And mycroft - I don't know! Perhaps the amount of RAM has something to do with it - the minimum specs say you should have at least 384MB! I have 512MB. I was talking to someone else on IRC yesterday, and they had to turn the 'particle' effects down to Medium, despite having what seemed like a better setup - however, we eventually blamed the fact that I've got DDR RAM, while he's got the same amount of ye olde SDRAM - and 'only' a Geforce 4.

If it's any consolation, I get graphical 'lag' throughout the whole game, where everything seems to take a fraction of a second to react to my movements - like I used to get in GTA3 and Return to Castle Wolfenstein when I had a GeForce2. It doesn't make it unplayable, though.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

DreamCatcher have unleashed a second singleplayer demo of Painkiller, offering you another chance to try out this upcoming FPS. This demo, previously available only through print magazines, features the City on Water Level, updated with retail code, so what you play is what you get!

I'll probably d/l it later today.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

This screenshot CANNOT even begin to do justice to how gorgeous the 'City On Water' level looks when you explore it in real time.

Okay, I just finished this second demo. WOW!! What a beautiful looking level! You can't just trust me on this, you gotta go through it yourself to really appreciate it. Though it's rather sparse, exploring it in real time is immensely enjoyable. It's done to look a lot like a palatial Venice at late afternoon, with its Renaissance style piazzas, columns, rotundas, and arcades, the lighting is extraordinary, the architecture design superb in its detail (especially with some multisampling effects), and the level design itself impressive (though very linear). I can't stress enough how jawdropping it is. What a pity it's only used for a shooter, this gameworld would make a startlingly divine period adventure game setting!! Make sure you take the time to 'walk around' and gawk at the levels after killing all the monsters. There are secret rooms to be discovered, and of course the gold coins to be looted for powerup.

Gameplaywise, this second demo is even more fast paced, it'll remind you more of Serious Sam than the previous demo. The monster designs are memorable here, husky daemon types with skull heads and biker gang stylings, carrying miniguns, tossing molotovs, brandishing clubs. A tougher version of them wields a nasty shotgun.

[The Seed]

I tried to play the demo on my crapy Athlon 1.9, 256mb Ram, and it literally pointed and laughed in my face. That surely cannot be a good thing.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

What's your graphics card? The game ran fine (albeit slowing down when many enemies swarmed me) on my 1.2 Athlon, 384MB RAM, and GeForce 4 Ti 4400. I tweaked the settings slightly but for they were mostly on high.

[Huz]

Originally Posted by Intrepid Homoludens

What's your graphics card? The game ran fine (albeit slowing down when many enemies swarmed me) on my 1.2 Athlon, 384MB RAM, and GeForce 4 Ti 4400. I tweaked the settings slightly but for they were mostly on high.

Same here, with my marginally better setup - 1.3GHz Athlon, 512MB RAM, Geforce FX5200. For the first Painkiller demo, I came to the conclusion that RAM was very important (although I can't remember what I based this conclusion on ¬ ¬), so it could be the 256MB of the stuff that's biting The Seed in the face like some kind of proverbial face-biting thing. In any case, at a time when RAM is so cheap, you can't go wrong with the simplest of upgrades!

Of course, El Seed's woes could be down to a rubbish graphics card - but a fairly competent graphics card is quite affordable as well. You don't need anything too fancy to play the latest games, contrary to your belief that your 1.9GHz processor is "crappy"! For an outlay of around £100 you could end up with a moderately powerful games machine.

[The Seed]

Actually, I think it's the RAM. Looking at the games homepage I realise the reqiremtns are actually quite steep.

Minimum:
- OS: Windows 98SE/ME/2000/XP
- CPU: 1.5 GHz Pentium III or AMD Athlon processor
- RAM: 384 MB
- CD-ROM/DVD-ROM: 8X speed
- Hard Drive Space: 1.2 GB available
- Video: 64 MB DirectX 8.1 card with hardware Transform & Lighting
support (NVIDIA GeForce2 GTS or better)
- Sound: DirectX 8.1b or better compatible
- Input: Keyboard and mouse

Still, I'm not hugely dissapointed. I was just curious to see what it was like since I havn't been playing shooters for a while.