After I updated Supreme Commander to the latest patch I could no longer play the original game. It turns out I had to remove game.prefs from application data and then it worked fine. (The old save files were incompatible but it wasn’t a big deal for me). I really enjoyed going through the campaigns when I found the side I liked best and went with it. I played through the Aeon campaign. It didnt have as many levels as I expected,but each level takes a long time. Throughout the level it slowly expands your area of operations until you have access to the entire map. The best thing about the campaigns is that on many levels you get to start with prebuilt tech 3 bases. Which means you get to jump into the best part of the game, the tech 3 and experimental units. Epic battles oh yeah, with some of the best graphics I’ve seen. Thanks to an ATI Radeon 4870, and Intel E8500 Dual 3.16 ghz with 8gb of RAM. Surprisingly I still get a little lag when playing huge skirmish maps with the larger unit limits. They were right this game requires a monster of a computer. But it does look awesome.

I really like being able to move your queue orders after you place them. Simply hold down shift and you can move the different parts of your queue. Say you want to build a few towers but you change your mind on the exact placement. Just click and drag the unbuilt buildings to their proper location. One thing I notice about supcom is that you constantly have to zoom in and out. Out to make your plans and then In if you want to see the action.

So is digital distribution the next best thing? Instant gratification is quite convenient. I wish more companies would put up their old games for download (for a reasonable fee if they insist). Its funny they have nothing to lose and money to gain. I mean especially with how the economy is. Nintendo’s stance on this is very irritating. If they hadn’t noticed just because they sell some of their old games for the Wii people still want to play it on their PC. Lucas Arts has been the same way except they don’t sell any of their old games. It makes no sense. If they put a really small old game up for download, people will pay for it. I really wish there was a legal way in obtaining these games like Monkey Island and Quest for Glory.

The companies that I have had experience with:
Blizzard: They offer Warcraft 3 and the Expansion Frozen Throne, Starcraft and Diablo II. A little bit pricey for 6+ year old games. And they really should offer their older titles like Warcraft 1 and 2.

Steam: I bought Commander Keen 1-5 for $4.99. Its lame that the huge and bloated steam program is required to download their games but the price was good. They have a big selection but I saw nothing else I’m interested in.

Good Old Games: I bought Earthworm Jim 1 and 2 for $5.99. They have a decent selection which is getting better every week. They are very committed to being DRM Free which is a big plus. They also throw in any extra goodies they can find with your purchase; like pdf manuals, backgrounds, icons, soundtracks. Good old Games is the best option in my opinion.

Speaking of Quest for Glory, I was able to find Hero’s Quest 1 SCI, Quest for Glory 3 and 4 as well as Kings Quest 4 at the used game store Fun Unlimited in Logan, Utah. Which was very exciting. The Quest for Glory 4 cd was scratched but I got them for the license anyways. I never expected to find them all in one place. Since AGD released their QFG2 Remake, now I’m only missing Quest For Glory 5 which is going for $40-50 used. I also got Dungeon Siege 1, which is quite fun to play multiplayer for how simple it is.

I have been playing a lot of Warcraft 3 recently, thanks to Blizzard’s digital downloads. I beat the campaigns for Reign of Chaos last night. So now I’m on to the Frozen Throne campaigns. Now I know why WOW is the most popular MMORPG these days. Blizzard actually spent some time making interesting races with backstories. Its not the best plot but it keeps you interested. The heroes really make Warcraft 3 stand out from other RTS games. Though they should make more of the settings changeable in game like the population limit (90 for regular and 100 for expansion). You can up the food limit to 300 in the the constants editor in the Frozen Throne Map editor. But they really should have done that in game. I know their idea is to focus on smaller squad based battles. But who doesn’t want epic battles some times. Most of all the maps have really limited gold which I find very frustrating. When your heroes, and armies are finally ready you attack the enemy only to find empty bases because they ran out of gold. So thats another thing to change in the map editor. I understand once you get better at it then it would be easy enough to beat the enemies before all the gold runs dry. I guess I’m used to long epic battles like TA, TAK, Supcom so it takes some getting used too.
A really fun multiplayer hero based multiplayer map for Warcraft 3 Frozen Throne is called Defense of the Ancients. You can get the map with really hard AI opponents at Dotahomer’s DOTA AI You control a hero whose job it is to defend your town and destroy the enemy’s. There are tons of heroes and items to chose from so you don’t get bored. Its a little lame that DOTA only has one map but you get used to it.