i’m looking for a php project to work on this summer, any ideas are welcome make a comment and it’ll be considered, like everything else i’ve made on bonta-kun.net it’ll be fully open source and available to anyone who wants the source code, at the moment i’m knocking around a few ideas in my head but in general i’m not sure where i’m gonna go with this

widgets are also welcome recommendations, or something you’d like to see in my webcomic widget

well to get things started (again) i’m going to do some reviews, mainly because reviews are relatively easy for me to churn out, first up is battlefield 2.

first things first, this game is meant to be played online, so singleplayer is slim pickens although it does have some impressive bots.  so now to talk about the bulk of the game, the multiplayer, there is a new login system that is interesting, as far as i can tell you are totally unable to play this game without an internet connection, because it forces you to login to their server before it will let you get into the actual game itself, this does have it’s advantages, like access to stats that travel with you and track everything you do while you play (on ranked servers) from how long you use specific vehicles to your accuracy with each different gun, it is truely amazing how many stats are tracked.  anyways i was trying to talk to the game and somehow got sidetracked onto the stats system, the multiplayer is a point control system (similar to day of defeat or onslaught in UT2K4), the difference is that in battlefield each team starts with a set number of tickets and they are always ticking down, the number of points you control directly affects the rate you lose tickets, this is unique system compared to day of defeat and UT2K4, because for one thing unlock those you know the match will end eventually even if no points change ownership, this gives the matches a sense of rush that you don’t get with the other two games.  like UT2K4 there are vehicles, the primary difference is that UT2K4 is the it’s set in teh future and battlefield is set in present day using current weapons and vehicles, and it really seems to create a much more realistic atmosphere the vehicles really are much more powerful than people and a person with skill in a tank can easily hold down an area, and good air support can dominate a map. but honestly the core of this game is a really fun mess of people and vehicles fighting like mad to control the map, it really is just a ton of fun to play this game, to be honest it’s very hard to quantify what makes the game so fun, other than it’s just a mess of violence (as horrible as that sounds).  with version 1.02 most of the problems have been cleared up, there is still a number of things i dont’ understand why they did or didn’t do, like teh login system, if you’re going to implement this online system for all stats and settings, why not integrate an update system too, it’s going to your servers anyways why not just let it download any updates then too, and a friends list (like steam’s but one that works), these are just minor complaints and rather small ones at that, that barely mar an otherwise very fun game.

this time i’m serious when i say writing is going to continue, work and FFXI has been kicking my butt lately, but i’m going to strike back with some serious blogging