This week on Minecraft, nothing particularly interesting happened. Or at least if it DID, nobody told me about it, or I don't remember because it wasn't that cool. I need stuffs to write about. So tell me about your stuffs, noobs.

Anyway, here's the official Minecraft Division Youtbe video/song of the week

So, this week on Minecraft, we got a new map! Hooray! The previous map lasted for about 3 months, and we’re aiming for 6 months with this one. We’re disabled some mods and recipes in an effort to make the game more balanced and to make this map last longer. You can see a list of all of the disabled mods and recipes HERE.

Also, not only did we switch to  a new map, we switched to a new (to us) modpack! Double Hooray! We’re on FTB Ultimate now! It’s got a few new mods that are pretty cool and seem to be balanced so far. For a list of all of the mods in the FTB Ultimate Modpack, and details about each one, look HERE.

So far, Detoxii is the most advanced (like that’s a surprise?) but everyone who is playing regularly is doing well so far.

And now, here’s the Official Minecraft Division Song/Youtube Video of the Week: CLICK ME!!!

So, this week on Minecraft...I blew up my house. Hell yeah. Why did I blow up my house, you ask, incredulously? BECAUSE! Also, We're looking to do a server restart soon. How soon? I don't know. So if for some reason you STILL haven't read THIS POST then get your ass over there and leave a response.

Also, this week on Minecraft...Other stuff happened, and if you want me to write about it, tell me. IJ wants me to do a weekly news deal and I said "Sure, why not?". So now you all get to read this. Congrats.

HERE is the official Minecraft Division song/Youtube video of the week:

And why did I choose this video, you ask? BECAUSE!

From 1942 to BF3

Former Host of BASHandSlash.com’s Overclocked podcast and co-founder and President of the gaming community The Company, Jag_Five-O has re-entered the FPS world full force after taking some time off due to RL issues.

Jag’s an ol’school Battlefield gamer and he has kindly decided to share his thoughts on the past and future of Battlefield with us, just days before the franchise’s latest release, BF3, is due to hit the shelves on the 25th.

From 1942 to BF3

by Jag_Five-O

As someone who has played every version of Battlefield for the PC (except for Vietnam, I wasn’t drafted for that one) I thought I might add some quick insight on the franchise and where I think they might be heading.

It’s been a really, really long time since I sat down and wrote something like this so please excuse the rusty prose.

Recently, I ran into an old friend who asked for my perspective on the Battlefield franchise. As someone who has been around the block a few times in BF, I said ‘sure, no problem,’ but there was a problem.  I didn’t know how I was going to fit everything about BF3 into a few paragraphs. The technical side of the game alone would be a massive undertaking to write. Should I add reams and reams on the gameplay?  With only the Beta under my belt, not.  I know. I’ll do it from the heart.  So here goes.

For me the Battlefield series started with Battlefield 1942.  I loved the game and loved the demo at the time.  I used to sit at night for hours and hours just playing the Wake Island map demo.  When I did get the full game only then did I find out how much more fun this game really was.  It had vehicles!  How cool was that?  Remember, this is back when CoD was still only on the PC and had no vehicles.  What I remember best about Battlefield then was it seemed to be pushing the technical envelope.  Maps were huge, tons of vehicles, but there was always a fight around every corner.

Skipping ahead to Battlefield 2, I didn’t get the game right away only because I was still enjoying CoD:UO.  When I did get it: Wow!  Loved it.  Right from the beginning.  I saw everything I liked in 1942.  Maps were big, vehicles were awesome. Heck, even though the graphics were upgraded it still felt like a Battlefield game.  Battlefield 1942 players could quickly pick up from where they left off.  It was consistent.  I played BF2 for a long time.  I strayed to CoD for a while but always came back because with Battlefield I knew what I was getting.  I loved when CoD players came to BF2 because they couldn’t hit a damn thing.  You would always see them running around with their guns blazing, not knowing it took patience and precision not just a quick finger.  How many times did I have to tell them, ‘always aim and if possible be prone or crouched.  Don’t move and fire 1 or 2 rounds at a time.’

Battlefield 2142 came along later and once again you could tell this was a Battlefield game.  DICE, the game’s developer,  added a new gametype, “Titan” which was completely awesome, but it showed they were willing to make some changes and push the game, but it never felt anything other than Battlefield.  The weapons were great and the vehicles were crazy.  My favorite thing to do was to step on enemies with a walker.  If you haven’t done that I don’t think there is a greater feeling in a game.  2142 brought a deeper squad system than had been seen before as you could have beacons to spawn on players other than just your squad leader.  The game felt like a reskin of BF2 and it probably was, but the graphics were improved and it had it’s only value to the BF Series.

After 2142, Battlefield took a break.  At the time everyone thought it was because BF3 was coming.  BF3 hadn’t come. Instead, the game DICE threw at us was Bad Company 2.  In my view Battlefield was back and it brought with it a brand new engine and great maps.  While it wasn’t BF3 it was something.  The maps weren’t as big as in BF2, but with no jets they didn’t have to be.  The maps beat any standard CoD map hands down.  Regardless of all the BF2-things missing there was something else up with BC2 that only those of us who had been through the whole series might have noticed.  While I loved the gameplay and everything about BC2, there were bugs and it always felt like a Beta. The fact that the bugs were taking so long to get squashed could only suggest that DICE was busy doing something else. Was that something on the horizon?  The announcement of Battlefield 3 confirmed my suspicions and BC2, with the Frostbite 1 engine, now all made sense.  BC2 could now be seen as a glorified precursor along the development road to Frostbite 2.

With BF3 now out in Beta, I’m still not going to judge anything too harshly, just yet. Yes the map had it’s issues, but then again it is a Beta, not a demo.  From everything that has been delivered to us in past releases, I have no reason to worry.  DICE supports their games and instead of just using the same engine as they did in their first version (<cough> CoD <cough>) they decided to go all out and bring something new that would set a new standard for all new games.  As for what I would like to see from Battlefield 3, I have a list of things.  Maybe I’ll save those for another post after the game is released, because I’m sure a wishlist seven days before launch is pretty useless.  However, whatever DICE decides to throw at us with BF3 there is one thing I know.  Even in 2011, I’ll still be able to see BF1942 live on in the gameplay and for video games that is something unique and will keep me coming back.

- Jag_Five-O

Posted Today, 03:20 AM on EnterBF3.com

Back to Karkand, the upcoming Battlefield 3 expansion pack is set for release this December. What we know of this expansion pack is that it will ship with four maps, three new vehicles, and weapons from BF2. The nostalgic factor should be pretty high, but what about BF3's additions? According to executive producer Patrick Bach, DICE doesn't want to just reignite the flame of those maps, but to bring a new twist. This is evident in the most recent media that we've seen of Back to Karkand. If you played the original BF2 maps, you'd remember Karkand as the fun, yet foggy map. In BF3 the dust storm/evening has passed. (Check out our comparison screenies.)

Quote

Destruction is big for us Battlefield 3 players and Patrick Suderland of DICE knows it. The expansion pack will have more than vanilla (original) BF3.

IGN said:

Well,  as far as working together to catch hackers on our servers! 

Check this notice out that's been posted on pbbans homepage for some time now.

I'm sure some know about the PBBans decision to block the GGC website from accessing our banlists. We have done so for more than one reason but the biggest reason is they are encouraging admins they do not need to stream to PBBans which even led to some server admins dropping PBBans entirely. Their reason for that suggestion is because they import and enforce our bans anyway. We blocked their servers from accessing our webserver and formally informed them to cease downloading our banlist to which they ignored and downloaded them using other means. We asked them for a second time to do so but again they refuse to acknowledge our request. We even displayed a similar message as this post to any traffic originating from their website but they added a redirect service anonym.to to bypass this message. So we are now posting this information to the public. Shortly after we blocked them they removed the feed we used to import their bans and displayed "- Please contact the webmaster -" instead. That is why they are no longer included in our EBL. We remove any site that we cannot get an up to date banlist for because unbanned guids wouldn't be updated on our end which means innocent players would be kicked and we do not want that to occur. We respected their decision and have not tried to import them using other methods. PBBans imports and enforces bans as well but we do not suggest anyone drop streaming to another site. The EBL was not created to replace anyone. In fact it was created out of my laziness. I was tired of checking the same GUID on many different anti-cheat websites so I made the EBL to check those sites automatically and if a match was found then provide a link to the website the guid is banned on. It was never my intention to replace any 3rd party anti-cheat website with the EBL in order to gain streaming exclusivity. In fact we often promote server admins to multi-stream to others to make a better anti-cheat community. There have been other incidents that we ignored over the many months because we didn't want to start an AC war. Only people who win in those are the cheaters. Since streaming servers is what makes PBBans so effective, we will not allow anyone to import our ban lists and have them encourage users to cease streaming or not sign up with PBBans because the server admin can use an enforce bans option. Without streaming servers, fewer cheaters get caught and that is against our goal. I'm sure server admins know what it's like to have a player come in your server and spam their server info or clan website in a hope to attract players away from your server. It's disrespectful to say the least. We didn't want to resort to this but in the end we have to protect ourselves and our goals. Server admins can stream to PBBans, AON, GGC and others simultaneously therefore we feel this decision is best for us but doesn't affect the anti-cheat community.

Battlefield 3 has a single-player campaign... unfortunately

The Battlefield series isn't just another war game franchise that's trying to compete with the first-person shooter Call of Duty; it's a series that offers an experience that's utterly distinct from Activision's testosterone-drenched celebration of war. The multiplayer in Battlefield places an emphasis on teamwork, communication, and vehicles, and this combination has appealed to those who don't care for the alpha-male play of Call of Duty.

The single-player campaign in a Battlefield title would ideally focus on what the game does differently from its main competitor, but DICE seemed content to simply steal everything it could from the Call of Duty series, placing it all in an engine that will take advantage of every bit of power your PC can throw at it. It may be pretty to look at, but it's an utterly hollow experience.

Hit the space bar to kill that dude

DICE seemed to forget everything that made the Battlefield games successful as it crafted the single-player campaign. The missions are linear, and the action is often broken up with lame quick-time events in order to show you something cinematic. Serious men say serious things in serious voices during the cutscenes, and there is none of the goofy humor and personality from the Bad Company 2 campaign. This is a deadly serious look at war—if war is a roller coaster that gave you no control over anything.

The choices you can make boil down to in what order should you kill the guys in front of you. Even playing the game on the Normal difficulty setting I died way too often, usually due to breaking the expected order of the scripted events. You can't pop your head up out of cover until the game says you should, or it's instant death. Don't try to find a bad guy until you're handed a weapon and told exactly where to fire it. The strings that keep all these scripted events running smoothly are visible the entire time, so nothing ever feels natural or organic.

The game expects you do to things a certain way, and will often kill you for trying to deviate from that path. There is no way to quick-save, with the result that some sections feel like lengthy experiments in trial-and error-gameplay. There were sections where I was killed during one attempt and made it through without a scratch on the second—and I'm not sure what I did differently to survive.

By the time the game introduces jets, you're ready for something interesting, but the game doesn't let you fly. You just aim and fire. If you want to actually become a pilot, you need to play the multiplayer portion of the game. It would have been interesting if DICE used the single-player portion of the game to introduce you to the concepts and vehicles of the multiplayer game, but that idea must have been thrown out in favor of stripping control from the player in order to ape Call of Duty and create something that tries to remind you over and over how important it is.

Even the large-scale destruction is scripted; the game gives you the weapon, and then tells you exactly where to aim it.

All these shortcomings add up to create an experience that may be amazing visually, but offers very little in terms of fun. Everything is heavily scripted, and you need to follow that script if you'd like to make it to the next section. The multiplayer sections of the game reward quick thinking and improvisation, but the single-player campaign doesn't want you thinking for yourself; your job is to show up, hit the buttons when the game tells you, and marvel at the scenery.

We'll be playing the multiplayer over the next few days to prepare for a larger review that deals with that aspect of the game, but no one should be buying BF3 in order to play the single-player game. It's okay that it's there, and there are a few exciting moments, but I walked away from the game three hours into the six-hour or so campaign because I was getting tired of being told what to do. I'm not sure why DICE got rid of everything that made their game so special in order to try to one-up Call of Duty, but the result is a joyless (but pretty) game of "me too" that's best avoided.

The graphics are, to put it bluntly, amazing. I was able to run the game with the Ultra settings on our review rig at between 50 and 60 frames per second, and there's nothing on the market that can touch the Frostbite 2 engine right now in terms of sheer visual spectacle. If you're a graphics nut—and there's no shame in that—it may be worth playing through the campaign just to see how good modern video games can look. Our suggestion in that case would be to keep the difficulty on "easy" so you can avoid the firefights as much as possible... which isn't advice we're used to giving when it comes to war games.

Still, this review should only deter those who won't play the game online; Battlefield 3 having a poor single-player campaign is like going to the world's best steak house and complaining that the glass of water the waiter just poured you was warm. The single-player doesn't take away from the amazing multiplayer game—and we'll have more on that in the coming days as we play. Until then, don't buy this game for the single-player, or play it if your Internet connection is down. We thought it was worthwhile to get the warning out.

Top 10 Battlefield 3 Open Beta issues and how we are addressing them

BY: HBrun POSTED: Oct 06, 2011, 05:04PM

REPOSTED: Oct 07, 2011, 8:10PM

We’re more than half way through the open beta and thrilled to see so many people still enjoying the game while continuing to give us great feedback. As part of our dedication to showing you how your feedback is directly affecting and improving Battlefield 3, here are the latest Top-Ten Community Issues that we’re addressing.

1. Squad issues: Cannot play with friends within same squad, squads get split up onto opposite teams, etc.

There will be improved squad functionality in the retail game (including but not limited to): the ability to create squads prior to launching into a game, sticking with your squad when joining a game and continuing together through future games (If team balance on the server allows it), inviting friends to a squad and changing squads once in game.

2. Regarding additional Open Beta content and fixes/patches for consoles, including PlayStation 3 issues with chat and party systems

While we would like to patch the Open Beta, DICE is currently focusing its available resources on polishing the retail game.

3. Will DICE have enough time to iron out everything by release?

Please see General Manager Karl Magnus Troedsson's blog post regarding this question.

4. Can we have ability to change settings/options before deployment into match on PC?

The ability to modify your settings via the deploy screen has been added into the retail game.

5. Issues with terrain stability and “falling into the map” on Operation Métro

This has been fixed for the beta via a server side update.

6. Kill cam sometimes zooms out too far or outside the map

This has been fixed for the launch of the retail game.

7. A bug that sometimes keeps some players from being able to sprint

This has been fixed for the launch of the retail game.

8. Screen flickering/stuttering. Blue screen remains after respawn. Game locks up after deploying C4 (360)

This has been fixed for the launch of the retail game.

9. Downed bodies appear to be dead, but are not

The DICE team has been looking into this issue – which is caused by a combination of incidents in a

confined area - and are working hard to address the issue for the launch of the retail game.

10. Why is the hit detection seemingly different from Battlefield: Bad Company 2?

The netcode is one of the many things that we are testing as part of the Open Beta and is not necessarily reflective of the final retail game.

The DICE team appreciates and has heard the feedback you’ve provided and is further optimizing online play. 

Don’t forget to keep submitting your ideas and issues to the Battlelog forums.

Thanks to your help and participation we’re on track to make Battlefield 3 our greatest game to date!