1 comments about Tie Fighter Collector's Cd-ROM: The Official Strategy Guide.

1. A great reference to a great game. Rusel Demaria pads out the dry strategy sections with some fan-fiction to flesh out the story. It reminds me of the "choose your own adventure" books from the 1980s, which isn't a bad thing. Without it, this would be a dry tome full of stats and tables, the kind of thing one could print from an online listing.
   
   The only criticism I have is that laying all the code on the table like this takes away a lot of the mystery and fun of the game -- it becomes painfully clear that it's a computer program when you know all the trigger points for the game's events. For the purest experience, use this as a reference if you get stuck, not as a companion piece to every mission, lest you spoil some of the surprises.

1 comments about StarFox Adventures: Dinosaur Planet: Prima's Official Strategy Guide.

1. This Strategy Guide is a very good thing to have! When I got this it helped me through all the things I had no idea how to get to, like Darkice Mines, I had no idea how to get up to that vortex but now I do haa! anyways anyone who has this game get this guide its very good and well written! The game isawesome too so ppl who don't have it get it holla!!!!!!!!!!!!

1 comments about TUROK: Dinosaur Hunter, Official Guide to (Brady Games Strategy Guides).

1. this book gives you every detail on the game that it took me only a couple of hours to beat the game it shows you where every gun,key,anything is.one good guide for one good game.

No comments about SPQR: The Official Strategy Guide (Prima's Secrets of the Games).

4 comments about James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing (Prima's Official Strategy Guide).

1. This is great! The guide offers the ultimate walk through of 007: everything or nothing! If you are having trouble locating an objective, or just want a basic overview of the game this is for you. There are sections on multiplayer strategy, and general sigle player stratgey. The guide has detailed maps of each level. If I was you I would get out and buy this guide and the game also because they are gonna go quick!



2. This is not a bad guide at all, but first of all, it's a universal guide, covering all three consoles. This is fine, except that I prefer a guide tailored to my own system, so that instead of the guide saying, "press Action to...whatever," it says, "press X or Circle..."

   Also, the guide assumes you'll play the game at the second difficulty level and doesn't account for the fact that some people, me included, play at the easy level at first. The guide is then very confusing, because it tells you to do stuff that the game doesn't want you to. There really should have been two sections, detailing the Easy and the Hard walkthroughs separately.

   Though it can be tricky, the game itself is awesome. The guide on the other hand could have been better.




3. You can always trust Prima when it comes to game guides, and you can still trust them. This guide has everything for someone playing through EoN for their first time. Maps that layout entire levels, pointing out important things like weapon pick ups and bond moments. And the walkthrough itself will get you through any level, single player and co-op. It isn't whats in the guide that made me shy of giving it five stars or calling it a must-buy, but what they left out. First off, there are three difficulty levels, operative, agent, and 00agent. this guide is for agent only. It points out armor locations and objectives for agent. It doesn't point out which objectives are left out in operative, or which armor locations aren't there in 00agent. Sometimes htere will be another person here or there on 00 that there isn't on agent, but it still gets left out. Another thing that's missing, a section on how to get the gold awards. If you cant quite get 450,000 points on the last mission, it will take more than the listed bond moments to get you there. Another problem is that there really isn't a guide for getting platinum medals on the levels. There are paragrpah long tips at the end of a mission walkthrough on how to get platinum, but no real guide. The largest problem I had with this guide was that it was either too vague or nonchalant about how to obtain the gold and platinum medals throughout the game, and basically left you guessing once you tried to unlock them. This guide is only good (but very good) for getting to the last level on agent, and ignores helping you unlocking the awards.



4. The guide is very detailed and informative. It tells step by step how to play each stage and how to obtain all the 007 moves. I highly recommend this guide to the serious Bond player.

4 comments about Beyond Good and Evil Official Strategy Guide.

1. There are some games that pretty much play themselves. As far as primary objectives go, Beyond Good and Evil is one of them. The game is good, but the puzzles are relatively uncomplicated for a stealth based game, and fighting is just as straightforward. In this context, it's fair to ask what purpose a strategy guide serves. Sarcasm aside, the top answer has to be that it is a cool souvenir.

   Well, there are some other things. The walkthrough will get you photos of all the creatures needed for the subquest, and that is an important source of early game cash. Since there aren't dependable sources of income that is a valuable service. Ditto for making sure you find all the pearls lying about. But, for the most part, this is a well-written, intelligent guide for a game that doesn't need one.

   Oddly enough, this is one of the best practical guides I've seen this year. It sticks to providing a clear, timely walkthrough with a minimum of fluff, fan service shots of Jade, or extended biographies of momentary characters. The big, overdone 300 page monstrosities that pass for strategy guides should only be this good. Whether you want this guide will depend on if you really want to accomplish everything there is to accomplish. If you do, then this guide really will help you track down those last elusive clues.




2. it's overall a very good game with a good story all the way through. as you sneak and battle through countless maps to uncover a conspirisy that has lasted year's. I think this would be a five star game if it were not for the ultra hard boss leading to the worst end sequence ever...



3. What can one say about such a unique and different game as Beyond Good and Evil, except that it is one great experience!
   
   You are Jade a journalist with a mission. Take photos of the species around the Islands where you live. But the sweet exterior hides a sinister and conspiratorial interior. People are being taken from their homes and lands, you must find out who is taking them, where they are being taken, and why they are being taken there.
   
   With simple controls and a mixture of platform and adventure, and an opportunity to use your brain not a weapon, this game is a must. Clever in its story line and with unique gameplay (click goes the camera, click goes your mind), it goes far Beyond Good and Evil.



4. To Expose the Conspiracy...
   And Capture the Truth...
   All Must Be Revelaled!
   
   All 56 Animal Species Locations Revealed!
   Snapping the shots of the planet's fauna fills your pockets and brings you closer to the truth.
   We show you how to nab pictures of them all!
   
   Masterful Fighting Strategies!
   Take on even the toughest enemies---and win!
   The expert tactics allow you to crush the opposition!
   
   Maps of Key Levels!
   Maps show key items, ideal photo spots and more!
   The perfect resource for those wanting the most out of their game!
   
   Species Checklist
   Don't lose track of which animals still need to be photographed!
   THIS ONE-PAGE CHECKLIST IS ALL YOU NEED!
   [from the book of the back cover]

No comments about Naruto Uzumaki Chronicles 2: Prima Official Game Guide (Prima Official Game Guides).

No comments about The Lord of the Rings - War of the Ring (Official Strategy Guide).

5 comments about Dragon Warrior I & II (Prima's Official Strategy Guide).

1. I was disappointed in this guide, due to the lack of detailed strategy. Also, it seemed to gloss over a few of the important areas and treat them like they didn't even exist. Not a good idea.

   It seemed as though the authors quickly wrote it, without verifying strategy and concepts that they described. I expected much more specific and accurate strategy from an official strategy guide. It sure wasn't worth the money in my opinion.

   All in all, it was a very unsatisfying book.




2. I was disappointed in this guide, due to the lack of detailed strategy. Also, it seemed to gloss over a few of the important areas and treat them like they didn't even exist. Not a good idea.

   It seemed as though the authors quickly wrote it, without verifying strategy and concepts that they described. I expected much more specific and accurate strategy from an official strategy guide. It sure wasn't worth the money in my opinion.

   All in all, it was a very unsatisfying book.




3. This was an excellent strategy guide (unlike some, it goes in order, rather than say things like, 'when you get <-NAME->, go back and...", it says where to go back when you get it. The one thing I didn't like was that it didn't have the kinds of maps I wanted. Otherwise, it was excellent. Worth every penny.



4. This is not what I would expect from a company like prima. The guides from prima that I have used were supperior to that of Nintendo and Brady. Unless you're a serious gamer, that means absoluetly nothing to you. The guide itself is of very high quality and the list of monsters is excellent. However, there are a few things wrong with it. It fails to actually tell you how many HP Sidoh has. It does not give a very good strategy to beat him. It doesn't even give you a picture of what he looks like. Also, in the Rhone cave, a crucial turning point in the game, it sais there is a pit where there isn't. It took me hours of gameplay to discover that the book was simply wrong. No matter. I like the "down to earth" format, although I wish the would be a bit more specific. Instead of saying "Go to the north eastern staircase" they could have said, "Go to stair case 3" to take advantage of the strategy and map format. To sum it up, its fairly good, with only a few errors, (which can easily be solved by looking on the internet), and is worth every penny.



5. I received it within a week and a half and for a used issue, it was in mint condition. Thanks

5 comments about Programming Linux Games.

1. I had high expectations from this book, coming as it was from a
   company specialized in porting the most complex games to Linux.
   Unfortunately it seems that the fall of Loki has brought down this book with it. As other readers have said it is a good SDL
   primer (covering just the basics). Other APIS are mentioned but just ina cursory view. There is a whole chapter dedicated to the code of a sound player software whoch is really out of place here.. it looks more like the author stuffed it in since he for some reason had developed it and he thought it was marginally relevant.. A good point is the book is about a working 2D game, Penguin Warrion ( a spaceship against spaceship typical game ) but the game development is not properly explained.. it loks like the book is an appendix to the game and not the contrary... in short to really learn something you must go and scan the code on your own...
   With a little bit more affort and time to give the book more depth and solidity it could have been a great beginner's text..too bad!



2. Programming Linux Games is an excellent beginning to Linux and cross platform game development.
   Its main deficiencies are:
   detail on the libraries suggested,
   the use of C instead of C++,
   and buggy openAL code which I could not get working.

   It is a very good reference to basic SDL and OpenAL, and is very handy to have in one place.

   I still recommend as a basic book on game programming.




3. The computer game market is dominated by dedicated game console platforms, like Sony's Playstation and Microsoft's XBox. But the steady rise of linux on fast, cheap hardware and the parallel rise of an open source community leads one to wonder if there are alternatives.

   Which leads to this book. It has some of the ambience of the flashback to the 70s or 80s, when programmers in their spare time might gin up a cool game, which would then spread like a virus when word got out. Of course, you can use the book's advice to design a proprietary game. Nobody says you need give it away.

   The book's code examples are in C. Not Java, please note. While Java is good for some applications, typically in gaming, performance is always an issue, as measured by latency, for example. The book also does not mention C++. Pity. C++ compilers nowadays are usually as efficient as C compilers. Plus, if you want to code a game of any complexity (over 100 000 lines, say), then C scales badly, unless you use really strict design and coding standards.

   Overall, though, the book is well done. Very easy reading if you're experienced. Very little knowledge of graphics is required. The book is more about the back end design. Graphics is pushed out to OpenGL and similar packages.




4. The book starts off ok with a good introduction of the various API's and is ok reading up untill chapter 6 "Programming Linux Audio". This is where the book fails terribly. None of the audio samples will compile and the information about OpenAL is just plain wrong. First the function used to open a WAV file is no the corerct function to use for linux. The author uses the win32 version. This is just the start of the openAL errors. Minus one star!
   
   Second the book's two websites (one of which no longer exists (Loki) ) contains no errata and no way to contact the author. The only information is avalible is a zip file of the books sample files (which do not compile of course). Minus two stars!
   
   Ohter things about the book that did not work for me was the fact that the author uses C instead of C++. While C is still used for game development , most programmers are attempting to migrate to C++ and OOD. Books released about 1950 should reflect that!
   
   Second the author uses Tcl as a game scripting engine. While I can agree to a point (based on the fact of the easy of implementation) the author should have used a common scripting engine such as Lua. (although the author does mention at the end of the book that Tcl was proably a bad idea.
   
   Third the author should have introduced Autoconf very early in the book instead of waiting untill Chapter 10.
   
   The main thing that I liked about the book was the good intro to programming with Linux in general. The topics of linux debugging and Makefiles I thought was good (assuming you have experince in these areas on other platfoms).
   
   Also the coverage of SDL was a pretty good intro.



5. There aren't enough books written about game programming for Linux. Although this book is dated (A lot of API evolution can occur in 4 years), it is probably the best introduction I have seen so far. The book walks you through the creation of a simple, but full-featured game using mostly cross-platform APIs. It is elegantly written and easy to understand. Because of how much the libraries have changed, you will not be able to use all of the code directly, but it should not be difficult to look up the new function calls in the respective libraries' online documentations. It would be great if someone could write an update of the book. This book is not a one-stop place for all you need to know, but it is a good place to start and get you thinking. After reading the book, you should know what to look for to learn more.