5 comments about Assassin's Creed Limited Edition Bundle: Prima Official Game Guide (Prima Official Game Guides).

1. It's awesome. The art book have a lot of pictures and they are very good.
   In other hand, I've already finished the game so I haven't read the guide very carefully but I have seen it and looks great



2. Just as promised. Perfect and in time to make a boy very happy at Christmas.



3. To put it short. This limited edition bundle/guide was worth it. Since I am a fan of video game art, and since this product included a detailed strategy guide with it, it was a steal for me.



4. A complete storyline of the game itself, pictures and a full book of photos from each of the developers, strong construction, easy to read!



5. I bought this at Gamestop for $35.00 and it was still worth it. Fans of the game, especially those into art/concept art would surely enjoy it as much as I did. The art book is about 150 pages and filled with wonderfully detailed paintings and computer renderings of Altaïr, the Assassins, Templars and cityfolk as well as the cities of Masyaf, Acre, Jerusalem and Damascus. Commentary of those who worked on the project is in the artbook too, giving light to things not often noticed and explaining the details behind the designs.
   
   The lithograph is glossy and about postcard sized. The art in the book is much better. Enough said. As far as I can tell, the Hidden Blade is NOT on the wrong hand, he is facing the viewer so the orientation is reversed. (Think looking in a mirror)
   
   The game guide spends an entire chapter on combat schematics/ interpreting guard and civilian reactions alone. A paragraph or so biography of all of the main characters is included as well as Maps containing the locations of flags and view points and screenshots showing Templars and ways to deal them. A step-by-step guide to each of the cities and their districts is followed by a walkthrough of the memory blocks, with tips, cautions and alerts to plot details easily missed throughout. X-box 360 Achievements are listed in the back. They also give you a very rippable map of the Holy Land attached to the guide, which I would highly recommend taking out with scissors.
   
   Overall, a 5/5 for extra content, great details and value.

No comments about Too Human (Prima Official Game Guide).

2 comments about The Darkness Official Strategy Guide (Official Strategy Guides (Bradygames)).

1. This is a fun game. It does seem a bit short though. I'm right near the end. I do believe they start you with the wrong power as well. They should start you with the demon arm IMO. Worth buying though!



2. The guide was very straight forward. The ony thing was I had acces to collectables in Chapter 1 that weren't revealed until later chapters in the guide, otherwise most everything was straight forward.

3 comments about Killer Poker Online, Vol. 2: Advanced Strategies for Crushing the Internet Game.

1. I read a lot of poker books and a lot of the information in these books is repetitive. This is not the case with Killer Poker Online 2 by John Vorhaus. Vorhaus takes a more cerebral look than some other books that focus on technical analysis. This book is more about the philosophy and psychology of the online poker table than the other books I have read. Some of the concepts and information in the book I already subconsiously knew, but Vorhaus fleshed them out and made me think on a deeper contextual level.
   
   I like best the section on heads up play. I think it is better than Harrington's HU strategy(HOH Vol 2). I love playing heads up and I can thank Vorhaus for improving my HU game light years.
   
   This book will stay part of my poker library for years to come, along side the Harrington On Hold'em Volumes, Phil Gordon's Little Green and Little Blue Books, Brunson's Super System 1 & 2, and Caro's Book of Poker Tells. I am also planning to read Vorhaus's other poker books.



2. Killer Poker Online Vol. 2 was to be the redeeming value of this two part series. Most would expect that since the original book, "Killer Poker Online" left a lot to be desired, and focused on just about everything but actually playing, that this latest endeavor would expand upon the apparent foundation that Vorhaus was attempting to define previously. Unfortunately, we just get mostly more of the same useless information.
   
   The major flaw with this book is that it provides little insight into how to actually win big pots, lose small ones, and "crush the internet game". To make matters worse, some of the advice about actual play which is given has been routinely dis-proven via real life examples. For instance, Vorhaus mentions that Sit-n-go tournaments should be utilized for entertainment only, in that trying to build a bankroll via this method is hazardous. He further mentions that Sit-n-go tournaments require more luck than skill.
   
   The problem here is that many online regulars play only Sit-n-go games, and many famous, world renowned players found their way to stardom by focusing on Sit-n-go style games. But then to contradict himself, Vorhaus mentions that regular, multitable tournaments are your best bet. Any poker regular understands that multitable tournaments require luck as a prominent variable in your play. I don't understand how Vorhaus would consider luck to be too big of a factor in sit-n-go play, but not one in multitable tournament play. On top of that, at the final table in a multitable tournament the play is almost identical to sit-n-go games with the exception that not all players will begin the final table with the same amount of chips. Where are we to get this final table experience if we don't play sit-n-go games, especially considering that one position apart at the final table can be thousands, or even millions of dollars in payout differences?
   
   His advice on cash game playing is limited, and mostly focuses on the philosophy of getting a big pot when you have a big hand, or folding your cards before you commit too much of your money with a losing hand. This is common sense stuff.
   
   But sadly, most of the book involves the same type of "advice" given in the first; which is to talk about things outside of the game. Telling readers things like, "don't play tired", "don't play distracted", or "don't play with the TV on" all make sense and are worthy of mention, but I fail to see why they should be reiterated to the point of consuming a large percentage of the book.
   
   Advice on booking is reiterated here as well, which is keeping track of other players' habits. This is good advice and should be stressed because most players will not do this, even those that agree that it would give their play an edge. With online poker however, unless you are playing very high limits where you regularly (on a daily basis) play the same people over and over, you rarely see the same person twice. This becomes especially true when considering that a single poker site may have tens of thousands of players in your limit range, and you play at 3 or 4 different sites on top of that. Not to mention, it doesn't serve much purpose to keep track of play styles if you don't know which strategies to use against such playstyles. Vorhaus successfully convinces the reader of the advantages of booking, while simultaneously failing to teach the reader what to do with his findings.
   
   Something quite disturbing to me is that Vorhaus does spend quite a bit of time explaining what you shouldn't do, rather than what you should. He presents problems without solutions, and quite honestly gives more advice on how you can lose money than how you can make money. Any fool can go to a poker table and lose money, we don't need to learn that. While some may point out that examining mistakes is important in learning to avoid them (something I do not disagree with), it serves no purpose if a lesson isn't learned from it. For example, let's say I'm faced with a situation where big money could go either way on a big hand. Rather than simply understanding how I could lose big, it would be nice if a potential error was followed up with a practical solution or approach. So I know how not to lose big money on a hand, but do I know how to win big money on a hand? It seems to me a more productive approach to teach me the right way to do things, rather than teach me the wrong way to do things and then expect me to figure out an alternative.
   
   To be honest there is no substitute for experience, and I think we know that holds true with just about anything. Getting experience in online poker is expensive though, so books are a good way to offset that cost by giving insight and helping to develop your game faster. Unfortunately, this book won't do that for you, unless of course you didn't know that distractions can make you lose focus. If you have absolutely no clue as to what online poker is, then this book comes highly recommended, otherwise you'll get a better return on your money elsewhere.



3. I received this book as a Christmas gift from my brother who knows that I like to play online; my first impression was "Oh no, not another poker book...and worst of all, this one looks like a gimmicky attempt to address online poker rather than live casino play." I wondered whether it would teach me anything new, or whether it was simply going to be one of the dozens of books out there that have a simple preflop chart, and advocate a no-frills tight and aggressive playing style. I must say I was pleasantly surprised -- Vorhaus has clearly done his homework and understands that online play requires a markedly different approach than playing live. I (like many others) used to place too much emphasis on "reading people", which is of course impossible when playing online. Not having that tool at my disposal made me delve deeper into the mathematics and probability of poker, and I think ultimately has made me a much better player, both live and online. I think truly appreciating this book requires enough humility to "unlearn" the strategies that you've become accustomed to while playing live -- Vorhaus discusses a lot of sit-and-go and multi-table tournament play (maybe because that's what you see most on TV) but I wish he had devoted a little more space to cash games.
   
   Now for my constructive criticism: I can empathize somewhat with Vorhaus, because it's admittedly hard to write a book about online poker with a long life-span because the state of online poker changes so rapidly...for example, online play today looks substantially different than in 2004 (what some would consider to be its "glory-days"). The average online player today is better-educated, tighter preflop, and trickier post-flop. I think a lot of poker authors a few years ago got away with writing books advocating a simple tight and aggressive strategy, which was good enough to beat the average player back then, but at present might only be enough to turn you into a break-even player. But what I think Vorhaus COULD have included in his book -- or at least what I'd like to see published in SOME contemporary poker book -- is a description of the add-on software programs that have become more or less essential to optimize your online play. PokerTracker, PokerAce HUD, datamining tools...all of these I would consider to be a "must" for anyone wanting to get serious about their online game. Would it have been so hard for Vorhaus to at least pay lip service to these tools...? Sure, they may be outdated 3 or 4 years from now, but they've been the "gold standard" for the past few years, and I think any book about online poker wanting to present a complete picture of the online game requires a section explaining these tools and how to optimize their use. I guess one thing Vorhaus couldn't have foreseen was how the U.S. legislation in the Fall of 2006 would change the online poker scene forever...I think a lot of American players erroneously came to believe that the law made playing poker online illegal...when NOTHING could be further from the truth. It simply made it more difficult to deposit from the U.S., but there are still plenty of ways to fund accounts at the US-friendly poker sites. THe PokerSavior website has an oft-updated list of sites that continue to serve the U.S. market and the most frequently-used deposit methods at each. I think a book about online poker written today would look very different than Vorhaus' offering, although I will admit that his is one of the few to specifically address some aspects unique to online play...I've seen a few other books for sale that purport to discuss online poker, but they're simply poorly-written attempts to cash in on the online poker boom, and don't really offer anything new. Vorhaus' book doesn't fall into that trap, and I think it's a worthwhile investment for any online player.

5 comments about Modeling a Character in 3DS Max, 2nd Edition (Wordware Game Developer's Library).

1. I haven't read the second edition yet but the first edition was KICK ASS. Paul Steed takes you through modeling a charater and teaches you all kinds of tricks that hours of reading technical books never taught me. Basically the diference with this book is that it was written by an artist and not some computer nerd with a math degree.



2. I got this book 2 years ago when it was hyped as being top notch for learning 3D modeling. On the postive side it is easy to understand and gives you a good idea of the entire process of making a character rather than just jumping around and trying to explain a hundred different unrelated things like other 3D modeling books. The bad part is that the modeling technics are a bit dated and backwards. A person who posted a previous review mentioned that he uses wierd modeling techniques like booleans and splines instead of regular box modeling, and that is the truth. He also wastes A LOT of time turning edges. If you model in quads (4 sided polys) to begin with, and then teselate (triangulate) then its all done for you automatically. And as mentioned previously not much time was spent on the concepts of uv unwrapping and creating the image map.



3. I was expected more model of the book but the whole book only teached one model



4. I purchased this book a couple of months ago. Needless to say, I am deeply disappointed with Steed's approach. I found his methods of modeling to be cumbersome to say the least. It seems as if the book has not been updated since the first edition to reflect the many changes now available in 3ds Max 6 or 7 (I don't mention 8 because the book was written BEFORE 8).
   
   When I initially dived into the modeling portion I thought everything was fine. Then -- and this is why I rated it so low -- Steed begins to divide/turn edges in Part II / Chapter 4 / Step 5, which is titled "Step 5: Add Vertices by Dividing Edges." I suppose this would not have been so bad if Steed had thought to include COLOR screen shots on the books CD-ROM, but since he neglected to do so it becomes frustrating -- to say the least -- to use Steed's method of refining one's mesh.
   
   Considering the fact that the CD-ROM is a whopping 19.5MB, it would have been prudent to include full color reference images. Let me give you some specifics on why I found this book such a bitter waste of TIME and MONEY:
   
   * Firstly, let me tell you friends -- it is most frustrating to try to refine one's mesh based on the author's direction when one can hardly see the edges/vertices that are being discussed.
   
   * Secondly, there are easier methods to refine a mesh than dividing or turning edges if you have 3ds 5 AT LEAST!
   
   * Thirdly, Steed falls flat on his face when explaining the reason for turning edges and which SPECIFIC edges to turn. Suffice it to say, grayscale pictures in a book DO NOT work!
   
   * Fourthly, if one cannot get the edge dividing/turning method down, then you'll get stuck because the rest of the modeling tutorials are so heavily based on this method. The only reason I was able to finish the model is because of my familiarity with 3ds Max, Lightwave, and on a more limited basis, Maya.
   
   * Fifthly, and lastly (I hope), when one is able to look at tutorials for Lightwave or Maya, as I have done, and model more quickly and effectively in 3ds Max than Steed's method, then the book leaves quite a lot to be desired...
   
   I think that's all I will say for now, but let me warn you all -- there are far, far better tutorials available online for free. Don't waste your money on this book unless you plan on using it as fuel for a fire.



5. This book is a must have for your collection. It emphasizes the basics in concept design (2d sketches) and walks you through character modeling step by step. In my opinion the book does more than get you started it gives you a solid foundation from which to build. It includes more than enough screenshots plus the CD contains the MAX files for each step.
   I highly suggest it!!!

5 comments about The Sims 2: Nightlife (Prima Official Game Guide).

1. This book follows the same format as the other Prima guides to the Sims. It has lots of tips about game play and good overviews of how the new elements of the expansion pack work. It includes tables of objects, community lots, and new commands so that you can look items up fairly quickly during game play.
   
   The primary negatives are the lack of an index (also missing in the other Prima guides) and the repeated use of the same graphics from the game over and over throughout the book.
   
   Still, if you are a Sims 2 fan and have the Nightlife expansion pack this is a very helpful book.



2. I hoped for more information about the game in general and less images of new products or objects from the game. There were not enough tricks and tricks included to make it worth the price.



3. I've avoided purchasing Prima's other strategy guides for the Sims expansions because Prima has a habit of devoting half of their guides to the base game and the rest to the expansion pack. In the guide for Nightlife however they've improved. More than half of the guide is devoted to Nightlife: new socials, new characters, new relationships, new objects..etc. There's still information on the base game which could have been left out however overall I do recommend the guide. I don't have to skip over the first half of the book to find information on the expansion pack with this guide. Well done Prima thank you!



4. These guides are worth every dollar if you want to get the most out of your game.



5. As usual, this is the most wonderful, fulfilling, mesmerizing game out there! Thanks again, Sims creators! My daughter received this for Christmas, took it to her room, and we haven't seen her since. Just kidding! She loves it!

5 comments about Dungeons and Dreamers: The Rise of Computer Game Culture from Geek to Chic.

1. Was given this book as a freebie--someone must be buying up copies. For an Austinite, this adoring account of the life of a hasbeen fifth-string techno-celebrity is a little embarrassing in its breathlessness--kind of reminds one of the courtiers who saluted when Louis the XIV's chamber pot was carried by, except this isn't the Sun King, guys. Get a life, or at least an authentic artist to swoon over--all of Garriott's stuff was strictly derivative. Now that we have the real Lord of the Rings to watch, who cares about cheap imitations?



2. This book taught me alot about how the games got started and how video, board, and pen and paper games bring people to gether if any ones looking for an interesting read this is for you. im going to buy and apple2 just so i can play some of those games. ITS GREAT!



3. Very enjoyable and non-heavy book stretching back to Gygax and his crew of Chainmail folks up through the current crop of MMORPG play (yeah, Carmack and Romero and all those guys are in it too). A great read and a diverse one too, in that it discusses the technical issues of game development and game play, video games in a social context and under fire from concerned activists, and also a cool look at the personal lives of the key players who introduced the games themselves, Never boring, and although it's not a super heavy read it's got definite gems of inspiration and insight. It's well written and engaging. If you're a fan, (especially if you had a C64/Atari/Pong and spent time with the 20 sided die) it's a must have. Lots of fun! I'd disregard the 1-star bad review (if you read past page 14, it gets much more interesting Kathy82...that goes for most books, btw).



4. Overall, the book provides a good overview of the evolution of the genre detailing the early use of university computing resources for covert sessions of SpaceWar, Adventure and Colossal Cave thru to the emergence of the Professional Gaming League.
   
   Where the narrative starts to get bogged down is when it gets to Richard Garriott (aka Lord British), the creator of the Ultima series of games. (For the record, I'm a huge Ultima fan - the original Ultima packaging, with a knight on a black warhorse facing off against a dragon emerging from hot lava, was the reason I bought my first computer.) Once the authors get to Garriott, the pace slows as we explore his life in extended detail from his early family life to the release of Ultima Online. In contrast, significantly less time is spent on the other pivotal computer games like Doom, Half-Life and EverQuest. While I'd be the first to point to Garriott's role in the development of this genre, all roads don't necessarily lead to Lord British.
   
   Net/Net: Decent overview of a topic that has often been eclipsed by the more glamorous console videogames industry. Would have appreciated less detail on Garriott, and more on the other games.
   
   Full Disclosure: Reviewer works as a marketer for Windows and Xbox games at Microsoft.



5. First of all- this is one of the few books I bought and could not put it down for more than a few hours. I will admit I'm a bit bias as Richard Garriott is one of my personal heroes in life. But added surprise of how Dungeons & Dragon got started in the first chapter really pulled this book together for me as an indie game developer. Hoping to walk in the very foot steps of those mentioned in this book, I found it more as a roadmap of how to plan ahead for my own future gaming company and things I should consider. Without trying to, this book represents the D&D-SCA-Gamer type of person, who wishes to escape the mundane world around us. To live and breathe in a Fantasy world where the possibilities are only limited by the imagination. Growing up in Texas myself, I was surprised to find out how many other Texans game developers there were, aside from Richard. I would recommend this book for any interested in RPGs/Gaming/SCA.

5 comments about Essential Mathematics for Games and Interactive Applications: A Programmer's Guide (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Interactive 3d Technology) (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Interactive 3d Technology).

1. See my other review. I bought this book and the other. I got stuck in that other book. I am learning linear algebra for the first time. This book is doing it! Although it gets quite abstract at times, and seems to be presenting the subject as if it is not related to 3D programming (like solving equations for an n-dimensional space), and it explains something and then says it is not used in 3D programming, it explains the concepts extremely well, and although it may take a while for a new concept to sink in for me, I do not find myself having to go elsewhere for help.
   
   One note though, I tried to email one of the authors to find out about errata for the book and never got a response. I did eventually find it though. Don't expect the authors to be available. They do not have a message board.



2. The book presentation is very good but the presentation of the material 'jumps right in there' with a good review and is very technical and a bit difficult to follow. It is an excellent book for someone that remembers their basic math, if your rusty, take a refresher course first.



3. Do you know the history of quaternions? About a century ago, they were investigated, as an exercise in pure, abstract maths. Yet in recent years, people in computer graphics found this very useful in defining certain types of rotations. Interested? Well, this book has a good, clear section that explains how they are used. That requires only some basic knowledge of trigonometry and complex numbers.
   
   Much of the book is like this. Though perhaps with concepts more readily apparent than quaternions. Ideas drawn from three dimensional analysis. But with topics that are not typically in maths courses, relating specifically to graphical displays. Like different types of tesselations, different shaders and texture maps.
   
   Some physics also shows up in the book. Often related to ray tracing and approximating the effects of light on a surface.
   
   Nothing too hard, despite some remarks by other reviewers. The really advanced and specialised material, like applying Monte Carlo methods, has been omitted. This is essentially a basic text. You should have mastery of this material to do useful contributions in graphics.



4. I'm a computer science and digital arts student. I've found this book to be an excellent primer on the math that I haven't gone in-depths with for some time. The first few chapters provide excellent background materials to the actual mathematical basis for the following chapters.



5. I am an avid tech book reader, especially about any technology related to game programming.
   
   I found this book to be an outstanding reference for math related to game programming.
   
   I think the authors are very good at explaining and focus on the core concepts instead of getting mired in the details.
   
   I particularly liked the sections on rigid Body Dynamics - I needed a good overview to conceptually understand the implementation.

5 comments about Introduction to Game Development (Game Development Series).

1. Steve Rabin edits Introduction To Game Development a weighty text based on the curriculum guidelines of the IGDA and the first to examine all aspects of the theory and applications of game development and design. It lends to use either as the classroom text or as supplemental college-level reading: a comprehensive overview accompanied by a detailed CD-ROM holding all animations, documents and demos referenced in the text makes for a very detailed presentation packed with tutorials and source code, while almost thirty leading industry game developers and programmers contribute technical chapters. A highly recommended pick, indeed.



2. I am a Instructor who adopted this book for a College Course, Intro to Game Design. This book is well organized and goes over numerous major concepts that apply to all interested people in the game field. The only complaint is there is almost no pictures, so that makes the text extremely heavy being 945 pages.



3. This is a good book introducing game programming. It is massive, trying to cover almost every essential aspect of game programming. This book would be a great supplemental text, along with another code specific book, for a two-semester game programming class. If you are a newbie looking for a quick way to learn basic game programming techniques on your own, this book is probaly not for you. (Not that there is truly a quick way.) It is a long read with little code. Let me make it clear this is a good book worth reading: it is just not the quick and dirty introduction that I was looking for. I suggest a step-by-step type book that offers a working game at the end, along with this book.



4. The book only offers some insight into a realistic game production pipeline; it tries to cover subjects from "Fun" theory to BASIC to small Physics equations to Artistry.
   
   As an introductory book it is -ok- in these respects; however, I just suppose I found myself disagreeing with alot of the subject matter that is presented. Especially when it came to the design section, they try to put in the "waterfall" flow of design into game design which just seems too counter productive to be a realistic methodology for developing a game. Especially if you're only an 'entry' level designer.



5. This is a very useful book with respect to tying the elements of a game together as well as giving a broad outline of game program flow. It highlights necessary business considerations toward completing the final product.
   
   Sadly, as a programming book, it falls short of the mark with respect to teaching any programming code. It aludes to examples on the included CD but does not explain concepts covered in the code.
   
   This book is useful to a person who already has a strong programming background who is looking for ways to tie things up and market their final product. For a person who is looking for a tutorial for programming games, I would look somewhere else.

5 comments about Ultimate Game Design: Building Game Worlds.

1. "Ultimate Games Design" There seems to be no shortage of games design books, and they all claim to be the ultimate. All of them wants to deal primarily with the big fluffy ideas of the lead design - the overall idea of the game and so forth. Few of them has anything to say about the actual execution in terms of level design for example.

   Untill now. Despite hating the title (and the colour scheme) of this book, I have to bow to the ultimate thing. This is as good a good as you will get right now about actually building game worlds - the level designs, the modelling, the texturing, the lighting and so forth. It also has one of the mandatory chapters on getting into the industry, where Tom Meigs goes beyond the usual war stories from the pros and repetitive listing of roles in the games industry, to actually offer the reader a good ammount of introspective questions to ponder and sage advice to gear up for the bumpy ride ahead.

   So from hating it, this book has become one of my absolute favourites on games design. Well done Tom Meigs, whoever you are!




2. If your not in the gaming industry, but want to be, then this book will be a very valuable resource to you. For me, it was a welcome break from reading all software books. Which you must also do to get into gaming, or at least the art or programming jobs. This book reveals little known facts such as getting a job in the QA dept of a game company is a great way to get in if your not an artist or programmer. It also paints a picture of an industry that has its problems like anything else. Great chapters are included that discuss level mapping concepts and design techniques that are sure to boost ones though process as well as good interviews with key gaming gods. It simply does a great job at covering the gamut that is games. The author also gives you some good tips on what game developers "who hire" think like, cause he probably has done it. Must read for any potential game industry people. Harsh reality in many ways.



3. Ambiguous content with statements such as light can be very useful... AND! This book is of no value to any one who is remotely interested in greating/building actual game worlds. You would be better off giving the book a miss and check the forums out on the internet. I am gutted that I made the mistake of reading and believing the comments made on the books contents which now seems obvious these were placed by the authors friends and relatives. It's a pity Amazon do not accept returns! As such the book is destined for the bin.



4. Tom Meigs, Ultimate Game Design: Building Game Worlds (McGraw-Hill, 2003)
   
   While there's a decent amount of useful information here, the reader of books on game design has seen a good deal of it before in other game design books. If it's your first game design book, it will likely be quite helpful to you; those who have read two or three other general books on game design are likely to only get anything out of the interviews.



5. Tom Meigs does a great job with this text. It goes over all of the concepts that you need to think about when designing your own levels, characters or even complete games. He includes many interviews with industry pro's that really "tell it like it is." The best part, I think though, is the last chapter where he gives some examples of the different episodes that have happened at the companies he has worked for. Man, stress can drive some people crazy.