Enter the Mothership rush. Essentially the strategy of old but Protoss now has some more tricks up its sleeve for holding out against the Terran player.

The build is a typical powering build with a single nexus built strategically near the single choke point into the base. Having two gas vents really opens up a lot of strategic depth as most maps in starcraft 1 only had a single gas location.

Next built is the cybernetics core which gives the protoss player an all important unit in this strategy the sentry. With its force field it is able to block off the choke point far more effectively when the Terran attacks. Next up comes the forge just in time to warp in some photon cannons to help hold off a little longer.

A stargate is warped in next followed by a fleet beacon which allows for the mothership construction to begin. The basic strategy here is the same as the oldschool carrier rush with the same crushing effect.

Starcraft 2 is shaping up to be one hell of a competitive RTS The likes of which hasn’t been seen in awhile. Some may argue that not enough has changed from the original released oh so many years ago but they’re wrong. The changes open a whole new layer of tactical depth, one that will take the pros another 12 years to fully figure out.

In case you’re wondering what that most beastly music is in the background it is none other than the Thrash Gods Megadeth.

I’ll be posting more good BFBC2 finds as I get them.

Firstly There is no difference in zoom between all of the sights you can see this is true in the following video.

Secondly The Holographic seems to increase the accuracy of some weapons to some degree. The M-16 is one example. This doesn’t necessarily hold true for all weapons though. See the following video for a better explanation.

The Rusher

The Rusher  equips marathon and attempts to surprise an enemy by getting into an unlikely flanking position in order to get kills. They are also very adept at reacting to captured flags and the like because of their high mobility. If you are pushing hard into enemy territory chances are you’ll come in contact with groups of enemies. If you have rushed in correctly you’ll have the element of surprise and a silencer will add to the confusion your enemy faces as they realize their friends are dropping like flies around them. I prefer using the full auto weapons like the M4, ACR, SCAR-H etc for this type of role. Sure you can use an SMG as well but I don’t think the extra mobility that it gives is worth losing out on the range / damage of the assault rifles.

If you are more into running head first into your opponent and rely on your amazing reflexes, forgo the silencer as you’ll want as much oomph to your shots as possible. Guns like the M16 and FAMAS are excellent weapons for this type of role as they are a “one trigger pull one kill” sort of weapon. Don’t miss the enemies center mass and you’ll be sure to get a quick kill. Keeping mobile and moving between kills is essential to this sort of play style as your enemy will know where you are between each shot, you need to keep them guessing.

The Sneaker

The sneaker creeps around the map from ambush point to ambush point usually hiding slightly off the main travel routes waiting for an unsuspecting enemy to walk by. A silencer is essential for this type of play-style as you can easily ambush groups of enemies from behind without alerting his comrades as to your presence.

I find Bling with a RDS / silencer works wonders for this type of build, it moves forwards slowly testing each corner, looking for good hiding spots. knowing where and when the enemies will come from is a huge benefit to this sort of build. Stopping power or hardline are both great choices as when a UAV is in the air you have almost full tactical awareness.

The Long Range Specialist

The LRS fights from a distance, and uses terrain to mask his location. A silencer is almost useless as you are engaging enemies at a distance that makes your bullets less effective already. Attaching a silencer is like trying to hit them with spit balls. Since you’re so far away your shots registering on the map still won’t reveal your true location as you are not close enough for the enemy to see you on the mini map.

I like to take a shotgun as a backup weapon for this sort of play style and use either a 3 round burst AR like the FAMAS or M16, an LMG like the m240 with grip, or a trusty sniper rifle. Depending on how you like to play each gun has its advantages and disadvantages but all are geared towards a long range style of play.

Remember what Arnold said kids and “Get to the choppah!”.

I still have some time before the game is released though so I asked around for some good recommendations for story driven games. The Uncharted series and Metal Gear Solid 4 were both recommended to me.

I had heard that MGS4 had an epic amount of cut-scenes and have been a follower of the series since the NES days. For those that haven’t played the game it is broken down into 5 acts with a very lengthy cut-scene between each act. All of these scenes tell the story and tie together the numerous locations involved in MGS4.

I found I was getting sucked into the story as always but one thing constantly bothered me about the presentation. The pacing of these cut-scenes were far to slow. It seemed like the pauses in dialog were much too long, sections could have been easily condensed giving the scenes even greater impact.

The scene opens up with Liquid driving into a trap set my Meryl. The tension is set from the first few shots but it drags on too long before anything happens, the shots of the faces, some random grunting you lose a little intensity.

Then as the trap is revealed you see Meryl’s forces revealing themselves first some assault boats, then some very badass looking blackhawk helicopters, then some not very impressive jeeps. Again the intensity of the scene drops because of a poor choice in pacing. The focus shifted to a less impressive element that retained that focus for far to long.

The whole scene is still very impressive there is no doubt but If you are going to create a 10 minute cut-scene the pacing needs to be bang on as well. You could probably cut the scene down to 8 minutes quite easily and even up the intensity a little with very little effort.

I thought I would give this a go so I stood on top where this guy did with the same setup and guess what? I got killed. A lot. I can’t aim at all though so your mileage may vary.

I would have to give the edge to the FAMAS if you don’t want to take a RDS or Holo sight as your attachment. If you do use RDS or Holo pick the one that looks better since the difference is purely aesthetic.