In my experience, the games bought from Impulse are good as well. I have two games from them, and in both cases I was able to copy the games to my newer PC and the laptop without installing or even having the Impulse client. I'm not sure how their DRM works, but it seems to be lighter than steam. They generally don't have as many games in their library or as good a deals as steam though.
http://www.impulsedriven.com/
2-3 years ago steam was charging the same US price in Australia which made it about half price. Now my guess is that the some publishers have closed that loop hole so we get a price much closer to the brick shops in Australia than used too. Australian Dollar is roughly has the same value as the US one at the moment.
For example I just looked up steam
Games
Shogun total war,, AU$ 89
Dragon Age 2,,,,,, AU$ 69
AC Brotherhood,,, AU$ 49
The same can't be said about impulse. That said, impulse has those huge discounts that more than makes up for the added cost. The majority of my games are from steam.
The DRM is lighter on impulse as well based on my experience. I have two games from them and I run them even without having the impulse client.
The problem with impulse is that their game collection is no where as extensive as steams and many of the more recognized games or bundles are not offered in Australia. There were many time that I wanted to buy a game bet when I went to the page it gave me a message about the game not being available in my region. Never had that experience in Steam.
The auto aim is there and I don't think it can be disabled.
Fast transportation is a major plus in JC2 ans is not an issue. It's much faster than any GTA. You can instantly teleport! to any location you have visited in the past as long as you are not in a mission or being chased. Additionally, there are choppers and fast planes that can get you anywhere you want. So for example if I want to go to a new place which is far away, I teleport! to an airport, steal a plane and I pilot it to the new location. as I pass through cities, towns and other POIs by the plane, they register as visited, so I can instantly move there in the future. In addition to that, the hook provide a way to fast move around, vertically and horizontally and it makes it easy to hijack cars/choppers as the need arises.
I think the gameplay has a lot that is done better than GTA 4, specially the free movement and transportation. It's not as polished and does not the same level of high production values though. GTA4's battles are less chaotic but the JC2 is less frustrating and has a faster arcade feel to it. I have not played the multiplayer and apart from that I would consider these two on the same level based on single player only experience.
I've started playing Red faction Guerrilla and the concept has a lot of similarity with JC2 and this far JC2 seems generally superior. But then I have only a few hours in RFG.
I've played Red dead on my brother's PS3 for a few hours (on lowest difficulty I think). It felt fresh and interesting
Well, I have not played just cause, but I played GTA 3s and GTA4 with both expansions on PC. Just last week I beat the campaign in Just Cause2. it is a truly worthy game where the grappling hook put to good use.
I enjoyed last GTA3 (was it san andreas?) more than the 4th one. The expansions improved the situation though. Just cause 2 doesn't have the production values of a GTA game, but it's light hearted and arcade like approach is fun. There are quite a few things I hope the improve and add for the sequel. Stuff as simple as what you mentioned about the auto aim issue on PC or adding some thing akin to coop or multiplayer.
Overall the second iteration was fun, robust and worthy sand box game with variety of missions as long as you are not looking for great story and characters.
Looking to the trackpoint which I never use is an interesting idea. I usually consider the screen resolution is an indicator to sort the hay from chaff.
idle: 848 mins ( over 14 hours)
web surfing: 587 mins ( about 10 hours)
HD video: 361 mins ( about 6 hours)
Impressive I would say.
http://www.anandtech.com/mobile/showdoc.aspx?i=3689
Here is the opening sentence of their conclusion:
"Right now, the ASUS UL80Vt is the high water mark for a do-everything laptop: office, gaming, and mobility are all handled with aplomb."
As for which countries can be trusted. Ones with secular governments that keep religion out of government policy and decisions
Does your circle of trust encompass Nazi Germany?
It is easier to change the specification to fit the program than vice versa.