I am actually super keen to give this game a spin, but the cheapest I've ever seen it is for $15 on Beamdog. Does anybody know where I could pick it up for $10 on a digital distribution site?

From what I've heard, the English patch is better than the official translation. I believe the English release wasn't very long ago, probably why the price is still high.

EDIT: Actually, it might be Precursors I'm thinking of. I can't remember. :P

It's been on sale on Gamersgate several times.

For $15, yuplay.ru sells it for 8.72

Well that's priced for Russia... I don't really agree with you buying it there, but that's obviously between you and no one else.

Fair enough. I want to get this version so I can apply the unofficial English patch, which is apparently much better than the official one

I'm cancelling the order now because it needs you to check a small sum of money in your account. I'll just get in on Beamdog or something when it's cheap

I've never used Beamdog but I think Gamersgate will alert you through email when it goes on sale if you tell it to.

Both games have imperfect translations for their English releases. The unofficial patches work on both the Russian and English releases of these games so you can get nicely cleaned up English no matter which you originally bought.

With Precursors the fan patch actually adds back some Russian which was removed and not replaced by English, there was just no dialogue where there should have been. Crazy.

And I never got that far in Boiling point. Looked at White gold, thought it looked interesting, then never heard anything more about it, I thought it'd been cancelled.

One thing the thread sort of doesn't mention I'm interested in. Is it any good?

That's good to know. I'll keep an eye on them at gamersgate then.

Wait for a sale on Gamersgate. It won't be too long I wager.

The game is a love-and-hate one. I love its brilliance, its ambition, its goals; I also hate it so much I wanted to just quickly get it over and done with. For every beautiful moment that sweeps you off your feet, there are 3 events that make you want to punch something. In particular, the last 2 levels are just sloppily designed. I won't spoil anything, but seeing is believing.
It is, for some parts of the game. It's better than Far Cry 2, and really it's more Far Cry than Far Cry 2 will ever be - I stopped playing after Act 2 in FC2. White Gold did what FC2 couldn't - dream. It's one of those games where the developers must have spent more time in the drawing board room discussing the game, than they did actually developing it, because it shows in the gameplay itself. Sounds are broken (you need to download the Russian sound files from RPGWatch), quests are broken, perks are awfully unbalanced, vehicles are a joke, certain levels don't make sense, not enough weapons etc.

But you get to see the "could have been" of the game in some parts, and those in particular are done very well. The AI isn't a breakthrough (there's still the "musta been rats" quirk), but it is challenging enough to force you to take cover, and hiding in tall grass actually works!@!!!!111. If you've played STALKER on the hardest difficulty, you get a rough idea of what to expect. Some parts are absolutely fantastic - mostly in the earlier sections of the game. Even though the game starts to falter and stumble on its own feet later, and flaws become even more glaring, it's still worth playing just to know that something like that exists.

Minor spoiler (but safe to read): in one mission, I had to travel to an island where a former prison stood, but which was taken over by the prisoners. The mission was to find some artifact (or was it to kill the leader? Can't really remember, the objectives are forgettable). I had a helicopter, so I had a few choices to make to complete the mission. Do I try to parachute down into the base's headquarters, or is it wiser to park it at the pier and fight my way in? I also have a third choice, but that one's harder: find a landing zone where I can quickly get in, get out, but this was hard to accomplish since helicopters (hilariously) explode immediately when they touch anything.

Well I liked the chopper (though there are many in the game that you can hijack), so I chose the 2nd option. I wanted the loot! But really, I could have just entered by any way, as long as it's possible to. The degree of freedom in the game is amazing (until you reach the final stages, much palming of foreheads there).

It doesn't take much for a game to surpass Far Cry 2 in my opinion. Mechanics and entertainment wise such dogs as Daikatana and Gore managed to do better than Far Cry 2, so that isn't saying much. Heck even Boiling Point (same company I believe, is the reason I got to looking at this game back then) did a whole lot better than Far Cry 2, and I found Boiling point to be impressive, but clunky controls, horrible writing and bugs kept me from playing very far in it. There were some good things though, and I really liked the GTA 2 borrowed system where you could ally with whatever faction you wanted, and unlike GTA IV, if you pissed off a faction they might actually do something about you if you pass by them when not on a mission. It had so many great things going for it and was just generally marred by a bunch of bothersome things. Still loved my experience of trying to sneak up on one of the mafia's mansions, getting spotted and just running for my life into the jungle as a helicopter chased after me.