feelthedarkness

I think the combat in DA2 was the high point. On harder difficulties I needed every level up point, and agonized over the improvements. The healing seemed very tightly tuned, where I always seemed to use all my tricks. The thing I liked best, and was most disappointed that they removed was the way each character seemed to be more their own class, and the skills referenced their personalities. I'm really not crazy about the combat in 3, not the least of which is very limited behavior options. They have specific stats for flanking, so why not be able to set melee DPS to "try and flank [char name]"? Also, for casters and archers, why not "stay at range"? It was driving me nuts in the dragon fight that Sera kept running to shoot this living barn from 3 feet. I would prefer a greater focus on tactical combat, with an option to just turn it off for disinterested players.

Final report. Choosing no choice. Shadowrealms is D.E.D. dead. http://www.engadget.com/2015/02/10/bioware-cancels-shadowrealms/?utm_source=Feed_Classic_Full&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Engadget&?ncid=rss_full

I feel a little conservative saying this, but without any pressure, which in our world is basically only market, what incentive do they have to improve? Also, a significant portion of the recent successful work they've done has been market driven/playing to their biggest success. Hats Hats Hats! Edit: I don't know the general sense, but I don't love the Steam revisions. I liked the idea that we were all seeing the same front page.

Valve is weird. They have this veneer of infallibility, like they are the beating heart of PC Gaming, but personally it seems kind of negative value. I've loved a lot of their games, but it's odd how little actually gets out, and how much of the last decade's output is a refining of other ideas. The flat structure sounds nice and fanciful, but given what we know about how much of the tech industry works, and Jeri's displeasure, I imagine it can be rough for some people. Also, is the lack of typical job structure the reason nobody has taken up the mantle of community manager?

good god: and the F2P mobile game Chain Chronicles (which reaped $72M in sales in less than a year.)

In the blighted early days of The Console Warz I was definitely a Genesis person. This is sort of a bummer. I wonder why they dragged sonics through decades of muck but didn't try to revitalize Streets of Rage, Space Harrier, Phantasy Star (outside of limited appeal soft-MMO) or Shinobi? I know Golden Axe got a shot, but it was pretty weak right?

i'm in a pretty active guild i could add you to. people are generally nice and helpful, also not all dudes. they're legit randoms to me though, and sometimes the language on Teamspeak gets a little "gamery" for my taste. it's a second guild, after my main guild of people from my main forum of punx petered out. everyone is nice, but it's not like deliberately progressive. I'd have to look up my account but my main character names are Bombraid, Zigyaku, or Krakdown if you want to message me!

I don't have many complaints about the PvE stuff. I think the way they've stuck to keeping most of their focus on open world play is really admirable, and that they have generally balanced that well. The stuff that really pushed the limits of combat mechanics seems a bit less successful. I'm thinking of Teq & Triple Trouble. Teq took a long time, and a concerted cross server guild organization to figure out, and still it requires everyone to gather on one server to finish. I know people have, but I've never finished TT, or seen a group really try. The end of Season 1 with Scarlet seemed well balanced to me. Finishing that whole raid wasn't easy, but by the end of the month it was happening in several instances at once. I think that is an ideal curve. I don't think I was ever in a group that got the hard achievement on that. I like the way the last few story patches have added hard modes. I haven't done much WvW except karma farming in edge to finish my legendary. I would agree that the big map stuff isn't great, and I sort of don't see the point, but I've had some fun huge edge fights. I actually just start sPvPing to get more clovers super casual for a 2nd weapon. I'm digging it.

I think comparison of games and movies is tough because we've all internalized this notion that films can be capital I important, but I feel that in a very broad social context the jury is still out on that being true for games. I also really appreciated the notion the difficulty in parsing the idea that games require a kind of skilled input to begin to appreciate that quality. I know there are many great films that are difficult to appreciate if you aren't verse in film, but that's a problem that can be solved with some explanation, but if DOTA or LoL were the highest form, then what? The personal appreciation of that would be out of the hands of pretty much most people. Also to be pedantic, "feature" film is like 100 years old! (Even if talkies are only about 80!) We need another 30/40 years of gaming to reach film's decadence. What will the superhero glut of games in 30 years look like, if GTA 5 is the Godfather 2 of now?

Haha! Sharp uniform too. That uniform never blue shelled anybody.

GW2 is brilliantly designed in every way as far as i'm concerned with MMOs, the way they gated gear, avoided creep, avoided having to balance pvp & pve stats.

During the Mini Metro talk I just kept thinking about what a good bad idea it would be to reskin it as Mussolini's Pride

Great discussions! I agree with a lot of what Argobot's putting down, and if I can paint it with a broad brush, it often feels like "the left" is perpetually cannibalizing itself before it can reach some critical mass. It's a problem with no solution other than trying to be understanding, but sometimes it seems like the fragmentation is endless, and the right rarely has this problem. I've seen it smaller communities often relating to feminism issues, and one that always jumps out to me is Kathleen Hannah/Bikini Kill/Riot Grrl stuff, which when it hit was so vital and revolutionary, but now whenever it comes she's getting dumped on for failure to be more inclusive, and being called an egomaniac or asshole. To the former I will totally acknowledge that they didn't do a great job bringing in non-whites, but she was basically a kid and people trying to shake things up from a position of less power can't get it all right the first time. For the latter, she was trying to make something happen and that almost always requires a person with a near unreasonable degree of self confidence. It ends up being a case where everyone could have been more understanding, but I also feel like we wind up tarnishing inspiring figures.

it's a well known fact that Alienware started in a public urinal, one of the trough kinds.

two months from now Twig changes his username to Count Vapula

but it's the FUTURE!?

don't drink, don't drug, support full decriminalization and governmental treatment for addicts.

I'm a little excited about this, but when I rebuilt my PC in december I used one of those ultra fast samsung M.2 drives, and I'm a little nervous about switching OSs. I wonder why they don't release Xbox Dashboard as their own "Steam"? and let PC users run Xbox only titles?

i need to peep that Larry Willmore! Also, I'm really easy going about my TV Sci-fi, in that I desperately want something good and catch on, but I definitely enjoyed the 12 Monkeys premier.

this is probably my age talking, but if the games were about "big boob eye candy for boys", what a totally wretched hill to choose to die on, rhetorically.

On the "yogic healing" thing. I think there have been a few similar lines sprinkled throughout, referencing yoga or meditation, and I always assume they related to Lynch's advocacy of transcendental meditation. http://www.davidlynchfoundation.org/ Also, since the song came up again, I just want to say that I love it, and find it remarkable how it perfectly prefigured a fairly popular kind of music, aka The Raveonettes whole shtick.

I grabbed All the Light We Cannot See as this month's audible choice, as there were no Ferrante options, though they're a little short for my monthly commute.

National Trend! I got my first new pair of glasses in almost 12 years last week!

Whoa. Go away for a minute. For my bonafides, I'm 20 years vegan, which sort of makes it hard for for me to do any deep dive into argument, as it's just the fabric of existence for a long time, but I do not agree with the recent turn of moral equivalence. Anyway, I don't think animals and humans occupy the same moral plane, which in a roundabout way is one of arguments for veganism. I find the last few pages sort of bizarre, 1 luv to all. It's a quick trip down reductio ad absurdum. It gets us to a place nobody can relate to anymore. I'm reminded of the Calvin and Hobbes where they worry they're massacring bacteria with every breath.Are Hippos brutally immoral? Worse than the most virulent racists? They'll bite a human in half given the chance. They'll attack a car. Humans biologically can eat everything. If we were hunter gathers, it makes sense, but technology and civilization has abrogated those most primal needs. While I don't find omnivorous activity to be inherently immoral I do believe we've reached a point where it isn't necessary, and the alternative is beneficial on a moral (factory farming is gross), economic, and environmental levels. Also, being basically formed as a 90s punk, I'm instantly reminded of the legendary worms story. Quoting a friend, for laffs:

When translating these things into video games the greater war horror is largely abstracted in strategic moves played across countless nameless units. Sexual assault is more inherently personal, and people are far more likely to have encountered that than be cluster bombed on D-Day. I'm sure if you found somebody that had they probably wouldn't enjoy the game version. Also, however minor it might be those units have a fighting chance, some kind of autonomy. They're actors/heros of their own story. Sexual assault is inherently about disempowering.