Merus

They're inspired by a roll from a table, but it's my game and I do what I want so it's not directly taken from the table. Oddities aren't intended to have a direct gameplay purpose - sometimes they're just a neat thing - but there's nothing stopping me from dropping an oddity into the game that has relevance to the plot.

I really like the idea of a theme park that has fucking dinosaurs in it, and all the comment cards are saying is "what have you done for us lately?" We have small pieces of glass that connect to the entirety of human knowledge, available on a two-year contract, and we somehow manage to be disappointed when they bring out a new one.

My favourite part of running Numenera are the oddities. Here's what the players have run across in their travels before the game starts proper: A glass cube containing what appears to be an aerial live feed of an abandoned city. There's something alarming about the brown material it's made out of. A box with tiny musicians in it, that play when it is opened, and look at you, horrified and pleadingly, when closing it. 56 cards made of a transparent material, most of which show creatures unknown to you. While the cards are transparent, when turned over they instead have some kind of text or data in an unknown language. Some of the markings are only visible in the dark. A semi-circular disc of glass. If you squeeze it (and you can squeeze it), it emits a tight, red beam of light that travels about 45m. A two-headed cat fetus, in a jar. Why is Hank carrying this around? I mean, yes, it's unusual, but for Truth's sake, Hank.

which Persona? I recall that the gameplay of Persona is that you junk personas every couple of hours, so there's no real way to be locked into a combat-focused decision you regret. The story content, on the other hand, is all about spending your limited time as well as you can, and so letting people undo those choices doesn't work thematically. The 'optimal path' through Persona 4 is so fiddly that it's clearly only there for people who don't want to play the game properly. (And there are certain options that clearly are only available in New Game + anyway.)

I'd be disappointed if the 'training' aspect of the amiibo AI was just level-gated.

It's an ironic name because Canberra the city is really striking and very unpopular

You're right, it's definitely not a pic. I'm not sure what it's supposed to be, but will be excited to find out when you return to fix it.

He wrestled crocodiles for decades Decades

They look too much like ostriches! We need more scales!

Oh boy that is a thing, isn't it Well I guess I'm shutting up about the Dunning-Kruger effect now

Given Steve Irwin's propensity for using 'crikey', and the many, many opportunities he had for God to punish him for blasphemy, I guess that counts as proof that God doesn't care. Or at least doesn't care about Australians.

Well, if it wasn't a "peaceful" dispersal then they wouldn't have been allowed to use weapons that have been banned for use in war The depressing inevitability of this, and frankly everything else that has been going on, reminds me of Leonard Cohen: Irritatingly, Alex Jones uses it as his theme song.

whatever you say dude

My favourite thing about the DS was how much it felt like a desperate attempt from Nintendo to stay relevant in the face of Sony coming in and colonising the handheld market. And then it turned out that Sony were bringing games that didn't work on a handheld, and Nintendo brought touch controls and instant sleep and wake.

The thing about "be like MLK" is that he still upset a fuckload of white people that wanted him to go home and do things by their terms. But fuck the people who want to tell those in Ferguson how they're allowed to feel about this. This is democracy. They can be however they want.

And yep, there it is.

I don't even know why grand juries exist, other than an admission that the public prosecutors need oversight regarding whether they're wasting the court's time with substandard cases. Then again, the idea that the police can just straight up shoot someone because of a perception that they might turn violent in some unspecified point in the future is not good. My housemate is deeply concerned that the police may misinterpret him holding a butterknife because he has a history of mental illness.

Have a think about what kind of character in a post-post-post apocalyptic world you'd like to play, and what they'd be doing in a big city and why they might have attracted the attention of someone in need of a group of discreet travellers. (If you have the sourcebook, you're starting in Navarene.)

There's some really solid choices for Christmas movies, actually: Edward Scissorhands Brazil Lethal Weapon Kiss Kiss Bang Bang Trading Places Batman Returns Rare Exports and of course: Nightmare Before Christmas Bad Santa Elf Muppet Christmas Carol Scrooged

Die Hard's my favourite, but I also want to put a good word in for In Bruges.

I find it useful to have passing familiarity with sport because it doesn't actually cost me very much and in return I'm prepared when dealing with normal people to at least have something they like that I understand. I figure, with a large enough group of fans, there must be something there that I can find worthy of interest, even if it's "what is wrong with people who like this obvious tripe".

Oh jesus christ Miyamoto created the ARG

Whoa yeah, let's... let's just edit out that reference.

Ya know... other than the online pokemon battle things people have built, I don't actually recall any PC RPGs where you draw your party members from the things you fight.