plasticflesh

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Posts posted by plasticflesh

  2. Posted

    Haven't scanned this thread all the way. My personal cut off for The Simpsons was the Season 8 Chili Cook Off. Which is so early, 1997. It was to me the beginning of the non-sequitor style jokes and waning of the continuity jokes.

     

    I've recently had a rewatch of some of seasons 1-7. I just love the acid colors. My theory is that they cranked the CRT contrast to the max and based their palette off that.

     

    A friend of mine says he appreciates the new episodes for their topical commentary. This does have value. It's my nostalgia clouded eyes that can't appreciate this new abomination.

     

    I also watched a bit of The Critic, fun show. Also a bit of Duckman. Whats most notable to me about watching these old cartoons is the amount of sexist humour how storyboard driven they are, how much they are "one camera" shows, moving the imaginary camera around the room. The ease of reuse in digital workflows encourages a lot more "dollhouse" style background layouts. Like an adventure video game. This is a more universal note about animation production and not specifically at modern Simpsons.

  3. Posted

    That's fair. I'm disappointed that I've fallen into the trap of blaming Fish. I really enjoyed Fez and was excited for the prospect of a Fez 2.

     

    I should have more compassion for Fish's emotional issues, I suffer many myself, perhaps that's what makes me cringe seeing him poke the hornets nest over and over. I have a real mortal fear of "internet bullying" in this brave new world of ours.

     

    But when I compare Fish's personality to Gareth Bourn's personality, I realize how irrelevant it actually is. Gareth Bourn is sort of the polar opposite of a Phil Fish, in terms of personality and communication style.

    What similarity then was there between their public relations. They were both sort of indie flagship titles for their eras, and they were both had periods of console exclusivity. So they are small indie developers getting AAA attention, but without the AAA PR team.

     

    This is probably well tread material

  4. Posted

    Your assessment does sound more accurate, I was really stretching to give the benefit of the doubt

     

    It's the sort of environment that lead to Phil Fish canceling Fez 2. Of course, Fish was fueling much of the controversy. It's just one of the go-to examples I can think of. 

     

     

    I guess the other famous flubs of recent are AAA games hitting the water totally broken, like Assassin's Creed 3 and that Batman game.

     

    I enjoyed Assassins Creed 3

  6. Posted

    (the witness has an actual story)

     

    Myst and The Witness share the both play with the theme of the world-builder. Myst tells the story of wizards creating world and becoming literally stuck in those worlds. The Witness "tells the story" of the player's constant agony to find the meaning of a game designers world.

     

    I really apreciate The Witness as an essay. As far as I can tell any story implications are post-modern fourth wall deconstructions, exploring the implications of living inside the world of a game designers, and the struggle of game designers to achieve the right tone in their constructed worlds. Unless hmm have I missed the greater story?

     

    Honestly I also projected a lot of The Talos Project's story into The Witness. 

  7. Posted

    "Dual Universe" Kickstarter videos launched today, and comments on related threads are generally portraying skepticism of the space genre. Nothing specific to NMS, just the space sim genre in general.

     

     

    The ubiquity of this is skepticism is obnoxious, but acceptable, hopefully it will lead to better managed expectations. My main distaste is the tabloid amounts of shunning and shaming. Which I guess still has the air of consumer justice. It muddies future waters when every game is now compared to "the game NMS should have been."

     

    As for Dual Universe itself, it some how looks more appealling than Space Engineers. I'm not sure why, I can't list the main differences in the two. Dual Universe has more in depth planet support, larger ship interiors? I've done no researched. But neither have butt-headed antelope, I'm pretty sure about that.

  8. Posted

    I grabbed Subnautica recently. I tried the survival modes for a few minutes, but really I just wanted to build a labyrinthian underwater base. So I went into creative mode and started making underwater bases.  Abstractly rebuilding seafloor sprawls akin to SOMA or The Abyss is pretty satisfying in and of itself. The building mechanics has some interesting quirks to it, which is to be expected; so learning them in creative mode seems worth while before trying to invest in the survivial toil.

  11. Posted

    Spore is on sale on Steam, so I went to take a look at how its overall review status is. I was surprised to see it was mostly positive, considering it's generally considered a notorious disappointment, one that many likened their experience of NMS to. Turns out loads of NMS haters have gone on and given Spore positive reviews because "it's better than No Man's Sky". Gamer petulance at its finest.

     

    One of the PS4 PS+ free games for September is "Rebel Galaxy." The conspiracy theorist in me wrote a narrative where this game was chosen as consolatory damage control for NMS fallout. I played a few minutes of Rebel Galaxy, it was sort of cool, but I doubt I'll return to it.

     

    I do admit I've been interested in Spore recently, not quite out of NMS spite, but out of enthusiasm for the genre. Also, Stellaris. 

     

    Rob Zacny made a great point in the "Sci-Fi's Sky" Idle Weekend podcast, that space as a setting is never really utilized in its expansiveness. Instead, that expansiveness is a thematic background for what is often a smaller and controlled story. The "lore" in NMS even reflects this, the three primary alien races.

  12. Posted

    Wow that is a cool post. It makes sense that the fetish of an attic full of guns and the gun-unlock system would drive the game immediately into unrealistic realms. An authentic WW1 game would be about drowning in a cesspit of a trench while enduring endless artillary bombardments; basically what the Verdun game already does. How else could that be hamstrung into the modern multiplayer XP unlock-ables carrot? Upgrading your shovel? Upgrading your helmet-on-top-of-a-stick-to-fool-snipers?

     

    What makes me most excited about the hamstringing of history into an arena-shooter is when inevitably WWI gets played out, and the COD and BF franchises dig deeper into history, making sweet arena-shooters with during 19th and 18th century combat, with semi-auto muskets, horse-drawn-cannons getting carted around the map, dandies jumping out of bushes with dual akimbo blunderbusses. Upgrade your tricorner hat. Set in the French-American Wars, Barbary Wars, Napoleonic Wars. Who am I kidding, they'd obviously just focus on the American Revolutionary War.

  13. Posted

    Wow a North American extremist Militia setting. That is pretty unique. And a nice way to mix-up the mansion formula.

     

     

    The screenshot reminds me a little of

    For a tacky parody game, it had great level designs, such as an interesting lumber-mill.

  14. Posted

    Interesting game. Very pretty. Good shooting. Fun vehicles. I do like the return to simpler weapons. It was an aspect of the BFBC2: Viet Nam DLC that I enjoyed, to play Battlefield without heat seeking RPGs and various hi-tech gadgetry. That said, I hope BF1 does go into the alternate history route and do some goofy steampunk weapons and vehicles. Why not?

     

    I have some aesthetic quibbles. The re-use of graphic design elements from Battlefront is seems mostly out of place, the very clean menu design betrays the tone of WWI, or at least my stereotyped notion that there should be some skeumorphic references for a period piece UI. What bothers me even more is the view from orbit, seeing the globe of Earth on the menu. I admit it is cool that the globe zooms into the theater of the map you play on, but it again rubs against the theme of WWI, humans weren't in space yet, so obviously we are aliens.

     

    My final quibble is the female announcer voice. She's so calm, as if she is speaking from an announcement booth. But that again is something that takes me out of the WWI realm. She should be there on the front line with me, screaming at the top of her lungs. WE LOST GEORGE!! 

  20. Posted

    The end of the socks advertisement cracks me up. "At least I'm not a crypto-fascist." "wut?!"

     

    To speak to the appeal of Alien. "Alien" is so significant as a trope-defining movie for so much sci-fi. The scenes where the crew discovers the alien nest, the crazy huge room full of eggs, and the pilot-alien that is imbedded into his telescope-chair. These are iconic and often repeated scenes. 

     

    Plus, the Alien pilot-room scene was filmed using children stand-ins wearing space suits, to push the scale further. How great.

    Alien_filming_tumblr_m1df18gvqi1r8oqq3o1

  23. Posted

    Post outro trailer trope mashup was hilarious!

     

    Back in April when slow piano tinkle was at its peak, Argobot suggested mashing up the piano tinkle music between the offending trailers and I made this :P

     

     

     

    Wow Kickinthehead this is incredible! This really highlights the nostalgia hook element of the piano tinkle. Because those melodies (Ghost Busters, Star Wars, Jurassic Park) have been in pop culture for decades, inevitably they become the first songs we try and learn on piano, slowly feeling out the themes note by note. To me, that is the feeling those specific three trailers evoke and manipulate. I now vaguely recall enjoying the piano tinkle in these trailers, for resonating with the memory of trying to perform them on piano.

     

    To a professional musician, I can see how piano tinkle is low effort submission. It is such a sketch, such a preset.

  24. Posted

    Haha, that Mode 7 article references Aphex Twin's classic obstinate interview style. Good times.

     

    I excuse Hello Games almost solely on the premise that I was always a Molyneux fan, I always sort of enjoyed Molyneux for dreaming too big. But I will agree it is not a great business or PR strategy. Like the Mode 7 article says, being specific about the limited scope about your project is crucial.

     

    Recent interviews with Team Ico about "The Last Gaurdian" represent the sort of polar opposite of PR communication. They have distinctly stated they are not making an open world game, instead they are making a linear game with specific puzzle solutions. While this has an initial cooling effect, as if they are short-selling their game by not including trendy features; it also steels the focus of the game, they know what they are making and are clear to communicate that. 

     

    I have this vague memory, that when Nintendo was working with Sony on what eventually became the Playstation, there was a interview in a gaming magazine, most likely Nintendo Power, where the "fly from the surface of one planet to another planet" exploration game design was described, as an example of something possible with 3D technology. That was what planted the seed of desire for the Norman's Sky-like game in my head. And Norman's Sky delivered on that premise, for me. 

     

    I stopped playing Normans Sky though, because it crashes consistently on my PS4. I'll come back in a few patches, especially if there's a content update. I still never got a warp-drive upgrade capable of going to the weirder star systems.

     

    I kept expecting The Witness style interaction pads to appear. Or even to just randomly land on an entirely The Witness themed planet.