Max Ernst

The Dream Machine, Team Fortress 2, Kentucky Route Zero, Half-Life 2: Episode 2, Deus Ex, Red Dead Redemption and Enslaved. These are good games that can be, at times, really flawed, but they do some things so wonderful and unique that they remain favourites. For example, while RDR nails mood and tone, its narrative is a huge mess and bloats out in order to create a large 'epic' game experience. The individual stories and side missions, however, were spot on, especially when it starts channeling The Blood Meridian. Enslaved has some mechanical issues, but has the best characterisation I have seen in a video game. People should play Enslaved, and it is a shame it didn't come out on PC.

Nailed it in one!

Whenever I play TF2, it is often with the mindset of "I should be doing something else". I tell myself it is to 'unwind' but really it is to procrastinate.

I have 650 Team Fortress 2 hours and I am ashamed of it. Often, I feel that learning a new game entirely is too exhausting for me, so I just flip on the ol TF2, put on whatever record I am currently fucking with on the sound system, and dick around for a couple of hours. Sometimes I quit this routine for several months, but I always come crawling back. It is my comfort food. I've also played Fallout: New Vegas three times to completion, but that was to role-play, that is to play with a strict set of character traits and rules, so the experience was quite different every time. Even now I am considering starting a character who is so addicted to drugs that he immediately takes whatever drug he picks up, regardless of where she is or what she is doing. Might make her melee to really emphasis a crazy hopped-up junkie tearing around the Mojave like a pit-bull that has broken free from its chains.

A Serious Man is the best Coen Brothers film, right? That Kafka irrationality and despair is so beautifully depicted. Ugh, so good.

I'm reading Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man and it is a fantastic look at race through the "us versus them" dynamic. It's a social war in which the division is obvious, but not its members. The protagonist wants to ignore this war and forge himself a life within his own constraints, but the social clash keeps trying to recruit him. Touches a lot on 'white man's burden', 'white gaze' and the otherness. I'm only 300 pages in, about halfway, so if any of this sounds like a premature evaluation that will be usurped by finishing the novel I apologise. Also, the prose is touching, yet distant. Its descriptions are vivid except when discussing the protagonist, which I feel was deliberate.

Thank you thumbs for the Woody Allen stuff. I am a changed man.

Dumb question from the unenlightened: what Woody Allen movies do I see if I have watched Manhattan and Annie Hall?

Sorry, I meant that the game was wildly inconsistent when it came to jumps you could pull yourself up on. Sometimes you bump into the edge, others Faith pulled herself up. This would happen if your angle was just slightly off. The producers have acknowledged this and said they were going to fix it this time around.

Not to be a buttcrack, but what is happening with this? Are we skipping a month?

Are you one of these two dudes?:

Best way to play the game was to disarm, shoot all the bullets left in the clip and throw the gun away without breaking your stride. Also, I hope they tighten the game up this time around. A few jumps have you saying "oh come on!" when you miss.

Don't bump this thread during E3, you nerds. My heart can't take it.

Yes, I am excited about a big release video game again. For the first time in years. Look at that colour palette! Look at those character designs! (Story will hopefully not be as ass as it was in the first game)

This game looks interesting, but I have Kickstarter fatigue. Also, I am poor. Horror is a sensation explored far too often in video games, but the feeling of helplessness and the sense of scale that comes along with this game's premise could be really interesting.

He is a great drummer and I think that his skill overshadows just how well he can fit into a song. The guy knows restraint, and isn't afraid to throw in a simple drum fill or a standard beat. Think about how powerful the drums are on 'The Ghost of Karelia', and how he is just hammering the snare at just the right time, giving this great, marching beat to the track. Re-listening to the Hunter, it can be fun to play "guess the influence". 'Blasteroid' sounds like Torche, 'The Creature Lives' sounds like Pink Floyd, 'Black Tongue' sounds like High on Fire. It's cool to hear them jam all these ideas and trying to see how they fit. Hopefully on the next records they don't wear the influences so brazenly, so it feels like a cohesive piece of work inspired by various genres rather than "let's see if we can write this type of pop song".

The only way to do TF2 melee is to force everyone to be soldier and have their only weapon as the shovel. Watch as 30 soldiers meet on the 2Fort bridge and scream and yell and make "thunking" sounds as shovel smacks helmet. Also, The Swapper is a terrible title and all I can think of is seeing a game box written as "The Swapper: The Man who Swaps".

I just got through Cave Story+ and I was at the point where I can get the 'bad' ending and finish the game by riding a dragon onto the sunset, or continue the game and get the good ending and save everybody. I bailed. I was done with this game a long time ago. The game is trying to tell me what a shitty decision I made and I couldn't agree with it less.

The Hunter is weird because it is them exploring a bunch of different genres and influences and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. It's a really cool record to hear as a fan of the band, but I'm not sure if it is their best front-to-back record. It feels like a rap mixtape more than a complete record. As big a beast Dailor is behind the kit, I'm surprised how well he has transitioned to the slower Mastodon stuff. On the last two records, he has been able to play grooves and interesting beats. The song above is a great example of that. Also, the guy can actually sing. Also, the new Boards of Canada released here early, and I've been giving it a spin. It's a great album, but not a huge departure from their previous work. It won't alienate any old fans, but it isn't likely to draw in a bigger crowd. Their music still has a great sense of space and elation. Wonderful drum programming, too.

Yeah, The Giants is in English. The 1975 original print is out, but it has been reprinted as part of the Vintage Classics range. No Amazon listing so far, which is strange. Maybe it is a United States thing? This is the edition I have. I accidentally bought it twice (long story), so if it becomes rare I am prepared. Le Clezio's The Book of Flights is next on my list.

Restarting JMG Le Clezio's The Giants and it might be one of the most compelling, through provoking novels I have ever read. It is a strange, almost experimental (but not difficult to read) novel about the city of Hyperpolis, a "city of electronic signage dominated by cybernetic giantism". It talks about the disorientation of the senses and the loss of identity in large, man-made structures. It laments the extinction of the real. It suggests that corporate advertising hijacks original thought and pushes us into a collective direction. It is a call to rebellion. Also, it was written in the late 1960's, but it is still just as prevalent as ever. If not, more so.

Well that's ten years of therapy down the drain. Thanks for dredging that back up.

I played a graphics mod for Half Life 2 and it ruined the art direction and turned the women into porn stars so then I turned it off.

They're the kind of band I don't really want to listen to in low quality. I'll wait until I can get my hands on a proper copy and give it a whirl on my nice headphones.

Hey, Kevin Parker from Tame Impala actually had his hand in another record last year, and it might be better than his day job. Wonderful, melodic, dreamy French pop. It's music to walk home to after a big day at work to make you realise that the day isn't over. It sounds like falling in love. This is the best song on the record: However, I like this video, so I will post it as well: