BadHat

Watching a friend stream and talk about this compelled me to impulse buy. I have no idea what I'm doing. I haven't played anything like this since tinkering around with the original Sim City on mum's work computer when I was... 12? But just building stuff and getting everything running smoothly looks so satisfying I had to give it a shot. So far I am mostly confused. Turns out I don't know a whole lot about public infrastructure!

My opinion of Drive improved vastly the more time went on after I saw it. I still have trouble rewatching it because of the elevator scene, though. I'm generally not bothered by violence but something about the sheer, gleeful aggression in that scene really makes me queasy. So, I finally watched Whiplash. Gosh... I really want to like this film but, as a drummer, there are so many things about this that just annoyed the crap out of me. If it were just inaccuracies then I'd be more willing to look past it (like, for instance, every scene of drumming being ADR'd over in the worst way, meaning that basically nothing matched the performance on screen), but the way it seeped into the message of the film really rubbed me the wrong way. The biggest issue I have is that the way he's shown practicing is fucking horrible and counter-productive, and yet the film consistently shows him getting results from it. And then (ending spoilers) Basically, the way it's treated as a sports movie where he just has to "push past his limits!" is kind of gross when that is literally the last thing you want to be doing as a drummer who actually cares about technique and doesn't want to fuck themselves up for life. But hey... good acting! Mononoke is a weird one for me. It was my first Miyazaki film, so naturally my favourite, but I saw the dubbed version before knowing anything about the cast, or about Ghibli in general (I'd seen Grave of the Fireflies year earlier but didn't know it was them). The only cast member I actually recognised at the time was Billy Bob, so it actually seemed kind of... appropriate to me? I've watched the original dub since and prefer it, but I still have a soft spot for the english dub, even though I think it's kind of weird in retrospect.

This game came out of nowhere and now I really want it. Too bad my wallet is being uncooperative lately. I'm sorry what

Wanted to touch on this because Maddy's comments kind of mirror a lot of things I was feeling as an observer (and have already written about in this thread). Jay Allen said it in response to her, but it really does feel like misery tourism sometimes. The reaction to her comments on ghazi were pretty disappointing, as well. The most highly voted comments (which I'm never sure how seriously to take) in a discussion thread about the criticism disregarded her view because they found her complaints unimportant compared to having a safe space to talk about stuff, or because GG had been targeting people "well before ghazi," like that dispels the notion that they could still be using it to find people. On the whole many of their objections are too simplistic and defensive to allow for the nuance required to actually take her views on board, which kind of proves her original assertion that there are a lot of well-meaning idiots there (or at least, I took that to be the implication). Not that her views are beyond criticism, but again, nuance. One of the things she touches on is that GG likes having ghazi around because it makes it easier for them to find targets. I'm not sure how true this is, but I had a way simpler take on this. GG likes ghazi being around because it gives them an antagonist. It turns "anti-GG" into something tangible, instead of their own contrived bogeyman. GG is fuelled by antagonism, and ghazi plays into their narrative uncomfortably well. That said, ghazi could be way worse, and they do a pretty admirable job of policing themselves when things get out of hand, but still, it's messy. I don't think they've earned the right to disregard criticism, especially from victims of GG, just because they made a sport out of pointing and laughing at their victimisers. Also, and this has nothing to do with anything, but Maddy is great and I enjoy her writing immensely. So... I'm biased. Edit: If you're confused then Maddy's remarks begin with this tweet. And then I guess follow the rest in the replies or something I don't know WHAT IS TWITTER SERIOUSLY

Jeff reading Tim Allen is pretty much the best/worst thing.

Princess Kaguya is so good. It's really good. I liked it a lot. I don't really have anything else to say about it. I'm glad a Ghibli film can still make me feel this way. Edit: It is always so bizarre to look up Ghibli films and see who was cast for the english dub. Like, Chloe Grace Moretz? I don't have a problem with her as an actor really, but she's so... trendy, in a way that this movie almost pointedly is not. It's just weird, yannow?

Got two copies of Velvet Sundown if anyone wants to sample the madness. They switched from a subscription model to a straight up DLC model, these have all the current premium episodes included.

Finally got this, just tackling the newbie stuff and trying to get a half decent armor set. The charge blade is nuts! I'd totally be up for some multi, especially with newer players. Is there somewhere people have been exchanging codes or am I blind?

Well fine, I hereby retract my opinion on episode 4. I think we have differing definitions of "hardly noticeable." They just need to make a feature film that uses the same animation technique as Guilty Gear Xrd.

Of all possible things to be a gatekeeping asshole over... dyed hair? Really?

I just started watching Kill la Kill and WOW does the animation take a nosedive in episode four or WHAT. I really love the style of this show about 90% of the time but it seems like they rely on some cheap techniques here and there, presumably to save their budget for the really big stuff. I nearly barfed when it switched into cel-shaded 3D for a bit because oh my god I hate this in anime now. Like I get that studios can't afford to hand-draw every little thing, so it doesn't bother me if it's just background details, but every time it's used to animate a prominent foreground object I just...

Nothing makes me uncomfortable after watching Q&A panels from Minecraft/My Little Pony conventions.

KOOL AID WEARING OFF!!! LISTEN AND BELIEVE FIELDS WEAKENING!!!

Edit: Changed the images to hotlinks because they were fucking massive. Checking in on KiA because why not, this is front page'd at the moment. https://i.imgur.com/atxVUqR.png Which... I mean... do parts of this not perfectly describe how GG has been operating this entire time? Who outside of GG has been "attacking organisations that publish stories they don't like." The only instance that springs to mind is that Polygon article that "attacked" Christian H. Sommers when she made that stupid video about Anita and "hipsters with women's studies degrees," which, while it definitely struck me as a little weird at the time, was completely deserved. Which other "organisation" have the media attacked? GG? You mean the movement that is characterized by not being organized? Then there's this, which is sitting on around 3000 upvotes, which means they're on the front page again. Ugh. https://i.imgur.com/MWJ5rCe.png Like, I'll be the first to say that Brianna has said some ridiculous things (except you probably won't hear me saying that because I care more about the fact that she's constantly hounded than I do about my personal opinion about her public persona), but is it really so difficult to understand that class and wealth are not the only forms of privilege imaginable? To wit, it's pretty obvious to read that the pertinent forms of privilege she's referring to are not being a woman in tech, or a trans woman, or an outspoken feminist, or any of the many things Wu has been targeted for for months, which is prooooobably why Kern might fail to grasp that the "media spin" he's rallying against was maybe, possibly, sort of... accurate? But as always, people who don't understand concepts like privilege come at them in the same way they think social justice proponents do, which is to view privilege as a linear scale with no privilege at one end and ALL THE PRIVILEGE at the other, and in this case Kern wins the oppression olympics because he grew up with less money. 3000 upvotes.

I dreamt I was in a blizzard looking for shelter. I came upon a wall of ice with an opening a few metres off the ground, and it had a rope hanging out of it. Except it wasn't a rope, it was a bunch of sheets tied together end-to-end, the way damsels use them to escape from towers or something. So I start pulling on the sheet rope, and it keeps coming and coming, all these different colours and patterns of sheet, like a line of handkerchiefs coming out of a magician's sleeve. And just when I think it couldn't possibly get any longer it reaches the end, but it turns out it wasn't even attached to anything so it just kind of sadly falls out and lands in the snow, leaving me trapped in the blizzard. WHAT DOES IT MEEEEEAN

Whenever I try to remember Batman Begins my mind always goes to Christian Bale's character in the 2000 Shaft movie, for some reason.

Man, I read Nick's Dead Rising 3 review and made the mistake of stumbling into the comments. They're all about going against "what gamers want," presumably because he spent a few paragraphs talking about how lazily written it is... including lampooning some awful-sounding stereotypes. Never mind there's actually a pretty cogent mechanical review in there if you actually read the fucking thing, everyone gets hung up on that or the score. Apparently on the list of "what gamers don't want," making them think occupies the top spot.

I spend far too much time crafting in this game just so I can remodel my house.

I mean... no. Come on. That's a parody. Please.

Anyone notice how every single TB rant eventually comes back around to him? Leigh is wrong because NO YOU'RE OUTMODED and I, TOTALBISCUIT left those industries behind. This article on not letting trans people die is innapropriate because I, TOTALBISCUIT am supportive of trans people and this messaging makes ME uncomfortable. Like, really, it's uncanny.

Samantha Kalman on the latest UPF! Edit: That first game was fucking amazing.

I started to get back into Metal Gear Scanlon since I stopped after the first game, got a few episodes into 2 and had to stop so I could play it for myself. I originally went from 1 straight to 3 and kind of hated it, but 2 is a blast. Really holds up once you get around some of the controls. Also Demo Derby is still the best feature. They should get Danny on there.

Reviving this thread to point out that playing Far Cry 4 without the minimap on is so much better. I love that they made the interface so tweakable after making it so cluttered in 3. I'm still in two minds about leaving detection indicators off though. I've played most of the game this way and it definitely makes things more tense, but whenever I do get detected it tends to feel unpredictable (or maybe I just hadn't prepared enough), and there's very little opportunity to salvage it and return to stealth before they yell and alert everyone. On the other hand, I really hate the indicators because of how much it feels like "magic stealth sense," and because they just look so cluttery. I generally like my shooter UIs to fuck off and let me see things as much as possible. I can't say why the same logic doesn't apply to magically seeing dudes through walls. I guess it just seems more excusable? Like it's a logical extension of the vision cones from MGS. Hell, even Ground Zeroes embraced this approach. *shrug*

Now I wanna see a poorly aged version of them that looks like an adult Macaulay Culkin or Haley Joel Osment.