BadHat

Reading that kind of reassures me that I might get into X after I (eventually, some day, maybe a few years from now) finish with XenoChron sans-X. Still playing and loving it. It's still constantly surprising me with little details that make me think whoever was in charge of plotting out the dialog was completely insane. I just got to the Nopon village, wandered around for a bit, did some random helpy quests and some backtracking which eventually landed me back in Colony 9 (the first city). I decided to have another wander around to see if I could trigger any new dialog or unearth any quests I missed, and randomly talked to some unnamed Nopon NPC. Their dialog had actually changed to "oh, so you've been to the Nopon village?" and some small backstory about how they grew up around Homs and had never been there. They actually thought that up and programmed a trigger for a random unnamed NPC that 99.9% of players would never bother to interact with again. I don't know if it has more to do with my expectations of games in general or just of JRPGs, but that blows my fucking mind.

Robot is the safest pick, in my mind. He (?) finds better guns out of the gate, which can be huge if you get a hyper rifle or something crazy and you're still only on snow, and he has safety in the form of ammo and HP (especially w/ butt) from guns. In terms of the other "safe" picks, I tried giving Fish and Crystal a fair shot but I could never use their abilities very well. Same with Steroids, I just can't seem to make dual guns work for me. Most of the others, like Eyes or Plant, I just forget their ability is even there. Y.V. is my favourite pick for just melting everything's face off (don't get me started on Melting, though ). Plus, any kind of double shotgun + throne butt + bouncy shells = yeeeeeeeeeees. Man, I really gotta unlock Rebel and Rogue again. They were the most fun to play as if I wasn't trying to go for a "proper" run. Edit: Oh god this post fell apart and I had to edit it about 7 times. Sorry if you replied early.

Tomorrowland was a weird fucking movie. I had no idea what to expect from it going in, and I kind of still don't know what I got.

I've gotten far better at dealing with Lil Hunter since I developed a more aggressive play style. Honestly, I just gave up on preserving ammo and go for the biggest, spammiest weapons. It's a bit riskier but I tend to favour characters/perks that give me more of a safety net in terms of ammo anyway (Robot 4 lyfe), so it all works out. From there I mediate between taking cover from nasty stuff and just going all-in on rooms full of baddies if I feel like I can deal with them (basically anything with shots I can dodge, melee enemies I'm way more careful with). But yeah, dealing with Lil Hunter is largely a matter of being able to clear a room before he shows up and having some reliable cover. Having some kind of bow weapon makes the snow levels a breeze, too. Even a basic crossbow 1-shots everything but the bots, and they're easy to deal with anyway.

Best new games of 2015* *but don't pay for this one if you don't want to No, no this is not a smart list.

I don't know I thought that was a pretty good trailer for Dude, Where's My Enterprise?

This is basically the premise of every Onion editorial cartoon ever.

I haven't played this but I'm just posting here to say that all the hype surrounding this made me revisit Xenoblade sans X and I'm LOVING IT. Holy cow it is so dense but in just the right way. How did they pack in all those character interactions? The relationship menu and the way it triggers new interactions and quests is insane and puts Oblivion's "living world" to shame. Is this stuff still in X?

Is the daily/weekly leaderboard broken for everyone else? Not that I ever place anywhere near the top, anyway...

Half-Life 2: Episode 2: Remastered. Pre-orders come with access to Ricochet 2 alpha test!

A lot of people have been talking about Shantae in the Recently Completed thread, but I don't recall anyone mentioning how kickass the soundtrack is. The whole thing is pretty great, but this track in particular is just 100% jammin.

On a bit of a 'vania tear lately. Just beat Shadow Complex: Remastered, wanted to try and 100% it since it was a pretty chill podcasting game, but some of the secrets seemed like a real pain in the ass, so I just went ahead and finished at 92% complete. Kind of annoyed that I couldn't go back and polish up the stuff I missed after the ending, but oh well, I feel like I got my money's worth (oh wait, it was free). I'm a little mystified that I enjoyed it so much considering how janky so many parts of it are. The movement is floaty and imprecise, you're always getting caught on rails and crap, jumping up to vents and stuff is a fucking nightmare. Worst hookshot in video game history. Shooting feels great until you need to aim at anything in the foreground/background, which is just... why did they think this was a good idea??? In fact, the whole obsession with highlighting objects outside of the player's 2D plane of movement is so bizarre and distracting, especially when it's not always clear where an object is in relation to your character. Am I going to run into this crate or hide behind it? It could have been kind of neat if there was more of a focus on taking cover behind things I guess, and if they did it more gracefully by having you switch your focus to the background with a button press or something? Like come on, Contra did this shit better, what's your guys' excuse. Also the story is forgettable garbage and the ending is a giant wet fart out of a nowhere. Buuuuuuuuuut it was really fun! And I don't really know why exactly except for maybe the level design? But even that has it faults, especially how difficult it can be just to move from A to B. Like, help a guy out with some freakin shortcuts maybe? Seriously though it's good. I'm not even conflicted about it really I just have no idea how to elucidate why it's good. What a weird fucking game.

Really, of all the "four horsemen" of atheism, Daniel Dennett was (is?) the only one who was kind of nice about it, possibly because (as far as I know) he didn't tend to stray off-topic. The other three just had the uncanny ability to sound reasonable and level-headed even when they were wading into topics well out of their depth, like women or muslims (seriously, always one or the other).

I think the plot of WALL-E is kind of dumb but it's still my fav because it just resonates with me, emotionally? I can still watch it and tear up over certain scenes, not because I find them sad or whatever, but because they effect me deeply on an audiovisual level. The scene where they just zip around in space for a bit is soooo nice.

They announced it at the Playstation Experience, as well as announcing that it was now "released" on PC. As in, it's no longer listed as early access on Steam. What does that mean? Well... sweet FA really, since they say they're gonna keep updating it anyway. But it's a neat milestone for them!

Chuck Norris killed her lol This is probably more iconic to me than either of those, simply because it was what I logged into most of the time (horde 4lyfe): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuLMkfG_Xu0 Also, in remembrance of all the nelf characters I created and abandoned over the years:

Mariel (I forget her last name) from Skullgirls also did art on Pirate's Curse, and she's no stranger to boobs. I also finished this game and really really liked it. So much so that I'm doing a second playthrough (on pirate mode, how fun!) and trying to nail all the achievements. I only have three left: all dark magic, all hearts, and finishing the game without upgrading my health. That last one will be super fun I'm sure. Edit: Just googled Joakim and remembered I still gotta play Noitu Love 2!

Yeah, that's the way most high-profile review sites operate in my eyes. Or, more cynically, it's how their userbase wants them to operate. Another example: Carolyn Petit's much-loathed review of GTA V should've been way lower than a 9, but Gamespot just isn't the venue for "that" kind of review. I don't remember exactly what I hated about BI, mechanically. Besides the dissonance between the protagonists' morals and the excessive amount of killing (but then that goes for most AAA games, don't it), I just remember thinking the way they handled guns and plasmids (whatever they were called) was kind of bad? But I don't remember enough about the game to elaborate on that more.

I played a few rounds and hated the movement and gun feel. Might be a great game but those a dealbreakers for me. :/

I feel so conflicted about the new Bowie because I've been successfully avoiding him all my life, but the backing band on this new album is made up of some of my favourite jazz musicians around today. This is what they sound like when they're not Bowieing:

I gave up on Talos about 3/4 through (my mind doesn't bend that far!) but I'd still heartily recommend it.

I only put stock in Metacritic scores in terms of technical - and, to a lesser extent, mechanical - competency. The best example of this is Bioshock Infinite, which has a 94 on Metacritic. For sure, it's very technically competent, but it's also one of the dullest, most conflicted (both morally and mechanically) games I've slogged through in years. In fact, I saw plenty of reviews that agreed with my take on it, but all of them were either video essays or articles without scores attached. On the other hand, some of the most interesting and original games I've played in recent years have probably been in the 60-80 range. Thing is, if you're trying something new, your game is bound to be less polished and mechanically rigorous than other, more fleshed-out genres, and that's the easiest thing to mark a game down on.

Argh, Oni is one of my favourite games ever. Every time I'm reminded of it I feel legitimately frustrated that nobody (to my knowledge) has attempted to replicate the formula since then. Not even on Kickstarter!! I would throw so many dollars at that (alright, not that many dollars). Small criticism on the video, which is otherwise great - you trail off a bit towards the end of your sentences, meaning it gets quieter and then spikes back up when you begin the next sentence. Made it a bit difficult to follow in parts.

I didn't give a shit about the Play Asia thing until I checked their twitter and saw this. https://twitter.com/playasia/status/669469895420153857 Like, fuck, a real customer is someone who buys your products, end of. I meet that criteria handily, but apparently GG's dollars are so important to them that my custom doesn't count any more. Fine, fuck em. I couldn't give less of a shit about this utterly transparent, manufactured non-controversy, but the stance they're taking is so cynical and manipulative that I'll never feel comfortable giving them money again. Hope they aren't banking on this "boycott" too hard, GG will have moved on to the next pre-emptive anti-outrage (because, really, that's all they have left) in a couple of weeks, then they'll find out who their "real customers" actually are. (Who am I kidding, their actual service is great, they'll probably do fine.)

I just got Shantae: Pirate's Curse and Broken Age, 50 and 75% off respectively. I wasn't in a rush to get Broken Age but that was too good to pass up. Edit: Other deals I was tempted by - State of Decay Survival Edition - 60% off Vector Thrust - 66% off (to scratch that Ace Combat itch) Robot Roller-Derby Disco Dodgeball - 67% off Off-World Trading Company - 50% off (prices not included since mine are in whacky NZ moneys)