BadHat

There will be a kickstarter for a thing.

Every now and again Reddit delivers something transcendent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtQ8cYuLSPE

Based on this, you might like Anathema. This guy's also quite good.

Well, if we're posting HL2.

Well hey, if we're overthinking things, what constitutes a hidden drawback when it comes to mental health? This is the first thing that occurs to me when I think of not having to sleep - how long would it take to go mental? Also, if I still have the option of sleeping, does that mean I'm able to do it at will? I have enough trouble dozing off sometimes already, how the fuck would I fall asleep if I were never tired? When would I wake up? How would my body know to? I mean I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm pretty dependent on sleep to keep me in (what vaguely resembles) a sound state of mind, so I'd have to have some pretty solid wish guarantees before I signed on the dotted line.

Can I redeem the eating wish in DayZ instead of real life?

Right, but by what rubric is he judging it be superior? I just feel like people fall back on this agreed-upon standard of what makes a game worthy of accolade, when really there's more bias to those assessments than is being acknowledged. The bias only seems more justifiable, or more objective to some, because it falls so snugly within the boundaries that have already been carved out by countless other games before it. I don't care about the individual people who hold this standard up as objective, but I do care that they help to perpetuate an attitude that makes this standard seem more real and binding than it actually is. But anyway I wasn't actually aware the IGN award was a site-wide thing and not his personal pick, so my bad. GOTY(.cx) is a pretty dumb distinction in the first place, so maybe I shouldn't be getting so up in arms about it.

Right, but I'd argue it goes a bit deeper than building consensus with the most people possible. A lot of people consume these reviews regularly enough that they've built a view of what constitutes an objectively good game, and they use that imaginary standard to dismiss any opinions that don't align with it. I've had conversations with people who can't accept that someone could give a game a 3, or a 5, or whatever the fuck, unless they were trying to be "controversial," because it objectively does not warrant anything less than a 7. On the reviewer's part, they might just be trying to cater to a wider audience instead of outright pandering to them, but I can't help but see it as the difference between reviews as an honest statement of opinion, versus grading them for competency as a consumer product. "How could they give Game a 5 when it has all the requisite bells and whistles and doesn't crash to desktop every 3 minutes? Fucking snobs, don't they know games are just meant to be fun?" Sorry if I seem kind of bitter, I just see this sentiment shockingly often. I actually had that review bookmarked because I enjoyed it so much, but it looks like the blog is dead now. http://nexoscluster.wordpress.com/2013/09/16/an-objective-apolitical-review-of-gta-v/

Yeah, I knew it was about to blow, but the title card really got me.

God, now I just want a Scooby Doo game in the vein of Spelunky. Except with mysteries and every level ends with you pulling a mask off a dude.

The most hilarious part is they have a "Mass Effect Collection" on Steam even though it's not really collecting everything. I sort of wish Valve would bring down the hammer a bit more with this sort of stuff, companies like EA want to have their fingers in all the pies while having their cake and eating it. Metaphorically speaking.

I think his choice has more to do with pandering to expected norms than it does with objectivity, but I can't really blame him for it either. When Gone Home won indie of the year or whatever it was at the VGX, there was a pretty big outcry from people accusing them of including it because it was "controversial" and would act as nerd bait to drive up viewership. Many people won't accept a pick as valid unless it's sufficiently gamey in a way that they're accustomed to, otherwise they'll cry fowl instead of considering that, hey, maybe they're the ones being pandered to and not everyone who doesn't share their tastes. The fact that people will still rail against a review for not being "objective" enough based on a set of standards they believe to be set in stone, when really it's just a norm which has been established by the glut of similar games released in the past, is telling of the level of thought many are willing to put towards the validity of games that might fall outside their wheelhouse. So people will argue definitively on what is or isn't a game, or whether it's game enough to be considered someone's top pick, instead of considering what a game is capable of being. Last of Us is a solid pick, but it's also a really easy one.

I'm all about black pirate lady. Before that I usually went with contented dude or eskimo guy.

It'll function as an interactive will. Whoever completes the game in the most charitable fashion will take over Valve, Willy Wonka style.

I laughed so fucking hard at "Woman Woman."

It's very robust and there's a lot of interesting things to do and craft and become self-sufficient, but my ultimate frustration with it was that it involved a whole lot of clicking things and inventory management and that sort of stuff, especially when you're starting a new game and getting set up. If you don't mind that, it's quite good.

Damn it, how am I only just finding out this album exists? And it has motherfucking on drums? Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

There was a list of planned features on the Starbound blog, and freely teleporting back to your home planet was on there I believe.

So far, between what I've bought for myself and some gifts from an especially generous friend, this is my haul: Deus Ex: Human Revolution - Director's Cut upgrade Eldritch Antichamber Huntsman: The Orphanage Amnesia: Machine for Pigs Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons The Stanley Parable Race The Sun Super Hexagon (... but shit, it was 29 cents!) So I have my work cut out for me!

I can't pinpoint why but I recall quite liking the dialogue in ME2, despite being it pretty cheesy/pulpy. Then I watched a friend play the first couple hours of ME3 and found it utterly cringe-worthy. From memory it had the same lead writer as Dragon Age 2 which I decided was terrible based on the dialogue in the demo alone ("I want to be a dragon!"). I wish I had something to contribute to this thread but I'm bad at finishing games.

To me when I read "e" it just sounds like a shortened he in my head. Like you're just saying it a bit britishly.

I'd advise you to keep playing just because of this comment, but it really doesn't sound like you're enjoying it so maybe I won't.

I enjoyed both Far Cry 2 and 3, but they were pretty different games on a deeper level than just variety or how much "stuff" there was to do. Far Cry 2 dropped you into a hostile world where you felt like a mostly-insignificant cog in a terrible machine and more or less left you to your own devices. It wasn't perfectly balanced and it had some significant flaws, but it did something interesting and different instead of being yet another sandbox game which is actually just a giant theme park full of boxes to tick (at least not outwardly). Far Cry 3, I think, tried to compensate for the perceived flaws of FC2 a little too drastically, and ended up skewing in completely the opposite direction. It's a big, dumb, ego-tripping power fantasy, and it doesn't make any bones about it - it's reflected directly in the protagonist's story arc. I didn't hate the crafting or the hunting missions, but you could become overpowered incredibly early if you focused on that stuff. You clear an outpost and it's gone forever, which makes travel even more consequence-free than it already was. Then you get to the second island and, as if the game hadn't already done you enough favours, you get an enemy uniform so you don't even have to engage unless and until you want to, and a (admittedly really sweet) wingsuit to make travel easier yet. Like I said, I still had fun with FC3, but 2 was by far the more engaging experience.

Podcasts are probably partially responsible for why I've been so drawn to roguelikes/likelikes*. I try to always have one on rotation to futilely chip away at while listening to casts. Two meaningless activities for the price of one! * I just got an idea for a super cheesy line of GAMER greeting cards for significant others. The cover says "I don't roguelike you," then you open it up and there's a picture of any one of the three damsels from Spelunky doing the kissy face and it says "I roguelikelike you." Sorry.