Bjorn

Nuh-uh! Both words are used in the phrase, and ran/run have actually been on the rise while ride/rode are in decline. Your lack of knowledge about common English phrases clearly demonstrates that you are unqualified to talk about ethics. Jokes aside, I hope the conversation with your friend went well.

I love the Bell Towers, so, so much. Probably ended up being some of my favorite areas in the game, and by far my most memorable PvP. Does anyone know if the expansions have any new dedicated PvP zones? I really ought to pick them up soon.

I meant to get a more in-depth response typed up earlier, but work and social plans ended up nixing that. But I think that several other people's replies covered some excellent ground. I'm continuing to try and think about gg from other angles than the ones we've predominantly covered already in this thread. And a line from Kathleen Hale's rather disturbing essay has been lodged in my brain for the last few days: That desperate cry of, "I exist!" has some role to play in gg. "Listen to me!" "I matter!" Oliver Campbell, in his earlier linked piece directly addresses this. His first stream, where people showed up and wanted to listen to him, hear his thoughts, ask him questions and actually listen to him. His reaction to it sounds...intoxicating and rejuvenating at the same time. He talks about not being able to imagine speaking for as long as he did, and yet he did and continues to, stream after stream. There are a lot of people in the world who feel voiceless, even if that isn't entirely true. I mean, any American feeling "voiceless" is rather hollow and privileged when you consider people from any number of other places in the world. But it doesn't mean that feeling doesn't have some validity to it. I'm sure it must feel intoxicating to go from a place of feeling alienated to, practically overnight, feeling like you not only have a voice, but a loudspeaker, and can make people listen to it. There's a powerful motivation there to ignore where the loudspeaker came from, to pretend that you're not part of the mob that ran roughshod over a bunch of people's lives in order to be heard. Because that would invalidate everything you think you need to say. I also don't know how to explain to some of them that the rest of the world does not hear their voice anyways, just the screaming of the mob in a thousand voices. Also, that Hale piece has kind of stuck in my brain, I went down a brief hole over the weekend reading the book world's reactions to it. I feel like there are some similarities there brewing, that while it is distinctly different than gamergate, shares some if its DNA. I've also had a few ciders tonight, and it's entirely possible the above was just a rambling mess. If so, please ignore and move on.

A few years ago I knew people who didn't hook up their consoles online (when the 360 still didn't come with integrated wireless), but since every console comes with wireless as a standard now, I don't think I personally know anyone who doesn't anymore.

I played through on 360 and loved it. I own the PC version, but haven't played it yet. I just did some searches, and apparently it was originally titled Rainy Woods back in 2004, and when it was first shown off, it was almost literally Twin Peaks the game (like every single character might as well have been lifted straight from TP). It was eventually canceled, and then rebooted in 2008 and some more changes were made to dial back the similarities amongst the characters in the game.

DP was, apparently, even closer to its source material originally, and was delayed to make changes in order to avoid the likelihood of a lawsuit (I know I saw a story about this when DP was originally released, but I'm not finding it now).

Not at all, a reactionary movement is the opposite of that. A reactionary movement is about the retention of a changing status quo, or reverting back to a previous status quo that has been lost. That's specifically what the phrase means. Some people have misunderstood it, as they think any movement that is a reaction to something is automatically a reactionary movement. The phrase actually has a very specific meaning. And yes, gg is a reactionary movement by that definition. In the case of gg, the status quo has been that politics, feminism, and other social issues weren't a topic for discussion in games or gaming media. That status quo has been challenged and is slowly changing. The reaction is against that change and a desire to return to the way things were before. Okay, so I started to write a different response to some of your earlier posts, but lets back up for a minute. What do you believe the concerns of GamerGate are, and how do you think that pro-gg people have pursued corrective action for those concerns? One of the problems with having a discussion about any of this is understanding each person's frame of reference, and I'm not sure what yours is. Mine is pretty clear from even going back over the last few pages and seeing my thoughts about gg. Edited a couple of sentences for clarity.

I'm not sure why that went viral, I think it had to do just with the "puppy sized spider" headline and widespread arachnophobia, it's not like the Goliath Birdeater hasn't been a known species for...like a century or more? I really like spiders, and am fascinated by them. The only reason I don't actually have one is that I'm not a fan of terrarium pets (and my wife is a pretty serious arachnophobe, though she has gotten better over the last few years as I've taught her some things about spiders and showed her how cool they can be). By contrast, I'm actually quite scared of big dogs. Every single time I post something about spiders on Facebook, I'm honestly amused by the horrified reactions and who they come from. A few times I've pointed out that as someone who is afraid of dogs, I see people post stuff about their pooches on a daily basis and never say a word about it, but people can't stop themselves from condemning snakes and spiders. To some dog lovers I've mentioned this to, it's a completely alien thought to them.

Because Americans are dumb and from what I remember of the anti-Japanese sentiment in the 80s it was often generalized as being anti-Asian. To be fair I was a kid, so both my perception and my memory are probably not perfect.

Holy shit, I was wrong, I did back at the beta level. For some reason I was sure I had backed at the minimum tier, but checking KS, I definitely backed at the $50 tier. I completely don't remember doing that. At any rate, I'm in the beta. I do want to play it now that I've got it, but this is shaping up to be a super busy week, particularly with the World Series going on. Maybe I'll squeeze in an hour or so somewhere to at least check out how it opens. It's supposed to be a complete game, just a beta for balance and bug squashing. I also apparently get a free copy to give away? Which I had no idea about. So that's really cool. I've got one friend who might want it, if not, I'll probably give it out here on the forums.

I'd agree with that, and I'd say that she's subverting the anti-Asian (predominantly anti-Japanese) tropes that were established in the 80s even while the structure of the character was being informed by those influences. Although, as far as the inheritance goes (big spoiler if someone hasn't seen the show before):

I made a post on Facebook about wanting a giant pet spider, and a retired priest replied to me, "Hell no." This has pretty much made my day.

You could own DS on GFWL and not on Steam, so I would assume that save transfers would be tied to that, and not if you own it on Steam. No matter what though, this is good news!

At least in a few instances of gg being totally banned, there was plenty of proof of organized harassment and/or sharing doxxing information. It's not even a question whether or not you ban that shit, and if it dominates the conversation, then just ban the whole topic. I'm not sure what else you would expect a mod to do.

Apparently tweeting death threats at Gabe Newell is a bad idea if you're a developer.

Planet Money story: When women stopped coding

Nah, those are all interesting points to make. Echoing some of the thoughts above, I'm also not surprised that he found an embracing, encouraging audience, for a variety of reasons. Shortly after writing that piece, he also wrote a guide on how to write a review with "minimal subjectivity", an examination of how to come as close as possible to the mythical objective review. This is the kind of opinion that tends to go over quite well with certain parts of the gaming community, the part of it that I find to be unfathomable, the part that believes games be approached and discussed in the same way one might discuss a TV or a toy. That they should not be discussed as works of art, that emotional reactions are a footnote beneath hair physics and 4K resolution, that their place in and reflection of our culture has no place in a review. I also learned from Campbell's twitter that the EiC of Destructoid resigned. Anyone know what that's about? I've never been a 'toid reader, so have no frame of reference about what's going on there and if it's related to all the gigglygloop stuff.

I got through 3 episodes of Serial at work today, and damn is that a compelling show. Kind of wish I would have just waited until this series was done. I also listened to a couple of episodes of the Daily Show podcast last week. It's good, it shows some potential to be great, giving you a view of what it's like making various parts of the show.

Jade Raymond is leaving Ubisoft, for destinations unknown.

I don't disagree with you, but also I know how close I've come to using terms like misogynerd, or allowing myself to go down some paths in thinking or talking about this that would have led me to be disappointed in myself. And I've allowed gater to stand in for using shittier words at times. And I often feel frustrated talking about any of this, as there I think there are some interesting elements worth talking about, like neurodiversity, mental health, and sex (both the desire for and lack of). But I recognize that exploring any of those, particularly when I'm feeling angry about some of this, could easily lead me to making blanket or othering statements that would ultimately be about making myself feel better through condemnation rather than actually chasing down an interesting line of thought. And I'm not saying that the rest of you shouldn't use gater, or whatever noun you want to use. I won't argue with anyone using the word of their choice. I'm just trying to be cognizant of my own language use and thought processes here to see if I'm falling into the traps that are inherent to angry us vs. them conflicts.

Ludwig at Joystiq finally wrote something about this fiasco.

Wasn't anticipating a gaming comic making me a bit emotional this morning. Critical hit right to the feels.

It's 4 days away from closing, and still 19K short ($111K raised, $130K needed). This is one of the only Kickstarters I've backed that looks like it's going to be close.

I don't even know how many plants we have in our house. 20? 30? Maybe more? My wife is a crazy plant/gardener person. I know next to nothing about plants. If anyone has any questions about plants, she can probably answer them.

That's awesome! I'm actually quite find of opossums. We have a bunch that live around our property, and they've become quite unafraid of me, as I tend to hang out on the front porch at night and watch them go around the yard scavenging for stuff. The best though is that each of the last two years we've had a mother raccoon and her brood visit our mulberry tree on a regular basis. A bunch of young raccoons stuffing themselves on mulberries is the CUTEST!