Bjorn

Been meaning to post this, I finished my first playthrough of Dark Souls 2. Of the 3 souls games, I feel that it is the best and most balanced/diverse in terms of mechanics, though ultimately the world and characters fall short of either DeS or DS1. So that's a bit of a mixed bag, it should be great for multiplayer, speedruns and challenge runs for a long time, but won't spawn the obsessiveness that people had for lore and characters in DS1. All told though, a fantastic experience and still better (for me) than most other games made in the last few years.

You guys are really making me want to play KR0. I own it, but had been putting it off until it was finished. I've really avoided knowing anything about it, so this conversation is super intriguing.

So are you guys contemplating keeping the Nelsbot? Also, I would be super interested in hearing the deeper discussion about the Burial at Sea episodes.

Curious cubes queued up to meet Q, queuing questions for the man behind the quixotic character.

Oh hell yes, that would have been soooo good. Oliver with his own show in that slot would have been terrific.

No, I haven't seen anything about the plan/structure of the show. I would guess that he won't be in character?

So Stephen Colbert is taking over the Late Show with David Letterman next year. Weird. Those night shows just feel like these aging dinosaurs to me that need to die, not be revitalized with new blood. Not that I want to see Colbert do the Report forever, I'm sure the guy has other goals, but going to CBS just feels like he'll never have the freedom to pull some of the shit that cable affords him.

Woah, that comes out in like a month? Weird. As for the trailer, the opening 20 seconds of that had me hooked, thinking that this was going to be something really bold and different (like hunting war criminals in Brazil)...and then it wasn't that at all. That said, the pedigree of the developers is certainly interesting and so won't make me dismiss it out of hand.

I love that you can start to hear the *tink* of the Black Market after you've died, mocking you.

Even Better Quest Objectives

Sounds like you are just super ready to be done, but I will say that

Yeah, any software management of passwords has always had me worried as just something else to possibly go wrong. Theoretically I understand how something like LP is secure...but I still have this nagging distrust of any solution like that? Though Heartbleed is making me rethink that option.

There are two places to trade boss souls for things. MOST souls don't overlap between the two, but there are a few that do. Dark Spirits? What does the summon sign look like? Sounds like you're making great progress now though! On my main character, I keep a pair of +10 regular clubs on hand for emergencies. I bought a club early, loved it, and just haven't been able to give it up. I prefer my fists for most encounters, then the Malformed Skull for things that need big hit damage, but the clubs get broke out when I need something in between. I decided to mess around with learning a bit about speedrunning and a no-bonfire run last night. Not doing a proper speedrun, just trying to use some of their tactics to facilitate no-bonfire. I...kinda like it. It adds something back to the game that's more like DeS and DS1. You can light a fire, and still return to it with a Homeward Bone or death. But you don't necessarily want to light every fire if you're trying to be as efficient as possible and minimize backtracking. So it makes the time between bonfires a lot longer, if you die, it's a much bigger deal to get your bloodstain back. You have to manage healing and weapon degradation a lot more. I wouldn't have guessed that what DkS2 really needed was something to make it more challenging. I'm pretty sure that

I don't think I've seen any Blue options yet, BUT, if you lose someone to an event (like the space spiders), then they just get cloned and you get them back. The cloning bay doesn't have to be on to have that happen. The flavor text of some of that is pretty amusing.

Once you get the cloning machine leveled up and its healing a fair amount per jump, then asphyxiating them doesn't seem that necessary. Your dead will still queue up to be cloned even while the machine is off as well. You have a few seconds to turn it on before their soul is lost to the vastness of space.

I have been listening to it, was really excited when they had Paddy from Twin Humanities on. That's the show I want to start back up, but the other half of it has apparently had some sort of throat infection/problem that has knocked his voice out for the last couple of weeks, delaying the start of their DS2 shows.

Listening to a podcast, I learned that

Shadow of the Colossus? That's unexpected. Great list of games to talk about all the way around though.

Someone needs to make a painting of a grenade rolling down a hill and sell that as a print or t-shirt.

I read them for awhile, until the story started shifting up to big picture stuff (the war with the Adversary). It's not that it turned bad, I just found the smaller, earlier stories a lot more compelling than the grand arcs. I'd certainly recommend checking them out.

Huh, did not know that! So that basically reduces it down to needing the Rock Homeworlds to spawn in a run, and the time/challenge to unlock Rock B. That overall seems better that there are 3 ways to get it, even if none of them are "easy".

I'm waiting for the whole season to release. Even if I buy a game like this midway through, I want everything out before I start.

And that just makes me think of my favorite time travel short stories. Wikihistory is the best story about going back to kill Hitler, written in the style of Wikipedia editor wars. I don't know if there's a copy of All You Zombies online, but it's the go to example of a great story about going back in time to fuck with your previous self.

I finally tried TotD: Overkill after getting it in the Sega bundle. Super pleased that it also comes with the regular version of House of the Dead! I had no idea, I had assumed it was just the Typing version. I have a deep seated fondness for light gun games, there's just something about them that makes me stupid happy. It's gloriously dumb, fun, and offensive. And I'm way the hell better at typing than I am aiming with a mouse, apparently. It makes me really want to have a light gun to play it with, but after doing a bit of research last night, apparently there aren't any decent PC light guns that sell for less than around $100. Apparently it might be possible to make a DIY gun and use my 360's Kinect...but it looked complicated and it ultimately might not work that well. Only real complaint is that HotD doesn't have local co-op like it did on the PS3.

It's bad when you want to swap equipment or move stuff around. The worst is your chest, you can't see the full stats when moving items into or out of storage. And buying items, you can't compare to your current equipment. So yeah, bad. Oh, I watched Polygon's video on the PC version, which is 1080p without being gated like the GB video. I felt like I have a better feel for the better resolution and textures now.