Architecture

Indeed. In fact, I used Mordor's release as an excuse to pick up the Xbox One controller:

For reference, here's last year's stab at Scorpion: If I go the Reddit Atheist route, I was intending to get a shirt and iron on some letters; I was thinking either #notallmen or #gamergate. Maybe just #notallgamers.

So I've decided to either dress up as a Reddit Atheist or recycle my Scorpion costume from last year. Thoughts?

A steady 30 looks better than a game which oscillates between 40 and 60, at least in my personal opinion. I would guess that the Cyber Monday deals on 760s and 770s will be pretty great this year, if you can swing a couple hundred bucks for a new GPU.

I haven't seen the console version, but I was running the game incredibly smoothly on my rig with mostly maxed out settings. For reference, I'm running: ASUS Z-97A MOBO Intel Core i5 4670K @4.2GHz Gigabyte GTX760 2GB 8GB DD3 RAM @1866MHz 500GB Samsung 840 Evo SSD Enabling V-sync certainly drops performance, but even the tearing I was experience was pretty minimal. I will play around with the settings later, but it seemed pretty buttery on my end. Even my boss said he was amazed at how well it ran. It seems pretty optimized to me!

I keep getting follows based solely on my username. Which is funny because all these architects are going to be real disappointed when all I do is post my thoughts about video games.

So I recently started a Tumblr to host some Skyrim screenshots I had been taking and found everything about the Tumblr dash infuriating. So much so, in fact, that I deleted my account. Ello may fill the same space, but at least it's friendlier. They just need to make it work more consistently and integrate a few things, like Youtube embedding or better text editing. I could get CTRL+I to italicize text last night from home, but can't manage that this morning from work.

I've only played an hour, but I'm confident in asserting that this game is Fucking. Awesome.

Super Mario 64 was the first game I ever completed. I didn't find it all that taxing other than the final confrontation with Bowser. I recall waking up early every day before school for at least a week, just playing that last damn level over and over until I finally conquered it. Mario 64 was generally recognized--at the time, at least--as the first 3D action game to have a serviceable camera. I personally played with the Mario follow camera as opposed to Lakitu's directed camera, which I found less prone to interfering with the gameplay.

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I keep getting followed by architects and architectural firms, which I find absolutely hilarious.

At least GMG finally got their keys. Really shitty of WB to force them to wait as long as they did. Only four hours to go!

I would complete homicide and then move on, it's the best part of the game. The ending is just mind-numbingly stupid, and it basically becomes a full-fledged shooter with some of the worst controls you've ever experienced.

Really, I just want to listen to this track and punch the heck out of dudes on motorbikes:

Ended up running around doing some patrols for a bounty last night and partied up with a guy who was level 27. He was friendly and we ended up going through some Moon story missions together. This game is definitely a lot better if you're playing with at least one other person, though my number of kills was dwarfed by his (obviously). Does the game just split XP? It seemed like I was getting his share as well, which is nice to see. I'll probably play this for one more night and then return it tomorrow so that I can dig into Shadow of Mordor, but I've been pleasantly surprised by the game as a whole. That's actually quite invigorating to say, as usually it's the other way around.

This reminds me of the 138th episode spectacular when one of the trivia questions was, "Which two popular characters passed away on the Simpsons last season? If you answered Bleeding Gums Murphy and Dr. Marvin Monroe, you're incorrect! They were never popular!"

I have almost purchased this game about half a dozen times at this point. I've been dying for a modern take on Road Rash for at least a decade. Does it have awesome music? Failing that, can I import my own collection of awesome music to supplement whatever they've got in-game?

United Front Games is following up Sleeping Dogs with this: PC-exclusive, at least so far. You can register for the closed beta via http://www.triadwars.com/. Yes, please.

Either control scheme is a learned skill and requires practice. Also, it's entirely possible that the sensitivity of the mouse was too great for him to feel comfortable--I find myself turning down the DPI on my mouse for most first-person games, especially twitchy skill-based shooters.

I've wondered about that quagmire regarding reviews for years and unfortunately, I'm not sure there's a good way around it. Fans demand reviews day-and-date with the release of a game to help them make an informed decision and yet, it seems like requiring information upfront limits a reviewer's ability to properly critique a game. I really wish there was a resource for more in-depth games criticism that wasn't just a 1,000 word jumble of impressions wherein everything was described as "visceral." I think Clint Hocking's writeup of Bioshock is the closest thing I've seen to real games criticism, which is incredibly disappointing when you consider the history of gaming and the number of people involved in the industry at every conceivable level. I've toyed around with writing about games as a hobby for years and have never really managed to strike the right balance--oft-times, my writing just feels derivative and overly influenced by other peoples' takes on the game in question.

My friend and I did a couple moon missions this afternoon. I'm up to level 6 and still enjoying my time with the game. I think it's a solid 7 or 7.5 out of 10, and I have to wonder if reviewers who were rushing to get through the game found it less enjoyable because they didn't get to play it at a more leisurely pace. The story is still impenetrable and one of the biggest failings of the game from my vantage point. It'd be interesting to learn about Joe Staten's exit from the company, and how much that did or did not impact the story in Destiny.

Let me add an additional head-scratcher to your list: Why doesn't the game explain its systems to the player in any way whatsoever? I'm collecting items with odd names and no real understanding of why I'm doing it or what I should do afterward. I shouldn't have to visit an external website to understand the concept of Glimmer, your PRIMARY IN-GAME CURRENCY! There's nothing wrong with burying your lore so that it doesn't obfuscate the player's experience, but there should be in-game codices for all of this stuff. Outstandingly beautiful game though, even on last-gen consoles. And the guns feel great--they're weighty and satisfying to shoot. I'm guessing that a lot of troubles with the game have mostly to do with trying to corral a stable of developers at such an immense scale; how could you possibly ever get everyone on the same page?

I'm playing on PS3, in case anyone needs an upcoming Hunter on his or her fireteam. My PSN name is Ar-chi-tec-ture, feel free to add me.

Eggs up inside ya?

I'm /architecture, in case y'all feel like following me. I've not posted anything yet, but I'm considering using it as a springboard for some armchair games criticism. Anyway, I also have invites in case someone would like one. Can you just PM the code you generate to another user? On my primary board, we were doing it by PMing each other our email addresses and then receiving email invites.