utilityfrog
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Posts posted by utilityfrog
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While talking about Owlboy Jake(?) used the pejorative "beta" unironically. This took me aback as I'd only ever associated use of the term with misogynistic alt-right shit heads. Does anyone care to comment on this? i could be incorrect about this, but I've always considered use of the word to be fairly vicious and mean-spirited.
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1 hour ago, Jake said:Does it need to be docked to broadcast to the tv? I'm guessing yes but...
I'd guess yes as well, but if it doesn't and you can play undocked-to-tv, you'd have to either project the tablet quality image to the tv (around 720p going by the rumoured specs) or crank the processor (which it seems is part of what the dock does) to be able to do 1080p and kill battery life.
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Okay, I've seen a lot of people say here and elsewhere that they would be shocked if this thing didn't have a touch screen. On the contrary, I don't see how the switch can have touch controls, given that it has to control the same when docked and undocked (since you obviously couldn't use touch controls while it's docked). Aside from that issue, a non-touch screen will obviously be cheaper than a touch screen, but by how much I'm not sure.
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I'm officially done with Daft Souls. Matt Lees is an arsehole - there, I've said it.
Frankly the only reason I actually liked that podcast was because Keza McDonald from Kotaku UK was a regular guest. Her appearances were rare then almost non-existent apart from Monster Hunter and Dark Souls shows. If she did a podcast, I'd totally listen to that.
If you don't mind, could you elaborate on what he did / said?
I stopped listening quite a while back, there was always something vaguely offputting about the show. I think the final straw for me was when the main co-host (dunno his name), in response to some complaints about a game being too expensive, made reference to "poor people" or something to that effect.
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I've summoned for at least three other bosses and never had this issue. It feels really weird for them all to come at once, and not to occur with the few white phantoms I summoned, but...
I've not been able to have a friendly summon join me for a boss at all, tried on two different bosses, maybe five or six times in total. Found some posts on the steam forums where people have had the same issue. Apparently the phantom doesn't get the message stating that they can enter the boss fog and are unable to do anything but black crystal out. A pretty annoying and severe bug I'd say.
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Spent a couple of hours with this the other day and I was surprised by just how Titan Quest it is. The skill system especially is exactly the same as far as I can see, right down to the visual design. Thankfully the feel of combat is much quicker and more impactfull than TQ. I also agree that the visual design of the world is kind of muddy and cluttered, to the point where, for example, it took me quite a while to notice the first merchant in the first town.
Also, has anyone found this to be quite demanding on system resources? Granted, I have a potato for a video card, but I've had to set all settings to low and also set resolution to lower than native to boot.
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If "spoiler culture" counts as those who don't want to have things spoiled for them then count me in as part of "spoiler culture" (god, what a stupid name).
For me it comes down to this: everyone has the the right to decide for themselves how much information about a work they want to know before consuming it. It's not for anyone else to decide how much is too much or too little. If you post spoilers without sufficient warning or in an inappropriate context then you're a dick imposing your will on others and potentially ruining an experience for them because... why?
I was also more than a little annoyed to hear the podcast hosts being flippantly dismissive of people wanting to avoid Star Wars spoilers on the most recent episode. As if just because Star Wars is frivolous nonsense that people have no right to avoid being spoiled on it.
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I'd recommend reading the Culture books in order of publication, though that's how I prefer to consume most media anyway. Consider Phlebas was definitely the hardest Culture book to get through for me as well, but it makes an interesting contrast to the rest of the series which have far more insights into the Culture itself and take place more or less from the Culture's point of view.
I'd actually strongly recommend reading Player of Games next. It provides a far better look at what the Culture is and is like, and is probably the most narratively straightforward book in the series. It's also quite a breezy, fun read.
I'd also recommend not reading Look to Windward until you have at least another one or two of the intervening novels under your belt. LtW is presented as a sort of distantly removed coda to Consider Phlebas and I think works best with the context of the preceding novels.
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Oh weird. I wonder if it would make sense to conclude that he is now beginning to merge with the other Cooper? How are his eyes when he is chasing through the strobe-lit Red Room and comes right up into the camera? It's interesting that in utiltyfrog's screencap, and also in the final image as Coop looks sideways and laughs, his eyes are still lit (or underlit) kind of cloudy and dark, almost like a shark's eyes. I don't think it's a matter of contact lenses in THAT case (as it obviously is for the milky blue eyes), but maybe I'm wrong. Man, Lynch does so much crazy hidden stuff...
Yeah I noticed the eyes when I posted that pic (Doppel-Coop and Doppel-Leland in the corridor) and thought it was kind of odd. Kyle Maclachlan's performance in that moment though is still very much in the mode of Doppel-Coop.
I just looked at the scene again and I think it's down to lighting. See this moment from a few seconds earlier:
It's still a bit hard to see but it looks a lot like he has the glassy eyes.
And he definitely has the cloudy eyes in the strobe room:
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I'm not sure what's intended, but I love this idea. Especially as I tend to see Mike and Bob as the two fundamental forces in conflict
(given that FWWM folds Mike and the Little Man together).
Although that still kind of leaves the Tremonds unaccounted for.
Yeah, perhaps "intended" is wrong, maybe "heavily suggested"? It's really their identical poses as the Giant says the line that does it for me. As far as the nature of the Tremonds, I'm not really sure that all the forces of the Lodge need to work by the same rules, or fit into a neat taxonomy. It's part of the reason I don't like the idea of the Little Man having a doppelganger.
She does seem to have doppelganger eyes. I've also seen a photo in which she has them (although of course this could theoretically be from another shot that was cut - but fwiw I don't think I've seen any photos of her as Maddy without the lenses).
I wonder if this was partly Lynch's subconscious acknowledging that Maddy was most important to him as Laura's real-world doppelganger rather than an individual character who happened to look like Laura. It's worth noting that he was not involved with the episodes in which Maddy is customed to look really different from Laura and that when he directed Sheryl Lee as Maddy for the first time (in the season 2 premiere) he had hair straightened and made a point of her breaking her glasses and declaring she'd never wear them again. He seems to have wanted to de-emphasize her distinction from Laura. He also cut a scene from the following episode in which she talks with Leland and gives more of a sense of her background as a distinct character (revealing that her father has recently died; Leland also invites her to stay with the Palmers indefinitely which would have been a good set-up for episode 14). On the other hand, of course Maddy can't simply be Laura's doppelganger in the Lodge because we also see doppelganger-Laura.
I agree that although the doppelgangers are all really creepy, suggesting that they represent the "evil" side, something a bit more complicated seems to be going on with the way they are used.
I've seen those photos of Maddy as well. It's interesting that there are two human characters who we only see their doppelgangers of, those being Maddy (assuming she is in fact a doppelganger) and Caroline. It seems to me that, in some sense, and perhaps only from Cooper's point of view, Maddy is Laura's doppelganger, and Caroline is Annie's.
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Have you seen Fire Walk With Me? I do feel like that supports the response about it being real Leland that's culpable. I think DoppeLeland's delight with the line does reinforce it too.
Yeah I've seen FWWM, and I agree that it supports Real-Lelands culpability. Of course that opens the question of "what is a doppelganger?". If real Leland is being held culpable, to the extent that Doppel-Leland isn't, then what exactly is Doppel-Leland? Because it doesn't seem like a clean good/evil split, at least in Leland's case.
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Hi everyone, this is my first post on these forums. I first watched Twin Peaks in it's entirety 15 years ago. I must've watched it a dozen or more times over the years, though there are many episodes that I often skip in part or in full. I've been listening to the podcast since the start and it's been great throughout.
This episode is my favorite of the series with only episode 14 (Maddy's death) coming close. I think it's one of the best things Lynch has ever done, as well as one of the scariest and most disturbing things I've ever seen on screen.
I'm just going to list the things that strike me about the episode, including ideas I've picked up from the web over the years, as well as some reactions to points raised in the podcast.
- When Earle and Annie are approaching the entrance to the Lodge and Earle shines the torch in both his and Annie's faces, their eyes momentarily look a lot like the doppelganger eyes.
- The circle of sycammore trees with the pool of oil in the middle is such a striking, unnatural image. The residue of white powder around the edge of the pool suggests something toxic and unhealthy.
- I re-watched Cooper's entrance to the Lodge and couldn't find the part Chris talked about with our view of the Lodge momentarily becoming desaturated. Does anyone know what he was talking about?
- Ben Horne is definitely unconscious on the ground with a severe head injury after hitting his head on the fireplace.
- The Sycammore Trees song has such an air of finality to it. It really seems to be there to prepare Cooper (and us) for the final stage of his journey, perhaps even his "death", depending on your interpretation of what happens to him in the Lodge.
- The strobe light set up during the song, with alternate sides of Coopers face being illuminated, is excellent. I'm assuming this was quite difficult to position and time correctly. It also provides a nice visual foreshadowing of the doppelgangers and Coopers doppelganger in particular.
- The music that plays underneath the entire Lodge sequence is probably the most unsettling and eerie music I've ever heard.
- The Giant's "One and the same" line can be interpreted in two ways. One, that the Giant and the old waiter are the same. Two, that the Giant, the waiter and the Little Man are one and the same. The fact that the Giant and the Little Man have almost exactly the same pose at this moment heavilly suggests to me that the second interpretation is intended.
- I don't see any connection between the Giant's eyes and the doppelganger eyes. In fact, the Giant's eyes look completely normal to me, in this episode anyway.
- Maddy wears the exact same dress as Laura does in ine Lodge. I couldn't really tell from my copy whether the Maddy we see has the white doppelganger eyes or not. Could anyone who has the bluray confirm?
- The Little Man's doppelganger is interesting to me. I don't really like the idea of the native lodge spirits having doppelgangers, they seem to me to be more elemental than that. I prefer to think that the Little Man's doppelganger is there simply to demonstrate the concept to Cooper (and to us as well).
- Doppel-Laura screaming into the camera is the first of several fourth wall breaks in the episode. As she moves up to the camera we're presumably seeing Cooper's point of view, but after Cooper runs away we return to the original POV and Doppel-Laura is still there, screaming. These 4th wall breaks greatly reduce the distance between what's happening and the audience, making them far more terrifying and unsettling. Certainly for me at least.
- Cooper discovers he's injured immediately after running away from D-Laura (and the momentary flash of Earle we see). Seems that that was the moment of weakness (or perhaps one of the moments) that condems him.
- The Cooper-Annie-D-Caroline seems to present Caroline as in some sense Annie's doppelganger, or perhaps vice-a-versa. Or it might be a representation of Cooper's confusion about his feelings towards the two women.
- Earle's clothing in this whole episode is exactly the same as Cooper's, just dirtied up and shabby. Presenting another version of an inverted double of Cooper.
- Cooper seems to act with complete selflessness when offering his soul to Earle in exchange for Annie's life. Either allowing BOB to destroy Earle, or leaving when BOB tells him to, or maybe both, seems to be the act that promps Doppel-Cooper to appear. Or the acts may not be causally related to D-Cooper's appearance, who knows?
- With D-Coop's appearance we also get the next 4th wall break as he cackles madly into the camera.
- D-Leland's statement that he didn't kill anybody is interesting. Is he telling the truth? If he is, does that imply some level of culpability on Real-Leland for his actions? I don't really know. Also interesting is that D-Leland has some traces of white in his hair (presumably the last traces of Ray Wise's hair from when he was last on the show, but still interesting).
- This might be my favorite shot from the episode:
So unnerving, and so suggestive of what Cooper's fears about himself are. - The next, and most explicit, 4th wall break. Also the scariest, IMO.
- We get another 4th wall break as D-Coop is chasing Coop, where D-Coop runs up to the camera and momentarily stares into it with a crazy look on his face.
- After D-Coop catches Coop we get the last 4th wall break as BOB laughs into the camera.
Well, that was a bit longer than I initially intended.
Twin Peaks Rewatch 36: The Return, Part 2
in Twin Peaks Rewatch Episodes
Posted
(Speaking of eps 1 and 2 here, haven't seen further yet)
Well that was the weirdest thing I've seen since... Inland Empire, I guess. Everything pointed to the new series being something very different to the original show, and I'm glad it delivered on that. Scattered thoughts/observations below:
Everything about the look and feel of the lodge seemed very different from how it looked/felt in the finale and FWWM. Some of this is inevitable I guess just from the passage of time, but I think some of the changes could be deliberate as well. I'm just not sure which is which. Some of the changes I noticed: