Erkki

awesome episode!

I'm almost finished playing it (on PC), and so far I like it a lot. I do get where the complaints are coming from, but nothing about the game bothers me that much. ... ok, the not dying part is kind of lame.

A bit more complicated for me, but basically I log in to a web site and press "ok" a couple of times.

This one actually missed my face. Probably because I was doing some reading or web browsing or something during listening to it, so I wasn't playing full attention. Usually I play Spider Solitaire while listening to the cast, and those times it really hits my face.

Have you guys seen this (Full Throttle as about an hour long movie): http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2009/01/07/full-throttle-goes-cinematic/ It's awesome, except the video is really poor quality. The guy who made it also commented that article, saying he lost the files so he can't put up a better quality version.

I just downloaded Spelunky. Isn't some of the art (and sounds) taken from Doukutsu Monogatari? Or perhaps they both got it from the same source... [edit] after taking a closer look, it doesn't look exactly the same, just very similar in style.

So, there's going to be a WoT MMO (and possibly films and other games). Since I'm currently reading the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan, I have actually been thinking that it might be a good property to base a fantasy RPG on. Some aspects of the world and character interactions in those books are described in more detail than usual in fantasy novels (hence all the books are bricks where not much happens for hundreds of pages) and I think this is a good opportunity for some developer do an RPG that is a bit different. Not that I really hope that Red Eagle Entertainment (a new studio apparently) will handle it well, but I'm going to post my thoughts about what I think a WOT RPG should be like anyway (warning: long post). First and foremost, the most important feature of any WoT RPG must be a Clothing Simulation Engine -- the engine has to do clothing better than any game before. I mean, the most repeatedly occuring thing in the books is women adjusting their shawls and deferring to other women, possibly both at the same time. A WOT game just wouldn't be the right without it. But really, I was only half-joking. Even though I never quite managed to visualise all the attire described in the books, they are described in rather a detailed way and I would like to see that detail put to use in the supposed game. So a WOT game should take the clothing physics into the "next level" and possibly even make characters somewhat aware of their clothes: they should walk and behave differently depending on what they're wearing, etc. This game should preferrably be in first person, with full body awareness, like Mirror's Edge, but you should be able to see your character more often than ME (cutscenes, mirrors, optional third person perspective?). The reason is that while the books often change between characters, the writing style is very much from inside the character's head, detailing their thoughts in quite onerous ways. In the game you should occasionally hear those thoughts in your head. But more seriously, a WOT RPG would be a great opportunity to create a somewhat more interesting magic system that focuses equally on player skill and character skill. Player skill would determine the effectiveness of your magic and even what magic you can use, while character skill would adjust the difficulty setting. To use the One Power the player would use mouse gestures or even play minigames, weaving the flows into certain patterns. It's the player's skill to weave them as best they can, but character skill will make it easier eventually (slowing down time while you draw the patterns, autocompleting complex parts). This allows the simpler "spells" to become more and more easy to cast, while more powerful magic would actually be quite hard to weave at first, being made up of more complex patterns. Making a portal for Travelling should be almost like a minigame, but warding against eavesdropping should be doable with a simple gesture. Of course, players shouldn't be forced to memorize the really complex patterns completely, so the system should give hints, maybe displaying possible known patterns while the player is weaving a flow. Another side to the magic would be reading the weaves and their residue: you can learn new "spells" by watching the patterns woven by others, but it's the player who has to memorize and try to replicate them. Character skill can effect the readability of magic cast by others: how clearly the residue and active weaves are seen, for how long the residue is visible. Magic should be something that is relatively rarely used, but powerful. For male characters, the Dark One's taint should make magic even more difficult to use. Besides the magic system and the appearance of characters, I think another important thing would be the character behaviour. This should also be something that surpasses any RPG done before, as the WOT really is about the characters. I would expect awesome NPC AI, including group AI. For example, in case you would play a leader, you should have bodyguards that behave in a somewhat realistic manner (moving ahead of you etc.) but don't get in your way too much.

Outcast did that pretty well. If you were really far from someone, they told you the general direction, as you got closer, they actually pointed to the person you were looking for. Even though Outcast is technically a bit outdated by now, it still did some things really well that haven't really been repeated by any other game (AFAIK).

I would still want PS3 as a media player. A media player should be quiet.

Iiiiii want too beeeeee nonarchist

Well, I didn't really play much on consoles before this generation (only a few games on the PS2), but it seems like this generation we have some good online capabilities (especially on Xbox), and thanks to that, indie/smaller games on consoles that were previously only possible on the PC. To me, that is the defining quality of this console generation * * HD graphics is nice too

Oh man, that was a classic.

I think your score depends on the number of people though.

Aargh, I hate this game! I've played a couple of games every day, but I always make some stupid mistake just when I'm about to beat my high score.

Welcome back, jester of a monarch!

The characters made me think of some of the smaller/creepier creatures from Moomin. I think there were some others that were more similar, but I can't find them on the interconnected nets.

Good episode! I liked the talk about how markets and stuff evolve in MMO's, but since I don't play MMOs myself, some of it went over my head. What's instancing? etc. The game pitches were fun!

Since this came up, if anyone has ideas for what to do with riprollickingride.com, suggestions and/or working HTML/whatever is welcome

The concept is interesting... for the first five minutes. I don't know if its the execution or maybe one couldn't make this game great without changing it into something entirely different. As it is, all the solutions are just too similar. I'd pay 5$ or a bit more though, but not 20$.

It just isn't Fallout with a blue sky.

So, the game is out and a new demo too: http://www.crayonphysics.com/ It's improved a lot. Levels are placed on islands in a World of Goo-esque way, and you progress similarly as well. What's cool is that you can draw on the islands -- no physics there, but I think that's pretty cool. However, the gameplay is kind of boring to me, I'm not sure if I'll buy the game.

Yeah, perhaps too much stuff was cut. I'd like to see someone give it a second try, because if done properly, the movie would be more than awesome. I wonder if the art could be somehow turned into vector images and rendered in higher quality? Can current graphics technology do that? I know that some guy rendered a linkeness of Mona Lisa from polygons, using Markov Chains.

There's also a Source conversion of Opposing Force in the works: http://www.moddb.com/mods/operation-black-mesa

I didn't actually see the killer robot in HL2E2