Roderick

I completely agree, and I also dislike it when people run to the internet and, perhaps even before they've actually played the game, find out what the optimal builds are and what the best way to play it is. Especially if that makes them feel like they're better players. Oh, you may be more effective, but you've also just destroyed most of what is fun about the game. So, once again, I recommend trying to figure things out on your own.

I think I didn't phrase my point properly, in fact, I know I didn't. The editors may be more accessible, but what I'm trying to say is that the underlying mechanics get so complex as to be incomprehensible. It's like computers themselves, I know how to operate them because they're user friendly, but I wouldn't know how to construct them or even what it is that makes them work.

What concerns me is that as graphics get so incredibly detailed and the tech supporting these worlds expands into insane possibilities, it is becoming less and less accessible to newcomers. If I think about learning the basics of how all of these 3D worlds are built up, it's a daunting prospect. It has become a highly specialized job, where in the past the average person could at least get the fundamentals right on account of everything being a lot simpler (Duke3D editor simple). Or am I a hopelessly incompetent non-programmer of a person? You decide.

Since Blizzard is trying, at least, to make a multitude of builds equally valid, there is no one source for The Ultimate Build. I've found wildly varying build plans too, which seems to back this up. I'm sure at some point people will be able to point out the best combinations, in time. As for figuring out what is good and what is not, part of the fun is doing that yourself. Try to think about your spells in an abstract way, figure out what their boons are. Once you do that it becomes a bit of logic that the Hydra is good because it allows the Wizard to maintain moveability. Especially on high levels that becomes very important. Think about what spells would complement each other and give you a range of responses to the game's various threats. It makes little sense to equip only spells that have a huge reach, what if you come across a Mortar enemy that forces you to close range or be destroyed? (The answer is Spectral Blade... improved Spectral Blade (with Deep Cuts.))

After months, I'm still picking up Pullblox / Pushmo now and then. I'm on the last of the 250 puzzles now. Basically, the first 210 puzzles were so easy as to be off-putting (if the mechanic hadn't been so much fun, that is), but it's getting delightfully tough now. It feels really good to solve a puzzle now. I'm miffed that it'll be over soon, just now it's getting interesting. The game should've ramped the difficulty up a little sooner, I feel. Ah well, great download in any case.

OK.

It's a great comedy skit on its own. Kickstarter is turning into a comedy channel comparable to Funny or Die or College Humor. Still, this looks cool. It reminds me of the design goals of Die By The Sword. I'm not sure exactly what the product is going to be though. I understand it's an arena game about two-handers, but will there be a sword peripheral to control it with? Neil spends some time explaining that you shouldn't control a sword game with a controller, but developing a whole new controller seems like an expensive and difficult thing way beyond the half million Kickstarter goal. I don't want to shoot holes in this thing, I think it's cool and interesting. But there are some questions.

Lovin' the Lobo.

Recently, the top position in least favorite Zelda (that I played, anyway) got taken by Minish Cap. Whataboringgame!

"Everything is connected, nothing is true"

The first moments of Up were sweet, but then the thing devolved into a nightmare. I didn't like any of the characters, the plot was stupid, I hated the talking dogs, ugh. It was just so disappointing. I haven't wrongfully attributing any other CGI movies to Pixar, and it doesn't really matter for my argument either. The meeting of bad guys might be funny, but I saw pretty much the exact same idea in a Toy Story short where Buzz gets thrown in with MacDonalds toy rejects. And honestly, a bad guy at a public meeting has some fucking large shoes to fill after this: [media=] [/media]

Good luck!

I find that I slowly have less and less enthusiasm for Pixar every year. Up was a fucked up movie, I didn't like it at all. Wreck-It Ralph seems fine, that's not the problem, but the whole god damn fish-out-of-water comedy plot bores the hell out of me, even if there are amusing video game trappings.

Dude, I AM currently living in with my parents again, age 28. There really are worse things, I found it put things into good perspective and it forces me to embrace change. Getting jobs is tough, but if you work at it hard and long enough, something will come up. I'm not too fearful of the immediate future. It's the long-term future that is a teeny bit scary: will I be able to get a mortgage, will I be able to pay it off, will I live my whole life in financial bondage? It's a brave new world we live in, especially since the old systems of economy are failing and we'll have to figure out a new way of living. In the resultant shuffle, I hope our generation doesn't get lost.

Very cool! It was quite exciting to see him drink from the bottle. I wonder how he manufactured the filter though, what is it made from? How recyclable are the components in the bottle? Those are be important corollary questions to answer.

I want to play it on mute while listening to the Step Up 2: The Streets soundtrack now.

Watch Dogs looked like really impressive tech with the swaying trees and cloth, but the gameplay didn't actually do a whole lot for me. I like, abstractly, the idea of hacking into everything around you and that could possibly be a cool way to get into the personal lives of characters, but it seems like it's going to serve a really run of the mill hitman story. PLUS, the obvious implication in the trailer is that you can do things the way you want to do them, but if you look closely it becomes clear that everything here is really scripted to happen just this way. The whole crossroad traffic collision seemed really cool and spontaneous at first, but then it turns out there's a scripted cutscene for exactly that scenario. So, really, it's Assassin's Creed with hacking instead of parkour. It will probably still be a very enjoyable game, but I'm withholding enthusiasm until I know more specifically about the story.

Perhaps the sheer parade of violence on E3 made me extra happy with Mario chasing after gold coins, or Pikmin gathering fruit.

I thought the Nintendo press conference yesterday was wonderful. The presentation itself was top notch with Reggie once again showing he is the top performer in this field and a great sense of honest fun all around (apart from some stilted guests droning their lines). The games were great as well. I got very enthused seeing Pikmin 3 and Lego City: Undercover, Zombi U and the Mario games. Racing after gold coins seems like frantic fun. The only thing that didn't convince me was Paper Mario. Those stickers, meh. It's all just a new bunch of locked doors you have to find keys for, but it doesn't seem at first glance to deliver particularly interesting new gameplay. There were stinkers, of course. Arkham City Armored Edition is something no one is really waiting for and Nintendoland, I have no words for it. I wish the creator of Animal Crossing had just made Animal Crossing the menu for the Wii U. How supreme would that be? The Wii U menu would be a delightful little village with folks walking around and tons of casual stuff to do. I heard there were some complaints about the lack of a Zelda or Metroid announcements, but I don't agree with those sentiments. I thought it was wonderful to see Nintendo give away such a warm and fun presentation (you know, fun! That thing that was sorely missing from everything Microsoft was doing) without leaning on their old franchises like a leper on crutches.

Hoooa shit, the salesman was excellent, super creepy!

Can he impersonate blaring sirens? hired. Congrats, Shammack! It's really cool. Did you leverage any Idle Thumbs connections? You know, I know these guys... Let's call it the Rodkin Bump.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot the absolute hilarity of Microsoft announcing that Internet Explorer is coming to Xbox, and then a round of applause. Applause. For Internet Explorer. That's my mind blown.

Microsoft sucked balls.

Reducing the gem cost makes no sense to me whatsoever, since gems drop rather frequently and you can reuse them, so that you'll only ever need a fixed set of gems of any kind for the entire game.