Roderick

Also here, no kids (yet), but last year I did babysit a few times for the neighbor's kid, a seven-year-old. He was content to watch me play video games like Lego Batman on the 3DS. The most violent thing we played was, well, The Force Unleashed, which is actually pretty fucking dark. However, the kid was crazy about Star Wars and watched the films all the time. As he was already familiar with stormtroopers dying by the dozens and Anakin murdering kids, I didn't think I had much to spoil there. I didn't allow him to play it himself, though. We did play a bunch of Mario Kart together, and taking turns at Forza Horizon. Racing is really fun together! The moral of the story is that I'll probably be a little less slapdash with my own kids later on.

That's not stopping Two-Kids Osmosisch, who I see every day on Steam, so the baby must be you.

For me, this «generation», or rather the past five to seven years, was marked by a few key events: - The switch back to PC after a stint in consoles starting with Gamecube and ending with Xbox 360. Only handhelds forever remain, I love Nintendo handhelds, have since Game Boy. - Concurring with that, a complete embracing of Steam and digital gaming. I now emphatically don't want to own any more plastic cases carrying plastic discs, taking up valuable space, marking up prices and taking a toll on resources and environment. - The rise of quality indie games. Some of the best experiences of the past years were from indies: Bastion, FTL, Dear Esther. - Losing a lot of interest in triple-A games. I still play them, but it's become more and more clear how limited they are. Even the big guns, like Assassin's Creed and Mass Effect, have lost some of their shine due to high frequency or the loss of some undefinable quality. I play only the proven pick of the litter, like Dark Souls. - I have learned to completely ignore hype of any kind. I don't read previews, I don't wait for games all that much and often I don't even know something's coming until it's already here. And you what? It's fantastic. - Trend of this year: I've rediscovered adventuring games and love 'em.

Yeah, that's a really spiffy card, and amazing catch in one booster.

Spaaaaaaff!

I didn't go for NaNoWriMo this year, since I was busy wrapping up my actual novel, which after a year of editing is now very close to being done. Fourth draft with small refinements. Pretty happy with the current results and hopeful this'll actually get printed.

I just came out of Clue after, I believe, a recommendation on these very forums. What a delightful farce. Fun, energetic, and once Tim Curry starts exhaustively explaining the plot, it's a tour de force of physical comedy. My god, at one point he pulls a woman up the stairs and when she can't keep up halfway through the flight, allows her to just drop down and not look back.

Patters, that Jamie Lenman double bill was fantastic. Unusual and good.

Today I was at an anime convention in the Netherlands and it was 3DS heaven. I kept raking in oodles of mii's, finishing all my puzzles, advancing heftily in Mii Quest and getting some good results in Mii Force. It's truly the greatest thing.

Apparently there's a weird problem with the HDMI port that it has a metal component in the way that chips some of the pins out of the cable, whereupon the video part doesn't function anymore.

The unspoken implication being that the PS4 is likely (or likelier) to have overheating problems. If it won't, we regress to the original argument of sloppy design, yesno?

Yeah, I don't think I read any book that came out this year, but so far I've read 18 books this year (I keep a nerdy, nerdy list). It's tricky. I was very touched by Oscar Wilde's De Profundis (which he wrote in prison), and I loved Isaac Asimov's Foundation. But currently I'm a third into Timur Vermes' Er Ist Wieder Da, about Hitler returned to modern day Berlin, and it's just hysterically good so far. I think that may be the one, but I'll have to read on to know for sure.

It's a dickish bunch of responses, but then I can imagine few things as soulcrushing as doing press junkets where people ask you the same insipid questions over and over and over.

Yeah, frankly I'm baffled at that exact thing. Has the Xbox One been that much sloppier designed? Where's the rub? How could it be that a machine that's a little less powerful is 2,5 times as large (power brick included)!

I think you're right, most episodes would work better being half hour long. I tend to drift off at the midway point, going online for a bit with the show windowed next to the browser. And for the most part, it is family friendly, though there are exceptions, most of which have been named in this thread. TOS is weird and idiosyncratic.

To be fair, after the original Wario Land on Game Boy - arguably the best game on the entire platform - the series has struggled to live up to the quality of its originator. The later Wario Land titles were all kind of weird and puzzley thingies. Master of Disguise was pretty fun, but also flawed. I'd like another Wario game, but it has to be really good, and I dunno, maybe less about farting and picking noses?

«Dutch carnival» could totally be some wild designer venereal disease. I love how in language, the world sees us as cheapskates, liars, frauds, blustering idiots or drunken braggards. I wonder if the trend started with Voltaire, who famously said of us that we were a country of «canaux, canards, canaille», canals, ducks and riffraff.

February is FILTH! It's like, December has the festivities, then January is a breath of air and repose, but then February swings along... besides more winter, it brings the Dutch carnaval, a time when reasonable people flee to the north.

I liked the weird dynamic between Khan and the ancient earth specialist crew member. He completely domineers her from a position of pure arrogance and entitlement - Khan is basically the ultimate PUA. Today I finished the first season. The City of the Edge of Forever is rightly a classic episode. And when the credits rolled I saw, to my surprise, that it was written by none other than Harlan Ellison. So, that figures. I look forward to the second season. Let's see if it ramps up the 'Star Trekkiness'. The first season took a while to find its footing and by gum it had its weird shit. (COUGH Squire of Gothos COUGH)

It reminds me as much of Revolution's In Cold Blood as it does Sanitarium. Good show!

«Beautiful»

2014 YEAR OF WALUIGI

Zeus, you should make a reskinning mod for Majora's Mask. It's basically that; an iteration of days until you reach the perfect run and save everything.