Nachimir

Of course that's cool, though I'm guessing it might be a quiet one tonight. Coop Borderlands probably a bad idea, since both my characters are level 30ish and I'll go insane if I have to play through the introductory missions a third time

Life is pretty sweet at the moment. Still seeing that girl, and things are going well ten weeks in. Since work upgraded the mobile tariffs, I got my bosses old iphone, which is 3G and in good nick. I also took up Systema regularly after a break over Christmas, and it's very, very good. The instructor makes the class as flat and non-hierarchical as possible by getting everyone to teach what they can, and everyone is patient and nice even though what we're learning is a bit nasty. We're not just learning self-defense, but also how to be good training partners. Bullies get told to not come back. There's some very hard physical training at the start of each class, and it feels good to ache all over regularly. Also, someone asked the instructor "What's your best fight?" and he responded "I'm not proud of that sort of thing". Think this is the right class for me

true I own fewer than 20 DVDs, and Amelie is right in there.

Eljay and Marek! Happy Birthdays to yous.

*waves* I spotted in the newsletter before that one that they were groaning at DC Comics using quotes from IGN, who apparently gave DC some kind of award for publishing comics. If the award comes down to publishers who are like DC, IGN may was well just flip a coin for it.

I got past and into the next section, and the aesthetics really do make a difference: Current record is 207...

The guys who made Samorost and Samorost 2 are now working on a full adventure game: Machinarium Woo &c!

Or the more concise: Beyond &

So Far Beyond Good And Evil That It Goes Straight Through Amorality, Out The Other Side, And Back Around To Binary Morals. Look, Baddies. Kill.

Did I already post this video of Jack Black dancing on Yo Gabba Gabba? If so, it needs to be posted again anyway: AekphQP1kbM

It seems to be positioned so as to make the heroine look like she has an absurdly thin waist.

BREAKING NEWS: Video game makes David Cage cry: http://twitter.com/davidcage/status/7667011671

The Flytrap guy's comments were amazing. Michaël Samyn trolled the comments thread of his own interview here, starting with the very first one: http://tale-of-tales.com/blog/interviews/interview-with-frank-lantz/

Snitches with nothing better to do than get other people in trouble might though

You should have a link at the top that says "View live feed" or something. The live feed is working chronologically, the newsfeed seems to be pulling in random posts and is a bit fucked. Annoyingly, it seems to switch automatically from live feed back to news feed once or twice a week for me. If you're using Firefox, I'd also recommend Facebook Purity for Greasemonkey, it gets rid of a *lot* of the annoying spam items in feeds.

I hate rapidshare too. Very few sites that can send me into a seething rage so fast. http://www.dropsend.com will allow files of up to 1GB on a free account, though they're only meant for one person, it's not really hosting as such. edit I was wrong:

They really are; I don't know another game studio like them. A lot of publisher owned studios are near commoditised, or at least, were during the absolute nadir of developer-publisher relationships. Rare and Lionhead both seem to be solidly embedded in Microsoft tech, and possibly far more useful to keep than to sell of whenever MS need to cut costs. Rare have a bunch of renovated buildings in the countryside, with exposed beams inside, and landscaped grounds that are managed by a couple of full time gardeners. Everyone goes for a walks at lunch. They also always have lunch at the same time, even the receptionist, which I think is quite a nice way to make sure people are getting a break and looking after themselves rather than skipping meals because they're under pressure. I really hope they've not lost any talent due to now working on all the XBL stuff. I wonder if working on the front end for that would be good for CVs, or have a similar effect to working on casual games then trying to get back into triple-A console games?

That's a tricky question. On boxed console titles, nowhere near what was paid for them. Most of the figures for those games, AFAIK, came from bundling with 360s rather than individual sales. Rare never had the runaway hits on 360 that were expected on the basis of their track record. However, when you get into the new Xbox front end, avatars, better design for the XBLA marketplace, and Natal, then it becomes difficult if not impossible to quantify and potentially very profitable indeed. Making boxed console titles didn't work after the purchase, but they've become a very different kind of studio in the past few years.

Excellent, thanks! I suspect it's not just the aesthetic change, but also that that makes it more difficult at that stage.

A steal at $375 million? His liberal and unusual usage of steal points to a promising career in the tattered remains of the music industry.

:tup: toblix, you are far too harsh on yourself. Your threads are among the best. Maybe because I'm playing it on console, I have very low expectations of menus anyway. I think Mass Effect had worse ones, but yes, having to confirm even trivial purchases individually in BL is annoying.

I don't think it's necessarily saying that all relationships are futile, but it's possibly about a protagonist with a very unhealthy attitude to them. It does seems a little perverse that we push for more and more technological power when we often suck at looking after and getting on with each other on even the smallest scale, and looking back that's what I remember of the narrative bits of Braid.

Ouch! Have Brandon Hardesty's videos been in this thread yet? Jo6dkHgT6TI T67AewxhBaQ

Hmm. I got within seconds of the 45min speedrun, something ridiculous like 45:02 (!), then got distracted by other games. Must go back. Tempted to get the stars as well. I saw the speedrun record is something like 29 minutes, and downloaded a copy of a similar one to watch which is hanging around somewhere...

Yeah, it's very well crafted entertainment. The point that made me realise is how close each and every one of their races is, i.e. mountain bike/runner/skidoo against car. I find even if I try to put my cynical hat on and spot whatever's been edited or set up, it's still enormously entertaining. Thanks for recommending the Bolivia episode, I'd missed that there was a new series, and hearing James May utter "I'll cut your fucking head off" was a treat