RubixsQube

My favorite tiny, tiny joke that Sean said under his breath in this episode

I largely agree with what's been said here, but I want to echo the sentiments raised by Chris: while jargon does have an important use, and does represent the language growing and evolving, way, way too often it's used as a signifier of exclusive knowledge. Within the realm of video games, as this is, ostensibly, a video game podcast, it's incredibly difficult to gain a toehold into many game discussions because of the sheer volume of arcane jargon that tumbles out when you open the door. Trying to watch any "e-sports" competitions can be enormously difficult at first because of the stupid terminology applied to everything, all shouted loudly by the announcers. I do agree that much of it was necessary, but damn if it isn't a challenge to sift through the necessary jargon from the inside-joke stuff. (This is also very true with physical/non-e sport broadcasts as well) I'm not suggesting jargon be thrown out the door, but I wish that people would be much more thoughtful about when they use it. As a way of creating a common culture, it can seem super duper forced. (Ha, wow, I had to go through that paragraph and add a lot of qualifiers to back off of making any concrete statements. How wishy-washy!) As a side note regarding jargon, it seems as if the internet has a habit of creating specific terminology in order to label something and somehow "remove it's power." For instance, the term "social justice warrior" is something that drives me completely insane when I realize that the purpose of the term is to belittle. "Because I have given you a term, and put you into a box, you have been reduced to a cardboard cutout, and therefore you have no power here." It happens all the damn time.

Yo Microsoft, I’m really happy for you, Imma let you finish but Disney had one of the best create-and-ride-a-roller-coaster games of all time…

Jake, in the episode you were hoping that Crypt of the Necrodancer would test you on your rhythm at the beginning of the game, jokingly. Did you ever play any of the Rhythm Heaven games? ? And are also ?

Olly Moss posted a screenshot and the game is looking beautiful but TeenPartyZoneEventData.ass is my new favorite thing about this video game.

LET'S SEE THEM POOCHED POP SCREENS EDIT: Jesus Christ I find the idea of a "pooched pop screen" so funny.

I think my friends, who prioritize video game playing higher than I do in their lives, would be willing to keep an alternate character who they switch to when playing with me to keep the levels equalized, but they'll still probably be playing through the level for a second / third / nth time. When I played one of the later levels in the beta with my friend he had already played that level, lessening the cool experience of fighting a new enemy type for the first time. It is indeed a bummer, but then I remember that the things I'm doing that are not playing co-op video games with my friends online are ALSO fun, so it's not so bad.

I agree with a lot of what is said in this thread and in the Destiny thread about the game. I played the game exclusively co-op with my friend, and I have like, the tiniest experience with Halo and Halo multiplayer. I would not want to play it solo, or at least, the beta content did not particularly inspire me to want to explore it slowly by myself. It seemed like a lot of the same sort of thing, but as I went up in levels, the enemies, who looked the same, just had a larger number by their name and did more damage. I think that Chris could definitely find co-op people, considering he hosts a podcast listened to by people who would absolutely love to partner up for a bit. I mean, judging by how quickly people came to Olly and Sean's aid in the Most Dangerous Game, I think that if Chris wanted, he could find people at any hour of the day to play with, and I hope he gets a chance to, considering it's kind of fun to play with people, since it changes the strategy significantly from take a shot / take cover / take a shot. There were quite a few "boss" fights where my buddy and I spread out to force the enemies to have to split their attention, exposing them. Pretty neat. HOWEVER, maybe Chris wants to play against people he "knows in real life." WHICH IS FINE, AND THEN YEAH, PROBABLY TOUGH. I think that the problem for me then, is, I have a very small amount of time I can devote to playing video games in a given week. If I don't play the game with the frequency of my buddies, they're not going to have any interest in playing co-op my low-level ass as they move through at a different pace. My buddy asked if I were going to purchase Destiny from having played the beta for some hours, and I think I'm still holding off because it just didn't seem varied enough in what they showed. What a weird way to show off your game - with one area you return to to complete the same things over and over again. Weird.

I think that this is the weird problem with modern internet celebrity. The Thumbs, like a lot of internet content creators, presumably started making the podcast for a fun outlet to talk about games. We all listen to the podcasts, and it feels like a bunch of cool friends who could be OUR friends just having a conversation that we probably also have an opinion on. Look at the individual episode threads - while sometimes there's talk between forum members, A LOT OF THE TIME it's just a bunch of people saying the thing they would have said if they had been involved in the conversation. And with the fact that there are facebook and twitter and steam and psn accounts, and suddenly it's like friendship without friendship, and it developed in a weird, slow, organic way. Weird! Weird. What is our relationship to the Thumbs? We're readers. So, largely, it's passive. I would love to think that the times in which I get in a conversation with Jake on twitter over, say, Monkey Island EGA graphics, he connects it to the person on the boards, but why should he? We're all one giant mass of largely male, aged 20 - 30 nerds. Readers! What a weird thing modern communication is.

Mouth Sounds and Mouth Silence are a perfect expression of Humor on The Internet. They're both delightfully weird referential nonsense smoothies. You just feel gross listening to it, but you can't stop. Eventually, the entire internet will be pulled into a Niel Cicierega mashup album, and then the world around it, and eventually time and space will fold over on itself, turning and turning in the widening gyre the pokemon cannot hear the pokemon trainer things fall apart; the center cannot hold; Somebody once told me, the world was gonna roll me

I am NOT a person who plays FPS games, AT ALL. I like my games to feature plumbers or platforming or both. BUT, I own a PS3, and a buddy had a beta code, so we played for a few hours this afternoon. First, it's real pretty, even on what people are now considering "last generation hardware." I was disappointed that the moon wizard line was removed, because come on, if you're going to make a joke of it, keep it in the damn game. Fix the rest of the dialogue, but leave the trademark line. Also, these Hive Acolytes look a lot like clowns.

Whoever is the person who designs video game male protagonists needs to stop with the extra cool dude layers: Aiden Pierce has a jacket+orange lining + puffy mock turtleneck sweater + shirt + scruffy body hair + iconic cap Infamous Second Son dude has jean jacket + cool dude punk vest + hoodie + Pacific Northwest Grunge © flannel + unruly hair + beanie

Naw, it's cool

I have a strong feeling that this would be "unwanted." I am a pretty big believer in not wanting to be worried about weirdos prowling around your place of business. (My buddy did point out Dear Mom last night when we drove by, which was neat)

I am in San Francisco after a wedding. Walking around the city I am convinced I am going to just run into one of the thumbs. That is not going to happen, but damn it would be neat if it did. I want to get a drink with Jake Rodkin.

!!! Yeah, that and Blambo's ideas are real good. Oh man.

Yes, but Dune is like a prequel of sorts.

That was incredible. I love bobbing laughter heads. (Also, and I know that this is an obnoxious question always posed to people who make things like this, but what software did you use to make this?)

I really want a companion version of this painting depicting Sean after he's held in his pride and been like: "hey, good fight Danielle, that was fun" and then turned and spat out blood.

Yep, . There are some good NSMBU players.

I was at E3 a few years ago, when Sonic Colours was being shown. I spent the whole demo slowly walking through the level. Everything kept blowing up when Sonic walked up to it. It was actually pretty tough, but it was totally worth it, especially since the Sega guy running the demo was flipping out. I kept playing it off as if I had never played a Sonic game before. He responded "you have to run fast. Just push the stick forward...here let me show you" and then he tried to take the controllr. At the end, I just walked away shaking my head. "I guess I don't know what this game is all about."

Oh man, this episode. This episode. So many moments that made me giddy: When Nick discussed the WiiU's controller, talking about how he thought he wouldn't like it because he had seen it and made up his mind before using it, and then he actually used the thing and says it's great. When he reminds Jake that it can be used as a TV remote. When he talks about the gamepad just sitting in its little cradle. When Chris talks about how he hasn't had a fun, goofy multiplayer Mario Kart-esque experience in forever. When Danielle gets to introduce herself and it's made official that she's part of the show. When she reveals the truth bomb that she ALSO RECENTLY GOT A WIIU. When the eventual discussion of how Nintendo's exclusives make it a great partner with a PC. Guys, this episode was the CULMINATION of so many things I have hoped for. It was as if the crew sat down and said: "Now, I know we don't know this guy on our forums at all, but it's time for us to record an episode where we just make him very, very happy." ...And then Nick just casually tosses in a reference to how terrifying the SNES Jurassic Park game was, and I fucking lost it. I could write a book about that damn game. Thank you guys.

I want a little sprite of the frog man who is not a fan of Shovel Knight's jokes. He's the best. (Edited to include a link to this guy)

I wish that Shovel Knight moved a little faster, but that's my only complaint about the controls. This game feels like the most recent Mega Man 9 and 10 games, where the people who designed and developed the game understand what made NES platformers so fun. Big sprites, and exciting music, and perfect controls. I really recommend people pick it up on the 3DS, because it looks so good in 3D. I mean, this is a game where, because it was developed for next-gen consoles and the PC, it looks good stretched out on a big HDTV, but damn if it's nice to have something like this on a portable console.

At 1:31:30, Sean inadvertently stumbles upon the true setting of Capsule, with Hideo Kojima being assaulted from every side by the reality that his inappropriate video game narratives have human emotional consequences. Spoiler alert!