kuddles

Chris, watch "Tickled". I think the stretching the story to a full length movie is a little rough, but it is an entertaining enough watch. However, like a lot of this stuff, it'll leave you with an extra dose of cynicism...

This is the overwhelming issue with interpreting David Lynch and his work. With his bizarre dream logic and refusal to ever talk about what anything in his work means, the difference between a deliberate clue of significant importance and a genuine coincidence or continuity error is nearly impossible to distinguish.

http://www.indiewire.com/2017/09/twin-peaks-return-cinematographer-peter-deming-david-lynch-1201878462/ Interesting interview with the cinematographer, with yet more evidence that Lynch definitely viewed this endeavour as an 18-hour film from the start. I wonder if there will be a fan edit once the Bluray hits that does this, taking out the opening theme and removing the end credits from the music scenes.

It's kind of bittersweet how many great actors managed to make it for one last wonderful performance in the new Twin Peaks.

Didn't mean for my post to step on your theories. While I don't feel like I need to strain myself to make everything "fit" to enjoy it, I certainly love everyone making their own interpretations and connections. It was more just an unrelated interesting note about how even back in 1990, Lynch makes it clear that he hates explaining things. Which just makes it funny that people still don't seem to grasp that with everything he has made so far. I mean, half the discussion online revolving around Lynch saying that a Season 4 is not impossible still has people saying things like "I can wait 4 more years to find out what happened to Audrey" or "Maybe then we'll see if Cooper succeeded." Like, even after taking everything Lynch has done through his entire career, so many people STILL go "Well, maybe this is the time around he'll tie up all the loose threads." Talk about setting yourself up for disappointment. https://imgur.com/a/b5fHx

Someone on Reddit found this old article that was posted before the pilot of the original Twin Peaks even aired, and the quote David Lynch gives at the end is very telling about how his mindset was even at that point. When it is pointed out to Lynch that television shows almost always catch the bad guy at the end of each episode, that the audience likes its criminals behind bars before they go to bed, that it gives them a sense of "closure," his soft-spoken patter erupts in disgust. "Closure. I keep hearing that word. It's the theater of the absurd. Everybody knows that on television they'll see the end of the story in the last 15 minutes of the thing. It's like a drug. To me, that's the beauty of 'Twin Peaks.' We throw in some curve balls. As soon as a show has a sense of closure, it gives you an excuse to forget you've seen the damn thing."

Lynch has said himself as much in interviews. I remember him comparing it to how you really want a magician to tell you how he did a trick you were fooled by, because it's not enough to have a theory, you desire someone to validate it. But if the magician tells you exactly how he did it, you usually end up disappointed because it seems so obvious now and you feel foolish for not figuring it out.

I'm now getting excited to rewatch all Twin Peaks content in a row. I wonder if Showtime will be picky with rights, or if something can be arranged for all Twin Peaks material to be part of one box set. If so, I wonder what they would call it since the current box set calls itself "The Complete Mystery".

Haha, I was literally thinking the same thing. And it's especially hard with someone like Lynch who loves using symbolism. Makes you wonder if theories of his past movies are based on "evidence" that actually was just a forgetful accident. Just another wrinkle in being left to interpret something that will always have gaps, and nobody to tell you which parts of your ideas are right and which are off-base. Not much difference from finding anything of significance in something the director planned as a pointless aside, I suppose. Although we're talking about a series where a lame bit about Lucy's confusion over cell phones led to the demise of an antagonist so it's hard to think that anything is meant to be a meaningless aside. That said, I think the lapel pin thing works out. They even repeat a bit of the red room scene from Episode 1 in the end, and that combined with the "is it future or is it past" line suggests that maybe that's when that discussion took place.

I love stuff like this that happens after only Lynch films or a small selection of movies and TV shows, many of which seem at least partially inspired by Lynch. Even though I never agree with everything being posited. (I'm sorry, the "last two episodes should be played in sync" theory holds no water for me. It feels way too close to stuff like The Dark Side of the Moon mixed with The Wizard of Oz or the theories espoused in Room 237, where it feels like coincidences and confirmation bias is making up for a lot.) Of course, no interpretation is ever going to be 100% satisfying, because there are always things that you have to "feel out". Lynch himself has admitted this in interviews. I think that Waggish theory is really interesting and gives me more to think about - in particular, the idea that RR2GO does not exist in the "new" Twin Peaks because neither Dale nor Laura would know it should be there. But I agree with Jake in that it doesn't "ring emotionally true". For all of Lynch's diversions and playing with expectations (can I just say I loved the scene where we all are forced to wait an agonizingly long time for the lady to leave the room before one sentence of information is exchanged?), he is nothing if not wholly sincere in how he presents things - and this has been true in everything he has created in the past. If something is supposed to be funny, happy or playful, he makes that clear. If something is meant to be dark and foreboding, he also makes that clear. That's why he couldn't even provide us with that final battle in Episode 17 without letting us know "something" was wrong about it. Nothing about the last few minutes of The Return gave off the impression we were supposed to feel Cooper succeeded in his mission. Of course, maybe that means everything in that theory is correct except the absolute ending.

So, there has already been a ton of writing and I don't want to repeat too much, so just a smattering of my thoughts below: - Boo to no more "Invitation to Love". - Boo to the original Sheriff Truman not being there. - Maybe it's because I binge-watched it after the whole series came out, meaning I always had a new episode to watch, but I thought the Dougie Jones stuff was amazing and I couldn't get enough of it. - I wonder if that creepy, gross drunk guy in the cell was a doppleganger that went wrong. He was repeating everything being said, Dougie-style. - With how much this tied into weird asides from the original series and FWWM, and even re-used footage so that they made more sense in this new contect, I'm curious how much of this Lynch and Frost came up with now and how much of this was maybe a version of how they originally planned to end the series had it gone for multiple seasons, with the required changes due to time passing (i.e. The new season of Twin Peaks is like the new season of Gilmore Girls!). The fact that the new season needed a "Sheriff Truman" despite the actor not coming back and other significant attachments suggest this might have been Lynch's plan all along. But then again, it's just as plausible that Lynch had a new story and Twin Peaks was the vessel where he could get his 18-hour story funded. - I definitely get the feeling that at least part of the show is meant to mock the trend of nostalgia television as a whole. Dougie was basically a hilarious version of how ridiculously intuitive Cooper was. The show basically starting with someone staring at an empty box, waiting for something to happen, and eventually something does happen and he dies while not really paying attention. The original stars of the show are now old and it's the younger generation telling their stories and replacing them with interesting drama. The bits about the original cast that are there - most of those characters have changed so much in time passing, they aren't recognizable as their current selves (Bobby is an understated police officer, Dr. Jacoby is a raving Alex Jones-style lunatic). The boss obsessed with his time as a young boxer, several instances of characters being stuck in a lobotomized state re-watching the same content over and over again, watching something we just saw in the context of the show, re-shown on a screen inside the show being watched by other characters. You get the gist.

As someone who adores Half-Life 2, I would like to believe otherwise, but I feel like this is exteremely plausible. Everything Valve has been focused on recently involves it's employees doing whatever they feel like; community engagement; multiplayer with a cooperative component; releasing products early and altering them constantly based on feedback; free to play models that work; reaching out to as many gamers as possible, etc. Everyone hunkering down for years to work on a single player shooter campaign feels like the antithesis to all that.

I know it's obvious they wrote it to get quoted by EA's marketing, but I thought this line by TIME magazine was hilarious: With beefier combat added to the role-playing, it's the Avatar of video games — except it's better written. Also, while I loved the intro, I almost wish I'm playing on the PC so I don't know if it's different on the 360 version, but I also post at Something Awful and Gamers with Jobs, and I haven't read a single other person (or review for that matter) who doesn't agree that the combat, cover mechanic and interface are far, far better than the first game. Not to say mikemariano doesn't have a valid opinion or anything but he is in the extreme minority in this case so I wouldn't let it get to you until you experience it yourself.

Five hours in and it just continues to get better. The only thing I don't like is the whole "Mission Complete" thing that comes up between intervals, it's a little gamey and it takes me out of the cinematic moment a bit. But I think it speaks volumes that I have to look at stuff like that to find complaints. I have to admit, I like the customization options to your armor way more than I should. My Jane Shepard just looks so adorable in her baby blue helmet. Also, I was kind of turned off by the change in music to a more traditional symphonic sound since it seemed like such a unique style in the first one, but now that I realize it fits better with the different tone of the sequel.

Holy crap. Nearly every review says the game is between 35-40 hours long. I'm a little wary that it might start to wear out it's welcome at that length but considering they managed to improve nearly every every problem with the first and doubled the size at the same time suggests they really hit it out of the park. I managed to force AA using nhancer so this game is looking gorgeous now.

Just like with Dragon Age, I ordered the collector's edition (PC version) straight from the EA store and it got delivered today. The way the game opens is fantastic. Right from the first half hour, you're already wrapped in a mystery - specifically when you find out who was responsible for saving your life from that accident. I can say without a doubt, the combat is much, much better and the controls overall feel more fluid. The hacking stuff still isn't great but on the plus side the world isn't nearly as stale as most of BioWare's stuff. So far - I'm impressed. No, you can pretty much change everything except gender. You might want to take a look at this site full of ME1 PC saves and see if there's something close enough to your original playthrough, especially since you can change your looks.

Yeah, this isn't much of a spoiler but supposedly an event happens at the beginning of the game where they ask you if you remember your past properly. It also gives them an excuse to say you had to undergo surgery to recuperate, letting you make changes to your appearance or class if you want as well.

Mask of the Betrayer is wonderful, easily the best thing Obsidian has done so far as far as I'm concerned. There's a kind of a game mechanic that is introduced about 1/3rd into the game that occasionally gets annoying to deal with so often, but other then that, it's really well written and has some really good quests. I recommend you play through that if you liked the original campaign. The third expansion is okay, but probably only enjoyable if you really like the combat, since it kind of has an "Icewind Dale" kind of thing where you customize your entire party and go through the land, except the story is kind of dull. Of course, if you're interested, there's tons of great player-made modules as well, which had me hanging unto the first NWN for ages. And yeah, the ending of that original campaign was terrible - they clearly must have run out of time or money or both just like they did for KOTOR 2. But I agree with the poster above: once you experience Dragon Age you'll be reminded how exponentially better the storytelling/characterizations/skills can be when you don't have to strictly adhere to the tired AD&D archetypes for every damn aspect, so it might be hard to go back afterwards. Of course, you've waited this long so maybe you'll be better off waiting for the "gold" edition of Dragon Age at this point.

Holy crap. If I tried to make some fake hyperbolic statement about how "evil" Activision was, I would make a lame joke about how they dumped Brutal Legend because they couldn't find a way to turn it into a Guitar Hero game. But Double Fine's countersuit filed today claims that's exactly what happened. Unreal. They're also demanding a judge to make a ruling as they claimed Activision legally terminated their agreement. Here's hoping this turns out in their favour.

Seriously, that is what I don't understand. In every other hobby/entertainment I take part in, if something seems like a crappy deal, I just tell myself to forget about it and move on with my life. It's only in gaming where the enthusiasts seem to feel that voting with their wallet isn't enough, they have to act as if the company that is doing something they don't like with their video games, they might as well be selling Nuclear warheads to Bin Laden for all the bile spewed towards them. Amazon review bombs, public boycotts and petitions, and being sure to add something negative to every comment or thread vaguely related to the game for ever and ever. If you don't think "Left 4 Dead 2" is worth the money, why is simply buying something else not a valid option? I find it infuriating. I wrote a review for a site for the PC version of Mass Effect, and the entire conversation revolved around how horrible a human being I was for supporting "draconian copy protection" just by talking about the game. I responded by email to them stating that if someone had a problem with the DRM, I could respect that, but personally it didn't affect my purchase. I recieved six - six - responses that made the astronomically hyperbolic comparison to that poem about people who didn't speak up for minorities in Nazi Germany until there was no one left to speak for them. And yet these are the same people who think any discussion on game theory is pretentious or think Croal expressing personal feelings about race in RE5 should just shut up and go away. In other words, video games aren't meant to be taken seriously...unless it's the most trivial issue in the world, in which case it's the most serious thing possible. This is the shit that makes me embarrassed to admit I'm a gamer in public.

Fair enough. I still don't agree with it, but at least you have a clear reasoning behind it. I unfairly judged you as one of the kneejerk angry man that seem to make up the majority of internet forums. Plus, I'll admit this is a little less trivial then usual. If they win, it would set a horrible precedent involving developer's rights. Not to mention that if Brutal Legend is delayed yet again and hung up in legal courts, the game will eventually look too dated and hype for it would dissipate, resulting in Tim Shafer's best chance of actually having a sales success being squandered, which would make me cry a thousand tears.

I've seen a couple interviews with the dev team so it sounds like it might not be a straight-up hack'n'slash. They talk about both factions in the game being neither the "good" or "bad" side, and discuss puzzles that sound Zelda-ish, naturally they're going to show off the action bits for the trailer. I guess my biggest concern is a relatively new development team making their first big budget title for...Southpeak Interactive. Take the non-generic setting and you can almost see the inevitable right in front of you: The game ends up shipping lacking the polish it needs since the dev has very strict time/resource restraints, and is further marred by a marketing campaign that is either terrible or non-existent, and ends up selling about 50k the first week before being crushed by the holiday AAA onslaught.

I enjoyed Prototype more. Most games give you comic-book style superpowers, then immediately find a way to alter the gameplay so you still feel like a weakling. Prototype understands why their concept is so appealing. I find Prototype's missions more inviting. If I'm not a perfectionist, I can just be happy getting the bronze in some missions. Plus, they are open to more tactical approaches sometimes. I find the side missions in inFamous almost always trial-and-error in a very binary sense, which make them frustrating. For example, the stealth missions, where I can't tell you how many times moving a literal inch on the screen changes my status from almost failing to the mission because I was apparently too far away from the person I was following to instantly failing because I was too close. While InFamous clearly is the better looking game, it also is yet another sandbox game that puts out a barely playable framerate the second my character does anything. As stale and low-detail the world of Prototype is, there's something to be said for the fact that I can run up the side of a wall, drop kick a helicopter, crash twenty stories to the ground and then unleash tentacles that kill everything left alive on the screen and never see the framerate hitch or screen tear. Animations are nice too. Both stories are generic and forgettable, but Prototype delivers it very quickly and in a neat and completely optional "collectable" way, while Infamous throws it in your face constantly, clearly unaware of how uninteresting it is. While I agree that the difficulty spike in Prototype towards the end is really cheap, I feel like Infamous is cheap right out of the get go. For instance, being on a rooftop and having your health rapidly depleted by an enemy getting a perfect shot at your head every time, even though he's so far away that your reticule doesn't even recognize him as a viable target. This is less Infamous's fault, but I just can't for the life of me get used to the PS3 controller. The loosy-goosy thumbsticks are just flat out terrible. That said, I don't understand why PS3-exclusive developers don't acknowledge this. While I still prefer a 360 pad or a mouse, I can handle multi-platform shooters just fine on the PS3, but it seems like the PS3 exclusive titles demand precision from a controller just not willing to provide it. Also, I had the same problem with Killzone 2 that I have in this one. I understand and appreciate the desire to minimize the HUD as much as possible. But for the love of Christ, when you're trying to alert me that I'm about to die and need to find safe haven immediately, nothing helps me less in that situation - where I need as much awareness of my surrounding as possible - then making the screen go black and muffling the audio. Jesus. I'm sorry but I hear this a lot and to me it just comes off as ridiculous. The boycott isn't going to make anywhere near a noticeable dent, and therefore Activision isn't going to know or care about anyone boycotting them. Even if it did hurt their bottom line, there's no way to attach it to such a broad action. If the only original IP Activision has released in almost two years undersells, is that going to make them drop their lawsuit, or think they need to stop making greedy business decisions? Quite the opposite. So even if boycotting them was successful, it would still actually be a horrible failure. Instead of boycotting, just be a reasonable customer, and the result will be pretty much the same. I don't need to boycott Activision. By being a company more interested in making generic titles and boring franchise retreads, I've naturally become disinterested in the majority of their titles anyways. All a full out boycott will do is cut yourself off of potentially fun games, will punish developers who make quality ones, and will inform the publisher that they're right to stop making them because the people who care about quality games aren't buying them anyways.

Cool that you're enjoying Cryostasis. I had quite the emotional ride with it myself, and actually did a little piece on it(plug, plug, plug). I agree that I like games that actually give the player the benefit of the doubt instead of handholding them like an idiot. Valve does that to some extent with their level design, but most games don't even bother. While I do enjoy these East European oddities like Cryostasis, Boiling Point, King's Bounty, STALKER, etc. especially for them taking interesting risks and having a more old school hardcore PC gaming feel then most mainstream titles think they can get away with, I also fret that I enjoy them despite their inevitable performance issues and bugs and translation oddities (although Cryostasis is shocking well translated and acted, all things considered). While I'm impressed that their ambition always goes beyond their budget, I also acknowledge that most people are understandably not patient enough to accept the technical problems and outdated design choices. Even The Witcher took a year to give it's game an acceptable level of polish, and that was only because the game had a surprising amount of success. I guess I wonder if things will improve as these small Eastern Bloc countries, primarily Russia, become more used to the developing tools and make progress, or if things will get worse as sales continue to be low but bigger budgets are required to compete. Right now, it's looking like they may be the saviours of traditional PC gaming so I hope it'll be the former. Also, you can save the cow's life! It certainly is a resource hog, no doubt about it. But it utilizes multi-core processors just fine according to several sites that tested it. I wouldn't take much stock from those claims, they come from the same people who thought the "special PhysX patch only recommended for high-end Nvidia cards" was just being discriminatory and unfair, then found it somewhere other then the Nvidia site and installed it, and then complained about how it was clearly a bad patch for making performance worse for them and their mid-range ATI cards.

If you mean because the reviewer didn't really spend an adequate amount of time with the game, then sure. But if you mean game sites should give a game a second review just because a bunch of whiney internet gamers don't agree with it, then that would be a horrible precedent to set.