blackboxme

Yeah, I would have to say KOTOR was a better game. KOTOR is better on all these levels: Plot, combat, memorable characters, minigames, universe, built out areas. At the same time Mass Effect is an impressive game because it tried things that were never done before, made a relatively successful action-battle mechanic and was Bioware's first next-gen game. It's crazy to think about adjusting to next-gen while creating an RPG with all these elements.

I'll also endorse Brainy Gamer: his rss feed contains really insightful interviews with: Clint Hocking Steve Gaynor Jenova Chen Leigh Alexander The Jenova Chen one was particularly eye-opening for me. Also, thanks for bringing up a bunch of 'casts dudes. I hadn't heard of many of these. Actually, I got into brainy gamer because one of you brought it up in an IdleThumbs episode thread, so thanks.

The pictures/movies section is pretty cool. The pictures section is kind of like a book about the history of the beatles, with lots of interesting info, like how the Beatles liked to play and sing girl-group songs early on. The story mode has an interesting arc to it as well. In the beginning, they're mobbed by millions, then by the end, there are like 20 people watching at that final show, and they're just hanging out and enjoying and they have beards and look like normal dudes.

I would say the game does a good job of letting me interact with the game world, not the character. When I was in a period where all I could do at night was play Far Cry 2, my real life hands became Far Cry 2 hands for a little while.

I'm too exhausted from trying to keep up with Ringo

This game is amazing

cool.

To Jake: Ever heard of Librivox? I listened to most of Dickens and much more off librivox, and it really gave me a greater appreciation of classic literature, and how accessible a lot of it is.

Any advice on how to not bother the neighbors while playing drums?

I'm going to go out on a limb here, and say that in every MGS game, aside from Twin Snakes, the most impressive scenes are always in gameplay, and MGS in particular really shows this because the game is kind of an all-purpose arcade game, with the way the bosses were handled. I can definitely see that, but I looked at it differently. I was like 13 when I played Metal Gear Solid, so it's like a "game of my childhood." As a result, I see the game as a story about growing up with Snake, and now I'm an adult and he's dying of old age. As a player, you have played the most significant chapters of this character's life, and now he's looking back on his life, and I was looking back on my childhood, when I spent so much time going on adventures in virtual worlds.

Also, aside from disagreeing with the Thumbs on MGS4, I just wanna say thanks for episode 39, it was really funny. Also, thanks for all the Blizzard talk: I'm really in the mood for Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3 these days. I can't believe how long its been. Blizzard is just now making its third game using the novel technology, "the polygon."

Is it free on PC?

Me too

I just want to say that I strongly disagree with Remo's assessment of MGS4. I do not think that there is a dissonance between Snake in cut-scenes vs. Snake in game-play. In fact, I think the two halves tie together thematically in a powerful way. In fact, the two things Snake does most in cutscenes is convalesce and get the shit beat out of him in a horrible way. In MGS4, even the basic strain of going out on a mission wears him out, and all he can do between missions is lie down and stare at the ceiling. I think that matches up quite nicely with how Snake has to hide from everybody.

About Mass Effect, what kind of skills did your team have Chris? Having people with force push, weapon overheat and or singularity really helps. Maybe being a sniper screws you over in those situations because you don't have those crowd control skills. I do agree with you that Mass Effect's difficulty was poorly balanced, too hard sometimes and too easy at others. Also the comment about those dumb boss battles that were pointless difficulty spikes, especially one that I'm thinking of now that I don't want to spoil for people.

Thanks for the links dpp I agree with you guys, these trailers are really well crafted. I wonder if they hired editors from Hollywood.

I looked up "limb independence" on youtube today, so I started trying to practice with an eye toward that. I put it on training mode->expert->beastie boys song->%50 speed Hand plays constant quarter notes, foot plays a bunch of out of time eighth notes. I try to get my hand going 1-2-3-4 and get it to ignore my foot. That beastie boys song is 1 star of difficulty and man, it's tough! Thunderpeel, what difficulty did you play on?

Or Beyond Good & Evil populated by the offspring of Chunk from the Goonies

Cool, it's now the next thing in my netflix queue.

I need to check out Paranoia Agent, is it pretty similar in tone to Kon's films? I love that guy. I just listened to the The Sound Of Young America podcast with Scott McCloud, and he seemed crazy smart.

Thanks for feedback, it's been interesting. I will play Rock Band (2) for the first time today when I get off work. I'll try looking for the drum training mode mentioned here...

I agree with this superhero/garfield analogy. We all know that US comics have a wider scope than superhero/garfield, but if we weren't from the US or didn't speak English, would we know that? Maybe I'm walking into a trap by saying this, but let me use Azumanga Daioh! as an example. It's the story of a group of friends going through high-school along with two of their teachers. There is zero romance, zero violence and almost zero plot. The skeleton of the series is just the rhythms of the school year taken over three years until high school graduation. The story is told through self contained 4 panel comics, and each panel is just a simple square going from the top of the page to the bottom. I'm reading the books in Japanese. So I'm slowly reading a comic book about high school girls, one of whom was promoted from grade school into high school, in a language pretty radically different from my own and it is a perfect representation of my high-school experience. A group of friends, none of whom gets romantically involved, ever, just happily going through high-school like complete dopes, right up until the end where they take the college exams and quietly realize that they don't know what life is outside of high-school and they're all splitting up and going to different colleges. The end. I think that it's crazy that the medium supports stories like this. The story of everyday life, friendship, putting off dealing with life's big questions without even knowing that you're doing that. I also happen to enjoy the art which not everybody would. I love the use of texture in the black and white format, which to me definitely stems from woodblock printing techniques.

I'm planning on using Rock Band to learn basic drumming, and Beatles rock band to learn singing harmonies. Think it will work music-types?

I don't really get Chris's point about Mass Effect piling on non-interactive cut-scenes. If possible I'd love to hear some examples. I find myself in the cut-scene camp, since I like Final Fantasy and Metal Gear, but at the same time time, I get just as frustrated as you guys do when cut-scenes come up in many other games. For instance, in Halo 2 there were all those scenes with the priests and the religion and that made me angry. I'm just like, "You think that's an interesting concept? What are you doing Bungie!? I thought you guys were smart!" I think the difference for me, is whether the game has characters that I can get invested in. If the game has that, then I'd happily sit there and watch tons of cut-scenes about nothing at all. If the game doesn't have that, the cut-scenes need to have such an incredibly light touch as to barely exist. Halo 1 is an example of that light touch coming out nicely, Halo 2 is the lack of that light touch.