mikemariano

As a child I was unnerved when I discovered that Howard Stern looked exactly like my mental picture of him. I pictured short hair instead of long, but otherwise I had constructed the eyes, the face, the build all correctly, all without ever seeing him.

When Chris tweeted about the Zadie Smith discussion, I was put off—I thought he was playing a literary snob card! But his description on the podcast was really good, especially the conclusion: you don't have to and shouldn't put up with the same old ways of thinking and reacting. Give yourself something that does something different to your brain! Just knowing that your mind doesn't have to go to the same places all the time and opening yourself to voices who can communicate where their trains of thought are going is reassuring.

This is so good! As a child I couldn't even manage to make an all-black Play-Doh Darth Vader correctly. Look at that banjo!

It was Sinbad as a genie who died getting the plans. RIP Sinbad.

Super Mario Maker 3DS has an ending credits sequence following its 18-World Challenge. It's just the Super Mario sprite running slowly to some chill music, but it's nice and gives a small sense of satisfaction to a game that technically won't ever end. Uh, pay no attention to the cheesecake shot of tutorial assistant "Mary O.", swinging her legs while inside of a pipe.

Afterbirth+ is out! Afterbirth+ is way too stressful...

I finished the 18-world challenge in Super Mario Maker 3DS. I recently played through Super Mario 3D Land again and got really stressed out. Mario Maker stressed me out, too, especially a level with a moving vine on a block and spikes. I don't remember Mario being this stressful! So now I'm making a slow-paced water level. I am now a Mario baby.

If you like your puzzles a little shaggy, seek out Quantum Conundrum by one of the original Portal Developers. The mechanics are a little different but they are more freewheeling than Portal 2.

Haha awesome. I do enjoy in the stream being able to see the gleam in Jake's eyes when he gets set up for a goofy comment.

(Or wizardj, I guess. Either one is $99.)

FYI this gif came up in a Twitter thread yesterday, posted by none other than Weird Twitter superstar @Mobute! Congratulations @dusk and @atte!

This explains so much. *angry tomato* At least I get to race a slot car around by myself...

AMAZING

Aaaah!

I didn't find Read Only Memories very interesting, but I was impressed with the economy of usage. The way the supporting cast was re-used didn't cheapen those characters. Of course, it also meant the main story had nowhere to go but in circles.

When I saw the "threat neutralized" tweet earlier in the week, I heard it in Chris's "weapons hot/lock and load/oh yeah!" military voice. Instead of getting that voice this episode, we get a breakdown of the mindset of an individual who can only process video games through pseudo-military jargon. Idle Thumbs goes deep!

I'm not familiar with Divinity or Dragon Age (beyond a demo), but I believe any similarities are slight. Pillars of Eternity, Dragon Age, and Mass Effect all let you pause the action to deliver commands to your characters, but in Pillars that amounts to: "Click on a command while action is going on," or "Click on a command while action is paused." You are never controlling a character directly to swing a sword, move, etc. Conversation in Pillars is also intentionally denser than the Bioware wheel-based conversations. It's closest to New Vegas or Shadowrun-style.

This is likely true, but I think it also needs to be a defined strategy by opposition leaders, protesters, etc.

I am currently at the Santa Barbara Bowl for a Morrissey concert slash Day of the Dead celebration. There are people here in Manny, Meche, and Sal costumes!

This is a really good point. It's a shame we won't get to see this actor in the new series.

FYI the official Dishonored twitter account has been tweeting "Happy Halloween" messages today and today only. Could Dishonored Halloween have been October 31st all along?

If you're interested in more "How I Found Idle Thumbs" posts, please also check out the 10th Anniversary thread! It's heartwarming!

Here are some spoilery thoughts.

Was this the same report as Ants: Do They Deserve The Torture? or did you have multiple ant reports?