mikemariano

Trust people that have played both versions and ignore me, especially because I can no longer find any mention of what changed for the Xbox version. I remember reading a list of changes, though, hoping for a Baby Mode, and the only changes mentioned were things that were considered the player's fault, "We now consider the way you played the game to be wrong, so we are shortening the whip, increasing the hit box on the arrows, etc. You took advantage of our generosity for too long!" Doing these things might not make the game harder, but it was a firm statement that the developers considered the original version of the game to be exactly what they want the game to always be: Spelunky is and always will be perfect—it's mankind that is imperfect and must be destroyed.

I found the original free PC version of the game far more punishing than charming. Reading a list of changes from the old version to the new revealed that the only changes were to make the game even crueler. ("Arrows are too easy to dodge!") I've given up on Spelunky. It isn't even challenging; it just hates to be played.

No no no, having an option for this is necessary: to me a game where you accidentally throw innocent pugs onto spikes is far more offensive than one where you do the same thing to Kate Capshaw.

I have been frantically searching for a picture of the Goldeneye N64 television screen divider Danielle mentioned, but I can only find forum posts where people describe creating their own. One 2004 Neoseeker post describes splitting the N64 signal to four television sets, then strategically covering 3/4 of each screen with newspaper so everyone can only see their own screen. Crazy! Anyway, a story about a ridiculous video game accessory is pure Idle Thumbs, so thank you Danielle for being such an awesome guest.

Looks like I'm specced out of playing this game. I mean, I guess I could buy a modern computer. Gone Home will literally cost me thousands of dollars.

Rock, Paper, Shotgun's most recent Sunday Papers linked to a Gamasutra article called The Simulation Dream. Tynan Sylvester's article argues that the results of a simulation need to be exposed and meaningful to the player. Even further, the impression that a player can make something happen is more important than actually modelling that specific system! (As a player, he had a jealous Sim hatch a murder plot, even though The Sims doesn't specifically model jealousy or revenge.) What really blew my mind were the blog entries designer Raph Koster linked to in the comments: Areas in which NPCs can be improved and three separate articles about how resources were originally meant to be handled in Ultima Online. These are articles from 2006 about design documents from 1995! I want to believe that we can create better simulations now. I want to believe they can make better games. Have any of you played games that you felt could use more background simulation that would have added to your experience as a player? Or are there any games you can think of where the simulation bits got in the way?

"I didn't see a mudcrab the other day. Someone must have killed them all." That's a great example you got from Pride and Prejudice. Austen may have been a little blunt in exposing her character motivations in that first paragraph, but she makes it pay off with that joke. I do wonder, though, if exposing parts of the Ultima Online systems would reward the players trying to roleplay more than it would get exploited by min/maxers and gold farmers.

Counterpoint: the Jedi-only double-jump in Lego Star Wars.

Gameplay-wise, would there be any direction for Fez to go in? I only played the demo for the first game, but I basically just jumped, came to a cliff, rotated the screen, and jumped again until I got a cube. It worked, but seemed limited. I know the game gets deeper, but only in terms of translating secret codes, hidden times of day, etc. But does jumping and rotating ever get any more interesting?

I'm like Roman from Party Down and I dislike fantasy. I'm into hard sci-fi. So beyond the fact that this character is a Pokemon and can only say his own name, does Hodor do anything else? At least Jigglypuff sings.

Hey, I'm a rigger, too! I've only seen vents used in story scenes, not in combat. It is fun to have my two drones open doors and be the first wave assault while I'm just hanging in a corner somewhere else. The repair costs are adding up, though!

"Rouge Squadron" will always make me laugh. I picture Wedge applying concealer before taking off. I also enjoy the idea of a LucasArts executive looking back and forth between the "Rebel Jedi" and "Jedi Rebel" logos.

Has anyone played the updated version of Ridiculous Fishing? It has new fish behavior, the only thing I thought was necessary to add to the game! PS: Since it's 2013, we don't have changelogs anymore. We have no mention of the update on the developer site and we only have a single Twitter message which people are using as a bug tracker.

Whoa, I want to see videos of people competing in this using iPads, trackballs, Kinect, etc.

There are plenty of valid concerns in the Steam Trading Card thread you've been posting in, Niyeaux. So how about an invalid concern? Gabe Newell is literally Satan! Blarg blarg blarg!

I started playing Shadowrun about an hour and a half before Nick did, so it was like peering into a weird time vortex of all the choices I could have made. When Nick first announced that he would stream, I went to Twitch.tv to see if he had started. He hadn't, so I picked a random Shadowrun Returns player and watched his game. When combat went south for this man, he pouted and whined so much that I had to the stream off after a few minutes. Later Nick started dying during the tutorial flashback and his screams were glorious. There's nothing like the sound of genuine Breckon anguish.

You can do some of that, but firing him too far makes him really hard to find again. I mostly wedged him against Alyx. I really do like dumb, goofball achievements like that. They are a good way of saying "You shouldn't take ANY achievements seriously."

https://twitter.com/excite_mike/status/284684049979686913

I'm pretty sure Nick's birthday isn't the same day as my birthday, so this is probably a different Breckon. And check out that comment from 2012! Searching for SnowVDemon opens an entire world I'd rather avoid.

Thanks to these trading cards, I can now only see Football Manager 2013 guy eating an invisible hamburger.

I just saw Counter Strike: GO on sale for 14 cents. "How devious of Valve!" I thought. "They know that selling one card of any type will result in at least 14¢ in the seller's Steam wallet! Instead of just giving the game away, they are giving it away in a way that normalizes their wallet, marketplace, and trading card system—all in the sneakiest way possible!" But apparently it's a mistake and the discount was supposed to be 66% off and not 99%.

Oh man, now I want to paint little Bomberman figurines. San Francisco is fun so far, but my hotel is in a relentlessly commercial part of town. There is no need for a Bugatti store to exist.

ysbreker it was great seeing you on the stream even if I won't see you tomorrow and next week. If anyone else will be in San Francisco starting tomorrow, feel free to e-mail/iMessage me at michaeljmariano [at] gmail. If you want to come watch me as a panelist at my convention and ask questions, I'm pretty sure that's not allowed but you can probably get away with doing it anyway.

I'm enjoying Dark Souls, but it's really missing that "Thanks Obama" Game Over screen mod.

The Lady Torgo Collection.