Irishjohn

I've been there. Good for you for walking away.

I think his reaction to the voice of Mario was more or less perfect.

I know exactly what you mean, I had a similar experience but I really do encourage you to push on and get through it. Whether you end up liking or disliking how the story winds up, you should try and get through to see the end.

I've written a blog post about Starcraft 2 and my own personal experience with eSports as spectacle. It's brief and mostly personal, but you guys might find it interesting: http://www.theculturalapocalypse.com/home/2013/6/1/discussing-esports-again-the-drama-of-the-comeback.html It includes a link to a post I wrote about eSports and sports in historical context a week or two ago. A couple of friends and I have also started a podcast. It's not games exclusive (or even focused on games, actually) but you might give it a go: http://www.theculturalapocalypse.com/culturalapocalypsepodcast/ Cheers!

Spoiler for last night's MLG final in Korea, but I wrote a post about my experience watching it that touches on the larger concept of how eSports ties into sports. It's not the first time I've written on it, but maybe you guys might fancy a look: http://www.theculturalapocalypse.com/home/2013/6/1/discussing-esports-again-the-drama-of-the-comeback.html I'm interested in the connection between modern conceptions of popular sport and the emergence of "eSports" generally.

Very much so!! I was Crazy Crane. I took the approach that I should believe absolutely NOTHING of what I was told by anyone, and I knew from the start that I was a terrible liar and not much of a schemer in general. I suffered some early problems but once I realised that it wasn't so much the number of stars but the value of the stars you controlled that mattered, I began to make a rather limited comeback. My biggest issue early on is that I had no clear roadmap or plan for research. I was hugely reliant on the help of Sax and Spacey and ultimately looked to trade on that as much as possible. I was in a difficult situation; if I could have got Sax to turn on Mallard I hoped to break out east and then move into Dahle's territory. Even before his/her AFK, Dahle was floundering behind me in weapons tech and it seemed possible that I could establish some room for myself moving east. Spacey had been pretty good to me as far as I could tell, despite my initial commitment to believing nobody (something that in the end seems to have been justified though it does seem that the Spacey/Crane/Mallard relationship was... complicated). In truth, I'm not good at this game. I genuinely bristled at Uhrmungle's bullying and I found a rather bizarre message from Dahle as I eventually moved east (surely an attempt to intimidate or confuse me) as rather frustrating. In any case, my attempt to get involved in intrigue, looking to sacrifice my alliance with Spacey (doomed as it was from its own Bismarckian nightmare) was completely undermined by my sending a "let's backstab Spacey" message to Spacey, Sax and Mallard. I felt incredibly stupid though funnily enough, Mallard pointed out it was difficult to tell if it was a ruse or not! This game. The pressure was becoming too much and although my home planet was extremely valuable I knew the jig was up and decided not to go gently into the good night. As stated above I coordinated with my enemies to the east to fly a suicide mission as far into Uhrmungle's empire as I could, something that ultimately didn't have too much effect but that was worth it on the off chance I got into his/her supply lines and could cause some chaos. The rest of my ships I moved east to try and craft a brand new foothold in Dahle's empire, hoping that I could perhaps re-establish myself long term. I actually should have had a chance to do this but I foolishly split my forces, and left myself at the mercy of Dahle's remaining ships. It was great fun, and a great gang here to play with it must be said. Well played all and congrats to Wubbles. Lovely write up as well!

Looking forward to hearing more about that. I am, unfortunately, really bad at lying.

Totally happened to me as well. I felt incredibly stupid but you have to laugh, really.

Huh. Was it a rage quit?

Whoah. What happened to Dahle?

Crazy Crane is apparently also crazy. Whether it's like a fox or not is yet to be determined.

Maybe if there was some kind of alliance feature that let you sign on with an empire CKII-style. I suppose that could happen in game too through mails.

Couldn't agree more regarding the appeal of Red Dead Redemption. Just remembering that sensation makes me want to play that game all over again.

I am not good at this game. But enjoying it, nonetheless. The naming convention is a big deal. I also want to learn to be not terrible. Not sure where/when to research. Perhaps I should focus on a small core of planets and ignore expense next time as frontiers will shift.

I think I'm too late but I'm in if there's room. If not, have fun guys!

I also love the term "Expandalone." I'm down for this for sure, and I'll probably end up playing it before I actually play Far Cry 3.

Hi everyone, I'm not sure this is really plugging as it's not a game or a podcast but my blog. I've been up and down with writing but have been getting my momentum back up and running recently. I'm going to start writing blog posts on Fridays about video games I've wanted to play forever and never got around to playing. Many of them are games I'm stunned I missed when I was playing adventure games regularly in my early teens. All of them are games I bought during a Steam sale and never got around to. The list is on the blog post, I'm starting with The Dig for next Friday. Come on by if you're interested! http://www.theculturalapocalypse.com/home/2013/4/13/adventures-in-video-gaming-and-writing-about-it.html Cheers.

I had a look at it but it did indeed look extremely difficult to get into. I'd like it to click but I'm just not sure yet.

I joined the Idle Thumbs group on NA. My SC2 ID is Cover these days. I just beat the AI on Hard and am thrilled. That should tell you where I am.

Cheers man, thanks for the advice! I think I'm slowly improving, it's a matter of figuring out when to actually put units together now. Also, I tend to freak out. I had a weird game yesterday against a Protoss player. He sent down that new flying unit (the core) and I freaked out and spawned more queens because I didn't have any AA. Yeah, I don't know why I did that either. So I'm getting ? and WTF? on chat from the other guy. Now, I can see where he has coming from (I suddenly have five queens on two hatcheries and a few roaches around the place) but I thought he was being a jackass. Turns out that for whatever reason I was put up against a diamond player (he may have been diamond for an earlier season and was getting placed maybe?) and so I could see his point of view.

Ok, so Google is my friend. I would prefer a Clan but seeing as you can only join one there may be Thumbs who'd prefer a Group so they can remain free agents. Those floozies. But I say Clan. I've never joined a clan. Except for the one I was born in to. None of them play Starcraft though.

I'm not clear on the difference... I've been placed in Silver somehow and am getting my ASS kicked. Horrible weak minded type that I am, the XP system is mitigating the fact I'm useless. I also refuse to go back to Terran. I will learn to play Zerg. I hope that the fact I'm getting killed (eight losses, no win yet) in Silver is a sign I could at least survive in Bronze now. So yeah, don't expect a high quality playing partner but I'd be happy to join in whatever and help boost the numbers a bit.

Ugh, this game. I won four of my five placement matches though really it should have been 3-2 but one of my opponents quit early after thrashing me. I got put in silver (this is a big deal for me!) and now I'm getting crushed. Again and again. And again. And again. I remember that this happened to me last time, I lost ten or eleven in a row before I won one, and at one point I won about thirty in a row (I think something was going wrong with matchmaking there). That was Terran, this is Zerg, and I'd like to play Zerg. But I'm getting crushed. I'm trying to drone up and not panic and just be ready. In my placement matches I felt comfortable, doing pretty well at holding off the other guy with a couple of units and a spine crawler. Now, I'm just getting eaten alive and I've slipping down completely, getting torn apart by quick strategies (pylons teleporting zealots into my expansion, Terran bio). Now, I profited from the Terran bioball myself a couple of years ago, vaulting all the way into silver. But any general tips here on playing zerg would be nice. I'm trying to follow some Day 9 stuff but I'm essentially useless at this game.

I'm sure it must have been covered because the game can be pretty buggy, but I've had the same problem. Unfortunately I had to just quit out of the game and load it up again. I think I CTRL-ALT-DEL'd my way out. Hopefully you'll have a reasonably decent save? I know that at least twice I've been frustrated thinking I was screwed but my Ironman (Normal baby mode) save brought me back pretty close.

I bought SR3 during a Steam sale as well, and played a few minutes of it... I really need to go back and play that game.