Lu 

I made some posts last night and when I checked today, they were no longer funny. What's up with that?

This always confused me about marriage. When you get married, shouldn't you get married to the best man? Because he's the best man. I say, always get married to the best man. Grooms are alright, but the best men are the best.

I was gonna wait till all episodes were out, but I have poor impulse control, so I figured "4 is close enough".

The story stuff, for being "story" stuff is pretty horrible anyway. The way it's paced totally kills it. Something dramatic happened!! Now go grind sidequests until your level is high enough so you can do the next one and find out who the traitor is. God, thinking back on it infuriates me. Fuck their me-too bullshit. Star Wars is 100x more interesting than that (failed) money grab is.

Oh yes, I know that feeling. And I still tend to go to bed late, every once in a while flipping my sleep schedule to something more healthy so I can screw it up again. For some reason it has gotten a lot easier for me to set aside distractions, but I don't know exactly when that change happened or why.

Amazing.

To be fair, it's a little petty of both sides. Still funny.

Molars or incisors, it's such a simplified, banal system that doesn't even begin to describe the depth of the human mastication experience.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=82LCKBdjywQ MASHUP TIME!! I think this is the right thread this time. It's music but I thought it'd fit here better. Maybe.

This game is finally coming to PS3! Which means I'll finally get a chance to check it out!

That's super interesting. I remember reading about superstitions in video games, WoW in particular, where you had people doing these bizarre rituals like taking off all their gear only to put it back on in the dungeon, because apparently that upped your chances of getting a certain rare drop. Even when the developers say flat out that it's nonsense and doesn't work like that, the behavior persisted. Here's another example of this, but in Dungeons & Dragons Online. The same Skinner Box experiment is mentioned.

I think the crack cocaine analogy is a bit ridiculous. There is a very big difference between addiction and compulsion. Because it exploits the same compulsorily psychology, I think. Why would money need to be involved for it to be unethical? Edit: Having thought about it a bit more, I think the aspect of money does push it over the ethical line for me. I think I agree, but I'm not sure yet. I agree, and you are right; the players will decide, but to me this discussion of ethical/unethical is a question for developers and something that presents a choice for us. How far do we go with these techniques and tricks, and how do we apply them? They're tools of the trade, no doubt, but I think most of us here would prefer to engage a player through other means than compulsion, right?. I think it's healthy that the folks who have an influence on culture ask questions about said influence and their role. Basically, when is it alright and when does it go too far is what concerns me. No shit.

You guys are magical to me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=oUGHB9X2zFM Edit: Wait, why won't this shit embed? WHAT AM I DOING WRONG?

Check out the google.com logo for today, if you get the chance.

I'm pretty much of the same mind. I got a chance to check out the gamepad at Gamescom and it's a controller with a screen alright. I played Tank, Tank, Tank, which had no wait because it's an absolute turd and no one would voluntarily play that. I wouldn't like to see Nintendo fail, but I'm skeptical that their plans will work out for them. Yea, and next year the new round of consoles from MS and Sony will at least be unveiled and potentially released by years end. Then Nintendo will be behind the curve again. Why should a developer take a chance with Nintendo, at this point? Their track record with 3rd party speaks for itself. I fear that with Wii, they caught lightning in a bottle. The Wii remote, the moment they explained it, I got it. It made sense and it was exciting to me. The gamepad? I think the extra screen is really handy for utilitarian reasons, but other than that? I don't really care, I think; I thought it looked/felt kind of cheap, but I have no idea how finalized the pad I held was, so I'll have to defer judgement until I get to try out a retail version. My outlook is pessimistic, is what I'm saying.

I did, sorry. I edited it.

I agree with Rodi too, to an extent. And yea, I think game designers have an ethical responsibility, but obviously not all design has an ethically questionable basis; referring back to the Nik Davidson quote ("Our industry bears the characteristics of a gold rush, and in any gold rush, you have honest prospectors and you have claim jumpers.") I take some issue with the idea that freemium's objective is to be addictive. It's true for a lot of them, but I think a lot of standard retail games do the exact same thing. Maybe they're not linked to a marketplace, but does that make it any less ethically dubious? There are a lot of aspects of game design that deal with the manipulation of a player's psychology to get them to do what we want. That isn't inherently good or bad, but I think there is a blurry line between having a good sense of feedback and stimulating compulsion. In that sense, I think some of the games out there are downright predatory, banking on those for whom it becomes compulsory. The 2nd thing Davidson said, basically. The subject of casinos and people with gambling addiction seems closely related? Is it the distinction of making games to entertain and making games to make money? I don't know. I'm unsure about most things.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XN-okpqPB-k The Rumble 2012: Bill O'Reilly vs Jon Stewart 's All poli'ical 'n' stuff. I set my alarm so I could watch it live and I did not regret doing so. Anyone with the faintest interest in US politics will really enjoy it too, I think. The level of discourse is incredibly refreshing. Anyone else who watched it?

I think skeletons have more cavity space than we do. If I were a skeleton, I'd decorate the inside of my ribcage and then others can stick their head in it and it'll be like a cool diorama.

My soldier had a 99% chance of hitting the enemy. He missed. Goddammit.

There was also this PS2 game called Maximo

I had played hours into Freelancer until it got too hard that I couldn't continue the story missions. When I revisited the game years later, I noticed in the keybinds "Boost". I played through hours and hours of the game, never realizing I could do that.

I don't think you're alone. I put many, many hours into Freelancer and I remember it as an awesome game. And I just remembered something that needs to go here.

Like a boss.