Salacious Snake

edit: Also, I have a Rift, now.

I like some of the aliens.

Holy shit, I never would have remembered Modus Operandi on my own. Those games were weird. MUDs are still pretty interesting to me, though I can't get into them for any length of time. Also, I totally did weird chat room roleplaying game stuff. There's a spectrum of how emotionally involved different people get in those situations which makes for very odd moments of disharmony. Like, you can never gauge the level of investment of the person on the other end. There is something cool about the shared imagination element; it's not altogether unlike playing an RPG around a table, but the lack of visual stimulus (staring at each other's neck-bearded faces) can make it more absorbing. I feel vaguely uncomfortable thinking about this stuff.

Niyeaux and Gormongongous definitely get where I was coming from with that. Don't take it to be a huge indictment, though, I was kind of being a jerk. There's nothing wrong with being a gamer and whatever that may entail for you. I'm just super picky about labels; I didn't mean to come across as that dismissive. It's a knee-jerk thing, but "Annoyed Gamer" makes me imagine a pretty horrible type of person, which seems funny given the topic at hand. Also, the whole gamer culture is pretty messed up, and I'd rather not be associated with elements of it (says the guy posting on a forum about video games). And yeah, Gamer Grub. Bookworm Bites?

It just makes me picture cheetos-encrusted anime body pillows and stuff. edit: Basically, when I see the word gamer, my mind immediately fills in "grub." edit 2: Like, I bet he refers to things as being "epic."

My hackles are up as soon as I see a moniker like "Annoyed Gamer." Like, oh, it's your schtick to be a petty, antisocial internet guy, so it's ok? Self-identifying as a "gamer" is gross enough on its own.

I enjoyed the Starbreeze game, though I can't help being bummed about how much better a first-person Syndicate could be if it took more significant elements of the old games. The path in the shooter is so extremely narrow, when the open, living city sectors in the original were such a major part of the appeal. A wider design with some kind of squad tactics but still controlled as a first-person shooter could be a perfectly reasonable extension of Syndicate. Kinda like what they're trying to do with the new X-COM shooter thing, which I don't think looks very good. My sort of dream version is like open world Rainbow Six or Hidden & Dangerous. I mean, the cyberpunk setting actually contains justification for being able to "possess" and control multiple soldiers, something that always seemed super weird in those games. I'm pretty sure you play as a ghost in Rainbow Six.

The only issue I have with Fantasy Flight is their aversion to proofreading. Their products tend to be riddled with typographical errors. I do love many of their products, though.

There's an easier way! If you click "Create Chat Channel" instead of trying to join one and type idlethumbs, you'll actually join the existing channel. Utterly counter-intuitive, but it works.

I just couldn't deal with the slow pace, waiting for Han to get his ass over to some planet or whatever. I still have a hard time getting into Paradox games and the like because of the time element. I end up with things crawling along at a snail's pace, because I fear that if I use too much time compression, everything will spiral out of control immediately. Fully turn-based games relieve that pressure on my brain tremendously. Of course, you can pause something like CK2, but it stresses me out. When I have time, I plan to watch the stream; I suspect it'll help me get more into the game. I'm still at the point where I'll find myself clicking all over the screen to try to open some window pane I was looking at only minutes ago. I hate the interface.

I've read a few posts, and it sure is livejournaly, if not incriminating.

Whenever a thing like this has an editor I get jazzed and tell myself I'll make an adventure, but then I never do. Maybe this time will be different!

I would like that, it would be a nice way to relieve the helmet fire aspect of the game a bit. It would also be cooler and less of a detriment to the pacing than the ability to give order while paused, which would be another option. I like there being an in-world explanation, along with there still being some time pressure.

Yeah, I've never seen anyone in there, nor in the in-game chat which is confusing and weird. There always seem to be multiple idlethumbs channels with nobody in them. Or is it a chat system where people's names only show up in the right-hand column when they've recently spoken? I don't know, it's all very distressing and confusing.

That's a huge bummer.

Although it's not exactly precise terminology, I'd classify it as more than a "small step." It's huge and it's regressive. Things are fucked up here in the US too, but they're getting better, not worse on the whole.

Hay guys http://steamcommunity.com/id/infogrames Since I keep listening to these podcasts about a game I've never played, I figure it's time to try it out. I'm currently running through the tutorials. I'm scared, like in a pit-of-the-stomach physical way. edit: for some reason, Steam thinks I've played Dota 2 for 22 hours, when I just started the tutorials today. Weird.

I just have to counter that PC bleeper rendition of the Stunts intro in the first post with the totally radical to the max MT-32 version:

Yeah, and in some of the games, it gets ridiculously hard if you go too far down the underachiever branch. You'd have a much easier time if you got yourself killed or just manually restarted the mission until you got through. It makes narrative sense that your losses would make it that much harder to claw your way back to victory, but from a more gamey standpoint if a player is having that much trouble, maybe ramping up the difficulty isn't so great. If there was a "permadeath" kind of thing going on, it would be cool that ejecting means you still get another shot, even if it's harder. Steel Battalion did that interestingly, although it didn't branch, so the narrative part was weird. Successfully ejecting meant you didn't die (and therefore your save file wouldn't be deleted) and you'd now have to go forward with probably a less expensive and capable Vertical Tank, making the mission harder, but it would still be the same exact mission over again with no dialog or anything to suggest that you're repeating your actions. God, I love Steel Battalion. (A good game to stream, I would say.)

Dave Snider has some words about him: http://www.thanksryan.com.s3-website-us-east-1.amazonaws.com/

I had a similar reaction. I imagine that last scene is important in terms of how it'll tie into the season proper, but this episode would better stand alone without it. Maybe cutting right after the walkie-talkie woman picks up the photos would be effective, or simply at the end of whichever vignette the player finishes last. That one niggle aside, I am experiencing maximum stokage on all fronts. The new cast seems interesting. The structure of the episode works very well, because there isn't any filler; it was all very tense. Shel's younger sister should prove fascinating; exploring the effect of the zombie outbreak on someone in such a formative time has me excited. It's like fast-forwarding a bit and seeing the kind of person Clem could potentially become. I'm already feeling pretty heartbroken about how cold she has grown, and that's without having a significant amount of time to develop an attachment to the character. Like how the fuck do you balance instilling the necessary tools for survival with not turning into a survivalist asshole? Is that even a worthwhile goal?

It seems pretty crazy now that I bought Moonbase Commander in a box from a physical store. Also I saw a man who looked like Joel from the Last of Us at the Greenpoint Ave subway station in Brooklyn this morning, so much so that it's a testament to how lifelike the video game man is.

I'm backing it. I love Syndicate (which I played primarily on the Jaguar), and Wars is cool if a bit too fiddly. That RPS interview is what really pushed me over the edge. I'm very happy to see that they're embracing the "living city" aspect, as that was by far one of the most interesting elements of the old games. [sELECTED]

It's me, I'm the jerk in the QUILTBAG. (I'm sorry.) As Sententia points out, the way it currently works here in the States is that marriage is wholly within the purview of the state government. You get a license, and can be married by a Justice of the Peace. Religious ceremonies are there for flavor, but have no legal import. It sounded like you were saying that we should let the Churches have marriage, and call the legal thing a civil partnership, which in my eyes would be a significant step backward. The other side of this is that I don't believe that discrimination is something that should be protected as a religious right. Whether the ceremonial marriage is legally important or not, I don't agree that a Church (or Mosque or Synagogue, etc.) should be allowed to be picky about it. Can a religious organization say that it's against their religion for white and black attendees to use the same water fountains and get away with it? Jesus Christ that was an awful analogy, and I apologize for it, but I'm not editing it out!

Yeah, Cutter Slade! Curious to see what they do with this. I'd kinda like to see a repackaging of the original with support for arbitrary resolutions and less weird controls. Such an odd game.