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Just in time! I was hoping we could do something about 2010, since it was an embarrassment of riches.

Graduate degrees are often prevent you from getting jobs. People feel you're overqualified and don't even give you an interview.

From Kevin Smith's Smodcast episode. [NSFW language] dGm6n9aK5RE

I've signed up w/ Civ Thumbs.

I know we have another Podcast thread, and ALWW has been mentioned a few times in it, but this latest episode deserves it's own mention. If you're not listening to this podcast, you're missing out. Here's a short video from the latest episode: HqeEg_KXosg http://alifewellwasted.com/2010/06/23/episode-six-big-ideas/

I believe the facebook group for Rebel FM bum-rushed the poll. Personally I stopped listening a long time ago, because it was all bullshit echo-chamber nonsense from GAF, and Arthur's constant dickish behaviour.The votes somewhat balanced themselves as other sites found the poll, but it should really be nowhere near second place.

Also, Dave is the most PC ass PC gamer ever.

Jeff and Ryan are both very transparent with their emotions, but I agree I don't really share their taste in games that often. Like the New Yorker said, they're "charmingly garrulous". It does get a bit frustrating when they're in an argument with someone and aren't articulating their point beyond their base emotions.

That's a garbage technicality. Also, if someone were to pick up vanilla WoW right now, they'd have an entirely different game. All of which was rolled out as part of Cataclysm.Honestly though, they wouldn't have done it justice in the discussion or votes either way, so it doesn't bother me too much.

Music is definitely not universal. Since the early 20th century it's been a constant shuffle of clashing genre's and generations. I'll preemptively edit myself, and not go down this rabbit hole, but the diversity of the art form, and what is beautiful rather than "noise" is always up for debate.I was saying it's the best, in contrast to movies, in which most people seem to make it, but it's not a natural fit. If you drop all the baggage of thinking about how games are like movies, and the way they are more successful as art is by becoming more like movies, and look at their musical qualities a lot of the arguments from people like Ebert just go away. Music is interpretive and interactive. There's an overarching design to it's sound, but the execution is crucial. People don't go to listen to famous classical musicians because they are able to hit the musical notes with robotic precision. A great deal of music is made primarily for enjoyment, and has huge commercial influences. It drives culture, and is sometimes embarrassing, but is able to excel because of the places people are not afraid to go to.

The more I think about this, music is the best parallel.

I think you guys are assuming that the cinematic takes place at the start of the game. It'd probably fit in about the same point as the reaper IFF did in ME2. Maybe with a longer "all-in" portion to the game.

In Cataclysm you have to free some prisoners from cages, and there's a wolf walking around with the keys in his mouth. I'm not sure if it's a monkey island reference, a Pirates of the Caribbean the ride reference, or a reference to PotC the movie made with work for the monkey island movie referencing the ride.

I thought ME2 might get forgotten since it was released so early in the year, but it looks like everyone is still in love with it

Cataclysm Mass Effect 2 Starcraft 2 Civ 5

wow, druids are absolutely rediculous in vashir or whatever the underwater zone is. With the underwater buff, aquatic form buff and aquatic form glyph i'm moving at a crazy speed. I'm not sure, but I may be going faster than the seahorses and i can loot items and take damage, and moonfire to tag mobs. The underwater area is by far the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in this engine. The level of detail is insane.

lol that is messed up. Why is she wearing a man suit? She looks disturbed and you can see what looks like a parent reassuring her.

Darkshore doesn't seem as polished as it should be. They went to the effort to rework all those quests, but I feel like they ran out of time because like you said they sometimes feel pointless. Riding the dragon could have been as good as the quest in Storm Peaks, but it was poorly timed and over quick. I agree with the ancient, they ruined the momentum of that invasion. Malfurion looks fine to me though.

Northern Barrens is by far the worst 10-20 zone i've seen so far. It starts off alright with a few new mechanics, but once you're at the crossroads you're pretty much doing all the same quests, just in a more streamlined fashion. Considering that your alternatives are Silverpine and Azshara, it's one of the most played out zones in the old world, and one of the most physically transformed by Deathwing I just don't understand it. Redridge was a solid 15-20, with the cliche 80s action movie quest line. And Duskwood was very familiar, but vastly improved by reducing travel distances. So far the best 20-30 zones I've seen is Hillsbrad, though I haven't gone to Stonetalon yet.

Arathi is not good, so you're in the clear. I didn't finish it, but of all the zones i've visited it is by far the most old-school and reuses the most quests.

UNRELATED 85PwJ86_LBU

I thought it was slightly strange that Garrosh was voiced and Sylvanas was not during that interaction, but I had chat bubbles up so I knew what was going on. I think it might have something to do with the new streaming content system.

Thank you angelbaby. I'm glad some robots agree.

We are officially out of names for first person shooters. http://www.joystiq.com/2010/11/25/crytek-puts-on-its-warface-launching-free-to-play-fps-in-asian/

So the final pre-cata patch 4.03a was released last week, and I'm absolutely blown away (IGN.com). At first I just went around Orgrimmar emptied my bags, cleared my quest log. I explored the zones a bit, looking at how Deathwing had changed the geography. Exploring quickly got boring, as interesting as it was to see the old world renewed, it didn't seem that different, and what I really wanted to do was get into flight form it felt so sluggish. Then I decided to level an alt to see the new zones. Holy crap. I expected things to be tuned slightly to remove grinding, and optimize quest flow. I did not expect a completely new game. It's something you can only experience if you start from scratch. WoW has always had a somewhat ambiguous time line. The world was in a set state, and the story progressed with your level. If you decided to go back and visit low level areas, the same NPCs were sitting around, low level players were escorting the same guy you rescued, Hogger was killing newbs. You had to suspend your disbelief to reconcile the passage of time with the realities of an open world MMORPG. Wrath of the Lich king played around with phasing, allowing players to occupy the same space at the same time, in a different isolated state. I kind of figured that they would implement phasing into the new old-world, but I didn't know to what extent. First of-all there is a new baseline for the time. Everything in Azeroth is happening post-sundering. For example, when you start a new undead character, you are resurrected by a val'kyr that you find Sylvanas has recruited after killing the lich king. They've found a way to turn casualties from the sundering and the horde alliance war into new Forsaken, with the Val'kyr's help. There have always been small changes as content changed, but now the old world is completely gone. You will do a few similar things, but the story (if you care for it) is completely different. But if you're like the majority of players, and don't really care that much about the story, and find yourself constantly skipping quest text, you will notice the first significant changes when you enter the second zone. 1-10 is still prettymuch a tutorial in core game concepts, 11-20 is a showcase of Blizzard development. It's not just Zones that are phased, certain NPCs are phased. You're not likely to see another escort NPC outside of the time you rescued them, other players will appear alone. You're presented a story line that feels deliberate. You're still free to do what you want, and go where you wish, but in the open world they've built a roller coaster of quests that is intensely satisfying. Based on the way they've tuned the leveling, I bet that you could level 4 or 5 characters per faction to 60 without ever doing the same quest twice or stepping foot into a common zone. And Cataclysm isn't even out, this is all just the base game now. It's ridiculous, the best game of 2010 is a 5 dollar copy of Vanilla WoW.