SecretAsianMan

There's an opt-in beta available now for the new update. It adds several weapons, enemies, and some gameplay changes. Some of the bigger things are elemental effects (like oil increasing fire damage and water increasing electric damage) and a change to shields (all shields will generate a brief force field when you take damage and you can reflect back some projectiles). It's still a bit unstable so I'd suggest waiting for the next public release.

Curious to know how long before your job is replaced by a robot and you are obsolete? https://willrobotstakemyjob.com/

I couldn't read this post and not think that Waypoint is also the name for the online hub of the Halo series.

You can sometimes find blueprints behind timed doors so yes. But once you find the blueprint, I don't think anything else appears besides gold so you don't have to keep farming the door in hopes of other loot. At least not that I've seen and I've been in every timed door at least twice. If you're doing a door run I suggest not even bothering to fight enemies unless absolutely necessary. Although there is a ten minute door behind the first boss that requires some good luck to get enough upgrades and decent weapon/skill drops to take him out in time. The phaser pairs really well with the assassin's dagger too (does critical damage on a backstab which stacks with the phaser's damage boost). There are so many good combos. My personal favorite right now is the sadist's sword with the throwing knives. The sadist's sword does critical damage on anything bleeding and the throwing knives are a projectile that causes bleeding. It's so much fun to throw a knife into a guy then run up and smack him into oblivion.

I'd like to point out that more than 3 years ago the forums not only learned what being hoisted by a petard really means, but also predicted it's usage in an Idle Thumbs podcast

Honestly, if the environments are your main concern I wouldn't worry. While there's nothing I'd call outstanding, they're not static either and there's enough variety to be interesting. Some tips

As promised, I recorded some gameplay. I didn't show off everything but it gives an idea of what the game is like.

I haven't listened yet, but there's also a prequel game to A Dark Room called The Ensign. I believe that one is only on iOS. Coincidentally enough, I also downloaded A Dark Room on Android last week (it was on sale for free at the time). I had played the web version years ago and it was neat to revisit.

The meat grinder and turret definitely lead to some cheese tactics. I'm a fan of freeze/stun items because they can get you out of trouble and make for great opening moves. I think the only category of thing I've been consistently skipping is the shields. If I could constantly block at the cost of some chip damage (with a well timed parry blocking full damage) then maybe they'd be more useful. As it is you still need to time the block right so it's functionally similar to a dodge except the dodge doesn't take up a weapon slot. I'll try and stream/record some once I get time.

I actually liked Rogue Legacy but totally acknowledge the flaws that most other people found in it and for the most part I think this game does it right. One area where Dead Cells might be lacking is the level design. It's much more fluid than RL in that you're not moving through what are basically static rooms that change positions on a grid. For the most part the levels seem to be mostly linear with branches that either lead to the next level or end in a chest/room with items. There are a liberal amount of teleporters, so returning to the main path usually doesn't involve a ton of backtracking. It is still procedurally driven, so it's piecing the levels together from a library of parts. There aren't individual rooms like there are RL so the whole thing feels more natural but you will definitely see some repetition and occasionally things like a path with no reward at the end or two teleporters next to each other. I'm willing to overlook a good amount of that in the name of Early Access though. Visually I think they're great, if not a little busy. I've only seen about 4 areas but there's lots of nice detail and each area has distinct looks. As far as grind, this game definitely has it but the moment-to-moment combat feels much better than RL. Tactics largely revolve around what weapons and items you're able to find, meaning lots of variation between runs. Sometimes you'll get a combo of weapons and enemies that will totally screw you, other times you can totally clear a level without a hit. The game encourages you to switch it up a lot too by dropping higher level weapons the further you progress, meaning you have to keep swapping up to do meaningful damage. If anyone is interested I'd consider streaming/uploading some gameplay, although I'm sure that it can be found if you look.

I haven't yet done it myself but I've heard good things about Private Internet Access. I think a couple people here recommended it too.

Yay work! Also boo work but for other reasons

I feel like I didn't hear enough from Abby to get a feel for her, but she seemed ok (I've only listened to the Beastcast so if she's in other stuff I haven't seen it yet). At the very least having a female voice alone is already a nice change.

GBeast hired a lady. She was also on the last Beastcast.

Sneezing due to allergies is the worst. It generally does nothing to help relieve you and usually just results in a spray of mucus and spit onto everything else. At least that's my experience.

I felt the same way. I've tried a couple of times to complete it but just never interested me the same way that Zelda or God of War did. Ditto for the sequel.

Potentially yes. It's what happens when you have an administration that is so committed to undoing everything it can from the previous administration whether it makes sense or not. While I really hope it doesn't turn out this way, I have the feeling that regardless of how many people show their opposition to this change they're going to do it anyway because they can.

Recent John Oliver bit on the current Net Neutrality situation. Includes the great site gofccyourself.com if you want to comment to the FCC

Looks like something I'd love to try but I don't have a mixer and doing it by hand seems like more effort than I can currently muster.

I love a good pretzel but have never bothered to try and make one myself. Is it easy? Got that recipe handy?

Yay! Congrats!

Sitting at work rereading this thread instead of actually working, I'm pleased to realize that three years before the podcast existed we predicted an Important If True episode.

I just got my old graphing calculator from high school working and was far too excited by this. I've been needing a calculator at work lately. The one built into Windows isn't cutting it anymore and I don't like using my phone for this either. I'm a nerdy old man.

Is the April Ruination stream going to be released in audio format like the March one was?

That was also a reason I stopped. I hate first person melee combat and Riddick didn't do anything to alleviate that, at least from what I remember. I find first person melee really counter-intuitive no matter what the game and using guns in a Riddick themed thing just felt wrong.