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Jake

Idle Thumbs '95: H.D. Cool Spot

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I thought Chris was right on the nose about the architecture that's used for "futuristic" cities. I guess in the future there was one shitty architect that got the contract of a lifetime after that super earthquake that leveled every city on the planet. It reminds me of how every sci-fi alien race is totally homogeneous and kind of monolithic..."warrior" species or "super smart but weak" species. It's just kind of lazy and thoughtless design.

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GameFly and a few other services were replicas of Netflix' old disc based model, where you paid a monthly fee and they would always mail you the next game in your queue when you returned the one you had. They tended to be flakier than Netflix though, with very few copies of some games so you'd end up with your second or third choice, and none of them seem to have adapted to any sort of streaming model.

 

When OnLive was first announced I thought it was going to be a subscription service, which would have been pretty insane, but then it turned out to be another storefront to buy the games one at a time after all, which is a bummer. Who has the tremendous bandwidth required to support OnLive but doesn't have the hardware to buy and play the games natively? It seems like one could have justified the whole thing if it was a subscription on top of internet access, because then you could have mid to high range consumer DSL, a MacBook Air, and a 360 game pad and have access to every game, but once they start charging you quite a lot per title, the cost/benefit stopped making sense to me.

 

the cost/benefit would be the important factor for a subscription based game service

 

(I think?) the link I posted (to the OnLive Playpack) is a subsription based service (for a 200-ish-game subset of their catalogue). Not as good as streaming All The Games, but still interesting.

 

yeah i have a UK account and it redirected me to the UK onlive, but the value of those 200+ games would be gone in a few months (i either own them or don't rate them very highly) it would really need a large selection of the best games for it to be worth a subscription else it would feel like i was subscribed to like 2 games and wouldn't be worth it, it would need to feel like i could just play anything for me to feel like i was getting value for money, or if episodic games take off and more get made it would need more than one game for it to be worth subscribing to, like paying for a TV channel.

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yeah i have a UK account and it redirected me to the UK onlive, but the value of those 200+ games would be gone in a few months

 

Agreed =P I don't actually think it's a good bargain or anything, just pointing out that a kind of crappy, non-local-installed, expensive Netflix For Games does exist. ;)

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It reminds me of how every sci-fi alien race is totally homogeneous and kind of monolithic..."warrior" species or "super smart but weak" species. It's just kind of lazy and thoughtless design.

I usually let that shit slide because each of the races is really just a proxy for a human archetype, which is fine from a narrative standpoint. Still, I like the idea that every species that makes it to spacefaring technology went through an intense eugenic homogenization, so everyone looks and acts the same. Hey, maybe that's what genetic engineering will do to us!

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I thought Chris was right on the nose about the architecture that's used for "futuristic" cities. I guess in the future there was one shitty architect that got the contract of a lifetime after that super earthquake that leveled every city on the planet. It reminds me of how every sci-fi alien race is totally homogeneous and kind of monolithic..."warrior" species or "super smart but weak" species. It's just kind of lazy and thoughtless design.

 

I got stuck thinking about this for a few hours today while I nursed a fever. A book on anime criticism I read last year made a good point about how speculative fiction tends to revel in the liberation of imagination from context and purpose. I think that's why a lot of low-grade sci-fi crops up in mass market fiction, CGI-heavy movies, and video game plots. You just write/draw/say some cool shit and you're done.

 

But I think most people who spend even a little time around that breed of speculative fiction get tired of it, to judge from the response people have to things like the sci-fi wrapper of Assassin's Creed. Sci-fi as a genre is theoretically independent from human experience, but it's invariably populated by human characters, which possess a past and a consciousness, unlike all other life on this world. Building a speculative world without history or mythology is an empty exercise and the human mind grasps that in short order. Just like the best fantasy adapts the different strands of human experience that already exist to weave a different cloth, like Tolkien and his Middle-Earth, the best sci-fi is all about extrapolating out the historical forces that have shaped humanity to this point. I'm thinking of Red Mars and its sequels, which are so deeply embroiled in contemporary politics, yet without stripping them down to allegory or cheapening the reality of human beings.

 

I don't know. I think there's a wealth of good sci-fi that speaks to our past and present selves just as much as our own history does, but it's smothered by the myriad authors and creators who are interested only in telling a story without having to do the legwork.

 

 

Edit: Maybe still a little feverish? You be the judge.

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It did just occur to me, that sort of stylistic homogeneity is why I don't really like steampunk all that much. Except I really love Castle in the Sky and Howl's Moving Castle, which are totally steampunk, but they feel more organic; there's a cultural gradient between the rural folk and the dudes living in airships. I feel like in steampunk fiction I've read, it's all just about Victorian aristocrats in a world full of steam-powered cyborgs. The point of the genre I guess is just to be self-indulgent with that setting, but it's still kinda bland. Wild Wild West is cool.

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I also like the residential architecture in the Sunset. With all the fog, and the general lack of people walking around the street compared to other parts of the city the whole area has a serious land-forgotten-by-time vibe that is really amazing.

Also I made some remark about some off hand comment about Tim & Eric several podcasts ago where I misinterpreted something or whatever, and listening to this podcast I feel bad that this is like a frustrating thing for Chris. Sorry about that! I totally get how that sort of out-of-context misinterpretation can be frustrating. This is why all politicians are basically robots!

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If alien races are kind of broad stroke stand ins for "ethnicity" or extrapolations of specific qualities then I don't think it's out of the realm for it to be a bit homogeneous. Greek, Danish Modern, Dutch Colonial, Tudor Revival, Spanish Villa, etc. England stirs this pot a bit with a long empire, and modernism mixes it up, but like transnational modernism is like the polar opposite of video game SYFY. 

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Alien races only seem homogeneous to the backwards humans of the 21st century. If we were a little more culturally sensitive, we'd be able to see "warlike" and "obsessed with honor" are stereotypes borne of ignorance, and that every Klingon is unique.

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The fact that each character in Karateka has a little cutscene and different movesets made me purposefully lose the last bossfight as the Monk so that I could see the Brute.

 

I was not dissapointed with the brute ending.

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I think commuting can happen and buying/selling energy can also happen. If city to city loans can happen I'm golden.

Yes, it totally can! Just click the speech bubble in the tutorial to continue...

 

Yes, in the tutorial they have a brief thing where you go to region view and you check what services and people are moving in between cities. So it showed that you're getting garbage truck service from CasinoVille, and residents from your city are going there to work.

 

Aaaaaahhhh so excited for this game.

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Was that something about coming over to lord it up in London for the BAFTAs at the end there? 

P.S.: XsBYU1b.jpg

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Just finished, great cast, the cool spot stuff killed me

It's like fate! I'm having two weeks (twoooo weeks) off from March 1st as I'm having minor surgery on the inside of my head (sinuses). So I'm totally available for the British podcast! I'm almost 100% certain you won't want me, but what the hell do you know, I'm fantastic :) we can make a day of it, I'll take you to wetherspoons, we'll go shopping for tuxs, it'll be great

I'm kinda getting ahead myself a bit, I'm already imagining that you've made me your plus one to the BAFTAs and that I've gone up on stage with you to collect an award and I'm trying to think of something clever to say into the microphone. Don't worry it'll come to me I'm good under pressure.

So yeah, think about it :)

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I'm kinda getting ahead myself a bit, I'm already imagining that you've made me your plus one to the BAFTAs and that I've gone up on stage with you to collect an award and I'm trying to think of something clever to say into the microphone.

The reality: You will be home alone, watching the BAFTA livestream.  You will see Jake and Sean approach, alongside the man pictured in your avatar.  As he passes, he looks into the camera and stares into your soul.

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Your descriptions of the difference of approach between Anno 2070 vs. SimCity (European vs. American) reminded me of a big divide in boardgames (which I only bring up since you guys play them, at least occasionally), Euros and Ameritrash games.

Eurogames are generally all about the game mechanics. Very tight systems based on efficiency. You are trying to make your mechanics-based engine run better than everyone else's. Theme is the least important thing and usually pretty bare, and not tied to the mechanics at all.

Ameritrash, on the other hand, is very much about theme, and how those mechanics are tied to the theme. They also tend to go big on production, with lots of plastic figures and other "bling" just because it's awesome and adds flavor.

 

Maybe I'm reaching here, but it was the first thing I thought of when you started describing the difference in approach.

 

 

You're totally right about the difference between American and European board game design, although I don't think it's totally analogous to the difference I described in city builders. Theme-heavy American board games tend to be really low on simulation, whereas I feel that's just the opposite of SimCity. And sort of ironically, I think European sims tend to be a lot heavier on theme--city builders like Anno but also grand strategy games of the Paradox variety--whereas American ones like SimCity or Civilization tend to scale back on theme and emphasize player-driven simulation. So the different cultures seem to express themselves somewhat differently in board game design than in video game simulation design. Of course, there are some common factors for sure--European board and video games are both much more economically focused than their American counterparts. But we're probably so far down the evolutionary branches in each case that we've diverged a fair amount from whatever original unifying seed each cultural block might have started with.

 

 

HTRM repairman I think the way you describe the difference between Eurogames and Ameritrash while generally pretty accurate, missed out on the heart of the problem.

In a Eurogame victory goes too who ever understands the game the best and works within its constraints. It is as you so put it about building your engine. However a Ameritrash game isn't necessarily a less detailed or complicated game, in fact as you say they often have far more parts than their euro counterparts.

The difference I feel is that Ameritrash games allow the disruptive effects of luck and competitive interaction free reign often meaning that understanding the system becomes far less important to the end result than taking advantage of your luck to effectively break free of the constraints that bind others, and using any advantage you have to further punish your opponent.

To try and put it succinctly, In a Ameritrash game you win by controlling the board, in a Eurogame you win by understanding the game.

 

I don't know if that would change Chris mind at all about the comparison, and I haven't played enough Anno myself to say whether that's true in this case.

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The reality: You will be home alone, watching the BAFTA livestream.  You will see Jake and Sean approach, alongside the man pictured in your avatar.  As he passes, he looks into the camera and stares into your soul.

:) yeah, thats more likely. Although there's one thing wrong with it, shao kahn swallowed my soul when I was 8 years old

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I am also looking forward to being invited to the BAFTAs, and more importantly to appear on the podcast, even though no one knows who I am! I'm sure you can tell, from the single digit number of posts I have made, and my expert abilities to photoshop the word "LORD" that I am exactly the person you need to talk about video games into a microphone. 

 

I'll say "thanks", and raise my hand to the camera, just like Jake did at the VGAs :')

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The reality: You will be home alone, watching the BAFTA livestream.  You will see Jake and Sean approach, alongside the man pictured in your avatar.  As he passes, he looks into the camera and stares into your soul.

 

 tumblr_ma3wd76e6s1rz2ibto1_500.gif

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:) lol

I've gotta start using Roger Sterling reaction gif more often, why have I never thought of this! :) thank you

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