Jake

Idle Thumbs 99: "I'm Blown Away"

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So if F. Nick is now working at Telltale does that mean he's going to appearing regularly?

I assume that is what "and I'm Nick Breckon" means. We'll know his true status if his name is ever added to the new(-ish) hosts page.

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Ah, it's good to know all the small maddening things in SimCity are not just my brain messing with me.  I am both addicted and extremely fustrated with the game, good to know I'm not the only one!

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AW man. I was hoping the file size was indicative of the episode length, and then just totally had my expectations crushed when Winamp said it's just 82 minutes.

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Chris, the sewage treatment plants will replenish the water table around them in SimCity with clean water, so if you have the water pumping station next to them you'll never really run out. It's usually the first thing I build towards after learning about that, department of utilities at the first town hall upgrade for the high end sewage / water buildings because water becomes a such a pain in the ass as the population grows.

 

I also thought I read somewhere that rain is supposed to put some water back into the ground, but I haven't seen any rain since the beta. Or perhaps I imagined that and there is no rain at all in this game. I swear there was rain before release, though. Not crazy. And it probably goes without saying, but so much of the little stuff is frustrating to me as well. I haven't really played in days because so many things were broken or appeared to be broken, and on top of that it started rolling back my cities resulting in hours of lost progress. I want to wait for more patches and for Maxis to re-enable all the features that are still disabled, but I'm not sure that will be enough by then. Will just have to wait and see. 

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Holy crap Pyide, I never thought of doing that with the sewage treatment plants.  *high five*

 

Never seen rain either, you're not crazy dude.

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On dota rage, sometimes it can be funny when the person is just losing it. Had a russian guy FLIP out on me for taking a rune he seemed to not want. He screamed at me in mic, first in english, then about a minute straight in russian. At the end he just yelled "MCDONALDS, COCA COLA!" I died laughing.

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Wrapping up on the last few minutes of the podcast still but I wanted to note this.

 

I was playing SimCity 4 while listening (how appropriate), and I just got my first skyscraper. Not just for this one city I've been playing, I mean out of all the times I've played the game (which is very off and on over the last couple years). And hearing you guys talk about the new SimCity has me thinking that it sounds pretty effortless, that you cannot 'fail,' that you will always be rewarded with a big bustlin' city. Meanwhile in SC4 this is like the 50th city I've started ever (fifth in this region I'm playing) and I really had to work at it. Maybe I'm just bad at the game. But I'd rather have it the hard way than just handed to me.

 

That's tip toeing toward some 'casual vs. hardcore' video game player crap which isn't my intent.

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By the way, the LOMA discussion about competitiveness, I'm very much of the same sort of mindset that Jake is with those games. Competitiveness in video games is not new. When I ran around in Counter-Strike ten years ago, if I fucked up I wasn't getting chewed out like this game was the main event. There were exhibition matches (which was playing whenever) and then clan matches that were very regulated on who could play and spectate. People were able to parse out the competitive behavior from playing for the sake of playing. In DotA and LoL there is a heavy atmosphere where every match is a competitive match (and I mean the negative kind of competitive). Why didn't these communities foster an establishment with exhibition matches and clan matches?

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Great episode, I really needed this tonight. I've had a rough couple days and needed the distraction and laughs. 

By the way, the LOMA discussion about competitiveness, I'm very much of the same sort of mindset that Jake is with those games. Competitiveness in video games is not new. When I ran around in Counter-Strike ten years ago, if I fucked up I wasn't getting chewed out like this game was the main event. There were exhibition matches (which was playing whenever) and then clan matches that were very regulated on who could play and spectate. People were able to parse out the competitive behavior from playing for the sake of playing. In DotA and LoL there is a heavy atmosphere where every match is a competitive match (and I mean the negative kind of competitive). Why didn't these communities foster an establishment with exhibition matches and clan matches?

The thing is that in CS one player could screw up and the rest of the team could easily make up for it. In a LOMA one person's simple mistake can cost everyone the match. Also, a round of CS is 2 minutes a LOMA round is closer to 30.

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I would definitely put Super Monday Night Combat in the LOMA category. It's DOTA/LoL with 3rd person controls and a little TF2 mixed in. I played the hell out of it early on in beta but the community died shortly after release. 

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They made a console DOTA rip off with LotR Guardians of Middle-earth, came out a few months ago, not sure how successful it was. Videos

 

Also i just signed up to a beta for Ascend: New Gods, a console free to play rpg thing. To be honest i don't even know what the game is, i should find out... it actually looks more like WoW then DoTA

Anyway, knock yourself out if you're interested: ascendgame.com/beta/

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Great episode, I really needed this tonight. I've had a rough couple days and needed the distraction and laughs. 

The thing is that in CS one player could screw up and the rest of the team could easily make up for it. In a LOMA one person's simple mistake can cost everyone the match. Also, a round of CS is 2 minutes a LOMA round is closer to 30.

I'm not sure how I feel about this. People don't sit down with CS, hear the first "Counter Terrorists win" announcement in 2 minutes, and go, "Ah, that was a nice session of Counter-Strike!" and walk away. They sit down and continually engage it over and over. The rounds in Counter-Strike are akin to each outing from your base in LOMAs, only the latter lacks any formalized returning of everyone to their home for a few seconds to regroup and try again. It would be better to draw the comparison to map changing after whatever parameters are in place on a CS server (be it by rounds won or timer). And sure, even then CS still ultimately adds up to overall less time invested, but again I never really saw people join for a map's worth of play and bow out. Two, three maps, then out.

 

At any rate, the point about team play may be the case here, in which case I fault the very nature of the design of LOMAs. Which is something I'd hate to do because then the awful behavior of people online was created by the developers, whether it was their intention or not.

 

I'd rather say people are at fault for their own behavior within a culture. Even with a more team-centric play system in LOMAs, it didn't have to come with, to quote Jake to his dismay probably, "SHUTTHEFUCKUPGAGAGAGAGA."

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Oh, well shit, listening to the discussion again Sean actually flat out says there's something mechanical about the game that makes people what they are when playing it.

 

I really, really disagree. I think people are managing frustration with loss, even casually, way too poorly.

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They made a console DOTA rip off with LotR Guardians of Middle-earth, came out a few months ago, not sure how successful it was. Videos

Haven't played it myself but I heard it works pretty well.

This game is actually the topic of the GDC talk they mentioned, I think they may have just missed the description.

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Oh, well shit, listening to the discussion again Sean actually flat out says there's something mechanical about the game that makes people what they are when playing it.

 

I really, really disagree. I think people are managing frustration with loss, even casually, way too poorly.

I really think it's just that a simple mistake can mean so much more in a LOMA. Me buying the wrong gun in round 2 of a CS match isn't gonna fuck me a couple rounds later. Making a simple mistake early on in DOTA can fuck you later on.

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Cs was the total opposite back in the day. You didn't get screamed at for doing bad, you got screamed at for doing too good. People accused each other of hacking every other minute in that game back in hl1. I can't comment on today though, I haven't played cs since then.

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I really think it's just that a simple mistake can mean so much more in a LOMA. Me buying the wrong gun in round 2 of a CS match isn't gonna fuck me a couple rounds later. Making a simple mistake early on in DOTA can fuck you later on.

Yeah, this. The cost of just walking into the wrong place for 10 seconds is so high that people are going to intrinsically be on edge. It demands a unified level of play across an entire team/server that is uncommon. I think it's really cool that gaming has that in LOMAs, as it is really unique. It's just hard on my personality. I like high level competitive play a lot, but I usually need a formalized learning curve (which I know is coming) or a big group of friends (which I have and am willingly ignoring like a cool) to get there.

Maybe Dota needs formalized Little League. Not just ranked servers, which is common, but specifically set up loa rank servers for people who are there to have fun and learn while competing, with coaches, high level players who willingly sign up to play on lower ranked servers and be identified out on your team via unique ui specifically to teach. Maybe that would be the worst? Maybe someone's already tried that?

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Maybe Dota needs formalized Little League.

 

I would say that Nintendo could do that easily by making a Pokemon LoMa, but I'm not sure if Mystery Dungeon players have "graduated" on to other Rogue-likes.  Even Roguelike Radio went out of its way to not talk about Pokemon when discussing Mystery Dungeon.

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Every time you guys talk about LOMAs, my brain just goes "this must be what it's like to not play Pokémon." I love it.

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Yeah, this. The cost of just walking into the wrong place for 10 seconds is so high that people are going to intrinsically be on edge. It demands a unified level of play across an entire team/server that is uncommon. I think it's really cool that gaming has that in LOMAs, as it is really unique. It's just hard on my personality. I like high level competitive play a lot, but I usually need a formalized learning curve (which I know is coming) or a big group of friends (which I have and am willingly ignoring like a cool) to get there.

Maybe Dota needs formalized Little League. Not just ranked servers, which is common, but specifically set up loa rank servers for people who are there to have fun and learn while competing, with coaches, high level players who willingly sign up to play on lower ranked servers and be identified out on your team via unique ui specifically to teach. Maybe that would be the worst? Maybe someone's already tried that?

That's a totally fair point about what a mistake could mean down the line. But how that mistake is communicated and handled is in what's in question here. I don't mind tight team coordination being a path of success, but that should be the mark of a great team. When it becomes the barrier of entry to a game I have a real big problem with it. People are essentially demanding others play in specific manners. I don't jive with that at all.

 

In the few guilds I'd been a part of in WoW, they all had more relaxed approaches to the end-game - you play however you want, all the guild cared about was you doing it well and being an asset when needed. I don't bring that up to compare the gameplay of WoW to LOMAs, I'm trying to compare the approach people have with newer players or players who may not be that invested in success. Which isn't to say people aren't interested in success, but does it really require the coordinated dance that LOMA players seem to demand? It's like there's an unspoken, "Why are you playing this if you don't care as much as I do" when it comes to the shit I see/hear people say to others when playing these games.

 

Also throwaway joke: LOMAs are less of a sport and more of ballet.

 

I have a question for Sean - you told Jake that the behavior isn't about picking on others, it's an aggressive communication. It kinda bothered me when you said that because you made it sound like it's the norm and completely acceptable. The question is, does it have to be aggressive? Which is a silly question but I'm asking it to maybe get some perspective about your own investment in the game. You recognize you're starting to bite into the negative behavior that surrounds these games, and instead of questioning it by any means you seemed to be justifying it.

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Thats so funny to hear them talk about their changing opinion of Simcity. I got really swept along and excited listening to the thumbs episode with the simcity beta

 

If anyone's behind on the episodes and have just finished listening to that one today they will have instantly purchased the game and are now probably buying copies for all their family and friends

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Honestly, that snowball effect is why a lot of racing games will have rubber-band AI. Could there be a more forgiving DOTA/LoMa that still allows for the micro but isn't always balanced on a blade's edge? Or at least, something where mistakes will end a game more quickly, rather than trying to hold out and see if the other side makes a counteracting mistake of their own?

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