Idle Thumbs 154: Super Good

[Salacious Snake]

During my time at Ubisoft Montreal years back, Yannis Mallat (CEO of ubisoft montreal) had an open door policy and would take the time to meet with any employee that wanted to talk, even just to pop in and say "Hi". Also, he came and addressed each and every employee to wish them a happy holidays during Christmas, which I haven't seen any CEO ever do.

 

Black Flags conceptual set up is hilarious, but I'm pretty sure it's in the spirit of Ubisofts culture more than anything, so it's not that far from being totally unrealistic.

This is super great. Assassin's Creed IV: Accurate Ubisoft Simulator.

[Twig]

I honestly think they could get away with just having some diplomacy and quest texts refer to i) the three most powerful nations on Old Earth, ii) the dominant religion, and iii) the type of victory won by the player. I think the ability to import a save from a previous game and have it acknowledged in any way is more important to nine out of ten players than the way it's acknowledged. I mean, frankly, every Crusader Kings II save I've imported into Europa Universalis IV has not been remotely as interesting as the default scenario, usually because I'm "winning" the former game by a ludicrous margin, but it's the pleasure of seeing that empire rendered with a different engine and systems that actually matters to me.

Yeah that's what I meant by the first line in my post, but I figured why not go a little further into hypothesis-land.

[Problem Machine]

I get "Nos intendo quaerentis frustrationem." Which I think is pretty close to "We intend to seek frustration."

I like that on a casual or careless reading this at first appears to say something involving Nintendo. I think that adds a layer of frustration. Well done.

 

The other thing that is sort of related but also completely different is that the Idle Thumbs hosts never shove their opinions down your throat. They almost always make it a point of saying, "But it's fine if other people are into that", which I really appreciate because I disagree enough that it would bother me otherwise. Other podcasts would just expound on the suckiness or greatness of this or that without even pretending that they might just have a differing opinion.

I really appreciate when people can manage to gain a certain amount of critical distance like this. I enjoy the content (LP and criticism) that Northernlion puts out precisely because he tries to see the best in every game, while fully acknowledging and stating outright whether he personally enjoys it. I see a lot of comments on his videos complaining that he isn't harsh enough on 'bad' games, but it makes me sad and sick to see people tear apart games that people spent years of their life on for the sake of a few cheap laughs. It's sad that this is such a rare commodity in humorous games criticism. Then again, mean criticism is always the easiest and most popular, so it's not like games are unique in that regard.

[Badfinger]

Started to say that something today was Super Cool. Stopped. Reconsidered. Said it was super cool anyway.

[SecretAsianMan]

I said super good a lot before I started listening to the podcast so my usage hasn't really changed that much.  On the other hand, I say "best" and "worst" a lot more.

[Bjorn]

I'm pretty sure the podcast added the word Gross to my vocabulary as a general, one-word reaction to things I find distasteful. 

[Gormongous]

I say "best" and "worst" now because of the podcast. I say "super" a bit more too, but I like how this episode has added the extra cognitive step where I start to say something is "super" something, then stop to think if maybe "very" is the better word to use, then choose which works best.

[SecretAsianMan]

I'm pretty sure the podcast added the word Gross to my vocabulary as a general, one-word reaction to things I find distasteful. 

 

Also this.

[TychoCelchuuu]

I say Congrats Nick a lot more than I think I otherwise would have.

[TychoCelchuuu]

Not out loud though.

[Merus]

This is super great. Assassin's Creed IV: Accurate Ubisoft Simulator.

 

My favourite bit about the Abstergo content is where Ubisoft are clearly snickering behind their hands at how terrible Abstergo is, with the social media policy and the leave only available after 12 months and the figurines instead of bonuses, but then it's an attractive office with lots of space and bosses that are supportive of your efforts and plenty of room to recharge. It's very curious to see how the institutional blindness manifests itself.

[electricblue]

My favourite bit about the Abstergo content is where Ubisoft are clearly snickering behind their hands at how terrible Abstergo is, with the social media policy and the leave only available after 12 months and the figurines instead of bonuses, but then it's an attractive office with lots of space and bosses that are supportive of your efforts and plenty of room to recharge. It's very curious to see how the institutional blindness manifests itself.

 

I couldn't tell how much of that is just satire of the AAA game development culture in general and how much of it was critical of Ubisoft in particular (and maybe that was the aim, to keep that a little vague). Obviously certain elements are a dead giveaway, such as the CEO and assistant using french and english interchangeably and the ultra subtle jabs at uplay, but what about the management taking the super good Kenway story and turning it into a by-the-numbers pirate adventure called Devils of the Caribbean or computer security being laughably lax or IT people being saboteurs. How much of that is what they think of Ubisoft and how much is just "wouldn't it be funny if..."

[pabosher]

I said super good a lot before I started listening to the podcast so my usage hasn't really changed that much.  On the other hand, I say "best" and "worst" a lot more.

 

This is undoubtedly true for me, and I have definitely infected friends with it.

[mikemariano]

Chris being invited to a bar via Twitter and then being shown a video game prototype on someone's phone sounds like a scene from a William Gibson novel.

 

And it looks like that guy is Jason Schreiber.  Check out that bio!

[Badfinger]

My favourite bit about the Abstergo content is where Ubisoft are clearly snickering behind their hands at how terrible Abstergo is, with the social media policy and the leave only available after 12 months and the figurines instead of bonuses, but then it's an attractive office with lots of space and bosses that are supportive of your efforts and plenty of room to recharge. It's very curious to see how the institutional blindness manifests itself.

 

The bosses thing I think is to show that they're not in on the Abstergo craziness; that they're on the up and up.

 

The amazing office has to be mostly a concession to gameplay. Shitty temporary tables schlepped together and cubicles would be a nightmare to navigate. Purposely poor lighting would look bad, and there aren't good ways to show not tell poor ventilation.

 

Plus there's the whole weird essentially prison wing of the building.

[dibs]

We aim to frustrate.

 

I stopped listening to Player1 (i think) podcast because they got some details on Civ 4 wrong. At least you guys have the decency to preface, postface and intraface each of your utterances which "i don't know, maybe i'm misremembering". They just used toddle into 15 minute discussions based on things which were entirely mistaken. My trust in them as mouthpieces took a nosedive after that, and it never recovered.

 

Also, christ, if you are going to talk about food do it properly! Describe the stuff. I still don't know if Mandarin Garlic Peas taste like tiny oranges mixed with garlic, or some exotic oriental spicing.

[Salacious Snake]

Chris being invited to a bar via Twitter and then being shown a video game prototype on someone's phone sounds like a scene from a William Gibson novel.

 

And it looks like that guy is Jason Schreiber.  Check out that bio!

Wow, he has paid his dues.

[Nappi]

Chris being invited to a bar via Twitter and then being shown a video game prototype on someone's phone sounds like a scene from a William Gibson novel.

 

Yes! I know exactly what you mean. 

[Stuart]

Paid his super dues.

[Merus]

I'm surprised that no-one noticed that Google's suggested use of their drone technology was to build a sky Net.