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Any gamers around here?

Started by Agramon, June 21, 2013, 02:55:17 AM

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Baruch

#3045
Quote from: Mike Cl on March 21, 2019, 09:18:50 AM
True.  And lately, rarely does he give us his actual feelings or thoughts.  He likes to be what he considers clever.  I think he has been blinded by his personal hatred--much like a spurned lover, he now hates what used to be his great love--democrats, Hillary, Obama and it even seems to have spilled over into a hatred of humanity in general.  Instead of spreading joy and appreciation for anything, he spreads hate, dread and a general put-down of life in general.

We live in a septic tank.  I don't see any reason to be cheerful, watching the biggest chunks in society floating to the top ... not that I hate chunks ... they don't have volition.  I may not be inter-sectionalized ... but I am inter-crapified.

Yes, if Hillary and Obama (I voted for him remember, but stay with me) weren't human, it would be easier to hate them.  They are human, so bad humans are a good reason to hate humanity (at least part of the time).  I didn't vote for Trump, and still wouldn't.  I don't hate Obama, I just don't messiah him.  I do hate Hillary (when running for office).  To even put those two in the same category, is racist (sarc).  I will not be voting ever, for the offspring of the Marquis De Sade.

Sometimes I give my actual feelings and thoughts, but I don't clearly mark them.  I sometimes mark jokes and sarcasm, but not always.  Given my life experience (which includes empathy for people worse off than I am ... I did used to be a Democrat) I see no reason to be up-lifting.  I would have to take illegal drugs to do that ;-)  I do care for human beings, one at a time.  Collectively we are nasty.  See that reaction to the Catholic MAGA boy ...

BTW - MikeCL ... did you bother with the 3.5 hours of Ehrman?  Right up your ally (and mine).  When I find something interesting, I share.

Sorry to respond to something that didn't belong in this string.
Ha’át’íísh baa naniná?
Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
Táadoo ánít’iní.
What are you doing?
Are you taking any medications?
Don't do that.

Baruch

Quote from: Cavebear on March 21, 2019, 04:17:57 AM
Baruch loves to do the either/or argument.  In his black and white world, he sees no grey...

This is fight club.  Put down that cheese-in-a-can you fairy.
Ha’át’íísh baa naniná?
Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
Táadoo ánít’iní.
What are you doing?
Are you taking any medications?
Don't do that.

Blackleaf

Quote from: SoldierofFortune on March 21, 2019, 06:53:50 PM
If the game IRL were saved in 60s
lets start all over there as a flower child.
did you save there? ahahhah

I didn't roll my character until the dusk of the 80's. The 90's were a weird time for IRL.
"Oh, wearisome condition of humanity,
Born under one law, to another bound;
Vainly begot, and yet forbidden vanity,
Created sick, commanded to be sound."
--Fulke Greville--

Munch

#3048
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdOng1N158E&t=925s

This.. game. I don't think I've in all the years I've been playing games (since the 80s) seen something that disgusted me so much in this genre.

This thing is the combination of everything shallow and vapid greedy executives want to use to make money from a product, without putting anything of substance in it, and the saddest thing, its worked.
When I hear how my 6 and 9 year old nephews are allowed to play it, I lose all humanly faith in my brother for letting them.

I believe even if a game is designed by a company today is made with things like microtransactions as part of it, that you can still find something memorable in the storytelling and world building. Asura's Wrath was one that demanded you to pay out to unlock most of its content, but despite that the story and narrative was amazing.

This however, its so blatantly cash grab, so shallow in its execution, and is marketed to children who are drawn in by the shallow aspects of it without any depth, which makes kids want their parents to buy buy buy more points in it to buy more costumes and shit, money that could go to better things like going to the cinema to watch a movie or any other game with a meaningful story.

Even when I was a kid, things like saturday morning cartoons were made with much of an expectation to market it to sell toys, things like transformers and thundercats. But in there, they contained stories and characters you could get invested in.

Fortnite is born from the shallow and empty extension of corporate greed and low expectations pushed into the undeveloped minds of children. I think this is cancerous to them, instead of giving them something of substance, its just feeding their lizard brains the same way kids want to eat sweets all day every day. 
'Political correctness is fascism pretending to be manners' - George Carlin

Mr.Obvious

I'd forgotton THE fun that MTg arena could be.
"If we have to go down, we go down together!"
- Your mum, last night, requesting 69.

Atheist Mantis does not pray.

Cavebear

Quote from: Munch on March 22, 2019, 11:00:03 AM
This.. game. I don't think I've in all the years I've been playing games (since the 80s) seen something that disgusted me so much in this genre.

This thing is the combination of everything shallow and vapid greedy executives want to use to make money from a product, without putting anything of substance in it, and the saddest thing, its worked.
When I hear how my 6 and 9 year old nephews are allowed to play it, I lose all humanly faith in my brother for letting them.

I believe even if a game is designed by a company today is made with things like microtransactions as part of it, that you can still find something memorable in the storytelling and world building. Asura's Wrath was one that demanded you to pay out to unlock most of its content, but despite that the story and narrative was amazing.

This however, its so blatantly cash grab, so shallow in its execution, and is marketed to children who are drawn in by the shallow aspects of it without any depth, which makes kids want their parents to buy buy buy more points in it to buy more costumes and shit, money that could go to better things like going to the cinema to watch a movie or any other game with a meaningful story.

Even when I was a kid, things like saturday morning cartoons were made with much of an expectation to market it to sell toys, things like transformers and thundercats. But in there, they contained stories and characters you could get invested in.

Fortnite is born from the shallow and empty extension of corporate greed and low expectations pushed into the undeveloped minds of children. I think this is cancerous to them, instead of giving them something of substance, its just feeding their lizard brains the same way kids want to eat sweets all day every day.

Well, hopefully, the players will see that there is no benefit to living life like that game. 
Atheist born, atheist bred.  And when I die, atheist dead!

Hydra009

#3051
Quote from: Munch on March 22, 2019, 11:00:03 AM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdOng1N158E&t=925s
Summary of video criticisms:

1) Fortnite is stuffed to the gills with microtransactions for cosmetic skins and other virtual items
2) Fortnite has no story
3) Fortnite is marketed to kids

All three are correct and there are plenty of other guilty parties.

1) Any EA game is stuffed to the gills with microtransactions.  Hell, look at Fallout 76.  You have some paint jobs that run you like $20 as well as virtual items that give a gameplay advantage.  Other games also have lockboxes, which are essentially a legal form of gambling.  Fortnite is bad, but it's definitely not even close to the worst offender.
2) Online shooters like Counter Strike, Call of Duty, Battlefield, and Team Fortress also have little to no story.  That's also the norm for fighting and racing games. 
3) Guilty without a doubt and yeah, that chicken man skin is stupid and cheesy, but I dunno kids really eat up stupid and cheesy stuff.

I mean, I love Rocket League and it's not all that different from Fortnite's model - free to play with paid skins and no story, just different gameplay modes that you play either with bots or with other human players, and aggressive marketing to certain demographics.

I don't see a logically consistent argument for concluding that one is morally wrong and the other is not.  Perhaps popularity really is the deciding factor here.

Hydra009

Also, I want to be super clear on what "scamming" is, because the above video tosses it around all over the place when it really shouldn't be.

When you go on, I dunno, Amazon and buy a Pokemon t-shirt and receive the Pokemon t-shirt that you ordered, that is not scam.
If you get a rock instead and neither the seller nor Amazon will refund you, that is a scam.

Very, very important distinction here.  Just because you pay for something you didn't like or later think was overpriced, that doesn't make it a scam.  It makes it a very unwise purchase.  And yes, the very low age of the buyer definitely makes this an unsavory business practice, but it's not fraud.

Munch

Quote from: Hydra009 on March 25, 2019, 12:45:17 PM
Also, I want to be super clear on what "scamming" is, because the above video tosses it around all over the place when it really shouldn't be.

When you go on, I dunno, Amazon and buy a Pokemon t-shirt and receive the Pokemon t-shirt that you ordered, that is not scam.
If you get a rock instead and neither the seller nor Amazon will refund you, that is a scam.

Very, very important distinction here.  Just because you pay for something you didn't like or later think was overpriced, that doesn't make it a scam.  It makes it a very unwise purchase.  And yes, the very low age of the buyer definitely makes this an unsavory business practice, but it's not fraud.

perhaps he does overuse it, but its more just highlighting a problem in children and these kind of features. When I was a kid, getting a game meant you'd have everything you'd need, just the game, you plug it in and play it. Today, more so when just needing a subscription to games, the devs want to milk as much from people as they can, and when the product they are advertising to children being a game that does milk you for all its worth, this results in thousends to maybe millions of kids across the globe whining to their parents to buy them skins for this game.
And the returns in this, is just shallow junk food for the brain. They aren't getting anything more out of it between a coke or sugar fix for 10 minutes before needing it again.
And on top of that, its a game that demands constant attention, they can't just pause and put it down, they have to stay fixated on it.

so putting all that together, unless the parents are highly strong willed in disciplining their kids to not play this kind of thing for very long, your have kids developing addiction early on.

And I don't want to sound like a prude saying this, I'm an uncle and this kind of shit concerns me about seeing my nephews wanting to play this crap. I'm just thankful their parents only let them play on a heavily monitored play of it, while making sure they get off and do other stuff in their day.
'Political correctness is fascism pretending to be manners' - George Carlin

Blackleaf

#3054
Quote from: Hydra009 on March 25, 2019, 12:22:17 PM
Summary of video criticisms:

1) Fortnite is stuffed to the gills with microtransactions for cosmetic skins and other virtual items
2) Fortnite has no story
3) Fortnite is marked to kids

All three are correct and there are plenty of other guilty parties.

1) Any EA game is stuffed to the gills with microtransactions.  Hell, look at Fallout 76.  You have some paint jobs that run you like $20 as well as virtual items that give a gameplay advantage.  Other games also have lockboxes, which are essentially a legal form of gambling.  Fortnite is bad, but it's definitely not even close to the worst offender.
2) Online shooters like Counter Strike, Call of Duty, Battlefield, and Team Fortress also have little to no story.  That's also the norm for fighting and racing games. 
3) Guilty without a doubt and yeah, that chicken man skin is stupid and cheesy, but I dunno kids really eat up stupid and cheesy stuff.

I mean, I love Rocket League and it's not all that different from Fortnite's model - free to play with paid skins and no story, just different gameplay modes that you play either with bots or with other human players, and aggressive marketing to certain demographics.

I don't see a logically consistent argument for concluding that one is morally wrong and the other is not.  Perhaps popularity really is the deciding factor here.

Fortnite actually does have a story, as I understand it. It's just that no one really cared about the story. Most players never touched the story, but would rather play the multiplayer, so it didn't have as much priority with the developers as they original planned to give it. As for the microtransactions, I'd gladly accept cosmetic items for sale in a free-to-play game, which grant no advantages in gameplay. That way, people who just want to give it a shot can play it for free, while more devoted players can opt for optional stuff. I prefer that over a developer charging full price for the game, then charging extra for those items. EA can go fuck off with that shit.
"Oh, wearisome condition of humanity,
Born under one law, to another bound;
Vainly begot, and yet forbidden vanity,
Created sick, commanded to be sound."
--Fulke Greville--

Cavebear

#3055
OK, here is a game bummer.  I've been slowly regaining my Civ2 skills and have won my last 3 games by getting to Alpha Centuri.  But you can also win by eliminating the oppnents militarily. 

That's not my style, but I decided to try it tonight.  And I'm on a F***ing ISLAND!  It just figures...  I can't get AT anyone until I build ships and my advances weren't going in that direction.  I'll be going to Civ2 after being here to work on that problem.

Edited to correct embarrassing spelling and to add details...
Atheist born, atheist bred.  And when I die, atheist dead!

GrinningYMIR

Try to play long war-crashes on startup
Delete and reinstall- Virus blows my computer to kingdom come

Can’t win
"Human history is a litany of blood shed over differing ideals of rulership and afterlife"<br /><br />Governor of the 32nd Province of the New Lunar Republic. Luna Nobis Custodit

Hydra009

#3057
ATTENTION ALL CITIZENS OF THE EMPIRE

MORROWIND IS FREE to download this weekend on the official Bethesda site.  It requires the Bethesda launcher, but meh, free is free.

Be there or be a filthly n'wah.

Objection 1:  I've never heard of Morrowind.  What a stupid name.  This game sounds dumb.

Answer:  Shut your mouth, s'wit!  Morrowind is the grandfather of open-world RPGs.  It is the very foundation for almost everything Bethesda has made since and it has been incredibly influential among other RPGs.  It had fully 3D terrain and models, day-night cycles, a calendar, weather, flying/swimming/walking mobs, a faction system, customizable magic, a varied and detailed continent, and lore like you wouldn't believe.  In short, a highly ambitious open world that very nearly seems to have a life of its own and nearly endless lore that delves deep into philosophy, politics, history, and religion.  Read but a single tome and you may never look at the sun and the stars the same way again.

Objection 2:  This game sounds super old.  I bet it looks terrible now.

Answer:  You'd be surprised.  It has a strong modding community that has continually revamped and expanded on the original content.  Suffice it to say that it's never looked better.

HAIL NEREVARINE AND HORTATOR, HERO OF AGES PAST AND HERO YET TO BE.  HAIL DREAMER, WHO SLUMBERS STILL.  BEFORE YOU STRETCHES DAWN'S BEAUTY, THE ARENA.  GO FORTH ON WHATEVER ROAD YOU CHOOSE, AND KNOW THAT WE ARE WATCHING.  GO FORTH AND FIND WHATEVER TRUTH SEARCHES FOR YOU.

THE ENDING OF THE WORDS IS ALMSIVI

Blackleaf

#3058
I already own two copies of Morrowind. I got all five main games in a collection, plus Skyrim: Special Edition for free during that period they offered it to PC players who already had Skyrim.

Also, if anyone who hasn't tried Morrowind before decides to give it a try, one question you'll probably have after the first five minutes is, "Why do my attacks keep missing? Am I doing something wrong?" Unlike the later games in the series, Morrowind still retains classic RPG mechanics. That includes rolls for accuracy, dodges, blocks, etc. When you're first starting off, you're going to be missing a lot. However, if you stick with one weapon type, your accuracy will improve. At level 50, you'll pretty much be hitting 100% of the time.

Another thing that is different about Morrowind is that it doesn't scale to your level. I personally prefer it that way, because scaling just makes it feel like I'm not making any progress, but it's a matter of preference. If you wander into a difficult dungeon and get your ass handed to you, just leave and come back at a higher level. Also, don't even touch the DLC until you've finished the main quest. If you go into them right away like you might in Skyrim, you're going to have a bad time.

One more thing, if the Cliffracers get on your nerves, there's a very popular mod that removes them. Skyrim actually referenced that mod with Saint Jiub, who singlehandedly killed every cliffracer on Vaardenfell (the island mass portion of Morrowind the game takes place on). Which means, it's not really cheating. It's canon. lol
"Oh, wearisome condition of humanity,
Born under one law, to another bound;
Vainly begot, and yet forbidden vanity,
Created sick, commanded to be sound."
--Fulke Greville--

Hydra009

Cliffracers are kinda fun, since there's constantly a threat literally loomng over you.  Not so fun during escort missions.  :(

Also, the questng system doesn't hold your hand.  Someone will tell you to clear out a bandit nest SW of Balmora and you're doing to have to figure out exactly where that is for yourself.  (It's intentionally vague so that you explore your surroundings more)

That and be careful who you kill.  You absolutely can botch the main quest.

And feel free to ask the natives plenty of questions, you never know what you'll find out.  But some topics will anger them.  Know your audience.