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An interesting demonstration of how Finns take the war in Ukraine very seriously: there was a general election on Sunday, and nearly all representatives who had demonstrated hesitation or unwillingness to join NATO lost their place. Definitely not surprising, in my view.

i just clicked on one video, i swear I will have to live with it for next week or so.. not that I mind it...

I cant get enough of this Russian outrage and as the tweet says " Putin is a master strategist who pushed a neutral country into joining NATO "

I think I rage quit ME3 when the second dream sequence started. I will never return to that series. In retrospect my opinion of the game has worsened even more, not helped by the defenders who claim "only the ending is bad". No, the beginning is just as bad, as is the middle, and everything else. The Mass Effect series parallels the the Rambo movies quite neatly, come to think of it. The high concept vanishes pretty much immediately after the first title. That's being too kind to ME3 though. It doesn't just lose the original point, it twists back on itself and delivers the exact opposite message it originally attempted to convey. _____ As for the others, I don't recall much of KoTOR, no strong feelings about it either way. I suspect that's because it's wedged awkwardly between my fondness (at the time) for BG2 and my general dislike of Star Wars. Never played JE.

I buy it for the spring loaded spout on the bottle

Master Li! Man, I love Jade Empire. I wish we would get a decent sequel to it - a action-RPG fantasy kung-fu could be so fun. The whole time I was playing through Lo Wong, all I could think is Jade Empire2. I thought the flaw twist was really well done in JE2

Enemies 'winning' in cutscenes having been splattered in gameplay is a bit of a Bioware tradition, see the first encounter with Malak in K1. Hmm, and while I've expurgated most of the game from my memory I'm pretty sure the same thing happens in Jade Empire too, via your 'flaw', though at least that is a more creative and well set up way to deal with it than 'u lose lol'. It's just that Malak (and I can't even remember who the JE main bad guy is except he used to be your mentor) is merely a boring antagonist as opposed to K** L*** who is a charisma singularity that makes everything associated with him worse and worse and worse. Sometimes I even wonder if he's actually a good antagonist he generates such a negative response, but having your playerbase want to take a drill to their frontal cortex in the hope of hitting the bit containing memories of KL is not really ideal, they might hit their memories of Jade Empire instead. OTOH, it's a less annoying fight than Letho v1 in TWitcher2 which is a legitimately difficult fight, that you then... lose by cutscene. Ho hum. On a completely different tack, I am here to spread the Good News about Terraformers. Every once in a while I hit an indie game bought on a whim that makes the money spent on mediocre ones or ones that don't quite work worthwhile; and Terraformers is that game. Just perfectly crafted to my tastes. Basically just a really simple colonise/ terraform Mars tile game, but much like Chess or Go the simple systems result in a whole heap of underlying complexity. 100% unequivocal recommendation to anyone who likes turn based strategy (and, just to be equivocal, doesn't mind there being no (e)X(terminate) in their 4X, and some potential RNG unfairness).

Sure thing! Original by Inar-of-Shilmista Originally by Couple of Kooks I thought I'd seen the watercolors linked in a later post/thread but can't find it. So did a quick conversion.

I very much doubt the footsloggers will survive much longer.

So I just killed Belranga and headed to Ukaizo, went through the forced rest, lost my boons, was sad, rested with consoled food in prep for practicing guardian fight, and saw this new boon: Shattering Screech: +5 Perception, 50% of Grazes converted to Hits Hmm. Sounds like "aware" but it looks permanent. I've never seen this before and couldn't find anything about it in wiki or googling it. I did "findgamedata shattering_screech" and it appears to be one of Belranga's abilities. Not initially sure how I picked it up. My character is a transcendent. Actually let's see...Belranga was surprisingly difficult this time because I have a couple mods installed (BPM and Deadly Deadfire), the second of which greatly increases Belranga's starting stats and I'm already on POTD upscaled. So by the time you kill enough little spiders so you can actually hit her, she crits every single attack because she's starting like 50 points higher than she's meant to. Deadly Deadfire Hardcore is like POTD upscaled upscaled, the monsters keep leveling up to like 8 levels beyond you. Anyway... So the strategy I settled on was stick Vela in starting corner, sneak to northeast corner, use enduring dance, then summon dichotomous souls over and over while staying as out of range, poking stray spiders with instruments of pain, until Belranga's will is around 150, then I start hitting her with Tenuous Grasp so she kills the spiders faster, once will is around 120 I debuff her with tenuous grasp and psychovampiric shield, then hit with pupper master. While dominated you can still beat her to death. So I'm guessing she used this ability while dominated, from the search results it looks like it's the one that gives her 4 stacks of concentration and makes the spiders "aware", but it isn't listed as "aware" for me though the stats are the same, and I didn't get the other stuff like concentration. I've seen this happen before with other enemy abilities, like the eoten chanters in Bekarna's Observatory, whose chants land on you if you flip them, but those chants are temporary unless you extend them. Shattering Screech appears to be permanent. Didn't even go away while resting. Anyone else run into this? I wonder what other abilities get erroneously transferred to the player character on alliance flip. I don't use the charm abilities much so there could be a lot of them. ------ It actually isn't permanent lol, I just assumed it was because it had no expiration, but it is treated as an inspiration like anything else. I guess if you wear Effigys Husk (incidentally the armor I am wearing) then it is permanent, though I have "Armor of Flesh" and not "Eyes of Blackstone".

Nope.

That was supposedly the slogan written on the messhall wall of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment ("Blackhorse") standing watch at the Fulda Gap in West Germany during the Cold War: Average lifespan of a Blackhorse cavalryman in WWIII: 45 seconds

Might not be so bad if you're in a Western tank, have all that shiny armour and APS.

I wouldnt want to be a tanker in WW III. Lifespan measured in hours or days.

I have always supported them in several things since 1994. These include the role they played during Codesa and the negotiations to create the new SA they respect the Constitution and the rule of law and order they are committed to ending corruption and transforming the economy they dont support radical left policies like the EFF they believe in partnerships between the private sector and public sector they recognize the importance of a free media they believe in an independent judiciary I can go on and on but I dont support many of there foreign policy decisions and positions they take

It isn't really appreciation for Russia that informs RSA's position, it's that the ANC really doesn't like the west at all because while we may have been quite loud shouting how reprehensible apartheid was we were busy supporting them, practically, because at least they weren't red. Hence their regime only collapsing once the Cold War was over and they weren't needed any more. Plus really petty crap like Mandela being on a US terrorist watch list until, lol, 2008. As for Bruce... well, maybe majestic will grace you with his Bruce.txt if you ask nicely. Suffice it to say that the only thing Bruce has ever approved of the ANC doing was Cyril Ramaphosa- now President- ordering the police to machine gun strikers at a mine he owned. That, Bruce loved.

By "well established" you mean they did a twist in BG1? Fortunately for me, I played BG2 before BG1, so I completely didn't see the twist coming for KOTOR. I was rather lukewarm on the game before that happened. For JE, I think twist works for the character we play. Flaw and "Great Strategist" did raise red flags for me as a player, but as long as it is not obvious to the character I tend to be onboard. I saw JE twist as a narrative payoff, rather than trick on the player, and in my book it is the best twist one can have.

Decided I wanted my giant, shorter-height-than-typical, office desk back (that I'll never find anything like it again) vs. tossing it, so we took it apart and lugged it in this room and put it back together (it would not fit hallway/doorway otherwise). Spent most of today shifting everything around to make it the centerpiece of the room again, with the smaller table hubby made to the side. So I'm now exhausted, but I like it much better/am happier.

I'm dealing with the same issue, and after quite a bit of research....this seems to be an ongoing problem for many. I've opened a ticket with Obsidian, I'll let you know if they help me find a resolution.

I picked it, but I don't think it was the game's fault per se. On the meta side Bioware was completely in their M Night Shylamalan phase with the plot twists for one- Melissan--> Aribeth--> Revan* for their previous three games- and in game they laid it on a bit thick with people observing that your technique had something wrong with it as well, especially since JE was not a long game so you tended to get those observations close together. It was a lot better done than the average Bioware twist was though. OTOH by that point I was heartily sick of the repetitive Bioware trope NPCs and wanted something a bit more than martial arts kotor with Wuxia veneer and SW stuff excised so JE is far from my favourite even among Bioware games. *heh, the Bioware twist was so well established by then that after the first dream sequence in Kotor I restarted with a character named... Darth Revan. Which lead to some funny dialogue later.

Wartales comes out on April 12th. I'm already playing it and enjoying all of the new stuff, but I'll probably restart when 1.0 drops. It's like Battle Brothers with legs, although it has more storyline and is less sandboxy. It's a pretty fantastic turn based combat RPG and well worth the money.

Yep, that dude. About fighting in MEs - I really liked it in ME1. Adept was super fun, tech stuff not so much, but had its uses, guns were kinda samey but did what I wanted them to do, i.e. I pointed them at dudes and they eventually died. I didn't have to sit crouched behind a chest-high wall all the time, running and gunning was very much doable, and inventory has nothing on the mess of, say, Pathfinder games. ME2 turned biotic and tech powers non-viable, like, you can't kill anything but husks with them, and overturned ME's fantastic idea of not having to bother with goddamn ammo. Scrounging for those motherloving clips is the worst and most boring part of already boring pew-pew fest, also if you are playing a sniper you run out real fast and then sit behind the stupid wall pew-pewing outta reliable but boring SMG. Vanguard was fun though. ME3 did away with chores of running around for ammo by having it scattered everywhere and brought back tech/biotic powers with extra oomph in the form of fun combos. I loved that. As for the story, it seems to me that ME was written by someone who loved science fiction and read books; ME2's writer was into neither, but obviously liked pulpy cop and crime shows, and ME3's team wanted a JRPG - like, your character has no agency anymore and is on rails so tight you're told not just what to do but how to feel, everyone is overly dramatic, NPCs make you look stupid in conversations and cutscenes, also get to win in cutscenes after you beat them in game, the last boss rambles forever at you while you can't skip or fast forward and the game pushes Liara as your designated girlfriend real hard. It even explains Kai Leng!

It's my staple virgin oil I sometimes get the less strongly flavoured variant, but mostly I get the one below

Wasn't Kai Leng the random dude who mailed "haha i beat you" after you kicked his ass

Worst part of ME1 is the loot progression. Swapping your gun every 100m for the same gun in a different color with +1 better stats is NOT fun. Especially not in that terrible inventory.

@Gorth we viewed the newish jacques pépin video we linked in the youtube algorithm thread and it occurred to us we did not recognize the brand o' olive oil he uses. is noteworthy monsieur pépin, while not hard up for cash, is rare splurging on exotic and overpriced ingredients when doing his home cooking. he uses mccormick spices, mazzola corn oil, and generic grocery store brand beans. unpretentious. am mentioning 'cause we didn't immediate recognize the brand o' extra virgin olive oil he uses. https://cobramestate.com.au/ or https://www.cobramestate.com/ not sooper expensive regardless if is ca or australia. we tagged gorth for this 'cause is likely he is gonna have ez access to cobram australia olive oil. we didn't start using costco for anything but gasoline until the pandemic, but am admitted a limited convert to the warehouse grocery culture and one item we do not hesitate to purchase is the kirkland brand 2l italian extra virgin olive oil. in spite o' the low cost am having no qualms 'bout the quality. even so, am gonna at least try cobram the next time we run low on olive oil. HA! Good Fun!

If we do hot takes on ME trilogy, than here is mine. ME1 is my favourite one. I like the slow pacing and buildup, and worldbuilding is easily the best in the series. It was the only game in the trilogy when I felt like Shepard was part of the world. Combat, however, is absolutely ****e. I love RPGs, but I hate bad action RPGs, and Mass Effect1 suffers from being a bad RPG and bad action game. As such, even though not my favourite, I see Mass Effect2 as the best of the series. As far as gameplay goes it does what ME1 did well better, and ditches the bad bits. The only thing I am not sure about, is swapping Mako levels for planet scanning - both are a shade of bad, but Mako gave the world gorundeness and scope, while ME2 feels rather small by comparison. And as goofy as Mako was, I always enjoy those bits in ME1. Story wise, I actually think it is pretty strong, especially being a middle child of the trilogy. I loved it when it first came out, but I have more complaints now. I don't think any of it is bad, but it could be better. I don't quite know why Shepard was killed - just feels like an unnecessary thing you need to suspect your disbelief for. Illusive Man is awesome in ME2, but our interaction with him aren't particulary interesting. NPCs are the strongest in the trilogy, and Suicide Mission is actually a pretty cool thing to revolve your game around. ME3 is bad. Combat would be it's saving grace, but I still it is not good enough to carry the game. I won't claim it is not better than ME1&2, but that's like Andromeda having best vehicle control. Sure, but that's not really what carries the experience. My issues with combat in ME3 are mostly little details - animations looking off, running looks like you pooed your pants, and I remember being very annoying with to many actions being tied to one button. I think sticking to cover was also rolling, or something like that and it just didn't work with a more mobility that game demanded. Story of course, was pretty bad. ME3 is pretty much Throne of Bhaal to me, except it went step a further and at the end made previous installments worse, rather than wrapping them up nicely.

I watched the new Dungeons and Dragons movie and thought it was excellent. Feels like it did a good job of pandering to hardcore fans while not alienating newcomers, too.

Deus Ex was a documentary all along.

I don't know if these should be properly labelled as historical ironies, but they can be ugly and cringeworthy indeed. I mean, I'm sure I don't have to tell you anything about the extent to which it was the west that nourished radical Islam and all that, up to and including Bin Laden. I suppose a position of moral superiority can only be attributed to a country that has been so insignificant that it hasn't been able to participate in any truly atrocious actions -- but it would have, had it been able to. So. History is ugly. Here's a claim that I think is almost certainly true: Adolf Hitler's anti-semitism saved the world. If it hadn't been for that, the nazis would've had the bomb in 1942-1943 and that would have meant kaboom; just look at who were involved in the Manhattan Project and where they came from. (Interestingly, Einstein pointed this out already in the 1930s -- not the bomb thing but the fact that Hitler is doing himself an enormous disservice by forcing Jewish scientists into exile.)

I finally played a handful of hours of Elden Ring. There was only one good hair option for my character, but one good hair option is better than no good hair options. The gameplay is...Dark Souls III crossed with Breath of the Wild, except way clunkier and jankier. Which is to say it feels decidedly mediocre and I think I got my fill already. Okay, now that that's forever out of the way, Bloodborne on PC, please and thank you. I would alternatively accept someone making a working PS4 emulator.