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One of the primary reasons I continue to be drawn to Obsidian Entertainment, reaching back to the days of Black Isle, has been its commitment to great storytelling. This has been a quality that I believe has and continues to set it apart in the creative venture to tells stories through the gaming medium. I would like to delve into their artistic storytelling by highlighting just three examples that display their unique approach to narrative design. For me, I was hooked by their stories back in 1990s. When I discovered the stylised ‘isometric’ game of Fallout. It illustrated to me the importance to establish a foundation for narrative depth and complexity. In these early days, I believe Fallout telegraphed this hallmark of Obsidian's later works. The game's post-apocalyptic setting, moral dilemmas, and branching storylines captured my attention to the extent that much sleep was lost and it set my expectation quite high for storytelling in video games. And it all began with a water chip … Though the post-apocalyptic genre has always captured my geeky imagination, it has always been the fantasy medium to which I have been drawn. Some of the first books I dove into, as I discovered the power of the written words, were Tolkien’s and the vastness of Middle Earth. As I shared this passion with so many, Obsidian’s first foray into the genre, particularly through Gary Gygax’ D&D worlds, from Icewind Dale to Neverwinter nights, was amazing, but Obsidian’s ability to create its own IP was when they went to the next level. For me, the evolution of Obsidian has been their ability to create immersive worlds that come alive in dynamic ways. At the launch of the first Kickstarter for Pillars of Eternity, I knew that something amazing was happening in the maturation of the company’s ability to weave tales. The dedication to illustrating rich and detailed environments had me lost for hours. The world of Eora, which I believe will be further expanded in Avowed, exposed me to a living, breathing world with its own history, cultures, and conflicts. The depth of the lore and the complexity of the characters means my choices unfolded in meaningful and engaging ways. Beyond just the first title in the franchise, with Deadfire it was clear to me that my choices had consequences. This is a recurring theme in Obsidian's games, where my agency as a player is paramount. The storylines are often not linear path, but they present multiple divergent paths that lead to different outcomes. This approach not only offers opportunity to replay (if one had the time!) but it allowed me to feel like I was the agent helping the story unfold. Deadfire’s narrative, as an example of Obsidian’s narrative commitments, was further enriched by its well-written dialogue and memorable characters. The last example that I will touch on in this blog is the storytelling that shines in The Outer Worlds. If Fallout was post-apocalyptic, this recent addition to their creative library involves a journey through a dystopic future where the rich and autocratic corporations’ rule and individual freedom is intentionally oppressed. The story unfolds with satire on capitalistic greed. The satire presents a story that unfolds with a nimble wit and dark humour, which I believe is an essential component of Obsidian’s taletelling. As with their other stories, I felt I could become the Stranger. The character offered me a blank slate that allowed me to become the Stranger as I realised my choices would affect the fate of entire colonies, need alone my companions in dramatic ways. The writing is clever and thought-provoking, with plenty of twists and turns that kept me up much too late far too often! Let me conclude this musing, by focusing on Parvati’s Companion Quest. This component of Obsidian’s storytelling is what hooks me every time. Their ability to weave storytelling to liberate the player to see more widely through an artistic medium allows me to commit to the outcome of the story. Parvati’s relationship with Junlei is rich, human, and inspires me to see outside of the box. It allowed me to feel like I was hanging out with Kaylee from Firefly, recognising that in this dystopic future, love endures. The human connexion and emotion this questline evokes are profound, standing as a powerful challenge to the very real-life struggles we face outside the immersion of great gameplay. If a creative story can stir our hearts and show us options that translate into how we might aspire to be better human beings to one another, then those are the games I will passionately continue to play. And that is the true power of storytelling that I continue to experience from Obsidian after over twenty-years of my relationship with them.

Well I've been kept fairly busy the last few months. Pretty much constantly required in the actual office, which is added fun to dealing with the house and my father's things. The majority of watch and clock stuff is now off to the auction house. Spent a chunk of one day over the christmas break taking up carpets from a few rooms in the house. But that whole combination of elements has been why I haven't really been lurking around the forums or doing my usual constant updates of the funnythings thread. Today has been about the.. 4th? work from home day I've had since September, and I had to spend about an hour and a half on the phone with the tax people because they sent me a note that my father owed taxes for last year. The tax folk were really nice and helpful, and it looks like its a paperwork screw-up from the pension companies filing wrong stuff. But it means I do need to schedule in more phone time chasing up other people. Huzzah. Hope you folks are all finding the journey into the New Year welcoming and non-disturbing.

I dropped out of that at the early 2000s already tbh. Prior I changed GPUs and CPUs like Al Bundy never changed his pants. Since then, well let's say that in the past twenty years, I'd spend less than 1,000 EUR on GPUs. I've been a mid settings gamer since (and have stopped played the majority of blockbuster games anyway). Indy is nice on high to max even on the RTX 3060 though -- with Pathtracing disabled, naturally. But hey, Nvidia have just promised the 5070 would be able to render as many frames as the 4090* (*with DLSS4). So who knows what the 5060 is capable of.

SpaceX to launch Starship megarocket's Flight 7 test mission on Jan. 13 | Space

Not news, but I found it hilarious watching him run around manhandling all the displayed gpu's, commenting on physical appearance/designs. Kept thinking "don't drop them!" And ... even as a 2-slot, 50xx gen is ofc huge - but the aftermarket ones even moreso. If I were to get a 5090, I'd want the FE if I could still get it when I wanted to buy - wouldn't care re: any OC and not keen on bigger size and bigger price, lol.

Mexico’s president calls for parts of US to be renamed ‘Mexican America’

Thaos is a great villain. He is menacing and mysterious, and he has a personal connection to the player character. It's the sort of nemesis that Deadfire is missing a bit. I guess Deadfire went for a bit less traditional storytelling, but I don't really remember any antagonist from Deadfire that quite has the same impact as Thaos. Not even Nemnok. Sorry, little fellow.

No need for me. The only two new games scheduled for 2025/6 which are of interest to me, is Awoved and the Outer Worlds. And for that my 16GB 6900XT (to which I’ve upgraded after 8 yearsof playing on GT760) is more than enough. For everything else, there is always GOG

Will tell my Ukrainian neighbour that.

Frame generation is hilarious to me: you get fake frames that make the visuals seem smoother but actually introduce input lag and make the game noticeably feel and perform worse despite the artificial smoothness. It's brilliant, except that it's total garbage, but hey, at least a bunch of dummies get fooled by it and think their games are better with than without it. Perhaps even more comical is that as the higher visual fidelity that 3D graphics are able to achieve, it inversely becomes easier and easier to notice that animations simply aren't able to keep up. Nothing like pumping all the pixels and ray tracing in the world into models, textures, and lighting, only to be immediately let down by forever wonky animation work that make the whole effort seem hardly worth the bother.

Had pretty nice day today at Dark Souls 2. The fight, which I was most afraid of (Gank Squad) has been victorious on my first try (solo). I have not anticipated that at all, so I had not prepared for anything else to fight against . So after few minutes I have decided to go for Darklurker as well. To my surprise, I was able to defeat him on a second try Another big surprise for me Soo I have decided to go solo against Burnt Ivory King as well Of course this was much bigger obstacle, but still in the end, I had like 5 or 6 tries to win the fight Out of them, I was able to get to the boss fight only three time, and as this was my first ever solo encounter against him, I had to learn his moves as well. Compared to anything before, he was not very difficult so on third try, I already knew how to avoid most of his moves. Aaaand even though I have messed up the last attempt as well, I was still able to find openings to heal up and finish him off So, now every single boss I have ever encountered in DS2, has been defeated solo. The worst one will be for me forever Lud and Zala duo at the Frigid Outskirts, which almost caused me to quit the DLC altogether. YAY... No just to finish the NG+ and go through few more fights to get all of the items and then last three spells for Platinum Trophy EDIT: just one more useless info, I had some time in previous sessions to grind for all of required Loyce Souls to get two more Armour Sets and one more Weapon, which have been locked behind the "paywall". 50 loyce souls and a victory over the Burnt Ivory King were needed to get them.

It's 100% the bus. They're more expensive size wise (relatively; and they get hotter) as the process size shrinks so there's always a push to keep them as small as possible and it's not trivial to change on the fly either. If you have a 192 bit bus the options come in 6GB slices or you end up with something like the 970 with it's 3.5 fast 0.5 slow configuration; you cannot change it to 256 bit. You probably could change it to 128, but that would be slower, and for no purpose.