alanschu

Not game dev, but I did get a laugh out of this story: https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1563667-boxer-curtis-woodhouse-tracks-down-twitter-troll-shows-up-at-his-house

People do change for sure. Although I think it's actually, sadly, not entirely accurate that it's the 12 year olds that get all petulant. I fully bet that many of them are in their 20s and beyond. I'm 32 and can still be a twit!

Nice, I was curious if it was an eccentric contraction or not. Those always seemed to be murder (but hella effective) when I tried them. It's interesting because some research has shown that eccentric contractions can be good for muscle fiber alignment (at least, unless it's been debunked since 2008 ). I was struggling with a pulled hamstring rehab for a long time, and the physiotherapist put me on some light weight, eccentric leg curls, and the progress was almost immediate. Very fast results.

This is my general mentality when on a place like BSN, as much to encourage thoughtful discussion rather than outright hating/fanboying. But there are days I epically fail. I did it recently on this forum actually, now that I think about it, which led to rather entertaining results

In BG1 I got a role with my paladin that let me go 18 in everything, with 3 intelligence. I did just that, and while the mindflayers are certainly a more challenging part of the game because of the low intellect, I didn't find the game all that challenging.

Nope! I actually have very high expectations for this game, relatively speaking. Obsidian games and I have a definite synergy, and I tend to like what they deliver. I wouldn't be surprised if this game ends up being one that fits right up there with games like BG2 and PST for myself, in terms of how much I enjoy it. I tend to agree with a lot of Josh's design ideas, looking back at other games. And the team's writing has always been something I have really enjoyed. I wouldn't be surprised if this is the game I enjoy most out of the first wave of all the kickstarters, up to and including Torment 2.

I'm certainly not disputing the strength of your hamstrings. More just putting forth that different exercises will work things in a different way and there could be biomechanical predispositions to doing an exercise like that effectively. It's not an exercise I would likely ever do because I would probably require knee pads in order to do them. In terms of leverage, I was actually more thinking overall height (a 6'8" man with broad shoulders is going to need much stronger hamstrings than a 5'3" ectomorph), and in terms of core strength, I was more just meaning that despite the motion being similar to fairly vanilla leg curl, you'll still be doing that on top of keep your core/glutes/shoulders tight in order to keep your body fairly rigid, so it'll be a lot more taxing than a standard leg curl. I see no problem with attempting the exercise, but I wouldn't take it as a personal sleight if you struggle with it. Does that type of curl have a more specific name? Admittedly I am years past most of my active working out, but I'm curious if literature has anything to say about it.

I wonder if this is an advantage of the condensed message length. Someone wanting to dump some rage is going to have to split it off and deal with additional inconvenience (and I could potentially block you before you have even said it all). How much anger and vitriol can one *really* get in 140 characters? It likely wouldn't be done real time, but some level of reporting and enforcement could still be done. Certainly moreso than now (which is little, if any, as far as I know). It'd require work and telemetry, however. I have heard ideas that people that are frequently muted could come into games automuted and other stuff that is less overtly invasive, as well as more punitive measures such as tracking those that receive numerous complaints and analyzing their games (with an observer or otherwise) to determine type of behaviour. A user's history would be a large factor. I'm sure there are other ways as well.

Well, the hamstrings will mostly just be stabilizers on a squat, whereas that exercise is going to be a lot of focus (and isolation) on the hamstrings. Couple in some punitive leverage (which will be accented the bigger your upper body is), I'm not too surprised that it's a hell of a workout. Even looking past the hamstring aspect, to do it safely is still going to require a lot of core strength to keep everything straight.

I actually prefer the wired controller as it's easier to move it to the PC when necessary.

I'm not sure. In following someone like Mike Laidlaw or David Gaider, I still see plenty of happy/excitable posts from fans on their twitters. I think there's a degree of enthusiasm as well, when a developer actively tweets something a fan did (I know an author that squee'd when she found out BioWare loved her E3 reaction video). BSN has the reputation of being quite toxic (especially in response to the last two games BioWare Edmonton released). I don't think Obsidian is quite as bad, although I think Obsidian is not nearly as active. A place like RPG Codex I don't even venture into. In general, I'd say the overwhelming response to ME3's ending on BSN was a LOT of outrage. I would not say the same for the responses I saw to people like Merizan on Twitter. I found it much, much easier to see supportive comments towards the ending there than on BSN. (Though I haven't really broken down the numbers at all). To me, it made me wonder if different types of people frequented forums compared to twitter, and also if there's a degree of isolation (ironically) with twitter, in that you can clearly reply directly to the developer, and then just disengage after you said your piece. I agree that this is an issue. I'd like to see software/hardware developers take better steps to improving this in a proactive way.

RoboCop!

I'd dispute that the monarchy is a product of the people. The legacy of the monarchy, and the feudal system in general, is closer to that of a landlord IMO. The taxes could be construed as rent.

Served the public trust. Protected the innocent. Upheld the law.

How do forums differ from something like twitter? My default action on the forums when I am angry is to disengage, regardless (it explains my breaks on even this forum from time to time). I actually think more diverse groups and types of fandom interact with content creators via social media than they do with forums. Forums are still for the decidedly hardcore, IMO. You have to integrate more directly with the whole culture (which may suffer from Group Think) of the board. On twitter, I can literally reply directly to the content creator without much filters and it's pretty easy for him or her to see said response. I actually just shared a brief exchange with Jake Solomon. It can be hard keeping track of all the responses to a post of mine on the BSN, or even this forum. On the part of both sides, really.

Certainly could have been more cutting. "Whatever, ****ing moron" is pretty weak. If I recall, Hepler's initial responses were a bit more directly antagonistic, although highly criticized at a lot of places where I saw, as it started to play on stereotypes of many male gamers and was basically seen by many as an insulting remark towards gamers in general. It definitely led to a defensive response and further antagonism in general. In this case, defending oneself may have led to further scrutiny, to the point where the option left was "remove myself from social media" (which I think is bad for developer-customer interaction).

Yeah, as a person I can understand Aaryn's response. If I had seen the situation unraveling live, I can't say I wouldn't have responded similarly. Having said that, it certainly added more fuel to the fire, especially in the eyes of those that feed off the reaction (who then try to egg on further responses). I have to admit that while 90% of me or so goes "Whoa police, you went way too far" with the kid that went to a jail for his comments after a LOL game, there was like 10% skoodenfroody because of it. (I find LOL, due to its sheer size, has no shortage of people that make me want to finish work on my internet punching device....)

For the target, equal abuse back, I'd say. I don't know. I have been snappy back to people that I think are being unreasonable. Sometimes it may be like "Oh that Allan guy is pretty witty" but other times I'm sure it comes across as "That's kind of a **** response.... That Allan guy shouldn't let people get to him." I'd probably be more inclined to agree with Amentep, in that validating the attacking by responding could very well be counterproductive. Feeding the trolls and all that. Having said that, as an observer I do find Rockstar's responses to be quite entertaining sometimes XD.

This was my (perhaps not so surprising) epiphany right after the Kickstarter* came out. There was large consensus from people that "we need more RPGs like Baldur's Gate!" for a long time now. The problem is, however, that there is not a consensus over what aspects of those games are essential. At the time, they still appealed to different people for different reasons. I think nostalgia convinced a lot of people that "we all love those games. Therefore someone making one like it would make us ALL happy" EDIT: Said "game" instead of "kickstarter"

Agreed. Forums often become insular because of this. It's more just an example of self-policing, less so as to whether or not it's holistically only appropriate self-policing. I actually prefer people to just say "You made bad decisions that I think were wrong." I definitely have my trigger points (I hate being called lazy) and I try to understand that when someone says I'm lazy, they are probably more meaning "You made a bad decision that I think was wrong." It's a degree of shaming, which I definitely feel can be used very inappropriately and it can be unproductive. I do agree, however, if it's "FYAD" versus "This was dumb" that's different.

I notice this in more than just gaming (I saw some articles about geek culture as well, and how people can be VERY exclusive in their views with things like cosplay = consent type stuff, and fake geek girl), but this article I came across is in response to some balance changes in Black Ops 2. http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/07/24/httpwww-pcgamer-com20130724cod-developer-receives-death-threats-following-blops-2-gun-tweaksutm_sourcetwutm_mediumemputm_campaignuk/ Basically, you get some level of death threats because of some game balance. Now, I think it's reasonable safe to assume that the threat isn't genuine, and might even just be someone trolling up a storm. I think there's undoubtedly some level of "well that's the internet for you" but, to me it does seem that there's a bit more outspokenness about these types of things (extending beyond just gaming). I've been told I need to have a thicker skin (especially when I first got started) as it comes with the territory of being a dev. I think I have gotten better, although still have my moments where I get snappy and jaded. At the same time, is it all only on me? I remember being told that my Mom should have aborted me so that DAO would have had some competent QA. I gave him points for creativity.... I never have agreed with the idea of "it's the internet, not much you can do about it" although admittedly had zero clue what could be done to do about it. In the geek culture article I read, they had suggested the idea that frankly, the culture needs to self-police more aggressively. It's probably the best way to do so, so maybe calling out "these guys are being stupid" helps paint a light? Does it just make the devs seem like whiners? Should he just "suck it up?" (If so, why? Note, I *will* follow up with further questions if someone does feel this way) I think forums tend to self-police relatively well. They tend to have a hegemony that will push out overly contrary posts, doubly so if they are hostile.

I can probably pass on the Mass Effect one if I can get a more solid source

The problem is that, in my opinion, fans are better served NOT trying to come up with business cases why a developer should or should not do something. Most times I find it undermines the argument as people demonstrate only a cursory level of understanding, and that that understanding is in large part founded on assumptions. I try not to fault people, though, since I remember making all the same arguments myself back in the day, and on a high level there's still some validity to a lot of them. It's much more useful for the feedback to be "This is what I like, and why" or "This is what I didn't like, and why" as opposed to "this is why you should do thing I like instead of thing I like less, because of <business reasons I may or may not fully appreciate>"

I don't consider the analogy perfect (although I do agree it likely brought in more money). I had no expectation that the game would be a perfect mirror when they harkened back to the IE days in their pitch. I was looking at scale and scope of their times. Explicitly calling the game Torment places a lot more expectations on a game than "I want to make a game inspired by Torment." for someone such as myself. Given that "this is not what my imagination told me I was promised" appears to be an epidemic across some online groups, on some level I'd still say yes. I accept full responsibility that Fargo billing his game "Torment" got my money (and on some level I actually do regret it). This is the fun part. I see little that has convinced me that this isn't still a close approximation.

Are prostitute scandals even scandals nowadays?