algroth

I read posted about it on the news thread a couple of weeks ago. I plan on delving deeper into it but from what little I've read I don't really agree with their views on those particular RPGs or, for another matter, some of the throwaway statements made for these without much explanation as to why they say as much. Probably the one that aggravates me the most is the weird notion that Planescape: Torment is a "JRPG cleverly disguised as a WRPG to confuse players who are too cool to play console games": it says the case "can be argued", but proceeds to give no argument as to why that could be the case or what would even be meant with that statement.

For some reason I never knew of this series until yesterday. Thanks, Chris Avellone. http://webcomicname.com/

I really liked it, but it's not a patch on Mask of the Betrayer. But still found it better overall to the main campaign and Storm of Zehir.

That's what happens when dwarves have no beards. They're like Samson, kinda.

Does having liked/enjoyed something really need justification? We all do it, but I'll never understand it. People are strange. For me it's less that taste requires *justification* and more that it's a good exercise to subject yourself to to best identify what makes a good or bad film (or anything else) for you. It's especially useful if you plan on working or delving beyond casual enjoyment in that medium, as it helps cultivate a more sophisticated eye and critical mind over what you are consuming, and in the former's case it would obviously lend itself to learning more about what makes a good piece and what you could attempt to employ for your own work. 'Justification' does sound more like you have to be able to defend your taste, and honestly it's perfectly fine to not have a reason for finding enjoyment out of something.

They are only for dialogue panes, so there was no analogue for their use in Pillars 1. This way they can give most or all npcs (I forget) a custom portrait. Then your character will have an additional one so that these dialogue panes can have a consistent style. For everything else it will be the standard detailed portrait. My one question about their presence in the game is... Will they replace the traditional portraits for characters who either have them or would normally have them (e.g. a Thaos/Iovara-type NPC)? I would certainly miss those.

Hey guys! So I'm playing through Pillars again in preparation for Deadfire, and recently I've been doing plenty of White March stuff - including, of course, investigating Durgan's Battery and learning more about the Eyeless. Now, one thing that's always made me curious is how the Eyeless are referred to by the Pargrunen as a kind of maegfolc. The word is used much like one we ought to have heard up to that point, but although we can roughly decipher what they mean through sound and context, the question nevertheless remains in my mind: who and what *exactly* were the maegfolc? The shortest and most evident answer seems to be that they're the game's term for 'giantfolk' or the likes, and that the Eyeless resembled the same either in size, strength or something else (that something else would, as far as I'm aware, be unknown based on the few info we get on them). So anyhow... I took the liberty to exploring a little more about where else they cropped up in Pillars and in other internet discussions on the matter. Mostly what I ran across were a few brief descriptions relating to items, as well as the fact that they are mentioned as some kind of rare or legendary sight in the context of one of the plays at Copperlane. Probably the most descriptive text we've found so far relates to the Maegfolc skull, which is as follows: The other text, belonging to the Girdle of Maegfolc Might, seems a lot less embellished and mysterious regarding the history or 'legend' of the maegfolc: Both of these texts seem to suggest some pretty different ideas regarding the maegfolc's role or history within Eora. The latter, for one, assumes them as a kind of creature that still exists in the present - albeit rarely seen - and presents some kind of threat to the Eastern Reach due to their strength and, more especially, their 'destructive fury'. I underline these aspects because the maegfolc skull seems to indicate something rather different: firstly, that their presence reaches all of Eora and at the very least their remains have been found throughout (initially I had assumed that the "or their remains" referred to the universal sightings of maegfolc, i.e. that the only known or credible evidence points to their remains existing and not to any living specimen having been found - but this could apply to some continents or regions and not to others); secondly that there have been such things as maegfolc civilizations, replete with cities and government structures built and led by the same; and thirdly that what little we know of them are 'rumours' or legends or possible stories opposite to concrete historical fact, beyond their actual remains. So whilst writing this text I reckon I came across the possibility on how these two texts could overlap and tell of a species that still exists but may have at a different time been *very* different to how we know them now, or at least been very different within certain regions opposite to others (like the Living Lands for example). But all the same I'll be going on a limb and proposing a bunch of ideas about them that came to mind whilst mulling about them and their role within the world of Eora. And of course you can call me a fool or accuse me of reading *way* too much into this little bit of history, so here goes... So this will be mostly fan-theorizing, so take it with a pinch of salt. Reading between the lines of what is expressed in the *first* text primarily, as well as in the use of the 'maegfolc' term in other contexts like the description of the Eyeless (and their history of course) and plays, I feel like what records there may be of their existence relates mostly to their remains and not actual kith-to-maegfolc interaction or experiences, hence also leading to them being more creatures of 'legend' and looked at with either fear or awe in turn, perfect fodder for wondrous tales within plays and poems and the likes but hardly relating to experience and actual history on their background. Which leads me to question... *Is* there any recorded history relating the maegfolc? Are there perhaps ruins that suggest the maegfolc *did* build such wondrous cities in some distant past? Or were they merely an abnormally large form of wilder, with little else that is special to them, and all other things said about them are just that, tales? The last bit could certainly prove true, but just because I like the ring of the first one better (and after all this is a fantasy setting of its own accord, where the first would not be unlikely either), I'll delve a little more on that idea. So suppose the maegfolc did exist in greater quantities in a previous era, and were responsible for building great cities and the likes. If we have no history relating to their exploits or to their own development as a culture and as a people, it could very well mean they preceeded the recorded history of kith, or even the memory of kith as such. Maybe their peak as a civilization occured as far back as the times of Engwith, or even earlier, and that is why so little records of them exist. They are not part of recorded kith history, but what if they, in some way, were an original form of kith too? So a while back I had another train of tought along these lines regarding the mechanics behind souls and the way they split and degrade over time. As far as we know, upon death souls return to the Wheel, some great pool or source of souls, and are then brought back to a new body upon the birth of a new living being; but also so as to accomodate for the ever-growing population in Eora, they split into tinier and tinier fragments, spreading further amongst the great number of living beings that require these. And there's more: based on our chats with/about Rymrgand and so on, every time the souls split a little of them is lost to entropy, so clearly the souls that harbour each new generation are weaker than the one before. So my question initially was: to what extent is the *opposite* true the further back we look in history? To what extent were souls stronger and more unified in ages past, and if we were to look back far enough, would we reach a time where souls were comprised of the strength, size and power of *several* souls in the present Eoran time, and would there ultimately be one giant singular soul at the very start that acts as a root or a common history and starting point to the history of all souls? This ties back to my thoughts on the maegfolc as follows: what if the maegfolc *were* the original kith in a time back when stronger souls either could fill up or required a stronger, larger vessel? What if they also died out as souls became too weak to sustain such a people, and thus the smaller, individually 'weaker' kith races became more sustainable in the end? Maybe this is a civilization that even predates the Engwithans and we've yet to even touch on it. Obviously this is all fairly far-fetched and it's probable that I'm just babbling on about very silly things that won't come to pass. But all the same I woke up thinking about them and I figured, why not make a post about them? And experience with fantasy settings tells me that when a certain aspect of the setting provokes mystery, it's because there usually *is* more to it. There's a few other things that could be taken into consideration too, like: maybe maegfolc as more of an umbrella term the same way 'giantfolk' or 'giantkin' would be in D&D. Maybe the Eyeless *are* a form of maegfolc, and maybe the eotens or rathun are as well. Maybe there are kinds that resemble wilder more, and others that resemble kith instead. Another interesting thing to note about the Eyeless themselves is that, upon dying, they do leave behind a bit of vessel flesh, meaning that even whilst looking like constructs there is probably some kind of flesh-based body beneath all the metal and armour. Anyhow, it's a holiday here, I had some time in the morning and this is how I decided to waste it. Any thoughts?

Not sure how to feel about that. I felt the joke was already spread rather thin at the short's full length, even as I really enjoyed the concept trailer and videoclip leading up to it.

Maybe EOTHAS IS THAOS

Uh, no. The "let's make it our own" approach, as you call it, isn't great for "making money", it's simply the natural byproduct of an artist within a different medium adapting and choosing to tell his own vision of a particular story, roster of characters and/or setting. Sometimes the changes can be informed by financial/money-making ambitions, sometimes by artistic ones. Tarkovsky didn't make his own vision of Roadside Picnic, which differed greatly from the source material, just to 'make money'. It's no different in this case. Nolan is under no obligation to portray the Batman villains as they were in the source material either, it is simply his take on them. As far as I'm concerned, with both Bane and the Joker he's made some of the most memorable comic book film villains to date too, perhaps precisely because these two were molded to fit the themes and conflicts that Nolan wanted to explore in either of his films. And mind that I don't think the Dark Knight trilogy is even amidst the half of Nolan's best work. But no doubt it is head and shoulders above pretty much the rest of the genre it's a part of.

For some reason I thought Japanese translation was among the stretched goals achieved. Seems not. Sorry to hear that, Fackman.

I think I wrote about it back when it came out. Either way, for me the sheer spectacle of it is unimpeachable, but what is arguably more impressive is the very minimalist, Bressonian element of transcendence born from survival, all told, as LadyCrimson says, through the gestures and the faces more so than through the dialogues, the backstories or what have you. Nolan does a stunning job in this at capturing certain moments in the event in a way that seem to break through the very realist pretentions of register and straight into the fantastic or magical realist, in feel if not necessarily in actuality. Case in point, Hardy's gliding plane towards the end of the film. Obviously as far as emotional response goes, something can either strike a chord with you or not, and it's hard to really convey that across to someone who got nothing out of the same; yet as far as I'm concerned it's still the best film I've seen from 2017, and one of Nolan's finest for certain. Personally I thoroughly agree with Zacharek's take on it: http://time.com/4864051/dunkirk-review/ Also, as is often the case with Nolan's films, I still admire the heck out of someone at the top of the Hollywood industry who is so persistent in including references to Borges in just about every one of his works. The Dark Knight is essentially an adaptation of Theme of the Traitor and the Hero, Interstellar's tesseract is pretty much the libraries of Babel, heck, Borges' short story compilation Labyrinths is clearly displayed in this film as well. Mazes, apocryphal diaries, dreams within dreams and narratives within narratives all abound his films. And whether he has seen it or not, it is amusing how 'the enemy' as depicted in Dunkirk, a faceless threat that seems always to exist at the edge of the screen yet is made all the more eerie and unreachable for it, clearly resembles the approach of the same in the Borges and Bioy Casares-penned Invasión, in my book the finest Argentine film to date (and also made by Robert Bresson assistant director Hugo Santiago, so as to even arrive to a full circle).

Fooling around with Google translate, a friend of mine found this little gem...

That makes him even better in my eyes!

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/johann-johannsson-visionary-composer-behind-sicario-dies-at-48-1083619 This is shocking, and truly sad. Johann Johannsson was one of the most interesting and promising score composers at the present time. This is a huge loss, and at a relatively young age too. R.I.P.

Pillars was full of thick American accents, which is not too surprising considering the Dyrwood seems to mirror USA in several ways too. But I do agree that it was often jarring, and took me right off the setting and world. I also feel like the whole "Dyrwood = USA" excuse runs a little thin when the likes of Maneha, who's meant to be from Rauatai and who arguably spent most of her life in Old Vailia and the Deadfire, has such a thick southern drawl - the voice acting feels a bit half-assed and lazy in turn (in all fairness, her whole character's a bit of a mess, like she's being pulled in too many directions at once). And she's not the only non-Dyrwood American either - amidst our companions we can also take a look at Sagani, but unlike Maneha her accent seems a tad more neutral and thus I don't mind it as much. Then again, I do have a general prejudice against American accents, so I see how that feeds into my distaste for their presence in Pillars.

Grimoires can't be edited in Deadfire, if I'm not mistaken.

What is Iselmyr ain't there? I guess not matter what, Aloth found time to bulk. Probably because of the long cast times. Had to compensate elsewhere for the spellcaster nerfs.

He kind of looks like Agent Smith.... or better yet, Elrond. So like Sand? Actually he reminds me of the orcs from the WarCraft film, mostly for what Aramintai mentioned.

I'm not really in agreement here - to me the better X-Men films are still the most interesting by quite some margin within the Marvel catalogue, and still the saga with the most potential amidst their projects. Most recently Days of Future Past and Logan were excellent, and Legion was thoroughly brilliant. And as for DC, Nolan's films are in the superhero movie pantheon for a very good reason, they're definitely something of their very own. The only other superhero film I would place at a similar level is probably Hellboy II: The Golden Army. But all thoughts on each individual film aside, Suicide Squad may have at some point been going for a grittier, darker tone but the end result was much more colourful, hyperstylized and schizophrenic, with every element on the screen fighting for your attention. The use of colour filters seemed to reflect on this sort of acid, kaleidoscopic aesthetic they ended up going with. From that teaser at least, Venom seems to be taking a far more standard and conventional approach which is more along the lines of "moody" and "realist" (at least as far as a comic book movie about some alien symbiotic goo can be), with largely cold and desaturated colours, as well as an aesthetic that seems to me to strive for invisibility, save for that very opening shot. What it resembles far more are the likes of the aforementioned Fant4stic or, for a slightly less unfortunate comparison, The Amazing Spider-Man, than it does any of the more stylized films in the genre.

Aloth's model is rather long-faced, isn't it? A bit weird, but it looks alright. Better than the David Hemmigs-browed model for the first Pillars anyways.

I'm not seeing the Suicide Squad connection, which is for the best since that's one of the worst films in recent years.