Bartimaeus

Playing Europa Universalis 4 ruined the Total War series for forever for me. The RTS bits - which are completely optional: the turn-based strategic map part is really the main focus of the game - are literally the only attraction left for the Total War games for me (as EU4 does not bother with it)...and Rome II: Total War demonstrated that Creative Assembly (the dev) still isn't able to handle even that competently even after over a decade of trying to get it right, so forget about it. And the overall strategic map part, while having a few points of interest, is so painfully inferior in general to EU4's, that I just can't go back to it. *shrug* I'm saying this even though I hate the Renaissance (EU4) and love the Medieval and Antiquity (Medieval/Rome) time periods - probably something to do with Antiquity marking the beginning of the Roman Age (really roughly - Antiquity really actually goes a bit further back, especially when considering the Roman's Republic relative power throughout the first half of it) and the Renaissance marking the end of it.

I'm not sure I saw a single thing I was even moderately interested in. I'm not very in tune with the current gaming industry, I guess. Things I have a passing interest in but am not really expecting to like or really care about in time: 1. Dark Souls 3, because though I rather liked 1, I thought 2 was absolutely awful and it was virtually unplayable even after many, many hours of trying to like it. 2. Mirror's Edge Catalyst: I just have zero faith in EA-anything these days. This is probably the game that I have the best shot at actually liking, though. 3. The Pillars of Eternity expansion: I sunk 60 hours into trying to like PoE, but I just couldn't: am hoping that an expansion makes it...not so bad, but I'm not expecting much if J.E. Sawyer and his design philosophy remain at the helm...and the loss of MCA, one of my favorite writers, doesn't help any, either. Nothing else. Like I said, not feeling much for the current gaming industry. (e): I lied: I also have a passing interest in the new Hitman, but again, I'm not really expecting much. Maybe this is all just my annual crippling summer depression talking, though. I'm officially ready for winter!

I had previously heard he hadn't had such a great time since the Phantom Menace...guess here's more proof.

I don't know what this video is

So...ideally, we should have a more positive narrative/environment for women developers, which means that this positivity, even if it's ignoring the actual facts of the situation, could actually be good. On the other hand, it's these same people who are now celebrating this - that things have gotten better as a result of their "efforts" - who are the ones that have been actually pushing the narrative that the industry is not welcoming...and who are now reversing their positions, even though things don't really look that much different at all. What a perplexing (and perhaps paradoxical?) situation.

Just curious...do you know of any specific examples where the traditional family structure has broken down and has had clear adverse effects as a result? I would think if something like that happens, there's usually a whole bunch of other terrible crap going on at the same time.

I don't see why we're getting so stuck on her race: so what if she identified as black? I'll admit that transracialism sounds pretty silly to me, but if she identified as being more of the black ethnicity/culture than not, so what? Does it really matter that much? Isn't it some of her other craziness that we should be more concerned about?

"The Weird, Random, or and Interesting Things[...]" Isn't it more likely that kids just *seem* to get more and more obnoxious each generation...because you're getting older?

That's what we keep trying to tell you. All a matter of perspective, Bruce.

If you do it, be sure to bring back those photos for us.

This might sound stupid, but...when I was younger (about ten or so) and playing TES: Oblivion, I was always a bit miffed that you could often see the galaxy at night in game. For the longest time, I thought it was completely whack: never understood why in the world they would have such a patently unrealistic detail...just for the sake of having a pretty looking night sky? How silly! Took me many years to realize...yeah, it is actually possible to see the Milky Way in such a manner...I just haven't ever been anywhere even close to where it could happen, and there seems to be an ever-decreasing amount of places where it's possible.

Would they be wrong?

Outsourcing jobs is, in my opinion, a much more multi-facted issue than a lot of people would like to believe...there are winners and losers regardless of which side you take. Then again, I think that's true about most issues in general. Are you a horrible person for not caring? That's for you to decide, I think.

"In Turnabout, Disney Cancels Tech Worker Layoffs" http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/17/us/in-turnabout-disney-cancels-tech-worker-layoffs.html

Whatever you believe to be the lesser of two evils is still evil and when they start escalating their actions soon it won't be worth it. Please don't try to frame my words in support of your beliefs whatever they may be, when I make broad sweeping statements they are meant for all. Whoa, whoa, I was just trying to ask a question, because I wasn't sure what kind of radicals you were talking about...I assumed that the kind of people frequenting /r/fatpeoplehate (because they're about as anti-PC as you can get, I would think...) would be included in your theory. Personally, I would prefer if the subs had never been banned at all...but they (and some others like them, including other NSFW subs) were permanently disbarred from ever showing up on the front page. The reddit situation went way too far, in my opinion.

Clarification, Orogun...radicals like those you'd find in the recently banned reddit subs (with one in particular in mind), for example?

Sorry can you just tell me your reasons, I really don't feel like going back to read previous posts Because if the game is being designed as having both options...it's pointlessly limiting and serves practically no benefit to force one choice...unless they redesign the game around the new lack of a gender choice and actually have playing a female character mean something...because if the game is being designed around having the choice of choosing either, they're not going to develop any meaningful content around what is essentially an arbitrary choice made at character creation - nevermind that these types of games don't usually have strong characterization for protagonists to begin with, and I doubt they could write an intriguing/decent main character, regardless of gender, even if they tried. This is frustrating to me, because gender (and other things like it, including something as simple as height), are actually pretty important distinctions (or at least they CAN be important distinctions) in most other mediums (and life!)...and because of the costly nature of game development, these sorts of choices that you make as a player will never truly matter if you're being allowed to actually make them. I'll admit that I don't fully understand what Anita's reasons for this are, because she doesn't state them. If her reasons are the same as mine, then by all means, go ahead and have only a female character...but my reasons are just as good of an argument for having only a male character, so I don't think they are her reasons. I am presuming her reasons are something more along the lines of, "There aren't enough strong female protagonists in the gaming industry...and I think there should be more. Therefore, I'm going to pick on a game that is allowing both options for some inexplicable reason!"...and while I can agree with the first sentence, I just don't understand the rationale behind the second, so I can't do the same for it.

I've always wondered about your typing style and why you were always so true to it...not even oby could be so perfectly consistent. This is also about the best possible explanation I can imagine for it. I admire your dedication and general person even more now.

As I said before, for the reasons presumably implied by Anita, I definitely would. I don't think Shady said he would have a problem with "only having a female character": he said he has a preference. These are not equitable.

That's definitely a better counter article than the one I linked earlier.

Purchased AudioSurf 2 on Steam. I have several hundred hours in AudioSurf 1, and was expecting to like AudioSurf 2. I don't. Seems like the game is worst in every conceivable way that matters while improving on or adding things I don't care about. I'll be giving it another hour tomorrow, but if I still can't stand it by then, I'll likely be getting a refund.

Joe Buck wannabee getting splatterized? I might need to see this... (...although, to be honest, most other sportscasters bother me more than Joe Buck...and I say that as a Packers fan, and he and Aikman sportscast the majority of their games)

I don't disagree: it's unfortunate, then, that this is (or appears to be?) the general viewpoint of the gaming industry. I understand why it is, because time is money and most corporations are, on the macro-level, developing games to make money...but I don't like it.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/claims-edward-snowdens-whistleblower-files-5882142

Agreed...though this problem isn't usually limited to just the protagonist in most games. Additionally, if you have the option of choosing either gender, the game probably won't be all that well written in this regard to begin with, it seems to me...because good writing would take stuff like gender (and race, if it's a fantasy/sci-fi game...and height, and character build, etc.) into account in a more meaningful, non-superficial way than games ever do today if you're given the choice: it's generally not worth development time building meaningful content around multi-faceted choices, because your players will not be able to see/appreciate all of the dev-time put into that content unless they replay the game several times...which most players don't do (or, if they do, it doesn't hardly ever matter for the sales of the game). In games, having even just two choices means that taking either of those choices won't end up having meaningful consequences/effects most of the time outside of maybe two, three major game decisions for games like Mass Effect (and sometimes not even then), and three or more choices pretty much guarantees that it won't end up mattering. So...in reality, yeah, I would prefer to see less choice for most games in this regard (outside of blank-state RPGs like Baldur's Gate)...so that more dev-time could be spent making what is chosen (or, rather, what is not chosen) actually mean something in the game - actually have it play some part...even if it's not that big of a part, if it's still meaningful. I definitely don't want that to happen simply for the reasons (I'm assuming are implied) in the tweet, though. But seriously, if there was like a...post log for posts being edited, my posts would have sooo many entries. I swear I need to like actually force myself to practice reading my posts and fix/finish them before actually hitting submit...