Nepenthe

But you do know you're a troll, right? An ice troll from the Finnish wastes to be precise. Nah, I don't post to sow discord and provoke arguments, I post (in part) so that you and the other gaming hipsters wouldn't start thinking that your opinions represent the objective truth or that anyone who doesn't share your views on gaming is an unwashed and uneducated teenager from the basement. Of course, mostly I just post because I like Obsidian games. And this is their forum, not a gaming superiority complex club.

Got to love all the chortling in the comments. This isn't even news. I have books from the _90s_ in my library talking about eavesdropping at these sorts of meetings. In fact there was a woman who whistleblew on GCHQ about five years ago, doing exactly this. We discussed it _on this forum_. People still turn up. It seems the slack jawed mandarins who attend have also learned nothing about security. I'm sure it goes even further than the 90s, and while I agree that this isn't really a smoking gun - possibly due to the stuff Guardian chose not to publish at this time - I think it's only a matter of time before they link Prism to this type of more banal espionage. And then you start having trouble with your moral justification, when all the curtailing of liberties that has taken place during both the past two administrations (I'd like to point out before the hypocritical Republican strike team arrives) has had it's justification in "stopping terror". While both you and I know, I'm sure, that it's at best only a part of the reason for the measures, I assume that it plays a big part in convincing Joe Sixpack of the necessity of these measures, since they keep repeating it ad nauseam. Or maybe it's just how Morpheus posits in Deus Ex, people need to be watched to feel special.

It was so subtle even I didn't know I was doing it!

The next time someone asks what a gaming hipster is, I'm going to link them to this post. I got a bingo on my gaming hipster card halfway through the second paragraph, and it just gets better after that. What's hipsterish about liking SoC and hoping for more from the same author? Now you're strawmanning, there's nothing hipsterish about that point.

It's those damn g20 terrorists again: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/jun/16/gchq-intercepted-communications-g20-summits

The next time someone asks what a gaming hipster is, I'm going to link them to this post. I got a bingo on my gaming hipster card halfway through the second paragraph, and it just gets better after that.

Gorth, but that would rob the playground of the "Superman is tougher than Batman!" discussions. Meh, that always comes up. Groupthink. While I get that some criticisms of a game like, say, DA2, are fairly universal, there's also this rather disingenious repeating of the same mutated half-truths over and over.

Conclusive proof that people are stupid.

And suddenly everything that the congress passes becomes ok, the constitution be damned? Ok, I'll take your guns now!

Well, don't. Much better to work towards new ones.

I liked Shattered Steel too. I think you meant "Shattered Steel is absolutely the best game Bioware has ever produced! Too bad you've probably never heard of it!"

Just gone past it a couple of times, never felt the urge to explore closer.

Just not the gaming hipster crowd! "I played Bioware games before they were popular!"

What could go wrong there? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Office_of_Special_Counsel#Scott_J._Bloch Sometimes, that system doesn't work (by design). Often, it doesn't give the protection from retaliation it should, or even originally was planned to do.

Hmm, that doesn't reflect my recollections. I mean, I've never done the rivalry route with her, but IIRC the final outcome is pretty much that. Is the storyline progression different in that way? I was writing a rant about "empowerment", feminist jargon and ideology, the usual failure of assuming that there is a baseline society with a certain gender balance etc. but I started getting those little black dots swimming in my eyes and crtl-axed the whole thing.

They play PC games you've probably never heard of. (I unintentionally do that every time people ask me about the sort of music I like, as I reply with, say, Aesthetic Perfection and XP8 and they give me that blank look. I can be aggressively mainstream in the rest of my life).

Got Unwavering and Insanity in ME3. I'm one odd Omega 'chievo away from having 100 % in all three Mass Effect games.

I think this is, from my subjective point of view, the most accurate review I've seen of the game. That's even worse than a game being branded as bad. At least a bad game you're likely to remember. Well, YMMV. I'd rather play a game I tremendously enjoy while I'm playing through it and then later forget about (DA2, some others that I've forgotten. ) than one that causes active suffering to me. But I'm not a gaming hipster!

Well, on PS3 at least it installs itself within the game, but accessible through the menu. It's still a download for the main game and thus subject to the download size limits Microsoft imposes (but Sony doesn't, and which were circumvented in the case of the last ME3 DLC, anyway). I don't think they'll do it that way, unless they somehow manage to recycle the old assets with the new lighting model... :/

Were you at my place last weekend?

Dunno. I do have a massive bulge indicating my assets, after all, so it's difficult to imagine otherwise. :smug: Seriously though, I don't think guys think that way, in general. Most male game avatars are pretty buff alpha male types, after all. It's not really a subject to generalise in too much though precisely because it is generalisation and characterising half the population a particular way based on sex is not going to be particularly accurate. No doubt there are men who get upset about their depiction (and not in the Men's Rights! sense) and women who really don't care even slightly about ending up playing a guy half the time or having a lot of women be half dressed. I think you're right on the money. I now regret I didn't spend years bitching about how inadequate I feel when I am forced to play a chiseled male super model space marine who wears either skintight uniforms or a kinky cowboy outfit on his space ship. Haven't seen too many fat slobs in the games, certainly not after I switched to a non-reflective screen (aka the 13 monkeys effect).

I think this is, from my subjective point of view, the most accurate review I've seen of the game.

This better also come as a cheap upgrade for those who already own the game. They were intentionally vague on the way the non-WiiU versions are going to be released, I think a part of it is that they're looking at the technical options. Obviously, if you're going to have the graphical engine rewritten, it might not be something doable in a patch. OTOH, if they release it as a Blood Dragon price level stand alone game... I could live with it, but I'm sure a lot of other people would throw a hissy. Just to be clear. I'm speaking about the PC version. I assumed as much, but I think it's unlikely they'll, say, give a free patch to PC users and not to console gamers, even if it would be technically viable in one case and not in the others, and sort of unrealistic to expect it. A selling point seems to be different kinds of developer commentaries you can turn on in the menus (that pop up at the relevant parts in the game, looking like infolink messages)... Squeenix could be testing different models in the franchise (see the ipad game), so they might go as far as see how many people would be ready to cough up for a movie type "double dip". I mean, I'll go on record now that I'm ready to play 20 euros for this with the features I've seen, if it's a new disc release and especially if it takes advantage of the blu-ray's availabe space, unlike the original version. The fact that I have basically 0 games I'm looking forward to for the rest of the year might be adding to my willingness, but still. Semi-related. That Order whachamacallit and Watch Dogs have been the two games I've been eyeing for release/near it purchases. Not sure if they've announced release dates for either one of those just yet. Might be a really dry year for gaming purchases...

This better also come as a cheap upgrade for those who already own the game. They were intentionally vague on the way the non-WiiU versions are going to be released, I think a part of it is that they're looking at the technical options. Obviously, if you're going to have the graphical engine rewritten, it might not be something doable in a patch. OTOH, if they release it as a Blood Dragon price level stand alone game... I could live with it, but I'm sure a lot of other people would throw a hissy.

Because, just in case it wasn't already on record, the voice actress was an actual French speaker. As for Viconia being overrated. You, sir, ARE WRONG and on the Internet!