AwesomeOcelot

They're in optional challenge areas, this is where the more traditional puzzle platforming arena style gameplay is. There's a lot less platforming and a lot more 3rd person shooting, the game is also riddled with QTE and cutscenes, which I can only assume is because people don't want to play games any more.

Reboot. Turn off any networking related programs. Try stopping any non-essential services and programs running in the background. These problems don't usually come out of the blue. Have you or have you let WIndows update your LAN/WLAN drivers? You can check at Control Panel\System and Security\Windows Update\View update history and Control Panel\Hardware and Sound\Device Manager\Network adapters\[adapter name], properties/driver, roll back driver. If that doesn't work then try updating the LAN/WLAN drivers, they could be corrupted. Some rootkits can cause these problems, install Microsoft Security Essentials and run a scan. You would expect to have these problems immediately if it was a hardware problem, unless you've installed new hardware or touched anything inside the computer. You'd also expect to have other problems such as file corruption, and not associated with a specific device drivers, You can test memory with Memtest86 or Memtest86+, it's on most Linux liveCDs e.g. Ubuntu and Knoppix.

Google comes up with a conflict with Windows and Anti-Virus/Firewall software. If you have some running try turning it off, if it fixes it uninstall and use Microsoft Security Essentials/Windows Firewall. My previous 8 year old PC was throwing up STOP: 0x000000D1 before it completely died, but it wasn't the NETIO.SYS file, I believe the motherboard chipset was the culprit (the network and audio chips had gone a couple of years previously, replaced with PCI cards), I was getting all sorts of corruption problems. So worst case scenario, it's your RAM or chipset although you only usually get these problems in really new or old PCs.

You're right, I'd have to give it at least a week to see if it's a trend. I don't think the $93 was a part of PE's middle stretch, it's more like $20K-$60K, but WL2 wasn't very consistent at all, it slowed down for a week then the paced doubled with quadruple spikes. Other projects have had slow friday-sunday periods. Total $ for today was $22K, PE was $42.7K. More exciting than Brian Mitsoda? I don't believe you.

The dictionary is not sufficient, especially when it's exhaustive. It can give you synonyms but it won't tell you how the words are used differently in terms of fashion. Dictionaries have definitions for words how they would be used hundreds of years ago. There's a reason why even though frail is a synonym of weak, the definition of frail is not "see:weak" because there's actually a reason for its existence. Frail, when applied to a person, almost always means physical traits, and often also in the context of health. I can assure you that when speaking to a general audience, if you use the word frail to describe a person, the audience will think physical properties. Words don't have essential meanings, they don't inherently mean anything, they are meaning carriers, symbols. Exclusive, excluding all other meanings, is not a stronger version of essential, the essence referring to the indispensable properties that serve to characterize something. A word can exclusively mean something, it can't intrinsically refer to anything, x can't intrinsically refer to y.

You can call someone's knowledge frail but you wouldn't refer to a woman as frail meaning their knowledge is unsubstantial, a person would not be described in the same context as 2. unless the property was also referred to, it's highly unlikely that someone would intentionally use the word frail and not mean something physical, unless they meant morally weak which does not fit the context. Also I think you mean explicitly or exclusively, not intrinsically. It's perfectly possible that someone has used a phrase equivalent to "a person was frail" meaning a non-physical property, words a meaning carriers, they are symbols. In this culture, especially speaking to a wide audience, frail means physical, is a physically biased word in English culture, as is slight and substantial.

Only frail is primarily, the other can be used for more than just physical traits, although frail can mean "easily led astray" but I don't think that would apply to being kidnapped. I don't know. Twilight seemed to do pretty well. If the guys in there were a "girls dream" of a guy, I can only conclude that girls wants guys to look and act like girls... Then female gamers have a massive library of Japanese games that cater to them.

If that's what kind of game you'd like I'm not going to call you sexist for it, because I don't see why it would be. Even if it makes that guy uncomfortable, which I suspect may be repressed homosexuality, then that's not a good reason why it shouldn't exist. I'm sure homophobes would feel uncomfortable watching Shortbus or Tipping the Velvet, and racists would feel uncomfortable watching The Wire, but I don't care about their feelings, they don't have to watch it. If this was a valid position then, that things that make us feel uncomfortable is reason to seek its cessation, I can't stand romantic comedies and torture porn (Saw, W Delta Z), they make me physically ill, they should cease production immediately, or I could just not watch them, whichever.

Was she really suggesting that it's a socially constructed myth that women are naturally weaker physically than men that's of course completely false? I ignored that statement when I watched the video, because I didn't think I understood it, because that interpretation would mean she was saying something pretty crazy. Even if it was debatable, nature vs nurture, it's not something you could say it's "of course" completely false.

Yes. Did the video really make any arguments or even many statements about this at all? She called Double Dragon regressive crap, and that the damsel in distress trope seeks to paint women as weak, ineffective, or incapable (which would be a criticism of the developers that use it, especially ones that have used it many times over a decade and a half). I don't think it does necessarily seek to paint women as weak, as male characters get killed or captured all the time. I don't know why Double Dragon is regressive crap, I only played Super Double Dragon for about 20 minutes, and I only remember something about a dojo. Where is the justification for this? Where is the in depth analysis?

I'm not even sure I accept the premise that the damsel in distress trope gives the impression that women are weak. How many male characters are captured or killed? Mario is a really strange example, because if the toad people are male, as the video suggests, then you save many more of them from castles than you do female characters. I've completed Mario Bro's 1, 3, and Galaxy, and I think I have saved many many more mushroom people than I ever did save Princess Peach. Another example, Psychonauts I would say is classic damsel in distress, yet the whole camp gets kidnapped. It's hard to argue the ill effects of this trope without taking the game as a whole. It's hard to argue that kidnapped women are sending the wrong message, when as a gamer I've rescued many times more males than females, the only difference usually is that my character is meant to give more of a **** about a specific female. The argument doesn't even pass the simplest logical scrutiny. On protagonists, agency, and objects it's a tricky question. By definition a character is an object, even the PC. It's certainly harder to give a NPC agency than it is the protagonist, and being a protagonist in games, a lot of the time power fantasies, does mean they're going to be able to do things that NPCs won't. At what point would people stop complaining that there aren't enough female protagonists? Male gamers, who are the vast majority core gamer demographic, are going to prefer male protagonists. What are game developers meant to do? This could mean many lost sales, many can't risk a flop. There are still going to exist many games that have male protagonists, and they're going to be directly competing with games with female protagonists. Sexism against males. I don't think it's a good idea to go tit-for-tat with this. That someone interested in equality would only focus on sexism against women is far-fetched, frankly it's obviously bull****, but that doesn't detract from what they're saying. Two wrongs don't make a right. So what if there's sexism against males too? That's not an argument for sexism against females. It's a valid criticism towards the person and their project, but it's not valid argument against what they're saying. Objectification as a charge is a nonsense. Objectification is inevitable and not necessarily bad, in terms of people, in terms of fictional characters it's inevitable and necessarily not bad. Every character is an object, they're fictional characters, not real people. So what if a character is a sex object? Lets not use misleading language, they're a sex symbol, a character designed to be sexually attractive, sexually exciting. I think people who are against this should be asked questions about why they are against objects that are made to be sexually attractive, it seems to me to be their problem, to be prudish and repressed to such an extent that they're not just concerned with their own experiences but want to effect other peoples experiences.

Doesn't have to be representative of reality, it's not reality it's fantasy, realism is a stylistic choice, a matter of taste. How do games utilize the trope in an unflattering way?

It's slowed down a bit compared to Project Eternity, on Thursday they were keeping pace $37K vs $36K, but then $40K vs $ 35K, $48K vs $32K. Total backers for TToN are still in front of PE. My interpretation would be that TToN did better at getting the word out and I think the early bird setup may have pushed the $ per backer total total up. This would mean TToN wouldn't get anywhere near the sort of spike that PE got in the last week, but TToN's $ per backer is over PE's final $ per backer right now and I can't see it dropping below, that would mean $4.2m even if TToN ends with 60K backers, and I'm confident it's going to have more.

No, they're not the foundations in either, that's your stance, that you can't even express mine means you do not understand my point at all. I suspect you haven't truly been reading my posts. Go back and read them, if not I don't think it's worth my time to respond. Because science and religion are opposites. One assumes naturalism, one assumes supernaturalism. One works with reason and empiricism, one works with authority and faith. There is of course a conflict between these two views, someone cannot simultaneously hold these two views about the same subject, they are in conflict, they have to alternate between them. What do you even mean by atheism? Most atheists have a lack of belief, they don't have a negative belief in the non-existence of gods, a lack of belief never caused anyone to commit any act good or evil. Even given the premise, believing there is no god doesn't lead to the belief that religion is evil, that's a non-sequitur. Just because the world would be better without religion does not logically lead to burning down churches, that's another non-sequitur. Stalinism trying to purge religious organisations that were opposed to it is not different from Islam and Catholicism purging their lands of competitors. That conflict isn't about atheism or religious belief. Religious belief undoubtedly motivates people to do bad things, because religion can manifest itself in many beliefs about the world, as soon as you allow for supernatural agents to dictate rules and beliefs about the world through revelation, then there is the possibility for good or evil acts. There's a difference between killing because of faith and killing people because they don't belief the same as you, that tribalism happens with or without religion, humanity certainly didn't need another way to separate ourselves but that's besides the point. Killing because of faith is people believing that they shouldn't go to the doctor because God will heal them, as it is written in the Bible, not just revelation but from God himself. Killing because of faith is believing that someone is possessed by demons. Executing people for blasphemy, that's about religious belief. I have no doubt that you will not attempt to understand my position, but I hope other people will read and understand, and see how vapid and inane your posts have been.

The way to reverse the damsel in distress trope is for the damsel to escape herself or for her to not accept her role as prize. There's also the opportunity to pervert the damsel in distress trope, making the knight a douche or have less than chivalric motives, or the way Sands of Time and Braid work that are even more inventive. Men get raped in reality. I don't know how it would be represented in a game in a way that doesn't suck, you probably can't and definitely shouldn't represent the experience from either the perspective from the rapist or the victim. You could go the way of Archer "The Wind Cries Mary", where the victim is told later. A better way would be for the PC to discover through gameplay that others have been raped, how they were, who, and why, and for them to then be knocked out in gameplay, and discover that they're in the aftermaths of the same situation and there's evidence they've been raped all around. It's a legitimate subject for games, it doesn't even matter if it's realistic, as long as its logical in the context the world and narrative of the game. Presenting it as "interesting" if the male PC got raped suggests that it's a "role reversal" which does suggest some agenda. Male and Female PC gets raped in Fallout 2, and male and female rape are explored in Fallout: New Vegas.

In marketing and some cut scenes, the game didn't have that many, and it wasn't that prevalent in them. What's wrong with Male Gaze anyway? It's only art from the male perspective. In terms of "core" gaming, the industry is dominated by male developers and male consumers, some games are inevitably going to be directed towards males. I love the first Tomb Raider, it's one of my favourite games, I don't really care about the sexual content in it, but I don't believe it would have been such a success without it. There's nothing wrong with Male Gaze.

Axioms, a set of premises and possibly basic beliefs, are used in models, models used in science which seeks knowledge through observation while eliminating other possibilities to the best of ability, one way is to limit the amount as axioms as much as possible. Faith, irrational attribution of supernatural agency to natural phenomena, is not a set of beliefs but a way of seeing the world that generates irrational beliefs, sometimes on a daily basis, a religious person may be mostly ignorant of the canon of "their" religion. Saying that they both have the same sort of "core" is wrong because it gives a false impression of science and religion, science at its core is not axioms, it's a method. Organised religion might have "core beliefs" in the same way other societies have a charter or constitution, but that doesn't cover all religions, some of which do not, and it certainly doesn't describe science as it is a method. It's possible but not reality. It's not "in the name" of one religion, it is often one religion. Even if the founders were often charlatans, some of them were not, people who suffer from schizophrenia and epilepsy can have visions, people through indoctrination, stupidity, or ignorance can take revelation to be true, there are true believers, and some of them have religions that are evil. There's so much wrong in religions as a consequence of what religion is, not because there's so many "non-believers" who would use it to their gain. Blessed are the cheese makers. Religion does not encompass all beliefs, religion is superstitious beliefs, hyperactive agency detection, and the various organisations, rituals, and culture surrounding them. The difference is, whether someone is logical or not, the premises matter, so you can't say "I do something in the name of logic", they did something because logic dictated it or they did not even if they are mistaken. Logic is a tool, you don't blame tools for what those who wield them do, logic dictates that path A is the best way up the mountain, but it doesn't dictate that you should go up that mountain, so blaming it when the expedition dies is really stupid, hindsight trumps logic. Religion is only a tool for non-believers, for believers it's a way of thinking, a set of beliefs, a life-style, a set of rituals they must perform.

Love is a four letter word. Equivocation, it's extremely misleading. Faith in the context of religion is the irrational superstitious beliefs of people, they're using the word faith in another sense but applying it wrongly to religion. Axioms are the minimal amount of premises we use to model reality as best we can using observation. There is no absolute truth, but to say that there are not vast differences between science and religion is an obvious lie, you can't just say "everything is at it's core faith" because there's much more to science than axioms. Even some "religious" people and defenders of religion acknowledge this, they only accept the symbolism, ritual, and some of the moral teachings (AKA philosophy). Also they repeat the stupidity of "religion can do no wrong". If someone does something "in the name of" religion they're perverting or misusing it, as if religion has nothing to do with it. Religions promote irrational beliefs and appeals to authority, they all rely on revelation one way or another, either internal or external, those can be bad or good, it's not "misuse" or "perversion" either way. This heads you lose tails I win stuff shows their bias towards religion. No, religion has to own the bad and the good. I'm a fan of democracy, but I'm not so delusional that I can't see it's not perfect. So they're not just wrong about games, they're wrong about a lot of things. They seriously suggested a linear scale for "belief" and "scepticism". If "good" and "bad" wasn't the dumbest **** ever, they've gone total retard. Faith is all in the interpretation of natural phenomena, people have evolved paranoia, a hyperactive imagine for agency, the myths and theology applied to that are a part of culture. This is all happening internally, you can throw questions at the gamer, something like the movie "Doubt", but the subject of faith can't be explored directly through narrative. The terrible game Dreamfall was about faith, I rest my case. You can call yourself a game designer but that doesn't mean your opinion is worth more, there are terrible games out there, like the Call of Duty series. CliffyB, I'd respect his opinion on FPS maps, but not on what makes a good RPG. Not going to respect what David Cage says about games, he's made some of the worst ever.

I don't expect private individuals to use personal fortune to fund projects. If they do, it's cool that they do. Large corporations, well I don't have a problem with their crowd funding campaigns but I wouldn't consider them as deserving, and I hope most other feel the same way.

I'm playing Blood Bowl: Chaos Edition and loving it. God damn it simulated dice, betrayed me again. Does anyone know why Games Workshop didn't sue Blizzard? it's a more cast iron case than White Wolf had with Underworld. I've seen Chinese knock-offs that are a better attempt at disguise.

CliffyB and David Cage on games growing up? Seems like the art of rectal oration is blooming. If games growing up are QTE sex simulators that are very similar to hentai games mechanically, press A to thrust, then I don't ever ever want them to grow up. And talking about "women getting kidnapped" as a sexist trope, it's exploiting romantic relationships with characters to become a goal, games now seem to go for the "Taken" route of exploiting the parent/guardian child relationship, and these same people slurp that watery excrement up all day long, as demonstrated by CliffyB. You get that a lot in RPG's "my husband/wife/children have been kidnapped by raiders/gnomes/goblins". Sonic, Streets of Rage 2, Abe's Odyssey, Fallout 2 are counter examples. I think this is just one of many examples where there's no reasoned argument, just assertions about why something is the way it is, and a giant list of games. Why is the formula so popular? Game developers are have been extremely unoriginal when it comes to plot. Males game way more than females in terms of "core" gaming. Males generally prefer male protagonists. I never actually cared as long as the character was good, if I got to choose I'd pick female at least half the time. Game designers don't seem to pander to my wishes, why should they pander to female gamers wishes when they're a minority?

Steam does not set prices for other publisher's games, competition between services won't drive down prices. The UK Steam price for Tomb Raider is 260 DKK, there's not more competition. Amazon UK is selling Tomb Raider for 195 DKK, but the same Austrian company's website is selling it for 373 DKK, and prices in Germany aren't that much different to that price. I believe publishers and Steam have had region locked games in the past, if this becomes more widespread they will do it more, and they'll probably blame it on the various incidents that have been happening within the resale market.

Human Revolution didn't have QTE melee, they were canned animations like stealth kills in most games now. My opinion on it is that well, it's certainly better than bad melee gameplay, especially since it's optional. Tomb Raider on the other hand is full of QTE.

They're a bunch of idiots. I hope developers don't watch that crap.

Double Fine Adventure has been delayed. Whether a game is too short is pretty subjective. If a game is too buggy that'll be a problem, although considering publisher released games are also extremely buggy maybe not so much, and things like Xenonauts and Minecraft. A bad game? Well the backer made that judgement, it's their fault if they don't like the game, sure they might not want to back another game, although they've probably backed several games so one bad game probably won't discourage them backing more. People who have donated to KickStarter, even the most popular ones, have still been mostly fans, this is only to give kickstarter projects sympathy, maybe more than they deserve sometimes. The nay sayers and other idiots talking about KickStarter "fatigue" and a bad game destroying confidence aren't fans of projects, a lot of them are probably not backers. They don't understand that backers aren't children, they won't turn into cry babies like the people who discount crowd funding, they've been told by the projects about the risks and challenges, they understand the process. One failed project won't matter when there's tens of successful ones, FTL, Chivalry, and Gianna are already KickStarter successes.