majestic

Joe has a bunch of other videos you can spend hours watching, and he always says if you'd like to play the game at some point it's better to play first, then watch. Except for games where it really doesn't matter, e.g. Factorio.

It is finally here, after five thousand hours of work, 800 of which were spent on playing, reading and watching the Witcher franchise, here's Joseph Anderson's analysis, part 1: And yes, that 4 hour video is part one. Two more videos to follow.

The game gave me the strangest dreams I ever had. Reading all them overwritten descriptions about how weird the world is before going to bed left their mark. For that alone it's probably a 10/10, but that might not work for anyone else.

I loved every second of Castlevania so far. It's a fun romp and well animated, something that's otherwise usually lacking in Western animation. It's no BoJack Horseman but it looks a damn sight better for sure.

I finished Tomb Raider. Groaned a bunch at the end when Lara picks up that second pistol to cutscene blast Mathias off that cliff with it. For a game that short it also really felt too stretched out for its own good. Every setpiece repeats itself ad nauseum. Lara climbs a crumbling tower. Lara runs over a crumbling bridge. Lara runs from explosions. Lara climbs a crumbling tower. Lara runs over a crumbling bridge. Lara runs from explosions. Lara climbs a crumbling tower. Lara runs over a crumbling bridge. Lara runs from explosions. In a game that - with padding - scratches the 20h mark? Just how did it get the raving reviews it did when it came out? The one thing I really liked, and that's Lara learning to cope with her situation and progressing from scared out of her mind to ruthless killer rivalling Steven Segal's bodycount, also got ruined by the end when she starts killing the otherwise undefeatable and scary Oni by the score. Really? Fully equipped commando teams couldn't stand up to them but Lara and her trusty bow can, after a few days of learning wilderness survival and camping?

Insist on getting proper moonshine and drinking it for breakfast for the full Balkan experience.

Finland, actually. Yes, that's another one of those in-jokes. I mean, not that obscure, that signature's been around for a while...

Great times at work. First we had our pay raise cancelled. Wait, sorry, delayed until June as if everything will be back to normal by then. Now we no longer get paid any overtime. We also should not be doing overtime. Which also means my lump sum overtime payment per month is gone, which just about kills 10% of my regular income. But we have more work than ever before. Yes, yes, I realize everyone else has less and less work to do, but that doesn't help us as a small team, and as a special bonus I'm supposed to use up my vacation credits. Next month I'll have 57 days left. That's going to go really well with the current workload, not sure how I'm supposed to drop at least 27 days, ideally more. There's a reason why I have that many days left, and it's certainly not because I'm a workaholic who loves being at the office more than being home doing a whole bunch of nothing. I'll just take six weeks off during an off-season peak due to everyone ordering stuff online because regular shops are closed. Seems a bit like first world problems, almost 8% of all employees here lost their jobs in the past two weeks and a whole truckload of small companies are facing doom, so all in all our situation's not terribad and our management is doing their best to keep everyone employed for the time being. That's great, really, and it affects a whole lot of people in a positive way. Feeling like collateral damage doesn't help though. Le sigh.

I haven't shaved (myself, that is) in years. With all the barber shops closed I'm beginning to look like a Canadian lumberjack.

Did you find Qis in your absence?

Well why not, but I've always found that image to be rather tame in comparison, at least compared to most of the others (Meatspin's pretty similar minus the ageism ).

Seven of Nine quite clearly had a thing with Bejazal, not that it makes it any better in terms of writing. It was pandering all right, but not entirely to virtue signal, this is Star Trek (eh, in name at least) after all. But, umh, Seven being bisexual was pandering to the ridiculous Voyager fanbase that used to ship her with everyone and the kitchen sink way back when. It's been a while but that brought it back. Feels a bit like that moment when Mulder and Scully finally admitted their feelings for each other so that every 'shipper on the planet can hug and sing Kumbaya together. Except those two had seven seasons of extreme on screen chemistry to make it believable. Seven has a one liner and a scene with Raffi after wanting to casually boff Ensign Kim on VOY and had a, dunno, thing with Chakotay. Seven getting terrible romance plots is kind of the norm here. Heh.

Considering how much of a beating Lara can take in the cutscenes I had to laugh at Roth dying from that little axe hit in the back. He really should have had her tank the hit.

I'm not entirely certain, I might be thinking of The New Adventures of Robin Hood. Because that was outright Hercules-ish. Although that is far too "recent" for me to only have vague recollections of it. 1997 feels like yesterday. Heh.

Tomb Raider since it was free on Steam. Game suffers from pacing issues due to checklist syndrome. GPS caches? Check. Relics? Check. Documents? Check. Challenges? Check! Aside from that it's fun and pretty decent. Eh, and no way Lara survives falling into that rebar spike.

Is that the Robin Hood show with the magic powers? I have a very vague recollection of watching that.

So have you shown him Goatse, 2 Girls 1 Cup, Meatspin or Tubgirl yet? Kathoeys are amateur hour, really. edit: Should any readers not know, then please, don't google it. Really. Or at least don't blame me for your curiosity. Also very much not safe for work.

Well, just disarm them...

Why, yes. Lord Eomer Vaako McCoy finds out that Khan's blood can resurrect dead tribbles some five minutes before Kirk, in a role reversal from The Wrath of Khan, "sacrifices" his life in order to kickstart (literally) the Enterprise's warp core in Star Trek: Into Darkness. So instead of being Dead, Jim! Kirk is injected with the blood and yay, back from the dead. I always imagine this is what happens during writers' meetings when they come up with complete and utter failures like that. It's not really a surprise that Alex Kurtzman was involved in both Into Derpness and Picard. Can somebody give me a sock?

I reject your conclusion there. Sure Spock stated time and time again that Vulcans have no emotions, but even TOS had Amok Time and introduced Pon Farr as a concept that very clearly shows that Vuclans aren't completely free of emotion and that they really need an outlet every now and then. The Motion Picture also further implies that the final and complete emotional purge is a choice and that not every Vulcan can or need completely master (Kolinahr). And while it really is the red-headed step child of the classic movies, The Final Frontier has a Vulcan that chose to retain his emotions. TNG's Sarek was perhaps a soft retcon, but certainly not as egregious as pulling a long lost brother - or adoptive sister - of Spock out of the arse of a writer or two. (Klingons might be a better example, yes? ;)).

I'm looking forward to see if they get worked up over completely different things. I often (but not always, Mike and Jay both liked Cowboys and Aliens and I have no idea how the hell that happened) find myself agreeing with their general points, but not their examples. Last episode of Re:View Rich said that everyone is acting out of character, and that is completely true, but neither of them mentioned how jarring it was to have Troi call Picard out on acting out of character. For me that was the low point of the show.

Star Trek: Picard Season 1 finale. What a dumpster fire.

You don't think if Qis was still around she'd be jealous of how BruceVC has been fawning over Angie? I would be in her shoes.

^ Can't help with that, sorry. Anyway, on topic: Brave New World. It's one of these novels that I knew through book discussions and school/studying but never actually read myself. It was a pretty good read all in all, but I don't think I've gained anything from reading it. Other than a more direct appreciation for Aldous Huxley, which in itselft might be worthwhile enough.

BruceVC wants to have Angela's babies. That's not really an in-joke, he just loves her that much. An in-joke would be if I said Qis was jealous of it.