majestic

For the record, I do not really disagree with her take that she's most likely worth more than the offer she got (unless Bayonetta's lines in the game are doable in a single recording session), and that the offer may as well have been an intentional insult to make her quit or get good value out of her in an exploitative manner. It is all the rest of what she says that smells like hurt ivory tower ego much more than glorious champion of exploited labour.

You really need to get out of California at some point in your life. Five second google, from https://www.nurses.co.uk/ Again with the average, not the median, but what can you do. For the record, our nurse average monthly income before taxes is roughly 2000€, there are some better paid outliers, but in general they're not paid all that well, and certainly not anywhere close to six figures. It was her who brought up nurses in particular, which was my point. She feels badly treated and the offer was insulting to her, that is fine. Putting herself in the same position as a nurse waiting in line at a food bank because runaway energy prices and inflation killed their income after turning down a relatively quick 4000$ contract? Nope. Average income for voice actors isn't all that great, by the way. US union rates for audiobook narrators, for instance, are in the ballpark of 250$ per completed hour (and maybe optional royalties per sale). That is probably a lot less than top-shelf non-union narrators make, of course, but it is a decent ballpark. For what it is worth, I think Jennifer Hale is still a member of SAG-AFTRA, so she charges union rates too. Month? How much dialogue does Bayonetta have in the new game, as much as the entirety of A Song of Ice and Fire has by now?

Caveat: Most of those were made before 2.0, and as you already noticed, a few things changed. Playful Darkness never before had an issue with being afraid, Boon Companion is probably still inconsistent and wonky, now Oracle merged spellbooks no longer enjoy the CL boost that a Cleric would get. Who knows what else is going to change until such a time you up the difficulty level.

https://www.ign.com/articles/bayonetta-voice-actor-hellena-taylor-says-she-didnt-reprise-the-role-in-bayonetta-3-as-she-was-only-offered-4000 Above quote from the IGN article, taken from a video of hers, apparently. Cannot afford to run a car right now, is afraid that she might end up on the street, but does not take a 4000$ contract and whatever she may or may not make from promotions, i.e. the later complained about possibility that Jennifer Hale could strut around pretending to be Bayonetta. Sounds legit. Even if she would spend a month in the voice booth and have no time to voice something else (now, my experience is limited, but something tells me this is not the case). Time for some google-fu. https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/averageweeklyearningsingreatbritain/july2022 Sadly that's average income, not median, which would be a better figure to compare. She really is a right champion of the little people, is she not? Yeah, something tells me the 'new girl' doing the Bayonetta voice acting does not need to sign Bayonetta merch and most certainly does not need to pretend to be Bayonetta. Now for the conclusion, at a first glance, 4000$ for a somewhat iconic voice role for a 450m$ franchise does sound insulting. On the other hand, we're talking about the English dub of a Japanese game, and one where the second entry was considered a financial failure which was actually cancelled and only released because Nintendo picked it up for its ill-fated Wii U. It did have a stronger Switch re-release, but that came bundled with the original Bayonetta. Between writing directly to Hideki Kamiya, which he probably appreciated very much, Japanese (corporate) culture being what it is, the jabs at Jennifer Hale and the woe is me call to boycott the game, I shall be honest: this does not a good case make. Especially for a woman who has a handful of voice acting and acting credits to her name, and let us face it, at the end of the day, she is Bayonetta, not Commander Shepard. Well, but it worked, she has got the Twatteria raging for fair wages for her. Because, you know, that poor nurse at the food bank probably needs to put two in months worth of back breaking, physically and mentally exhausting work to earn that kind of money, while Ms. Taylor's work is sitting in a recording booth, wearing her pajamas and sipping on some coffee (paraphrased quote by Mark Hamill on why he does more voice acting than regular acting). Or not, because Jennifer Hale seemed to have no problems with whatever Plantium offered her. Which likely is more than what Ms. Taylor would have earned, but how much we will probably never know. I will agree that the offer is low and she probably has a point insofar as that her voice is probably worth more for Bayonetta 3, however, time and sales will tell. On the other hand, she went to an audition, got an offer, and was unhappy with it. The rest? The rest smells like hurt ego.

Yeah, if your Elrond could just move to Stranger Things and reasonably replace Steve Harrison, there's something very wrong.

Nothing a couple of Pillars of Life and Creeping Doom does not fix, now that it is easier than ever to have characters capable of casting it by that point, just let Ember pick it through Loremaster, or give Daeran Second Mystery: Nature, which is his go-to pick for Mythic 1 anyway. Having enough levels at that point should not be that big of an issue any more after the new DLC areas. Getting better summons on Ember is the road less travelled, but it works well enough if you do not need her as a ray railgun blaster. Give her all the summoning bonus feats and mythic abilities. Loremaster can add Creeping Doom and Elemental Swarm, but you'd have to fit Skill Focus into her feat list early enough. Ember does not get a whole lot of feats to play with, and you lose at least one hex too, more if you go for three levels of Loremaster. See, everything in this game is made easier by playing an Angel Oracle MC. Edit: To make things even more ridiculous, Seekers get bonus feats at almost no cost (not like you really need those revelations).

They were also supposed to do something related to Star Wars, funny how nothing of that materialized after that final Game of Thrones season.

There are a couple of main issues with Rings of Power, and Sauron and whatever 'canonical' story they think they have for season two not being in season one was not one of them. The series is, by far and large, boring. This is the largest issue, because it gives the viewer plenty of time to appreciate the other failings in more detail. The acting is serviceable at best, atrocious (hello Galadriel) at worst. Plot points feel like they're making me dumberer just for look at them. Me will smash you. Smash you to goo! The dialogue writing is, well, terrible, and its delivery is stilted and unnatural. So many flat shots. Costume design looks like cosplayers can do a better job of it, even when it is decent they went with the Hobbit look, not the Lord of the Rings look. The combination of 2 and 4 means poor casting and direction. Much of that is to be expected when you have a largely inexperience showrunning crew. Everyone has to start at some point, but a project of this size and budget could have done with some veterans to help out. Then there are some minor problems: The lore is not consistent even with what preciously little of it they licensed, the show directly contradicts Lord of the Ring's appendices. The ultimate prequel issue of trying to fashion drama from foregone conclusions. The elves are so unelven that I feel like apologizing to Liv Tyler for calling her a terrible choice for Arwen. Overall it just translated into something that is simply not enjoyable. The cinematography is boring, the cast was chosen for their ability to make vapid faces or gaze wistfully just beyond the camera while speaking their dialogue in a terribly stilted, unnatural and often monotone way. There are way too many plot lines in way too many locations, all at once, something that worked in Game of Thrones for a while but even there eventually became problematic.

I should have not turned that episode off so soon, because it gets even 'better' from there. Vanity projects of rich people have a way of getting the axe whenever they feel like it, and Rings of Power is most certainly not the Game of Thrones of Amazon Prime that Bezos for some reason so desperately wants to happen. Point in case, although entirely unrelated to filmmaking, we once had a billionaire invest in a local football club here. They hired a couple of good players and a new coach, everything was going well. Played good football, were leading the league with more than a decent margin, finances were fine, the works. Billionaire investor went ahead and fired the coach and installed one of his own choosing because the old one was too 'provincial' for his more sophisticated taste, and he wanted someone with an international reputation, so the club in question ended up with a known cocaine addict. They still won the championship this year, but not with the same comfortable lead they enjoyed he sacked the old coach, and while not playing nearly as entertaining football. Of course, the equivalent here would be to fire the showrunners while they enjoy high praise from both professional critics and the audience alike, but as we say here, not everything that has a limp is a comparison (it makes more sense in German ).

No more Kwasi/quasi puns for me any more. To use the new king's words: "Dear, oh dear..."

Are there really going to be five seasons of Rings of Power, or is there a chance - any chance, really - that we somehow magically get spared a second one because Bezos is unhappy and cancels everything? edit:

Delegates sent from the national parliaments of the members of the Council of Europe who gather to, ah, counsel the Council of Europe. The European Court of Human Rights is also a part of the Council of Europe (and a much better known one, I would wager). Not to be confused with the European Council, the European Union or the Court of Justice of the European Union. No. PACE has 318 members and 318 deputies, out of which 100 were present for the vote, 99 voted in favor, one representative of Turkey abstained and, it only has advisory, not any binding character. It is basically a suggestion to the member states of the Council of Europe. News presentation worked though, people on Twatter already believe this is something official from the European Union. Quote from the relevant section: Emphasis added by me. Taking bets on how many member nations will follow the call and publicly and officially declare the Russian regime a terrorist one. Heh, they do not even bother to follow the rulings of the European Court of Human Rights even though they all techincally agreed to observe its judgments. Those are meant to be binding.

Eh, I have (had) many consoles myself, though none of the new generation - newest one is a Switch, and before that it was a GameCube and an original XBox. I like my Switch.

Bethesda games were shallow as a puddle long before any of them made it to consoles. The peasantry of the world has much to answer for, of course, but Bethesda's crimes against the master race were not committed solely on their behest.

Question for anyone else who watches House of the Dragon, which probably is just @InsaneCommander at this point. Both Daemon and Rhaenyra are dragonriders. Why are they constantly using carriages and other means of transport? Show ran out of budget already, or what? Did the day for night shooting of last week's episode eat too much money?

Still looks like sci-fi Chucky.

Indeed. Obligatory Gamers Nexus post: Huh, dunno, maybe an upgrade later to a smaller version is back on the table, if the gains are similar. Edit: had a bit of a chuckle about the temperature being stable and pretty good on the FE's cooling setup, and that's without DARK POWER SHARK FIN fans.

Our previous minister of finance is a politial science major, and when asked what he felt made him qualified for the job, he said that he thinks he is qualified because he never failed to pay a bill, so in that, you're not quite alone. He also sent his wife for a walk with his laptop in the baby carriage a couple of minutes before the police arrived at his home with a search warrant. I am convinced this was simply a coincidence, I mean, who of us does not send their spouses out to walk the laptops, huh? One of his biggest achievements was forgetting a couple of zeroes on an official budget proposal, because who cares if we are talking about millions or billions of euros, right?

Yep, that was Quincy, M. E.

The silly little cat is one of the two cannibals. The other one barely counts, but it does trigger the achievements, so yeah, I forgot her, although outside of Elves and Dwarves, she'll have a hard time consorting with anyone her actual age...

The game has great choices for romance in general. Not one, but two nutjob cannibal women. One male character posessed by an eldritch horror from beyond the veil of reality, a pushy half-goat, half-reptile, a succubus on a road to redemption and a... well, actually, I guess a cleric worshipping the Goddess of Beauty and looking for his brother is the oddly normal one out of the bunch. Huh, how did that happen? Bruce and romance spoilers:

Yeah, it's basically "Hey, I caught you in the act of killing someone and consuming their flesh in some creepy sacrificial ritual, how about we do it atop the still warm corpse?", which, wow, is so much more involved than Viconia or Morrigan, which I assume you're referencing here.

Blasters would go Devil Azata for the combiation of Favorable/Zippy Magic and the Decrees, so the free infite Hellfire Rays don't really factor into it, no. Not much trash left after Mythic 9 after all, and otherwise you'd just bolster/empower real Hellfire Rays. There's just not enough game left after getting it, I agree, even with Inevitable Excess.

Just do everything Early Sunset wants, I hear he can give you the ability to cast Hellfire Ray at-will at some point.

The VA for Shiina has a rather annoying tendency to yell in an ear-piercing manner (might be a slight exaggeration, though) and the second episode features one of your favorite character archetypes, s-s-shy, slightly st-t-t-uttering Akira who talks somewhat silently and who... Aside from that, the main impression I have from the first three episodes is like watching a slowly unfolding eldritch horror show set in a rather colorful and otherwise fairly normal school setting. Shiina goes to school, there's a Kendo class where she meets Akira, she cooks, goes to a restaurant and talks to her Patrick, who does very little else than just creepily stare at her. Everything just feels wrong, in the same way authors describe their eldritch horrors. Unknowable, reality bending. Although the soft piano music underlying some scenes is an inversion of the trope just as well. It is slow piano music all right, but it's not soft. Generally, this series is hell on the ears. Is it terrible? Yes, most definitely. Just probably not in the way you asked. I have no idea where it is going with whathever it is, but it's probably going to continue being first team all American creepy, like D1ck Cheney: Heh. Here's the opening: It's cute and fuzzy until Shiina and Patrick turn into Godzilla like monstrosities and attack each other in the city. Uhm, yeah. Magic eight ball says: Unclear. I have no idea what is going on yet, no idea where it will go and no idea if I like it - let alone anyone else.