The Gamer's Quarter

ryan · . Joined: 20 Feb 2005 Posts: 999

oh yeah, I need to get that out to you.

I didn't like the demo either, but the full version grew on me. One thing, though, do not download the update! Holy hell, the final boss is impossible if you do. Without the update, you can destroy pillars that take away each of his powers one at a time but after he becomes invincible after the patch because it makes the pillars indestructible. I was really looking forward to whatever Ironlore was working on next though. BOO.
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Come to me, Mordel. We shall depart.

Scratchmonkey · . Joined: 02 Mar 2005 Posts: 1439

So, uh, can you avoid downloading the update if you got TQ off of Steam, or are you completely hosed?

dhex · Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 8:49 am Post subject:

you can prevent any game from updating automatically in the preferences section.

also, ryan no worries i still haven't sent out that package. it's sitting on my kitchen table, looking at me balefully.
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ryan · . Joined: 20 Feb 2005 Posts: 999

I tried for over a week to kill him post patch. Out of about thirty attempts, maybe twice did I take enough life away for it to even be noticeable. I reinstalled the game without updating and beat him my first try. He literally smacks the shit out of you. Every spell is thrown at you, and if you dodge those, he'll just freeze you and slap you around. It is one of the most infuriating things I've ever had to deal with in the game. It burned me out on TQ to the point where I stopped about ten minutes into the expansion.
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Come to me, Mordel. We shall depart.

dhex · Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 9:44 am Post subject:

ugh. that does sound shitty. i will keep the eschew the last patch thing in mind.

unrelated:
fun update on recent maps research via ru sirius
http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/03/29/maps-drugs-research-ru-sirius/
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dhex · Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 11:41 am Post subject:

bet i know which clerk said this.

dhex · Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 11:55 am Post subject:

i've read in a few places, getting back to piracy and tq, some folks saying "rather than looking at it in terms of 80%+ lost sales, think of it as a 800% gain in word of mouth advertising."

this is silly for the same reason counting every torrent seed as a sale is silly.

and unlike bands, there aren't any possibilities for second income sources for game developers - no live shows, no merch sales, etc.
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dhex · Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 4:03 pm Post subject:

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/31236.html

warning: this fails the boobicon so hard it actually reinvents the concept.
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dhex · Posted: Sat Mar 01, 2008 1:46 pm Post subject:

http://dhex.wordpress.com/2008/03/01/brass-bed-midnight-matinee/
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dhex · Posted: Sat Mar 01, 2008 1:57 pm Post subject:

someone i know moderates a forum somewhere.

gems sometimes crop up:

dhex · Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2008 9:15 am Post subject:

confession: i am kind of enjoying the first neverwinter nights OC.

at least enough to consider picking up nwn2 down the road.
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boojiboy7 · Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2008 9:48 am Post subject:

The first OC is kinda funny in that it is a lot more fun if you sit around trying to break it, and it was clearly made with such in mind. It is so basic and straight forward that I think a lot of boredom with it came out of people who just fighter-ed their way through the whole thing, though even on that level is is fun in a nice mindless way.

I never finished it, though that is the story of a lot of games and me.

dhex · Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2008 10:06 am Post subject:

yeah, i'm playing a monk (poor choice on my part, probabl) and outside of those dire bloated giant spider things and a few mages i've been mowing people down. i've mastered the gentle art of run away and do something else.

unrelated: i want a roundtable sunday morning talk show comprised solely of commenters from feministing and freerepublic. the companion drinking game would kill so many.
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Swimmy · . Joined: 16 Sep 2005 Posts: 990 Location: Fairfax, VA

This is why Language Log rules.
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"Ayn Rand fans are the old school version of Xenogears fanboys."
-seryogin

dhex · Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2008 6:22 pm Post subject:

to the original author:

Scratchmonkey · . Joined: 02 Mar 2005 Posts: 1439

Speaking as a Linguist:

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAahahahahaAH!

Dracko · . Joined: 10 Oct 2005 Posts: 2613

God was an Englishman, huh?
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"This is the most fun I've ever had without being drenched in the blood of my enemies!"

dhex · Posted: Mon Mar 03, 2008 10:20 pm Post subject:

http://www.reason.com/blog/show/125297.html

dhex · Posted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 8:41 am Post subject:

i have been telling the women in my life to stay off the fucking cell phones at night because they do not make you safer.

http://gothamist.com/2008/03/04/police_investig_5.php

dhex · Posted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 10:47 am Post subject:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wv4BZN89jk

SOCCER IS VERY DRAMATIC
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Harveyjames · the meteor kid Joined: 06 Jul 2006 Posts: 3636

dhex · Posted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 10:59 am Post subject:

huh?
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Harveyjames · the meteor kid Joined: 06 Jul 2006 Posts: 3636

Sorry

women, cell phones, you set me off

dhex · Posted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 12:47 pm Post subject:

ah, ok.

i'm pretty racist against cell phones myself.
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Swimmy · . Joined: 16 Sep 2005 Posts: 990 Location: Fairfax, VA

dhex · Posted: Wed Mar 05, 2008 1:43 pm Post subject:

yeah there was a slew of those in nyc a while back when they were still seen as status symbols. now it doesn't matter because everyone has them.

and also there were a few of those eight on one attacks around brooklyn that got people all riled up. but for the most part it was kids ripping off other kids, not just idly whacking people around prospect park (though this happened as well).

oddly enough it was at the same time a bunch of nighttime attacks on dudes cruising the park came about. i guess the unifying string in both is that they're fairly easy prey, in that both categories are distracted people.

unrelated, short one sentence lament:
why does baldur's gate 2 - a game featuring a sidekick character who is bald, half-retarded and loves his pet hamster more than life itself - leave me so cold inside?

(it can't all be the interface)
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dhex · Posted: Wed Mar 05, 2008 3:36 pm Post subject:

this is the best postmortem on buckley i've read:
http://whoisioz.blogspot.com/2008/02/free-at-last.html

i never cared for chesterton myself.
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dhex · Posted: Wed Mar 05, 2008 8:25 pm Post subject:

CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS
CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS
CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS
CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS
CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS
CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS CUNTS
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simplicio · . Joined: 03 May 2005 Posts: 1091

dhex · Posted: Wed Mar 05, 2008 9:15 pm Post subject:

soccer?
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ryan · . Joined: 20 Feb 2005 Posts: 999

What Buckley is this?
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Come to me, Mordel. We shall depart.

dhex · Posted: Wed Mar 05, 2008 9:43 pm Post subject:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/illegalphotos/

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Scratchmonkey · . Joined: 02 Mar 2005 Posts: 1439

simplicio · . Joined: 03 May 2005 Posts: 1091

yeah, that's the one. though to be honest there only seemed to be about a minute of gameplay in 10 minutes of video, so you can be forgiven for thinking it was actually a star trek warp speed simulator or something.

Redeye · . Joined: 02 Oct 2006 Posts: 986 Location: filth

ryan · . Joined: 20 Feb 2005 Posts: 999

Go for the eyes!

I loved that game. I was doing great until I did a side quest that involved clearing a castle. As a mage, that was supposed to lead to a sphere at a later point, but instead the NPCs got mixed up with one recognizing that I cleared it and another not. I went ahead, pissed, to another town and one of my party members vanished, but since I missed the first bit of text I skipped the rest and later found out I had incorrectly assumed that all of the events would've been noted in my journal. So I was left without my healer and without the reward for a quest that took me weeks of after-work play and no idea on how to proceed. Broke my heart!

Aside: badass cRPG collection at GoGamer.com
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Come to me, Mordel. We shall depart.

dhex · Posted: Thu Mar 06, 2008 10:13 am Post subject:

re: bg2

i will slog at it a bit when i have time this weekend. i sort of ran out of steam in neverwinter nights, though i do sort of want to see what the sequel was like. people have been raving about mask of the betrayer that normally go poo on you bioware, so...

re: buckley

i don't quite go as far as ioz - which is true in most cases to be sure - but it does say a lot about the current state of rhetoric that, even with his back and forth bickering with gore vidal (sort of like alien v. predator except it's elitist v. elitist, har har) he did at least try to introduce a public tv format that's now only carried on by the mclaughlin group to some small degree and a bunch of sunday morning egghead shows on obscure public access channels.

imagine a whole tv show of political commentary where there were no ad hominems even though guests a, b and c had not one shred of commonality between them. i can't really do it. i was talking this over with a friend who, god bless her, mentioned democracy now. amy goodman is a decent host for a commie and all, but most of her guests aren't necessarily about the intellectual discourse so much as rallying the troops, or at least getting them riled up. the whole greenspan and klein exchange comes readily to mind - what a horrendous mismatch. they couldn't find a single left-wing economist?

it was like having a show with a gay rights activist and author and then ken phelps or someone of a similar asshole level. of course, they would disagree with that comparison, but frankly, they'd be dead fucking wrong.

i still want to see the freepers v. feministing-ers tv show though. i want audience romances. i want soap opera plots. if we're going to let the hoi polloi play public rhetoric games (rather than using them as food) we might as well get *something* of value from it.
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ryan · . Joined: 20 Feb 2005 Posts: 999

I'm playing Mask of the Betrayer now. I'm definitely enjoying it, but I am also finding it hard to jump into a level 20 (or is it 18?) character right off of the bat. Without being able to gradually familiarize myself with my equipment or spells - I play PC RPGs but my knowledge on D&D, and its spells and armor and weapons and whatnot, is limited - I feel really lost. I am progressing in the story, but I am constantly getting my ass kicked because I can't formulate any decent strategies. I like the character I created - a shame you can't dump them down to 1 and put them in the original NWN2 campaign - but I hate being so confused. What? You can make armor? Why? How? Is that what all of these essences are for? Why is this blessing spell different from this one? Why am I not casting that now? AARRGHH!
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Come to me, Mordel. We shall depart.

Redeye · . Joined: 02 Oct 2006 Posts: 986 Location: filth

There are strategy guides/etc.

For simplicity i guess maybe you could just make a Monk.

You could also maybe use cheat codes to start at L1, then progress each level to 20.

Not really cheating this way.

At least get a crafting guide for instructions on all essences and formulas.
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I felt sheer anarchic joy when I ran over my first pedestrian.

ryan · . Joined: 20 Feb 2005 Posts: 999

Thanks - checking out the guide now.

I've gone through the manual a bit, but just jumping in like this is almost too disorienting. I progress very slowly when I play RPGs, because I like to tweak my characters just so. My brain basically resets after each RPG and I need to relearn all the spell names and effects my next time through. I would play through the original NWN2 campaign, but I hear nothing but bad things about it.

Aside: just got my ass kicked by some animal ghosts.
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Come to me, Mordel. We shall depart.

dhex · Posted: Thu Mar 06, 2008 3:47 pm Post subject:

i haven't had this chance yet, but one day god will smile upon me to provide someone of the "information wants to be free" persuasion vis a vis downloading software during an evening's entertainment, because i desperately want to see their reaction when i start stealing their shoes off their feet.

will they fight back? will they think it's some kind of weird come-on? at what point do they get angry?

is it while i'm yelling "but your shoes are made out of information!" or when i finally get it off and start walking away with it?
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simplicio · . Joined: 03 May 2005 Posts: 1091

Not that I'm one of them, but do you actually stand on that side of the "one pirated copy= one lost sale" debate?

Maybe if you just took their shoelaces.
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"Worlds turn the new machine to thee. To thee. Though, thine the new machine space."
-Kurt Schwitters, 1919

dhex · Posted: Thu Mar 06, 2008 7:23 pm Post subject:

no, that's a retardedly simple metric.

piracy does effect sales, but it's not 1:1 by any stretch. that one indie games guy who did that piece in gamasutra about their drm tweaks (casual market) was more on the 1:1000 side.
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simplicio · . Joined: 03 May 2005 Posts: 1091

so from whence cometh the anger? or is it just irritation at the general attitudes of bitkiddies?
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"Worlds turn the new machine to thee. To thee. Though, thine the new machine space."
-Kurt Schwitters, 1919

dhex · Posted: Thu Mar 06, 2008 10:44 pm Post subject:

you don't think that's funny?
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Redeye · . Joined: 02 Oct 2006 Posts: 986 Location: filth

dhex · Posted: Sat Mar 08, 2008 2:35 pm Post subject:

so i broke down and got nwn2 and motb today for 45 bucks. (some kinda gamestop sale)

don't ask why. (no, i wasn't high.)

i was also blown away by the title and boxart of "you are empty" but apparently it's a soulless russian fps game. there were a few other fps games i'd never heard of as well but i didn't give them much of a look.

unrelated:
http://strangemaps.wordpress.com/2008/03/05/251-pot-kettle-black-yugoslav-map-of-the-near-collapsing-us/

http://strangemaps.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/dscn0341.jpg

awesome.
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dhex · Posted: Sat Mar 08, 2008 2:45 pm Post subject:

http://www.youareempty.com/

welcome to communism!
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Cycle · Mac daddy Joined: 08 Sep 2006 Posts: 2767

Yeah, I've seen that game around too and always been a bit curious about it!
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dhex · Posted: Sat Mar 08, 2008 5:14 pm Post subject:

the gameplay video makes it look like a really competent quake 2 mod.

great title, though.
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