zircon

I'm really excited. * Between +10 levels worth of skills/passives, inevitable rebalancing, and legendary skill affixes, we should see a huge proliferation in viable builds. I'm actually pretty surprised at how many viable builds there are in the game right now due to monster power and more density in the earlier acts. * New loot system in terms of drops, enchanting, rerolling affixes, etc. sounds really good. * "Loot runs" should satisfy people's desire for totally random stuff. Again between this and the existing density changes in 1.08, it will be viable to farm pretty much anywhere and in any way you want. * The 'smart drop' system + enchanting/rerolling + crafting = more worthwhile and easier to craft/find stuff than use the AH. * Paragon 2.0 sounds really good for character customization that people have been really wanting (customize your stat points, utility and so forth). SirNuts what problems do you think it's not addressing?

http://zirconstudios.com/music/wips/Tonoe%20de%20Pon%20de%20Floor.mp3 Well, I made this thing. Major Lazer vs. Phantasy Star IV.

I think it could be interesting to have a 'no matchmaking' option, but again I think the overwhelming majority of people would hate it. You would think from a vocal minority that everyone hates existing matchmaking but the metrics would seem to say otherwise. After Riot switched the system over to the new 'leagues' thing (which is still the same matchmaking algorithm, just a coat of paint on top) they reported that there was a noticeable increase in the % of the playerbase playing ranked. Perception IS everything. The current system has some edge cases but mathematically you are going to be matched fairly well most of the time, as opposed to a random system which will mean you're statistically going to be matched really badly most of the time. I have played matches of LoL with smurfs, or placement matches where there were people who clearly did not belong there (i.e. ridiculously good, or absolute beginners) and those games simply were not fun.

There is no way Riot would ever do that, and for good reason... virtually the entire playerbase would hate it. Imagine if you join a game and you're paired with 4 people that have literally never played before, and you're up against people in Diamond. Think about how much people rage NOW when they have someone on their team that they perceive is 'incompetent', and imagine how bad it will be then. Or, if you're a skilled player, say in the top 10%, 90% of your teammates and enemies will be bad. That is also really not fun. If anything I could see them doing a total random matchmaking *option* but it's senseless to get rid of matchmaking altogether... it would be suicide.

But the alternative is no matchmaking which would be way worse. The current rating system isn't perfect (that would be impossible anyway) but it is certainly better than having random games where you're against Challenger-level players. It works reasonably well. If you're in Bronze, you will generally be playing people in the ballpark of your level. If you're in Gold, the skill level will be generally higher. If that much is true MOST of the time, then the system is working.

I'm not a mathematician but those strike me as variants of Elo. LoL does not use unmodified Elo either, in fact reading the description of TrueSkill, it sounds MORE like that. For example after I was in Bronze I for awhile, the system was more confident about my place and my ranking (LP in division) only changed minimally per win, whereas once I went on a streak, the system became less confident and I started getting larger chunks of LP. LoL also has rating/ranking decay etc. I don't see how any of those are fundamentally different from the IDEA of Elo, or whatever variant LoL is using. You can still only measure skill of an individual based on ONE factor, whether or not their team won a game. The common criticism of LoL's ranking system is "But I played well, and my team lost"... my point is that you cannot develop a good system based on anything but W/L, which happens on a per-team and not per-player basis. There will ALWAYS be cases where you "played well" but your team lost, and you will pay the same penalty as if you played poorly, insofar as that game's impact on your rating goes.

Yea. It's also used by a lot of single player competitive games and to a lesser extent in some team sports (college football/basketball in some capacity, at least according to Wiki) but it definitely originated for Chess. I don't think it's possible to come up with a better system. The only stat that matters in a game like LoL is if you win a game or not... that's why tournaments are based around who *wins* as opposed to who farms the most, buys the most wards, has the best KDA, etc. And since only an entire team can win or lose, as opposed to a single player, it's just sort of a necessary evil to only view the game result (W/L) when determining ranking.

Elo is supposed to approximate skill - why would it be ranking instead? It's not going to be perfectly accurate in a team-based game (as you said), but that is a problem inherent to any team-based game. I don't believe there is a truly better alternative in terms of measurement, however the way you display data to players is important. Here's a good article by David Sirlin on the topic of ranking & matchmaking systems, looking at the StarCraft 2 system as an example. LoL took a big page out of Blizzard's book so it's worth a read. http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2010/7/24/analyzing-starcraft-2s-ranking-system.html

And I assume the Dota 2 Master Race method is presumably better? Elo is a fine system, works very well for most any kind of game or sport, but obviously it's not gonna be 100% accurate in a team-based game.

In the U.S., as far as I'm aware, you can sell stuff at whatever price you want. There are sometimes limits on what price you advertise something at (MAP - minimum advertised price) though, and possibly some additional local restrictions. But manufacturers have not been able to dictate retail prices for a long time.

Oh yeah, the inferno difficulty curve was one of the first things they fixed last year. Inferno is now a pretty smooth curve. You can use Monster Power to make things much harder, of course. They also made it so good items drop far more frequently, even in Hell, and generally nerfed Inferno across the board.

I think Diablo 3 at launch was a very good game, but the lategame was lacking compared to what we expected from D2X. Like playing through the game once or twice initially was very fun, but then by Inferno there were a lot of problems that needed to be addressed. The subsequent patches have helped tremendously - it's almost like an expansion pack's worth of content in and of itself (new bosses, new legendaries, rebalanced skills, monster power, paragon levels, brawling system). So the xpack should be really good.

In August: http://www.joystiq.com/2013/08/01/damsel-in-distress-part-3-of-tropes-series-discusses-dude-in-d/ http://www.destructoid.com/tropes-vs-women-in-video-games-damsel-in-distress-part-3-259223.phtml http://www.polygon.com/2013/8/1/4580210/tropes-vs-women-episode-3-looks-at-dudes-in-distress-and-games-that http://www.ign.com/blogs/original-mr.jam0/2013/08/01/report-tropes-vs-women-in-video-games-episode-3/ http://kotaku.com/indie-games-are-full-of-helpless-women-but-critic-finds-994879878 http://www.blisteredthumbs.net/2013/08/feminist-frequency-finally-debuts-tropes-vs-women-in-games/

Err that's actually as far from the truth as possible. EVERY mainstream gaming site has been posting about the videos. You're completely wrong. http://www.polygon.com/2013/5/28/4373870/tropes-vs-women-in-video-games-returns-with-the-damsel-in-distress http://www.joystiq.com/2013/05/28/tropes-vs-women-in-video-games-digs-into-the-damsel-in-distress/ http://www.destructoid.com/tropes-vs-women-in-video-games-damsel-in-distress-part-3-259223.phtml http://kotaku.com/5989286/heres-anita-sarkeesians-first-tropes-vs-women-in-games-video http://www.theverge.com/2013/3/7/4076560/watch-first-episode-of-tropes-vs-women-by-anita-sarkeesian http://www.penny-arcade.com/report/article/the-use-of-violence-against-women-to-justify-and-propel-the-stories-of-mode http://n4g.com/news/1028239/anita-sarkeesian-female-stereotypes-in-videogames-and-you (tons of posts here) http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/05/31/tropes-vs-women-in-video-games-why-it-matters

Yep, it was fun 4 player BUT I will say that it helps if people play the game themselves a bit first. There was so much stuff I didn't realize playing 4 player. For some reason, there's essentially only one person 'in control' at any time. Unlike some other beat-em-up style games, where people get splitscreens when managing inventory etc,. only one person can do that at a time. So if you want to change your gear or skills, you have to cycle through all 4 people. Kind of a pain and I hope they patch that. Once you play it single player you realize there's a ton of depth.

I don't think that's really true at all. On Reddit, there are massive threads of people disagreeing with her vehemently (to put it extremely mildly) and I'm sure there's much worse on other forums. It all depends on where you look.

We covered this about 10 pages ago. The gameplay videos themselves are not her argument. Whether she recorded them or someone else did makes no difference; her arguments are (as far as I'm aware) original. So, the comparison to academia is not really apt. Not crediting people who did the recording work IS uncool but it doesn't speak to the quality or originality of her arguments whatsoever. (quick post, more stuff tomorrow)

Man, this thread moves fast. Wow. Agree to disagree, I suppose. If you want to make a PPR thread about MALE stereotypes in media we could take the discussion there, but I think it's pretty far off-topic at this point. I'll put it this way. I find it impossibly hard to believe that there is some substantial hidden contingent of men who were offended by the portrayal of Guybrush Threepwood as a representation of their gender. Literally the single thing that got us on this topic of debate was someone who thought it's unfair, or hypocritical, that women historically have more reason to be offended over stereotypes of their gender as helpless objects than men. And you agreed with that before, with Vig. I don't understand what changed. You said earlier it's possible the use of, shall we say, 'sexist tropes' could in fact be harmful - albeit difficult to prove. We do know for a fact that there is a large and vocal contingent of women (both game consumers and game developers) who don't like them, that much is not arguable. So if we add 'could be harmful' to 'lots of people don't like them', surely that SHOULD hold some weight in our motivations. I absolutely agree with that. What I was saying to Moguta was more that we TEND to value individual rights and freedoms over utilitarianism, at least in most 1st world countries. The "optimal" configuration for our species, or genders, or whatever, might be one that some people find restrictive, and so even if someone were to prove that indeed males should do X and women should do Y, entering into those arrangements would (should) be as voluntary as they are now. We collectively value our freedom too much to sacrifice our ability to generally direct our own lives.

Since I know you don't believe the tropes can be proven as actually harmful one way or the other (hence our earlier disagreements), let's assume for a moment that trope X actually enforces real-world stereotype X. OK. I don't see how the stereotype - forget the trope of the stereotype - of impotent men is harmful. If anything I'm MORE confident about that because, well, I'm a man and it doesn't bother me in the slightest. That stereotype has never affected or hurt me, or anyone else I know, nor do I see men elsewhere in the world being affected by it (or if they are, it's not on any scale that I've observed personally, or read about). Maybe it is problematic on some level, but the fact that most men appear not to care about it at all - relative to the vocal crowd of men AND women speaking out against female tropes in games - seems to indicate that it's not as problematic as the female tropes. You'd think that if it were actually troublesome to males, that the loud vocal contingent of male gamers out there would speak up. But they haven't, so either we as a gender are afraid to speak our minds (this is the internet, seems unlikely) or it isn't harmful. Yep, that's very true. Human history has been pretty terrible for humans. I still think that, all things considered - including the modern state of gender affairs - women have had it slightly worse. In the developed world, aside from rape, pay gap, sexual harassment and reproductive rights issues, it's not as bad as it was 50-100 years ago, but if you look at the entire world including developing and third-world countries, women have it bad. I agree with you on this. I want to see game stories mature and do less objectification of women, but that doesn't mean the trope should be totally eliminated (which would never happen anyway.) Just balanced out with other stuff. True, this is a stereotype... but I don't think it's a big deal. It's not something that I think negatively affects our gender on a deep or wide scale. It's certainly never hurt or affected me personally, or anyone else I know. We have our problems but I don't think they compare in magnitude of what women have to deal with (see: reproductive rights) It's possible, but does that matter? It seems like most developed countries have adopted a system of values where we tend to let people do what they want, even if the result is not as utilitarian as possible. It's pretty much undeniable for example that end-of-life healthcare is grossly expensive and provides the smallest benefit relative to providing health care and preventative services to younger folks, but obviously nobody would dream of enforcing laws that say we can't care for our elderly if we so choose...

We're getting really off-topic here, but there are tons of double standards in society and in everyday life. I can call someone (and be called) an asshole while playing Mario Party and it's not offensive - in fact, it's funny! - because of the company, and the context. Calling a cashier at a grocery store an asshole is a totally different context and has totally different meaning. There are appropriate times or situations for some language and behavior and inappropriate times for that same exact language & behavior... it's just part of being human. This doesn't make any logical sense, Calpis. If the stereotype is "saving the damsel", the stereotype can't ALSO be "not saving the damsel". It's logically impossible. In the case of video games, the trope is that the man saves the woman. Inventing a funny situation where the woman is saving herself, but the man messes up the plan, is not itself a trope or a stereotype, and it's certainly not playing into some long-standing sexism against men that has existed for thousands of years.

Derrit: I guess you're also one of those people that doesn't understand why it's generally OK for an African-American to call someone of the same race the n-word, while it is generally unacceptable and offensive for a white person to do it. You don't seem to understand the definition of sexism. To be sexist is to promote sexism, which means: A woman being offended at being portrayed as an object is not promoting that attitude. It's the opposite. On the other hand, if a man is portrayed as being incapable of saving a woman, that is not promoting an attitude or behavior based on traditional stereotypes. It's... the opposite. It's a play on the trope. Having a problem with sexist depictions of women is not discrimination or devaluation of women. It's the opposite. As the DEFINITION says, sexism refers to active discrimination i.e. restricting what someone can do based on their gender. There is no longstanding gender stereotype that men are incapable of saving damsels. Therefore, using that in a game is not sexist. Women have had to deal with sexism since the beginning of the history and billions of women around the world deal with it even today. I'm not talking about tropes, I'm talking about actual real-life sexism like being killed because you were raped, or not having the right to an education, or not having the right to vote, etc

No...? I'm saying historical + cultural context make some things more acceptable to make fun of than other things. Saying someone looks like a monkey, for example, is much more racist and offensive if you're referring to a black person as opposed to a white person (and sadly, people are still saying garbage like that unironically of people like Obama and the Italian Prime Minister). Context matters. Even djpretzel agreed (1000%) with Vig when he pointed out that women have much more of a reason to be offended by sexist depictions of their gender than men, because women have had to deal with actual real-life sexism for thousands of years.

Making a joke that a male would-be hero is actually bumbling isn't playing on any longstanding sexist tropes that men have had to deal with for thousands of years. Two completely different things, different historical context, etc. When did she say it was bad to draw attention to tropes...? That's sort of like the whole point of the videos, right?

I didn't realize it was a fad? I think it's the first time I've said it in 50+ pages, and IIRC nobody else has brought it up either. If anything the 'straw man' logical fallacy has been used or pointed out repeatedly. I just get a little annoyed at what I view as Dave talking down to me, or other people. Big bold + red text, size 24 font, instructing people to 'chew on' what he's written for several minutes, etc. It's more of a response to the general tone, if anything.

It almost seems like you're being deliberately obtuse to avoid making any sort of concessions of any kind. Obviously I understand nothing in art is 'necessary', including the use of tropes, don't be patronizing. If someone said "I made a game with a damsel in distress trope to make it retro", I think an acceptable and understandable English language response would be "You don't need a damsel in distress to make a retro game. You could do something else instead, such as x, y, or z." Do you have some sort of philosophical problem with that statement? Do you think it's offensive, or encouraging censorship, or whatever, to suggest or consider alternatives to an overused trope? Because that's what you're arguing against here. Whether or not you agree with all the various other points in the videos, in this thread, etc., this particular thing pretty much sounds exactly like what you've stated repeatedly that you support, i.e. more variety in games in general and less use of any one-dimensional or overused tropes. Why all of a sudden do you have such a problem with it?