sephfire

He just released another one! A Very 8-Bit Christmas 4 Links to the first three seem to have gone down. I'll see if I can find them somewhere.

I do kinda miss the old cases, but I haven't had any real problems worth complaining about yet. I guess as long as it puts a reasonable dent in their "eco-hazardous" levels, I can live.

I was about to come post this. There's a kind of beauty in it.

You know, I'm actually beginning to reconsider that statement I made. I feel like it's important for games to continue being the source of entertainment they always have been, but I'm starting to wonder if there might be a place for games that offer other kinds of experiences in an interactive way. The very fact that the interactivity involves you as the player in what happens could give people an entirely new perspective on a variety of things. I guess I'm starting to think of it like I think about movies: most of them are made to entertain, and I would never want that to go away. But there is also room for other kinds of movies: movies that scare, movies that inform, movies that make you think. I've heard of some indie games that fall roughly into this sort of category. I'd love to see games reach a point where other kinds of games could coexist with the fun ones. On a side note, thanks for your part in providing me such a great outro. I was worried about finding a good tone to go out on with this slightly-more-serious video until I remembered Passing the Blue Crown. Awesome, awesome remix and a perfect fit.

Yeah, like I said, there are definitely good arguments to be made on both sides of the issue. Many people who had seen early gameplay weren't convinced that Atomic would handle the game's subject matter appropriately. And then there are the poor relatives of the soldiers who died there. When I was trimming down the Fox News segment for time, one of the parts I hated to lose most was what the soldier's mother said. You can tell that Fox brought her into the discussion to be incendiary, but she was very reasonable. She said something to the tune of: "If I were to watch this game and have to see my son get killed, it would be terrible. On the other hand, if the game was trying to be a realistic historical account and my son was not included, that would be upsetting too." By cutting that out, I get the feeling I've painted her to look like Fox's tool, which she really, really wasn't.

Knock yourself out!

After a somewhat ridiculous wait, I have finally finished a new episode in my little series of game-related video lectures. Today's topic: Controversy. Special thanks (as always) to CarboHydroM for my intro theme, and especially to Sixto, Zircon and Steppo for unwittingly giving me such a kick-ass outro. I think I'm going to start throwing in links to these intro/outro tracks in the video description from now on. Enjoy!

Maaaaaan I been working on the next episode all daaaaay. I'm tiiiiiiiiiiired.

I thought this thread had ended on an unusually friendly note. It was starting to weird me out.

Damn those musicians. Thieves, the lot of them.

You do know the way to our hearts. If you made an album that people still crave fifty years down the line, then yeah, you probably deserve every cent. The entertainment industry is hardly the only industry that works this way. Consider a hypothetical Make-Up producing company. This company spends six months in R&D on a new kind of eyeliner. Then, with their new product tested and ready, they mass produce it and sell it to the world. That same eyeliner may be on shelves for years. It will be there as long as there is demand for it. But the company isn't just sitting on it's laurels! They are working hard to keep producing more of this new eyeliner to keep the shelves stocked. And they are simultaneously working hard to develop their next big product. How is that terribly different from what the music industry does? Maybe we would better understand what you're getting at if you described how you think the entertainment industry should be running things. What's your ideal scenario?

There IS a real logical reason for them to do what they're doing. It's just not a logical reason that any of us should be expected to like.

That was pretty enjoyable, actually. I like your take on things.

I could never stand the Nerd. Spoony's stuff I enjoyed, but then I found That Guy with the Glasses. His weekly Nostalgia Critic movie reviews have become a highlight of my week. His Video Game Confessions, Bum Reviews, and Ask That Guy mailbag shows are great too.

The fact that we choose to play these games with controllers on consoles probably indicates that most of us aren't too bothered by it. Besides which, game companies have already conditioned us to accept paying for map packs and such, and I highly doubt they would give that up for functionality we aren't really demanding.

I get the feeling they could patch it in. Hopefully, the fuss will be big enough that they cave in. I like that they're trying to solve some online gaming problems, but I'm not sure I understand why they don't allow both matchmaking and dedicated servers. Not wanting to "bifurcate the community" sounds pretty flimsy in the face of all this negative feedback.

1UP.com just put up a story on the issue. http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3176593 They covered it pretty thoroughly, including a pro/con list. Much better than having to read Game Informer anyway.

Yes there is. The question is whether or not that positive outcome outweighs the negatives of eliminating dedicated servers, which is debatable. I can see how this new system might significantly improve the online play experience for a lot of people. For a lot of PC gamers, though, it's probably not worth the cost. None of us are really in a place to make broad judgments until we see more about their matchmaking system. Also, please try to chill. I know you're frustrated, but it's coming off less like "righteous anger" and more like "adolescent nerdrage."

This thread is an awesome idea.

Oh definitely. I'm just sayin' that if some of us would be paying that fee anyway, we might as well get some other people's tracks in the game too.

We could, theoretically, form our own OCR charting team. Priority given to remixers' original work, of course.

The writing I've seen so far has been spot on, and Jack's vocal delivery has been stellar. Love or hate him, he gives a solid vocal performance. Why isn't it Rocktober 13th noooowwwwww?

It's not often I get this excited for an impending game release. I really hope this game does well. It's about time Schafer had a big hit. I'm hoping, with EA's help, this will make a bigger splash than Psychonauts did. If I can land a job at Double Fine, I will be a happy man.

I had kind of hoped this show would go ahead and die off so Whedon could start working on something else. But I suppose it is nice to see FOX actually give a show a second chance for once.

I actually started a WIP way back for this and never got it very far. So if you wanted another sample for what K.K. Dirge might have sounded like, here ya go. Dirge