T w e n t y S i d e d
Merry Christmas and Happy Life Day to all the readers of Twenty Sided!
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Happy Life Day 2024!”
Happy Life Day 2024!
Wednesday Action Log 12-25-24
This week I’ve started playing They Are Billions.
I’m so far enjoying the game. The post zombie apocalypse, steampunk world is a really cool setting. I like the Starcraft-style base exploring side missions, and I also like that the zombies remind me of Project Zomboid, in the sense that one zombie left unchecked is very dangerous and could completely destroy your colony.
That being said, just one zombie being so deadly does highlight one of the game’s major annoyances. The long missions paired with the lack of a quick save system. A lot of the missions’ times last at least an hour, and it’s not even due to the fact that I play RTS’s kind of slowly. No, it’s due to the fact that most of the main objectives have a set time before they can even be completed. And this makes the lack of saving so much worse. Now don’t get me wrong, you can save, but that’s for not having to restart the mission if you close the game, if you fail the mission you can’t load that save, you just have to start over. That is, unless you forcibly close the game without saving, then you can load one of the very few auto saves.
But, all of that aside, I’m still having fun and I’ll probably play more over the next week.
Anyway, I hope everyone has a good Christmas and if you’re getting together with family I hope that dinner has no arguments.
Quick Post for the Week of Christmas
Just a few news items for now. I’ll try to get something up later in the week, too. I made it through one family gathering and *just* managed to get through the preparations without shutting down and spoiling everyone’s day. This is actually much better than I used to be, where I would have reached my emotional limit and got really angry and pouty and start demanding things work they way *I* wanted them to work. Even when you’re right about something, getting loud and pushing people around isn’t the way to deal with stressful situations. If you’re stressed, so are they. We feed off it.
I have seen the new Superman teaser poster with the introductory music and the first trailer. I have maintained minimal awareness of the movie because James Gunn creating a Superman movie at least has potential. Gunn has fought hard to create movies that fit his own vision. Sure, I don’t always like the results; I don’t care for the Guardians movies, as an example. But he also made one of the greatest superhero parodies ever: The Specials. I think it’s worth pointing out that The Specials core message was about the primacy of the found family unit. It was also one of several movies from the turn of the millennium that feature commentary on corporate sponsorship of superheroes. ’99’s Mystery Men rotated around B-tier superheroes saving the city when the prominent superhero stages a fight with a paroled nemesis to boost his flagging sponsorship deals, only to get killed in the process. The Specials has subplot that essentially dovetails with the “oddball” nature of the various titular superheroes. If they want to make the headlines, and get invited to solve world-threatening problems, they need marketable images, personalities, and powers.
The world needs a good Superman movie right now. The trailer gives me hope. And I’m not the only person to comment on the trailer with those exact words. We are *all* that small Boravian child raising a home-made Superman flag praying to be saved by the one person who may care. And I suspect that whatever is going on in Boravia (and only a handful of things *ever* go on in Boravia) this segment of the movie is going to be highly filtered except for a handful of images. Because there are some clear parallels that *could* be made with current world events. And I can’t imagine DC being willing to say anything that might be construed as having an opinion on anything other than the conceptual.
Excepting the identity of various characters, most of the rest of the trailer is speculative in meaning. Possibly a corporate-backed Justice Society of America. Hawk Girl is in it, which I’m sure makes my kids happy. The Shayera Thal/Hol Hawk Girl was a favorite character from Justice League/Justice League Unlimited. This movie’s Hawk Girl would most accurately be based on the earlier Shiera Sanders-Hall, although I wouldn’t be surprised if they lean more heavily on the later interpretation of the character.
The music, of course, has been the star. Other than Krypto. The teaser’s use of the haunting, barely-discernible variation on the Superman Theme had me tearing up. Moving from that to the louder, clearer electric guitar version of the trailer was an excellent decision. If they’re smart (no evidence) we will NEVER hear the full, orchestral, Superman Theme until the final act or the END of the movie. Bring the house down.
So, yeah. I’m looking forward to the movie.
I hope everyone is finding the Steam sale to their liking. I haven’t actually checked what all *exactly* on my wish list is on sale. But I also try to avoid spending money *for me* in the days before Christmas. Steam gifting is such a useful tool. It’s a shame other services *still* haven’t figured it out.
Like last year, I’ll be back on Christmas. Because we’re all in this together.
Wednesday Action Log 12-18-24
This week I’ve ended up playing Viewfinder.
I’ve actually had it since last month, but I forgot entirely. So now I’ve played it and, it’s fine. The premise of being able to take a photo, look at it, and then it becomes a part of the environment is really cool, but there was more focus on story than I expected; which is okay, but story in games isn’t really my thing. Most of the story is in audio logs and there’s at least one audio log to listen to on each puzzle.
The gameplay itself is cool, but I felt like I was in a tutorial all the time, it would introduce a new concept, reinforce it, then move on. I guess the concepts did stick around for a whole zone, but the zones are pretty short, and only the optional puzzles had me actually stop and think about it for a minute before I figured out the solution.
I did still enjoy the game but I think I went in with the wrong expectations. I went in thinking of The Witness with its utilizing its one gimmick in every way possible, and its oddly quiet environment. But Viewfinder is more of a cute, three hour puzzle game that shows you its ideas once and then its done.
So that’s what I did this week, what’s everyone else doing?
It’s Christmas Time Again
I’ve been finishing up preparations for Christmas, and I’m guessing a significant portion of the readers are, too. The Christmas Life Day decorations have gone live on Star Wars: The Old Republic, as well as a graphics update that has utterly wrecked what I perceive as a fairly small minority of the user-base, but I don’t know that for sure. I, sadly, have not been able to watch any Christmas movies, yet; although I’ve come across a fair number of rankings of such films on YouTube this year. Specifically, I’ve seen multiple rankings of Rankin Bass Christmas specials (the company that did all the stop-motion films like Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer); comparisons of Peanuts specials, both Christmas and other holidays; and several rankings of the various major versions of A Christmas Carol. Oh, and a few talking about the Jean Shepherd universe movies that primarily rotate around the 80’s movie A Christmas Story. I’m gonna add to these and give my own favorite Christmas movies, and maybe some other holidays that I throw in. While I eat a chicken sandwich.
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “It’s Christmas Time Again”
DM of the Rings Remastered XCIX: Alliterative Antagonists
Wednesday Action Log 12-11-24
This week I’ve finally gotten back to Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord.
So far I’ve gotten a town through very nice methods and not at all taking it from a rebellion. Now I have to work very hard to not have a rebellion start in my new town, which is difficult with the population of the town not liking me for some unknown reason.
What’s everyone else doing this week?
From The Archives:
Denuvo and the "Death" of Piracy
Denuvo videogame DRM didn't actually kill piracy, but it did stop it for several months. Here's what we learned from that.
Programming Language for Games
Game developer Jon Blow is making a programming language just for games. Why is he doing this, and what will it mean for game development?
Hardware Review
So what happens when a SOFTWARE engineer tries to review hardware? This. This happens.
Crysis 2
Crysis 2 has basically the same plot as Half-Life 2. So why is one a classic and the other simply obnoxious and tiresome?
Bowlercoaster
Two minutes of fun at the expense of a badly-run theme park.
The Disappointment Engine
No Man's Sky is a game seemingly engineered to create a cycle of anticipation and disappointment.
The Best of 2018
I called 2018 "The Year of Good News". Here is a list of the games I thought were interesting or worth talking about that year.
Dead or Alive 5 Last Round
I'm not surprised a fighting game has an absurd story. I just can't figure out why they bothered with the story at all.
A Star is Born
Remember the superhero MMO from 2009? Neither does anyone else. It was dumb. So dumb I was compelled to write this.
Twelve Years
Even allegedly smart people can make life-changing blunders that seem very, very obvious in retrospect.