Twenty Sided

By Shamus Posted Sunday May 7, 2017

Filed under: Landmarks 62 comments

 Eleven Years of Twenty SidedPrevious Post

I have been doing this site for a dozen years, but the question didn’t occur to me until now. I noticed the three-year anniversary of my Patreon campaign was coming up and I was looking for a way to quantify my overall output. The question is:

How many words do I write in a year?

Of course, this number will go up and down from year to year. Some years my big project is a comic that will naturally be more image than words. Other years I end up posting most of my words on the Escapist. Sometimes I’ll focus on video content and sometimes I’ll lose my mind and write over a hundred thousand words about one videogame franchise.

But still. Even if I don’t have a convenient way to measure stuff I’ve done for other sites, we ought to be able to get some sort of handle on how many words I write on this site, right? I mean, I’ve got the database right here. (You can’t see it, but I’m holding up the database and gesturing with it right now.) That should have all the information we need.

I suppose the first step is to filter out the stuff not written by me. To date, 5,025 posts have been published on this site. (This includes posts you haven’t read yet, like the future entries in my Arkham City and Zenimax vs. Facebook series.) 321 of them have been written by other people, and the remaining 4,704 posts were written by me. So all we need to do is get a word count on those posts and we’ll have what we need, right?

Well…

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “How Many Words?”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 Eleven Years of Twenty SidedPrevious Post

Next PostPatreon: Year Three 

62 comments

What Are You Playing These Days?

By Shamus Posted Friday May 5, 2017

Filed under: Video Games 285 comments

 You Won't Believe These LEAKED KotOR3 Lines!Previous Post

Next PostI Am Currently Playing Four Videogames 

This was going to be my first impressions on Diablo III. Yes, 5 years after Diablo III was released I suddenly got the urge to see what the fuss was about.

It all started when I watched Joseph Anderson’s critique of the expansion and I saw how some of the late-game combat worked and how some of the skill trees operated. I started thinking that maybe there was enough complexity to be worth a look. My initial impression of the beta back in 2012 was that Diablo III was very pretty, but hopelessly dull and shallow. Also the “always online single-player” was pretty off putting. It still is. I guess the $20 price tag for the base game made the decision a little easier.

As I played, my “first impressions” post grew into a mini-review, which grew into a full review, which then expanded into analysis, which made me think that maybe this isn’t the kind of thing I ought to dash out over the space of a day and a half. That’s probably for the best anyway. Making something thoughtful and analytical is usually better than just blurting out the first 1,000 words that come charging out of the atavistic crevices of my brain. But this does leave me without a post for today.

So let me ask a question that’s pretty much always on my mind: What are you folks playing these days?

I don’t mean “what mobile game are you using to kill time while waiting for the bus”. I mean what game is really consuming your thoughts and attention in your free time? Or if you don’t have enough free time, what game would you spend it on if you did? Old stuff? New stuff? AAA stuff? Indies? Platformers? Shooters? Shooters? Visual novels? Is all of the time going into one title or are you splitting your attention between multiple games? There’s a really big world of games out there these days.

For me:

Primary: I’ve been playing the new 0.15 update for Factorio. It’s a pretty big improvement across the board, but after several hours I’ve only just begun to get a feel for the new content.

Secondary: I’ve also been playing Diablo III. I can’t decide if this is the best terrible game I’ve ever played, or the worst awesome game I’ve ever played. Nothing is an accident here. Blizzard made exactly the game they wanted to. But the game they wanted to make keeps deviating from the game I expect in strange ways.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 You Won't Believe These LEAKED KotOR3 Lines!Previous Post

Next PostI Am Currently Playing Four Videogames 

285 comments

Arkham City Part 15: Sniper, No Sniping!

By Shamus Posted Thursday May 4, 2017

Filed under: Batman 83 comments

 Arkham City Part 14: Freeze TagPrevious Post

Next PostArkham City Part 16: Batman v. Rubble 

Batman emerges from the GCPD building and heads for Joker’s Steel Mill to recover the cure for t-NOPE! It’s time for another distraction!

Helicopter

The news helicopter, just before it takes a missile.

Vicki Vale is just outside the police building in a helicopter, shining her spotlight in Batman’s eyes like a dingbat. Joker has got his hands on some rocket launchers by this point, and so he has his men shoot her down. The tail is blown off of her helicopter and she goes spinning out of control, flying out of the player’s view.

Judging by where she lands, the pilot evidently flew this half-a-helicopter over several rooftops, gaining altitude in the process. He was then able to descend straight down and land on a patch of highway in a small canyon of crumbling buildings. And then it exploded, burned to a crisp, disintegrated the pilot, and left Vicki Vale with black smudges on her face and very slightly disheveled hair. The aircraft and all of her gear exploded, but she’s still holding her cell phone which means she can still somehow maintain her live feed.

Snipers have converged on her position. I have no idea how Joker’s goons got here. This part of the city is flooded, so the only way to get around is by either swimming in the freezing water or gliding overhead using your superhero cape, and I’m going to assume those options aren’t available to Joker Goons #151 through #155.

It’s silly, but this segment serves a purpose. Several actually.

First, we need to slow Batman down a bit. The player thinks that Joker has the cure and that Batman will die without it. Naturally the worry is that he won’t leave any for our hero. The next time we see Joker it will be Clayface-Joker, looking healthy. It might feel a little strange if we go directly from the Freeze Fight to our confrontation with Joker. The writer needs to create some space in the minds of the audience for the Joker to be “cured”.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Arkham City Part 15: Sniper, No Sniping!”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 Arkham City Part 14: Freeze TagPrevious Post

Next PostArkham City Part 16: Batman v. Rubble 

83 comments

Nan o’ War CHX: Vince Neil’s Tatuado

By Rutskarn Posted Wednesday May 3, 2017

Filed under: Lets Play 54 comments

 Nan o' War CH9: Fifteen Men on a Big Ol' ChestPrevious Post

Next PostNan o' War CH10: Wet Run 

I’ve started a new job, which is good. But I haven’t played any more Blood and Gold: Caribbean!, which is bad. But I have just enough time to write a post. But I’ve run out of screenshots. But I have some I’d taken, but never used. But I don’t have much to say about them.

I think I’ve worked out a compromise. Today, I’m going to post my leftover screenshots of Blood and Gold: Caribbean! And on an entirely unrelated note, I am going to tell you about Vince Neil’s Tatuado.

Because no-one else will.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Nan o’ War CHX: Vince Neil’s Tatuado”

Rutskarn is a writer, author, wordsmith, text producer, article deviser, prose architect, and accredited language-talker. If you enjoy his contributions to this site you could always back his Patreon.

 Nan o' War CH9: Fifteen Men on a Big Ol' ChestPrevious Post

Next PostNan o' War CH10: Wet Run 

54 comments

Zenimax vs. Facebook Part 1: The Troubled History of VR

By Shamus Posted Tuesday May 2, 2017

Filed under: Column 64 comments

 This Dumb Industry: Fixing Match 3Previous Post

Next PostZenimax vs. Facebook Part 2: The 5 Problems Of VR 

Back in February of this year, a Texas jury awarded half a billion dollars to ZeniMax in the long-running Zenimax vs. Facebook case. Half a billion bucks is a lot of money, even for these titans. Zenimax is of course the parent company of Bethesda, of Skyrim and Fallout 4 fame. Facebook owns Oculus, the former darling of the VR headset scene. So while in court this was a fight between Zenimax and Facebook, to the gaming community this was a fight between “Bethesda” and “Oculus”.

I don’t really care about the petty slap-fight between these two gargantuan companies as they bicker over a pile of money neither one of them needs or knows what to do with, but there are some really interesting side-arguments going on here about source code and VR.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Zenimax vs. Facebook Part 1: The Troubled History of VR”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 This Dumb Industry: Fixing Match 3Previous Post

Next PostZenimax vs. Facebook Part 2: The 5 Problems Of VR 

64 comments

The Joy of Candy

By Shamus Posted Sunday Apr 30, 2017

Filed under: Personal 96 comments

 The Worst JobPrevious Post

Next PostAutism? 

I mentioned this last week, but not everyone listens to the podcast. So here is the text version:

One of the great delights of parenthood is introducing someone to candy. You get to be the one to put the very first piece of chocolate in the mouth of another human being. You get to see the look on someone’s face when they discover that chocolate is a thing that exists!!! Granted, they haven’t usually mastered language enough to describe the experience, but (judging by most photo albums) toddler facial expressions are worth a thousand pictures.

Things didn’t work out this way with our oldest. When Bay was growing up she couldn’t tolerate candy. Give her some candy, and twenty minutes later she’s gone red in the face, with dark circles under her eyes, and is engaging in uncharacteristic self-stimming behavior. As a parent, it was pretty unsettling. I’m not going to detail all of our efforts to figure out exactly what things were doing this to her, but it was not a precise process. Eventually we discovered that if we kept her away from corn and the usual food dyes, she was fine.

About the same time, we discovered I couldn’t have corn either. My symptoms were different, but the result was the same: Eat corn, feel terrible.

We called this a “food allergy”, but I’m not convinced this has anything to do with the immune system. Then again, I don’t know what it is. When I was growing up, I never heard of anyone who was “allergic” to corn. That’s crazy! That’s like being allergic to water! But then as the 90s rolled around I’d occasionally hear about people having this problem. Then in the 00s the problem afflicted Bay and I. These days it doesn’t seem uncommon at all. I know several people who can’t touch corn without taking a voyage through the Valley of Regret, down the river of Oh God Why Did I Eat That.

The worst is when I go to a party or family gathering. Continue reading ⟩⟩ “The Joy of Candy”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 The Worst JobPrevious Post

Next PostAutism? 

96 comments

The Site is Shaping Up

By Shamus Posted Friday Apr 28, 2017

Filed under: Notices 124 comments

 New Year StreamPrevious Post

Next PostSite Move 

Yes, I know we’re all sick to death of talking about fonts, cascading style sheets, and site layout. But it needs to be done. I mean, you wouldn’t want the site to still look like this would you? Of course not. Let’s just get it over with.

The short version: I’m nearly done tinkering with the site. Let me know if anything is still broken in terms of usability. Please be specific.

The 1,000 word version:

If you’ve ever clicked on the “archives” drop-down box above, you’ve probably noticed that this site has been running continuously since 2005. There are people old enough to vote now who weren’t old enough to read when this site began. During that time, screens have become both larger and smaller. Desktop users have embraced 16:9 jumbotron monitors while mobile users have created a demand for sites that can be comfortably read on a five-inch screen.

The well of content is deeper and the needs of the readership are more complex. This wouldn’t be a big deal if I was one of those fancy professional web developers with hipster glasses, an iMac, and a $10 Starbucks coffee too complex to pronounce. But I’m an aesthetically numb engineer and I’m mostly half-assing my way through this increasingly challenging job. Some of the challenges are just a normal part of web development, while others are problems created by past-me. (That lazy bastard.)

So let’s look at the problems I’ve left for myself. Also I’m going to “decorate” this post with archived images of how the blog looked in years past.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “The Site is Shaping Up”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 New Year StreamPrevious Post

From The Archives:

Helicopter

Video Compression Gone Wrong

Twelve Years

Please Help I Can’t Stop Playing Cities: Skylines

Artless in Alderaan

Revisiting a Dead Engine

Are Lootboxes Gambling?

Skyrim Thieves Guild

The Brilliance of Mass Effect

Another PC Golden Age?

Wolfenstein II