NEWER POSTS

Not April Fool

By Shamus Posted Friday Apr 1, 2016

Filed under: Personal 145 comments
Social Media has Turned me Into a Trained MonkeyPrevious Post
Next PostThe No Politics Rule

I’m not a fan of the “fake news” angle of the first of April, but I’m usually into the whole “do something fun and silly” idea. So it’s tradition around here that I replace the site theme with something colorful, crazy, or insane. But I’m just not feeling it today. In fact, I think I need to do some good old-fashioned complaining…

  • I’m sick with some sort of pernicious bug that makes the insides of my ears, lungs, and throat maddeningly itchy. This has destroyed my voice and put me in a bad mood.
  • The Escapist has shed all but one or two members of their staff, which included some nice colleagues. I don’t know how this will change the site, but it’s the end of an era.
  • They also discontinued my column. The economic ramifications of this are kind of alarming.
  • My stepfather is in the hospital. The ravages of age are taking their toll on him, but he should be home again in a couple of days. Fingers crossed.
  • My videogame comes out in four days, which is making me panicked.
  • Running and moderating this site has been less fun than usual, for reasons I won’t belabor.

Basically, it’s been a stupendously bad week. If I’ve been cranky or unreasonable, that’s why. If I’ve been inattentive in the comments, it’s why. If I don’t appear on the podcast or Spoiler Warning next week, that’s why.

Aside from the loss of my writing gig, all of these problems are probably temporary. In a week and a half, it’ll hopefully be sunshine and rainbows again. But in the meantime I’m not in the mood for HTML hi-jinks.

It’s not all bad. Archer Season 6 finally hit Netflix. So I’m going to have a nice tall glass of cough medicine and binge watch the whole thing twice. Be careful out there today. Beware of bullshit news.

 

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.

Social Media has Turned me Into a Trained MonkeyPrevious Post
Next PostThe No Politics Rule

145 comments

 

SOMA EP5: Insatiable!

By Shamus Posted Thursday Mar 31, 2016

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 92 comments
SOMA EP4: Deputy UnweldPrevious Post
Next PostSOMA EP6: Under The Sea

Note that this season is getting kind of verbally graphic, with jokes about sex and body parts. I think it comes with the territory. Yes, we make immature jokes about robo-dicks, but those jokes stem from the ongoing mysteries of what robo-life would be like.

Anyway, it gets slightly… raunchy. I guess? Honestly, I don’t know what the standards are these days who who taught Rutskarn all those words. Adjust your viewing habits accordingly.


Link (YouTube)

To articulate the point I was making in the episode in a more coherent way:

Let’s say we’re going to build a robot to hold a digital copy of someone’s brain. Are we just copying neuron activity? Because a lot of our personality and behavior is driven by the output of the testes, ovaries, thyroid, pancreas, and other hormone factories. If we don’t include and simulate their activity, then we’ll be missing a big part of what defines the subject and shapes their personality.

For example… Continue reading ⟩⟩ “SOMA EP5: Insatiable!”

 

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.

SOMA EP4: Deputy UnweldPrevious Post
Next PostSOMA EP6: Under The Sea

92 comments

 

Mass Effect Retrospective 41: Cerberus Sucks

By Shamus Posted Thursday Mar 31, 2016

Filed under: Mass Effect 210 comments
Mass Effect Retrospective 40: TIM IslandPrevious Post
Next PostMass Effect Retrospective 42: A Thoughtless Coup

Last time I talked about how building a massive warship in secret is an implausible idea that, at the very least, needs a thick layer of expositional excuses and lampshading.

Cerberus Building an Army

Cerberus is SO MASSIVE that Hackett thinks that even a "rogue faction" can stage a simultaneous invasion of multiple cities?
Cerberus is SO MASSIVE that Hackett thinks that even a "rogue faction" can stage a simultaneous invasion of multiple cities?

Think back to last week’s hypothetical project to build a single destroyer. Now imagine you don’t need to build one destroyer. Imagine you need to build an entire fleet of them. Also you need warships of several different classes. You also need shuttles, fighters, mechs, and ammunition. You need thousands of trained soldiers, pilots, mechanics, medics, officers. You need special custom-made body armor for all of them.

You need to feed, house, clothe, and train thousands of sailors, soldiers, officers, and military support personnel. You need cooks, plumbers, electricians, doctors, machinists, police, heavy equipment operators, and all those other people we talked about.

You’ll need literally hundreds of TIM Towns for this. Even if you steal the ships or poof them into existence using vast automated robo-factoriesBuilt by who? you still need supply lines of food, ammunition, fuel, and replacement parts to keep your forces going. And instead of moving all of those supplies over the vast empty ocean, you have to transport them from civilization to your (hopefully remote) base through many well-traveled mass effect relays.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Mass Effect Retrospective 41: Cerberus Sucks”

 

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.

Mass Effect Retrospective 40: TIM IslandPrevious Post
Next PostMass Effect Retrospective 42: A Thoughtless Coup

210 comments

 

SOMA EP4: Deputy Unweld

By Shamus Posted Wednesday Mar 30, 2016

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 38 comments
SOMA EP3: Creepy MessagesPrevious Post
Next PostSOMA EP5: Insatiable!


Link (YouTube)

I just played through this bit of the game a couple of days ago, and I ran into the same problem I had on my first trip through the game: The normal guidance markers don’t provide enough guidance. The common thing for players is to walk toward the nearest light. But here, doing so can send you into the loop. I found I had to leave the circuit of lights and wander off into the darkness at just the right point to find the next marker on the otherwise invisible trail.

I still don’t have a clear map in my head, but from watching this episode it looks like you need to go towards a RED LIGHT, after the game has taught you that red lights = danger.

As promised, here is a link to TRAINS WITH A ZEE.

 

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.

SOMA EP3: Creepy MessagesPrevious Post
Next PostSOMA EP5: Insatiable!

38 comments

 

Mumblo Drama: Spoiler Warning Edition

By Shamus Posted Wednesday Mar 30, 2016

Filed under: Diecast 170 comments
Diecast #146: Zack Snyder v Superman, Daredevil, D&DPrevious Post
Next PostDiecast #147: Disney, DC Universe, LA Noire


EDIT: Okay. That’s enough of this. Topic closed.

For me, it's always like this.
For me, it's always like this.

Last week there was a bit of controversy on Spoiler Warning. If you don’t watch the show or don’t read the comments then you probably won’t have the context for this. Basically, Mumbles made some jokes about torturing robots, some other people objected, and then Mumbles recorded this:

During the show, when she said she was sick of the female coach character, it hit on something I’d been thinking about for weeks, which was the series of design decisions that led to this trope. So as she commented on it, I reflexively went, “Oh, here’s a segue into that thing I’ve been thinking about!” So then I tried to talk about it on the spot, and halfway into it I realized it was too big and complicated to cover on the showThis actually happens pretty often. I should rename my column, “Random Shit That Didn’t Fit on Spoiler Warning.”. I ended up turning it into my weekly column. But then that dumped even more aggro on Mumbles. (Sorry Mumbles.)

Hopefully this clears everything up and puts the controversy to rest. This is supposed to be fun.

 

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.

Diecast #146: Zack Snyder v Superman, Daredevil, D&DPrevious Post
Next PostDiecast #147: Disney, DC Universe, LA Noire

170 comments

 

Ruts vs. Battlespire CH3: Disco Fever

By Rutskarn Posted Wednesday Mar 30, 2016

Filed under: Lets Play 33 comments
Ruts vs. Battlespire CH2: The Eldark ScroulsPrevious Post
Next PostRuts vs. Battlespire CH4: BAbagsGS

Last week we learned something very important about the Battlespire: it’s going to kill us a lot.

Time to take inventory. Things we got:

  1. Note that doesn’t tell us anything
  2. Sigils that don’t do anything
  3. Bags that hold
    1. Bags that hold
      1. Bags that hold
        1. Bags that hold
          1. Javelins we can’t use

Things we don’t got:

  1. Pants
  2. Slacks
  3. Trousers
  4. Hose
  5. Leggings
  6. Crotchgard(tm)

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Ruts vs. Battlespire CH3: Disco Fever”

 

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.

Ruts vs. Battlespire CH2: The Eldark ScroulsPrevious Post
Next PostRuts vs. Battlespire CH4: BAbagsGS

33 comments

 

Good Robot Hangout: It’s OVER!

By Shamus Posted Tuesday Mar 29, 2016

Filed under: Good Robot 29 comments
Good Robot #47: A Script ReadingPrevious Post
Next PostGood Robot: Out Now!

We are streaming Good Robot. Come watch Josh play the game, and ask questions of the development team. It’ll be fun. And also terrifying, if you’re one of the developers.

EDIT: Thanks to everyone who watched!

 

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.

Good Robot #47: A Script ReadingPrevious Post
Next PostGood Robot: Out Now!

29 comments

 
OLDER POSTS
From The Archives:

TitleWhat’s Inside Skinner’s Box?

What is a skinner box, how does it interact with neurotransmitters, and what does it have to do with shooting people in the face for rare loot?

 

Bethesda NEVER Understood Fallout

Let's count up the ways in which Bethesda has misunderstood and misused the Fallout property.

 

How to Forum

Dear people of the internet: Please stop doing these horrible idiotic things when you talk to each other.

 

Project Frontier

A programming project where I set out to make a gigantic and complex world from simple data.

 

Game at the Bottom

Why spend millions on visuals that are just a distraction from the REAL game of hotbar-watching?

 

Shamus Plays WOW

Ever wondered what's in all those quest boxes you've never bothered to read? Get ready: They're more insane than you might expect.

 

Was it a Hack?

A big chunk of the internet went down in October of 2016. What happened? Was it a hack?

 

Rage 2

The game was a dud, and I'm convinced a big part of that is due to the way the game leaned into its story. Its terrible, cringe-inducing story.

 

Blistering Stupidity of Fallout 3

Yeah, this game is a classic. But the story is idiotic, incoherent, thematically confused, and patronizing.

 

Who Broke the In-Game Economy?

Why are RPG economies so bad? Why are shopkeepers so mercenary, why are the prices so crazy, and why do you always end up a gazillionaire by the end of the game? Can't we just have a sensible balanced economy?