Link (YouTube) |
I like how the second half of the episode is faithful to the books in that there are no visuals. This is the first place I noticed a kind of conflict within the game: Fighting “monsters” in the dark is great for the atmosphere and story, but fighting humans makes for more interesting gameplay.
At the twelve minute mark: See? THIS is why we shouldn’t take random manhole covers and use them as tables back in town.
I didn’t add much in the way of new stuff this week. I spent a lot of time refining and polishing and bug-fixing, hoping to get a new build out to my testers* before the weekend. I’m spending a lot of time fussing with stuff I’ve already written about.
* For the record: I’m SLOWLY adding to my list of testers. I know people will get sick of playing the same broken game week after week, so I’m trying to add new people as the old ones lose interest.
So! Let’s talk about something controversial. Even better: Let’s talk about something incredibly controversial to programmers, and completely tedious, esoteric, and impenetrable to non-coders! Let’s talk about programming paradigms. Some people have asked about how my program is structured, and since I know the answer will leave some people deeply offended, I might as well discuss the “why” before I get to the “what”.
Just to bring normal people up to speed:
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Project Good Robot 23: Programming Paradigms”
Link (YouTube) |
You know what I want? I want the book Metro 2033 is based on, in audiobook format, as read by Rutskarn doing his “Russian” accent. I would pay many rubles for such a treasure.
It’s kind of annoying to get the same notification in six different posts, on twitter, and in email. So as a catch-all: Yes, comment threading is broken. Sort of. Sometimes. In some cases.
I can’t reply to certain threads in the most recent Spoiler Warning post. But others I can. It’s not based on user, or time, or comment depth. It’s not caused by any of the most likely plugins. I haven’t made any changes to the site on ages.
I put this post here to run some tests and to act as a general “OUT OF ORDER” sign on the site. I’m working on it.
Current status: Baffled and annoyed.
EDIT: Boom! Problem solved.
Okay, how WordPress handles threaded comments is a little unexpected. Let’s say we’ve got a comment thread like this:
If I delete the root comment, or even if Alan makes a change to his original comment that gets it shoved into moderation, then WordPress FREAKS OUT and abandons all attempts at threading:
All future replies to ANY of these comments will appear at the top level. Basically, none of these comments can ever appear in any thread ever again unless the original comment from Alan is restored.
So… that was odd.
Anyway. Problem solved. Let’s move on.
Link (YouTube) |
The people have spoken, and the people said they wanted some other game. So we ignored them and we’re giving you this.
I kid. This was actually one of the most requested games. I wasn’t kidding when I said this game won out over Max Payne 3. I find this interesting, since Max Payne looms large in terms the impression its marketing campaign left on me. But today’s hyped-up cultural event is the game everyone is kinda “meh” about a year later, and sometimes low-profile titles become beloved classics. I think time has a way of washing away the bullshit of marketing and review scores to show the real worth of a game.
Having said that? I’m not a huge fan of this game yet. I admire it from a storytelling / worldbuilding perspective, but I never really enjoyed the mechanics. I spent a lot of time wishing the game was more Fallout-ish, having more looting and exploring. (Which is interesting, since Fallout 3 could stand to take a few hints from this game when it comes to everything else.)
And Chris is right: “Ranger Hardcore” totally sounds like a pornstar.
No pretty screenshots for you today, just walls of text and some confused ramblings. I’m a little out of sorts and not really in any mental shape to be accomplishing interesting things.
I’m feeling a bit un-creative and run down today. So I want to get away from the stuff that requires a lot of creativity (gameplay, writing, art) and just work on something straightforward and mechanical. I’m trying to make sure I do something on the project every day, but it’s probably a bad idea to do anything tricky while I’m all muddle-brained. I check out my miles-long to-do list and find something really dull: reading ini files.
You know ini files. Stuff like this:
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Project Good Robot 22: Text Files”
We open today’s show with a secret topic that I will not reveal. The only hint I’ll give you is that it’s about a certain perpetually broken and tragically mismanaged game that has appeared on the show many times in the past, was published by EA, and features the simulation of a city based on a game concept by Will Wright. See if you can unravel that riddle, Batman.
If you can’t figure it out in the space of five minutes, the answer is: Shame on you.
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Hosts: Rutskarn, Josh, Chris, and Shamus.
Show notes:
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Diecast #33: Crusader King Modding, Haunted Houses, and Elder Scrolls”
Grand Theft Auto is a lousy, cheating jerk of a game.
Why was this classic adventure game so funny in the 80's, and why did it stop being funny?
This is a massive step down in story, gameplay, and art design when compared to the 2014 soft reboot. Yet critics rated this one much higher. What's going on here?
I scoured the Steam database to figure out what words were the most commonly used in game titles.
My picks for what was important, awesome, or worth talking about in 2017.
It seems like a simple question, but it turns out everyone has a different idea of right and wrong in the digital world.
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.
My picks for what was important, awesome, or worth talking about in 2014.
Why spend millions on visuals that are just a distraction from the REAL game of hotbar-watching?
Here is how I'd conquer the game-publishing business. (Hint: NOT by copying EA, 2K, Activision, Take-Two, or Ubisoft.)
T w e n t y S i d e d
