Mass Effect 3 EP10:
The Space Tits Discussion

By Shamus Posted Thursday Sep 6, 2012

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 252 comments


Link (YouTube)

In this episode Chris mentioned a bit written by an actual armor smith, commenting on the various tradeoffs between sensible gender-obscuring armor and absurd stripper armor. It’s a pretty good read. As I’ve said in the past, I’m not against stripper armor in principle. My ideal game is one where everyone gets to choose just where they want to appear on the spectrum between boring and ridiculous.

It’s like a costume party. If a woman shows up dressed as a skimpy french maid I’m not going to be some puritanical killjoy and send her home. At the same time, I wouldn’t stop a woman as she came in, hand her a bikini, and say, “Here, you’re wearing this”. In any case, I give Mass Effect a solid thumbs up for their armor and uniform designs for Shepard.

Also we mentioned “I Remember Me”, a quest from the original Mass Effect. It’s a situation where Shepard has to confront a woman who has been kept in brutal slavery since childhood. I found it to be gut wrenching. Here’s an excerpt.

Also, Two Best Friends Play Prison Break.

 


 

Mass Effect 3 EP9: Interocitor Cycles

By Shamus Posted Wednesday Sep 5, 2012

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 391 comments

Well, Chris brought it up, so we are now officially talking about the ending. This will be the first of many discussions, I’m sure. Once again, no need to spoiler tag Mass Effect stuff. Anyone reading the comments has already bought the ticket and is clearly here to take the ride.

Also, sorry for bringing up my book again. That’s an obnoxious thing to do and I need to stop doing it. “Oh, I’m writing a book with these very themes!” Barf. It’s my innate desire to talk about what I’m working on, but it’s pretentious and it’s actually terrible for my productivity.


Link (YouTube)

Chris brings up Film Crit Hulk. I like Film Crit Hulk, which is why reading the FCH take of Mass Effect 3 was so painful. Film Crit Hulk wrote this bit about the ending of Mass Effect 3. I was really frustrated with it. As I’ve said before, I don’t mind people saying they liked the end of the game. If it gave you closure or satisfaction, then great. But if you’re going to wade in and say things like…

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Mass Effect 3 EP9: Interocitor Cycles”

 


 

Guild Wars 2: Broken Stuff

By Shamus Posted Tuesday Sep 4, 2012

Filed under: Game Reviews 153 comments

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Guild Wars 2 continues to impress. Having said, that, there are some really annoying problems with the game that are keeping me from enjoying it to the fullest. I don’t want you to go running off and buy the game, only to have you blame me for not giving you a proper heads-up. Some of these problems are serious, some are minor, some are situational. This is not a comprehensive list, it’s just what I’ve run into.

Fair warning: One of these complaints might not be entirely genuine. It is left as an exercise to the reader to figure out which one. Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Guild Wars 2: Broken Stuff”

 


 

Various Announcements

By Shamus Posted Sunday Sep 2, 2012

Filed under: Notices 207 comments

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Someone commented that the most flattering review of Guild Wars 2 so far is the empty hole it left in my blog. In order to make some halfhearted pretense of effort before alt-tabbing back to the game, allow me to hit you with a bunch of stuff that you need to know. Also there will be screenshots of Guild Wars 2 landscaping porn, because screenshots are more interesting than bullet-points. Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Various Announcements”

 


 

Guild Wars 2: What’s Different?

By Shamus Posted Wednesday Aug 29, 2012

Filed under: Game Reviews 204 comments

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I’m a few days into Guild Wars 2 at this point. I’ve tried about half the classes and all but one of the races. I’ve played enough that I’m ready to start making bold proclamations with regards to gameplay. Specifically, this game is my new gold standard for how an online game should play.

Maybe it’s too early and the game is too young to go around making blanket statements like that. If it all turns to frustration and tears later I suppose I’ll regret being so nice. I’m willing to risk that eventuality.

Some people are accusing this game of still being grind-y. Let’s get our definitions straight. Or at least, my definition, since I’m the one writing this thing. I consider grinding to be doing something inherently boring in order to make progress. This intersects a bit with what Chris has said in the past about motivation in his video on gamification. If you set your rewards improperly, then the gameplay becomes a means to an end instead of a source of entertainment. Grind is an even more severe case of the problem, where the gameplay is fundamentally un-engaging no matter how you structure the rewards, and the game has to resort to Skinner Box systems to motivate you to proceed.

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But here’s the thing… Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Guild Wars 2: What’s Different?”

 


 

SWTOR vs. Guild Wars 2

By Shamus Posted Monday Aug 27, 2012

Filed under: Rants 169 comments

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I am going to be talking about Star Wars: The Old Republic. However, I don’t want to fill this post with SWTOR screenshots, so everything you see here is from Guild Wars 2.

I was pretty hard on Star Wars: The Old Republic. But never have I felt less charitable than I do now, after my first day with Guild Wars 2. We can argue all you like about what went wrong with SWTOR. Did EA interfere too much? Did BioWare overreach? Was a grand vision marred by executive meddling? Did a few developers suddenly find themselves with more money and freedom than they had resources and ability?

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We can argue, but it’s all speculation. The only thing I know for sure is that the SWTOR team had some system of revolving-door contractors working on the thing. That’s idiotic and self-defeating. It does smack of EA’s bungling, heavy-handed management that doesn’t seem to understand how to make creative products. But In the end, I just don’t care. We can try to peek in the windows of EA / BioWare and guess at what went wrong, but what’s important is that it did go wrong. It went spectacularly wrong, and I seriously doubt the company is capable of making course correction. I would be delighted to be proven wrong on this point.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “SWTOR vs. Guild Wars 2”

 


 

Mass Effect 3 EP8: Krogan Air-Drop

By Josh Posted Saturday Aug 25, 2012

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 301 comments


Link (YouTube)

And the last episode of the week comes to you a day late courtesy of Guild Wars. You’re welcome. It’s an action-packed Let’s Play adventure featuring bad euphemisms by Chris, Rutskarn ruining everything by singing, and me chickening-out at making fun of all of you.

I wonder if Mumbles is going to be mad that we made it this far into the game while she was taking a break…