DM of the Rings XCIII:
Working from home
Several people have asked overlapping questions about my unusual employment. I’m not sure what triggered this, but rather than write a bunch of emails I thought I’d write one post.
Continue reading 〉〉 “Working from home”
Frayed Knights
Jay is onto something great here. He’s working on a comedy RPG. I had to make a WILL saving throw to keep from making a little “squee” sound when I read about it.
(The post mentions a hemp golem for crying out loud. There are about a hundred jokes in that idea alone.)
DM of the Rings XCII:
Ding!
GTA: LCS: Grand Theft Railroad
One of the things which bugs me about Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories (and its many siblings) is the appalling lack of freedom when encountering challenges: There are a dozen apparent ways to attempt to solve a problem. One of them is correct. Retry until you guess right.
Most missions require a certain degree of foreknowledge. Going into a situation, you never know if you will need a fast car, a heavy car, a motorcycle, or if you will be fighting on foot. Will you fight many weak foes (bring a pistol) or a single strong one (bring a shotgun) or will you need to be shooting while driving? (Bring a submachine gun.) You have to try a mission a few times to know what you’re up against and use that knowledge to prepare, but then the game thwarts attempts to otherwise use that knowledge to your advantage. You have to use some foreknowledge, but not too much, and only when the game allows. Case in point:
The Setup:
Salvatore Leone, a Mafia Don, has been kidnapped. His kidnappers have him in the trunk of a car. They plan to take the car to the junkyard and put it into the crusher. Sal is a lying, murderous, drug-selling, wife-beating scumball, and my job is to rescue him.
Continue reading 〉〉 “GTA: LCS: Grand Theft Railroad”
Pharmacomedy
For the last two weeks my sleep has been all messed up. Most nights I get between four and five hours. Once in a while I’ll luck out and get six. The doctor gave me Rozerem samples to see if that would help. Except: Once I had them I didn’t want to use them. I hate sleeping pills. They don’t really solve problems, only delay them. Sure, I can take a pill and it will put me to sleep tonight, but tomorrow if I don’t take the pill it will be even harder to get to sleep than it was in the first place, as my body will be anticipating the drug.
I decided to see if there is some sort of informational webpage that might describe the drug. Oh. My. Goodness.. I was expecting some raw text with technical specifications (or whatever you call them) of the drug. Instead I found this flash-driven comedy show staring an insomniac, a beaver, and Abe Lincoln. The drug doesn’t have it’s own webpage. It has its own website. With message boards. Message boards!
I like that the site lists other ways to help you get to sleep (some of the advice I found to be kind of helpful) without using their drug, although it was hard to find what I was looking for: Side-effects, how long the drug lasts, what the risks are, and how to take it. (With food, or water, or on an empty stomach, etc.) Eventually I found that you can get more info on the drug by (and I can’t believe I’m saying this) clicking on the beaver, and if you hunt around you can find a PDF with boring details like the side effects.
What a strange site. I’m not suggesting that these guys are going to supplant Homestar and Strongbad anytime soon, but still. I wonder how many other drugs have their own sites like this? Maybe judging the hilarity of a proposed drug will become part of the FDA approval process. Which drugs are the funniest, I wonder? If there is a site for Lithium, I think it should look like Sweet Cuppin’ Cakes. That would be awesome.
DM of the Rings XCI:
The Predictable Surprise
The Best of 2014
My picks for what was important, awesome, or worth talking about in 2014.
Seven Springs
The true story of three strange days in 1989, when the last months of my adolescence ran out and the first few sparks of adulthood appeared.
What is Piracy?
It seems like a simple question, but it turns out everyone has a different idea of right and wrong in the digital world.
Skyrim Thieves Guild
The Thieves Guild quest in Skyrim is a vortex of disjointed plot-holes, contrivances, and nonsense.
Wolfenstein II
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?
Please Help I Can’t Stop Playing Cities: Skylines
What makes this borderline indie title so much better than the AAA juggernauts that came before?
Dead Island
A stream-of-gameplay review of Dead Island. This game is a cavalcade of bugs and bad design choices.
Another PC Golden Age?
Is it real? Is PC gaming returning to its former glory? Sort of. It's complicated.
Netscape 1997
What did web browsers look like 20 years ago, and what kind of crazy features did they have?
Why I Hated Resident Evil 4
Ever wonder how seemingly sane people can hate popular games? It can happen!
T w e n t y S i d e d


