Sméagol

http://popwatch.ew.com/2014/08/06/terminator-5-title-genisys/

Saw Boyhood last week, neglected to post so far (I also didn´t see it earlier, because I was under the impression it was already out here, but it openened 31-07). Boyhood was awesome, and definitely going to be amongst my 2014 favourites. 2014 has generally been great so far.. But Boyhood yeah. Simply something you won´t see often (if ever again) in cinema.. Seeing all those actors literally grow up, really adds to the experience. Even though it´s fiction, you´re engrossed in watching a boy grow up, more than you´d normally would with coming of age stories. Richard Linklater was fortunate with his cast, especially the kids (or at least in the beginning when they actually were kids). Not just seeing them literally grow up, but also seeing them grow as actors is incredibly fun. This will probably be the most endearing film I´ve seen this year. Also saw Fading gigolo, a film with (not by) Woody Allen. Nice but totally forgettable. Woody pimps out out his friend John Turturro to the likes of Sharon Stone and Sofia Vergara, but then Turturro falls in love with Vanessa Paradis. Good performances, but I´d loved more comedy. Two faces of January was pretty cool. Nice thriller, nothing fancy or complex, just a small-time conman getting caught up in the troubles of a big-time con man. With Viggo Mortensen, Oscar Isaacs, and Kirsten Dunst. Ooh.. And next week Guardians of the galaxy.. I am giddy.

I dunno. It sounds totally appropriate for some generic evil tech corporation. I have no strong feelings one way or another about a new Terminator, but I´m certainly not going to dismiss the film because of the name.

Ehh.. I hear Studio Ghibli just closed its doors.. ..

Barely played Turok 1, but I own Turok 2. Back in the day, I also found it "too hard" even though I never actually tried beating it. Like others, I messed around with cheats to see the bosses, but I had no clue how I was supposed to defeat them without cheats. Like I said, I never actually tried beating it, I finished the first 3 levels without any problems, than simply stopped because I was dreading those later enemies and bosses.. After this talk and watching a let´s play, I´m almost inclined to play it again to see how hard it actually is (or how much I´ve improved ). Anyway, apart from that, there were things I really loved about the game. Atmosphere is great, and so was the music. Most people will remember the game for its awesome weapons, but for me the highlight were always the animations, which were somewhat tied to the weapons, but still. Every enemy had various death animations, depending on what kind of weapon you used and where you dealt the killing blow. Seeing one of the standard enemies commit suicide for the first time when succumbing to superior fire power.. was simply amazing. And that was just one of many death animations.

Yes. I believe it´s only a problem when you´ve upgraded you´re motherboard.

No, you want the porno version, with the sex-scenes intact. Or even better, the porno version with the non-sex scenes edited out.

I saw it on Steam, but some of the comments put me off. I suspect this is a game you´ll only play for the atmosphere and story (and not the gameplay), so I´d wait for a Steam sale..

A better job, even.

By default I´ll use the 2nd option, I suspect that will do more for discussion anyway.

It´s a dating sim / visual novel.

Hatoful boyfriend on Steam? Sure! http://store.steampowered.com/app/310080/

I hope I just bought a Blackmagic pocket camera. It´s a bit of a stretch to be able to afford one now, nor can I afford any lenses for it, or any other essential stuff. But there´s a deal going on currently, 50% off (making it € 477,-). It´s sold out everywhere, most of the shops are already asking the regular price again, and others warn they probably can´t sell the camera for the lower price any more. I´m totally expecting an e-mail saying they can´t honor my order, but oh well, at least I´ve tried . Should´ve ordered one as soon as I heard of that deal.

A large group of people re-animated an episode of Sailor Moon shot by shot. Some used a more serious style, some an absolutely ridiculous style, with quality varying each shot. The result is both wonderful and hilarious.

2 things: San Diego comic con 2014, and Wonder Festival 2014 summer. New announcements, and sculpt reveals. I bring you pics (of the stuff i like). Batwoman bishoujo by Kotobukiya Zatanna bishoujo by Kotobukiya Iron giant by Mondo Marty McFly (+ DeLorean) by Hot Toys Rocket & Groot by Gentle Giant Batman Nendoroid by Goodsmile company Darth Vader & Storm trooper Nendoroid by Goodsmile company Racing Miku 2014 by Goodsmile company Kanzaki Ranko by Phat! Elsa Nendoroid (!!!!!) Anyway, that´s most of the stuff I like from what I´ve seen the last few days (minus some more Nendoroids). I´ll leave you with a picture of how Jubilee turned out: Jubilee bishoujo by Kotobukiya And something I discovered by chance today: Liara by Gaming Heads

As I´ve said before, I´m not really in to action figures, but thanks to Smash Bros, I´m strongly considering getting her, plus the re-release of Link. Mario is instant pre-order of course.

Yeah, I wanted to post that in the collectibles thread. There other stuff announced at Comic Con. Oh and I pre-ordered Game of Thrones 4. Now I just have to wait until March.

Saw the whole season yesterday. Started off great, but the ending was utter crap. The

I hate that style. I mean, it´s great the first time, but I don't want to see another ever again. That Weird Al Jankovic song is hilarious though. But no, the video for the original Blurred lines is much better (because boobs). Engadget reported on a story, it´s pretty sweet. Original story here: https://autos.yahoo.com/blogs/motoramic/teenage-son-discovers-his-deceased-father-s-ghost-car-in-xbox-rally-game-154558866.html Not exactly awesome, but I didn´t want to start a "sweet stuff" thread. Or should I? But it would be pretty ambiguous anyway.. Engadget also linked to a similar story about Animal Crossing: http://www.duelinganalogs.com/comic/a-tear-jerking-story-about-animal-crossing/

Downloading right now. X-box / PS tomorrow. Edit (played the chapter): Ok. First of all, you´re not going to like this: this is the shortest episode yet, at 1.5 hours. That said, holy motherfucker, that was some grim shit. I daresay that was the grimmest shit I´ve seen in the 9 episodes so far.

For the record, I really liked How to train your dragon 2. I think this is actually the very first time I went to see a western non-Pixar 3D animation in a cinema. Looking forward to it, probably going to see it this weekend.

Wanted to make a quick post about this in the general movie thread, but seeing the first had its own thread.. Went to the marathon yesterday. Hadn´t seent the first before yesterday (haven´t seen the originals or remake actually). Can´t remember why, or what my thoughts were on the film (I imagine pretty neutral), but it was pretty cool. But god.. The 2nd one blows the first one right out of the water. First of all, watching them together had its advantages, as you can easily see the progression.. Apart from that, even though the story is set 10 years later I believe, most if not all Apes return, so you have an immediate bond with the characters, and can see how they´ve developed so far, and how they continue to do so. Technically, the film is amazing. I´ve only seen the teaser before, and you can see it there: the cgi is beautiful. The wet fur looks great. Sometimes, you simply forget you´re looking at CGI, it´s simply the best I´ve seen this year. Coupled with that of course comes the fantastic animation. Mo-cap has come a long way, and I can now finally say it´s perfect. You´re looking at real, believable characters. Since the Apes are now established from the start, there´s plenty more action than in the first.

I want to discuss 2 things. Even if you're not interested in Riot 2 (which I don't intend to start soon by the way), at least read my 2nd point. About Riot 2 As I already said, I´d love to do another one, probably around Christmas again, as people aren´t as invested around that time, so it´s perfect to do a non-serious game. Of course the theme of the game is extreme chaos, but I want some balance, so there is still an actual game to be found underneath. Some mafia members were not happy with the balance I believe, although I still believe I need to see a game with a fully active mafia team to see if there´s really something wrong with the balance. So I don´t intend to make big changes to the next game. If in the next game, it appears there is something wrong, I have some things in mind to add, but we´ll see about that that time arrives. For Riot 2, to only thing regarding balance I want to change (so far), is that I give the mafia team a full day´s head start, so they can think up strategies and decide on targets before the actual game starts. I have some other things in mind, but these are additional game mechanics, which I don´t think will affect the balance in a negative way. I want to specifically ask about 2 things: revival and recruitment. I didn´t see a way to make this work in a mafia game, well specifically, this mafia game. I mean, it´s fine as a one-off in a regular mafia game, but not in a game where everyone can choose to do this every turn. Unlike other abilities, I see this as a massive disadvantage for the mafia team, as there are more townies than scumnags. It´s a tug-of-war in favour of town. I originally intended to allow revival, but when recruitment was suggested, I saw some problems with it, and I realised revival was very similar to recruitment in certain regards. I´d love to allow them in the next game, but I don´t see how I can make it work, short of adding a type of "super ability" which can be used only once per game. On the other hand, I´m not sure why I´m making an exception for these 2 abilities, as the whole philosophy of this game is that everything can be undone or circumvented with creative use of the passive ability. The mafia team just need to be smarter about it, and collectively, they hopefully are. So I appreciate any suggestions or general comments regarding the above, or general comments and suggestions in general (although again, I'm unlikely to make big changes regarding balance). #################### A non-mafia Riot variant I had this idea for a non-mafia variant which would circumvent any potential balance issues as you´re playing in 2 equally sized teams. If you people like the idea, I could start this soon. Changes and their implications, and similarities: - 2 equally sized teams. - No use for voting and lynching. - Not much use for discussion but.. - Players start of not knowing the other members of their team. - This would make the alignment investigation still useful. The main discussion thread, which doesn´t have much use, could be used for some mindgames. You could openly declare your alignment, in the hope of finding others (which leads to teamwork and hopefully better strategies), and hope you get properly protected. You can also lie about it for other effects. - Unlike mafia games, it not only becomes a race to find the members of the other team, but the members of your own team. - People didn´t have much use for PM'ing eachother in the Riot mafia, although that probably was simply because you weren´t used to being allowed to. It probably has more use in this game, although there are similar risks. - Regarding abilities it´s the same as the Riot mafia. Same restrictions apply. Although, the first subject of this post also applies here, so it may be useful to provide some input on that if you haven´t already. I am not sure if I have thought this through, but if you like this idea, let me know, and comments are always appreciated.

I did? It´s literally "if you don´t shoot, you always miss". Nothing specific about darts :p. Asking someone to ask you something? Yeah, I thought the post restriction would make for some fun tactical posting, but that´s no use if people aren´t active. I suggested in the first post of the game, a post I technically wasn´t allowed to make, that everyone should make use of that one post they´re allowed, but some even didn´t manage that. Maybe the 24 hour phases were a bit too short, but I suspect people simply lost interest from the start, since "discussion" was hard to manage. Then people didn´t even read the few posts that were up there.. Like Cube said, he should´ve been lynched, I tried for 3 phases straight. I blame Mr-Paul mostly :p. After Eevil refused to ask me about my info, it was apparent he gave up, and I can´t blame him, and that´s when I gave up. There were not enough active townies to make a lynch happen. Personally I thought the scumnag team consisted of Cube, Yvonne, and ReZ. My (apparently accurate) report on Jonnas threw me off, that´s why I trusted him. I would´ve gone for Yvonne next personally. I personally like the instant nature of abilities, I mean, I used it in my Riot games and I even wanted to use it in my very first game, so hopefully people are more used to it by now . I sent most of my targets pretty early, I assume that report on Yvonne was the only one tampered with? Did you choose what would go in the report, or did Cube had a hand in it? Anyway, it´s a shame it turned out like this, but at least we now know it doesn´t work .