The Bard

I don't think you can by any stretch call a series of games as polished as the Zelda series "lazy." They've just gotten unimaginative, and I don't think changing the colour palette or adding a new wrinkle to the modes of transportation are enough to distract from the fact that the core structure of the games has been the same since I was four years old.

I can't really comment on the dudes, but I gotta say none of the women look like they could satisfy a bone in my body. You know which bone I mean. Anyway voted for you, which I would have done anyway, having chanced upon that poll without knowing you, since you look plain baffled and surprised as fuck to be there.

It's simultaneously funny, and a dick move. Sort of like meatspin.

Mate, not to be funny or anything, but you're turning this thread into a wretched shrine to filth and infamy.

Yeah, I figured as much when I went to CEX to trade in my phone, and the clerk asked me whether I go to mosque. @Ashley. You've got the fucking starship Enterprise in your bedroom, just switch to another computer.

I think the way in which Gamespot's reputation is still a little tarnished from the events of 2007 might push someone to making that conclusion, but in what world is 9/10 not an absolutely outstanding score from a site that doesn't deal in .5 demarcations any more? It was a game review, which means that it was an experience of a piece of entertainment, which in turn means it is subjective. From what you know about the reviewer at hand - that she is transgendered, that gender politics probably inform a great deal of her day to day perspective, it's reasonable to assume that the way she interpreted the game (and the way she interprets all other forms of cultural media) are filtered through this perspective. When you come to this fairly easy understanding of the the reviewer at hand (an understanding that is supported by what she implicitly reveals about herself throughout the review) you can say that either A. I am aligned with this persons perspective and thus I might share similarities in opinion about the game in question, or B. I cannot relate to this person, so what she thinks won't impact my buying decision. Irrespective of either though, what she says about it helps you find out more about what YOU may think about the game by way of contrast, or, equally healthily, may point you in the direction of ways of looking at things that aren't native to you. Which can only be a good thing. I don't understand the outrage. It's like gamers exist only to buoy the monied corporations that produce these pieces of consumer entertainment at the expense of all reason or sense. It makes me sad.

It's hovering near 6000 comments now.

I really want it to reach its final stretch goal, I'd love to play it on Vita.

If you want a reason to end your life, go check out Gamespot's GTA V review and then look at the comments. Oh humanity

It was probably the booze that was making me smile

Me with what was aspiring to be a dirty Bin Laden beard: Sans beard:

Thanks for reminding me. Using the dark beam, which was lazily just templated from the Ice Beam, looked like you were firing a fucking chocolate raisin. I didn't mind the weapons much though, the mechanic of which weapon to use against which enemy added a little to combat. The world had some great elements to it - Sanctuary Fortress is to this day, the best environment in any Metroid game. Aether was skillfully constructed, and if it had been made for a console that could stream data more efficiently, most of my problem with the game could have been eliminated. It's the only reason I've only finished Echoes once but finished Prime five times. When you have to go between worlds five fucking times to get just one of the keys you need to trigger the end game, it gets furiously frustrating.

The only thing about Echoes that was shitty, was traversing the worlds. If you don't have a perfect memory and don't remember exactly where you need to backtrack to upon having discovered some new power, it got really really tedious trying to find where you needed to go by trial and error just because of the fucking awful load times.

Eat my balls you reet cunt.

They're your friends/ exes though. You could always tell them you're not a fucking chauffeur. I don't get the whole culture of being coy with friends. I don't really consider someone a friend unless I can tell them to fuck off without hurting their feelings.

Grats mang.

I thought your girlfriend was a cool lady, but I have a tendency to get really really bored if I'm around the same person day after day. Seems like you just need to spend a little time apart, and you'll inevitably wind up missing her company. Did you live with her, or as close as? I find that living with your girlfriend leaves so little time for you to do all of the things you want to pursue on your own, so maybe you're feeling that you haven't had sufficient time to develop your own interests as a result of being around her persistently?

Deus Ex stealth runs were almost identical to lethal, the only real difference is that you used a tranq gun instead of your full arsenal (I was so bummed out there was no non-lethal alternative to the amazing Typhoon), and you got a different totally awesome animation of Jensen delivering a haymaker of almost cosmic momentum to the unsuspecting jaw of whichever poor sod was between you and the next room. Fuck, now you've made me want to play Human Revolution again. THANKS BRO.

Just got Stealth Bastard on Vita, tragically retitled Stealth Inc. Forgot how much fun that game is. I'm really excited about this whole Sony + Indies situation going on recently. I would love to turn my Vita into my secondary indie gaming machine, it's pretty much the perfect place for lower budget, auteur heavy games.

Really glad you enjoyed it too man. I visited the Steam community hub, and it's just full of boneheads going "this isn't a game." Which is sort of true - but it's more interesting because of how much it does with such a lack of mechanical systems. I was really impressed with it just because it gave me the illusion that I was going wherever I wanted in the house, exploring largely at whim, but it somehow still managed to keep a linear plot thread going. Good stuff, hope moar peeps get to experience it.

Reloading and replaying is such a boring way to play the game though. It makes for such a better narrative when you go into a level with good intentions, all hell breaks loose and you try your best to do some damage control. Compulsively going for a ghost playthrough is so frustrating and inevitably, something will go wrong. Why play a game where you've been given all these amazing tools, and then force yourself to not use them?

It's wicked right? I'm sure a lot of games have done the whole diffused neon lighting combined with earthy, elemental tones thing, but not in a Zelda inspired pixel art game.

Anyone here played either Gone Home or Outlast? After getting on these, I think I'm pretty much done with AAA $300 million games made by bloated studios, and completely devoid of a cohesive tone or thematic vision. Both of those games have a wonderful sense of minimalism about them that makes them so much more effective at what they're trying to do; they focus on imparting one impression, and because of that they do it so so well.

Found this game on Kickstarter, as well as a pretty excited RPS preview. Sets itself up as a cross between A Link to The Past, Diablo and Superbrothers: Swords and Sworcery. Love the music too; some sort of bizarre combination of syncopated future trance and orchestral strings. Creates a beautiful mood that's less gamey and more artful than either Zelda or Diablo. Doesn't it look rad? Kickstarter

The Xbox 360 wasn't loads less powerful - it actually had huge advantages over the PS3, namely unified RAM, processing architecture that didn't rely on multithreading nearly as much as the Cell, and a better GPU. It was far easier to develop for. The Xbox One and the PS4 are almost architecturally identical meaning there won't be any complications or differences that arise from idiosyncrasies to do with the way the systems are put together - except, the PS4 is more powerful. The only advantage the One has comes from the fact that DDR3 RAM has slightly less latency than GDDR5 ram, a fact more than compensated for by the ridiculous bus width of the latter.