ConstableJelly @ ConstableJelly @beehaw.org

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25

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232

Joined

2 yr. ago

Theoretically, should an emergency occur, I may contact one close acquaintance, like a family member, and ask that they notify anyone else who needs to know, like work, so that I don't have to provide updates through multiple channels all the time. Or I don't feel like answering questions about something private to someone, like my boss, who has no business with the details.

That part doesn't strike me as suspicious, but the persisting concern from friends and colleagues (as well as the potential unreliability of the paper's representatives) does.

Still playing the field since finishing my second BG3 playthrough a few weeks ago:

• Sniper Elite 5: I wish I'd known about this series 10 years ago. SE5 is a surprisingly fun stealth action game, with enormous sandbox levels that encourage varied approaches, styles, and paths. Lots of unlockables and customizations (and unlike the new Hitman games, those unlockables can be used across all levels once you get them). Unfortunately I'm just not super into this kind of experience anymore, but I still had a lot of fun for the time I did spend on it before getting worn out. I'm keeping it on my system because I'm sure it will scratch another itch soon.
• Bus Simulator 21: I wanted something I could zone out with, just kind of dive into mundanity and focus on little details. The game does meet that criteria conceptually, but the gameplay just doesn't feel super well-tuned, and you get these little penalties for everything that goes wrong. I didn't play it long enough to deal with the business management aspect, which I think is a significant part of the appeal, but it really just didn't click like I wanted it to.
• Firewatch: Skipped this when it released and was a huge deal. I didn't know anything going into it and really liked the format of the game, exploring the woods, pulling up the map and compass to navigate and all that. Characters and performances were exceptional. But ultimately I was kind of disappointed because ...
  spoiler
• Concrete Genie: Really stellar artistic achievement. The quasi-stop-motion style of the in-engine game, the animations of the genies, and the sketchbook style cutscenes all looked phenomenal in their individual styles. The story was touching and I loved the idea of a hero whose value is his artistic drive, but I was a little bothered by what I felt was a fairly reductive approach to bullying. But the biggest problem was that the game feels really incomplete. Exploration is competent, but the drawing mechanics are not nearly robust enough to tap into the creativity it's trying to celebrate, and the final act of the game introduces a whole new set of mechanics that, again, are really shallow. By the halfway point, the game felt more like a really, really sophisticated proof of concept than a completed game.
• Two Point Hospital: This game is doing a much better job with what I was hoping to get out of Bus Simulator 21. Love the art style and UI. No complaints, just something easy to dip into from time to time.
• Paradise Killer: I just started this and it is fucking nuts in a very sincere way. Opening lines: "The Syndicate created the first Paradise Island to worship their dead alien gods. Guided by Leader Monserrat, the Syndicate attempt to resurrect the gods by forcing Citizens into psychic worship rituals. However, the worship invites demonic corruption from beyond the stars. The islands always fail. The islands die and a new Paradise Island is born. The cycle repeats." Really unique art style and game world. Time will tell if the investigative core lives up to the rest.

Worked at the paper for 18 years, good. But it's owned by Alibaba Holdings in China, bad. The paper claims they're in the contact with family and have confirmed she's safe and taking time for personal issues, good. But her friends, colleagues, and Hong Kong Journalists Association remain concerned for her safety, bad.

I don't know anything about all the elements at play here but it certainly sounds suspicious.

Just before the vote was about to begin, Max Miller of Ohio, one of Santos' Republican colleagues, sent an email to the full Republican conference, writing that he and his mother were victims of credit card fraud tied to Santos' campaign and that he would be voting to remove Santos.

"Neither my Mother nor I approved these charges or were aware of them," Miller wrote in the email obtained by NPR. "We have spent tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees in the resulting follow up."

Can't imagine a more appropriate way to miss the point.

This doesn't strike me as a bad move on their part. From the way the responses are worded, this feels very much like it's intended to counterbalance negative impressions specifically for potential buyers who might otherwise be swayed by negative comments.

If I'm on the fence about something, I can be pretty easily swayed by a negative review that enumerates things that I'm specifically on the lookout for. Like if I saw one of those reviews that said bad story and boring gameplay, I would find myself think "sounds like the Bethesda formula hasn't updated enough for me," but I could be swayed back then other way by a dev response that enthusiastically mentions the exploration and crafting. "Maybe there's enough here for me that I don't need to bother with the story."

Is it underhanded? Maybe. But it seems like a no-lose scenario either way for Bethesda.

I am impressed by your resilience that you didn't immediately swoon over his intelligence, diligence, and confidence, which is what I would strongly presume was his actual expectation.

Dunno. You're allowed to film people freely in most places where there's no reasonable expectation of privacy, but maybe when there's commercial benefit from publication, a release is needed? I honestly have no idea.

And I've never really thought about it, but they do seem to rarely show a reveal, probably because the focus is supposed to be on them, whereas with something like Candid Camera and its ilk, the uninvolved subjects are the focus.

Nice, thanks! I'm playing on PS5 and it actually coincidentally just went on sale this morning so I think I'll go for it.

Haha, yeah I get what it is and what's happening, but I could never wrap my head around tracking it all. It was too chaotic in fights with more than a few enemies, and I guess what I really meant is that I do not get how the system is realistically meant to facilitate the kind of participation and strategy it seems to expect of me.

I read a lot of forums around that time about it, and I do recognize that a lot of people not only like it but prefer it over turn based, but it just doesn't work for me.

Can you tell me how it compares to Subnautica if you've played it? I've been looking for something that scratches that very particular itch that Subnautica hit so well, and so far I just don't like the aimlessness of the other survival/crafting games I've played. Subnautica's purposeful progression really hit the sweet spot.

I keep trying No Man's Sky, but after 2 years I finally figured out why it never clicks for more than a few hours at a time: it's essentially a live service game, which for some reason I never recognized. It throws all its updates at you immediately, which destroys any real sense of earned progression in some ways, and its economy is designed for frequent and persistent play and multiplayer, so if you're just playing casually, progress is sloggy as hell in other ways. And there's just a thousand discovered things to do at all times, it's overwhelming. It's my fault for misunderstanding, but I've been trying to play it like I played Subnautica, and that's just not what this is.

The closest I've come so far to recreating the Subnautica magic was Dysmantled, which is a totally different game in a lot of ways but really terrific in its own right. Looking forward to their next game, Dysplaced, next year.

Anyway, I've had my eye on The Forest lately. Waiting for a sale, wondering if it will fit the bill.

I played maybe half or more of PoE and still do not get RTwP at all. I was playing on normal difficulty but started getting absolutely trounced frequently, so I gave up. If I'd thought about it at the time, I would have just dropped the difficulty, but it didn't occur to me until so late I'd forgotten too much to pick it back up.

Shame cause it was a lot of fun otherwise.

Impractical Jokers is a guilty pleasure of mine. It's a pretty "dumb" show, often crass, occasionally a little mean spirited. But I love watching real people have genuine fun (love bloopers for the same reason) and I do generally believe that's what these guys are doing. And you are right, in almost everything I've seen, they themselves are the butts of the jokes.

I'm trying to get back into watching movies, which used to be a major passion of mine, after a couple years not keeping up. I watched Ida this week, about a Polish nun in the sixties who meets her last living relative before swearing her vows and learns she's Jewish. The two of them travel to the family's hometown to learn exactly what happened to her parents during WWII. It was slow and immersive, as much care given to the sound design as the cinematography, and an absolutely powerhouse performance from Agata Kulesza as the aunt.

I like the intention and execution here, but credit to cyberpunk 2077 because they did essentially the same thing first a couple years ago.

I personally think TLOU2 is one of the most effective works of art in the entire medium and I love the game top to bottom, but I'm also overjoyed to hear they're working on something else now.

I too hope it's more cheerful, for the exact same reasons.

I finally finished my second run of BG3 myself for a grand total of about 200 hours. I haven't played a single game that much probably since Oblivion 15 years ago, and I racked those hours up over a much longer period of time. It's difficult to comprehend, no less express, how monumental an achievement this game is. The only thing that stopped me immediately rolling another character is the memory of the final gauntlet of major battles in act 3 (including the one who sings their own boss theme, which I didn't do the first time). I'm not following any build guides or anything, so it's been a pretty stressful week of game time and I'm ready to relax a bit.

On that note, I started playing Omno. It's fine. Nothing really stands out: not a big fan of the art style, the score is pleasant but not as noteworthy or impactful as something like the score in Gris, and the gameplay is simple and tight. I think I'd have lost interest if I wasn't playing immediately after 200 hours of BG3. But since I am, it happens to be hitting the right notes.

I'm seeing expertise outside the Abrhamic traditions demonstrated in there (e.g., Greek mythology). Any reason why the site seems focused primarily on biblical scholarship, rather than world religions more broadly?

If I can think of a question I'll contribute, I just don't have anything atm.

I am a total ignoramus about law, but this sounds more like a legislative failure than a judicial one.

But the appellate judge ruled Tuesday that the interception and recording of mobile phone activity did not meet the Washington Privacy Act’s standard that a plaintiff must prove that “his or her business, his or her person, or his or her reputation” has been threatened.

If we had comprehensive federal data privacy law, then we wouldn't have to challenge these practices against wet-noodle state laws that weren't actually designed for it, right?

We had city commission candidates in my area who expressed similar sentiments ("He says ... the city is not doing enough to deal with the homeless population and crime. He wants to improve the budget for both police and street maintenance").

Seems it's easy to think any attention is good attention if you believe the subject of your attention is more sidewalk detritus than person.

I discovered today that I live in an unincorporated community, so I'm apparently not governed by the city in which my address resides but rather just by the county. So I have nothing to vote for today.

Best of luck to everyone else for a quick and painless experience!

That's what captivated me about The Room, it's an unfiltered view into the mind of an insecure, narcissistic man-child. It frequently and inadvertently borders on comedy, sure, but I mostly found it pretty uncomfortable.