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Omegathon Games

By Gabe – March 2, 2011

Time to start practicing Omeganauts! 

Something To Consider

By Tycho – March 2, 2011

Your choice of Pokemon games mostly comes down to whether or not you want Reshiram or Zekrom. Clearly, Zekrom is the right choice. Even more than usual, though, the whole experience actually comes from having access to someone playing the opposite cart.

Beauty And Another Kind Of Beauty

By Tycho – February 28, 2011

It was an act of will to keep from cocking my head at the Beastly trailer, which Gabriel queued up while laughing through his nose. Eventually I had to use my hands to maintain a neutral orientation, but then the urge to knit a scornful brow nudged its way through and everything fell apart. Ugly has received a significant downgrade, or perhaps an upgrade; maybe it depends on what you're trying to determine.

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Space Beans, Red Racers

By Tycho – February 25, 2011

Gabriel was trying to tell me about his Smurf Town, and how many Smurfs were there, or something. I was given to understand that there were "hella" Smurfs, almost perpetually "up in." I also learned that, like most freemium lures which writhe and flash on the hook, it has a potentially brutal microtransactional backend whose thorny roots grow into its very heart. Apparently, these "Smurfberries" make your Smurfs work their asses off, stay up real late, war with androgynous Shadow Men, and avoid mirrors.

What's Past Is Prologue

By Tycho – February 23, 2011

I've been reading Jane McGonigal's Reality Is Broken, and some of the things she says track very closely with the way things work in my own sphere. I am trained - intensely trained - to fail and select retry, that is to say, to iterate, and I can't tell you how much that conditioning helps when you're trying to teach someone to do something when they have no cultural frame of reference, a low threshold for frustration, and an annoying tendency to repeat every Goddamned thing you say in a sing-song, munchkin-like register.

Side Effects

By Gabe – February 21, 2011

I certainly appreciate everyone sending me tips on gaining weight and building muscle. Tycho’s story was from a few years ago though and I really don’t have that problem anymore. I wish I could say that I committed to a daily exercise routine or something but that’s not the case.

A Campaign Of Perpetual Psychic Warfare

By Tycho – February 21, 2011

It's crucial to abuse Gabriel lest he get airs, to make him chase phantoms and spirits, to ride his anguish, howling like a pirate in the rigging. Real-Life Gabriel had the exact opposite of the typical problem, though, and I would have thought it was the opposite of a problem at all (that is to say, great!) if I hadn't seen it for myself: he thought he didn't have enough weight.

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The Wounds Of The Past

By Tycho – February 18, 2011

It's very hard to tell how long a fighting game will be a going proposition around here. Soulcalibur IV is still played almost daily by Keek and Robert, typically beginning at 4:30, and that game is three and a half years old. That said, I'm not entirely sure it's really about Soulcalibur anymore.

Serendipity

By Tycho – February 16, 2011

I played Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 at the San Diego Comic-Con what seems like a hundred years ago, and though the roster was a profoundly truncated version of the retail selection, it was very much like what you're playing now: lickety-split full contact puppetry, with shit flying all around. Maybe you're responsible for the shit, maybe not. Maybe the shit happens even if no controllers are touched - I'll test this today. Or maybe you just moved your hands according to the ancient ways, what our people once called a somatic component, and some measure of their magic is made manifest unconsciously.

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The Ecology Of The Loser

By Tycho – February 14, 2011

Losing in a game that takes a long time to play feels bad; and losing in a wargame (which has a tactical component, even if dice are the final arbiter) feels worse. These things are compounded until the defeat becomes a barbed crown of shame, a crown which stands upon each brow differently.

PAX East

By Gabe – February 11, 2011

If you want to get a three day pass for PAX East you had better move quick. We only have 1000 of them left. Head over to the PAX site and grab yours today before they are gone!

Gawk-Blocking

By Tycho – February 11, 2011

Pulling Gawker sites off my bar felt momentous, but the relief was incredible. Once I realized that I didn't have to look at them, even if I have done so for years, the habit was broken absolutely.  If I am curious what they have said on any of their sites, I type them in manually. That's right.

Appliances For The Nefarious Home

By Tycho – February 9, 2011

In many ways, I just buy the industrial design in Killzone. I buy that actual ISA weapons and dropships might look this way, and I can see a kind of mechanical genetics at play: this lead to this, pragmatism with the occasional muted flourish. I wont lie, I've reloaded just to see the weapon. The Helghast, on the other hand - British Space Nazis (?) that make up Killzone's opposing force - have an industrial design that is all kinds of brooding Skynet nonsense. There's a certain PR factor to be taken into account; a floating, red-eyed arachnoid is definitely situated in Scarytown. But in the middle of all this functional stuff, thoughtful stuff, it verges on hokum. It's like the Helghast have internalized the villainy, they think of themselves as villains, and they surround themselves with little shrines to their own evil.