Baal_Sagoth

@Ravenlight said:

• Forgot to turn on the Med Bay when fighting invaders.
• Forgot to turn on O2 after disabling it to boost shields.
• Teleported entirecrew to enemy ship and forgot I had auto-fire turned on.

Holy fuck, I can't even count how often that infamous trinity gloriously screwed otherwise perfectly decent runs of mine. I always feel so stupid as well - and then do the same silly thing again in the near future. It's like FTL is shoving it in the player's face too: "This is not hectic, you could've paused, could've weighed your options, could've paid attention to the important details..."

I do still love this game very much. I wonder if they plan to expand the random encounters in a massive fashion or consider reiterating on the concept in another game or sequel. I'd be down with that.

I'm hesitant to even comment because I might potentially be part of the problem by doing so. Reading this I can't help but ask a couple of questions.

How is this minimalist "news" article related to a random application? Yes, the NRA's lazy reaction to the shooting is disgusting but this transparent retort is no better than that.

How has the video or the application you link to any place on a website that allegedly covers videogames for enthusiasts in an in-depth fashion? The app seems like barely competent edutainment fare and the video hardly ever even touches the videogame topic (even though the meeting in question might have).

Has the click-bait strategy of wasting readers time by indicating sensational (or for that matter interesting) news and offering barely fucking anything been so successful on GB that I can expect garbage like this to come up regularly now?

Fucking bullshit like this is what I get up in arms about when lazy morons use it against media I enjoy or opinions I hold. It's incredibly sad to see a website I quite enjoy immediately abusing the same strategy to further its own agenda. Gun owners/ users/ advocates are hypocrites and weirdos, videogamers are murderers and rapists in the making, horror movies are for psychopaths, rap music is for misogynists and heavy metal is satanism in musical form. Fuck this cycle of morons trying present their opinion as fact. Fuck this whole manipulative freak show. If you're going to chime in do the work and come up with something meaningful.

@wjb said:

@Baal_Sagoth said:

[...]

As much as I loved 1up, I sometimes forget it was purely for the personality driven content and not for the traditional written work. The original shows and podcasts were where they shined, which was funny because not a ton of people (especially the CGW/GFW crew) weren't entirely on-board with the whole "podcasting" thing.

I never cared for the site itself. I enjoyed most of the podcasts, but Garnett Lee was obnoxious sometimes and Luke Smith, although funny, became a cartoon character to me after a while; I was kind of okay with him leaving. The 1up Show had its problems, but I started to prefer it over On the Spot and whatever IGN had at the time. As much as I thought Rich Gallup was a pro at hosting, On the Spot was really a show of Quick Look EXs, and half the games featured weren't all that interesting. It had its moments, but in order to get to 5 minutes of Jeff and Carrie goofing off, you had to sit through 15 minutes of Koei developers showing off their boring game no one cared about. From what little I remember, the IGN Chobot-driven show was too "E! Network programming" for me. There kind of was nothing else at the time back in 2006.

And I never understood associating 1up with "hipsters". Other people have said that, but I suppose I have different criteria for the term.

I'm not sure what IGN was up to at the time as I only sporadically checked them out when they came up in forums and elsewhere after I settled for GB as my go to location for games (I gave that Chobot news segment a shot for a short while and that's pretty much it). But curiously I pretty much enjoyed On the Spot as long as I visited Gamespot. After leaving the world of local gaming magazines I first learned to respect Greg Kasavin and actually discovered Rich Gallup, Jeff, Ryan and everyone else via GS's video formats. Your criticisms are acurate but they didn't bother me at the time for some reason. Plus, the glorious madness was already present occasionally (Ryan and Jeff performing a Britney Spears song still haunts my GS memories). The timid approach of some 1UP staffers towards podcasts and the like on the other hand made me feel at home very much as I just got used to all of that myself at the time. It was a significant part of my enjoyment of their content.

Other than that we're pretty much on the same page for the most part, I think. As for my "hipster" remark - I suppose after hearing that term in all kinds of contradictory contexts and having been called that myself I should just admit to not knowing what that even means anymore but I'm guilty of habitually still using it. I tried to say that 1UP, for my particular tastes, leaned a little too heavily towards getting on top of trends sooner than everyone else at the expense of in-depth, careful perspectives. This is, of course, pretty characteristic for websites, forums and critics in general. After all, some of the fine folks at 1UP really shaped parts of my gaming habits even if I favored GS a little more at the time.

@h0lgr said:

Man, Company of Heroes 2 needs to be taken care of. Can't bear to see that game drop off into nothingness.

Hell yes! So there are still plenty of reasons to be concerned. Fuck, Relic really needs to find a proper new home.

1UP was very influential and ambitious in the field of transitioning coventional gaming coverage to a modern online format. It was also incredibly flawed and ultimately a spectacular failure in my opinion. The 1UP Show delivered great moments and had a good concept but was way to hype focussed and didn't give the games themselves enough time. Too much dumb Halo collectors edition nonsense and too little insight into what I though a gaming website should be about - the games.

The podcasts were on their own level at the time, especially GFW Radio, and played a huge part in my enjoyment of the format to be honest. This is mostly due to incredibly good personalities like Jeff Green, Shawn Elliott, Shane Bettenhausen, Mark McDonald and Garnett Lee. In a way I'm still puzzled how a single site could have so much talent and still be so mediocre in many respects. All of the forum, community and review parts of 1 UP never interested me. The constant inside baseball discussions about gaming journalism where so far up their own assholes it wasn't even funny (especially how far they missed the point of critically reflecting the role of gaming coverage by obsessing about the journalism bit). There always were way to many opportunistic morons blatantly trying to get a "real" job in the gaming industry. Also a lot of hipster bullshit.

In the end one has to respect the ambition concerning some of 1UP's progressive direction (and, by proxy, the influence it had over GB's genesis in some way). At the time there was nothing like it. I still dearly love and respect some of my favorite people from there but I can't say I ever really liked 1UP as a whole. Or that I trusted their editorial voice and opinions on games. I can't deny its influence over my personal views on gaming and gaming coverage though.

@Morrow said:

@DizzyMedal said:

Personally I think that scene would have worked better if it had been a choice. Either use the phosphorus or have a really gruelling gun fight with the soldiers. A super hard fight, almost impossible but not actually impossible. That way it would be have a really interesting case of "Look what you did."

I think one of the messages Spec Ops wanted to convey is that sometimes, there simply is no choice. People are often faced with situations where they seem to have two choices: Do the bad thing, or do the worse. But the worse choice would often lead to incredible disaster, so the human mind will always pick the lesser evil.

I mean, think about it. Imagine you were Walker, what would you have done?

Facing dozens or even hundreds of armed enemies with tanks, turrets and whatnot as a three-man squad, or using your chance of a surprise attack that could give you an immense advantage, but with the possibility of casualties?

Sure, the usual video game would have given you the possibility to win this fight, or stealth-kill them or whatever, but in my opinion, Spec Ops was aiming to go beyond the structure of a video game, or "video game free will", and instead presented you with the stigma of real-life free will.

That's very well said. Makes a lot of sense and it also was what I came away with after playing it myself.

I can't possibly decide that. At least murder slingshot, Pennies rant, Walmart shoplifiting, Mile High and North Korea are far to good in their unique respective ways to pick my favorite. It was good to be reminded of those glorious moments though!

So glad you chose to do this yet again! It's a fun aspect of experiencing the GOTY discussions on this site.

Since I'm done with playing 2012 games this year, here's my list.

I think this short-lived PR stunt is superficial, dumb, pandering, lacking any substance and - insult to injury - it does a huge disservice to the thing being "advertised". In other words it's a perfect fucking fit for Facebook.

Well, I'm getting bored with the moronic platform exclusivity. I have been itching to get back into Skyrim and I probably will give it another magnificent run when all the DLC is actually out on PC. I may just wait for the whole package to receive a good discount at this point. There's so much other great stuff to play that I just can't be bothered with following all the weird release date nonsense every fucking time. Shit like this makes me really miss a good old expansion pack that ensured I'd get another significant chunk of game to dive back into a beloved universe. Skyrim, as excellent as I personally think it is, doesn't lend itself well to dispensing bite-sized quests every once in a while. When they decide to even make me wait at the very moment I'm aware of a new piece of content I'll just pass for the time being.