sweep

I've found it pretty great in Dirt V, you get some nice feedback/rumble when driving over different terrains and you get a real sense of having to push against the pedal when accelerating. It seems like a natural/easy fit for driving games.

I really like the controller overall, it looks/feels great to hold. I wish the mic was off by default and didn't need to light up the orange button in the middle when disabled, but otherwise I'm pretty happy with it.

This continues to be a huge bummer, yes.

Unity having access to weta's toolset will make unity more versatile both for existing game developers and for unity as a software than can now also be used for film/VFX work. Unreal has been moving in that direction for years and it's working out pretty great for them, and it seems like the more versatile a software package can be the more likely it's going to be integrated into existing workflows. This is a big step towards blurring the lines between game and film quality vfx. So it's going to make Unity a much more desirable software to use for large scale/big budget film and game production.

As for weta, they just made 1.6 billion dollars. That's million bucks.

Unity has now acquired weta digital for an insane amount of money. For those who don't know Weta Digital, they're a giant in the VFX world for their work on every Lord Of The Rings movie, all the Planet Of The Apes remakes, and they've hand a hand in everything from Godzilla to Game Of Thrones. They have won six oscars for Visual Effects, and multiple other awards too. Simply put, this is a huge deal both for videogames and VFX industries - Unity is acquiring the insanely high-end AAA Weta tech with the intention of making those tools available to anyone with a Unity licence. I don't doubt this will also catapult Unity forward towards being a multi-purpose 3D package on par with Unreal (and their groundbreaking virtual production toolset), and will continue to blur the lines between VFX for games and for films.

Also joining Unity are 275 of Weta’s engineers; in addition, Unity is acquiring Weta’s data and SaaS cloud businesses as well as a large library of visual effects assets. Not included is Weta Digital’s core visual effects business; the company’s visual effects artists will instead be working under the roof of a newly formed entity called WetaFX

The US-listed Unity said the visual special effect tools created by Weta Digital, which has built characters and scenes from film spanning Avatar, LOTR, Wonder Woman and Planet of the Apes, will now be “democratised” and put in the hands of “millions of creators and artists around the world”. “Weta Digital’s tools created unlimited possibilities for us to bring to life the worlds and creatures that originally lived in our imaginations,” said Sir Peter, chairman and co-founder of Weta Digital. “Together, Unity and Weta Digital can create a pathway for any artist, from any industry, to be able to leverage these incredibly creative and powerful tools.”

More here.

Simply put, it's a huge investment in one of the most popular game development softwares in the world. It's pretty exciting to think what game devs will be able to do with free access to the weta toolset. Having said that, I do not envy the army of engineers that are now having to integrate all their shit into Unity!

Since moving to the southern hemisphere 6 years ago I haven't really cared for it, as Halloween takes place right at the end of spring/start of summer, and without the autumnal seasoning it feels weirdly forced and commercial.

On the flip side though, I get to dress up my dog like a crocodile.

With lockdown in Australia gradually easing to the point that we're allowed vaccinated guests in our homes, combined with the timely release of Mario Party Superstars, it looks like we're going to be hosting a Mario Party Party in the immediate future. Because we're adults and we have identification to prove it, we're planning on involving alcohol in some shape or form in order to enhance the Nobody Wins-ness by allowing the sense of exasperation and regret to physically remind the participants of their poor life choices the following day.

So I guess my question here is: Are there pre-defined drinking games? The obvious one seems like "Every time you get a star you take a shot" - preferably of something thematic like Fireball whiskey. This would work because:

1. In a typically Mario Party match you're unlikely to gain an amount of stars that would result in alcohol poisoning (ie less than 15)
2. You're punished for stealing stars from other players. Real-time karma.
3. Gives a natural handicap to the more experienced players who might take an early lead
4. The arbitrary nature of star rewards means everyone is likely to end up drinking something regardless of how good they are at the game

But before we lock in this transparently stupid idea, I wanted to see if there's an alternative way to do this. Thoughts?

I've found that the games themselves became less important than the social experience of playing them as a group - for months my primary form of social interaction was playing WoW or PUBG, without really worrying too much about what I was doing or whether we were winning, but just having that common interest with a group of friends who I could talk to and interact with. In that regard I found that my desire to play games alone, or to play single player games, has been greatly diminished - without the social aspect games occasionally just feel frustrating and arbitrary.

Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken is probably my favourite of the past few years - it's got a great art style, as well as being pretty informative when it comes to anime production, and I like the atypical character design as well.

I don't have the energy to give you a full list, but that's a pretty solid jumping off point.

I haven't watched an entire playthrough since the Persona 4 Endurance Run for exactly that reason. If I want to play a game I'll buy it and play it myself. If I don't want to play it then I'm unlikely to want to watch someone else play it either.

But I'm basically an old man at this point, I don't have the energy to spend hours watching livestreams. I find most popular streamers to be obnoxious, usually because they're barely out of the fucking womb, with the world experience of a gnat. Give me a condensed 10 minute highlight video and I'm all set. Anything beyond that is gratuitous.

Edward Norton can play any role.