Giant Bombcast 10/06/2015

Minor nitpick, but "infect" is probably not the right word to use for how flu shots work. They're inactivated, which means what they put in you is dead or can't function.

http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/hcp/vis/vis-statements/flu.html

"There is no live flu virus in flu shots. They cannot cause the flu."

Wha? Why would no one play Rock Band on a PS3? I played a fuckton of RB on the PS3 with friends.

@set: To each his own I suppose! Speaking of important games, personally I'd recommend the 2009 Bionic Commando, one of the finest examples of physics driven locomotion I've had the pleasure of experiencing to this day.

Don't understand flu shots.

Voice actors sometimes have the opposite effect on me. Whenever any product has John Dimaggio in it, I have a hard time focusing or taking the character seriously. After watching so much Adventure Time and Futurama, I can't help but think of Jake or Bender when John Dimaggio is voicing a character. It completely ruined "Under The Red Hood" and Final Fantasy X for me.

This may be appropriate:

There is totally a couple of lightgun-like shooting segments in Read Only Memories, by the way.

Either time code episodes so we can skip destiny talk or start a separate Destiny podcast.

Enough is enough brad.

I imagine that the main reason why Goodwill wouldn't take Rock Band instruments is because what the hell are the going to do with them? Child toilets and trash cans are viable needs for less fortunate people. Rock Band is most certainly not. You need instruments, a console, and a copy of the game. People using Goodwill for its intended purpose aren't going to be in the market for Rock Band.

Dan knowing what a Neti Pot is and even having used one kind of blew my mind. Dan, of all people? Just look at his track record of knowing things. This man did not know how to buy pants a month ago. It's bizarre. I disagree with their opinion of it, though. Yeah, it feels weird pouring the water through your nose for a bit, but man is it great when you get cleared up.

Eh, I've never played Destiny or don't intend to, but it really is interesting to hear how the game develops over time. Seeing if the wreck can be repaired into something that's worthwhile.

Destiny is not interesting enough to take up 1/3 of a podcast. blah blah blah loot blah blah level up rabble rabble raid

yawn

Saw Destiny listed in the "filed under" links, decided not to click play.

@humanity: I think my only real problem with indie games these days can be summed up by the conversation had on this bombcast (which I just listened to because hey, I'm fashionably late). When discussing The Beginner's Guide, Jason almost seemed scared to criticize it. Now obviously, I don't think the dude is legitimately frightened to criticize indie games, but there definitely seems to be a reluctance to criticize small games like that. A lot of these games get by on "Oh, that's really interesting, that's nice" and people seem to remember it more for being different and "interesting" than really being all that great on its own terms. I dread the possibility during GOTY deliberations that there will be multiple games on the list that are there just because they stand in contrast to those evil AAA games and create a more diverse lineup.

There's also the fact that, because many critics are often so reluctant to criticize indie games or hold them to a particularly high standard, the question "Does this make good use of what makes video games special: its interactivity?" never really gets asked. Beginner's Guide may be "neat" and "interesting" but is it well served by being interactive? Does the interactivity *really* add much to it, or does this just exist because if it was a short film nobody would be talking about it at all and it's way easier to get by on novelty in videogames right now than anywhere else? These are introspective questions not many critics like to ask themselves because I feel like they view it as unfair or insensitive somehow.

I just feel like that's incredibly patronizing to indie games, personally. The phrase "soft bigotry of low expectations" comes to mind.

@marokai: You touch on a lot of points that I discussed in your other thread just recently and I agree completely, especially regarding the question of "did this need to be a game, and if so how does it benefit from being one?" I think the reluctance to criticize is exacerbated the further the title in question gets from actually being a classic videogame. Things like Broforce or Super Time Force are much more often discarded as "average" or worse in a relatively offhanded manner, while less recognizable games are pondered upon for much longer - perhaps longer than they deserve at times. This doesn't always happen of course, and maybe we are reaching some sort of boiling point as Everybody's Gone to the Rapture was actually panned by most critics despite following a formula that had thus far gained similar titles quite a bit of acclaim. Either way whenever some new indie release does come along, lacking in a lot of ways but doing a few things in a unique manner, critics and general public seem more often than not seem to rediscover gaming in them as if they've never seen a game before in their entire life.

They need to make a dance of the nay nay

@Rorie: When I click the RSS button in Safari iOS to subscribe to the premium feed, it opens the news app instead of podcasts. Am I trying to do this the wrong way? Sorry to bother

@cactusapple: lol k

@hypnotoadbrwowrowrow: Hmm, I don't really know much about iOS. You can find the feed directly on the following page and subscribe to it manually, perhaps?

http://www.giantbomb.com/feeds

@rorie: So that link also tried opening the News app instead of the Podcast app. What I had to do was tap on the RSS link, copy the URL, open Podcasts app manually, tap Add Pocast and then it asks to input a podcast URL. Kind of cumbersome way of doing it but it worked.