carnifexseverian

So, I have no problem with Anita Sarkeesian having a strong opinion on sexism in video games and making youtube videos about it. Personally I don't really care about the subject but if there are folks out there that feel this is a battle to be fought, more power to them.

But for the love of god do we need to compare Sarkeesian to Rosa Parks, really? Its insulting and embarrassing to hear. Parks' standing up against segregation was one of the most courageous acts in american civil rights history. Sarkeesian purportedly finds sexism in Zelda.

Is it too much to ask for a shred of perspective?

And yes the Tom Bissell article is fantastic and I'm not surprised its found at Grantland. One of the few places I can go to find smart, extremely well written articles that don't treat the readers like idiots.

God damn, Jaffe fucking rules. He's out of his mind yet he makes so much sense. Giantbomb needs a "Jaffe keepin' it real" weekly video feature.

Hi there,

I've been in the market to purchase a home PC that can do more than my aging Macbook. The problem is that with a new baby in the family as well as a recently purchased home, well.. I practically have no money to invest in one.

I wouldn't be needing anything fancy. It's main use would be to play music, browse the web, simple word processing and excel use, with a long term goal of tinkering with software like Gamemaker. On the game playing side I really only want something that can play some of the cool indy games that only come out on PC with the high end being something like Dota 2.

Affordability would be the key here. If I can get a part at a thrift store or pawn shop that would be great. I'm thinking this will be a piece by piece project and I'm fine with that.

Any advice on what parts I should look for, where to find them, or even links to other posts or websites would be helpful. Also, what to start with as I'm pretty computer illiterate at this point and am looking at this as a sort of hobby/learning experience.

I apologize if posts like these are common but after searching around I find myself a little overwhelmed.

Thanks for any help whatsoever anyone can provide.

@Coombs: Yeah, can't really fix Tetris. I just kind of put it in the same category as Pong, fair or not. I think it's very hard for more modern, complex games to fit the standard of "perfect". The more simple the game the easier it is to make it flawless.

Also, so much of what you view as perfect or great comes from your personal perspective. Take a game from my list for example, MK9. I can understand why some would roll their eyes at that selection. However, if you grew up playing MK in arcades and haven't played fighting games in years your opinion would differ vastly from someone who never had that history with the franchise or was a hardcore fighting game fan and was just picking up the next latest thing.

Its such a subjective question, which makes it fun.

Side Note: I like the early Mega Man games a lot for this topic.

@Coombs said:

Final Fantasy III (VI)

Super Mario Bros 3

Tetris

Everything else doesn't even come close

The best list I've seen if I'm trying to stick to topic. Tetris being the exception, I enjoyed it but would always eventually find it boring. FFIII will always go down as my favorite game of all time though (yes, I realize that statement is highly influenced by nostalgia)

No games is perfect.... yada... yada... yada...

I would also probably say Dark Souls is at the top of my list. I'm not even saying its my favorite game but as far as having a vision of what you want your game to be and applying a laser focus to it, yeah I think Dark Souls is one hell of a well designed game.

Also, Batman: Arkham City is right there for me too. I know quite a few people liked Asylum better but for me City got everything right with little to no flaws.

Honorable mention would go to MK9. I just loved the total package I got being an old school MK fan that hasn't been interested in fighting games in over a decade. NetherRealm nailed the cheesy storyline by taking it self just the right amount of serious, the character design was perfect, I loved the fighting system, and the game just had so much content.

I realize my list probably fits better under "What do you think are the best designed games" or "What games were you completely satisfied with" but I can't objectively say any game I've played in my 25 years of gaming is flawless. Oh, and I also stuck with current gen games too because trying to itemize other gens would make my brain hurt.

@bearshamanbro: I pretty much agree with everything you said. The menu UI could definitely be improved and I also found myself losing track of my character when multiple people were on screen.

I kind of wish they would have gone with a more individual character approach, something more like a fighting game or a Moba. A set characters with unique abilities that you could master, while using equipment and relics to augment and customize their playstyles. How it stands now resembles more of a multiplayer shooter approach where everyone has a base model and separate loadouts to tweak that model.

All that aside I actually find the gameplay pretty fun. I've only put a couple of hours into it but I've been surprised at how well the netcode is. I haven't noticed any lag and have experienced no disconnects. The matches just roll one after another with not a lot of downtime which is nice.

The multiplayer in general doesn't feel that deep or complex, but when paired with what I expect to be a GoW3 level single player game, it seems like a pretty good value. I can see this being similar to the Uncharted 2 package where you get a nice, full single payer game with a fun, arcady multiplayer mode added on. Not bad at all.

I'm with you. This is my first MOBA too, and find the key is the gameplay. Just fantastic gameplay that values decision making over twitch reactions. Matches are a series of decisions based on game knowledge and discipline.

My only prior knowledge of MOBA's came from limited discussions from the Bombcast, where I usually only heard about the toxic community. This game makes me want to dig into some of the big boy MOBA's once I put together my PC I'm planning on building within the next year. I'm definitely enjoying this in the meantime though.

Well, hopefully we'll see some more PSN players when this game is free on PS Plus next week.

@Hailinel said:

The sexism talk. For all of the idiocy behind Retake Mass Effect and the strange details of Doritosgate, too many journalists were too clumsy in rushing out to shame developers for being sexist when they barely knew anything about the games in question. Also, for all of the criticism of one developer's comment about "protecting" Lara, a lot of white knights came out of the woodwork to attack that comment.

Perfectly summed up. The Lara Croft "protecting" comment drama was one of the most unimportant, media manufactured "controversies" I've heard in quite some time. It was embarrassing to hear journalists attempt to have a serious take on it, even on the bombcast.