SansJason

Abby is certainly keeping the spirit of Dan alive on the site by asking if ethanol is in booze.

As a longtime collaborator with Colin Moriarty, I don't believe it's appropriate for Greg Miller to be featured on the site.

I also like the dumbness of spinning for every coin, so maybe have two wheels? Low stakes one for coins, high stakes for things like boss keys? The low stakes one can still have slim chances of dumb stuff too, of course.

This series rules.

@leraa:You could always check out Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney as a taste test.

P.S. While I'm here, @s5n8k3, come on, this is really embarrassing. Stop.

I just want to chime in to say that I super disagree with Alex and Vinny describing the proto-survival stuff in Snake Eater as a chore. The hunting and wound care in that game was incredibly purposeful and deliberate; fully realized systems as opposed to the bog standard ways those sort of actions appear in games now.

To say that "fridging" doesn't apply to God of War requires some serious pedantry. No, Kratos' wife wasn't murdered to drive him to vengeance (you know, the way the series already did beat-for-beat in the original trilogy), but her off-screen death is not only the inciting incident for this story, but is implied to have come as a result of the new setting's, once more, male-dominated central conflict.

As for excusing Freya and the Valkyries willfully asking to be killed or expressing gratitude, y'all had five years to watch this episode of Tropes that addresses this precise thing.

The contrivances of the plot don't matter when the end result contributes to an ever-growing list of scenes which lionize violence inflicted on women by men.

God of War is in my top ten, but Abby's complaints are valid and I completely agree that if Giant Bomb had more of a female presence earlier in its history, her perspective wouldn't seem so outlandish to its audience, because it isn't. It's reasonable, and in many cases it just seems to be the first time people here have been confronted with them.

I can't lie, when I got to the end of yesterday's video and saw that they were still doing another day of just naming games I really deflated. I hate being so negative but I super do not like this format, at all.

I like awards, I like debate. Yeah, sometimes it gets circuitous, but it at least feels like it has a point, an imminent conclusion once the arguments are settled.

I look forward to the GOTY deliberations; it's been some of my favorite content on this site, consistently, all the way back to MGS4 vs. GTA IV. Turning the first two days (or more?) of it into simply rehashing people's takes on games that they've been expressing throughout the year via the regular podcasts seems redundant and dull.

Especially when bringing up games that the crew doesn't like. As, for instance, a fan of Detroit: Become Human, I'm not very fond of bringing it up just to rant on it when normally it'd just be mentioned briefly on, say, Worst Game and then cut.

While I'm not a fan of Metal Gear Survive, Sea of Thieves, or other titles which get this treatment, I'm sure the people who like those games experience similar alienation during this new format (ostensibly meant to increase celebration and positivity), which now tosses games onto the table for no reason other than general negativity, merely earmarking them for more specific criticism later in the week.

No, but people grow up. (And so does their audience.)

Maybe it's not a big deal that some people find things upsetting that you personally don't? Maybe you don't need to be the arbiter of what warrants "outrage"?

I really, really love this series and also strongly feel they should implement a rule that Abby can only control whichever Sim's name is drawn that week. Bring the autonomy of the others down, maybe, although I don't think that should be necessary. Each episode should be a passion play about that Sim's lone path to the grave. Otherwise this turns into just watching Abby run a prison painting farm and shower simulator.