spicy_jasonator

Having ads on the site might not be a big deal for a lot of people, but for me it's nice to have at least one place without them, especially considering how many other things you can pay for and still have ads (TV, magazines, and even Hulu Plus these days). I like having the choice between viewing ads and supporting the site directly. For those who like the direct support idea, it's also a chance to participate and show the validity of such a model.

@ZeForgotten said:

@SSully said:

@TyCobb said:

So let me get this straight. The goal is get girls interested in Engineering by sticking some pegs in a plastic board and spinning a ribbon....

Legos -- more learning potential than this.

Erector Sets -- more learning potential than this.

K'Nex -- more learning potential than this.

Yes, marketers just slap pink on the box to make it appeal to girls, but you know what? They can learn a lot more with those than what she is selling.

You have to start somewhere, and this looks like it is a good introduction to other toys like that. Also it sounds like she plans to make more from this, so there is potential for more complex toys from her company later on.

I thoght he was just being a negative nancy just to be negative for no reason. But I guess if we're talking him seriously for some reason then yeah, it's a start.

Why does there need to be a start for toys that already exist? Getting a girl to play with legos is a simple as buying her legos. They don't need a princess filter. The integration of building instructions into a story does sound like a fun concept, though. I think I would have been into that as a kid.

Also yeah, cool to see Tim Schafer paying forward his kickstarter success by support other projects.

Just pronounce it like the man in the commercial and everything will be cool.

@fmprodguy said:

@Vampir said:

@fmprodguy said:

How could you fall for leading more hits to an internet Troll?!

Hate, Love, or indifferent to the Halo franchise, or Halo 4, he gave it a 20... yes 20 out of 100.

Carnival Games, Fn Carnival Games didn't get a lower score FROM anyone than a 49!!!!

Naughty Bears, a semi broken game didn't get lower than a 43!

Plus it's not a well articulated point, his complaints would fairly apply to all Call of Duties since 4, Gears of War, New Super Mario, Mario, Zelda (well a little bit at least), and God of War. Oh Nos, they didn't reinvent the wheel when changing developers... and it still feels like the game who's name is on the box... I'll give it a 20!

The only reason to score a Tripple A game, for being like the game it is a sequel to, and that IS NOT broken, below the score of broken games and far far below the average is to get attention, hits, and start a flame war with the only goal to get more attention or hits to your site.

I own and love all three consoles, this is not about Halo, xbox360, PS3, Wii, fanboy-ism.... It's about calling out BS

Bummed you fell for the BS Patrick.

Or maybe he's just using a 100 point rating system in a way that makes some amount of sense. What purpose is there to having a range of 100 points if even universally reviled games like Carnival Games and Naughty Bears get scores in the 40s. What does being AAA matter if you don't like the game?

You wouldn't expect a movie to get a decent rating just because it was big-budget, and I see no reason that should be true about video games either.

Hmmm, out of context rationalization.

The fact that a game is a "Tripple A" doesn't get it a good score. The point was that scoring a super high profile game lower than broken games and phoned in minigames collections, is opportunistic at best.

For example, plenty of people can say they thought The Avengers was not a good movie. Everyone is more than allowed an opinion, and their own view on what is good and bad. A published "Review" though is placing yourself up on the pedestal and saying that this is MORE than opinion.

Just check the Dictionary:

re·view

[ri-vyoo] Show IPA

noun1.

acriticalarticleorreport, asinaperiodical,onabook,play,recital,orthelike;critique;evaluation.

He didn't score Halo 4 lower than those games, because he did not give those games those scores. If reviewers are expected to base their scores for a game off of what other people scored another game, than game reviewing has gone to a scary, broken place. Were all of those Resident Evil 6 bad reviews opportunistic? If it was some cheap, opportunistic grab a publicity, he probably would not have put it at the bottom where you have to read the whole text to get to. Speaking of which, just noticed that it was a 1 out of 5, not a 20 out of 100. Game scores are not math, and conversions like that don't work. By that logic, carnival games would would get a 2 or 3, depending on the outlet.

Also, I'm not really sure what you are pointing out with the definition. The review was certainly a critical evaluation.

@fmprodguy said:

How could you fall for leading more hits to an internet Troll?!

Hate, Love, or indifferent to the Halo franchise, or Halo 4, he gave it a 20... yes 20 out of 100.

Carnival Games, Fn Carnival Games didn't get a lower score FROM anyone than a 49!!!!

Naughty Bears, a semi broken game didn't get lower than a 43!

Plus it's not a well articulated point, his complaints would fairly apply to all Call of Duties since 4, Gears of War, New Super Mario, Mario, Zelda (well a little bit at least), and God of War. Oh Nos, they didn't reinvent the wheel when changing developers... and it still feels like the game who's name is on the box... I'll give it a 20!

The only reason to score a Tripple A game, for being like the game it is a sequel to, and that IS NOT broken, below the score of broken games and far far below the average is to get attention, hits, and start a flame war with the only goal to get more attention or hits to your site.

I own and love all three consoles, this is not about Halo, xbox360, PS3, Wii, fanboy-ism.... It's about calling out BS

Bummed you fell for the BS Patrick.

Or maybe he's just using a 100 point rating system in a way that makes some amount of sense. What purpose is there to having a range of 100 points if even universally reviled games like Carnival Games and Naughty Bears get scores in the 40s. What does being AAA matter if you don't like the game?

You wouldn't expect a movie to get a decent rating just because it was big-budget, and I see no reason that should be true about video games either.

Neither. I wouldn't replay a game just for an ending if I wasn't going to replay the game anyway, but I also find it harder to appreciate endings just watching them on youtube, because they don't feel earned. Having experienced a potentially different narrative than another play also makes something interesting to talk about.

Looks better and seems faster moving between screens, but it still takes way to many steps to download a demo. Some more than others, for some reason.

@YOU_DIED: I totally get that that's you're point, I'm just disagreeing with it. My point wasn't about US law, rather that not all potentially offensive things to say belong in the same category. When it comes to verbal abuse like the later of the two examples I mentioned, I don't think it matters if it's "casual" speech for the speaker if it isn't for the listener, and I don't think it should be consequence free on Live.

Though I do think preliminary steps like temporary and voice bans would be a good idea, and only use perma-bans for repeat offenders. Like Brodehouse just said, certainty over severity. If someone still has access to the account they've been playing one for a while, they might be motivated to actually work things out so they can keep it.

@TheSouthernDandy said:

@YOU_DIED said:

@Vampir said:

@YOU_DIED: I'm not sure what you mean. Those are the examples he is using to support his point.

From the OP:

Speaking to GameSpot, Ross and Wolfkill said there is zero tolerance for Xbox Live players who are found to be making sexist or discriminatory comments against others

Penn is talking about the right to not be offended. There's a big difference between just being offending by what someone else says, and actually feeling verbally abused. There's also a big difference between something like cursing, which people dislike for mostly arbitrary reasons, and outright racism, which is a serious societal issue.

I think you just defined 'offended'. My point is that up until now MS has let users mostly police their own social experience using the mute and block tools. All I am saying is that they should go more in that direction and less in the direction of booting users off the service permanently for casual conversation, regardless of whether someone finds it offensive or not.

Cmon, we're not talking about casual conversation here. The reason Xbox Live has a reputation for being a cesspool isn't because somebody in lobby chat overheard to guys discussing something and using bad language. It's abuse DIRECTED at other players that's the issue and it completely different.

For example, if I overheard someone saying something in a discussion like, "homosexuality is a sin that needs to be cured through prayer," I would be offended by the implication that there is something fundemental to the identity of some of my friends and family that needs to be cured. However, it's easy to draw a distinction between expressing potentially offensive options like that, and a directed attack like one player saying to another something like, "You don't belong in this game you f**cking f*g."

@YOU_DIED: I'm not sure what you mean. Those are the examples he is using to support his point.

From the OP:

Speaking to GameSpot, Ross and Wolfkill said there is zero tolerance for Xbox Live players who are found to be making sexist or discriminatory comments against others

Penn is talking about the right to not be offended. There's a big difference between just being offending by what someone else says, and actually feeling verbally abused. There's also a big difference between something like cursing, which people dislike for mostly arbitrary reasons, and outright racism, which is a serious societal issue.