(( Hey satyreyes,

...um... wow, you weren't kidding.  I thought I was in the room full of creepy, but the game decided to go all out creepy-freaky-terrifying! 

I totally had to get Chapter 2 from Steam.

All,

Has anyone tried Deadly Premonitions? ))

gpink wrote:

Now playing Fate/Stay Night. It's consuming my life.

I found out that the PSS has Dark Cloud, one of my favorite games of all time. So, I bought it and started playing. I'm also considering getting FFXIV, though I'm not 100% on that yet. Regardless, I've started streaming games I do play. So...There's that. XD

I put off getting Sims 4 because dear god another one, and the initial reviews weren't very good, plus the angle they were selling (REAL EMOTIONS!) sounded like shit, and yeah, having less features than the third one bugged me.

So I wasn't even going to get Sims 4 until I was trying to get Dragon Age II back up and working on my computer, and it was right there and it was really easy to buy, and so I gave up and got it, three weeks ago, plus the Get to Work expansion when it went on sale a week later.

The Sims and I have a history.

I had a garage sale and sold a bunch of stuff from when I was really young to get the money to buy The Sims when it first came out.  I was maybe 10 or 11 years old, and a bunch of my friends played it and it was THE BEST.

Then Sims 2 came out and OH MY GOD.  The building engine was a million times more powerful, and they aged up so you could have entire dynasties, and they had motivations as well as needs, and it kept track of family structure and IT WAS IN 3D, not isometric crap-o-vision, and it had face customization and every object had so many actions tied to it and you could stargaze and look at clouds and get abducted by aliens right off the bat, and if you left them alone, you'd find your Sims doing something you didn't even know was possible.

Sims 2 was my favorite.  It had flavor.  I still remember my families from Sims 2, and that's where I got into modding, even though it was a pain in the ass.  Sims 2 had a sense of space, and a vibrancy, that really allowed for investment in the houses you built.  It didn't quite have the variety to fill out that potential, and that's where the modding community came in.

Sims 3 was a buggy piece of shit.  Also somehow really boring and empty.  And ugly.  There were some decent water effects, but everything was faintly grey, and matte, even with INFINITE COLOR AND PATTERN CHOICES.  I modded it to hell and gone to try to wring some sort of interest out of it, but no dice, and that just made it more unstable.

Sims Medieval took the engine from Sims 3 and did something with it.  Sims 3 lacked… writing, where the off-beat humor of the writing had previously been a strong point in the series.  The quest system brought that back with a vengeance.  And Medieval looked at Sims 3's rather bland customization options and went, "by Jove, we don't have to use our limited options to represent all possible hairstyles for a flatly realistic world, we could be EPIC!!!!" And so they were.  And the opening cinematic is just great.

Sims 4 is… it really does lack a bunch of features from Sims 3.  And I am so glad it does.  Instead of a MASSIVE OPEN WORLD that's always running, all the time, you get a small mini-neighborhood, centered around one lot, thus preserving the ability to roam around a bit without putting loading screens absolutely everywhere, and eliminating the need to have EVERYONE'S AI WORKING ALL THE TIME which really left them a bit shit.  Really shit, in fact.  Sims in Sims 3 were better a pathing, they could negotiate around objects with obvious gaps between them while their brethren from 1 & 2 would be hopelessly lost, but they just didn't do anything interesting.  The fact that they were doing nothing interesting all at the same time was supposed to make up for it, but it didn't.  In Sims 4, you leave for a minute, and your sporty lesbian housewife will have like 3 lovers that she didn't even know before you left.

Also, Sims 4 gets rid of using rabbit holes for pretty much everything.  There's still some, for jobs and such, but the map isn't dotted with them the same way it was in Sims 3.  If you were going to take your Sim out to do anything but fish and talk, you'd end up watching as they disappeared in front of an empty box of a building and their task bar reported that they were doing the thing, as a gauge slowly filled up.  Those are gone now, which means you can't take a tour of town hall, watch the symphony, or go to a sports game, but hell, you weren't doing that anyways.

In Sims 4, the building tools are more slap-it-together-and-go friendly, which might suggest that they were significantly shallower, but I've found that they're really good at making interesting architecture, if you take the time for it.  I find the wall height selection to be particularly intriguing, along with the ability to tweak and adjust bits of roof individually, and OMG THE FOUNDATION SLIDER.  WHERE HAS IT BEEN ALL MY LIFE.  NEVER AGAIN SHALL I HAVE TO REBUILD A HOUSE FROM SCRATCH BECAUSE I DECIDED LATER THAT I WANTED A PATIO.

The Sims building engine has always worked around recognizing rooms, and in Sims 3 you started to get room-by-room modification tools, what with the click-and-drag walls that DIDN'T WORK ON COUNTERS AND CABINETS, which always seemed to be on the walls I most wanted to move.  Now, the wall re-sizer will FIND A WAY, and if it doesn't, it will MOVE YOUR SHIT to the family inventory, except for the baby.  You have to move the baby yourself.  Also, you can just PICK UP AND MOVE a room anywhere on the lot, even onto another story, or remove the floor, or the walls, or change them to fences, or go up a story and do away with the floor there to open up the ceiling.  It takes a while to get used to what counts as a room, and stairs are a bit wonky, but overall, it's quick, it's easy, and it's got all the cool little flavor bits that I've always wanted: bell towers and wrought iron mini-balconies and cornices and the like.  Oh, and columns FINALLY go on the vertices where they belong.  AND THEY CAN INTERSECT WITH WALLS.  AND THE BUILD ENGINE MOVES YOUR SIM IF THEY'RE IN THE WAY, or cancels an interaction if you move an object they were queued up to use.  That has always been a major annoyance.

And lastly, SIMS 4 HAS REFLECTIVE FLOORS, YOU GUYS.  REFLECTIVE FLOORS.  THAT WORK IN-ENGINE.  AND ARE JUST NORMAL.  Since the Sims 1, I'm pretty sure that's all I've ever wanted.

(( Okay... just finished Neverending Nightmares... and... wow.  I never want to be alone, in an otherworldly mansion that's populated by nothing but expensive looking dolls.

Finished Chapter 2 of Higurashi... and... also, equally as frightening.  I'm looking forward to when Chapter 3 gets released. 

Also, I have to say, I'm really liking Tristris' commentary in Child of Light.  While he does tend to be on the melancholy side, I love how he always can count on the support of his sister Rubella.  And I've met Oengus (sp?)!  This whole cast is just a boat-ton of fun! ))

satyreyes wrote:

I broke down and got a New 3DS.  At some point you say, "okay, this console has a Persona game, an Ace Attorney game, and a Final Fantasy rhythm game, what the hell does Nintendo have to do to get my business?"  No regrets.  Making Terra, Auron, Lightning, and Yuffie fight monsters to the tune of the FF6 boss theme makes me miserably happy.  Don't give me original content, just give me shameless nostalgia pandering and I'm a happy guy.

That said, I also played Tomb Raider (the 2013 one) last week, and I could hardly put that down either.  I have a thing for the combat-archaeologist archetype -- maybe I saw Indiana Jones at a formative age -- and the game really delivers on that.  Plus I really like Lara in this game; she spends a lot of time being scared but really brave, and every time I get her killed I feel like I have to apologize to her. 

Did you get the New 3DS? If so, how is it? I'm considering picking one up once I get my tax refund since I'm not hitting Katsucon this year.

Also, I finally beat Ni no Kuni  and have moved on to Star Ocean: The Last Hope*. Also, I've been playing Fat Princess, Tokyo Jungle, When Vikings Attack, and Sound Scapes here and there.

(*I really should get Integrity and Faithlessness whenever it comes out...)

satyreyes wrote:

Well, I never had an old 3DS, so I don't have much basis for comparison, but I like the new one! Big screens, bright colors, decent battery life, and the 3D is fairly stable and not headache-inducing. (It works best in bright light.) On the other hand, based on sales numbers I am apparently the only person on Earth who loves the PS Vita, so maybe you should take my opinions about handheld consoles with a grain of salt. ;)

Seriously, though, if all you ever play on the Vita is Persona 4 Golden and the Danganronpa games, as far as I'm concerned you got your money's worth.

I finished Dual Destinies, and it still cracks me up whenever Phoenix uses "lawyer" to mean the opposite of "prosecutor." My little brother is actually in law school, taking criminal law this semester, so I constantly remind him of the tenets of good lawyering. Believe in your client; the worst of times are when lawyers have to fake the biggest smiles; and if all else fails, turn the case upside down! (And/or accuse the witness of murder.) So far he has not seen the wisdom of these judicial principles, but that's just because I haven't repeated them often enough.

I also got a New 3DS recently but I haven't had the urge to play it nearly as much as my Vita. I got it mainly for games like Persona and Danganronpa (which I did enjoy) but I was surprised to find myself dumping hundreds of hours into indie games,which I never really cared for on PC, like Binding of Isaac, Super Meat Boy, Rogue Legacy,etc.. Given my 2 hour commute it's easily my most played handheld.

satyreyes wrote:

Well, I never had an old 3DS, so I don't have much basis for comparison, but I like the new one! Big screens, bright colors, decent battery life, and the 3D is fairly stable and not headache-inducing. (It works best in bright light.) On the other hand, based on sales numbers I am apparently the only person on Earth who loves the PS Vita, so maybe you should take my opinions about handheld consoles with a grain of salt. ;)

Seriously, though, if all you ever play on the Vita is Persona 4 Golden and the Danganronpa games, as far as I'm concerned you got your money's worth.

I finished Dual Destinies, and it still cracks me up whenever Phoenix uses "lawyer" to mean the opposite of "prosecutor." My little brother is actually in law school, taking criminal law this semester, so I constantly remind him of the tenets of good lawyering. Believe in your client; the worst of times are when lawyers have to fake the biggest smiles; and if all else fails, turn the case upside down! (And/or accuse the witness of murder.) So far he has not seen the wisdom of these judicial principles, but that's just because I haven't repeated them often enough.

Well, I have an old model 3DS XL, and I love it. But while it still works, it's difficult to deal with; one of the hinges is broken completely, and I don't wanna mess with it too much. So, while it would be cheaper to get the needed parts to fix it myself... there's no way in heck I could do that. So it's just easier to buy a New 3DS XL. Plus I can get Xenoblade. XD

(( Hey all,

One of the biggest reasons I picked up the Vita was just to play Persona 4: The Golden... actually, for the longest of times, that was the only reason I broke down and picked up the Vita.  Now, I'm kinda looking forward to getting spooked and creeped out by the re-released Corpse Party.  I had Corpse Party for the PSP, and this one is supposedly just like that... but on super-horror-steroids-of-fear-inducing-death!

Thinking of that, has anyone tried the Growlancer (at least that's how I think it's spelled) series? ))

Tonight I stayed up until five fricking thirty in the morning playing Ice-Bound, a Kickstarter project where... there's a guy who died while writing a much-anticipated book called Ice-Bound... so they make an AI of his brain to finish the book... and you're supposed to help, only you have an unauthorized copy of a weird document called the Ice-Bound Compendium, which contains drafts of Ice-Bound as well as other, weirder stuff.  This is an actual physical object.  And sometimes you have to hold pages of it up to your webcam in order to convince the AI that the direction you're taking with the rest of Ice-Bound is a legitimate direction.  The process of writing is really clever and satisfying -- you activate nodes of story that appeal to you, and you can see the results as excerpts from the finished chapter.  And your interactions with the AI itself are well-written, philosophical, and sometimes disturbing.  It reminds me of a Christine Love game, if Christine Love wrote weird meta stuff.  Very cool.

Must sleeeep

satyreyes wrote:

Tonight I stayed up until five fricking thirty in the morning playing Ice-Bound, a Kickstarter project where... there's a guy who died while writing a much-anticipated book called Ice-Bound... so they make an AI of his brain to finish the book... and you're supposed to help, only you have an unauthorized copy of a weird document called the Ice-Bound Compendium, which contains drafts of Ice-Bound as well as other, weirder stuff.  This is an actual physical object.  And sometimes you have to hold pages of it up to your webcam in order to convince the AI that the direction you're taking with the rest of Ice-Bound is a legitimate direction.  The process of writing is really clever and satisfying -- you activate nodes of story that appeal to you, and you can see the results as excerpts from the finished chapter.  And your interactions with the AI itself are well-written, philosophical, and sometimes disturbing.  It reminds me of a Christine Love game, if Christine Love wrote weird meta stuff.  Very cool.

Must sleeeep

Damn, that sounds interesting. I wish the compendium was available to non-backers in Europe

Really? Wow thanks.