Lurker > MrMallard

MedeaLysistrata posted...

What's the logic, how does this bring someone closer to Love Live?

Love Live is set in a high school, so with authentic high school equipment and shit, Love Live fans can live out their fandom and greater fantasies.

So in other words, the logic is brain-fuckingly deranged horseshit logic.

There's one that I always go 50/50 on, because the subject matter is kind of obscure and it's a very dark joke.

What's the difference between a baby and a bag of cocaine?

Eric Clapton would save a bag of cocaine from falling off a balcony

electrochica posted...

Why do mother kangaroos hate the rain? Because the kids have to play inside all day.

Oh shit that's a good one. I went with "my uncle was a prize fighter - he broke both his hands fighting a washing machine he won from The Price is Right", but if she replies this'll be the next one

Wow, this court case lasted for longer than these people's children were alive.

Well it's not gonna be very quick but I'd still like to hear some banger jokes. I tried watching a bunch of Norm MacDonald jokes for one of the big gutbusting ones but I can't find anything.

It's for tinder

Like this is just some pug enthusiast's blog, but you can see photos of more recent pug breeds with the muzzle:

https://pugdogpassion.com/a-healthy-pug-standard/

There's a guy who's cross-breeding pugs to give them proper muzzles. The flat-faced pug has only happened in the last hundred years or so, it's possible to crossbreed them to be healthy again.

DoctorPiranha3 posted...

Fun fact: Mother 1 is more popular in Japan than Mother 3, the latter of which is considered a disappointment over there.

Why? I have no fucking clue. It's like saying that Super Mario Bros. 1 is a vastly superior game to Super Mario World.

The way I see it, it's like saying you prefer Pokemon Yellow to Pokemon Emerald.

I certainly don't begrudge personal taste, but fuck man once you go 16 bit, it's hard to quit.

CyricZ posted...

I played it once all the way through and I don't think I need to play it again.

Oh, absolutely. This is a one and done game for sure. It's a good one and done, but the whole schtick is how large and wanderable the world is while you do this largely non-linear quest with very nebulous requirements, and a lot of that space is empty walking space with random encounters. It's not an experience that leads to very engaging replays imo.

That alone has its charm, but it's not something I'd like to repeat. Like I think FF13 is a visually gorgeous game to this day, but I wouldn't play it again to run down a never-ending series of corridors. Kind of the opposite issue to EBB tbh.

Dat_Cracka_Jax posted...

How long did it take you to finish?

Honestly idk, I have 25 cumulative hours played on NSO and I've played at least five hours of NES games. I'd play this game for long stretches of time after work and usually jump off once it got dark.

Oh shit I didn't even realise, lmao

I was in a mood so I began posting my favorite Rocky Horror clips.

Whatever happened to Faye Wray?
That delicate, satin-draped frame
As it clung to her thigh
How I started to cry...
Because I wanted to be dressed just the same

https://youtu.be/8wLArncKxag

Even smiling makes my face ache.

https://youtu.be/6eo-zQrLxtE

Strider102 posted...

How much did you enjoy the final bosses theme music?

Lol

I actually really liked the eerie atmosphere that the last corridor and boss fight had. Finding the encapsulated townsperson who tells you not to save him, and that Ana needs to brace herself to see her mother once the battle is all said and done. Of course it's just an atonal pitch to sell the alienness of the... well, alien bad guy, but it's very effective at setting the off-putting and unpleasant tone of the final boss. Like yeah, Giygas is a fucked up wallpaper in Earthbound and infamously upsetting and strange - but even the embodied alien form of Giygas is very creepy and kind of upsetting to face. Trying to manipulate you into leaving your friends, telling you to die with the ugly humans you belong to - it's unpleasant and challenging in the same way that Youngtown is. The atonal pitch that scores his boss fight enhances the atmosphere of a boss who's already so uncomfortable and hostile to face.

So basically yeah I did like the final boss theme, lol.

Just as a preface, please don't spoil Earthbound for me because I haven't played it. I made sure to play Beginnings first both because it's the first game in the series, and so that any high points of later games remain high and I don't have to potentially take a dip in quality later on.

I think this is a very impressive RPG for its time. Not perfect by any means, but the world map is massive, the music is pretty good, the humour is very distinct and unique and the game lacks a lot of the rigidity that plagues NES era games. Mother 1 is within a style of its own, and it occupies a truly unique niche in the RPG space.

The issue is that Earthbound blows it out of the water according to the wider fanbase, and because Earthbound is the only one of these games that was ever officially localised, fuckin every English speaking player in the world has played Mother 2 before Mother 1. So going back to EBB is a pain in the ass, because the game isn't perfect. Graphical fidelity is pretty good for the NES, but being a NES game, it's never going to meet Earthbound's visuals. The story is offbeat and takes a different approach to RPG storytelling, skewing away from slaying the dragon to collecting melodies for a sad, amnesiac queen of some kind of dream realm to cease her nightmares and make her happy again. It's post-modern in an era where games like Mario were trying to define modernity in the medium or where games like Dragon Quest were trying to capture the romantic, empowering ideals of the fantasy genre. Earthbound apparently takes that concept a step further still.

So Earthbound Beginnings, as it exists in the west today, is at something of a handicap. But that doesn't mean that it isn't impressive or good, or that its legacy is insignificant because EarthBound/Mother 2 did it better. Earthbound Beginnings set a standard for emotional storytelling in a roleplaying game, and it set the mold for every imitator, every copycat, every game inspired by both its and Earthbound's offbeat and emotional tone and story.

Like on top of potentially getting a cold as a dehabilitating status effect from speaking to random NPCs and having to go out of your way to return a baby canary chick to a canary village, or using telepathy to figure out the answer to a riddle that hasn't been made up yet, you also have moments like fighting a gargantuan alien robot in a tank, or uncovering a village of panicked and upset children whose parents were all abducted by aliens - played surprisingly straight, and sold pretty well - or the male lead and sole female party member sharing a dance on the eve of their final ascent of Mt. Itoi before she confesses her affection to him.

This is the game where you sing to the final boss to get him to leave you alone. It's a game where you can unintentionally kill off a family of five birdmen as a way to improve your own chances of survival. It's a game where you have to telepathically communicate with a magic conch shell to get transported to a heaven-like realm ruled by a fairy queen. Earthbound Beginnings, if nothing else, sets expectations for the next two games and establishes a high bar of narrative, emotional and musical quality relative to its contemporaries. What it offers is ridiculously good, held back only by the limitations of its time and less of a budget than the true cream of the JRPG crop.

I kinda don't like that it'll always be defined by its sequels, because its flaws will always shine brighter in the shadow of Earthbound. The same way that it's hard to return to Pokemon gens 1 and 2 once you play 3, at least on a mechanical level. The same way it's hard to go back to the Harry Potter GBC turn-based roleplaying game once you start playing Final Fantasy.

I dunno. Honestly, by the time I finished this game, I was kinda fed up with it. It's a slog, I won't deny that. And that last area is a kick in the nuts. But I have an affinity for what Mother 1 represents, for what it led to. It's an oddball and a true underdog. And I think playing it before Earthbound was the best choice, because I wanted to enjoy it at face value without Earthbound ruining it for me - and I did. I have no doubt in my mind that Earthbound is gonna fuck hard, so I'm glad I got Earthbound Beginnings as an appetizer.

So yeah, it's old and janky and it suffers by it essentially being the first of its kind. But the humor, the passion, the emotional and informative intelligence is there. The surprisingly effective storytelling, when you run into it, is there. And by playing it first, I made it easier to experience something that feels original and weirdly subversive for its time, without any of the baggage from what comes after. Earthbound Beginnings is a game that benefits sorely from a guide, and you will be frustrated with it. This is for the folks who play old JRPGs from the dawn of the genre, who either grew up with this standard of gaming or for dumbass babby-mode enthusiasts like me who enjoy both the simplicity of the gameplay and the ability to fast-forward past the dated parts. I rewound like a motherfucker - sue me.

I dunno. There's an innocence to it all, a pureness to it. A lack of outright cynicism, but with an emotional edge to it that's hard to define. It's hard to swallow, but it's honest.

Final thoughts? I'm sure that Earthbound is so beloved as a sequel for building on what the first game started, and improving the parts of it that weren't as appealing. So to experience this game through fresh eyes was a treat, and despite being frustrating and almost unbearably dated in certain respects, what it establishes on an aesthetic level is truly unique and very enjoyable. Use savestates, and use a guide - and be prepared to slog through, because the game is non-linear and it's very easy to get sidetracked with the amount of freedom you have. But I'd recommend playing it if you have a long weekend to blow on bruteforcing a 33 year old NES-era RPG.

I mean Ben Wyatt honestly looked pretty amazing in the Batsuit. Until he started crying.

Not talking about the effect of either, or which one is "worse" than the other - because let's face it, GoT bros are the ones who got robbed in the end, which is at odds with how crypto tends to go. The question is whether they're as annoying as each other.

Both treat their interest as their sole personality trait, and they treat it as if it's the sun that they, the lucky enlightened few, feel honoured to orbit around. Though the question still holds - are they as annoying as each other with how far they go with it?

Didn't have either platform. 3DS was cool enough, but I was initially planning to get a Wii U for cheap when the NX got announced - until the Switch announcement was basically "all the good shit and techological innovations from the Wii U without the drawbacks".

I work in an industrial laundry where we do everything by hand. It's not as blue collar as, say, an abattoir job - but it's still hard physical labor.

Battam West is Boomer Batman. Baby boomers were born from 1945 onwards, and many would have either been coming into their own around the time the show was on, or the younger members of that generation were growing up on it.

Like, boomers grew up in the 60's and reaped all of the opportunities that decade offered, and from the 80's onwards they more or less made it harder for the next generation to climb the ladder as they attained significant positions of power and gated them off to those in their circle. Keaton's Batman is moreso Gen X Batman, as Gen X grew up in the 70's and 80's, with Christian Bale being Millenial Batman.

Does that make Affleck Gen Y Batman and Pattinson zoomer Batman? I think the latter is true, at least. After a while the distinction stops mattering. I'm just kinda bummed out that after the initial fad served to highlight the stagnation of wages against rising costs and the stranglehold on wealth and influence that baby boomers have, we've reduced the generational gap to within one or two levels of our own and forgotten where a rotten amount of wealth, influence, entitlement and financial ignorance has accumulated.

Though that's not to say that generational conflict is the answer, class is more relevant to that conversation. But I've made enough of an ass of myself itt.

I mean ideally nobody should be getting bullied at school. Like that's just a fact.

Of course, the well has become so thoroughly poisoned that saying "children shouldn't be bullied" gets you called a snowflake. The right is obsessed with the image of power and of pulling one's self up by the bootstraps that they either don't understand or willfully ignore the reality of bullying, which is that when it becomes a systemic, everyday occurrence, it breaks people before they get a chance to build up any "mettle" to be tested. They view it as a trial by fire that only the worthy will be able to weather, and an irreplaceable part of the school system that "PC culture" is trying to artificially remove from what they view as a natural social ecosystem - the strong prey on the weak, and the ones who rise above the bullying are stronger for the experience. Which requires you to forget about the ones who didn't persevere, who were broken by the ordeal - because by that logic, they were always going to be the weak small fish for the sharks' food chain.

Of course, I have my own reservations about anti-bullying policies - namely that they often aren't actually enforced all that stringently, and at the end of the day the kids who make the most fuss - who are usually the little shits doing the bullying - get results weighted in their favor while the kids they bully into silence tend to endure it and try to disengage as much as possible. But with that being said, it's almost better to make a hollow gesture that you don't deliver on than to outright complain about how people should be able to bully other people.

More than anything, I think it belies a significant lack of empathy and a lack of personal suffering to make a statement like this. When someone says "Why can't children make fun of other kids at school?", that tells me that they weren't bullied. It tells me that you were either a bully, you were bullied as a child and you became so vindictive that you'd rather let countless generations of children suffer like you did as a way of coping with what happened to you rather than lessen the burden that bullying puts onto them, or you're an oblivious brainwashed prick who's let a sterile political ideology of "might makes right, survival of the fittest, the natural order is that some people are baitfish and other people are sharks and you can't mess with nature" override your sense of empathy and decency.

But to specifically single out any group who already cops a disproportionate lashing for who they are - whether they be gay, transgender, immigrants, redheads, short, tall, disabled, Asian, black, Hispanic - makes this so much worse. Even as a white guy in rural Australia, I got shit on so much for reasons I didn't understand. I still don't understand why I was different in the way that I was that led to the amount of bullying I suffered. Fucking imagine being trans and having some bigoted little shithead call you slurs and beat you up for being queer. Imagine being black or muslim around some dumb fuck trailer trash kids, or some snide little prick whose dad owns a company and thinks black people and Muslims are ruining the country.

Even without being a minority group, bullying is a disgusting and deeply wrong practice that needs to be curbed with education and empathy. To incite bullying against a minority group, especially as an adult? It is nothing short of evil. The question should never be "why can't we make fun of transgender kids". It should never fucking be "why can't children bully other children anymore". The question should be on how to improve conditions for all children, academically and emotionally. You could fight for better funding for the education sector, who along with nursing see the most significant budget cuts. You could fight to end zoning, where low income neighbourhoods get the least amount of funding while high income areas get the lion's share, and low income kids can't go to high income schools even if their schoolwork is perfect.

How in the name of everloving fuck do you make the world a better place for any child by asking why schools won't let children be bullies any more? That alone is callous and evil. To single out any minority in that statement is fucked up on a whole other level, and I hope having realised what she was saying, this woman can begin to fully comprehend what sort of reprehensible lows her lifepath has brought her to and possibly course-correct to put her energy towards causes that actually do aim to make school life better for children.

This topic and the Star Trek topic melt my mind in a very similar way. At least I can understand this topic, with Iron Man 3 being a divisive movie since it came out - I don't think it's a bad movie, but this topic makes a lot more sense to me than people whose favorite Star Trek reboot movie is Into Darkness.

Honestly, I thought Iron Man 3 was a pretty entertaining movie. It's RDJ ganking dudes with a pistol for an hour and a half, it's funny and it has a lot of heart. Killgore or whatever his name is was a lame antagonist, sure. The Mandarin twist was dumb, sure. But imo, this was a movie which was carried by Robert Downey Jr's natural charisma, and watching him act outside of the suit on a one-man revenge mission was pretty entertaining.

I'm a lot less invested in Marvel since I stopped spending time with some old friends, and frankly I'm regretting a lot of MCU fandom bullshit I was dragged into. I never really liked Guardians of the Galaxy 2 that much, first one was okay but the second one felt like a less enjoyable rehash of what made the first one so unique for its time. Ant Man and the Wasp is one of the blandest movies I've ever seen, and the MCU Spiderman movies feel like mediocre CG junk rather than anything I like about Spiderman (though I'm itching to watch No Way Home tbh).

I still remember enjoying Iron Man 3. I wasn't expecting Tony Stark shooting dudes with a pistol, and as far as his revenge quest went, I was honestly pretty entertained by the action and by RDJ's charismatic portrayal of Tony Stark. I don't begrudge people for being upset with such a mediocre antagonist, but I enjoyed the movie enough that I didn't care about that. It was goofy action schlock - it wasn't a Winter Soldier-level MCU movie, but it was perfectly watchable.

Make me *jumps off a cliff*

I bought an eShop gift card yesterday and saw that Wii U was listed alongside 3DS and Switch. Thought to myself "jeez, who'd still be buying junk on that old pile of crap?"

Turns out the answer was nobody, or at least nobody past the end of March 2023.

So it's not the guy who ran for office on a bunch of qanon horseshit? dang

Kim_Seong-a posted...

Since you mentioned the humor, have there been any bits that stood out to you?

One of my favorite parts are the NPCs. You find some real interesting weirdos in this game. >_>

A standout moment is the janitor who lets you onto the Merrysville school roof. He bitches about his wife a bunch, but when he asks you if she sounds terrible and you agree with him, he gets upset with you and tells you to scram.

But also, the game really sets the tone from the beginning when you have that first moment of control - you walk around, you look at things, and as you're going to leave you get attacked by a lamp. It's a very funny and abrupt start to such an old game, games from back then have a rigidity to them that Earthbound Beginnings immediately discards.

I also really appreciate how goofy the enemies are, like the cars and trucks are one thing but why the fuck are coils of rope walking around on two legs? I like that on top of these weird ass robots with PK powers, you have to beat the fuck out of dozens of mad scientists who reside in an abandoned factory.

I like that you get a free heal after listening to a fisherman ramble about his fishing until the sun comes up, and while it would be a total pain in the ass without rewind functionality - which I've been abusing like a motherfucker - I kind of love how talking to random NPCs has a chance of infecting you with a cold.

I understand that EarthBound is touted as this watershed moment of emotional storytelling and unrestrained absurdism, a signal flare in the minds of many that resulted in a wave of independent successors to mixed results. Going back to the NES game, many people consider it a step back - which it is, in the same way Dragon Quest 1 is a step back from Dragon Quest 2.

But without that baggage, Earthbound Beginnings has a chance to shine on its own merits, to rely on its own character. And sometimes that character is finding a nerd in a trashcan on top of a school to escape bullies, only to find that nerd's dad hiding in a separate trashcan on the other side of America for no reason. It's going from a city defined by poverty to a city of dine-and-dashers and con artists emboldened by incompetent/corrupt police, to a town of lost children whose parents have all been abducted by aliens to their panic and chagrin.

It's the audacity of this NES game to break significant rules of the JRPG format and take on a wholly original tone and a wacky, cartoons aesthetic inspired by classic Americana that makes it such an entertaining game. Maybe not as entertaining as a party member named Poo, but legitimately disarming with its comedy juxtaposed with its willingness to poke at darker subject matter from beginning to end. And I get that EarthBound is the bar at which Earthbound fans set their expectations, but I don't have that bar to meet.

That I can agree on. I think a lot of it has to do with fundraising, I think Labor has fundraising and donation guidelines that keep them from being tied up in donor promises and shady deals. Meanwhile the United Australia Party is bankrolled by a billionaire, and who knows where the Liberal party are getting their money.

Nah, just venting about one of the worst modern members of parliament. I only found out about this like a year or two ago, way after I knew about his immigration hypocrisy and his attempt to deflect from Fraser Anning's statement about the Christchurch shootings by smearing the Greens as "just as bad".

It was a significant and particularly aggressive derail from the point of the thread, I'll give you that. So in regards to the actual topic:

This statement from Scott Morrison is yet another significant political gaffe in a conga line of the media kicking the shit out of him, and what he doesn't seem to acknowledge is that the initial apology was received pretty well by the indigenous community - all the way to a significant figure in the field of indigenous human rights:

Dr. Tom Calma, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner of the Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, gave a speech formally responding to the government's apology. Calma thanked the Parliament for acknowledging and paying respects to the Stolen Generations, stating "By acknowledging and paying respect, Parliament has now laid the foundations for healing to take place and for a reconciled Australia in which everyone belongs".

Outside of the seven toads who decided to boycott the event, even the opposition leader released a statement in support for the apology, which itself was appreciated.

Rather, the reason why this quote from Morrison sounds particularly tone-deaf is because after the apology itself, progress towards repairing the rift between indigenous Australians didn't exactly kick into high gear. Even as far back as 2009, it was acknowledged that not every recommendation made by the Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission was taken up by the laws and acts introduced during the apology - by the same man who was appreciative of the apology, even:

However, Calma did note that there were many recommendations in the Bringing Them Home report that, as of 2009, had not yet been implemented.

One reason that tensions are flaring in the indigenous community is that the last 9 years of Liberal rule haven't been promising in actually improving relations with the indigenous population. We're making strides, but between Tony "Stop the Boats" Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull and his extensive corporate tax cuts and the balding little churchy stooge we have right now, we've had so many ridiculous media circuses about mouth-breathing morons making obscenely expensive moves with taxpayer money.

We've seen unprecedented corruption between Daryl Maguire, Gladys Berejiklian and John Barilaro. We've seen more money going to private schools - schools which charge their own fees into the hundreds of thousands - than public schools who don't charge their own fees. We've seen banks and large retailers retain hundreds of millions of illegally gained JobKeeper funds in the past two years alone.

So who's thinking about the indigenous population while all of this is going on?

The communities affected by water trading and illegal damming in the Murray-Darling basin are predominantly rural indigenous communities, who were already significantly poorer than the average Australian community. They got one shipment of bottled water from a third party, and zero aid from the Government themselves. But the government over there is more interested in profiting off of water trading than fixing the natural flow of the Murray-Darling river, which can be done if the flow of the river wasn't being hijacked by cotton farmers before it got to the bottom of the basin.

You've got far-right anti-vaxxer groups trying to hijack indigenous protest groups and redirect them to alt-right causes. You can see what happened there with the scumfucks who used indigenous protestors as a smokescreen to set fire to Old Parilament house.

You can see it in the disrespectful way that indigenous communities are policed, letting indigenous women fight in the street without trying to break it up because "stopping it now would just escalate it later".

So you can see how 13 years after Kevin Rudd's apology to the indigenous community and getting the ball rolling on legislation that sought to make amends for human rights violations that were perpetuated by the state, indigenous people might not exactly be happy with how little has actually been done to mend that rift. Because with this nation's disgusting history of leadership spills in the past 12 years - yes, even under Labor - and the absolute clown show this nation has been governed by, and especially with the emergence of a more fervent and nationalistic right wing in the wake of the mid-10's global shift to the right... not a whole lot has been going on to address the indigenous community.

What Kevin Rudd did was get the ball rolling. A sane and competent government would have found a way to keep that ball rolling to some degree while balancing the budget and keeping an air of dignity and respectfulness about them. But our elected officials have descended into such a level of jackanapery that we can't even trust them not to enrich themselves through abject corruption. And now, thirteen years later, the most repugnant toad of them all - even worse than Tony Abbott, which I never fucking thought I would say - has the gall to say "hey, we apologized to you, why didn't you ever forgive us?".

Kevin Rudd's apology was a start. We didn't hold up our end of the bargain because we were legislating the ability to send refugee boats back out to sea to die, deposing our prime minister for being too moderate and enriching not just members of parliament, but corporate entities like banks and Harvey Norman with hundreds of millions of illegally granted funds. The indigenous community aren't happy about that, and I don't blame them - so to turn around like the smug prick he is and complain about the indigenous community "not forgiving" the government after such a respectful and well-received apology? It misses the point of that apology entirely, and it's such a crude and remarkably disappointing way to commemorate what should be remembered as one of this nation's most important steps forward.

Of course none of what I said was without anger, so please do respond to my standard wall of text shenanigans with a quote of your "lol what a meltdown" post. But regardless, that's my actual opinion of this statement, and considering the absolute beatdown this moron has rightfully been suffering at the hands of the media, I can only hope that this truly dumb-fuck take Scomo has put out gets him another wave of journalistic boots lodged in his shitter.

Fun fact, our current Minister of Defence - the same man who spearheaded two attempts to remove the Prime Minister to attain the position for himself, only to get bitch-whipped both times - was one of seven MPs who boycotted the apology.

Imagine being such an evil little rat that when the PM issues an apology for the wilful abduction and forcible assimilation of indigenous children, a move which won significant bipartisan support at the time, you're one of seven losers so upset at the thought of apologizing for colonial atrocities that you make a show of boycotting it.

Peter Dutton has always been a fucked little weasel, and the sooner someone takes him out back and stomps on his head for breaking into the chicken coop and eating all the eggs, the better. Absolute scum.

I've been reading about the game, and honestly I do think it's ahead of its time. Non-linearity to the point of aimlessness is an issue, but I do have to commend MOTHER's seamless world map. I also think that the tone of the game is pretty decent.

It absolutely does have caveats, but I still think that for a NES game, MOTHER is pretty fantastic. It looks and sounds great, the game world is massive and the tone is pretty entertaining. It's aimless to the point of being detrimental, but it's still good and its innovations are no less impressive.

Just got Teddy. I named all my characters differently, was gonna name Ana Suzy but there's a named character named Suzy so I had to change it to Vana. Ninten became Mallard, of course, Lloyd became Farley and Teddy became Chogus.

Finally, they're cracking down on crackers. Nature is finally healing.

People who get their panties in a bunch over "honky" and "cracker" never fail to disappoint.

Though saying that, the mods have modded me for using mayonnaise in a "racially insensitive" manner, so I can definitely respect people who've been moderated for using said words not being happy with the double standard.

I'm using a guide now. The frigging cactus one is bizarre, like this is some schoolyard rumor bullshit.

The game's lost a bit of its lustre, though I still think it has a great sense of humour.

Alright, so for no reason I decided to walk from Merrysville to Reindeer. Had to rewind a LOT, leveled up like three times getting there. I have no idea what the deal is with Reindeer, so I got on a train to Union and walked to Youngtown.

This is an eerie plot development, but I also used telepathy on a baby who gave me the ability to teleport to towns I've been to before.

It was a hot button issue for about a month these past couple years, to the point that here in Australia we had a representative of the CCP debating with a pro-democracy CCP critic about the treatment of Uyghurs in China on a political talkshow called Q&A.

I agree that it's fucking horrific what's happening to the Uyghur people, and I don't like that it's rotated out of the news cycle as strongly as it has because it's still happening. And yeah, organ harvesting and shit has been a concern of human rights advocacy groups for years now. It's abhorrent how Disney filmed their Mulan movie within spitting distance of a re-education camp when we already had human rights advocacy groups raising red flags about sterilization, unlawful detention and organ harvesting happening not only in China, but in the specific region that Disney filmed Mulan.

With that being said, what the Palestinian people are facing is also incredibly fucking horrific - with Israeli expansion into Palestine, the Palestinian people are facing ethnic cleansing. We're talking families being evicted from their homes by IDF soldiers without being allowed to pack anything, and then having their houses levelled into rubble before their eyes with all of their belongings except the clothes on their back. I'd like to emphasize that while I wholly agree that the Uyghur genocide should be remembered and spoken about more, I find it distasteful to level the hardships and oppression of one group of people against another - rather than "the unlawful detainment and re-educatuon of Uyghurs is more pressing than the continued occupation of Palestine and its assimilation into Israel", both atrocities should be spoken about and openly opposed.

It's like when Shab deflects from China's atrocities by going "America commits human rights violations too", as if you can't openly oppose more than one atrocity at a time and you're so implicit in the failure of your own government that you have no right to speak about the atrocities of others.

That's not to say that TC is saying one is more important than the other, moreso to emphasize that rather than split hairs, it's important to consider the misery and evil of both scenarios as a violation of the sanctity of freedom and human rights that they are. What's happening to the Uyghur population is horrifying and revolting, and it has fallen by the wayside - it should be spoken about more openly and ferverently than it's being spoken about. What's happening to the Palestinian people is illegal, wholly unnecessary, selfish and infuriating, and we should absolutely maintain a spotlight on what's happening between Israel and Palestine.

A lot of really chill, insightful commentary so far. Personally, I don't smoke - I don't like the taste or the sensation. But I've grown up around smokers, and while it's very much something that I don't do and don't want to do, I respect the decision of others to smoke without judgement.

Curious about CE's smoking habits. Also a dozen eggs to the first person to get the reference.

So uhh. I googled Lloyd. Turns out he's back at the school hiding in a trash can. Goddamnit.

Edit: okay, this part with the janitor has been really funny and cute. He just complains about his wife, and if you say she sounds terrible, he gets pissed off and shoos you away. This is fantastic.

Seriously, where the hell is Lloyd? This factory level sucks lmao

I'm at Duncan's Factory, and whoever wished me luck here is appreciated. This place is a goddamn maze. Fucking massive, so many floors to explore and shit.

I've been using the rewind feature a lot thanks to PK Beam and Bombers.

I'm at the rusty old rocket on the top floor. Do I need Lloyd to do something here? I'm assuming he's on a lower floor that I missed because I gunned it straight for the top of the factory.

It makes sense that Kirby is a placeholder, because that pink motherfucker holds a place in my heart.

I can see how people would feel that way. Not gonna stop me, though.

simp5 posted...

Absolutely no way it was "that" good

It was pretty good. Like worst case scenario, it was a 7/10 gaming experience imo - looked amazing, was incredibly well made as far as models and systems go, with a few significant hiccups in the story including a final act that felt a little bit shoehorned. Perfectly fine game that wasn't perfect in itself, but was an impressive feat all the same.

The issue with the backlash it received is that the dumb fuck instigators made it impossible to actually have a critical and nuanced discussion about the game. For every person who wants to talk about aspects of the game they didn't like in a constructive and genuinely critical way, there was someone else saying that Neil Druckman made a self insert who has sex with one of the characters, that Abby's physique is impossible with the diet they must have according to a couple in-game assets related to her commune's food supply, and people who send death threats to Laura Bailey and the person whose face they captured to portray the character.

The awards are whatever - like Goldie said, the people who give out the awards thought it should get awards, and to add to what they said, that reflects on the award giver moreso than on the game itself. The scores of awards it earned can be seen as an indicator of quality, but the transaction between an award giver and an award recipient is ultimately an expression of the award giver's feelings towards the recipient - it's a transaction rooted in the award giver's tastes and personal values moreso than it is a seal of quality.

At the end of the day, while I think it's well-made and generally pretty impressive, The Last of Us II isn't perfect. I still think it's pretty good, and the backlash it faced is frustrating because it makes it harder to have an actual conversation about the game, but it's a low to mid 7/10 as far as I'm concerned. My stance on the game is mostly wrapped up in its reception, because while criticism is absolutely valid, there's always been something extremely stupid and rotten about this game's reception, and it's frustrating.

500 baybee

Imit8m3 posted...

You don't need to smoke weed. In fact edibles are much more effective and healthy.

The "cognitive decline" you speak of is actually just old propaganda. The only time cognitive function is impaired, is while you are high. When you sober up, it's all back to normal, unlike alcohol.

I don't wholly believe that to be honest. I'm not against THC, if edibles become more prevalent where I live it's not off the table. But anything that affects cognitive function offers some degree of risk, and I don't think THC is exempt from that.

I totally buy that it's not as destructive as alcohol, and I can believe that the risk of cognitive dysfunction isn't too high. But I absolutely do believe that it's still a factor, and that saying there's "no risk" is a step too far in the other direction.

I live around stoners, when they reach a certain age they start slipping hardcore. They slow right down like a tortoise. Again, zero issue with weed or people's choice to smoke it - I think it should be legalised and taxed like tobacco and alcohol. I don't buy that there's no risk of cognitive decline after significant exposure to THC.

Bad_Mojo posted...

I havent read the entire topic, but another tip is to let your friends know that you have a drinking issue and need help. I saw that you choose to stop drinking but then went out for beers. You cant do that anymore, and it might be helpful to let them know that

Im wishing the best for you!

I appreciate the advice, and I appreciate the well wishes. My only irl friends right now are drinking buddies, unfortunately - that makes socialising without alcohol impossible. These aren't the sort of guys who buy into sobriety.

You're right that I've gotta stop going out for beers, I was considering staying sober last night but socialisation won out in the end. I'm planning to curb this by moving in the next couple of years, and tackling sobriety with my counsellor.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

I have this scenario in my head of like joining some radical zine crowd or like joining a writing hobbyist group or something in the city. Something fun like that. The first one is kinda pie in the sky, but anything can happen.

And you don't have to apologize for talking about your dad. One way I relate to what people are going through is by offering an experience that resonates with what they're saying, as a way of expressing that what they're saying is being heard. It was relevant and it was helpful to see - I appreciate you talking about it. Can definitely relate to that sort of grieving.

Guide posted...

You are way too fucking smart and coherent to ruin your shit like this, man. I don't know how to help, but if I can, let me know.

I'm good, but I appreciate you saying that. Not to like be conceited and overvalue myself, but I don't think brainpower has much to do with alcoholism. It's like trying to overwrite how you feel with how you should feel - no amount of rationalisation, facts or logic is going to eliminate that base feeling that something instills in you. People don't drink because they're not smart enough to get out of it, they drink because they're unhappy.

FightingJester posted...

I quit drinking and smoking cold turkey. No problem.

I quit for about three and a half months, honestly feel pretty proud of that. It's less the alcohol that got in the way there, and the fucking soul-sucking void of depression that hit me without that numbness that alcohol had previously provided. It was like getting hit by a truck, I wasn't in counselling at the time, and alcohol was my last resort - otherwise I would have kept to my sobriety.

Quitting cold turkey is possible, I've done it before and I can do it again. It's rough, then it's smooth, but god fucking help me when that depression hits - it's on a whole other level.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

That's definitely how it is. I lost some friends last year - I left, and despite how hard it was I don't regret it - but before I left, I was going through a long sober streak due to a health problem caused by alcohol. And I realised how uncomfortable my best friend made me. I straight up didn't like him, being around him made me feel bad about myself. Something was seriously fucking wrong, and I began spending less time around him. Sidenote, that feeling was absolutely fucking correct and he was a scumbag fuckface - but that's another story.

After three and a half months of sobriety, I came to a crossroads where I would either follow the most advanced, spiralling depression I had ever felt in my life, or I would drink as a stopgap measure to stay sane. I chose to drink, though it wasn't an easy decision - I spent a couple of hours staring at a bottle of gin before I opened it.

The next day, I could be around my friend no problem - I wanted to be around him, even. He said that it was like I was like my old self again.

And I agreed with him. I felt normal again.

I appreciate your story, and that you're interacting with this thread in good faith. The biggest challenge for me is losing what few friends I do have due to them being drinking buddies who I don't see otherwise, and the thought of that spiralling advanced depression coming back. It is truly the worst I've ever felt, and I know a better life is past it and I have counselling to help me through it, but it will absolutely be the hardest part about overcoming this. It's seriously fucking bad, and it comes after a moment where sobriety "clicks" and chases a period of time where it feels normal and okay to be sober.

I'm sorry to hear about your dad. It really does feel like being drunk is the only time you feel normal, and I'm sorry that led to where things led for him.

Xavier_On_High posted...

I only stopped drinking so much because I moved again. The fresh start allowed me to form friendships that weren't based on drinking.

This is my hope with moving. The one caveat is that I need to save up about 20 grand before I even consider making the sort of move I want to make, which is like... October at the earliest. Almost certainly gonna be longer than that.

And yeah, that support structure would be good. Though saying that, I was the heaviest drinker in my old friend group. I'd be drinking even when they weren't, it didn't really curb my own alcoholism. Though saying that, I think it's because of how unhappy my old best friend was making me.

Imit8m3 posted...

Use weed. It's less harmful and not addictive. Also, no hangover!

I don't like smoking, and smoking weed poses similar health risks to smoking tobacco. It also carries the risk of cognitive decline like all recreational substances that impair brain activity. It's probably better for people than alcohol, but pot carries other health risks, including some that don't currently affect me. So I'd rather abstain.

Unsugarized_Foo posted...

Yes, use different drugs

Or go to AA and have them yank ya around

I'm critical of programs like AA, especially anything with a religious angle. I'll check myself into a mental ward if I need to, that's what my sister did when her mental illness reached a peak and she was eventually diagnosed with BPD because of it. I'll also see counsellors and psychiatrists. But I'm wary of groups like that, and even if there was a program like that where I live which I don't think there is, I wouldn't be comfortable going to it.

I'm going to prioritise my ongoing counselling.