Lurker > Polycosm

Wolfram also made similar, grand promises with his A New Kind of Science book, almost 20 years ago. It was a fascinating read but little came of it.

I think some people are drawn to these figures like Wolfram and Weinstein for the wrong reasons... because they romanticize this story of the polymath whos too smart for school and embarrasses all his former teachers with his hidden genius. Im not saying we should be dismissive of their ideas, but we ought to be very skeptical of anyone who avoids peer review.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

I agree on the clunky movement and hit-or-miss dialogue, although OG FFVII was much, much worse in both departments. The poor localization of the original was charming in a way, but let's be honest, it's objectively bad.

I disagree on the backgrounds being a problem, with a couple of exceptions. I can't deny that there's some copy-paste, but it didn't seem especially prevalent to me. On the other hand, every time I look up and see the plates looming above me, oppressively... I'm in awe.

The battle system might be the best ever for FF as a series, although they're obviously holding back for the sequels.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Octopath is making a match out of this, taking a narrow lead. It was the lowest seed (14) to win a Round 1 match, against the reigning champ.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

There have been more cases of GOP election fraud than individual instances of voter fraud.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

COVID-19 might actually kill us all.


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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Everywhere you look, people are asking for steep "tips" and "donations" for the privilege of visiting their islands. Buncha' Tom Nooks. Hard pass.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

https://youtu.be/vhgbYy2DJNM

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

I don't know what I expected but it wasn't that

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Nope, but I'm thankful to be starting a new job in a couple of weeks. I had been planning my exit for about a year... then the decision was made for me. It's scary to think about how fucked my family would have been had I not been preparing to make the move in advance. The job market suuuuucks right now.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

73 genders? What kind of school do you go to?

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

California has its problems of course, but the coronavirus response has been exemplary.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

How. Strangely. Erotic..

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

I think it's good, but not memorable. I can recall at least a dozen songs from Chrono Trigger but can't hum anything from Cross from memory. The parts of Cross that quote melodies from Trigger are the best parts, imho.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

AlisLandale posted...

8 hours and youre in the Shinra building?

I thought this was gonna be expanded to full game length >_>

People have been estimating it's about 30 - 40 hours depending on whether you took the front entrance or the stairs.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Good nostalgia trip.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Okay, but here's some not-so-wild prognostication: if Trump wins another term, he's going to put two more Kavanaughs on the Supreme Court and the Judicial branch will be Republican for generations to come.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

shockthemonkey posted...

As someone who doesnt think Biden should be the Dem nominee, its pretty clear what hes communicating when you watch the clip.

It's decipherable, but only because I've had so much practice parsing Trump's geriatric word salads. I'm not sure why the Democratic base thought this was a good idea, but I guess we don't have a choice now. At least Biden seems well-intentioned.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

One thing from the IGN review gives me pause: plot convolution reminiscent of Kingdom Hearts.

That said, I'm pretty excited to spend some time in these environments and get to know these characters better.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Yeah, I think I feel pretty much the same way. It was just alright, imo. I was glad to have an excuse to wander around some more and see some new things. The base game is such a ludicrously good deal that I didn't even flinch at the price of the DLC.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Its a surprisingly well-rounded and memorable little game, considering it was made by one person.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

You can't always save people from themselves, but maybe her death will inspire others to take better care of each other and follow precautions. This is going to be a rough month.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Dying alone, gasping for air to own the libs

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

People who endanger others should be at the bottom of the list when hospitals are forced to triage.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Tropical Freeze has always been a victim of both timing and platform. A lot of great games got sucked into the black hole that was the Wii U. On top of that, Tropical Freeze was initially a February release and was totally snubbed from any GotY discussion among the gaming media. TF struggled to get attention back in 2014 and it's still overlooked today, despite a Switch re-release.

I think it's the best 2D platformer since DKC2 and I probably let my personal opinion of the game get in the way when I chose it to win. I mean, I was blindsided by the result too.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Endgame is such a massive movie, it's ripe for a range of interpretation. That said, I don't find this take to be a compelling one. I mean, just to focus in on the central character (because I don't have time to write about all of them)... Tony's relationship with Pepper had been growing since the very beginning of the MCU, and his relationship with his father was central to the Avengers splitting up in Civil War. It would be weird if the movie didn't spend some time resolving those relationships. (And keep in mind, this comes after Infinity War spent a good chunk of time on the Tony / Peter Parker relationship).

True, the original team is split up for most of Endgame's runtime... because that's how badly Thanos beat them; he destroyed everything they stood for. The turning point of Endgame is when Tony decides to leave his family (by blood) behind to save the people he lost (found family).

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

CM_Ponch posted...

What does Covid have to do with them being able to out it up for download?

Naughty Dog, for better or worse, has been following the trend of releasing enormous day-one patches for their games. It's probably an essential part of their process at this point, and the game might suffer severely if they were to release without it.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Musourenka posted...

Fair, next.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

TheMikh posted...

reminds me of a low-budget movie i saw on tv many years ago where aliens that infiltrated the human population could be identified because their knees bent in the opposite direction

https://youtu.be/lL2AwD_4G8w?t=111

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Nah... the writing is a big letdown, with it's fan-fictiony vibe. But the battle mechanics are fun and the game has a ton of originality. The music is great too.

I much prefer Octopath but Undertale doesn't deserve the hate.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Cyrus for gameplay
Primrose for story and character development
Tressa for personality and jolly vibes

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Squall28 posted...

We have people complaining that it's racist to say the virus came from China though.

Everyone acknowledges the fact that the virus originated in China. What people are questioning is why Trump and various Fox News hosts keep branding this as the "Chinese Virus" and "Wuhan Flu" when literally no one else refers to Covid-19 by those names. When only one political tribe in the world is doing it, you have to stop and ask yourself what the motivation is.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Glad to see Octopath getting some love. It's a solid, HD retro-style RPG that plays to nostalgia in all the right ways. Such a cozy game.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Kim is more of a Tom than a Tommy. Kim's win was bland because she was so dominant. Tommy's was bland because he was so average.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Ouch my bracket today oof

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Bioshock and Biochosk Infinite both have this problem where experimentation isn't rewarded (in fact, weapon switching is actively punished in Infinite). If you ignore the disincentives though, you can do some really fun combos with plasmids / vigors. The combat doesn't have to be that boring if you put some effort and imagination into it... but the games do make the player work for it, which is totally fair to criticize imo.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Leonhart4 posted...

My one doubt about Octopath is that it seems to have an extremely high burnout rate.

I definitely get that feeling, reading posts about the game on these boards. Personally, I love Octopath but I don't think it's widely respected. It's not as polarizing as Undertale though, so I think this match is essentially a measure of how GameFAQs feels about Undertale. Not an easy one to call.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

cmiller4642 posted...

2 weeks ago everyone was acting like this was all a big hoax and were heading out to Walmart to be on top of each other.

2 weeks ago, Trump, Fox News and Republicans were acting like this was all a big hoax, while everyone else was shouting at them from the rooftops. Trump is still telling people that this will all be over by Easter. This is their fuck-up, they own it and we shouldn't mince words about it.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Ni No Kuni lost because we no votey.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

If you close your eyes it almost tastes like a Trump Steak.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

The Michelle / Wendell dynamic is icky, but I don't think it's a case of Michelle being lost-- I think they're both playing up the drama surrounding the break-up and it wasn't nearly as bad as they've made it out to be. All four of them pre-gamed together and I think the edit really struggled to explain the outcome in the context of the game... but I suspect Michelle and Wendell are on much friendlier terms than they're letting on, and in returning-player seasons we often see players fall back on the relationships they formed before the game.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

RDR > P4G

I'm just having trouble respecting a re-release that really doesn't belong in this decade. And I'm counting on some weird kind of Rockstar synergy with GTA V competing in the same day. I know it's dumb but I just can't.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

Mega Mana posted...

And Yul is the last old school Survivor out. He is the All-Stars Ethan Zohn of Winners at War, the last of his kind before the game goes to hell.

The only way this boot order could have been worse is if the entire pre-merge was flipped backwards (Yul first, Nat last). This is why I have a love/hate feeling towards all-stars seasons. I initially get excited to see my favorites return, they all get voted off immediately, and the C- and D-listers play the back half.

The one redeeming thing is that I've grown to love all the winners of these types of seasons. Boston Rob was a nobody going into All-Stars but became a legend (bending the rule here, I know... he was the runner-up). Parvati was one of the most random picks for FvF/Micronesia but she earned the win and became one of my favorites. I thought Sandra was a weak winner heading into HvV but then distinguished herself by becoming a two-time winner.

Winners at War will probably feel better in retrospect once we know the winner and are presented with the full story of how they won.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

https://pastebin.com/XxmVLtF2

TB: 2345432

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

The epidemic in the US is going to last until enough people are infected and we develop herd immunity. The only questions are, how quickly is the government going to allow it to spread and how many people are going to die along the way? Because if we don't keep the curve down, this disease is going to overwhelm our healthcare facilities, and when that happens, the CFR takes off as doctors are forced to triage.

Keep in mind, the CFR in Italy was around 7.2% as of a couple days ago. They have an older population, yes, but the US has a fatter and more-diabetic one. It's not at all safe to assume that we'll fare any better than Italy if Trump takes his foot off the brakes in a week.

Personally I don't think it's worth it to sacrifice between 3 - 7% of our population to stave off a Great Depression.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

viewmaster_pi posted...

it wasn't the right link, lol

That's okay, I got you covered. Here's the link to the correct Sonic track:

https://youtu.be/cGUAp_xoi4o?t=52

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)

I mean, all I can do at this point is hunker down with my family and wait out this 3rd-world regime. I vote against them at every opportunity but nothing's going to change until the GOP voter base hits rock bottom and decides to leave their abuser. Until then, we're all going to suffer, together.

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I bow before my emperor, Advokaiser-- winner of the 2018 guru contest. (thengamer.com/guru)