CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

I'm ready go tonight. There's a party, alright. We don't need the raisin for joy, oh yeah. Tick down to midnight.
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cybersix
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by cybersix » Fri Sep 06, 2019 7:38 pm

I also finally got around to finishing Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice and it is the best depiction of mental illness in a video game, ever, even though it made me feel viscerally uncomfortable and it gets the dubious honor of being awarded "most disturbing thing i've seen in a video game".

I'm flabbergasted that the mocap/voice actress for Senua was a video editor from the team who always wanted to try acting, but never had. She nails that part.

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Delthazar
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Delthazar » Fri Sep 06, 2019 8:28 pm

cybersix wrote:
Fri Sep 06, 2019 7:34 pm
Life is Strange episode 4 chat
Spoiler :
YOOO SHE WENT TO A DOCTOR FOR HER INFECTED HOOHAA
https://twitter.com/GeekRemix/status/11 ... 73792?s=20

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Falcon Critical
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Falcon Critical » Mon Sep 09, 2019 10:32 pm

Finished Control. I went back and listened to that Waypoint podcast again where they were all talking it up and Austin was getting more and more excited, and yeah they nailed it. It's definitely fighting for GOTY for me, it even stuck the landing which can often be a bit of a letdown in these mystery action games. Highly recommended (now I'm going to watch Jesse Cox's playthrough on youtube, because he gets really into conspiracy theories and deep takes on games and I'm sure he galaxy brains stuff I missed)

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Thunderhead
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Thunderhead » Tue Sep 10, 2019 7:00 pm

So, I don't know if you guys heard, but Horizon: Zero Dawn is actually pretty good.

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Delthazar
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Delthazar » Tue Sep 10, 2019 7:10 pm

Hell, Horizon inches closer and closer to being my favourite game of 2017 the more I think about it. I really ought to go back and finish my NG+ run, get those last few trophies.

Have you gotten into the Frozen Wilds stuff?

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Bier_Engel
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Bier_Engel » Tue Sep 10, 2019 7:14 pm

I bought that at a thrift store and still haven't touched it. One day...

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Thunderhead
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Thunderhead » Tue Sep 10, 2019 7:45 pm

I'm high enough level for it, but I think I'll wait til post game to do it.

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Delthazar
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Delthazar » Tue Sep 10, 2019 8:03 pm

That's not a bad idea. Some of what you'll face up there is a lot. The suggested level might actually be a bit of a lowball, if I remember correctly.

One neat thing about Frozen Wilds though is a lot of dialogue will change a bit depending on when you run it. I think I went up there soon as I found myself near its starting location in my NG+, but I hear doing it post-game will open up a bunch of new conversations, or going early and returning later from time to time as the main story progresses will get you that stuff, too.

A little bit like
Spoiler for vanilla earlygame Horizon thing :
going back to visit Rost's grave now and then.

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Thunderhead
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Thunderhead » Tue Sep 10, 2019 8:27 pm

I only did that once to get the metal flower. I'd probably be a lot farther along if I'd stop hunting collectibles, doing side quests, and fighting every cool, big thing I see. (OoOoOo, is that a Stormbird fighting two Snapmaws? I want in on that! Okay, now to...OoOoOo, a Thunderjaw!)

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Delthazar
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Delthazar » Tue Sep 10, 2019 9:15 pm

Heh, that's pretty much how I played, too. It helps that Horizon has all those maps you can buy for collectables that give you a good idea where to find them without totally giving away their exact locations.

Often there's cool things to see on your way to them. Or just great photo mode opportunities. You Nathan Drake'd your way up that cliff to reach that banuk figurine, you may as well get some good shots of the sunset that creeped in while you were making the climb.

A lot of them have great lore tidbits attached in their inventory blurbs, as well. The Vantages especially. Collecting all the Vantages and then re-reading/listening to them in sequence is one of the most memorable side pieces for me recently. Better than the Survivalist logs in New Vegas, maybe.

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DHerder222
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by DHerder222 » Wed Sep 11, 2019 5:03 pm

Only about an hour through the first Trails in the Sky, but digging it so far. You can tell the devs tried very hard to make it as Steam-friendly as possible.

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Bier_Engel
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Bier_Engel » Wed Sep 11, 2019 7:55 pm

Good to know. That's one of many games in my backlog.

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Falcon Critical
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Falcon Critical » Sun Sep 15, 2019 1:15 pm

So Realm of Magic came out for the Sims last week, and I got stuck in on the weekend. Typically when I play the Sims I like to create decent people; like even if I have someone who is mean-spirited or rebellious, that mostly just manifests in self-destructive behaviour.

So this time I figured why not go with someone evil. I figured I'd create a teenager (Jia Magica) who would become a witch and move her into the biggest house in the new neighbourhood, sorta like a homestay exchange student. The idea was that she would then engineer the deaths of everyone else in the house, becoming the sole inheritor.

So I move her in and start her spellcasting journey. The household is an elder who is a pretty high level witch (Minerva), her YA son (Darrel), teen daughter (Gemma), and Darrel's fiance (Emilia). Immediately I built a narrative around them that they have had a lot of students come to board with them over the years, and Emilia was one of them who ended up falling for Darrel and deciding to stay.

Then the privacy violations began. Jia was having a bubblebath in one of the three bathrooms in this house, when Gemma waltzes right in the door, walks over to the shower, and shoos Jia out of the room. What the hell? Like MAYBE if she's busting to poo or something and had to dash to the nearest bathroom, but no, she didn't even really need a shower but decided to do a power play and mess with Jia.

(Part of the way I'm playing this out is that I only control Jia, and normally the AI can tell if someone is in the bathroom to avoid this kind of situation, but apparently not here).

Jia was pretty furious about this, so after everyone went to sleep she cast a magic lock on Gemma's door. When Gemma woke up she was unable to leave her room, and slowly starved to death.

Meanwhile Jia continued to go to school and played nice with the family, until the next time she needed to bathe. She chose a shower this time since it's a faster way to get clean, and with Gemma locked in her room it should be smooth sailing. Midway through her shower, Minerva walks into the bathroom (again I'll stress there are THREE BATHROOMS!) and wants to use the toilet so shoos Jia out of the shower...

This pattern continues for a week or so, the only time that Jia manages to actually shower without Minerva barging in is right as Gemma dies because all the other sims are distracted by that event.

Relationships deteriorate in the household, Jia loathes Minerva and works on ways to kill the old hag. Every time she tries to cast magic on Minerva it backfires, making her a tough cookie. Jia starts to re-strategize, but a couple of days (and a couple more privacy violations) later, I get a notification that Minerva is reaching the end of her lifespan. Jia just has to wait it out. The day before Minerva passes on, Jia breaks out in hives. She suspects the old hag, but just buys some medicine since she doesn't know any get-well-spells. Almost immediately after Jia gets tiger fever (puts some kinda cute tiger stripes all over you), and so I lean into this as if Minerva has cursed our teen witch. Jia tries to drink some tea and other herbal remedies, but is still afflicted when Minerva passes on. Once the tiger fever passes, Jia contracts a cold. She decides this must be a lingering curse from the old hag, and sets to studying uncurse potions. (Uncurse potions and curses are a thing, I'm pretty sure in this case though Jia was just supes unlucky and got three illnesses in a row). After drinking an uncurse (and some more medicine) Jia's skin clears up.

Emilia has been respectful and helpful to Jia throughout this, they may not exactly be friends, but Jia is kind of fine with her.

Then there's Darrel. To be fair, Darrel hasn't done anything in particular to piss off Jia... he's just more of a softer target than his mother was. Jia can cast spells on him with abandon and so she does. This (unsurprisingly) deteriorates their relationship. Darrel however has the luck of the Thors. This is not an actual mechanic, but he has an uncanny knack for evading death. Jia sent him wandering aimlessly in a thunderstorm... he was fine. She set fire to him... he managed to put himself out and then just hung out in the middle of a raging fire like it was no big deal. She shocked him and then compelled him to fix complex electronics.... he didn't electrocute himself once. She sicked her pet bees on him... he kinda just laughed it off. She fought him continuously in magic duels to overload his magic... he overloaded, but was fine. This man just refuses to die.

I'm kind of starting to respect his resilience. I entertained thoughts about just allowing the couple to move away and get out of my hair, but that leaves a messy path of inheritance. All traces of this family must die so Jia has the best claim to the house. Perhaps it's time to grow a cowplant.

Jia does enjoy going downstairs to the living room and laughing at Gemma's ashes though.


tl;dr - I created an evil sim who had a bunch of misadventures in her attempts to murder a sim family.

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True Perception
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by True Perception » Sun Sep 15, 2019 2:18 pm

That tilder has me wanting to read that wall o' text just to find out if she's the "creative kills" type of murderer...

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Falcon Critical
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Falcon Critical » Sun Sep 15, 2019 8:00 pm

Haha, I didn't want to do things too easy. I mean I could just put them in a pool and put a wall around it, but that's very much a 'Thor intervention' thing rather than something I can cause via a controlled sim.

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True Perception
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by True Perception » Sun Sep 15, 2019 9:00 pm

Man, your girl is pretty petty if all it takes to earn her ire is interrupting her beauty regimen. Then again, if the daughter was dumb enough to starve to death from a locked door, this can just be seen as Darwin stepping in?

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Falcon Critical
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Falcon Critical » Mon Sep 16, 2019 12:28 pm

I mean she was going to kill them either way, but their weird lack of boundaries was a convenient catalyst.

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True Perception
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by True Perception » Mon Sep 16, 2019 3:07 pm

You expect personal boundaries from a group that dances naked under the full moon? (an actual "witch" I knew said she does this... not sure if she was just messing around or not)

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Falcon Critical
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Falcon Critical » Mon Sep 16, 2019 6:49 pm

I'd expect them at least to work up to inviting a boarder out for naked frolicking, rather than just busting in on them when they're expecting privacy. Also it's just weird because Sims don't normally do this.

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DHerder222
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by DHerder222 » Tue Sep 24, 2019 8:00 pm

Just finished Trails of the Sky, First Chapter. It was fun! Played extremely well on Steam. I can see why the Trails series is so renowned for its world-building - you can tell from the very first game the writers were planning to be in this world for the long-haul.

Some have criticized the game as too light-hearted, and I'll concede there's a bit of that. And there's more than a little ass-pulling in places. But I was worried the characters would be trope-y and they surprised me, so that's good. And the game's setting, which had to be designed small due to the PSP's hardware limitations, really leans well into its Switzerland-esque situation of being sandwiched between two much larger, more powerful nations. I'll play Second Chapter for sure.

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Bier_Engel
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Bier_Engel » Tue Sep 24, 2019 8:22 pm

Wait, I didn't realize it was divided into chapters? When I downloaded the game, there was no "chapter 1" indication, or anything like that. Or, does the Steam download include all chapters, but they play like sequels or something?

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DHerder222
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by DHerder222 » Tue Sep 24, 2019 11:04 pm

It's a traditional trilogy, the naming system is needlessly confusing. The "Sky" entries are referred to as "Trails in the Sky FC (First Chapter)", "Trails in the Sky SC (Second Chapter)" and, for some raisin, "Trails in the Sky the Third."

I'm guessing they did that because the games are a true trilogy, with the same characters appearing in all three games. Unlike an anthology series a la FF or Persona.

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Thunderhead
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Thunderhead » Wed Oct 02, 2019 3:27 pm

If anyone has a Switch and is interested, there's a DQ 11 "demo" available. I say "demo", because it features 10+ hours of gameplay, or thereabouts. I mean, I'm 8+ hours in so far, and your save info transfers to the full version if you get it. Oh, and the game's pretty good, too.

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Bier_Engel
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Bier_Engel » Wed Oct 02, 2019 6:47 pm

Never got into DQ but that's quite tempting to check out, with that much content. Thanks for sharing! I might try it later.

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Falcon Critical
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Re: CF-WRUP V: Good play. Nice talk.

Post by Falcon Critical » Wed Oct 02, 2019 9:59 pm

Came across this video today. The actress for Jesse Faden in Control takes you on a tour of the Remedy offices as her character.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIDr-rzzOdU