I hated Myst as a kid. Not just because I disliked the gameplay, but because its inexplicable popularity heralded a shift in the adventure game market. Instead of more Sierra or LucasArts-type games, there were, for years, scads of shitty, boring Myst-likes.

I thought this had come out already? All the garbage is blurring together.

I tried to get into Fallout 4 for the second or third time recently, and have just given up, and uninstalled it. It’s the simplified dialogue that ultimately robs it of any meaning for me. Nobody has anything very interesting to say, and the player just has a few one-word prompts to respond with. I don’t suppose that’s any different in Fallout: London? I imagine they’d have had to go to unreasonable lengths to change it.

Yeah, I tried Black Flag a while back—because I’d heard good things—but just couldn’t be bothered with all the busy work. I did really enjoy Mafia 3, The Witcher 3, RDR2; I’m not anti-side quest by any means. I think I need a more compelling story, and that’s never been AC’s strong point (based on ~3 AC games I’ve picked up and quickly dropped over the years).

People are saying it. Many great people.

I think 75% is far too generous an estimate, tbh. Every policy I’ve acquired through the ACA-mandated marketplace has been garbage, right from the start. For-profit health care is evil, and the ACA just served to further entrench this evil in our lives. It did some marginal good, and I’m certainly not advocating for its repeal in favor of ‘concepts of a plan’. But 75%? I can’t get on board with that.

Top 12 by play time. Definitely wouldn’t have guessed some of these were up there. I’ll often leave a game running while doing something else, which skews the results. I’ll have to check what gog galaxy says later.

No, you’re thinking of James Dean. Dean Cain’s the dipshit trumpet who played Superman on tv 30 years ago, and makes terrible hallmark movies.

Hadn’t played any of these games until recently; picked up the remastered series on sale, and spent months playing through Yakuza 0. Really enjoyed the setting, the characters, the drama, the humorous substories and fun little minigames.

I finally decided to stop hitting the batting cages and move on to Kiwami, which I’ve just started. Loving it so far, although Majima seems to have gone quite mad in the intervening years. Looking forward to a long career of singing karaoke, racing RC cars, and swinging motorcycles around.

I’m looking forward to the inevitable Flop House episode.

Alan Alda’s got a pretty good podcast now. I watched a lot of MASH reruns growing up. Feels strange that kids now don’t have the experience of watching a bunch of stuff that’s not made for them at all, just because that’s what’s on TV.

I’ve just reinstalled Grim Dawn, having last played it some years ago, and am currently working my way through Act 2. I don’t frequently play ARPG’s, but I’ll try a new one when I get it in a bundle or somesuch. Mostly, they don’t hold my interest. Grim Dawn, vanilla and unmodded (I assume there’s some kind of modding scene; haven’t looked yet) still manages to scratch that itch for me. At some point I’ll pick up the DLC. Right now I just want to find something good enough to replace this crazy caster 2h sword I’m using, so that I can bring Albrecht’s Aether Ray back into the rotation!

I really appreciate this take. It’s good-hearted and makes good sense. I’ll try to remember it going forward, when cynicism overwhelms.

If you’re interested, The Flop House (long running bad movie podcast with three hosts and sometimes a guest; 2/3 hosts are former Daily Show writers [they are three cishet white guys, but not stupid or bigoted]) did an episode with Parker Bennett, one of the screenwriters of the '93 SMB movie. He’s got some pretty great anecdotes about making it!

Every single article about “gen x” this or “gen z” that is 100% bullshit. Stop reposting this garbage.