Topic: The Chit-Chat Thread

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@Tyranexx No, it was relatively deserved! It wasn't too painful so the punishment very much fitted the crime. I haven't broken any bones, save of course the swimming pool incident I mentioned a few weeks ago. A pretty superhuman effort though, to limp back that far with a dead leg. I'm far too careful for my own good, so I'm fairly confident I won't get into too much trouble...

I enjoy Sawano's musical style, at times it borderlines noise, and audio design genius. A bit like the Tenet soundtrack by Ludwig Göransson, which has very intricate sound design also, like playing forward and backward pieces together, and sampling everyday sounds. One of the songs uses a sampled and compressed fire truck siren as a bass track, and it's a beautiful thing to hear. “[I envisioned] a really heavy fire engine rumble as a bass track, and then something on top of that, that would symbolize fire alarms, using manipulation like side-chaining,” he said for Deadline.

Lemme know when you find the sampled alarm;

Rap in video games is a side effect of more lyrics in video games. Sawano's style has a lot of otherworldly elements mixed with such grounded, intrinsically human elements. When listening to Xenoblade X and Attack on Titan songs, both of which have frickin' German lyrics for crying out loud, it becomes very distinct. I also really like Black Tar, because it's a perfect fusion of synth, rock, and rap. Uncontrollable's very catchy, and the two leads have a lovely duel at the second chorus.

Noctilum starts with a funky guitar and builds fantastically, both day and night. Oblivia's awesome, but doesn't have anything intrinsically special, except for the synthesiser notes playing in the background between the string parts, that also show up in MONO X, the title theme. Wir Fliegen is probably my favourite song in the game, it has such a dreamy feeling. A friend described it as giving the impression you're on drugs, and considering the nature of Overdrive, they weren't too off the mark. The chorus (sang of course in German) is straight-up fantastic too.

For those reasons I recommend Attack on Titan. Seems that we both have similar thought processes when it comes to what media and video games we consider... but nonetheless the concept is really cool. The stakes are so unbelievably high every single episode, and some of the plot twists are very captivating. The lore is also very interesting. The animation quality for the anime is top-notch, and has a really clean, but gritty feel to it. This is only the second anime I've watched, first being Persona 4: The Animation, so I'm very new to the structure and pacing. Do let me know how you find it, however.

I have absolutely no idea where the suggestive themes marker can be applied in either Ocarina of Time, or Majora's Mask. If you're really trying to stretch the people playing may have been put on high alert when Cremia hugged Link after his escort mission, but that was completely misunderstood by many people. There isn't any innuendo at all in any Zelda games otherwise, apart from Breath of the Wild when the NPC Rola makes comments about Link. That's also stretching it so it's very dubious.

My view on Cyberpunk is limited because though I have the platforms to play the game on, I have no interest in playing it. The hype never really reached me in that respect. We'll just have to see how CDPR responds, because all they've done as of now is patch, stuff that should have been done three to six months ago. Good analogy, it's quite astute. Never underestimate the average gamer, they're very astute.

@MarioLover92 Ah, I see. I also hoped for Ninjara, I really like his colour scheme and overall design, so he could have been the second choice had Min Min... died or something. But she's excellent to represent the ARMS series, so I'm content with that. It must have been very nostalgic to see Banjo & Kazooie make it, so I'm glad you have that fighter at least to remind you of what I've gathered was a memorable and joyous gaming childhood!

Kinda why I rely on remakes and remasters, to bring games I can't play, to the consoles I do have. Final Fantasy VII, X, XII, all could have been lost to me if Square didn't remake and/or remaster them from the PS1/2 to the PS4 and Switch. Same with Super Mario 3D All-Stars, it brought three games I never owned, right back to me. In that I'm very excited to see what Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne feels like with an HD coat of paint. It looks quite cool, and the art style's very nice so it's a matter of time until I get into that.

The Ultimate History of Video Games is my favourite book of them all. I listened to the audiobook, read by Dan Woren (a dulcet tone with tons of experience), when I travelled to Spain about five years ago. It was a massively insightful book with so much useful data. The writing was clean, precise, and was organised perfectly.

Another book I can recommend is Phoenix IV: The History of the Videogame Industry, by Leonard Herman. It's very comprehensive, though Herman's writing is a bit sluggish. It clocks in at about 400,000 words, so about 1800 pages of pure videogame material. It has loads of pictures to supplement the writing, and is organised by year, so it's very easy to find something specific. There's also a free bonus chapter covering 2016 available on the Rolenta Press website, so here it is if you want to check that out. It's 24 pages, which speaks for the detail of the book.

http://www.rolentapress.com/Products/Phoenix/Phoenix%202016.pdf

I mentioned Console Wars as a weak material for my book, but conversely a book that was superbly insightful for my own personal reading, is Blood, Sweat, and Pixels by Jason Schreier. It has so much story, and the interview depths are absolutely unreal. The development cycles of indie games like Stardew Valley and Shovel Knight, and AAA games like Diablo 3, The Witcher 3, and Uncharted 4 are all covered. The insight is invaluable and is worth reading at all costs.

And as for books I conversely imported from the US, I bought the Super Mario Bros Encyclopedia, The Art of Super Mario Odyssey, The Legend of Zelda: Encyclopedia, The Legend of Zelda: Art & Artifacts, and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild: Creating a Champion. I spent over two hundred dollars but it was worth it, the print quality is superb and the artwork itself is more than worthy of the weighted paper.

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So yet another case of a service or big name "fixing" something that isn't broken in the names of "progress" and a new look....There's a time and place for such changes, but not always.

Congrats to @Magician and @Zuljaras for the raises! Always a good feeling. Don't celebrate TOO hard, now.

@TheJGG The leg wasn't completely dead, just gimped in the middle. I managed. Thankfully, the dog was also older at that point; she was quite a handful to control on a leash when she was a lot younger. She was a border collie/shepherd/lab mix, so she used to get pretty excited at...almost everything. It was a question of who walked who for awhile. XD Actually, I briefly experienced the sensation of actually having a dead leg for a minute or two a few years before that incident. Let's just say I don't advise getting zapped on the rear by an electric fence (not very high voltage, but enough that it definitely smarts).

I certainly like music that has various elements layered in. Trucks In Place is a very good track! Haven't seen Tenet yet either; another movie for the list. I've heard nothing but good things about it. Does the siren start at about 0:55, or 1:28? (Some traffic outside right now, so it might be messing with my ears a bit)

I think the rock and synths in Black Tar are why I like the track so much. I find Uncontrollable...energizing, powerful even. Which is fitting IMO, since it plays during Tyrant battles. Aesthetically, Noctilum's my favorite continent, and the music is a definite plus. Oblivia is my second favorite, though I much prefer the day theme over the night theme. You're completely on the mark with Wir Fliegen and why I like it so much! Though I never equated how uplifting I find it to drugs. XD I really do need to listen to the soundtrack again. Heck, Xenoblade Chronicles X deserves a second chance on the Switch; it was such an awesome, ambitious game. It'd be a shame to just leave it tied to the Wii U. I know Monolith has stated it would be difficult to port the game, however.

Part of the reason why I think I'd like actually watching Attack On Titan is due to some of the lore; I'm not aware of any recent developments, but I do know enough that the titans themselves seem to be made, not born. I've seen a few clips of earlier seasons and one brief one related to the most recent/final season, though it wasn't anything that significant. Some of the characters and their motivations certainly intrigue me. I first heard of it from someone I used to work with; he occasionally watched anime and is the same person who loaned me two Studio Ghibli films (My Neighbor Totoro and Spirited Away) to watch at one point.

I think it's also a stretch that there's any innuendo in Zelda games until you get up to the very few rated T titles in the series (Twilight Princess I do get). That said, I'm also not as...shall we say...dirty-minded compared to some people. Or I'm just oblivious to some things that others may object to.

Glad that analogy didn't confuse you. Don't know how many people I've come across who don't realize pyrite and "fool's gold" are the same thing.

@MarioLover92 Next to the side/people-sized door to exit the garage, actually. They were taken care of not long after by Raid by my father. I'm not a big fan of pesticides, but I harbored little mercy towards the flying insects by that point. Not the first time I've sustained stings, but I've found wasps and hornets to be way more aggressive than bees; so long as you don't disturb the normal European honeybee and its nest, you can get pretty close and watch them go in and out of their hive. I've been within a foot of a hive that was once on our property and didn't have any issues....I was very careful.

2004 is probably about the time we had those. XD They were cheap entertainment. I much would've preferred an actual TV console, but they were too expensive. I had handheld systems from age 10 upward since they were cheaper overall.

I'd like to see progress pics of your drawing, but only if you're up for it.