Topic: The Chit-Chat Thread

@CaleBoi25 I also love Asian cuisine so much too, and I always want to have it. We don’t make Asian food a ton, but we have made lumpia usually for Thanksgiving or New Years. Very good.

There is this sort of hotspot that has a grocery store full of so many foods from various Asian countries, but it also does stock some American products. Have gotten a few Asian snacks there like a bag of honey flavored rice crackers and lemon flavored biscuit snacks. Nearby there is a Japanese, Chinese and Vietnamese restaurant, and I bet that their food is really good. Usually the only Asian restaurant we get is Panda Express, but I think that’s more American-Chinese than authentic Chinese. I like Panda Express, but sometimes the grease gets too excessive with stuff like their chow mein. I rarely eat Japanese dishes, and I think ramen would be the only one I’ve had.

@CaleBoi25 nice!! im so glad you have been having fun with totk!
(nice new pfp i love it!)

Yo...!
I got some nice retro game (PS1) that I have ever played when I was teenager.
It is Tail Concerto

I got the Japanese version as the cheapest option I could get from my country as the English version was really expensive for retro games and since I have ever played the game long time ago in English version, I could follow the game as I have some understanding the Japanese letters and game like this is okay to play with Japanese language since the game is very simple.

Edit: Phew, this went through. Getting really tired of running into the 504 Bad Gateway Errors sometimes....

@Pastellioli Very true; companies generally are never quite the same when a lot of the staff who worked on well-beloved titles leave or pass away. I used to also assume MS ran them into the ground - and despite my somewhat fond approach to Windows platforms, am still not a fan of the mega corporation - but that indeed wasn't really the case if interviews are to be believed.

The criticisms regarding censored swears are understandable. I don't mind some swearwords as long as they aren't used to an insane level (a good example is a movie like The Hangover), and IMO such censorship/bleeps cheapen the content. Reminds me of censored music I'd sometimes hear on some CDs obtained from Walmart; even with the words cut out, you still basically know what it says lol. Didn't realize the remake's visuals were revamped too, though I've not played Conker's Bad Fur Day. Most of my experience is related to the differences between the censored and uncensored versions of the Great Mighty Poo's operatic tones (half the reason why I want to play the game lol), the former which does mess with the song's flow IMO.

@Yousef- After that awesome restaurant - it's called Danbo Ramen, which is an actual chain in Japan - I don't think I can eat instant package ramen again. LMJ is very slice of life. Not a bad thing at all, but at this point I think I slightly prefer the higher stakes of previous Layton titles. Not to mention most of the crimes so far have been...minimal to nonexistent. The puzzles are hit or miss for sure. Some are genuinely decent, but many are either very easy or obscure answers and leaps in logic.

@jedgamesguy That ice cream was only the outer chocolate shell too; it was actual chocolate and much better than the shellac junk many fast food chains use for some of their ice cream options in the US (it's thin, cheap-tasting, and not a texture I like with my ice cream at all). We could choose different ice cream for the filling. I went with raspberry sorbet, which surprisingly worked pretty well with the chocolate and marshmallow flavors. In any case, I don't easily turn down many forms of frozen ice cream or frozen yogurt.

Glad you also get to experience your own food journey! Decent food in places we haven't been, or at least haven't been to often, is an amazing part of the overall experience IMO. This is from someone who likes trying new things. As a fellow fan of most things Italian (Except almost anything with Alfredo sauce...no thanks), that lasagna sounds amazing! I probably would have destroyed my own portion lol.

@Sunsy I'd try both the fried and steamed versions, though if it were regular I'd probably opt for the latter most of the time. I'd love to live near an Asian market to help satisfy my Far Eastern tastes when those arise, but sadly I do not. I typically have to settle for a restaurant or what little I can find in the international food aisle in my local Walmart. I'm highly tempted to order red/adzuki bean paste online now that I've had it though.

Glad you enjoyed the food pictures! Yeah, the gyoza were a (somewhat pricey) side at the ramen restaurant. I've had it before and knew I'd enjoy it, plus I was pretty hungry by then.

@Tyranexx Oh yeah, the Great Mighty Poo song I do think was really ruined in the remake…that is one of the highlights of the game and the one a lot of people remember the most. The entire point of the song is to be crass, so the censoring really ruins the whole thing. I replayed that part not too long ago, and the noises they put on top during the parts where he curses in the song is so terrible and awkward, and I do agree it ruins the flow of the song. The performance was redone and is higher quality, but I think the original version is the superior version. I do like the remake for having better controls, but I like the original for its charm and cartoony visuals, and I feel that the remake removed a lot of the things that made Bad Fur Day charming, so I do think that the N64 version would be the better version to play.

Plus, the art style change the remake had that went toward a more detailed and semi-realistic art style does sort of give away the fact that it’s a “mature” game, cuz with the original, it was supposed to be a “mature” game disguising itself as a kids game, so when you take a glance at it and go in expecting a kids game, you are really surprised with the content like cursing, suggestive references and somewhat gory violence.

@Pastellioli Exactly regarding the Great Mighty Poo song, especially since crassness is the whole point. The noises, while "appropriate" in a sense, sound really phoned in and awkward. Almost like taking a paintbrush and painting random strips of color over a famous painting. Sounds like there are some benefits to the remake at least; maybe one day there will be another remake or remaster with the best of both worlds?

@Tyranexx There are, though it’s mostly with the gameplay being less repetitive and having improved controls. I prefer a lot of things in the original over the remake, of course the cartoony and colorful Disney art style, the goofiness being top notch, and the fact that it doesn’t treat every single curse word like the f-word. Although I didn’t get most out of the many different multiplayer modes in the original, I do think that them removing them all for a war-themed third-person shooter mode really removes the silliness present, as the multiplayer in Bad Fur Day brought out a lot of charm, lightheartedness, and stupidity. The remake for some strange reason, likes to censor the s-word and a-hole a bunch and act like they are really bad when they aren’t, they are super mild swear words. So yeah, although I do think the remake is good, my main gripe is that it’s less charming and memorable than the original.

I wish that would happen. Too bad the games always sold bad and no one has an interest in making one

Hello! How are you all? Doing well right now, and I’m considering watching The Matrix again later. That movie is stuck in my head now.

Hey, hi, hello, yo, what’s up? Good morning, good afternoon, or goodnight, wherever you live. How are you doing?

For me, I’m just doing nothing. Just reading a few random articles here and imagining a drawing I’m going to make later. There was a recent article I read here where a game publisher apparently got hacked and sensitive and private customer info got stolen, which makes me anxious, so I need to do something to get my mind off of it. Whenever I hear of security stuff and people losing access to their accounts from hackers, it never escapes my mind, and I always go “but what if it happens to me?” or I worry that someone is hacking into my account when I see activity I don’t remember when it was just me. It’s such an awful feeling since I don’t want to lose access to using this site and accessing games on my Xbox, and it’s so hard to let go of it.

Not sure if anyone's noticed but the Kickstarter for KoRobo(the Chibi-Robo spiritual successor) went up a few days ago( https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tinywonderstudio/korobo ). It's already got a lot of backers supporting the project, and while I'm not one of them, I do wish the dev team the best of luck; these 3D crowd-funded spiritual successors have a habit of not working out well, and it'd be nice to see one of them succeed for once.

@Pastellioli hi, hello. Unfortunately I have no positive news to share. Today took a day off work due to massive sleep deprivation. I’m not feeling great as I’ve been severely sleep deprived for the past two weeks and it’s finally caught up to me. I have nothing really positive to say. I’m just really sleep deprived and continue hoping I’ll be able to recover within hopefully the next few days soonest. I wish I could I chat more but it’s probably wiser to just try to be more offline. It’s funny because mood-wise I’m actually fairly neutral, but I’m definitely neglectful of my own physical health at times. Work stress catches up to me a lot.

Gaming-wise surprisingly I am feeling quite good. I’ve started Castlevania: Lords of Shadow on my Xbox and it’s a pretty serviceable god of war clone with a fun movement and combat system. Need to go through more of my 360 games some day and this feels like a nice way to work up towards it. Tons of games that were way too easy to rack up due to going on sale for 2.99. 360 might be the most collector friendly console in the universe. I really like the library. It’s very honest.

@Yousef- Oh, sleep deprivation sucks. I didn’t know you had been sleep deprived. It’s fine if you can’t chat a bunch, sleep is very important! I can be neglectful of it too and I always try to keep myself up, but maybe that’s something I need to stop before I start to feel side effects. Having to work sometimes stinks since it can really make you feel tired. Just take as long as you need until you feel better! I look forward to chatting with you more when you are ready.

Hm, with gaming for me I haven’t really played anything this week since I am trying to focus on drawing. I am already planning what to make, and it’s a redraw of a video game cover art, mostly since I can’t think of anything else to draw and also cuz I want to challenge myself with my art since it tends to be too simple and boring. I could show you the original picture that I’m going to try redrawing. After that, I’ll probably just go back to the Xbox and play more Rare games, probably back to the ones I wrote on my signature message in the forum. I’m hoping that the Pure Xbox game club votes on Conker as its next game, cuz that’s actually the reason why I joined it in the first place.

@Pastellioli we’ll likely out-vote them. Yay democracy.
Yeah, not much I can do ‘cept try to actually sleep on frecking time! College was a pain because of my constant sleep deprivation. Was always scared I’d miss a class or two.

@Yousef- usually when I go to bed late and wake up a few hours later, I still feel wide awake but only a bit sleepy, maybe a bit of yawning, but I still think it’d be best to sleep anyway even if I do feel fully awake. I mostly stay awake late so I can do some fun stuff, but usually I don’t have time to get into it as much as I can, which does give me more of a reason to go to bed if I can’t do much of my hobbies. I have a pretty bad sleep schedule and I pretty much wake up at whatever time in the morning, usually early.

@Pastellioli I relate to your sentiment. Well today been a rocky day. Hope tomorrow’s better. I look forward to our chats.

(As a side note, if you need to chat with me, just ping me. I won’t be bothered. All my pings are emailed to me. I’m always here)

(That extends also to anyone here, if any of you feel lonely or need comfort or need to chat with someone, drop me a word, I’m always here and if you don’t know what to say you can just ask me how my day was and that’d be enough : ) )

Took my friend to see Despicable Me 4 today, we both enjoyed the movie.

@CaleBoi25 That's awesome. Me too, sometimes mom and I will get Chinese for dinner, but also, I did get a Japanese cookbook and did learn how to make some Japanese dishes.

@Tyranexx They're very good steamed. At least you have a restaurant. I use to enjoy going to the old Asian food market, just for the options they have that the local supermarket didn't have. I remember the Walmart aisle. I use to get Nissin Raoh ramen there, it was honestly some of the best ramen I've ever had.

Indeed, at least you had a good time at that restaurant.

@Pastellioli I really don't understand the push for grittier game worlds during that period. Sure, they have their place depending on the setting, but the tradeoff was it made a lot of games look the same. Part of the reason I never got into the FPS genre is because most of those games looked like mud pits then. I do like the occasional "realistic" game, but variety is the spice of life. In my opinion, that includes art - which I consider games a part of.

@Sunsy Glad you enjoyed the new Despicable Me movie; the only reason I'm holding off from it is due to the fact I need to watch the previous two and a half. (I've only seen part of the first movie)

It's a Japanese steakhouse. Very good quality, but that is reflected in the price. So I don't go often. Chinese is somewhat easy to get here too. I've heard there's also a Thai place, but I've not had their food before. I'm stuck with ordering ingredients online if I want to try anything else (and if I feel creative in the food department, which is rare).

I loved that ramen restaurant. Sadly, the closest search hit I got to one near my whereabouts is in a college town over an hour away. And that particular chain we went to is mostly in Japan. They only have three US locations according to a map on the restaurant wall, all of which would require me to hop on a plane. One was in Seattle, the other two near New York City if I recall.

@Tyranexx Yeah, and plus, Bad Fur Day is supposed to be stupid and funny, so the game having a more semi-realistic and grittier art style and visuals really does not fit at all. I’d have to assume the new and more detailed art style was to fit the war-themed multiplayer it was advertising heavily (and was pretty much the entire selling point). I did play a bit of that and it was more serious and less comedic and jokey than the single-player.

I don’t hate art styles really, and I love them all, but some art styles are just super unfitting for the tone of some media. Some of the characters in the remake got redesigns alongside the graphical overhaul, but some of them just look unappealing and sort of ugly…I am not a fan of how a lot of the characters in this prehistoric level look in the remake, and the redesigns they gave to these squirrel and teddy bear characters I also wasn’t a fan of because of how significantly different they looked compared to their original designs. People say Conker’s updated design in the remake was bad, but if I’m being honest, it doesn’t look bad and I do think the hate towards his new design is overblown, though I prefer the more pudgy and cuter design he originally had and really wish they kept it in. His redesign in the remake is honestly one of the more better ones.

I really love games having a variety of different art styles and visuals, and I am a fan of the more cartoony, Disney-esque ones with vivid Technicolor visuals and some slapstick, which is what a good few of Rare’s games did, such as Bad Fur Day and the Banjo games, and those tend to be my most favorite games from them. It’s probably why I wasn’t interested in some of their other games like Perfect Dark at first and a majority of modern shooter games.

I think it’s very rare to see any triple-a games that have cartoony art styles, since most triple-a games go for realistic or detailed art styles and graphics, and that is the visual style that likely pops into your mind when you hear “triple-a games.” I most certainly don’t dislike realistic art styles or graphics, but I think it’s super common with most games nowadays and I wish there was some more variety with the visual styles of higher budget games. I believe the appearance and art style of a game can really influence a person’s interest in a game, especially with me, as I am less interested in games that have gritty or realistic art styles and more into games with silly or cartoony art styles.

Sweet!
I finished Tail Concerto PS1 in four days since i got the game on Sunday.
A hidden gem from PS1 era that i have ever played when i was teenager.
The game was very short, i finished it around 7 hours.
The anthro dog & cat character design was so 90's anime style.
Here is the video if you have never heard about Tail Concerto.

Hey does anyone play rocket league???