CuriousCat Archive Page 176 of 202

  1. do you think there's value in the downright sadistic approach to game design that Roberta Williams had in the King's Quest games? I would end up hating a game that lets me progress fully aware I have fucked up and can't win without letting me know what i did wrong (for example: the mouse puzzle at the start of KQ5), but at the same time i can see the appeal of a more """""realistic"""" experience, as in you don't know you've fucked up until it's too late.

    I think that particular design is horrid and it's why I don't like old school Sierra games.

    However:

    I do think there are *ways* to make those design decisions work if you come at them a little differently.

    The game progressing even when you miss something also happened in Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers, but that game was designed so that you could go back and find the things you missed much later in the game. It allowed you to make mistakes and suffer consequences without rendering the game unwinnable. (I don't think it entirely worked there, either, but it worked *better* than King's Quest.)

    The infamous "Oops You're Dead" design of old Sierra games - where making a small mistake can get you killed at any time which discourages exploration - works much better in, say, Telltale games, where you can die suddenly but the game autosaves and takes you back to right before you died. Still keeps some of the danger and "realism" of death, but, again, without the dead end.

    You can even render the game, in a sense, unwinnable in The Last Express, where you can fail to solve a section of the game and the player just gets off the train without ever solving the mystery, but then the game rewinds to the last point where you could have actually solved the sequence. So not only does it not punish you for screwing up, where it rewinds you to is a subtle hint about what you have to do differently. (The Last Express is one of the best adventure games ever made and you should play it right now.)

    So, yeah. Most of Sierra's design was deliberately unfair to incentivize buying the hintbook. But there are ways to be harsh while also being fair.

  2. Animal Farm or Brave New World?

    Isn't the usual comparison Brave New World vs. 1984?

  4. I got DEMOCRACY FOR REALISTS for Christmas, and I'm 50 pages in, but often there are up to six or seven citations on any given page, and although I want to be thorough and I want to understand, I don't have time to consult all of these studies, but does taking the authors' presentation at face value make me a negligent reader, in a way? What's your protocol on this front?

    If there are a lot of citations, I generally trust that the author has done their homework. (People with weak reasoning tend to have fewer citations, or most of their citations are the same handful of sources.) If I'm at all skeptical, I might check out one or two to see if they check out. Mostly, I read the citations on subjects I want to read further on, like if they're especially relevant to my research. I could be more thorough, but the whole point of reading a book with sources is so you don't have to read all the sources. It means taking a little on faith, but faith isn't always misplaced. Check however much you need to check to feel like you can trust the rest.

  5. What is in your tweet about Rob Marshall that you dislike fake sentiments and mediocre reprisals? Especially about mourning a lost family member?

    How can you tell if it's dishonest and the one that is sincerely genuine emotionally?

    You can't tell whether it's dishonest or sincere. You can only assess if it rings true to you while you're watching it. In my case, it did not even come close.

  6. What do you think of people making/treating art as blank canvases rather than with at least some speck of paint?

    Nothing can't be art.

  7. This is actually off-topic af, but my ex-gf wants to be in an open relationship (polyamorous) and I'm not sure whether to agree or not. I get jealous, and even though I never say a word about that to her, I feel awful about it. Do you think I should try having that relationship or to let her go? What is your position on monogamy, btw?

    Hi, I know you mean well, but this really isn't an advice column. I am not qualified to tell anyone what to do in their relationships. The go-to books on polyamory are Opening Up and The Ethical Slut. I would recommend reading the chapters on jealousy, because not talking to your potential partner about your feelings is going to bite you in the ass.

  8. Is there anything wrong having a centrist opinion?

    depends on what you're in the center of

  9. Use 3 words to describe your Christmas

    wub wub wub

  12. A bunch of left tube has had one or more videos where they pour some kind of viscous liquid on their face. I think OP is referring to philosophytube's newest video where he pours HP sauce on his face.

    in response to Ian, when will the liquid pouring on face happen? It needs to be done! For Left Unity!

    Just take me at my word that I was pouring condensed coconut milk on my face while recording my last video.

  13. Oh good point. Pretentious just sorta blends in with elitism in my mind.

    in response to Why do you call yourself pretentious? Whenever I look at a lot of games as art criticism. The big takes seem to boil down to "general audiences are idiots who degrade the artistic value of games" and blind nostalgia "new bad". Perhaps fairly reductive but I found you had found the niche of games as art criticism that was not hella pretentious.

    <3

  14. Why do you call yourself pretentious? Whenever I look at a lot of games as art criticism. The big takes seem to boil down to "general audiences are idiots who degrade the artistic value of games" and blind nostalgia "new bad". Perhaps fairly reductive but I found you had found the niche of games as art criticism that was not hella pretentious.

    I used an obscure branch of film theory (enunciation) to analyze an obscure indie game (The Beginner's Guide), I had the audacity to admit that I know what Deleuzean corporeality is without deigning to describe it, and my very first video used the word "memetic." If I'm not pretentious, maybe we're using different definitions of the word.

  16. Are you a fan of social media influencers on Instagram and on Youtube promoting about what defines them in the guise of promoting a commercial product (eg. Beauty skin products) while doing so?

    I don't know what that is.

  17. Ian, when will the liquid pouring on face happen? It needs to be done! For Left Unity!

    what?

  19. Is it a controversial opinion to think that Mary Poppins wasn’t that great of a film? I watched it as a kid and felt like the musical parts dragged on for too long.

    I have no idea whether Mary Poppins holds up, I haven't watched it in ages. There are at least a number of things about it that work, moreso than the sequel.

  20. Just discovered your tumblr post where you recommend some other people's patreons. Might I ask why the video is unlisted?

    I'm a video essay channel and I don't like filling my feed with vlogs.

  21. Hey Ian I want to learn how to write but i don't think college is for me. I've want to try to become self-taught and I was wondering if you have any recommendations on books that would be helpful.

    https://curiouscat.me/InnuendoStudios/post/625297479

  22. What's your opinion on the steel slat barrier design proposed by your president?

    I think Trump's idea is to think of the entire rest of the world like the inside of a zoo.

  23. I saw your tweets on Mary Poppins and Christopher Robin, and I was wondering about what you think about A Christmas Carol, since its story is basically just Big Bad Capitalist becomes Older Nicer Capitalist

    Scrooge is a miser, but he's not exactly wealthy, so he's not much of a shorthand for capitalism. And his arc isn't to just chastise greed and then be kind when someone proves kindness is profitable, but to redistribute (some) of his money and empower his workers. Hardly radical, but I have less cause to comment on it.

    But, like, if you're expecting Dickens to be a comrade, expect something else.

  24. I’m a fellow YouTube creator, and I’m looking to get into making videos about bigger and broader topics about art criticism and the way audiences interact with art and each other. For example, things like authorial intent or how we even define art, which are subjects other creators like yourself have covered before. The one hesitation I have is I don’t know that I feel like I can add anything significantly original to these conversations, because, I mean come on, how do you add anything “significantly” new to ideas that have been debated for decades or even centuries.

    I still want to pursue talking about these ideas, in hopes that by at least adding my own perspective, by putting things in my own words, it can have its own version of originality, and thus be persuasive in ways other videos might not be. But I still have this nagging feeling in the back of my head that I’m just copying and regurgitating information I’ve collected and coalited elsewhere, and simply translating these things into my own words isn’t enough to keep me from being a plagiarist, albeit not a lazy one. As someone who has tackled topics like this in the past, I assume you’ve struggled with this before. What helped you go through with talking about these things, and how do you feel about those videos now that you have some distance from them?

    Hm. Most of my videos shake out into three categories:

    Arguments I Haven't Heard: "The Walking Dead's Kenny is Clementine's Abusive Stepfather" and "Life Is Strange is Two Games at Once and the Final Choice is the Player Deciding Which Game Gets an Ending" were statements I didn't see anyone else making. They were both things I realized about those games that helped me understand them, and I wanted to make a video to explore that perspective.

    Arguments I Haven't Heard Brought Together: I hadn't seen anyone dissect Super Smash Bros. through the lens of sports analysis, game theory, and speedrunning, which is what came to mind as I was thinking about it. Similarly, I hadn't seen The Beginner's Guide dissected through the lens of semiotics or enunciation theory. None of the individual arguments were new, but I was bringing a lot of disparate stuff together which combined to a somewhat unique perspective.

    Arguments My Audience Hasn't Heard: My video on cultivation theory is mostly just summarizing a study and the body of research it's based on. There's a bit of my own interpretation there, but, primarily, it's not saying anything you couldn't learn yourself by reading the study and doing a brief run through Wikipedia. The value of this video is that it's information a particular audience is ignorant of, and which, I think, was useful to the conversation that was happening at the time.

    Now, these categories are less PREscriptive than DEscriptive. I get ideas for videos, but some I lose interest in and never execute, and some won't leave me alone until I get them out of my head and onto YouTube. It just seems that one thing differentiating an idea I execute from one I lose interest in is whether it adds anything to The Discourse™.

    I guess where I differ from a lot of people is I tend to start with a specific argument rather than a subject I want to weigh in on. Like, I didn't decide I wanted to talk about Death of the Author; I realized talking about Death of the Author would help me say the thing I wanted to say about The Beginner's Guide. This seems to be the way I'm wired, and it does spare me from a lot of anxiety around "not adding enough to the conversation." Adding something to the conversation is what draws me to a subject in the first place.

    But I would agree with you that adding your own perspective, even to well-trod ground, is more than enough justification to make a video. I've never heard YOUR perspective on YouTube, and would encourage you not to psych yourself out by demanding you be 100% original. You'll almost certainly find something uniquely your own during the writing process, and it's up to your audience whether your perspective was valuable. The most important thing is to just keep making stuff!

  25. Not quite a question, but thanks for doing your work, it’s great!

    no u

  26. Do you think that there is a clock on the US giving reperations to black people in the context that post scarcity might be achieved realitivly soon?

    This may be an odd way of think about that topic. I suppose it's hard to predict any outcome that far away. But the idea in essence is 'is it possible to pay reperations when there is no need/reason for an economic system?'

    Between climate change, the return of fascism, and the horrors of late capitalism, I find it very hard to imagine there being *less* scarcity right now.

  27. Would it had been more appropriate if Freddy Krueger was a child molester instead of a child Killer? I know you distane expolation and cruelty and that due to the time period they couldn't do that without a massive boycott. But giving Freddy's sexually predatory behavior in the movie that got more blatant in the sequels. Even removing the baggage it carries, should Freddy been written as a child molester and not a child killer?

    Horror movies often engage with thorny subjects like trauma and abuse, and whether or not it's exploitative or needlessly cruel is a matter of execution. The 2010 remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street did make Freddy a child molester, and the teens he terrorized were his former victims. The reason none of them remembered him was that they'd repressed their memories. The movie was... not good, but it did add some substance to it that could have enriched the material in better hands. Freddy as an embodiment of repressed trauma, rather than just a general "murderous bad guy," at least has potential.

    "Should" is a weird word to use in this context, though.

  28. Not the same anon here, but I like to ask about your point 2), any research articles/events about the opposite of what that anon said that is available online that we can look at?

    Is it possible to equate the effects of banning extremism similar to the effects of banning a reformation rally held by a political opposition party? Case in point, a reformation rally in 1998 held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia that empowered the opposition party for the 1st time to the public. Under an Internal Security Act, the ruling govt arrested more people involved in the rally but it didn't stopped the opposition to spread further news that the ruling govt was corrupt. More than that, over the years more people were jailed and the public begin to have sympathy with them and hence in the most recent election that ruling govt was finally deposed of power. Wouldn't the opposite ring true as well if you jail more misled people which would lead to further racism, hate and finally a return to power of the oppressors?

    Also, using an example from the Malaysian government and about your reductio ad absurdum example, the police state incident has happened before in Malaysia during the implementation of the Internal Security Act. Gerrymandering was created to ensure only the people in power to be in power and hence why the previous ruling govt of Malaysia held power for almost 50 years without question...

    I don't know about the US and China where certain racists rallies are allowed or not to be present in public to feed on the fear of the misled...

    But if it's a controlled rally with several potential hate group members arrested before the rally takes place, why is there a need to ban such rallies ?

    in response to To begin with, to said that you heard it before is not an argument that can take out my rebuttal. 1.You need to proof whatever that I stated is not a legitimate reason to be concern, it will not bring harm as I mentioned, and even if it occurred, there is enough mechanism in a country to prevent all of the possible harms that I mentioned. That didn't happened in what you were rambling here. 2. The only argument that you had was we need control these freedom for the benefit of the community, which I totally agree, I stated that each country have enough law to prevent hate speech or even exploitation of children in the interest of politics. Thus why is there a need to ban such rally if it is under control? As I said before, if you ban them it will not stop the extreme racism in any country but it will radicalize them even further. 3. Here the difference between your reductio an absurdum and my argument is that what ever that I mentioned had occurred before. The police state is what exactly happened in an Asian country was during the implementation of ISA in that specific country. Gerrymandering was created to ensure only the people in power to be in power and that is why such ruling party been reign supreme for the past 60 years Has what ever that you mentioned even occurred in this world besides that Asian country? Thus at this point you are not arguing rationally but you are arguing for the sake of arguing

    Forgive me for taking several days to respond, and I trust that you're asking in good faith, but, please understand, this is a very frustrating line of questioning for me.

    In the last year, I have linked a video explaining the Overton Window: https://bit.ly/2sgvW8t

    I have made a video about mainstreaming: https://bit.ly/2BwNyRa

    I have livetweeted an entire book on authoritarianism: https://bit.ly/2PRYvlq

    I could point to any one of them as evidence that banning fascist rallies disempowers them and allowing them to rally radicalizes them further. The more public reactionaries are allowed to be, the more society thinks of them as acceptable. The more society thinks of them as acceptable, the more their beliefs are treated as normal. The more their beliefs are treated as normal, the more people start to adhere to those beliefs. And the more people adhere to reactionary politics, the easier it is for the extremists to get more extreme. The whole reason the Alt-Right wears suits and ties and focuses on rallying on college campuses is to look more normal and acceptable than skinheads and the KKK. Richard Spencer has gone on record that their movement depends on the ability to rally in public. All of this has been central to my work in 2018; if you've been watching my videos, you must know my position on this.

    Can I point to events? All of them! Every racist rally in the US has followed this pattern. Charlottesville was a huge rally defended - or at least tolerated - by much of the conservative establishment. It had permits and was supported by the ACLU. And it had people marching under swastikas, proclaiming "gas the k*kes" to thunderous applause, and firing guns at counterprotestors. And Heather Heyer is dead because of it. The next Far Right rally was in Boston, and because there was huge backlash, enormous opposition, and a counterprotest that outnumbered them 1000 to 1, only 50 people showed up, they ended the event after an hour, and not a single punch was thrown.

    I feel like "doesn't deplatforming radicals make things worse" is impossible to still believe in the Era of Trump. Trump ascent and the rise of the Alt-Right happened BEFORE there was any effort to deplatform them. Trump generated MORE attention than anyone else running. The Alt-Right grew because they were convinced a large number of people they were legitimate. What power they have lost has happened BECAUSE we started pushing back after Trump was elected.

    Deplatforming fascists works where deplatforming social justice activists often fails because fascism depends on consolidated power where social justice depends on breaking power up. Fascism that is marginal and distributed isn't fascism.

    Also, fascists are fucking cowards.

  29. I had a dream in which I read Arendt. Does that count as reading Arendt?

    if it does, I've had sex with a lot more friends than I thought

  32. Yeah I thought about indicating that you probably already know that and agree with me on this point , but got lazy on changing the phrasing for that. that's actually not a cool thing on my part.

    in response to A lot of people hear the short and quippy phrase, much less will do the research, and the phrase actually make the average uninitiated think the idea is extremist and dumb, so less motivation to check it. Not exactly a great strategy.

    no worries

  33. Mario 64 Vs. Mario Odyssey? (Assuming you played both.)

    64

  34. will the next presidential election saga be better or worse than the last one?

    that depends on the democrats NOT NOMINATING JOE BIDEN

  36. It’s probably just my patience running dry after everything happening this year, but at this point do not understand how people can condemn things like protesting at restaurants or, most recently like you saw on Twitter, yelling at advertisers to stop sponsoring white supremacist. I can only wonder: is it pure ignorance or are certain people legitimately afraid of their status being challenged?

    It is often willful ignorance *because* they're - on a visceral but largely unconscious level - afraid of their status being challenged.

  37. What's your take on David Koepp's writing?

    I've seen Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, a movie written by him... it's pretty sloppy, don't you think?

    David Koepp doesn't write screenplays, he strings together soundbites meant for the trailer.

  38. Keira Knightley or Daisy Ridley?

    correct

  40. Would you recommend Beginning Theory by Peter Barry? Especially on accurate definitions of several critical theories like postcolonialism, postmodernism etc.

    Haven't read it.

  41. is it worth to read Arendt? I keep tabs on the human condition but i am not convinced i should read it.

    I am 25 pages into my first Arendt, so I can't really say. But those 25 pages have been *very* interesting.

  42. What's your take on the whole "Brad Bird seems to like Ayn Rand" thing? I rewatched The Incredibles recently, and I still love it, but the "if everyone is special, no one is*", "celebrating mediocrity" etc. moments have definitely started to rub me the wrong way as I've gotten older.

    *Which is also just a completely bullshit argument, since, as kumbaya as it may sound, there's a shit ton of different ways to excel and be "special". But anyway.

    https://curiouscat.me/InnuendoStudios/post/526373840

  43. So you think any movie director and writer hired by Marvel are just SIMPLY making stuff up with the SOLE intention of just getting profits from selling a commercial product in cinemas??

    in response to was the movie Captain America Civil War’s message of “it’d be better if superheroes werent regulated by big gov” libertarian?

    Hi. This is very rude? You know that's not what I'm saying, so this is a crappy way to continue a conversation. In the event that you're kidding, I don't really get what the joke is.

    I think the writers of Cap 2, Cap 3, and Infinity War are mostly interested in plot twists, characters bouncing off each other, and action scenes, and don't think too hard on the themes and overall plot. This is variably true of most of the Marvel movies, with some being pretty committed to theme, plot, and character arcs, but the ones by Markus and McFeely are the least concerned with that stuff.

  44. A lot of people hear the short and quippy phrase, much less will do the research, and the phrase actually make the average uninitiated think the idea is extremist and dumb, so less motivation to check it. Not exactly a great strategy.

    in response to I often hear other leftists talk about "abolishing" ICE/police/prisons & then acting like it's ridiculous when centrists or other folks think they mean "take away ICE/police/prisons while keeping everything else the same," but is it that ridiculous? For the disengaged, that's what abolishing is (ie the inaccurate way we're taught about the abolition of slavery). Should leftists adapt the language of our visible slogans to be more accessible?

    Didn't say it was. I *am* saying that the Left often assumes that, if they find the just-right phrasing for a complex idea, suddenly everyone will finally GET IT. This assumes the problem is a failure of communication, not an ideological difference.

    Adapting language will help some, because there are always people sympathetic to the idea but misinformed. But we also need to reckon with the idea that maybe a lot of people have personal investment in the hegemonic institutional power of ICE and the prison system, and it will take more to convince them to give up that investment than the same argument with different phrasing.

  45. So now that your patreon goal is reached (congrats btw) can we expect a new podcast or vlog channel in the near future? Who knows, you might become the next vlogbrothers, or Paul brothers even.

    yes! I've been planning a podcast for a while, but I seem to always be behind schedule on the videos, so it's hard to make time for additional projects. The plan is to jump into it properly in 2019, even if I have to come at it slowly.

  46. what's the name of the song in the outro music for your alt-right playbook videos?

    Cologne

  49. Is it wrong to argue for the sake of arguing rather than out of rationale?

    nah, there are tons of things that are worth arguing about that aren't rational, like which ballplayers are bums or whether mayo is an appropriate condiment on fries

    it's when people debate social and political issues the way they debate what is and isn't a sandwich that we run into problems

  50. I often hear other leftists talk about "abolishing" ICE/police/prisons & then acting like it's ridiculous when centrists or other folks think they mean "take away ICE/police/prisons while keeping everything else the same," but is it that ridiculous? For the disengaged, that's what abolishing is (ie the inaccurate way we're taught about the abolition of slavery). Should leftists adapt the language of our visible slogans to be more accessible?

    It's not like there aren't leftists out there explaining, in dozens and dozens of different ways, what people mean by abolition. I'm never opposed to adapting language, but part of the problem is that people don't want to understand.

  51. if i'm not asking for too much, do you have a list of movies that are must-see for shot/composition analysis? or know where i can find one? thank you!

    How To Make Shots Edit Together Well: anything by David Fincher

    How To Make Shots Edit Together Badly: anything by Tim Burton

    And just watch everything by Every Frame a Painting:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5V-k-p4wzxg

  52. was the movie Captain America Civil War’s message of “it’d be better if superheroes werent regulated by big gov” libertarian?

    I'm confident the writers of Civil War haven't the faintest idea what its message is.

  53. Not OP, but what kind of consequences to actions would you like to see decisionmaking games have, if not branching content? In your write up on Unavowed you mention you would have liked to see Logan's character development mean something in the missions you go on after it, do you mean something like that?
    I'd consider that content, in a way. Maybe not extra levels or endings, but someone still has to write/code that kind of thing.

    in response to Do you think it is possible for a game that give you choices that those choices truly affact the game in more than just whether or not person 1 or person 2 will live or whether you get the good ending for being the good guy or a bad ending for playing the bad guy? That the choices can truly give you multiple endings that are drastically different from each other. Basically, can one make a game that truly have choices with consciences even if it take a entire console generation or two to have it fully realized?

    Aaron Reed, the author of Blue Lacuna, talked about the decisions in most narrative games as creating a "branching tree," where he considered Blue Lacuna as a "braided rope." Rather than a handful of major differences, there were many, many small differences based on decisions you made, which added up to a very tailored experience. This is obviously easier to do in an interactive novel like Blue Lacuna, where all this unique content is a lot of work but all it takes is writing, and writing is comparatively inexpensive. But I think it's still a lot cheaper to think it terms of lots of small things.

    But, honestly, I don't think there's a lot wrong with the models that exist. The Walking Dead is an excellent game, and I find its choices deep and emotional. There's still territory I'd like to see us explore, but I think our biggest problem is a failure of audiences to engage with the material as it is because they're comparing it to an imagined ideal that's neither practical nor meaningful.

  54. How do I obtain the will to live when therapy is crapitalistic rubbish aaaaaaa

    Sorry to be a parasocial parasite but all my friends are liberals and it's exhausting convincing them that there's even anything wrong

    and no i can't just get new friends because nobody wants to hang out with someone who has no will to live and 100000 other upfuckednesses and just generally acts as an unfillable emotional void

    You are not a parasite, but I am not equipped to help you much, I'm afraid. In my experience, the void never gets filled, only more or less manageable. No one thing does it. Community helps. Meds help. Therapy helps. (Social sites, therapy, and meds are no more or less capitalist than any other part of modern life, and will probably all exist after the revolution.)

    I hope there is something that helps that you have the energy to pursue. It will probably make pursuing the other things slightly easier. I'm sorry I can't be more help, but I'm rooting for you.

  55. Do you think it is possible for a game that give you choices that those choices truly affact the game in more than just whether or not person 1 or person 2 will live or whether you get the good ending for being the good guy or a bad ending for playing the bad guy? That the choices can truly give you multiple endings that are drastically different from each other. Basically, can one make a game that truly have choices with consciences even if it take a entire console generation or two to have it fully realized?

    Well, the problem isn't technological limitations, it's that making that much bespoke content is a phenomenal amount of work, that work is expensive, and there's only so much labor you can exploit from game designers. So, yes, it's possible right now, but it's very hard to justify doing.

    I also wanna push back on the framing that choices are only "meaningful" if they lead to lots of different endings and story branches. Like I've said elsewhere, the difference between the theatrical cut and the director's cut of Blade Runner isn't significant in terms of unique content, but the addition of literally two shots - the unicorn dream and a bit of origami at Deckard's feet - change the themes and meaning of the entire film. Your choices may only make small changes, but those changes can be incredibly significant.

    I think it says something about the way we think about games that we only think of "meaningful consequence" in terms of unique content. It's thinking of games purely as software products, like we're criticizing two playthroughs of The Walking Dead for not having enough unique features. But The Walking Dead isn't a word processor, and I don't think we should measure the impact of a choice by how many hours of labor resulted from it.

  56. I'm really enjoying the Alt-Right Playbook series, you're doing a phenomenal job with it! I was wondering if you were planning on talking about and debunking the myth of the supposed "alt-left", either as its own video in the series, or perhaps as part a video on projection and accusations (since that seems to be another play the alt-right loves to run). Keep up the great work, it's very important and very much appreciated!

    Probably not as a topic of an entire video, but I imagine it will come up eventually. :)

  57. Do you go straight to your PC when you have a story idea or jot down notes on your phone/notebook first?

    Do you Microsoft word for drafting? Or another software? Is it possible to just use Microsoft word?

    For jotting down notes, I use Notepad on the PC and TextEdit on the Mac. If I'm away from my computer(s), I use ColorNote on my phone. If I'm writing properly, I pretty much only use Google Docs these days, because then I can access what I'm working on from any device.

    And it's fine to use Word if that's what works for you! The program isn't that important, so I'd say just go with whatever makes it easiest to write.

  60. can it be one where the character just wants to feel good and the other owes him/her for covering each other's backs from trouble for a long time?

    in response to I'm currently trying to write a draft of a novel with my friend and we seem to struggle about this... Is there any better way to a write sex scene between two protagonists without it being too overtly sexually exploitative and pornographic?

    I'm really not a writing instructor, so I don't want to encourage more follow-up questions. But, for my part, that sounds pretty exploitative on the character's part regardless of how it's written, so I'd hope you at least engage with the severity of that, and I wouldn't want that scene to be written with eroticism.

  61. Since you’re so into Logan (like I am, obv) do you think this game (and maybe adventure games in general) would have benifitted from a romance sidequest, or should that only be in Rpgs like Bioware games or Witcher?
    P.S: did you picked up any hints that Logan was ace? Cause he did mentioned waking up with strangers when he was drunk

    I don't think there's any value to restricting romance options to RPGs, and there's some decent overlap between adventure games and dating sims. (Alone With You comes to mind.) I don't think Unavowed would have benefited from one, though - the player character is such a cipher, it's hard to imagine them having a believable relationship with anyone.

    In my playthrough, Logan was clear that, at the very least, he's been in a phase where sex is not important to him for several years. I've known people who go through phases like that but are very sexual when they make relationships a priority. So, maybe he's ace, maybe he's demisexual, or maybe he's just doing other stuff right now! But I would not deny anyone their ace Logan interpretation.

  62. The official Wadjet account actually quote-tweeted you. Sooo... Congrats on being famous Ian! Who knew being horny on main was such an effective strategy?

    How dare you speak so glibly about my connection with Logan! We have an intimacy that should not be reduced to mere horniness.

  63. What do you call captain falcon's forward aerial A? My circle of friends has always called it "the justice knee," but I'm not sure how widespread that is.

    It's like the only fair that doesn't get called a fair, it's just "knee." "Knee of Justice" works if you're not into the whole brevity thing; that's definitely common.

  64. Should I stop being a Pewds fan?

    I got no say over what you do and don't do, but I always encourage people to engage critically with whatever media they consume.

  65. I'm currently trying to write a draft of a novel with my friend and we seem to struggle about this...

    Is there any better way to a write sex scene between two protagonists without it being too overtly sexually exploitative and pornographic?

    I mean, I don't write a lot of sex scenes, but, I did, my rule of thumb would be to keep treating the characters as subjects. They are people, they have desires, they have agency. What does the POV character want in addition to getting off? What does the person they've having sex with want? How are they communicating? So long as both characters are relatable and human, it may be porny, but it shouldn't be exploitative. And porny isn't all bad.

  66. Not a question but just to let you know that I was watching your The Avenging Feminine video from your Bringing Back What's Stolen series, there was a Dior ad featuring Charlize Theron before your video started

    Coincidence? I don't believe in coincidences, especially on Youtube

    Charlize Theron's name is in the metadata, so it's algorithms.

  67. What is it about Adaptation that you liked compared to Barton Fink?

    Or do you feel Dhalgren is the king of metafiction compared to those two (three if you want to include The Player)?

    I just like Adaptation more. I generally feel like the Coens are more clever than they are funny or deep.

    I dunno if we need to crown a king of metafiction, but we'd have to at least put House of Leaves in the running if we're going to consider Dhalgren. And, like, the Neverending Story while we're at it.

  68. What about Adult Swim shorts? Unedited Footage of a Bear?

    in response to why don't you want to watch Twin Peaks?

    Too Many Cooks was neat.

  69. why don't you want to watch Twin Peaks?

    Because the spell David Lynch casts on people apparently doesn't work on me.

  70. Something I never really understood is just how pathetic pewdiepie is (and the same can be said with Notch). His net worth is at least $20 mil. He has tons of friends and a lovely wife. Why can't he spend his time on a tropical island somewhere instead of making videos ranting about how the evils of social justice and how unfair the media is to him? What is it with white dudes and their obsession with imaginary oppression?

    in response to Should we be concerned about how pewdiepie is a essentially a gateway channel to fascism or is it just the norm nowadays? What's worse is seeing him being endorsed by oblivious "non-political" content creators whom I respect. It's like seeing the phenomenon of "fascism being spread among close-knit but """ideologically-different""" community" you described happening in large scale. And there's not really any solution to this problem, is there?

    Empathy decreases as wealth increases.

  71. What is the artist for the outro music on your alt-right playbook movies?

    TransAm

  73. Just rewatched your 'Things of Beauty' video, and was curious if you had an opinion on SonicFox?

    Well, he plays a game I don't follow, so I know next to nothing about him other than the bullet points. It's a pretty rad set of bullet points, though.

  74. Should we be concerned about how pewdiepie is a essentially a gateway channel to fascism or is it just the norm nowadays? What's worse is seeing him being endorsed by oblivious "non-political" content creators whom I respect. It's like seeing the phenomenon of "fascism being spread among close-knit but """ideologically-different""" community" you described happening in large scale. And there's not really any solution to this problem, is there?

    It is both a new norm *and* extremely concerning. There is a very simple solution to this, which is for YouTube to enact consequences for spreading fascism on their platform in any way whatsoever, but, seeing as they are not presently doing that, our solutions are slowing and more frustrating - pressuring advertisers to pull ads from fascist content, trying to direct communities away from this garbage so that PewDiePie has less incentive to cater to it, pressuring YouTube to actually enforce their TOS, making and promoting more explicitly antifascist #content as alternatives to pewds. None are great solutions, but they're what we've got, and they can be effective with enough time and dedication.

  75. Why are you so mean?

    who am I mean to?

Anon commented:
Ian replied: