Month: June 2012

Cthulhu didn't save the world

Db0

Just finished the third installment of the Rain-slick Precipice of Darkness and it was good. Even though I’m not particularly impressed in the faux 16 bit graphics, the mechanics were solid and the game was enjoying to play. With that experience in mind, I tried playing Cthulhu saves the world, which comes from the same developers and I got disappointed. The game is missing all the improvements that made the RSPoD game enjoyable and just turned into an annoying grind. I tried playing in hard to have a challenge (because in RSPoD normal was too easy for me) and quickly found out that hard in this game doesn’t mean more challenging encounters, it merely means one needs to grind more to proceed. I just spent 1 hour sitting in one spot in the map and doing random encounters until I realized that the game is just not interesting enough to worth doing that. The battle is not even as interesting as RSPoD. Half the time I didn’t know why I lost, and that, combined with the fact that you can actually lose the game and thus from minutes up to hours of play as well (if you forgot to save and didn’t have “continues”.)  Combine that with the fact that mana points carry over from one battle to the next and first town was so designed that I needed to travel one minute to refill my MP, and it was just an exercise in frustration.

Perhaps the game would be not so annoying had I not played in hard, but if your only difference between the modes is how much grind you need to do, then that’s bad design right there. I hope they reuse the engine of RSPoD to more games because the ones they had before just don’t grab me in the slightest. Not in gameplay, nor graphics not even story.

Meh.

"'A key that can open many locks is called a master key, but a lock that can be opened by many keys is a shitty lock.'”

Db049 Comments

It’s not that I don’t have a sense of humor, it’s that you’re unoriginal and sexist.

Ha ha, what a funny joke, right?

No.

Quoth Ricecake:

That’s a pretty shitty analogy. It only holds if you already accept the conclusion. I can come up with several that make just as much sense, but would lead to different conclusions.

If you have a pencil that can be sharpened by any sharpener, you have a normal pencil; if you have a sharpener that will only sharpen certain pencils, you have a shitty sharpener.

A man who can ride any horse is a cowboy; a horse anyone can ride is a good horse.

A function that can be computed by any machine is a simple function; a machine that can compute any computable function is a Universal Turing Machine.

A man who’ll dance with anyone is fun at a party; A woman who’ll dance with anyone is fun at a party.

A better way for you to have phrased it would have been “look at it this way: ‘ I approve of promiscuous males, and I disapprove of promiscuous females.'”

Emphasis mine. Face it, the joke is only funny if you’re already a misogynist who is against female promiscuity.

And if someone says that to you, and reason is not an option just retort with this:

“Sooo… you’re about two inches long and often found in the hands of authority figures? Sounds about right, from what I’ve heard.”

Quote of the Day: Staring at women's bodies

Db06 Comments

Should women take it as a compliment when men catcall them or stare at them? No!

In response to this comment, SRSister Kelderwick replied:

Not sure if “subjugate” is actual transcribed word or a totally clueless yet perfect mis-remembered “objectify”. (Despite shitthatneverhappened.txt)

But okay really dudes. Thought experiment thing time yeah? You are at the gym, running, and your workout clothes are somewhat showy and fairly form-fitting. In the mirror you notice Jane Random Runner inspecting you – awesome, says you. Okay sure, whatever. What if JRR is still staring at you ten minutes later – are you still fine? That’s not intrusive at all? Now pretend her expression isn’t neutral – she’s obviously interested. Doesn’t say a word, just stares at you or takes long glances. The whole time. You are still not affected at all by this? She keeps watching you.

Sure. Now, it isn’t just JRR anymore. Now she has 10 peers all using machines behind you. Some of them don’t look, one of them stares like JRR, some of them take the odd glance. One of them wrinkles her nose in disapproval because she doesn’t find you attractive, or so she whispers to her friend beside her. Thinks she’s being quiet, probably, but maybe not? Wait, was that a camera her friend just slipped away? Hmmm. Oh well.

But now it’s not just JRR and her peers, it’s your female co-workers. Most of them are decent enough folks and don’t bother you. But Gwen does. She leans in too close when you talk, she watches you a bit too long when you wear shorts. Whenever you go to office parties Gwen always corners you and tries to make conversation. She doesn’t take well to rejection. But she’s nice enough most of them time, right? And she’s never, you know, said anything – she is married, after all. Definitely hasn’t done anything either. Well okay there was that one time she put her hand… It doesn’t matter, she was a bit upset that day (home stuff and all that). Besides, you talked to Stephanie and she figures you just over-analyzed the whole thing.

Okay. But now it’s not just JRR and her peers and your female co-workers and Stephanie. Now it’s women on the street. Some of them whistle at you. Some are rather more lewd. Usually you’re too tired or too determined and just ignore them. But if you flip them off and reject them, sometimes they get mad.

They get real mad.

And their friends get mad too.

Now listen, you bunch of shitlord smugfucks who’ve never experienced fucking anything like this, who have no comprehension of the experiences of women who are subjected to this very predominantly male behaviour, get a fuckin’ clue: they are people out there. They have to fuckin’ live a whole life in this context. You, you who felt so stung about getting called out, or vicariously felt so, or were so morally stoked by the thought of such happening that you made it up to circlejerk with your like-minded shitlord friends like a bunch of fucking leeches writhing in a pool of liquid fucking manure, fuck off. Your little sting, that was nothing – one hair pulled out from the arse of an elephant. There is no thing, no habit from women or overbearing cultural narrative and tropes, there is no thing that gives you any fucking perspective on this.

P.S. You, shitlord, do not think this means that gender-flipping situations will be a good tool for analyzing every situation. It is not.

This is actually a very common complaint from men and a prime example of how male privilege works. For us that we have never experienced anything like this in our day-to-day lives, it’s impossible to intuitively comprehend why staring/leering/creeping at random women is not flattering to them. The thought process above is exactly what is meant when one asks us to “Check our Privilege”.

/inb4biotruths

Quote of the Day: Hipster Racism

Db01 Comment

Quoth Shattersnipe:

So straight off the bat, anyone who says they refuse to get angry about rape culture because that’s what everyone else is doing – or, to use Tycho’s words, because they “don’t do compulsory” –  has, much like the hipster racist, completely sidestepped the issue of whether bad things are genuinely happening in order to try and look cool. Which, yeah, no.

On a related note, reddit is still shit (surprise, I know). I think my comments got in the negative hundreds in /r/games when I posted this article for discussion. Redditors were falling over each other trying to explain how not-offended they are. Ugh.