What my buddy thinks of no man's sky

Thanks Patrick!

I may not have a dog in this fight yet and I won't until it costs at least half as much as it does now, but my friend got his hands on it and he's luvin' it. He regaled me with a tale of how he spent 45 minutes trying to escape from a hole in a mountain made entirely of gold. I'm not sold yet, but a couple more stories like that and I might ponder it. But over a year ago I wasn't convinced there would actually be anything to do in NMS. It's sad to see a butt-ton of critics and commenters concede that exact sentiment.

One of those days.

Somedays I get home from work and I'll try to bake something interesting. A ziti or this awesome teriyaki shepherd's pie that one time. Nothing truly "Awful" happened today but man... I'm done. I have a small tub of microwavable mashed potatoes and I have a simple 3 step plan for it. I'm gonna drown it in sriracha, tie my hands behind my back and just embarrass myself. Good day to you all!

The Jimquisition is down... becasue he didn't like No Man's Sky

Allegedly his review of No man's Sky is posted. But you can't see it. The promise of NMS, the idea that procedural generation has finally cracked "infinite" content has turned mere fandom into a cottage religion. When the release date was pushed back, the devs got death threats. When Jim gave a heavy sigh and said this wasn't his bag... they gave his site a dos attack. Classy as usual, gentleman.

Here's an idea: The Idea Channel is my favorite thing PBS has ever made

I love me some pop philosophy. Seeing as the scant few "academic" philosophers I've meet were thick and elitist creeps (though I'm sure most of you are quite lovely) I've always wanted some of their better ideas to break into the main stream.

I'm still shocked learning about logical fallacies isn't part of the core curriculum. Just think how much harder politicians would have to work if every voter knew what an ad hominem attack was! Mike Rugnetta is the perfect host for what could easily devolve into navel gazing tripe no one cares to finish listening to. He's affable, seriously funny, and knows exactly where he's going to loose the audience so he can turn to the camera and tell everyone to bear with the material. Because it'll be worth it!

Making philosophy accessible is a thankless job and I salute his years of service!

History for the Hardcore

I think I talked about Hardcore Game of Thrones a while back. It was cute seeing a guy managing to have an interesting lecture about all the stuff that happened outside the books. But he was mocking Dan Carlin's Hardcore History and since I'm deep in Inquisition (and I need a good  podcast to make it through that game's grindier aspects) I thought I'd give his series on the lead up to the Cold War a shot. It was 4 hours long and it. Was. Awesome.

It's a bird's eye view of America's transition into foreign affairs and the fall of the Russian Czars. If you think you know everything about either of those events Carlin's editorial voice compares and contrasts them both in ways that are worth your time.

Huh... Inquisition's dlc ain't half bad.

Bioware's DLC has always been up and down. Sometimes you get something as amazing as Shadow Broker or a place holding shrug like Arrival. It doesn't help that they never EVER drop in price and while I'm in rant mode, keeping ME2 dlc at where it launched at is ludicrous. I wouldn't buy the entire game at the price they're selling that stuff for.

But that being said, I've finally got around to playing Descent. I still don't know why I dropped $15 on this thing and didn't play it for 5 months (past-me is getting a stern talking to) because it really isn't worth more than $8. But now that I have it... it's a huge awesome dungeon! The kind I wish they had leading up to, oh I don't know, the finale? I'm sorry, but if the only thing beyond your game's point of no return is a single unremarkable boss fight you f**ked up. Rushed finales are a huge pet peeve of mine.

After the week I've had; a huge awesome dungeon that forces you to change up your tactics and makes you sweat running out of potions makes me happy. The Jaws of Hawken is up next. Let's see if I like it enough to buy Tresspaser and complete the set. Of course that would require me to care about Solus and his limp end credits betrayal. Sometimes having a character do one or two interesting things isn't enough to make up for how boring (and yet somehow irritating) they were before.

I liked Anders more than you. Anders.

You're goddamned right, America.

The dignified end of the party of Lincoln

I've never tried to get this political on the crackpot before but I feel as if I've been carrying a weight on my shoulders for the past year. Not so much about Trump as what he represented. Was he the sign of a party's death throes as it cast out all it's moderates? Or was this the start of a neo-white power movement with a real shot at an entire branch of government? If recent polls and Nate Silver are to be believed (and aside from Trump in general his track record is as close to prophecy as we'll ever get) if the election were held today Hillary has a 92% chance of winning.

I've been listening to so much gospel today, guys.

Let that wash over you. I honestly didn't think this many republicans could get over themselves to do the right thing. I thought this election would see 40% voting for a man who would give away all responsibility of the office and just sit on the oval throne. Occasionally venturing out to go boar hunting. I never seriously thought Hillary could hit these numbers. This time 4 years ago Obama and Romney were practically tied and even then the polls skewed too conservative. Also keep in mind there hasn't been a single debate yet!

The price of liberty is constant vigilance so y'all better not get too comfortable. If you don't want Trump you have to vote for Hillary. Simple as that. I don't care what you think about her, you can't say she's even remotely similar to him in terms of pure competence. It's sad it's come to this but here we are. Even still... I haven't been this proud of my country in years.