March 2017 - Tales of the Aggronaut

Archon of the Tiers

March 31, 2017 by Belghast

This morning I am flailing quite a bit when it comes down actually sitting here and composing a blog post. Its been one thing or the other… like a cat that decided she had to be held before she would relinquish the keyboard to me to actually type. Or the fact that I spilled coffee on my shirt and needed to go change it. Now that I actually sit down at the keyboard I am not entirely certain what I have to talk about. Last night was a night devoted to Tyranny because Saturday we are recording our March AggroChat Game Club game show and I wanted to be able to participate in the conversation fully. I like the idea of the Game Club, but I am a poor member. I am highly susceptible to whims, and tend to get focused in on a game… or number of games at a time. I am also super bad at forcing myself to finish some thing when I am really not that into it. This is evidenced by the fact that my night stand is filled with partially finished books discarded when the mood left me. There was a time when I was actually rather good at finishing games… in fact I spent one entire summer competing with a friend of mine trying to see how many Nintendo games we could finish. The difference there however was that I had very limited options…. and now thanks to the commodity that games have become… I have all of the options in the world to distract me from actually focusing on a game once the going gets less than enjoyable. As a result I tend to bounce back and forth between the games that excite me the most and when any one of those games slows down… I tend to stall and eventually stop playing it.

Playing games for the game club often times feels like homework, and I either avoid it entirely… or put it off until the point where I cannot reasonably finish the game before the show. There is a big reasons why I don’t really do reviews, because I never really have that drive to finish games. In fact I have the opposite drive. When I get sucked into a story and a world, there is a part of me that never wants the journey to end. So I have found myself constantly reaching points in games where I am a few hours from the end… and then I simply never make that finish push. It is like so long as I do not cross that hill then the adventure never has to end. All of that said… I didn’t want this to be the case with Tyranny because I had a really amazing first weekend playing the game… but stalled out at some point during the middle section. However over the last few weeks I have tried to put in a few hours, every few nights hoping to pull through on the other side and get to a place in the game where the pace quickened once more. Last night I seemed to hit that stride and found myself completely unable to stop playing as I circled the ending and finally finished around 11:30 last night. I was not going to sleep without completing this… or at least what I hoped and apparently guessed right was going to be the ending. All of this said… I absolutely crave a continuation. I want dlc or a sequel that lets me continue on from the point I reached in the main games arc.

I don’t really want to go into a lot of details because I am largely saving them up for the podcast, but I have to say… this was a really great game. More shockingly it goes on the pile of games that I want to play through a second or third time because along the journey you have to make so many choices. There are things that I did that I might have done differently. The game is absolutely brutal in forcing you down a path based on your actions, and not letting you wriggle out from under those actions without consequences. In many ways it reminds me of the way Undertale did this, with the exception that at least here you can reload a save file and try again. However usually by the time you reach one of these branching points… it is too late because a series of tiny decisions will ultimately make or break your choices when it comes to a larger one. The game flips so many conventions on its head, as you play through as the functional “bad guy” in the story… but one that is entirely capable of making fair and just choices in spite of this fact. In many ways there are chunks of my play through that remind me of what it was like trying to play a Light Side Sith in Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic. I did not succeed entirely but in the grand scheme I thought I was doing a good job of walking the line… until I reached the end and was forced to account for all of my past decisions. This game remembers… and winds up rubbing your nose in them… forcing you to confront the ramifications of each minor choice. All told start to finish I spent 14 hours… and could have probably easily spent another 10 hours were I not rushing towards a fixed goal. I highly suggest checking out this game if you are into classic Baldur’s Gate era PC RPGs.

Hair Elemental Gone

March 30, 2017 by Belghast

Yesterday was a bit of a mixed day for me, given that I was sick and staying home. I spent the majority of it watching Iron Fist on the sofa while attempting to do other things…. and sorta fading in and out of sleep. Throughout the course of the day I played a little Tyranny, working my way closer and closer to the end. I also worked my way through the new Final Fantasy XIV patch content, that represents the last bit of story we will see before the launch of Stormblood this summer. That said I feel like it is just too soon to really talk about the patch or any of the ramifications of it. In the evening I poked my head around in Destiny attempting to get a husk to drop for the new necrochasm exotic quest. I had zero luck and instead just completed a few bounties, when I wandered away from the game to do something else. I found out that apparently Skyforge is available not on the PS4, in its pre-launch patron pack sort of scheme like they did on the PC. Now there have been a number of times in the past where I have talked about liking this game, but feeling it would play considerably better on a console. As a result I absolutely jumped on the bandwagon last night and gave it a shot. You functionally have three options that you can go with if you feel like buying your way into what is essentially console based early access. Each of the prices listed is with the PS+ discount… because really I consider plus a cost of owning a PS4.

Early Adopter Pack – $11.99 – Access to 3 Base Classes
Rage of the Beserker – $39.99 – 3 Base + Berserker Class
Wrath of the Gods – $55.99 – 3 Base + Berserker + Gunner + Mount

I jumped in with both feet and went ahead and went for the pack that includes the Gunner class and mount, because in truth I already know I like this game. One of the things about this game that I wish others would notice… is all the damned beard options. It wasn’t just a choice of full mountain man vs stubble beard… but instead I had this complex set of styling options for facial hair that seriously put every other game to shame. The end result allowed me to create a “Belghast” I am extremely happy with… the lack of the whole eye scar thing made me go with an eyepatch instead even though it is on the wrong eye. Traditionally when given the option I give my “Bel” characters some sort of a scar around their left eye… and if given the choice I do the damaged white eye thing as well. All of that said I was able to create a character that I really like… instead of a character that wound up being the lesser of evils like is always the case with South Korean MMOs. The UI took a little getting used to because it varies slightly depending on the screen, but is generally navigated by a combination of bumpers, triggers and the d-pad. The square to show and hide hints piece is something super important that I took a bit to grasp, because the game inexplicably pops windows up over other windows… and the only way to remove them is to click the button.

Something important to note is that it has been a really long time since I have played Skyforge. I played quite a bit during July of 2015, and have poked my head in occasionally since but never for terribly long. The mouse and keyboard control scheme worked, but it always felt artificial. So as a result I have not seen the intro to this game in a very long time… and back then it felt somewhat random. They seem to have fixed some things narratively, to give you a better explanation of the world you inhabit and why your character happens to be immortal. The end result still feels extremely thin, but it at least flows better than I remember it doing in the past. Similarly I noticed that they fixed some of the problems I had with a few of the character models. Herida for example the NPC that you talk to as part of the tutorial had a weird design in the past of teal hair wearing a turquoise hood that flows down into a dress. The problem is the hair was not distinct enough of a color and it make it look like she was a lady with turquoise hair that somehow connected to her boobs. In the console version however she has blonde hair, and the hood itself has been moved back a bit so that you can clearly see the haircut below. As a result you have some contrast and it no longer looks like she is some sort of hair elemental.

As far as the gameplay itself… the game feels excellent but it has a complex enough control scheme that I am still getting used to it. It is following in the footsteps of console MMOs like FFXIV and using the face buttons for most of the attacks with bumpers and triggers acting as either modifiers or quick time event buttons for finishers and power attacks. It was a little awkward at first but after completing the first few missions it started to feel extremely solid. All in all I feel like this game is so much more suited for the console, with its pseudo lobby system and little bite sized missions. Another tweak that I noticed is that we now apparently have a pet that follows us around, and over time can be trained to do functions like automagically picking up loot Diablo 3 style. At some point I want to go through all of the tutorials for sub classes, because if I remember correctly each one of them unlocked a new outfit. I never really made much progress in the PC version of the game, so abandoning it completely for the console is not really that big of a decision for me. That said if you are happy with the PC, then in truth there probably isn’t enough new in the console release to really tempt you. I think the game just feels better in this form factor, but that is a deeply personal preference. Its not like I needed another game to be playing, but whatever the case it seems like I am going to be poking my head more into the PS4 Skyforge.

[Edit]

These are not exact comparison shots, since I failed to take a screenshot during the tutorial. However this at least shows the slight difference between the two models. Column A… weird hair elemental, Column B – someone just wearing a shawl.

Content Creator

March 29, 2017 by Belghast

This is probably not the best subject to talk about on a day when I am feeling lousy. However there is something that bugs the shit out of me, and I feel like I want to get it off my chest… or at the very least use my frustration for a blog post. I hate the term “Content Creator”. Over the last few years it has gone from something you would hear every now and then to something that is constantly used. At face value it seems like a term that places all sorts of incoming content on an even playing field. Do you write a blog? Awesome you are a “Content Creator”. Do you post amazing artwork on Deviant Art? Awesome you too are a “Content Creator”. Do you create a Podcast, upload songs to SoundCloud, stream “let’s plays”, post creative photos on Instagram, carefully curate a Reddit, or create amazing videos… then awesome by all reason you should all be “Content Creators”. The only problem is that this new unifying term… isn’t really that unifying at all. Functionally it should by definition mean anyone who produces content for others to consume. In my experience however that really is not the case.

When you see someone talking about “Content Creators” the majority of the time they exclusively mean Youtubers and Streamers. Please don’t think this is a rant against Youtube or Streaming, because while I fail miserably at doing either I greatly respect both platforms. This is a rant against the creating this theoretically inclusive term but instead applying it to a very narrow margin of items that are “content”. Functionally the frustration comes when someone says they are looking for content creators to work with a product, but in truth really meaning they want eyeballs on YouTube. For years I have struggled with the definition of “Media” as concerned with conventions and such. While I can qualify as such, it always feels wrong. I am not the news and I don’t produce content designed necessarily to inform purchase decisions or report breaking stories. I am the editorial page in the newspaper and spend my time talking about the things I want to talk about. More importantly however is the distinction that I do not do it for monetary gain. That last part often knocks me out of the traditional Media category completely. However having that special “media” pass sort of grants you an instant layer of legitimacy that cuts through some of the awkwardness that comes from introducing yourself and trying to get detailed information out of them about their product. Side note… having a business card also does this but it still ends up being wierd as you shove a crisp card with your logo on it into someone else’s hand.

Now I have gone to PAX three times and I have found ways to do this without the vaunted badge each time. However it would have made things easier, and acted as a sort of social lubricant to make the conversations flow a little more smoothly. I’ve been able to set up press appointments on my own without the benefit of the designation, so the truth is it isn’t a hard barrier. This year around however I saw that they had “Content Creator” badges for the first time, and then was instantly saddened when I saw that they were almost exclusively targeting Youtubers and Streamers with them. Maybe everyone just assumes this and I am the last one to the show. When you say “Content” to me that is a super universal term for literally anything that a user can consume. Hell if you are creating xeroxed “Zines” and handing them out to random people passing by… that is still Content to me because someone devoted time and effort and more importantly mental cycles in to creating something that they thought another human being would enjoy consuming. So all thing are largely equal to me… but it feels like some animals are more equal than others. Were it just PAX it would be no big deal… they maybe used the wrong term for the wrong thing. The problem is I have seen the same sort of stacked deck against non-video creatives in a lot of different “creator” programs in the gaming industry.

Maybe this is a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing, and maybe this is just a sign that I am old. Hell this past week I got my very first prescription for multi-focal lenses, which is sort of the gold standard of “signs that you are old”. However this is not me yelling at those damned kids to get off my lawn. In truth I just want all of the people standing on the lawn to be treated equally. While I might have preferences towards this or that sort of medium for consuming information… I am still actively consuming pretty much all of them. While I largely still think of myself as a blogger and a podcaster, that doesn’t mean I only get information from blogs or podcasts. I have a pretty steady diet of YouTube channel that I follow, and a handful of streamers that I watch “as time allows”. To branch out there are even a bunch of artists that I follow on a regular basis, and a few people that I keep tabs on just because they make really amazing craftables. In my mind each and every one of these people that I have identified… is a Content Creator. It should be this unifying term, not something that narrows the focus. I mean labels are bizarre in the first place, and there are a lot of them that I struggle with. Content Creator is just another in a long line of titles that I used to think seemed like a great idea… until I saw the way it was being used.

Dangerous Water

March 28, 2017 by Belghast

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I am pretty sure I am coming down with something because I have felt fairly lousy since the weekend. It is the sort of indiscriminate miserable that just makes doing anything a complete trudge. It also feels like I have spent more time searching for something to play than actually playing anything. Then things happen like the fact that for some reason I booted up Bioshock Remastered? I got the game free for owning all of the other Bioshock content, and I installed it some time ago thinking it might be nice to play back through this game. Then the election happened… and the character of Andrew Ryan felt a little too on the nose for me personally. So as a result it has sat unloved as a desktop icon… waiting on someone to give it the time of day and click on it. For whatever reason last night I did just that… and apparently the game defaults to running at 4k. Did you know that 4k PNG screenshots are almost 15 mb a piece? I didn’t but now do… I have lots of them that I will ultimately need to drop down if I ever hope to use them. Something else that I did not know is that if you have a USB Controller connected to your system… the game doesn’t seem to be willing to give you a mouse and keyboard option. So as a result I played through on the Xbox 360 controller I leave hooked up to my gaming machine. I didn’t get super far before the whim changed, but enough to remember how much I really love this game. I do find it extremely odd that you can’t really sight any of the weapons though…. that is not something I remembered but I guess it makes sense given that your alternate fire is whatever plasmid you happen to have equipped. Personally I still think the game looks gorgeous, and artistically it has some of the most memorable visual sequences and staging.

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When I bounced I ultimately did so in the direction of Mass Effect Andromeda, and opted to finish up Hvarl. The weird part about this is that I thought I had not actually really scratched the surface of this planet. However it seems like in the grand scheme of things is is maybe half the length of Voeld. The weird part about this is it seems like the last thing that I waited to do was actually go vault hunting. I am not exactly sure if you can do this early however since the actual access to the vault and the second half of the map only work if you happen to be on specific quests. So far this seems like the most “on rails” planet given that things need to happen in a specific sequence to end up leading to the end of it. The planet itself reminds me an awful lot of Dromund Kaas from SWTOR, with a much more wild jungle area. In the grand scheme I did not like this planet nearly as much as I did Voeld… and also it doesn’t feel nearly as satisfying to move on past it either. I think the biggest part of this for me is the complete and total lack of Nomad action, which makes sense given how dense the foliage is. That said I did not really realize how much of my enjoyment planet side is related to driving my Nomad around until I hit this planet. We talked about it on twitter yesterday… but want to buy a Nomad racing DLC for this game.

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Towards the end of the night I moved forward in the story and started the world of Kadara, which happens to be populated by a bunch of the Exiles off the Nexus. Functionally you can think of it as Omega by any other name… except instead of a slew of interesting Aliens… you have a bunch of asshole humans instead. After Desert World, Ice World and Night World… I was happy to move on to something that looked relatively normal. You know other than the whole acid water thing going on… and toxic regions that damage your suit similar to the last few worlds we have been on. Something tells me that I am ultimately going to work on terraforming the shit out of this world first thing so that I can enjoy the ride more freely. I’ve barely just scratched the surface but I gotta say… fighting Nexus outlaws is way more enjoyable than any of the enemy types I have encountered to date in this game. I mean I love the Remnant and it is always fun to kill Kett, but the outlaws here feel much more varied. Especially when you factor in that apparently there is a turf war going on, and the two factions are gunning for each other as well as you. I am sort of longing for a “kill everyone and settle the planet” option but I am not likely going to see that.