fistfuls of honey

why’s it gotta be that way? :(

Anonymous asked: what is your opinion on kingdoms of amalur?

Based on the demo, I thought it was fun, but nothing groundbreaking. A few months back I was SUPER SUPER ANTICIPATING IT, but I feel like for me Skyrim actually stole a lot of its shine. What I was most interested in was their dynamic class system and I do think the controls for the action part of the game are pretty nice with how easy it is to switch between different kinds of weapons and attacks on the fly. But, unfortunately, they talked up the idea of not being LOCKED IN and being able to LEVEL AS WHATEVER YOU WANT and not having to CHOOSE AT THE OUTSET or whatever, but didn’t really deliver.

They’re still doing the traditional Rogue/Warrior/Mage triad AND more than that you DO actually have to choose once you unlock destinies. And from that point on they just offer the different combinations of Rogue/Warrior/Mage aka hybrid classes. Which. Eh.

Whereas, Skyrim’s set of individual skills (though still perfunctorily classified as Rogue/Warrior/Mage-related) and the leveling system where you level up FROM increasing your skills, allows you to play through that game legitimately with any skillset you want. Even ones focusing primarily on non-combat skills.

So, while Amalur is quite enjoyable and I’ll probably pick it up sooner or later once it releases, it didn’t at all live up to the hopes I had for it. Ultimately, it’s a pretty stock action game pasted onto an MMO world.

Today seems like a good day to start my Skyrim Let’s Play!!!1

5) Sloppy mechanics/design. There are multiple (multiple!!) gameplay innovations/choices that I love in DA2: the conversation system! the friend/rival system! the fact that you can romance any of the options regardless of gender! the existence of characters you can hit on but who will not return your feelings! the fact that your frigging family members are actually generated to look like you! But that gear situation where since I’m a specific class I can only equip certain gear and I can’t actually equip any of my party members so I am just constantly overloaded with stuff the game has coughed up that I literally would not be able to use under any circumstances is just LAZY. Similarly, the endless waves of magically appearing enemies instead of properly scaling difficulty: LAZY. And do I even need to mention the nine billion repeats of the same half a dozen areas? LAZYYYY.

4) I’m not that interested in gnawing on the whole total paucity of choice bone again but the lack of even the ILLUSION of meaningful choice in most instances was just annoying. How many times did I stand there while someone killed an innocent person right in front of me? Then there’s the fact that every single element of the main plot is completely unchanged no matter what you do even though there were numerous instances where, given a meaningful choice, you could actually have done something to affect the outcome, even if it was just going to be for an epilogue card! If you just want to tell me a static story, then fine. Tell me it! (Frankly, on a fundamental technical level I don’t think you’re that good at it, but go for it anyway!) But don’t present or market it to me as something I have any kind of control over.

3) Poorly paced and super segmented narrative. Most of each act has shit all to do with the previous acts. I understand the whole tenuous thread thing and know that they tried to fix it with the (clumsy) framing device and they’re going for a whole little things becoming big things sitch, but it’s all mostly just disjointed, which goes for the character/relationship arcs as well. Which is sad because they could have salvaged the game for me if they were better. (Fenris! We banged! And you left! And then… we apparently didn’t talk about it for three years???? Yet you get all pissy when Zevran propositions me THREE YEARS LATER? Oh. I see.) Unfortunately, due to the way the relationships were structured to fit into the framing device, I felt like I didn’t really get to know most of the characters very well at all. And if I don’t know them, I don’t really care about them.

2) I am so fucking over the insertion of supernatural beings as stand-ins for oppressed minorities. I am not a werewolf or a vampire or a fucking mage, okay. Frankly, such analogies are usually just a way for people to pretend that they’re being socially conscious while still not being forced to tell stories about anyone but conventionally attractive white people, and I’m sick (and bored) to death of it.

1) It’s ableist as fuck. At least five major storylines I can remember off of the top of my head boil down to LOOK AT ALL THE EVIL THIS ~CRAZY~ PERSON HAS DONE! Cuz they’re ~*~*~crazy~*~*~!!1 And that’s not counting the entire mage storyline in and of itself presented as them just hulking out/losing it and literally becoming demons. I straight up find the level of ableism in the game sickening.

In conclusion, all of this mixed together in a giant knot of umbrage and disappointment in my gut that caused me to play Dragon Age 2 through, beginning to end, exactly once and then go, “Okay, I’m done now.” and never touch it again.

i just ascended the 7000 steps up a fucking mountain

with bears and trolls and ice wraiths trying to kill my poor horse the whole time

to get to ~the throat of the world~

and then when i tried to take a screencap

i made a mistake and hit the “quick load” button

and so it automatically loaded my last save

which was at

the base of the mountain

the-fox-bandit asked: Do you have Sims 3? I've been playing Sims 2 again lately. I started from scratch, so I was thinking that maybe I should just get Sims 3 or Sims Medieval. Do you think it's worth it?

I do! I have like two different legacies that I’ve been neglecting too.

I enjoy Sims 3 quite a lot, though it differs in gameplay mechanics from Sims 2 in such a way that it doesn’t feel like a replacement so much as a alternate.

I haven’t been that impressed by/interested in what I’ve seen of Sims Medieval though. But that’s in terms of it being a Sims game as opposed to an entity unto itself. I like the relatively freeform nature of the Sims so I’ve never been into those more goal focused versions or consoles ports and things like that.

gatheringbones replied to your post: so last week i decided to finally install dragon…

Yeah. …… Yeeaaaaaaah. I’d actually like to hear your thoughts on it- but really, what an…. experience.

anangelstears replied to your post: so last week i decided to finally install dragon…

I am also curious about your thoughts. Because, uh. Yeah. That.

SO UH haha since this is a hot topic: I don’t know if I found it disappointing, per se, given that I waited long enough to play it to have already heard and been aware of the majority of the complaints, though I DO NOT DISAGREE WITH THEM. It was obviously rushed out and the sheer repetition of assets throughout was almost insulting tbh.

I think what bothered me the most, personally, was that using a limited setting and a relatively HUGE span of time, they could have done pretty amazing things with how your choices shaped the world, but instead they… actually pulled back significantly since it was pretty obvious that in terms of the main plot not a damn thing you did mattered. And clearly they were trying to use the framing device to justify that but… eh. (Not to mention that throughout the billion sidequests WHICH… MADE UP A HUGE CHUNK OF THE GAME?! I lost count of the number of times that you’re made to just stand there and do nothing for no apparent reason while innocent people are killed or what have you.)

I also disliked them limiting customization since it just meant that I spent the entire game constantly picking up armor that I COULDN’T USE AND COULDN’T GIVE TO MY PARTY EITHER SO WHAT WAS THE POINT.

I mean I didn’t HATE the game. I especially enjoyed the new dialogue system where you could actually decide the TONE of what you were saying and having all flirtation options clearly marked. Though, I think the relationships are yet another place where, like the main plot, the context and length of time the game covered gave them the opportunity to do really exciting things that they just didn’t bother to do at all.

Overall, I actually felt like… I mean Origins only took place over the course of two years (now retconned to one year) and DA2 took place over ten years, but DA2 felt like it took place over less time than Origins because they basically just told you THEN SOME YEARS PASSED except nothing ever really changed in any meaningful way. Same town running the same boring errands for the same people waiting for something to happen and then it kind of sort of does and ehhhhh.

UH ANYWAY

I do not think it was a very good game! I don’t necessarily regret the time I spent playing it, but I wouldn’t play it again.

I HOPE THIS ANSWERS YOUR QUESTIONS. IF YOU HAVE MORE, MY ASK IS THERE FOR YOU.

sour-idealist asked: Sorry to bother you, but I noticed that you said you had Final Fantasy XIII, and I kind of personally love it to pieces - mostly due to the ladies - and I was wondering if a) you'd played it significantly, and b) if you had any particular opinions? I'd be interested in knowing what you think of it.

You’re not bothering me!

I haven’t actually ever played it THAT significantly. I think at this point I’ve only done like two or three hours?

I didn’t hate what I played! I liked the combat system a lot.

Haha sorry sometimes I start games and then just… WANDER OFF FOR A REALLY LONG TIME.

NO ONE CARES BUT…

BIOWARE IS EXPANDING SAME SEX ROMANCE OPTIONS FOR THE UPCOMING MASS EFFECT 3 

WHICH IF YOU DON’T KNOW, UP TO THIS POINT, THROUGH TWO GAMES AND NINE ROMANCE OPTIONS, ONLY ONE (1) WAS QUEER

and it was with a “monogendered” alien race who all just happen to look like hot, thin human women which they tried to use to say that it wasn’t REALLY ~gay~ that your female character banged this hot, thin human-except-for-being-blue woman when people asked why there were no m/m options as well, which was horrible but somehow still slightly less so than when they basically just went BCS THEY’RE SPACE MARINES AND SPACE MARINES 200 HUNDRED YEARS IN THE FUTURE TOTES CAN’T BE QUEER BCS WHO EVER HEARD OF QUEER PEOPLE IN A MILITARY SETTING

but anyway

guys i am just… SO. HAPPY. ;____;

I never play dudes in RPGs ever because there are already enough stories about dudes in the world so if I’m shaping the narrative about the badass hero who is the most important person in the world you can fucking BET that it will be a lady every time and also in terms of Mass Effect specifically I REALLY REALLY REALLY hate the voice acting on the dude player character

and so

FULL DISCLOSURE:

Throughout the entirety of the Mass Effect series WHICH I LOVE DEARLY

the number of dudes i have legitimately seriously wanted to romance for a reason other than i am a completionist is…

ONE (1)

the number of ladies i have legitimately seriously wanted to romance for a reason other than i am a completionist is…

ALL OF THEM

EXCEPT… the ONE (1) that i could

because that was my life

BUT NOOOOW <3___<3

i am just really excited about this okay

DID I MENTION THAT ONE OF THESE LADIES I WAS PREVIOUSLY CRUELLY DENIED BEING ABLE TO BE IN LESBIANS WITH WAS BOTH VOICED AND MODELED AFTER YVONNE STRAHOVSKI

YVONNE STRAHOVSKI

with her real accent

okay i’ll show myself out