Withywarlock

I bought both of those, the World of Warcraft and Hearthstone cookbooks as gifts for my late stepmum (being a chef most of her life), and she'd adored them. I think she only ended up cooking one of the things for them, and I don't remember which, but they were nice for her to read all the same. Being a curmudgeon I'd reviewed these favourably as "Skyrim" and "Fallout 4" cookbooks, as they had few to no recipes from other games of their respective series, and even Hearthstone's was only loosely inspired by things within Warcraft setting, and don't get me started on the Overwatch one. The WoW cookbook is phenominal, and it was seemingly good (or profitable) enough to release a second one. How they'll do the upcoming Dungeons & Dragons one, I cannot say.

Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition is the worst offender of this I've ever seen. The instructions exist, but not in the game. You have to use the PDF that came with the games, but who remembers how to do that on Steam? Who has ever needed to find an instruction manual for a remaster? And these the kind of game where you need the book, or someone to explain it, because ThAC0 and the other rules are complicated as all the Nine Hells. It was one thing to expect players to know how it worked because it was based on Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition, which was the latest edition at the time and only D&D players would be playing this sort of game. But when these are some of the highest regarded RPGs of all time, a remaster's the perfect time to add the instructions in. They had time to retexture the coffee-bean JPG cobblestones into something more believable, I imagine they had the time to give a brief tutorial on why your stats going into minus figures is a good thing.

I'm not sure how it can be done without being just another apocalypse-based TV show, as I had said previously about The Last of Us being adapted in such a way? I'll end by saying that much because I'll piss and moan about the grimy ol' days of Fallout 1 & 2.

I'd mostly be trying to recall and theorise from my own perspective as an autistic person, and there's a lot of speculations within my social circles that mute characters might be non-verbal autistic, especially in those where the game makes a point of saying the character doesn't speak much (i.e Half-Life's Gordon Freeman). I think even Yahtzee Croshaw has joked about the character being autistic because of his... perculiar actions during the game. However, when it comes to mental disability I can only recall one character who doesn't suffer the generic bad guy madness that afflicts most Warcraft villains, and that's Senua, of Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. I'm told her depiction of psychosis and episodes of that nature are painfully accurate. The only physically disabled characters that come to mind are those without an arm. Adam Jensen of Deus Ex (whether augmentation is a disability or not is a conversation I'm not qualified to partake in), Billie Lurk of Dishonored, Khârn the Betrayer was missing an arm from Warhammer 40,000: Dark Nexus Arena (there's no lore explanation I've seen for this), and Sekiro of his namesake game.

I've tried not to call myself a "gamer" for years in an attempt to differentiate from the "Capital G gamers", preferring games enthusiast. Because on the one hand everyone's an [x]er just by doing [x] activity, but then on the other hand, what's to 'seperate' one gamer from another? I suppose I do still care about the identity enough to gatekeep by saying "you're not an enthusiast because you don't do [x], [y] and [z]" but they can still be a gamer. Truer words will not be spoken when I say "I just don't know anymore." 🤣

I've no strong feelings about it either way, but I do like how the developers of Disco Elysium have your companion mention how often you sprint around (at least two times in my playthrough), as a form of breaking-the-fourth-wall. It was a nice remark, the opposite of old Away dialogue when companions would comment on you not getting a move on!

When I'm in a racing game, depending on how into it I am, I tend to lean left and right whilst steering. When jumping in a platform game, I tend to sit upright or lean forward. Whilst agonising over a real-time with pause (RTwP) game, I tend to hunch forward to inspect every single facet of my characters to see what can be tweaked to wrench the odds into my favour. Science* shows that doing this actually improves in-game performance**. *Not actually science. **Does not actually improve in-game performance.

Play enough of the old Infinity Engine games, and followers teleporting isn't at all immersion breaking. What is immersion breaking is being told "you must gather your party before venturing forth," and having to wait for them because you've got Boots of Speed or something on, zipping through the map while everyone else saunters (and depending on their race, this can be anywhere between 30-25ft. per round). I can appreciate how followers teleporting can be annoying when they just pop into view, but the best way I've seen it done is to have that happen off camera. I suppose in games where it doesn't happen either can't be helped, or it isn't viewed as that big a priority to 'fix'. "You cannot rest while your party is scattered" is another joyous moment, too.

Noah Antweiler of The Spoony Experiment had made a point of this in his Ultima 9 review, as part of a full-series analytical retrospective. The breaking point for him was "What's a Paladin?" which became a recurring joke in his later works, including his tabletop roleplaying game tale series Counter Monkey. The gist is that the Avatar of the Eight Virtues, the main character of all Ultima games, asks "what's a Paladin," when he should know full well what one is given his history with paladins. This was all the more heartbreaking for Spoony due to his emotional attachment to Ultima, having learned to read and enjoy doing so thanks to this series. For context, this is the same as Geralt of Rivia asking what is a Witcher (in the third game, no less). While the question exists to help newer players getting into the game, the wording makes it rather off-putting. This is true for me also. Pillars of Eternity is rife with this sort of nonsense, even with the helpful tooltips for each of their words, often derived from old Cornish and Danish language, I'll still forget a lot of it. Not helping matters is that this information is just dumped on the player, and because there's so many paragraphs to the tooltips it's sometimes hard to determine what's important to know and what isn't. I only managed to grasp the vaguest idea of what the game was about by the end of the second act.

Interestingly enough it contains, quote from Engadget, "....new features, including a fishing mechanic, as well as 500 pieces of Creation Club content, quests, dungeon, bosses, weapons and spells unique to the version." I doubt it's worth £50 up front, but it'll be interesting to see if it sees a sale. Given Bethesda and parent Zenimax are owned by Microsoft, it might well not budge in price to encourage people to instead play it on Game Pass. As someone who isn't confident modding, this is a welcome addition to the game, but not for that price. I'll wait to see how much the upgrade from the remastered version is to Anniversary. If you build it, they will come. - Field of Dreams, 1989.

It would've been a completely different game, but a better game all the same, We Happy Few does nothing with its open world except show how procedural generation is a cracked masque when in the hands of an inexperienced or time-short developer. The DLC prove that sometimes less is more, with their tighter narratives that focus on characters that I prefer far more to the three main antagonists of the base game. Dragon Age: Inquisition is another game that doesn't really do much with its open world either, other than gather engagement metrics with the time you spend fannying about going from one dull activity for a great enough reward to justify its existence to another dull activity for a great enough reward to justify its existence. It really shines a light on how Dragon Age wasn't planned to go past Origins, because every story that need be told was told and wrapped up in a neat little bow. I'm not much of a God of War fan to begin with, but I would've enjoyed (the latest, if that's what you're referring to) GoW if it scrapped its quasi-open-world-ness. Granted, that's just one of the many, many issues I took with the game, but it would've been a start. I can imagine similar things with TLoU Part 2, though I have to say I disagree about Dark Souls, I think those games are better served as open world.

You might have luck with MyAbandonware, which contains games that are no longer supported by developers and publishers, but the usual caveat applies of "just because I've had no problems there doesn't mean it's 100% safe and/or legal."

It's an ability that's used by the Tank role, specifically for player versus environment (PvE) content, rather than player versus player modes. Otherwise yeah, in PvP it would require quite a few DPS players going above the stagger threshold (as it doesn't reduce all incoming damage, only a certain amount), and it has a cooldown and cost as well I think. That's why, in response to @Reality vs Adventure, this ability is controversial. Many players believe the amount is not enough, or the cooldown is too long, or the cost is too great. I haven't followed Brewmaster Monk closely enough to say.

I'm currently part of two Discord servers I use frequently: one for my Final Fantasy XIV free company which was necessary to join, and my D&D newbies programme. I wasn't really a fan of Discord and how it worked until I joined the latter, and I'm not entirely sure how it became so intuitive. It must've been some sort of ghostly possession, that's the only plausible explanation I've got for it.

I've just about given up trying to hold out on Early Access, and many practices I've rallied against in the past. I've got my eyes on Baldur's Gate III, and while my opinions on Larian Studios aren't as overwhelmingly positive as others', I've got a D&D video game itch to scratch and that would do it nicely. The same with Mount & Blade: Bannerlord. If it sucks, I'm too pooped to care at this stage. This isn't to say I'll buy early access games willy-nilly, it's just that I'm far more likely to buy it for what it is than what it will be.

The idea of staggering damage is delaying the full amount over time. Say you take 1000 points of damage; staggering would spread it over the course of five seconds, ergo you'd take 200 damage per second. It's quite controverisal within the WoW community, but it gives your healers measurable time to keep you alive.

Mine would probably be Bard, and not the kind everyone wants in their MMO that does vIaBlE damage and buffing. I mean the kind that only writes uplifting verse and likes to be well-read upon lore of a subject. Playing bass guitar (however badly) also helps with the class image. I am essentially a walking version of the Bless spell. Go me. In D&D 5th Edition there is such a subclass for the Monk named 'the Way of the Drunken Master', which obviously comes from its inspiration back in 2nd Edition, the film of the same name. There's also Brewmaster Monks in Warcraft. That style is one of my favourites, but alas, I don't drink myself (though I do stumble because I've got two left feet.)

It's hard to say. Nobody would consider themselves evil unless they were unhinged, had cripplingly low self esteem, or were just being ironic about it so that's one third of the alignment chart removed. People tend not to do things in the name of balance and neutrality, so True Neutral is out. I'm not confident enough to believe I have adventurous enough a lifestyle to think I deserve to be called Lawful or Chaotic Good, so like most commonfolk in settings where alignment is used mine would probably be Neutral Good. Perhaps when being totally pragmatic about things, such as the mindset of my corner of the autism spectrum, maybe Chaotic Neutral. If I had my games review head on, probably Lawful Neutral. But then having to choose from these three alignments goes to show how 'exotic' I'd like my alignment to be. Neutral Good, and that's my Final Answer, Chris.

I'd looked on the Steam store page to see where the gameplay is, and apparently it's turn-based tactics with cards or something to that extent? Much as I like tactical games, that's a turn-off when combined with this amazing style. I was expecting a platformer of some sort, but I can appreciate why they would've gone with cards and board games given the aesthetic. I'm not sure I'll be playing this until a deep discount and seeing some consistent reviews.

I rather like the look of this and wish it the best. I'm just not sure where the video game in all of this is. I'd much rather it be a movie based on what I've seen, and they clearly appear talented enough to pull something off like that.

Only recently have I decided to subscribe to Discord Nitro to 'boost' the servers I'm on, but I suspect I'll cancel it after a month because I don't find it particularly useful. I am however finding use in D&D Beyond's subscription which lets me share my books among my fellow players and the dungeon master (DM), so they don't have to worry about buying stuff. This is particularly useful when the server we're all from was aimed entirely at people who were brand new to the game so they want to make it as cheap as possible. And as much as I hate to say it, I think I'm starting to prefer digital to print when it comes to my D&D stuff. 😣

That's fair. I imagine that would apply more to the Mages Guilds than the Arcane University, where the politicking seems to be far more prominent. But then maybe that's what led to their downfall: Archmage Traven's choice to chuck out the necromancers caused the cracks to appear, and maybe the Arcane University since went on to become about might being right, which left them vulnerable to the Thalmor's infiltration. Or maybe you're right, that by using the sword rather than the pen they might've dealt with the Thalmor. There's 200 years of speculation there, so we might both be right!

I remember renting the game several times because I was stuck on the monster truck boss early in the game. The nice lady at Blockbuster was kind enough to tell me how to beat it only after I was returning it! But I had a good time with it, not so much when trying to replay it. Its main selling point was it was a heist game before Payday 2 came along and did it properly, which was a fairly big deal at the time.

Spoilers for The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. While I agree that being removed from a guild for breaking rules is realistic, the requirements to re-enter are a mixed bag. I can't imagine being welcomed back into a Guild after murdering a guildmate in cold blood, which is apparently forgiven if you hand in 20 bear pelts or minotaur horns for the Fighters Guild, or 20 Daedra Hearts and Vampire Dust for the Mages' Guild. Not only are those requirements insane for someone who would need a guild for the training to slay the creatures necessary to harvest those parts, but one of them is going to be in scarce supply if the Oblivion crisis comes to a complete halt. The Thieves Guild has somewhat understandable rules given it's a rather dishonourable craft, which just requires you to pay a debt in gold (or items equalling the gold value of the debt) to get back in, though according to the above link there are some questionable gameplay mechanics surrounding expulsion. And finally, The Dark Brotherhood fittingly has an "eye for an eye" style of requirement to rejoin, demanding you slay 'the Wrath of Sithis' prior to the Purification questline. As per two of the three guilds mentioned before, it's two strikes and you're out.... and you have to slay the Wrath of Sithis again with 700HP. At least the Dark Brotherhood has a questline that makes a point of breaking the tenets, or rather, being immune to them. So if you've any pent up frustrations about being kicked out of a guild, take them out during the Purification. Interestingly, the Guildmaster of the Fighters Guild and Archmage of the Arcane University can't lose their positions. I would've liked to have seen a questline wherein those who reach such positions can end up losing them in a trial by combat for the former, or a series of votes via the latter. Of course, those who desperately want the position can resort to dirty tricks, but the option to step down could also be a nice bit of roleplay for those who don't want to be the Master of All Trades the Champion of Cyrodiil ends up becoming. I'll end by saying this: I also like that if you're inactive during your initiation, you can lose your membership and have to re-apply to become a member of the Mages and Fighters Guild. The only way you know this as far as I recall is by looking at your factions screen and no longer seeing your rank there. I do like, however much it aggrevated me at the time, that the Thieves' Guild gives you a time-sensitive initiation that can be cheated by pickpocketing one of the other thieves on their way back from the race! OK, one final note: I've not played around with the guilds much in The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, but from what I understand they were a lot more hardline about the relationships with guilds and punishment. IIRC one could not be in both the Fighters and Thieves Guild because they had quests against each other, and the Houses were at odds with one another. I'm not sure how the Morag Tong - state sanctioned assassins - did crime and punishment, but I imagine they had a one strike system, and the strike would've been planned barbarism.

I thought this was a decent video. I would've liked more citations for claims in regards to how necromancy works, as well as maybe dispelling some of the myths surrounding the school of conjuration versus necromancy, but it did an OK job of explaining these things and giving the lore a respectable enough look to have some nice discussion about it. I think I could easily sit with this person and talk to them about the game, though if things got heated I'd personally want to have a laptop between us so we can show each other our sources.