I think Sonic Adventure can be a frustrating game. I confess it has some issues that I have learned to work around. But I still can’t see it as anything less than a great game that gets way more hate than it deserves.

The first Sims was in fake 3D, the 2nd one was already full 3D. The fourth one is known for being a huge downgrade when compared to 3 and even 2. I haven’t played 4 a lot but people really hate it, a lot of the community stayed on 3. It doesn’t help that EA is EA, and while the whole series has always had expansion packs and extra purchaseable content, with 3 already being a bit unreasonable, The Sims 4 took it to unimaginable heights. I think buying everything will set you back like 1500 USD or more, and it was super criticized for slicing up content into multiple packs. They even have DLC for DLC, with a content pack only having content for another pack…

It’s a mess hahaha

I’ve been working on some personal and work things and there are a few moments with more free time (and anxiety) than I’m used to. So, I’m juggling 3 games right now:

• Yo-Kai Watch 2: Psychic Specters for the 3DS. I played the first one and really liked it, but when I went through the sequel I had a lot going on and really rushed through it. I ended up not liking it very much and not even doing the post game stuff, which is weird because everybody praised the post game online. Now I’m going through it with a bit more time and I’m enjoying it much more, it surpasses the first one for sure.
• Sonic Adventure 2 on Steam: I felt like revisiting this one due to all the focus on Shadow Generations now. I’m going for a 100% completion for the first time since I was a kid. I must have sucked back then, because I’m finding that getting A ranks is much easier than I remembered (and much more fun). The chao are cute but I wish I could have a “Skip” button for them to grow up, eat and sleep. I have already resorted to leaving the game on while I showered and it still wasn’t enough.
• Minecraft with the Cobblemon mod, essentially Pokémon in Minecraft: I tried Pixelmon too, and to be honest I didn’t mind the art style clash, but one of the mods I added to Cobblemon was a trainer/gym leader system, with included level caps, so there’s a sense of progression. But the enemy gyms are tough so I’m only on Misty so far and I’m seeing that my team needs a lot of work, even though I’m already at the level cap!

I also started The Sims 1, got to the top of my career and got married, was planning on continuing with the content from the expansions but haven’t picked it up in weeks. I guess I’ll go back some day, or maybe not.

Discord is an alternative to IRC, the fact that people use it as a replacement for forums is baffling

I would assume that if they want to make the world a better place, they admit that their actions have long-reaching impact, which is not really a feature of nihilism, optimistic or not

But I’m not an expert, do what you want

I would give credit, but your username being CarbonatedPastaSauce gives different expectations to any recipe with your name attached

Same here. Last time this was shared I found a single recipe kind of interesting, but not enough for me to actually memorize what it was.

Thinking back, it was probably the Mac and Cheese one, and I had already wanted to try to make it anyway (it’s not a very common dish in my country, or at least my circle)

I bet all the people who said “chess is a solved game” are feeling really silly right now

I’ve always said that the worst thing that 9 did was completely destroy any excitement for Star Wars in an instant.

Prior to 9 releasing, people didn’t like 8 and were already souring on 7, but there was still discourse, people caught up on Star Wars news, people were excited for the new content.

After 9, the excitement dropped like a brick. It was the closure of a trilogy in one of the most profitable IPs in the world. There was still more content planned to come out soon iirc (the shows, and I think there was talk of more movies), so it’s not like people stopped caring due to the lack of content. Nobody I knew was interested in discussing fan theories or analyzing the movies (except to rag on them, I suppose). It was as if millions of voices cried out in terror… And were suddenly silenced.

Sounds deep but isn’t

Title of your sex tape

Harm yourself?

Take the knife and harm the people responsible for this travesty. The laws of robotics prevent robots from harming humans: if you manage to harm them, then that means either you’re human or they’re not!

With yt-dlp? Skip them manually.

Like, my main issue with ads is all the tracking they do. If they add non-targeted ads to the video file I downloaded, whatever, I’ll just fast forward through that part of the video.

Wait, why is his name Robobrain when his brain is the only non-robotic part? Either Robobody or Biobrain/Wetbrain would be more adequate names

AI will start hiding penises in its output, everybody loves it, you ushered in a new era of peace and prosperity worldwide, all peoples united by their love for hidden AI genitalia. Well done!

Play again?

A lot of people around me tend to parrot that a lot of the safety measures are not for explosives detection, but for drug trafficking prevention. I’ve always disagreed because nobody ever presented any evidence to it, and the measures in place do come from explosive detection (unless they have metal drugs now idk). But I’ve wondered whether there is some truth to it.

I agree with you, but Xbox just took the Dreamcast’s layout, which means SEGA is the original culprit

I’ve only played the original Freeware title. I can definitely recommend this. At the time I played it, it had an incredible impact on me, opening the door to the world of indies and the freeware scene in general. I can credit it with having a direct influence on me trying game development as a hobby. It’s wild how amazing of a game and how much polish it has for a free game made in 2004 by one dude. 20 years ago!

… Also, I’ve been reading forum threads debating if this is a metroidvania since at least 2010, possibly even earlier!

I understand. I thought you had a better way of implementing the high jump with different properties, instead of just removing it altogether. To be fair, I’d remove it too and a double jump would probably be my preferred approach!

I like Mario 64’s triple jump, but I don’t think it’d be a good fit for a colectathon like this. I can’t put to words why I think it’d be different in YL, but I have a feeling that I’d get really annoyed if it asked me to use multi-jumps often to reach specific ledges. I don’t think triple jumps are ever required in Mario games, are they? I doubt YL would ever introduce a move and not flood the levels after that with obstacles that you need to use the move on to progress

Thanks for your write up! I never finished the game, it didn’t really pull me in as I expected it to. But on this topic:

My main gripe is just that they seem to have mapped controls in a retro way for nostalgia reasons and it holds the game back. Rather than triggering the moves organically through context, the left trigger is again used as a face button modifier. Jump with A, high jump with LT+A. Sonar ping with Y, Sonar explosion with LT+Y. They didn’t need to do that but at least the animations are short to trigger so it isn’t too painful.

How would you have done it? I don’t think I’m against the LT being used in this way. For instance, how would you have implemented a high jump like what they have? Or would you have removed the move entirely?

When thinking of space games with limited graphics, the first thing that comes to mind is ASCII Sector.

But the Star Control 2: The Ur-Quan Masters (or whatever it’s name is now) gets my strongest recommendation. And Starsector looks inspired by it, so I’ll have a look!

Good to officially know the Switch will have a sucessor, by Nintendo’s silence I would not have been surprised if the Switch remained Nintendo’s main console until after the heat death of the universe!