I actually tried this. I played a 30 hour run, just mainlining the story and the quests I actually enjoyed. What I found was that, stripped of all the illusion of grandeur the game presents and all the distractions that make it feel big, long, and epic - the story is actually pretty dull and uninteresting. Corypheus…

It’s an unpopular opinion, but I think DA2 was the best of the series by a mile. It miiiight even be better than any single entry in the Mass Effect series, but that’s not something I’m committing to without thinking on it a lot more. In any case, DA2 did everything I love in a Bioware game: deep story that gives me a…

I’d have been far happier to play a 20-hour DAI that was pure story and plot quests, even if it was more on rails and had zero open world, than to have spent over 100 hours on thing after thing that ultimately felt like wastes of my time.

I’m with you. I always say Inquisition is a game that’s a mile wide and an inch deep.

The war table was a great idea for all the reasons you mention - giving a wider sense of the world, the conflict, and the role of the Inquisitor & Inquisition.

Has anybody said His and Her Circumstances? Because His and Her Circumstances. It’s the sweetest, most honest romance anime I’ve ever seen, and one of the few that didn’t make me want to rage-quit within 3 episodes from trope-fury.

I think an all-Bard game could be an absolute blast and a half. Especially if run by a GM who liked the idea and tailored adventures to suit the characters. Like, maybe save the “Magic-immune Orc” for a later session when the players get on a roll, rather than right out of the gate when they don’t have much backup…

I also wouldn’t mind longer games if the journey felt worth the effort. Most times, the only reward at the end of these filler sidequests is some minor piece of gear. Usually a reskin, usually not something that makes the rest of the game more fun. Like you said - grind to get stuff so you can grind to get more stuff.…

gathering shit to craft shit in order to gather more shit

I am also in a situation where I’ve only got an hour to game on any given night, though it isn’t child-related. Two at the most. I actually have the complete opposite feeling about open-world games. The fact that I can only get a few map points checked off before I have to quit and get some sleep leaves me feeling…

Radiohead is an excellent example, and one of the best of all-time, no question - but U2 started over a decade earlier than they did, and I’d say the U2 live experience is still stronger than Radiohead’s.

They’re still magical, and I’ll go rounds on that to the death. They don’t have the bite they did in their youth, sure - few do in their 50's - but show me another band who, four decades into their career, are still taking chances with their music, producing albums with meaningful entries in their libraries of songs,…

This is the live version from Under a Blood Red Sky, not the album version from War. I actually like this version a lot more - this is one of those songs that really took on a new dimension in live performance, and BRS is an album where almost every song is stronger as part of the performance than it was in the studio.

For a while now, I’ve wanted a crying baby gif to keep on-hand for whenever one of these whining knuckleheads shows up. I think yours is better. Thank you.

I was wondering if every show they did was just going to feature them playing their Always Sunny characters in slightly different settings. I love Kaitlin Olsen, but The Mick is unwatchable to me. Seeing the commercials for this one, it looked like School of Rock but with Dennis Reynolds instead of Jack Black, and…

YES Luke. God bless you. Atlantis was the top of what I think of as Disney’s Second Renaissance - Emperor’s New Groove, Lilo and Stitch, even the deeply flawed but almost great Treasure Planet. So few people have seen these movies, but they’re absolute gems.

Yeah, you’re almost better off with them not touching it than using their usual less-than-kind touch. I went in expecting to see the two leads in one of anime’s typical heavily-implied romantic relationships, but walked away not feeling like there was any implication of love, and little of genuine friendship. Akira…

Thanks for a thoughtful response! I must admit I have seen very little of Von Trier’s work, mostly because I’m not a big fan of hopelessness as an aesthetic. That being said, I do believe that nihilism can be used as the basis for great art. But one of the most important things in creating a story that delivers a…

Naruto’s tech level was never what you’d call consistent. It always had the feel of feudal Japan, but at the same time would occasionally throw in modern photography/cameras, movies/movie theaters, computers, advanced crime labs & forensic science, radios, and other stuff.