I don't have any advice for you since I've never played Planescape:Torment, but I do want to sympathize with you about that awful "backseat driver" behavior - it is just the worst! My wife has an anxiety disorder and gets flustered very easily when she's driving so I've worked very hard to not behave that way, but…

To each his own. I found it bland and derivative, but honestly I was probably never in the target demographic anyway since I wasn't a big fan of God of War either. We all have personal tastes that don't necessarily match up with the majority - for instance, I absolutely couldn't stand Red Dead: Redemption, and I…

My tolerance for spectators, or for being a spectator myself, usually depends on who the other people are and what game is involved; watching my family play Wii Sports or one of the dancing games is almost always fun, but of course I get self-concious when I'm up there myself. When I'm playing with my gaming buddy we…

Still, I'm sure it's not completely unregulated. The computer must have some sort of auditing enabled that would show how much time you've spent in the holodeck and how much energy you've requested through the replicator. Counselor Troi probably had notifications set up to alert her when certain crewmembers hit a…

Better, even!

Of course, the other magical 24th century technology! Still, on a military vessel like the Enterprise you'd probably have a quota on the amount of matter you could request from the replicators on a daily basis - were crewmembers literally starving themselves for fashion? Then again, it's probably all dependent on…

What always bugged me about the holodeck was that you had to bring your own costumes, which always begged the question, where were they getting all these costumes? Did people maintain there own costumes, meaning Starfleet was full of cosplaying deviants? Or was there an official Starfleet costumer assigned to every…

There was also a comic book series called Harsh Realms that featured an incredibly detailed virtual reality setting; it was later adapted into a TV show with the same name by Chris Carter.

I love Futurama's game "played entirely on video," Death Factory 3: The Legend of Death Factory 2. The mix of platformer and FPS complete with finger guns just looks awesome.

Actually, Panamanian Strongman is the one that ends with Bush Sr. kicking your corpse. "Rawr! No es bueno!"

@avclub-4cc7a542d4f9acb781267998eec42d95:disqus is technically correct - the best kind of correct.

I can only speak for myself but I wouldn't say it was common; I played it a couple of times, either organized by my dorm or by the campus theatre troupe. It was usually proposed by one of the older students since they were presumably more familiar with it (I'd never heard of the game until I got to college.) No one…

Pickpocket sounds like a really fun game to include as part of a larger gathering; it reminds me of those Assassin games college kids sometimes play but with even more of a focus on stealth. Wrong Bet is another one where the focus seems to be on guile and manipulation rather than simple strategy - as an inveterate…

But without the backwards 'R's how will we know the game was made in Russia? Those onion domes and dancing cossacks could be from anywhere!

Happy Friday, Gameologicians! We had a plenitude of articles on the Games tab this week thanks to lots of Newswire and Great Job, Internet! posts, and our most-commented article was the Newswire about Seth Rogen's new project with 326 comments. Next up, the Top 5:

That's a lot of fun! I'll have to come back and play some more after work.

My gaming buddy and I are finally going to get a chance to jump back into our multiplayer game of Civ 4/Fall From Heaven. If I remember correctly, when we left off his orc civilization had just put the boot to the dwarves that were sharing his island, while my mage civilization had just learned the technology to cast…

I had to go track down this "Wrecking Ball" recreation you mentioned - I found it here. It's as goofy and ridiculous as you'd expect. Octodad's wild flailing as he attempts to climb onto the wrecking ball is particularly wonderful.

I've definitely felt that gaming ennui before; I'll go to start a new title and I'll be confronted with an excessively long character creation mechanic, or the same tired storytelling tropes, or some other thing that just rankles. When it hits I've found the only real solution is what you're already doing - avoid…

Hidely-ho, Gameologarinos! Our most-commented article this week was the Inventory about hidden game characters with 366 comments. Next up, thee Top 5 Most Liked comments: