I used to watch TotalBiscuit's videos to learn about PC ports of games, to see if they were any good. Obviously I can't do that anymore, and the best replacement I've found so far is looking at PCGamingWiki. If a game has a long page with a lot of issues and workarounds, it is probably a bad port.

But that doesn't really help if I want to know if a game has improved a lot since launch. Does anyone do a good "state of game x a few years later" series?

"How could a low-budget, black and white movie from the 60s possibly scare be that scary." I thought to myself as I was purchasing my ticket for the movie. I was going to see the movie, because I had always heard that it was a good movie. I thought that this movie couldn't possibly be scary, so it had to have other merit to have it be considered a good movie.

I left the cinema that day quite spooked. I was amazed at with all of it. The true horror weren't the wondering ghouls, but the interaction between the people inside the house. It was a social experiment more than anything else. What would happen if six people were placed inside a house, with a wounded child, and impending doom closing in on them? This is the question answered by the movie. A power struggle between Ben and Harry, about the safest place in the house to hide, led to the death of Harry. Everybody sided with Ben, and in the end he only survived the longest because he hid in the cellar as Harry had suggested from the beginning.

TL;DR
I found the fighting between the survivors in the house to be very spooky.

Adjustment Day is a parody, at least I hope it is, of a United States dystopia. The concept is rather ambitious, but the author rises to the task. The prime conspiracy theory behind the book is that throughout history, civilization has periodically weeded out young men of 18-24 through war and whatever other means available to keep society from returning to the dark ages. Who does this in the U.S? Why, your government, of course.

In this version of the conspiracy, the young men turn the tables. Most of the book is about what happens after Adjustment Day. I've only read Fight Club and Choke by Palahniuk before this. All I can say is the cynicism and nihilism of those two books seems increased tenfold in Adjustment Day. Do you have a conservative conspiracy theory that you think about from time to time? They're all in here. I'd even bet that the author comes up with some you've never heard before.

In a satire that is as biting as The Sellout, Palahniuk presents several characters who live through the aftermath of the event, including the originator of it. But instead of nobody talking about it, (like in Fight Club) everybody is talking about this new bizarre movement/social-political revolution. As you go down this rabbit hole of irrational rationalization, it's easy to lose sight of what is going on. Scenes and characters are switched at the beginning of random paragraphs, causing me to back up every few pages.

A good example of Palahniuk's treatment of infrastructure is given by a new form of money that comes out of the movement:

Officially, the order called them Talbotts, but everyone knew them as skins. Rumor was the first batches were refined from, somehow crafted from the stretched and bleached skin taken from targeted persons. People seemed to take a hysterical joy from the idea.
Instead of being backed by gold or the full faith of government or some such, this money was backed by death. The suggestion was always that failure to accept the new currency and honor its face value might result in the rejecter being targeted. Never was this stated, not overtly, but the message was always on television and billboards: Please Report Anyone Failing to Honor the Talbott. The bills held their face value for as long as a season, but faded faster in strong light and fastest in sunlight. A faded bill held less value as the markers along the edges became illegible.

Because the money had a shelf life, people had to work all the time. At the top of the hierarchy were the young men who had put their lives on the line during the Adjustment Day revolution. They would get the money from some source and give it away to their workers and people they knew, spending it all as fast as they could.

If that sounds ridiculous, you haven't even scratched the surface of this world. Chief among the topics are racism and prejudice toward everyone you can imagine. All in all I found the book a little tedious. Palahniuk puts the crazy theories in the mouths of people who voice them so convincingly that it becomes surreal. If you're a fan of the author you might like it. But practically every paragraph seems engineered to be offensive in some way, to someone.

Let's just hope Chuck is making all this stuff up.

So I've spent nearly the entire weekend watching Humans and I wanted to share what I think of it and maybe get some discussion going.

For those who are not familiar with it, the basic premise is an alternate reality present day where "synths" - robots that replaced humans in most menial tasks - are part of everyday life to the point of being a common household item. Within the first episode we learn that there are a handful of synths that are sentient - thinking, feeling individuals. The show explores the implications of that - how previously-servile machines becoming sentient would impact society. There are many parallels to contemporary issues around racism, xenophobia, fear, and I think the show does good job of handling the topic. It is a smart, well-written sci-fi drama.

So, did anyone else here watch it? What do you think of it?

PS: While the post itself doesn't have any spoilers, the comments do.

For anyone who doesn't recognize Patience Phillips, she was Halle Berry's Catwoman in the most terrible superhero film - Catwoman (2004)...that I really enjoyed it. Probably because it wasn't well-received, it's often overlooked when talking about things like "the first female hero on screen" or "the first black hero..." sort of things. And technically, Catwoman's not a superhero.

Spoilers ahead. I'm also going to keep my points to the story and characters themselves. I honestly had no issues with any of the actors.

The good

• The theme and social commentary on make-up, beauty products, self-harm/addiction and image issues woman do face. The added layer of cooperate greed. The idea of what you see in the mirror vs. what others see (and if they're right), alongside what you want to present to the world or to specific people - honestly this movie has probably one of the best takes on "the cost of beauty" that I've seen in a while, and since.
• The scene where Tom thinks he's saving a jumper, but Patience is actually trying to save a cat. This random scene turns out to be a great storytelling scene when brought up again after Tom arrests Patience for murder and she asks him what he first saw the first time they met.
• Laurel is probably the most interesting character in this movie. There's a really well-framed shot of her photos being removed from her company lobby in favour of a younger model. I think it's one of the best scenes in the movie. Laurel is capable, powerful, rich and very accomplished, but somehow her relevance still fades as her beauty does. (I can honestly say I generally can't stand the evil step-mother wrestling with her fading beauty and taking out her bitterness on some young snow white-y girl, but this one worked for me.)
• I loved that Batman wasn't in it (but didn't really like that a love interest still had to be introduced).

The bad

• That she's call Patience Phillips...but honestly this is the warning to divorce this from any Catwoman or female superheros (or anti-heros) you know.
• Patience doesn't earn her "powers" - Selina Kyle (Catwoman in basically all other versions) works obsessively to perfect all her abilities. She's an insanely good cat burglar, not a magic cat.
• Patience doesn't earn or drive her own growth. There is basically no growth as a character. A magic cat ghost could have simply possessed Patience's body and the story would be the same.
• Oversexualization of Catwoman...which I didn't even know could be a thing until this movie. Black leather for a sexy Catwoman - awesome. Whatever the belt thing was - grossly missed the point while trying to copy Pfeiffer's patched up catsuit.
• I'm also not the biggest fan of make-over tropes in general.

The ugly

• The basketball scene - just everything about it.
• The hate that surrounded the movie because Catwoman wasn't blonde (or Michelle Pfeiffer), and that Batman's not in it.
• The physical punch-them-out fight scene between Laurel and Catwoman in the end - just why? This isn't a movie at all about physical strength, and having a "face like marble" isn't a real power. (To be fair, I don't like this showdown in really any superhero movie, with the exception of The Death of Superman.)

The cheesy

• The crazy cat-lady Patience goes too, and her tossing a cat toy at her
• The sushi eating scene
• The in case of date emergency kit her friends gave her.
• Laurel seeing her cracked beauty in the moment of a showdown fight
• The cat scratches on Tom
• Her best friend hooking up with her doctor
• The comparing signatures on the coffee cups
• Her Marvel-like comic book name

Final thoughts

So yeah...I would recommend this movie, and really hope that when they do make another Catwoman film that it might share some themes. Have you seen this movie? Did you hate it? Who's your favourite Catwoman? What would you like to see in a Catwoman movie?

Hello Tildes, one common thread that I've noticed in a lot of the threads I've been browsing under ~hobbies and ~creative is that it seems like a lot of folks are looking for new hobbies and things to get into.

To that end one great hobby I've picked up somewhat recently is playing and collecting board games. To some of you, the term 'board game' likely inspires thoughts of old school board games like you may have played in your youth (Clue, Connect 4, Shoots N Ladders, Monopoly, Stratego) "Modern" board games can certainly still be as simple as some of those, but we are actually in a sort of second golden age for board games right now.

What I mean by the above statement is that quite recently (the last 5 years or so) Tabletop and board games have really become popular again, to the point where if you live in a major city there are most likely several places to buy games, and likely even a couple of places you can go to just hang out and play games that belong to the store. Between that, and the popularity of things like Wil Wheaton's TableTop on Youtube, both major game companies as well as small independent folks are creating more and arguably better games than ever in the past.

Now - to the actual subject of the post title. The games I'll list below vary from things most people have heard of or played (Cards Against Humanity) to somewhat obscure, but they should all be pretty easy to find, and very easy to pick up and get into. I'll try to include as much relevant information for each of them (Price, Number of players, Game type etc) and a brief description of what the game is like to play.

If anyone has any other suggestions to contribute please do - One of the best parts of the hobby is the community aspect and finding new games to play.

Let's start with something popular, but not quite ubiquitous yet -
Cards Against Humanity: (3-Unlimited(?) players, $25 Base game + Expansions, Play time Varies based on player count and house rules, ~1hr is a safe bet, but can be made shorter or longer by adjusting rules)
Cards against humanity is a NSFW card game described as 'a party game for horrible people' on the box, which is pretty accurate. Gameplay consists of one player (The judge) playing a black card from the top of a deck with a sentence on it such as "I drink to forget ______" after which the rest of the players will play a white card with things like "My ex-wife" or "Random Erections" or "A bigger, blacker dick" written on them. Once all of the players have played their white cards, they are shuffled, read aloud, and the "Judge" decides which of the white cards is their favorite, awarding a point to the player that played that white card. This is a great icebreaker game because it pretty much forces everyone to get outside of their comfort zone and get weird with it. There are many expansion packs, which are generally themed, but some are just general. These include more cards to keep things fresh after you've played through the originals too many times. - Note: Not recommended for Family Game Night.

Cthulu Dice (3-Unlimited(?) players, $11, Play time ~5-10 minutes):
Cthulu dice is what is called a "micro-game" it consists of just a single plastic (or metal, if you want to dent your table) die with some symbols on it. It's a variant of the old "put and take" game with a bit of a cthulu twist to it, this kind of game is great because it's simple, portable, can be taught to new players in minutes, and also makes a great drinking game. You can also add house rules or look up other variants to keep things fresh

Next up - Dixit (3-6 Players, $30 base game plus standalone expansions, Play time ~30-45 Minutes):
The gameplay of Dixit is somewhat similar to Cards Against Humanity with one player acting as a judge, but from there things get different and rather interesting. Whereas Cards Against Humanity has cards with absurd, obscure, or obscene sentences or words, Dixit has cards with pictures on them. The pictures are generally bizarre, surreal, and kind of whimsical art (Like these examples: https://i.imgur.com/VHtISAZ.png). The way the game is played is the "Judge" player will select a card from their hand and say a single word or phrase that describes something about the picture on the card (It could be a color, an object in the picture, the way the picture makes you feel, what the picture makes you think of, anything that makes sense really) and then plays the card face down. The other players then try to select a card from their hand that matches the judges phrase as best they can in order to fool the other players into picking their card instead of the judges. Once all players have played their face down cards, they are laid out and all players vote on which card they think is the original one played by the Judge, Points are handed out accordingly. Similar to Cards Against humanity, the expansions for this game are additional packs of cards, often following some loose theme to freshen up the game. Most of the expansions contain enough cards that they could be used to play the game standalone. This is a great game to play with people of any age or maturity, it can be as clean or as dirty as the people playing the game but is just generally always a good time.

For the next few games, the actual mechanics of gameplay can get pretty complex, and so rather than explain what the gameplay is like, I'll just link a relevant episode of TableTop for anyone who is interested enough to check them out.

Red Dragon Inn (2-4 Players, $35 Plus Expansions, Play time ~30-60 Minutes) Unfortunately, no TableTop of this one, I can expand if there's interest:
Red Dragon Inn is a game about what the adventurers from DnD do during their 'long rests' at the inn. It's intended to be a drinking game, with players assuming the roles of characters at the inn ( The base game comes with a Wizard, a Rogue, a Priestess, and Warrior ) and are given decks of cards containing context-sensitive actions and abilities. The goal of the game is to be the last person at the inn that isn't broke or passed out from injury or alcohol. The three main resources tracked are a characters health, sobriety, and coins and various cards can affect each of these in various ways. There's also a gambling mini-game that is a lot of fun. The expansions come in 2 types, main releases which consist of 4 new characters (later ones, 4+ seem not to work as well with the earlier ones, and may do better as standalones) as well as single character decks that aren't included in any of the main releases.

Tokaido(2-5 Players 3+ preferable, $30 + Expansion, Play time ~45-60 Minutes):
Tabletop: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pipFRzGYgdk

Tokaido is a bit different than the rest of the games on this list so far in that it isn't explicitly competitive. At its' core, Tokaido is a game about seeing who can have the best vacation. Each player assumes the role of a different traveler (each with their own benefits and abilities) and proceeds on their way, trying to stop at the different available locations in such a way that they end the game with the most points (how points are scored is kinda complex, Watch the TableTop for this) but it tends to be a nice, low stress game as there's few ways to really 'attack' other players. There is currently one expansion out for it which introduces some new mechanics and does a good job of freshening up the game for players who have had it a while.

The Resistance/Avalon/Werewolf/Mafia and similar games (Many players, ~$15, Price varies, Play time ~30 minutes, depending on the variant):
Tabletop: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_QRczGzXqw

The Resistance and similar are games about lying to your friends and trying to convince them that you are somebody that you're not. Or maybe they're games about telling the truth and trying to get people to believe you, that all really depends on the cards you draw. These are some of my favorite party games to play in a big group because it can really show you who among your friends has the best poker face. Games tend to go pretty quick so when a player is eliminated it's generally not a big deal (this can sometimes not be the case if the group is way large). Of the different variants I've played, Avalon is my personal favorite of the different variants due to the interesting mechanics that the additional roles bring to the table in this one.

Finally - Betrayal at the house on the hill (3-6 Players, more is better, $35 plus expansions, Play time ~60+ minutes )
Tabletop (Part 1 of 2): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MINNKyE4fjs

Betrayal is my go-to example of how great a modern board game can be. It's a moderately complex game, but don't let that scare you off - after you play it once you'll get it just fine, and setup is relatively quick and easy compared to a lot of the other sort of "DnD Lite" games that exist (Lookin at you here, Arkham Horror!). The game consists of players exploring rooms in a spooky house, building out the map as they go from a stack of game tiles with rooms on them. The rooms will have different effects and trigger different types of events as the players explore through the house collecting items and discovering 'omens'. These 'omens' tie into the whole point of the game implied in the title, the "Betrayal". What this translates to in real terms is that for the first half of the game, all of the player characters are cooperating, trying to help each other get as many useful items and to position themselves in the house in such a way that when one of the other players inevitably fails the 'omen' check and triggers the 'haunt' and begins the second half of the game that the non-betrayers can survive and/or escape. Survive and/or escape what you might ask? That is one of my favorite parts about this game, in the base version there are over 50 different scenarios depending on a bunch of different factors. These scenarios can be everything from demonic possession, ghosts, werewolves, 'the blob' and many other creatures, monsters, and horrific situations and do an absolutely fantastic job of giving the base game a TON of replayability. On top of that, they released an expansion for the first game (Widow's Walk) which introduced even MORE scenarios, as well as new rooms and an entirely new floor to the house, as well as Betrayal at Baldur's Gate, which has similar gameplay but takes place in that universe.

I could really keep going all day, but I think this post has gotten well long enough. Let me know in the comments what games you guys play and love, or if you want to hear about some other kinds of games (There are too many to think about even coming close to touching on all of them: Deck building games, Dice building games, Pandemic-like games, Classics like Catan, Ticket to Ride, Dominion, Milles Borne etc etc etc)

Needing a down weekend, the spouse and I settled in to watch TV, and discovered that Starz' series, Counterpart - spoiler warning, is one of the better series we've seen in quite a while, let alone among science fiction stories. Though The Expanse wins for sheer SFX pyrotechnics and breadth of technical scope, it's wonderful to sit in for a deep, thoughtful drama like Counterpart. The series focuses on character, story, world-building, plausible plotting, and avoidance of the usual alternate universe cliches. Counterpart is a genuine Cold War Noir spy thriller which happens to occur in a science-fictional setting, and the writers have managed to avoid or refresh the tropes of both genres in ways that ask interesting philosophical questions. It's quiet, slow, and meticulous in a way that most current television writing seems to have abandoned. There's tense action, but no primary colored-supersuits, no scary aliens, no gaudy laser beams, just... a split of history that leaves two distorted mirrors, reflecting each other.

J.K. Simmons' performances in the roles of Howard (Prime) and Howard (Alpha) are mesmerizing in a way that outmatches Tatiana Mazlany's Orphan Black characters. There's a slow unveiling of the respective parallel worlds' history, with continuing evolution and interplay of characters and relationships, which brings to mind the best of series like The Wire or The Americans.

To the extent that Counterpart borrows from literary canon, the most significant underlying influences are John LeCarre's find-the-mole games in the Smiley series, China Mieville's The City and the City, and Philip K. Dick (particularly, The Adjustment Team).

The really guilty pleasure, and the lightweight pressure relief from the grimdark of Peaky Blinders or Counterpart, was a spit-and-giggles Canadian production called Letterkenny. I didn't have high hopes, but the 22-minute episodes are exactly what my brain needed to get over the daily doses of blah.

The opening credits of each episode refer to the fictional rural Ontario town of Letterkenny as follows:

There are 5,000 people in Letterkenny. These are their problems.

The plots are barely coat-hangers, with most of the comic tension spent on interactions among the Hicks (farm people), Skids (creative-but-disaffected Internet subculture wannabes), hockey players and Christians - a/k/a small-town tribes recognizable anywhere in North America. The portrayals are caricaturized enough to be both humorously offensive and humorously sympathetic simultaneously. [Could be some toxic racial/gender meta, but mostly, the treatment of women and minorities is in keeping with the setting.]

The banter, and the utter Spock-like deadpan of Wayne (the toughest guy in Letterkenny)'s Hick character are the stars of the show. Some people have complained that the rapid-fire use of heavy dialect in the dialogue is impenetrable; that actually helps with comic timing. When your brain catches up to what was actually said, it's like receiving a two-by-four between the eyes of funny. I've got a bit of home-team advantage in the midwestern North American dialects area, and usually get it on the first run, but it's good enough to re-watch happily if the spouse needs a do-over. Transcripts are available, but watch the show before looking.

We now have a new battery of in-jokes and gag lines to add to our secret spousal language - "Hard no.", "That's what I appreciates about ya", "...and he was never the same after that."

There's really nothing quite like Letterkenny, and it's exactly smart/dumb enough to make fantastic comedy. Two seven-episode seasons are currently available on Hulu.

I saw this movie last week, so I thought I'll share some thoughts on it.

First off, spoilers! Be warned.

I start of by saying, I'm not really a romcom fan in general, and wasn't specifically into watching this movie because it was an all Asian cast. I grew up watching Chinese dramas (HK, mainland and from Taiwan), and so many of them are romantic comedies. So, though I love the idea of Hollywood taking on more diverse stories, movies like "Crazy Rich Asians" already exist.

Having said all that, I honestly loved the movie! And I believe one of the major reasons why is the depiction of different Asians, specifically Asian-Americans (or as we're referred to in Chinese, foreign-Chinese or overseas-Chinese).

...unrelated to the movie itself, but a little background if anyone's interested...
I'm a Canadian-born Chinese and grew up when people thought all Chinese people lived in Chinatown. I literally had teachers confirm with my parents that the address I gave was correct and that it was in fact not in Chinatown. I was automatically placed in ESL classes, though English is my first language. So, little bit of an outsider in the country I was born in. When I visit family and friends in Hong Kong though, I'm the white girl. Literally everything I do is a novelty. I can write my own name in Chinese, I recognize famous Chinese songs (like Beatles level famous), or I can order my own breakfast (a bun with coffee).

So back to the movie. In Crazy Rich Asians, in Rachel, I feel they captured this really well. If this movie was less Asian centric, I feel "Asia" would have been overly exotic, instead of gross wealth being exotic. If this movie were made in HK or China, I feel, Rachel would have been portrayed as far more foreign and her "Banana" qualities exaggerated.

I also really appreciated that a lot of jokes, and moments, especially the MaJong scene weren't explained. The jokes were so funny, especially the lucky red colour. I haven't laughed out loud in a theater for a while.

This post is already getting sort of long, so I might do another one on the strong women in the movie, which I believe they were really well done too. Rachel was amazing!

Who else has seen this? What are your thoughts?

Edit: I added a spoiler tag, but guess I really didn't. Still leaving it in, in case comments contain them.

Finished this last night. It's been so long since I read any Bradbury for the first time. His style shows some age, but he's a really poetic and visionary writer.

Published in 1953, this tale is a battle between visual media and books, but taking the form of the fleeting versus the permanent, the here and now versus history, pop culture versus capital C Culture.

In a way, its datedness is a strength, because of so much of Bradbury's prophetic vision and because of the way his 1950's idea of dystopia contrasts with the more numerous recent ideas.

If there was ever an object lesson about filter bubbles, Farenheit 451 is it: recent enough to be relatable and distant enough to be outside our current filters. Readers should take note of this when relating and evaluating fiction and any work that lies outside their personal space. A valuable lesson in itself.

So often we're totally unaware of the walls we create for ourselves, our comfort zone. It's precisely because they provide comfort that we tend to stay within them.

And of course, Bradbury's whole novel is both about this issue and again a reference object for it.

Anyone seen this? I heard about this movie on NPR and decided to check it out. Wow! It's a great, well told story that pulls a lot of discreet threads together. As an aside from the main story of a black cop infiltrating the Ku Klux Klan it also references racist media of yesteryear like Gone With the Wind and Birth of a Nation. There are several moments that wink at Donald Trump's talking points and policies. There was a lot of reaction from the predominantly black crowd I was in, the connection was certainly noticed.

And the end! Wow. Almost had me in tears, really brought me back to a year ago when I saw the Vice News on Charlottesville. I was in a theater in Richmond, VA about an hour from Charlottesville. You could have heard a pin drop right when the movie ended. I've never seen so many people get gut punched like that all at once. The timing of this movie was absolutely well thought out.

while its not the best star wars movie, it isn't the abomination that people make it out to be. its legitimately fun to watch and comfy with all its bad CGI.

Favorite star wars movies in order: IV, V, Solo, VII, I, VIII, VI, Rogue One, III, II