I happen to have one of those big, clunky boxes. I built it myself in 2010 and have done some upgrades since. I'm quite pleased with it, in fact, and I spend about 15 hours a day at it, between work and gaming. I *am* one of those hobbyists, and yet I know that, to the population at large, I'm a minority. Read more
At a certain point, when PCs became more common and Windows was on most of them, the make and model mattered less. There were new computers regularly and the marketplace came to look a lot more like it does now, just smaller and more expensive. I remember that our first Windows computer (running 3.11) was a Packard… Read more
There are approximately 310 million people living in the United States. Depending on where (and when) you pull figures from, between 70% and 80% of them identify as Christian. That actually makes my intentionally rough 200 million figure on the conservative, low end rather than on the high one. Read more
What really did me in (as a Templar) were two choke points. One, on the bottom level: as soon as you read the writing on the wall and turn around to leave, four mobsters spawn. You can stun them with a road flare, but you still have to take them all down or else they follow you and take you down. And I couldn't… Read more
On the gaming specs, not great. If you don't have it plugged in when you turn the dial to "gaming" it pops up with a warning that you really need to be on AC power. There's an "eco" mode that's more battery-friendly but you're still not going to get more than a couple of hours out of it. At least, I wasn't going to. Read more
The issue I had, unfortunately, was with the back half of the quest. I reached the bottom, and then died dozens of times trying to get back out. And by then, "go level up elsewhere" wasn't an option. The one and only anima well I was permitted to respawn at was the one at the bottom of the instance. Had it been as… Read more
I've actually been a big fan of Tornquist's games (though The Longest Journey and Dreamfall both came decades after Myst, which I found to be compelling and have a long history with as well), but I still hadn't quite felt that sense of compassion in many or any. There's a lot of emotion in the supporting cast of TLJ… Read more
Mmm, there's a difference. The Toy Story analogy is actually quite apt; I hadn't thought to mention it because I was too old for toys and too young for kids who wanted toys during the years that blitz began. Harry Potter is just your standard marketing juggernaut. The other sort is the kind with the fake nostalgia… Read more
This is a good point, and worth noting: one can explore the area in any way one wishes (and since I play with partners sometimes, I end up "off track" as it were), but there's a good natural flow to areas, where items lead to investigations lead to quest givers lead to items and so on. Read more
Playing with a heavy Fists focus, with Chaos for my other weapon. I'm using a mix of passives from both but I've got one or two heavy-hitting Fists hits and a heal, then with buffs and passives both the hits and the heal gain an over-time component, and I have a passive from some branch or other (can't think of it… Read more
