Posts by Thrik

I am so disappointed. I've always enjoyed Kevin Spacey's work and absolutely loved House of Cards. I admit that at first my bias was towards Spacey and thinking it was just some people wanting headlines — the same trap that I guess many victims of powerful people fall into — but as with other high-profile individuals recently the accusations have been consistent, numerous, and from people with their own successful show business careers who have no reason to make this stuff up.

So basically it seems pretty beyond doubt that Spacey has assaulted these people, and yet how does that leave my enjoyment of his films and shows, and my intention to enjoy rewatching them again in the future? It's the whole separation of artist and art thing I suppose. At what point do you draw the line? Is it possible or moral to enjoy the work of a scumbag? Personally I refuse to listen to any Chris Brown music even though a lot of it is quite good, because he's an abusive violent bastard. But I find it hard to apply this same strictness to what seems to be an endlessly increasing circle of ethically compromised celebrities and their films/music/tv shows/games. Jeez.

We didn't have this requirement before, but we did have it configured that someone needed to post once in any existing thread before being allowed to create their own thread.

This was removed recently because I had feedback that it might be putting new members off of getting involved and/or confusing them. Typically if someone signs up it might be because they want to share something they've been working on — that is our niche — and also it led to a low level of people getting in touch asking why they aren't allowed to post

Personally I'd rather people be able to dive in and get involved without arbitrary limitations, but am curious why you feel it'd be beneficial? If it relates to certain forums getting junk then perhaps we could implement a more precise restriction. For example, if we're worried about spammy threads in the creative forums we could make it so people's first threads have to be moderated (at cost of extra staff monitoring).

Quote from Squad

On 24/10/2017 at 10:03 PM, Squad said: Not exactly HL3 related, but I think it fits in here nonetheless:

HL2 voice actor passed away.

Jesus christ we lost Eli Vance again...

Awesome stuff Ravage! Wonderful to see the memory of Hurg lives on too hahaha. Need to build a Hurg/MapCore sightings page some time.

I hate to say it but I think we're starting to become a bit desensitised to the horrific terrorism that's been happening. I mean literally in the last week or so I have read of:

1. Mass shooting in Vegas
2. Attempted car bombing in Paris
3. Attempted bomb on London tube
4. Two young (~20) women killed with knife in France

And you know what? It almost feels like just another month. Sometimes its more intense — like the mass shooting at the beach resort a couple of years ago — and sometimes it's vehicles running several people down. But it has become almost relentless. Every day I open Apple News on my phone and expect to read about another sick incident ISIS is claiming responsibility for, even though it's only actually them some of the time.

What more can I say? It's a messed-up world right now.

...

On a more personal note, I'm in the midst of moving for the first time in a few years. Things are going well with my girlfriend so we're looking at moving in together, although initially it'll just be me in an apartment we've decided on and then she'll follow a few months later. That's all great, but equally exciting is I'm getting to live in a really nice block I've had my eye on for a few years but couldn't get things to line up right. I've always enjoyed living high up, and my current flat is pretty crappy in that regard — my view is essentially a wall. So this new one is 11th floor, great panoramic views, and it's all new and modern. I can't wait to have a year or few there before finally setting down into a more practical house.

Of course, moving is an absolute pain in the ass. There's so much to take care of and a lot of money to spend, and adding to the pressure is my letting agent doing short-notice viewings of my current flat. But I've borrowed some cash to get through the crunch and it should all even out. It's just so crazy having to pay for 2x rent (both flats during the move), agent fees, deposit which is at least equal to the rent, moving truck, new utilities, etc. God day-um.

I'm yet to play Quantum Break. I really loved Max Payne and Alan Wake so hoping it gives me at least some of that same excellent writing and atmosphere those games were known for.

Yeah, all these BBC ones (Planet Earth, Life, Africa, Blue Planet) are absolutely sublime. I wouldn't say I'm massively into nature documentaries, but these ones just make them so epic and awe-inspiring. Plus you just can't beat an Attenborough narration.

I'm going to do some optimisation work soon as some of the images on the home page could definitely be better compressed for their size. That should speed things up so we have less problems like this, although once cached things should be fairly snappy anyway.

Quote from Vilham

On 27/09/2017 at 12:54 AM, Vilham said: Front page now has a scroll bar, its all fucked up.

Do you have a screenshot of this? I've not been able to see it myself (in Chrome or Safari in desktop or mobile size).

I have noticed that occasionally during the last couple of days the assets loaded a bit slowly, causing icons and various other things to take a while to look right. It is possible you saw some glitchy stuff if that happened... not sure though.

God yes

This film was great! I really enjoyed its blend of truly sinister atmosphere and jump scares. I know some aren’t keen but I find them to be a very enjoyable part of watching horrors — especially with company.

The story felt like it had heart, and its largely child cast was excellent. Of course that also made it very sickening to see them preyed upon by evil, with the first death horrifyingly setting the scene.

Uncharted 4 has to be one of the best games I've ever played. I don't know how Naughty Dog makes these worlds so damn immersive. Sometimes I was happy to just sit there with the game open while I savoured a cup of tea, watching and listening to the waves lapping away at the shore and it like I've got a window in my living room to a real lost island.

I have weird feelings about Lost Legacy. I'm so looking forward to playing it, but it's like I haven't waited long enough since my last Uncharted fix and I need to give it some more months at least so I can reward myself after the wait. It's a bit like how if Half-Life 3 had come out only a year after Half-Life 2 — nobody would have gave a crap.

Who am I kidding, it'd have been lapped up like the frosting on a Krispy Kreme doughnut.

I get the feeling I'm going to watch this outside of work and want to replay a whole bunch of games! Hearing music from a classic game always puts me in the mood for going back to it.

Jesus Christ. I never actually got past the first couple of bosses in the original, so I might finally get to enjoy this apparent masterpiece.

Oh yeah. Some games like Uncharted 4 are just beauty to look at in terms of faces. It's definitely not so slick across the board though.

That is absolutely superb. Uncanny how well such an old game captured their likenesses too. How is it games so much newer and better still struggle to make faces look as natural as HL2 did?! In some cases HL2 actually looks like a photo:

[Blocked Image: http://media.moddb.com/legacy/images/features/22/227/gallery/t_1117.jpg]

Yeah... I mean when you put it like that no wonder people are attracted to such a life. It's easy to disparage such behaviour when you're attracted to it in relatively cushy European countries, etc. But when it's somewhere where the options are so bad why not enjoy some years of exciting but extremely dangerous lifestyle. What a raw deal to end up born in those favelas.

Sounds pretty sobering. Even in this modern world of communication and news it's still impossible for me to imagine myself being in a situation like that. I seriously can't fathom how I'd cope with such a lifestyle, which I guess is exactly what you'd expect some developer living in England to say, but it does genuinely play on my mind sometimes when you see the outrageously bad conditions some people are living in and here we are acting like some piece of code or website is the most important thing ever. But what can you do? Aside from donating to charities I guess, which I do but it feels like a drop in an ocean. Bad stuff man.

Wonderful to hear that everything worked out! You'll have such a good set-up for multiplayer in a few years.

Oh boy. I really need to get around to playing Dishonored 2. I loved the original and hope to see the return of some rats.