iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Appreciate any help that I can get, seriously. I won't be getting paid until the end of the month.

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Basically doing a Bungie deep dive where I play all their games before Halo, and then Halo, and then I'll end it off with Destiny 1 & 2 which will be a lot of fuckin game.

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Been playing Marathon for the first time lately and it's such a cool game.

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And now that we have a PC version, it's even better lol. The whole "consoleization" thing just feels like a canned talking point at this point.

Titanfall 2 is also on Source engine lol, which always amazes me

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J. Brainpiss @jbrainpee.bsky.social · 28/07/2025

As much of a boomer shooter head as I am, I still think there is a huge void in games that follow in Half-Life's footsteps. HL influenced so many games, for fuckin years!!

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Reposted by J. Brainpiss

Anything helps me stay fed and pay my bills through August. I get to return to work in the middle of August but won't get paid until the end of that month. I need all the help I can get. gofund.me/2e3ef0cd

gofund.me

Donate to Help Jill Get Through Surgery, organized by Darian Bilderback

Hi, my name is Darian, and I am fundraising for my friend Jill. She was struck by a ve… Darian Bilderback needs your support for Help Jill Get Through Surgery

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J. Brainpiss @jbrainpee.bsky.social · 28/07/2025

gofund.me

Donate to Help Jill Get Through Surgery, organized by Darian Bilderback

Hi, my name is Darian, and I am fundraising for my friend Jill. She was struck by a ve… Darian Bilderback needs your support for Help Jill Get Through Surgery

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J. Brainpiss @jbrainpee.bsky.social · 27/07/2025

Trying to get out of here lol

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I think the style maybe fell off because some devs tried to imitate the style without really understanding all of it. This led to the souls style becoming more appealing because it's easier to imitate and simplify, while also making people feel like they're playing something balls hard.

Action games definitely did that for a while. Devil May Cry, Ninja Gaiden, God Hand and Bayonetta are some strong examples. They often get misclassified as "button mashers" when they really are far from that. The fighting game and beat em up blood runs deep in them.

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Yeah this is very true. I'm not as familiar with VF (only played a bit of 5) but I can see where they differ on that end.

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Yeah it's also present in other 3D fighters such as Tekken. Really any good action game makes use of the fact that a player could pick up on the differences between two opposing attack animations and exploit it. In souls it often just ends up being an easy way to steamroll a boss if found out.

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Additionally, I think a lot of systems pulling out the parry mechanics these days reminds me of everyone wanting to copy the free flow combat system from the Batman Arkham games a few console gens ago. That combat is nice to look at but ultimately offers very little depth.

I would much rather learn a bunch of combos than have to just be forced to learn parry timings. It often boils down to this very artificial feeling of difficulty, because once you figure out the pattern you're done learning. There's nothing else. If a game has more combos, you're always growing.

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Said this same thing to myself a few months ago lol. Must've been something in the air.

In some souls games this already exists if you pick up on certain bosses having blindspots and where some animations interact with that. Of course it's less of an intended route though. I would like to see it implemented more intentionally.

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J. Brainpiss @jbrainpee.bsky.social · 17/07/2025

Didn't know this feature was in 4D

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Yeah I agree. Some of the games that feel actually cozy for me are definitely full of conflict and even lots of sadness.

Really thinking about giving in to this primal feeling to juggle like 4 or 5 RPGs at a time because I'm in an RPG mood. I'm also on unpaid leave until like mid August so I really don't have much better to do.

I enjoy the cryptic nature and level of discovery present in a title. If I can come across a whole optional area basically by accident I'm in love. Even better if I can't tell if it's optional. I don't come to them for difficult boss fights though. I also like to be able to leave an area.

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This reminds me of the very reality that there are towns underneath the Lake of Ozarks as they are all artificial, man made lakes.

Yeah I did that one and got the full story as well. It was pretty nice. So far what I'm getting from the side quests is they excel at world building and providing a condensed story experience There's not much in the way for anything extremely emergent or entirely different approaches so far tho

It reminds me of a less emergent contrast to Dragon's Dogma. Where TW3 had some good writing in the quest, DD has quests that seem basic but can become very different because of the emergent systems present in the game.

Played that quest earlier today and it was very nice. Definitely enjoying the side questing aspect of it so far, has a similar appeal to me as an anthology movie or series. I'm just a sucker for side questing and optional boss level monsters.

Finally seeing what the hype is all about with The Witcher 3. Recovering from a heavy surgery is probably the best time for me to do this lol.

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but if you don't help him he still succeeds in his goal and you can just applaud him or be very passive about it. There are some other plots that are flirting with conflict but never even go there. Gameplay is entirely frictionless as well. Glitches were some of the most entertaining parts though.

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it off and say "yeah you might be right but that's fine" or something of the like. The only conflict is a NIMBY not wanting an apartment complex to be built in the town near his log cabin, and the game just wants you to agree with him and potentially romance him. You can opt not to help him...

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It's set in this very frictionless pastiche of the 1980s in small town Oregon. There's not an ounce of conflict or drama going on in the story of the game, which is supposed to be a pretty narrative heavy experience. If you make a choice that might cause some conflict a character will just shrug..

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