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Speedball posted:
Speedball posted:
Aliens play metagames.
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Feb 10, 2015 17:42
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ViggyNash posted:Space Invaders. ... I swear I've seen a game like that, for the Wii.
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Feb 10, 2015 18:55
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Speedball posted:
Oh God Zinchenko AN ALIEN GRENADE IS NOT A loving POOL BALL! FIRE IN THE HOLE!
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Feb 10, 2015 19:34
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Sadly Zhang never tested positive for PSI ability in my game
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Feb 10, 2015 22:00
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Robindaybird posted:Sadly Zhang never tested positive for PSI ability in my game huh. Go figure. It happened so consistently for me (though to be fair he was always part of the first batch to be tested) that I literally never had him not test positive for PSI. Still though, I imagine if he tests positive in this lp, it would lead to some very nice dialogue as made by Speedball. (possibly involving the others wondering if somehow his potential for PSI had unknowingly helped him during his time with the Triad) I can have moments of... eccentricity and sometimes be quite curious about things. Please forgive me if I do something foolish or rude.
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Feb 10, 2015 23:52
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Hey, I can turn this into a book recommendation - The Player of Games, by the late Iain M. Banks. It's about the greatest game player in a thoroughly transhuman, post-scarcity Utopian culture called... well, the Culture. In the middle of the kind of existential crisis you can only have when mortality and personal wealth are no longer a concern, he's "volunteered" to travel to the backwards (by the Culture's standards) alien Empire of Azad, and play in the massively complex game that they use to elect their political figures. It's a very interesting exploration of interacting with a foreign mindset through gaming, how cultural artifacts can both reflect and influence a people's philosophy. And it's super well written! Give it a go!
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Feb 11, 2015 00:35
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Robindaybird posted:Sadly Zhang never tested positive for PSI ability in my game Zhang didn't need Psi powers to smoke that Sectoid in his recruitment mission. Dude's just such a stone cold badass he knows what you're going to do before you do.
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Feb 11, 2015 01:59
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Anybody who wants more Zhang in their lives should be happy because, as part of the B team, he's going to be invited for the next mission.
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Feb 11, 2015 02:39
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Eponymous posted:Hey, I can turn this into a book recommendation - The Player of Games, by the late Iain M. Banks. It's about the greatest game player in a thoroughly transhuman, post-scarcity Utopian culture called... well, the Culture. In the middle of the kind of existential crisis you can only have when mortality and personal wealth are no longer a concern, he's "volunteered" to travel to the backwards (by the Culture's standards) alien Empire of Azad, and play in the massively complex game that they use to elect their political figures. It's a very interesting exploration of interacting with a foreign mindset through gaming, how cultural artifacts can both reflect and influence a people's philosophy. And it's super well written! Give it a go! I just want to second this, it really is an excellent book and probably the easiest introduction to The Culture.
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Feb 11, 2015 02:46
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Eponymous posted:Hey, I can turn this into a book recommendation - The Player of Games, by the late Iain M. Banks. It's about the greatest game player in a thoroughly transhuman, post-scarcity Utopian culture called... well, the Culture. In the middle of the kind of existential crisis you can only have when mortality and personal wealth are no longer a concern, he's "volunteered" to travel to the backwards (by the Culture's standards) alien Empire of Azad, and play in the massively complex game that they use to elect their political figures. It's a very interesting exploration of interacting with a foreign mindset through gaming, how cultural artifacts can both reflect and influence a people's philosophy. And it's super well written! Give it a go! Thirded, I really love this book.
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Feb 11, 2015 03:09
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Speedball posted:What the hell kind of video game do aliens even play?! I'll have you know Super Gl'vny'x 3-D World is the pinnacle of the platformer genre.
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Feb 11, 2015 03:47
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Speedball posted:What the hell kind of video game do aliens even play?! Mind games.
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Feb 11, 2015 04:04
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Bobbin Threadbare posted:
 Also, everything by Iain Banks is great and worth reading. Don't be like me and read Excession as your first Culture novel, though.
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Feb 11, 2015 04:17
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Ego Trip posted:
I did that. It was a heck of an introduction.
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Feb 11, 2015 05:37
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Start with Consider Phlebas. It's the action movie of the series, all setpieces and big explosions.
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Feb 11, 2015 05:54
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I do like this justification for getting the B-Team out and about!
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Feb 11, 2015 07:24
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Jadestars commanders guide and the wiki both explained that a soldier needs a high Will stat to become Psionic, and seeing how Zhang already has a high stat for his rank, just getting him up to Colonel gives him an even better chance. You even get a special quote/achievement if you use him as the Volunteer
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Feb 11, 2015 07:53
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Glazius posted:I do like this justification for getting the B-Team out and about! It may also be because in the actual mission most of the squad got severely injured, and Speedball didn't tell us  Also, what's your country panic situation like, Speedball? I'm three months into my game and I've already lost Brazil and have five countries at four bars of panic (some of which I've already spent satellites on!), because I keep getting abduction missions (unavoidable panic increases in two entire continents) instead of UFO shot down/landed missions (panic decreases in one country). Not gonna lie, I'm a little bitter about missing out on We Have Ways; I have several weeks' worth of autopsies and interrogations lined up.
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Feb 11, 2015 16:46
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Speedball posted:What the hell kind of video game do aliens even play?! The obvious answer (to me) was Incoming Forces, which was the sequel to Incoming. The difference being that in Incoming you were defending Earth from aliens, wheras in Incoming Forces you're defending your own alien planet against the vengeful forces of Earth. Neither game is exactly stellar but it fits for this question.  Also I question whether or not Incoming was a smash hit per-se. Angry_Ed fucked around with this message at 18:01 on Feb 12, 2015 |
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Feb 11, 2015 16:58
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:It may also be because in the actual mission most of the squad got severely injured, and Speedball didn't tell us Hey, the promotions screen didn't lie, Bar-Lev's out for a week due to injuries and the SHIV needs to be repaired (but it's just 3 days, so it's nothing) Europe is pretty bad but got its panic reduced by going on the Alien Base mission. Africa and North America, despite not being locked down yet, are practically untouched by the aliens so they're fine.
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Feb 11, 2015 18:27
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Also, what's your country panic situation like, Speedball? I'm three months into my game and I've already lost Brazil and have five countries at four bars of panic (some of which I've already spent satellites on!), because I keep getting abduction missions (unavoidable panic increases in two entire continents) instead of UFO shot down/landed missions (panic decreases in one country). Not gonna lie, I'm a little bitter about missing out on We Have Ways; I have several weeks' worth of autopsies and interrogations lined up. It pays to cover entire continents with satellites in one go, because abductions never happen in countries with satellites over them.
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Feb 11, 2015 20:15
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Eponymous posted:Hey, I can turn this into a book recommendation - The Player of Games, by the late Iain M. Banks. It's about the greatest game player in a thoroughly transhuman, post-scarcity Utopian culture called... well, the Culture. In the middle of the kind of existential crisis you can only have when mortality and personal wealth are no longer a concern, he's "volunteered" to travel to the backwards (by the Culture's standards) alien Empire of Azad, and play in the massively complex game that they use to elect their political figures. It's a very interesting exploration of interacting with a foreign mindset through gaming, how cultural artifacts can both reflect and influence a people's philosophy. And it's super well written! Give it a go! Fourthing this recommendation, Banks is pretty awesome and the Player of Games is an awesome novel. I'm also looking forward to more shenanigans, I do hope though that Watkins never realizes that if she had stunned the Commander, maybe the eggheads back at HQ could have done something for Allen, like giving her a SHIV body or something like that. But maybe that's still an option, who knows how the future Sectoid Commanders will work out.
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Feb 11, 2015 20:16
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pun pundit posted:It pays to cover entire continents with satellites in one go, because abductions never happen in countries with satellites over them. Good to know. Guess I'd better plaster the rest of Asia with satellites then. Unfortunately I now have satellites over every continent...
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Feb 11, 2015 20:50
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I think I just discovered the answer to my own question. EDIT: inflatablefish posted:Oh God Zinchenko AN ALIEN GRENADE IS NOT A loving POOL BALL! FIRE IN THE HOLE! I forgot to give this its due. Hahaha. Speedball fucked around with this message at 08:17 on Feb 13, 2015 |
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Feb 13, 2015 07:19
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They didn't anticipate that humanity would be willing to invest the resources to field a full six shooters on the front lines. The invaders only budgeted for three humans, someone back on the homeworld's getting reamed over this one.
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Feb 13, 2015 07:46
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Chard posted:They didn't anticipate that humanity would be willing to invest the resources to field a full six shooters on the front lines. The invaders only budgeted for three humans, someone back on the homeworld's getting reamed over this one. Hey, that's twice as many as the XCOM Commander used to be able to field. So... progress, I guess?
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Feb 13, 2015 13:37
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Yes there's gonna be another update tomorrow. It's half-done now. Heh heh. More new untested gene-mods, and a new soldier joins the active battle squad. ...and several rejects get, well, rejected.
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Feb 14, 2015 07:21
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inflatablefish posted:Oh God Zinchenko AN ALIEN GRENADE IS NOT A loving POOL BALL! FIRE IN THE HOLE! Well... at least he sunk it right?
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Feb 15, 2015 00:35
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Speedball posted:Yes there's gonna be another update tomorrow. It's half-done now. Heh heh. More new untested gene-mods, and a new soldier joins the active battle squad. A new soldier? Is it someone you get as a mission reward or just a new hire from the "hire soldiers" option? or does that count as a spoiler? I can have moments of... eccentricity and sometimes be quite curious about things. Please forgive me if I do something foolish or rude.
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Feb 15, 2015 00:39
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Stephen9001 posted:A new soldier? Is it someone you get as a mission reward or just a new hire from the "hire soldiers" option? or does that count as a spoiler? Let's find out together in the update!
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Feb 15, 2015 01:29
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drat this update's gonna be even longer than I thought it would be.
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Feb 15, 2015 02:09
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Part 28: Many New Faces Alright, what have we learned from the corpses? The drone, the sectoid commander, and that flying disc?  The drone is just that, a drone. But we might be able to use what we’ve learned from it to improve our SHIV, give it self-repair abilities.  The “cyberdisc” is very strange. It’s like organic technology. We’ve learned a few things from it, including how to possibly create a backup life support organ for our troops in the form of a gene mod. And this… well, giving our soldiers its mental abilities will require a specialized facility, but in the meantime we’ve devised a gene mod that will cause any invasive telepath intense pain. It won’t necessarily prevent mental attacks, but the enemy will pay for it. Oooh. Brain spikes! We’re going to want to put that on everyone as soon as possible.  *sigh* What’s up? Well… I’d be a fool not to get upgraded with the “brain spikes,” but every new gene mod I get will make it more and more expensive to get the old me back. And I’ve had no real complaints, but I’d like to keep my options open, y’know? Heh. Well, I can’t go back. But I stopped minding once I realized that in the future, they’ll have more and more humanoid limbs for me, and that I’ll be basically immune to aging. I’ll be kicking rear end when I’m eighty. Whoah. Yeah. Heh. That’s a hell of a bright side. Actually, after it’s done altering DNA, the meld repairs your telomeres, too, the protein sheaths that shorten as you age. For people who’ve been repeatedly modified or exposed to meld, they won’t show signs of aging for a while. … what. And you inherited the DNA of someone who’d been exposed to meld at least four or five times, Watkins, so I imagine you’ll remain young for… possibly up to a hundred years. Whoah. Of course, if you still want me to reverse everything, I can. Your comfort is important to us. Okay, no. Screw going back! If anybody has a problem with that, I’ll be laughing at them all the way to the 22nd century. Splice me MORE, doc! Hmm, yeah, can I get brain spikes too? Now would be a good time for me to finally get upgraded… I could always use a vision modification. Hell I don’t care if you mutate me into a purple-skinned Beyonce, immortality is worth it!  ENOUGH! The A-team’s on break. That means the only people who get mutated are the ones who are gonna use it. That’s me, Hugo, maybe Zhang once he’s out of the hospital, and anyone else who doesn’t suck. Latisha’s right. Can I — NO! Commander, who else do we have? Uh, we haven’t hired any new talent recently, so, uh… it’s not good. Francois Roux, formerly a chef out of Quebec, lied on his eye exam and blows up in everyone’s face when they disagree about what spices to use. Ugh, pass. Bobo Bananas, actually a chimpanzee that got mutated into a human during Dr. Vahlen’s initial meld tests. I… learning… talk. Help… kill… bad? No, Bobo, you just go back to your room and play with your kittens, okay? Kitty! And lastly, Maria Vos, who is intelligent, disciplined, loyal and dedicated, but can’t hit the broad side of a barn and freaks out at the sight of blood. I’m sorry, sir! But if I fail you on the field of battle, I will surely never fail you in the filing department! See what I mean? It takes at least three days and 10 megacredits just to hire one new soldier who’s been cleared by every background check the Council of Nations has to offer. It takes three days to get melded, right? Welp, I’m going in the tube. I hope you can scrounge up someone better in that time, sir. No promises… I’m working on an advanced placement program, too, that’ll help us discover their specialties sooner. Little expensive, but we can afford it. Hugo, you can test out the brain spikes mutation. I’m getting this cheerleader mod. It’s called Adrenal Neurosympathy, and it— Cheerleader mod. If this process really rejuvenates me I want the full effect, ‘kay? Hope this doesn’t make me go crazy… Now, we wait… Now that we’ve got Asia covered, getting help setting up our new test chamber is a breeze. We just throw the recruits into what they think is a dangerous situation, and how they react will determine their exact aptitude. Bit devious, but I guess it’ll save us time… Latisha, how do you feel? loving amazing. That poo poo is better than a mud bath, I feel like I’m 25 again. You should start experiencing combat rushes in battle, and with your new pheremones you’ll pass that on to nearby troops as well. You should all become more alert as the battle progresses. Sweet. I’ve got coffee for blood! And how are you, Hugo? I also feel like I’m 25 again! But then again, I am 25, so… Ha! I feel…pretty normal, but sharp, in a way I can’t quite describe. Like I can speed up my thinking when I want to. I guess we won’t know if this mod can hurt telepaths until one tries to attack me. Well, worst-case scenario, we’ve just sacrificed our sleeves. Great, now hopefully next time it won’t take so much space to build more satellite facilities. Gonna be a bitch to pay for, though… Ahh, hell! No time for anything else, who’s going? Rhino, Hugo, the SHIV, Zhang (now that he’s out of the hospital), and…?  To expedite the background check process, we tried hiring several recruits who were rescued from the alien base. (On the grounds that anyone they were going to mulch are not secretly on their side). Of all the new recruits, Lea Gerard of Belgium has the most outstanding aim scores, making her perfect for a rookie sniper. No! That’s not right! Huh? My name is Yoko Tachibana! Look, as long as you can kill aliens, I don’t care if your name is Moon Unit Zappa. Get on the skyranger, rookie, before that UFO takes off! Now, who else is going? ME. What? Dad, you’re still in recovery from the ambush. You’re not the killing machine you used to be! I don’t care. Someone’s got to keep these kids in line, and if I go one more week without killing something I’ll lose my edge forever! …y’know what, I’ll allow this. But in the field you have to earn your rank all over again, Van Doorn. Ha! Fine.  So, Lea, why are you— It’s YOKO! The aliens ripped out my brain and stuck it in the body of some white girl from Belgium for an experiment. Nobody believes me ‘cause I don’t have any signs of melding or surgery. Okay… well, your accent doesn’t seem Belgian, at least. I joined XCOM because I was hoping they could meld me to look like the old me or whatever. Ha! Well, you’d better prove yourself on the battlefield, Miss Tachibana, ‘cause we don’t waste meld on losers. I will murder every alien in the solar system if that’s what it takes. That’s the spirit!   WOO! Okay, troops, I’m in command today. It’s daylight and the UFO is undamaged, which means there will be up to thirteen enemies inside, including the leaders in the bridge. We don’t have any anti-invisibility measures to kill Seekers with, so we’ll have to make do. Any questions? Should we— Right. No questions. GO! Three sectoids north, they haven’t seen us yet. Grab some cover, fast! Ahh, hell, skinnies to the southeast too! They’ve spotted us and pulled back. We’re in a pincer. Zhang, you, Hugo and the SHIV go southeast to take out the Thin Men. You’ll be better against their poison. Everyone else, with me to the north! Who’s piloting the SHIV? Who cares? GO! Ohhh, this is too sweet for words. They’re ALL exposed. Who dies today? Eenie, meenie, miney, mo… EAT LASER SHOTGUN!  OWWW! You little grey poo poo! That’s ONE! Great shot! Ahh, hell, he’s in high cover, I’ve got no angle. Not for long. Here’s a trick I learned. Blast the ground next to ‘em, showers’ em with dirt. If you’re lucky it hurts and confuses ‘em enough that they break cover.  And sometimes you get REALLY lucky, haha! WHOO! drat it feels good to get poo poo done, doesn’t it? Wow. I dunno what the hell you’re on, Mrs. Watkins, but I think it’s starting to rub off on me. It’s working! Neat.  There are several very spread-out Thin Men in hard cover. Fortunately I have modified my rockets for increased area of effect. Backblast area all clear, rocket away! Two down. One left, position unknown. (Mother of God, why is everyone around me so much more of a badass?) Hey, SHIV, scout ahead! There he is, I’m taking him out! Phew. Six of the twelve or thirteen estimated enemies down. That’s… two more squads, thereabouts, inside the ship. Plus the pilots. poo poo! Seekers! The things that keep attacking Cam! They’re out for revenge! Aaaah crap. I’ll see if I can ‘nade em if I can tell where they are. MUTONS! Whoah, nice shot, SHIV pilot…whoever you are! First muton down. Second one is weakened. It’s mine! That’s two. Great! Okay, folks, you know the drill. Everyone on overwatch and huddle close so you can shoot those drat squids off each other when they attack. Here you go, Yoko. Let me patch that hole in your armor. Ahh…thanks… AAAH poo poo! No worries, Van Doorn. I got it. God drat it I can’t believe it snuck up on me. I’m losing my touch! When I fought the inviso-ninjas of Shadow Brazil I could always hear ‘em coming. I need that skin Leroy has. Everyone move inside the saucer. Behind you! Phew… looks like I’m not infallible either. Thank you. Okay, that does it. Who the hell’s piloting the SHIV? Who, indeed? Whaaaaat?! Bullshit! I’m really good at video games, my friend. Heh heh. Right, folks, the bridge is the only part of the UFO we haven’t cleared. There’s two or three commanding aliens in there, I bet. Probably those weird Outsider things. We’ll open the doors on both sides, try to get ‘em in a crossfire. Breach on three…two…one! Holy fucknuggets, TWO Sectoid Commanders! Back off! Everyone but Hugo and the SHIV, back off, NOW! Moving forward! They cannot control a machine! Aaaah, hell, I’ll try to blitz them from behind their own cover! Hope these brain spikes work… ZINCHENKO YOU IDIOTA! I don’t know what happened, it said I had an 88% chance to hit! Ffffuck! Firing weapon! Got him! Ahh, hell, they’re charging up their brains! Hhhhuuuugooooo. Hugo Gutierrez… we have you now. Like hell! Get out of my head! DIE! W-what!? FEEDBACK!? AIIIGHG!!! Haha! It worked! N-no! What are you?! Aoooowwwwwww… You bastards! What did you do to me!? Hey, HEY! Ease up there, soldier! Let me try to take it alive. But— I said back off! There. We can find out all the answers we want after we fry this bastard on the interrogation bench and kick him in his nonexistent nuts a few times. Okay? …okay. Sorry, Mama Watkins. Whew! Mission complete, and a fantastic job, everyone! …not everyone. *sniff* Peter? *sniff* I didn’t get to kill anything! *sob* Awww… Not a scratch on anyone. Wonderful work. You’re both promoted, Hugo and Zhang. And we’ve proven the effectiveness of the brain spikes. We’re gonna want to install those in everyone. Thanks, sir! And Lea — excuse me, Yoko — we’re going to get to the bottom of what’s up with you. I don’t think you’re faking or a delusional. Oh. Thank you, sir. I’m sorry, I won’t let my temper get the better of me in the future. And by the way, Rhino, great job of keeping a level head despite all the juices energizing you. No problem, sir. I am a very good multi-tasker. Baaaaahhhh hoo hoo hoo hoo hoo… Aww, c’mon, dad. It’s over, Hilda. Your old man is useless. I couldn’t kill anything. loving Zinchenko was better out there than me. I’ve had missions where I couldn’t kill anything. You just need some more time to sharpen yourself up! Come on, let’s go to the bar, you’ll feel a lot better after a few Cuba Libres. *sniff* If you say so…
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Feb 15, 2015 07:47
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(Sorry if this one was a little long, I wasn't sure where to break it up)
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Feb 15, 2015 08:03
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That wasn't long at all! It had a nice narrative curve. Also - Van Doorn as a Squaddie (I see he was on his second mission, 'natch!) is hilarious, and I hope to see more of him in the future.
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Feb 15, 2015 08:19
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Zinchenko continues to get kills without using his sniper rifle. If only SHIVs had explosives.
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Feb 15, 2015 10:52
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Van Doorn is great. I hope to see more in the future. Good update dude, didnt feel long at all.
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Feb 15, 2015 16:07
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Peter Van Doorn: Hero of earth once more.
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Feb 15, 2015 16:14
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AAaah, it's great! Thanks, Speedball. Glad to finally see Yoko.
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Feb 15, 2015 16:40
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That was pretty awesome. Great comedic timing. Thanks for the update!
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Feb 15, 2015 16:43
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Now that you have captured a sectoid commander, my complaints about getting psi before then is more or less moot! I'm glad for that and am pleased to see that we have reasonable odds of getting a good pace for updates now. (this is not meant to either put pressure on you or jinx it, it's just that everyone would likely like relatively rapid updates, but we all respect you and won't complain too much whenever there seems to be a delay). Yeash, that part I put in brackets almost seems sorta passive aggressive... let me just tell you I don't mean it like that, and if I ever seem rude like that or whatever it's probably just not really being able to think of a better way to word what I think, or (like last time) curiosity winning out over politeness. Or I'm drunk, that's always possible. Wow, that's a lot of rambling, short version is that sectoid commander capture is good, hope for good pace of updates and then followed by stream of conscious rambling along the lines of "please don't interpret this in a bad way". I can have moments of... eccentricity and sometimes be quite curious about things. Please forgive me if I do something foolish or rude. Stephen9001 fucked around with this message at 16:56 on Feb 15, 2015 |
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Feb 15, 2015 16:50
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