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RareAcumen posted:Crono Trigger is the most destiny free game I think. Everyone in the party aside from Crono or Ayla is important in some way. Given that the plot is basically "gently caress destiny, lets change it", that makes sense.
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Aug 17, 2018 10:54
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RareAcumen posted:Crono Trigger is the most destiny free game I think. Everyone in the party aside from Crono or Ayla is important in some way. Ayla’s the progenitor of a good chunk of humanity in the CT world, including the Guardia line (and more to the point Marle). She’s super important. It’s just not revealed until the closing minutes of the game so she seems rather unimportant in the grand scheme of things until then.
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Aug 17, 2018 11:38
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Max Wilco posted:I'm no big fan of Harry Potter either, but one sort of interesting aspect I remember (I don't know if this was intentional or not) is that in one of the books, it's said that the prophecy didn't explicitly say the Harry was the one to stop Voldemort. It was something along the lines of a child born on a certain day, and while Harry was born on that day, so was Neville Longbottom. That comment was mainly in reference to the divide between muggles and wizards. I don't think the books ever really explain why some people can use magic and others can't, but it's just taken for granted that this is the way things work. Neville's role in the last book was a nice twist, as it's always good to see a character who is treated as a joke grow up and become more fleshed-out. Unfortunately, this didn't work as well as it could have because so much of his development happened offscreen. With Luna (one of the few characters in the books I actually really like) her transformation from comic relief to capable hero happens naturally, but with Neville he just vanishes for most of the book and shows up at the end as a completely different person.
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Aug 17, 2018 13:24
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iirc there was a bit of development around him accepting and drawing inspiration from his parents' bravery
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Aug 17, 2018 13:28
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nine-gear crow posted:Ayla’s the progenitor of a good chunk of humanity in the CT world, including the Guardia line (and more to the point Marle). She’s super important. It’s just not revealed until the closing minutes of the game so she seems rather unimportant in the grand scheme of things until then. Oh, I just remembered her being some member of a tribe 65 million years ago. Kay, just Crono then.
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Aug 17, 2018 14:07
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Augus posted:Noah Caldwell-Gervais put out another huge video reviewing No Man’s Sky, this time in its latest, post-patch incarnation. "Not pushing myself to be a completionist about it certainly had a lot to do with that [having a positive review at launch]" I want this to be a slam against that one guy who just HAD to get EVERY collectable in Mario Odyssey and as such declared the game to be bad because there was way too many.
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Aug 17, 2018 14:49
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Strictly speaking, in Chrono Trigger all of the characters kind of have been chosen, it's only kind of discussed in one sidequest scene but the natural gates leading the party from time zone to time zone aren't a coincidence. They're created by the planet itself. It's showing them its history and the future it wants to avoid, and guiding them to the point that they'll be able to understand and remove the parasite that's threatening to destroy it.
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Aug 17, 2018 15:27
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Amusingly you can finish the game with Magus dead, Crono waiting to be revived, and R-66Y (What a great name) looking at his watch because you said you'd pick him up after 400 years. This leaves the heavy lifting to Ayla, Lucca, and Frog. Also Marle, but nobody uses her.
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Aug 17, 2018 15:42
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Harry Potter is great in that regard, since it makes pretty clear that there isn’t actually a destiny or a chosen one. Most prophecies, even the once given by genuine seers, are bogus since the future can always chance. The series has a lot of problems, but I always really liked that Harry specifically isn’t chosen by destiny, but be his own dedication to stopping Voldemort. Or better, that he was chosen be the villain, since it is mostly Voldemort’s believe in prophecies that fuels his pursuit of Harry. I hate chosen one narratives with a burning passion, since they are often explained incredible poorly, so I was very positively surprised when I read Harry Potter for the first time.
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Aug 17, 2018 15:50
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I always use Marle because I'm a wimp who likes having a dedicate healer...and her Ice water combo with Frog is just -broken- early on. Is there any game where your motivation in "I'm a radical/political weirdo/poo poo-disturber and that's basically it"? I think Chrono Trigger might have been the last game I played where the motivation wasn't They burned my village/killed my family/kidnapped my loved one.
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Aug 17, 2018 15:53
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Blade Runner 2049 is awesome for skewering the idea that anybody is special due to their circumstances, memories, or birthrights. Because that doesn't matter; what does matter is the choices one makes and the meaning they glean from their memories, whether real or imaginary.
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Aug 17, 2018 16:16
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Sephyr posted:I always use Marle because I'm a wimp who likes having a dedicate healer...and her Ice water combo with Frog is just -broken- early on. There's plenty of games where you're just exploring a tomb or dungeon or something because you're a treasure hunter.
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Aug 17, 2018 17:25
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Dragon's Dogma has you become the chosen one on account of being the only person who saw a dragon attacking their village, grab a rusty sword and went "I can do this". Then the dragon steals your heart and now you're the chosen.
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Aug 17, 2018 17:36
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New Contrapoints, hot off the presses! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fD2briZ6fB0
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Aug 17, 2018 17:40
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Augus posted:New Contrapoints, hot off the presses! I've been following the whole incel phenomenon for a while through mock threads here on SA and drama threads on reddit so I'm familiar with most of the incel stuff Natalie goes over but when you boil it down and take it seriously like she does in the first part of the video it's actually really disturbing.  Definitely worth a watch.
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Aug 17, 2018 18:18
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MelvinBison posted:More importantly, your character only fulfills that prophesy because becoming the chosen one is a condition of their parole. IIRC it's also impossible to make a character who actually fulfills all the requirements to be the chosen one. You can get most but not all. You're proclaimed the savior because you get the job done, rather than getting the job done because you're the savior. Acute Grill fucked around with this message at 18:21 on Aug 17, 2018 |
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Aug 17, 2018 18:18
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Augus posted:New Contrapoints, hot off the presses! how does it always, always come back to skulls?
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Aug 17, 2018 19:12
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SatansBestBuddy posted:how does it always, always come back to skulls? Because Khorne will not be denied!
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Aug 17, 2018 19:17
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Dabir posted:There's plenty of games where you're just exploring a tomb or dungeon or something because you're a treasure hunter. And those are fine. I just wish I could think of a game in which the protagonist is chasing a big goal because he or she -cares- about it, and that's that. You don't always need to wait for the Evil Empire to murder your parents before getting invested in fighting it, you know. One might even argue it's better that you don't!
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Aug 17, 2018 19:19
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Skulls for 90s kids were a symbol of a Cool Bad Dude, and these dorks really, really want to be Cool Bad Dudes. Same with katanas, duster coats, etc. Unfortunately, they did not have the self-awareness to realize that the Coolness and Badness comes from the dude, and that the symbols are incapable of bestowing those qualities on milquetoast weenies.
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Aug 17, 2018 19:22
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Augus posted:New Contrapoints, hot off the presses! This video is another Contra Classic(TM). There's a lot to unpack here. As someone who still visits communities that have their share of incels and people like incels I hear a lot of their terminology and I sympathize with Natalie where their words and hatred can infect you. I'm usually good about filtering out all that edgy alt-right dogma but some stuff seeps through and recently it got to a point where I left some communities because I grew tired of sharing a space with assholes.
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Aug 17, 2018 19:37
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Augus posted:New Contrapoints, hot off the presses! Enlightening, yet horrifying.
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Aug 17, 2018 19:47
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Rayna Denison guest talks about Princess Mononoke on Pause and Select and has criminally low view numbers right now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSN45qBFUO4 I could honestly watch a two hour cut of this video, there's just so, so much to unpack from this one movie.
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Aug 17, 2018 19:47
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SatansBestBuddy posted:how does it always, always come back to skulls? Phrenology is actually a very old, abandoned idea from the days when science was a lot less scientific than it is now. Fringe groups on the internet love to dredge up these kinds of long-discredited theories when they can’t find any real science to support their arguments, because it makes them feel like they aren’t just making poo poo up as they go along.
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Aug 17, 2018 19:51
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Incels: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVvg1CKBE20
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Aug 17, 2018 21:09
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Well, I made it to 27 seconds before I had to pause, making a face like I'd swallowed a lemon. How about you? e: Also most of the Suikoden games have you starting off as a regular guy just going about their business before you get wrapped up in events far bigger than yourself and swiftly radicalised into being/used as a figurehead of a violent rebel movement. Don't know how that plays out with your rebellious activist thing but there you go. I contributed. KayTee fucked around with this message at 21:21 on Aug 17, 2018 |
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Aug 17, 2018 21:16
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Arcsquad12 posted:Blade Runner 2049 is awesome for skewering the idea that anybody is special due to their circumstances, memories, or birthrights. Because that doesn't matter; what does matter is the choices one makes and the meaning they glean from their memories, whether real or imaginary. i actually had a bit of an epiphany wrt this (and coincidentally the new ContraPoints video, i guess, kinda) today earlier. I was talking about the matrix and suddenly realized that the matrix and they live are almost the same movie with a hidden upper class exploiting the populace through a false reality and such, with the exception that in They Live John Nada is a working class nobody who, through his inquisitive nature, stumbles upon the truth and basically ends up saving the world through connecting with other working class stiffs to bring down the status quo, while in the matrix neo is some middle class cubicle worker who becomes a messianic figure through the sheer force of predestination. (idc if i trigger some CineD trap with this, but i think most people relate to the film this way) I mean the red pill is basically the same thing as the sunglasses, except abstracted to the point where frustrated virgins can turn it into a misogynistic metaphor for a reactionary movement. and why i love 2049 is because K starts the movie wanting to be the Neo, but ends up realizing he's but a mere Nada, and still decides to take direct action, even if he won't be remembered as some grand historic hero. I feel it speaks directly to our late capitalist condition. or something, i don't know. I mean Nada is still a cheesy 80's action hero who saves the day by shooting the baad guys and blowing their base up, unlike K, but he couldn't have been a hero without coincidence and collective action, just like K. a cool fellow fucked around with this message at 22:01 on Aug 17, 2018 |
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Aug 17, 2018 21:16
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New Ross Game Dungeon, on Requital: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XOBtNSxKIw
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Aug 17, 2018 21:32
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PlayitBogart covers  the NES gamehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-xPswA4Lfc
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Aug 17, 2018 23:01
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RareAcumen posted:Crono Trigger is the most destiny free game I think. Everyone in the party aside from Crono or Ayla is important in some way. The Phantasy Star series is a favorite of mine that happens to fall into this category, especially part 2 (which I'll focus on to keep from drifting into the reeds in talking about 1-4). The series, as a whole, is grim and dark in ways that may not be outwardly obvious on the surface. 2 might be the darkest entry of the series (which is saying something considering that Phantasy Star 3 is called "Generations of Doom"). It's rare that any game rails as hard against the notion of traditional RPG notion of destiny as Phantasy Star 2, and does it in such a satisfying way.  edit: clipped a bunch of stuff as I already got carried away.Here, I'll let this sum things up. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkfdoT0tZB0 He gets a couple details wrong. One in mentioning that the appearance of Darkfalz (the true boss of part 1 and a reoccurring entity throughout the series) feeling tacked on. It's the harbinger of things to come. The second - which is much more understandable - is not knowing what happens after the events of 2. This is because of a - frankly - awful translation of Phantasy Star 3's plot that muddied everything. The short of it was the villains of 2 succeeded, took over the planets and essentially threw the worlds into the Dark Ages.
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Aug 17, 2018 23:13
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Max Wilco posted:New Ross Game Dungeon, on Requital: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XOBtNSxKIw That bit at the end of the game where you can choose to turn evil and then continue to play the game and fight all your former allies is a really cool concept completely wasted on a game that doesn't know what to do it (or really pretty much anything). I hope a better game can do that concept justice.
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Aug 18, 2018 00:21
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Mr.Radar posted:That bit at the end of the game where you can choose to turn evil and then continue to play the game and fight all your former allies is a really cool concept completely wasted on a game that doesn't know what to do it (or really pretty much anything). I hope a better game can do that concept justice. Haven't watched the video yet, but I do know of a few games like that. Shin Megami Tensei IV Apocalypse has something like that, where your mentor/patron deity has been saying all game that his goal is to annihilate all life and return everything to the beginning and you can choose to follow that path where you fight all your allies. There's also Soul Nomad, where on a New Game + you can play "The Demon Path" which can either end in your character committing Omnicide or your character getting sealed in a sword like the previous Big Bad was.
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Aug 18, 2018 00:28
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Bakeneko posted:Phrenology is actually a very old, abandoned idea from the days when science was a lot less scientific than it is now. Fringe groups on the internet love to dredge up these kinds of long-discredited theories when they can’t find any real science to support their arguments, because it makes them feel like they aren’t just making poo poo up as they go along. This is likely going to end with some of these people getting really into trepanning and killing themselves.
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Aug 18, 2018 01:01
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Mr.Radar posted:That bit at the end of the game where you can choose to turn evil and then continue to play the game and fight all your former allies is a really cool concept completely wasted on a game that doesn't know what to do it (or really pretty much anything). I hope a better game can do that concept justice. Star Wars: Jedi Academy did that decently imo.
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Aug 18, 2018 01:10
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The intro to that Incel's video by nathalie made me shudder, good job PhiTube but drat. I'm pretty familiar with the incelsphere but hearing it out loud doesn't help.
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Aug 18, 2018 01:31
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gently caress that was actually Natalie's Tinder account then. small loving world.
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Aug 18, 2018 01:36
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The incel perception of the chad is the strangest thing about them. You’d think they would hate Chad, but he’s like this terrible god or unknowable wildman of the wilderness they revere from afar. It’s actually a perfect example of homosociality, something I found implausible when I learned about it in college, but which I have come to know is accurate through seeing the internet. I don’t think they’re gay or bi to any degree, but it’s just a really clear tell that they’re on the massively extreme end of regular American misogyny, where it’s kind of folded back in on itself because they fail at using women as objects. Natalie’s analysis is dead-on. They’re a problem created by modernity and as capitalism continues to unravel they’re on,y going to get worse. I really don’t see what’s to be done about them, although like the rest of the internet reactionaries of the world, they’re not particularly numerous and mostly leave an outsized footprint online (other than when they murder people). It’s kind of fun that Oliver Thorne/Philosophy Tube slips into sounding like a few different Canadian accents when doing an American one and yelling. He’s good at the performance, although it has to be worse for your soul than performing in a million tragedies.
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Aug 18, 2018 04:26
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business hammocks posted:The incel perception of the chad is the strangest thing about them. You’d think they would hate Chad, but he’s like this terrible god or unknowable wildman of the wilderness they revere from afar. It’s actually a perfect example of homosociality, something I found implausible when I learned about it in college, but which I have come to know is accurate through seeing the internet. I don’t think they’re gay or bi to any degree, but it’s just a really clear tell that they’re on the massively extreme end of regular American misogyny, where it’s kind of folded back in on itself because they fail at using women as objects. yeah, i am weirdly shocked they don't hate chads. when i was lonely angry high school/jr high kid. i always blamed the dudes. i didnt blame the women because they can't help what they find attractive or whatever my logic was then. I wouldnt say i feel sympathy for them but i do have empathy. It took me a long loving while to meet girl who would go out with me much less get laid. Having physical disibilities plus being a weird nerd does that. eventually it sorta just clicked. sure the first gf didn't work out but i have been with my current GF for almost 3 years now. okcupid/dating sites loving destroys yourself esteem sometimes because alot of girls can be really loving cruel. i can't fully blame them because of all the assholes but it still hurts. they get sick of hearing people tell them they are "great and handsome" and "girls will love them" and after awhile it feels like lies and incel stuff starts to sound like truth. so yeah gently caress em, but there by the grace of god go I. if my parents hadn't taught to be a decent person. i could be one of these fucks. Dapper_Swindler fucked around with this message at 05:11 on Aug 18, 2018 |
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Aug 18, 2018 05:07
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Best part of the whole Chad thing is it gave us the virgin/Chad meme, which has made for funny stuff. One I saw recently in the Infinity Engine thread (minor spoilers for Baldur's Gate 1&2):  Baka-nin posted:PlayitBogart covers It's cool to see PlayItBogart's still making content. I found an archive of his old stuff, along with some other reviewers who were notable around that time (most notable ones being Armake21 and UrinatingTree). Max Wilco fucked around with this message at 06:03 on Aug 18, 2018 |
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Aug 18, 2018 06:01
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Augus posted:New Contrapoints, hot off the presses! Learn a lot in this video, glad I'm not a wristcel (lol) Wish the music/sound-effects were a bit more quiet
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Aug 18, 2018 20:50
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