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1stGear posted:So people who haven't read Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead can understand the reference, its a play following the perspective of two minor characters in Hamlet, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. But instead of playing the perspective straight, R&G are somewhat aware that things are...off. The two essentially wander through the events of Hamlet as the major characters of that play briefly intersect with the parts that R&G played as occurred in Hamlet. Its a heavily meta play and touches on themes of fate, insignificance, and the line between art and reality. The coin flipping is a reference to an event from the beginning of the play where the two are betting on coin flips and every single time the coin comes up heads. A perfectly ordinary lighthouse rocket-transport. But today Booker DeWitt found himself not taken to a holy Paradise on Earth. Today, this capsule took him on a one-man trip, to the Twilight Zone. And yeah, R&G are Dead is an incredible bit of theater full of humor and wordplay and metahumor and philosophy and absolutely marvelous.
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# ¿ Aug 26, 2013 07:19 |
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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 04:09 |
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Also, Comstock's religion was apparently not intended to reference Mormonism, but when you go for a splinter sect with an American Exceptionalism focus there's going to be some similar themes. Whether that's true or "don't piss off the Mormons" marketing spin is up to the viewer. That said, when I reached the baptism my first words were "oh poo poo, I'm in Mormon Stepford." The bit before the baptism, "if he had done this and had not done the other thing it would have been enough," does anyone know if this is general Christian liturgy? I know it as Dayenu, a song Jews tend to sing at Passover dating from the Middle Ages, but the style is so strong I wouldn't be surprised if it's been appropriated and adapted outside of this game.
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# ¿ Aug 26, 2013 07:56 |
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Sundowner posted:
I think a lot of "we're going to give you clues from the start that you have no idea are clues because we're not going 'mwahaha' after saying them" games (for example 999 and Virtue's Last Reward) have this effect when LP'd. When you're playing the game you move from scene to scene without any time to stop and reflect, while LPs go in chunks so you have a lot less to digest at a time (or in the case of screenshot LPs, things which were onscreen for a second get plenty of time sticking around to be noticed). There's also a lot more eyes on any given part of the story than when one person's playing. When I played it myself I had to rely on dreams to figure things out, when playing I was just too caught up in the top-level of figuring out how to kill whatever was in my way.
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# ¿ Aug 26, 2013 08:46 |
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Where things started feeling silly to me was when I pulled a cup of steaming hot coffee out of the trash and drank it.
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# ¿ Aug 26, 2013 20:14 |
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Attestant posted:It's pretty easy to miss for some weird reason. The game itself even gives you the option to hold a button to focus the camera on it, and I still missed it the first time I played. I blame the fact that you approach the statue from the side and are somewhat distant from it. It doesn't change profile quite enough to draw your attention, if you miss the weird static effect. Yeah, first time I saw it I thought it was some glitchy "error in the Matrix" kind of thing, but didn't see any actual change.
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# ¿ Aug 27, 2013 11:23 |
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Note the second piece of clothing was from a broken gear vending machine (we never see any working ones to use) that features a stylized Jewish tailor as its mascot. Just a bit more of the casual racism. That "mulatto dwarf or a Frenchman with a missing left eye" line sounds like it's referencing something, but I have been unable to find any hints what. Anyone have any ideas?
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# ¿ Aug 28, 2013 01:12 |
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Louispul5 posted:Until then, I have never understood why the Irish aren't "white." They're the whitest non-albinos ever, but every racist group hates them, here and in Europe. It's the immigrants. America got a flood of Irish immigrants, which became a reason for the established True Americans (aka the LAST wave of immigrants) to complain about them taking up space and taking jobs and all that fun stuff when you can abuse a group of downtrodden people and then get mad at them for letting you do so. These days you get some residual stuff (mostly from history books) but the Irish have been around long enough to be complaining about the new immigrants, and I doubt you'd find many folks in the modern day who didn't call them "white" as a result. America: if you come here and put up with hate long enough you get to pretend you didn't deal with any of it and hate the next folks in line. Unless you're black, then you never get un-screwed. EDIT: to answer your comment less indirectly, you can't go hatin' on white folks, that's just not Christian. Anyone you're hating has to have a reason not to be white.
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# ¿ Aug 28, 2013 02:41 |
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The amusing thing with God Only Knows is that they did such a good job adapting it to barbershop (though the Beach Boys are already pretty much all bout pure tones and harmonies and all that) that it took me a good two minutes of listening to remember that it wasn't supposed to sound that way or exist in 1900.
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# ¿ Aug 28, 2013 03:03 |
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It's odd, there's some bits of info I've figured out but I can't recall how I figured them out. For example the Order of the Raven doesn't get any more information, and I know some pieces people haven't mentioned, but I can't recall if dots I connected for that came later. I'll have to re-watch the first videos to figure out what we know.
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# ¿ Aug 28, 2013 05:34 |
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Speedball posted:The first words of the title of this LP being "Quantum Theory" keeps fooling my subconscious into thinking this is an entirely different video game. "Quantum Theory," an attempt at imitating Gears of War that had some neat setting ideas but absolutely terrible gameplay. It could be Quantum Conundrum. Booker sends all of Columbia into the fluffy dimension.
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# ¿ Aug 28, 2013 05:53 |
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It could also me a more literal meaning of misogynist, "someone who would go and harm those fragile little creatures who men should be protecting."
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# ¿ Aug 28, 2013 08:47 |
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Real hurthling! posted:Maybe the cop was dumb? Misogyny is his sled.
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# ¿ Aug 29, 2013 02:01 |
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thiswayliesmadness posted:Are we allowed to spoil future songs they're going to "old tyme" up? I honestly didn't notice this part of the game at all till later on [...] and heard a popular 80's song. Whoever did the job of converting some of the music was just fantastic. 95% of people miss that song, and 100% of people have a "what the frak" moment when it's pointed out to them, but I think it can wait. Don't want to spoil the surprise. And I agree, somebody had a lot of fun making bits of these games. Whoever drew/painted/whateverthetermis those paintings depicting Lincoln? They're so detailed and so well done.
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# ¿ Aug 29, 2013 04:38 |
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JamieTheD posted:So, Letuce and her "brother"... Doesn't anyone think it weird that they literally seem to have one mind? This is my speculation: They're both a single Schrodinger's Cat. In the "Unadulterated Cat" sense of the phrase. It'd be heavy handed, but it makes sense, in the way people popularly understand Quantum... thingumajigs. It's a twin/BFF thing. My brother and I have spent so much time together that we'll finish each other's sentences and pick up trains of thought before the other person's finished saying them. Other people say it's like we're speaking code to each other; when we really get into a problem or idea we use just enough words and gestures for the other guy to run with it, since we know how each other thinks and don't have to worry much about being misunderstood. It also gets me in trouble with other people when they can't follow what I'm saying, because I do it out of habit. I'll drop off in mid-sentence because the guy I usually talk to can fill in the blanks, leaving whoever I'm currently talking to hanging.
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# ¿ Aug 29, 2013 19:28 |
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dotchan posted:On "It Would Have Been Enough", Google says Joseph Smith preached a sermon on this very topic. Man, that sermon makes me feel uneasy. Please indulge me for a moment while I try to sort out why. Dayenu and the Bioshock ones are songs of praise, one to Hashem and one to Comstock. Dayenu builds through the whole thing, ending with the biggest moments of the giving of the Torah, delivery into Israel, and building of the first Temple. The Bioshock one builds as well, in tone at least. "Sacrifice of his beloved" and "expulsion of the Vox Populi" don't mean much to us the listener without context, but the preacher certainly feels they're important. Smith's sermon is a eulogy. It takes a woman's life and forces it into the structure, and instead of praising her will, or wisdom, or kindness, it gives credit at every step along the way to God, including such things as "they moved into a different house, praise the Lord!" The climax, the greatest deed done if following the structure of the original poem, is her death. Maybe it was better in person, I've known some powerful orators who don't translate to paper well and you don't found a religion as a clumsy speaker, but the whole thing feels off.
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# ¿ Aug 29, 2013 22:01 |
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Sundowner posted:Edit: Oh yeah, I bought the season pass earlier this week so now my guns are gold. A little weird and I'm not sure if it's a permanent thing. I personally like 'em because they look really cool and ornate but, eh, whatever. I don't know how to access my bonus infusions after starting a new game or if I even can, I don't even know if I should use them anyway considering they're just flat out free upgrades for being a season pass holder. Once you pass the Blue Ribbon you can't get em.
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# ¿ Sep 4, 2013 22:45 |
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The book Elizabeth wields is The Principles of Quantum Mechanics by Rosalind Lutece. I'd like to note that this isn't quite an anachronism like some other things. Modern-ish "many worlds" quantum is from the late 70s/early 80s, but Planck's hypothesis was in the late 1890s, and Einstein used it in 1905 to explain the photoelectric effect. I just wanted to head that off before anyone jumped on it, I've seen that happen in every thread about this game on every forum. Lutece, of course, is entirely fictional as are her contributions to the field. The phrase "quantum mechanics" to classify all this stuff is slightly anachronistic by five years or so but I think that can be attributed to her research, unlike some other things we've heard in this game.
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# ¿ Sep 5, 2013 22:53 |
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John Liver posted:This is a similar situation to the barbershop quartet, I noticed - sounds like the song is Everybody Wants to Rule the World. It plays in Paris as well, though a lot of folks are too busy looking at Paris to notice that.
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# ¿ Sep 6, 2013 00:21 |
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Ulvirich posted:Surprised no one mentioned the title of the book Elizabeth was holding when she's about to clock Booker upside the head. I did.
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# ¿ Sep 6, 2013 04:33 |
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And the children's rhyme for completion's sake: "Songbird, Songbird see him fly, drop the children from the sky. When the young ones misbehave, escorts children to their grave. Never back-talk, never lie, or he'll drop you from the sky!"
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# ¿ Sep 8, 2013 05:10 |
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That song is very subtle, and I've seen a lot of folks say "man I was humming that song when I left the boardwalk but I had no idea why." It's neat. You skipped (understandably especially since this was a replayand there's a lot of stuff to show off) taking Elizabeth around the beach. She'll comment on things, try to lift one of the medicine balls, and generally be adorable.
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# ¿ Sep 10, 2013 22:11 |
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Some other little touches, the bits before the ambush of people trying to act natural. "Do you sell... sauerkraut" and the guy saying it was a dollar when the sign on the stand says two gets me every time.
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# ¿ Sep 10, 2013 23:01 |
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CommissarMega posted:...which is why they're able to connect each others' sentences and such... That's just a matter of being close. My twin brother and I do it all the time, and I've seen other people do it as well once they've known each other for ages. It tends to feel odd to an outside viewer because if we do it ourselves it feels natural since our brains are supplying the context and the rest of the words. Like listening to one side of a telephone call.
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# ¿ Sep 11, 2013 05:07 |
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Claven666 posted:Can someone be white but not be "white"? If a reason must be found for one man to hate another man he feels must be hated, a reason will be found no matter how twisted the logic.
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# ¿ Sep 15, 2013 07:26 |
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Ekster posted:Sorry for not clarifying before, but yes I have read the previous posts, but I wasn't sure about how mainstream these viewpoints actually were. Judging from the previous reactions, apparently more mainstream than I thought. Guess my view of early 20th century America was more rosy than I had previously thought. Sorry about that. It's not something Americans like to talk about unless they're drumming up political support in certain parts of the country. Usually gets a brief mention in history class, which may be followed by a "but that's all better now, we fixed it" depending on the teacher. Spoiler: it's better than it was, but we haven't fixed it.
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# ¿ Sep 15, 2013 17:36 |
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citybeatnik posted:My West Texas, Church of Christ dirt farming grandparents said the exact same thing about my mother. My mom made a couple of comments the first time I dated a non-Jewish girl, but they stopped when I pointed to my goyim dad and asked if my grandparents said the same thing when she married him (they did, and she gave them an earful about it at the time). It led to some useful discussion about reflex reactions and first- and second-thoughts, so I don't hold it against her.
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# ¿ Sep 16, 2013 06:00 |
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cokerpilot posted:So what was the replica heater? Another weapon.
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# ¿ Sep 17, 2013 00:06 |
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In RPG terms, high Int low Wis.
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# ¿ Sep 20, 2013 05:06 |
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ynohtna posted:Wow, they really do love doing the whole Harry Lime heavy characterisation of people we've yet to meet in these *Shock games, don't they? It's been ages since I've seen The Third Man, can you explain what you mean by this?
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# ¿ Sep 24, 2013 01:22 |
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citybeatnik posted:Anyone recognize that song that was playing ~15 minutes in to the video? I can't quite make it out but I swear I recognize it from somewhere. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LQfRXalvHQ The Bonnie Blue Flag. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bonnie_Blue_Flag has the full lyrics of both it and the Union's version. Bruceski fucked around with this message at 01:31 on Sep 25, 2013 |
# ¿ Sep 25, 2013 01:28 |
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Abilifier posted:I just read about Wounded Knee on Wikipedia. Was this covered in the thread yet? Because that little bit of history really adds a lot to the characters of Slate, Booker, and Comstock. I'll add a quick summary if it seems appropriate. It has not and oof, is it nasty. Having been both there and with the Pinkertons it's not surprising that the office flashbacks (hallucinations or whatever you wanna call them, definitely some dream/nightmare and reality intermixed) show him sitting there staring at a bottle.
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# ¿ Oct 5, 2013 21:27 |
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Abilifier posted:I also saw this quote from L. Frank Baum, you know, the guy who wrote The Wizard of Oz Here's the full text of Baum's editorials for Wounded Knee and Sitting Bull's death, taken from http://hsmt.history.ox.ac.uk/courses_reading/undergraduate/authority_of_nature/week_7/baum.pdf quote:The Sitting Bull Editorial quote:The Wounded Knee Editorial Hard to pin doiwn a man's mind a hundred and twenty-five years after the fact, but it sounds like someone disgusted at what had been done, but who felt that there was no way to redeem the Sioux.
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# ¿ Oct 6, 2013 00:27 |
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Dr. Buttass posted:There's a rather brilliant series of blog posts kicking around the internet about how the Twilight series is just riddled with unconscious references to Mormonism (Cliff's Notes version: Edward Cullen is Joseph Smith. Stephanie Meyer wants to screw her prophet). I think it serves better as commentary on the faith than as a form of actual entertainment; if I recall the posts correctly pretty much everything creepy and/or incongruous in those books is rooted in Mormonism to a greater or lesser degree. Even the stuff that isn't directly relevant to the faith still gets a pass on the basis of Jose-I mean Edward being super hot. The ones I've seen about that tend to do quite a bit of reaching to reinforce their argument. Things like "the books have Native American characters, Mormons believe they have a ancestral link to Native Americans" or "Bella doesn't drink tea, Mormons don't drink tea, therefore THESE BOOKS ARE ENTIRELY ABOUT MORMON DOCTRINE." They're definitely books written from a "nice boys and girls who do the things nice boys and girls do" perspective that has values lagging a bit behind the times in a manner shared by Mormonism and other religions (but not all religions and not exclusive to religions), but there's a fair bit of difference between that and "Meyer wants to bone Joseph Smith." That said, I consider my threshold of "books that exist as a mouthpiece for religion/author's philosophy" to be the Narnia series, particularly the later books. That's a pretty high bar to pass, and I think the only other books I've willingly read that passed it are the Golden Compass trilogy, where one character stands up on a soapbox and monologues about everything that's wrong with the Catholic church. Bruceski fucked around with this message at 14:08 on Oct 8, 2013 |
# ¿ Oct 8, 2013 14:01 |
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Kangra posted:I'm sure you know this, but Pullman did this deliberately as a sort of response to the Narnia books (and his criticism could well have been aimed at the Anglicans as well as the Catholics). No, I didn't know that. Did he intend it as a satire or "you think you can write a heavy-handed essay of your dogma disguised as a children's story? Check THIS out!" Because it doesn't really work on the former count.
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# ¿ Oct 9, 2013 00:11 |
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Trust me, we can't even safely tell you what Elizabeth had for breakfast. Unless you think it's been mentioned and you missed it, just don't ask.
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# ¿ Oct 22, 2013 23:05 |
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Flesnolk posted:I seem to recall the "pay your workers in tender only valid at the company store" was a thing, too, but I can't recall the why of it. Because it means you keep all the money. If I can get everyone working for me using tender that can only be exchanged for my goods I can jerk wages and fees around all I want. You get a 10% raise and everything at the store's more expensive! It also keeps them from leaving. No saving up to start somewhere else.
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# ¿ Oct 30, 2013 02:55 |
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Capitalist barons were used to thinking big. Buffalo Bill was hired to feed the railway workers and personally killed 4200 bison in eight months, if you believe the tales he told about himself. A lot of these work areas (depending on the industry) were towns in their own right, so the boss provided the food, the lodging, the transport... not a situation where you can just pop over to Safeway for some tomatoes. And it let him skim off every side.
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# ¿ Oct 30, 2013 04:22 |
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Flesnolk posted:Well now don't I look stupid, but at least it's an interesting topic. Thanks for bearing with me. Oh yeah, I meant things more as teaching than admonishing. A lot of the major American fortunes (Rockefeller, Carnegie, Morgan, the kinds of names you now see in PBS credits) were made in this era between the Civil War and the rise of the unions and workers' rights, it's kinda both fascinating and horrifying what they got away with.
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# ¿ Oct 30, 2013 04:37 |
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Hirayuki posted:Is there an easy way to tell the Columbias apart, or are you truly stuck in this version of it with no hope of return? (Don't answer that spoilery last part.) I often have a hard time knowing where I am in parallel-world games. At various points the Games threads have exploded with people trying to make sense of things, so I'd recommend you just do like Mystery Science Theater. Repeat to yourself it's just a game and relax. They don't do any "slipped back into Universe A without noticing" kind of thing, it's all up front.
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# ¿ Nov 6, 2013 01:27 |
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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 04:09 |
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Rather than Red and Blue universes, the weapons' proper labels are Vox and Police. The Police weapons tend to be more standard, the Vox ones are cobbles together, stronger but less accurate or smaller clips and such. I'd like the idea of "variations on a theme" with those weapons a lot more if the upgrades were for each pair rather than separate ones for the Vox weapons. It spreads the whole upgrade mechanic a bit too thin for my tastes.
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# ¿ Nov 13, 2013 01:07 |