2020 Miscellaneous Links: Untitled Moose Game

[Grefter]

Do you seriously think that isn't literally a day in the office for the Square Enix Design team?

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Do you seriously think that isn't literally a day in the office for the Square Enix Design team?

A day in the office for the Square-Enix design team

-Show up
-Complain about how gamers are too Western and want choice, agency
-Figure out what move their waifu should do in THIS pre-rendered video
-Fuck a dog
-Go back to their wives and children, who are strangers to them

[Grefter]

That's how I assume your road trips turn out yeah.

[AndrewRogue]

Has anyone here gotten their hands on the new Baldur's Gate Expansion? It is the new core of -internet drama- and I need some firsthand accounts.

[Grefter]

I haven't got around to it.  But I have heard two fronts of complaint.

One that a Baldir's Gate game, which is two linear games told in Chapters, set between two fixed plot points, is linear.

The other one is that the series with Edwin/Edwina has a woman who is Trans.  This game with magic and dragons is immersion breaking.  This series that made reference to the Girdle of Femininity/Masculinity from AD&D.  This series set in Forgotten Realms which is full of Ed Greenwood hippy free love progressivism.

Pick your poison.

[Shale]

Also, Minsc says "actually, it's about ethics in adventuring" once.

[AndrewRogue]

I have heard there is some possibly legit complaining about it being buggy, which is my actual concern. From what I understand, Beamdog has been pretty good about cleaning stuff up, but if it is legit bad I might want to hold off.

INB4: lol infinity engine, buggy, pick 2, then keep picking buggy

[Grefter]

My experience of the first two Enhanced Editions was buggy at release but yeah cleared up after 2 months or so.  Also yeah only really about as buggy as unpatched original games.

[dunie]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/new-york-paid-family-leave_us_5702ae75e4b0daf53af042b7

*tosses PIXIE DUST*

*erases Hillary photo op*

[NotMiki]

Also, Minsc says "actually, it's about ethics in adventuring" once.

Excellent.

[The Duck]

I had some problems with the other Baldur's Gate EEs at launch but they were good at patching things up. I tend to hold off for a few months now so that things stabilize and I do think Beamdog will fix most things by that time.

The reactions to this are also so predictable that they all must be written by Milo's 44 interns.

[Captain K]

http://zelda30tribute.com/

[DjinnAndTonic]

Well that was 5 hours of my life well spent.

[NotMiki]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-04-04/did-nintendo-fire-an-employee-to-appease-a-gamergate-mob

Just posting this to note that the Alison Rapp firing was noticed in a publication as mainstream as Bloomberg.

[Grefter]

Ed Greenwood latest 2 posts on the Baldur's Gate drama.

I am saddened by what I hear of the current kerfluffle raging about Siege of Dragonspear and the trans character Amber Scott designed and included in it.
Folks, the Realms have ALWAYS had characters (mortals and deities) who crossdressed, changed gender (and not just to sneak past guards in an adventure, by way of shapeshifting magic or illusions), were actively bisexual, and openly gay. How underscored this was by TSR and later Wizards varied over time, and was always softpedaled, because D&D wasn't a sex game, and we generally don't rub the reader's nose in sex unless there's a good in-story reason for it.
But even deities have changed gender, sometimes for good, and the servants of deities (Elminster, in ELMINSTER: THE MAKING OF A MAGE) have sometimes been forced by the deity to "spend time as the other" to learn what life is like.
So it has always been there, and is an integral part of the Realms. With that said, I've never met a gamer yet who doesn't tinker with every adventure to "make it their own" at their own gaming table, so if trans, LGBT, or sexual matters at all don't suit your tastes and needs in your gaming sessions, leave it out or change it.
But D&D has half-orcs, and half-dragons, and half-elves, and has magic items that specifically change gender, right there in the rules. Surely, if you can handle the basic notion of cross-SPECIES sex, having a full variety of gender roles should be something that doesn't blow your mind. If it's not for you, that's fine. I hate wearing certain shades of yellow. But I don't scream and yell at someone I see wearing those shades of yellow, and call them names, and threaten things. My right to dislike yellow applies to me; it doesn't extend to others. Because somehow, through an incredible oversight on the part of the universe that still hasn't been rectified, no one made me a god. (I'm still crushed.)

And another thing: I have always felt HONOURED to have met, worked with, and enjoyed the work of so many talented women in all of my professional fields (library work has traditionally been dominated by females, gaming hasn't, and fiction-writing was male-dominated when I was young, but has steadily shifted throughout my lifetime). Does Paul Jaquays becoming Jennell Jaquays rob his, now her, artwork or game design or prose of one iota of its richness and the enjoyment it gives me? NO! And how by the Nine flaming Hells does one human being made happier by being the gender they prefer to be lessen my own security, or happiness, or make my life the less?
Sheesh.
The world has REAL problems, people. Telling someone else how to behave in bed (or dress, or what jobs they can hold down) isn't one of them. Or shouldn't be.

Mic drop.

[AndrewRogue]

Speaking of, Tracer Butt Gate has ended. Blizzard has caved to the SJW illuminati. All games are ruined forever.

[NotMiki]

Turns out she's still wearing hotpants.  Who knew?!

This would all be really funny if it weren't for the death threats/rape threats/swatting.

[Captain K]

That's kind of... worse than the original?  Like now she's striking some kind of showgirl pose and sticking her chest out more.

[AndrewRogue]

Well, the ACTUAL ORIGINAL COMPLAINT was basically that it was a lazy sexy pose and not in-character for Tracer, which you can argue that this one deals with better.

On related notes, turns out it shall no longer be about ethics in adventuring.

https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/51161/beamdog-statement-on-siege-of-dragonspear

[Shale]

That's kind of... worse than the original?  Like now she's striking some kind of showgirl pose and sticking her chest out more.

Brianna Wu went into some detail on Twitter about how the underlying problem seems to be that Blizzard got way too into modeling her butt-crack.

[NotMiki]

Do you mean to imply that form-fitting clothing does not, in fact, achieve sentience and crawl into its wearer's anus?

[Hunter Sopko]

Do you mean to imply that form-fitting clothing does not, in fact, achieve sentience and crawl into its wearer's anus?

Many non-form-fitting kinds of clothes manage this, to be fair.

[AndrewRogue]

Do you mean to imply that form-fitting clothing does not, in fact, achieve sentience and crawl into its wearer's anus?

Many non-form-fitting kinds of clothes manage this, to be fair.

Source: My Boxers

[Grefter]

A reliable source for all kinds of fascinating stories.

[Hunter Sopko]

Funny. I was under the impression nothing of import happened there.