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Gaming / Marvel vs Capcom Infinite

« Last post by vladgd on Today at 01:44:24 AM »

This topic probably won't go anywhere because this place (and most places) just aren't into the genre. But, despite my better judgement, and capcom burning me twice in the past "cough" street fighter x tekken and street fighter 5 "cough", I BOUGHT IT ANYWAY BECAUSE IM A CAPCUCK.

This post shouldn't be too long because I haven't had the time to invest too much into it, so here's my initial impressions.

THE GAME LOOKS AWFUL. seriously, marvel vs capcom 3 looked great, the character models in that game still look great today(I may argue some characters look better than even sf5, which I think has pretty good looking characters), and they look 1000 times better than what infinite has to offer. Do not buy this game to be impressed by graphics, besides a (small) handfull of characters, they look flatout BAD. HERE IS AN EXAMPLE!



OK they did fix her face to...



but cmon this was marvel 3, YEEEEEEEAAAAAAAARRRRRRRSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS AGO



So the game looks like ass, and im not even a graphics snob (you can tell from mass effect andromeda). But we as people who enjoy games, do not play a game for looks, that's what movies are for, we play them for the gameplay.

The game is fun. Ignoring Tekken because another companies game wouldn't be fair, not to mention comparing a 3d namco fighting game to a capcom vs series game is just apples to oranges. The freedom you get from marvel is still intact. It isn't like street fighter 5 where you're locked down to specific paths. OHH WITH ALEX YOU CAN ONLY DO A LIGHT FLASH CHOP AFTER A STANDING MEDIUM PUNCH AND THATS IT~! NOTHING MORE NOTHING LESS

So I don't have a team yet but i'm playing around with firebrand, ghostrider, haggar, frank west, doctor strange, and im open to more. It's really fun seeing what's possible and what synergy characters can have with eachother. The sense of exploration like if I do this thing with ghostrider, then tag firebrand, can I do this other thing? Well you probably can, and it feels like you have a ton of options at your disposal.

Day 3 verdict

GRAPHICS BAD, GAMEPLAY GUD

WORTH PURCHASE

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Gaming / Re: World of Warcraft

« Last post by Spectere on September 19, 2017, 10:57:39 AM »

I think that might be why my perceptions with regards to leveling are colored a bit differently--I started in TBC soon after the Black Temple raid was released, so the vanilla content set was complete. Plus, I had the option of packing up and leaving at level 58, which made the final push to 60 absurdly easy, given the exp curve in TBC compared to vanilla. I've done a bit of reading and from what I understand some zones (like Silithus) had almost zero content, even general questing, for quite a while. I really think that if I started WoW during early to mid-vanilla (and I almost did!) I would have probably gotten disgusted around the mid-50s and quit.

And yeah, heirlooms became such a ho-hum thing that I completely forgot to factor those in. You would definitely see quite a lot more of the world without having those equipped.

a horde warrior so I can have my favorite class on the better faction

\m/

(minus the bloodelves, if you want alliance then play goddamn alliance).

Shit man, even the Alliance didn't want them.

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Gaming / Re: World of Warcraft

« Last post by vladgd on September 19, 2017, 01:18:27 AM »

I will say as someone who's best times with the game were in vanilla, the new leveling is 1000% better. ANY class you fancy can be had in a few weeks of casual play, or one or two marathon game sessions, with pre requisites. IE heirlooms, alts with money, pathfinder unlocked, legion assaults unlocked, a proper gameplan on how to efficiently get through the content and all that jazz. I see no drawbacks to it mainly for one reason I overheard on a youtube video. Lore Alt. If you want to go through the leveling process 1-110 and experience the zones, you can, don't use heirlooms, stay in each zone long enough to get what you want out of them and whatnot(which you'll have to because even without heirlooms you'll most likely overlevel them before you're done, I know this is a fact in outland where you can EASILY finish before even blades edge mountains, let alone netherstorm or shadowmoon). They balance the leveling curve for the current expansion now a days, and past expansions are like hyperspeed.

So damn near my entire current wow experience has been in this thread for the most part, and draenor went fast, and while legion went by fast too...I still went through most of the zones/quests. With my mage, I wasn't using heirlooms at all, and I got through most of 3 zones, and ~half way through the last leveling zone before I dinged 110. It did feel like a balanced well paced and most importantly to me, fair, leveling experience. Because as much as I'll suck vanillas dick all day, the leveling was pretty brutal (not at all compared to the mmos of the day because even hard wow was casual as fuck compared to everquest or something, but comparing it to what the game has become) and there was rarely enough quests in a zone or even series of zones for your level range, to get to the next zone, so you'd have to grind.

I had two 60's in vanilla for the ~90-100 days I had played it, game made you commit to a character. But on both of said characters, I specifically recall dinging them 60 the same way, last 2-3 levels ghosts in the frozen pond in winterspring, and I know I'm not alone in that. There was simply not enough content made to finish the leveling process by questing, which they went above and beyond in TBC. My memories of TBC leveling may be my most fond now that I think of it. It was like a midpoint between vanilla and now, it took a lot of effort to gain a level, but there was more than enough quests to get you there. I remember draining the quest's out of damn near every zone with only the latter part of shadowmoon not being required, and it was nice to see all of the content.

But I think I'm rambling now so this is a snapshot of my current status level wise. Everybody is in legion assault mode, and depending on interest I may just shelve the hunter until the next expansion. If I finish with 8 max level characters, not going to be disappointed. I honestly don't even care at all about monk/druid so I may just never bother playing either of them. Hunter seems like a fun easy class to just brute force to 110 casually, so I may use my next max level boost (from the next expansion) on a rogue...or if I'm crazy, a horde warrior so I can have my favorite class on the better faction(minus the bloodelves, if you want alliance then play goddamn alliance).

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Random Chat / Re: Youtube Copyright

« Last post by Spectere on September 18, 2017, 11:45:44 PM »

Disclaimer: Sorry if this is a bit scatterbrained. I'm getting ready for bed, so this is basically a bunch of stream-of-consciousness ramblings.

Kind of a tricky question, really. I'd say "yes" because it makes the Internet more legitimized and..."no," because it makes the Internet more legitimized.

It's a two-sided coin. On one hand, legitimately acquiring and consuming media has become cheaper, easier, and more convenient than ever thanks to companies taking it seriously. These distribution models are equally useful for larger companies and indies. If there were major barriers to entry with regards to media creation and distribution, people like Gavin Dunne (Miracle of Sound) would have had a much harder time making a livelihood from their creative pursuits. Instead, he stands shoulder to shoulder with bands like Metallica on the iTunes sales charts. At one point, he literally topped the metal charts.

If we were still in the Wild West era, sure, he might have gotten some word of mouth exposure. But, given his niche (video game inspired music, primarily), what are the odds that a label would have picked him up? Odds are he would have just been another name on mp3.com with a small, dedicated following and dozens of people sharing his music freely on file sharing sites. Bear in mind that popular bands weren't the only music being spread on Napster, KaZaA, Limewire, Morpheus, Soulseek, et al--the indies were, too. Streaming music services made it so easy to just pick a song--while still allowing the artist to be compensated--that there's really not much of a need for peer-to-peer file sharing anymore. It's become a pretty niche thing once again.

Movie services aren't quite up to that level of maturity yet, but for a while YouTube was a bastion of light for independent creators. While there's a lot of garbage on there, there is plenty of extremely high quality content. Take a peek at just about anything on Ahoy's channel. You'd swear some of that stuff was professional content. Even post-adgate, with the amount of exposure and quality content that channels like that have received, they can make a decent living through crowd funding. In 2006 you'd have to be picked up by a network to even have a chance, and even then a lot of content creators were forced to work full-time jobs on top of making regular videos. Again, without having that air of legitimacy, ad networks would have never taken a chance on YouTube.

As far as why the olden days were better, there are two big reasons: with everyone and their grandmother (literally!) being online, the signal-to-noise ratio is extremely high. Without a solid hook it's difficult to break into those markets.

In addition to that, large companies (as previous discussed) have gotten overzealous when it comes to enforcing their copyrights. While I totally get sending takedown notices to channels that upload entire, full-length episodes (and, really, that's what the system was intended for, but you know what they say about the road to Hell), it's become a weapon that copyright holders gleefully use. Why should they consider fair use? What's some nobody with 200 subscribers going to throw at them? Even if it looks like the YouTuber is going to win, all they have to do is throw a token settlement their way so as to keep from setting a precedent. Throw in a gag clause as one of the settlement conditions and all of a sudden the bad press goes away, too.

The problem with legitimacy in that aspect is that there are rules that need to be followed from both sides, and only one side readily has the power to issue a challenge. The rest of us have to bow our heads and fall in line. While Viacom was somewhat in the right to file that suit (though that doesn't excuse the extremely shady shit that they did--apparently they thought that Google retained a staff of two-bit lawyers that weren't going to actually do any investigation)--because, let's face it, wholesale copyright infringement was a huge problem on YouTube back then--the impact of that case has resulted in the ContentID leash getting pulled tighter and tighter as time goes on, to the point where one of the cornerstones of gaming content on YouTube, gameplay videos, are in serious danger. Nintendo's already proven that they aren't interested in that pesky "fair use" business with their sham of a "Creator's Program," and even indies like Campo Santo (god, I wish I could refund Firewatch after their recent bullshit) are abusing the DMCA to silence someone because they didn't like something they said, nullifying the implied consent clause that they have on their site.

It's a fucking mess, and I have a feeling as a result of this strife we're going to be seeing a crash of sorts in due time. It probably won't be a huge financial crash, but it could lead to YouTube itself ceasing to be financially viable for Google to continue operating if ad revenue keeps plummeting.

I guess the best way I can sum up my thoughts is that yes, the modern Internet is a resounding improvement for certain tasks (most notable anything related with music and general information) and a resounding "NO" for anything that's commonly impacted, illegally, by the DMCA. That piece of legislation was designed for the Internet of the late 90s and early 2000s, not 2017. For a hosting company to retain their safe harbor status they must pull the content immediate when contacted, otherwise they can be held liable. If the claim is spurious, the claimant becomes liable for perjury. Great. But that brings us right back to the lawyer argument. Are you going to hire a lawyer and sue Atlantic Records despite you more than likely being in the right to use it under fair use? No. Why would you? How could you? They're well aware of this, so they can send out fraudulent claim after fraudulent claim without punishment.

The only real punishment that big corporations received in that regard is the result of Lenz v. Universal Music, where they were told that they must consider fair use when submitting takedown requests. But that leads us back to Content ID. It's an automated system, so how, pray tell, can it possibly consider something that even lawyers can't fully agree upon? Again, IANAL, and I haven't read the relevant ruling in full, but it seems to me like Content ID could possibly be illegal as a result of that. But, again, who's going to sue Google because their cat video got taken down? Not many people would even consider it.

Sorry I can't really give you a more straightforward answer. I'm kind of a centrist.

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Random Chat / Re: Youtube Copyright

« Last post by Zephlar on September 18, 2017, 05:25:43 PM »

Well, that was a very informative answer.

Do you think the internet is better now than the days of the "Wild West"? Just curious what you think.

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Gaming / Re: World of Warcraft

« Last post by Spectere on September 18, 2017, 03:54:39 PM »

Shit, man.

See, I don't know which method I actually prefer. On one hand, I really enjoyed the journey that I went through on my hunter, DK, and priest. When I played through my first toon in BC it almost felt magical--overwhelming at points, but that made the experience that much more enjoyable for me. It probably helped that I was in the midst of a huge slump IRL when I first started playing (and a lesser, but still significant, slump when I was pushing through Wrath), so having a sort of deep escapism was a good thing for me.

Of course, now that I'm a bit of a WoW vet the fast leveling is a blessing. I dunno. I guess I'm just wondering if I would have even stayed interested in the game long enough to get into raiding if I first started in the post-Cata era. The current game is still compelling, albeit for radically different reasons, so it's hard to say.

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Gaming / Re: World of Warcraft

« Last post by vladgd on September 18, 2017, 02:07:30 PM »

the sheer speed at which one can level is addicting, I can't stop

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Creation Station / Re: 3D Printers

« Last post by Spectere on September 17, 2017, 09:24:17 PM »

It's a fun "quirk" with the Melzi boards, and the screw terminal that they use now isn't nearly as bad as the connectors that they used to use. I'm not aware of recent v2.1 Di3s catching on fire (seems like it's mostly the old v2.1s and earlier) but I don't really want to risk it. I've been thinking about getting a MOSFET board for the hotend as well, though that doesn't draw nearly as much current as the hotbed does.

And hey, it's still a downright safe system compared to other i3 clones, like the Anet A8. Anet actually disabled the thermal runaway protection on the standard firmware. Who knows what else they skimped on.

Edit: Also, I should add that "Melzi," being Italian, is pronounced "MELT-zi." Hah.

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Creation Station / Re: 3D Printers

« Last post by Bobbias on September 17, 2017, 08:40:35 PM »

Yeah, currently having enough trouble saving up for my PC, so any 3D printer I buy will be a long way off, if I ever decide I want one bad enough.

But seriously, a screw terminal not rated for the current? Jesus...

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Creation Station / Re: 3D Printers

« Last post by Spectere on September 17, 2017, 06:05:33 PM »

Ooh, good luck with that.

Honestly, it all depends on what you're willing to spend on the base printer.  My printer was about US$300. I put maybe $350 worth of mods into it (the most expensive one being the extruder at $180), but with the combination of mods that I selected it gives it the level of performance as a $1500 printer. It did take a bit of work to get it there, but I enjoy doing that sort of thing.

Additionally, this is a good printer to get started with. Aside from one mod that I'd consider important for safety (bypassing a screw terminal that isn't rated for the current passing through it--a MOSFET board, a few cents worth of wire, a printed raft for it to sit on, and some industrial velcro to hold it on--roughly $15 total cost), none of the other mods are essential for getting great prints. Even right out of the box that printer is kind of a beast for the price. The commonly recommended mods for it really just take it from making great prints to making even better prints. It's a great base unit for getting into the craft.

If you want one that's truly going to give you an amazing out of box experience, you'd want to get something like an Ultimaker. It's very expensive ($2500 for the UM2+ and $3500 for the UM3) but with that price you're buying a stellar machine and excellent support. Another option is the Prusa i3 MK2S ($699 for a DIY kit, $899 pre-assembled). Basically, it's an evolution of my printer's design, and includes a lot of great features (auto-leveling bed, included all-metal E3D V6 hotend, PEI surface, 50 micron layer height, etc). IMO it's a bit of an expensive beast for just breaking into the hobby, but it's a nice piece of kit for the cost.

I have to admit, I'm really considering moving up to the Prusa just because of this upcoming kit. 4 material prints? Sign me the fuck up.

Alternatively, I could always just build my own multi-material printer. That might be fun.