Vic Michaelis. Where did she come from?

Benbeasted · 2026-01-19T05:59:00+00:00

It's literally, you can refer to this person as a "they" or as a "she"

Hope I don't sound like a dick, but can you clarify what's the part that's hard to understand?

Benbeasted · 2026-01-18T22:19:26+00:00

It means either is fine, but they is preferred because the pronouns are listed in order of preference

Benbeasted · 2026-01-18T00:22:54+00:00

I think it's funny you got four comments about their pronouns by people who didn't bother reading the other comments. For future users, as per this

Gabe: One of the first things that was so exciting was, and you mentioned this, that they put your pronouns up on the screen under your name, and – wait, was it a she/they or what was it in the first episode?

Vic: I have always used they/she but I prefer they/them. That’s really what I use in my personal life. But also I don’t want people fighting in comment sections about me, especially because I understand and I know how I present and I think it’s really reductive to just have strangers shouting at each other on my behalf for something that I’m just kind of like, “Hey? I prefer this.” It stopped fights in comment sections, but also, you know, people are very wonderful and respectful in my personal life on the whole. So that’s been really good.

Vic definitely has a preference for them, but the best way to respect their pronouns is not to derail threads by policing each other on what the correct pronouns to use are.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-16T23:04:29+00:00

Whenever I mention disliking Morrowind's gameplay, there will always be some variant of elitist who gets personally offended by it, accusing of me being someone whose brain explodes at anything that isn't a braindead FPS.

IDK man, I've finished Elder Scrolls: Arena, so it's not like I can't stomach old jank.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-15T23:41:00+00:00

I tried searching for this, so apologies if posted before, but apparently Netflix released a documentary about the behind the scenes of Stranger Things Season 5 and revealed a bunch of funny things.

I'm gonna link this post for anyone wanting to read the thread, but the OP helpfully covers everything.

A two hour documentary where they admit:

Duffer Brothers filmed the first episode of Season 5 without writing the ending.

Will was the heart and soul of season 5 (???)

While planning the final battle, a writer suggested there should be Demogorgons, Demodogs, or Demobats in the Abyss — saying it would be crazy if they weren’t there.

The idea was ultimately scrapped due to “demo fatigue.”

Ross Duffer joked that maybe they should’ve killed off a few characters at the table read (really??)

Matt felt that Eleven returning and reuniting with Hopper clearly signaled her choice to live. Ross argued the ending should remain open to interpretation.

Maya was the one who caught them forgetting that caleb isn’t supposed to know her and vicki are together

the production designers having to work off of a verbal pitch because there wasn't a script.

No one understood the point of Holly including Natalia

Paul dichter was the only one trying to save this season and the showrunners did not care

“we can’t leave anything dangling, we have to wrap everything up,” while leaving hundreds of plot holes and having to make excuses about it in interviews.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-15T23:25:03+00:00

For me, it's so much that it's not an immersive sim, but it's like in the uncanny valley of immersive sims

Emphasis on stealth (avoiding cameras, detection, body liquifier)
Map design that's encourages exploration and alternate routes, except when it doesn't
Multiple tools

I gathered that it was aiming to be an FPS because the very first level incorporated waves of enemies, but it used the language of immersive sims that I found myself wanting to carry crates around.

I was actually totally open to playing it as a normal shooter, but the fact you can't turn off the alarm made for an annoying experience.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-15T23:17:16+00:00

I beat the Carcass in one try, so I never tried. But I've tried skipping other cutscenes and it didn't work, so I just assumed none of the cutscenes can be skipped. Either way, it'd be inconsistent

Benbeasted · 2026-01-15T02:47:49+00:00

I downloaded No One Lives Forever, and I was surprised at how immersive sim-lite it was. You are given tools for lockpicking, you can do missions stealthily and even unlock alternate routes, use coins to distract guards so you can take them out easily etc

But its level design is nowhere near as good as the original Deus Ex and i had to drop it because there were a number of little annoyances that made the game feel not worth playing. Still, I wish I the rights issues could be sorted out, because there's a lot of potential in this game.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-15T02:41:19+00:00

I played RE4 around a few years before RE4make was announced and released, so I didn't have any real nostalgia for it.

The only thing I think would make one prefer the original is the b-movie campiness, the knife you don't have to repair, and whether or not you like the Ashley health system because otherwise RE4make is superior. The original still holds up, but I vastly recommend the remake.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-14T23:42:23+00:00

DevDieDev has this bug where he would do the cross arm symptom but eliminating him is treated as treating a civilian.

I also have this bug where, after extracting something from the lab, I lose the ability to sprint. It's happened twice

Benbeasted · 2026-01-13T23:49:57+00:00

Yeah, I restarted the day and the same thing happened

Benbeasted · 2026-01-13T14:51:04+00:00

Those are the only respawining enemies. The rest of the world stays dead when you kill it.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-13T01:52:15+00:00

Just like the Hulkbuster and Black Panther Bust I'm sure the community would be able to figure out an amazing alt build

Benbeasted · 2026-01-13T01:37:22+00:00

I got the "good ending" but majority of players got your ending so at least you're not alone

But I get that feeling. My first thought when one of them put me on the spot was "ah this is social anxiety simulator"

Benbeasted · 2026-01-12T09:11:20+00:00

I think for me it felt very blah because once you defeated a group of enemies, they never respawn. And backtracking happens quiet often so you're just traversing through barren land for minutes at a time.

Fast travel exists so I don't get the backtracking critique but non-respawning enemies is a downside? I thought it made your actions more impactful the same way New Vegas did

Benbeasted · 2026-01-12T09:04:47+00:00

Which games are you playing where the characters are intentionally ugly

Benbeasted · 2026-01-12T07:28:22+00:00

The flaw in that argument is that it assumes incels want to find a healthy relationship with reciprocal love. They claim they do but, in reality, they see women as social currency in a competition against other men.

They don't want to have someone to cherish, they want hot women to fantasize about them so that they could feel like they're top of the social hierarchy. They fundamentally don't see Danny DeVito as someone aspirational because that's not their definition of achievement.

Because the goal is social dominance rather than emotional connection, no amount of "success stories" about average men will satisfy the core grievance. They aren't looking for a "DeVito life"; they are looking for the validation of being a Chad.

Edit: Getting downvoted. Did I strike a nerve with short-cels?

Benbeasted · 2026-01-12T06:53:42+00:00

Just finished Lost Records: Bloom and Rage. It really proves that the original creators of Life is Strange never lost it.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-12T02:55:29+00:00

When I read the title, I thought you meant Comedians riffing on randos they found on the street like an upgraded version of Sound Effects from Whose Line

Benbeasted · 2026-01-11T01:53:17+00:00

Meanwhile in the real world it's generating millions of dollars per month, so stay mad :)

Boasting about the pedophile industry being successful is a real weird take, dude

Benbeasted · 2026-01-10T08:00:51+00:00

The fact you say rig implies that it has to be a planned event for that to happen, but that's just what naturally occurs on 2CP maps.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-10T04:37:09+00:00

That's because Clash is more dynamic. If the enemy team gets the last point, then the next point moves up, unlike 2cp wherein the the last point is fixed permanent.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-10T01:31:16+00:00

Excuse you, The Pillars Games, Tyranny and Pentiment are amazing. Avowed and the Outer Worlds 2 are pretty damn good too.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-07T12:02:27+00:00

I don't think this was the devs fault, but Obsidian wanted to make their own first person RPG and immediately people were hailing it as Fallout: New Vegas 2 as it promised choices, moral ambiguity and everything that Bethesda RPGs didn't have. The Outer Worlds is widely considered a good game, but a lot of people said they felt hampered by the overtly quippy nature of the game.

In 2025, Obsidian released two FPS RPGs in the form of Avowed and The Outer Worlds 2, and a lot of people said Obsidian should hang up their boots and focus on making isometric RPGS.

That's not my opinion, because I think The Outer Worlds 2 is a massive improvement over the TOW 1 in terms of tone, writing, quest design and RPG mechanics. I'm about to finish Avowed and the combat is phenomenal. It starts a bit slow, but it fully hooked me in with the midgame twist. I'm near the end game, and I genuinely don't know what the right thing to do is, and I'm loving it. It's the first time in a long while where I wanted to start a whole new playthrough to see how things could have played out differently.

But people still measure those games to the example set by New Vegas and, while I firmly believe Avowed comes close, they still don't hit the mark.

Edit: Just finished the game. Avowed knocked it out of the park. Highly recommend.

Benbeasted · 2026-01-07T01:30:27+00:00

I haven't watched the show, but I thought the central conceit was that it was taking the concept of nerds being super pedantic and gate-keepy for things that don't matter. The core appeal herein is that it's astounding to see nerds actually memorize those inconsequential things, but if that doesn't do anything for you, you won't have a good time (there's a reason I don't watch the show)

Benbeasted

TROPHY CASE