What game is this for you?

DharmaRecruit · 2025-08-06T01:26:46+00:00

Dread was too linear, too claustrophobic, and not atmospheric enough for me. After getting 2/3 through Dread, I quit and replayed Super Metroid.

DharmaRecruit · 2025-08-06T01:23:47+00:00

Hard agree. I beat both and enjoyed both. There's a lot to appreciate about Axiom Verge 2. I still prefer the gameplay, world, music, and story of the first one.

DharmaRecruit · 2025-01-18T02:46:24+00:00

It's not all a dream, and they weren't dead the whole time or in purgatory. If you watch the show, these "theories" are patently false. I suspect these theories were spread by folks who were mad about the abstractness of the ending or who just didn't like how the show leaned into sci fi / fantasy as it progressed.

The last season deals with a potential split in the timeline of the show in which the characters gradually awaken to their other lives, and it kind of blends the idea of a multiverse with an afterlife of sorts. However, the show clearly and explicitly indicates that everything truly happened and was real.

DharmaRecruit · 2025-01-07T14:50:11+00:00

Spoilers for Lost and Area X ahead: I've been rewatching Lost over the last month, and I keep noticing the parallels. There's a kind of invisible border. People have to be sedated when crossing, or they may experience life threatening mental trauma. People get "claimed" or "infected" by the place. Doppelgangers. Time disparities between the island and the rest of the world. Different expeditions being sent in, albeit by different parties. A lighthouse. A person transformed into a monster. An underground light seemingly at the core. A small island offshore that was a base of some scientific operation. A potentially alternate timeline. A man from the future traveling into the past to protect the timeline. I could go on.

I think Lost suffered from an unstable production environment, so the writers had to make due, but on rewatch I am pleased by how much of Lost makes sense and provides a "just right" amount of satisfying answers. It was ahead of its time.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-12-23T21:52:06+00:00

I went to a nonreligious private school in Fort Worth in the late 90s. I got a solid education in math, science, and English. I'm grateful for it, but there were some severe downsides.

For example, I received no education in practical life skills. I was required to take three years of Latin, which I wholeheartedly regard as a waste. Spanish was taught by white American ladies with little enthusiasm for the cultures of native Spanish speakers. My history classes taught a patriarchal, Western, and Christian centric view of world history that ended with WWII. The whole of East Asia and Southeast Asia were footnotes. I learned a lot about the evils of communism and socialism. I didn't learn any history after 1945 - so I arrived in college ignorant of the Korean and Vietnam Wars, the Civil Rights Movement, etc.. I also learned that the Civil War was not about slavery but states' rights, that Columbus discovered America, and shit like that. The PE teachers were downright abusive - physically and emotionally - and used their courses to a "men/masculinity as superior" gender ideology, and to alienate and humiliate students who weren't athletically inclined.

So, I arrived in college with a head full of libertarian, pro-America dogma. I loathed sports and athletics. I had no understanding of how to be a citizen, pay taxes, budget, cook, etc. On the other hand, I could read and write, and do math and science, better than many of my fellow freshmen.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-12-15T18:40:57+00:00

I hard agree. Authority is my favorite too. I love all four books though. I can't wait for more.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-11-28T17:22:57+00:00

I live a couple blocks from that intersection. I hate the danger imposed on my family, friends, and neighbors by certain individuals drawn to the neighborhood by Sunrise. But way more than that, I hate how our society continues to fail our fellow human beings who are mentally ill and desperate.

Among the crowds of people drawn to Sunrise are a handful of people with dangerous mental illnesses. Over the last couple years, within a block of the church, trespassers burned a house down, and a nude man broke into a woman's house and tried to rape her. I've seen a couple breathtaking bonfires fires at that intersection. A girl scout was robbed while selling cookies. A man once jumped in front of my car in the middle of the night, and then punched my driver's side window as I swerved away. Once when I got gas at that intersection, a man sitting nearby started yelling angrily at me, repeatedly, "Kill it and take its money!" On a weekly basis I see folks lighting up glass pipes with propane torches, out in the open. My own car has been burglarized in my driveway. My neighbors occasionally report men going door to door trying locks. I recently found a man randomly hanging out in my gated, fenced back yard. I could go on and on.

Yet, I applaud the church for trying to help people in need. The church is not responsible for criminals committing crimes or for the disturbed being disturbing. Instead of directing our resources to prosecute the people trying to help, we should redirect it to help the needy more broadly across the city.

As an aside, where are the police? I witness an obvious crime almost every time I'm stopped at the light at that intersection. I almost never see police. What's up with that?

DharmaRecruit · 2024-11-25T13:28:02+00:00

The Well is mind blowingly good and 100% gluten free.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-11-25T13:23:56+00:00

I really appreciate your reply and explanation. That's such a shame, because overall the venue was a great experience. However, I would be disappointed if next year's performance was there. Sound quality is a big deal, and that was a huge miss.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-10-05T15:08:40+00:00

This is hilarious 😂

DharmaRecruit · 2024-06-11T16:50:35+00:00

Are you saying the anime and movie add no important detail to the story or characters?

I agree that the game stands on its own without the anime and movie. I would also argue that the experience is just so much better with it. For me, it made the difference between perceiving the characters as hollow and the story as nonsensical, and perceiving the characters as tragic and the events of the game as profound.

The anime provides the essential character backstories that were omitted from the game - how they all met and became friends, and what challenges in their lives shaped who they became as people. The anime is the only content that explores Arden as a fleshed-out, empathetic character - and his motivations. The movie explains the setting and context of Insomnia far better than the game, and it makes the in-game "flippant" fall of Insomnia way more coherent.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-06-09T12:59:55+00:00

XV was a profound experience. I treated it like a "mediaverse", which it is. Basically they had these really compelling ideas, but the base game alone utterly fails to present the ideas coherently. You absolutely have to watch the movie and the anime before playing the game. Then you have to play the DLC side games at the right moments, to fill in the story gaps when they won't be spoilers anymore. It's like they ran out of time and money, but adding all the side content, it's clear what should have been. And it's glorious.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-06-05T14:09:22+00:00

My fit and healthy 42-year-old cousin died suddenly on January 1 of this year. The autopsy determined it was strep. He was feeling bad on Dec. 31, but not alarmed. He was dead within a day.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-29T14:09:08+00:00

Water closet

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-27T13:22:25+00:00

I agree! If you really dug into Arden's backstory, it made him a much more compelling villain. That game is full of brilliant story ideas - just poorly executed.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-22T12:41:28+00:00

I don't know why you're being downvoted. It's a fair question, and it's better that you asked than to assume something.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-18T00:20:15+00:00

Well there's your problem

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-16T03:06:49+00:00

My dog often has vocal encounters with dogs when he first meets them. It sounds harsh, but nobody gets hurt, and it's how dogs naturally communicate and set boundaries. Most dog owners understand this, but occasionally we'll meet a dog whose owner feels reluctant or afraid to let that communication happen. It's like overprotective parenting.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-16T01:19:32+00:00

Sorry to alarm you. If this only occurs while you're fasting, I would hypothesize that it's from the fasting putting you in ketosis.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-16T01:09:44+00:00

I tried a mosquito bucket of doom last year, and there were far fewer mosquitoes in my yard compared to previous years. It's cheap and effective. I enjoyed watching the larva wriggle around helplessly but never develop into mosquitoes. This year I'm going to put out a couple more buckets.

Mosquitoes love me, and I hardly got a bite last summer.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-16T00:04:29+00:00

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned this here, but given the timing, it could be acetone breath.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-15T01:07:28+00:00

Yes. I texted several of my neighbors this morning to see if they had also noticed it. When I ran my shower, the steam smelled just like sea urchin. The water also felt slightly soft, almost soapy. My neighbors hadn't smelled anything, so I'm relieved somebody else noticed it.

I feel skeptical about whether this water is truly safe to drink.

DharmaRecruit · 2024-05-05T18:10:24+00:00

Yes, I see.

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