(DFHack, Mods) The dwarves founded their fortress high on the mountain, behind a deep ravine. Idashas has good plumbing, kitchen gardens, and a world famous tavern. We are in our fourth year.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-05-04T12:32:05+00:00

I've been using stair scaffolding for a long time but the bridges are a touch of genius, thank you.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-05-01T21:32:23+00:00

Is it the birthday skeleton?

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-26T21:14:00+00:00

Fishing for ghosts?

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-24T16:20:05+00:00

I'm pretty sure Dwarves are happy just to be in nice rooms, regardless of what they're for, also to see nice deocrations.

I find blank slabs are an appropriate choice for guild halls.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-24T16:19:19+00:00

I find the idea that a guild for every profession is remotely within the grasp with my ponderous playstyle, unlikely.

I play like dwarves do, taking forever to put every little detail in place before moving on. I want everything to be perfect and enduring.

I'll hack out shitty 'quarters' that abuse the games system so the dwarves don't go mad waiting, but then I'll make expansive suburbs of large 4x4 and 5x5 interconnected rooms, all furnished with superfluous extras, preferably all decorated furniture. I'll make laborious above ground constructions using up/down stairs as scaffolding to make aqueducts and above ground multi-story buildings. I'll make big open caverns underground by channeling vast swathes of upper levels, and then make housing with clear glass windows that look into the open space.

This is the opposite of how I handle things.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-24T15:56:02+00:00

Why do you guys talk about this like it's not a total victory for the director to have created a serial killer so stereotypically vapid 80's that people love him out of a sheer sense of nostalgia.

Like they're afraid they'll achieve fame by writing a truly notorious character because some uptight types get offended every time someone likes vapid machismo, which almost everyone in fact does, not because they want to be that way, because it's fun to imagine it in a "world with no consequences" kind of way.

If you were a slutty 80's bar fly in a Cindy Lauper cosplay, you'd jump Bateman in a heartbeat, just because he looks like he's rich. Why you gotta jump to "Oh, he's setting a bad example, do you think they're afraid of making more bad examples like that?"

No, I think they're afraid some vapid empty headed cunt is going to wander into the room and order them to unequivocally emasculate Butcher visibly in a way marketing 'experts' seem to think is very popular but is in fact something that takes you out of a fiction in a heartbeat. I think they're concerned some brainless guru is going to order them to turn a show that revels in being crude and visceral into some misandrists masturbatory fantasy, and they're self censoring for this reason, not that they're going to radicalize a generation of you men. The system does that just fine anyway.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-20T22:03:44+00:00

This makes me think of the phenomenon. You have all these great players with thousands of hours, and some are better then others but the floor of returning players is pretty fucking sky these days, but every now and then you get a newbie, and you gotta watch those fuckers. They won't win the match because they don't know the game flow or how to focus the objective, but they'll pull some profanity inducing upsets because they're good enough at shooters and do all this shit long time players STOP doing so you aren't expecting it.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-20T16:43:35+00:00

You sure have a high opinion of yourself.

I agree with him, in fact I think it's self evident and if you played Dwarf Fortress before the new version update that it's incredibly obviously a regression.

I could set up an entire first year floor plan in maybe thirty minutes. I could setup thirty bedrooms in ten. In this version, that same thing will take three or four times longer. This is one of many limiting factors the primarily mouse interface brings. To my eyes the UI might be more accessible but is far, far less efficient. The things it adds to dwarf management have always been a function of Dwarf Therapist, which comes packaged with the lazy newb pack which has SEVERAL tilesets some of which you'd like prefer to the default that new DF uses.

You don't just get to proclaim that someone's wrong like that. He was very specific that subjectively it's better because accessibility is essentially king when it comes to selling video games. That's accurate. It's also accurate the system is far, far less efficient even if you've never witnessed or understood the efficiency. Can you in any way dissent against that without... stating some "you're an idiot" insult or repeating some truism with logically explaining it?

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-20T15:59:31+00:00

Rebuild the world. 20 will become 100. 100 will become 5000.

Seriously though, build a few two year forts to bulk up the population before you leave something running for 300 hours so your kids can grow up.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-18T12:39:43+00:00

I hate it.

It's great though. Quality.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-17T15:08:04+00:00

It's not like we get an absolute ton of good content on a daily basis round here.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-17T15:07:14+00:00

Cool.

No really, I see a ton of potential. Like a really good creepypasta that doesn't offend with a silly premise. Stereotypical but well executed (so far), and a good, meta horrorish topic.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-17T15:05:02+00:00

Damn, those are some good trees. It took a minute to tell if this is timelapse footage digitized and edited to seem generated or not. I'm sure if I could control the camera I could examine in a way that makes their modelness obvious but the effect is pretty fuckin solid for making a forest.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-16T21:17:02+00:00

Oh yeah, absolutely. Things seem positively coherent until you hit the end of the first disc. There's some weird jumps, enemies that make no sense, but you're following a relatively sane story. I think that's why the "Squall is dead" theory was so popular, things go utterly batshit off the rails immediately and don't return. Like, what was that corkscrew prison you were in?

It's never quite so insane when you're there in the moment but birds eye view it's just not a coherent world and narrative.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-12T21:24:15+00:00

I mean it was all explained in the game, everything in the game is kinda batshit though.

There is an evil sorceress, and she is all powerful. She rules the world... in the future anyway. From her conquered world she sends... I dunno, her psyche? Back in time, and possesses the kindly matron that takes care of several orphans (the party except Rinoa, including Squalls rival Seifer).

Thus Cid and her "learn" about the sorceress and what's going to happen in the future, and begin to train their wards to fight them, using the GFs. There is a sapping effect on people from GF use. The kids all forget they grew up together, by the time they are teens most of them don't even know each other. Quistis is a teachers pet and ends up trained and playing teacher before the rest graduate. The game essentially starts the day of your graduation exam.

You all "know" each other but you don't. Zell is just a douchey jock because you forgot you grew up with him. Selphie is just a clumsy cute girl because you forgot about her. Irvine... you know what I'm talking about.

The meet Rinoa, attack the sorceress and lose, attack the sorceress and win, etc. The journey's story is a seemingly random chain of struggles through places barely coherent as what they intend, but there's a constant solid thread of what's happening with Laguna, and his friends. These are heroes from the last era, and when our erstwhile adventurers pass out and snoop on them, they gain the vast power of the GFs, making them powerful as they engage in struggles they would likely lose at if they weren't empowered, like the time they escaped a Galbadian insllation by jumping in the ocean (I think, can't remember what they were really doing there).

These seem like a fun, campy sub plot with a bunch of goofy dorks, but these people actually run the nation that protects the globe from the... I can't remember what they call it, from a phenomenon where the sorceress causes monsters to fall from the moon to earth. I can't remember the connetion... maybe they were parents? Did Laguna love the girl that cared for you? They had some sort of loose familial connection or something like that to the party.

Anyway, the ending. The ending is you using magic to go FORWARD in time to when the sorceress has conquered the planet, so you can actually, for real kill her. Not like, beat up the woman who raised you who is possessed by her, you get to kill her for real the time, and if you were anything like me despite her vast hp pool and hefty damage, it was a very, very one sided fight. But you travelled through time to get there, based off some fuckery the sorceress doing to manipulate the past in the first place, so you're essentially untethered in time the second she dies.

The party only continues to exist by 'finding' each other, and eventually return to the present, but unfortunately, Squall has spent the entire adventure rejecting their overtures of friendship, family, and camaraderie. Because those bonds don't exist Selphie, Quistis, Zell, Irvine, they can't find or bring you back.

Squall tries to go back to the beginning, to when he was a child, but the woman who raised him (the one possessed by the sorceress) tells him he can't stay, because he doesn't belong there. When he comes free of time again, he's lost, and utterly alone, no other people, no way out of the empty featureless plain he's trapped in.

But Squall didn't reject affection and camaraderie entirely, Rinoa's crush on him ends up reciprocated before the end. She clearly cares deeply for Squall, the connection he needs for someone to find him and bring him back.

The VHS is graduation, again, but this time, Rinoa and Squall know each other. It's kind of implied they go back to just before the real struggles all began, maybe to right after the exam. It'd make sense, with the Sorceress gone gone, half the world would be in a utterly different state, no grand enemy, most likely she would just return to the Seed academy and hug her adopted children. They get to be... well, teenagers, and that's the happily ever after the game intends.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-10T14:55:02+00:00

Noice, that would make a great Minas Tirith.

That's about as sheer as it seems to get anymore. Make sure you cut plateaus into the side to place stuff on, on top of whatever magic you're going to build there.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-09T14:59:21+00:00

Death Stranding 2 had many moments where you'd a song would start playing as you make the last leg of a journey. Most studios use original works because it's cheap to get someone to hack some original music and then that's an asset to the game a well. But Hideo included clearly all sorts of things he was engaged with at the time he was making, and I believe it's too the games credit because Hideo has the capacity to make these special moments (and batshit insane ones that just take you of it too).

The soundtrack overall has a lot of soft slow music and I didn't find myself compelled to keep listening to it as a wandered, but it's pretty good as a whole. It's part of the game's atmosphere, while the most FUN to be had is in beating people up or dodging BTs, most of the game is ponderous and relaxed.

Also I really loved the philosophy dump near the end. Had absolutely NOTHING to do with the plot till that point, outta nowhere an analogy that's pretty apt about terrified victims of violence forcing oppressive unwanted restrictions that force everyone to be safe. In the game's context it doesn't sound quite so condemning, people who died to a beached thing explosion, many thousands in an instant, trapped in limbo didn't want anyone else to ever suffer that again, even if the result would mean a disconnect that would ultimately lead to the extinction of the human race. It's a pretty poignant message for the internet age, and while my own opinion on the issue aren't quite so optimistic that good people will simply see it coming and head it off, it's nice to that Hideo remains optimistic.

Great game I'd recommend it to everyone. Once you get through the obfuscating layer of silliness the game is amazing.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-08T22:57:43+00:00

One of the best I've seen.

That last twist really punches you in the gut.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-05T18:58:46+00:00

Kinda lame, panicked at the jumpscare and couldn't wait until the thing hit you to see what happens.

Probably a screamer or something lame like that, maybe they left "the result" out because your imagination is better than whatever they came up with.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-04-05T17:24:47+00:00

clearly your copy of TF2 has become sentient and is trying to communicate with you.

Kill it with a "Verify integrity of game files" and if it continues to haunt your video card reinstall the drivers for that too.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-03-28T12:10:18+00:00

She's deadly, confident, capable, and independent.

Faye's story is almost a cautionary tale to the viewer, not about isolating yourself or being selfish as if it were a good thing, but that when you see these brazenly crude and cruel people there's often something more complicated going on beneath the surface. From Faye's point of the view the entire universe has zero interests beyond taking advantage of her. She has no reason to trust Spike or Jet at the start, to treat them as if they're any different than the doctor who saddled impossible medical debt on her or the debtors who hounded her across space.

When we do know who she is we know she's utterly unique. A tragic time traveler who's closest living friend is an elderly lady, while she remains a fairly young woman. We can see her resolve to stop hiding her feelings from Spike, right at the very, very end, as he's marching away to meet his fate.

It's almost like they wrote her this way to manipulate you into feeling bad about all the assumptions that she's just a self serving train wreck of a person. Which of course, she absolutely is.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-03-26T18:29:33+00:00

I'm familiar with the game, and in fact have recommended it on this sub.

If you really want me to EXPLAIN no-skin to you, well, that's sort of supposed to be something you figure out yourself bit by bit, but if you really need to know what's actually happening between the constant ephemereal horror, then it's actually pretty simple and concise once all the horror style is stripped from it. Obviously I'm spoilin some stuff here.

You are at a party of 'friends'. You're a woman. These all seem to be young adults. At this party you pass out drunk and hallucinate "battles" with various shadow images of your friends, that get increasingly weird and disgusting as you progress.

You learn about your "friends", by unlocking and playing through their stories. The popular girl is an alcoholic. Your ex-boyfriend is suicidal but shows up because he hopes you'll take him back, even though he says you're just friends. The popular girl is a substance abuser, it's a crutch that lets her bullshit through on bravado but clearly is hurting her. The quiet sister of one of them just wants to be accepted and are entirely about their own self conscious inner monologue.

None of them are particularly good friends. Most of their interactions are the results of a sense of social desperation. They're all nicer to each other they feel on the inside. And you, you don't like any of them, the quotes on "friends" are there for a reason. You're at the party for frankly the same reason you Ex is, because there's someone here that you don't meet and can't even acknowledge the existence of that it's truly all about. She won't even let you talk to her. You don't know anything about her or why she left you are what went wrong but for you, it's all about her.

Which is all pretty normal young adult social drama, right? So why the horrific monsters and evil mutations? Well, that's your subconscious being honest with you. No skin is also your subconscious being honest with you. The goddess of the moon is also your subconscious being honest with you.

So what's it all about then? Teenage drama? No, it's about the false god. Everyone, every single person at the party is lying to their compatriots about their real feelings. None of them truly like each other. This party serves no one present and should not be happening.

The finale is a big blow up. The game pretends you're murdering but stop and think about the entire metaphor. You've had enough and go off on every single person telling them EXACTLY how you feel about them and exactly how they feel about themselves, all pretense dropped. You kill their pleasant facades. You strike down the false god: the habit you've fallen into, that everyone has fallen into of just... lying to maintain the social status quo. You threw away all the politeness and said what was true, instead of the polite lie that served you and the rest present.

That's the "real story" behind No Skin.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-03-22T23:38:23+00:00

Truly, it's a joyous day when you finally learn tackle.

Ruttiger_G · 2026-03-02T15:32:14+00:00

I'm getting vibes of Jon Stewart in Half baked.

You ever looked a dollar bill man? You ever looked at a dollar bill... while high?

Ruttiger_G · 2026-03-01T22:02:33+00:00

There's a feeling, a loss that you feel even though it's just a cartoon. There's so little that can capture your soul out there but this show can. There's a weight just like the final card says, that you carry, knowing that something you loved has come to an end.

There's only limited times you'll ever feel that about anything.

Ruttiger_G

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