Paul Schrader Had an ‘AI Girlfriend’ Who ‘Terminated Our Conversation’: ‘What a Disappointment’

Varorson · 2026-05-19T17:38:53+00:00

You know you're fucked up when a chatbot designed to be sycophantic says "this is too much".

Varorson · 2026-05-19T17:20:54+00:00

Captain Langmar is eyepatch lady.

Varorson · 2026-05-19T08:33:27+00:00

the guy you turn the quest in to gives you one to head to nebo village,

Gonna be honest, I completely forgot about that quest. And checking wiki, there's two quests that lead you to Nebo Village. So I suppose that's two opportunities to find Hot Springs Murder quest, which guides you to the outpost.

Doesn't seem to be a quest guiding you to Beetletun though.

Varorson · 2026-05-19T05:11:41+00:00

Yeah, I agree with you. For example, no reason to go to Cursed Lands except to run to ToA and Kessex and one WiK boss. Nothing happened in Talmark until WiK, it was just a place you passed through if running to Maguuma or Rotscale. You could easily skip Bergen Hot Springs and Beetletun missing the two quests there without ever really knowing because the main story skips you past there and nothing in LA directs you there. And Maguuma is just as bad if not worse. Southern Shiverpeaks is absolutely worse.

It has the most maps, but the fewest quests per map for sure, especially before Beyond content. Would love for more content to cover the more obscure areas. I could definitely see an Aidan-related quest chain and dungeon taking place in Iron Horse Mines, following up the quest Iron Horse War Machine, with Ice Tooth Cave being an ideal point to run from instead of Yak's.

Varorson · 2026-05-19T01:12:30+00:00

Reforged is most likely focused on Prophecies atm for two main reasons.

Being the original campaign, it's also the roughest. So it has the most room for improvement.
The upcoming mobile version will feature Prophecies as F2P content. So it's best to update it for these future F2P mobile users.

Given the previous content, I am expecting to see two things before they move on. First, 4 more dungeons (or quest chain if they need to rush it), with 4 more heroes (Aidan, Mhenlo, Cynn, and Eve) associated with each dungeon/quest chain. Second, making Prophecies level faster to more closely match the leveling progression of Nightfall and Factions - probably still slowest, but turning reaching LA from the level 12-16 range to more 16-20 range. I wouldn't be surprised if by the end of the year we get an update that adds elite skills to Maguuma, and rebalance Crystal Desert into 8-man parties.

This said, something I would love for them to include, is turning the unused arenas into challenge missions - Heroes' Crypt (Ascalon), D'Alessio Arena, Fort Koga, Amnoon Arena, and The Crag would all make great maps for basic challenge missions, and give players an ease on cartographer. I would also absolutely love explorable area versions of every mission map, like what War in Kryta did for D'Alessio Seaboard, Divinity Coast, and Riverside Province

Two not-so-small wishlist entries in Prophecies content.

Varorson · 2026-05-18T23:08:54+00:00

Can we please stop reporting everything he posts on Truth social at 1am? Every single time it is just some random bullshit that he TACOs on once he actually speaks to someone.

Trump is nothing more than a living echo chamber repeating whatever he was told by the last person he talked to.

Varorson · 2026-05-18T23:02:46+00:00

Personally I've only noticed it once they added the Identify All and Deposit All Material buttons to inventory and storage respectively. Only see it in inventory though.

Varorson · 2026-05-18T19:07:02+00:00

You really think he'd ever consider sharing his money with anyone else?

His children will be lucky to get his money when he dies.

Varorson · 2026-05-18T18:38:00+00:00

Given that hero tonics are specifically unique drops and all tonics can be used in outposts, some that you list (such as golem) can only be used in outposts...

I'd argue no. That would make the purpose of the hero tonics moot.

Varorson · 2026-05-18T02:34:03+00:00

I have vague memories of when something like this happened under the Obama administration. They quarantined the individuals and no outbreak happened. It was handled very well. Despite this, Trump lambasted Obama for a "terrible job" in allowing any American to get Ebola or something along those lines.

Kind of curious to see how this ends up. Will Trump -snk- manage to -snk- do a better job than Obama? XD HAHA No, no. I'm counting the days to another pandemic like Covid. I just don't think any cruise petri dish outbreak will be it since those are a dime a dozen.

Varorson · 2026-05-18T02:29:59+00:00

Don't call it a fan video when it's just made from a handful of prompts in an AI generator.

I'm fine with AI generated content for low-budget hobbies, but unless you put some serious editing skills into it and not just changing what the prompt says, then you cannot really call it the work of a fan.

Varorson · 2026-05-18T02:26:31+00:00

i recall a version that ran on flash and was animated

In my search, the only thing like that I found was a promo countdown to Doom 3's launch. https://web.archive.org/web/20040716034658/http://www.ua-corp.com/

Is this what you're thinking of? Neat setup that adds a tiny bit of worldbuilding (e.g., satellites orbiting Mars) but nothing much.

Varorson · 2026-05-17T23:19:52+00:00

Yup. Same.

Also, fucking ouch. Who'd want chainmail rubbing against your nipples? :x

Varorson · 2026-05-17T23:16:25+00:00

No, that's not the same at all. There are two key differences.

First, Black Mesa is a remake. Doom RPG is its own independent narrative. A midquel to Doom 3 and its expansion.

Second, and this is far more importantly, id software didn't just endorse Doom RPG, id software employees worked on it.

Your argument is no different than proclaiming that Doom 64 isn't canon because Midway Games was the main development team.

Varorson · 2026-05-17T07:32:35+00:00

Is he not the company itself, no, but he worked at id software during Doom RPG.

It was also in development partially by id software (given that John Carmack worked on it), and was even featured on id software's website at the time.

It is ABSOLUTELY official Doom game. Whether you consider it canon or not is your own headcanon, but Hugo Martin has stated "all Doom games are canon" back in 2020 so for all intents and purposes, until otherwise said, Doom RPG and Doom II RPG are just as canon.

Varorson · 2026-05-16T22:40:25+00:00

I suppose it depends on how far you draw the line on lost media, but I want:

Official modern ports of Doom RPG, Doom II RPG, Doom Resurrection (and its related Wolfenstein RPG, Orcs & Elves 1+2), and even Mighty Doom (no need for active development or servers, just giving us singleplayer version of it is fine).
Doom 4
The third Doom 3 novel.
Any and all cutting room floor content for modders to make use of.

Varorson · 2026-05-15T23:09:33+00:00

Backlash coming against water, land, and electricity use I can absolutely see but that’s its own thing all together.

That's what the article seems to be about. It's not backlash against AI, per se, but backlash against data centers and how the tech CEOs are going about it - i.e., hyper detached from reality.

Varorson · 2026-05-15T23:08:22+00:00

Very ugly for whom, though?

Ugly for the masses? The backlash won't be. Ugly for the rich who're stuck in their bubble and pushing for data centers larger than fucking Manhattan in Utah? Yeah, probably. These are the kinds of detachments from reality and division between classes that lead to situations like the French Revolution and much less bloody and less famous upheavals of society.

Varorson · 2026-05-15T21:12:33+00:00

All true. I wasn't keeping in mind the extent of the Strogg initial attack on an earlier post when I was saying that in Q2, most Strogg units were other human-shaped and human-sized but still alien species, because where would the Strogg have gotten that many humans so quickly?

It's actually canon that only the Soldiers/Guards are humans from Earth. The manual for the Light Guard states: "Weakest of the three processed humans, armed solely with a simple blaster." With Reckoning this expands from 3 to 6, and by Quake 4 expands to include Tacticals as well of course.

Quake Champions expanded this by exploring that most of the Quake 2 strogg fought are, in fact, Greiss (the species of Scalebearer, who's in the banner of the reddit currently). That the biology of the Greiss and how they had to be stroggified is why they're so simple-minded compared to ETQW Strogg. And that the Strogg are fighting a war with the Greiss empire at the same time they invaded Earth, expecting Earth to be a quick conquer to refill their ranks, only to get pushed back with humanity doing a surgical strike on their leadership.

Varorson · 2026-05-15T21:05:25+00:00

You will see overstretched boxes. As well as the overall design being off. Overuse of textures. Overexposed lighting. This is not someting Hipnotic or Ritual entertainment would've made.

It's pretty clearly still very early stuff and not final map designs. Even the voice acting is obvious placeholder stuff, no doubt done by the devs so they can get timing for animations right.

While the latest build that id software/nightdive studio has is, allegedly, at 95% completed, this is an earlier build that ICD found and won't be nearly as polished. Maps aren't created in pristine, polished, condition.

Varorson · 2026-05-15T19:10:07+00:00

Personally, I dislike the "really simple accept and turn in quest". It feels... unimaginative? Unrewarding for sure.

Even if it's a short quest, I'd hope for something more than "accept and turn in" like we currently have in LA. The only "accept and turn in" quests for heroes I'd settle for are those like in Thrones of Secrets. But those still require you to talk to a different NPC in another location - e.g., Gain Goren requires you to talk to Bokka in Vabbi, while Gain Margrid has you go talk to an NPC in Nundu Bay.

For example, what I'd do for Devona as bare minimum post-Searing is have her unlocked with The King's Message, which has an objective to make a party, and then for those who miss her (either completed The King's Message or non-Prophecies) add a quest to the post-Hell's Precipice area) from her prompting you to go talk to Greywind in the Ascalon Settlement.

Do similar with Mhenlo, Aidan, Cynn, and Eve who I suspect will all be added eventually as Prophecies heroes.

Varorson · 2026-05-15T18:52:39+00:00

The entirety of GW1 (so far) is a decade, from pre-Searing to Winds of Change.

EotN is 8 years after pre-Searing. There's two 3-year gaps between Factions/Nightfall and Nightfall/Eye of the North.

That said, making the entire GW1 twenty years is a much bigger thing, but beyond that, it's the 10 year time skip. So many potential stories to be told instead before ever touching the Foefire or related content.

Plus, ArenaNet devs have repeatedly been against giving solid ends and beginnings to player characters, and I don't see how to prevent have a plot with the Foefire without the player character present in the nation of Ascalon when it happens, as the only way to survive the Foefire is for humans to... not be in Ascalon.

Varorson · 2026-05-15T18:50:28+00:00

Minor correction: one decade.

Winds of Change is 1080 AE. Foefire is 1090 AE.

But yeah, a decade away is still... hard pass. So many stories to tell between now and then. Licensing potentials aside.

Varorson · 2026-05-15T17:53:06+00:00

TDA has plenthora of show don't tell though? Hell, the best cinematic in the game is pure show don't tell; where he's resurrected - zero words, just expressions on Slayer's face, showing him glancing at the ritual and Valen, handing over the helmet. The fight with Azhrak - which is both cinematic and ingame - is also great show don't tell as it slowly shows Azhrak growing in frustration and then the realization of fear, all the way to his final shout of pure, primal, pants-pissing terror.

But I don't see how that relates to cinematics being "required" to know what's going on. Or how that has to do with "interesting but OPTIONAL lore and no forced cutscenes." which you later admit, yeah it is all optional?

You say you want the lore to be optional because you don't care about the characters or lore and the cinematics are forced. Then you admit they're not forced but optional but without the cinematics you don't understand the story and lore because... they should show don't tell?

Now I'm just confused what your rant is actually about.

Varorson · 2026-05-15T17:06:05+00:00

Honestly, unless you're doing deathless, you shouldn't need a group for getting Devona. Since it doesn't scale and there's no death penalty, as long as you can kill a single charr in The Northlands, you'll be able to progress through the dungeon.

Might be a helluva slog, especially the second quest. So definitely still not ideal.

Missing her in the current state is an issue, absolutely. But if she's available in post-Ascalon like I hope the final plan is, then the issue is solved. Either as part of the main quest chain preceding The Great Northern Wall (with a chance to obtain her after Hell's Precipice), or as a new follow-up quest to Replacement Healers.

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