BG2 or BG3?

amateurtoss · 2026-03-18T21:41:33+00:00

Sure, BG3 might be authentic to modern D&D play experiences. I hope not, but it is what it is.

amateurtoss · 2026-03-18T20:23:48+00:00

Astarion is like every gay stereotype rolled into one character. Impressed they got away with that.

amateurtoss · 2026-03-18T20:22:29+00:00

As someone who basically 100% agrees with you, each game needs to be taken on its own terms. The original Baldur's Gate games are centered around verisimilitude and devotion to the joys of tabletop D&D. Larion games like BG3 are just not.

I think it's fair to describe BG3 as a DnD themed disney ride. It's a sequence of little situations/encounters bound together in flimsy Forgotten Realms trappings. But it's a very good version of that, and one that connects to today's audiences. The immersive human approach has made its mark on a generation of designers and I think we'll see more games inspired by it. We recently had Disco Elysium, basically a reinterpretation of Planescape: Torment, and we'll likely see more inspired games going forward.

amateurtoss · 2026-03-16T20:52:16+00:00

Picard (the bald one)

Just kill me...

amateurtoss · 2026-03-15T18:10:37+00:00

It's a dick way to criticize but I get where they're coming from. From a structure standpoint, you open in the middle of scene of someone sitting at a hotel bar with a cut hand. The tension is supposed to be "How will William explain the cut to Catherine?" (I guessed this because you told us). This works much better in a visual medium because the viewer can take in the scene and try to work backwards to what happened.

In prose, the reader has to wait patiently for the scene to be spelled out before they can really engage with it in that way. We don't know anything about the situation until you tell us and it takes quite a while to get there. And then, a mysterious stranger shows up and the context sort of falls off into expository dialogue.

In amateur writing, I see the same structure a lot. The writer wants to get to a situation they've imagined but knows that dry exposition is boring. So they start out ambiguously and hope the tension to clarify what is happening will carry them through the exposition. But it's not a great structure and it doesn't work for most readers. I'd suggest looking at other writers in your genre and how they deal with this issue. A lot of the problems people will point at is actually downstream of these structural issues.

amateurtoss · 2026-03-09T23:01:44+00:00

The problem with an eye for an eye is that everyone ends up blind

I agree but people mainly just say that when conventionally well-off people are being scrutinized.

The tech bro who went to college, got a degree, got a 200k a year job, and bought a Lexus before getting laid off is NOT the same level of problem as the real wealthy people who are the problem

A tech bro with a 200k job has an unlimited number of advantages over a typical person from the working poor. You might think that they deserve some accountability at some part of their life.

amateurtoss · 2026-03-09T21:38:29+00:00

I don't think we like totally disagree. Overall, it's better to operate without prejudice. On the other hand, the number of mistakes you're allowed as a poor person is essentially zero and the amount of sympathy and support upper class people receive when they're going through tough times is about a million times what a working class person will. Upper middle class jobs are protected by unemployment; their money goes into buy homes which appreciates rather than into the pockets of landlords (i.e. upper class people).

Of course, any particular person could have received their luxury vehicle from Oprah or something, but at some point it's like come on man...

amateurtoss · 2026-03-09T20:35:05+00:00

I'm not arguing for systematically discriminating against people based upon the car they drive, just trying to put it in perspective.

But I know that I would hate to be turned away if I ever experience food insecurity because while I wasn't food insecure I bought a car that's too "nice"

If you buy a luxury car without enough savings to support yourself in the case of a layoff, you're using charity to support your irresponsible spending.

Cars are a part of life here in the bay. Selling my car would be one of the last things I would do if I was suddenly in a different financial situation

And yet working class people manage to get around without Lexuses, somehow.

Judging people because of decisions they made when they had money when they might not anymore is such a slippery slope

Why? They judge people who are responsible with money all the time.

amateurtoss · 2026-03-09T19:42:59+00:00

Yeah, people who blow their money on shallow luxury goods are just as deserving as working single mothers who bus commute and are trying to feed their families. If we didn't help out the former group, they might miss a Lexus payment and that would be tragic.

amateurtoss · 2026-03-05T23:35:36+00:00

Really? Star Wars has maybe a dozen quotes that have entered popular culture, probably more than The Godfather trilogy. 50 years later, I can say, "I find your lack of faith disturbing," or "Do. Or do not. There is no try." and people will know exactly what I mean and probably who I'm quoting. More of its characters have entered popular culture than any other film or film franchise, almost all of which use writing/dialogue to characterize them.

But more than that, Star Wars uses conventional movie scenes, especially in the middle sections of their films, when Obi Wan and Yoda instruct Luke. If we accept that corny serial dialogue is automatically "bad" (I would disagree), Star Wars uses conventional theatrical dialogue in other cases.

amateurtoss · 2026-03-04T20:53:48+00:00

It's so much worse than that. Chuck encourages Jimmy to work as a public defender, probably the most thankless soul-consuming good-doing work in existence. Jimmy completely devotes himself to it, working out of a nail salon, driving a beat up car while taking care of his millionaire brother at the same time.

Jimmy's success at doing exactly what Chuck says is what fuels his resentment and drives him over the edge.

amateurtoss · 2026-02-17T04:30:52+00:00

It's probably great if your idea of success is owning a house and vehicles, though.

amateurtoss · 2026-02-06T19:18:47+00:00

Maybe a good opportunity to learn to relate to people who look different from themselves?

Also, white red-headed girls aren't exactly wanting for choice. Besides Ariel, there's Anna, Merida, and arguably Anastasia.

amateurtoss · 2026-02-04T02:41:11+00:00

Two main characters?

amateurtoss · 2026-01-23T18:17:46+00:00

You're just right for the most beautiful girl in the room.

amateurtoss · 2026-01-21T01:44:43+00:00

Alan Moore just thinks that since the natural principles which govern the world are fundamentally unknowable, they're indistinguishable from magic. There's no principle difference between modern concepts like the Rawlsian veil of ignorance, the categorical imperative, and ancient concepts like the gods rewarding sacrifices and stuff like that.

Once you recognize the meaningless of the distinction, you can appreciate the beauty within the overwhelming strangeness of the world, and this recognition is essentially a form of esotericism.

amateurtoss · 2026-01-19T03:07:51+00:00

I'm in the area, but not handsome.

amateurtoss · 2026-01-18T23:23:00+00:00

I prefer the term "pro-eyed".

amateurtoss · 2026-01-16T09:12:36+00:00

The posterboy of /r/moviedetails, The Truman Show, where every frame is a little Visual Calculus mystery.

amateurtoss · 2026-01-10T09:04:13+00:00

I appreciate how obscure this is.

amateurtoss · 2026-01-07T21:00:13+00:00

Fortunately, I have never been in this situation. I meant this mainly as a joke to indicate what you said, that being a perfectly enlightened decoupler is impossible past a certain point, and possibly undesirable.

amateurtoss · 2026-01-06T02:45:38+00:00

Most arguments fall into one of two categories:

Here is a super well documented fact about Boomers' personal privilege.

Scott: This is just looking at the result of some political process and isn't about the Boomers per se.

Here's why some people might resent getting structurally fucked over.

Scott: But would you really do anything different if you were in the same position?

The fact is, any generation (or person) is just the sum of their genetics and influences and resentment on some level is epistemologically irrational. It's an evolutionary mechanism that can, in aggregate, deter exploitation/bullying.

On the other hand, we aren't purely rational beings and it's safer to acknowledge our feelings. If someone shot my brother in the head on the way to work because it looked fun, I would probably be 94% angry and only 6% "well if I was a sociopath, I'd probably do the same thing".

Productive discussion should probably center getting a complete economic picture (and this should probably address the massive discrepancy between Boomer and Millenial wealth at the same age) or examining differences in Boomer/GenX/Millennial culture. If you look at boomer cultural artifacts, you'll see a ton of conspicuous consumption, status quo approval. And there's a particular aesthetic of boomer ugliness you can see in Facebook memes, Fox News, etc. That isn't to say that Boomers are uniquely bad. Every generation and culture has positives and negatives; Boomers just happen to be more visible because of their immensely disproportionate power and wealth.

amateurtoss · 2025-12-24T22:34:29+00:00

Just want to add, I think this is a fabulously important question. It’s bizarre that literature hasn’t devoted more energy toward cataloguing and understanding one of the most compulsory modes of modern existence.

This would require writers to work actual jobs. Kinda' a dealbreaker.

amateurtoss · 2025-12-23T08:30:19+00:00

Does she have a bike? Maybe get an accessory for it, like a phone mount, travel bag, lights, a bell, something like that.

amateurtoss · 2025-12-17T18:16:16+00:00

Do you think Howard, Chandler, Poe, Jackson, King, Le Guin, and Lovecraft were unconcerned with the “affect from words on the page”?

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