Idle Thumbs 265: A Chill Hell

[Jake]

Idle Thumbs 265:

A Chill Hell

This week we're joined by special guest Danielle Riendeau to wander the abandoned hallways of Mars, where we create a Hell of our own, one where there's no one to bother us and all the time in the world to relax and take it in. Meanwhile, Chris takes a risky assignment in Marrakesh and is killed on the toilet, but makes it home to regale Jake with accounts of how good Overwatch is.

Discussed: Hitman (2016), Doom (2016), Overwatch, Team Fortress 2, World of Warcraft, Soft Body, The Idle Fiction Jam, Mouth Feel: The Summer Wizard Cocktail Jam, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed

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[zerofiftyone]

Danielle!!!! What a nice surprise.

[RubixsQube]

It's a plush Tingle with a bean butt

[mikemariano]

CHRIS: (1:14:50) "We also didn't mention why Nick isn't here."

 

[Proceeds not to mention why Nick isn't there.]

 

Yay, Danielle!

[doodle_robot]

qwop? bigdogs? basketball? yep

 

https://powerhoof.itch.io/regular-human-basketball

[Chris]

  On 6/2/2016 at 9:36 PM, mikemariano said:

CHRIS: (1:14:50) "We also didn't mention why Nick isn't here."

 

[Proceeds not to mention why Nick isn't there.]

 

Yay, Danielle!

 

Oh he was just really tired

[Twig]

Classic Nick!

[Gormongous]

Actually, it's the first Progresscast when the "And I'm Nick Breckon" meme really got cemented, at least as far as I can tell. At the beginning of that cast, Sean says "And I'm Nick Breckon," and then at the end, Sean, Jake, and Chris all say it at least twenty times, over and over. If anything, Nick was responding to that with his own F. Nick Breckon Transmission 87.

 

Also, I'm sure this gets asked a lot, but is there a possibility that the Progresscasts could be released and hosted somewhere that's not the Kickstarter page? I don't think anyone cares about keeping them exclusive, four years out.

[doodle_robot]

looking forward to the wizard jam stream.  any chance we could get some recipies in advance so we can be ready?

 

thanks!

[Badfinger]

Oh man, a new flourish on the intro and a new musical stinger!

[Patrick R]

  On 6/3/2016 at 12:29 AM, Gormongous said:

Also, I'm sure this gets asked a lot, but is there a possibility that the Progresscasts could be released and hosted somewhere that's not the Kickstarter page? I don't think anyone cares about keeping them exclusive, four years out.

 

I was actually going to ask this same thing today, for an entirely different reason.

[Hyroero]

So about DOOM

 

You gain points used to spend on upgrading weapons via completing the challenges for each level, you can see these in the pause menu and are often Kill X via Y / While doing Y and so on.

You also gain these points from completing combat encounters, if you collected 100% of them you would have more then enough to get every upgrade, this means you can miss a fair few and still cover all the upgrades you want.

The Chainsaw is best thought of as a mechanic and not a weapon. It uses fuel as ammo and bigger enemies require more pips of fuel to attack. If you have enough you do an instant kill and the enemy will spill out loads of ammunition. Basically you can use it to take out a harder enemy instantly but its most used to regenerate ammunition the same way melee kills are used to drop health once you've taken damage.

 

[voxn]

yowza, I hadn't realized blizzard made animated shorts to accompany overwatch until Chris mentioned it, but he's 100% right about them being too anime. Though personally - as someone who doesn't use much social media, and hasn't had the entire concept of anime poisoned by people with anime avatars - 'too adolescent' might be a better description. Which has to qualify as something of an achilles heel for blizzard at this point, right? I couldn't skip diablo 3 cutscenes fast enough, and while I haven't played SC2, I've heard its plot described as '

' (though at least in a somewhat incredulous/affectionate way).

 

game itself is fantastic though. One of my favorite touches is the spawn rooms, which have evolved from their TF2 counterparts into crazy detailed playpens full of interactive doodads, glass windows looking out over the defenders, and absurd props of the sort Olly would enjoy.

 

looking forward to [hot new segment] jake's takes!

 

 

[SecretAsianMan]

  On 6/3/2016 at 6:16 AM, Hyroero said:

So about DOOM

 

You gain points used to spend on upgrading weapons via completing the challenges for each level, you can see these in the pause menu and are often Kill X via Y / While doing Y and so on.

You also gain these points from completing combat encounters, if you collected 100% of them you would have more then enough to get every upgrade, this means you can miss a fair few and still cover all the upgrades you want.

The Chainsaw is best thought of as a mechanic and not a weapon. It uses fuel as ammo and bigger enemies require more pips of fuel to attack. If you have enough you do an instant kill and the enemy will spill out loads of ammunition. Basically you can use it to take out a harder enemy instantly but its most used to regenerate ammunition the same way melee kills are used to drop health once you've taken damage.

 

Weapon upgrade points are also earned by finding the secrets in each map.  You can get up to two points per level if you find them all.  The weapon upgrade points are used to upgrade the weapon mods.  Each weapon has 2 mods (except for the super shotgun and pistol which don't get mods, the chainsaw and BFG are special weapons that don't get upgraded at all) which are obtained from drones scattered around the levels.  When you find one you can pick any mod you don't have for one weapon.  Most mods have 3 upgrades with an increasing point cost.  The bigger weapons like the rocket launcher and gauss cannon have two upgrades.  Getting all the upgrades opens the final upgrade which is unlocked by using the mod to kill enemies in specific ways.

 

The chips from the elite guards upgrade your suit's abilities.  There are five categories ranging from things like showing secrets on the map, improving power ups, or switching weapons faster.

 

The argent cell upgrades your max health, max armor, or max ammo.  Up to five points for each category.

 

Finally, the runes give you special abilities like performing glory kills faster or having glory kills drop armor in addition to health.  Runes are obtained by completing special trials that are specific scenarios like using exploding barrels to kill enemies.  You can have up to three equipped.  Runes can be upgraded once by completing specific challenges that relate to the rune, like filling your armor to the max a certain number of times.

 

It all sounds complicated when laid out but in practice it works pretty well.  The challenges especially are good for encouraging you to use different weapons and tactics.  If not for those, I probably would have just stuck to using only 2 or 3 weapons the entire time.

[Vasari]

Chris, you said the chainsaw was the feature you never used, but did you ever use grenades? I completely forgot about them as soon as they were introduced, and I only remembered they existed when I'd idly click the middle mouse button and throw one at my feet. I think they have a use for when you need to drop something and run away from a tough enemy, but I found they got in the way of the flow of combat too much to ever be useful.

[SecretAsianMan]

I always forget about the chainsaw but I love the grenades.  I think they complement the gunplay really well.  Normally I'm not a fan of offhand grenades in other games but in DOOM I'm finding them extremely useful.  Probably because the AI has no sense of self preservation so they make no effort to get out of the way meaning I can toss a grenade at a group of imps and be almost certain I'll get them all.  I also like tossing them behind shield guys or at a pinkie demon before it charges.

 

The hologram and siphon grenades I don't use very much though.  The hologram I don't find very effective and the glory kills give me enough health to keep going.

[Brannigan]

  On 6/3/2016 at 12:19 PM, voxn said:

yowza, I hadn't realized blizzard made animated shorts to accompany overwatch until Chris mentioned it, but he's 100% right about them being too anime. Though personally - as someone who doesn't use much social media, and hasn't had the entire concept of anime poisoned by people with anime avatars - 'too adolescent' might be a better description. Which has to qualify as something of an achilles heel for blizzard at this point, right? I couldn't skip diablo 3 cutscenes fast enough, and while I haven't played SC2, I've heard its plot described as '

' (though at least in a somewhat incredulous/affectionate way).

 

game itself is fantastic though. One of my favorite touches is the spawn rooms, which have evolved from their TF2 counterparts into crazy detailed playpens full of interactive doodads, glass windows looking out over the defenders, and absurd props of the sort Olly would enjoy.

 

looking forward to [hot new segment] jake's takes!

I agree that they're not particularly interesting, but relieved at the same time that they don't get to the silliness level of diablo/sc2 cutscenes in the very least.  More or less indifferent towards overwatch's videos I guess.

[Badfinger]

I barely used grenades in my first playthrough. The chainsaw became invaluable, though. It was an integral part of the flow of strategy. Use rockets/gauss/minigun to fight through the first few waves of enemies, chainsaw a baron of hell, pick up enough ammo to clean up the rest of the encounter, etc. I don't share the sentiment that you can play it like a melee game. The melee creates a risk/reward scenario where you can dive in for health and armor after you stagger enemies, but outside of the chainsaw using melee is not viable. Your melee weapon is a shotgun.

 

Thanks for mentioning the dumbname cocktail jam! It's a fun silly thing. I'm hopeful I can contribute more to real actual cocktails at some point.

[Twig]

"anime"

 

i'd describe the short i just watched as "typical blizzard nonsense"

 

but well i actually watch anime so what do i know!!!

[Dewar]

I guess I like the typical Blizzard nonsense? 

[Twig]

Lots of people do! I just take umbrage with the dismissively negative connotation for "anime" that is so popular these days.

[SecretAsianMan]

  On 6/3/2016 at 2:55 PM, Badfinger said:

I barely used grenades in my first playthrough. The chainsaw became invaluable, though. It was an integral part of the flow of strategy. Use rockets/gauss/minigun to fight through the first few waves of enemies, chainsaw a baron of hell, pick up enough ammo to clean up the rest of the encounter, etc. I don't share the sentiment that you can play it like a melee game. The melee creates a risk/reward scenario where you can dive in for health and armor after you stagger enemies, but outside of the chainsaw using melee is not viable. Your melee weapon is a shotgun.

 

I like utilizing all the weapons so I'm frequently switching between them during combat which I then refill with the ammo drops scattered around the level.  As a result, I'm rarely hurting for ammo so the chainsaw is more of a novelty to me.  Plus since it doesn't show up on the weapon select wheel I forget it's there.  Same for the BFG.  I also maxed my ammo count before health or armor and use the rune that gives you infinite ammo when you have 100 or more armor (75 armor after you upgrade it).  I admire the design concept of using the chainsaw to create an ammo ebb and flow similar to health with the glory kills but it just doesn't fit into my playstyle.

[Gormongous]

  On 6/3/2016 at 4:02 PM, Twig said:

I just take umbrage with the dismissively negative connotation for "anime" that is so popular these days.

 

Nah, anime's all cartoonish bullshit with no sense of grounding or tone.

 

 

Anime, as a genre and a medium, is suitable for describing works from other genres and mediums that are shallow, overwrought, or otherwise immature in their execution.

 

 

I kid because I love (anime).

[dium]

"Anime" was used in this very thread as a literal one-to-one synonym for "dumb", and is OFTEN use that way, and as myopic and dismissive as that is I understand completely how frustrating that can be.

 

But personally I find it hilarious.

[Gormongous]

  On 6/3/2016 at 5:27 PM, dium said:

"Anime" was used in this very thread as a literal one-to-one synonym for "dumb", and is OFTEN use that way, and as myopic and dismissive as that is I understand completely how frustrating that can be.

 

Consciously or not, I think it's part of the age-old "geek hierarchy" wherein people are drawn to using "lesser" mediums to conceptualize the less desirable aspects of their own preferred mediums. Art-film enthusiasts complain when an art film is too Hollywood, blockbuster enthusiasts complain when a movie is too video gamey, gaming enthusiasts complain when a video game is too anime, anime enthusiasts complain when an anime is too cartoony, and so on. It's a natural consequence of geek-adjacent communities defining themselves by how their favorite works are different from the rest, but it does lead to instances of accidental elitism all the time, which is too bad.