The Zeropunctuation thread

[Jarmo]

Croshaw will become a published novelist in August when Mogworld comes out. Chris Sims from Comics Alliance discusses the novel with Croshaw in an interview.

[Fugitive]

Mass Effect 2! (And here’s ME1 for reference).

[Brian_Seiler]

Man, is he going to be disappointed if the Hammerhead ever releases. Good thing he reviewed it before that happened.

[Gus_Smedstad1]

But… but… but… I want to be a resource surveyor. I have very fond memories of picking up colored blobs while dodging moving walls of flame from Star Control 2.

• Gus

[Charles]

Does the video just crap out at 4:13 for anyone else? Dammit.

[JonRowe]

But… but… but… I want to be a resource surveyor. I have very fond memories of picking up colored blobs while dodging moving walls of flame from Star Control 2.

• Gus

I still have nightmares.

[BobJustBob]

Did he say writing is an integral part or the integral part? Because the former is merely misguided while the latter… hoo boy.

Also I totally already suggested that the Mako be replaced with a jetpack.

[Gus_Smedstad1]

Did he say writing is an integral part or the integral part? Because the former is merely misguided while the latter… hoo boy.

I gagged a big when he harped on BioWare’s writing being good. It’s not good. It’s not JRPG gouge-your-eyeballs-out-bad, but it’s not good. For counterpoint to Yahtzee’s review, I quote this guy:

Now, pair up my last few statements until this paragraph is roughly the same length as Marcel Proust’s À la recherche du temps perdu then read it out loud to yourself while occasionally flinging the text across the room so you have to go pick it up again and you’ll have a pretty good idea of the Mass Effect experience.

People often say to me, Yahtzee you [unintelligible] superman, how can you, a game writer yourself, complain about a game having too much dialog? I would reply for the same reason that a hairdresser is entitled to complain when someone fills their car with shampoo. The best writing in visual media is succinct and punchy, a thing a lot of web comic writers need to understand.

BioWare’s writing is bland and boring, which would be OK if there weren’t so fracking much of it.

• Gus

[Rimbo]

But… but… but… I want to be a resource surveyor. I have very fond memories of picking up colored blobs while dodging moving walls of flame from Star Control 2.

• Gus

And in both Starflight games!

[BrianRubin]

And in both Starflight games!

Yay! But in the SF games, you went down on the planet, and in ME2 it doesn’t sound like you get to do that, right?

[Drastic]

In Protostar, which was sort of the unofficial Starflight 3, you went down to planets in a sort of basic hovercraft/aircraft thingie. Thrust and turning and a mild altitude range, you weren’t banking about and whatnot; you’d hoover up minerals and lifeforms and engage in basic combat in it. Someone, whether Mass Effect 3 or otherwise, should steal that using the ability to generate much more impressive landscapes to zoom around over.

[BrianRubin]

Heh, totally loved Protostar, not as much as SF 1 and 2, but still loved it. Sounds like ME2 is missing some key ingredients here…

[MattKeil]

BioWare’s writing is bland and boring, which would be OK if there weren’t so fracking much of it.

• Gus

In Dragon Age, yes. In Mass Effect 2, no.

His comments in the ME2 review are odd if only for the fact that BioWare writing is not always good. The Mass Effect series’ writing is the first BioWare writing in years I would call legitimately good. There’s a lot more going on in the ME games writing-wise than in the vast majority of other games, and if they can pay it all off in ME3 it will stand as one of the (possibly the first?) great writing accomplishments in the medium.

[TimJames]

…and if they can pay it all off in ME3 it will stand as one of the (possibly the first?) great writing accomplishments in the medium.

Oh no…

[Istari6]

Hello? Planescape: Torment?

Some have argued there was too much writing and not enough game (I don’t agree), but the quality of the writing was superb.

Chris

[Quitch]

I gagged a big when he harped on BioWare’s writing being good. It’s not good. It’s not JRPG gouge-your-eyeballs-out-bad, but it’s not good.

Sorry, but I just finished watching the trailer for Final Fantasy XIII. By comparison, Mass Effect 2 is Shakespeare.

[MattKeil]

Hello? Planescape: Torment?

Some have argued there was too much writing and not enough game (I don’t agree), but the quality of the writing was superb.

Chris

I’d have to play it again to review. Regardless, if ME3 pays off, I don’t think it can be denied its place as an accomplishment in game writing. Whether or not one likes it is another matter, but tying together a three-game saga with so many variables and still making it flow as well as it does (so far) is an ambitious task and I’m impressed with how well BioWare has pulled it off to this point.

[Pogo]

That’s especially true as soon as you get access to the teleport system - going back is often a matter of walking half a minute to the nearest teleport spot, teleport to the place the quest-giver hangs out (or board is located) and walk another half a minute to it - done.
I abandoned BL for ME2 before I could get to the DLC, but from what I’ve been told a big problem in the otherwise good Zombie Island DLC is the lack of teleport spots (outposts or what they call them).

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rezaf

This would be ok if the map and waypoint feature weren’t so clumsy to use.

[Bahimiron]

Sounds like Yahtzee loved it.

[mrmolecule88]

Sounds like Yahtzee loved it.

uh…did we watch the same video?