I'm going to give a pass to the latest bombcast for the 1 minute bit where they imagined Assassin's Creed: 33AD. Just that one moment when Jeff throws out the "and Jesus is a templar and you hammer the last nail in" while Vinnie is saying "I'm just going to be over here crossing myself". I love Gerstmann most of all for his nihilism. I did also enjoy them being 300 years off on the crusades, 100 years off on electricity (although Vinnie may not have been just covering there, I guess), and all agreeing that the Amercian revolution was after the French. Little too much time playing video games to do that history homework in high school guys, eh? Also, it did make me realize the French Revolution would be an amazingly great video game setting for something in the Assassin's Creed or Dishonored vein.
Ha, I was just going to post that. It was the cross-shaped gyrocopter image that really got me. Eh, I think they were sufficiently hedging their statements on that. They didn't exactly come off as certain. And were they really that far off about light bulbs? I thought they were still a novelty in Victorian times, which would have still been around 100 years later. Give or take.
I'm going to put on my Adree cap for a second. The addition of JP Lebreton on the last Idle Thumbs and the ensuing conversation about just how dull and mined out violence was in video games was just... horrid. They spent 10 minutes saying the same thing in ever more pretentious ways and ever more tortured metaphors. You may think it's a grand vision you have for some kind of Dogme 95 of video games, but at least say something interesting about it! And besides, that shit only produced one good movie and inflicted Lars Von Trier on the world. Sorry, I know I shouldn't just post to crap on the podcast, but I really did love Idle Thumbs once upon a time. To make up for it, I'll note the latest Three Moves Ahead, mostly about board game component design, was excellent.
This doesn't really fit in the podcast thread but I just have to share that in the Metal Gear: Revengeance quicklook Patrick Klepeck says Bayonetta didn't have a dodge mechanic.
Lars Von Trier made movies before Dogme 95 - The Element Of Crime and Europa being the big ones, both of which are fantastic. And The Kingdom predates Dogme 95, although that's a TV show. Was the "one good movie" Vinterberg's The Celebration? I loved the hell out of that movie.
There are things about Patrick that I just don't understand. Like, for instance, how do you get worked up over Paul Revere but not completely incensed by the Boston Tea Party, which the team themselves admit is a complete lie in the service of doing a video game. I don't understand that. I also think that it should be required at this point that anybody who's going to try and criticize the complete batshit insanity of Assassin's Creed's "story" read this. Because, yo - it will inform your understanding of what to expect. And, for the record, those books didn't really lay any groundwork for their twists either.
Wait, what? You can't criticize the Assassin's Creed storyline because there's this other book that has no relation to it that also exists? "Guys, before you criticize Transformers you should totally watch Robot Jox."
Because he's not concerned about the accuracy of what is being portrayed as much as he is concerned about Connor's increasingly Forrest Gumpian role in the formation of the United States. I do not agree with him, as I find that concern to be ridiculous, but it is a clearly different concern from what you are describing.
Well, for starters, I was being facetious, but it's not really an unrelated book. The Illuminatus! Trilogy is the font from which an awful lot of the particular brand of fictional bullshit that this series is based on (conspiracy fiction) flows, and it actually shares a lot of mythology as well (the Order of Assassins, for instance, where I still have some hard time recalling whether or not it's actually included in the first game). When the things you criticize have more to do with the genre than with the specific item you're discussing (as is the case with Klepek's complaint about the ending to AC2), and when the thing you're criticizing is trying very hard to be in that genre, eventually I get tired of repeatedly saying that it's supposed to be that way. For example, I don't plan on watching Saw 37 or whatever number it is we're up to because I don't like the torture horror genre. I don't like the torture horror genre because all of that particular kind of violence makes me feel sick and uncomfortable. The transitive theorem of bullshit clearly holds that I will not enjoy Hostel because the violence will make me feel sick and uncomfortable, but criticizing the movie for being exactly what it is trying to be seems to me to be a little bit pointless. Edit: Also, Jesus Christ Pat. Come on. You're the fucking news guy. Maybe you were out of the game when it was first announced, so you didn't do this research, but you should still probably know why Whore of the Orient is named what it is - specifically, that that is one of the many colorful terms used to refer to the city of Shanghai back in the day, which implies that the game will be set at that time in Shanghai. Back before the game news crapped all over the Google results, you just had to punch that in to find out what it meant.
You are wildly mistaking The Illuminatus! Trilogy's role in conspiracy theory. Assassin's Creed shares some similar thematic ground with Robert Anton Wilson's crazy awesome series, but it didn't invent them, any more than Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum or Garth Ennis' Preacher did. Just because two things take their inspirations from the same source doesn't mean one influenced the other. Are all superhero comics based on Superman? Is Hellboy based on Castle Wolfenstein? It seems a lot more likely that anybody who worked on Assassin's Creed read Dan Brown books and said "Let's make a game out of that."
You missed my point. The game's treatment of Paul Revere's "ride" is more accurate than what Patrick thought it was. The podcast made it sound like Patrick wanted the game to be like the poem.
At the end of last week's 46 hour Bombcast, Klepek provided the most perfect example of what I always complain about with him. The guys were discussing which is better, Hot Pockets or pizza rolls which led, perhaps inevitably, to a discussion of how both can burn your mouth. Klepek jumped in and said that burning your mouth in that way was going to be a thing of the past thanks to a new technological development he had read about. The following is my summation of the ensuing discussion: Patrick Klepek (PK): Yeah, I totally read this article about how science will save you from burning your mouth when you take an overly enthusiastic bite into a hot piece of pizza or a Hot Pocket. Bombcast Fellows (BF): Oh really? What's up with that? PK: Oh, uh. I think it's strips you put on the roof of your mouth. BF: Really? How will that work? PK: Uh, I don't know. I actually only read the headline. Not the actual article. fin. Speaking of Klepek, what exactly does he do there? Anyone else notice that Ryan takes care of the news on the Bombcast, not the supposed news guy they hired?
He writes most of their news coverage. You are aware that Giant Bomb is not just a podcast, yes? I look forward to your next vitriolic multi-post rant about a podcast host to whom you've taken an irrational dislike.
I think Patrick says dumb things too. However... HIS NAME IS KLEPEK, OK!? IRRATIONAL RAGE AT PODCAST HOST MISSPELLING!
How DARE a supposed gaming news professional not have up-to-the-minute breaking facts about a product totally unrelated to the gaming industry!
Most? I remember thinking, the last time I paged through a backlog of their stuff in my reader, that Alex's name showed up kind of a whole lot in the bylines for him being their only East Coast resource. I've got nothing for or against Klepek personally (I like that he had the good humor to show up on Idle Thumbs) - though I find it hilarious that the news guy, of all people, doesn't know what Provocative Game Title actually means - but I must admit that I'm a little bit stymied as to what he's doing with all of his time myself, unless the bylines that I get in Google Reader are somehow incorrect. It certainly can't just be news. That or Alex is a robot.
He writes some news coverage, to be sure. Poorly, in my opinion. I'd take one Alex Navarro news post over a dozen Patrick Klepek junior high essay news posts. Regardless, I don't understand why the guy supposedly handling news over there isn't the one that collects the news stories for discussion during the podcast. Moreover, whenever Ryan turns to him during the podcast for commentary, clarification or reaction to a particular news story, Klepek rarely seems to have a handle on any actual facts. That usually doesn't stop him from commenting, of course. As for my ranting about the guy, this is the thread for podcast discussion, yes? I think the guy is a net negative for the Bombcast and all aspects of the Giantbomb site that I consume. I thought this was the place where we talked about that stuff. Ficksed!
I donno about multi-post. There've been lots of anti-Klepek posts made since the last Bombcast. Only one seems to be from Steve. Also, since he explained himself, I'm not too sure how good 'irrational' is as a descriptor, too. Patrick's the one that brought it up, then didn't know what he was talking about. It's less a matter of "Patrick should know more about science!" than it is "this is the sort of contribution he regularly offers the show, 'I don't know, I only read the headline'". Edit: And I'm saying all of this as someone who generally has no problem with Patrick, though the latest Bombcast had a good half hour there where it just fell into a rathole.
That wasn't the point and you know it. He does the same kind of talking out of his ass on gaming topics. I just thought the Hot Pocket thing was a great example and distillation of his particular approach to the relationship between knowing things and talking about things.
I count at least 4 posts about Klepek in the last few pages from Our Man Steve. The explanation does not comport with my recollection of the Bombcast, hence the descriptor "irrational."
Whereas I count two in the last ten days. I guess it's nice to know that for you a vitriolic rant can take upwards of two months to really get it all out there. Ah. So you're being irrational. I haven't read in the site in quite a while, so I'm glad to know that Dave is still around. I always liked episodes where Brad was out and Dave sat in. Of course back then he and Vinny were pretty much the only guys playing games on PC, so the two of them offered a unique take compared to the usual conversation on the Bombcast at that point.
Yeah, I think that's the main thing here - I often do not interpret the Bombcast the way that MSUSteve does. Klepek seems like a kid* who is very excited about horror and indie games, and does a good job with features on the site. The 'Cast isn't supposed to be The Newsroom, where everything that's said has to have three additional sources before you can utter a sentence. It's a weekly roundtable bullshit session that is only sometimes about videogames. Shit said off-the-cuff is just that - off the cuff. Nothing Patrick says on the 'Cast should be taken as journalism. Which is not to say MSUSteve is wrong, necessarily. I just don't see what he sees in his criticism of the Bombcast. * Don't bother correcting me. I'm 42. The whole fucking Bombcast are kids to me.
I think Dave has been working on the new site (which is his main job at GiantBomb. To be honest I'd rather have Patrick than just about anybody from any other gaming site, and he does play some of the stuff that you'd not really hear about if he wasn't on (Tokyo Jungle, Dragon's Dogma.)
Dave does the occasional Quick Look. Flight sims are usually him, Vinny, and Drew, and are HILARIOUS and must be watched. I like Patrick but I think he falls into the same trap as Idle Thumbs of thinking the words coming out of his mouth are a lot more profound than they are, or that he needs to aspire to dispensing learned wisdom about The State of The Industry or what have you. When he's just talking about games he likes or just being a fun part of the general discussion, he's fine. He was also out for an extended period of time with his wedding, honeymoon, and father's death happening all at once, which is why Alex pulled ahead in the number of stories posted department.
Garnett Lee has been talking a lot on Weekend Confirmed about Gamefly's new mobile game publishing initiative and his role as the head of that initiative. In a couple of recent episodes they talked quite a lot about the Rab Florence dust up, but never acknowledged Garnett's compromised role as both head of the nascent publishing division of Gamefly and as Shacknews' Editorial Director. Maybe I'm assuming too much, but doesn't it seem like a bad idea to have a guy who is now actively engaged in publishing games also be the head of editorial for a site that reports on and reviews games? I thought it was a missed opportunity to talk about that during the lengthy industry naval gazing they engaged in over the course of two WC episodes recently. To be fair, I'm not even sure if Garnett reviews games anymore, but I assume he has at least some role in review assignments and obviously has a huge role in overall site direction. I don't mean to call the guy's character into question, but I thought it was slightly shady that before he revealed his romantic relationship with Ariel Angelotti, he was talking up Q Games stuff quite a lot on the show. Not that he can't appreciate games that his girlfriend had some role in making, but he really should've made it clear that his relationship with that studio was more personal than professional.
Oof, Gamers With Jobs presents this week another illustration of why alcohol and podcasting don't mix. Tipsy Corey just brought several discussions to a screeching halt. Plus we get a far-too-long discussion of billiards. BILLIARDS.
And I kinda feel like Brad has been warming up his intractable grump act for the last couple of weeks already.
