Seattleite

So, I was recruited by my friend Justin into an indie dev team. Right now it's me, my brother Jack, Justin, our friend Steven and one of that friend's friends whose name I cannot recall. We're still in the planning stages, and most of us are learning at least one new tool right now. (Unity, for instance, is entirely new to everybody but me and Justin.) I'm writing along with Justin, a designer again with Justin, level building with Justin, composing music alongside Justin and Steven, doing pixel art alongside Justin and Jack and I'm learning C# so I can take some stress off Steven's friend, who is presently our only programmer. The game's a top-down 2d action-RPG, with faux 16-bit graphics. We're aiming to have two-player co-op capability, with one player controlling each of the game's two player characters (in single player, the second PC is left at the Sanctuary and you can switch between them). The game's combat is extremely defensive in nature, and the player must prioritize avoiding damage over dealing it. To this end, the player has block and dodge moves, both of which they can be expected to use frequently, probably more than their attacks. (Taking one solid hit can often be the beginning of the end for you, crippling a limb or causing life-threatening bleeding.) The player characters are two small children of indeterminate age, a boy and a girl. They stand at a positively tiny 28px, where most adult NPCs are 40-50px tall. That translates to 112cm, and their in-game weight (which is relevant to only a few things) is 20kg. They're both celestials, immortals tasked with maintaining the sixteen realms and all the lesser connected worlds, with these two tiny ones being tasked with closing unwanted links between them, and occasionally re-opening links when they are needed. This task is not normally a difficult one. By the time they arrive, the opener of an unwanted link is usually not present and the portal can be safely closed without confronting them. In the intro, however, things go differently. The link open is a stable portal, rather than the normal temporary link. That isn't too unusual, but it is cause for concern. Still, the girl approaches the portal and cheerfully greets the unseen owner of it on the other side, asking him what the purpose of the portal is, and how long he plans on keeping it open. A sword erupts from her back, and she is thrown aside. A being with six arms, twelve wings and many tongues steps through the portal, dressed in a loose black robe. Eyes adorn the palms of its hands, and it carries with it a sword, an apple, a book and a small sack. The boy gets ready to fight it, only for it to raise a hand and blind him with the eye in its palm. The boy is then run through while he's blind. (Yes, we seriously are starting with two tiny children being horribly murdered in the intro sequence. They're immortal, it's hardly the same.) Both children awaken in a bed, in the quarters of a church, with clothes laid out for them at the foot of the bed. This is the Sanctuary, and where the cutscene ends. The actual game starts with the children dressed at the foot of the bed, and control is handed to the player. The plot of the game from here is that the players have been disowned by their old god and picked up by a new one, who wants a series of links it made to be re-opened, and whoever or whatever is responsible for closing them to be eliminated. The players never see this god, or hear from it, all their orders are given by a woman in a victorian mourning dress (just referred to as "the Mourner"), in the church they wake up in. (Which is actually a sort of pocket-world.) These start with the one connecting this church to a nexus beyond it (also a pocket world) and then all the links leading out of this nexus. The player finds that the creatures that shut down the nexus have also barricaded the doors between its levels, forcing the player to venture into the worlds the nexus links to in order to reach each successive level and remove the barricades. They don't have to visit every world, but they have to visit one world per nexus level and make their way through it to reach the following nexus level. (There's only one between the first and second nexus levels, but three for each of the others.) This makes huge parts of the game entirely optional, but the huge difficulty spikes after each area encourage you to go back and do the other worlds. The game also features a lot of combat, with enemies coming in far fewer numbers but being individually much stronger than the fodder found in most action RPGs. Enemies have complex attack patterns, and finding where the openings are is central to fighting them. It should be to the point where every encounter feels like a miniboss, that's about the feeling we're going for. However, the game is also going to include a lot of secrets, hidden areas and hidden pathways. It's possible to completely bypass many of the game's fights, and often beneficial to do so. (And not just because it helps you keep all your fingers and toes.) There's always more than one solution to each encounter, and even with bosses the requirement is just to open the links they're guarding, not necessarily to kill the boss. If you can come up with another way of doing that, the game won't exactly look down on you for it. The results are the important part, not your means. The game's projected to be released in late 2017, or early 2018. We should have the demo up within the year, but we aren't putting up a Kickstarter until the demo is released because none of us are willing to take anybody's money until they at least know what they're getting into. More as it develops.

Well, if you want to know, BTG, the answer would be "Steven Universe" (which is really good), "Gravity Falls" (which was really, REALLY good), "Adventure Time" (which is kinda shit) and I think still "Spongebob Squarepants" (which is complete and absolute shit). Oh, and of course, "My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic" (which I don't really get the appeal of, but I can't say it's necessarily bad). As for which specific one they're bonding over right this second, I assume that's a spinoff of MLP with human girls because she's got the hair and really such a thing was inevitable. And as miss Sunset seems to be leaning on a desk, I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's the typical teen show set in a high school. Because we don't have enough of those, apparently. (Note: Not hating... At least not as much as it sounds like I am. Some of those are good... Well, two or three were. Well... One, if you don't count Japanese programs. I'mma stop talking now.)

Having another meeting in the same goddamn day.

Huh. I thought I was the only one. Back when I was on Xbox Live in 2007-2010, at least once a day, you'd get an intelligent and talkative person willing to have an in-depth conversation or occasionally even a debate about game mechanics, level design, sometimes even politics if it drifted that way, in a very controlled and civil manner. Often, you'd be teamed with said person for several matches, even party up with them and keep it going for a couple hours. And this was on Xbox Live, no less, which people often compare unfavourably to the YouTube comments section.

Customer service is one place, but I'd say Chris Bruzzo is another good option. Glad to be of service. As for verification, Andrew Wilson's email is listed by CEOemail.com, that's how I got the format for the others. I can't speak to the other people on the list, though.

I thought he did, too, then said it was still better than nothing. Maybe in the thread? Either way, doesn't matter. I found contact info because he wanted it, not because I thought it would work. I don't think it'll do much. I'm planning on just sending letters. I don't think Email will do anything, and the temptation to Email-bomb them is too strong. I'd use social media too, but... I'm kinda already blocked from EA's Twitter. (Not related to this. I... Was not satisfied with Sim City.) I have confirmed all those Email addresses. They do work, and my error reporting in the case of a non-existant address returns in four seconds, so there's no chance of a false positive. Go nuts.

I'm just giving him what he wanted, okay? Don't argue its validity with me.

Uh, dude?

Sitting through the dullest meeting so far this week. Browsing the site to ease the boredom.

Since you're looking for ideas, how about mailing EA empty game cases of games they've killed, or are about to kill? Combined with an obituary, and a note asking them to stop killing games, I think it might have an impact. If the game was never distributed physically, maybe a printed out promotional image, or paraphernalia? On the note of contact information, here's all I could find. I don't know what, if any of this, is what you're looking for. Except for their work Emails, of course, though these are their generic work Emails and they may or may not actually use them. I didn't have much time to look, but I'll be looking more later today. If anybody wants to join me in the search, here's the guide I've been following to find Emails. Brute force will work a lot better with a couple extra sets of hands. http://consumerist.com/2012/10/24/a-guide-to-figuring-out-executive-e-mail-addresses/ So far, the Email format seems to be [email protected]. I tried it with each executive and got no failure notifications. I haven't tried board members yet, but I imagine not only will that work, you could probably adapt that to any member of the company.

Yeah, I don't like how slow everybody moves in Verdun. The sprint is about the speed of a normal man's jog, like all the soldiers are on a strict diet of deep fried twinkies and beer. I get that a lot of shooters are like that nowadays, but can't we please go back to the era where we remembered that humans are bloody fast when they want to be? I'm not saying we make the opposite mistake, where everybody moves at the speed of an olympic sprinter all the time and never get tired, but "realistic" should not mean "slow", at least when it comes to movement speed. Well, never the less, not a deal breaker. I'll see about picking up a copy once my tax return comes in. Afraid I have little choice, now that I've gotten into the spirit of things. Cheerio!

I'll look into it, thanks. Though I have to ask, is it strictly a shooter, or does it have vehicular combat like the Battlefield series? (I'd love to take an early fighter plane for a spin. Haven't done that in years.)

Funny thing, I actually played World at War for a while. People actually used the bolt-action rifles a LOT. It was a refreshing change of pace.

Safe space culture?

...Okay. This is going to make boycotting EA really, REALLY hard. I've been hoping we'd get a game on the *first* world war for quite a while. Though if they treat the subject matter as well as they treat modern warfare and the second world war, it'll make me want to mail them a howler.

And I gave one last response. Now excuse me, I feel a pressing need to go start a serious topics thread on McDonalds. (Not really.)

Hey, she brought it up. I'm not going to continue talking about it if she won't. And there's a difference between visiting a place and living there, alright? I've been to Canada. Doesn't mean I know anything about the concerns of the Canadian people. And if I was talking about said concerns and a Canadian showed up and told me I was off base, I'd listen.

You've never been to the United States if you think we have any reason to fear getting shot. The odds of that are so astronomically low, no matter what part of the US you're in, that it's completely irrelevant to our daily lives. Most of us die of heart failure or cancer, just like anywhere else, and the leading unnatural cause of death is car crashes. Even in cases of violence, knives and blunt objects still kill more people than guns. Do you want to ban those, too? Of course you don't, never mind which weapons actually kill the most people, you just personally hate guns for some reason you don't understand. Guns do not have any extra, special danger to them. They just have ridiculous hysteria attached to them. The overwhelming majority of gun owners will never fire their weapon at a living being, and the overwhelming majority of those that do are firing at a wild animal they specifically got a permit to hunt. The few people who use a gun against another human being are almost always using it for state-sanctioned murder (military, police) or are using a weapon that was acquired illegally (pretty much everybody else). Occasionally, somebody will use a legally acquired firearm for violence not sanctioned by the state, most in self defence but a few for murder, but their numbers are massively dwarfed by the numbers who use knives and blunt objects. And let's not forget the parts of the world where gun deaths are the most common are NOT the ones with the highest rate of gun ownership. There's by far fewer gun owners in every country in Africa, and several orders of magnitude more deaths. Why? Little or no law enforcement, extreme poverty and civil unrest. All of these factors trump gun ownership. The reason the US has more gun deaths than most of Europe (not even all of Europe, nor by as much as you've been lead to believe) is not due to an increased number of guns. Switzerland proves that in one direction by having more guns and fewer deaths, the entire continent of Africa proves that in another by having fewer guns and more deaths. The reason is a combination of drug policy (all gang violence is the result of the drug war, as gangs exist to make money selling illegal drugs), a very high poverty rate for a "first-world" country, and a shameful lack of regulation. (That last one can largely be blamed on corruption, with the second cause being stupidity.) Banning all guns is insane, the kind of policy only written by people who have been shamefully misinformed on the issue, and usually this kind of agenda is pushed by people with little or no connection to reality. Banning all guns is not the answer. The answer is to end the drug war, combat poverty and put in better regulation on gun ownership, including universal background checks, waiting periods, mandatory safety courses and tracking weapon purchases and sales to make sure the exact, legal owner of a firearm is always on file. Switzerland does all of these things, and nobody gets shot despite there being a rifle in every household, almost literally. I really, truly don't think you understand the issue. Now, you want to talk actual danger, something that us Americans actually do have to be afraid of, which results in many pointless, unnecessary deaths and really needs legislation to put a stop to it? Then let's talk about McDonalds, and their so-called "food". Remember how I said most Americans die of heart disease or cancer? Well, you can blame diet for that, and McDonalds is the best example. They're what's really killing Americans, they certainly contribute more to our poor life expectancy than guns do.

And you think it's a good idea to punish the three hundred million people who own guns and have never done a thing wrong with them because occasionally people are assholes? Okay, better question. Do you really think it's a better idea to try prohibition, which we've already proven with drugs and alcohol not only doesn't work but leads to less regulation and more violence, instead of say, mandatory gun safety courses? Because honestly, that's the reasonable, not totally insane thing to do. Universal background checks, waiting periods and mandatory safety courses are all highly effective. Switzerland has already proven that, given that they have more gun owners per capita than the United States and by far lower rates of gun crime. But this isn't the thread to go on about this too long. OT: Kinda irritated. Clinton wins a state we already knew she was going to win, and people are acting like it's a huge upset to Bernie supporters. No, it isn't. We wrote South Carolina off six months ago and never even tried to move it, because it was a lost cause. Wait for Tuesday.

1. Do not presume to give me orders. 2. I am trying to convince him to NOT get involved with the troll, so we can stay on the topic we JUST got back onto, you dunce. I don't want another page of this crap. @Binky If you find regional offices, that might work. Aim for marketing directors. But as for mass emailing, crossing the line into email bombing might be the only option to make that stick. That means save the letter as a compressed attachment, put as many as you can on each Email, and save as a draft so yoi can send it over and over again. Automate it to keep sending, have multiple people do it. This ties up the malware scanners, and it can't add Emails that aren't scanned. Soon they will not be able to receive any Emails until the attack has stopped and the rest are sorted through. Spam filters generally don't block this, as it continues to check those flagged as spam. Not sure this is still practical today, but it was murderous in the early 2000s.

Tell the users on Witchwind that last one. They'll throw your dick in a garbage disposal and cheer. (They seriously cheered a woman who did that to her husband because she *suspected* infidelity.) Or they'll call you a rapist, if you are't a virgin, as to them all sex is rape. (Once again, not kidding. That's also a thing they believe.) I get that they're extremists, but they infiltrated and infected the entire feminist movement, poisoning it from the inside out. Now we have women like Big Red, who have never been on any of the female supremacy sites but share many of their stances and all of their completely unreasonable aggression because some of her "feminist" friends were actually misandrist extremists using the "feminist" title as a shield. It is very hard to find feminists not poisoned by those kinds of people. I sure can't find any. And that is one of many massive flaws with the third wave.

Popping Ibuprofen and going to bed. If all goes well, which it never does.

Dude, he won't listen to you. He's the single most thick-headed guy on the site. I blocked him several years ago, because he's the kind of guy that has mastered the art of double-think, the art of "TL;DR" and the art of rectal conjuring. Which is to say it doesn't bother him when he contradicts himself, he won't actually read what you write, and he pulls things straight out of his ass that are conveniently impossible to find a source for. I don't give up trying to convince people easily, and trust me when I say you're wasting your time.

Well, why not do the online part, then? Mass Emailing, that kind of thing. I'd love to see a DDoS, but I'm a bit more bloodthirsty when it comes to EA than most of the people here. EDIT: Okay, a lot more bloodthirsty. They killed Maxis and Westwood, this is personal for me. They're the only company I can think of that not only kills games for no good reason, they kill entire franchises and studios for no good reason. EDIT 2: Hmmm... If we set up a massive enough mass mailing system, maybe a nice botnet, we could overwhelm their mail servers, and effectively launch a DDoS with nothing but strongly worded Emails... But I don't think that's practical. EDIT 3: No, I don't *actually* want a DDoS. I'd LOVE to see it, but it wouldn't be productive, at least towards the intended goal. Though it also wouldn't hurt, if Anonymous caught wind of the outrage and just decided to get some target practice in with the LOIC, that'd be okay.

Hmmm... That's actually a good question. The way I see it, piling it all one one could break that one guy much more easily, but splitting it up would allow us to break more people, which is more likely to get results. My opinion? Hybridize it. Split it up across most of the smaller ones, but pick one guy (and we all know who) to bombard with as many as all the others put together. I mean, he asked how he could help EA win back our trust, and I agree with Ross that we should tell him. Where Ross and I disagree is on the number. Ross says to tell him thousands of times. I think that's an absurd figure. We should tell him tens of thousands of times.