Heliocentrical

Or one of you just drop it and walk away. Honestly what are you guys even fighting for? The ability to say I'm right on the internet? What a truly noble and honorable cause to fight that helps us as a society. As I said this is a pointless pissing match.

It's extremely frustrating when you're trying to get points of criticism across when the people you're conversing with are more than content having pissing contests amongst themselves while also brushing aside your points. I'm reminded of this video by CGPGrey in which he discusses anger in general and while he's being very broad I think his ideas apply to Gamergate pretty well. rE3j_RHkqJc

My thoughts exactly.

So I've been really enjoying playing Guild Wars 2 lately. I love all the nifty little features like not having to go to individual NPCs for quests, the seamless combat and not having to use mounts to go faster just to name a few. honestly it feels very clean and slick to pickup and play. The only thing I really don't like about is the crafting system. Now don't get me wrong it's unique but it also takes forever to get the best gear which as far as I know is through crafting. What are your thoughts on it guys?

An annoying clickbaiting twat with a patreon account. You do realize you're not obligated to watch VNN's content right? As far as Youtubers go Tyler's alright in my book.

It would need more than just a name change. The new group would also need to not get wrapped up in social media or they'll wind up in the same position as Gamergate is now. Also the new group should be a lot more strict in terms of who can join it. Despite what Gamergate supporters saying they watch their ranks Gamergate started as a twitter hashtag so everyone can use it so policing Gamergate is impossible. Gamergate for all intents and purposes is an unorganized mob. Organization and a sharp focus is what the new group will need.

Faux feminism or not honestly what difference does that make? If that side of GG was trying to defend itself from slander instead of being anti-feminist that still doesn't make that side any less pointless. Why are you trying to defend Gamergate from slander when you could help contribute to the journalist side which would A be infinitely more important and B give Gamergate credibility in the process? Do you honestly think defending Gamergate itself would make the slander stop? Gamergate dug it's own grave by trying to defend itself instead of letting the slander go and continuing with their ethics in games journalism.

I still think the anti-feminist side of Gamergate is nothing but pseudo-intellectual BS that ultimately crushed whatever good the Journalist side of Gamergate had going for it. I hate the anti-feminist side of Gamergate with a passion because of this. The journalist side of Gamergate could've achieved so much more if The anti-feminist side of Gamergate wasn't there to drag them down. The anti-feminist side of Gamergate pretended to care about game journalism while at the same time shoved their agenda driven propaganda down your throat. The anti-feminist side of Gamergate was also the perfect scapegoat for mainstream media to declare all of Gamergate as nothing but misogynists and to cover their backsides. This was all of the anti-feminist side of Gamergate's fault. @Presence I'm sorry, I might get back to you once I'm in a better mood. This was more of an opportunity to vent my frustrations with Gamergate and it's left me in a quite bitter and resent state.

That thread doesn't really cover the journalist side of Gamergate and the thread itself is pretty toxic. A good portion of it is just mudslinging. I really don't want this thread devolving into mudslinging if it can be helped.

Can we please agree to stop accusing who harassed who? Both sides have horrible people and both sides have fairly reasonable people. Arguing which side has worse people gets us nowhere.

@ThePest179 I think the best way to look at Gamergate is that it's two sides. One side is for exposing journalistic corruption which on it's own without anything else attached is fine. But the journalistic side is dragged down by the cancerous mass that is the anti-feminist side. The media used the Anti-Feminist side as a scapegoat to brush aside journalistic side and from that point it went nowhere. From that point onward the anti-feminist side completely dominated Gamergate as a whole like a cancer. This is probably due to most of the people who started Gamergate where already anti-feminist to begin with. So it was cancerous from the get go. That doesn't mean there isn't anything to be learned from Gamergate as a whole though. I completely agree with Ross that there could be a more sharp and focused journalistic group that emerges as a byproduct of the journalistic side of Gamergate and not something that is bound to an anti-feminist mob.

I agree with your point, vigilance has to start from somewhere even if that somewhere seems relatively harmless. Corruption will slip through anything and everything even if the person causing it thinks what they're doing is ultimately good. That's one of the worst aspects of humanity for me. People who have an investment in what they support and other people who oppose their ideas only reinforces their investment regardless of the actual quality of their ideas. When they should consider whether or not their ideas are any good and what their opposition has to say. Doesn't matter if in the end their ideas ultimately harms us all. What matters to them is that investment and quite frankly that is completely disgusting and I absolutely refuse to support that. Also Ross I have two questions I would like to ask. First what's your opinion of Steam's Christmas caching error incident? There's a video made by a guy named Tom Scott who describes what happened fairly well https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkSslseq9Y8. Does it make you even more paranoid about what doors DRM leaves you vulnerable to? Second what's your opinion on cracks? I know in the past you mentioned that you crack all of your games. I think outright piracy is wrong but cracking an exe of a game that you legitimately purchased should be entirely legal. I have a game that I purchased and due to the nature of it's DRM I can no longer play it. Sounds fair right? Gosh it's horrible how much games publishers screw over their customers. They force DRM into a game and sometimes completely destroy the game to save their bottom line. There's one article in particular that got under my skin. http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/165784-No-More-Pirated-Games-in-2-Years-Says-Cracking-Forum. It is nothing but kissing the publisher's ass and justifying the DRM they put in to their games.

One of the issues I have with Gamergate is that it seems like a fairly unimportant aspect of the games industry. I think in terms of other problems the games industry is having like killing games, games becoming abandoned and forgotten and nasty DRM games journalism ranks has the lowest priority in my mind. In the grand scheme of that is the games industry what does games journalism influence within it? It doesn't, the games industry holds a stranglehold over most games journalism sites in exchange for range, power and money that these game companies will provide. This agreement is incredibly circular and self-feeding.That is a massive obstacle to try and overcome if it's even possible. I don't think most of games journalism has any impact on games industry at all outside of consumers possibly. But then some savvy consumers already know not to trust most games journalism sites except for a few independent press outlets/individual personalities. These savvy consumers are few in number compared to the unchanging majority and unchanging majority will most likely not change/not care about what they read/view. I gonna go out on limb and say that the audience of the few independent press outlets/individual personalities are largely the same people reading/viewing their content over and over again. There are people who these few independent press outlets/individual personalities can convert into watching well-informed content and making well-informed decisions. But that means the audience changes/grows at a snail's pace and they can't convert all of them which where the main problem in games journalism lies. These few independent press outlets/individual personalities lack the range of their larger more powerful competitors. I'll be honest this task seems downright Sisyphean and I don't think a whole lot of value in accomplishing it. The only real value I can see is if you're a journalist who's trying to legitimize journalism itself. But you gotta realize that you're working on the entirety of journalism and not the games industry because journalistic corruption isn't unique to the games industry it encompasses all of journalism.

I almost forgot that Unreal Tournament 4 is currently in alpha. UT 4 looks promising but then again it's in alpha so it's subject to change. I'm glad Epic's done with Gears of Muscular Meatbags Super Dude Bros Deluxe. Remember when Epic awkwardly mashed Unreal Tournament with Gears of War with UT 2008 and didn't make anymore UT games for seven years? That was fun right? Oh well better late the never.

I know, right? I loved how distinct his 3d model was from all the others with his giant robotic arm and unforgettable grin . By the way how did you re size your UT 2004 portrait? I want to do something similar with Abaddon's portrait without blurring it to hell and back.

You mentioned that if Ross has around 47 people at the meetup that he'll need more experienced players. Do you mean as in actual experience with the game or in terms of what they've unlocked? I don't know how much the unlockables matter in PS2 but judging by what you're saying they don't seem to matter that much. Is that true? I went over to the PS2 website and right on their front page there's an alert that says PS2 is now available on Playstation 4. I wonder how close they were to saying PS2 is now available on PS4.

Ross if you haven't decided on an empire yet how can I go get experience before the meetup? I think once you choose an empire the game locks you to that empire. So if I joined the Vanu Sovereignty and you chose the New Conglomerate I couldn't join the meetup. Also how will this work for people who already have PlanetSide 2 accounts? Odds are that most of your audience will be pretty split across the board and you would have to exclude 2/3rds of your audience. Unless there's a way to work around this I could be completely wrong. Also my favorite UT 2004 character is Abaddon. I spent a ton of time playing UT 2004. I recently beat the campaign again on masterful difficulty. I thought that was pretty good since that's the third highest difficulty along with inhuman and godlike. Ross which difficulty did you usually pick when you played UT 2004? Edit: Ok did some googling and found that you can make other characters for a different empire but your unlocks don't carry over to the new character. Ross I was thinking what you could do is make a poll before the meetup for the people who are currently playing PlanetSide 2 for which empire they're currently playing as and choose your empire based on which empire ranks the highest in that poll.

Which empire will I need to be in to join the meetup? I'm guessing it's the Vanu Sovereignty maybe? Also should I start playing PlanetSide 2 before the meetup so I can get some experience with how the game works?

What kind of communication will you use for the PlanetSide 2 meetup? Will it be text chat or mic chat? I don't have a mic.

Ross have you considered possibly changing the way you hold a mouse? The way I hold my mouse only leaves my pinky finger out. I put my thumb on the side of the mouse, index finger on the left mouse button, middle finger on the scrollwheel and ring finger on the right mouse button. I was thinking this method of holding might make using regular three button mice a lot more appealing for you if you have no other options.

On Christmas Day Steam had a caching issue and displayed random user accounts when you attempt to login to your steam client. This would then reveal personal information of said account. Valve has addressed this caching issue and Steam is back to normal. However this is a large security hiccup on their part and they are the largest digital distributor of video games. Has anyone been having issues with their steam account? Tom Scott's video on Steam's caching issue.

I really only have one song in mind. But it is fantastic. It's a medley of all the versions of Hell March from C&C Red Alert's 1,2 and 3 made by a guy named Smiechu. You can view it on Youtube and download it from his Google Drive page. Happy Birthday Ross from Crazy Ivan. Video Download https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4MBMvmYX6TOdlpDZ0ZnaEhPcTQ/edit?pref=2&pli=1

Ross do you have anymore great life stories to tell? I loved the story about you and Metal Dave buying peoples' souls with candy.

So here's my late Christmas present for everyone. I went and wrote down the entire office directory list for those who want to read it. It's pretty much impossible to read in the video due to the speed of the scrolling and slowing down the video to read them isn't exactly ideal. They're quite interesting. I think we've also come full circle with cow shed listed as one of the directories. It's D1 to be specific.

I was looking at Professor Layton at one point and considered getting it but the bits of story I saw in playthroughs to me looked really uninteresting. Maybe it gets interesting once you've played through the game and have the whole picture. But I'm not willing to invest time into something that doesn't grip me right off the bat. I will say however Puzzle Agent does grip me. The Grickle World looks like it's packed to brim with all sorts of weird stuff that I would be interested in alongside logic puzzles sounds like a win win to me unlike Professor Layton.