Topic: Hot Takes Thread (Gaming and Non-gaming)

@Ralizah late response, sorry! I am pretty underweight so I can handle the large amounts of food buffets offer, but I don’t go to buffets a ton so I am pretty neutral on them. But now thinking about the sanitary aspects of them, I think I don’t really want to go to one for a while. Never gotten sick from one, but there is no way I want to eat food left in the public that someone could have touched with their unclean hands.

@Yousef- I love Panda Express, but I only really have it every now and then. The orange chicken combined with chow mein or fried rice is probably my favorite, but it’s a bit greasy and oily, and pretty unhealthy. When I used to worry about eating healthy at fast food restaurants, I always got beef and broccoli with brown rice at Panda, since the beef is listed as being “wok smart,” meaning it has less calories and are healthier than their other food choices, and brown rice is way more nutritious and healthier than fried rice or white rice, but I always hated how much rice they gave me. While I do think Panda Express has a bit of an issue with grease in some of their food (like the chow mein) and that some of the food tastes better if it’s cooked at home, it’s honestly better than another Chinese food restaurant me and my family had once. The food started to taste gross later from all the grease and food we got and we got sick of it compared to how happy we were with it initially. There is this thing with unhealthy food, where I get really excited to eat it, but all the junk and all the stuff in it gets to me the more I eat it, and my excitement wears off and I get sick of it. I do feel the same way when I eat sugar sometimes.

@Ravix Oh, I wonder how the Game Awards are going to go down later this year. I think this is probably going to be the first time I don’t watch it at all. I am expecting the Player’s Choice category to be a big mess.

@Pastellioli pacing yourself and spending at least two days eating minimally can also help you tackle buffets prettt well from my experience, and getting decent sleep

@Yousef- Interesting, I don’t eat fast when I am at buffets, I think I took a bit of a slow time eating at the buffet I went to with my family the last time, but I got a bit too crazy and got too much food, I didn’t feel sick at all luckily, but I got a combination of food that maybe could have hurt my stomach real bad if I got more; it was noodles with peas, shrimp, fish, and then some small cakes and fruit, I think I should have felt sick after that but I luckily didn’t. I am pretty bad with choosing foods that mix well and it hurts afterward, and the same kind of happens when I am at a buffet since you are free to get whatever of anything. If I did eat at an ordinary restaurant, I would have better portion control with the food.

@Pastellioli I’m more perceptible to motion sickness these days due to my dairy product addiction, lack of sleep and constantly driving so I try to chill out when I can. Thankfully I eat a lot of homemade food (I make it)

@Yousef- I can handle bad food, but some just makes me feel a bit sick. A full cup of ice cream makes me sometimes feel terrible, but probably because I don’t have a lot of ordinary dairy products like milk a lot. I haven’t been eating homemade food a lot, but I want to change that, luckily, I made slightly spicy lentils and rice with chorizo and vegetables in them a few days ago, alongside some green beans and carrots with sesame seeds and coconut amino flavoring with some help from my mom it’s super nutritious and I can handle eating more of that than something at a fast food restaurant. I haven’t been eating a lot of vegetables lately, but I am glad to go back to it now. I want to incorporate more vegetables into my diet, I forgot how good they taste with rice and beans!

@Pastellioli eating homemade will start out as something you willingly go out of your way to do, then it’ll slowly become second nature and will feel incidental and not something you think about

@Yousef- Yeah, I really want to cook more, I am getting tired of eating junk food and sugary drinks a lot recently, plus some of it has been disappointing, I remember buying a peach oolong tea drink with popping boba recently, only bought it cuz I was thirsty and made the poor decision to not bring a water bottle with me. I really didn’t like that because the boba would break the second it got into contact with my teeth, and the drink was ok, but very disappointing and something I won’t buy again. I have still been drinking tea and water, so it significantly outdoes the sugary drinks though. I need to get some ideas of what to make next with what I have here once those tasty rice and lentils go out.

@Pastellioli start slow and build up. Eggs and chicken are my go-to. After that maybe some stir fry noodles. Jacket potatoes are a great too. Spice it up by using sweet potatoes (unless they’re not your thing).
If you can somehow get your hands on a falafel mix that you can cook, make it with some fried potatoes and eggplants to make maoon mushakal, a popular Kuwaiti dish.

@Yousef- Sweet potatoes ARE my thing haha. They taste so good and are a great substitute to desserts and artificial sugars. Those sound like great recommendations, I probably will try to do those! I will probably look around and see if any of the stores here sell eggplants. Thank you for the recommendations again!

@Malaise I haven’t played days gone, so if it’s fine I’d like a brief rundown over deacon’s character (and what you dislike about it)

Aloy I can kinda guess what you hate about her but could you point out one negative trait you don’t like? Just to narrow it down a bit for me.

Kratos… I love kratos. Old kratos, that is. Do you dislike both old and new kratos? I can kinda guess why you dislike the former, but not the latter.

@Malaise IMO this is why something like Playstation All-Stars was doomed from the beginning. Sony's output has its place, but they are NOT in the business of creating iconic characters, generally. The closet they've come is with Nathan Drake.

@Ralizah I had a reply ready here but my device sadly shut-off so I’ll do my best to remember what I was gonna write. Also hence why this is a bit late so here goes;

I’m personally on two minds here.
On one hand; I gotta agree Sony isn’t as good as it thinks at creating iconic marketable characters. There’s nowhere near as much focus and identity as there was back in the ps1 days. But even then, those old guards came with their own set of issues. Like the fact they were kind of on a time limit, and it didn’t feel like you could make an entire franchise out of them past the third game.

On the other hand; Those same old guards are still extremely iconic in my opinion and well worth a cross over. to this day I will still never get over that the song and stage remix between ratchet and clank with god of war. That was one of the most validating things I seen in my entire life as a gamer.

Edit: As a general note, Sony might need to create more “simplified” icons that aren’t drench in MAH TRAUMA

@Malaise oh sorry. Didn’t see your comment there. I edited my previous comment, the edit includes a small reply something both you and Ralizah have said.

I can see what you mean. It’s quite refreshing to see, shall we say, less worshippy perspective on these guys (and gals)?
It’s actually really interesting seeing a certain indifference to the entire kratos character, as opposed to regurgitating the same song and dance about how he magically became likable out of nowhere, when to be he was always likable. There’s this small gameplay section in one of the ps2 games where kratos protect his dying family, and you have to restore their health by constantly hugging them. And there’s a really cute scene in Ascension where he kisses his daughter on the forehead right before she sleeps. Touches my heart strings every time.

Once again, I’m glad we have more varied opinions on these guys. They’re not as invincible to criticism as Sony thinks they are.

A maybe unpopular opinion that I forgot to share, but candy corn is disgusting in my opinion.

I know it’s a well-known treat for fall and trick-or-treating, but I didn’t like it. I bought a bag of it on impulse near Halloween a few weeks ago after not eating it for a few years and it didn’t taste as good as I remembered it, but it was also way too similar to other desserts I like more. The taste candy corn reminded me of was the sprinkles and frosting on a sugar cookie, or just a bunch of sprinkles by themselves. Probably the biggest food disappointment of the year for me!

And another small one, but I think mint chip ice cream is amazing.

I can understand why people dislike the idea of a mint and chocolate food combination, but I don’t get why people say it tastes like toothpaste, actual toothpaste would taste stronger and wouldn’t even have any chocolate bits in it. Mint chip ice cream has always tasted refreshing and delicious and I never thought it was toothpaste ice cream. Kind of surprised I didn’t bring that up when I was going on my chocolate ice cream tangent on this thread a few months ago.

I wasn’t sure where to post this, but I don’t think it’s quite robust enough of a topic to have an independent thread and seems to fit here. The topic —

Which game series and/or developer do you think has the most rabid and dedicated fanbase?

@colonelkilgore and @PorkchopExpress and I were discussing it over on the PS3 thread when the colonel noted how surprised he was how many people made it through the very grueling platinum for Final Fantasy XIII. I told him it was a sign of the fantastical nature of the FF audience.

So, take into account factors like number of fans who platinum the games or that dedicate massive hours to them, as well as just other considerations like online presence, popularity, penchant for evangelizing and/or vehemently complaining about their favorite series. Sheer number of YouTube videos, podcasts, forum posts, guides amd walkthroughs, websites dedicated to their lore, fan art, fan fiction, etc, etc, etc.

My quick top 5 was:
5) Final Fantasy fans
4) Souls and Fromsoft fans
3) Like a Dragon / Yakuza fans
2) GTA/Rockstar fans
1) Sonic the Hedgehog fans

Others brought up by colonel and Porkchop were Mass Effect/Dragon Age and Metal Gear Solid/Kojima fans. I might also throw in there Naughty Dog fans.

In contrast, I think popular games like Fortnite and FIFA don’t really have what I’d consider a “fanatical” player base. I feel like most fans of those types of series are just hopping in and out of those games, with no real commitment to the developer, creators, culture, and longevity of the series. At least not like a Yakuza fan who commits to like 14 games over 1000 hours of playtime to see the whole thing. Or a Sonic fan whose very identity seems forever bound to the iconic blue blur. Do Fortnite players have tattoos of the game’s art on their bodies? No.

Thoughts?

@Th3solution I’ve been thinking about this a bit since yesterday and one of the things that seems like it could fit but I personally am probably not the best person to quantify would be Nintendo stuff. Although I’ve had the occasional Nintendo console (had an N64 & Wii and currently have a switch) their stuff just doesn’t do it for me but I’m sure that Mario and Zelda fans are pretty fervent in their fandom… probably a couple of other Nintendo series’ too I’d imagine.

@colonelkilgore Yeah, I thought about the Nintendo devotees as a whole group, and I think they are very enthusiastic and zealous. Each console has its own following really, so teasing out the franchises within the Nintendo faithful I’d say Mario is probably the most rabid. Of the Mario-Zelda-Pokemon trinity, Mario is the one that I think people flock to out of sheer fandom and dedication to the IP. I feel like Zelda has become more fractured in its fanbase after the last couple games, but I don’t know. Pokemon is something that people consume but I don’t know that it defines them. Like, I don’t know if people say that they are “Pokémon fans” in the same way people say they are Souls fans or Sonic fans.

Another I thought of was Bioshock / Ken Levine fans. It’s a series we don’t hear talked about much, but the people who follow Levine are very dedicated. The BioShock 2 situation was very reminiscent of the Miyazaki-Dark Souls 2 situation where the fans have been split about the entry because the series creator didn’t directly participate in the game. Likewise for Kojima and the last Metal Gear game.

@Th3solution About those Pokeman fans...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/articles/cgj79npx58no

@JohnnyShoulder 😂 I think we have a new contender. I underestimated the fanaticism of the Poke crowd.