#most of the stuff I noticed is just like reinterpreting how dynamics work that make them make a bit more sense

[moghedien]

honest to god, as someone who was obsessed with PJO as a kid when it was released but who hasn't read the series since the last book came out, the number of changes I actually could point out in the show I could count on one hand. and some of those barely count

[fuckblizzardbearlover]

Ok so reasons why i Love Warcraft the Beginning, and why its perfect and i hope for more. Might be a little incorherant cus i'm just doing my thoughts as they come. i  dont have the time to spend hours writing articles i'm not being payed for.

Yes Warcraft is a great, i say Perfect movie. "But it has flaws". Everything does. That perfect movie you love so much? someone found it boring, someone found it pretentious , someone found it stupid. Perfect pizza? someone doesnt like your toppings, someone thought there wasnt enough for it. A movie, a show, a book, art in general cannot be judged by an arbitrary list of items it must meet to sufficient quality. "no plotholes, great acting, good effects" are not good qualifiers. Most ppl dont know the meaning of plotholes, different tons of story require different acting (Casablanca is seen as a masterpiece but i dislike movies of that era because the acting is over the top, stiff, and campy. however that does not make them bad, it just means i dont like it). Really the only way a piece of art can be judged is by judging it based on what it TRIED to do. If your character is suppose to show they are angry in this scene and they just seem constipated then you did fail and that was bad acting. But if your character is suppose to be angry and some of the audience thinks they should have acted a different way, then thats just a difference of opinion between author and audience.

So what did Warcraft the Beginning TRY to do? Pay homage to the original franchise, tell a heartfelt complex story, give a larger than life epic, and reinterpret the story into something thats better than it was and can be accepted by a general audience

-So i love how much the art, style and themes embraced the franchise. The intro was PERFECT. The little cameos and everything were well done. For some weird reason a few thought that was cringe but part of good cameos is world building. They arent putting "this way to the stoutelager inn" so fans can go "i get that refrence" they are doing it to create  a scene that involves a sign to an inn and might as well be a real one from the story, right? The franchise STARTED as Err orcs bad humans good but it has since evolved past that, and you saw that with the  theme of the H and A heroes banding together against guldan. The armor and costumes were perfect, using the major flair of warcraft without being overly done. Llane's and Lothar's armor is perfect example.

some people have a problem with what i'd say was the "family friendly epic fantasy adventure" aspect of the movie. yes pacing was quick but when you go into a weird story you just suspend disbelief and take things as you go. They never explain how the Flashy Thingies in men in black work, they just do. you accept it and move. And there was some slightly heavy handed themes and moments. but thats what we call Camp. Its a fantasy adventure, you have snark, a few cheesy lines, hope vs darkness and all that good stuff. I remember when Wonder Woman came out an interviewer asked about the....hammy? ending. i think they used  a different word. but the idea was that it seemed...bad? that the ending revolved around Wonder woman's faith in humanity, faith in goodness and trying to do good, was naieve. And Patty Jenkens said that she thinks the world needs more hope like that, not everything is doom and gloom and the point of a hero is to be hopeful.

A GOOD movie, a PERFECT movie doesnt need to be high art. Ppl talk about inception cus it was so intense but IMO if half the audience doesnt know whats happening then its not so good is it? and like i said So many "great perfect movies' in history are boring, or weird or unlikable to many people. And i think its a great detriment to the world that people got to act like only high art movies that win awards are any good.

And then there is the story and charactes. I loved Lothar and Llane, very relatable and good example of heroic men. The mirror between the father Lothar and Durotan was great. I loved how well they did the orcs, just everything about them. Like their meeting and having it so that you could only understand the side you were listening from, if you listen when its focused on the orcs and Garona is translating you can hear Llane speaking something that is NOT english. But like even with the kinder orcs they kept the furiosity. Durotan makes it clear that their world is dead and they cannot simply go back, and thats very realisitc. even were it not for guldan if he was fighting to save his people he'd willingly fight the humans if they tried to stop them. It was great seeing them touch on the idea of the fel infused orcs with Medivh's ability to create spells that specifically target them. Oh and geeze his whole arch. the actor and directing i think did a great job of showing him struggling to do as much as he could to help the alliance against the orcs. He seemed addled, like he was losing it or on drugs but you find out it is really because the fel is taking hold of him. thats what was great about the last guardian is the whole Inner monster storyline. Betrayal of one's self and all that. And it showed the variety in the orcs, yes you had dark ones who embraced the pillage too, and its a shame that the campfire scene "but you're...Green" scene didnt make it. Kadgar, did a good job with the whole "he's smart enough to notice when his 'betters' are wrong but he's young and inexperienced and doesnt know how to assert himself" was great.  Its funny cus some didnt like he didnt age, but far as i can tell nothing in warcraft even addressed that. Like he mentions once or twice in the book and in click dialogue that it sucks losing his childhood but there is no angst about it. you wouldnt know he's only in his 40s now. Even his little cinematic before legion focused on him taking up the mantle of the guardian.

And then there are the improvements it made. Rise of the Horde was good but they didnt have time to have the 'non fel orcs being around fel turn slightly green', so it was a good choice to have that dynamic visual change. Lothar's son arc i think gave him more of a personal reason to be invested in this other than "defense of our nation". And it kinda sucks in the original narrative that stormwind just kinda got its butt kicked. I'm sure it will still fall but it will be nice to see more effort put into it. And goodness we actually got to see varian's mother? and she was an important part of the story? she was an interesting character and had influence and was crucial to getting garona on their side. Speaking of , Garona by herself is the best change and alone makes this movie better than the original. She is a product of love, the first human/orc couple, presumably when Medivh was first exploring Draenor. And not a tool created by rape? Its so great that this shitty aspect of the story generated from the naive creator's idea of womens place in stories, was rewritten. Oh i'd be the first to say it wasnt malicious. but between Kerrigan and Sylvannas and Garona, heck this attitude exists today. That a man's humanity comes from his family, that he is violent emotionless and a killer but a wife brings out his peace and children his humanity . so the worst thing that can happen to him is his family is killed, thus bringing the beast back. And that for a Woman she is defined by her love of the man, does she reject him or accept him, does she play hard to get or support him? how freely does she give herself to him. And thus the worst thing that can happen to a woman is to have her body violated, and what many guys who grew up in the 70s-90s fantasy era that was the go to story. Woman is violated (in body) and gets her revenge and feels empowered by killing her rapist. while the man is violated by those he LOVES being killed, and empowered by avenging them and finding a new family (or a way to honor the dead ones)

So yea its REALLy awesome that this story rejected that whole farse and said "no, the key behind saving both peoples is a young woman who exists because 2 people from different planets loved each other"

[drink-n-watch]

I have said in the past that I like Christmas a lot but I’m not crazy about Christmas episodes. Not sure why. They just rarely end up entertaining me. But this one, it really snuck up on me there. Airing it in November was a nice touch too.

So how do I feel about Christmas episodes now?

What I thought Would Happen

Last week ended with the reinvention of hydroelectricity. Which is absolutely amazing but without a power grid, I’m not sure how much use it would be. Essentially it’s just a stationary low yield generator and they don’t have any electrical devices… yet… but crafting electronic components seems just a bit too insane.

I also had no idea how this would help with their cell phone plan. OK, I admit, they’ve been saying cell phone from the start, but my slow little brain kept on reinterpreting it as “telephone”, you know, a landline. So I spent most of my week trying to figure out how they were going to lay all those wires down (and secretly infiltrate Tsukasa’s base while they’re at it.

I only today clicked that they actually mean cell phones. So I guess they’re betting on those satellites still working after thousands of years. I really don’t know enough about satellites to know why they wouldn’t be working so, why not. And with Senku’s dad being an astronaut as the time of the event, there’s even reason to think that Senku would know the right frequencies…If any of these words are correct, it’s pure coincidence, I assure you.

What Did Happen

Well, they haven’t started laying down wire at all. But they did manage to harness the power of hydroelectricity to create actual light bulbs. That’s a big deal. They even made a vacuum. And then immediately used those light bulbs for decoration. And that may sound silly but we are creatures who crave entertainment. I think it was a fine use of their time….

These light bulbs also inspire Chrome to go mineral picking now that he has a way to see in the dark. (Oh they made flashlights too, it was a productive episode!).

So I’m poking fun at Senku making Christmas lights but what he also did was start to automate certain parts of their manufacturing process which is really smart actually. Unfortunately, when it came time to creating vacuum tubes, it seems bamboo simply couldn’t stand up to the heat and with no better material available, Senku finally hit a wall.

Luck favours the kind and so when sweet little Suika decided she needed to do something and combed through all the rocks Chrome had collected, desperate to find anything that could help, she noticed something she had never seen before. As the new year starts, Senku and his team have a new hope in the form of tungsten. The world’s most heat resistant metal!

What About the Characters

Well we already know these guys pretty well but, and this could just as easily go into the stuff I liked category, this week was a subtle turning point for Senku.

I mentioned that Senku didn’t come up with the water wheel. Chrome did, on his own. In many ways Senku is a bit like a smartphone. He simply shares previously stored information and often relies on the strengths and skills of others to get anything done. He certainly seems to have a prodigious memory but beyond that, when faced with a problem he doesn’t already know the answer to…

And this week, he was finally faced with an obstacle he couldn’t simply overcome. We do know that Senku is no stranger to failure, he will try over and over again, tinkering and adjusting things until it works. He tried everything with those vacuum tubes. But when he had to accept that he just didn’t have the materials, he was quick to give up.

We haven’t seen Senku openly admit defeat before. Even if it did turn out to be a temporary setback. It was still a side of him that was new. It made him more relatable. And I was impressed by how mature he was about it. Not that he needed to, but Senku is growing on me.

Also, I’ve been noticing it for a while, but Gen is actually playing the straight man. It’s pretty awesome to have your trickster archetype be the one sane guy!

What I Liked

Well I really liked that things didn’t go as planned for Senku. And not through unexpected circumstances or surprise attack or something. He just failed at something. It was refreshing.

I really liked Senku’s explanation of vacuum tubes. I plan to steal it and try to work it into a conversation as soon as possible!

And you know what, I was super happy to see Santa! It was cheesy and it didn’t make any sense and I may have let out an audible aww. Narratively it was in fact a rather sweet bookend as Senku had asked his father for a Christmas gift of Science! And in a way, he got it. This village and the foundations it provided was Byakuya’s long-promised Christmas gift to his beloved son. I may not be a huge fan of Christmas episodes, but I’m not made of stone. This was pretty.

Finally, picking Magma as the third member of their little expedition is really interesting. We haven’t seen these characters interact much at all. Next episode is going to have some interesting dynamics.

What I Liked Less

I suppose the discovery of the tungsten was a bit convenient but I’m gonna let them have this one. C’mon guys, it’s Christmas!

Maybe the festive spirit is getting to me, but I can’t really come up with anything. This wasn’t my favourite episode but there really wasn’t much for me to pick at either. And it was also a really fun episode…so there!

Closing Thoughts

I’m already considering buying up the available manga. I’m pretty sure the season is not going to wrap up the story and I want to know what happens. Amazon seems to have up to vol 10…

Mood: Exhilarated

      Dr. Stone Episode 21 – Warm Wishes I have said in the past that I like Christmas a lot but I'm not crazy about Christmas episodes.

[buytabletsonline]

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The capitol city of the new Scottish civilization in Civlization VI: Rise and Fall.

Samuel Axon

The new timeline view that shows your civlization’s historical progress.

Samuel Axon

The diplomacy interface is the same, but new leaders and expanded alliances bring fresh dynamics to the peaceful way.

Samuel Axon

This is the new loyalty lens, which tells you which civilizations are influencing your city, and how much.

Samuel Axon

The governor management window.

Samuel Axon

You’re still greeted with a speech from Sean Bean when you start, even with new civilizations.

Samuel Axon

There are a lot of new policies; here, we see some of the new dark policies that are only accessible in a dark age.

Samuel Axon

The vibrant colors of a heroic age, and the capitol city of new Korean leader Seondeok.

Samuel Axon

Every Civilization game since Civilization IV has followed the same trajectory: the initial release remixes and reinterprets some base systems from the previous game, but franchise veterans deem it anemic because it has fewer systems and features than its fully expanded predecessor. From there, new expansions gradually reintroduce the complexity that was lost in the move to a new game until many of those players conclude that it’s the best game in the series yet.

In many ways, though, 2016’s Civilization VI was a bigger departure than previous entries, and it has been divisive accordingly. The game completely overhauled how cities were expanded and how religious warfare was waged, among other things. If you’re a Civ traditionalist who felt Civilization VI strayed too far, you won’t like this latest expansion. It takes the changes even further. But if you’ve been itching for even more ambitious fresh ideas in a franchise that has historically been very conservative, you’ll find what you’re looking for here.

After binging a couple games of an early copy of Rise and Fall virtually non-stop for the past day and a half (as you do), I’m not quite sure this expansion adds enough meat to make Civilization VI feel as robust as its predecessors. So far, I’m left with the impression that we’re moving in the right direction, but we haven’t quite arrived yet.

The requisite new leaders and wonders

Just like previous expansions for previous Civ games, Rise and Fall adds a bunch of new leaders and wonders. In this case, we have nine new leaders, and every one of them brings something truly unique to the table. It’s always impressive when this series manages to create entirely new playstyles with just a few bullet points of new rules for an added leader.

I tried a few of them and found that Rise and Fall follows that tradition quite well. Here are all the new leaders, along with their attributes:

Among other things, India’s Chandragupta is able to aggressively expand via warfare once he learns a key classical era civic.

Samuel Axon

Mongolia’s Genghis Khan is back, bringing cavalry bonuses and expanding the ability to leverage trading routes.

Samuel Axon

The Mapuche’s Lautaro can drive down enemy cities’ loyalty by winning battles near them.

Samuel Axon

The Cree’s Poundmaker greatly enhances the benefits of both alliances and trade.

Samuel Axon

Scotland’s Robert the Bruce can build a golf course, which is all you probably need to know.

Korea’s Seondeok is a great pick if you’re going for a science victory.

Samuel Axon

Military bonuses abound for the Zulu’s Shaka, who can form Corps and Armies earlier than other leaders.

Samuel Axon

Georgia’s Tamar combines religious bonuses with more powerful Age transitions.

With the Netherlands’ Wilhelmina, you can create powerful cities with improved adjacency bonuses when you have a river nearby, then improve loyalty in neighboring cities via trade.

Samuel Axon

Building wonders is one of Civilization‘s great pleasures—made all the better by VI‘s lovely wonder completion animations—and I count eight new wonders in Rise and Fall. Some have appeared in past games, but others (like Antarctica’s Amundsen-Scott Research Station) haven’t. A few of them play off new mechanics like governors and loyalty, but most of them are pretty classic, actually.

Here are the Civilopedia entries for each of them:

The Amundsen-Scott Research Station provides massive science bonuses, especially if your city is somewhere Antarctica-esque.

Samuel Axon

Casa de Contratación gives you instant power-ups for your Governors, and makes them more effective when they are assigned to far-flung continents.

Samuel Axon

Kilwa Kisiwani grants big incentives for fully wooing city-states.

Samuel Axon

Kotoku-in increases faith in its host city, and it produces a handful of useful warrior monks.

Samuel Axon

St. Basil’s Cathedral doubles religious tourism in the city in which you build it and provides bonuses when there are tundra tiles nearby.

Samuel Axon

The Statue of Liberty gives you multiple free settlers, and ensure its host city and those very close by always stay loyal.

Samuel Axon

The Taj Mahal helps you amp up your Era Score with big Historic Moments.

Samuel Axon

The Temple of Artemis makes several types of improvements generate amenities.

Samuel Axon

Some of the wonders are quite powerful, and they all fill some niche not previously filled by Civilization VI‘s existing wonders. There are also four new units, two new districts and a handful of new resources. None of those are game-changing—except for the Government Plaza district, which we’ll examine more closely later.

There are also several small UI tweaks and some adjustments to the contents of the civics tree. Notifications are consolidated in clever ways to avoid overload, and so on. Every UI tweak was welcome.

Firaxis even endeavored to improve the AI in Rise and Fall. The improvements are noticeable, but there’s still some wonkiness. You still see AI leaders making bizarre military decisions, but they don’t hassle you with nonsensical diplomatic communications as often.

That’s it for the obvious stuff. Let’s get into the new systems.

Friendship is magic again

Civilization VI is a game about building a civilization “to stand the test of time,” and ostensibly, you have multiple ways to do that—some violent, some peaceful, and some a combination of the two. One of my biggest problems with the game as compared to some previous titles, though, was that the peaceful path never seemed very relevant.

The game’s AI always seemed rigged to stir up unnecessary drama to keep things exciting (as if Queen Victoria was an over-the-top reality TV star) and I usually found that war was the only way to effectively quell that drama—even if conquest was not my target victory condition. And forget about diplomacy; it was paper thin, and the AI always seemed to find a reason to turn on you 20 turns later anyway.

Fortunately, addressing that seems like Rise and Fall‘s primary mission, in two main ways.

Alliances

First, alliances have been overhauled. There are now multiple alliance types. A research alliance causes trade routes between allies to generate many more science points or makes allies automatically share technology boosts from time to time. There are also military, cultural, religious, and economic alliances.

Alliances gain levels and become more powerful over time. This gives the actors on the world stage, including the player, incentive to be less fickle and antagonistic. There’s still no world congress or equivalent, though.

Loyalty

The second addition that de-emphasizes warfare is also the expansion’s biggest new system: loyalty.

Your cities now each have a loyalty score which represents how invested citizens are in your own government and culture. Keeping them happy, assigning a governor, enacting certain policies, and other actions can help generate enough loyalty to keep your cities, well, loyal. But other civilizations can foster loyalty in your cities, too—and vice versa.

Cities on the border between two civilizations are always harboring a sort of cultural cold war. If China fails to foster enough loyalty in Shanghai, and neighboring Greece is pumping out the influence, Shanghai could very easily flip into Greece’s hands—kind of like culture flipping in prior Civ games. Further, if you build a city far from your home cities and another civilization is nearby, it’s almost certainly going to end up in enemy hands without a shot fired unless you get very clever about how you approach it.

Here’s a screenshot illustrating how this works. (Most of the screenshots and examples we’ll see are from the same game; this hopefully helps give a sense of how these features play into the arc of a single playthrough.)

Enlarge / Here, I’m trying to pick a place to build a new city. These numbers tell me all these tiles are nonstarters because the nearby civilization would cost a city in these spots 20 loyalty per turn. (That’s a lot.)

Samuel Axon

This makes the domination victory much harder than it was previously. It’s very difficult to prevent insurgency when you’re occupying cities in far off lands. At one point, a city state—Stockholm—was sitting between my civilization and that of my nemesis, Shaka. I decided to conquer Stockholm with my superior army, but it didn’t do me a lot of good. The city very quickly flipped to Shaka, because its loyalty rating was more heavily influenced by him than by me. I ended up reconquering it only to lose it again two more times. On a final conquest, I just razed the city because I couldn’t possibly keep it.

It turns out being an occupying force is difficult. This is relatively realistic, but players who like to bulldoze through the world with their armies will find that the game no longer plays out in the way to which they’re accustomed. That said, I get the sense that with more experience and very deliberate planning, it would still be possible to do what I was trying to do. It’s just a lot more fraught than it used to be.

This system makes thoughtless aggression less fruitful, and it finally gives you nonviolent ways to expand your empire and hinder your enemies in Civilization VI. It’s the best thing about Rise and Fall.

Emergency situations

When I conquered Stockholm without a reasonable casus belli, I triggered another of the game’s new features: an emergency situation. The game set up a short contest between me and the other civilizations with a stake in what happened. They were given a short period of time to “liberate” Stockholm. If they succeeded, they would receive substantial bonuses (check out the screenshot for details). If I fended them off, I would receive a bonus instead.

Enlarge / This window pops up when an emergency situation has been triggered, explaining the rules and the stakes.

Samuel Axon

Since emergency situations are designed to band weaker players together against a belligerent leader (usually me—no apologies), they’re meant as a sort of catch-up mechanic—kind of like a far less ridiculous variation on the blue shell from Mario Kart. The intent is that the leader has a steeper incline ahead of themselves since the other civs are teamed up.

That said, there’s no good way for the other civs to coordinate their efforts, so it doesn’t always play out that way. It feels like Rise and Fall‘s least-baked idea.

Listing image by Samuel Axon

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