Poll of the Day > Have you given up onThe Geek Life?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Metalsonic66 posted...

https://www.amazon.com/Yamaha-Weighted-Digital-Sustain-P125AB/dp/B0B9KBMPZ8

You have expensive taste, but damn good taste.

The P-45 also has the weighted keys and all that but I really want the 125

I'm getting old. I just want my living room painted and the rest of my yard fenced in, and a smoker, definitely a smoker.

Smoker feels like something that's clutter 350 days of the year.
And if it's not, you become one of those people.

shadowsword87 posted...

Smoker feels like something that's clutter 350 days of the year.
And if it's not, you become one of those people.

Mary Jane loves brisket, and my backyard is big enough where I'll put it under the patio and use it the once a month. I'm also southern, and smoked meats is a right of passage.

Kang was conquered...

https://deadline.com/2023/12/jonathan-majors-marvel-fired-guilty-verdict-1235671790/

Don't hit women. I shouldn't even have to say that to anyone, ever, but people need to be told the obvious from time to time.

The_Wave_Master posted...

I just want my living room painted

if you were my neighbour i'd paint ur rooms. I like painting

Lokarin posted...

if you were my neighbour i'd paint ur rooms. I like painting

Aw thank you. I must warn you I have 20ft cathedral ceilings.

I admit that I'm an old man, but I do not care for SpongeBob Square Pants.

I do not care for his antics.

Who else is brave enough to admit this truth?

I literally dressed like Broadway SpongeBob at the con this year so...

Metalsonic66 posted...

I literally dressed like Broadway SpongeBob at the con this year so...

Nooooooooooooo!

I learned how old I truly feel when I dipped into the Battletech sub on Reddit and realized I had no idea what anybody there was talking about. ... I think that universe ended at 3062 for me.

By the time SpongeBob was a thing I had already outgrown those kinds of cartoons for the most part. Never really watched the show. My kids watch it now and it's good for a chuckle here and there but I could take it or leave it

fwiw when I go back and watch Ren & Stimpy now, which I loved as a kid, a lot of it doesn't appeal to me any more

But I love shows like Home Movies <3

MeatiestMeatus posted...

By the time SpongeBob was a thing I had already outgrown those kinds of cartoons for the most part. Never really watched the show. My kids watch it now and it's good for a chuckle here and there but I could take it or leave it

fwiw when I go back and watch Ren & Stimpy now, which I loved as a kid, a lot of it doesn't appeal to me any more

But I love shows like Home Movies <3

Home movies is great.

I did finish Spider-Man 2. It was solid.

I also finished Final Fantasy XVI. Yet, I need to finish the boy band simulator known as Final Fantasy XV. I just can't bring myself to do it.

are they any good?

XVI is better than XV, but boy banding it up versus an epic Game of Tvrobes type of adventure, isn't a fair comparison. Unless you're really into boy bands.

Spider-Man was 2 was great for the type of game it is, and I'm a Spider-Man fan boy so I was pleased.

I'm basically waiting for Final Fantasy VII Rebirth at the end of February. I may get Tekken 8, but I try not to pay full price for video games anymore.

The boy band thing probably coulda been done better if the game was themed around being a road trip like how Earthbound was

Am I the only Geek playing Marvel Snap?

Mary Jabe and I are obsessed. Mainly me.

Merry Christmas fellow Geeks.

Happy Holidays. I hope you got everything you wanted, and always get what you need.

The_Wave_Master posted...

Am I the only Geek playing Marvel Snap?

Mary Jabe and I are obsessed. Mainly me.

One of my old Army buddies is super into this and Clix and keeps asking me to join in with him on both but I never make time for it

The_Wave_Master posted...

Don't hit women. I shouldn't even have to say that to anyone, ever, but people need to be told the obvious from time to time.

https://youtu.be/imZWJTWIlDM?t=15



The_Wave_Master posted...

I admit that I'm an old man, but I do not care for SpongeBob Square Pants.

I do not care for his antics.

Who else is brave enough to admit this truth?

I was 22 when the show started, so I've never found it anything other than vaguely annoying.

My niece and nephew used to watch it all the time as kids, so that didn't help.

I don't hate the fact that it exists or anything, but like with most stuff made for kids post-2000 or so, I generally just ignore it completely.

MeatiestMeatus posted...

fwiw when I go back and watch Ren & Stimpy now, which I loved as a kid, a lot of it doesn't appeal to me any more

Even at the time I found Ren & Stimpy to be mostly shit.

It's like, in your memory you remember it being good, but you're mostly only remembering the first few episodes. Most of the best jokes I still remember today are literally from the first six episodes or so. After you get past the first season, the show becomes incredibly uneven, and a lot of the humor falls flat. I remember having my "Man, this is really starting to suck now" moment in the middle of the second season, and things just kept getting worse from there.

Kricfalusi's surrealist humor worked best when he was still limited in what he could do - as the show succeeded and he had more room to push the envelope, most of the jokes stopped being funny. And then after he got booted off the show (after season 2), things kind of went too far in the opposite direction, and it mostly just became bland and pointless. The show had like 90 episodes across 5 seasons - and maybe a dozen or so of those episodes at best were actually worth watching.

It's sort of like The Simpsons in that respect. Almost everything I remember enjoying from the Simpsons comes from episodes from the first 8 seasons or so. And even at the time I started feeling like the show was getting worse somewhere in the 7th season (and looking back with hindsight, I'd say the slow rot kind of started even earlier). Who Shot Mr. Burns? might actually have been the shark-jumping moment, though there were still good episodes after that (even if they started to become more and more rare).

The first three SpongeBob seasons are golden

In my mind, Stimpy is still searching for his fart.

I hope everyone had a merry Christmas and drink responsibly and safely tomorrow night.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

I'd argue that the problem isn't that it was mainstreamed. The problem is what they did with it afterwards.

I think I'm at the point now where nearly every single geeky interest I had for the first 30+ years of my life is now something I utterly loathe and have completely cut out of my life entirely. Shitty people ruined it all because most entertainment industries have been taken over by post-postmodern narcissists who are no longer capable of saying anything worth hearing, let alone anything profound or interesting.

That's a natural part of the mainstreaming process, though. Gotta "broaden the appeal" until it appeals to nobody, and then things tank.

The_Wave_Master posted...

What do you Geeks want for Christmas?

I wanted Tears of the Kingdom, but instead my brother gave me $100

...actually, that might've been just about the only gift I got this year, other than a sherpa blanket. Granted, I also only gave gifts to a few people this year, so it kinda works out.

shadowsword87 posted...

Smoker feels like something that's clutter 350 days of the year.
And if it's not, you become one of those people.

Somebody who loves the delicious, delicious taste of smoked meats and that pleasant aroma around their home?

Granted, I imagine it gets super-unhealthy super-fast.

The_Wave_Master posted...

Kang was conquered...

https://deadline.com/2023/12/jonathan-majors-marvel-fired-guilty-verdict-1235671790/

Don't hit women. I shouldn't even have to say that to anyone, ever, but people need to be told the obvious from time to time.

Shit casting, shit person. And, honestly, the MCU's plans in general were complete shit. Between re-rolling the Avengers, building the next arc around a villain whose variants are encountered (AND DEFEATED!) across movies/shows prior to the big arc movies, a terrible casting choice for said villain that failed spectacularly, etc, it's amazing how Disney/Marvel managed to completely fuck everything up in amazingly short order.

That said, GotG3 might've been shit, but Warlock was fun and the cartoonishly evil take on the High Evolutionary made me giggle.

The_Wave_Master posted...

I admit that I'm an old man, but I do not care for SpongeBob Square Pants.

I do not care for his antics.

Who else is brave enough to admit this truth?

The show came out at the wrong time in my life. It actually looks funny, but -- like a lot of recent stuff -- I've been checked out of western animation aimed at younger audiences. Granted, entertainment in general hasn't been doing it for me in recent years.

Again, a lot of the clips I've been shown for it and several others shows seem like something I'd enjoy. Despite that, my interest level is pretty low. But a lot of that is the result of entertainment overload years ago where I just burned out on everything and it just takes a ton of effort to want to watch anything.

I did, however, finally watch Moon Knight recently. It was... like four or five hours. >_>

But yeah, my enjoyment varied where the first episode mostly sucked, then for a lot of the rest I was like "this is pretty good," but the next day I was like, "Was it, really?"

To compare Moon Knight to the NF Marvel shows, it was pretty Iron Fist but not as fun. The show seemed to hit many of the same story beats, etc. And then the resolution for the final fight was deeply unsatisfying since it more or less existed to set up a continuation. Oh, not to mention the MASSIVE plot hole where the third personality is clearly working for Khonshu, yet it killed the people who were going to tell where Ammit might've been located


ParanoidObsessive posted...

Even at the time I found Ren & Stimpy to be mostly shit.

I'm not sure it was ever not shit. The show was mostly poorly-done toilet humor. Plus, didn't the creator groom a thirteen year-old girl or other absurdly young minor?

ParanoidObsessive posted...

It's sort of like The Simpsons in that respect. Almost everything I remember enjoying from the Simpsons comes from episodes from the first 8 seasons or so. And even at the time I started feeling like the show was getting worse somewhere in the 7th season (and looking back with hindsight, I'd say the slow rot kind of started even earlier). Who Shot Mr. Burns? might actually have been the shark-jumping moment, though there were still good episodes after that (even if they started to become more and more rare).

I think season 11 was the last good season, until maybe season 25? idk, the Simpsons dips and then it recovers. However, the dips weren't as bad in the past. At this point, I'm maybe a year or two behind.

iirc, I *thought* the last time I did an episode list, seasons 7-9 were the best. Season 1 was pretty terrible, and I think season 2 was before it was consistently good.

Count_Drachma posted...

That's a natural part of the mainstreaming process, though. Gotta "broaden the appeal" until it appeals to nobody, and then things tank.

I'll concede this. Though I think it also goes beyond just that.

I like the one theory I've heard, which basically boils down to the idea that most of the younger writers today (and by that I mostly mean people under 40-50 or so) are the kids who grew up as complete and total narcissists who have never really had any interesting life experiences, and who have only ever really consumed pop culture (as opposed to anything more meaningful or artistic). So you're basically left with people who have no interesting stories to tell, who can only fake creativity by regurgitating pop culture they grew up with, and who can't write characters who are anything other than thinly-veiled versions of themselves. They're post-postmodernists who can't write stories that resonate with anyone other than themselves, not helped by their habit of inserting their personal politics into everything (in an annoyingly preachy way rather than an interesting or engaging way).

Then you plug those people into a system that has grown "too big to fail" and which can't afford to reward creativity, but which has to exploit existing properties and nostalgia to survive. Where the people making the money decisions are completely disconnected from the actual work, and more or less incapable of understanding it.

The end result is a lot of soulless "content" that is neither art nor entertainment. The inevitable end result of pop culture eating itself, fueled by a Hollywood machine that has grown out of control and can no longer properly function.

It's why the rare jewels you still see now and then all seem to come from smaller studios or artists outside of the massive corporate machine. Or even from alternate distribution models like YouTube. Creativity still exists, but it's rarer, and it has a harder time getting to the audience.

The current system rewards and encourages mediocrity, while discouraging innovation. It's not entirely surprising that we're getting what we're getting. And that most older franchises and IPs are basically becoming zombified versions of themselves without soul, meaning, or purpose.

Which raises the scary question of what the creators of a few decades from now are going to look like, having grown up in this time and absorbed most of their creative expectations from the dreck that's out now.

More medical stuff that I will update tomorrow after my doctor's appointment. I'm doing well and I'm still alive. I just need maintenance.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

I like the one theory I've heard, which basically boils down to the idea that most of the younger writers today (and by that I mostly mean people under 40-50 or so) are the kids who grew up as complete and total narcissists who have never really had any interesting life experiences, and who have only ever really consumed pop culture (as opposed to anything more meaningful or artistic). So you're basically left with people who have no interesting stories to tell, who can only fake creativity by regurgitating pop culture they grew up with, and who can't write characters who are anything other than thinly-veiled versions of themselves. They're post-postmodernists who can't write stories that resonate with anyone other than themselves, not helped by their habit of inserting their personal politics into everything (in an annoyingly preachy way rather than an interesting or engaging way).

I like the idea simply because it appeals to my jaded cynicism. But, on a more practical level, that's probably more of an issue with so much long-running content where people can write for THE SAME THINGS they enjoyed as a kid, at which point their shitty fan fiction can become canon (and Joe Quesada can fuck up Spider-Man). A lot of early franchises were great simply because it was a new thing, not something too popular to ever die.

However, society is partly to blame. Because kids today tend to be in cities and sticking around technology, they never go exploring the woods and finding a dead body anymore.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

Then you plug those people into a system that has grown "too big to fail" and which can't afford to reward creativity, but which has to exploit existing properties and nostalgia to survive. Where the people making the money decisions are completely disconnected from the actual work, and more or less incapable of understanding it.

The end result is a lot of soulless "content" that is neither art nor entertainment. The inevitable end result of pop culture eating itself, fueled by a Hollywood machine that has grown out of control and can no longer properly function.

It's why the rare jewels you still see now and then all seem to come from smaller studios or artists outside of the massive corporate machine. Or even from alternate distribution models like YouTube. Creativity still exists, but it's rarer, and it has a harder time getting to the audience.

On top of that, the consolidation of entertainment (certainly in the US) has made it more difficult for creativity to get through the cracks.

All that Simpsons talk got me thinking about the Simpsons, which I'd fallen behind on. Went back to watching season 33 and it's. so. bad.

Worst thing ever? Maybe not, but bad. Very, very bad.

So far, I've watched:
-Seriously Flanders (the one where he finds the bag of money, which was ehhhh...)
-The one where Marge and Burns fight over a football player (it was okay-ish)
-The one where Marge and Homer wind up in the wilderness (that one was somewhat enjoyable)
-The one where Bart is sentenced to hiking (had some good moments, but... eh)
-The one where Maggie gets a godfather (some good jokes, but mostly a slog)
-The one where Homer needs reputation reform (I mean, some of the lead-up was good, at least)

And then I skipped a bunch because there was a Smithers episode, an episode where a teen Homer looks for his mom, and some other uninteresting ones.

Probably one of the worst seasons in a while.

Just watched the Slipreme episode. That one was pretty good. Not amazing, but pretty good, whereas a bunch of the others felt like a waste.

I'm fine. I went to see my surgeon, she gave me some medicine, and I'm good. I just have some healing up to do.

Glad to hear you're doing well Wave!

Geekin' off over here: I'm debating if I should sell-off my warhammer stuff

I don't need the cash, but I'm not committed to it anymore; In 10 years I played 3 games. ya.

I don't wanna sell off my pretty models, the ones I did up nice; just the ones that are Pay to Win and still sitting in their boxes unloved.

Yes.
Games Workshop hates their players and just wants peoples money.
Spend money on places that actually care about their customers.

shadowsword87 posted...

Spend money on places that actually care about their customers.

[file not found]

The Simpsons episode about Brandine getting smart was a 20-minute slog for an alright payoff. Other than the hillbilly museum, not a lot of laughs in that one.

Lokarin posted...

Geekin' off over here: I'm debating if I should sell-off my warhammer stuff

I don't need the cash, but I'm not committed to it anymore; In 10 years I played 3 games. ya.

I don't wanna sell off my pretty models, the ones I did up nice; just the ones that are Pay to Win and still sitting in their boxes unloved.

tbh, the figurines and decoration thereof always struck me as being more enjoyable than the actual game... which is probably why I never learned to play the actual game.

shadowsword87 posted...

Spend money on places that actually care about their customers.

Yeah, like...
Or, um, like...
...I've got nothing.

Well, there are some companies out there, but not a whole lot.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

[file not found]

Look, it's a small amount, yes, but they still exist.

Here's a funny story.

A few years ago I moved out of the house I'm currently living in to start my life with Mary Jane.

After I left? Oreon would come over to help with my brother and my mom, who have noth passed, and while doing so he ran over my mailbox in his truck.

He then went to Goodwill, and purchased the cheapest, crappiest mailbox he could afford, a cheap shovel, dug a hole, and planted the new cheap mailbox.where the original good mailbox and post stood.

There the mailbox stood for around 9 years through bad thunder storms, tropical storms, even hurricanes, and my wife hitting it slightly, and the neighborhood kids hitting it too.

Until Yesterday.

We had very bad thunderstorms and a tornado and the mailbox finally blew over. We decided to replace the mailbox with a nice one, a d asked Oreon to dog the hoke again.

He couldn't do it today, and MJ and I left to run errands, and when we came back home the mailbox, the old crappy one, was back in its original spot ready for service.

We asked Bank Robber if he did it, and whe said he didn't. We looked at the Ring footage, and he didn't do it, and we scrubbed rhe footage and couldn't see where it was put up again and by whom, but it's up again ready for service.

A true mystery.

The_Wave_Master posted...

Here's a funny story.

A few years ago I moved out of the house I'm currently living in to start my life with Mary Jane.

After I left? Oreon would come over to help with my brother and my mom, who have noth passed, and while doing so he ran over my mailbox in his truck.

He then went to Goodwill, and purchased the cheapest, crappiest mailbox he could afford, a cheap shovel, dug a hole, and planted the new cheap mailbox.where the original good mailbox and post stood.

There the mailbox stood for around 9 years through bad thunder storms, tropical storms, even hurricanes, and my wife hitting it slightly, and the neighborhood kids hitting it too.

Until Yesterday.

We had very bad thunderstorms and a tornado and the mailbox finally blew over. We decided to replace the mailbox with a nice one, a d asked Oreon to dog the hoke again.

He couldn't do it today, and MJ and I left to run errands, and when we came back home the mailbox, the old crappy one, was back in its original spot ready for service.

We asked Bank Robber if he did it, and whe said he didn't. We looked at the Ring footage, and he didn't do it, and we scrubbed rhe footage and couldn't see where it was put up again and by whom, but it's up again ready for service.

A true mystery.

Sounds like a wizard fixed it to me.

You've got a friendly ghost

It was clearly a glitch in the Matrix.

Laurence Fishburne is going to show up tomorrow with a handful of pills.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

It was clearly a glitch in the Matrix.

Laurence Fishburne is going to show up tomorrow with a handful of pills.

How big are your pills if 2 is a handful?

marthalies posted...

How big are your pills if 2 is a handful?

That was movie Laurence Fishburne.

When real life Laurence Fishburne shows up at your house, it looks more like this:

https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xAw0Rs7XIJQ/U_JK0eHYy0I/AAAAAAAAbAE/oPC5nSnA3mc/s1600/handful%2Bof%2Bmedications.jpg

Laurence Fishburne knows how to party.

That's why they added this scene to the second movie:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nie4HCJEpwI

ParanoidObsessive posted...

That was movie Laurence Fishburne.

When real life Laurence Fishburne shows up at your house, it looks more like this:

https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xAw0Rs7XIJQ/U_JK0eHYy0I/AAAAAAAAbAE/oPC5nSnA3mc/s1600/handful%2Bof%2Bmedications.jpg

Laurence Fishburne knows how to party.

That's why they added this scene to the second movie:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nie4HCJEpwI

I wouldn't accept anything less from the leader of the beggar sect.

SandLand looks fun

https://youtu.be/SatQjDO6K24

I've never been able to appreciate Akira Toriyama's art.

It's actually discouraged me from playing games that I might otherwise have played, like the later Dragon Quest games (his art style was less obvious in the earlier games, when they were using NES graphics, but the newer games make it very on-model and very visibly his work).