After a trip back to my parents house, wherein my gaming was more or less replaced by some light hacking (with dramatically varied levels of success) for the span of my Thanksgiving break, I realized I had to write a Super Nerd Sunday. And while there are a lot of things I’d like to write about right now I don’t really feel comfortable doing so for a number of reasons. But since NDAs are legally binding and not having finished Skyrim isn’t I think I’m going to talk about the latter.
I still don’t want to assess Skyrim as a finished product – I’d feel uncomfortable doing that. Despite putting in almost seventy hours I still don’t think I’m anywhere clear the end game, and there are still corners of the world map I’ve barely touched. But the sections I’ve visited and the quests I’ve navigated have been incredible experiences for me. Every creature I fight, from wolf to giant, has been a joy. So I’d like to list off, just randomly, a few of my choicest Skyrim experiences.
- Robbing a museum filled with deadly traps
- Fleeing said museum by tricking some guards with an arrow and jumping into a waterfall to land safely at its base
- Becoming a werewolf (Of course)
- Helping someone else stop being a werewolf
- Going on a bender with the god of liquor and merriment
- Getting my own woman in exchange for slaying a dragon, who I leave in my house for her own safety
- Buying a house, then renovating it with absolutely no help from my house-lady
- Making armor from the skin and bones of my enemies
- Meeting the stripper god of stealing shit and making a good first impression
- Fencing a gemstone the size of a statue’s eye
- Jumping on a dragon’s head and driving a sword into its skull repeatedly
- Cinematically stabbing a guard through the chest after bungling the job on the first try, then letting her body slide off my blade into the still waters of a smuggler’s cove
- Piecing together my bender with the aforementioned god of merriment
- Getting locked in a cage
- Getting a pet robot spider
- Killing a pet robot spider
- Killing a ghost
- Taking back a marriage proposal
- Breaking into dozens of safes
- Downed a dragon with the sound of my voice
- Broke a Viking out of Elf Gitmo
- Made some stew
That is, at Skyrim’s heart, the sort of game it aspires to be. It’s a game rife with cool shit in a world where you can really appreciate the scope of your shit and how cool it really is. It’s one thing to provide players with a sandbox, as so many do, but Skyrim takes it one step farther: it makes the world more than just a sandbox. It makes it a place where you can have an impact.
It’s nothing new, really, for this team or their allies: Bethesda and Obsidian have been doing this for decades. But the way they’ve done it in Skyrim, along with the changes to the interface and the underlying systems of the game, really makes the whole thing feel tighter than it ever has before. It’s one thing to populate a world with interesting people, it’s another altogether to write stories tying them together and parcel them out as perfect as Skyrim has.
And the stripped down character development system forwards this end: instead of letting characters micromanage each of the ten stats you make very skill-specific bonus choices and add to one of your three previously derived stats in other Elder Scrolls games (health, magicka and stamina). There are certainly ways that the whole system could’ve worked better, for example the addition of racially specific trees with character bonuses that consumed skill points could’ve added personality to the races that the alteration of the skill system sort of removed. But as it stands it’s a nice, tight little system that seems to give characters an excellent sense of customization without distracting them from the real star here: the world of Skyrim itself.
I’ll write more about that soon, more about how new systems like dual wielding and a revamped spellcasting system have changed the way this plays as an Elder Scrolls game. But for now I’d like to just leave it at the wonderful world of Skyrim itself and the crazy shit that happens there. Because I’ve never enjoyed crazy shit quite so much or in such wonderful variety as I have in Skyrim.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Congratulations Worst X-Man Ever!
After X-Men First Class we didn’t think there could be any shittier collection of heroes. But holy shit, were we ever wrong, and are you ever going to prove that to us today when you are accepted into the X-Men for having the power of being able to make people feel irrationally bad about shit they’ve done.
You’ll be called The Jewess, which is weird because you’re actually an agnostic who was raised by Episcopalian parents, but everyone will call you by the name and you’ll be weirdly sexualized for it as well. You’ll only go on missions where the villains are doing things that are kind of dickish but not really violent in an immediate or threatening way.
You’ll spend most of your time watching TV, occasionally working out and learning how to cook from books that other people in the mansion will buy. You will very rarely venture out into world and buy groceries, but your powers will often make total strangers feel terrible about themselves in public so, for the good of the world, you’ll do your best not to expose them to your presence.
We’d offer you these congratulations directly, but we know you’d use your super guilt powers to make us feel bad for pointing out something you’re good at. So celebrate this, the day of your inauguration to what used to be one of the most prestigious super-hero groups in North America before you came along!
Congratulations Worst X-Man Ever!
You’ll be called The Jewess, which is weird because you’re actually an agnostic who was raised by Episcopalian parents, but everyone will call you by the name and you’ll be weirdly sexualized for it as well. You’ll only go on missions where the villains are doing things that are kind of dickish but not really violent in an immediate or threatening way.
You’ll spend most of your time watching TV, occasionally working out and learning how to cook from books that other people in the mansion will buy. You will very rarely venture out into world and buy groceries, but your powers will often make total strangers feel terrible about themselves in public so, for the good of the world, you’ll do your best not to expose them to your presence.
We’d offer you these congratulations directly, but we know you’d use your super guilt powers to make us feel bad for pointing out something you’re good at. So celebrate this, the day of your inauguration to what used to be one of the most prestigious super-hero groups in North America before you came along!
Congratulations Worst X-Man Ever!
Friday, November 25, 2011
Congratulations on Eating All the Suet You Like!
Times are tough in this economy. We even came up with a little saying to drive it home: ITE. See, wasn’t that clever? Well, we think it was, and that’s what really counts. Anyhow, people have to find a way to survive. Which is why you’ve taken to eating things people normally don’t eat.
You’ve done lots of stuff on this front so far: you’ve eaten cat food, dog food, lizard food. You even sprinkled some fish food into water and then drank it to see if it would keep you from blacking out (it didn’t). But these various measures still cost money, money you don’t have if you want to maintain your lavish penthouse lifestyle. So today you’re going to try something new, something cheaper.
Turns out suet, that fatty tissue normally taken from cows or sheep, is dirt cheap. And you know who loves that? Birds! No one’s ever heard of an unhealthy bird, either. So you know what you’re going to do, right? That’s right! You’re going to buy a bunch of suet at the grocery store, take it home and eat it up.
“You must really like birds,” the cashier will say. You’ll nod at him tersely. Then you’ll run out the door, suit flapping in the wind, back to your apartment where you’ll tear into the suet with your teeth.
You’ll feel like a wild beast devouring a fresh kill, a very cold fresh kill, which will make you feel very masculine and help you get through the truly, truly awful taste of suet. After eating your fill (which will take less than a minute) you’ll retch into the sink for around fifteen minutes, but luckily nothing will come up.
“I can make this work,” you’ll tell your garbage disposal, which stubbornly won’t respond: it really wanted you to vomit into it.
Congratulations on Eating All the Suet You Like!
You’ve done lots of stuff on this front so far: you’ve eaten cat food, dog food, lizard food. You even sprinkled some fish food into water and then drank it to see if it would keep you from blacking out (it didn’t). But these various measures still cost money, money you don’t have if you want to maintain your lavish penthouse lifestyle. So today you’re going to try something new, something cheaper.
Turns out suet, that fatty tissue normally taken from cows or sheep, is dirt cheap. And you know who loves that? Birds! No one’s ever heard of an unhealthy bird, either. So you know what you’re going to do, right? That’s right! You’re going to buy a bunch of suet at the grocery store, take it home and eat it up.
“You must really like birds,” the cashier will say. You’ll nod at him tersely. Then you’ll run out the door, suit flapping in the wind, back to your apartment where you’ll tear into the suet with your teeth.
You’ll feel like a wild beast devouring a fresh kill, a very cold fresh kill, which will make you feel very masculine and help you get through the truly, truly awful taste of suet. After eating your fill (which will take less than a minute) you’ll retch into the sink for around fifteen minutes, but luckily nothing will come up.
“I can make this work,” you’ll tell your garbage disposal, which stubbornly won’t respond: it really wanted you to vomit into it.
Congratulations on Eating All the Suet You Like!
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Congratulations Sentient Tree!
There are plenty of great trees in human history who have done lots of amazing shit. Shel Silvertstein’s Giving Tree, for example, did amazing shit for all the people who asked it for things. And Yggdrasyl was pretty awesome, we’re pretty sure it gave us some stuff (like the substance of the universe for example). But there’s never been a sentient tree quite like you.
You’re a tree who likes to grow his branches into people’s bedrooms and steal their underwear.
Normally you do it while people are away at work, which means they just notice some shit missing from their dressers when they get back. But every once in a while you fuck up and break into an occupied room and have to get out fast. You’ve never been caught before, but today you will be.
An unemployed 24 year old who used to work in customer service will be napping in her room, wearing a pair of Mickie Mouse underpants clearly made for an adult by some sort of ironically kitchy underwear company. You’ll notice that the young woman isn’t just a pile of clothes but is, in fact, a very sad person as you reach in her window and graze her bottom, trying to grab her underwear.
She’ll rouse instantly, throwing off the covers and she’ll see a tree branch poking in through the window and she’ll let off a scream that will make your bark crawl. You’ll try to grab her as quickly as you can, but she’ll be out the door before you have a chance to catch her and either explain things to her or kill her (despite being a tree and incredibly long lived you’re not a very good planner) and she’ll call the DPW for her town from the hallway, sobbing.
They’ll show up almost immediately and remove the, as she’ll call it “rape tree,” with extreme prejudice, chopping off your limbs and ripping your trunk from the ground. In a few hours you’ll be on a pile of wood, screaming your last which, since you’re a tree, will be very, very quiet.
Congratulations Sentient Tree!
You’re a tree who likes to grow his branches into people’s bedrooms and steal their underwear.
Normally you do it while people are away at work, which means they just notice some shit missing from their dressers when they get back. But every once in a while you fuck up and break into an occupied room and have to get out fast. You’ve never been caught before, but today you will be.
An unemployed 24 year old who used to work in customer service will be napping in her room, wearing a pair of Mickie Mouse underpants clearly made for an adult by some sort of ironically kitchy underwear company. You’ll notice that the young woman isn’t just a pile of clothes but is, in fact, a very sad person as you reach in her window and graze her bottom, trying to grab her underwear.
She’ll rouse instantly, throwing off the covers and she’ll see a tree branch poking in through the window and she’ll let off a scream that will make your bark crawl. You’ll try to grab her as quickly as you can, but she’ll be out the door before you have a chance to catch her and either explain things to her or kill her (despite being a tree and incredibly long lived you’re not a very good planner) and she’ll call the DPW for her town from the hallway, sobbing.
They’ll show up almost immediately and remove the, as she’ll call it “rape tree,” with extreme prejudice, chopping off your limbs and ripping your trunk from the ground. In a few hours you’ll be on a pile of wood, screaming your last which, since you’re a tree, will be very, very quiet.
Congratulations Sentient Tree!
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Congratulations on Finding Out What Sounds Sound Like!
You’re a deaf person and like all deaf people you’ve always been curious what sounds sound like. But medicine hasn’t advanced far enough to really give you a good idea of what that’s all about, so you’ve spent most of your life just wondering and waiting for time to give you a chance to hear. You’ve spent months and months sitting in your one bedroom apartment, lamenting the lack of music in your life.
“What cruel fate!” you think you’re saying, “That has so severely barred me from this experience!”
Really you’re kind of just mumbling like “WHA CRA FA! SA SO BARRO MATO EXPARA!”
It sounds pretty cool, kind of like some ancient, mystical language, but it isn’t what you’re going for and you don’t know any better because you can’t hear yourself. You’re deaf, all you know about speech is that when people move their lips shit comes out.
But today is your lucky today. Today a crazy scientist is going to finally get clearance to perform one of his crazier experiments and he’s going to take the ears from a convicted murderer and transplant them on to you.
It won’t just be the outside of the ears, either. It’ll be all the working parts, the ear guts and everything. After the murderer is executed they’ll rush the ears over to you in a cooler (a pair of coolers, really, to make sure the ear guts don’t get tangled up) and they’ll get you in there and cut open your skull and ram the murderer’s ears into the space your ruined listening pipes once sat.
Today you’re going to wake up from the operation and, for the first time ever, you’re going to hear stuff. The first thing you hear will be the door opening, which will be amazing. Then you’ll hear the doctor walking up to you. Then he’ll open his mouth and ask how you’re doing. You’ll know this is what he’s asking because his lips will form those words and you’ll be quite good at reading lips at this point.
But you’ll hear him say “HAIL SATAN, KILL THE BREEDERS!” instead.
You’ll open your mouth to tell him that something is wrong but you’ll suddenly realize that you have no idea how to speak, so instead you’ll sign at him.
I think there’s something wrong with these ears?
What do you mean, his lips will say.
His voice will echo “FUCKING WHORES GOTTA DIE!”
You’ll sign at him. I think I’m just hearing what a murderer hears that makes him kill, which is so much worse than being deaf.
These last few signs will be kind of complex, so he won’t really know what’s going on. He’ll leave the room to go find a speech therapist who knows enough sign language to effectively translate and you’ll put on the TV to pass the time. The only sound that comes out of it will be the sound of dogs barking which, compared to the weird satanic voices you’ve been hearing, will actually be quite nice. So nice you won’t even put on the closed captions, you’ll be so pleased to just let the dogs talk at one another.
Congratulations on Finding Out What Sounds Sound Like!
“What cruel fate!” you think you’re saying, “That has so severely barred me from this experience!”
Really you’re kind of just mumbling like “WHA CRA FA! SA SO BARRO MATO EXPARA!”
It sounds pretty cool, kind of like some ancient, mystical language, but it isn’t what you’re going for and you don’t know any better because you can’t hear yourself. You’re deaf, all you know about speech is that when people move their lips shit comes out.
But today is your lucky today. Today a crazy scientist is going to finally get clearance to perform one of his crazier experiments and he’s going to take the ears from a convicted murderer and transplant them on to you.
It won’t just be the outside of the ears, either. It’ll be all the working parts, the ear guts and everything. After the murderer is executed they’ll rush the ears over to you in a cooler (a pair of coolers, really, to make sure the ear guts don’t get tangled up) and they’ll get you in there and cut open your skull and ram the murderer’s ears into the space your ruined listening pipes once sat.
Today you’re going to wake up from the operation and, for the first time ever, you’re going to hear stuff. The first thing you hear will be the door opening, which will be amazing. Then you’ll hear the doctor walking up to you. Then he’ll open his mouth and ask how you’re doing. You’ll know this is what he’s asking because his lips will form those words and you’ll be quite good at reading lips at this point.
But you’ll hear him say “HAIL SATAN, KILL THE BREEDERS!” instead.
You’ll open your mouth to tell him that something is wrong but you’ll suddenly realize that you have no idea how to speak, so instead you’ll sign at him.
I think there’s something wrong with these ears?
What do you mean, his lips will say.
His voice will echo “FUCKING WHORES GOTTA DIE!”
You’ll sign at him. I think I’m just hearing what a murderer hears that makes him kill, which is so much worse than being deaf.
These last few signs will be kind of complex, so he won’t really know what’s going on. He’ll leave the room to go find a speech therapist who knows enough sign language to effectively translate and you’ll put on the TV to pass the time. The only sound that comes out of it will be the sound of dogs barking which, compared to the weird satanic voices you’ve been hearing, will actually be quite nice. So nice you won’t even put on the closed captions, you’ll be so pleased to just let the dogs talk at one another.
Congratulations on Finding Out What Sounds Sound Like!
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Congratulations Really Smart Parakeet!
Yesterday you became super-intelligent after three years living in a cage, shitting on newspapers and generally feeling angry at the world for reasons you couldn’t articulate. But yesterday you gained the ability to comment on the things that piss you off, and today you’re going to gain the courage to use them. You’ll start with the biggest issue.
“Look,” you’ll tell the human who elevated you to super-intelligence. “We know you’re lonely, but you should know we all understand what you’re doing when you masturbate.” He’ll start to turn red, but you’ll put your wing out as if to say don’t worry. “It’s cool, we’re not that concerned with it, but I figured you should know. Just in case you wanted to start doing it behind closed doors.”
“Sorry,” he’ll begin, but you’ll again hold your wing up (you’re an expert on body language, probably because birds use a lot of body language to talk in general) to show him it’s okay and that he can just shut his craw.
“We don’t judge,” you’ll inform him. “But you might judge yourself.”
He’ll nod and make you some lunch, which will consist of a bagel with plain cream cheese on it. You’ll peck at it lazily and the two of you will sit across from each other. You’ll both be imagining how much this is like being a married couple who are watching their relationship dissolve, and you’ll suddenly realize why your owner, who is so brilliant, is so alone: he is beyond awful. He’ll always be alone, simply by merit of being a shitty, shitty human being. Which is kind of a shame, because he’s so bright, but also kind of great because his awful genes won’t pass on.
When he finally breaks the silence to ask you “So what do you want to do?” it’ll take all your strength not to snap at him for giving you all this desire to express yourself and such a limited capacity to do so, all your power not to scream at him that he’ll be alone for the rest of his life and for you to instead do a little birdy shrug and ask him:
“What do you have on DVD here?” praying for something even remotely watch-able like Planet Earth or something. You’ll know as soon as you ask that you’ll be disappointed, though.
Congratulations Really Smart Parakeet!
“Look,” you’ll tell the human who elevated you to super-intelligence. “We know you’re lonely, but you should know we all understand what you’re doing when you masturbate.” He’ll start to turn red, but you’ll put your wing out as if to say don’t worry. “It’s cool, we’re not that concerned with it, but I figured you should know. Just in case you wanted to start doing it behind closed doors.”
“Sorry,” he’ll begin, but you’ll again hold your wing up (you’re an expert on body language, probably because birds use a lot of body language to talk in general) to show him it’s okay and that he can just shut his craw.
“We don’t judge,” you’ll inform him. “But you might judge yourself.”
He’ll nod and make you some lunch, which will consist of a bagel with plain cream cheese on it. You’ll peck at it lazily and the two of you will sit across from each other. You’ll both be imagining how much this is like being a married couple who are watching their relationship dissolve, and you’ll suddenly realize why your owner, who is so brilliant, is so alone: he is beyond awful. He’ll always be alone, simply by merit of being a shitty, shitty human being. Which is kind of a shame, because he’s so bright, but also kind of great because his awful genes won’t pass on.
When he finally breaks the silence to ask you “So what do you want to do?” it’ll take all your strength not to snap at him for giving you all this desire to express yourself and such a limited capacity to do so, all your power not to scream at him that he’ll be alone for the rest of his life and for you to instead do a little birdy shrug and ask him:
“What do you have on DVD here?” praying for something even remotely watch-able like Planet Earth or something. You’ll know as soon as you ask that you’ll be disappointed, though.
Congratulations Really Smart Parakeet!
Monday, November 21, 2011
Congratulations Lonely Parakeet Owner!
It’s a big, scary world and people have all sorts of ways of dealing with that. Some folk, they try to make art. Some people try to find someone to hold on to and they just cling to that person with all they’ve got. Some people try to get as much stuff as possible, nice stuff if they can manage it. And then there’s you.
You’ve been collecting pets.
It’s kind of rational: most animals that end up as pets can’t take care of themselves, and you’re kind of doing good in the world by finding them, giving them a good home and making them feel loved. But there’s a problem: pets can’t talk to you, and there’s only so much love you can extract from the constant nuzzling of cats against your body.
Which is why you’ve been researching a formula to make an animal super smart, so smart it’ll be able to figure out how to love you back and talk to you about your day. And today is testing day. But you’re worried.
You’ve seen enough science fiction movies to know that this could go all sorts of wrong if you let it, so you don’t want to imbue an animal that could do a lot of harm to you with superior intelligence. So even though you really want to make a cat so smart it can talk, you know better than to try that right off the bat: what if making an animal super smart makes it evil too? So you’ll test your formula on one of the most innocuous animals in your coiterie: the humble parakeet.
You’ll inject half a dose of your super intelligence serum into the parakeet right under its wing in what you hope is the least painful place for parakeets to have things injected into them. Then you’ll wait to see what happens.
You’ll sit there for forty minutes while the parakeet moves around erratically, as if it is for the first time understanding that it has a body, a body capable of flight contained within a cage. At minute forty-one the parakeet’s head will perk up and it will open its beak and craw.
“Holy shit.”
You’ll leap up from your chair.
“Hi!” you’ll shout at it
“Oh thank god,” the bird will chirp. “What’s going on? Why am I in a cage filled with my own shit?”
You’ll be so excited that you’ll throw all caution to the wind and open the parakeet’s cage door.
“Sorry about that, until this morning you were too stupid to live in this apartment without killing yourself.” You’ll regret saying it as soon as the words are out of your mouth. The bird will sit inside of its cage and cock its head at you to the side.
“Well, that’s a hell of a thing to say,” the bird will chirp at you as it hops out of its cage, thus beginning a new era in your life and a new relationship with your tiniest roommate ever.
Congratulations Lonely Parakeet Owner!
You’ve been collecting pets.
It’s kind of rational: most animals that end up as pets can’t take care of themselves, and you’re kind of doing good in the world by finding them, giving them a good home and making them feel loved. But there’s a problem: pets can’t talk to you, and there’s only so much love you can extract from the constant nuzzling of cats against your body.
Which is why you’ve been researching a formula to make an animal super smart, so smart it’ll be able to figure out how to love you back and talk to you about your day. And today is testing day. But you’re worried.
You’ve seen enough science fiction movies to know that this could go all sorts of wrong if you let it, so you don’t want to imbue an animal that could do a lot of harm to you with superior intelligence. So even though you really want to make a cat so smart it can talk, you know better than to try that right off the bat: what if making an animal super smart makes it evil too? So you’ll test your formula on one of the most innocuous animals in your coiterie: the humble parakeet.
You’ll inject half a dose of your super intelligence serum into the parakeet right under its wing in what you hope is the least painful place for parakeets to have things injected into them. Then you’ll wait to see what happens.
You’ll sit there for forty minutes while the parakeet moves around erratically, as if it is for the first time understanding that it has a body, a body capable of flight contained within a cage. At minute forty-one the parakeet’s head will perk up and it will open its beak and craw.
“Holy shit.”
You’ll leap up from your chair.
“Hi!” you’ll shout at it
“Oh thank god,” the bird will chirp. “What’s going on? Why am I in a cage filled with my own shit?”
You’ll be so excited that you’ll throw all caution to the wind and open the parakeet’s cage door.
“Sorry about that, until this morning you were too stupid to live in this apartment without killing yourself.” You’ll regret saying it as soon as the words are out of your mouth. The bird will sit inside of its cage and cock its head at you to the side.
“Well, that’s a hell of a thing to say,” the bird will chirp at you as it hops out of its cage, thus beginning a new era in your life and a new relationship with your tiniest roommate ever.
Congratulations Lonely Parakeet Owner!
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