Posts made by Alexander Salkin

@SwampCreature The one with the dog... that's part of the Clocktower series, I think? Unless you're referring to Rule of Rose.

SIlent Hill 2 is legendary and for good reason. I got my start with that series with that one. It holds a dread ambiance like nothing else.

If you like Fatal Frame, have you tried the DreadOut series? They're somewhat similar as I understand. I like DreadOut, but it's not balanced as well as it could be with some of the bosses.

The most recent horror type game I've played is Withering Rooms. It's a survival title in a haunted mansion and while it has some Clock Tower elements, it's more of a focus on being a rogue-like style these days. It's not intensely scary or anything, but there's some good monster designs.

Honestly, I can't think of any pure horror titles that have clicked for me in a while. I couldn't get into Amnesia and while FNAF is good for jump scares and dread, I never liked the controls, so I would just watch YT'ers play it.

Come to think of it, the last really scary thing I played was the Silent Hill mod for Fallout 4. Coupled with a few other mods for fog and such, that was a genuinely nerve-wracking experience. Just trying to survive nights and having a real reason to be hyper-cautious in houses and streets (compared to the base game) truly brought out a terrifying style of gameplay.

@Alexander-Salkin So, um, a quick errata to my last message. I have no sense of time whatsoever. According to my players, it hasn't been 9 or so games. It's been 21 sessions so far.

Imma just go sit in the corner with my dunce cap now.

@SwampCreature I'm playing the Shin Megami Tensei remaster of Nocturne. Yeah, I would do abysmal in that world. It's severely human unfriendly. The handful that exist eventually all follow some form of Reason, a spiritual manifesto that relates to them transcending into monsters with the aim of creating a new world. I doubt I'd survive that long to even have the chance.

@FlamingUnicron Looks good! Thank you!

@mianngu I certainly hope they're happy, ha ha! But yeah, they're a great group. I think it's been going well, they're starting to see how the smaller indirect aspects of the campaign can lead to steps toward their ultimate goal and the deeper historical lore that explains the relevance of what's going on in the world of Tau. These things put a certain nuance on what's around them that can't be discerned at first glance. We've done around 8-10 sessions of EotS by now and it's been a lot of fun to explore the world with a new group like this. I've tried my best not to give them too much of a plot-hammered linear path, but just enough thread pieces for them to follow the tapestry, so to speak. Of course, nothing but quick reflexes can protect the heroes from a sudden wandering cat on-the-board attack. The heroes might be seeking magic, but Donut and Amira are there for attention and power loafing on the map.

Ah, you've noticed my dice bag! I LOVE THAT THING. So, my old black/white spiderweb pattern dice bag (the usual pouch style, unlike the mushroom one) had seen a lot of campaigns over the years, but between the string tie becoming loose and the inevitable coffee stains that come from being at the game table, it was time to retire it. I visited a local punk rock flea market at the local club where I go dancing and I found the mushroom moon bag for sale by an indie vendor. It was one of those times where you walk by something and then immediately walk backward, fixated on something you just glanced at, you know?

I'm not sure if the original purpose was to be a dice baggie, a small art material holder, or a pouch for reagants but I fell in love with the rustic pattern. It's just one of those things that spoke to me. It has a little zipper on top and it does a great job of keeping my myriad of dice in check. I think it only ran me about $10 which feels like a bargain.

Hey, just wanted to let you know I've noticed some difficulty using the forum on my Android phone since the last update. Namely the various top buttons can be highlighted, but they don't click through or otherwise open. I included an example of the top left triple line sitting idle instead of it showing the recent threads area. I still navigate the main body of the posts individually, however.

So I showed up to run the usual EotS game for our weekly group at a friend's house and found the mood was rather subdued. I suspected that everyone was tired from Labor Day weekend and we might have a low-energy game. A shame, but that can happen. I readied myself to push on through regardless.

One of the players comes in shortly after me hauling bags of groceries. A little unusual, but I figured he had food shopping to do and since he was running late, he just wanted to bring it all in.

Nope! All of a sudden my players light up with "Congratulations"! They planned a little surprise for me after EotS made the final 3 and I had no idea!

It's been a great day here and I just wanted to share the cheer from the EotS squad. From left to right, using their character names to protect the guilty, we have Clintovious (ranger) (with the fluffy CR20 cat threat known as Donut), Screech (cleric), Roan (paladin/warlock), Bramble (cleric), and Chad (bard). Not able to make it today was Shazz (artificer). I formed this group out of a local FB gaming group post that I made around (or just after, I don't remember which) the time I submitted Eye of the Sorceress for the contest. The last few months have been a wild ride with everything involved and I couldn't be happier.

Included are bonus cat tax pictures of the local fuzzy mascots, Donut and Amira.

@mianngu That's a crime!

Have you not even been allowed to play the Drakewarden Ranger??

@Mariano I loved Skyrim, no question. It's odd though, for as much hype as I've heard about Starfield, I really haven't seen much talk about the actual gameplay or story itself. I'm curious, but I know next to nothing of what it's even supposed to be about. I feel as though people are talking around it?

@SwampCreature Parasite Eve would be great for a proper remake. It had a really good atmosphere and felt fairly distinctive for it's time. Giving the designs updated visuals (and maybe improving that walk cycle) would be grand.

Going old school and with unrealistic hopes, I'd love to see Ultima Exodus, Bubble Bobble, and Magic of Scherezade updated and expanded.

Prototype would be really cool too.

@Mariano My younger brother was a huge fan of the show back in the day so I watched it with him. Honestly, I'm a monster of the week kind of guy so I mostly enjoyed seeing the Rangers fighting their rubber suited villains. Scorpina and Goldar were favorites to watch.

I went most of my life being shooed out of kitchens or simply not knowing how to anything more complicated than stew. Even then, I just couldn't figure out flavor profiles.

When I watched my then wife-to-be expand from baking to making dinners, however, I was happy to help with the prep work and I started to understand the nuances of spices, cooking methodology, and how to modify recipes. I've really come to enjoy cooking for us in the last several years as a result!

Although I'm a lousy spectator for cooking shows, the actual act of making stuffed peppers, chicken scampi, and baked salmon is a pleasure. One day I'd like to tackle a Thanksgiving turkey.

Do you cook and if so, what's your favorite meal to make?

@mianngu I can't think of any in media that are standing out to me, but I gravitate hard towards pet classes in games of any kind. Back when I played WoW, I used to get pretty attached to my little crab pet. Crabbert was so fidgety looking and he had this great little mohawk on his shell, although I think they changed the graphics on that since. Having grown up at the shore IRL just made me appreciate having a battle crab on my adventures.

And back when I first started playing D+D, my ranger had a boar for a companion. I loved that bristly little guy. We put a little metal warrior's cap on him and Ferdinand the Boar of Battle was our team mascot. My ranger used to feed him little cakes and snacks I bought from the local inns. When I learned ogres killed him, I systematically tracked down their camp and to excuse the pun, I went absolutely ham on them, sparing no one. Never cross my pets!

@Ezra It's a contemporary style modern sci-fi book, but I absolutely adore The Roadside Picnic. It's absolutely haunting and brilliant withn the explanation of it's own absurdity. This is one of those books that gave rise to the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series of games, but that doesn't do justice to it.

@SwampCreature Good choices!

I'm also a big fan of Akira Yamaoka's work on Silent Hill. Really interesting compositions that are uniquely atmospheric.

David Wise used to make really distinctive soundtracks for Rare. You can listen to anything on Wizards and Warriors and RC Pro Am for the NES and know his thumb stamp is firmly on that music. It's a unique fun sound that shows what could be done on the tech from that era.

I love the Earthbound soundtrack. That's another unique sound style that evokes the episodic atmosphere of the game's areas. Very identifying stuff.

I always bring up Yume Nikki stuff, but yeah... Kikiyama did short haunting minimalist songs like no one else. I respect the end result gained from the small use of notes applied, it's rather inspiring.

An obscure title, but I'm rather fond of the OST for Space Funeral. It's a very bizarre selection of productions from BBC Radio, to spoken dirges of Ruth White, and even some rockabilly. I don't know, it just works and adds to the acid trip design of the entire experience.

Chrono Trigger's final battle song against Lavos is absolute banger. Few other tracks in video games reach that concluding zenith that delivers a feeling of the immensity of the fight's importance coupled with a vibe of "Let's f***** do this!"

Finally, I want to give respect to Shoji Meguro of Shin Megami Tensei fame. His driving rock techno funk tracks are a driving force in those titles and he's been going at it since '96. Especially with a talented vocalist like Rin involved, these titles have amazing osts that both inspire creativity and function just as well for physical work outs.

In times past, I've often enjoyed taking hayrides, haunted or otherwise, and enjoying a cider donut somewhere along the way.

I'd love to go to an adult costume party but ehh... people my age don't really do much or they have family trick or treating to do.

In more recent years, I've gone to the dance club in costume and did my moves on the floor. That's always fun. I've been trying to work out a costume for this year, but it's falling through a bit. I wanted to be something more esoteric like 'The Green Man' but there's not much in the way of affordable options in costume components for something like that. I keep dreaming of doing a Beetlejuice outfit, though. Maybe this'll be the year. Failing that, perhaps Popeye?

@Ezra Becoming or being friends with an ex is just something that happens, but it's definitely not that common. I've heard it many times and that person just wanders off into the aethers usually. I've also found it rarely works even with effort applied. Often, when a relationship is done, it's done. Best to move on in slow gradual steps.

@SwampCreature I've been jonesing to get a Pac-Man tattoo for the last decade and I just never get around to it. I want the old fashioned simple pixel look, maybe even with some dots or a ghost running away.

What creative project have you been dreaming of completing if you had all of these uninterrupted for the next several months?

I've been itching to make a visual encyclopedia of an unexplored world full of life. I want to design and detail a scenario where live developed under different but relatable circumstances. I would make entries for not only the various critters that live on this world and how they associate with each other, but the 'lesser' forms of life, such as plant and insect equivalents, each with a simple illustration alongside an entry. Imagine a wildlife/nature handbook crossed with a less alien take on The Future Is Wild.

I've almost never really enjoyed any job I've ever had. Tolerated would be more accurate. It's not for lack of work ethic, but most things I've had to do aren't interesting or fulfilling in any way. There was a couple of times where this wasn't the case. Along this line of was how my bad day translated into a bad year.

In this instance, I used to be an assistant manager at a Wizards of the Coast retail store. The pay was lousy, but I was in my wheelhouse on several levels. I got paid to run weekly dungeons and dragons games, was able to learn of many new games to play, and had the time off to routinely attend live action Vampire the Masquerade sessions. I also met a great young woman at the time. But none of it could last.

One afternoon, I was called in to the back office and told I was fired. They would not explain why, although I had some ideas. One of the managers was a jealous ex of that young woman I mentioned and by then, we were done and she was back with him. Never date co-workers, people. Coupling this was the fact they fired me on my birthday.

"What? We didn't know..." I pointed to the calendar directly next to them that indicated as such.

I fell into a deep depression for months following this. I had no meaningful job skills beyond retail and stock. No one wanted me. Unemployment wouldn't pay me anything since I was fired. I ran though all my savings during this time and they turned off my credit card. I did a moving job during this time to make ends meet and got stuck in a truck cab with a chain smoker. This resulted in me developing an acute throat infection that nearly had me asphyxiate several months later since I had no insurance or money to take care of it. And the emergency room visit from that wasn't entirely covered by charity care, which I later found out when they stuck me with an overdue medical bill of several hundred dollars because 'charity care doesn't cover doctors, only the ER visit'.

I was becoming increasingly fatalistic and was losing the will to live. I tried entering the national guard thinking I could catch a bullet in some conflict and spare my mother the idea any notion that I was ready to leave the world but I was rejected over the phone on grounds that I had bad knees which made getting up from a crouch difficult. They wouldn't hear otherwise. I had so little agency in life that I couldn't even elect to die on my own terms.

After all of this, I developed Cotard's Delusion for a week. Let me tell you, that was a surreal mind space to be in. I stopped eating, just drank water and wandered listlessly around town in the early hours looking for change in payphone booths. I found myself staring at the sky often, particularly at the sun, and feeling peaceful about it all. Then it just... ended.

All of this was a long long time ago and obviously, I've turned things around. But I still remember my longest year from having one really bad day.