Tali'Thread vas Clan Zorah nar BSN 6.0

[magnuskn]

ERE was easy-mode in comparison, riiiiight up until the Sassanids and their 30 vassals declare war on you. If the White Huns aren't gouging out chunks of them, bad times ahead.

For some reason the Sassanids were very amenable to bribery in the long game I remember, so I had the leisure to deal with the roving barbarians at my western border and THEN turn around and crush the Sassanids.

In another game I only started, that didn't go so well, because the slightly corrupt ruler died and his son was having none of my shit.

[Vol]

For some reason the Sassanids were very amenable to bribery in the long game I remember, so I had the leisure to deal with the roving barbarians at my western border and THEN turn around and crush the Sassanids.

In another game I only started, that didn't go so well, because the slightly corrupt ruler died and his son was having none of my shit.

You know, I tried that, but it never worked. I'd run out of bribe money well before on stable legs. Though I've had queer luck in TW campaigns too. Once did a dwarf run where the Greenskins, post revamp, barely attacked Silver Road. They got gutted by Mors and Border Princes for some impossible reason. It was weird.

[magnuskn]

Play enough Total War and really weird stuff starts happening every once in a while. First victory I got with the High Elves in TW:WH2, I took out Nagarond and Lustria (because I started as Teclis). In the meanwhile, the fucking vampire counts had overrun everyone else in the Old World and the Southlands. I managed to win by throwing insane amounts of money at the bitey boys, until they relented and entered a military alliance with me. ^^

[Dragaros]

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

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhyLZGOMH4A

SS4 Gogeta is broken as fuck, holy shit.

[Mazder]

Something for the 40k fans

[Ragabul]

Well, I just went through a PS4 being bricked fake-out where I spent nearly 45 minutes of trouble shooting with no luck getting it to boot. Then on a whim I ejected the disc that was in it and it booted just fine. Okay, whatever.

Saving stuff to USB now instead of internal HDD. I should probably have been doing that anyway.

The PS4 is the most held together with spit and tape console I have ever owned. I have had more issues with it than every other system I've ever owned combined including the original Xbox 360 which had a like 10% system failure rate or something in the first year. I played a PS2 to death but it took like 5 years and falling over the shelf twice to do it.

[Vol]

Play enough Total War and really weird stuff starts happening every once in a while. First victory I got with the High Elves in TW:WH2, I took out Nagarond and Lustria (because I started as Teclis). In the meanwhile, the fucking vampire counts had overrun everyone else in the Old World and the Southlands. I managed to win by throwing insane amounts of money at the bitey boys, until they relented and entered a military alliance with me. ^^

Finished the English campaign. Forgot how easy the game was in comparison to later ones, a half stack can hold most settlements, but even then, I think I fought a full stack less than 4 times, total. Diplomacy was pointless outside of buttering up the Pope, as all the Catholics inevitably attacked me, but for Poland for some reason. Ended up barely holding Jerusalem, because I was building cannon towers before a brothel, and the spy they had in there was real nasty. But finished a Long campaign before the Black Death even popped out. Only fought the Mongols once, as they were coming out of Thorn.

How the fuck did you end up in Naggarond as Teclis? Campaign's over by then! Though I wish there was more "chaos" in general, having to deal with skaven mega-clans by endgame every, single, time, gets miserable.

[magnuskn]

Finished the English campaign. Forgot how easy the game was in comparison to later ones, a half stack can hold most settlements, but even then, I think I fought a full stack less than 4 times, total. Diplomacy was pointless outside of buttering up the Pope, as all the Catholics inevitably attacked me, but for Poland for some reason. Ended up barely holding Jerusalem, because I was building cannon towers before a brothel, and the spy they had in there was real nasty. But finished a Long campaign before the Black Death even popped out. Only fought the Mongols once, as they were coming out of Thorn.

How the fuck did you end up in Naggarond as Teclis? Campaign's over by then! Though I wish there was more "chaos" in general, having to deal with skaven mega-clans by endgame every, single, time, gets miserable.

It was my first Warhammer: Total War campaign I'd played through, so I didn't really know what I was doing and wiping out the Dark Elves, after I confederated the rest of the High Elves, seemed like the thing to do. Also, for the long campaign victory, you still need to have control or be allied with the owner of 17 specific cities and even with full control of Naggarond, Ulthuan and Lustria, I was short by quite a lot of them. I needed that military alliance with the vampires to win.

I haven't really played a historical Total War in quite a while now, however I am building up to it. It'll be either an Empire or Three Kingdoms campaign, with doing a Troy campaign as a long shot. I'd like to experience the ressource system they got in that game for once, I admit.

[magnuskn]

On another topic, one thing the pandemic definitely pushed me out of is comics. I've been an avid reader of Marvel comics for thirty years, but the disruption in their weekly publication for months on end really did a number on my enthusiasm. That was also coupled with the X-Men and especially the base premise of the X-Men getting systematically ruined by Jonathan Hickman in the Dawn of X relaunch. The X-Men were my entry point into Marvel and seeing them getting pulled down in the way they did was just brutal to my enjoyment of Marvel overall.

[Alienmorph]

On another topic, one thing the pandemic definitely pushed me out of is comics... The X-Men were my entry point into Marvel and seeing them getting pulled down in the way they did was just brutal to my enjoyment of Marvel overall.

The X-Men truly got the worst end of the deal after the Disney buyout. First they tried multiple times to sideline them and replace them with the Inhumans, then now that they can be on the forefront again thei're basically turned into an isolationist eugenic cult. Like, what the fuck?

The good news is that there is a world of non-superhero comics and a bunch of manga that do superheroes better than Marvel and DC have been doing these last few years, so if you ever miss having some of that stuff to read there's plenty of options. Just... if you go american comic, make sure it's nothing released past 2015.

[magnuskn]

On another topic, one thing the pandemic definitely pushed me out of is comics... The X-Men were my entry point into Marvel and seeing them getting pulled down in the way they did was just brutal to my enjoyment of Marvel overall.

The X-Men truly got the worst end of the deal after the Disney buyout. First they tried multiple times to sideline them and replace them with the Inhumans, then now that they can be on the forefront again thei're basically turned into an isolationist eugenic cult. Like, what the fuck?

Yeah, their storylines before Dawn of X also were terrible, due to their movie rights being owned by Fox, but, men, Dawn of X was and is just on another level of this mountain of shit. Not the storytelling of the intro duo-series itself, that was well crafted by Hickman. But the story... oh my. Not only are they, as you aptly put it, an isolationist eugenic sex cult (added the "sex" in there, because that's another aspect of it), their basic premise has also been utterly obliterated. Which basic premise? Well, peaceful coexistance with the human race. Cooperation. Understanding each other. Done. Donzo.

The entire premise of Dawn of X is that the humans of the MU are so uniquely shitty, so terribly bigoted, so unredeemable, that there is literally no way to realize Charles Xaviers dream, no matter what he and the X-Men do to make it happen. And so, Xavier gives up and establishes his isolationist mutant North Korea. His X-Men are now disposable as well, since they can be brought back to life at will. I got zero empathy for any of them at this point, since they also act very, very differently from the characters I grew up with.

Now, you can probably try to reverse the whole isolationist eugenic sex cult thing and the strange behaviour of the characters with some reality altering bullshit explanation, whenever this storyline has run its course. But you can't reverse the lesson we got from Moira MacTaggerts multi-lifetime attempts to find a way to make the mutants coexist with the humans of the MU. And that lesson is: It's bloody fucking pointless. There is absolutely no way that it works, the humans will always, literally always, wipe out mutants and/or destroy themselves and Earth.

And that's it. The basic premise of the X-Men was murdered with Dawn of X. There's no coming back to it, ever. If they reverse Dawn of X with reality altering shenanigans, this basic fact will remain and any attempt to get back to the idealism of the basic premise of the X-Men can only be met with derisive laughter. They killed basic human decency in the MU with their stupid, stupid attempt at being edgy and innovative. Fuck Hickman and fuck the editors who let this shit through. Fuck all of them.

The good news is that there is a world of non-superhero comics and a bunch of manga that do superheroes better than Marvel and DC have been doing these last few years, so if you ever miss having some of that stuff to read there's plenty of options. Just... if you go american comic, make sure it's nothing released past 2015.

Yeah, currently loosely following a few mangas here and there. But, overall, I think I'm okay with getting out of comics. I got a plethora of other time-consuming free time occupations (reading, PC games, following politics, watching some series, still trying to write my novel (despite basically zero progress since the start of 2020), weekly anime) so I am not lacking for entertainment, but rather time to get all my entertainment done. I dropped World of Warcraft recently and I sincerely hope I am done by now, so I can get that chunk of free time back for all the other stuff. But, man, it still sucks to see the X-Men getting shit on in this way, especially Kitty Pryde, Magneto and Cable, my favorite comic book characters of all time.

[Alienmorph]

These days I'm either hunting down old comics, or helping out indie and semi/indie projects on Kickstarter and the likes. I have been bitching about the state of comics a lot in the past, but I still love the medium and at least try to find worthwhile stuff whenever I can. THere's a lot of crap in there too, but it's a much more diverse market (and not in the Twitter sense, as in you actually do get variety) and more and more good authors that got kicked out of the mainstream publishers are doing their thing through crowdfunding. It's not perfect, and there's been attempts at gatekeeping that part of the market too, and I'm sure there's gonna be more in the future, but it's... something. Certainly better than just waiting to see wheter Marvel or DC go out of business first.

Still, I can't really hold a grudge on anyone wanting out of comics. There has been so. Much. Shit. In the last 5-6 years.

[TTTX]

These days I'm either hunting down old comics, or helping out indie and semi/indie projects on Kickstarter and the likes. I have been bitching about the state of comics a lot in the past, but I still love the medium and at least try to find worthwhile stuff whenever I can. THere's a lot of crap in there too, but it's a much more diverse market (and not in the Twitter sense, as in you actually do get variety) and more and more good authors that got kicked out of the mainstream publishers are doing their thing through crowdfunding. It's not perfect, and there's been attempts at gatekeeping that part of the market too, and I'm sure there's gonna be more in the future, but it's... something. Certainly better than just waiting to see wheter Marvel or DC go out of business first.

Still, I can't really hold a grudge on anyone wanting out of comics. There has been so. Much. Shit. In the last 5-6 years.

I stick with Donald Duck comics at least those have never let me down.

[magnuskn]

Certainly better than just waiting to see wheter Marvel or DC go out of business first.

Still, I can't really hold a grudge on anyone wanting out of comics. There has been so. Much. Shit. In the last 5-6 years.

Marvel ain't gonna fail, since Disney will save them. But I wonder about the correlation between job security due to Disney and all the shitty decisions of the last half decade at that place. Then again, really stupid storylines have been coming and going since at least the 90's collector craze.

[Dragaros]

Something for the 40k fans

Has anyone ever named a spider species after Shelob or Ungoliant?

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6L0CS3U7V28

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_nxSLggLl4

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6Mwnv5EGHg

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-Eb1tAczEk

[Alienmorph]

Marvel ain't gonna fail, since Disney will save them. But I wonder about the correlation between job security due to Disney and all the shitty decisions of the last half decade at that place. Then again, really stupid storylines have been coming and going since at least the 90's collector craze.

I think a few years from now both Marvel and DC comics will be closed and their respective mother companies will just sell the publishing rights to smaller companies. They're not going to sell Marvel or DC of course, but I expect in-house publications to cease sooner rather than later. Which, if it leads to someone actually passionate about superheroes and comics getting a chance to play with those characters and settings, actually could be a major improvement.

[Dragaros]

"For those of you who play Destiny 2 by Bungie, here's a survey you might want to get involved in! You can choose "Classic Monster Armor" or "Dinosaur Armor"."

[Dragaros]

"DOOM Eternal: The Ancient Gods - Part Two Teaser trailer on 03.15.2021."



ITS HAMMER TIME, HELL-SPAWN!

[Sinekein]

Certainly better than just waiting to see wheter Marvel or DC go out of business first.

Still, I can't really hold a grudge on anyone wanting out of comics. There has been so. Much. Shit. In the last 5-6 years.

Marvel ain't gonna fail, since Disney will save them. But I wonder about the correlation between job security due to Disney and all the shitty decisions of the last half decade at that place. Then again, really stupid storylines have been coming and going since at least the 90's collector craze.

I am convinced DC/Marvel comics are a medium you are supposed to grow out of, and that its only goal is to get you to spend as much money as possible while you're hooked.

Even before the last decade, the number of reboots and retcons was just silly. That their pace has increased does not change the fact that it has been built over inconsistent universes since the very beginning. It's just that for a while, comics were the only way for the companies to get money. So they stuck with what works, and what works is mind-boggling predictability, just like the entire MCU. It was a well-oiled machine built to give one conventional storyline after another with enough quips and dumb twists to keep readers hooked. Now that they're not the primary income source for the companies, they are probably giving the authors some leeway, knowing that fewer people read the stories, and hoping that some of them will finally give them some original material to adapt in the future.

The sooner the better really. This way we might finally see some budget going in the adaptation of superhero-less stories. It kills me to see that there have been three - three! - fucking movies adapted from a source material as stupid as Thor, and no one has tried to make a Thorgal movie yet. Or Corto Maltese. Or Lanfeust. Or any of the dozens other series that have more originality in two pages than five story arc's worth of Iron Man.

[Vol]

I never got into comics, despite having been giving subscriptions and literal boxes of them before. The medium didn't "click" with me. That said, with the sort of obligation to cycle the same heroes forever, it seemed as if it served as a proving grounds for new talent. Do something interesting and fresh with Batman, draw for Superman, maybe do a subversive reboot for a bit, then move onto your own stuff. That's what I assumed it was anyway, and the fans were happy for their favorites to be constantly made new and fresh-ish.

[magnuskn]

I think a few years from now both Marvel and DC comics will be closed and their respective mother companies will just sell the publishing rights to smaller companies. They're not going to sell Marvel or DC of course, but I expect in-house publications to cease sooner rather than later. Which, if it leads to someone actually passionate about superheroes and comics getting a chance to play with those characters and settings, actually could be a major improvement.

Again, not gonna happen. Marvel is turning out a lot of shit, but they are an idea factory for future Disney movies, as well as a way to make more money via Star Wars comics (and whatever other franchise Disney wants to make comics out of).

I am convinced DC/Marvel comics are a medium you are supposed to grow out of, and that its only goal is to get you to spend as much money as possible while you're hooked.

Even before the last decade, the number of reboots and retcons was just silly. That their pace has increased does not change the fact that it has been built over inconsistent universes since the very beginning. It's just that for a while, comics were the only way for the companies to get money. So they stuck with what works, and what works is mind-boggling predictability, just like the entire MCU. It was a well-oiled machine built to give one conventional storyline after another with enough quips and dumb twists to keep readers hooked. Now that they're not the primary income source for the companies, they are probably giving the authors some leeway, knowing that fewer people read the stories, and hoping that some of them will finally give them some original material to adapt in the future.

The sooner the better really. This way we might finally see some budget going in the adaptation of superhero-less stories. It kills me to see that there have been three - three! - fucking movies adapted from a source material as stupid as Thor, and no one has tried to make a Thorgal movie yet. Or Corto Maltese. Or Lanfeust. Or any of the dozens other series that have more originality in two pages than five story arc's worth of Iron Man.

Sorry, gonna disagree hard here. Saying "you are suppose to grow out of comics" is the same as saying "you are supposed to grow out of anime, RPG's, computer games, etc", i.e. all the stuff I very much enjoy (as does my circle of friends who are about the same age as I am, i.e. mid-fourties going toward fifty). I will admit that comics are a particularly problematic area, since, as you point out correctly, writer churn and constant crossover storyline destruction make it a hard medium to stay invested in. It still took a huge publication disruption due to the pandemic and Hickman basically destroying forever the entire premise of my favorite section of Marvel, i.e. the X-Men, to make me go say "fuck that shit..." and quit.

And I am going to disagree extra hard on your dislike for superhero movies, since I got quite a lot of them in my list of best movies and Thor: Ragnarok is on place number three of that list (after the LOTR trilogy and The Fifth Element, if you wonder).

[Sinekein]

Sorry, gonna disagree hard here. Saying "you are suppose to grow out of comics" is the same as saying "you are supposed to grow out of anime, RPG's, computer games, etc", i.e. all the stuff I very much enjoy (as does my circle of friends who are about the same age as I am, i.e. mid-fourties going toward fifty). I will admit that comics are a particularly problematic area, since, as you point out correctly, writer churn and constant crossover storyline destruction make it a hard medium to stay invested in. It still took a huge publication disruption due to the pandemic and Hickman basically destroying forever the entire premise of my favorite section of Marvel, i.e. the X-Men, to make me go say "fuck that shit..." and quit.

And I am going to disagree extra hard on your dislike for superhero movies, since I got quite a lot of them in my list of best movies and Thor: Ragnarok is on place number three of that list (after the LOTR trilogy and The Fifth Element, if you wonder).

There is much, much more diversity, originality and creative freedom in anime, RPGs and computer games. Video games don't all belong to one of two universes. 95% of anime don't feature superheroes - there's just the one as far as I know, My Hero Academia.

All the themes that are featured in comic books can be found in mangas, video games or french-belgian comic books. And they obviously can go much further because they are not forced by executive meddling to always take place in a world in which people dress like a bat at night to fight crime - and all the logical issues that come with it.

Whan I say "growing out", I don't mean "being too old/too mature", I mean "realizing at some point that those are still the same stories being rehashed over and over and over". Imagine if 95% of video games took place either in Tamriel or in Ivalice: even if they were as good as The Witcher 3, at some point, that would become boring.

And commercial success is killing all attempts at creative originality. Thor movies are not worse than other superhero movies, but they're still incredibly calibrated, and Ragnarok, like GotG 1 and 2, are the same recipe seen in every other MCU movie, except with a talented and funny director (Gunn/Waititi) to wrap things up.

[magnuskn]

Sure, superhero comics and movies follow a formula. So do tons of other movies and comics and manga and anime, for example the isekai genre in Japanese media.

That the superhero movies were and are so successful just shows that their formula works. And while now a superhero movie had the best box office of all time, the list behind that still shows a ton of other stuff. The winning formula for Marvel was in part, that they made the supernatural relatable. That's why so many other fantasy and sci-fi stuff sadly fails (and because of otherwise bad execution).

[Sinekein]

Yeah but Isekai is but one subgenre of Shonen, and one that is not even the dominant one - Naruto, Dragon Ball, Bleach or One Piece are not Isekai. You have fantasy Shonen, like Arslan Senki, Soul Eater or Fullmetal Alchemist. You have mecha Shonen like Full Metal Panic! or Code Geass. And you have a ton of other categories - like, Assassination Classroom doesn't fit any of the previous ones. And Shonen/Shojo aren't even the most diverse - you get far more variety in Seinen.

Superheroes are not a "subgenre" of comics. Well, technically they are, but they are a subgenre that occupies maybe 98% of publications - the remaining 2% being, I assume, The Walking Dead, Fables and a couple of Alan Moore stories (and even then, they still managed to stick Constantine in the larger DC universe - I somehow doubt it was Moore's initial plan).

The top grossing superhero movies are pretty poor diversity-wise too, pretty much all of them are, well, supernatural actioners. Some of them can verge more on the thriller, like The Dark Knight or Winter Soldier, but there hasn't been a superhero movie that transcended its genre to offer something never seen before. It's basically a series of paint jobs: the one with magic (Dr Strange), the one in space (GotG), the one with vikings (Thor), the one with black people (Black Panther), the one with a female lead (Wonder Woman) - all of them supernatural actioners.

There has been more diversity among TV shows, since there was an actual spy drama (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D), a hardboiled detective story (Jessica Jones), a pure pulp (Legends of Tomorrow) - but in movies, there is next to none. There hasn't been a drama, or a romance, or a psychological thriller, or a horror movie. And it's a problem because, in proportion, superhero TV shows are not as prominent, and are not really making it impossible for other shows to air. When it comes to blockbusters however, almost all of them are superhero movies. Or Fast & Furious. Or completely unnecessary Disney live remakes. That's pretty much the extent of 2010's AAA cinema.

It's just action. With next to no stakes since you know characters have to survive for the next big crossover, too.

And it's often not even that great at action either. You have some great stunts and visuals in some movies, like Spiderman, but a large majority of those superhero movies just copy each other's style and end up looking pretty average. Not bad, but not something you get out of the theater thinking "I've never seen that before".

I mean, for all its flaws, I still think Revenge of the Sith had more memorable visuals than 90% of the MCU.

[Dragaros]

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

[Dragaros]

https://www.warhammer-community.com/202 ... -enormous/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLW4Kk0fKao

[magnuskn]

Yeah but Isekai is but one subgenre of Shonen, and one that is not even the dominant one - Naruto, Dragon Ball, Bleach or One Piece are not Isekai. You have fantasy Shonen, like Arslan Senki, Soul Eater or Fullmetal Alchemist. You have mecha Shonen like Full Metal Panic! or Code Geass. And you have a ton of other categories - like, Assassination Classroom doesn't fit any of the previous ones. And Shonen/Shojo aren't even the most diverse - you get far more variety in Seinen.

Superheroes are not a "subgenre" of comics. Well, technically they are, but they are a subgenre that occupies maybe 98% of publications - the remaining 2% being, I assume, The Walking Dead, Fables and a couple of Alan Moore stories (and even then, they still managed to stick Constantine in the larger DC universe - I somehow doubt it was Moore's initial plan).

The top grossing superhero movies are pretty poor diversity-wise too, pretty much all of them are, well, supernatural actioners. Some of them can verge more on the thriller, like The Dark Knight or Winter Soldier, but there hasn't been a superhero movie that transcended its genre to offer something never seen before. It's basically a series of paint jobs: the one with magic (Dr Strange), the one in space (GotG), the one with vikings (Thor), the one with black people (Black Panther), the one with a female lead (Wonder Woman) - all of them supernatural actioners.

There has been more diversity among TV shows, since there was an actual spy drama (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D), a hardboiled detective story (Jessica Jones), a pure pulp (Legends of Tomorrow) - but in movies, there is next to none. There hasn't been a drama, or a romance, or a psychological thriller, or a horror movie. And it's a problem because, in proportion, superhero TV shows are not as prominent, and are not really making it impossible for other shows to air. When it comes to blockbusters however, almost all of them are superhero movies. Or Fast & Furious. Or completely unnecessary Disney live remakes. That's pretty much the extent of 2010's AAA cinema.

It's just action. With next to no stakes since you know characters have to survive for the next big crossover, too.

And it's often not even that great at action either. You have some great stunts and visuals in some movies, like Spiderman, but a large majority of those superhero movies just copy each other's style and end up looking pretty average. Not bad, but not something you get out of the theater thinking "I've never seen that before".

I mean, for all its flaws, I still think Revenge of the Sith had more memorable visuals than 90% of the MCU.

Well, to cite somebody who abides, "that's just your opinion, man". I'm happy to live in the time where there are many and good superhero movies. Much better than the times where there only were few and shitty ones. And there were quite a lot of good other kind of movies in that 2010's as well. Tron: Legacy, Zootopia, Dredd, Edge of Tomorrow, Mad Max Fury Road are all from that decade.

[Ragabul]

I never got into comics, despite having been giving subscriptions and literal boxes of them before. The medium didn't "click" with me. That said, with the sort of obligation to cycle the same heroes forever, it seemed as if it served as a proving grounds for new talent. Do something interesting and fresh with Batman, draw for Superman, maybe do a subversive reboot for a bit, then move onto your own stuff. That's what I assumed it was anyway, and the fans were happy for their favorites to be constantly made new and fresh-ish.

Same. One because I didn't try to read them until I was about 19 and thus was frankly too old to find much of the standard DC/Marvel fare anything but stupid. In particular, reading Silver Age comics is unbearable and a huge percentage of newer stuff is fueled on lore that comes from that era. Another is that the comic a week or so format drives me batshit. You never get a satisfactory conclusion to anything and you only get to progress the story in infuriatingly small increments. Eventually I did find individual comics or series that I liked such that now I am not totally allergic to the whole format anymore. Even so, I only read collected graphics novels and usually won't bother with a series that isn't done or that doesn't have a finite ending planned in the near future.

Comics are what I call a "needy" format which is to say that they demand your full attention. You have no alternative but to sit down with one and pay full attention to it focusing on both words and images. I have to constantly remind myself to look at details in the pictures and not just read the dialogue quickly. Pictures in comics are very often to me the equivalent of long extraneous physical descriptions of things in novels. I just don't care. My imagination can supply details. I don't need them explicitly provided. These days I just have so much I want to do that I don't have much time for "needy" formats which includes print books, comics, and most TV. Playing a game with mostly mindless combat + listening to audiobook is my preferred combination. I just pause the book when I get to cutscenes or actual story content.

If I'm gonna take time to do something "needy" it had better be damn good and worth the price of my full attention. This is one reason I mostly use that time for RPGs. A passing few print books make the cut. Even fewer TV shows and movies make the cut. Comics, never my favorite format anyway have a big uphill battle to get noticed.

[Sinekein]

Well, to cite somebody who abides, "that's just your opinion, man". I'm happy to live in the time where there are many and good superhero movies. Much better than the times where there only were few and shitty ones. And there were quite a lot of good other kind of movies in that 2010's as well. Tron: Legacy, Zootopia, Dredd, Edge of Tomorrow, Mad Max Fury Road are all from that decade.

Note that I don't dislike superhero movies per se, I only dislike their overwhelming dominance in culture right now. I would say the same if we had 4 space-opera sci-fi movies a year, or Westerns only (that kinda was the case some time ago, and it wasn't better).

The Dark Knight, Raimiderman or (most) X-Men movies aired before the era where everything was about superheroes, which proves that you don't need 5 SH movies a year to get a couple decent ones. I just hope we quickly get back to the time where we get superhero movies and also other big blockbusters.

Because of the four movies you mentioned, if I put Zootopia aside - animation is prominent, no question - the other three are almost the only noteworthy non-animated, non-SH AAA movies in a decade. It's not much, no matter how awesome MMFR or EoT can be.

[magnuskn]

Sure, I'd love to see more other sci-fi and fantasy stuff and just out-there premises be made into AAA movies, but if its the time for superhero movies, man, am I happy that we even got there. There's still stuff like the Mission Impossible movies, the James Bond movies and so on, so it's not as if there was only that stuff. I just cited from my personal 20+ top movies list, in which at least ten movies are from the last decade. Heck, I even forgot the new Jumanji, which I loved to death (the first one, the second one was fine as well, but the premise was already done).

[Dragaros]

[[ "Microsoft has announced that it has officially completed the acquisition of Bethesda Softworks parent company ZeniMax Media first announced in September 2020. The acquisition brings eight new studios under Microsoft ownership—including Bethesda Game Studios, id Software, ZeniMax Online Studios, Arkane Studios, MachineGames, Tango Gameworks, Alpha Dog Studios, and Roundhouse Studios—and a plethora of popular IP including DOOM, The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, and more. Microsoft will share more about what will come next for its teams later in 2021. In the meantime, additional Bethesda Softworks games are coming to Xbox Game Pass later this week. More details will be announced soon.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xy2930hAXnc

[Vol]

Fun fact if any of you grow your hair long: Turns out that having an awful tangle to comb out multiple times a day can be greatly mitigated by cutting split ends, which in fact can become quite split with time.

Pulling out entwined clumps of hair in the shower way less often now. Waking up, far less painful to comb. Though I suppose going from using clippers on my head for years and years to a long ponytail comes with some harsh lessons.

[Someone With Mass]

Fun fact if any of you grow your hair long: Turns out that having an awful tangle to comb out multiple times a day can be greatly mitigated by cutting split ends, which in fact can become quite split with time.

Pulling out entwined clumps of hair in the shower way less often now. Waking up, far less painful to comb. Though I suppose going from using clippers on my head for years and years to a long ponytail comes with some harsh lessons.

I'm having the exact opposite problem and I'm not sure if I want to bother doing something about it. The only reason why I would want to try something would be because getting a decent hair style is a pain. I'm also annoyingly self-conscious about the thin spots whenever I'm going outside.

That said, I think it's a good thing I don't have long hair. Kind of like my beard, I would likely get tired of constantly having to maintain it and just go for short styles, like buzzcuts anyway.

[Vol]

Ouch. My dad has natural blonde hair (lucky guy), so it's always light and soft, never really needs to be combed. Also means him going grey took forever to notice. Meanwhile, I have Euromutt hair, thick, dark brown/red, mostly straight. Lost a fair bit off the temples, but it looks like it's holding ground there as a matured hairline.

If you have a strong beard, much easier to pull off the shaved head look. Makes you look tough.

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffssHmOkPe4

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXG8nqBfY34

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sok2qaRM1k0

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZvbCEx4olI

[Dragaros]

[SciFlyBoy]

If you have a strong beard, much easier to pull off the shaved head look. Makes you look tough.

I have neither a strong beard nor so little hair that shaving is a necessity. I don't think I could look tough even shaved bald. Though I think I can try to get the front part (mustache and chin) to poke out a bit like a Van Dyke style since that's a strength. At least I won't have to rely on the sides being strong or a beard style that borders on boring.

When I did have long hair I don't remember split ends being much of an issue and I forgot what the cause of that actually is. My hair is pretty oily so it was definitely soft enough, just really thin on top and frail on the sides. Man, I can still go through the hand-motions of tying a pony tail. I guess some things never leave you.

[Spartanburger]

I'm having the exact opposite problem and I'm not sure if I want to bother doing something about it. The only reason why I would want to try something would be because getting a decent hair style is a pain. I'm also annoyingly self-conscious about the thin spots whenever I'm going outside.

I'm in the same boat. I used to have nice flowy hair that I really liked, but sadly I got my Dad's hair, which means my hairline is receding and thinning right in the middle, but is perfectly fine along the sides and back. Treatment doesn't reverse hair loss, only stops it from progressing, so if I were to start treating it, it would stay looking ehhhhh rather than look good.

At this point, I resolved myself to just live with it, and it it gets bad, just shave it all off. I've got a reasonably nice beard/mustache to compensate.

[Someone With Mass]

Ouch. My dad has natural blonde hair (lucky guy), so it's always light and soft, never really needs to be combed. Also means him going grey took forever to notice. Meanwhile, I have Euromutt hair, thick, dark brown/red, mostly straight. Lost a fair bit off the temples, but it looks like it's holding ground there as a matured hairline.

If you have a strong beard, much easier to pull off the shaved head look. Makes you look tough.

I guess my beard is okay, but much like the hair on the rest of my head, it gets rather curly instead of straight and long. Got hair for days on the sides, though. Feels like it'd be a waste to shave that off. Maybe I should look for a comfy hat to wear instead. Preferably something that can handle being washed, unlike that POS baseball cap I had last year which lost its coloring the second it got warm water on it.

[Mazder]

I'm actually favouring medium lengths right now, mainly due to lockdown and being unable to go back to my short hair experimentations.
Long hair I am used to, was probably full of split ends because I never knew how to deal with them, lol.

Beard...urgh.
Facial hair is too fine so the Stache and upper cheeks area are all light hair and the lower cheeks, chin, jaw, neck and sideburns are more darker.

Actually my hair has changed colour to be darker over time and now I am more mousey blonde, the only old colour of my hair is the fine/light facial hair.

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=beQz99CDztY

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WP36M7lSW1I