Stolen Pixels #235: Laugh or Die

By Shamus Posted Friday Oct 15, 2010

Filed under: Column 30 comments

It’s not about Minecraft.

 


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30 thoughts on “Stolen Pixels #235: Laugh or Die

  1. Sornas says:

    Is it bad if when I read “A third of you will not be tortured,” I immediately thought he meant a third of each individual person would not be tortured? XD

    1. Meredith says:

      Knowing the Combine, this would not be surprising. :)

      “Stop complaining, we didn’t even touch your left leg, or your right arm from the elbow down, and you’ve still got one kidney.”

  2. Moridin says:

    Refreshingly direct threats, I must say.

  3. I know that the jokes in the monologue weren’t supposed to be funny, but the one about Duke Nukem Forever still cracked me up.

    Also, I have to wonder, of the people who read this blog, or the Escapist, how many are old enough to remember Daikatana? I mean, I’m almost thirty and Daikatana came out when I was a Freshman in college. Someone in their early to mid twenties might only know about Daikatana because of the persistent running jokes in the gamer community.

    1. krellen says:

      I still don’t know what Daikatana is (other than a famously bad game), and I’m closer to Shamus’s age.

        1. winter says:

          Even better, real live human beings are tortured by play the entirety of Daikatana for your amusement.

          (Warning: incredible (but appropriate) amount of swearing and stuff.)

          (Edit: also it saddens me that you people will read stuff like “Me. And Thresh.” and not know who Thresh is. Very sad.)

        2. krellen says:

          No thanks. I think McCoy down there pinned the reason: I’m too old for new, crappy games. Thanks, though.

        3. Dev Null says:

          I always hear DK jokes and feel a bit like I missed out on a seminal moment in gaming history. I might just download that demo…

          1. Hitch says:

            You can’t really get the Daikatana experience by downloading the demo. Unless the demo takes 3 years to download and keeps constantly reminding you how awesome it’s going to be when it finally finishes.

    2. DrMcCoy says:

      Wait, what, “Someone in their early to mid twenties”?!? You’ve got your timeline messed up there.

      I’m 25. I grew up with Monkey Island and the like. I only have a passing knowledge of Daikatana, because it’s too /new/ for my tastes. It was released in the 00s, ffs! All that new-fangled 3D stuff, bah!

    3. Ian says:

      I was 15 when the demo for Daikatana was released; I’m 25 now. I also distinctly remember just about all of the memorable Apogee titles of the early 90s, probably because I was never a console kid (I got my first console at…17, I think — a PS2).

      I’d say the age cap for someone most likely knowing what Daikatana is would be closer to an even 20. Most of the people I regularly played with online at that time (Action Quake 2, Rocket Quake, Counter-Strike beta, etc…ah, fun times) were around my age and they were well aware of that game’s suckitude.

    4. acronix says:

      I learnt about Daikatana on a gaming magazine when I was around 10. I don´t recall if it was a review or a preview, but I do recall it had DAIKATANA in big letters and pictures, which were what interested me the most in those days.

    5. mixmastermind says:

      I know Daikatana by reputation, but not by playing it. Owning all the Penny Arcade archives in book form helps in my understanding of how huge a disaster that game was. .

    6. Heron says:

      I consider myself just barely old enough to remember it (I’m 25); I remember buying some other game that came with a demo CD, which included a demo of Daikatana. My computer at the time was not capable of running it, so I never tried the game.

    7. Ralph says:

      25 here, and I remember exactly how much Daikatana sucks… Also totally understand minecraft induced productivity problems.

    8. Soylent Dave says:

      I remember Daikatana, but I’m not allowed to talk about it because I’m too busy being John Romero’s bitch.

      What a brilliant advertising campaign that was. Oh yes indeedy.

  4. I feel slightly dumb saying this, but after reading the title of the strip, did anyone else imagine MetroCop doing the vocal part of the intro to Skate Or Die 2?

  5. Jarenth says:

    Sharp viewers may notice there’s no little text blurb under today’s comic.

    This is probably not Minecraft related in any way.

    1. bit says:

      You may also observe the entirely non-minecraft related coincidence that there is also no Experience Points today.

      Again, we stress that minecraft does in no way relate to this oddity. Please move along.

  6. X2-Eliah says:

    I really, really hope Shamus is working on an importable (or hand-crafted) minecraft map that is an actual comic sheet by itself.

    If he is playing Mincecraft just for his own selfish desires, then that just won’t do now, will it? I mean, Shamus could’ve at least picked a game that has unicorns in it.

    1. Hitch says:

      He might be busy creating a Minecraft unicorn.

  7. Brandon says:

    I really am interested in giving Minecraft a try, but I’m currently way too addicted to Starcraft 2. Oh, and trying not to fail all of my classes. That’s important too, I guess.

    Really though, Minecraft, from everything I’ve heard, is something that any game designer or aspiring game designer should be looking at very closely.

    1. lazlo says:

      I’m struck by how backwards things are right now. My biggest problem is that there’s way too much good fun stuff to do. WoW patch 4 is out, so I’m re-learning how to heal. Halo: Reach is sitting there tempting me (Yes, I’m a Halo fan. The Halo franchise, WoW, NWN and Baldur’s Gate are some of the very few games that my wife and I can both have a lot of fun playing together.) All the shows I like to watch have started new seasons, so I’ve got a Tivo full of goodness. And then, just to top it off, I walk outside and the weather is so incredibly beautiful it defies description. Just being outside and breathing this time of year makes me feel better than I usually do throughout the middle of summer.

      So my plan for the weekend is to play some WoW, play some Halo, watch some good TV, take my kids for a hike, and get some projects done around the house. So in other words, I need this weekend to be about two weeks longer than it’s going to be. It’s like I’m being oppressed by too much awesome.

      1. Freykin says:

        I feel you on this. I have a giant stack of games to work through. I could not buy anything for a year and I probably wouldn’t finish them all. This is just counting the ones that you CAN finish, too, League of Legends eats up my time at an alarming rate.

  8. Aldowyn says:

    It’s amazing when something that’s essentially a tech demo to a game can have you caught up in for days or weeks, and the ALPHA can have you skimping on your job. And yet we all still laugh, because that’s our job and we understand how awesome Minecraft is!

  9. Ramsus says:

    *snickers* Daikatana

  10. HeadHunter says:

    That Duke Nukem joke was actually pretty good! :)

  11. MrWhales says:

    (actually about this post)Kinda.

  12. Nathan Sanzone says:

    I’m catching up on old posts (yeah, it’s a big backlog””I blame Minecraft!), but none of the Stolen Pixels posts have links…

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