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Ror posted:This is sort of a weird thematic association recommendation question but people in here really know their stuff, so here goes. I've tried to spoiler stuff in case you're looking forward to reading something I mention. If you're willing to get that experience from a game as well, Piranesi gave me huge Cultist Simulator vibes, where CS is hitting a lot of the same notes, albeit in the key of horror. It's essentially a single-player digital card game where you're playing a person in an alternate version of the Belle Epoque (late 1800s through 1913) who comes into possession of secret knowledge about the true nature of the universe, becomes obsessed with revelation, and slowly accumulates a cult of fellow mystery-seekers and pawns to help them tear open the veil of reality and reveal The Truth. Much of that process involves journeying through an elaborate dreamworld ala Lovecraft's Dream Cycle, a place where Piranesi's halls would fit right in. Even your waking world feels slightly off and dreamlike. It's a game absolutely crammed to the gills with internal (and internally consistent) mythology, and while the cultists do eventually gain power over reality, it's all in the form of elaborate, narrowly-constrained rituals which you assemble the components for like puzzle pieces, and which always carry a risk of going horribly, horribly wrong.
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Aug 22, 2021 18:31
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The problem with Cultist Simulator is that it’s made by Alexis Kennedy, notorious sexual harasser who preyed on the women in junior positions in his company.
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Aug 22, 2021 18:47
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D-Pad posted:Along these lines I'm curious what the threads opinion on The Prince of Nothing/The Aspect Emperor series is. I've ran out of stuff to read so I went back to it and am on the last book because I never finished it before. ed: MrNemo posted:It genuinely saddens me that this series started with an interesting concept of the horror of an objective non materialist morality system, humans as biological machinery, magic as differential ways of understanding and shaping reality and ended up with a cannibal rape fest, an Empire Strikes back ending and a dragon screaming 'I smell cunny!' Sham bam bamina! fucked around with this message at 18:49 on Aug 22, 2021 |
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Aug 22, 2021 18:47
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I read the first Prince of Nothing book and wiki summaries of the rest, and felt that this was a good way to enjoy the series. Everything I have read about the books later has made this seem more and more like the right decision. There are interesting ideas in those books, but there is no reason to actually read them to get at those. Other people have already gone through that ordeal for you.
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Aug 22, 2021 19:07
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StrixNebulosa posted:The problem with Cultist Simulator is that it’s made by Alexis Kennedy, notorious sexual harasser who preyed on the women in junior positions in his company. I hate that I learned this right after finishing the game; it has completely killed my ambition to replay it and explore all its narrative nooks and crannies. Speaking of game lore, except one where the author is a good person (or at least a goon person) what's the best way to engage with the Destiny storyline that's not a fan wiki or squinting over item descriptions?
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Aug 22, 2021 19:09
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are there any other books that take on the Limitless style ultra genius? ones without people loving a hole in the ground preferably
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Aug 22, 2021 19:10
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StrixNebulosa posted:The problem with Cultist Simulator is that it’s made by Alexis Kennedy, notorious sexual harasser who preyed on the women in junior positions in his company. The problem with Cultist Simulator is that it requires you to go through the same, very repetitive grind every time you have to start over or want to go for a different path. What you are describing is the problem with Alexis Kennedy.
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Aug 22, 2021 19:12
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StrixNebulosa posted:The problem with Cultist Simulator is that it’s made by Alexis Kennedy, notorious sexual harasser who preyed on the women in junior positions in his company. sounds like he knows a thing or two about running a cult, though perhaps not anything that would translate into a game I'd want to play
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Aug 22, 2021 19:19
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If anyone else here has pre-ordered or plans to get Cassandra Khaw's upcoming scifi/horror novel The All-Consuming World, there's a really neat pre-order bonus available: https://www.erewhonbooks.com/the-all-consuming-world-preorder-exclusive It's a solo/journaling/keepsake game by Jeeyon Shim. I've played a few of Shim's keepsake games now, and they're basically a series of journal prompts and activities that take you through a story while you create an artefact of play (sort of like a combination diary and scrapbook -- it can be as simple or intricate as you like). So if sounds like fun to you, and if the book sounds cool too, this is a really neat pre-order bonus! As much I love the enamel pins that have been used a lot as pre-order bonuses recently, it's really cool to see a publisher branching out into something else entirely, too.
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Aug 22, 2021 19:31
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wizzardstaff posted:I hate that I learned this right after finishing the game; it has completely killed my ambition to replay it and explore all its narrative nooks and crannies. There's not really a good way. Just read anything on Ishtar that sounds interesting, and only read stuff that's interesting for its own sake, don't expect big payoffs in-game for stuff set up in the lore.
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Aug 22, 2021 19:34
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Oh, the storyline, not the lore. I dunno. Maybe there are cinematics compilations on Youtube?
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Aug 22, 2021 19:36
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DurianGray posted:If anyone else here has pre-ordered or plans to get Cassandra Khaw's upcoming scifi/horror novel The All-Consuming World, there's a really neat pre-order bonus available: Oooh! Drop this into the Solo Roleplaying thread too, they might like it! We've been talking about journalling RPGs over there lately. https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3959142
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Aug 22, 2021 19:38
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General Battuta posted:Oh, the storyline, not the lore. I dunno. Maybe there are cinematics compilations on Youtube? No, I guess I really meant the lore, I was just trying to vary my word choice. The present-day plotline of game events is a lot less interesting to me than the background and history, especially the Taken King material. (Which is really good, by the way.) I'm just the kind of lazy consumer who would rather have it spoon-fed in a novel than try to infer it from dialogue thrown at me while I'm solving a platforming puzzle.
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Aug 22, 2021 20:02
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Read the Books of Sorrow I guess.
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Aug 22, 2021 20:06
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smackfu posted:How is the Princess Bride book anyway? The movie is so well known I wonder how the book holds up. Be aware that this is the "good bits" version as shown in the movie, substantially abridged from the politics-heavy original. The premise of the movie is that the Peter Falk character is skipping big chunks to keep the story interesting to his grandson. This is joke. Supposedly the publishers still get inquiries about where to obtain the "Morgenstern original" edition.
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Aug 22, 2021 20:08
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Aardvark! posted:are there any other books that take on the Limitless style ultra genius? ones without people loving a hole in the ground preferably ”Understand” a science fiction novelette by Ted Chiang is probably the best take on this. Maybe Protector by Larry Niven.
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Aug 22, 2021 20:20
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Hobnob posted:Be aware that this is the "good bits" version as shown in the movie, substantially abridged from the politics-heavy original. The premise of the movie is that the Peter Falk character is skipping big chunks to keep the story interesting to his grandson. I work at a library and I can't tell you the number of people who would complain that we bought the abridged version for the collection. And explaining just got me blank looks.
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Aug 22, 2021 21:24
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That's the funniest poo poo.
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Aug 22, 2021 21:28
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Aardvark! posted:are there any other books that take on the Limitless style ultra genius? ones without people loving a hole in the ground preferably I, uh, assume you’ve read flowers for Algernon? There’s also a story in the Ted Chiang “Story of Your Life” collection that fits.
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Aug 22, 2021 21:49
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wizzardstaff posted:
Bungie has put out several hard-copy anthologies of curated Grimoire material (i.e. the short-fiction lore entries you can collect in game) Available as ebooks as well they're illustrated, look really nice, and i presume gather the material together according to some thematic or sequential organization that makes more sense than a wiki rabbit-hole would I don't know if the General or other writers receive any sort of money based on sales of those, however. If they don't, i perhaps would not care to purchase them PupsOfWar fucked around with this message at 23:30 on Aug 22, 2021 |
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Aug 22, 2021 23:26
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No, no royalties or names on the cover. Nor consulted on the art or anything. Nor told they were happening before they were officially announced. But it's good to see Bungie investing in the fiction, hard to call that a bad thing. And the team that works on them does a fantastic job, from art to design. General Battuta fucked around with this message at 23:34 on Aug 22, 2021 |
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Aug 22, 2021 23:30
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there are also i think multiple fan-illustrated versions of the Books of Sorrows floating around, perhaps other storylines as well, idk it's a big fandom
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Aug 22, 2021 23:35
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General Battuta posted:No, no royalties or names on the cover. Nor consulted on the art or anything. Nor told they were happening before they were officially announced. You probably can't say all that much regarding questions like this, but is that to do with contract work or something? It would be amazing for the lore writers to get their financial dues, and also the amount of digging a fan has to do to even guess at the authorship of the lore entries is downright archaeological at times.
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Aug 23, 2021 00:26
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SimonChris posted:I read the first Prince of Nothing book and wiki summaries of the rest, and felt that this was a good way to enjoy the series. Everything I have read about the books later has made this seem more and more like the right decision. it's a series where even the people who liked it at first and were willing to go to bat for it got far enough in and went "wait what the hell is this poo poo???" I would honestly be a little wary of hanging out with the sort of person who unreservedly likes the whole thing. Maybe unfairly but I have a hard time seeing how someone could without internalizing some nasty rear end stuff
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Aug 23, 2021 00:27
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blunderheart posted:You probably can't say all that much regarding questions like this, but is that to do with contract work or something? It would be amazing for the lore writers to get their financial dues, and also the amount of digging a fan has to do to even guess at the authorship of the lore entries is downright archaeological at times. Yes. Everything you write while working for a game company (either as a FTE or a freelance writer) belongs entirely to them forever.
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Aug 23, 2021 00:34
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StrixNebulosa posted:The problem with Cultist Simulator is that it’s made by Alexis Kennedy, notorious sexual harasser who preyed on the women in junior positions in his company. Turns out that Twitter mobs are bad and not always correct..
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Aug 23, 2021 04:29
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Probably best to keep the discussion of the sexual predator game developers to the thread for it over in Games. https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3897556
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Aug 23, 2021 05:57
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neongrey posted:it's a series where even the people who liked it at first and were willing to go to bat for it got far enough in and went "wait what the hell is this poo poo???" I read the first trilogy and enjoyed it quite a bit at the time. Then never got around to reading the follow-up and by now I guess I'm better off that way. The crusade-ripoff thing, the wizards reliving a millennia-old apocalypse in their sleep, the main wizard dude going off and dropping raw epistemology on everyone, those were some good bits that I'll remember.
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Aug 23, 2021 09:12
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Aardvark! posted:are there any other books that take on the Limitless style ultra genius? ones without people loving a hole in the ground preferably
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Aug 23, 2021 09:14
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Ror posted:I'm trying to think what else has this vibe I'm looking for. In Clarke's previous Norrell & Strange, the whole history of magic in our world and the glimpses of the faerie worlds and how they interact in the past and present. Lud-in-the-Mist by Hope Mirrlees if you're like for something in the vein of Strange and Norrell in particular
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Aug 23, 2021 09:59
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Issuing a correction, to a previous post of mine about the prolific rape-book author (and part time fantasy novelist) R Scott Bakker. You do not, under any circumstances, "gotta hand it to him".
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Aug 23, 2021 10:08
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FPyat posted:I've tried and failed to read New York 2140 twice. I probably should give it another chance, though, because I hear it has an attempt to write a realistic anti-capitalist revolution outside the typical Marxist ideas. It... does, yes, but I don't think it's handled particularly well and it's probably not even KSR's own best example of that. The Mars trilogy is better on that front. mrs. nicholas sarkozy posted:Nthing David Mitchell (I think Ghostwritten could scratch this itch a bit too) The Bone Clocks is a decent one of his novels, but if I put aside my other feelings about it and just approach it as a standalone fantasy, it's really really good. Though I do wish if he wants to keep writing about the Horologists he'd give us another example of what actually makes them interesting (which is getting reincarnated in a totally random body somewhere else and continuing your long uninterrupted march through history) rather than having Marinus show up and wink at the camera in every other book like some dumb superhero deus ex machina. Also that section at the end set in Ireland in the 2140s (?) is so loving prescient in retrospect. An apocalyptic future where there hasn't been any one big event, just a whole bunch of little ones, until your lives are measurably way worse than when you a kid and you know they're never, ever getting better.
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Aug 23, 2021 11:46
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freebooter posted:The Bone Clocks is a decent one of his novels, but if I put aside my other feelings about it and just approach it as a standalone fantasy, it's really really good. Though I do wish if he wants to keep writing about the Horologists he'd give us another example of what actually makes them interesting (which is getting reincarnated in a totally random body somewhere else and continuing your long uninterrupted march through history) rather than having Marinus show up and wink at the camera in every other book like some dumb superhero deus ex machina. Yeah, I read Utopia Avenue earlier this year and the Horologists stuff felt really shoehorned in, to the detriment of the book. Still a decent read though, but definitely not on the level of my fave Mitchells, like Cloud Atlas, The Bone Clocks, or Black Swan Green. Ror posted:I'm trying to think what else has this vibe I'm looking for. In Clarke's previous Norrell & Strange, the whole history of magic in our world and the glimpses of the faerie worlds and how they interact in the past and present. In the Magicians series, the parts about the nexus city of fountains that connects to other worlds. Arthur C. Clarke's The City and The Stars maybe? In the sense that it features people realizing that their way of life is not the only way that exists and there are also powers out there they don't understand. Hm, and I thought I had another example but I'm blanking for now, I'll edit it in if I remember. The Neverending Story? (Even if you've seen the movie, the book is loads better.) Selachian fucked around with this message at 12:57 on Aug 23, 2021 |
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Aug 23, 2021 12:11
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Aardvark! posted:are there any other books that take on the Limitless style ultra genius? ones without people loving a hole in the ground preferably Theodore Sturgeon's Microcosmic God is a very influential novelette that's still engaging despite everyone borrowing from it. I'd give more of a description but so much of it has become foundational tropes that it'd lessen the enjoyment if you do check it out.
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Aug 23, 2021 13:30
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You want me to listen to Alexis Kennedy tell me about how he, Alexis Kennedy, was wronged? No thank you. I'd give this more credence if it were written by literally anyone else.
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Aug 23, 2021 13:38
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Ror posted:This is sort of a weird thematic association recommendation question but people in here really know their stuff, so here goes. I've tried to spoiler stuff in case you're looking forward to reading something I mention. You'll want to read Little, Big by John Crowley. It'll scratch that itch harder than any book you or anyone else has yet mentioned. If you want a high literary take on it, John Crowley also wrote the Aegypt series which is largely set in the realist tradition but progressively gets weirder as a possible secret history of the world is discovered. Beware though the pleasures are more literary than genre oriented unlike Little, Big. fez_machine fucked around with this message at 14:00 on Aug 23, 2021 |
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Aug 23, 2021 13:38
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Edit: Disregard, better suited to another thread. I am loving Redemptor so far, the sequel to Raybearer. I may have a thing for YA fiction. DreamingofRoses fucked around with this message at 14:24 on Aug 23, 2021 |
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Aug 23, 2021 13:55
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DreamingofRoses posted:I’d be more concerned with the fact that FailBetter Games has been refusing requests for copies of the HR records of his time at the company and was refusing an offer for an independent investigator to come in and look at Kennedy’s time in the company and abide by the investigators’ decision as a Weather Factory policy. I'm going to believe the women speaking out against him in this case, thanks.
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Aug 23, 2021 14:02
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StrixNebulosa posted:I'm going to believe the women speaking out against him in this case, thanks. I swear I was editing before you posted that. I’m all for believing victims. I also believe that if someone has evidence in either direction, they should have a chance to access it/share it.
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Aug 23, 2021 14:30
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C.M. Kruger posted:Probably best to keep the discussion of the sexual predator game developers to the thread for it over in Games. Thanks folks
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