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Pennywise the Frown posted:I've probably mentioned it in here before but I used to love this 90s program on Discovery called Movie Magic. It was all about the behind the scenes stuff like this. I LOVED seeing the miniatures and matte paintings and the insanely detailed poo poo that they built.
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Apr 4, 2023 14:11
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One of the best gifts I ever got as a kid was a huge pile of Starlog and Starburst magazines. My mother's boyfriend (a boring person) had a very cool workmate who gave him the pile go pass onto me. I read every single one so many times, even taking them on holiday to read (again) while camping. I'm now wondering if this is the same workmate who gave him a grainy 10th generation pirate VHS of Aliens that I watched so many times. I dunno, but maybe. Either way, that random dude/dudes in the 1980s provided me with a foundational love of both Aliens (the movie) and sci-fi and practical special effects in general.
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Apr 4, 2023 21:13
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If anyone wants to see some instructional behind the scenes movie stuff, check out The Stan Winston School of Character Arts. Sign up for a free 7-day trial, and there are loads of tutorial vids where industry pros and alums of Stan Winston Effects show you how to actually do the movie magic stuff. From animatronics to latex creatures to painting, they cover a bit of everything. I've used a load of the info provided there for my hobbies, but it's great stuff for anyone who wants to see how exactly they make a creature move, or get dimensional paint effects on a flat surface, or how to build a puppet.
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Apr 5, 2023 03:39
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 This is funny to me because when I was a kid I tried to figure out little stuff like who Wierzbowski was and what was written on everyone’s gear and I was sure it said “fly me friendly” on her helmet.It’s actually “fly the friendly skies” ofc but from this angle…
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Apr 5, 2023 22:46
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My friend's mom looked like Ferro and she wore aviators and we laughed about it.
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Apr 5, 2023 23:23
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Idk if it was here or from my buddy that loving loves Aliens, but Another Glorious Day in the Corps is getting a reprint! I also heard rumor of new missions and Ferro/Spunkmeyer possibly being added too, but i don’t remember much more. https://www.gf9games.com/aliens/1690/theyre-back/
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Apr 6, 2023 00:23
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Pennywise the Frown posted:My friend's mom looked like Ferro and she wore aviators and we laughed about it. Yeah, just like we laughed about microwave's mom. Hahaha, we would laugh. And, are there any more in that set?
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Apr 6, 2023 00:45
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Pennywise the Frown posted:My friend's mom looked like Ferro and she wore aviators and we laughed about it.
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Apr 6, 2023 01:39
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"Man, Dave's mom rocking those aviators really tickles my funnybone IYKWIM" Young Pennywise: "Yes. I definitely know what you mean."
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Apr 6, 2023 01:46
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Icon Of Sin posted:Idk if it was here or from my buddy that loving loves Aliens, but Another Glorious Day in the Corps is getting a reprint! I also heard rumor of new missions and Ferro/Spunkmeyer possibly being added too, but i don’t remember much more. I own all of this, and the figures are amazing. Sadly, it is a terrible game with massively over-complex systems for just shooting guns at aliens, and every mission is just grinding, loving *grinding*, through a wall of aliens towards the exit. I'm going to just use the figures and build a board to their scale to use them to play the old Leading Edge Aliens game which still holds up 30 years later. It's a shame, as the components are all high quality, and there are some amazing 3rd party resin scenery pieces to make the boards look gorgeous, but the game... it gives me no pleasure to say the game is awful.
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Apr 6, 2023 06:35
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Parkingtigers posted:Sadly, it is a terrible game with massively over-complex systems for just shooting guns at aliens, and every mission is just grinding, loving *grinding*, through a wall of aliens towards the exit. As do I, and I actually enjoy it. Playing it isn’t a slog like playing the Doom 2016 board game  Weapon ranges? Card-based activation order? Random effects played by the invader? Card-based defense system whose icons do different things for different demons? It’s all there 
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Apr 6, 2023 09:47
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Spunkmeyer is just an objectively fun name to say
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Apr 6, 2023 11:43
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Parkingtigers posted:I own all of this, and the figures are amazing. I feel like a lot of licensed board games fall into this trap especially Kickstarted ones like the Dark Souls and Bloodborne board games come to mind.
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Apr 6, 2023 15:34
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SilvergunSuperman posted:Spunkmeyer is just an objectively fun name to say I can't imagine a military unit where everyone isn't just calling them Spunky.
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Apr 6, 2023 17:55
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Some moron in boot got the name Spanky by the DIs. Another was Havichith and they called him Ha-bitch-a-bitch.
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Apr 6, 2023 18:18
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The Zombie Guy posted:I can't imagine a military unit where everyone isn't just calling them Spunky. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XdP26I_v68
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Apr 6, 2023 18:22
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The Zombie Guy posted:I can't imagine a military unit where everyone isn't just calling them Spunky. Knowing how notorious marines are for being bored and crass and how nicknames quickly evolve, I'd imagine they'd go straight to calling him 'Jizz'.
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Apr 6, 2023 18:40
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Neo Rasa posted:I feel like a lot of licensed board games fall into this trap especially Kickstarted ones like the Dark Souls and Bloodborne board games come to mind. I mean, some people like it, and I've had these same discussions at much greater length over on BGG with people who swear they love it. But it's just so odd as it's by Gale Force 9 and they have put out a ton of good games, and it seemed to have a long development cycle. The problem I have is that every mission is the reactor room scene from the movies. The marines are suddenly outnumbered and overwhelmed and fighting desperately to escape. Now that works in the movie because they only do it once, and they are hampered by lack of weapons and incompetent leadership, and it's first contact with a new and unexpected enemy. When mission after mission does it then they are all turned up to 11, there's no variety, no ebb and flow. Take the first scenario, which has the marines entering into the complex. You have to move to check out several locations and (randomly) find Newt then exit pursued by aliens. It's the reactor room with a slightly slower start and a need to pick up a missing civvie along the way. It's not "we've met aliens, get back out to the APC/dropship" which would make sense in that setup, it's about running deeper into the complex chased by monsters and THEN facing the reactor room scenario. A simple change to just that first scenario, to make it a combat encounter that remains smaller than the reactor room, and without bursting that aura of invincibility the marines have (which is the entire narrative lynchpin of the reactor room scene) would be to make it a sweep and clear scenario. Approach the alien spawn points, weld them shut (and being that close to spawn makes it risky) and kill all aliens on the board. It would be thematic, playable, and establishing a safe zone matches the movie and is different from the next scenario. Requires no new rules or game mechanics. But nope, just facegrind the horde. There's also just Too Many Aliens. Each blip in the game isn't one alien, but 1 - 5, with the model on the board getting a stack of counters under its base for the other 1 - 4 aliens standing in that same square. So you can turn a lot of cards, rotate a lot of dials, roll a lot of dice, and remove a lot of counters, and all your (successful) shooting for the turn can leave the board looking basically identical. And I'm not joking about it being all those actions. You have a really interesting system where you have a deck of cards to represent hazards and wargear and events. And you have to burn through that deck to attempt actions, and run out of cards and they start getting discarded instead and you gradually get fewer of them. So over time, you can do fewer actions. That's a fun and interesting system. But every time you fire your gun, you don't just burn a card. No, that's paying for the shot. If you could burn the cards, and shoot as much as you want, and have the cards be successes but make it a pure card management thing that would be cool as hell. But you are limited to only two actions per turn, which stops it being just about using the cards which makes the cards less interesting. So then you have to roll dice to hit. Simple, effective, standard board game stuff. But each shot you take reduces your aim for the next shot, so you have to change your aim dial. So more shots, more chance to miss, and that is also a cool as hell idea, but you've already got the card burning thing so you are being punished for taking the extra shots twice over. And there's no point in not shooting because if an alien grabs you then the defence is to fire your gun (also burning a card, also rolling dice, and also lowering your aim) so might as well just shoot until you fail in your own turn, removing any choice in the matter. Burn a card, roll a dice, turn a dial to reduce aim, score a hit, pick up the model and remove a counter. Repeat. Repeat if the gun is "full auto" and allows multiple shots with one action. It's so many steps to do such a basic thing. Meanwhile someone has to be assigned to make "rest" actions just to recharge the card deck. It's systems on systems on systems when it should be about positioning and movement and player choices. I've had situations where putting Hudson (better at melee) with a knife in a doorway stabbing aliens in the front stack to block the (literally) 25 aliens behind that front stack was a better choice than having him shoot his pulse rifle at them because he was statistically likely to only be able to kill maybe 3 of them (while weakening the card deck) and the other 20+ aliens would then murder him because it's just not possible to kill that many aliens at once. The game comes with 26 alien figures, and a whole pile of counters to stick under their bases, and I've run out of both aliens and counters in games before because the board is full and it's still churning more on to the table because "wall of xenomorphs" is how its designed. Even with the expansion that adds some more scenarios, that scene where the alien queen hitches a ride on the landing gear of the drop ship? The scenario is exactly that, but this time there was also 50 aliens that did the same, spawning from the landing gear like they rode it up like a dangling barrel o' monkeys. No cleverness or artistry to the design, just wall of aliens enjoy spending hours of busywork making their numbers go down. Sorry, ranting, but I hate it. But I kinda don't care as the dollies were good and I got my money's worth from them and at some point I absolutely will get to use them in other projects. Fate of the Nostromo is a fantastic Alien game that delivers on the concept of what it does, and that one is well worth picking up. The Aliens game is only for people who are willing to assemble (and probably paint) the figures, because they aren't even pre-built but require a lot of work from expert hobbyists. Which is me, I didn't mind that, but for casuals it's another strike against picking these up. The tails alone are a *nightmare* to glue in, and I used the hot water technique to shape them for variety and because the design of the game requires that you cram a dozen of them very close together which... as they come is just not possible because the tail of the front rank stops the one behind being able to fit on their square, which affects the ones behind. gently caress it, at some point I'll likely crack and do a full rules rewrite because the components are so nice I *WANT* to use them. I do urge people to at least watch a video and decide if it looks fun for them before picking it up, because right now it's split between people who see to really like it, and people like me who are massively disappointed. edit: the dollies are very nice, and they do sell these separately if you want just the figures and not the game that comes with it, I will finally paint the marines soon. Honest.      "What do you mean they cut the power? They're just animals."   Parkingtigers fucked around with this message at 19:04 on Apr 6, 2023 |
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Apr 6, 2023 18:56
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Parkingtigers posted:I mean, some people like it, and I've had these same discussions at much greater length over on BGG with people who swear they love it. But it's just so odd as it's by Gale Force 9 and they have put out a ton of good games, and it seemed to have a long development cycle. After Sean Sweigart died and Aaron Dill left, there was a pretty significant drop in the quality of their games.
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Apr 6, 2023 20:03
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Apr 8, 2023 23:45
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I saw this and it got me thinking about Aliens.
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Apr 12, 2023 04:23
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Fall Dog posted:I saw this and it got me thinking about Aliens. I, too, view things that are explicitly about Alien and think about Alien
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Apr 12, 2023 04:29
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That reminds me, noted nu-metal scatman dubstep dad Jonathan Davis has a custom microphone stand designed by Giger:
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Apr 12, 2023 04:38
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Mister Speaker posted:That reminds me, noted nu-metal scatman dubstep dad Jonathan Davis has a custom microphone stand designed by Giger: Go!
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Apr 12, 2023 04:47
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Mister Speaker posted:That reminds me, noted nu-metal scatman dubstep dad Jonathan Davis has a custom microphone stand designed by Giger: Such a cool piece.
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Apr 12, 2023 05:43
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Fall Dog posted:I saw this and it got me thinking about Aliens. that would be a cool as hell halligan bar
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Apr 12, 2023 05:55
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I am really not sure what to tell you if "The 90s" And "Giger" bring up anything other than Tool in your mind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzrRoDd9CxM
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Apr 12, 2023 06:00
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Well for starters i don't like tool
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Apr 12, 2023 06:02
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HiroProtagonist posted:Well for starters i don't like tool 20 years ago I would have given you poo poo, but like what you like
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Apr 12, 2023 06:04
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Enjoy your pretentious art rock now excuse me while i put on my rush x dream theater prog mix 
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Apr 12, 2023 06:12
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HiroProtagonist posted:Enjoy your pretentious art rock now excuse me while i put on my rush x dream theater prog mix jokes on you. I also like those bands call me when you listen to Andrew WK
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Apr 12, 2023 06:14
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Mumpy Puffinz posted:jokes on you. I also like those bands https://www.stereogum.com/2015589
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Apr 12, 2023 16:34
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Mumpy Puffinz posted:I am really not sure what to tell you if "The 90s" And "Giger" bring up anything other than Tool in your mind. Carcass? If you had said 'the 80s', then Celtic Frost.
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Apr 12, 2023 16:46
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HiroProtagonist posted:Well for starters i don't like tool A person of taste, I see.
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Apr 12, 2023 18:01
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Conspiracy theory: Maynard James Keenan and Scott Adams are actually the same person.
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Apr 12, 2023 18:06
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Why did those dumbass marines initially discount Vasquez's theory of dropping in seven cans of CN20 and nerve gassing the nest? Obviously they had no way of knowing if it would work but it seems a better idea than welding yourself into a lab and waiting 27 days for rescue that may also be wiped out. I've gone back and watched all Alien films since this thread opened and there's literally only two good ones. Alien and Aliens. 3 is a personal favourite and could have been so much more, but it's several levels below the original two. Aliens might be an example of the perfect film - I can't find a single flaw in it. Narratively or functionally. Just amazing storytelling. Edit: ok Newt's line delivery isn't great but her acting is good.
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Apr 15, 2023 01:36
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Bishop saying he prefers the term Artificial Person over the term Synthetic. Later in the film when he has to crawl through the pipe, he calls himself a Synthetic. Is this some clever jibe at racism? Like Bishop says "don't worry about me boss, I'm only a Synthetic!"
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Apr 15, 2023 01:53
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Kosmo Gallion posted:Bishop saying he prefers the term Artificial Person over the term Synthetic. Later in the film when he has to crawl through the pipe, he calls himself a Synthetic. Is this some clever jibe at racism? Like Bishop says "don't worry about me boss, I'm only a Synthetic!" I'd like to think he is otherizing himself to help the humans agree with the objectively correct plan he puts forth because he's just that nice. Bishop crew 4Eva E:it also ties in nicely with the cut part of the script where he can 'see' xenos through the walls of the passage with cool android sonar but they can't quite figure his signature out and ignore him, whereas they would have made a human a snack
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Apr 15, 2023 02:07
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The Queen still rips him in half. She might recognise he's no good for reproduction but he's clearly still a predator/prey. I agree on your first point though, Bishop has this sad resignation that he's the only person qualified to "pilot the ship from autopilot anyway".
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Apr 15, 2023 02:16
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Kosmo Gallion posted:The Queen still rips him in half. She might recognise he's no good for reproduction but he's clearly still a predator/prey. What, is a threatening biomechanical analogue of detached ur-maternity just NOT going to violently penetrate an androgenous perfect surrogate paternal figure in a cinematic spray of viscous white fluid?!? I don't want to live in that world But yeah
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Apr 15, 2023 03:46
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