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 Alternate title: Crapheap Challenge. So the recent news that the BBC is bringing back Robot Wars for a new series got me digging up and watching through the old episodes on Youtube, reveling in watching barely functioning amateur engineering projects smash into each other like I was 12 years old again. This, in turn, got me to dig out my old Robot Wars PC game from amongst the ever expanding piles of books and old video games that is my living space and now here we are. Specifically what we're playing is this: Which came out in 2001 around the time of the fourth series of Robot Wars. There is also a sequel "Robot Wars: Extreme Destruction" which I didn't know existed until doing research for this LP and I have since procured a copy of. If all goes well we'll be playing that too once Arenas is finished. I'd like to preface before we begin that Arenas of Destruction is a 15 year old PC game. It has no windowed mode and took a lot of fiddling and messing around with old patches dredged up from the depths of the internet to even get it running. It's been difficult to record, has recurring audio issues and crashes fairly regularly. It's a game all about building your own little combat robot by gluing together some configuration of pre-made parts and then smashing it into other robots. A few of the favourite contestants from the show make appearances as expensive unlockables and the ever popular House Robots patrol around the various arenas as extremely dangerous mobile hazards (Or optional boss fights depending on how you want to look at it.) Although I absolutely adored it as a wee lad it's not really a very good game. The selection of parts and what you can do with them is frustratingly limited and there's only eight different arenas you can battle in, the last of which doesn't unlock until you beat the game. That said it's still a game about strapping a chainsaw to a lawnmower you found in the scrapheap and driving it around against other people who've done the same thing. Let the Wars begin!         This has been an LP fraught with recording difficulties and more than a little incompetence on my part. Although I think they're amusing enough to be worth keeping around for folks who are interested, the early episodes are in a really weird and messed up resolution because it was the only way I could get it working at the time and the audio levels in the first recording session (Episodes 1-3) are completely hosed. If you don't want to be bothered with any of that skip ahead to the updates below where I finally manage to get my poo poo together and have the game and OBS co-operate.  with: Jamie The D and Manic_Misanthrope.  with: Jamie and Manic.  with: Manic and Mini Librarian.  with: Manic and Mini Librarian.  with: Manic and Mini Librarian.  with: Jamie, Manic and TheMcD  with: Manic and McD  with: Manic and McD  with: Manic and McD  with: Manic and McD  with: Jamie, Manic and McD  with: Manic and McD  with: Manic and McD  with: Manic and McD  with: Manic and McD  with: Manic and McD  with: Manic and McD  with: Mini Librarian, Manic and McD. Technical issues resulted in very quiet audio for this episode. You'll have to turn your volume up. Super sorry.  with: Mini Librarian, Manic and McD. Still got the super quiet audio but given how angry I get in this one that's probably not a bad thing. Captain Fargle fucked around with this message at 15:50 on Apr 17, 2016 |
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Feb 11, 2016 14:16
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| # ¿ May 10, 2024 00:32 |
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SPECIAL BONUS TIME: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ek7mXOPtJeM Captain Fargle fucked around with this message at 23:39 on Mar 23, 2016 |
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Feb 11, 2016 14:33
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Jolyne Cujoh posted:You should try to build something like the Mythbusters' old robot that flung other robots so high and so hard that the event organizers gave them a prize after their first match and said "hey, your robot is cool and could probably win but we're afraid that you are going to toss another robot into the audience and hurt someone." The closest thing to that is already in the game and it's called Chaos 2.
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Feb 11, 2016 17:20
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 With Crapocalypse living up to his name Manic, Jamie and I bring a new contender to the field. Captain Fargle fucked around with this message at 12:39 on Feb 12, 2016 |
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Feb 12, 2016 12:29
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ElTipejoLoco posted:What's your recording/encoding setup that your output video is only taking up a fraction of the screen, Fargle? Or are you avoiding cropping because the video looks awful stretched to fit, even using PointResize? I'm recording the game and commentary using OBS and I know gently caress all about video editing tbh. This is just how things turned out due to the game being really old and loving my resolution up. It's direct game capture too which I thought would fix it but nope.  EDIT: Youtube keeps suggesting some kind of autocrappoing/resizing when I upload them but it really fucks with the quality so I don't want to do it. Teledahn posted:Also your levels are pretty goofy. I can barely hear the game or your co-commentators. It's my first time making a VLP and I screwed up the audio balance in the first recording session. It's fixed after Episode 3. Captain Fargle fucked around with this message at 06:18 on Feb 13, 2016 |
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Feb 13, 2016 06:14
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ElTipejoLoco posted:Yeah, don't let YouTube do anything it offers to do on your behalf unless you want to laugh at the results. I hadn't considered a virtual machine. I'll probably play around with that at some point and see how it works out.
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Feb 13, 2016 17:21
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 The last of our dodgy audio updates. After a game crash Manic and I experience a happy accident.
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Feb 13, 2016 17:34
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RickVoid posted:Huh, okay. I was going to ask about the "Entry Fees", and if those were actually just gates showing that "Yes, I beat the previous tournaments and have this much cash available to spend on my 'bot". Can you replay earlier tournaments to earn more cash? Yup. You need a certain cash threshold to unlock later arenas but once they're open they stay open provided you can afford the entry fees for the tournaments there. The locations are considered actually considered separate from the tournaments held there in terms of unlocks.
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Feb 13, 2016 23:16
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Manic_Misanthrope posted:Speaking of our Reigning Assault Tournament champion.... "Throwing poo poo at the wall to see what sticks"
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Feb 13, 2016 23:50
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Gertrude Perkins posted:This is really fun so far (though I am looking forward to the nicer audio/video quality!) I was a diehard Robot Wars fan for about five or six years, but being a preteen for most of that time I was never particularly familiar with any of the humans involved apart from the presenters. You mentioned match-fixing, and I was wondering where the best places were for behind-the-scenes Robot Wars gossip, because that sounds amazing. Just type "Controversy" into Robot Wars Wiki. That'll get you pretty much everything. There were quite a few instances over the course of the show's run.
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Feb 14, 2016 21:13
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 with Manic. As promised in the vid here's Plunderbird shenanigans: https://youtu.be/9XnfENigRi8?list=PL2DACD519E9B8FD66&t=543 https://youtu.be/3ik-rJttfK4?list=PL2DACD519E9B8FD66&t=39 This is their appearance in entry Series 4 so the one most concurrent to the LP. They are the best. 
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Feb 15, 2016 19:51
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Manic_Misanthrope posted:because for now we're retiring the Accident, THAT THING IS NOT COMING BACK DAMNIT!
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Feb 15, 2016 23:57
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 In which Manic and I declare Rambo to be King of the Vikings.
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Feb 17, 2016 11:35
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TheMcD posted:Technical help Oooh! Thank you! I already have up to Episode 6 recorded but after that I'll definitely implement this. That's a huge help. EDIT:  In which I try to grind for money and Jamie very emphatically DOES NOT read Time Cube. Captain Fargle fucked around with this message at 10:59 on Feb 18, 2016 |
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Feb 18, 2016 09:40
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JamieTheD posted:Hehe, that's actually assuming I'm allowed to do any future interludes, for anyone, ever. loving NOBODY IS GOING TO READ PIERS GODDAMN ANTHONY IN MY THREAD!
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Feb 18, 2016 22:40
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. But I can safely say that my library has some truly diabolical stinkers in it. Let's see here... Got some Piers Anthony, those Orcs books (Y'know, the one with the unicorn horn dildo... Not even joking), Dragons of Summer Flame, some bad, but nonetheless apparently official Carnacki the Ghost Hunter fanfics... Yeah, if anyone wants a reading of a cringeworthy book, I come cheap. Although, to be fair, I also have some good stuff, like the Deptford Mice trilogy and Colin Kapp's Unorthodox Engineers. So someone's gonna be entertained, at some unknown point in the future. 
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AJ_Impy posted:I just read this in your thread. I want you to know that I hate you. Also kinda impressed but mostly hate.
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Feb 19, 2016 11:50
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 In which Jamie STOPS reading.
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Feb 19, 2016 12:30
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In which Jamie, Manic and I attempt Tunnelling to Java. So I'd like to say a few words about this. This game is old and temperamental. It was hard to get running, fucks with my resolution, has a lot of audio issues where the music just stops playing, it crashes on me repeatedly and I often have to manually end the game's process in the task manager when trying to close it. In this episode not only do I finally realise that I can turn up the video settings way higher than they were previously (It doesn't save correctly and I have to redo it every time I launch the game but whatever) but I also get the game and OBS to play nice with each other after some coaching from Jamie. (Jamie is much better at this stuff than I am guys. Holy crap.) Anyway. Although I feel the previous episodes are amusing enough that they're worth still keeping around the difference in quality here is so huge that I can't help but feel like calling a do-over on the LP. As such I'm calling this video Episode 1.1 and I'll be going back to edit the OP and put the old episodes into their own little section. Thank you for watching and hopefully from here on out it will be smooth sailing.
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Feb 20, 2016 01:45
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I've gone back and edited the OP to reflect the new structure as of the latest update.
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Feb 20, 2016 03:34
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In which Manic, Jamie and I provide an expose on some of East London's most notorious gang leaders.
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Feb 21, 2016 14:18
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TheMcD posted:Spoilers. I appreciate what you're doing but could you please edit out the videos for stuff that hasn't turned up in the LP yet? Thanks.
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Feb 21, 2016 16:04
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In which Manic and I are joined by Mini Librarian to show off the robots we've unlocked so far.
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Feb 23, 2016 02:27
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TheMcD posted:
Honestly I'm thinking at this point that I should just bring you in on the next recording session. PM me.
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Feb 23, 2016 05:55
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In which Manic, Mini Librarian and I try to help Trotter's Independent Trading Co. expand it's business operations overseas.
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Feb 25, 2016 23:14
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KennyMan666 posted:So I just watched the new episode 3 and the talk of the series 4 finals reminded me how I on reviewing that found Chaos 2 winning was kinda bullshit. It even seemed to me that Stinger should have won against it, but Pussycat losing was even weirder. The show very blatantly played favourites a lot but I think Chaos 2 winning was pretty reasonable especially in the case of the final vs. Pussycat. The version we saw on TV was edited down considerably and if you watch the full match (which is available on Youtube if you want to look it up) there's a bunch of points where Pussycat gets stuck in the "flailing mode" I talk about in the episode and the only reason they were still in at the end was that Chaos 2 ran out of enough CO2 pressure to toss them OotA. (Out of the Arena). Between that AND the fact that it's saw got bent beyond use.... Anyway! I think we're due for another episode over here! In which Manic, Mini Librarian and I go exploring. Captain Fargle fucked around with this message at 13:52 on Feb 27, 2016 |
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Feb 27, 2016 13:46
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Zanzibar Ham posted:Whoops, looks like you forgot to set it public. Accidentally uploaded the wrong episode. It'll be fixed in a few minutes once Youtube finishes processing.
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Feb 27, 2016 13:54
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In which TheMcD joins my roster of cohorts just in time for me to persuade a certain Welshman to start reading again. (Note: Still not Time Cube)
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Feb 28, 2016 17:09
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In which Manic, McD and I debut the best robot.
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Mar 2, 2016 05:23
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In which Manic, McD and I are finally able to get the gently caress out of Japan forever.
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Mar 4, 2016 11:25
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In which Diotoir continues to be the best robot.
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Mar 7, 2016 21:08
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I'm honestly starting to think the judges might just automatically rule against the player.
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Mar 8, 2016 07:23
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TheMcD posted:No, I've won judges' decisions before, it's just incredibly rare that I do. There's some sort of logic behind it, but I'll be hosed if I can work that out. Which is entirely in keeping with the show.
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Mar 8, 2016 15:44
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Ben Kasack posted:Also, Fargle hopped up on pain meds is just plain funny. I knew something was wrong right away when I started the vid, but I thought he was completely smashed, not drugged up. I don't drink so if you see me like that it's always because I'm drugged up. With that said time for a late update! In which Manic, McD and I discover poetry. (Sorry this was so far behind schedule. I haven't been well.)
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Mar 12, 2016 13:49
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Zanzibar Ham posted:One thing that's problematic for me with these videos is that at least for me they are kind of quiet. I always need to crank up the volume on both the video player and the main PC volume setting. And since otherwise I pretty much never need to change my volume so extremely I forget to lower it after and the next thing I play hits my ears like a truck. Hmm. That's odd they've always been fine on my end. (Excluding the handful of early episodes where the levels were out of whack) Has anyone else been having this issue? Either way I can try playing around with the settings a bit next session.
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Mar 12, 2016 14:16
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In which the gang discovers the power of Poop. -I've played with the audio levels a bit again. Let me know what you guys think of them now.
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Mar 15, 2016 23:50
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In which Manic, McD and I poo poo our way to victory.
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Mar 18, 2016 20:17
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In which I get upset about Thomas the Tank Engine.
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Mar 21, 2016 17:53
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SPECIAL BONUS TIME! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ek7mXOPtJeM Jamie may have refused to read Time Cube but that doesn't mean that McD and I won't do it as I test recording settings in Dolphin! Please enjoy this very special half hour of me destroying my throat while trying to pay at least some attention to Pokemon Colosseum.
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Mar 23, 2016 23:37
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We're back from our Easter break and taking a special all access tour of a New York foundry.
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Mar 31, 2016 23:57
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Aesculus posted:Does this game have crushing weapons and jaws? I remember in the other robot wars game, I think complete destruction, you could get both pincers and a crushing claw and the physics would completely break once you started on an enemy. Maybe try building that for your next robot. It does indeed but they're really pretty awful. The game models the hit detection for them very poorly and it makes it difficult to tell what's actually going on with them.
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Apr 1, 2016 12:27
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