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That's amazing. I never knew about the extra mechanists that show up if you don't disable the alarm. I just always turned it off. And I can't believe you murdered Longdaddy in cold blood.  This game actually came out after System Shock 2; the nebulous connection between LGS and Irrational was I think part of the legal mess that Nightdive had to deal with to get it released (EA's interest being another big part of it).
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Aug 9, 2019 21:11
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 13:09 |
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Honestly... yeah, killing Longdaddy the second time was kind of a dick move! I think I did it to get at my brother because I knew he'd be co-commentating. In the past there'd be a spider in the room and I'd be like  "kill it!" and he'd be like "no, it's cool" I always forget which came out first between this and SS2. Oh yeah, and speaking of System Shock, the first one will be my next LP after I finish Thief 2. I decided that like a month ago and was waiting until this one was almost done to say it. I haven't had a chance to watch the last one after uploading until now, I didn't realize how bad the video quality is. On the plus side, I solved the issue I was having with exporting, so this new one will be better. Precious Cargo Episode 17 drygear fucked around with this message at 20:22 on Aug 23, 2019 |
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Aug 11, 2019 19:37
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Happy Wednesday! Precious Cargo Episode 18 This one picks up straight off from the end of the last one, I hope it's not too jarring. I'm a fan of this mission. Kind of interesting the space you travel to. You begin way underground and then go up and spend some time at the surface, and then you go back down possibly even farther. It would be interesting to see the 3d space of this mapped out to see where everything is relative to each other. I did a quick search and didn't find anything. My favorite part personally is outside with the lighthouse. There's the visual and aural rain effect and it feels mysterious as you wonder where Cavador is. Then you get into the freezer and there's a defining moment for Garrett, then there's that cool elevator ride in the lighthouse. It's easy to forget that that's all the same mission as the subaquatic base and submarine stuff.
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Aug 14, 2019 18:37
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You can get Dromed, the level editor, working pretty easily if you want to view the levels in their full glory. I've never used it to edit any missions, but you can move the camera around fairly easily (using the key cluster around Z-Q-E-C). I may be able to post a screenshot later on of this one. I think it's an excellent design in terms of progression and layout. It feels much bigger than it actually is.
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Aug 15, 2019 22:53
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Here's a wireframe image of the level, taken from Dromed. You can make out the lighthouse on the right and the elevator shaft below it. The initial start area is roughly in the center (the room in red where the white crosshairs are pointing). The 'subaquatic' bases are straight ahead, but they don't go too far back. Markham's ship is on the left side, and we can see it's actually higher up than the starting cave! 
Kangra fucked around with this message at 19:10 on Aug 16, 2019 |
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Aug 16, 2019 19:07
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Cool! I was poking around in it last night but had trouble finding an angle to see it all at once. The space works better than I expected except for the place you row into being too low, but I realize you don't need to open the map to see that because you climb way up and then see the coast. I made a Haunted Mansion joke but now I'm thinking of another Disneyland ride Pirates of the Carribean. Maybe Garrett took a waterfall down to find the pirates. I was wondering too about the next one, if the map lines up at all with the other one in the same location.
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Aug 16, 2019 22:40
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Hi everyone, new update time. Kidnap Episode 19 This one is a little more manic than usual in both my use of music and my commentary. Also my phone rings at one point in this, so I'm sorry to everyone who has the same ringtone and thinks it's theirs!
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Aug 18, 2019 18:58
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Hello, everyone. Kidnap Episode 20 Probably boring LP making stuff for this next paragraph This is the first time I've had trouble with using music. I didn't check most songs first to see if youtube would block the videos and they all were good. This time I wanted to use "Lucretia, My Reflection" by The Sisters of Mercy (it has the words "machine" and "the city" in it!) but just knowing the personality of the band I had a feeling I should check it first and it was blocked. Then I kept trying to come up with other suitable songs and each one was blocked in a bunch of countries or outright unusable. I finally found one that works well enough that I can use. The second song in this also took me a couple of tries but I'm glad I did because the one I ended up using *belongs* in this LP. Ok, so I keep wanting to mention something around this part of the game, because the characterization of Garrett is really well done here. A few months ago I watched a little bit of an LP of Thief 2014, and it's Garrett's characterization in this part of the game particularly that the newer one completely misses. In the 2014 game Garrett says he doesn't steal because he needs the money, but for the thrill. The beginning of this game obviously shows how wrong they get that character, with lowering his standards so he can pay his rent. But this part also repeatedly shows that he strongly dislikes making unnecessary risks. He makes it clear multiple times that he would prefer not to be sticking his neck out like this, and is angry with Victoria when he thinks the risks he took in Life of the Party went to waste. In the bank mission you can see that Garrett gets some enjoyment out of displaying his mastery, but he still needs a good justification. He says he's always wanted a good enough excuse to rob that bank, and even though there's a lot of money there it's when his life is on the line that he feels it's a justified undertaking. drygear fucked around with this message at 20:26 on Aug 23, 2019 |
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Aug 21, 2019 19:46
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Happy Sunday! Casing the Joint Episode 21 If you're not familiar with the game, this mission and the next one have the same map. It's not the exact same experience due to different loot and guard placements and different rules and objectives, but it is considered by many the nadir of the game. I was originally thinking of doing a fan mission in between, but I've decided what I'll do instead is have my brother come back on as a guest commentator for the mission after this one. I think that will add some variety for the audience.
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Aug 25, 2019 19:07
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Next one's going up a little early Episode 22 I think this episode turned out well. I had fun making it, and I hope that lightens it a little for people who aren't as into this stretch of the game. Rough editing is done for the next level, and that one is going to be three episodes instead of two. I might still all release them in the same week if I can make progress this weekend on the final level. I got a little confused in this video on the sequence of things I had or hadn't done yet due to working on so many episodes in the same map.
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Aug 28, 2019 09:32
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Hello, this one is a little later today because I got slowed down a little between exporting and uploading this one. The audio quality isn't great but hopefully you will find it serviceable. Masks Episode 23 Here we return to the same mansion to properly rob it. My brother is with me for this video and the others for this mission. We had fun making it, hopefully you will enjoy watching it.
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Sep 2, 2019 03:43
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I'm way behind on watching these but I wanted to say how much I'm enjoying when I get the chance to watch them!
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Sep 3, 2019 06:35
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^ Thank you! I really appreciate feedback, especially when it's nice. I get the impression that it's the same for most of the people watching these, that they're going at their own pace. For those few that are keeping up, it's likely that tomorrow's update won't be up until evening or later because these videos with my brother take a lot longer to edit and export
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Sep 4, 2019 03:43
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Episode 24 Finally done uploading! There is one more episode for this mission after this one. Once again, the sound quality for the commentary isn't great. That seems to happen when I record with my brother even though I use the same microphone. I hope I'm understandable enough that the trade off is worth it, because I think our commentary is a lot of fun in this one.
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Sep 5, 2019 09:37
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I think it's time to get out of that mansion for good. That's right, it's time for Episode 25 The good news is the commentary audio is better, the bad news is there's some persistent noise on my track that I wasn't able to filter out. It seems to diminish over time at least. I think this is a cool map so I don't really mind being here for two missions. It probably gets more tiresome to watch than it does to play.
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Sep 8, 2019 19:00
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Sabotage at Soulforge Episode 26 Here we are, the final mission. I'm going to be adding a subtitles file that I'll upload to youtube. I considered enabling them for this mission and decided against it, but someone requested them and I think they're right that they should be available.
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Sep 12, 2019 05:49
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It's good that Sabotage at Soulforge is a pretty decent final mission; it's a lot better than Into the Maw in the first game. Masks was a lot more enjoyable with a co-commentator, since they could add observations from seeing the map in the previous mission, while also being able to talk about what you were doing now. It's abundantly clear that it's one good mission stretched out, but even then it's kind of a mess. The whole security light puzzle is way too obtuse -- when you enter the room there's no hint as to what they do, or why they turn on/off in odd patterns but never all off at once. The idea is that the colors correspond to the room's wall color, except they barely match (notably the 'blue' light is purple). You also have all the misaligned or incomplete objects, like the pipe in the secret passage. Additionally, it barely feels like the time spent casing is applicable. Chests and more loot* suddenly appear, you really don't learn much about how to get to the masks other than the secret passage, and even the additional guards don't present much challenge. Incidentally you can completely bypass the cuckoo clock to get to the third floor, and it's usually where I start. By climbing up to the second level (it's easier & less noisy to stack crates by the wall where you start) you can sneak past the guards and use a vine arrow to get up the wooden balcony structure. There is a Watcher out there, so you have to be careful and quick getting to the door, but then you're in free. I think it's not even locked in Casing. One neat note about the clock though, is that once you fix it, it actually 'works', so when you set the time to midnight, the passage closes one minute later as it changes to 12:01. * A great deal of the loot in Casing is just in the form of coins. But they're often really well hidden in random spots, which is why so much of it was missed in your run.
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Sep 12, 2019 16:37
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I kind of hate Sabotage but I wouldn't disagree that it's better than Into the Maw. From what I remember of the latter you can just run through most of it, which I appreciate. It seems like a lot of immersive sims have bad final levels where they just throw a bunch of enemies at you; at least the Thief games, Deus Ex, System Shock 2 (before the actual final section). Maybe my problem with Sabotage is it's just where the difficulty of the game outpaces my skill level and I can't just "nope" my way out of the challenges. Casing/Masks is where it's most obvious that they ran out of money and had to rush to finish the game. I'm surprised modders haven't taken to improving it because there are lots of interesting ways it could be done. I have to laugh about the clock working because it did leave me confused why it kept closing on me. I love that kind of stuff they do with this game.  Mid Post Update! Episode 27 In which I make stuff and get killed by robots a lot. I think I'll push back the release of the final episode a little, so instead of Wednesday I'll release it next weekend.
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Sep 15, 2019 19:21
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Here it is, the final episode. Episode 28 Overall I think it's a good note to go out on. Not one of my better episodes in terms of my playing performance but I hope you will enjoy it all the same. I don't know the standard protocol for finishing these but I suppose I'll leave the thread open for a week for anyone who might want to post.
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Sep 21, 2019 20:50
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 13:09 |
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All right, time to wrap this up. I'll begin my Let's Play of System Shock in a few weeks. For now, I'm about to head over to the Sandcastle to post the first video, so if you're so inclined check it out and give some feedback.
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Sep 29, 2019 18:53
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