Archive for March 26th, 2013

Bioshock Infinite is aptly named. It’s an ambitious and sometimes dazzling story far too big for the too familiar game that holds it. It contains multitudes and they’re all pinned under the boots of an unseen protagonist in a two-fisted first-person shooter, plasmid in one hand, rivet gun in the other. It is beautiful in the way that a snow globe is beautiful. Small, ruthlessly bounded, a little precious and silly, but its intricacy undeniably lovely in that diffuse light. I admire it more than I like it. I’m glad I played it, and although I’m pretty sure I’ll never play it again, I’ll be talking about it for a long time to come.

After the jump, let the talking — spoiler-free — commence Continue reading →

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Today’s update to Guild Wars 2 adds a whole mess of new content, including a revised World vs World system for its massive battles. Furthermore, ArenaNet has officially eliminated culling, the technique they used to get so many characters onscreen in PvP battles without bringing everyone’s framerate down. They basically cheated by just not drawing some of the characters. Which works, but then you can’t see who you’re attacking or — worse — who’s attacking you. It’s like a random invisibility spell for characters who aren’t even thieves!

Today, culling is gone. It’s been replaced with, well…I don’t know what it’s been replace with. Aggressive LOD technology? Higher system requirements? Faerie magicks? Whatever the solution, culling is the best thing removed from Guild Wars 2 since bots!

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