Robert Rees

  • I think that Trump proves that authenticity is not a substitute for integrity.

  • Death Stranding: first hours

    I started playing Death Stranding and I like the whole walking simulator feel to things. I still don’t understand the Kojima approach to stealth though. While the BB system is much clearer than MGS there have been a few times when the scanner looks like it is identifying something behind me when something then materialises in front of me.

    Connecting the outposts it pretty satisfying as is the idea that essentially you don’t fight you just run.

  • Appropriate and president in the same sentence? Come on, why would we start making that judgment now?

    Nice burn from Nancy Pelosi on Trump’s tweeting during the impeachment hearings.

  • I visited a pub gig night web page and every band listing was a Facebook page but every Facebook page had a Bandcamp page. Why the middleman here?

  • Days Gone: Rescues gone bad

    Failed to understand the hostage icons and threw a pipebomb into an execution, killing everyone.

    Stopped to save someone trapped in a car. Forgot about the horde that were barrelling down the hill after me turning the survivor into a canned meal.

  • Days Gone: No nice guys (except when there are)

    I was kind of admiring Days Gone for having two equally unlikeable survivor camps.

    Initially I was sending survivors I encountered to Hot Springs as I deeply disliked the militia camp. Then I came to see Hot Springs as basically a labour camp and started sending people to the militia on the basis that at least some concept of individual liberty was central to the camp.

    I was getting to the point where I almost wanted to say to some of the people I was rescuing: just stay in the car, it’s safer. But probably doing forced labour is still kind of better than being eaten alive or executed by thieves.

    And then just as I was admiring the way the game was forcing me to make some pretty unpalatable choices a new camp was revealed. Iron Mike might have some dark secrets but I’m guessing the fact that there are several different personalities with different points of view in the camp mean this is the one I’m meant to be rooting for.

    I would like to have that expectation subverted though.

  • What are billionaires who threaten to leave a country on the election of one party trying to achieve. Do they honestly think that the average voter is very interested in what they think? Do they think it is really an effective threat?

  • I enjoyed this interview with Steve Bray (Mr. Stop Brexit). I think it’s interesting that he’s fallen into being an iconic character in the Brexit drama and the way his protest has come to change what he thinks about himself.

  • It feels as if culturally we might be over the idea of authenticity and swinging back to the idea that what you think matters

  • The mysteries of collaboration

    The first time I ever saw Marika Hackman live it was a joint show with the Big Moon ahead of the release of I’m not your man. I’ve seen both artists perform since and its a weird thing but neither are quite as compelling for me as their combined work.

    Big Moon are comparatively staid in their composition and lyrics but a tight unit musically and better than Hackman’s touring band. They also seem to get her sense of humour more.

    Hackman struggles to reproduce her more complex tunes live (see also The Japanese House) but also seems to struggle to front the performance effectively while Big Moon give the impression of loving it on stage.

  • Maraoke relaunch

    I went to Maraoke last Friday, my first time at the event. It’s public pub karaoke only with the lyrics of popular tunes changed to reference computer gaming culture.

    The event is highly nerdy which is never really my scene but where the songs are iconic and the lyrics mostly match their originals. It is a lot of fun. Common People is recast as Console People; System of a Down’s Toxicity is recast as Dishonoured a song about the protagonist of Dishonoured.

    If I’m honest going along made me want to go to a normal karaoke as the often painful comedy lyrics were a reminder as to the difficulty of coming up with something you an sing along with. Maybe if I was with the right group of people…

  • I just read Batman: Curse of the White Knight and while I love the pencils the story seems a bit meh with a simple inversion of the Wayne origin story.

  • I replaced the battery on my old OnePlus 3 and I wouldn’t say it is a different phone but it has given it a whole new lease of life for less than £50. To think I actually considered buying a whole new phone!

  • Tiny House seems to be my ultimate lifestyle fetish book: cabins, mobile homes and sea shelters. It’s all here in one rehashed Instagram feed.

  • I finally understand enough how Dead Cells works enough to consistently run through the first level and get the speed bonus. The cell reward for a fast completion is substantial and being able to get ~25 cells in around a minute means that buying improvements is a lot easier.

  • Dead Cells: weapon combos

    I’m starting to learn some of the good combinations of weapons in Dead Cells. I finally beat the Concierge by using a mix of Wolf Trap, Freeze Blast and the Nutcracker.

    For a while I had perfected the Spartan sandals and the art of kicking monsters into walls and off platforms but I’m not sure whether I should be combining it with a ranged weapon (kick and shoot) or a shield for complete melee dedication.

  • Skyrim: Stockholm Syndrome?

    I’ve started to play Skyrim again (this time on the Switch). I’ve played through the opening execution scene numerous times but this time through I realised that I’ve never gone down the Imperial storyline. The game doesn’t really do a lot to have the Imperials win back your trust after they try to execute for the crime of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

    I’m wondering what kind of person would immediately throw themselves back into the arms of the people who just moments ago had them imprisoned.

  • Rage 2 versus Mad Max

    Rage 2 reminds a lot of the Mad Max game.

    The convoy takedowns while different due to the lack of a harpoon are quite similar with the energy blast taking the role of the harpoon in terms of exposing weak spots.

    The feeling of driving around finding random loot points and then working through the location to acquire all the resources there is also similar. Although this time at least we’re not looking to try and find a pile of maggots.

    The combat is more fluid, harking back to that ID history but there is also something similar about the running battles on various industrial walkways and the little race off events.

  • A tale of two commutes

    I had a pretty bad cycling commute to work this morning. Pedestrians were walking in the road, some stepped out in front of me, I cut some up. Harsh words were exchanged. Other cyclists (particular the ebike rentals) kept overtaking or expressing frustration that we weren’t travelling at their preferred speed or wanted to sneak across red lights. Everyone was pretty cranky and pissed off and the in general London felt like a place where everyone wanted everyone else gone.

    Then in the evening I rode back, drinkers were in the street but generally respectful. Another cyclist dropped his wallet and another cyclist and I recovered it and were in the process of trying to find out whether we could contact the owner based on the contents when the owner returned and was very happy to reclaim it. We all virtuous and parted as friendly strangers.

    Then at a red light I noticed a man letting his toddler sit on the pavement after a near tantrum and we had a quick chat and a laugh. Then when I stopped to take a call I saw an old colleague walking by and we had a quick chat and caught up.

    I felt great by the time I got home and wondered how the hell this can be the same city.

  • There’s a small kink in the Days Gone storylines where your missions can both be expressing the possibility that Sarah is alive while also making trips to her memorial stone where the dialogue states that you believe she’s dead.

  • Masculinity in God of War and Days Gone

    I was thinking about the two different takes on masculinity portrayed in God of War 4 and Days Gone. Both games feature a man grieving for a woman who is always essentially off-stage. However Kratos’s rumbling “boy” emphasises that he is a man and that that man is defined by both fatherhood and bereavement.

    Deacon on the other hand is essentially boy-like in his grief and his relation to Sarah. While he, like Kratos, is a violent man, his violence alone does not promote him to adulthood. He is essentially in a state of arrested adolescence.

    When he meets Lisa he fails to find the words to reassure or comfort her; in many ways they are actually similar. Both stuck in their routines waiting for a woman to return. This affinity reveals Deacon’s essentialy child-like nature. He recognises a kindred spirit but fails to articulate anything about or to act decisively to ensure her safety in the camp.

  • What country is Good Omens set in?

    After watching the first episode of Good Omens it was hard to relate the vision of England that the show embodies with the angry and divided Brexit nation that lies outside it.

    Pratchett always wrote about a nostalgic country that was already a myth by the time that Good Omens was written. This Economist piece about its tweeness is just part of the story.

    Pratchett seemed to have a belief in the essential goodness of the “yeomanry” that flowed right from Churchill and Tolkien. The Antichrist, raised in Oxfordshire, playing in the woods like a latter-day Swallows and Amazons, would discover an essential righteousness in their love of family and country.

    There’s no analysis of all the factors that would have to be true to make this happen, the qualities of Adam’s parents, the true nature of the bonds that would have to tie village life together.

    The result feels complancent and self-congratulatory.

  • A country dithering between Ayn Rand and Leon Trotsky

    A very tart quote (paywall) from Martin Wolf.

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