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[Sirus]

If you haven't read any World War Z (An Oral History of the Zombie War), I can't recommend it enough.  The movie was "okay" but had nothing to do with the book, which is a collection of short stories from survivors of the zombie plague.  Some of the best involve the original infection.

Heh, my dad even remembered one of them to me recently, the otaku's story.  Perhaps the best informed, yet least aware...

World War Z was great, don't get me wrong, but it's not quite what I'm looking for. Since all of the stories are being told from first-person perspectives, it doesn't really deliver the bigger picture regarding the actual spread of the zombie plague. There's a lot of hindsight contemplation, but nothing to really explain how the disease hit epidemic proportions in the first place (especially since, in the first story, it appears that Patient Zero was euthanized pretty quickly along with all of his victims).

Let's go back to The Stand for a second. There's a sequence that goes pretty much like this:
"Sheriff Bob is sick with the superflu, though he doesn't know it yet. He pulls over a guy for speeding and gives him a ticket - and a death sentence. This guy is an insurance salesman named Bill, and after getting let go by Sheriff Bob he drives to a diner for lunch where he infects everyone, including the cute waitress and the tourist family he gives directions to on his way out. This tourist family, let's call them the Johnsons, drive west to Nevada and check into a hotel. The kids swim in the hotel pool (infecting all the other kids, who are heading off to all sorts of places with their own families) and get sick the next day. Mr Johnson is pissed that his perfect vacation is ruined, but he and the Missus take the kids to the local doctor's office. There were twenty other people there for various ailments, along with the doctor, the nurses, and the receptionist, and sweet old lady named Muriel. All of them are exposed. After work, Muriel heads off to her bridge club and wins handily, then she goes home and infects her daughter, who goes to school the next day..."

That's what I like. I like seeing exactly how the situation deteriorates.

[Frumple]

... so inquiring minds want to know, what did you expect it to look like?

[Lord Shonus]

I haven't played much Gears of War, but I've never noticed any controller delay in any 360 game - and I'm so sensitive to controller delay that I use a CRT for any pre-HDMI console. From the bit of GoW I have played, I remember them trying to give "weight" to the character, which may be what you're experiencing.

That said, my 360 has never been that loud, and serious frame rate stutter in an early exclusive sounds suspicious (most exclusives run at a fairly solid 30 FPS, and only experience noticable lag when there is an immense amount of crap going on or else the developers were in love with stupid shaders (BLIGHTTOWN!)) to me. Your Xbox may be overheating, precisely which model is it? What other games have you played on it, and how well do they go?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

World War Z was great, don't get me wrong, but it's not quite what I'm looking for. Since all of the stories are being told from first-person perspectives, it doesn't really deliver the bigger picture regarding the actual spread of the zombie plague. There's a lot of hindsight contemplation, but nothing to really explain how the disease hit epidemic proportions in the first place (especially since, in the first story, it appears that Patient Zero was euthanized pretty quickly along with all of his victims).

It's in the Chinese stories, essentially China's government tried way too hard to cover up the infection, and when their containment collapsed the undead numbered millions.

[smjjames]

World War Z was great, don't get me wrong, but it's not quite what I'm looking for. Since all of the stories are being told from first-person perspectives, it doesn't really deliver the bigger picture regarding the actual spread of the zombie plague. There's a lot of hindsight contemplation, but nothing to really explain how the disease hit epidemic proportions in the first place (especially since, in the first story, it appears that Patient Zero was euthanized pretty quickly along with all of his victims).

It's in the Chinese stories, essentially China's government tried way too hard to cover up the infection, and when their containment collapsed the undead numbered millions.

I wonder if that was inspired by Chernobyl and Russia's attempt to cover it up from the West.

[Sirus]

World War Z was great, don't get me wrong, but it's not quite what I'm looking for. Since all of the stories are being told from first-person perspectives, it doesn't really deliver the bigger picture regarding the actual spread of the zombie plague. There's a lot of hindsight contemplation, but nothing to really explain how the disease hit epidemic proportions in the first place (especially since, in the first story, it appears that Patient Zero was euthanized pretty quickly along with all of his victims).

It's in the Chinese stories, essentially China's government tried way too hard to cover up the infection, and when their containment collapsed the undead numbered millions.

I just don't see how it got out of their control, though. They showed up at an outbreak less than an hour after being informed of it, carted off the infected, checked the rest of the villagers for signs of infection, and killed the only active zombie. There's no logical connection between cover-up and millions-strong outbreak. China appeared to have things totally under control...until we get to the submarine story and suddenly China is overrun.

That story about transplanted Chinese organs being infected seems a somewhat more likely reason for the plague going world-wide.

[Lord Shonus]

I haven't played much Gears of War, but I've never noticed any controller delay in any 360 game - and I'm so sensitive to controller delay that I use a CRT for any pre-HDMI console. From the bit of GoW I have played, I remember them trying to give "weight" to the character, which may be what you're experiencing.

That said, my 360 has never been that loud, and serious frame rate stutter in an early exclusive sounds suspicious (most exclusives run at a fairly solid 30 FPS, and only experience noticable lag when there is an immense amount of crap going on or else the developers were in love with stupid shaders (BLIGHTTOWN!)) to me. Your Xbox may be overheating, precisely which model is it? What other games have you played on it, and how well do they go?

As before, it's that Halo 3 special edition (big ol green USMC all over it), so probably one of the launch consoles. Video's HDMI. Controller delay is in the realm of 100-250 ms, if I had to wager-maybe just a wireless thing. It's not too bad to play into the delay once you've a handle for it, delay can be felt even at main Xbox menus and other games. Cutscenes were more stuttery than general gameplay, of course. Other game played was Army of Two, Devil's Cartel, similar results.

If you're getting noticable delay on the Xbox menu, something is wrong. Mine is close to instantaneous, and I would almost certainly notice a delay as long as you seem to be experiencing. It could be your TV - noticeable TV-induced lag from native HDMI consoles is less common than it is for older ones, but it does still exist. See if your TV has a "game" mode - this disables a lot of the extra processing crap TVs do and can have a real difference.

As for stuttering, that doesn't seem right, but you don't seem to have played games I know enough to judge for sure. The fact that you describe the console as very loud makes me think it is getting too hot, which is a very real problem for early 360s. Fortunately, if the system dies completely they're dirt cheap.

[Rolan7]

I haven't played much Gears of War, but I've never noticed any controller delay in any 360 game - and I'm so sensitive to controller delay that I use a CRT for any pre-HDMI console. From the bit of GoW I have played, I remember them trying to give "weight" to the character, which may be what you're experiencing.

That said, my 360 has never been that loud, and serious frame rate stutter in an early exclusive sounds suspicious (most exclusives run at a fairly solid 30 FPS, and only experience noticable lag when there is an immense amount of crap going on or else the developers were in love with stupid shaders (BLIGHTTOWN!)) to me. Your Xbox may be overheating, precisely which model is it? What other games have you played on it, and how well do they go?

As before, it's that Halo 3 special edition (big ol green USMC all over it), so probably one of the launch consoles. Video's HDMI. Controller delay is in the realm of 100-250 ms, if I had to wager-maybe just a wireless thing. It's not too bad to play into the delay once you've a handle for it, delay can be felt even at main Xbox menus and other games. Cutscenes were more stuttery than general gameplay, of course. Other game played was Army of Two, Devil's Cartel, similar results.

Console is like eleven years old now, I couldn't expect a tower to hold up over the ages as well.

I guess, as things I wasn't expecting, it'd be the teleporting AI, occasional clipping (reloading a clip into a gun where the clip's already sticking out of it, just for latest reference), unskippable cutscenes, lack of options (gears is actually pretty okay as options go). Growing up, I always thought things were more polished on consoles, but word of mouth and advertising as a middle/high schooler will do that to you, I guess.

I'd like to say "congrats".  I picked up a refurbished 360 a few months ago, and I've been pretty satisfied with it... I guess.

As a literally fanatical Bungie fan, it was good to replay Halo 3 at my leisure instead of in bits and pieces.  Disappointing gameplay, solid story.
I have planted my flag in a strange place, heh.  I don't regret it.

My 360 has largely been unused since then, honestly, with one exception.  I occasionally boot it up for Metal Gear _rising: Revengeance
I should make a list of such games which provide lasting value far beyond their peers.  Yet it would also fit in the small list of games where I continue to care about their story!

I didn't even play MGS4, and avoided spoilers, and recently saw this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVdx8ni9nbs
In other words MGR:R is *made* of in-jokes I didn't get, and it was still freakin great.
Maybe even better, heh.

Of course I could and did play that on a PC, in fact there are very few good exclusives... uh...  I hope you like scrounging Gamestops as much as I do, the exotic feel of solid media between your fingers.

I did get a copy of Asura's Wrath I haven't tried.  And also a copy of Diablo 3 for like $3, heh, might be fun to play diablo with a controller.  Like Disgaea, Diablo is inane as HELL XD

[Lord Shonus]

I hope you like scrounging Gamestops as much as I do, the exotic feel of solid media between your fingers.

Gamestops are not really the best place to get used games, even if you're only interested in the consoles they actively support. There has been an explosion in independent/small-chain media stores in the last decade or so, and those generally have a better atmosphere, better selection (for older titles) and better pricing. Gamestops are great if you want the very latest releases, and sometimes they'll have a few more obscure titles in stock (I was able to pick up Disgaea 4 and a couple of Atlier games for PS3 last time I visited one) that they never sold new, but they tend to have weak selection of older used games because they cater to the new-release crowd.

Edit: For the record, MSG4 is 10% decent gameplay, 20% decent plot, 79% godawful dreck plot, and 1% super-amazing mech duel.

[Akura]

One largely unrelated video led to several scenes of Star Trek: TNG, which turned into a binge of Robot Chicken, and now I'm seeing a dozens-long comment thread about whether Dora the Explorer's backpack is a boy or a girl.


Don't do Youtube, kids. It's like crack, except you don't really have to pay for it and that's the best worst kind of crack.

[hector13]

First hit's always free, brah.

[milo christiansen]

Personally I hate YouTube and avoid it like the plague. Follow my example and help rid the world of idiotic videos today!

(I don't watch TV either, so maybe I'm a little biased...)

[Neonivek]

You know... I am overly sensitive, I always have been... It took me an exceptionally long time, for a boy, to stop crying and I've probably cried due to dumb stuff more than the average male (I am sure guys cry). I don't have a lot of ability to control how emotional I get and I tend to hit extremes and take a long time to recover (though on the plus side: I can't hold grudges for more than a single day).

So I was trying to say to someone that I am overly sensitive and they were like "Well everyone is sensitive" and I was like "Well, ok but I am actually overly sensitive" and they were like "Ohh so you aren't sensitive you are sensitive" xD

It was a weird conversation and kind of funny. I wonder if there is a difference between being thin skinned and overly sensitive.

[Tack]

It's probably going to blow the MidEast wide open.

Wait, what?
That kind of got glossed over but yeah, curious.

It was a weird conversation and kind of funny. I wonder if there is a difference between being thin skinned and overly sensitive.

I would call myself thick-skinned. I haven't cried since I was a child. Weddings, funerals, the pursuit of happyness.
Generally when I come close to crying it gets to some sort of 'block' where I can choose to either compartmentalise or cry, and I choose the former option because 'I am A Man lol'.

[Neonivek]

I don't QUITE want to make another post so fast... But when a BIGGER WTF comes up that is a planet sized bigger than the previous one.

So there was this group I demonized in my head, I didn't really comment on them because I felt that strawmanning a strawman is pointless AND they are tied to something genuinely important and I didn't want to give ANY validation to genuine attempts to express it. There is also another I kind of admonished or apologized for as well.

So I dived a LOT deeper these last few days and found out I was completely unfair to one and unjustly apologetic to another. Certainly neither are saints.

Yet it is surprising just how different this group was under the surface, outside the backlash, that it makes me feel bad for not really trying to probe deeper and I know why I didn't: Because it is REALLY uncomfortable.

While the other I knew there were problems with the other group I always thought of it as a few isolated members. I didn't think it was like say "BLM" where the genuine and very necessary movement was co-opted by its myriad of supporters way past its original intent to the point of becoming outright harmful to its own goals. If I had to guess why maybe it is because this group has been commoditized.

---

If you are wondering why I am being vague... It is because I don't want to be harassed or looked down upon. So think of it like a general thing "I didn't do my part to ignore the rumors and get to know someone. Only to find out that I was part of the problem and I should have known better"