Gyokuyoutama

1 hour ago, Raison d'être said:

 

Red Hot Chili Peppers, Blink 182, The Offspring, and trance music (although that blends into early 2000s). So basically a 90s flavor of pop-punk with Gen X angst (as opposed to 2000s pop punk which is millennial, post 9/11 angst).

As far as genres this is pretty much what I think, but you're missing ska (Reel Big Fish, Mighty Mighty Bosstones), big-beat techno (Prodigy, Chemical Brothers, Fatboy Slim; I mean it's your avatar!)

It was also a decade of "genres" which really meant specific bands that weren't that related.  For example "alternative rock" usually boiled down to Blues Traveler, Bare Naked Ladies, Faith No More or Red Hot Chili Peppers, while "grunge" meant Nirvana, Collective Soul, Soundgarden or Alice in Chains.  There's really not much connecting any of those bands, but record stores insisted on having subgenres to put them in (rather than just "rock") so that got lumped together.

At the end of the decade "nu metal" got big, which was largely another fake genre (especially when people would try to mix Rammstein in with that.)  I'm not denying that Linkin Park was huge, but that doesn't mean that we needed a genre just for vaguely similar bands.  But in any case that was definitely an end of the 90's thing, and feels more like how hair metal persisted throughout the beginning of the 90's but isn't really "90's music" and disco persisted through the beginning of the 80's but isn't really "80's music."

EDIT: I guess I overlooked Thrash metal, but I'm talking about stuff that was legitimately mainstream.  The only thrash metal band that really had any mainstream success was Metallica, and they suck, so who cares.

We all know what "80's music" is.

But what would you guys consider "90's music?"

It seems like in popular media it has been revised to mean "Nirvana, rap and maybe some boy bands."  But how do you think about it?

16 minutes ago, Moby said:

I'm guessing Kuroi is the "single after 25, MMORPG addict" part?

Hey! I'm not a MMORPG addict.

1 hour ago, Moby said:

Before or after the lesbian harem?

Before. There are several things in the early manga that directly parallel my own life.  Ex. hanging out alone where surplus desks are stored, having a young cousin admire me for skill at a card game while suspecting that she actually pitied me.  The thing that really resonates in the "Tomoko gets friends" period is having a delinquent guy stay in the same room with me on a school trip, and thereafter becoming friends in a very loose sense.

In contrast the top four are like an 80%+ match for my own life.  Minus the obvious like magical foxwives, time travel or go soccer.  (Though my "future labs" did discuss the possibility of time travel as a joke, circa 2007.)

On 9/19/2018 at 5:00 PM, Gyokuyoutama said:

Top Ten Anime Characters I Understand On A Deep Spiritual Level:

 

10. Mitsuhiro Maniwa (Paranoia Agent)

9. Ryouga Hibiki (Ranma 1/2)

8. Sakamoto (Nichijou)

7. Kamille Bidan (Zeta Gundam)

6. Fuyuki Hinata (Sgt. Frog)

5. Tomoko Kuroki (Watamote)

4. Mr. Cat (Princess Tutu)

3. Kiichi Goto (Patlabor)

2. Rintarou Okabe (Steins;Gate)

1. Manabu Takasaki (Nichijou)

Updated Standings:

10. Kamille Bidan (Zeta Gundam)

9. Eraserhead (My Hero Academia)

8. Fuyuki HInata (Sgt. Frog)

7. Tomoko Kuroki (Watamote)

6. Reiko-Sensei (Tamamo-Chan is a Fox)

5. Kiichi Goto (Patlabor)

4. Kuroto Nakano (The Helpful Fox Senko-San)

3. Kuroi-Sensei (Lucky Star)

2. Rintarou Okabe (Steins;Gate)

1. Manabu Takasaki (NIchijou)

This is pretty half-assed. Mainly done to convince myself that I can actually still parse Japanese sentences despite slacking off and to remind myself how to use the image software.

https://www.pixiv.net/en/artworks/108169378

One thing that's fun about digging into old games from about 1991-1996 is that they tend to have all assets uncompressed and unencrypted.  For example, with Myst you can look at the CD and load any animation into quicktime.  This is probably the easiest way to confirm the "Rush Limbaugh Understands" message (which is said in backwards speech): simply load the relevant file and select "loop forwards and backwards mode."

The Journeyman Project Turbo is even more extreme.  All animations are accessible in standard quicktime format, but that also includes all location backgrounds.  Locations are actually stored as frames in videos that go to each position in each area and look at everything from all four angles.  Another interesting animation is the biochip menu.  In the game you may notice that the chips are all dark with no letters on them until the menu is fully opened.  This is because the opening and closing is saved as a set animation, and they didn't want to have all possible combinations of chips show up (only the number of chips.) After the menu fully opens they draw bmp images over the dark chips.  The animation also confirms that you cannot fully fill your biochip menu; even if you get every chip in the game there will still be a blank spot at the end.

All sounds, including all music, are simply stored in WAV files.  All death screens and inventory elements are stored as bmp files.  So outside of the text and the game logic, you can easily access pretty much everything.

I kind of miss games doing this.  There's sort of a purity to simply allowing the user to see the component files.  And it often does raise interesting insights in terms of how the game was actually put together.  It also puts the sort of "cutting room floor" search for dummied out files within reach of the average user.

But I especially miss music being in the clear, since it's a very handy way to add soundtrack music to playlists.  I think developers were aware of this, because soundtracks in WAV, MP3 or OGG formats were pretty common until 2007 or so, but then they started hiding them in order to sell separate soundtrack DLC.  This also made soundtrack swapping in games more annoying.  (My WOG version of Heroes 3 has every single music file replaced, just because I can.)

I started emulating old operating systems to get better compatibility with old software.

But I quickly discovered that it's refreshing to use them and just have something that works out of the box, no questions asked.  Sure you do get problems with drivers, improperly emulated hardware, necessary programs such as old versions of Macromedia flash, etc.  But those things are very different from when the operating system itself says "fuck you, you can't even attempt to run this program" or "fuck you, you can't customize any part of this OS."

Nice Marasy, very cool

In the Rising Sun there is a murder at a Japanese corporate LA headquarters, so the cop in charge needs to take advice from an expert in Japanese culture.  Said expert is a total weeb who even has sliding paper doors in his apartment.  But nearly every single thing he says amounts to "Japan is a shit country with a horrible culture."  The closest things he gets to compliments are things like "we're fucking over our own country, and Japan is doing dumb shit that at least is maintaining their own country."  I think the more you learn Japanese, the more you feel like that guy.

But on the plus side, in the movie adaptation he's played by Sean Connery (this may be your first time hearing Connery say "senpai"):

A proud tradition of publishers has been printing public domain works.  Often has a built in audience, and you don't have to pay for the rights.

The tradition continues today on Amazon, and much moreso.  You too can download a book off Project Gutenberg and put it on Amazon.  All you really have to do is some basic formatting (not hard once you know how to set the settings in Word or your favorite pdf editor) and create a cover.  But you do still need a cover.  Just like in the physical publishing world (see Wordsworth) these are often charmingly low budget.

The funniest one I've seen is this kindle version of Abraham Merritt's Burn, Witch, Burn!:

https://www.amazon.com/Burn-Witch-Abraham-Merritt-ebook/dp/B00QL8A5MS

If you don't get why it's funny:

 

Just imagine, in five years we might have a prospective release date for Act 3.

On 8/12/2020 at 1:34 PM, Kraszu said:

lmao why are you guys digging up old polish meme songs

In retrospect I don't know why we never posted this one to complete the set:

Minnesota is winter to summer, no transition. Sometimes it oscillates for a while, I guess you could call that state of affairs "Spring."  It was in the 40's a few days ago, got to around 90 today and may snow tomorrow night.

I have the exact same issue on a work PC, so I guess I'll try that "disable the popup notification" trick and see if it works.

Does anyone even care that E3 is no more?

The universe in which it made sense hasn't existed for something like 10 years.

When you think about it, foxgirls are kind of an unsettling and disgusting concept, aren't they?

I was once again downloading the Abandonware game Inner Worlds, and decided to check out the publisher's old website.  To my shock, not only was it updated but the game isn't abandonware anymore and is available on steam.

The game reminds me a lot of Jill of the Jungle; you play a savage woman who can transform into an animal and makes use of various weapons you pick up in levels but is powerless in your normal form without a weapon.  Gameplay both in that and Inner Worlds is mainly platforming with fighting, and a lot of emphasis on finding secrets.  Though in Inner Worlds it's practically required from episode 2 as the enemies are tough enough to mop the floor with you without upgrades found in the level.  The transformation mechanic is also better implemented.  In Jill of the Jungle it's a gimmick that sometimes is allowed by special locations, kind of like what they did in some DKC2 levels.  In Inner Worlds you can cast a spell to change into a wolf or back, as long as you have mana.  There's advantages to both forms: the wolf is faster, jumps higher and has a basic attack which the human form lacks.  But only the human form can use weapons, grab handholds or climb ladders.  Both forms can use spells.

The version on Steam is just a no frills original DOS version run through DOS-Box.  That's fine, it holds up as far as I'm concerned.  And the platforming doesn't feel clunky like Jill of the Jungle did (except when you upgrade your jumping so far that you instantaneously pop to the top of the screen in one jump.)

But there is one absolutely bizarre choice made: the game starts with music turned off.  Some people apparently though they removed the music from this port.  It's still there, you just have to go into the options menu to reenable it.  I have no idea why they would do this, especially as the game had a great soundtrack which was very evocative of the tracker scene of the time.  It's not quite Jazz Jackrabbit, Deus Ex or Unreal Tournament level in that regard, but still very nice.  Have a listen:

(You'll notice that this last one uses the exact same drumline from Enigma's song "Sadeness," which has to be intentional considering the name.)

At this size it's a very EGA DOS aesthetic.

That being said since it is disabled on my computer, there must be some way to mess with the files to disable it on newer versions as well, though hell if I know what arcane combination of registry hacks, file manipulation, etc. are necessary.

EDIT: Currently installing Microshaft Winblows 98 to celebrate these developments.

I have this working on the home edition and it's still working so I don't know.  Maybe I did something else on top of that, or maybe I somehow got grandfathered in due to having it implemented before they restricted the feature.  That's the fun of Windows 10 no one, not even Microsoft, understands what makes a feature enabled or not.

And speaking of that, apparently some update disabled my ability to access the group policy editor.  "gpedit.msc" doesn't work in run or powershell, and I can't get to it through any manipulation of the control panel.  I used to be able to use it on this machine, so apparently some update broke it (judging from requests on Microsoft's troubleshooting site, probably around mid-2022.)  Thanks Microsoft.

Since the topic of disabling internet search has come up a few times, I thought I'd look up how I did it.

Luckily this is the last registry change I made, so it came up immediately upon opening regedit.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer\

Add DWORD DisableSearchBoxSuggestions, set value to 1, reboot.

EDIT: I also put that value in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer\

I'm not sure which location actually makes the internet suggestions go away, but it's been working for me for at least a couple of years.  (Though I have an update pending, and who knows what will happen after that.)

We may not get any more Venture Bros but at least we get this (til Nintendo scrubs it from the internet):