Travis | Cheerful Ghost

Twitch Plays Pokémon has beaten the game

If you haven't heard of Twitch Plays Pokémon, here's a brief synopsis: The people behind the channel set up a bot that would pass commands entered in the chat window to an emulator running the original Pokémon.

Of course, with anything like this, trolls were rampant. But the Borg collective of Twitch users playing the game managed to get through all the trolls throwing them off ledges and worked together to beat the game. It took about 16.5 days but they did it.

A message on the stream says that a new adventure will be starting in 19 hours as of this post, so we haven't seen the last of them. I wonder how far they'll take it? I'd love to see it keep going through all the games that can be emulated.

Something that has occurred to me though-- Nintendo is usually a stickler about their property being used publicly like this. I'm surprised they haven't stepped in to try to close it down. I'm glad they haven't, though. Maybe they realize this is excellent publicity for them. And it really is, it's making me want to pull out the DS.

Learn fission vs. fusion with GLaDOS

NASA got Ellen McLain to voice a supercomputer in this educational video. It does a fantastic job of explaining just what these concepts mean, while also staying true to character.

I mean it's corny, yeah, but it's fun.

Oh, it's you: Portal 2 beta for Linux

http://cdn4.steampowered.com/v/gfx/apps/620/ss_f3f6787d74739d3b2ec8a484b5c994b3d31ef325.1920x1080.jpg?t=1382638717

One of the last Valve games waiting to get the Linux treatment is now in beta. You can opt-in to it to play it now!

Very few games from Valve's library are left now. It may only be CS:GO? Not sure. But it's good to see another high-quality game join the Linux circle, even if it was one that was obviously coming.

Wolfenstein: The New Order will include DOOM beta

Wolfenstein: The New Order dropped a new trailer today. It is coming out May 20, which is great news and I'm sure I'll enjoy it thoroughly.

More importantly, though, IT COMES WITH ACCESS TO A DOOM BETA.

It is never referred to as DOOM 4, so it's possible this is a reboot, at least in name, in the same way the previous Wolfenstein was.

Guys and gals, I am stoked. Doom is one of my favorite franchises, and the fact that they're close enough to be talking about betas is exciting news on its own-- the fact that we can get our hands on it soon is icing on the cake.

Read more about the pre-order, the beta, and more here: http://www.wolfenstein.com/en-us/doom

Funniest video game moments

Please make sure your speakers aren't turned way up when you watch the embedded video.

I was recently reminded of the legendary Laddergoat video and have been going through youtube trying to find more hilarious videos I might have missed.

Many hilarious videos come out of streaming and Lets Plays. Sometimes intentional, sometimes a bug or an unexpected event will bring the hilarity.

For those who haven't seen it, this video is a recorded stream of one of the guys at Dopelives playing Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood. He sees a goat, and the goat does something unexpected. It's funny, but the streamer's reaction is the best part. Such an infectious laugh.

Dopelives have done some other hilarious videos, usually the ones with the same guy streaming. This one of Surgeon Simulator 2013 is pretty nifty as well. If you've played the game, you know how hilariously chaotic it can be. It's like QWOP in 3D. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoytOOlTvIc

My second place goes to "I Broke Star Trek." A couple of friends record themselves playing the recent Star Trek game and some of the bugs are spectacular. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZ2X8PHAI6Y

So what's your top pick?

EDIT: If you don't have a video, tell us a story about something hilarious that's happened to you. As CapnCurry demonstrated below, they can be just as funny.

CapnCurry Supporter wrote on 02/08/2014 at 09:33am

I wish I had a video of this, but alas, this was a long time ago. My friend Harry was introducing me to Halo - he was a veteran, but it was the first time I'd held an Xbox controller. Most notably, I wasn't used to the analog triggers.

Over the course of the game, I performed some *spectacular* failures. I found a way to lose the tank on the Rolling Thunder level, forcing us to take a long jog to our next objective. I could empty a clip at an enemy at point blank and hit nothing but Harry, but somehow I was a damn prodigy at driving the warthog. I could weave that jeep through impossibly tight spaces and park it on some asshole's head like it was no big deal. Of course, that led to me wanting to hold on to the warthog, so I tried to fit it through the door of a building. I wedged it in there so hard that we didn't think we'd make it to the next level, but we did something clever with mounting, dismounting, and grenades that somehow wound up doing the trick.

I also pioneered combat ballet. I'd hear an enemy, and I'd turn around and start firing my machine gun. Thing is, I had a tendency to pull the stick toward me as I turned, and the look sensitivity was set too high for me. From Harry's perspective, I'd get startled and react by doing a few tight pirouettes and shooting the shit out of the ceiling.

But my two favorite moments are the reasons I forever after had to take point in all of our co-op sessions. The first was when Harry was ahead of me, and starting to climb down a ladder. He commented that it was dark and he couldn't be sure there were no enemies. So, I walked up right behind him and turned on my flashlight. Or would have, if I hadn't mixed up my "flashlight" and "melee attack" buttons. You might already know that a melee attack from behind is an instakill. Harry chose to interpret this exchange as "Hey, it's kinda dark in this hole," "THEN IT IS A GOOD PLACE TO MURDER YOU AND HIDE YOUR BODY".

The second was when we were creeping along a hall, wary of enemies. We were moving slow, things were tense, and I didn't realize that I was holding my controller a little too tightly. Without a positive "click" to inform me I'd hit a button, my left trigger finger slowly crossed the shear line and tiny fluctuations in my grip shuttled it back and forth before I realized what was happening. My Master Chief *spazzed* out, and I twitched all four of my sticky plasma grenades right into the back of Harry's head. Harry said "Shit! I hear a plasma grenade!" I was staring, dumbfounded, at what I had done, and couldn't find the words to explain to him that the action had already been resolved. After a spectacular explosion that flung him clear down the hall, and left me battered but still alive, he looked at me and asked "What the hell just happened?"

I said, "The good news is, it's all over, and it can't happen anymore. The bad news is that I'm out of plasma grenades."

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 02/08/2014 at 01:51pm

Oh, Capn, I'm sitting in the office reading this right next to the bedroom where my wife is still sound asleep. It's been a while that I've had to struggle this hard not to laugh. I, too, wish you had video of this.

Timogorgon Member wrote on 02/09/2014 at 10:29pm

Oh man, can we start a new feature on the site called "Story time with CapnCurry?" Seriously, that was hilarious. I also have my new favorite out of context quote ever: "... we did something clever with mounting, dismounting, and grenades that somehow wound up doing the trick."

There are a ton of interesting/weird things you can do in that rolling thunder stage, like getting the Warthog into place it's not suppose to be or getting access to a banshee and skipping half the stage. One time we got the Warthog inside one of the buildings where the hallways were so narrow that the enemies had no where to run and we just ran them all over on our way through. I really miss the days of indestructible vehicles. With clever use of rockets and grenades you could really do some interesting things with the vehicles.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 02/09/2014 at 10:37pm

Yeah with this story and the tale of Gonzo the Norn, I think regular stories from the Cap'n are in order. :)

CapnCurry Supporter wrote on 02/13/2014 at 10:05am

Ooh, I'll have to go and refresh my memory - I've got a yarn or two about Halo 2 multiplayer, at least, and I might be able to dust off some old Twisted Metal II tales for good measure. :D

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Screenshot of L4D2 running in Source 2 leaked

The Source 2 engine looks to be coming along nicely. This image looks like a legitimate leak, and it is beautiful.

User "crazy buttocks on a train," who is known for the quality of his information leaks, has posted a screenshot of an internal powerpoint presentation containing screenshots of an updated version of the Plantation level. The image embedded above is a comparison, with the new hotness on the top, and the Left 4 Dead 2 we know and love on the bottom.

Thread here: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=758999

More info: http://www.valvetime.net/threads/source-2-left-4-dead-2-prototype-screenshots-leaked.244266/

Rewriting Super Mario World on the fly

Another wonder from Awesome Games Done Quick-- using a modified controller cable, these guys are able to rewrite Super Mario World as it's running, inserting new minigames like Pong and Snake.

Essentially two pins that normally go unused allow you to transfer data to the game. I'll let you get the full explanation from the video, because I'm sure I'd get something wrong if I tried to summarize further.

AGDQ streamers do Punch-Out blindfolded

For Awesome Games Done Quick, Sinisterwon and Zallard1 did blindfolded speedruns of Mike Tyson's Punch-Out and Super Punch-Out, respectively.

Sinisterwon broke his record from last year, where he was eliminated after the second Piston Honda fight. I'll let you watch the rest to see how far he gets.

After that, Zallard1 takes on Super Punch-Out. You can tell he's been practicing-- he pretty accurately guesses the times at the end of a few of the matches.

With games like this that are pattern-based, it's certainly feasible, but this is just impressive.

This tech demo is full of Portal-esque awesome

Pillow Castle Games, a student team from Carnegie Mellon, has developed a tech demo for a puzzle game that can't come out soon enough.

The basics are pretty straight-forward. Forced perspective mechanics allow you to resize objects in a very intriguing way. But it gets far more complex when portals are introduced. The portals are also resizable and let you essentially grow or shrink the entire world.

This 8 minute video makes me want more. I wouldn't be surprised if an established company tried to hire the members of Pillow Castle in the same way Valve hired the Narbacular Drop team to make Portal. Wherever they end up, I can't wait to play the finished product.

Humble Indie Bundle X

The new Humble Indie Bundle is out. This one includes To the Moon, Joe Danger 2, Papo y Yo, Bit Trip Runner 2, and if you beat the average, Reus and Surgeon Simulator 2013. If you got there early, you could also snag Starbound if you paid $10 or more, but those are long gone. There were 1000 of them and they were gone in a minute or so. I've been wanting to check out Reus and Papo y Yo for a while now, so I'm glad to jump on board.

Travis4

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