TOPIC: Father Watson Q&A v2

Jordz wrote:
Jordan, legend! Get on TeamSpeak mate!

"Have you ever watched The Green Mile?"

I haven't, but I've heard a considerable amount about it. I honestly think it sounds like a very interesting film. I'll give it a watch sometime. Speaking of Tom Hanks films, I'm also wanting to watch Won't You Be My Neighbour? That looks really interesting.

"What made you join ZARP?"

I credit a couple of my friends for this. I actually joined because they kept talking about Garry's Mod's interesting DarkRP servers. ZARP was the first server I tried. They played on another one for a bit, but I eventually got them to try ZARP and they quite enjoyed it. Unfortunately, they've kind of lost interest years ago, and I got them on recently, but it just didn't really captivate them anymore. Which is fine - I've made a number of lovely friends on here.

Funnily enough, when I first joined, I actually jumped between this one and a now-defunct server called KDG. They let you buy mod, which I think was also a feature on ZARP for a brief time. Anyway - I remember that for a while, DarkRP was probably one of my favourite things to play. I would sit at the computer in my living room and just enjoy the game for hours when I wasn't working. My first name on the game was Epiphany. It was the same name I had on another game I played called Torn. My first topic on this forum is actually my first moderator app, which I made only barely a week into starting playing. It was closed by someone called Smallville before the meeting, they claimed they had "never seen me" in the game, and just shut it.

Unfortunately, another thing when I first joined was my slightly weird tendency to jump between playing and... well, not. I used to play for hours, then eventually, I'd just get bored and leave for a couple of months, then come back. Nothing wrong with the game - I just had a limited attention span and occasionally that would make it difficult to keep my attention pressed to the game. Around 2015-ish was when I stopped doing this. That's why when I started collecting, I actually didn't have items that were available in the Christmas 2014 event, like the CS Grenades and the Silenced Sniper.

"Why are you so kind and cheerful?"

Always appreciate this kind of comment, but the truth is, I'm actually not always so cheerful and kind - sometimes I can be a bit impatient, a bit rough around the edges. Everyone can, but I suppose the reason I don't generally like being fussy or mean is because I'm not fond of confrontation, and I've always genuinely appreciated the concept of making people happy. Doing unto others as I'd have them do unto me. Maybe I have a bit of a need for approval. But that's just me.

No-one really asked, but just in case you're curious, I'm actually on the spectrum; in 2010, I was diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, but I've also been told I'm high-functioning, so perhaps it doesn't really affect me as much as it could. I still feel myself occasionally struggling with social cues, and finding it difficult to understand why people get upset over certain matters. Sometimes I worry I don't have enough empathy; sometimes I worry I just have different empathy. But I suppose everyone does. That's what makes us human, and individuals.

Please feel free to keep asking me questions. I enjoy answering the best I can. I'm an open book.

Are you happy with where you are at in life right now? and do you find ways to challenge yourself?

"Am I happy with where I am right now?"

Hm. Not fully? I'm slowly reaching the end of my Master's Degree and I'm struggling to produce as much work as I'd like to. Often times, procrastination is my bane. I also need to find new work, but the job market is rather competitive and complicated due to the world's events. I've found my greatest talent - writing - is slowly being lumped in with other skills, as some employers seem to like the idea of having a writer who is also capable of coding, or a writer who is also capable of producing art, or a writer who can do X and Y. Still, I persevere as best I can. Other than that, I'm content. I have friends, I have a lovely girlfriend and a supportive family.

"Do you challenge yourself?"

Again, not overly. I really should. I have the means to do so in various ways, but it seems my procrastination controls me to a rather unpleasant level. I was once told by a therapist that I exhibit certain self-destructive behaviours. I once had a 15k word assignment, and had the entire year to do it. I did it on the day it was due. I still got a very respectable mark, but it only goes to show how much better my work would have been had I pushed myself to work more on my project throughout the year.

Fun Fact: There's a horror game that was released on the PS2 in 2006. It was called Rule of Rose.

You might have heard of it, you might not have! But did you know that copies of it sell for literally hundreds of pounds in the UK? (uk.webuy.com/product-detail?id=802317100...e-%28uk-packaging%29) The reason for this is that copies are phenomenally rare, as the game drew significant controversy for having underage girls as the primary characters - who justice minister Franco Frattini suggested had "obscenely cruel and brutal" things done to them, including the suggestion that there was underlying eroticism and sadomasochism being performed by these girls.

Was this a feature?

Nope. (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_Rose#Controversy)

But it did call for changes to be made to the rating system in Europe - whiiich never really occured.

Anyway, because of this, the actual shipping of the game in the UK was cancelled - but copies of the game still exist!


And with that, I say bump!

Father Watson wrote: I feel like the only people to pay that amount of money for agame would be the kind of person to be into this kind of game

What is something you have enjoyed recently that you didn't expect you would?

Father Watson wrote:
I played more than half of it. It's a decent underrated horror game, based around a hierarchy of orphans. The cutscenes are beautiful for the ps2 era. It is twisted but nowhere as exaggerated as what the governement official is smoking.

"1 or 2?"

1.

Rule of Rose looks like a game for a certain kind of individual...

As bad as this sounds, I collect horror games and I've been angling for a copy of this for quite some time - but I'd rather not play hundreds of pounds! I promise I'm not that kind of person, horror is just one of my favourite genres.

An unexpected delight?

Hmm... This is tricky because generally I don't go into things thinking I'll not enjoy it. That said, I've just been watching Doctor Mike on YouTube. I didn't think I'd appreciate it very much, as I'm not overly big on a lot of YouTube stuff. But it's actually extremely interesting.

BONUS: In 2013/14-ish, I started watching Supernatural. I had been told by my ex about it, but I didn't think I'd enjoy it, and 6 years on, I've seen every episode!

"Rule of Rose is "

I've heard a lot of this stuff, actually. I'd rather not play it until I get my hands on a physical copy, but I am aware there are emulators and the like. Did you have a physical copy, or did you play it digitally?

PCSX2 emulator, I don't collect physical game copies.

"Congrats!"

What do I win?

Fun fact #2: The rating for games doesn't stop at 18, or M, or whatever the "max" rating is for your country.

There's a step above, reserved mainly for porn games, and games that are deemed too explicit and/or disturbing for the general public. It's called Adult Only, and is known for being a death sentence for games. The horror game Agony was almost given it for the sheer disturbing level of violent imagery.

The rating means that the game won't be distributed by Sony, Microsoft, or Steam.

Favorite Silent Hill game? And who's your favorite character from the franchise? :3

"Favourite Silent Hill game?"

Silent Hill 4. Walter Sullivan is actually my favourite antagonist of the bunch - though there is kind of an edgelord aspect to him with the whole dual-wielding fights in certain worlds.

If I had to rank them:

Silent Hill 4
Silent Hill 2
Silent Hill 3
Silent Hill
Silent Hill: Downpour
Silent Hill: Homecoming
Silent Hill Arcade
Silent Hill: Book of Memories

I'll understand if you disagree, it's an odd list. But this is just going by the ones I've played. I'm not including P.T. (or the sadly cancelled Silent Hills) in the list as I don't consider it a full game, but I'd rank it fairly highly by the teaser alone.

I can give a more in-depth answer, but the short of it is to simply say that Silent Hill 4 creates serious disturbia and fear without resorting to cheap tricks. Every monster feels vile, repugnant and genuinely frightening. The trailer for the game freaked me out because you saw the baby-faced giant humanoid with two heads that walks on its hands, and you feel shudders.
I played the demo before the game came out. I was only ten. It was a captivating, if very messed-up experience. Cynthia's death was where the demo cut off. I remember having to *really* work hard to convince my parents to get me the game when it actually came out.

The fact that the game had unkillable entities (the ghosts) was actually only adding to the fear factor. You were facing people who had suffered horrible deaths at the hands of a very sick man. And there were only five swords in the game. Bastard that you could only use them on normal ghosts and not Walter.

"Favourite SH character?"

That's difficult. Walter is definitely a contender. His absurdly tragic and horrible backstory really sells him as a man warped by an unfair world - but his actions are in no way justified.

James is probably the other contender. He's fascinating, and a genuinely case study in the effects of trauma-induced psychosis. He is, again, not necessarily justified in what he did. He was acting out of grief. But even knowing that his dead wife is in the back seat is a definitive sign of how far his psychosis has actually gone.

Bonus: Worst character?

...Not sure. Probably Deputy Wheeler. Just felt like kind of a forced black cop stereotype in some ways. I realise the diaries expand his character, but it's just... Well, not really enough.

Worst protagonist (in a main game): Probably Henry. As ironic as this is, every other protagonist has some kind of connection to Silent Hill, or some trauma that Silent Hill feeds on. Henry is pretty much the only example of a protagonist who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He doesn't react overly to the hellscape around him, not as much as the other characters do. His relationship with Eileen is nice, and it does work to some level to keep him interesting - but it also feels a tad forced.
That said, I also love Henry. His introversion borders on the eccentric and that's endearing.

Worst antagonist: This one is so bloody tricky, because the antagonists of all the games are fairly solid. Mary is iconic, for example.
If we're including the American games - Downpour is probably the worst when it comes to it's antagonist. I know what it was trying to do. It was flipping the trope, changing the field so the game made *you* the bad guy for once (even though Murphy was framed). But it still kind of comes out of left field, and the last battle feels... Lacking. At least in Homecoming, you were facing a direct cause of your trauma. In 4, you face the essence of nightmares itself. In 2, you face a horrific product of your guilt. In 3, you face the literal god of the Silent Hill cult. It's all fascinating. Downpour just felt...odd.

I will say that the final bosses of the original Silent Hill game did also suffer narrative-wise due to the fact that they kind of come out of nowhere. But that's just me.

Anyway, sorry, I got a bit carried away.

Fun Fact #3 (As a treat for Buffy): Did you know films and pachinko machines weren't the only things Silent Hill expanded into?

Silent Hill comics were another major point of interest, as evidenced by a considerable number of them being released: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Hill_(comics)

Interested in reading them?

readcomiconline.to/Comic/Silent-Hill-Dying-Inside
readcomiconline.to/Comic/Silent-Hill-Among-the-Damned
readcomiconline.to/Comic/Silent-Hill-The-Grinning-Man

There are a few more, but this is just a few to pique your interest.

Keep an open mind, they're not brilliant, but they definitely scratch the surface.

SUPER BONUS: Wanna try something even more fascinating?

mysilenthill.com/downloads/silent-hill-orphanmobile-downloads/

These should still work. They're the Silent Hill mobile games that were released over a decade ago. They're only puzzle-based games, but they're quite enjoyable! Feel like trying them? Check the link!

Fun Fact #4 (As a treat for Lewis_is_java): Did you know Dead by Daylight had at least two killers that were scrapped?

The Smasher was a killer that would have had the ability to destroy the environment around him. I imagine the difficulties revolved around balancing a character like this, and perhaps the general difficulty that comes from making fully destructible environments in games - Crackdown 3 is a good example of how difficult it can be to create these kinds of games, but you could also consider Red Faction, too.

The Teacher was a speculated killer. I say this because there's a theory that the killer was never going to be added in the first place, and was simply there to troll data miners. This killer would have had two abilities that don't have any information surrounding them, but it's suggested that the weapon would have been a ruler with a blade attached to it, and the two abilities were "Detention", and "Underperform". The second one sounds kind of closer to more a business type than an education type, in my opinion.

Edit: Oops, almost forgot my evidence of this: tcrf.net/Dead_by_Daylight_(Windows)#Unused_Characters

Bump!

One more thing - can someone clarify if I'm breaking any rules by bumping my own thread so much? I apologise if it's a nuisance or anything, just wanna make sure that by me posting every so often on here to keep it goin', I ain't steppin' on any toes.

Honest thoughts on KPOP?

Father Watson wrote: Appreciate the facts, man it's always cool too the hidden workings behind games and movies and the thought process they go through.
That smasher character would have been a nightmare, cause it would effectively just be breaking what the game is and how it works zero fun times.
Also you can tell you are a uni student because you like to refrence what you say a lot.

So here's a question do you enjoy uni? and have you joined any of the clubs/sports your uni has?

What is your opinion on Dead by Daylight? In my personal opinion it fucking sucks, but that is just me. What do you enjoy the most about ZARP, and what has made you stay all the way to where we are now? What do you think could be improved about SSRP? What is your opinion on Narexa?

"Honest thoughts on K-Pop?"



This was the first K-Pop song I really got into. Love it. I've never quite understood the stigma, though maybe it's just the same kind of joke as the whole "Weeb" thing. I have noticed the K-Pop fan presence on Twitter can be rather... perhaps harsh, but obnoxious at times?

I don't listen to a lot of it, I have pretty odd tastes, but I enjoy a good few K-Pop songs.

"Appreciate the facts!"

I thought it was better than just randomly typing "bump". It's nice to give people things to think about, and I enjoy sharing the trivia I've learned. I'm glad you like them.

"Smasher would have been a nightmare."

I don't even play the game very often, and I know this would be the case. I agree that he would have essentially destroyed the core of the game. I imagine he'd probably be a broken killer as most players would probably flock to him for an easy 4k... am I saying that right? 4k?

"Have you enjoyed uni? (Your use of references)"

I'm glad the references aren't lost on you, sometimes I get shit for being a little bit pretentious with the evidence. But while I do believe it's perfectly fair to say "Go look it up yourself", I also think that sharing links and the like is fun! People can read what they like about the topics I've mentioned, perhaps they'll research it further and pay it forward.

I have enjoyed uni. I actually had a rather different case as a uni student; I only did two years in the actual uni itself; my third year of my Bachelor's Degree, and my first (and only) year of my Master's Degree. The other two years of the Bachelor's were done in North Kent College, as part of what's known as an End-On Course. You do two years in college, and then move onto the final year of uni. It's cheaper, and gives you two qualifications instead of one.

Uni was a bit intimidating when I was thrown into the deep-end of the third year, because referencing was actually different as opposed to college referencing. It's also a lot more difficult to get used to the social elements of university, as friends aren't as easily made. I was fortunate as I chose to do a creative writing dissertation, which placed me in a group of about eight people, who were all part of a WhatsApp group. It was very helpful in making sure I didn't feel alone.

I do have a small problem with procrastination, so my assignments were often last minute which certainly had a detrimental effect on my grade.

"Did you join clubs/societies?"

I did! As I'm on the spectrum, I was part of the ASD group - but I was also the chairman of the Creative Writing Society. We actually got society of the month on the first month we were established, thanks to a lot of hard work from all five members of our team. I did actually have a small confrontation with my vice-chair, who responded to the advertisement too late to get the actual chair. He was very assertive, and had quite a big personality - which I found ironic, given he was very short... perhaps that's a little discriminatory. He and I butted heads as he wanted to essentially take charge of everything, to the point of nearly usurping my position until I managed to prove him wrong to the point where he actually asked me to stay as chair when I attempted to leave the society. It was nice to know my efforts were validated.

I didn't join any others, but that's mostly because I had work at the same time, and my university was a bit out of the way, so it was rather difficult to get into any others.

"What is your opinion on Dead by Daylight?"

Solid game, I'm just not very good at it. I probably think it's the best of the asymmetrical titles of recent years, but I'd definitely understand why you wouldn't enjoy it - it can be stressful for some people, boring, annoying to get juked/looped/tunnelled/camped, etc.

I'm fond of the Trapper, and I also like Bill. I would like to try Ghostface, Pyramid Head, Freddy, and Ash.

"What do you enjoy about ZARP?"

it sucks lol

In all seriousness, I actually enjoy collecting - they've given us a lot of fun stuff to collect over the years. The community can be divisive, but it's filled with a lot of interesting people. I think that's a good thing, even if it can be pretty heated, sometimes.

The other things tend to be stuff like selling, trading, and the occasional event or daily. I think it's all proven to be very enjoyable. I could go on and on, but I guess that's the bare essentials of it.

What made you stay?

You.

Again, in all seriousness, I'm just fond of the place. I got used to it, comfortable with it, even if things aren't always happy due to people's issues with content and the like, I just enjoy the community, and I like knowing that I can always come on and be welcomed.

That makes me happy.

"What could be improved about SSRP?"

Perhaps more balanced general-use weapons? The PSG is still quite extensively mained from what I've seen, it would be nice to see some more shotguns in use.

I'd also enjoy general balance to the entire line of specialty items. There are a lot of weapons that face major issues with how useful they are. You really don't see anyone using something like a flamethrower, do you? Or perhaps a laser dagger, even? Some items just don't feel very practical, as their effectiveness is outweighed by the cost of the item - which compares oddly to the gluon gun, a veritible wrecking ball of a weapon that many people love to use and don't mind losing, even if it does mean 200 mil down the drain.

The economy is an issue in my opinion, but I don't see how it can be fixed with money sinks, alone. When some people have 100 billion dollars, it can be very difficult for any new players to feel as though they have a chance to compete. Especially when the competitive atmosphere means that new players who base conventionally will have their base handcannon'ed and gluoned within seconds of building and placing the first printer - this doesn't always happen, but I have seen it occur.

"Thoughts on Narexa?"

He's a lovely guy. I'm fond of him, and we've been friends on ZARP for a while. His posts, along with Buffy, Daniel and Studio Banter, make me laugh.