TBSkyen

Why League of Legends erased its own story || video essay

IT'S FINALLY DONE.

An exhaustive deep dive into the circumstances and conditions that led to the 2014 lore reboot of League of Legends, supplemented with some developer information and... the uncomfortable revelations of recent articles about the company. 

Enjoy! Please let me know what you think, and whether it was worth the long, long wait (it's ok if it wasn't). I'll be putting up the vote for the next video topic soon, along with a general clean-up of the Patreon to make it all ...

LoL Lore Retcon video preview

I'm about 40% done editing this darn thing, but the latter half will probably take the longest to get done. Hence, here's a preview for you all, of the first couple of sections of the video.

PSA: Patreon card declines (again)

Well, here's an annoying message to have to run around and spread again: Patreon screwed something up, and is getting payments declined all over the place.

The exact reason isn't clear yet - there are some reports that it's American Express cards specifically that are suffering declines and can't be used anymore but I can't confirm it. I have tried to message everyone who seems to be affected, but I encourage you all to check the Patreon campaigns you're supporting to make sure your pledges ar...

The Patreon hit a milestone

uuuuuh

look i am speechless and I don't know how to begin to process this but the patreon hit the $750 goal which......

look that was a pipe-dream. that was pie-in-the-sky "let's imagine a fantasy world where this could happen ha ha" ridiculous impossible...

i'm a bit speechless right now. i'm sorting through myself.

I'm going to make a video and talk, uh, talk about this for a bit. I'll put it on here for you guys.

for now just

holy crap

i don't know what t...

VIDEO: What's the deal with Pyke? || Character design & lore discussion

L U D O N A R R A T I V E  D I S S O N A N C E

Pyke is an oddity in more ways than one. He's a support whose gameplay actively encourages them to killsteal, yes, but he's also a character whose excellent lore concept seems to be subtly but noticeably at odds with the character who was actually put in the game. Let's talk about that!  (take a shot every time I say "deranged")

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LINKS:
Ludonarrative dissonance explained: 2018-06-01 11:32:48 +0000 UTC View Post

VIDEO: Boss Designs of Dark Souls - 3b: The Bell Gargoyles

And finally we fight the gargoyles! ... well, mostly the gargoyles. I also discover the use of elevators, the utility of tail-cutting and learn the actual gameplay function of Humanity. That latter one... well, let's just say it was a harsh lesson.  We also talk about how the bosses of Dark Souls communicate the premise of the world to the player, and briefly discuss the history of grotesques in architecture as it relates to French 5th century folklore. 

Boss Designs of Dark Souls - 3a: Road to the Bell Gargoyles

I keep forgetting to post these videos to Patreon - gosh darn it!

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Well, this took a lot longer than the previous two bosses! I had to break this up into two parts because, frankly, I had too much footage and no way to edit it into a video that wouldn't be way too long.

I consider this the first proper episode of this series, in the sense that it's giving me the kinds of challenges I was hoping to get from a Dark Souls video series. Not just in terms of gameplay, but in terms ...

The Boss Designs of Dark Souls - 2: The Taurus Demon || Character design analysis

In my quest to fight and analyze the bosses of Dark Souls, we take our trek through the Undead Burg up to the parapets of an ancient castle and then... well, things don't go quite as I expected. 

VIDEO: What's the deal with Symmetra? || Character design discussion

A recurring request in the comments, Symmetra is a very interesting design. Designed to set visual precedents for both her role as a combat engineer and as a representation of an architect in a sci-fi/FPS context, as well as a representation of south-east Asian (particularly Indian) culture, Symmetra tries to do a lot. Question is, does she succeed?

Let's talk about that. 

My computer died, content on hold

tl;dr my computer's processor started overheating massively and throttling. I'm having a new one built with whatever components I could scavenge, but I don't know if it'll take a couple of days to get done. Until then, I'm on a crummy laptop and my phone only, so no videos, comics or art :(

(ADDENDUM) The Boss Designs of Dark Souls - 1: The Asylum Demon

First of all, I'm really happy to see the positive response to my Dark Souls video series "pilot," and also very happy to see all the comments and responses with advice and recommendations on how to proceed in the game.

One of the more common comments was to have a slower, quieter analysis after the fight where I dig into things a bit more than I can when I'm frantically running around and dodge-rolling on the wrong timing. I think that's a good idea, so here is one for episode 1. I'll be inte...

VIDEO: The Boss Designs of Dark Souls - 1: The Asylum Demon || Character design analysis

(UNLISTED UNTIL TOMORROW! Timed exclusive just for you <3)

Episode one of what I rather hope will be a series, in which I attempt to analyze the character designs of Dark Souls bosses while also simultaneously fighting them. Whether this is remotely possible at all, I have no idea, but I'm giving it a good try! 

POLL: Week 19 video topic

Well, the Dark Souls video won, so that's going to be the next thing I make. I'd like to make more than one episode of that particular series idea, but we'll see how it does on the views :)

For the next vote, some new ideas on videos I might do. I'll let the most popular option, the Yordles, carry over from last time so it gets another shot, too. 

VIDEO: What's the deal with Nautilus?

Nautilus is a popular pick in the comments for a video, and it's perhaps easy to see why. The old boy has got charm, and a lot of fun to him - plus a kit that's easy to love (or hate), when you face him in the jungle, or in toplane, or as a support, or, hey, let's put him mid. Why not? There are no rules! The universe is meaningless! To heck with your promotion series!

The charm, though, may turn out to be part of the problem... 

New: Patreon Discord Server

Since more than a few people have asked for it, I have created a Discord server for Patrons on Patreon - I'm not 100% sure how things work yet with Patreon integration but it LOOKS like the Patreon bot automatically adds you to the server, and assigns you a role based on your reward level. Everyone who supports at any level has access.

You might need to add your Discord account to your Patreon account to get it to work. Let me know if you have any trouble.

What's The Discord For?...