Stolen Pixels #48: 2008 Awards, Part 1

[Shamus Young]

Stolen Pixels #48: 2008 Awards, Part 1

World-famous game journalist Travis Taylor has taken a moment out of his incredibly busy schedule to share some year-end game awards with you. You can thank him later, preferably with cash.

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[Shamus Young]

This Travis guy is a hack. My stuff is way funnier.

 

[qrter]

This Travis guy is a hack. My stuff is way funnier.

Actually - yes, it is.

 

[scarbunny]

Not sure why, maybe its the whole writting as someone else, but it seems a little bit forced. Not that I am qualified to pass comment but the "by college I mean my liver" seemed a little bit redundant.

All in all a little bit, and I can think of no nicer way of putting it and for that I apologise, meh. Not awful but not great.

 

[Xyllar]

Oh, so "Travis" is actually a character you made up, and not some actual game reviewer from some magazine I've never heard of? The comic is a lot funnier to me now that that's explained.

 

[lesterley]

I loved the "I teabag noobs" t-shirt.

I do wish we'd all decide on the correct spelling of "noob". I think it should be spelled "newb", since the word refers to someone who is NEW at a game. But what do I know...

Although I like the Stolen Pixel comics, I don't enjoy them as much as I did "DM of the Ring" or even the one-off comics that were sometimes included in the Twenty Sided posts. I prefer "absurdist" humor, rather than "grumpy" humor, which seems to be the case most often with the Stolen Pixel comics.

Leslee

 

[Shamus Young]

Oh, so "Travis" is actually a character you made up, and not some actual game reviewer from some magazine I've never heard of? The comic is a lot funnier to me now that that's explained.

I thought "Gamepunx" magazine was outrageous enough to make the fiction obvious, but looking around at other gaming sites (I'm not naming names) it obviously isn't.

 

[Spectere]

I do wish we'd all decide on the correct spelling of "noob". I think it should be spelled "newb", since the word refers to someone who is NEW at a game. But what do I know...

A lot of people (myself included) are of the belief that the "newb" or "newbie" spelling designates a player who is simply new to the game and are of below average skill. As they learn more and become more experienced with the game they lose that label.

A "noob" or, as they're commonly referred to, "n00b," is a player who sucks at the game and will never get better simply because everyone else is "botting" or "has no life." They will never learn the game because they constantly make up excuses for why they are losing. Speaking from experience, this specimen is generally prepubescent (though older specimens have been encountered in large numbers) and loves the voice chat feature. A lot. Additionally, they usually throw in numerous uses of a certain word that rhymes with "muck" in order to spice up their monologues and make them a bit more edgy.

Generally speaking, "n00b" is intended as an insult while "newb" isn't. "Newb" is typically a label that players give to themselves (i.e. "sorry guys, I'm kind of a newb at this") while "n00b" is one that's bestowed upon them by others (i.e. "stfu n00b"). Because of this, "n00b" is sometimes thrown around similarly to how the word "fag" is tossed around in high school.

I hope this clears everything up.

Edit:

I thought "Gamepunx" magazine was outrageous enough to make the fiction obvious, but looking around at other gaming sites (I'm not naming names) it obviously isn't.

Heh, I actually tried going to gamepunx.com after reading this, only to find that it bounced me right back to the Escapist.

Dare I ask what that domain name was used for prior to this comic?

 

[Anaphyis]

Stolen Pixels suffers from the same phenomenon as every broad range gaming comic: It's way funnier if you actually played the game before. But at least, you still get some fun out of it contrary to VG Cats which just plain sucks if you don't know what the fuck the strip is about.

I do wish we'd all decide on the correct spelling of "noob". I think it should be spelled "newb", since the word refers to someone who is NEW at a game. But what do I know...

If you want definitions, I vaguely remember "newb" standing for "player new to the game" and "noob" for "player with learning disability and extra moron seasoning." Could be wrong though. Then again, people using either, especially with "cool and ironic" 1337-h4x0r dialect should get a mercy shot between the eyes in my opinion - for their sake and humanity's.

 

[theodulus]

The comic was much funnier once I figured out it was you in a new persona. As was commented on your blog by another, I too have a tendency to brush past guest comics as they are rarely as funny as the originals.

 

[Robyrt]

The fighting game community makes a good distinction here. A "noob"/newb is a player who is bad but still learning the game. A "scrub" is a player who is bad and too stupid to realize it.

 

[Shamus Young]

Wow. The "here is a guest comic" was about the worst thing I could have done to this poor strip. Lots of people don't don't guest comics, apparently. (I do, but I have a static list of a dozen or so comics I always read, and I don't use an RSS reader.)

So what if I was a guest at someone else's comic, who you didn't normally read?

 

[jmpatt]

I loved the "I teabag noobs" t-shirt.

D'oh! I just got that one. My initial thought was that it was a joke on pwn, and that those were tags that somehow denoted pwnership. Maybe if anyone ever actually wants to print some up they should have "earl gray" on the tags... For humor n00bs like me.

 

[Dev Null]

Just to prove that some of us really don't mind the Escapists forum system...

I read it and laughed, though I was never entirely sure it was actually you - could have been a real guest writer parodying a made-up reviewer. And GamePunx is totally believable. But in general I don't have a lot to actually _say_ about your comics, even when I really enjoy them. Not a big fan of the "LOL: ME2" post. Your blog generates more comment, IMO, simply because there you're not restricting yourself to just a couple of panels and a paragraph or two, so theres a bit more to actually discuss.

I'd watch the number of views more than the number of comments; if they trail off then you must have lost some folks.

 

[Mariena]

This Travis guy is a hack. My stuff is way funnier.

I'm going to be completely honest here.. Yes, it is way funnier. I hope this wasn't "instead of" a usual Stolen Pixels feature? Because, oh man, Shamus Young is so much better than.. wait a minute.

 

[Tryss]

I like that teabag shirt.

 

[Singing Gremlin]

Wow. The "here is a guest comic" was about the worst thing I could have done to this poor strip. Lots of people don't don't guest comics, apparently. (I do, but I have a static list of a dozen or so comics I always read, and I don't use an RSS reader.)

So what if I was a guest at someone else's comic, who you didn't normally read?

Heads would explode.

 

[MooseHowl]

You completely lost me on the Mirror's Edge panel. I'm not even sure what Travis was saying about the game, let alone you via him... possibly something about the story, which I've heard is quite thin? Or just platforming in general? Hm.

I approve 100% of a comic featuring that style of 'stache, however! Here in Canada we call that the Jack Layton Moustache. He's a politician, of variable influence/popularity, but his moustache is renowned for its presence in politics. Go ahead, ask any Canadian! That moustache is probably the most recognizable icon in canadian politics today. Bizarre but true.