Petie

For anyone who celebrates and happens to be checking in, merry Christmas and happy New Year!

My PMs only seem to go back to 2010 unfortunately. I seem to remember being unable to migrate them and was pretty upset at their loss but maybe it didn't affect everyone?

Threads shouldn't have been lost - just broken because the converter that Invision supplied completely ruined much of the formatting. Are you seeing threads that are outright gone?

I played the original Half-Life when I went through my pre-Alyx run. I do have Source and messed around a little in Black Mesa after the fact but really wanted to experience the original before diving into Half-Life 2. I intend to go back and play Black Mesa properly eventually, though. And yes, Half-Life 2 was outstanding, no arguments there. I don't remember exactly where I left off in Alyx but I'm pretty sure I'm nearing the end. I do intend to take another run through it on the easiest difficulty (I'm playing on normal now, I think) to pick up a few achievements I missed along the way though. Even knowing where it's going for a second playthrough, I think it will be just as good.

I'm ashamed to say I haven't actually finished it yet but I have been playing Alyx and it's an outstanding experience. When I heard it was coming out, I realized I had never actually played the original games so I played through all of Half-Life (and its expansions), and then all of Half-Life 2 (and the follow-up episodes) before starting Alyx and really had a blast finally experiencing them.

Being extra careful with a baby on the way right now makes complete sense. I definitely get why it feels weird though. Hoping everything goes without incident! I do think it’s smart to avoid working in healthcare right now regardless if it can be helped but especially with a newborn. Given a little time, if it’s something you really want, you can always look into it down the road. Nothing wrong with being a stay at home mom either though, if you can make it work! Also, can I just say how crazy it feels to be taking about babies and careers and things here? None of this was even in the radar when I first joined here and I’m sure that’s the same for many of those still here to see this post.

I’m all for another reunion! What’s the plan?

Hey everyone! The old OB podcast was mentioned in a chat earlier this morning and I happen to have a complete copy of the episodes that I hosted way back when (I'm not sure if others were uploaded elsewhere after the last one that I have). If anyone is interested in taking a walk back in time to 2011, I've uploaded all of the episodes and a CSV with titles, descriptions, and a few stats for each that you can download here: https://www.otakuboards.com/podcast.zip

Hey everyone! I know things here aren't anything like they used to be but I just want to wish any of you who still pop in to visit from time to time the best during these times. I hope you're all doing well, staying safe, and getting through COVID-19's visit to the Earth as best as you can.

It is sad that things are pretty dead here but if it's any consolation, the site itself isn't going anywhere. At the very least, it will remain available as an archive.

Sorry, I just now saw this. Unfortunately, I don't think I'm going to be able to get it back online this time. It uses an absurdly out of date version of Wordpress that's no longer compatible with the version of PHP I'm running. I can make a backup and then see if updating it works but no promises. Edit: That was easier than expected, seemingly anyway. It's back up at the same URL (and now also in the header!) as before and should be working but let me know if it's not!

I'd just like to point out that the last post in this thread was nearly 15 years ago. Given the lack of activity these days, it's really not a big deal but I had to say something given how incredible that time span is...

Looks like I'm rather late to the party but congratulations!

Technically me at this point, I suppose? Did you need something?

That's awesome! Congratulations :)

From what I can tell, it appears to be from KonoSuba: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KonoSuba

The site that hosted this has long since been taken down and the Stitcher link no longer works but I still have the original files. I attached the episode in question for anyone interested. OB Podcast 11 - The Real Stuff Sucks.mp3

I'm really at a loss for words. I unfortunately can't say I knew Des all too well but even still, I remember plenty of conversations we had and projects we worked on together. He was impossible to not like or not get along with and was a pleasure to be around. I didn't keep up with Twitter too well myself so I missed a lot of the updates but I do remember hearing about the cancer but also never made the connection that there was even a chance he wouldn't recover. It's a painful realization to make now. Des, thank you for everything. You'll be sorely missed.

This is a known issue and happens everywhere unfortunately. The upgrade from version 3 to 4 seemed to not like a lot of the older posts and the choice was to either lose huge chunks of them or revert them to their HTML states and hope that the bug would be fixed at some point. That's where we still are at the moment.

I don't know enough about how to comment on art to give you more than "these look really good" but they do look really good :) The markers appear to have been worth the wait because the skin in all of these is spot on. I miss the former activity levels of this place but it's nice to see people stop by and share every once in a while!

I'd just like to point out that I said nothing about the adoption being surprising or that the company/companies did a good job with the release. Expected is definitely the right word to use in terms of its popularity. What stuck out for me is the fact that, especially around the launch, looking at a crowded area and seeing people walking around with their phones out, it was very likely that those people were playing Pokémon Go. People who you'd never expect to pick up a Pokémon game are playing it and it's had a substantial impact in a few different aspects of daily life (and not just positively - the fact that we need warnings on highways stating "Don't Pokémon and drive" is concerning). That's what amazed me. Just because it's expected doesn't mean it can't also be fascinating. I agree with the rest of your points. The game itself was poorly executed, the lack of communication isn't helping, and there's still a lot of bugs to work out. Apparently, people signing in with Google accounts are having slightly better luck (as part of the server troubles are related to Nintendo's Pokemon Trainer Club authentication servers, not just the game servers) but even so, the game itself is down more than it's up and they really should have been better prepared for this kind of traffic knowing how popular the series is.

Pretty much this. I have a Pokmon Trainer Club account form way back and maybe trying to use it was my mistake but I seem to only be able to get into the game some 40% of the time. Combine that with the fact that Pokemon and PokeStops are not common where I live or work and I don't have much to report unfortunately. That said, I still like the concept and I continue to be amazed at how far reaching this game is, especially in such a short period of time.

I actually run a Discord server for my own networks and it works very well for that purpose. That said, suggestions here are really only for OB - I don't really influence what happens on theO. I was originally hosting the chat server for theO as well but that was mostly coincidence. The server I was hosting it on was upgraded and Adam never really got back to me with a plan to move the chat server elsewhere so that's kind of up in the air at the moment. For those interested though, my server is available via this link: https://discord.gg/0WTVjuJzSaZQgmNs If there's enough interest, I'll put together an OB channel.

I assume this was a student loan? Congratulations! They're designed to keep you paying for like 20 years so you've certainly done well! :)

Indeed - it has become a community of lurkers but a good community none the less. Welcome and enjoy your lurking!