LadyCrimson

I haven't tried Win7's "XP emulator" or whatever that is...I'd have to research how it works & I'm too lazy, since I have the extra PC. (I still much prefer separate rigs vs. dual-booting etc). I've considered switching this new pc back to XP, in fact...but eh...since I use this new one mainly for gaming/media having Win7 on the new rig seems fine. I left things like email, photography files etc. on the old XP. :D So yeah, I'd say if you don't have a specific need to switch, there's still no real reason for a home user to do so. The only reason I did it was because I built the new PC and wanted to see how Win7 ran on it compared to how XP ran on the same system, and since it doesn't run any worse/slower, at least, I'll leave it alone for now. Win7 pretty much uses 1GB of RAM even at idle...was Vista the same?

Potter/Half Blood Prince. Keep in mind that I haven't/don't read the books, so I'm going entirely by the film series here...I appreciated the darker more "adult" (or whatever) tone compared to the early ones, and I did like the Snape (best chr. in series imo) and potion teacher arcs, but at 2.5 hours, it was very plodding for the first half. I nearly fell asleep waiting for something to happen. Perhaps it would've helped if I had read the books and knew what was going on. Think I'll watch it again tomorrow and see if I like it better a 2nd time.

I don't have any number tests to give you, but in terms of how it feels...no, in either direction. Maybe XP felt a little faster here, and Win7 a little faster there, but overall I really see no difference. Keep in mind that I don't use all the Areo "pretty" options tho, since I have no need for "pretty" - plus I don't run that many programs on Win7 besides some basic stuff + games. My main annoyance with Win7 is that most of my fave (non-game) programs will work poorly-they run/don't crash, but don't work properly- requiring either new versions or new programs, which is as always, a potential added expense. And yeah, very old games are kind of a coin-flip, imo. Depends on patches, original disc etc. No dos-box, but I had the same thing with Diablo1 (had to put it on my ancient XP for bnet), and Lords of the Realm2 wouldn't install. If very old games are important, I'd make sure to keep an old XP system around, if you can, long as you can.

I did notice that. Which made me think of how Borderlands would've looked so much better if AA had actually worked.

When she turns around can you see the top of her thong? The 'realism' of her shirt and jeans is pretty impressive.

Did you know that dwarf hamsters can climb cage bars & ceilings w/their itty bitty paws like tiny, stumpy monkeys? I didn't either. It's pretty funny.

I haven't watched in a bit...is it basically the same formula or are they changing it up yet?

Sunshine -- Sci-fi flick about a group flying to sun to try and rekindle its dying energies. A little slow to start, becomes interesting/good, then degenerated into a typical monster-on-ship climax that really annoyed me...but only because the rest of the movie seemed more akin to 2001 atmosphere than Aliens, and thus it was jarring. Decent cast & special effects bits for what seems to be a lower-budget 2nd string sci fi flick.

Immortal Throne gives you a shared stash for extra storage plus EZ muling/exchange of items to other characters. Once you buy all the stash upgrades, it's big enough. Divine Divinity-ahhh, I needed alchemy skill lvl2 to make potions from ground herbs. Seems to be a Tolkein/LOTR subplot homage or something going on, too. Kinda funny.

Ooops, sorry, posted the above in the wrong thread, meant to put in the 'what are you playing.' Can't edit it out now...

Divine Divinity is awesome so far. I had a little trouble in the beginning trying to figure out how to change spells/hotkeys etc...after seemingly being unable to do anything but swing a dagger & teleport my mage around, I finally read the pdf manual. The game (Gog's version on Win7) has occasional path-finding annoyances (like when you click on an urn & you wander all the way around to get to it) and my mouse-clicking doesn't always seem instantly-responsive, but other than that, heck of a lot of fun. Also, can't seem to make the quick save work...having to long-save constantly in case I die and have to reload is kind of a drag. I have the alchemy skill & can combine potions, but still can't put an herb in a bottle to make a simple potion. I need a better manual.

Chocolate and yogurt covered raisins make a great snack between bouts of raking the yard. I can almost see the actual grass and cement patio, now.

After hearing about the beta cheat codes, I installed D2 and checked it out a little. Instant lvl 99, instant max gold as much as you want to gamble good gear, then away you go. You still have to 'rush' through the difficulties tho. And once I realized for the Sorc, at least, nothing much changed -I can now have 6 Hydras up at same time instead of 5, whoo! - I got bored and stopped. If you already quit the game long ago still no reason to go back. BUT, yes, still a nice thing for Blizz to do, for those who still play.

@Musopticon? -- You're making me want to reinstall Titan Quest/Immortal Throne yet again. ...and thanks for the comments on Divine Divinity, all. I was on the fence about getting it from GoG...think I'll give it a go-I like me some old skool action-RPG'ing. Especially for that price.

Perhaps their desire to have offered games work on XP/Vista limits them/slows them down somewhat? Their selection isn't large, but if they stick around a while, I'd imagine in a year or two it'll be much better. I like a lot of games beyond crpgs tho. They have quite a few games where my discs probably wouldn't work on XP/Win7 at all, and for 6-10 bucks would be worth downloading a compatible version. Like Myst...

That happened to me once, and it is a glitch. Unfortunately I don't remember exactly what fixes it, besides reloading an earlier save. ....you can try to kill the robots further away from the door, perhaps standing too close interferes with the trigger.

Every one of JE's answers in this thread is one of the reasons I keep coming back to this forum. ...I guess one day I'm going to have to try to play Fallout. Perhaps I'll buy it from GoG.

All this talk of Terminator films had me watching T2 again last night. 1-my eXtreme DVD of it looks really good 2-the 16 minutes of extra footage, imo, still make it a much better film than the theatrical release. Altho, there are some parts that could have been shortened a bit...I always thought Sarah's time in the asylum went on too long.

Never heard of GoG - went and looked. Now that looks like one digital download website that I could love.

Went to sleep very early, woke up very early...finally feel almost human and just in time for the weekend. Our escrow account was apparently altered -I think because of a property tax reassessment (in our favor) -and we got an 'excess' check + lowering of monthly payments. Which of course means that next year there will probably be a reason for a deficit and an increase.

Most likely. /players8 for single-player, in Hell diff, was one of the best patch tweaks ever. Come to think of it, that's probably when I started to play on bnet less and less...all that extra gold/loot just for me, no sharing with the bnet dweebs. ...but Hell cow level was still fun, until they started nerfing it. Blizzard loves to nerf everything...then bring some of it back...then nerf it again...

Has anyone played Divine Divinity before? It's a 2002 action/RPG. Sounds slightly less action+bigger/more open than, but w/many similarities/ease of use as the Diablos? What I found 'stupid' is that he's more than similar graphically...they could've made him look more different, at least. But yeah, he's a bit tougher because of the regen thing+his crazy attacks & occasional life leech, IIRC. Especially if you're a melee-only chr. And I think one patch made it even harder. The Lich summon was very handy against him. That and running to the stairs to let skill timers regen.

Up. I feel the same way about it as I did about Wall-E...about half of it was brilliant, the other half only so-so, which equals a generally pleasant & mildly entertaining overall watching experience. The old man character & story arc definitely one of the better ones in Pixar's history tho.

Been a while since I've been sick enough to stay in bed watching TV for a couple days...wow, daytime TV sucks even worse than I remember, even when you have cable. People (including us) pay a lot of money for 800+ channels of nothing. I think I've sucked up quite a bit of bandwidth watching Law&Order:CI-season 4 on Netflix.

The actual list of changes is not terribly impressive. They've made the game overall easier, nerfed hammerdins, re-powered Necro's CE a bit, stuff like that. Getting rid of IM being cast on players by those...Death Knights?...in Diablo's area may encourage more melee classes, tho...especially in hardcore. It was always funny how in most PvM groups you'd lots of ranged builds and very little melee builds, beyond late Nightmare difficulty. Feels like the 'end of the D2 era last patch' to me...as well as giving a bit of publicity and something to keep Diablo fans busy while waiting for D3. Not enough to bring me back, I think.