LadyCrimson

Fraps is the most popular/well known. Guncam is another similar option. There's many programs of the above type & quality these days - do some Google searches for game recorders or similar phrases. Download, compare; your mileage may vary. BTW, "Free" for many of the shareware programs often means you download the whole program, but your video will have a visible name/logo watermark embedded in every frame. Some of them also use a length-timer to restrict time you can record in one shot; ie, 30 sec. Thus you'd have to register the program by paying for it (usually $30 US) to get the license code to unlock/get rid of them. But if you don't mind the watermarks, you can use the free version forever. I don't know anything about opensource/linux possibilities. VirtualDub is a common seperate program for editing/compressing video game videos. It can also supposedly capture some video, but I've never tried to get that to work (there's some requirements), so I don't know what that really means/entails. G'luck.

Yeah, VirtualDub isn't meant for/doesn't work with DV. But I do like them for editing Fraps-made videos. I also don't have a Mac/Apple and have no plans to get one, although I must admit their gorgeous flat-display screens beckon temptingly to me whenever I browse through stores; something the ones for PC's have yet to do. Edit: and most of my use isn't in the serious pro category ... or rather, all of my useage. I like to tinker, but not quite to that extent. Maybe one day, heh.

I think it would be possible for a program to record using a high-compression mode - whether it's practical is another story. For instance, such on-the-fly high-compression methods might not be able to keep up in terms of 'real-time data speed' - resulting in a jerky-motion, missed-frames, sucky end-result. Example, for many folk, turning on Fraps - a program that results in huge video files - to record whilst in-game, the FPS drops drastically because of the extra load. You'd probably need a really, really powerful computer to handle it. So in short, my guess is that under most circumstances the answer would be "no."

Ulead VideoStudio was on sale for $40, and I figured "hey, it can't be any worse than Pinnacle" ... so I'll give that a shot. If that doesn't work, I'll look for the Sony one. Stuff like this only emphasizes how irritating it is (to me) these days, when you just want simple, basic functionality, but software keeps going in the opposite direction.

Agreed. There are still many many old houses, however, that probably don't meet current fire-resistant standards, because of the 'grandfather' concept - homes pre-built before certain years being exempt from having to alter stuff until/unless they rebuild/apply for permits to re-do/addon etc. I'd also read an article somewhere that because of the housing 'boom' of the past several years, they were allowing people to build in actual 'fire zones'. I don't know exactly how risky these 'fire zones' were/are, but that practice seems rather dangerous; hence, my build skyward instead of outward opinion. I like the ideal of every house having a big yard and white picket fence as much as anyone else, but there comes a time for every area when it's not practical anymore.

Shock value is a good way to describe them ... they're not really about "BOO!" type of scary.

http://icanhascheezburger.com/

Cute. I tried a few different settings ... the story is pretty much the same each time, tho.

I'd be playing Sim Societies if it was out in stores.... Looks like my kind of game ... if you're short on time, easy to play in short sessions, and full of god-sim tinkering-madness. Not long till release, tho.

By video I mean camcorder-generated files, not Fraps-or-similar game videos. I've been using Pinnacle Studio for a while now, and while it was fairly powerful/easy to use for simple things, it would crash/freeze a lot ... and I finally got fed up with it. Movie Edit Pro and Video Studio are two brands that some folk have mentioned before, but they seem an awful lot like Pinnacle - ie, feature-bloated that'll likely slow everything down. I suppose if they don't crash as much, it'd be worthwhile, but still ... I don't know if many people here work with home videos, but just idly curious if anyone's used any other program and liked it a lot? It has to work on XP and preferably be in the $100 or less range.

I knew the demo wasn't that great, but was wondering if the final release might've improved it some. Ah well. Back to Caesar4 I guess, then.

1408 - I liked it better than slug apparently did, but mostly because of the first half. The second half slid further and further into an abyss. The alternate endings on the DVD were kind of cool to see tho ... I liked one of those better than the theatrical ending. Transformers - finally saw it. Better than I expected, with of course fantastic eye-candy, but still silly fluff. It did, however, have some great little moments for those who've watched the cartoon series; odd bits of humor here and there. But mostly it's just one big explosion etc. after another, with a weak ending - they turned Mr. Prime into a serious wuss for the climax.

Most of the time I barely notice the soundtracks in games ... or I turn them off completely. So my choices are still ... hmm ... well ... Stronghold for overall goodness. Nox had a great theme and I liked a lot of the background/battle music as well. Majesty has a great theme - but it didn't have a lot of music overall. Someone mentioned Darkstone - I remember liking most of the background music from that one, too. Nothing stupendous, but pleasant and worked well with the game/set a nice mood. Can't think of anything else off-hand.

For those who've played/are playing HG:L - what's the opinion? Is it a decent single-player action-RPG, or if one has already played Diablo2/WoW to death, would it just be same ol' same ol' w/shiny graphics? I tried Ootp baseball, and it's an interesting looking, very detailed baseball/manager-sim (text-based, it's not a 3d graphic type game), but the 500 page pdf manual turned me away. No time for that, thanks. :D

I think I have a DVD copy with the audio commentary, but alas, I must admit I haven't listened to them yet. Maybe I'll do that soon, one night when I can't get to sleep.

Perhaps it's time for California to start thinking about building houses with more fire-resistant materials. We've taken some measures ... but perhaps not enough. Maybe some textured metal siding will come into fashion. Or maybe a skyscraper mentality should come into play soon, rather than spreading out in ranch-style further and further into riskier fire zones ... It's hard to picture California giving up their 'log cabins' and sprawled out homes any time soon, tho.

Alien - probably the only movie, ever, that made me so tense I seriously had a hard time watching it in one sitting; even, for a little while, on repeat viewings. John Carpenter's The Thing - nowhere near as tension-inducing as Alien, but great fun plus a decent level of tension. Still a fave movie overall. Poltergeist - I know it's not really a horror movie by most folks standards, and it's probably badly dated now, but at the time, it was great. There's a few scenes that, when released, "got" to a lot of people, including me. Evil Dead2 - keep in mind that 99.999% of zombie movies I view as being either hilarious comedies or very dreary comedies, rather than horror movies. Evil Dead2 falls in the hilarious category. I laughed like a loon almost the entire film, the first time I saw it. Honorable mentions: The Omen - (original) Jaws The Hitcher - (original - the remake was garbage) Hellraiser 1&2 - (I like Pinhead....) ... it's hard to remember all the movies you've ever seen.

Das Boat. Although, it was more like I saw it in three parts over three days, because one, it's really long, and two, I kept falling asleep, as I'd try to watch it at the end of my evening when I was very tired. Still my fav. war/sub movie, even broken up into parts. Zodiac. I didn't expect to, but I really enjoyed this film. Except for the early sections, perhaps, a very 'talky' type of motion picture, which isn't so common anymore.

She's very busy with non-internet things.

*peeks in* I'm glad to know everyone from this forum so far has escaped any major injury or damage. Hope it continues that way.

Some friends were in the beta and their general take was that it felt 'very Diablo-like' - but the character skills (the ability to be flexible w/them per class, I guess) were very lacking/boring in comparison... or something to that effect. ie, the usual "it has potential as a good action-rpg type game, but as-is, it's disappointing."

I"ve watched lots and lots and lots of TV lately. Seraphim Falls was an interesting little Western with Pierce Brosnan and Liam Neeson. Kind of a revenge/redemption theme perhaps, with the very end becoming almost a parody of some western cliches. I enjoyed it.

Don't eat the buns.

The series end episode for Stargate was pretty weak ....

Still a bit o' WoW, but losing interest. C'mon, Spore ....