alanschu

I actually find winning militarily is usually much more convenient (as usually I am able to establish military dominance long before the other winning conditions open up).

Haha, asks for a bit less, but could very well exceed the original request. Did they alter their scoping at all with the request for less money?

If it happens, we'll have to go to a server and form an SODOFF guild or something >.>

Is it? Surely you can restrict how much you use then. And if you're looking at just video gaming, your claim isn't true at all. (there are actually people where I work that only get games if they are DRM free) Does software piracy drive DRM adoption? Yes. Particularly the forms of copy protection. Even before things were known as "digital rights management" game developers would include mechanisms that would make distributing copies of the game difficult. Codes on brown paper (more difficult to photocopy) Code wheels Manual references And so forth. If piracy didn't exist, these would be colossal wastes of time and money (you can argue they still are now, but I'm not the person you have to convince, unfortunately).

Dikembe Mutombo is totally expanding the Mayan calendar so we should be ok.

That's true. But unless the software used by the SteamBox is proprietary, or for some other reason cannot be run on a PC, the idea of bringing it over to the PC is a non-issue. Yes, bringing it over to Windows could pose problems (assuming SteamBox is linux based), but that's a software problem and not a hardware one. Meaning if I get the software setup on my PC, I'd be able to play the games on my PC just fine. The real question is whether or not the backing of someone like Valve would be enough to give Linux PC gaming some real inertia.

I don't mod too often, but what happens if you tell XCOM to not update automatically?

I'm not even talking about the SteamBox. I'm talking about games released for the PC. In order to release a game for the SteamBox, as well as PC, is entirely possible, with a minimal amount of effort. Even if SteamBox has Steam requirements up the wazoo, that doesn't mean that a developer absolutely cannot release the game for standard PC.

Hmmm, does the licensing agreement state that no friends are allowed to look at the game?

That doesn't have to be a requirement though. It might be. The fact is you're creating code natively to run on the PC. So unless Steam/Valve requires all other distributions to also use Steam (something we don't know), what it means is that the idea of porting it over is a non-issue since time to create the port isn't required. Imagine being able to make something for the XBox 360 (and the install base that is has), and doing no work at all to release a PC version.

Depends on what your stance is on things like DRM. If you are adamantly against DRM, you should never download because all you do is provide data points that encourage people to enact various types of DRM. Best to stick exclusively with DRM free software. In other words, only download something if you are okay with the fact that your action will provide additional incentive for new DRMs (even if paradoxically DRM isn't as effective as some would like it to be).

One of the indictments of the Nuremberg trials was Count One, which indeed included crimes against humanity. Doentiz was found not guilty on this count.

I just realized it's the same day as our Christmas party!

To be fair I played subscription based. Though I wasn't talking about flashpoints (although it was fun to do those too). I love the MP aspect of just going through the standard content and watching everybody's stories and the decisions they made in them.

IMO the strength of the game is with its small group gaming. I never played the game solo, and only played with friends (real life friends, which is probably helpful). In this aspect, I didn't find the multiplayer component suffered much at all, and we had the added bonus of being able to complete more difficult content too. I agree that skill mirroring is a big issue. I was disappointed when I heard they were shifting to that (it didn't used to be that way).

I played a Sith Sorcerer that was decidedly nice and would even refuse to do quests where the only option was doing bad things. I only got a bit into Act 2, but I'd be surprised if it suddenly forced me to play a cruel individual. My roleplaying perspective was that compassion was as useful as any to rally those to the Sith side. Arguably more useful (especially at times). As for games, I am now playing The Witcher (for the first time).

I don't lose access to my Steam Library if I lose connection to the internet. I usually get a "Connection to steam servers lost. Retrying connection" that passively sits in a chat window or the friends list. It's never been a problem for me playing games. He's right that Steam offers those services to get people on board to using Steam. Even if you don't utilize Steam (for a particular product), the hope is that eventually the game itself will be sold on Steam to which Valve can take a cut of the sales (which is fine IMO). No, but it is how they have monetized their platform. Hence why they can offer stuff for free.

I think it's also important to note that if the issue is with Vega and the type of character that he is and any perceived failures to serve a purpose, these sort of things are independent of what species he is. So it has little to do with the fact that he's a muscular soldier type. Given the way the story starts off, changes would have to be made to make any non-human character appropriate at that juncture of the game.

controlled environment = console whatever OS it will run... Since a console is a computer, it's kind of a statement of the obvious. It'd effectively be a console that natively runs Windows (or perhaps Linux, since Valve seems to be making a push there) software. So yeah, it's a console. That natively runs PC games. You seem to be using the term "console" as a pejorative, however. If you're curious how it's different from, say, the XBOX 360 and the PS3, I suppose the answer would be "it depends." The PS3 and 360 are very different to develop for, and even then you can't just take code compiled for the 360 and expect it to run natively on the PC. A "PC console" would literally be a console that can just as well take the PC game that you're playing in your desktop, and still run it. Or perhaps more appropriately, a game developed for the "PC console" runs on your PC with no extra work required. As a PC gamer, this doesn't sound appealing to you? If you're talking about things like game development, it'd mean that the process of deploying software wouldn't be mandated by Sony or Microsoft. You could argue whether or not this is good or bad, but the most obvious difference would be the licensing fee per copy of the game sold would no longer exist. Companies would have more freedom for how they deploy their content, and whether or not to charge for it and so forth. For example, Microsoft and Sony aren't too keen on DLC being free, because they ultimately provide the bandwidth for the content. This means if a developer wanted to ship some DLC for free, there's intrinsic barriers that exist. It also means less control and regulation (which if you look at the Atari days, was bad), although maybe the industry is developed enough that such things won't be an issue.

To be fair, some chaps like Doenitz may have benefited (he was acquitted, with good reason IMO) Found guilty, I'm pretty sure, and in parts in rather dodgy fashion too. IIRC he was the guy who had Chester Nimitz say that if he (Donitz) was found guilty then he (Nimitz) should be as well since the US used the exact same unrestricted submarine warfare tactics wrt Japan. Whoops, he was found guilty on 2 counts (war of aggression and crimes against the laws of war), but not war crimes or crimes against humanity. Although yes I was referring to the lack of sentencing for unrestricted submarine warfare. I give points to Nimitz since he basically said he also used unrestricted submarine warfare tactics as Doenitz did. The interesting thing is Doentiz implemented them in response to attacks on his submarines that were performing rescue operations for civilian crews. Some of the things he was found guilty on was not immediately repealing some of Hitler's directives (even though said directives never applied during Doenitz's short reign as leader of Germany).

I loved the first game haha. Was freaking hard though (ninja touches water, ninja dies!)

I like Isabela too, but pure just doesn't seem like the right adjective >.>

It'll run the same software your PC does?

To be fair, some chaps like Doenitz may have benefited (he was acquitted, with good reason IMO)

I actually didn't remember Emily Wong, nor did I know about her news feed twitter (which I have since seen, and have a hard time believing that, prior to the ending ire spreading over to other aspects of the game, fans wouldn't have mostly enjoyed). Although I still get insane goosebumps just listening to Clint Mansell's piece at the end. (Enjoyed homage video that uses it)