Pop

NSFW, obviously.

I couldn't get past the terrible "universal ammo" thing. I played through 99% of the game exclusively with the pistol, and I quit after that because I didn't care enough.

You keep saying that. How long are you going to wait? All the other across-the-board-10 games (Starcraft, Half-Life 2) they kept as pricey as possible for as long as possible. If it's a hit (and it probably will be) you won't see a good price drop for months. These grapes taste fine to me. For the, what, 80-90% of the gaming populace that's anticipating Halo 3 or Gears of War 2 or God of War 3 as the epitome of what gaming is and should be? Absolutely. You don't strike me as the type to heed gaming press in the first place.

I have.

Nobody, yet. The people who got Bioshock early got the non-LE version.

Christ, I'm bored.

Overheating, un-fixable game errors -like the 1.2 Oblivion patch error that affects all SI players unless they edit a file in the game data folder-, etc. Hmmm, any way to fix that on the 360, at all? My copy of Oblivion started wigging out just as soon as I downloaded Shivering Isles. It was only after a few re-installs of the expansion that I was able to even start a new game, but alas, entering certain areas still crashes the game.

Ebert would argue that even though 2001: A Space Odyssey had key grips and screenwriters and second unit directors involved in its creation, it was still a Stanley Kubrick film. We're talking auteurism. Even with people like Warren Spector and Will Wright and Hideo Kojima out there, people who have immense control over their product, an auteur theory of games is rarely argued for. Has a game ever really made me reflect upon myself? Not really. Games to me at best are the greatest airport novels you can read combined with the best rollercoasters you can ride. There's no The Catcher in the Rye in gaming. But then again, I've never felt the need, as many have, to justify my love of gaming by prescribing it as art.

Good to hear, good to hear. Don't know if what I would consider surprising and what Khaveen would consider surprising about the future of NWN2 are the same thing, but I hope this means they'll go the same route Bioware went with NWN, which is to say, more than one official expansion.

Sounds like the same nerd-rage when Gamespot gave Halo 2 a "mere" score of 9.4 Or when some reviewer gave Twilight Princess an 8.8 (totally justified score)

btw, the "hard" difficulty eliminates the electro bolt / wrench one-hit kill, in case anybody was wondering.

That's the usual PETA line. They can't officially condone terrorist actions but they hope they succeed.

Nonsense. I was skeptical as well. Besides, all you reallly need to do is unplug your network cable and you're home free.

If perchance any of you ****s happen to have snagged early copies of Bioshock, you might want to hold off on playing them. Word through the grapevine is that being noticed playing or getting an achievement on your account could result in said account being shut down.

I thought that was obvious.

I've heard a lot of talk (from disgruntled self-denying fanboys) that 4e was going to go 100% digital, would require payment as an MMO would, and would do away with the Open Gaming License. Glad to see that they were wrong. I'll tentatively await, as always.

That is prbably why I would never give a game a perfect score. The better reason why you would never give a game a perfect score is that you would never play it.

While I might agree with you in principle, I think it would be unwise to make such an assertion. If "animal rights" is an unworthy cause compared to other, greater ones, then we're saying that the greater the scope of the problem, the more important it is, which sort of negates the "ground-up" approach to solving certain problems. More than that, we could similarly say that curbing domestic abuse is a waste of time when there are children starving in North Korea. I think domestic abuse is a pretty nasty thing, and while it might not be as glamorous as famine relief or stopping terrorism, it's probably a worthy thing to fight. No, we shouldn't be saying that "animal rights" are insignificant next to greater causes, we should say that "animal rights" are an insignificant cause, period. But then again, I've always held views of the Benthamite strain in contempt. Besides, it's funny how similar Hamas and PETA are. Both have a social / political wing, and both have a militant / terrorist wing (in PETA's case, the ALF). It's a sort-of amusing version of the "one man's terrorist, another man's freedom fighter" problem. PETA doesn't view Hamas' goal of jihad or palestinian revolt or whatever in high regard, and Hamas' doesn't give two ****s about the poor widdle mouses, but they hold in common a shared view of necessary and just violence against civilians. Theres' no reason they shouldn't be able to say what they want, there's plenty of reason that they should be ignored.

That you reneged on your statement is immaterial. What matters is that the statement was monumentally stupid and histrionic in the first place, stupid enough to easily warrant several months of nonstop ridicule.

Funny, I keep hearing sounds like someone who hasn't quit gaming forever is talking, but I don't see anybody when I look around. I think I'm haunted.

Trick revealed: If you set your profile's preferred difficulty to "hard" (however one does that) then the Hard difficulty is unlocked in the demo. Good for another few playthroughs, at least.

You fail at haiku.

The worst (and therefore best) fight scene ever filmed.

Speaking of Cheney,

They definitely have it, everywhere. They have it here. But T'r'U got wise and shut down all sales preemptively. Employees will probably get fired if they sell it.