DemonKing

My 2 cents...try this in order... 1. Update Motherboard Drivers 2. Update Bios 3. Windows reinstall 4. Borrow a friend's card and see if problem persists 5. Buy new card/return card to manufacturer if still under warranty

Cricket can be the most boring or the most exciting game of the world - I'm a true cricket tragic and will happily admit to that. However if you know even a tiny bit about the game and watch a match like the last England vs Australia match or perhaps the World Cup semi-final between South Africa and Australia in '99 you would become a convert. It really is edge of the seat stuff. Funny news is in Hong Kong the local broadcaster switched over from the dying minutes of the England Australia game to the "epic" clash between New Zealand and Zimbabwae.

Congratulations to England on coming back and wining the second test...albeit by a very slim margin. Forget Shane Warne's absurd legspinners - ball of the match for England must be the one McGrath stepped on before it even started!

It's a FPS... UBISOFT ANNOUNCES DARK MESSIAH

I tried the first level and it's pretty good - the monsters and treasure capture the D&D spirit quite well - especially the gelatinous cube. Unfortunately the characters and units the player has it his disposal feel more like generic Warcraft type characters. Also, is it possible to change the camera angle during gameplay?

DragonShard Singleplayer demo For all those D&D fans who have been wondering just what the heck Atari has been doing with the precious D&D license for the last few years...you'll probably still be wondering what the heck after playing this.

Is the demo the same as the beta from FilePlanet a few months back? If so, I'll pass. Can anyone who's downloaded it give us any more info?

I don't know - I remember trying the original and being awed by the engine but this engine didn't seem to have improved much other than a few flashier spell effects. Also while crappy voice-acting can be improved from a beta demo, crappy dialog and plotting usually can't.

I tried playing the original CS but it never did much for me, but started playing a bit with the advent of CS:S. I find it a bit lacking compared to most FPS games out there - no toggle crouch, prone, sprint etc, and the whole pre-round shopping expedition thing sucks, also the game is a bit unforgiving for new players - although mysteriously my scores have increased a bit now I only play on Valve Anti-Cheat secured servers. Saying that, the underlying engine is nice and I hope that DOD will take the HL2 engine to the next level.

I hope the single-player is better than the multi - I tried the multiplayer beta and it was pretty underwhelming and the graphics engine ran like a dog even my 6800GT.

Already played the beta 2 months ago..it was pretty *bleeh*. Graphics the same virtually, lame voice acting and storyline, and combat, while slightly different, is by no means better than the "play's itself" style of the original.

Black Adder, of course, series 2 being my favourite. The Office (English version - I saw a bit of the US version on the net, but it just wasn't the same). Spaced - because it reminds me of my own life ten years ago. Coupling I like even though for some reason I view it as a guilty pleasure. Almost forgot Drop the Dead Donkey, which is now on DVD I think. Also I used to love Not the Nine O'Clock News and Alas Smith & Jones. Strangely though, The Young Ones never did much for me.

Send me all your moxes and old power cards. I've arranged a little "accident" for my parents so I should be an orphan by the time they arrive.

Another great quote -this time from The Times: Dear Australia, Congratulations on winning the first Test match by 239 runs. You were great. We beg to remain, sirs, your humble servants, The England cricket team.

My wife always thought it must be (she's from Germany) but after being forced to hang around me she's almost as much as an addict as I am now. Simply put, Test cricket really is a "test" - of character, endurance and skill. There are shorter versions ranging from one day's play to only a few hours now for those with limited concentration, but Test cricket is still the purest and for me, the most enjoyable, form. Another great quote after last weekend's match: "My prediction is 2-1 to England so I'm still on course for that" David Graveney's optimism is still sky high despite England's first Test drubbing against Australia

Yet another "False Dawn" for English cricket - who would have thought it? However, while they may not win this time chances are McGrath and/or Warne will have retired by the next contest, plus a few of our batsmen who are a bit long in the tooth. England might have more of a chance then. In the mean time long may the Aussie dominance last...from the Guardian: Warne also had noisy support from his close-fielding convention, in whose presence Bell was made to feel a most unwelcome guest. The England batsman took his time between deliveries - the approved way to reduce heartrate and achieve inner calm these days - and ended up attaining a perfection of inertia. When the ball struck his pads, he looked up as though he could not believe the world contained such deceit and cruelty. Ahh - poetry to my ears.

I haven't played physical Magic for years - we started in 1994 and I managed to get full sets of everything from the Dark - Urza's Saga, but after that my gaming group was splintered around the world and a lot of the newer cards just seemed to be reprints of older cards. Then about a month ago I discovered Magic On-line and have started playing again. It's really a lot of fun plus I keep seeing new cards I've never seen before seeing as I've been out of the game for a while. Of course you are paying money for "virtual" cards but if you acquire a full set you can trade them in for their physical counterparts. Plus there are always tons of people to trade/play with. If anyone is interested I play as "TeufelHund666". You can demo the online version if you download the client.

I remember having great fears for Baldur's Gate after the FO2 release was so buggy, but really it was pretty good. As was the original POR, from memory. A few minor bugs/incorrectly implemented spells etc are not really a problem. The problem is when you get major bugs that either: 1. Are game-breaking - eg: the bug in Vampire that basically meant it was impossible to continue without doing some major hacking, which is beyond the capabilities of a lot of players who will simply give up at that point. 2. Are so frustrating and annoying that they seriously impact the enjoyment of the game - eg: the FO2 car problems or the NPC encumberance problem in TOEE. Somewhat annoying is when it is obvious that a game was rushed out due to missing storylines/plots or areas that seem to have been designed in a rush (often the final levels!). KOTOR2 is a good example of this problem - where it was possible to exhaust the dialog options of many of the party NPCs and the final levels were rather spartan and uninteresting compared to some of the earlier ones. However as Feargus once said, I believe, "Games are only released, never finished!".

If you get a full Henry VIII type outfit go for that - one of my mates wore one to my 21st and it looked fantastic - he even strapped a pillow to his gut to get the realistic "gluttonous" look.

The first game was OK but sufferred terribly from "consolitis" - particularly the flying physics. What Lucasarts needs to do is take the Battlefield 2 engine and make a PC game from there. I tried the Galactic Conquest mod for BF1942 but without the SW Music and S/FX it just didn't have the atmosphere for me.

Man - those insurgents were NOOBs. With my LEET sniper skilz I would have head-tapped that guy no problem from twice the distance. Their CLAN must suck.

Yep -I asked my wife what the hell that "RatHouse" building was when I first came to Germany, and when she told me, I thought "perfect". My favourite is: "Arbeitslosengeld" Arbeit = Work Losen = Loss Geld = Money In English one short word "dole", in German they literally construct the word from base words - "wordworms" they call it.

If it's not too long RP, PM me the material and I can usually do a half-decent translation if it's not overly technical, especially if the wife is in a good mood and can help me with the tricky bits!

I liked ROTJ the best. I'm a big Emperor fan and he was just plain evil in this film - he looks stupid in ROTS when he ages and whithers and develops a bum-crack down the middle of his forehead. I'm not a big fan of Ewoks but prefer them to Gungans, and the Jabba stuff was also good, plus the speeder-bike sequence and final space battle - oh yeah! I know a lot of people like ESB but I don't like Yoda and so much time is wasted with him and whiney Luke I can't make it top dog. Of the prequels I actually liked AOTC the best - if only for the last half-hour which was some of the most viscerally thrilling action I've seen for ages. The less said about the Padme/Anakin drivel the better though. ROTS was disappointing because the actions of the characters were a little unbelievable - Anakin goes from holding a lightsaber to Palpatine's throat to kneeling at his feet in about 5 seconds. I would have preferred it if they took more time on his corruption - it would have been awesome to see him secretly training with Palpatine while the council thought he was their spy!

Ummm...the acting looks like Gielguld next to the S/FX, IMHO! Also you have to be a little tolerant - they didn't have enough money to do more than one take pretty often.