Bartimaeus

People's idea of "old" for computer parts sometimes disturbs me...my mother was still using an old single core Athlon 64 up until a few months ago...now that's getting on the old side. Mothers don't count unless you're a mother who builds/buys a new gaming rig every few years. That said, it's not irrational to consider a product 2-3 years old to be "old" in the world of computing, given Moore's Law. Besides, for those of us who still haven't hit 30 and didn't major in geology, archaeology, paleontology, or astrophysics/cosmology, 2-3 years is a long time (I suppose I should also assume there are those who did/could not attend any institutions of higher education,) especially considering the fact that humans' biological clocks accelerate as one ages. 2-3 years pass in the blink of an eye for a senior but feel like an eternity for a 6 year old. BUT I DIGRESS. I get your point, but...when gaming computing "needs" have increased so very little over the past few years, an i5-2500k is still perfectly serviceable. More than, in fact - still fairly comparable to the "brand new" Haswell i5s. And a 680TI? Please. If my mother was able to play silly SW:TOR on her over ten year old machine, I don't think your "old" hardware is likely to be a problem for a while yet...so don't blame software problems on your still rather nice hardware. (I don't actually too feel strongly about this. It's just that I'm still running ye olde Phenom II X4 with an equally "old" 5770, and am still finding it hard to rationalize upgrading when there's no real apparent need to - not for gaming, anyways, unless I REALLY REALLY want to have the best, which I don't; "just" "high" - "medium" at the absolute worst - is perfectly fine for me - so when somebody mentions their much superior hardware as possibly being the source of their woes... .)

People's idea of "old" for computer parts sometimes disturbs me...my mother was still using an old single core Athlon 64 up until a few months ago...now that's getting on the old side.

Representative democracy means they vote indirectly. If people vote in corrupt people repeatedly, that means they suck as voters, not that the system is broken. Not when said voters [effectively] don't decide the candidates available to choose from to begin with...although I admit this is kind of blurry to me, as we [uSians] really *do* have the power to choose who we want, outside of the two usual candidates...we just never exercise that right, and probably never will, as we've basically been brainwashed not to. Pah.

You're talking as if Russia was an actual democracy where people had a vote as to what happens with their money. It's also a country that institutionalized homophobia and yet hosts an international sporting event supposed to stand for equality and fairness, not personal bigotry of a de facto dictator. You're talking as if democracies have it so that people can actually vote as to what happens with their money...

This is the problem I have with Total War games. My 300 against their 1500...I lose 10-20 guys and the enemy loses 1200-1300. The AI is always stupid in that it tends to rush ahead with its cavalry if it has great superiority, which leads to me quickly trying to take out said cavalry, which then leads to me picking off their ranged units with my cavalry with only lines of infantry to weave through...which then typically leads to me charging one unit of infantry from two opposing sides, causing them to rout, and then again for another unit or two, which subsequently causes a mass rout. I always build my stacks with Cavalry in mind, and tend to win every battle and always feel like I'm cheating. "Pretend inferiority and encourage his arrogance." -Sun Tzu, the Art of War

Circumstances beyond my control forced me to take down all my VNVN videos for a while yet more... In retrospect, uploading Transnational a few days before its official release wasn't such a great idea... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bJsCrloGa8 It's always fun seeing artwork you scanned yourself show up in other places. :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4USrHveKw-4 [...]nowhere else are people so addicted...so addicted...so addicted...to apathy, entertainment, naive faith, and emotionally potent oversimplifications[...]

I was trying to play Medieval 2, but it looks like something's gone wrong with Steam's build of the game in the past few days, because I can't start up the game suddenly and others have been reporting the same problem...the .exes just don't do anything, haha. Even tried doing a complete reinstall...neh. Some indie game called 10,000,000 that a friend gave to me because it was on sale for like $1 on Steam, and he enjoys making me play games I don't want to and/or suffer in general. It's actually not as bad as I thought it'd be, for what is essentially a Bejewlwed-RPG hybrid...

Whoa, maybe it's just me, but I feel like this is something that should've been mentioned months ago...haha. Hurray!

Possibly because you've either been dead, in a coma, or simply living under a rock these past few months? Where have you been that it has not been mentioned?

NuMantra - Mesh

Literally [one of] the best thing I've ever seen in my life. Thank you, Prosper.

I felt like Spec Ops gameplay was *extremely* boring. Not only that, but the game was also really preachy, too. I felt like they really didn't have to (and really shouldn't have) talk(ed) about the stupid crap the game was forcing you into doing every single time something happened. I felt like the events should've spoken for themselves enough. Also agreeing on Mass Effect >=2's gameplay - yuck. Horribly repetitive, especially on the hardest difficulty. Pop out to shoot until your shields break, hide until they heal, pop back out until your shields break, hide until they heal...pray to God that nobody tries to actually, y'know, flank you, because you'll be complete toast if they do...ugh.

What exactly is the definition of "blant"? I tried Googling it, but all I got were crappy urban dictionary entries that seemed to have nothing to do with the subject at hand, as well as one entry that basically equated to "bland".

You can skip the iffy Steam "reinstall" process, (which I *have* had problems with, though it worked well recently when I moved my Steam folder recently), by copying the relevant appmanifest_xxx.acf from your original SteamApps folder to the next and then restarting Steam. For Enemy Unknown, it'd be appmanifest_200510.acf.

Similar to mkreku, I don't keep even a single game on my C:\ drive, and have never had problems like that, (and my Steam is installed to my C:\ drive). Steam is neat in that it checks every time you start Steam up what games you have installed in your SteamApps directories, (if it's across multiple drives/locations), via the appmanifest_xxx.acf files in said directories...which is also useful for faking games being installed for collecting trading cards by having Steam launch the "game" and in reality only opening a notepad instance or such, (or for just accruing play time for whatever reason). Not sure why you're having problems with it.

I have no idea what "TL2" is, but my generic answer would be, "I very much doubt it" for both questions. As long as he originally played on his account and continues to play on his account, regardless of any other circumstances, his saves should be still used for any future playing. As for redownloading the game, I would say "no" no matter what. I can't think of any reason for having to redownload a game already installed. Steam is pretty good with that sort of thing.

I've played through it in both English and Russian, and I actually liked some of the English more than the Russian. The Dark Ones, particularly, I thought sounded better than with the deep Russian voices. Loved Metro 2033 - such a shame I really didn't like the sequel...

I could only find two, for games I actually enjoy(ed) play(ing)...and they were expansions: Total War: Rome: Alexander, and Total War: Medieval II: Kingdoms. Only checked about 40 out of my 166+282 library.

Finally beat Hitman: Blood Money - Silent Assassin on every mission. Last mission was ridiculous for trying to get the rating, as you can't have any bodies be discovered, (or indeed, take down anyone besides your primary targets except with your two shots of sedatives), but the game places a dead body as part of the story, (enemy assassin disguising as somebody else), right in front of a guard that basically eventually and almost always comes across it. You can't really move it, either, because, again, the guard will see you and/or the body. Between that and making sure you're not captured on any cameras in the bloody White House...it was relatively hard. Tried playing Path of Exile a bit, but after hitting about level 40, I'm already completely burnt out...thanks, Diablo, you soul-sucker of a game - can't play these types of games for any length of time anymore. Also trying Spec Ops: The Line...eh. Not a huge fan of third person shooters, especially ones that have wacky mouse controls...and ones that pointlessly try to preach verbally in ADDITION to the actual game, (why the game has to keep going on and on about the horrible stuff the game has railroaded you into doing, I don't know - I feel like the acts should speak for themselves). Played through Banjo-Kazooie recently, too. I used to really prefer Banjo-Kazooie over Banjo-Tooie, but this time it seemed almost...boring. Maybe Banjo-Tooie's relatively high world complexity will actually be a boon instead of a curse this next time I play it. (edit) Agiel, what exactly is the picture supposed to represent? I'm not familiar with this kind of graph...

Merry Christmas, indeed. I'm sick every Christmas, without fail, since moving back to Minnesota...*sigh*

If you're having difficulty with the default game, I don't recommend trying to do it with Sword Coast Stratagems. Man, that last level was hard as all heck with only having just reached epic levels by the time I got there, (I started going through Watcher's Keep in the beginning of Chapter 2 at like level 9...before joining either the Shadow Thieves or Bodhi, or really doing anything at all. Painfully difficult. Was epic leveled by the time I finished...and I still hadn't joined either. Completely broke the game. ). If I recall correctly, that fight in particular, (with the variety of creatures, including the Hive Mother), was the most difficult for me, too...although the super lich with the Robe of Vecna (SCS) and his buffed up, spellcasting (SCS) demi-lich buddies were also pretty hard. Hated that level, haha. I recall also trying to spam Abi-Dalzim's, and it not really having any effect...but in non-SCS, one could hope.

I think if a person screws up and is unable to get them as an ally, they should still be in the game in a way that's potentially equally as satisfying as having them as a party member - so much so, that if you're metagaming, there's a legitimate dilemma whether one should try and get them or not, I think. How would you do this? I have no idea. A problem for better minds than me.

Yes...but don't make it Obsidian's job to sort out the best talent. Instead, make it the community's, who decide who is worthy of Obsidian's notice, who can then (presumably) quickly pick out the few of a handful or two (at best) that they could use. Unfortunately, this would require making an actual system of some sort on Obsidian's end...which is probably already beyond P:E's budget. Therefore...probably no from me.

When I saw this one, I thought, "Wow, with a little touch-up, this could looks like it could be straight out of a Narnia movie or something!". Then I saw the ones after it, and thought, "...or maybe it's just a Prosper monster".