Monte Carlo

^ THat's truly awful art, they look like a Nordic Eurovision band entry circa 1998.

OK Brainiac, what about this? I can make a multiplayer game of BG2 where I create and control all of the characters. I'm playing a mp game... as a single player. MWuahahahahahahaaaaa!!! ETc. Mechanics = multiplayer. Gameplay = SP. I know folks who play the Conan MMO basically SP. They like the game, hate the other players. I'm not saying DA2 is a MMO, just that it adopts some of the concepts we associate with them.

Because, what you do when managing leaked security information, is give a running commentary to the other side as to it's veracity. Duh.

In which case the man is a buffoon and it serves him right, given what he has gone and done. People braver than he'll ever be are probably being hunted down and tortured as we speak because of his actions, so tough.

I made this point to a friend, a serving officer with a shed-load of ops tours under his belt. I made the old "imagine the BBC at Omaha Beach" argument. He replied that WW2 was a war of national survival. Afghanistan manifestly isn't. The hoops you have to jump through to make even a vicarious argument that it is simply aren't credible. Although I doubt anybody of one star rank plus who planned Overlord would ever have been promoted, by modern standards, and Ike would never have made PotUS. The French, for example, were extremely magnanimous about the strategic bombing of vast areas of Normandy in June 1944, even when it became apparent that it wasn't remotely accurate. Why? Because the alternative was Nazi occupation. The public in early 1944 were also fully aware of the charnel house of Cassino. After all, neighbours in every street were getting telegrams informing them of deaths in action. Why did they swallow it? Because the Nazis bombed London and Bristol and Exteter and Coventry and killed thousands. My argument remains - We could police Afghanistan by air, in much the same way we contained Saddam for ten years. The people there don't appear to want 'liberation.' We are spending blood and treasure we cannot afford on something that increasingly looks like a fool's errand. This isn't even a remotely controversial POV, I have neither a beard nor sandals and am one of the more Hawkish members of this forum. I simply believe that you only fight wars you can win, with clear strategic and tactical objectives. Afghanistan is the red-headed bastard stepchild of Tony Bliar and Dubya's love in. It really is time to move on, and find other smarter, cheaper and frankly ruthless ways of managing Islamo-Fascism festering in failed states. Cheers MC

With the greatest respect, one of the main issues with the Koran is that the haditha can, and are, interpreted in many different ways. In much the same way as stuff from the Bible is. Difference being, Islam hasn't had it's Martin Luther / Reformation moment yet.

If my character dies then I want him raised from the dead irrespective of cost or operational efficacy.

The Crazies Strange. I started to enjoy it then kinda lost my interest after the US Army & Government = SS Kommando. I was picking up this sort of half-arsed Iraq allegory in there and it just wasn't working. If you want to make a zombie movie without zombies then fine, but the government conspiracy meme can be done much more subtly and convincingly (State of Play, anyone?) or amusingly (Mel Gibson in Conspiracy Theory). My view = a horror hodgepodge with genre identity issues, some good characters wasted and typical mindless stormtrooper portrayal of the military. Cheers MC

Actually, yes. +1 Hell yeah.

I have bags of faith in Blizzard, D3 will be awesome, polished and basically the best thing to happen to gaming a year either side of it's release date. See y'all on Battle.net

Star Wars: The Old Republic. Granted. I meant new franchises - alhough I suppose MMOs are the natural PC-only route for Bio, DA2 looks like a single-player MMO!

There is a certain sense of the past repeating itself --- after BG they went in a console direction with Jade Empire and there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth. Then they delivered a PC title with NWN then went back to consoles with ME / ME2 then delivered a PC-orientated title. I think now, though, the direction of travel is clear (consoles) and Bio is simply echoing broader trends in the industry. I don't really like their games, well 90% of them, but that's show business. I'm not a gambling man but I doubt we will ever see a PC-only or PC-orientated title from Bio again.

The trailer is very purdy, liked the sword-staff on the main guy. However, one pretty trailer does not a great game make, does it?

Still playing the CoHO beta, which is awesome. BG2 on my new laptop, which is the perfect size for IE games (also have IWD / HoW / TotL on it). Installed Titan Quest on the lappie to see how purdy it looks (very) and played a bit more of it. I have to say that I really like the pick and mix skill tree system which allows you to be as gimpy / specialised as you like. It's a bit too hack and slash (not often you hear me say that) and certainly not enough tunnels but the ancient Greek vibe is groovy.

I am pleased with my progress thusfar, please post that stats screen so we can see more forensic evidence of my awesomeness.

^ Night, Is it true that they've got central heating up there now?

Because, like, it's about marines. In space.

It's a nice county with some lovely countryside. The university is well-regarded and it's easy to get to London. That depends where you live. I live in the South so travel to Europe via ferry or Eurostar is easy and I am a frequent visitor to France, Switzerland and Italy. I rarely fly, driving around Europe is brilliant the French have excellent toll roads. Even as a foot passenger on a ferry you can visit France cheaply, cycling is very popular. Normandy is good for that, it's one of my favourite parts of France. OTOH if you live in the Northeast then really you are nearer Scandinavia than France, travelling by road to the South coast sea ports wold be a bit of a pain.

... There you go, newc, seek and ye shall find.

I'm confused. Is this an issue about equality or the minutiae of the US federal vs state constitutional arrangements. My view is that sexuality is fixed. And in aby case, denying people the right to form a legally-binding partnership because of their sexuality is contrary to their civil liberties in a free society. Religions do not 'own' the concept of marriage. There, that's it. The rest is obfuscation.

^ What he said. Different companies aim different franchises at different markets. DA:O seemed like Bio's olive branch to PC gamers: a game that played to the platform's strengths that was also, and unashamedly, a satsifying but secondary experience on console. AS I've said before, I was sceptical about DA:O after NWN (why Bio? WHY?) but happily ate crow pie once I saw Dragon Age. A classy move, IMO, from a company that lost it's classiness in the eyes of a lot of PC gamers. OK, they're chasing the money and going for a console-feel. Not a problem. They are there to turn a profit. But wouldn't it be refreshing if they actually acknowledged that, even in veiled terms, rather than try to present the cuts / weaknesses as some sort of evolution. I'm not buying it, as I've said previously but I love PC games. So for me this is like watching a wildlife documentary about a strange creature shedding it's skin.

I'm sort of dabbling with a bit of this and a bit of that... BG2 / ToB Company of Heroes Titan Quest Medieval Total War 2 Fallout 3 Dragon Age I'm also planning on getting Alpha Protocol to play on my awesome new laptop next week.

Yes, precisely. Although that website has enlightened me as to what unemployed cultural studies and media graduates do all day.

So, 20 minutes into the future? That's interesting and sort of where I'm going. Look at Fatherland by Robert Harris. It's the 1960's. There's the beatles. TWA jets landing at glamorous airports. Oh, and the Nazis 'won' the war after a generously negotiated peace with the British Empire and USA. It's the world as we know it but completely different. Children of Men is another great example, that's the sort of thing I'm getting at.

I'd like an alternative history RPG, which would be 'real-world' enough to capture what the OP is talking about but different enough to explain the lack of everyday constraints that inevitably hinder immersion in a modern setting.