Nepenthe

You perceive a lack of thinking every time anyone disagrees with you. How about reflecting on that, lawyer? Your perception about my choice to make a point is woefully misplaced. I think that actibliz are colossal tools, and my opinion is only amplified by their drm solutions. However, I also view people who create elaborate scenarios (hotel wlan?) to make it appear that such a drm would give anyone any practical problems as tools. In fact, I think most people are tools (including probably myself), but that's neither here nor there...

Who has two thumbs and a splitting headache?

It's not really related to the workload, it's more like a conflict on the maslow hierarchy of needs. Making **** money, Remind me why you're punishing yourself, again? You seem pretty switched on, generally. Punishing myself with grad school or in general? If the latter, hard to say. We have a pretty high dropout rate in law post-grad, it burns out people who can survive pretty tough ordinary work life. Favouritism reigns pretty high, and I'm not one of the accepted golden boys (though, it could be a lot worse, I have some influential protectors). High-stress job, coupled with a lack of prospects, I guess. Having an absurdly tough time finding a job, like I've had for the past ten years. It's possible I'm triggering some kind of prejudice in a lot of employers, I guess, but still looking at unemployment in the end of all this **** I've been shoveling. That, and watching all the people around me who "settled" - they think "down", but actually "for". Them talking about the kind of music they used to listen to before their wives reprogrammed them. Being a bitter **** from having tasted a perfect relationship, for it to be discarded for a life in suburbia and real estate agency. That's the abridged version, anyway.

Always fun to see people's reactions when they are the butt of a joke. This one's pretty good, right here. That's not a simple joke, and you're being intellectually dishonest right now. Then again, not news for you. The difference between trolls and me is that trolls provoke you to make you snap in a childish way, while I try to provoke thinking, when I perceive a lack of it. Of course, I probably have a really low success rate, but it hasn't stopped me, yet.

Don't you guys get tired of running around, waving your hands, screaming that the sky is falling on a daily basis? Or doing the Internet equivalent of it?

Always fun to see people's reactions when they are the butt of a joke. This one's pretty good, right here.

Seems like my mental health is more fragile than I thought. Also been having an on/off migraine since saturday, which has totally knocked me out twice already. Also suicidal. Kids, don't go to grad school.

The internet artificial panic brigade only woke up now?

Why are we assuming that they are going to be idiots about it? Oh hang on, this is the Internet, we always leap to the conclusion that people are idiots, without giving them the benefit of the doubt or even spending a second to think about the possible causes. And yes, I admit, that mini-rant is only partially related to this topic. Now, if they incorporate stupid, clashing ads into their gameworld after spending an exceptional amount of energy on the visual style of their game, they are ****tards. I haven't seen any signs of them being ****tards, so for the moment, I'm going to assume that the ads stylistically match the game.

I don't think it's a real spoiler if I say that it discusses the origin of the Darkspawn. I've seen review sites mark it lower than the original game. Which surprises me, since I thought it addressed most, if not all, of the complaints people had about the original game. Well, DA2-bashing seems like a popular pass-time, and some sites seem to be quite happy to kiss up to their loudest commentators.

Would I be wrong in stating that "gangster holding a gun gets shot by police" wouldn't even be news in a sizeable part of the world, never mind the sparking for riots? I don't think even the Police RoE generally require you to be shot at to allowed to pull the trigger. IMO just an excuse to one-up the French from last year. Glad I got that big tv while I still had a lucrative job. When I'm an unemployed ll.d. I'll only have to steal the booze.

:D So, where were we. The usual problem of having too much time and not enough money. Been the same for millennia. Generally leads to a war someplace, where the excess testosterone of the underclass can be curbed. ;P

Close enough for the purposes of this discussion. If I had to guess, Bethesda's acting due to two reasons 1) they are afraid of trademark dilution 2) a registered "scrolls" trademark could wind up in the hands of someone much nastier than the guys applying for it now, and who could use it offensively against Bethesda. IMO Persson is just playing innocent (or he's stupid, which I doubt), and gamers are all too ready to gobble up the "evil producer harassing a poor indie developer" angle. The objection was to an attempt to trademark "scrolls". Edit: Missed that question. Roughly trademark gives you an exclusive right to something (name, term, pattern in the case of Burberry). No trademark, no exclusive right, anyone can make games called "scrolls". (Which, IMO, is not unreasonable)

Yup. Although HP isn't cyberpunk future. Mm, you're right, advertising would be a lot more out of place in something inspired by, say, Blade Runner or even Minority Report.

NFSHP had those too. I think. Frankly, if you're adding billboards to a game to make it more realistic, I'm not going to get my panties in a bunch if the products are real world. Depends a lot on the execution, of course, but I'm not opposed to it as a matter of principle.

So the whole brouhaha is that Notch tried to trademark "Scrolls" for game purposes and Bethesda opposed it? Maybe it's me being a lawyer, but that seems like a pretty ****ing reasonable reaction from them. Don't think "scrolls" is/should be trademarkeable, anyway. Also enjoying the commentary by people with the usual total lack of comprehesion of the differences between copyright, patents and trademarks, yet who still consider themselves to be experts.

That was the first deus ex!

When she comes back, there's the options Ok, my post was from the redundancy department of redundancy. Moving on...

Did they? Ok, the dwarf king choice gave you a reactive miniquest in DA2, but what did the redcliffe kid do? Give you one of three different end game slides? I think, say, whatever happens with the sibling that survives the prologue has a lot more variation than any of your examples... Though, I agree, that it's more about guessing/luck and less about choice. You had a choice who to crown, or to let the kid live or not. If the quests were made to DA2 standards, one of the Orzimmar dwarves would've been a lyrium-infused maddorf that you had to kill, while the kid would've turned into an abomination straight away. No, either one of those would have been dependent on whether you have a specific npc in the party or not.

:D Enjoy it will you still can. The Finnish thought police will have you too in a year or so! (p.s. Morgoth missed the point. They're already on an Island, kiling and looting each other off).

Did they? Ok, the dwarf king choice gave you a reactive miniquest in DA2, but what did the redcliffe kid do? Give you one of three different end game slides? I think, say, whatever happens with the sibling that survives the prologue has a lot more variation than any of your examples... Though, I agree, that it's more about guessing/luck and less about choice.

... You basically just have to travel to the outworld with him in your party in the 2nd act. Are you already in the third?

Walsh accidentally the whole post!

I always though discussion was okay, promotion and linking was not okay. The former can be useful, the latter two can have unfortunate consequences. Discretion is sometimes required to determine when something is 'promotion'. See, I got confused when the New Guy got jumped on for saying that he didn't pay for whatever game, and then displaying a disturbingly intricate knowledge of D2 hacking is perfectly normal... But that's ok, I get confused easily!

Am finding the guidelines of what constitutes a discussion on piracy exceedingly confusing, these days.