Zoraptor

It's easy, even I can do it. Whether the miniscule performance increase is worth it, on the other hand... When I said three years old I was talking about the 8800GT. Yeah my bad, I was thinking of the 4 1/2 year old 8800gts/x and forgot they had an extra letter. 8800GT is 3 1/2 years old.

Dude, and you are comparing the shipped to sale through. That number (2.7 million) is comparable to at least 3 million for ME2 (and they shipped even MORE later...some estimate upwards of that). For actual sales you are comparing it's 1.3 million to 1.6 million...DUDE. No, that 2.7 million is equivalent to... the 2 million shipped figure you linked to earlier (and which never got a "we've shipped more!" announcement), not some 3 million figure that materialised out of the ether. If you ship 2.7 million, then another 500k it's a fair assumption that the vast majority of that 2.7 million sold* as the alternative is saying that EA likes producing stock destined to sit around in warehouses- that's why you can fairly compare the 2.7 million shipped with a sell through figure, as I said in the original post. If we want to get picky about things then I could just add a [citation needed] after every one of your figures since I did actually provide links. Simple fact is that EA is bound by law to release accurate figures. They said they sold in 2 million copies of ME2 and sold through 1.6 million. That has to be, legally, as accurate a representation as it can be. NPD (presumably where you are getting the comparison from as they do US only figures; if it's VGChartz then I'll have a quiet laugh at the wasted time and move on) does not have to be accurate by law, and their figures are indicative and based in part on estimation and survey. *Alternatively, if you like maths, 2 million shipped (confirmed) -> 1.6 million sold (confirmed) therefore 3.2 million shipped (confirmed) -> 2.6 million sold (speculation; still a cool million above ME2 though, and matches well with most of the initial 2.7 million having been sold...) It's hardly difficult to find, first page of a google search. "Rob Bartel, the principal designer at BioWare, has told MCV that last year

There aren't many games with a 2.5Ghz C2Duo as minimum. That's more than I technically have, though I have had my ancient e6400 overclocked to faster than that. On the other hand a 9800GT is just a rebadged late model 8800GT so it's technically a five (?) year old graphics card.

Dude, it's from an official EA shareholder release. There's no question as to its accuracy. [Edit links, first showing that DAO shipped 2.7million, second showing they then shipped an extra 500k, illustrating the fact that at the very least the vast majority of the 2.7 million must have sold: http://kotaku.com/5467174/left-4-dead-2-se...oses-82-million "Leading video game developer BioWare™, a division of Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ: ERTS), announced today that Dragon Age™: Origins has sold-in over 3.2 million* units worldwide."] Sell in vs sell through. Unsurprisingly games journalists have little to no clue as to the difference hence the breathless "blah sold a billionty billion copies in one day!!!!" headlines. If you change shipped to sold then you can turn anything from Daikatana on up into great successes. Ultimately the only way to guage actual success is by the sell through. I'm not exactly disagreeing, just pointing out that you can get an awful lot of protection against a big budget if you're selling well- movie wise something like Titanic comes to mind, games wise you don't mind a GTAesque $100 million budget if you're also selling a GTAesque 15 million copies. On the subject of the 'rush', I'm actually of the opinion that it isn't being unduly rushed, as I think it's clear that a significant proportion of the DAO team started work on the sequel pretty much straight after the PC version stopped being developed, six months prior to the release. Which gives almost exactly a two year development cycle- not unreasonable for a sequel.

You can shoot Husk legs off too, though I think that also automatically kills them. I thought I noticed some dead 'genuine' humanoids missing limbs on occasion as well, though those were only occuring after death and it may have just been the standard odd ragdolling hiding limbs. Certainly it's nothing like JK2 with whatever the amputation switch was.

Per EA (a somewhat more reliable source than volo et alia parroting how ME2 sold a billionty billion copies!!! FACT!!!) ME2 had only sold 1.6 million units after three months, a full million less than DAO had at a similar time. I'd suspect either Baldurs Gate game/ NWN or KOTOR made more absolute profit even if it was distributed to a lot more parties as licenced IP/ publisher deals since the teams that made them were far smaller than those that made any of Bioware's recent games.

Bioware have used technology developed by other EA devs before- the mismemberment (such as it was) in ME2 was adapted (apparently) from the system used by Dead Space. And of course there's other collaborations like Ser Isaac's armour, the main reason anyone would want to buy DA2 now that awkward dwarf sex scenes are out.

The DRM by processor/ hardware locking was "Trusted Computing" (even earlier was Intel's unique processor identifier, whose technical name escapes me and which got demoted to default off after an outcry as well). TC's back: Steam is moving towards implementing hardware DRM in concert with Intel's new Sandy Bridge processors. On a purely optional basis and for your own protection, of course, and with the nice friendly name of Steam Guard. [Not that DA2 is using anything like that though, its DRM seems to be about as reasonable as any other activation based system now that the periodic dial homes are gone]

It's because in order to pirate the console versions you just need access to a disk from whatever source- fabrication plant, review copy, early stock delivery. Historically the same would be true for PC but the one thing the move towards activation has actually achieved is the tendency for PC games to be pirated day 1* rather than day < 1 as the exe andor other essential files aren't present on the physical dvd making early disk images a rather pointless download. On 360 and now PS3 if one has a modded console there's nothing to stop one playing early, so long as one isn't the sort of gibbering moron who goes onto Live/PSN while playing (in which case one would doubly deserve the inevitable ban or bricking which results). *Practically it's still less than day 1 for some regions due to the staggering of release dates.

Yes, it's far too complex a situation to put anything down to a single cause and anyone stating causes is really only stating their own opinion of what they think is significant. There's clearly a bunch of different factors and influences at work. At this stage though the obvious 'disprover' of the violence + anti-westernism = stability theory is, well, Libya.

Interesting angle. How would this explain the failure of revolts in several places? Does it correlate with the spread of such comms? I've no idea. If so, get a paper out about it, double quick. Depends what you mean by 'failure' of revolt. Generally where there is a 'failure' (and in many cases I suspect it is more like a delay rather than an outright failure) there is some sort of other circumstance effecting things- like the presence of very strongly motivated pro-government people in Iran to balance the anti-government ones, or the general disdain for Israel in Lebanon or Syria that tends to stabilise what should theoretically be fairly unpopular governments, or that there is a potential for just throwing enormous amounts of cash at problems if you're Saudi/ Kuwaiti/ Qatari. The main reason I'd say that the mass communication angle is important is that it evens out one of the really big advantages a repressive regime has traditionally had. If you have someone on a street corner shouting "down with the tyrants" it's a matter of simplicity to bundle them into a car. If someone says the same thing on the internet it is theoretically available to everyone, it's far more difficult to censor and far more difficult to bundle the offenders off to the arabic equivalent of Room 101. Basically it comes down to three factors: it's easier to disseminate the information, it's more difficult to repress the information and- in military terms- it gives protesters an ability to communicate that rivals the ability of police or military in terms of immediacy, even if it is not as robust. So whereas you might be dealing with a few scattered and easy to handle groups previously it is now far easier for those groups to cooperate/ amalgamate and organise.

I'm originally from Christchurch and lived there until I was twenty. I haven't heard of anyone I know who is missing, at least.

Part of their argument was that Iraq would act as an example- the first domino, if you will- and all the middle east would follow its shining example to freedom, pluralism and democracy, and that that would make further direct intervention unnecessary. It is at least arguable (though not something that I agree with, as I've said before I tend to think that the democratisation of mass communication is the most important factor) that a major factor in the unrest is Arabs looking at Iraq and asking "if they can have elections, why can't we?"

I hate to say it, but I don't see much hope for Iran, the government is too determined and brutal. May be if there's dissension in the ruling class. There is dissension in the ruling class*. The big thing Iran has going for it (governmental stability wise) is that its government is as widely liked by portions of its population as much as it is disliked by other parts. The loyalty Mubarak and Ben Ali had was almost entirely from those that were paid to be loyal, but there's still a very large segment of Iran's population- almost entirely ignored by the west- for which the Islamic Revolution is still a living, breathing entity and Ahmedinajad/ Khamenei etc are popular embodiments of that. In theory Gaddafi should have elements of the same support, but his pan-Arabism hasn't really panned (haha) out and his pan-Africansim has nowhere near the same resonance, which rather leaves him as just another rhetorical secular blowhard. *You don't get to be a presidential candidates in Iran (ie Kouroubi/ Mousavi) without being 'ruling class' and Rafsanjani/ Khatami are actual ex presidents.

Wing Commander 3 had a losing mission sequence, if you always succeeded in getting the temblor you'd never see them at all. In WC4 it was also possible to lose by messing up the choices at the end.

It's also problematic because the torrents 'know' they are being monitored and either block IPs known to be monitoring or seed dozens of spoofed IPs to them. On the subject of mass mailing of 'warning letters' I noted with despondency that ACS: Law folded a week or so ago. It is truly a tragedy that retired pensioners on dial up will no longer get letters demanding payment of fines in lieu of court action for no reason other than someone on a torrent spoofing their IP.

That's what D2D is doing with certain (mostly older) games, though they charge $5 which you get as a discount if you end up buying. I can't see it catching on, it would probably be difficult to implement and regulate properly, and an hours play if about half the length of some games nowadays. charging 5$ to rent a game for an hour is such a ripoff, i can only imagine it would make people want to pirate MORE. I definitely cant picture that type of scheme winning anyone over. Sorry, the d2d thing is $5 for five hours, so it's a decent amount of time. The second sentence was referring specifically to the 1 hour on steam idea but ended up implying both were an hour.

That's what D2D is doing with certain (mostly older) games, though they charge $5 which you get as a discount if you end up buying. I can't see it catching on, it would probably be difficult to implement and regulate properly, and an hours play if about half the length of some games nowadays.

I didn't take it seriously, as I said at the end the only serious thing was the question of why so many people who object to piracy on moral grounds think it's OK to throw unfounded accusations around despite that being morally questionable as well, as it always happens. And that's a garbage assumption. It's also irrelevant as I didn't come close to defending piracy by the most broad definition possible.

Why do those who get upset at piracy feel the need to, and that it is OK to, imply (if they're a gutless worm crawling on their belly) or outright say that those with a contrary view are pirates- thus defaming them. If you're going to go on about morality and the like then surely it is also immoral to slander? Hmm, you're a lawyer, is defaming someone on the internet slander or libel, I've always wondered whether it's counted as written (I presume) or spoken, or is it covered by the blanket defamation? Am I obliged to give you a chance to apologise or do I skip straight to the litigation at dawn part? Where does a slander stand on the morality scale relative to 'stealing'? Am I being serious?* [..] I'll give you credit, you were at least blunt about it unlike the usual so you're not a gutless worm. It's also rather amusing because I'm situationally incapable of pirating, seeing as I have dial up, or a mobile connection with a whopping 2 GB data cap. Still, if all you can come up with is TPB my point stands, if you pirate something you'll get sued rather than prosecuted except under unusual circumstances like running a large commercial enterprise. Mass mailings of 'infringement notices' would trump actual criminal cases by a factor of several thousand, I would suspect. *Well, the first question is a serious one, and I have always wondered about the defamation part though I'd guess it would vary by jurisdiction.

Well, it's almost always covered in civil law, as I understand it, ie you get sued for piracy rather than arrested unless there are very unusual circumstances. That's why it not being stealing is significant, as stealing is enforced by police while rights infringements are enforced by the rights holders, in civil court.

I've already got around the multiple Ravel aspects in PST/ IWD2 etc by the simple rhetorical device of defining D&D as a single dimension. Which leaves AP (no obvious analogue, maybe if there'd been a bit more from Albatross he could have been a scarf wearing, cross dressing Ravel) and FONV which I haven't played. Not much can be said about Alien or Torn since they weren't even released, and DS3 hasn't been released yet. So the point still stands, Carth is twice as dimensional as Kreia.

per WoD, much as I would like to claim to be an internet ninja it was the first link in the first Telegraph article I read.

Carth is a true multidimensional character, far more than Kreia. Carth exists in the D&D dimension (Anomen), Jade Empire dimension (Sky), SW dimension (well duh) and the Mass Effect dimension (Kaiden). How many more dimensions do you want? Kreia only exists in the D&D and SW dimensions. Thus Carth > Kreia FACT! or QED, for the cerebral who like a nice discussion of the finer points of Kant, Goethe, Descartes or Mathers in their RPG.

Warning: If you work for the US government DO NOT click the link below http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wikileaks-...TS-MEETING.html Goes to the cable (presumably, it's of little interest to me)