Zoraptor

(1) Doesn't really compute. You wouldn't say 'don't jump to conclusions, it was probably a mine' if you knew all along it was a torpedo. (2) Captain's ship blows in half, he phones in a 'we are being attacked' message. If it happened before his ship blew in half it'd be fairly compelling, for sure, but after? All he knows is that there's a big explosion. There's no suggestion that a torpedo launch was detected at any point, just an explosion. (3) First I've heard of them having new stealth tech, considering the US sonar is designed to detect 'proper' stealth tech used by the Russians on SSBNs I find it difficult to believe that DPRK has better, though I'd be willing to be convinced if you can provide evidence. Perhaps you'd care to furnish the quote where I suggest that? Either an accident or a mine would be alternatives to 'hey let's murder some of our own sailors'. Given what I'd already said I would have thought it obvious what I considered the most likely alternative- hint: I'm hardly going to say that it didn't have to be a torpedo (the parts of which constitute the only actual proof of anything other than a non contact explosion) and could be a mine in two separate places if I thought it had to be/ was a torpedo.

That contradicts their initial statements. It would be a bit embarrassing if true as (1) the Cheonan was an anti-submarine corvette and (2) there are a staggering number of active and passive sonars in that area. Doesn't mean the report isn't true, but most of the 'definitive' details released are no where near as definitive as they're made out to be. I hadn't heard anything about this. When was that? Do you have a link? This mentions two incidents, though it obviously isn't the greatest source in the world for specifics.

Yes exactly, that's why even though it is an example (ie someone could be insulted by being called a janitor) it is a bad example because it's obvious Parker wasn't. Don't worry, you'll never convince Volo it's a bad example, one of his charms is his absolute faith in his own opinions even in the face of incontrovertible proof he's wrong.

Nope, they don't (see spefcifically 'influence mines' as wiki calles them). Haven't since at least WW2 as the Germans had magnetic mines (as well as magnetic torpedoes) which could be nullified by degaussing ships, by that point. They also (can, it does of course depend on the exact torpedo/ exact mine) use the same explosives. I know the contact thing keeps getting repeated but it's simply wrong In this case LoF is right at least on one thing, ROK itself ruled out a torpedo attack initially for several reasons- main one being that there were no 'missing' DPRK submarines and that particular area has the most active/ passive sonar in the world for obvious reasons- and there was absolutely no indications from any intelligence sources that the DPRK had any knowledge about it, no unusual chatter etc. Whether it actually was a fix is unprovable of course, it certainly is politically expedient for the ROK's ruling party to blame the DPRK and they definitely had DPRK origin torpedoes available (from a submarine they nabbed trying to extract DPRK special forces, IIRC). Also their idea of an 'independent' panel was somewhat... well, it would have rather more impact if somewhere like Russia had been included. As it stands the only one with a shred of independence is Sweden.

Irrational has been working on a Civilisation fps for a while, so that's presumably the announcement.

Yeah, you don't get what an example is don't you? Volo is referring to an actual dialogue choice. It's a bad example, as Parker (who Thorton refers to as a 'janitor') takes no umbrage at the suggestion he's a janitor and actually says it would be a good guess later on in the conversation. You can make it an insult, but only if you follow up the initial professional choice with a suave (?) choice, iirc. That's probably the biggest criticism I'd make. It either needed to stay as a 'serious business' spy game or go the more stylised route fully. As it stands having some things realistic and some not is a bit of an uncomfortable blend.

Oh Volo, you've moved on to quoting Codex posters as authoritative sources? Time to give the internet a rest for a bit. Especially since that guy got things outright wrong ( )

And some people slobber all over anything new with a bit of marketing like a labrador puppy after a treat. That's hardly Road to Damascus stuff. A list of Steamworks benefits, from a developer/ publisher's POV 1) DRM. 1a) Not that Steam prevents piracy, of course, though like most online DRM it is at least good at preventing pre Day 1 piracy. 1b) Prevents 2nd hand sales, at least in theory. 2) Monitoring- allows analysis of well, everything game related. Theoretically useful for patching, practically I don't imagine it's used much as I doubt most publishers care enough. 3) Built in MP infrastructure 4) Built in DLC handling 5) Free 6) Misc other features (achievements/ cloud saving) 7) Built in, vocal, fanbase that will defend anything Valve/ Steam to the hilt and beyond. 3-5 can be covered by viLe as well as an alternative, free, middleware. The big points are probably 3-5, and especially 7. The number of people who rejoice at Steam exclusivity as if it's manna from heavan- and as if they wouldn't be able to buy on Steam without the exclusivity- is astounding, and it can hardly be said that any other DRM except for the much neglected and maligned None has anywhere near as much (any) support.

"YOU ACKNOWLEDGE AND AGREE THAT YOUR SOLE AND EXCLUSIVE REMEDY FOR ANY DISPUTE WITH VALVE WITH REGARD TO STEAM OR THE STEAM SOFTWARE IS TO DISCONTINUE USE OF STEAM AND CANCEL YOUR ACCOUNT." "Valve may amend this Agreement at any time in its sole discretion. As a Subscriber, you agree that Valve may amend the terms of this Agreement." [Not me shouting, Valve seems to think it's rather important]

...more seriously, there is an oil exec in Syriana called Leland.

He wrote Thief, System Shock 2 and Bioshock. They all have some pretty obvious narrative similarities ( ). SS3 was under development a few years ago (with no Irrational/ Levine involvement), but John R canceled it pretty much as soon as he got in the door.

Halliburton/ Bechtel. They are separate companies, in real life. I don't really see how much political knowledge is necessary, though it does help with spotting references and allusions/ setting the background. Halbech is pretty obviously The Bad Guys and all the real world knowledge gives you is that suspicion a little before it's confirmed. ".." False.

Most common list of complaints about Steam: Bad/ slow internet, 'moral' reasons, capped internet (particularly if Steamworks goes bonkers and decides to download the whole thing off Steam rather than install off the DVD), bloatware/ resource use, loss of control over your software, adware/ monitoring, service outages, forced patching, lack of mod compatibility (some titles), bad TOS, inconsistent offline mode, bad updates breaking your entire games catalogue, slow startup of games, monopolistic practices, no value added, it's a big target for phishing/ account hacking, just one more extraneous thing that can go wrong... I don't necessarily agree with all of those personally, though I do to some extent with most. As I've said, it doesn't really bother me as it just saves me money and I always have more games to play than time to play them- if Bethesda had stuck with a disk check I'd buy, as it is I won't, net effect $90 saved. I must admit to some fascination with why so many people like Steam so much they want everyone else to be forced into using it, as it's a bit of an alien concept to me. If Valve were to be bought, or go bankrupt, then Gabe would be in no position to make good on his promise- if it would be legal anyway, they'd probably need permission from publishers for each title too to vary the terms of their contracts. He can say it, he can even mean it, he could not legally make good on it as under those circumstances the call would simply no longer be his to make, it would be the new owner/ receiver's. It's largely irrelevant as there's no prospect of a receiver or new buyer shutting the service down, they'd be far more likely to turn it into a subscription model or data mine as the captive audience is one of Steam's most valuable features, commercially speaking.

The starforce thing is just plain wrong too. Sure, it might trash your optical drive but there's never been any indication of it monitoring what you were doing and reporting back to the mothership, let alone any other of the (far more popular than Starforce) disk check based systems- they never ask for internet connectivity. Activation based systems are a bit closer, but even then none of them require an always running client. And again the question is begged: Is Steam so good everyone should be forced to use it?

Even with the $10 difference a PC SKU makes more money (per unit sold) than a console one, though not by a huge amount.

I've hit the traffic cap on my fast internet else I might have actually looked for one. Until tomorrow when the cap resets just imagine some slave boy fanning Cleopatra with palm fronds while she reclines eating grapes.

Nothing personal intended, but... See, this is the thing which really annoys me about these arguments. Nobody wants FNV not to be available on Steam at all. All that is wanted is that it isn't available only on Steam. Given that, I'm always tempted to reply to "Steam is awesome" posts by asking: OK, but do you like it so much that you think everyone on PC should be forced to use it? If your answer is no then your defence of Steam is irrelevant. If it's yes then- as Purkake would put it- fanbois_gonna_fan_.gif

Yep, including hard/ recruit and hard/ no ranged weapons. To be clear though: I did hide behind things, I just didn't use them as formal-spacebar-press cover.

I never used cover (I usually just forgot it was an option) and played the game as a "3rd person fps". It was perfectly feasible to do it that way.

The 'junk' characters will include the number values, as hexadecimal. Many programs will interpret these as funny characters, typically rectangles. I haven't used notepad++ much but I'd be surprised if it doesn't have an interpret as hex/ binary or data inspection tool somewhere- otherwise get something like xvi32 (freeware) which has both raw and interpreted data in split windows, and use that. The uninterpreted junk characters after the variablename are usually a long string of zeroes with the actual variable visible as, well, something which isn't zero roughly in the middle. If you're not sure what you are doing make sure you have back ups!

If people said AP had PS2 level graphics what level of hyperbole do those need? At least it'll run on my 4MB Matrox Millenium? Is it coming for Atari 2600? ??? ?

Arcania is also being funded by the same investment group that part funded NWN2. Whether that is included in the 6 million or not isn't clear from what I read, so it could actually be more than that. I suspect JoWood needs to sell millions of copies because their financial position is dodgy rather than just to recoup investment because they should be in profit well short of millions of copies if that's the total cost.

If that's your primary criterion then you'd be far better off buying from Impulse (Stardock) or Gamersgate (Paradox) as neither associated company makes console games at all. I doubt Valve even think of PC as being a platform at all any more. The platform they support is Steam, not PC, as evidenced by the move to Mac and PS3.

It's Steamworks, you can buy it retail/ DVD and (theoretically at least) it will install completely from there up until it gets to the mandatory online verification/ downloading of updates. The only complaint I have with Gamersgate is that I can't buy with my UK credit card, only my NZ one. There's a bunch of games in that sale (MoWs, KBAP, SR2:R) I'd be all over if they did. I'd probably even buy King's Bounty: The Legend again.