Raithe

Not a movie.. but they had the final ever episode of Hustle tonight. A nicely done episode with a couple of returning faces, and a con that came down to a redone version of the Sting once more.. It's always quirky to have a show that every now and then breaks the 4th wall by having cast talk directly to the camera.

For the potential Spoiler...

If you're smuggling pot in a Cessna.. don't fly in front of Air Force One... http://www.latimes.c...7,0,82682.story

I have to admit, the recent spate of news over the Falklands is being a tad irksome. http://www.dailymail...tick-views.html http://www.huffingto..._n_1281143.html http://www.bbc.co.uk...gazine-17045169 - What are the Competing Claims? The fact that the islands have been under UK rule since before Argentina existed as a country, and the majority of the population there want to remain under UK rule.. seems to me a good reason to question why they should suddenly get turned over to another country. Sean Penn has done that wonderful thing, saying that the UK is showing old-school colonialism by keeping the islands.. I have to wonder does that mean he also thinks Hawaii should be handed off ? Or that all of his homes across America should be returned to the Native Americans who used to have possession of the land several centuries ago? Instead he's happy spouting off that "The world today is not going to tolerate any ludicrous and archaic commitment to colonialist ideology," - Which pretty much seems to be what the Argentines are doing. The UK is supporting the right of the people living on the Islands to choose who they want. Maybe it's my cynical nature, but I do get the feeling that the Argentine President is using the hot button of the Falklands to help distract folks from domestic issues...

Gibbed's Save Game Editor. Doesn't have any plot flags from ME2. Looks like he quit pretty early. I can't find anything to say if the save did a romance or what happened to Collector Base. There's an updated version as well I believe, one of the other bioware community members added some functionality. Look for "modified gibbed" or some such. I'm not sure exactly how it got expanded though, or whether it just cleans up what was already there. Edit: http://social.bioware.com/project/4373/

Something from the Art of the Mass Effect Universe book - The "Reaper Destroyers" that are actually doing most of the "landing on planets" in ME3 are actually only around 160 meters tall/long. As compared to Sovereign's 2km.... So there's possibilities on just how Reapers are divided into what sort of categories/purpose, and how powerful or not. I would imagine that Sovereign might be an ultra-powerful Reaper because of the role he was supposed to play in regards to the Reaper-Plans... We don't know how Harbringer relates to Sovereign, since he was only around as a presence possessing Collectors..

The question of whether its an action movie or a romance one.. Either way, it is quite good.

And for the quirky marketing ploy...

I was given Chronicles of Riddick over Christmas, realised it was both Escape from Butcher Bay and Dark Athena. Finally got around to installing it and had a short start up of it. Butcher Bay is showing some of its age visually, but it seems interesting enough. Plus its kind of amusing to hear all the voices and try to name the actor.

Well they're still giving you points for your choices, so something must exist. Since they seem to have set it all up to the Renegade choices if you weren't importing saves in ME2, I'll guess that the "Action mode" will automatically select Renegade options when that's possible to decide how the story semi-branches...

Heh, Claudia Black is doing two seperate voices.. and they even have Natalia Cigliuti back as Morinth. So they even wrote in that part if you chose to keep her alive in ME2... And yes, Conrad Verner is back again

So pretty much every squadmate from ME1 will turn up in your squad. Surviving members of ME2 squad will turn up in the game, and - potentially - might be squadmates for one or two missions, but won't be part of the fly around the universe, live out of the ship type of squadmates. Hm,also, if you pay attention ot the comics... apparently Cerberus were able to take over Omega, so Aria is on the run. Why do I get the feeling she's going to turn up in ME3. Either as a full on squadmate, or as a special squadmate....

One of the interesting things with Europe is how a lot of the countries have a legal system based on the Napoleonic code. And the French have a habit of talking about how rigerous their standards are compared to so many other countries. However, a lot of the European countries don't actually enforce the extent of their legal code on their citizenry. Case in point, MOT's. The French love to talk about how high their standards are compared to the UK's. However, when when we stopped French Lorry Drivers and enforced our apparently "low standards of MOT" to their vehicles, a large percentage failed. Lower standards that actually get enforced, rather then high standards that aren't... It's all sorts of fun and games with any legal systems.

"Valentine's Day can be a lot like your taste in chocolate. Sometimes its soft and gooey. Othertimes its just dark and bitter..."

Eh, she's moved out, she's come back, she got engaged, she moved in with her fiance, a year later that broke up and she moved home.. she spent a year away living at a farm and working at the stables there, then came home to save money so she can get a place for herself... It's that sort of repeat. Heh, I mean, i've kind of got a good excuse for not having left home. I've been mom's primary carer for the..hm, well last decade.

And are there any comparable statistics for unsolved crimes between China and the US? Or just how many of China's judgements end in the bullet to the head that the defendants family are then charged for?

I have to admit, that's one bit that made me blink. The Normandy Mark 2 is a privately owned vessel.. so by what right do the Alliance have to strip Shephard of it and then man it with their own personnel? I mean, apparently both Joker and Doc Chakwa had resigned after Shep's "death", and - depending on how you handle it - Shep is still a Spectre after ME2... Edit: Just had my copy of the Art of the Mass Effect Universe arrive and having a flip through it.. A lot of the 1st chapter is regurgitated from the original "Art of Mass Effect" of course, but has a few new things. The 2nd chapter sketches out some nice points on why things developed in ME2.. and I'm trying to avoid reading too much of the ME3 chapter .,, Although, one thing that did jump out... Apparently the majority of Reapers we see landing on planets are actually "small reapers" who are only around 160 meters tall, as compared to Sovereign's full 2km length. Geared more for "planetary invasion" then actual space battle. So that's one reason why Shephard is likely to be able to cause damage to them without a full Armada along taking pot shots...

Frustrations with the dog. Well, Okay, to be more fair, frustrations with my sister's attitude to the dog. It's her dog. She's the one who went out and insisted on getting an alsatian. And she carefully manipulated the truth to get it past dad. Along with the whole "i'll train it, I'll be walking it, and I'll be moving in with my boyfriend in x months time so you won't have to put up with it for long." Of course, now she's broken up with the bf, so she isn't moving out. The alsatian isn't that greatly trained for anyone else, and pretty much only pays attention to her. She's walking him less and less, and he's only just past his first birthday. The back garden has been turned into a mudpit along one large diagonal swathe. The carpets are getting wrecked no matter how many times I hoover and steam clean them. The washing machine is getting overloaded with mud from the towels used to dry off the dogs. The kitchen cupboards are just dirty from him running past them as he comes in from the garden.. And my sister keeps being totally oblivious about it and doesn't seem to recognise the fact that she should be cleaning some of this up. Even after mom's blown up at her and basically cried in frustration over it. For someone in her 30's... my sister seems to have a knack for acting like a totally clueless, spoiled 15 year old.

Hm, the sound was a bit low. The start up music was really low, but once you began the actual gameplay it did go up a little. Is it me, or does something about the general character animation this time around look a bit more off then usual? Shephards forearms and hands looked really odd during the introduction walk around....] Also, the demo was glitchy and kept doing little pauses when i played it.. which was.. a wee bit annoying. Gameplay wise, feels a lot like ME2, not really that much of a change to it. It would have been nice to have been able to play around with some of the actual non-combat elements, but..eh, it looks like that is not to be. Played through once, and then uninstalled. Nothing we haven't seen in a dozen gameplay videos over the last half a year...

I just installed Origin.. and found that it's recognised that I own TOR, and offered to let me download that as well, even with it already installed on my system. And it uses exactly the same login and password as both Bioware Social and my SW TOR account... so I'm guessing they're all merged together. So it's kind of nice to see that even though I picked up the physical copy of the game, I've also got access to the digital download if I need it at some future point..

Or dig out a copy of that Gibbed Save Game Editor for ME2 that lets you create a totally new save as you want?

Was meant to be doing research, but my internet keeps dying for large chunks of time. Tried calling up my isp to query them on it, and they won't even tell you the status of the exchange in your area unless you go through all sorts of security about who you are and what your account is... Now I'm crossing my fingers that things stay working longer then 5 minutes at a time..

David Weber's eArc of "War Maid's Choice" - a continuation of his Bahzell series. Cheerfully fun fantasy fair. A fairly accurate review - http://www.otherwheregazette.com/2012/02/10/war-maids-choice-a-geeky-good-time/

If you kept Wrex alive, things are more more "friendly" when you go to Tuchanka in ME2. Wrex has a whole plan about trying to organize the clans, and has kind of become a "kublai khan" type figure in his methods. Not quite as brutal as Genghis, and much more focused on trying to keep a certain civilized element of cooperation going.