BruceVC

ICC is going to be applying for warrants for the top 3 Hamas leaders and Netanyahu and the Israeli defence minister Interesting developments

I completed EOB2 after about 35 hours I didnt think it was as good as EOB1 for 2 main reasons and these are also my main criticisms First and main issue is you have an incredibly bad design where you cant complete the game if you dont find a specific item and you not able to go back to find the item because a particular door is closed. For example on Silver Tower level 3 you need to find the Crystal Hammer for access to the Azure Tower level but I didnt even know I had to find the Crystal Hammer and I got to the end of the Silver Tower, defeated the beholders and then got teleported back to Temple but I couldn't go back to Silver Tower L3 because the door on L2 is now closed. I then had to use ASE ( built-in automap) teleport function to get through the Crystal Door but the Steam version of ASE doesn't include ASE teleport so I had to download and configure the normal ASE But you shouldnt have to use a " cheat " just because you missed out on 1 item, any game should allow you to go back and find that item at the very least EOB1 wasnt like that, it allowed to you travel back and retrace your steps and I didnt have to " cheat" once to complete the game But I did enjoy EOB2, I liked several of the dungeon designs and puzzles like the Medusa Maze and the final battle with Dran was fun....I literally used save scumming and spent the entire battle moving from square to square to avoid his spells and then his dragon form fire breath. It was hard but he died at the end EOB2 gets a 58/100 on the globally followed " BruceVC game rate system " Its a fun game but very difficult and sometimes unfairly difficult. I cant imagine anyone completing this game without consulting game guides and getting tips but I suppose its possible I am now playing EOB3, I might as well complete the series. Its okay so far, nothing to write home about

This is really what my point is, the US needs to continue to provide aid to Ukraine if its going to "out last " Russia The EU provides aid but its not enough. The US can afford the aid but thats not the issue, its the requirement that aid packages must be approved in both the House and Senate and thats where the potential problem comes with approval You can see from the last aid packages and how representatives from both parties voted The House : 311 votes to 112 for the aid (While all 210 Democrats voted in favour, more Republicans were against the legislation than in favour of it, 112 to 101) The Senate : The package, which passed on a 79-18 bipartisan vote (The funding passed with the support of 46 Democrats, 31 Republicans and 2 independents, following hours of speeches by senators. Two Democrats, 15 Republicans and one independent opposed it. Three GOP senators — Rand Paul of Kentucky, Tim Scott of South Carolina and Tommy Tuberville of Alabama — didn’t vote) https://edition.cnn.com/2024/04/23/politics/senate-vote-israel-ukraine-aid-dg/index.html#:~:text=The funding passed with the,Alabama — didn't vote. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68848277 So you right thats its a group of GOP members in the House that are basically opposed to Ukraine aid but its 55% of them and then the GOP in the Senate support aid so thats not an issue But going forward we dont know how this is going to change and we dont know what Trump is going to do if he wins the election. He has influence on the GOP and there votes could change based on what he tells them to do This is the greatest risk to Ukraine defending against the Russian invasion and " out lasting " Russia , its not that many people in Congress dont support Ukraine or that the US doesnt have the resources . They do but we dont know how future votes are going to go because it depends on the individual representatives in Congress and these votes get influenced by other things like the border crisis or aid to Israel

Do we know the reason for the assassination? Is the shooter a nutjob or it political and if its political what is the political reason because it could be lots of things Keep us updated

I read that article and I found it interesting. The frustrating reality is we just know what really motivates Russia or Putin around these decisions. There is lots of informed and accurate guesses but nothing that is ever really confirmed But if this is true its about economic attrition around production and not a decisive Russian military victory. And its not a bad strategy and it means the West will have to continue to support Ukraine with aid which really matters and is not necessarily guaranteed if you think about the delayed US aid So the US would be critical in " out lasting " Russia in this proposed economic attrition

Whats with all these recent arrests in Russia, I heard its something to do with corruption within the Russian arms industry and the state being overcharged and the economic impact on the fiscus? Shoigu's replacement is an economist?

Another hilarious Babylon Bee take

I have never of him but I dont follow up of Putins inner circle or prominent Russian politicians I had heard of Shoigu but only when the war started

Malc you being cynical again, remember you said you werent going to be as cynical

Yes it is lots of unnecessary drama and outrage and Biden is right The US cant provide the same support to Israel for the Rafah military campaign without a proper humanitarian plan for the Palestinian civilians And despite discussion around this Israel has not provided a satisfactory plan for this so the US must do something like suspending this type of military aid, I dont know how much of difference it will make but its symbolically important

Yes thats all true It doesnt explain much but its not suppose to because they only had 30 seconds. Its not about the policies of the DA Its just another example of a sensationalized political advert but the point is really the overreaction to this advert from ANC which is also a political response Its been in the news the last 2-3 days and some people are literally " outraged " because they think its treasonous and racist Like I mentioned with the ANC grandstanding about taking legal steps because of the flag burning But a flag wasnt burned. Its just a political advert

Did they ever stop?

South Africa is having its national election on 29 May and we in full season of populist and utterly unrealistic campaign promises from numerous political parties that are ubiquitous with the " silly season " reality in any Democracy with different political parties The party I vote for, the DA, released this campaign video of the " South African flag burning " and it received the expected immediate criticism around "racism, treason " and " abhorrent and unpatriotic " comments from the ANC and other political parties The ANC even going as far to say " Sport, Arts and Culture Minister, Zizi Kodwa, is considering taking further steps against the Democratic Alliance over the party's ad depicting the South African flag burning" https://www.enca.com/top-stories/mi...action-against-da-after-flag-burning-campaign Here is the actual advert and its clear most people who are " outraged " haven't watched it or havent bothered to understand its political message In summary the advert doesnt show an actual physical flag being burnt, its a digital AI piece of paper and the " flag" gets restored its a political metaphor about the state of the country under a coalition of the ANC and other parties like the EFF But watch this video and tell me if you think its "treasonous " and legal action needs to be taken against the DA

I am going to do it, I havent forgotten

All business units and companies owned by Microsoft would have an individual yearly target within Microsoft's main financial target they announce at the beginning of the financial year Thats what all listed companies do and that is what is expected they must achieve for investors and shareholders So Bethesda and Obsidian would have a revenue goal they have to achieve and in gaming that would align with revenue sales once a new game is released I cant imagine it would work any other way? So its not really " Microsoft standards " but an expected agreement how all listed companies function and how smaller companies within the group need to deliver on

Fantastic news about your health GD, excellent to hear What a great retirement decision, you always spoke about travelling around the US and seeing the national parks. Now you get to do it in good company with Gwen You should create a blog with a one page story about each park, call it something like " A dogs journey around the gardens of the USA " Those types of tourist and interesting stories are always appreciated

Great read about Gorths gaming journey and its a good initiative to see other peoples stories and experiences

Hurlshot is 100% correct, the best way to ensure Obsidian doesn't get restructured or shutdown is for everyone to buy a copy of any game released by Obsidian We can add it to our Steam\GOG list of " games still to be played "

I never like to hear news about any gaming company closing down. But technically the way listed companies are structured its not shareholders who make the decisions about who gets fired, retrenched or a company within the main business gets restructured\shutdown Its the board who decides this and its normally about the overall sustainability and profitability of the business unit. Microsoft would have millions of different shareholders and almost all shareholders have an expectation of a positive return on the share price which is understandable. No one would buy shares if they didnt increase in value because whats the point if they dont ? And the board of every company manages the shareholder relationship which means they have to ensure that every business unit performs and makes its target Its not unreasonable this type of structure and relationship and Redfall was a bad game. So the main difference between a small development company making a bad game and that same company being part of the larger company like Microsoft is there less appetite for making a bad game because you are expected to deliver on results in the latter example But I also imagine the board would have to consider reputational damage, so you dont just shutdown iconic and prestigious studios like Obsidian or Bethesda over one bad game or one initially badly received game They would balance these things

Great story Gorthfuscious. Such an interesting journey and you have been around since the early days so you have seen things progress and advance to the level of gaming from where we are now

And these are all valid examples but what is the petition expecting to change legally In other words if there is an online gaming service that is losing money is the legislation going to say " you cant shutdown the gaming servers " ? And thats fine but then who is going to pay for the servers to be maintained? Maybe the idea is where the community maintains it like City of Heroes I just think trying to get the state to legislate this type of thing is problematic

I still dont understand what the petition is suppose to achieve, this what the petition website says " Many videogames rely on servers. When these are shut down, games can be left unplayable where no action is taken to remove this dependency. We believe this is effectively robbing customers, leaving them with no recourse to retain their purchases. We have concerns that existing laws and agencies do not effectively solve this problem. Thus we believe government intervention is needed to stop this practice." What if a company goes under, then the online servers will also be shutdown. But whats more relevant is what is an example of what they talking about ? Specifically around what they mean by " When these are shut down, games can be left unplayable"

Yes it makes no sense. It must be because of a specific example and that would be why this petition was created But the UK is famous for these types of well-meaning but mostly pointless examples of outrage, they dont lead to much real change around implementation

Im not sure I understand the objective? What are people expecting, what do they mean by " in a reasonably working state when support ends" Do they mean official patches and fixes and does this include community patches or mods, is that support? Because you can have a bug specific to your PC or mods you loaded and if you dont fix it then you cant finish the game. Its unrealistic to hold the original developers legally responsible for that? They must be talking about a specific game or games that was the foundation of this petition so I wonder what they mean?

I completed EoB1 after about 45 hours, it was a great experience and well worth playing So a couple of comments An Automap feature is a MUST for your average gamer if you serious about completing the game, of course you can make maps manually. A map is critical to completing levels for several reasons that include you find levers and buttons that sometimes open doors or hidden walls that aren't always in the vicinity of where you are but with the automap you can see immediately what a button does I loved how the game is non-linear and you sometimes find keys in different places that you decide what you want to unlock and then you can progress as you want and I didnt explore every level completely The " fast travel " was a brilliant and well done feature. It makes exploration for the stone items worthwhile but its not easy to teleport unless you find specific portals I enjoyed the overall combat mechanics, simple but still entertaining I had an interesting final battle with the beholder Xanathar, initially he decimated me after 3-4 rounds of combat with death spells and fireballs. Then I read some combat tips and I had the Wand of Silivias. But it didnt seem to work where you supposed to push Xanathar back to this spike trap so I adopted my own strategy. I ran to the room with the spike trap and literally fought him by running around the room, attacking him and avoiding his frontal spells. It was hard but eventually effective. I nearly had a crisis because I used a save game when he was down to 50% of health but then my front line fighters got killed and I accidently saved instead of restoring And because you only have 1 save game and load game that meant I was stuck with a party of 3 dead party members and these were the only people who could harm Xanathar. But I ran away and luckily my Cleric was still alive and I had 2 Raise Dead scrolls so I used that to resurrect my fighters, heal and return to the battle and I was able to win and defeat the diabolical Xanathar I am now playing EoB2 and I decided to import my previous party, I have just started and already I can see some improvements like how magical items are identified and multiple save games. Very appreciated change to EoB1 If someone had to ask me " why should I play such an old game like EoB1 when there are all these amazing new games with beautiful graphics and modern features " My answer would be these types of classic games capture the excitement and ambience of dungeon exploration better than any modern game and they always will. Modern games are great but if you want to experience the true thrill of classic D&D exploration you wont find a better way of doing it than from games like EoB And finally it gets a solid 70/100 on the globally respected " BruceVC game rating system "