BruceVC

I completed FO2 after about 65 hours, It was a fantastic game and I did prefer it to FO1 but they both excellent CPRG will all the mechanics that we love from that era of gaming Its also not really a fair comparison because FO1 is the original, iconic game and the developers couldnt predict it would be a success so FO2 has the benefit of expanding on established themes and lore which I appreciated like the Enclave, Hubologists and the NCR. But the highlights for me around FO2 were similar to FO1 and they include real character customization and this allows you to truly solve quests in different ways so you feel your characters build matters open world and real sandbox and lots of quests and ways to influence your own journey and reasons to explore the world map unique towns and factions, I loved the lore around New Reno and Vault City a varied choice of weapons and an economy that means you need to find and sell resources like weapons. Ammunition being my biggest constant drain on my finances. I like this type of in game economy because you dont take money for granted I had one major point of frustration and that was initially travelling on the world map and having to encounter endless random encounters as enemies but once I started increasing my outdoor skill that was vastly reduced and the world map became fun i have decided Im going to play FO3 again and continue my Wasteland adventures but not right now And finally I give F02 a 78/100 on the globally respected " BruceVC game rating system " Its highly recommended for anyone who wants a fun and worthwhile CRPG experience

Yes to the army being deployed or yes to no changes to the current immigration policies? And what do you think should be done around the waves of gang violence which is caused by immigrants? Or is that irrelevant to you

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/sweden-opposition-party-calls-military-tackle-deadly-gang-war-2023-09-28/ Sweden is deploying the army to deal with the rampant gang violence within the country, this is an outcome of the well meaning but flawed Swedish immigration policies @Azdeus and @Pidesco Whats your view on this, do you still support the liberal immigration policies that Sweden has adopted the last 10 years or so. And what do you think should be done if you dont support the army being deployed?

I do remember her, she created videos like the new McDonalds franchises in Russia and she went to that Russian mall. Thanks for sharing and if you come across videos like this please tag me because I appreciate it and I was wondering what happened to her. Im glad she is alright and living in Georgia I watched the whole video and I enjoyed it. I mentioned this to @xzar_monty but this type of citizen journalism I think provides more insight and reality into life on the ground in certain countries than what massive international media houses can often capture. She is similar to Daniil Orain And she is obviously young but very well meaning and believes in what she says. A couple of takeaways for me a general interesting video of Montenegro and the nuances in the Slavic language and how these countries are different to Russia, like what times shops close its so nice to see people who are not influenced by US culture wars garbage and have real principles that matter to her like the lack of media freedom in Russia and what that means. She uses words like " safe space " which in most Western countries is a meme and cringe but in her case it matters because she knows what real denial of freedom is. So " safe space " is something significant, its not some Canadian or US university attention seeking exercise I loved how a free media matters to her and other journalists, mostly from Russia, she interviewed. Most of us take for granted a free media and we tend just to criticize the media for being biased but there are many people who absolutely consider the role of journalists to be critical to a healthy society and she is one of them. I also like how she mentioned feminism And then I laughed how cute she is where she said " look at this nice graffiti " ( I detest street art that defaces any historical building or landmark like a bridge ) ' But great video and Im glad she is still alive and following her principles

That sounds more than adequate, I bought a new machine 4 years and I basically made sure it was the " best " hardware at the time ( no such thing really due to nature of hardware improvements ) My objective was ensuring I could run every game at maximum graphic settings and even 4 years later I can more or less still do that with the exception of a few games like RDR2 on certain advanced settings. But I have subsequently realized most of my favorite games dont need the best graphic settings Anyway my main specifications were 64 GB of memory : never had to use anything close to that, 32GB would have been fine' 2 TB SDD: Good investment around disk I\O speed Geoforce RTX 2080 with 12 GB memory : Probably the best investment around graphic settings but also not necessary for the games I play But your rig looks good

I agree, the outrage about Kadyrov son beating up people is a thing but invasions, rape, torture and killing of civilians is not an issue Its because its easier to deny the latter and also the general control of information in Russia means many Russians aren't very well informed about the truth and the atrocities ongoing in Ukraine

Monty are you telling a joke? I have never known you to tell a joke. I like it

I played Amalur and completed it after about 250 hours, But it was uninspirational and it was the easiest and most boring combat I have ever experienced. All I ended up doing was rolling and hitting. I also dont remember anything about the narrative which is never a good sign But the world was aesthetically pleasing and I clearly had some fun because I spent 250 hours on it

I''m about 30 hours into Fallout 2 and as predicted its been a very entertaining CRPG experience. I like all the changes compared to FO1 and they improve on some of the original mechanics like how you interact with your companions I have completed loads of quests and activities in the starting towns that include the Den and Redding. I love how they have expanded on the themes in the dialogue so you come across hilarious options where you accuse people of bigotry like how Sulik was being treated and the general low opinion some people have of you " being a tribal person" I am particularly enjoying the lack of resources and money on early levels but I got lucky, I joined a Caravan to Vault City and despite some really tough random encounters I was able to survive and I looted from the dead enemies loads of new weapons and ammunition which I plan to sell and use now that I have reached Vault City And combat seems harder, or at least much harder enemies like the Wanamingo. I still cant kill them yet, I was trying on level 4-5, but now I have better weapons I will go back to the mines in Redding But I like the harder combat and the way the game has no level scaling. Its always appreciated and adds to the overall risk vs reward

Im not convinced by that general point or argument that the US "should be spending on problem x and not problem y " because its a slippery slope that can lead to almost pointless debates For example you could argue " why is the US spending any money on support for NATO or the UN, why isnt all that money going towards border security, education or the FEMA fund " The US like all countries has a federal yearly budget and different departments would get money allocated to those institutions. But end of the day it has numerous international responsibilities that are reliant on the US funding them and this benefits the US as well around its global interests in most cases But I dont think the US should spend any money on any country or government that is hostile towards it or for example aligned to Russia which has become very anti-US since the invasion

Yes but Russia is not the USSR and Ukraine was also part the USSR and helped certain African countries in the liberation struggle including SA, so by that historical reason Ukraine is also our friend But more important than that the friendship that the ANC had with the USSR was during the Cold War, that cant be used to justify selective interpretations and condemnation of wars and invasions. The ANC official position before the invasion was always basically " we condemn wars and invasions " but they havent condemned Russia like they condemned the US And what makes its worse is they flipflopped around the invasion, here is a link from the initial comments our foreign affairs minister made https://africatimes.com/2022/02/24/south-africa-calls-on-russia-to-withdraw-from-ukraine/#:~:text=“The Republic of South Africa is dismayed at,the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO). To quote " The South African government on Thursday called on Russia to immediately withdraw forces from Ukraine, becoming one of the first African nations to speak up on the matter outside of a global forum like the United Nations Security Council." Then she got into trouble and the message changed and it became " wars are wrong, we believe in peace and all parties need to return to the negotiation table " which is the safe thing to say and obvious but meaningless because what would be the expected comment to make is for Russia to end the invasion. Then there would be immediate peace Im also not disagreeing the ANC sensitivity to perceived colonial and neo-colonial developments but you need to consistent with your views as a government if you say you stand for something like peace or you anti-war and its not just Ukraine where there is this inconsistency And then on a side issue, some people in SA have a lack of interest in understanding the events of history and more importantly how they influenced SA and how Apartheid ended. There is now a fairly common view that " Mandela was a sellout and he betrayed the liberation movement " because he played a huge part in the Codesa negotiations from 1991-1994. Its outrageous and badly informed but it exists Was Mandela a terrorist? He was a terrorist by the technical definition but I dont consider him one because he was fighting against an illegitimate and deeply immoral system and the National Party was not interested in changing anything through negotiations so a violent struggle was inevitable for the likes of ANC But I dont consider him a terrorist because I only consider people as terrorists if they using violence to change a legitimate system and Apartheid SA was not that

Yes I agree and this is the point I was trying to make especially around geographical proximity and lack of identifying with any conflict But then I would expect to find that general indifference when there is any conflict that fits the same profile. And my point is not directed at this forum, Im talking about other examples of how some people have responded to the invasion of Ukraine compared to the invasion of Iraq by the US For example the ANC took a very " critical " view of the invasion of Iraq by the US and condemned it and basically used the argument " its wrong to lie and invade a country. Invasions are wrong "...I can provide you the links with exactly what our president said at the time But they havent openly taken the same position and instead used doublespeak like " we call for peace and for all parties to return to the negotiation party " and some have even gone as far as saying " the invasion is an example of the failure of the UNSC and why we need to transform the UNSC" But Russia sits on the UNSC and Im not sure how having an African country sitting on the UNSC as a permanent member would have prevented this invasion especially when the Russians said they were doing a training exercise

This has nothing to do with Zora and Im also not criticizing anyone or trying to shame anyone . I am pointing out the reasons that people dont really care\have an interest in conflicts in Africa is because you dont live in Africa and you dont have any political or ideological connection to the various conflicts in Africa Its expected and normal. And there will be much more interest in the Ukraine war from the West and the world because people have ethnic, historical and geographical ties to that war and it impacts much of the world around the things like the grain deal and energy

Well there is still ongoing violence and sectarian conflict within the DRC and part of it is about resources And if people on this forum do have an interest about the numerous and ongoing conflicts in Africa why dont we talk about it? You tell me

Here is an informative video of how effectively UK Storm Shadow missiles are being used, always interesting to see how the Russians deny successful targeting of there infrastructure

And....you did didnt you? You amongst friends here so you can be honest

You should create a DRC thread but it wont be very well supported and there wont be much interest. Because its an African conflict and if the AU is indifferent and lacks the political will to fix its own problems you cant realistically expect people in Western countries to meaningfully get involved or to really care on a forum like this @Azdeus there is no media black out with what has been going on in the DRC, its well documented and there are numerous stories about the decades of sectarian violence and abuse in Cobalt mining that are owned mostly by the Chinese. International media houses have filmed some of this abuse and there are documentaries about it https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2212037120 https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/9/12/mining-of-cobalt-copper-in-drc-leading-to-human-rights-abuses-report But I dont want to blame the Chinese because its well known if the government of a country doesnt enforce basic labor laws then the Chinese arent going to do it. And the mines that operate in the DRC dont operate illegally, the government of the DRC is aware of them and they should be the ones insisting on humane work conditions

Yes I agree but I can guarantee you most of those same people will be outraged about any Western country, and particularly the US, doing anything similar to Russia. So they not indifferent when Western countries are involved in wars or invasions, so its selective indifference thats based on ideological reasons and anti-Western bias. This is common in SA from those who support Russia

But Monty if you dont read peoples comments how would you know you dont agree with them? What if someone says something that you agree with?

Its not that, people generally dont relate to wars that are not on there continent, directly impact them or are aligned with there ideological or political views For example in Africa there are now 5-6 military coups, several wars and ongoing Islamic extremist violence but very few people on this forum talk about it But thats because the majority of people on this forum dont live in Africa and they would understandably have other things they focus on.

Its partly because people want to say " look Ukraine is also bad like Russia " because they think its going to the change or reduce the warmongering and brutal nature of the Russian military in Ukraine But it doesn't convince or change anyone's views and who is responsible for this war

Yes and we can go around in circles with that type of argument and historical reasons for geopolitical developments "ISIS wouldn't exist if the Soviets hadnt invaded Afghanistan because AQ was only created because of the outcomes of that war. And then AQ attacked the US in 2001 which led to the understandable invasion of Afghanistan and then the mistake of invading Iraq. ISIS wouldnt exist in its current form if the US hadnt invaded Iraq but the US wouldnt have justified the Iraq invasion without 9/11 so the Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan is the real reason that ISIS exists because that spawned AQ which attacked the US " So its easy to do that and doesnt really help or change the reality of the unprovoked invasion of Ukraine by Russia or the long list of war crimes that Russia is responsible for

But you know wearing a tinfoil hat prevents this? The Devs cant destroy your gaming experience if you take this type of preventative measure Melkie the rabbit hole is deep but even the deepest rabbit hole cant overwhelm tinfoil hats

I just completed FO1 after about 40 hours or so. As I mentioned earlier it was an excellent CRPG experience that includes open world and a great sandbox overall experience no map quest hand holding on the area maps, you need to explore and ask people questions to complete quests. Like the Deathclaw quest in the Hub deep character customization and this allows you to really create different characters and that can influence your journey great lore and interesting quests unique towns and each one with there own characteristics I dont recall any bugs with Fixt but I might not have known because this is the first time I played FO1 but everything seemed to be fine I ended up getting a Plasma Rifle at Mariposa which made me deadly in combat and I enjoyed how the game provides so many different weapons. I really battled with the final Master fight, I was killed about 7 times before I adopted a winning strategy. I buffed up on drugs and then aimed for his eyes and fortunately scored critical hits and he died after about 5 rounds, I used super stimpacks and ignored the other enemies attacking I didn't particularly enjoy having to run out the Cathedral and Mariposa knowing there was 300 seconds but it was fun to get out the buildings and survive Now Im going to play FO2, Im really in the Fallout mood

Im starting an interesting project remotely in Zimbabwe for a public sector financial institution Its going to be interesting to see the efficiencies and how the project goes. I dont question the customers knowledge or commitment because every public sector financial institution I have ever worked at is always well staffed and people are professional I just want to see how the resources are allocated and how quickly things get done