~Di

Al Qaeda, on the other hand, is so very careful of civilians when it deliberately sends its suicide bombers into a bustling market and blows up a few dozen folks. Oddly enough I've never noticed you mentioning your indignance about those dead civilians. If the house in question contained Al Qaeda members, it was a legitimate target and you'd better believe it's going to be marked for destruction. If those Al Qaeda members put themselves in the middle of civilian areas, then it stands to reason that civilians are going to get killed along with them.

There hasn't been any official confirmation that Al Qaeda's #2 guy was killed, only speculation in the press. There was an attack on a house where "intelligence sources" (i.e. some guy on a camel who stuffed a $20 bribe in his pocket, then pointed to a house across the street) said a high-level Al Qaeda meeting was taking place. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't. That's the thing about missle/bombing runs; both count on somebody on the ground flashing a laser at the right target. Bad target, bad hit.

LOL, I think I caught of whiff of the facetious, but it amused me. Actually I did not think Morrowind was great. I thought it bordered on great; it bordered on brilliant. In reality it had flaws that, for me anyway, blemished the experience with dullness and boredom in too many instances. The reason I was so excited about the PC Gamer preview was that it took each of the "flaws" I personally found in Morrowind and explained how they had been (supposedly) eliminated in Oblivion. If Oblivion is the game described in that preview, then it will indeed be an RPG masterpiece. If not, it will be another "coulda-been" disappointment. Time will tell.

It never ceases to amaze me how touchy Europeans are to the vaguest hint of insult or slight, even as they heap blatant hostility and abuse upon a *cough* certain country on a daily basis. Double standard, anyone?

Yes, yes, let's hate Oblivion and hate Bethesda for making it even before the game goes gold. Why should we actually play something before casting aspersions when we can actually skip the middle man, save all that money, and trash the game before it's released! w00t! I sure wouldn't let "RPGCodex rants" make my game-buying decisions, but y'all can do what you wish. I plan to watch forums after the game's release, see if there are more than average tech problems, see what the consensus of players... players , not mean-spirited bad-mouthers... think of the game, then make my decision. I'm hoping it comes out like the PC Gamer preview indicates, because that is exactly the kind of game I would love. I also love the Gothic series and will be buying Gothic III no matter what. BTW, since Obsidian forum rules forbid trashing other game developers, please stop doing so. You'll get my poor little thread deleted.

I'm sorry to see you go, Shadowstrider.

My first game... Space Quest! (Yes, the original!) On a clunky old IBM, with an amber monitor. Hooked me forever.

Hehe, according to the article NPC's vital to the main quest CANNOT be killed... by anyone. Yeah, at this point the entire game just sounds too danged good to be true, but I can't keep myself from being excited about it. I am a bit worried about whether my aging PC will be able to handle the tech, though. Time will tell.

Well, if we didn't attack Iran after it invaded our embassy and held our diplomats hostage for nearly two years (if memory serves), then I doubt some fanatical blow-hard spewing hate speech for the anti-western press is likely to result in us pushing the old nuke button. Then again, Bush wasn't president then, so it's hard to predict how things might go. Of course it doesn't help that the US military is spread all over the globe, with the biggest hunk of its fighting force stuck in Iraq. If Iran or North Korea or anyone else on the planet decided to shove a nuke down our throat or Israel's throat, there's not a whole lot we could do about it beyond turning their entire country into glass. Not the option I personally would hope for, frankly.

It's NWN 2 if you need to know. -5 points for reading comprehension. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> No, I don't suppose I actually need to know... except it's a public forum and all, and it's nice to be able to figure out what the topic is. I'd thank you for answering my question, but had to take away 5 points for your snide remark, so there weren't enough points left over for gratitude!

Iran certainly hates Israel the most, but the USA runs a close second. In the same speech where Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made his infamous "Israel must be wiped off the face of the map" statement, he also said the following: "The president then said: "And God willing, with the force of God behind it, we shall soon experience a world without the United States and Zionism," according to a quote published by Iran's state news outlet, the Islamic Republic News Agency Source, CNN article

Hehe, yes it's kind of exciting to know that you will be evoking more realistic responses in a game where what you do and say, in fact your very presence, will change NPC reaction notably. That could really be great fun (although assassinating innocents, even in a game, isn't my bag). I much preferred the ogre-with-a-rake story! "... ... As a result, NPC behaviors are somewhat random and occasionally surprising, even to the developers. When a domesticated Ogre was assigned the condition to hoe a field, but was accidentally given a rake, he tried to steal a hoe from a tougher Ogre. But the tougher Ogre actually wanted a rake, so he clocked the would-be thief, picked up the rake, and happily tended his field. I also got a kick out of this: On another occasion , a developer was wielding a special Daedric weapon that can generate malevolent clones of any enemy, forcing foes to fight dopplegangers of themselves. But when he accidentally dropped the artifact, the enemy sheathed his sword and grabbed the artifact. He then created a perfect clone of the develoepr's player-character, which promptly bashed the avatar senseless." So yes, I'll confess that unexpected actions such as those listed do kinda make my RPG juices flow! IF... and it's a big if... such descriptions are accurate and routine within the scope of the game.

Hey, let's not turn yet another Oblivion thread into a Fallout 3 rant, dammit. Every time the word "Bethesda" or "Oblivion" is mentioned does not automatically become an invitation to spam the place with Fallout gripes and moans, ok? Go start your own thread, and leave my sweet little Oblivion thread alone! Grrrrrrr..... /rant :D

Eh, the US is hardly the only country that is "bullying" them. There are a whole potload of nations in the UN's nuclear watchdog group that are pretty much quaking in their boots at the thought of a country that publicly wishes for both Israel and America to be wiped off the face of the planet to have the nuclear capacity to make their own dreams come true. That said, the nuclear genie has been out of the bottle for 60 years now. Much as western nations would like to keep nukes out of the hands of Iran... and North Korea and Pakistan and yes, even India... all of those countries have every right to develop any weapon they wish. *shrug* We live in a dangerous world.

Y'know, I've scanned this entire thread and I've yet to figure out which game the original post was even referring to. I suppose the word "Ferret" was supposed to be a clue, but being blonde and all, it was a clue I missed.

Anakin: Me too. I enjoyed Morrowind... enjoyed it, didn't utterly love it... but saw the flaws all too clearly to put it up in my list of favorites. But it had potential to be the kind of game I had always wanted; it just... wasn't. Some of the features mentioned in the article really piqued my interest, particularly the new NPC AI that (according to a couple of really amusing acedotes in the article) has apparently surprised even the developers! I just hope it doesn't end up being such a buggy mess that nobody can even play it, ala Dungeon Lords. I'd rather looked forward to that game as well, but after reading the howls of agony from those who weren't smart enough to wait a few weeks before buying, I saved myself a bunch of time, money and pain. I'll probably read forums for a couple of weeks to make sure that the game has a fairly low tech-problem rate before I buy. I hope the article is a fair representation of what to expect, though, because the guy really makes it sound appealing.

Good God, I just shared information about a glowing preview of what will clearly be one of the biggest RPG releases in 2006. There's no need to turn this into yet another sour Bethesda bash, particularly when the game isn't even out yet. There are plenty of other threads for that. Atreides: Oblivion is the sequel to Daggerfall and Morrowind. If it follows the basis of the predecessors, it will have a very large non-linear world in which the player can wander freely, doing myriad quests (some of which are optional, some of which are required to advance the story line). Many folks had complaints about Morrowind, some preferring more action-oriented games, others just wanting a deeper story and more interesting quests, combat, etc. According to the preview I read, Bethesda has apparently made some signicant strides in improving all of these areas. We won't know until the game comes out, of course. I just thought those who were interested might want to know that there was an indepth article available on the topic. Edit: @Hurlshot: I get Computer Gaming World as well. So far I haven't seen much on Oblivion there, but if I do I'll post it here so certain forum-goers can waltz in and accuse me of fanboyism for having mentioned it!

Just got my Feb issue of PC Gamer with a hands-on preview of Oblivion. To say the guy who wrote it (Desslock, btw) is stoked would be an understatement! He raves about the graphics, the gameplay, the realistic NPC AI, and ends his long article with this statement: "... I think Bethesda may be on the brink of releasing its masterpiece." Pretty strong stuff! Sure got my juices flowing. I've been looking forward to Oblivion for years, and if it lives up to this preview it very well may be the RPG masterpiece some of us have been waiting for since BG2. I found the PC Gamer website but the article itself apparently cannot be accessed online.

Thus, making it available to people in this forum. Which is precisely what I said. Apparently you wanted to make certain everyone knew you had the video as well, since you kindly used it as a sub-heading to the threads title: "JUBA Sniper Video". Under the circumstances, it's disingenuous of you to try and divest yourself of responsibility for providing it, wouldn't you say? Nobody is telling me I have to watch it; you, however, are telling the forum that we have to have a thread on it, according to this discussion between you and kirottu. I guess we do cattus.... <{POST_SNAPBACK}> You didn't explain why we have to have such a thread, however. As for my comments about watching the video to "see what war is like", I was referring to statements by Fighter, who said the following: My comments were not sarcastic. They were sad, and they expressed disappointment to which I am entitled. Frankly I do not think that one who found it necessary to express himself by bringing an article and video of my countrymen... perhaps even someone I know and care about... being killed to this forum has any right to angry or huffy when others express themselves in a non-insulting and civilized manner. As for the sniper who is the "star" of the film, I doubt he demoralizes troops as much as the roadside bombs that result in 90+% of military deaths, the kidnapping and murder of journalists and other civilians that I know for a fact makes our troop want to weep with helplessness, and watching the rest of the civilian population targeted for destruction by terrorists that wouldn't even be in that damned country if not for our intervention there.

Which is why I personally think it's an utterly stupid law.

What y'all are missing is that those statistics (uses the 19-out-of-1000 Fortune 1000 CEO figure as an example) are 19 times higher than they were 20 years ago. And for good reason. Just because the law suddenly said females and miniorities had to be given equal opportunity doesn't mean that every female/minority in the country got up the next morning with the education and long-term experience to run a Fortune1000 company. It took years for women/minority percentages in universities to catch up, then many more years for those same women/minorities to work their way up the corporate ladder to even become eligible for those major CEO positions. In 50 years, this will be a non-issue. People just need to use some common sense, intelligence, and old fashioned patience, m'kay? LOL

I'm disappointed to see that someone felt it would be appropriate to make film of Americans being killed available to the forum. But I'm not surprised. As for "seeing what war is like", don't make me wretch. Two kids in our small county came home in pieces; one came home in a coffin. Several of my loved ones are fighting. One was severely injured. The others will, if my memory of VietNam vets is any clue, will never be the same emotionally. Over 2,000 soldiers have died, and 20 times that many have been wounded. Telling us we need to watch our soldiers die in order to "see what war is like" is rather like telling a Baghdad resident they need to see the bodies of their friends, neighbors and loved ones dismembered in living color in order to "see what war is like." Anyway I didn't watch the video of hostages being beheaded, and I don't plan to watch the video Hildeguard as so thoughtfully provided. Those who wish to see it in all its glory, knock yourselves out.

Er, I thought the topic of discussion was the Norweigian Law. How did it get switched to a debate about gender discrimination in America? *scratches head* BTW, most companies do indeed have male AND female "maternity" leave, in compliance with the Family Leave Act (I think that's what it was entitled). Smaller companies with few employees are exempt, but for the most part both parents are entitled to take a certain amount of family leave, maternity and otherwise. I still don't see what that has to do with Norway's intent to force a quota system into both the public and private sectors.

Yes, I agree. There was a time when blacks (and women for that matter) were so blatantly and consistently discriminated against that it was impossible for them to advance in any profession beyond the ones they were "allowed" to have, i.e., garbage pickup and file clerk. This violated their constitutional right to equal opportunity under the law, much as segregation did, so when government stepped in rather heavy-handedly, I understood the reasoning. And after 30 years of affirmative action, it has done the job intended. From this point on, however, it is simply being used as governmentally-sanctioned reverse discrimination against anyone who is not female or minority... otherwise known as white males. My heart doesn't bleed for them, since white males are still in charge of the country and at least 80% of it's wealth, but quotas now are simply used to take rights away from them and give more rights to others. Since the gross violations seen decades past do not exist any more (despite the whining by radicals that grates on my last nerve) then affirmative action itself has become, in my view, unconstitutional.

Thanks for the info! It doesn't sound like it would float my personal boat. I'm seriously turned off by the whole PvP/Gank thing. Still it seems like an ambitious product that would be a godsend to certain kinds of players. Just not me.