Elerond

Very informative update and I love Chris' troll pictures.

XAML alone does not make anything scale better per se, it's just XML to describe a GUI, but there may be more options now with WPF than there were with Windows Forms. However, PE will most certainly not be based on any parts of the .net framework that are highly dependent on the OS, if any at all (via Mono). Windows 8 uses Windows Runtime XAML Framework, which is successor to WPF. It uses XAML to define vector graphic elements that it uses as GUI objects. XAML Framework is native code framework, where WPF is based on CLR (common language runtime), so it don't need .net or mono framework to run under it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Runtime_XAML_Framework

Chess has very simple set of rules, but that don't make it to be game that is easy to master, with great number of valid strategies and moves.

If I am understood correctly they are currently finalizing their production piplelines, which mean that they can do accurate estimate of PE's completion date after they have finalized those pipelines as then they know how long it take them to do everything that they have planed.

MS moved to use XAML in all their new UI componets, those scale perfectly well to all resolutions and high ppis. But there is tons of programs that use Win32 or older .net componets that don't scale so well to monitors with high ppi or even high resolutions.

Removing romantic interaction options is not any better alternative to overly emphasised romantic dialogue path, because they both remove roleplaying options from player. In my opinion it is important that you have broad number of options when you interact with characters in the game especially with companion characters. And writers should avoid direct conversation paths (where there is friendship, romance, rivarly, neutral, ridicule, hate and etc. options) instead options should be more natural choices that at the end will sum what kind relationship you had with characters. Because then player will most likely roleplay his/her character instead trying to min-max their relationship status with npcs. In my opinion in modern rpgs relationships with npc have changed to be more like minigames where you need to choose right conversation options to get gameplay bonus or reward cut scene that you want, which has caused actual roleplaying devolved to background. So in my opinion we need more natural interaction options with npc and remove conversation "reward" system, because that is what in my opinion has caused relationships in modern rpgs feel as forced thing and that there is dominating dialogue paths (meaning more rewarding) for npcs.

But if you look for example word "dextertity" from dictionary then you will find that you could use that term in both of those scenarios. So when you choose your attribute names you need to only find those that have enough ambiguouness in them to work for your needs.

If it was so, then why police didn't for example investigated Zimmerman's background before media involement albeit they did so for Martin? Or did majority of media outlets give false information about the case in this matter?

Although without media's meddling whole case wouldn't have gone in court at all, as police at first say that there is no need for investigation. Which was in my understanding the main reason why the case got so widely known and which also caused race and racism speculations.

It's intresting how simultaneousness was bad thing when we Obsidian presented durability system and demanded more "gamist" system. And now people demand more "simulationist" system, even though they use gamist terms like "tanking". To me attribute system that encourage to build more "roleplaying" roles for the characters (like charismatic leader barbarian, intelligent stealthy fighter, dumb headbashing rogue, strong warrior wizard, etc.) than "gamist" roles for the characters (like tank, damage dealer, healer, etc.) is better sounding system.

Damage + heal bonus from same attribute sounds like they plan to use wisdom or similar attribute in that. So attribute rises you characters knowledge to where to hit so that it does maximum damage. And because you know how to hurt people you have also gained knowledge where you should fix things and etc. And accuracy attribute also sound logical, as if your character has natural good aim s/he don't lose it if s/he decides to hit things instead of shooting or vise versa. Because attributes tell your characters natural ability to do things and not his or her skill to do things. This attribute style is in my opinion better than d&d system where you hit better and do more damage with large weapons if you have high strength and dextertity does same thing for finesse and missle weapons. Because it makes all attributes important to every character, which makes min-maxing harder thing to accomplish and therefore has potential ability give more room for roleplaying.

Hispanic or Latino are in offical vocabulary marked meaning ethinical groups that have their roots in Spain or ancient Hispania. Which means that hispanic people can be from any race. United States Census Bureau has five categories for race: White Black or African American Native American or Alaska Native Asian Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander And as you can see darker white skin that is typical in Mediterranean and Latin America is not marked as it own race.

RK 62 and 95 TP are my favorite assault rifles, but my opinion is absolutely biased because they are only assault rifles that I have used outside of shooting range and which I am most familiar with.

I don't think this is really true actually. I believe Aristotle showed that the world was round in the Classical era. It wasn't so much that people felt the Earth was flat and that's why Columbus was crazy. It was more that they didn't believe a trip to India would really be feasible. Didn't the church supposedly disagree with Columbus on his calculations of the earths size? I recall someone telling me they told him that he'd made it too small or something like that. If true then it means they were correct incredibly enough. Eratosthenes had caluculated almost correctly Earth size in 300 BC and that estimate was widely know among scholars in Columbu's day, but they used old fashioned messurement which caused some debate about exact size of the Earth and was reason why Columbus get his way through in the end.

In Finland we have three tier court system, first tier is local courts which verdicts both parties can appeal to court of appeals, which decions are usually final, but in some cases those verdicts, for example precedence cases, can be appealed to supreme court. This systems problem is that sometimes cases can last years before final verdict.

I think that there is something wrong if someone can stalk person and kill that person by shooting after quarrel which was caused by stalking and get out without any punishment by law because shooting can be some legal reason be seen as self defense. So I think that there are at least some problems how Florida law determine self defense especially if deathly force was used, because it seems to give people, in some circumstances, ability to harass and kill people and get out without any consequences from legal system.

RAAAAAARGH! He said CLIP! CLIIIIIP! Get the inquisition, burn him, burn him ALAAIIIIVE! For those who don't know what the hell just happened, a magazine and a clip are two very different things and its sadly a common mistake to call a mag a clip. A CLIP, also called a stripper clip is used to LOAD a magazine. Therefore a magazine cannot be a clip. It is too bad that dictionary offers clip as translation for Finnish word lipas, which in Finnish means magazine like in ditto picture (not this kind magazines, which comes to my mind when I hear/read that word, which is was reason why I choose clip from two offered choices ), when we are speaking about guns. But now I know that right translation for clip in Finnish is patruunakampa or patruunaside.

I think that my first PnP rpg was Ankh, which was Finnish clone of D&D, but soon I moved to play Rune Quest, Twilight 2000, Cyberpunk 2020 and Rolemaster (second edition and later third, and mainly MERP campaigns), I tried AD&D also but my gaming circle didn't like it as much as they liked Rune Quest and Rolemaster.

for someone who knows nothing about guns, what am I looking at? This is how clip should look when bullets are in and as you can see in upper picture bullets are somewhat differently put in the clip, which is quite feat as clips usually have quite strong spring in them. EDIT: Seems that I was too slow

What's the big drawing tablet and where can I buy one? I would say, it's a Wacom Cintiq 24 or so. And thanks for the Q&A EDIT: Wacom Cintiq 21UX or bigger display with same build

These interviews are always nice reads. It is also good to hear that there is dragon like creatures in PE's world.

I am bit disappointed that there will not be skill pool only for the combat skills, although good ability system can compensate missing skills, but I would have preferred more skill based system. As some reason I have pictured PE system so that soul based things are abilities and non-soul based things are skill based.

I usually start with default as they should be settings that are optimal for the getting familiar with the game, but if game feels too easy I usually increase difficulty or start new game on higher difficulty level.

As they already separated skills to two different pools (combat and non-combat), so that you don't need to sacrifice character combat prowess to make character good in non-combat things, thus I would say including crafting skill would not had caused character be any less capable in combat than what they are now.