rjshae

I guess some stone blocks, wooden scaffolding and a medieval winch would be fairly easy to implement. The developers could just clone those and move them around (as an overlay graphic) each time the player visits.

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Personally, I prefer to think of Lady Gaga as an artsy rather than weird...

That would be interesting, but personally I don't think I'd like the end result as much as a fully painted portrait. I also have some doubt that it would be more efficient, but that would depend upon how long it takes the particular artist to paint them. My guess is that it would actually take more time. Really? Well thanks for the wild guesses. You've saved us the trouble of finding out whether touching up a digital image takes longer than painting it from scratch, or whether the results will be visually appealing. We can scratch off that technique from the P.E. production methods.

Presumably the characters in BG2 had been through more combat than in BG1. More combat = more scars.

I'd like to see the same illustration techniques used with the game area be applied to the portraits. I.e. start with a 3D model, convert it to 2.5D, have an artist touch it up and make it more lifelike, then apply the current in-game lighting effects to the illustration. If they use the same hi-res mesh that was employed to make the character skins, then they'd have a realistic 1-to-1 match with the in-game figures. Plus the technique may be more efficient than a pure oil painting approach, allowing the artists to produce a wider range of portraits to choose from.

The Kickstarted Traveller5 got a somewhat low rating on rpg.net, saying it was sparse on substance and needs work. That's unfortunate.

How about this: CERN completes its energy upgrade and begins performing experiments. Unfortunately, an extremely unlikely quantum event occurs, triggering a brief quasi-inflationary epoch lasting less than a picosecond that subtly alters the laws of physics in the local group of galaxies. Quantum states in the human brain are now capable of causing strange, magic-like phenomenon. Ancient artifacts that once held a mystical appeal to people are empowered with the ability to amplifying certain mental states. Creatures from other realms end up populating the Earth. Cats and dogs start living together... the state of bizarreness just seems to keep ramping up, with no end in sight.

Here's a few more: Raiders of R’lyeh: Horror Adventure RPG and Mythos Sandbox -- "A horror adventure tabletop roleplaying game and Mythos sandbox inspired by H.P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard." Looks like adventuring during the 1900-13 period just before the great war. Includes some nice artwork to check out. Currently at $6,463/$22,000 with 28 days to go. Grim World: Gaming Supplement for Dungeon World & FATE Core -- A set of six class books. Succeeding at $10,860 with 22 days to go. Jadepunk Roleplaying Game -- "A Fate Core roleplaying game about rebellious wuxia heroes in a fictional steampunk setting." (Wuxia apparently means martial hero.) Currently at $3,229/$7,500 with 26 days to go. Weird Wars Rome - Savage Worlds -- Looks to be Roman Empire era role-playing with some fantasy elements. Succeeding at $41,205 with 48 hours to go. Plus an intriguing virtual desktop for tabletop-style RPG: 3D Virtual Tabletop: Visually Stunning RPGs on iPad, Android

My other car is a smoking pile of metal bits... http://www.youtube.com/embed/BgGT0EhKUoQ?Autoplay=1rel=0&wmode=transparent

A big part of that problem was a flaw in the AD&D rules. That was fixed in version 3 of D&D. Magic missile spells never miss. I'll take one magic missile that never misses over two arrows that may or may not hit anyday.

He has reasoned it out... What a lucky fella...

Books can use a lot more (continuous) text to describe a given situation, compared to a cRPG in which the writers have to stick to short dialogue lines and descriptive snippets. Thus book authors can much more easily rely on context/repetition/redundancy/annotation to get the intended meaning of sentences across. In a cRPG individual lines have to be much more self-explanatory, thus the aforementioned "gimmicks" come into use. Agreed. However, I regularly see out of copyright books using italics for the aforementioned purpose. It's not just a recent gimmick intended for new millennium slackers. It can be overused, but when it is use properly it is beneficial for communicating tone.

Is that Miley Cyrus flashing her teddy? Well she is at that stage...

These all sound great. I was wondering though about the "sending companions on missions" activity. Are these separate adventures that we, as the players, will be able to play using just the companions? Or do these missions get completed based upon some internal formula? Thanks. Hopefully we can send NPCs we don't like on suicide missions. Then have them defect and join the other side. Bwahahahaha...

What? Do you think they are secretly sitting on the capability but are only waiting until we bomb Assad to spring into action and strike us down? It's possible, if not likely, that Iran has already been probing for that possibility--after all, they do share capabilities with North Korea (which did recently perform a successful cyberattack against South Korea). An asymmetrical response seems the most likely form of counterattack, and a cyber attack requires only a modest investment. I'm just saying it's a possibility, so best to be on the guard.

Here we go again. The military power at the hands of the U.S. President seems just too tempting for any politician not to use. I really hope we're ready for the cyber counter-attack (or first strike) by Iran and/or Syria, but I suspect we're not.

Yes the area exploration map of SoZ was nice, and overall it was a decent enough game. For the part of SoZ I played, I can't say I much cared for the location exploration aspects of SoZ. I'd prefer something more akin to the IE experience, which is what many of us contributed for. So no, I don't like the small area/single big battle approach.

Ah, well it looks like a certain intransitive verb was censored there because of its resemblance to a domesticated male poultry animal. Basically I was trying to say the lever was positioned for firing like the hammer of a gun. Funny I've seen much worse posted around here without being censored... shrug.

Smaller quests == side quests was my interpretation. Pretty normal stuff for a CRPG; I didn't sense a cause for concern. Presumably the smaller quests may help with faction approval, and provide a reason for exploration and interaction in settled areas. Hopefully a handful of these smaller quests will later tie back into the main quest in some subtle manner.

Is that Peter Cech? Ouch!

Saw a story about this at slashdot: Star Trek: Renegades It's an IndieGoGo campaign to fund a pilot for a new Star Trek series.

Naissurian Roulette Device This unwholesome gadget resembles a bulky metal crown with a set of six lever arms that are set to penetrate the skull with wickedly curved probes. On the top is a large screw implement that is used to retract and **** the lever arms. In the center of the forehead is a ruby button. When the button is depressed into it's nacelle, one of the arms, chosen at random, seems to shimmer and glow before releasing and penetrating the skull with a burst of energy. Five of the arms bestow a blessing upon the wearer. The sixth arm, chosen at random when the screw is wound up, utterly drains the soul from the body of the wearer. The gadget uses the resulting energy flow from the drained soul to power itself up for the next game...