Agiel

I love Divinity and I'll be the first to admit to admit that the Codex has some frankly brilliant stuff by their staff buried under a pile of racist ramblings. So if I were Larian I don't know if I would so proudly wear their seal of approval on the splash screen for the game.

On the bright side, unlike the North Koreans the Brazilians don't have to look forward to a fun-filled field trip to Yodok for them and their family members up to twice removed for losing that badly.

Trying to find my way in the graphic design and illustration industry at the moment, that made my day.

This is just too f***ing great: http://youtu.be/oVk18BJdHgM Adapted from this, excuse the earsplitting audio bugs:

Boeing (the losers of the JSF selection program with their X-32) was at one point invited by LockMart to participate in improving upon the X-35. They less than kindly declined and are currently working on their own not necessarily competitors but certainly parallels in the form of upgraded F-15Cs and F/A-18E/F Superhornets with AESA radars (actually more powerful than the one on the F-22, having been developed later) and the E/A-18G Growler electronic attack aircraft. Part of why the F-35 project seems so bloated is due to how the program is attempting to replace three different airframes in service (the AV-8 Harrier, the F-16, and the F/A-18) and to satisfy the requirements of three different services in the US military alone as well as the militaries of over a dozen partner nations, however in the end due to economies of scale I believe down the line ~10-20 years parts commonality and service interoperability is eventually going to vindicate the cost (adjusted for inflation and held up to the combined development costs of the above, the F-35 might seem like the deal of the century). Besides, there's stuff on the F-35 that even F-22 pilots* can only dream of like a superior AESA radar, EOTS targeting pod, SEAD/DEAD and electronic attack capability, and the EODAS (actually made by Northrop Grumman) that has the potential to revolutionise air to air combat as we know it. Combined, Marine Corps test pilots have said that they've only scratched the surface of what this all means for how they will do their jobs. As for Russian military hardware virtually all of their military aircraft design and production has been consolidated into a single company (Sukhoi) as well as their armoured vehicle production into Uralvagonzavod (since the Omsk factory that was slated to upgrade T-80s went bust, and the former Soviet Union's other big tank producer being in Ukraine). In fact development of variants of the MiG-29 and the MiG-31 now fall under Sukhoi's purview following the collapse of the Soviet Union. As for what that all means, I think it leaves them trying to do too much with too little, upgrading existing airframes, ensuring the ones that are already in service are airworthy, and producing 5th-generation aircraft with a fraction of the budget they had in the Cold War. I've been of the opinion were it not for the Indians, the Russian Air Force would have been flying Saab JAS-39 Gripens and Dassault Rafales alongside their Su-27s (in fact they're closer to that than some might think with the Mistral helicopter carrier sale from France going ahead, thermal imagers license-built from Thales, and training simulators from Rheinmetall). *These are planned to be implemented on the F-22 as part of mid-service life upgrades.

It largely depends. In the case of a modern Leopard 2A6, the working hull, turret, and engine is produced by KMW, though the gun is made by Rheinmetall AG, with the IVIS, optronics, and fire control system made by Thales. Since the end of the Cold War I think there's greater willingness to accept outside technologies into platforms (definitely a far cry from the cutthroat espionage affairs between companies to be sure). Right now there's competition between Northrop Grumman and Raytheon for the new AESA radar suite for the F-16 (made by Lockheed Martin).

In other news, KMW and Nexter announce plans to merge, with encapsulates just about all of western continental Europe's armour production capacity. http://online.wsj.com/articles/nexter-systems-krauss-maffei-wegman-plan-to-merge-1404238891 Guess we're looking at the "Eurokampfpanzer Leo-clerc."

But in real terms, the insurgents accomplish very little with a "mission kill". A trained crew is not so easily replaced as compared to a tank (of which many western tanks are very good at preserving). Hell, during the 1982 war the Israelis lost somewhere to the order of 300 tanks, of which only about 75 were deemed complete write-offs. From what I've seen in spite of the Iraqis lack of combined arms warfare nous, they've proven quite able to recover their armour, as I haven't even seen propagandist claims that ISIL has been able to take one for a spin.

One of five PAK-FA prototypes has had its own bout with extensive fire damage and the Indians have expressed extreme dissatisfaction with its underpowered engines, large radar cross section (for a supposed 5th generation fighter), and outdated sensors, armaments, and avionics. If the F-35 even close to the lemon that some pundits are claiming, then it doesn't explain why some of the most storied (and informed) air forces in the world like the IAF and the ROKAF have expressed a desire to buy it despite not being original partners in the program in the first place.

I actually found Vega in ME3 to be a pretty good character, and though he hasn't gotten the same fandom as Tali and Garrus he turned out to be fairly well-liked or at least tolerable as compared to Kaidan and Ashley (who personally I didn't mind) or Jacob and Miranda (not so much) by the playerbase. I can't quite attach Prinze's voice to that character in my head and a lot of the promotional material on the playable PCs don't inspire a lot of confidence, but hell, I only know what I know now, so I can only hope I'll be pleasantly surprised just like I was with Vega.

You can play the matchmaker between two felines in this game. Where is LadyCrimson? By the way, I do love that reference to "Unsinkable Sam" A.K.A. "Oskar".

Netherlands deems their traditional take on Christmas legend to be racist: https://news.vice.com/article/the-netherlands-has-decided-traditional-black-face-is-racist For those who are unfamiliar with the Dutch version: http://youtu.be/NYdpte1W0vk

This little excerpt from an article on the new 155mm "Excalibur" round for the M-109 self-propelled howitzers gave me a chuckle:

Fascinating bit of psychology, there. He says the moment the aircraft touched down, he "forgot" how to turn off the engines. Overcome with relief, I imagine, but it's interesting how, even after performing a complex task over and over again ... the one time a critical variable is introduced, meeting that challenge can temporarily erase whatever non-critical steps follow the event horizon. Anyway, well done, Captain. Anyone know what sort of decoration this calls for ... besides staying alive and not destroying the aircraft and ship. Well I think that aviator could tell that story to any woman he wanted in a bar and she'd undress for him right then and there. I'd say that's almost as good as a Congressional Medal of Honour

Maybe I'll actually find her attractive now that she doesn't remind me of Sarah Palin as much anymore with that haircut.

If the Inquisition in Dragon Age lived up to its namesake, would that make the PC like Herr Otto Flick of the Gestapo and Cassandra his Helga? Inquisitor: "Zhe Inquisition has vays of making zhem talk. Cassandra! Bring me my sharp Inquisition sword." Cassandra: "I find your piercing gaze and your commanding presence quite alluring. May I kiss you?" Inquisitor: "Certainly."

Damn was about to post this myself. Though a more detailed account:

So from the Steam sales I now have Divinity: Original Sin and Shadowrun Returns. Now Eagle Dynamics announced Digital Combat Simulator FW 190D-9 at sale price though I'm conflicted at the moment. On the one hand that was my favourite radial engine warfighter from the Second World War along with the F6F Hellcat and the F4U Corsair, on the other hand, there isn't really a good combat environment for it until the release of DCS: Europe WWII, and honestly having only P-51Ds and other "Butcher Birds" to tangle with over T'blisi may get old after a while.

Nice, I hope that the "You won't get the developer injected events" part does'nt mean you only get to fly around watching pretty systems but that you can still do some simple missions and such. On another note; Gah! Ninja'd this time! The version 0.0.0.0.01 footage in the media section looks rough and is far from indicative of the final product, but if it goes the Planetside 2 route then I have high hopes for it. Otherwise...coooome onnnnnn Harlequin class for the Eldar!

Honestly, if Putin is paying people to do that, he's being taken for a ride. Just go to UC Berkeley or Santa Cruz and you'll find kids who'll do that for free.

Any time. Just keep me updated if you have any questions you want answered about playing the game, platforms, and the like. It was pretty rough going for me trying to get the hang of it at first (though the fact that it was a bit buggy and crashy didn't help), but me being the persistent type I kept at it and it's a worthy addition to my games library. The last thing I want you to think is that you wasted the not so insignificant sum that you spent* on buying a Matrix joint that was either too buggy, had too steep a learning curve, or the presentation is too wooden for your tastes (as the company is clearly not on the same planet as most other game publishers when it comes to pricing). Don't be afraid to shoot a question on the forum which is packed to the brim with enthusiastic, knowledgeable people. *It is in fact possible to get a refund, as one user on the forum managed to do.

A fine arts lecturer at my uni once told me that "men spend nine months getting out of the womb, and the rest of their lives trying to get back in."

Me being a huge Harpoon, Dangerous Waters, and Falcon 4.0 fanatic as well as having classics like Red Storm Rising and the War that Never Was on my shelf, Command is my current wargaming poison. Though if you're starting out with it and do not have a beefy processor and an SSD, you may want to get those, turn off autosaving, and set range rings to "Selected Unit Only" nonetheless. That screen can get quite busy and make it very difficult to process the battespace, not to mention bring even fairly modern machines to their knees! For some tips, I'd also recommend watching Baloogan's streams of the game: https://www.youtube.com/user/baloogan And if you're having difficulty telling your Flankers from your Eagles, your Ticonderogas from your Kirovs, and SM-2MRs from your SA-10s, there is this handy database: http://www.harpoondatabases.com/Encyclopedia/Encyc_Index.aspx Other than that, it in ways plays like a cRPG. I mean, it has real-time pausing and die-rolls, except your Warriors with a +1 mace are F-16s and the die-rolls decide if your AN/ALE-50 decoy seduces that SAM instead of whether or not your char makes his mental saves.