ShadowPaladin V1.0

The Romans would disagree. The Romans also had a neat way of incorporating the local Dieties (Like Sulus Minerva at Bath). Well America tried to do things on the cheap. And they dont have the sort of ruthless streak required like the Romans did. Well imagine Iraq as a pressure cooker with Saddam sitting on top of it. Once you take him off the pressure explodes. Democracy is rarely painless.

Well the real question is. Do you force civilization on people or do you just wait for them to "grow up" ?

Voter apathy is either a sign of contentment or despondence.

Well Russian methods are a tad more extreme. Stalin was not a nice bloke. Effective , but definately not a nice chap. Well that happened. What Bin Ladens contribution was I dont know. I'll let one of the Americans deal with that. But it certainly dosnt fit with my perception of America.

Americans dont shoot rebels. Thats why the commisars were there to shoot anyone going the other way.

The reality isnt really important though. It's the perception that if you work hard you can succeed. You may see it as a form of social control if you wish. Once people conclude that no matter how hard they work they are screwed. Then they will "rebel".

Thats the American dream isnt it ? Or you could go on a reality TV show.

I'm not sure. I recall hearing something to that effect and the specs there says HD DVD wont support DVD-9. Your talking a matter of months and it depends on how they are selling. DVD's held their prices for quite a time. Unless you get a flood of cheap chinese imports. It was in the 360 specs for a very long time. :D I could probably dig up some news story from Eurogamer, but frankly not that bothered. I know I'd rather have 50 GB to play around with than 9 GB.

Comminism can exist in small units but not on a large scale since people cease to give a crap about each other.

Well the price is a curious thing. I just looked up HD DVD players (Toshiba) and aside from there not being anything to play on them they are quoted with prices of $500 and $800.

It's very simple. Movies now come on two DvD's as standard because of the extra features. This is what I dug up on the two although I didnt look very hard. blu ray Backwards compatible DVD JVC Hybrid DVD-9 + Blu-Ray Layer HD-DVD DVD Hybrid DVD-5 + 15Gb HD Layer If one will play all current movies and the other wont, that will be a big head start. I found price points for the two HD players of $500 and $800 respectively.So if your looking for a next gen player , then a PS3 will be in the same ballpark or cheaper. Lest we forget the 360 was supposed to come with a HD DVD till delays changed that .DVD was not the first choice format "

That was the one. Because they cut stuff just like the DO4 intro was changed because it took up too much space. As for movies, well since added features are now pretty much standard not often you see a single disk in the package. Which one is backwards compatible with your current DvD collection ?

Here ya go link to Eurogamer with details. http://forums.obsidianent.com/index.php?showtopic=40581

Orangina (as in Oranges) not Oringina (as in I dont know what) probably why you couldnt find it. http://www.orangina.com/

All next gen consoles. I wonder what they will do with the revolution controller

Reminds me of an old comic where Superman grew facial hair after being exposed to red K. It took Krypto and Supergirls combined heat vision to shave him.

Shaving is such a chore.

Heres the details from Eurogamer (which have now reappeared). http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=63292 The interesting bits. "The free service will support a host of communication and community features, including voice and video chat, messaging, unique user IDs and handles, and matchmaking, ranking and data upload and download service for games. Crucially, the basic service will allow users to play games online - a factor which sets it apart from Microsoft's equivalent free service, Xbox Live Silver, which enables community features and content purchases, but doesn't allow users to play multiplayer online games". The not so good bit ? "Sony's system will be handing off significantly more control to game publishers, who will be able to run their own game servers as they see fit. Although Sony will be creating a standard infrastructure for the service, with data centres in Asia, North America and Europe, the system will still run over the conventional Internet and publishers will be able to connect their own servers to it. This opens the possibility that game publishers could charge their own fees for playing games, which is indeed likely to be the case for titles such as massively multiplayer games - a genre which will be well-served by Sony's more "hands-off" approach to the network service, since some MMOG publishers have opined that Microsoft's approach is too restrictive on their business models. However, Sony is pushing hard for publishers to use the network to generate revenue through selling content, rather than through charging users for multiplayer functionality, and the PlayStation Network Platform is designed from the ground up to support a wide range of content sale and payment methods". Another good bit "What exactly will be sold on the marketplace system is still the subject of some speculation - but after we revealed last week that Sony has been speaking to its publishing partners about the technical issues regarding distributing PSone and PS2 content online, three more important hints have been dropped which suggest that this content will indeed be on the menu for PlayStation 3".

It's a very limited franchise.

Well think of Dell as the rich ugly bloke and Alien Ware as the trophy wife

Not true at all. Silver "subscription" (why do they bother calling it that?) doesn't allow you to do much more but to look at commercials for stuff you have to pay for. "Silver members begin by picking a gamertag, an online "handle," and building a gamer profile, just like Gold subscribers. Of course, Xbox Live is primarily an online multiplayer service, and you need an Xbox Live Gold Membership to do that. " With Silver I can create a gamer profile but I need Gold to actually play the games. Gee, thanks so ****ing much! Source: http://www.xbox.com/en-US/live/memberships/ The Sony Basic online service is supposed to allow you to play games online for free. That's a HUGE difference. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I didnt know that. Silvers a bit crap then really. Eurogamer seems to have pulled the article with the features of PlayOnline in it.

Isnt that exactly the same as the 360 ? You could even argue that it was more integrel to the 360 since thats what the BC is based on. By buying a core system, you have no BC and no live access to get it. One reason I dont own one btw. With the other two systems they can simply slot in at launch and still play any PS2/GC titles I might have an interest in. With the 360 you have that whole emulation thing. The whole HD thing is pretty mixed message even in the same article. Here for example "The PS3 will be compatible with all kinds of TVs and a high-speed broadband connection. Update 19 (via 1UP's updated page): DRM was what delayed the launch, but the system will come with a 60GB HDD preinstalled before 11/11/06". Well it was contradictory. But it appears it was edited Update 9: Kutaragi proclaims that the PS3 will require a hard drive, but not whether all systems will come bundled with one or not. What he does say is that the HDD "will be 60GB big, be completely upgradeable, and support Linux OS. Additionally, the peripheral will act as a home server and allow users to store various forms of media to be pulled up elsewhere." Thanks, RobR and sullyj! [update 17: The same link now says that "the unit will ship with the system right out of the box."]

Gather lots of people in one place and idiocy reings. The only place I havnt seen that is on premium servers which cost way above $10 a month.

You couldnt come up with 10 ?

Theres been so much contradictory stuff going around. The only "claim" I'm going to believe is when there is a fixed pre-order price I think. As long as it's under