Gorth

Yeah, sucks when you try to make a profit off corruption. The Greek system that was, was almost as corrupt as the Berlusconi government (funny story, Danish journalists found a Danish railroad train that had mysteriously disappeared, despite being bought and paid through Danish tax payer money. Turned out that Berlusconi had given it to Ghadaffi as a gift to celebrate his 40th anniversary as a dictator). I think they will moan and whinge and try to blackmail EU for a while to avoid having to touch those Russian money laundering accounts. I wouldn't be surprised if the kickback and bribes are substantial and the government officials wouldn't want to miss out on it.

Checking out some of those old saved links, I clicked on Globus - Preliator and ended up with the irresistible urge to declare war on somebody. After a brief game of EU III I went looking for the DVD and found a live concert from Wembley on Amazon UK and bought it. While waiting for it to arrive, I checked out some of the "related" videos just to see if I could find something interesting. Found a few. Can't say I've ever heard any of them before. Two Steps From Hell - Blackheart http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOrE2Qr1FMU

Doesn't sound as fun as going around and beating up a few deviants... Joking aside, my current host country doesn't exactly have a stellar human rights record. For fun, look up the referendum of 1967 (which later resulted in the aboriginal population being "reclassified" from 'Flora and Fauna' to 'Human Beings').

No need to I think. Morgoth is just a bit on the grumpy side. It happens People who has been around "forever" know each others quirks and when to just smile and nod and when not. Still waiting (impatiently) for Q3 to show up so I can get EU IV... Diplomacy (aka Lying and Cheating with style).

Having experienced both cyclones and earthquakes up close and personal, I have to disappoint you, they are somewhat overrated Never tried the tsunami thing though.

Damn, so much for my fuzzy memory (I blame old age) >_

Expectations can be a hard thing to manage (I work in software development), so in some ways it probably does come down to what you were expecting/hoping for. For me, it was the equivalent of those old movies from the 60's and 70's where they show a few extra minutes after the final credits, with bloopers, goof ups and off stage camera showing the crew having a good time "off the record". If you expected something "profound", then odds are indeed that you might be very disappointed.

Isabella and Zevran were both Antivan, weren't they? I'm going to be very disappointed if DA3 doesn't take place in Antiva

It's those you don't notice that worries me.

One of the advantages of living in suburbia and being a stranger to your neighbours, unless they show up with torches and pitchforks, you can pretty much not give a damn about appearances

Hey, alanschu, time for a pay rise (it said something including internal candidates for the position)

DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL Usually indicates bad RAM or bad HDD (if your system is installed correct and drivers up to date).

Who says I have to be either or? I can enjoy being a misogynist in a video game without going around and insulting the opposite sex once I put the keyboard aside. I love playing Carmageddon, but I never even considered running over that baby stroller on the sidewalk the last time I drove past one (didn't even think '10 points' or whatever). She may or may not have a point, but she is doing it all wrong (to use gamer terminology), when borders between fiction and reality starts getting blurred.

Still running around in 'The Strip' in the Citadel DLC. Found a Tower of Hanoi arcade game. Shepard: "Tower of Hanoi... I think *not*" Survived the party too (and the hangovers). All good fun.

You could argue, that the entire discussion is based on an Association Fallacy right from the premise. One market segment appears to be homophobic, misogynist chauvinistic games. One market segment seems to be predominantly aimed at a male audience. Conclusion: Male gamers are homophobic, misogynistic chauvinists. Honestly, there are days when politically correct BS gets too much and I wish a pox upon those who wishes to mess with my escapist fantasies. Seriously, what is it with people who want to change the colour of curtains to match the wallpaper in my home? Get your own damn curtains and paint the walls whichever colour you like.

I don't know. Twilight seemed to do pretty well. If the guys in there were a "girls dream" of a guy, I can only conclude that girls wants guys to look and act like girls... Of course, no guy worth his testosterone would like to be caught dead watching it Maybe it's because of the comfort inherent in familiarity?

Looks interesting. Australian desalination plants have used osmosis so far to separate water and whatever is in it. This sounds almost like a giant coffee filter

Elected politicians, It seems a universal law: Much overrated and little trustworthiness.

I must play the wrong games. Last one I remember where the protagonist fought the antagonist over a woman as a prize was Donkey Kong. Maybe it's common in the games I generally ignore (quite possibly).

Errr, her point with that was that the damsel in distress trope has its roots in early gaming, and she illustrated that the theme of Peach being captured has remained the central motivation for the game in 13 of 14 different iterations of Mario games, and that the trope continues today. Though she does acknowledge that the mere existence of this trope in a game doesn't mean that a game must be sexist. Eh, the original Lara Croft still focused heavily on Male Gaze. I think it got worse as the series progressed initially. A review by a Mary Sue writer details her experiences (and epiphany) with the Tomb Raider series and how her perspective of it changed as she got older and was exposed to the different games (she agreed that lara was amazing and awesome with the first game), and the reservations she had with the new game and how she ends up loving what the game did with Lara's character in this one. An enjoyable read. Ironically, the first Tomb Raider games were also the best *games*. When it (the franchise) switched focus from the game to all the peripheral stuff, Lara Croft included, the franchise started its downfall into mediocracy, never to recover quality wise.

Thread is becoming threadbare (oh the pun!)... new thread here

Start of old thread End of old thread In an unsubtle move supporting blatant consumerism, we toss out the old thread and aquire a new one... Will Guard Dog finally run up a deficit on his budget? Will LadyCrimson go into cryostasis? Questions to be answered in a new thread.

Didn't Heroes of Might and Magic III have such a mechanism? Awed by your overwhelming presence, enemies would offer to run away and the player could decide to force confrontation or let them run away. Was sort of a nice touch, adding something to the game.

Fusion power plant Just some pictures from France and a bit of trivia regarding the fusion reactor they are building. They call it safe. Not sure if anything that requires an operating temperature of 200 million degrees would qualify as "safe"? I hope they've got some good insulation. Still, it might be the beginning of the end of oil companies and fossil fuel as we know it, even if it's going to take a decade or two yet.

I found out that I could use a saved game from my first playthrough of ME3 for the 'Citadel' DLC. Not finished yet, but when I thought I was done, I'm suddenly stuck having to organize a party All I can say so far is: "Bwahahaha!" Most fun I've had playing a Bioware... "anything" really for years. The banter is just hilarious. I wonder if I would have met more party members if I'd had more save games to chose from. Looking forward to finish my ME2 game so I can start from scratch with a full roster. Tali ranting about the ruined fish tank made me spill my coffee when guffawing and I felt slightly sore afterwards from wearing a stupid grin most of the time.