Gorth

Start of old thread End of old thread Currently reading Soul Music by Terry Pratchett. What can I say? I'm a shallow person, I enjoy it >_ (it was either that or yet another David Gemmell book in the airport store).

While some things are indeed cultural, we are instilled with an objective appreciation of beauty based on some universal proportions (lots of examples if you can be bothered searching, just listing the top google one http://www.intmath.com/numbers/math-of-beauty.php). All aspects of our looks, from body to facial proportions gets analysed independently of culture and compared to an innate known set of rules. What the media is doing is pounding those not meeting the (usually unattainable) ideal proportions and offering (often useless) remedies to if not reach those proportions then at least give the illusion of having those proportions. Then there is of course the cultural aspect, but the reason is the same as far as the media is concerned, it's about pushing as many SKU"s over the counter as possible regardless of whether there is a need or not. Those of us who are old enough did notice that recently (like the last 10-15 years) adult women show a lot more body parts that previously was covered up or at least shown less in public. We also noticed the counter reaction and an increasing sense of Neo-Victorian prudeness wave washing over the western world. No self respecting male would be caught dead watching soaps. Don't be wrong just for the sake of being different You still have your teeth? Because society never bothered to buy, much less play JE They are both made by EA Your info is outdated. D&D players are no longer publicly accused of being satanists You got me there (what is BL and MW?!?) Would you be surprised... try searching for age groups and disposable income. Explains why some publishers are horrified by the thought of M or even worse, R ratings. Face it Volourn, you are perfectly normal

Back in Action, I played Jagged Alliance, I knew Jagged Alliance, Jagged Allience was a favourite of mine. Back in Action, you're no Jagged Alliance

They are in the middle of an evolutionary shift. In a few thousand generatiosn they'll have developed fully fledged wings on the side of their heads

I'm betting on Bethesda being the 'picky' one, they've got a reputation for being very protective of their IPs, no? I would have guessed LucasArts on that one

The no DRM thing was what sold me on the GOG preorder too. Crossing fingers and hoping the game is good. @Volourn: Yeah, almost as bad as offering ME2 for free just to get you to buy DA2

Damn, beaten to the suggestion. Keep in mind that SR2 is turnbased, tactical combat rather than "action" combat like the old Elite. Otherwise X-2 would be my suggestion (way easier to get into than X-3).

Not sure how the later Age of Wonders series works, but yes, you do have a basic resource management and city grabbing aspect to it. Thats what provides your heroes with the cannon fodder that follows you into battle (and what allows you to upgrade units).

Man, that is tempting... trying to picture it next to my original Commodore 64 (I still have one in working condition)

Tunnels are just sewers without the swampy bits. Like cheeseburgers without cheese

Depends on how you feel about swamps

I would mention Heroes of Might and Magic III (1999), but despite being a "hybrid", it does lean more towards strategy then roleplaying. Edit: @Orogun01

Gorth - Government 1 - 0 (overtime goal) (Backstory) Nothing that brute force can't overcome. Got an apology and my money. I'll continue pursuing the case through the police though, somebody is till going to jail without getting any money for passing the starting line

Fallout (which happened to be released before Black Isle was officially created)

Moved into my new place Saturday. New city, new state, new challenges My neck is a bit sore, but that is a combination of me not being used to carry 30kg of sportsbags and backpacks for 5km (I usually leave such stuff for military guys) and not having a bed to sleep on before Friday. No phone and internet yet either, which does suck a bit. That and not having a fridge or washing machine either. Ah well, 4 more days.

As somebody mentioned previously, it really is about control. Religion doesn't make people frothing lunatics, odds are they already were and some clever charismatic demagogue types will come along and find a way to channel the pent up rage. Instead of having an anarchistic, randomly lashing out mob, you get a directed, controlled anger lashing out at "designated" enemies of the mob. People feel more comfortable with "shared values" and hating the same things. If you want to solve the problem of fundamentalism and extremism, you first have to get to the bottom of the causes of peoples anger and do something about it first. Something a number of ex-leaders in North Africa realised too late. Some reasons are cultural, where medieval, tribal cultures feel their patriarchal (and often misogynistic) systems under threat by change, others are too many youths with too much spare time on their hands and probably dozens of other reasons.

The Soviet Union...

Plus, you would expect heavy resistance/obstacles from powerful lobbies, who have a vested interest in not finding cheap alternatives to current energy sources.

Just out of curiosity, have you read the two "heroes" books featuring Ludwig Schwartzhelm and Kurt Helborg? Same conundrum, except the protagonists are slightly different. The fight is over the empty elector seat in Averland (after the death of Marius 'The Mad' Leitdorf) and Helborg/Schwartzhelm is fighting to the death supporting the two opposing sides. All masterminded by a clever Slaanesh cultist who wants the province for herself Nothing like a bit of intrigue at court to get the blood flowing... quite literally.

Is DA2 all about the conflict between templars and mages? Honestly, that was the most boring part of DA1 and what made me lose most of my interest in the franchise even before DA2. It is just too much a poor mans Warhammer universe. Mages draw their power from the warp fade and unless properly trained and with disciplined minds risk possession by warp fade entities. Those with magic capability who refuses to live and study at the official College of Magic circles of magic will be branded renegades malificar and hunted down by the Templars of Sigmar and summarily executed. Warhammer just pulls it off so much better

Depending on how mod friendly/unfriendly the game turns out to be, I would expect custom weapons and nude mods to be among the first things to come out.

I haven't seen it, but the trailer makes it look just as bad as Independence Day Dicovererd that the pilot episode DVD of Caprica that I bought had a second disc in there with the pilot episode of something called 'Warehouse 13'. Never heard of it before, but looked kind of interesting in a twilight zone and x-files bastard child of way.

You won't say that when heavily armed Zen Buddhist guerillas starts the next insurgency somewhere...

And Kasumi is quite powerful too with her teleporting backstabbing. :D That sounds like the teleporting rogue in the DA2 demo.

A bit of Master of Orion 2. Experimenting with custom races that doesn't make sense from a "power gaming" perspective, yet not necessarily gimped either. Just trying fun combos. Cybernetic, sub terranean, less food producing Gorthaurians for the win When not playing that, I'm busy ridding the world of barbarians, purging them with Greek Fire as the Byzantine Empire in EUIII. National ideas focussing on religious intolerance and military elitism.