Gorth

You need potatoes:

Thanks, but I am probably such an old SoB that Death doesn't want me I once scared the crap out of a couple of colleagues by crossing a heavily trafficked road, elegantly avoiding the cars. I told them that I was perfectly safe, as I got statistics on my side. "How so?" they asked. "Well, how many people do you know who has been run over by a car twice?" On a more serious note, I am not sure the human brain has the capacity to process the information of such extended lifespans. Is there really a point in living so long that you start "pushing out" old memories, losing who once was? Or will you hit a wall where you brain deadlocks and refuses to process new impulses?

I would probably ending up getting myself killed "prematurely" as I would give in to greater and greater excesses to avoid boredom. I am a person that experiences the world through doing things. There are only so many things you can do within reason. Then you start doing unreasonable things. I've managed to get myself run over by cars, falling down cliff sides, drowned (twice, once in ice water), electrocuted, survived pneumonia, earthquakes, fires, car crashes and floodings. And that in slightly more than 40 years. Just imagine the odds over a time span of 1000 year :ninja10:

Life is like a badly paced game, you get the sword of dung beetle slaying as a reward for slaying the last dung beetle in the game. Sounds familiar? Did your article mention anything about life quality in general? Would we spend 500 years with the physique of 30-40 year olds or would it be like 920 years with the bodies of 80 year olds?

For Reds, I usually prefer chilean and argentinean as first choice, south african and spanish as second choice. The rest are 'Meh!' as far as I am concerned. Usually I drink Shiraz... yes, I am a plebeian when it comes to wine. For whites, I do prefer either kiwi Chardonnays or some of the local south australian stuff. Rose ('e' with an accent that I can't find on my keyboard) "wine" is an oxymoron. A bastard child with none of the good qualities of its parents

Bought a couple of movies when I went into the local mall yesterday. Resident Evil 2 & 3, Battlestar Galactica Season 3 and A Knights Tale. Trying to decide which one is going to be the 'Movies you have seen lately'

Where has all the good taste gone?!? Taking a break from NWN2 for a brief game of Master of Orion 2, playing Human.

One of the topmost, stickied posts in their project forum has links to the mantis bug tracker where you can see outstanding bugs and progress (only progress on bugfixing mind you, not on the actual restoring of content).

[conspiracy] It does look very "Chult" like [/conspiracy]

Since I don't have a clever closing remark, I am going to borrow Gromnirs (without asking him no less)... There is another thread discussing the company and it's games http://forums.obsidianent.com/index.php?showtopic=49079

why? Because it sounded like you were about to justify illegal activities as a perfectly fine and good thing to do (the "greater good") part. Piracy doesn't drive prices down and make stuff affordable, competition does. And as mentioned previously, you malaria example is irrelevant. People stealing for basic survival is a hell of a lot different from people stealing because they decided to spend their money elsewhere rather than buying what they are stealing. I am pretty sure that shipping 500.000 free copies of Halflife 2 to Bangladesh is not going to improve the infant mortality rate. A rather silly comparison really. As for your book example and photocopying, what you are stealing is the use of the book when copy it illegally (yes, a simplified way of putting it). People trying to explain why they are entitled to steal something, that nobody *forces* them to steal makes them look rather pathetic, like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

I am curious about that statemet. Care to elaborate? And I suggest you chose your wording very carefully...

Maybe we just don't have any decent training in proper argumentation techniques

I think we can agree on that. As I said previously, the events, technologically and culturally have evolved at different paces, creating some kind of anachronism. Voting with a wallet is fine, that is part of the capitalistic model. Only thing I take issue with is if it is done while "shoplifting" with the other hand. Nothing ruins ideals better than a bit of hypocrisy. @Newc: I disagree with your malaria medication example, because people are stealing a recipee to survive, which is a very basic instinct (survival). I don't think it is comparable with what is basically unessential entertainment. That isn't a question of survival, but of wanting a service without paying if you can get away with it.

Oh, I was by no means an angel in my young days :blush10: Some day, it just sort of dawned on me, that what I did was probably not a good thing. Quite a wrong thing really. It didn't happen overnight, but it happened eventually. As for lan games, I agree. Depressingly few publishers consider that people might want to have some fun in a group, but might not all be inclined to buy 15 copies each of 5 games for the few times they might get an opportunity to play it. A few games had the right idea, but the only one I can remember from top of my head is x-wing vs. tie-fighter which came with a "master" and a "slave" game cd, enabling at least two players to play. Maybe publishers need to seriously rethink their licensing when it comes to games that are aimed at co-op players, e.g. buy 1+x (one single player plus x multiplayer participants)?

I think part of the problem is, that the media and technology has completely outpaced peoples moral values. Kids grow up with an internet connection at home, with easy access to intangible goods, ready for snatching with little risk of being caught. Question is, how to accomplish a shift in attitude and get to the point where it is worth the investment in time and money to create "virtual" things?

If you steal the results of their labour without paying them, well guess what, they might get fed up with it and seek other pastures. It isn't only the loss of income as a result of theft that is harmful, is also the resulting frustration part, having to listen to snotty, spoiled brats trying to justify why stealing is ok with a stupid "But nobody gets hurt" or equally inane "But, they wouldn't have bought it anyway, so why should they pay for it". Low IQ excuses from ethically challenged people. Having spent the last 24 years in software development, I know one thing for sure. Nobody could ever force me to work in game development, not even at gunpoint. Less glamorous allright, but there is a certain satisfaction in doing one-off projects building custom products tailored for one and only purposes since you don't have to deal with the piracy that accompanies shrink wrapped products.

Would you refuse to pay the guy who built your house after it was finished? After all, if you provided the building materials why should he have any payment, all he contributed was his time and his health. He still has both his hands and can build other houses. Eventually, somebody might pay even him for his efforts if he is lucky.

For starters, it would nice with an incentive rather than a punishment for buying a game. I buy my games and have done so ever since I "grew up". It ticks me off though, that games are crippled by all kinds of mechanisms that works detrimental to fun. I've experienced more than once that I had to do things you are not supposed to do just to get the friggin thing to run (and then have to feel guilty about it afterwards, despite paying full price for the thing). Getting rid of built in crippleware for legit software would be a good thing Publishers need to come up with new ideas.

Supposedly Australia is still a monarchy as well. Who woulda thunk it. We are stealing one of your people to turn into our own royalty

I am looking forward to Purgatorio

Transvision Vamp - baby I don't care. Currently dusting off old cd's starting with the letter 'T'

That was some awesome pictures on that website I wonder how many ideas L.A. had for games before they decided to reduce their number of projects.

I usually had something like the following IWD: Human Paladin Human Thief Human Druid Human Specialist Mage (Necromancer) Human Bard Sometimes Human Ranger, Sometimes Human Cleric for the last slot Yes, I am a racist, I prefer humans in my party In IWD2 I tried some more "adventurous" themed parties, like Gorths Crusaders made up of Paladins and Clerics or The Treehuggers made up of Druids and Rangers. Never completed the game with any of those though. The shortest career was probably the Arcane Research team made up of 6 mages Still, good fun though.