metadigital

I rarely make a single point in one comment. :D Also, the Persians / inhabitants of Iran have a long and rich history: just like the Indian subcontinent and the Chinese ... trying to club them over the head and call them (collectively) a bunch of idjits doesn't address the global politcial issues. As soon as Pakistan obtained nukes, everyone started talking to them with respect; Britain talks about refurbishing its nuclear deterrent, not abiding by the spirit of the non-proliferation treaty and putting all nukes beyond use. Is it any wonder other countries, especially those with a long history and a rich culture where they used to be rulers of their region for many centuries (millennia, even), see the double standards in global politics and decide that they need to buy into the nuclear arms race to have a say at the adults' table?

That, and the Italians aren't Roman, they/we are Latinus.

Constant +6 Maybe random loot? I was level one, though ...

There was a quest? I just killed the rat (and read the manuscript, and looted the ) ...

Latinus

Why do you hate Easter and Christmas?

eBay.

I'm officialy lost, now.

Sssssssssssssss-T-Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiike! You're outa the game!

No.

Quite.

You can probably buy a PC to play the game for $40 ...

Not much to see, actually. Lockdown time.

Fixed!

you're always outnumbered and usually outgunned: if you run into battle without exercising tactics you will fail. You can also literally wander around the entire map and do anything in any order. (Some quests only open up when you complete a prerequisite, of course.) It's what all the whingers wanted in the KotORs: the ability to interact (and keep playing after the end of the primary quest) with the environment.

Um, from memory it was just after the laboratory invasion ... the central premise was that seeing the planet wasn't alone in the universe (finally seeing all the stars, and concluding that there might well be many other inhabitable worlds out there) was enough to make the deists crazy and rampage around and destroy the world. (God lied to us, We're not the chosen ones, etc, etc.) Quite a subtle critique of the dangers of religion as a theocracy. Still, you are right, it wouldn't be much of a film: films are best with lots of action and less philosophising. :D http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455507/ <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Hee hee. Harsh, but certainly a viable opinion. Mr Dawkins's film was broadcasted on free-to-air tv recently, and it was certainly good to hear someone talking logically about faith-based matters, for a change.

Fixed! It's okay. I was annoyed that it was a dumbed-down screenplay from Isaac Asimov's Nightfall (the short story, which he later turned into a novel, with a co-writer, that was, incongruously, less good). Nightfall is about a planet that orbits a bunch of stars (six?) so that there is never a "night" on the planet. Well, when I say never, there is, but only every few millennia ... and historians from the current age track back to find a bunch of civilizations before their own, at regularly timed intervals ... that just happen to coincide with the predicted total solar eclipse due shortly ... much more satisfying novella. But the film was okay for an action title.

Clint FTW! REAL men watch all five films back-to-back.

Psst: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0311361/ It's better. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Actually, Martin Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ is a better film for historical accuracy (the acting is not very good, though): Mel Gibson's effort is just perpetuating Roman Catholic fictions. Also, of course, Monty Python's Life of Brian gives some extra socio-historico-political background to the Palestine of two millennia ago.

You're talking about (arguably) the oldest surviving civilization on Earth, y'know.

in a fiction novel. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Metadigital is looking for Batman. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Indeed. I read a short story (Ray Bradbury?) where the police force was manned by only idealistic people: people who are incorruptible by dint of their Weltanschauung. They must retire when they become suseptible to corruption ... mandatory retirement age from the force was nineteen. :D (Joining age was thriteen, iirc). Then everyone went onto civilian life, having completed their military service.

sabre-rattling n noun the display or threat of military force.

clickie* * Google is your friend.

Should be less than fifty years before computers are more powerful than the human brain (the most powerful thinking engine in the known universe), based on Ray Kurzweil's extrapolations of human progress towards a technological singularity.

Who are you talking to, Eldar?