Gromnir

Nah, the difference is there's an ocean in between. The fact that Americans built a wall to keep their southern neighbours out, should tell enough how they would deal with muslims. so, the US built a wall to keep southern neighbors out? HA! new mexico gots a spanish-speaking population of over 47%. california and texas is both having more than 1/3 population o' native spanish speakers. the US is the country with the second largest number o' hispanic residents in the world. no other country in the world has as many total immigrants from all countries as the United States has immigrants from Mexico alone. 11% of all living people born in mexico live in the US. if the US gots some kinda pervasive animosity directed at its southern neighbors, they gots a funny way of showing it. border protections (not a wall) is to stem the tide o' ILLEGAL immigration. duh. HA! Good Fun! The US is often divided down the middle on it's issues (not to say always) so you get both the support, understanding and bigotry, animosity. disagree. the US left and right is actual not very far apart on most issues. with only two parties, you tends to get far less polarization than in european parliamentary systems. try to explain to foreigners that there is no more conservative beast than some southern democrat Congressmen is difficult. individuals in the US may be running the gamut from support, understanding, bigotry and animosity, but our laws rare turn out that way. most laws end up as compromise measures authored by folks with largely similar ideologies. since the civil rights acts o' 1964, any kinda overt public sanctioned bigotry has declined rapidly. sure, you can finds bigots everywhere in the US, but other than handling o' relations with domestic dependent nations (recognized indian tribes,) endemic, government sanctioned bigotry is rare. between the Court enforcement o' the civil war amendments, and Congressional tendency to avoid anything that even remotely smacks o' extremism, your suggestion o' disparate treatment is... unlikely. some folks want far too much from lawmaking. there is no law or Court decision that can change the beliefs and prejudices o' people. even so, American laws is very much supportive and understanding o' all racial minorities who is LEGALLY present within its borders. HA! Good Fun!

Nah, the difference is there's an ocean in between. The fact that Americans built a wall to keep their southern neighbours out, should tell enough how they would deal with muslims. so, the US built a wall to keep southern neighbors out? HA! new mexico gots a spanish-speaking population of over 47%. california and texas is both having more than 1/3 population o' native spanish speakers. the US is the country with the second largest number o' hispanic residents in the world. no other country in the world has as many total immigrants from all countries as the United States has immigrants from Mexico alone. 11% of all living people born in mexico live in the US. if the US gots some kinda pervasive animosity directed at its southern neighbors, they gots a funny way of showing it. border protections (not a wall) is to stem the tide o' ILLEGAL immigration. duh. HA! Good Fun!

again with the fallacies. point out where we claimed that the US has not killed people who is muslims. US forces has killed far more believers o' shinto, buddha and christ than they has killed those who follow mohammed, but rare is it claimed that the US harbors some kinda animosity towards the faithful o' the aforementioned. religion has been a relative non-factor leading to most US aggression beyond its own boarders. btw, am personally offended whenever and wherever freedom o' expression is abrogated. is the raison d'

is actual kinda impressive to be seeing how many logic fallacies you can fit in a two line post. *chuckle* even so, your ridiculous statements is actual managing to be examples o' the muslim perspective/paranoia. sure, is not as if the US is bombing folks 'cause they is wearing burqas or reading the koran, but the muslims not see it that way. thanks for illustrating the point. HA! Good Fun!

well then, given that the press reviews hasn't been mixed should be more than a little surprising to walsh. heck, even Gromnir has been mild perplexed that the albeit limited number o' press reviews thus far has been disappointing. HA! Good Fun!

is hard to explain to euros that their notions o' freedom of expression and religion is seeming more than a little oppressive to the average American. even rosbjerg, who would appear to be a relative open-minded fellow, suggests that muslims should be willing to Change to fits in with the herd notion o' Acceptable. this nation's revolutionary roots, and the fact that many early Americans were escaping religious oppression themselves, has given Americans a different pov regrading personal freedoms than you sees 'mongst the peoples o' the enlightened western nations. that being said, even here in the US we has failed to recognize that for many/most muslims, religion IS their identity. their entire world-view is filtered through religion-- makes it difficult for westerners on either side o' the pond to understand the seeming endemic paranoia and stubbornness o' the average muslim. here in the US we take it for granted that if Bob, the sheet wearing klansman, and Dave, the hasidic jew, lives next door to each other, they is both having equal rights to express their pov. the fact that Bob and his fellow nutters burns crosses on weekends does not, in and of itself, deprive Dave o' any o' his religious or personal liberty. euros is frequently disturbed by American indifference to the insulting and inflammatory behavior we allows in the name o' First Amendment protections. even so, relatively speaking, Americans and the people o' most western nations ain't all that far apart on these issues. both euros and Americans looks at burqas and recognize that there is an aspect o' the traditional islamic garb that is fundamentally demeaning to women. nevertheless, here in the US we thinks it is best to leave the choice o' wearing the burqa up to the individual rather than to create legislation which would threaten religious freedom. the euro pov is understandable. after all, can a muslim woman who has been raised since birth with muslim values really makes an informed choice? is not an easy question. even in the US we has some hard choices that makes our desire to protect the free exercise o' religion very difficult. assume for a moment that the aforementioned Bob is not a klansman. in our present hypothetical, Bob is a member o' a fringe religion that forbids the use o' modern medical treatments. Bob's son suffers from a disease that is easily cured with a readily available medication. without the medication, Bob's son will die. Bob says "no" to medical treatment for his son. am suspecting that even the average freedom-loving American would pause before jumping to protect Bob's claim o' religious free-exercise. after all, it is Bob's son who is gonna die for Bob's beliefs, not Bob. shouldn't we protect Bob's son until he is old enough to make his own choice? as hard as it is for folks to accept, American courts protect Bob and would stand aside as Bob's child died seeming unnecessary. euros, and even a goodly % o' Americans, would no doubt be disturbed by the death o' Bob's son. a "pointless" death in the name o' religious freedom? again, is not that euros and Americans is so far apart philosophically, but we is far more hesitant to embrace well-intentioned paternalism if it would touch upon free exercise o' religion. muslims is... different. everything is religion. is no line drawing possible 'cause all aspects touch 'pon religion. if a preacher in florida burns a koran, then America is allowing islam to be insulted. no school prayer is clear an attack 'pon islam, regardless if is a non-denominational prohibition. depictions o' western values in popular TV shows is also an attack 'pon islam. a scantily clad female movie protagonist who speaks back to men folk in public? clearly is meant to demean islam. sounds paranoid? sure it does, but if everything is somehow 'bout religion, then the paranoia is understandable. in the US and in most western nations, it is assumed that religious and secular interests can be separated. we draws lines different in the US than they does in europe, but we still recognize that some aspects o' every day life is discreet from religion and can be legislated w/o offense to core spiritual values. is different for muslims. is not that westerners is enlightened and that muslims is backwards, but there is a fundamental, and possibly irreconcilable, difference in our perspectives regarding religion. personally we thinks euros trying to legislate burqa dress codes is offensive. even so, we recognize that our espoused notions o' egalitarian religious tolerance is even more offensive to muslims than is the burqa prohibition. kinda ironic. HA! Good Fun!

we felt compelled to google "tsundere." ... dorks. HA! Good Fun!

the genre-spoof movies typically fail with Gromnir. is only funny if you has seen the source material, and we rarely has watched the requisite number o' bad movies to be making the spoof funny. HA! Good Fun!

Despite what you've just said... (and I agree)... Do you think Bethesda could do justice to someone elses' world? I'm not so sure myself, (I'm not to impressed with FO3 as series fan) but I am impressed with their talent (and technical ability) at crafting viable open world games; and of their modeling & texturing prowess. am gonna concede from the start that we clear ain't the target audience o' bethesda games. the only bethesda game we ever finished were fo3, and is not as if that game makes our top 10 list. however, your observations pinpoint why we thinks bethesda would actual benefit from trying to "do justice to someone else's world," as 'posed to building their own. fo3 was very successful- there is no denying that point. in spite o' fo3 success, am thinking it is clear that the strength o' the game were Not the characters and quests. as hurlshot identifies, character development is hardly a bethesda strength. similarly, we thinks that their quest design is simple and largely uninspired. nevertheless, even obsidian's ceo, uncle fergie, observed that bethesda managed to capture the spirit o' fo while making palatable to gamers who were born after the reagan presidency. as hard as it is for fallout purists to accept, what made fo3 successful were bethesda's spin on the setting, regardless o' how fast-and-loose the boys from DC played with interplay's source material. as such, is precisely 'cause o' their substantial technical prowess and creative paucity that we is thinking that bethesda is best suited to trying to "do justice to someone else's world." am not trusting bethesda to come up with their own world near as much as we sees 'em being competent craftsman who can recreate and mass produce the works o' some other developer or author. unfortunately, betehsda is too successful to voluntarily put their energy and resources into building a franchise owned by somebody other than themselves. is doubtful they again do a game for which their talents is most suited. HA! Good Fun!

I actually don't think that would be a good fit. Martin's books are good because they have fantastic characters, which is really Bethesda's biggest weakness. Sure, they would recreate Westeros and let you run through it and explore, but it would be hard to capture the personalities that make it an interesting world. dunno 'bout the character focus bit as a deterrent. the setting o' martin's books is at least as important as his characters. westeros alone is a rich, detailed and vibrant locale for developing story either in books or games. add in future possibility o' essos with the free cities and dothraki (sp?) sea, and you got loads o' material on which to build. given how much effort martin has put into his setting, we would suggest that his sandbox is as inviting as were interplay's fallout locale. honestly, we cannot even recall the name o' the setting o' the oblivion games, but it were well-received 'nuff to spawn multiple bestselling games. martin's world is at least as enticing as is oblivion, no... and it not have all those silly demon-gates neither. besides which, what really kills martin's world for gaming is lack o' magic and exotic races. tell fans o' the genre that they cannot play anime-inspired dark elves with bloated bosoms and donkey ears? sacrilege! regardless, the real reason for bethesda reluctance is as follows: "We wanted to do our own world." is an understandable pov. fallout were a relative unique situation 'cause while the setting already had considerable development and a small legion o' rabid fans, there were no bishop whose ring needed to be kissed every time a bethesda developer wanted to add content. no George Lucas and star wars. no wotc/hasbro and d&d. no George R. R. Martin and song. bethesda is not a desperate indie developer looking for the next handout to be staying solvent. bethesda is big 'nuff to be wearing their own ecclesiastical jewelry. HA! Good Fun!

In the US, you'll probably want to pick up Blue mussels. Those are in season during the winter and early spring. Depending on where you live, there might be specialty fish shops with better selections. Sorry got sick. mc is correct. what tigranes identified as mussels is unlikely to be available fresh anywhere in the US. fresh blue mussels is readily available 'round the year, particularly in the northeast or northwest. mc correctly identifies the season during which they is most flavorful, but you should be able to get in summer. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nr5L1IGSRmQ last couple minutes offers some simple and useful purchasing tips. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nr-hMSwZ0a4...feature=related part 2 offers storage tips, cooking recommendations. good luck. HA! Good Fun!

It can be cool and ridiculous. You just need to watch more Russ Meyer movies. faster, pussycat! kill! kill! we never actual saw the movie, but how can you go wrong with a title like that, eh? HA! Good Fun!

ps am looking for clarification. "Hollywood used to be cool. Like, a 1000 years ago or so. Now it's just ridiculous." clearly the thousand year mark is meant as a ha ha. however, you is suggesting that at some point in the dim past, hollywood were "cool." when? give us a frame o' reference. am just curious, cause we has a hard time recollecting an era o' hollywood film making that clearly and undeniably produced proportional less dreck than today. bad silents. bad early talkies. bad musicals (lord, there were a boat load o' bad musicals.) bad westerns, religious epics, war flicks. surf movies? *snort* bad crime dramas o' the 60's and 70's in particular. the eighties? don't even get us started on all the bad 80's films. limit yourself to the the john hughes copycats and the star wars wannabees made during the 80's and you could go mad if forced to watch all such films. was the 90's your Golden Age? doubt it. *shrug* the further we is removed from a given era o' film, the easier it is to forget/ignore all the crap that were produced during that time period. is understandable, but myopic. by the same token, we fully admit that we is hardly a movie historian. is quite possible that the 40's, or some other era, were some kinda relative Ultra-Cool period for hollywood. as old as we is, we ain't That old. dunno. seems like there has always been considerable bilge being belched forth by the hollywood machine, but no doubts somebody with actual expertise could correct us. HA! Good Fun!

You kidding me? Harrison Ford himself stated in an interview not a long time ago that C&A was a silly child movie. ...and a silly child movie is **** by default because...? ...because there's only so many silly child movies someone can take before stop watching movies altogether. Hollywood used to be cool. Like, a 1000 years ago or so. Now it's just ridiculous. am calling bs. come up with a list o' the 10 best films from 2010 and half is gonna be hollywood. another couple is gonna be from american indie film makers/producers who gots close ties with hollywood. there is a knee-jerk reaction by some to reject hollywood as producing that which is fake, plastic and homogenous. is a myopic assessment. 2010, not our favorite movie year by any stretch o' the imagination, included more than a few films we genuine enjoyed, such films as true grit, black swan, inception, rabbit hole, winter's bone, kick-a$$, despicable me, toy story 3, the town, i am love, the king's speech, the fighter, shutter island, and others. only two o' the aforementioned films is foreign, and most is hollywood. heck, our favorite documentary from last year, waiting for superman, were made and distributed by hollywood entities. is easy to dismiss hollywood 'cause it produces so much crap (the last airbender, jonah hex, transformers, etc.) but the % of crap foreign and indie films is no better, and probable worse. the thing is, hollywood produces so much more that it inevitable results in a much larger % o' the total good films in any given year. HA! Good Fun!

have never played the call of duty games, but we recently read that hans zimmer collaborated on the score for call o' duty: modern warfare 2, and stephen barton (less famous than zimmer, but respected in the industry) composed call of duty 4: modern warfare. am gonna have to listen to the respective soundtracks. HA! Good Fun!

wow. am actually kinda amazed that you were able to misrepresent us with all of your enumerated points. get points for the trifecta at least. oh, and if your feelings got hurt 'cause we suggested that some o' chrisA characters and writing is cartoony and overwritten, then we feels more than a little pity for you. we was quite happy to keep this thread limited to game content and opinions regarding writing, but if you is gonna accuse us o' character flaws simply 'cause we voice an opinion different than yours, then we suggest you disconnect from the internet and move somewhere north o' the arctic circle where you need only concern yourself with the poor table etiquette o' polar bears. grow up. really. btw, our criticisms regarding game writing were far more limited than those o' mr. sawyer. we noted that in spite o' the fact that chrisA indulges in the maudlin introspection and cheap exposition from time to time, he has also written our favorite game and our favorite crpg character. josh, on the other hand, suggested that the entire class o' crpg gamers is having very low standards for writing, and that writing in the genre is similarly low as a result. HA! Good Fun! ps what about the god/dog character suggested to you that he were schizophrenic? perhaps we missed something. we saw no signs o' schizophrenic behavior. god did not actual think he were god, and we don't recall hallucinations. also, it were suggested that the split in the god/dog personalities were the result o' trauma. schizophrenia is not resulting from trauma.

fair enough. your contrast 'tween the public awareness o' brown and eco were a bit misleading, but am comprehending and largely agreeing with your point. if the average gamer is not only satisfied, but happy with pap, then why invest in more substantial fare, yes? perhaps chrisA has stumbled onto a viable formula to meet low standard josh's attributes to the crpg gaming buyer. no doubt it is far more economic for obsidian writers to focus on character concept as 'posed to character development if concept alone suffice. however, one wonders how developers and publishers measure the degree to which quality writing helped the sales o' a game. having observed some o' the bizarre conclusions bioware reached via their data mining efforts, we suspect that there is far more art than science involved in the measuring o' a game's attributes both fair and foul. HA! Good Fun!

universal like? am not certain anybody has ever striven for such. am doubtful that any sane person ever considered such a benchmark to be a reasonable goal or measure. that being said, some authors is both popular and appreciated by the folks in the ivory towers. jack london made loads o' money as an author... which were pretty much unheard of til the mid 20th century. at the same time, london gots academic cred. cormac mccarthy is a more modern example o' an author who finds considerable commercial and academic appeal. mccarthy books almost invariably makes bestsellers lists, and has frequent been turned into movies. at the same time, mccarthy is gonna be on the short list o' greatest living authors cobbled together by most any critic or professor one cares to question. yeah, authors such as joyce or pynchon pretty much thumb their noses at the dirty, unwashed masses... dares the public to like their works. regardless, there is no insurmountable dichotomy o' popularity and quality, eh? is actual kinda funny that josh brings up faulkner and hemingway in the present context. while faulkner novels may have frequent scared the faint o' heart, he were also quite successful as a writer o' popular and sucessful movie screenplays. is not as if faulkner dumbed down his writing for movies neither- he simply recognized the differences and limitations o' the respective medium he were working with. in point o' fact, faulkner wrote the screenplay for To Have, and Have Not, a movie based 'pon a hemingway novel. heck, feel free to mention this tidbit o' trivia when next you speak to the obsidian writers. if they ever adopt a "pearls before swine" mentality, kick 'em in the chops with faulkner's The Big Sleep or Gunga Din movie credits. as for pmp comments... is startling that we already addressed most o' your concerns earlier in this thread. wacky setting for sci-fi and fantasy IS almost a given, but that don't mean that the characters needs necessarily be wacky. regardless, no matter how wacky or alien a character is, the author needs make the character fundamentally human or the audience will not be able to empathize. no empathy = no emotion = fail. etc. if we repeats our self yet again, tale could chastise us for spam. am not seeing a pmp issue we didn't already address. *shrug* HA! Good Fun!

Oooh, Tale loves the game. What do you love about it? What about the SP was excellent? For however much I love it, there's several people around here who felt it was repetitive. most o' the reviews we read echoed the above sentiment. reviewers loved the game... for the first hour or so. followed by grind, grind, grindgrindgrindgrindgrindgrindgrindgrindgrind. characters and story were too shallow to overcome the ultimately tedious and repetitive gameplay. we have not played, but the warhammer franchise intrigues us enough that we has been following. HA! Good Fun!

oh sure. let us get out our script o' fo:nv and dead money. shucks, we don't have no script, so a "critical literary appraisal" is gonna be somewhat problematic, eh? *snort* we already pointed out the fortune-cookie flow/be like water nonsense from dog/god, but the best examples o' problematic chrisA stuff is from motb. now, we has all witnessed the stereotypical and clich

have no idea what eastenders is, but your beckett comment is childish straw-man. indulge in hyperbole much? in any event, while the setting and situations in sci-fi and fantasy is frequent over-the-top, the characters need not be... and should not be. the more remote characters become from reality, the less a reader is able to empathize. phillip k. d1ck's Roy from blade runner is an android, but he is very human. what makes roy ultimately such a great character is not his super strength or his shortened life-span. is his humanity... and **** didn't have to spell that out, did he? give sci-fi characters wacky attributes is fine... is why we mentioned geek love's freaks. the problem with chrisA characters is that he stops at the wacky, and for gets to make genuine and human. no matter how unique or alien is the sci-fi character's attributes, if his/her humanity is clich

yeah, "moving" in a cartoony kinda way. is too bad that the pc were not voiced, 'cause when we told dog/god (paraphrased) to be or flow like water, it sooooo needed a bruce lee impersonation. and am not even gonna detail the maudlin camp that were the dog/god positive epilogue. however, just as sawyer recognized that crpg fans demand very little o' the mechanics in games, we has observed that crpg fans tends to be far more accepting o' bad writing in games than they is o' writing in other media. some o' that is understandable as games gots different limitations than does drama, novels and even comic books. even so, as there is instances o' quality writing in games, there is obviously nothing that makes such admirable attempts impossible. am recalling a crpg roundtable in which chrisA noted the overwhelming importance o' character concept in crpg writing. is possible that chrisA has over-invested in his own theory, 'cause his dramatis personae tend to suffer from the wacky. 'stead o' making compelling through what the characters does, chrisA takes the shortcut and makes unique by having 'em suffer from mpd or similar oddities. he then gives his freak show menagerie dialogs that is overdone and a bit campy. there were a novel written in the late 80s or early 90s... were called geek love. the characters were actual freak show oddities. the thing is, while the situations and characters o' geek love were obviously unusual, the albino dwarf and fish-boy were both very human and genuine. is our opinion that mr. avellone is far too reliant on the wacky concept. even so, he did ravel... and we liked kreia, dean domino, and many other chrisA characters quite a bit. as a whole, planescape is still our favorite crpg, and we enjoyed dead money Writing if not the gameplay. we applaud much o' chrisA work, but like any young author he tends to overwrite. the thing is, he ain't a young author no more. HA! Good Fun! (edit: might need a new keyboard as we had multiple missing "t"s in our post. fixed)

have you ever read chrisA stuff? is frequent overwritten to a comical degree. a noteworthy example o' this failing is the dog/god dialogues and epilogue from dead money. on the other hand, chrisA does come up with some uniquely compelling characters, but he is just as likely to indulge in the comic book silliness you identify. he writes like a young author. am gonna guess that the thing that has hurt chrisA the mostest since planescape is his reputation. mr. avellone needs a take-no-prisoners editor to review his work and point out the heavy-handed nonsense that creeps into his writings. unfortunately, established writers often find it more difficult to gets good criticism than does tyros. for some folks it is harder to criticize updike than joe shmoe, eh? 'course, am only guessing that the writing you reference is chrisA... and the fact is that we didn't read the linked material 'cause we not like to be spoiled. even so, when we hears obsidian writing being described as cartoony or comic book, we cannot help but thinks o' dove from motb, god/dog from dead money, and a half dozen other characters that suffered from chrisA overindulgence. HA! Good Fun! ps visas mar may be the worst example o' the comic book silliness we can recollect, but am having a foggy 'membrance that a writer other than chrisA were responsible for most o' the blind sith's lines in kotor. could be wrong.

is amazing how personal experiences differ. we got ps:t on day 1 from a local computer gaming store at a nearby mall in CA. at the front o' the store were a cardboard cutout some 4' tall that included images o' tno and most o' the ps:t joinables. we cannot speak to how the game itself were displayed on shelves because Gromnir arrived almost contemporaneous with the delivery... were still in shipping box behind counter. ... also, for you folks who claim that ps:t were under the radar for mostest o' the crpg world, we calls bs. really. ign did more than a dozen stories on the game for the year leading up to release, and we can recall more than a few print stories in magazines such as cgw. am not certain how many ps:t full-page and 2-page ads we saw in print magazines, but it were more than a few. virtual every online magazine site had some ps:t preview in which the writers were obviously drooling to get their grubby little mitts on the game. additionally, our totsc disk had a nice long preview/advertisement for ps:t... although we concede that while the preview got kewl points, it were more than a little inscrutable. there were many problems with ps:t, but lack o' marketing is hardly at the top o' the list. HA! Good Fun! ps we always regret that we did not go back to the game store where we purchased ps:t... coulda' made an offer on the advertising display. we gots a 1987 buick grand national gnx, but am thinking that the advertising display would top it for geek love... and would be easier to maintain.

this kinda silliness is actually rather traditional and nostalgic 'round these parts. sure, is not exact parallel, but there is a die hard element that has been claiming that a major reason why ps:t were a financial failure is 'cause of the box art. *snort* oddly enough, there were an ign article that detailed the making o' ps:t box art... showed pictures o' guido henkel getting the makeup treatment. ps:t box art were kewl in april or july o' 1999. don't recall too many protests when the article were still being read the first time by those anticipating ps:t. nevertheless, there is a decade-long tradition o' interplay/black isle/obsidan fandom suggesting that box art transgressions is serious biz. HA! Good Fun!