Musopticon?

Capital, dear sir!(lol pun) You should've seen the ruckus and hullabaloo at the Tampere centre. People were running naked into the fountain and continued partying till the morning hours. It was crazy. And so very Finnish. Fortunately I decided to skip the occasion and get some study diaries done. Summer can't come any sooner...

What I did today? Well, I congratulated Nightshade on having a birthday and surreptitiously, so very very carefully returned. Hi guise.

Wolfmother - Joker and the thief This album is either a huge tribute to almost three decades of music or a very successfull mish-mash of rip-offs from old rock hits.

Solium Infernum, an indie hex-based tbs strategy game about vying for the throne of Hell. Yes, it's one of those "one more turn" affairs.

That was pretty damn top notch. I'm actually contemplating on updating this rig(or buying a new one, actually) just to get to play New Vegas and AP. The hype sustains me, I'm a sad sad man.

Crpg based on the Gumshoe-system Trail of Chtulhu, cheap license, interesting mechanics. Steampunk is always a hoot, but this time it could be honest-to-god Victorian steampunk, the dresses, the staches and lot. An fantasy action rpg with Obsidian's original setting, a merging of good writing with visceral action. Perhaps something contemporary, a mixture of espionage with ecoterrorism and esoteric cults as a backdrop. Doesn't really matter if it's supernatural or not, but the latter would avoid all kinds of PC issues and not seem like a statement against actual religious orders.

Shani > Triss +1 Honestly, nomnom.

Yeah, shame about the length, I was really interested. Now though, I don't want to fork over the dough for a full price game which offers only 7-12 hours of entertainment, too little content for a student's frail budget.

You're a godsend! Thanks a lot, I'll see to them.

If I may suggest an alternative, George MacDonald Frasier. He is perhaps less obvious, and far more colourful. His fictional works concern the anti-hero Flashman who in turn was a fictional character taken from the classic Tom Brown's school days. G MacD also wrote his own semi-autobiography in 'Quartered Safe Out Here' which is a historical account of his time fighting with 14th Army in Burma during WW2. Therefore, G MacD is not only the author of far more racy books, but you could contrast his true and fictional creations. I think you should find it hard NOT to be able to write reams about him. Hahhah, I would pick him, but we already had a class(well, half a class) about Frasier and Flashman! I'm actually reading the first book now, it's actually very well researched and as far from nationalistic, a trait that often springs up in historical fiction, as possible. And Afghanistan during the late Imperial period an interesting premise to say the least. Thanks though.

Really? Protective makes them harder than most to blitz, but I don't remember Wang's unit probability as being all that high (which is a better indicator of what a military pain an AI civ is likely to be), and he tends not to expand very quickly (via settlers or via invasions). Protective + a not-huge standing army can still be defeated; just bring a few more siege engines. In my experience, Korea never seems to grab enough territory to emerge as a power in the mid-late game. And the AI is one of the more reasonable ones-- get them to "Pleased" and you know you're safe from attack. It's relatively easy to beat Wang in the land grab, contain him, get him happy with you, and spend the whole game peacefully trading with him while you wail on your mutual enemies. The truly fearsome leaders at higher difficulty levels are the ones who tend to jump out in the early expansion race, and follow that up by building lots of units and throwing their weight around diplomatically-- Catherine, Gilgamesh, Suryavawhatever, Zara Yacob, and sometimes Shaka come to mind. Edit: Yes, I realize that this post includes the phrases "Wang's unit" and "beat Wang," so there's no need to bother pointing that out. Ah, but that's just it! The horrible trinity of Gilgamesh, Shaka Zulu and Cathy(I never seem to run to Ethiopians and can't say anything about Suryaman) are the ones you absolutely have to prepare for. After blitzing Montezuma or dropping your strongest warmongering ally(bless shared religions) into his lap, those three are the ones that always keep you on your toes. That's where Wang is at his trickiest, because he almost always can secure a location under your nose, while you are too busy tackling the other civs, which you can't really budge until Medieval and by that time he often has dozens upon dozens of kataparuto. I absolutely loathe him, much more than the Mongolian leaders, who always seem to target my civ. Then again, hey, I'm a fairly casual civonite! Undoubtedly there's a wealth of pain in the ass on the loftier difficulty levels. If I just had the time...

Ah, Civilization and it's massive fortification boni. You know which civ is still the most hated in Beyond the Sword circles? That's right, the freaking Koreans. Protective and Financial is a recipe for disaster the second they get to archers. Then it's turtling time. And I freaking hate the turtling time.

Hay guise, I'm in a British Historical Fiction course right now and am wondering if anyone could lighten my load by lending a hand. The situation is like this; we've talked about Robert Cornwell a couple of times, but there has not been an actual class about the author yet(we've looked into Walter Scott, Jones, Howard, Follet, etc) and I'd like to recitfy the situation by making a brief intro about the author, followed by a class about a short story of my choice. The problem is that I can't come up with a short story by him that I've actually read. I admit to my complete lack of knowledge over the Sharpe series, so I keep hoping someone here at the boards recalls a shorty story by the author, generally in the 30-60 pages range that I could use. Supposedly there's one or two Sharpe ones, but I've only read the Saxon series and Arthur series so far. Help an academian in need!

Few weeks ago our group did our second foray into the Skinsaw Murders, the second scenario of the Pathfinder Adventure path Rise of the Runelords. The scenario is spread over three or four parts in and around the city of Magnimar. Now, we've yet to enter Magnimar, which is a fairly sizeable trademeet of a city in Northern Varisia, a rival to the larger and more rigid Chelaxian(a hellish empire to the south, like Renaissance Italy with devils) ex-colony of Korvosa. All in all, Magnimar is the place where we finally actually get to use all the well-earned loot. It's large enough to have magical gear available and also a home to two people in our adventuring group, my character included. Of course we are blood excited to finally get there, but before that we had one obstacle to clear: Foxglove Manor. Ah, Foxglove Manor, your run-off-the-mill ghost house, or is it? Our group stumbled from haunting to haunting, vary of each other's sanity and well-being. Mostly it was merely metaphysical, not corporeal hauntings, but we did a fair bit of fighting as well. Traps and natural hazards and vermin, the works. All in all a great delve of a dungeon. Now, after finally finishing the mansion, giving the BBEG what he dearl deserved, we were left relatively unscathed, wandering in the first floor of the manor. Everyone was pretty spent and carrying a variety of exotic diseases and ailments("MUSHROOMS! I WANT MUSHROOMS! UNTIE ME!"), but also admiring the large haul and most importantly the next piece of te mystery we were sent to solve. Then it struck: "-Hey guys, we still haven't drawn that string", asked Jearis, the mageling "-What string?", I questioned "-You know, the one that goes in the preserved monkey head, right there in the hallway." "-Oh, right. Does anyone have a ten-foot pole? I don't want to launch another trap or spew my brain from hallucinations", intervened Dairhe, the Mierani druid "I don't, but we could design a system of pullies and ropes and perhaps..." Jearis was about to say, but... "RAAAGH, enough!", yelled the shoanti Skrym "-Yeah, I'll just pull the damn thing...", said I "-Wai..!" "-KREAAAGH!", screeches the taxidermic simian *as everyone stares empuzzled, I take another pull" "-HUAAAAAGH!" postulates the head "-You know, this could be worth something to the right buyer", offers the GM *laugh-a-tron ensues* We ended up selling the thing to an excentric old purveyor of ancient things for quite a bit of gold, but not before my character let loose a cacophony of ape noises just to see how a carrionstorm(a murder of undead carrion birds) would react to the cadences of the Mwangi jungles. Naturally they swarmed us, overtaken by an unholy rage. Fun times, fun times.

Hey, I hate the (although relative) stagnation too, so many companies seem to think that there's no market in the west for innovative new games and so we either get jrpgs in a very conservative vein or games that generally pass under radar, leading to vicious cycle of a lost market opportunity. Thank heavens we at least have Atlus, Inc to keep the western market for Asian games relatively fresh. Well, at least handheld gaming doesn't have this problem. But I wouldn't touch handhelds with a ten-foot pole.