Amentep

Really? The protagonists in VII, VIII, X, and XIII aren't exactly the "chosen one" or have "a special destiny" that ONLY THEY can pull off. In VII Cloud has the backstory connection to the antagonist, but that doesn't mean that he is the only one who can possibly beat the creatures coming at him and his party. In VIII you're kind of a victim of happenstance, in X any summoner could have done what the main protagonists did, and in XIII the characters are hardly unique in their abilities. Unlike, say, Baldurs Gate II where you're the son of bhaal, or Planetscape where you're an immortal and the only one of your kind, JE where you're the last of the only crew that can restore the world, ME where you're the first and only guy to even see the threat coming and only because you're the one who got really odd visions in his head... Are they special in terms of what ends up happening and the consequences? Yes, but in JRPGs you usually aren't that special at the beginning of your game (where most western RPG's have your character somehow having that unique thing that makes them different). I've only played the first 11 main series FF games, but I'd argue that 8 of them - FFI, FFIII, FFV, FFVI, FFVII, FFVIII, FFX, FFX-2 - follow a Chosen One motif. Note that for me a "Chosen One" motif is built around the idea that some external force "anoints" the hero or propels them into action. This can be internal by birth (the Bhaal-Spawn in BG or Terra in FFVI, the protaganist of JE, the shard bearer in NWN2) or external (the protaganists in FFIII being granted powers by the Crystal of Light or Sheppard being the one to use the Prothean Beacon, the protaganist in KotOR2 surviving being cut from the force, Sephrioth messing with Cloud's mind and body, Ultimicia arranging a lot of the events around the orphans and Edea). Accidental propulsion into the plot (the IWD protaganists happen to be the survivors of the group traveling to the beseiged town, Zidane getting involved in the events in FFIX) wouldn't count. FFI - your characters are the warriors of light, bearing 4 special orb (Chosen One) FFII - Your characters just happen to survive an attack; go on to defeat the villain FFIII - your characters are granted special powers by the Crystal of Light and the power to restore balance in the world (Chosen One) FFIV - Cecil and Kain are the only survivors of a failed attempt to protect the water crystal FFV - Group is charged by the shattered Wind Crystal with protecting the other crystals (Chosen One) FFVI - Terra is a half-esper and her being used by the Emerorer is the begining of the resistance against the Empire (Chosen One) FFVII - Cloud is given memories of Zack and zenova cells by Sephiroth, making him uniquely suited to tracking Sephiroth (Chosen One) FFVIII - All of the characters grew up in an orphanage run by the current host of the Sorceress Ultimicia (Chosen One) FFIX - Characters get coincidentally involved in main plot FFX - Tidus and his dad Jecht are actually summoned entities from a dreamland version of Zanarkand that Sin is actually protecting. (Chosen One) FFX-2 - Yuna's path is tied heavily into the events from the previous game (Chosen One)

I didn't hate Udina, but he was very much a politician. He'd kiss Krogan babies if it'd get him what he wanted/further the interests of the Alliance. I'm actually playing a maleShep for the first time through ME1 - have always had problems completing a run with him before, but I'm almost done with ME1 and ready to port to ME2 and plan on choosing Udina to be the council rep.

Only if you bookend it with : So lol is lol but :lol: is

Ya momma my volvo? Sure we know what MOTB means, but this forum isn't just for us. Someone comes in here who's new and we sound like a whole battery farm of c***s. EDIT: The fact that there are several potential interpretations of an acronym doesn't make my point less valid it makes it MORE valid. Why the f*** are we using acronyms with more than one meaning in the first place? NB: Before anyone asks, I don't know why I've suddenly got into profanity. YMMV = Your Mileage May Vary The problem is, in your hypothetical solution, the computer automagically changes MOTB to "Mask of the Betrayer" just as "lol" becomes . So how does the computer distinguish when I type :ME: as to whether I mean Mass Effect or Mirror's Edge? Or :D2: between Diablo 2 and D2? Or :AC: from Assassin's Creed, Asheron's Call or Ace Combat? From context I can understand the difference, but a computer...?

Exactly! I used to have fun when people would refer to Diablo II as "D2" when there's actually a game called D2 out there (a sequel to the game "D"), so I'd start talking about D2...

I dunno, my only problem with acronyms comes from me not being able to recognize them. So making a common one like MOTB become Mask of the Betrayer doesn't really help me. It'd be the uncommon stuff or stuff that wasn't distinct (so couldn't be shortcutted) that'd be the problem. IMO, YMMV.

I dunno to me They're a transparent obstacle put there for plot reasons, made annoying so that we, the players, can take pleasure in their eventual comeuppance. They're basically the tweedy police captain who is always hassling the hero cop into doing his paperwork and not embarrassing whichever corrupt politician happens to be mixed up with the villainous drug lords. Also, the best unintentional comedy in the series was the ME1 was Shep and Anderson insisting that the Council was crazy for not basing galactic policy on a 50,000-year-old unconfirmable psychic message experienced by exactly one person. That's just it; the council's complaints are rather easy to see IMO. They're taking a conservative approach and using what they can see and IMO have been consistent from ME1 to ME2 (and also I don't really think that Shep was wrong for fighting for what he knew even if he was the only one who knew it. Anderson might be the odd one out, but he basically supports Shep; something to the effect of "if you say it happened, then I believe you".

I dunno to me

Cannon fodder in ME3? Oddly one of the things I was wondering after playing ME1 and 2... Frankly I didn't think the reveal that the was all that big a deal. We already knew that .

The first Dark Alliance game was made by Snowblind Studios, and the second was made using Snowblind's engine. The Icewind Dale games used Bioware's infinity engine. And the D&D License is with Atari and all the games were published by Interplay. Which I think would make porting the DA (or IWD or PST) games an extreme unlikelyhood.

OMG, that's an AWESOME idea!

I always took the bit in the first game where the council basically downplays the attack on Eden Prime (before you get Tali's info on Saren) by saying something to the effect of humanity was colonizing dangerous places as implying that the council wasn't going to waste their time with these colonies if something bad happened.

Drawn by Ethan Nicolle (Age 29) and written by his brother Malachai Nicolle (Age 5) and full of awesome. http://axecop.com/ Sites getting a lot of hits, so you can also find the episodes so far on Ethan's blog: http://eefblogger.blogspot.com/2010/01/axe...orary-home.html

I think "spiritual successor to BG" means its supposed to be the next Bioware fantasy title; in other words if you liked BG then Bioware is delivering what it feels to be the next BG.

Yeah, well I don't get a lot of the scuff that goes around.

Since my 360 isn't connected to the internet, I'm playing it because its fun.

I didn't notice anything like that haha. It's listed as a Beta though. I couldn't seem to find the Fast Travel option they talked about however. It floats around the top left, between your character portrait and the character options across the top.

Egads man, think about what you're saying!

"Lionhead boss Peter Molyneux isn't just pushing the curve on Xbox 360 with now-confirmed Project Natal support in Fable 3..." Its the Xbox 260 "Controler Free Gaming" periphrial.

I'm not complaining though.

I don't think I ever had that problem. But then having to switch in and out to mod probably helped make me more aware of changing accounts.

I always wanted to see it done so that in a game where NPCs "came back to life" after "dying" in a fight that letting them "die" too many times would call them to insult your leadership and leave the party. I mean really, either I'm the world's best con-person or they're the stupidest followers in the world to keep following me and getting killed all the time! Or, you know, you could be playing a video game. I would have thought the smiley after the second sentence was unnecessary to show I wasn't serious, but since it apparently was:

I always wanted to see it done so that in a game where NPCs "came back to life" after "dying" in a fight that letting them "die" too many times would call them to insult your leadership and leave the party. I mean really, either I'm the world's best con-person or they're the stupidest followers in the world to keep following me and getting killed all the time! How so? Literally the only consequence of wiping out your entire party is you might not like the replacements? Theres no level loss. Theres no gear loss as you can just loot the party members you just killed. What exactly is the consequence? In the case mentioned the consequence would be that - while leveled - the remaining characters at camp have not received the same amount of experience as the active-in-party NPCs (same for dead NPCs at the end of battle getting less XP).

I think I had 4...

I remember deleting spam. And deleting thread links to content not allowed on the boards. And the guy who thought it was funny to spam 5 or 6 BISIMGs in every thread over a weekend when no one was around who could ban him. I remember the guy who learned why you don't hotlink to pictures from some websites. And I remember the weekend the Interplay forums burned after FO:BOS was announced.