TRoaches

Happy endings are rarely the result of a conscious choice made by a protagonist. More often a happy ending is caused by a miracle of some sort, where everything lined up just perfectly and was timed just right to the hero's favor. This is fantasy, it has a place in art. It does not, however, resemble anything real. At the very least I like the choice to have some level of moral ambiguity that forces you to compromise with yourself. A hero who is forced to pragmatically deviate from his or her own moral compass reeks of authenticity. It is a central theme in a large portion of history's prominent works of literature. When I'm forced to choose between Stormcloak vs Empire, or Dark Side vs Light, or NCR vs Legion it adds a level of depth when both choices come with advantages and disadvantages. If it is obvious that you are choosing between "Total Victory" vs "Partial Victory" vs "Total Defeat" there is no true moral challenge being presented to the player. Same goes for when the question amounts to asking "So do you want to be a good guy or a bad guy?". Real heros and villains are not created by a conscious decision to be heroic or villainous They follow their instincts or morality or whatever drives them, and history applies the label after evaluating their deeds.

I think it is a sign that the gaming industry is catching up with its customers in terms of maturity. 30 years ago a "mature game" would have implied pornography. Adults played games back then too, but it was a much smaller minority and gaming was still viewed by the majority as child's play. This meant that most games had simple plots with simple endings that usually amounted to "save the princess and/or world from evil". I remember when games like GTA, Postal, and Fallout were new releases that were surrounded by controversy because of their mature content. Things have changed for the better, and adult games are now more acceptable. The industry surely does their own research on this, and have hard numbers describing how many gamers are age 30-50. In other words, people who grew up in the the Pong, Atari, Commodore, and Nintendo eras. I imagine this is a LARGE number. They probably love to market to this demographic. From a business viewpoint this demographic has its own disposable income, so no need to beg Mom to buy them that new game. From a plot writer's viewpoint it is probably more fun to write an adult plot without constraint. All of this adds up to a general increase in the overall maturity level of some new games, and this applies to the ending perhaps more than anything. A happy ending in a film is nice for a lighthearted romantic comedy but if you want real drama some good guys are going to have to die because that is how real life works. Real life good guys are not bulletproof or charmed or even lucky; they are beaten and bruised and broken, and usually hated. They are the first ones to get screwed over and the last ones to receive reward. It just comes with the territory of being a true good guy. Ask a retired police officer which statement he heard more often during his career: "thank you" or "F%!@ you" If you look at any critic's list of "100 Greatest Films/Novels" I would guess that at least 50 of the works listed will have sad, or at least melancholy endings. A sad ending has more potential to provoke thought in the viewer. There is more for the viewer to mentally process as they attempt to come to terms with why all of that terrible stuff just happened. It allows the writer to break away from the simple equation of good guy + bad guy = bad guy dies/goes to jail while good guy gets the girl. It can serve as a warning to the viewer (1984). It can reinforce the heroism and sacrifice of a central character (Spock in Wrath of Khan). It can be a vehicle of redemption for a villain (Darth Vader), or it can work the opposite way and show the downfall of a hero (the other Darth Vader). It can also just be a reflection of history (most post-Vietnam war films) and how good humans are at being terrible to each other. I'm not saying that the games you mentioned are masterpieces just because they are sad. I haven't played them, and they may indeed be poorly written. That said, I thought the Mass Effect 3 ending was an absolute masterpiece, production-rushed or not. Most seemed to think it was crap, but I'm sure I'm not alone and there is probably a silent minority out there who feel the same way. They took a ton of flak for that ending because people wanted to be the hero AND live to tell about it while sweeping their chosen love interest off his or her feet. It pushed the envelope just a little bit, forced the player to choose between bad and worse, and utilized symbolism that was probably lost on 95% of the people who viewed it. I have a huge amount of respect for their writers for taking that risk with their prized title.

They charged you some fees. I've never had a HUGE problem with ticketmaster's charging their fees, but they insist on calling it a "convenience charge" or something like that which is really annoying. The performers probably hate ticketmaster more than the customers, but they are also the ones who choose to do business with ticketmaster in the first place so its really their own fault when they get screwed for a fat percentage. I think ticketmaster's days are numbered by technology. When I buy my baseball tickets I usually do it online and print them out at home. There is a bar code is scanned when I go through the gate. I realized this, and figured it was all in good fun. You can't have a serious poll on the internet. It is just not possible. This award probably came up as a water cooler or board room joke at a company that is ACTUALLY evil in a real way, i.e. slavers, mercenaries, arms manufacturers, etc. Exec 1: Have we received the latest shipment of slave laborers from Burma? Exec 2: Sure did! They look nice and healthy, considering the month they spent in that shipping container. I think (client) will be pleased! Exec 1: Excellent. And what a great deal! The RPG's that we traded for those kids were old tech anyway. Half of the crate were probably duds. Maybe that dictator can use them to invent a new national sport or something. Exec 2: *chuckles* Hey did you hear that EA won another "Worst Company in the World" award?

Fantasy and sci-fi often use "race" as a literary vehicle to address real life cultural political clashes. I'm sure you could find dozens of academic papers on what Tolkien was really talking about, and who those races really represent. Same for The Wizard of Oz or Star Trek. Sometimes the correlation plays on blatant racial stereotypes (see: the Trade Federation and Watto in Star Wars). Here's what I see in the Skyrim lore if I try to read between the literary lines: Empire = Greece, Persia, Rome: the old and eternal empire that collapsed under its own weight, corruption, and blowback from conquest Dominion = Britain, France, Germany, etc: The empire that replaced the old one, claimed to be a huge improvement, and probably was to some extent, but eventually degraded into a clone of the previous empire and begins making all of the same arrogant mistakes Khajit and Argonians = Asian, African, and South American cultures that were looted and enslaved at various times by the above mentioned empires, who then install a puppet government to maintain an illusion of local autonomy Nords = Europeans who settled in "new worlds" such as the Americas and Australia. Generally speaking, they were less than nice to the natives, either enslaving them or eliminating them via some form of genocide. The Stormcloaks are violent and single-minded revolutionaries, such as those who overthrew their governments by force in the US and France, necessarily surrendering much of their moral high-ground in the process. Bretons = Fairly obvious reference to the English, with the Foresworn being the English xenophobes. I live in the states, but English friends of mine have described a general fear and unspoken dislike for immigrants that exists in the UK. Metaphorically, the anti-immigrant crowd in UK are the "Native" Foresworn Bretons who have been driven to madness by all of these foreigners living on their island. This would also apply to current US social politics, but the US is the rambunctious runaway cultural child of England so a reference to English culture would probably be inherited by US culture. This is what I see when I look at the TES races, because I'm a politics and history junky and I project some of that on to any art that I view, consciously or unconsciously. If a person who has no interest in politics or history looks at the same thing they will see none of this. Yet another person, who DOES have an interest in history and politics, may see similar correlations with RL but disagree with my breakdown of what it means because they come from a different culture, and hence a different perspective. For example, an unwavering English or American patriot would probably take issue with my above synopsis of their country's history or culture. I would not be surprised if Europeans are openly regarded as hideously ugly people in certain parts of the world that lived under a European boot heel for much of their recent history. Many Chinese people probably think the Japanese are physicall ugly, because the events of WW2 are still fresh in the collective memory. The fact that the TES lore is ambiguous enough for us to wonder what it means is, in my opinion, an indicator of how well it is constructed. There are no obvious good or bad guys in the story, just like in real history, and the player is allowed to choose who to support and who to hate. Where one person sees a Nazi-like oppressor another sees the one true hope for order and stability. Where you see ugly elves who act like oppresive and insensitive jerks another person would see the most advanced society in Tamriel struggling to provide culture to mentally-backwards savages who can't even cast simple spells. Call it the Altmer's Burden. Quick note: I enjoy reading history and politics but wouldn't claim expertise knowledge in either. I cede that the above characterizations of various political histories are completely unfair and biased and lacking 99% of the relevant information and context surrounding them. Please consider this if I have offended your patriotic sensibilities.

I knew EA was a stupid company run by people who are out of touch with gamers. I love the ME games (even the ending), but I had a very low opinion of them as a company even before I read this thread and read the material linked here. Even so, I am completely blown away by the stupidity of the COO's response. I would have assumed that public statement's like that, even when presented as the unfiltered word of an executive, had to pass through a PR filter of some kind to prevent a top guy from making the company look that bad. I worked for many years in the restaurant business. Any restaurant, no matter how incredible the food or service is, will attract complaints. I suspect that for some people it may even be their primary motivation for going out to eat: they love to complain, and love the attention that they receive when they do. When running restaurant it is imperative that you always keep your ego in check and remember that old cliche that the customer is always right. The merits of their complaints are, to a large extent, irrelevant You do not respond to them with anything other than apology, an acceptance of responsibility, and a bribe of some kind to make them happy (free cocktail/beer/dessert/entire meal) and keep them as a customer. It has to be this way because it is a cut-throat business, the profit margins can be slim to begin with, and your competitor is often one door away. If I had ever heard an employee say anything resembling that COO's statement to a customer (hey at least we're not as bad as BP amiright?) that employee would have been fired immediately. If possible I would have done it in view of the customer. Applying this to EA, their competitor is one click away, which is even less distance for a customer to travel. I was considering purchasing a mass effect DLC, but after reading this thread I probably won't. I think the only thing that will fix EA's problems is a big drop in income. EA's problems seem to stem from holding investors above customers. They institute these DRM schemes because they like to assure their investors that it prevents their games from being pirated (not true) and that the only people who have a problem with it are the pirates. A decline in sales is probably the only thing that would prove this to be false. **Addendum** I started playing Civ 5 this week. I cut my gamer's teeth on Simcity in the early 90's and have never played any of the Civ games until now. I would love to try the new version of Simcity but not with the DRM problems. If anyone is fiending for a Simcity fix I recommend CIv 5 as an alternative. It is not quite the same, but it is a very fun, very well designed game. I play it through steam, and if there is a hidden "must be connected" DRM that I don't know about I can at least testify to it working 100% for me.

search nexus for "zombie".

I'm talking about something entirely different than receiving credit or (dis)allowing use. I don't care much about credit, but I don't want someone to take a shared resource, produce something from that shared resource, and then hoard the result. I'm asking if we are allowed to declare the type of use that is permitted to that degree of specificity. If I declare a resource as "copylefted" (is that how you say that?) and someone uses the resource in a closed-permissions mod, regardless of credit given or whatever, would that be a violation of site rules? Am I allowed to be that specific as far as what is permitted, and would my specific request be upheld?

If a person were to declare their mods to be "Copyleft" protected, meaning that it is free to use by others as a resource so long as the mods that they produce using it are also made freely available resources, would the Nexus rules be capable of enforcing this? As it is right now the available choices for the "Users can modify my file" question are: Yes, no permission needed Yes, with credit Not without permission No None of which would describe what I'm thinking of. I realize that there is the option to "specify my own permissions", so I could write a little copyleft blurb in there but I wonder if it would be enforced under the site rules. A search of the forums for "copyleft" turns up only a few results, mostly about NMM and none of which clarify how the site rules would play on this.

Remember the climbing skill in Daggerfall? I have wanted to add some sort of rock climbing ability to Skyrim since day one. I have poked around the game files looking for a setting or anything that determines how steep the terrain must be before the game engine will no longer allow the player to walk up it. So far I haven't been able to find anything in the CK or on the web. Ideally I imagine there has to be a game setting in there somewhere that, if set to 0 or 99999 or whatever, would allow the PC to walk straight into a wall and immediately start moving up. If that exists then the rest of the mod seems easy, all that would be needed would be some mechanism to trigger that temporary change to that game setting, such as a toggle "Rock Climbing" power or some equipable climbing item like a chalk bag or climbing gloves. Does anyone know what setting(s) affect the PC's ability to walk up steep terrain, or if such a value exists at all?

I occasionally get a request to include a mod that I authored in a mod compilation, which I respectfully deny because I have always thought that the mega-compilation overhauls that combine 50 existing mods into one were a terrible idea. It is hard enough to make a single game enhancement work the way that you want it to, respond to the inevitable bug reports that will pop up when it is tested by 500 people instead of just yourself, fix the reported bugs, then perhaps do it all over again when an official patch is released that changes something relevant to your mod. Combining a ton of mods would only multiply the complexity of this and keeping a compilation updated and bugfixed must be a nightmare for the person who made the compilation as well as the people who use it. Today I was browsing the forum and I came across a mention somewhere of a rule prohibiting mod compilations in the nexus TOS. I checked and sure enough this is the text from the TOS: To further complicate things you can actually tag search for compilations. Being able to tag search for a type of mod that is prohibited by the TOS seems contradictory. Is this rule simply not enforced, or am I not correctly understanding what its purpose is?

If you are using the script extender try using ListAddForminstead. An important thing to note is that the change that ListAddForm makes does not persist in a saved game, so the command must be issued each time the game is loaded inside a GetGameLoaded block.

I also thought that the feeds looked too bad to be true (exactly like McclaudEagle's first screenie) so I checked here and found this thread. I am using Chrome and Dark0ne's ctrl-F5 solution didn't work for me, but opening the browsing history and choosing "Clear all browsing data", the restarting the browser fixed it.

Space Quest!

I just tried loading the page in a different browser and its the same thing still, so I don't think its a browser issue. Firefox and Chrome both display it exactly the same.

Yes, that is the problem. Its not hidden, its deleted. I just tried deleted all of the pics to see if that helps, so there are NO pics associated with this mod now, hidden or otherwise and the red arrow pic is still displaying for me. I took a screenshot of my browser to illustrate: http://pinealsqueegee.net/glitch.jpg The big pic that is at the top, with the back of the guy's head and the arrow, is what I'm talking about. I never uploaded that, never set it to be displayed, and deleted it a few days ago if memory serves. Cache cleared, browser closed and restarted, no change.

It looks like you deleted the second pic that I uploaded in response to the earlier suggestion about the initial pic being too small. Maybe its just a browser issue on my end, but I tried clearing all my browser caches etc and it hasn't made a difference. If I load the main NV nexus page and mouse-over my mod in the hot files listing or wait for it to cycle through automatically the larger pic that shows in the upper area is not my pic, but one that a user uploaded to demonstrate a bug. It shows a guy's head and has a red arrow and a circled area. It was never meant to be displayed and was deleted after I got the relevant info from it. It is no longer listed in the images section for the mod so I can't delete again but it is being used on the front page. Its definitely seems like a bug or glitch of some kind that a deleted image is displaying but its just a little one so no worries, and thanks for looking into it.

Thanks for the reply. I don't think thats the issue, though. The glitch report pic that it is displaying was never set to be publicly viewable, and was deleted some time ago. Its just hanging around now and refusing to die. I doubt that displaying a delete, hidden pic is the intended behavior. The screenshot I initially uploaded was 640x480, which doesn't seem that small, but I uploaded a scaled-up pic to see if it makes a difference or at least eliminate that as the problem. It made no difference, and the hidden-then-deleted pic is still being displayed.

I think I found a very minor bug in the front page of the site. I have a mod that is listed in the "Hot Files" thingy right now. The mod only has one picture uploaded by me, and another pic that was uploaded at some point by a user to show a glitch which I deleted after viewing. I have the listing set to require user pics to be approved by me. When the Hot Files thing scrolls through the featured mods on the main page it displays this glitch-report pic instead of the correct one. I deleted that pic long ago, and the mod has been a hot file for a few days so I don't think its going to update if it hasn't already. The mod in question is here: http://newvegas.nexusmods.com/mods/46532

I can't think of a better setting for F04 than New Orleans. New Orleans is spooky, reputed to be haunted, and filled with insane characters RIGHT NOW in RL so imagine the possibilities one you give it the Fallout treatment. The outlying area is swampland, and as far as I can tell Point Lookout is probably the most loved FO3 by the fans. It definitely was my favorite DLC, and I'm a Pittsburgher. They scratched the surface a bit with PL as far as spoofing southern culture and I think New Orleans would be the best possible place to further explore that.

My suggestion was not that the original mod creator grant any additional access to anyone, and I don't think that is the only way to do it. I propose general discouragement of the listing of the same mod under several languages unless it actually has a significant amount of translatable content. It makes perfect sense to do translations of books or dialogue, but not so much for an armor or weapon mod and certainly not for a sound effect mod. For things like this the translation would amount to changing a few text strings, and I wonder if changing a few text strings a calling it a new mod is a cool idea, even if it is allowed within the rules. It seems to just clutter things up. I realize that is hardly a great sin, but it is moderately annoying. My proposal requires no alteration of site code, just a small rules clarification. Right now it is a grey area, or at least seems like it is being perceived that way.

I was just offering feedback, and a suggestion.

I agree, the translations are getting ridiculous. For example, I downloaded an Italian translation of a sound-effect mod and opened it in TESVSnip just to satisfy my curiosity and, sure enough, I could not find any translated text. It is nothing but sound-related data. I could not find any in-game text at all. I couldn't even find anything Italian. Look around and you'll find plenty of "translation" mods for things like sound effects and armor that probably require no translation because they contain little or no text. About a week ago I noticed a translated version of one of my own mods in the Latest section. The person who made it had never contacted me and had ignored the permission settings on the file, which prohibited modifications and re-uploads. I asked him to take the translated version down, and he did, but the situation raises at least one significant issue. By the time that I had noticed the translated version existed I had already updated my file to a new version, making the translated one obsolete. Are all of these mod translators going to keep up on the version updates on all of these mods? If not, are the people that use the translated mods going to be bombarding the original mod authors with questions about bugs that have already been fixed in the original version because they are using an outdated translation? What about accidental mod-breaking edits that may be committed by the translators? It seems to go against the whole Nexus system of permissions control to allow this, and I think it will complicate mod support and development for authors. The translators are cranking these out. Some of them have spammed 15+ mod translations and I very much doubt they are going to be able to maintain all of them with updates. I can think of at least one way to address this and that is to make a rule against separate translation mod listings, requiring that they be uploaded as optional downloads with the parent mod. If someone wants to translate a mod they can send the file or the relevant translated text to the original author. This would reduce the listing clutter and make things easier for mod authors, allowing them to decide if they want to support multiple versions of the same mod.

OMG.....KLANSMEN!!! I figured that the mod would start out with neo-nazis that would basically be like raiders and fiends, random spawns that attack on sight, and then maybe I could add some dialogue here and there and even (brace your sensitive little selves) allow you to ally with them assuming your pigmentation is to your liking and, well, that would pretty much be the only requirement since they view race as a person's single most important attribute. It would have been really easy for a caucasian to enter their settlement and rob them blind or kill them all if they wanted, since they equate race with character and would trust you implicitly if you are pale enough. But Klansmen.....wow.....that is much more fertile ground for hilarious dialogue and interactions, if nothing else due to their penchant for ridiculous titles ("Grandiose Wasteland Imperial Gecko Lord of the 7th Eternal Toilet") and pseudo-religious ceremony (thanks for the crosses, legion!). I'm thinking something like the Klan as depicted in the Harold & Kumar movie would fit just right. And, for those of you reading this with higher-than-average cranial density, I'm not advocating KKK philosophy. I think I'm laying the ridicule on pretty thick but I still expect that someone will get all pissed off at this post. Just so you know there is no Klan in the world that would have ME as a member. Trust me on that. I would be rejected, um, when they saw what I look like. This is satire. Look it up sometime: satire. Its a fancy word that us "readin'-folks" to use that means "makes fun of something"

Would hitting the crew make the tank go faster, or accomplish anything other than to lower the efficiency and precision with which the tank crew operates? I really don't think thats what it was for. First off, the historical Romans WERE european fascists, even if they didn't prefer the term. Sure, they had a senate, but so did WWII era Italy and Germany. Second, the historical Nazis WERE pre-apocalyptic Roman fans. If you don't believe me you should start greeting random people with a "Roman Salute" and see if anyone replies with "Oh hey, you must be a big fan of the Romans, cool!". Therefore, the question you should ask is "Is there a huge difference between pre-apocalyptic Roman fans and post-apocalyptic Roman fans?" That article traces the roots of the swagger stick to Roman military. It does shed some light on the subject when it says that "Nowadays it is more often a traditional visual attribute." In other words, its a fashion accessory. Patton was very, very far from stupid. He was, however, by all accounts a little "different". According to multiple first-hand accounts and somewhat corroborated by a letter to his mother he believed that he was.....get ready......a reincarnated Roman Legionnaire. He was also the allied general for who Hitler expressed the most fear and respect. Considering the circumstances Hitler actually liked Patton in a way, though Patton didn't have a very high opinion of Hitler. I can see that nobody likes the idea of a Nazi faction in the wasteland, which makes me want it to happen more than ever :) I don't intend to make this mod, so everyone can just calm down, but I do think it would be a good idea if done right. It does surprise me that people are such fans of the Legion. If someone DID do a nazi faction they would simply have to be allied with the Legion in some way. I always found them (the wasteland Legion, not the historical Romans) to represent everything repulsive about human history. Sort of like the Nazis!

I would argue that the Nazis would easily make the top 3 on a list of history's silliest dressed bunch of slavers. I've seen pictures of Nazi tank commanders holding binoculars AND A RIDING CROP, as if they're going to smack the tank to make it go faster. I'm sure there were a few instances where terrain or availability of motorized vehicles made horseback riding necessary for some of the top ranks, but I'm pretty sure that most of them were just accessorizing their outfits.