WrathOfDeadguy

Having smaller enclaves of... Enclave troops... wouldn't be a bad thing, but I'd rather not run into them as the main opposition again. By the time Fallout 3 rolled around the highest ranking officer remaining was a Colonel, their president was a computer... their entire command structure was decapitated, again, they lost not one but two major bases, dozens of irreplaceable Vertibirds and hundreds of power-armored soldiers... enough is enough. Let them die already. Let us fight more of the Legion, or- better yet- show us the conflict between the Brotherhood and the NCR. Bringing back the Enclave again would be utterly groan-inducing.

The Good: - Interesting companions with useful perks and likeable personalities. - Interesting if frequently frustrating enemies (bloody gas canister ghostmen!); I liked having to finish off downed bad guys and finding/destroying holo-emitters was nicely rewarding after sneaking past the holo-guards. - The new weapons are useful, especially since they do enhanced limb damage and thus reward accuracy with quick kills. - The speakers, fog, and radios present a unique challenge and encourage caution... but... The Bad: - The density of speakers in some areas makes it nearly impossible to get through them without dying a few times to map out the optimal route, especially towards the end. - The indestructible speakers were a horrible idea. Clever placement could have achieved the same level of difficulty without forcing a single-option solution. The terminal for the armored speakers is almost always past the speaker gauntlet and several enemies. - The enemies don't always give chase and often hang around near indestructible speakers and thanks to the confined spaces there isn't always a clean shot from afar so getting past those enemies without a necksplosion is often a matter of luck. - The companions can't be used in the latter half of the DLC, when Christine's perk in particular would be extremely handy. Having any of the companions along would have been tremendously helpful in looting the Vault. - The lighting is often too dark to accurately target ghostmen without VATS. - The ghostmen have too high of a PER stat. At 75 sneak with Silent Running, wearing the Assassin Suit (+10) and using the stealth-boosting magazine (+10), they still could spot me around corners and across dark courtyards while looking in the other direction. - A pack of cigarettes returns for more chips than a set of clothes? - Why the heck did the Vault blow up? That didn't make sense at all. I blow a guy's head off and suddenly the whole place reacts as though it's made from Explodium. There was no mention anywhere of a self-destruct mechanism, at least not that I found. The "get away before necksplosion" bit I got, but why the Dungeon Collapse routine? Why not let me go back for more loot after the collar's off? - For that matter, why make it impossible to return to the casino after going back to the Mojave? This alone makes it essential to prioritize unique items over the copious amounts of high-value lootables, since you can't come back for any of it. Why place so many valuable items that ultimately can't be recovered? Story questions... - There was an obvious sequel hook in there regarding the Big Empty. Will we get to see any of the Dead Money companions again? Dog and Christine each had been there at some point. - Did anyone else pick up on Christine being Veronica's long lost ex? I had to dig around in her conversation options a bit to find that, and she never named names, but it seemed like that was the implication. Their stories match too well for any other possibility to be remotely plausible- Christine is a lesbian (or bi; she references a lost love and when pressed says that it was a woman) who left the Brotherhood of Steel in part because her sexual preference was disapproved of, she has a personal connection to Elijah... I kinda wish it were possible to reunite the gals, or at least to tell Veronica that you bumped into her old flame (seeing as how you could update her on Elijah, I don't see why you couldn't tell her about Christine). - Anyone else disappointed that Dean didn't get a bit more screen time? He's the only one with an explicit personal connection to both the place the era in which it was built, yet he's only of peripheral importance in making progress through the DLC. He even lampshades that when you tell him where he's stationed for the Gala event. - Elijah was trapped in the Sierra Madre, but it isn't clear how since he's the one responsible for putting collars on everyone who comes through the gates. I thought at first that he might have been trapped in the Vault but that obviously wasn't the case. He was in communication with his bunker at some point, since the entries on his terminal detail things that happened after he got to the SM. What was keeping him from leaving aside from plain old greed? One other point... why exactly can't the DLC companions be brought out into the Mojave? Why can't regular companions be taken into the DLCs in Fo3 and NV? I can't see any reason why they shouldn't be transferable; everything else is. It'd likely be too much work for the devs to incorporate them into the story in any way, but after the DLC plot is played out, if the area is still accessible (and I don't understand why the Sierra Madre isn't- if you can find your way home then you should be able to find your way back again), why force the player to leave their companions behind when traveling from one place to the other?

I don't really identify with my PCs so much as I treat them as characters whose story I'm telling through the game... that said, I have a preference for female PCs who specialize in stealth, marksmanship, and technical skills (hacking, lockpicking, smithing, and so forth), have high intelligence and perception stats, and dress themselves in practical lightweight armor or clothes. Not coincidentally most of the lead characters in most of my stories are also female and often specialize in similar areas. As for why... it varies from game to game. Sometimes the PC's situation has parallels to a story I'm working on with a female lead; sometimes I just find female PCs easier on the eyes. Sometimes I rationalize that preference by saying I like the change in perspective since I'm a hairy ape of a man without much of a feminine side. All I know is that I like playing female characters in my games when I have the choice, and they generally don't run around in bikinis unless they're going for a swim. :thumbsup:

+1 for System Shock 2. If you can get it to run- some graphics cards are incompatible and the game must be set to use only one core on multi-core systems... which is pretty much every system these days... and I've no idea how it works under Vista or Win7- but if it works, it is positively the greatest cross-genre title ever made. RPG character development and inventory, survival-horror atmosphere, FPS combat, with a bunch of little details like weapon modification, hacking, and research. There's also an online co-op mode that supports up to four players, but good luck finding people to play with. There are also some fantastic mods out there- some of them add entire new campaigns complete with their own sets of audio logs; others add depth to gameplay by letting you hack robots and other fun stuff like that. Freelancer also comes to mind. It's heavy on the action, especially in the story portion of the game, but the exploration element of the game really makes it stand out IMO. Your ship is essentially your character; as you level up you gain access to better and better gear. Lots of factions and a reputation system with fairly complex alliances; it is possible but exceptionally difficult to make all factions (except one) neutral. The interface is pretty easy to pick up and use; everything can be operated by the mouse alone (though hotkeys are a must for efficiency's sake). Vampire: The Masquerade- Bloodlines... long name, amazing game. Buggy in vanilla form; there's a substantial community patch/mod that fixes just about all the vanilla glitches. Also a shooter/RPG hybrid, although much (but not nearly all) of the combat can be avoided until close to the end of the game. Offers multiple endings based on the player's declared allegiance, which also decides which of the endgame battles the player does or doesn't have to fight. The NPCs are... well, they're mostly scheming, devious pricks who all want to screw each other preferably using you for their dirty work. The politics and social dynamics in the World of Darkness universe the game is set in are delightfully twisted. Fable was/is pretty good, also, though very much a casual gaming experience compared to any other RPG series. With all the publicity they get thanks to Molyneux's overhyping little more needs to be said, but they're still fun romps to blow a few days on here or there. Those above and pretty much anything pre-Mass Effect by Bioware, if you haven't been there and done that already. While their older games have much in common with their newer ones with regards to structure and story pacing, most of the older titles are more RPG and less action with a lot more emphasis on strategy when combat does happen. The only real exception to that is Jade Empire, which is definitely heavier on the action and very light on strategy but still quite rich in story.

Three gripes. One, the loading screens. Every other game in the entire Half-Life/Portal universe does not have them, and their sudden appearance is jarring. The level transitions are seamless enough that the loading screens are utterly unnecessary (at least in singleplayer) and IMHO an unwanted breach of immersion in what is otherwise a very atmospheric game. Two, a slight Big-Lipped Alligator Moment right at the end. If you haven't seen it yet, you'll know it when you see it. If you have, then all I have to say is that while a funny nod to a much earlier moment, should have appeared during the credits or on a monitor, Three, most of the major puzzles had one and only one viable solution. It took a while to figure out sometimes, but once discovered it quickly became apparent that the testing environments would not have supported any other approach. Perhaps co-op will offer a bit more variation; I don't know- but I was expecting a slightly more free-form experience especially with the gels... which could be spread all over the place but not necessarily used wherever placed. That's it. I loved exploring the facility and its history, and the Wheatley-GLaDOS banter was absolutely hilarious. The puzzles never got too repetitive, nor were they so frustratingly difficult as to make me want to take breaks or look up solutions. The addition of zoom was definitely a plus; it removed all of the headaches of popping portals on distant tiles.I wouldn't call it a hardcore game by any standard, but neither was Portal 1. Sometimes it's nice to play a game where you've got some time to sit back and think in between being shot at, blown up, and chased into deathtraps. Unfortunately, unless I miss my guess, this will probably be the last Portal... or at least the last singleplayer Portal. The SP story did conclude with some degree of finality this time... which hopefully bodes well for the Half-Life side of the universe, since Valve has apparently learned (finally!) to not leave gargantuan cliffhangers on the end of every single SP game they make. Plot comments (don't read if you've yet to finish; spoilers and all that): 8/10 so far, for the reasons mentioned above. Great game; can't wait to drag a friend in and give co-op a spin.

Absolutely YES, you should install the unofficial patch. As others have said already, the game was rushed out unfinished. Lots of the content "added" by the patch was already there, just not implemented- sidequests, dialogue, items, etc. More importantly, though, the patch has a boatload of bugfixes. Without it, the game can be prone to crashing and some sidequests can break, halting your progress through the game. Bottom line, you won't miss out on anything by installing the patch, whereas you will miss out on content by playing vanilla. The patch might not be official, but it really does feel like the way the game was meant to be.

@ myrmaad- I'm sorry, but I feel that I have to call you out on the parent-dropping. I may be taking your posts the wrong way, and I apologize if I am, but it seems as though you're cutting opposing views off with the "you won't understand until you're a parent" line. No, we probably won't. However, as a parent you may be prematurely dismissing the other perspective- that is to say, your child's. From the images you're posting, I gather your child is quite young- far too young to understand the implications of these technologies and certainly too young to make an informed decision regarding their use. Does that mean you'd be making the wrong decision if you had the option of such an implant? Not necessarily, but the consequences of that decision do not simply go away when your child grows up, and that makes it an open issue- parents are not the only folks qualified to weigh in on it. Furthermore, what possible difference does it make if someone is living at home? That is utterly uncalled for and rather offensive. In point of fact, I do live at home- to take care of my mother who, like ginnyfizz's mum, has Alzheimer's disease (I wouldn't chip her either, although it hardly matters now that she can't get around on her own). I really do not see what that has to do with GPS tracking implants- it wouldn't make a difference if I were a deadbeat slob living in the basement contributing nothing to the family. One's means and location do not constitute qualification to judge the validity of one's opinions- else why not make the right to vote contingent upon socioeconomic status? I do not have children- I do not intend to any time in the immediate future. I'm 24... which is not so far removed from youth as to have forgotten the kid's point of view. I can only speak from how I would have felt if I had discovered somewhere in my pre-majority teen years that I had been implanted with a tracking device. I would have been absolutely furious- I was a very well-behaved kid, but I always had two hard limits. Those were any sort of mind-altering medication without my consent, and any sort of medical procedures without my consent. I had a very good home life, and I would have run away for certain if one of these things had been forced on me. I would have strongly considered cutting myself off from my parents entirely, though I'll freely admit that my views on this matter are rather extreme. You say these chips 'only' last for about 20 years... okay, great. If the chip is implanted at birth, then the person it's installed in will have been an adult for two full years by the time it dies. On upward from there- if the kid was chipped at five or six when they start school, then they'll be in their mid-twenties and possibly living in their own place by the time they're no longer traceable. I ask again, does the child have to be informed about the procedure or can it be done without their knowledge? Are they given the option of having it removed or are they stuck with it until it wears out or they have the money to get a doctor to remove it? Any procedure that lasts decades is effectively permanent. Even after the chip deactivates, it will not simply be absorbed into the body- it will remain there until removed by a doctor, whether it functions or not. Regardless of how simple removal is, bear in mind that no medical procedure is cheap to a young adult. Someone in their late teens or early twenties is likely to be in college or working a minimum-wage job, and even the simplest of optional procedures costs thousands of dollars- I somehow doubt that chip removal is covered under any insurance plans, and certainly not on a minimum-coverage plan of the sort commonly held by younger adults living independently. Again, there are consequences that go beyond a parent's responsibility here. As a parent, you certainly have a right to make decisions that you feel are in the best interests of your child. Nobody should ever take that away- it is one of the founding ideals of any free society. However, use of this sort of technolgy involves not just a decision for a child under a parent's authority, but a decision made without the consent of an adult as well- the adult that your child will become. This is not a purely beneficial decision, like braces are (as uncomfortable as the things are, nobody can contest that straighter teeth work better)- once that child becomes an adult legally and mentally capable of being responsible for their own affairs, it becomes an unwarranted intrusion into their private life. It does not matter if it is never used again after they turn 18 (or whatever the age of majority is where you live)- the potential for its use remains. I cannot say that it is something that is utterly wrong, nor that it could never be used responsibly, just that its responsible use requires one to look farther ahead than immediate safety concerns to include the civil rights issues involved. Because the law tends to lag well behind technology, all of the onus is on the parent to use such technology responsibly and safely... and there is no guarantee that it could not be abused by non-parental authorities such as schools and police, either. Heck, there are already a handful of school districts in the US that use GPS devices (not implants though) for truant enforcement. Are there legitimate uses for the technology? Yes, there are. I can even see it as an effective supplement to parental oversight, though I am personally against implanted devices because of the larger privacy rights issue. As long as GPS/RFID is not treated as a substitute for supervision... because if it is, and I fear that it will be should it become ubiquitous, it may well do more harm than good. I may be proven wrong- I can offer no evidence, only opinion. I would hope that any parent willing to make use of GPS or RFID technolgy in this manner would take the extra step and, when their child is old enough, inform them about it and offer to have it removed. Apologies if I'm coming across as preachy here... I get pretty worked up about privacy issues.

There are felony levels of theft, and there are misdemeanor levels of theft- often determined by the value of property stolen and whether or not the thief put anybody in harm's way while stealing it. Piracy of the online variety does not create a dangerous situation where people could be injured or killed. Yes, there should be a felony level of theft here- but it should not ever be applied for swiping a few songs or movies or games. That's right around the level of shoplifting, and shoplifters generally aren't even charged when they're caught. Most major retailers build allowances for shoplifting into their annual budgets- they call it "shrinkage." Felony charges for piracy in that context are completely absurd; it may be wrong but it just doesn't even begin to come close to being anywhere near touching a level of crime deserving hard prison time. Now, if there's a bust involving some mass amount of data and/or a distribution network, then yes there should be charges. Like it or not, all data is not and cannot be free- there are people whose jobs revolve around the creation and distribution of that data, and they deserve compensation from everyone who uses it. The folks who distribute stolen data en masse are the root of the problem- go after them. They fall under the category of white collar crime, and they do deserve prison time the same way someone would if they skimmed thousands or millions out of a company account. However... I believe strongly in Fair Use doctrine, and even more strongly in an individual's right to privacy. The Internet is not the domain of any government or corporation, and just because my computer is connected to the internet it does not become public. What I do on my computer is private unless I post it on a public-access site. If I visit a page that requires a username and password for access, then I believe that I should have an expectation of privacy the same way I would if I joined a private club out in the world. Any law enforcement agency should need a warrant, served to me personally,or to the owner of the site in question personally, before they should be allowed to search my computer or my privileged-access online activities. These searches should not be doable remotely, ever. They should not be doable through a simple demand to an ISP, ever. The key to maintaining governmental responsibility is maintaining transparency, and that requires face-to-face accountability. It is entirely too easy to eavesdrop on electronic communications of any type; the law has never kept pace with technology and it is well past time we rectified that situation. The burden of proof on the law is way too light. We are coming dangerously close to a state of affairs where a government can, with enough digging, find some crime for anyone to be guilty of regardless of whether or not there was reason for suspicion in the first place. Surveillance is something that should be used to build an existing case- it should not ever, under any circumstance whatsoever be used as a tool to create a case. If surveillance of any kind may be used as the foundation of a case, then surveillance will eventually become ubiquitous. Nothing we do or say online or over the phone will ever be private again and there will be no limits on who the law may watch or why.

Point one: There are too many questions. Just because technology exists does not mean it can be responsibly used- gps tracking will likely not be used half as much to find missing children as it will be to track their every move and keep them from getting into the sort of "trouble" that goes along with growing up. Parents worry about their children. They should; that's their job. However, a large part of becoming an adult is learning to exist independent of your parents. Learning to be responsible when you're not under supervision is a necessary step towards maturity, and knowing that you're always under supervision would be terribly detrimental to that process. As I like to say, a person not trusted to be responsible will never feel the need to be. Point two: Chipping your pets is one thing- pets do not have rights. Domesticated pets have lost most of their survival instincts and if they run away or get lost they are likely to die. If they lose their collars they cannot be identified by a stranger when they are found; they cannot tell anybody who their master is or where they live. Chipping a human being? Being a parent gives you the right to make most decisions on your child's behalf, but permanent medical procedures usually require the consent of both the parent and the child. Implanting an RFID or GPS chip is a permanent procedure; allowing it to be forced on a child without their consent would establish a dangerous legal precedent beyond the issue at hand here. What about other procedures- plastic surgery for example? Nevermind what happens when the child reaches majority- do they have to be informed about the chip, or can a parent have it implanted when they're too young to voice an objection or understand what's happening? Is there a way to remove the chip, and if so can the implanted individual insist on having it removed at their parents' expense... or do they have to eat the bill if they no longer want to be tracked everywhere they go? Point three: Better crime-prevention technology only makes smarter criminals, it does not stop crime. In fact, it often makes it harder to prevent crime when that technology fails. Stick a GPS chip inside a metal cage and it stops working. Install such a cage in the back of a panel van and all of a sudden getting a victim off the grid is as easy as forcing them into the vehicle. Technology breeds complacency. People who have remote car lock keyfobs don't check their locks as long as they hear the beep. People who use navigation systems get lost when they have to take a detour that isn't on the map. I'm willing to bet that there are quite a number of parents out there who would implant GPS chips in their children and abandon the notion that they should actually supervise their kids- perhaps rather than walking their 10-year-old to and from school, they'd let the kid go alone and keep tabs on their location via the family computer? After all, Junior must be safe as long as we know where he is! Some technology is good. I agree with giving a child a phone to carry in case of emergency. I do not believe that implanting children with GPS chips is a good next step. Not only has the law not caught up with the technology, its implementation given current societal trends could be downright dangerous because of the complacency it could feed.

Playing any game is always hardest before you've gotten up the learning curve. After the first playthrough, you have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn't, what abilities and classes are overpowered and which are less-than-useful. On the second or third, you probably know where the strongest enemies pop up and where you need to save to avoid losing hours of progress to a party-wipe. I had trouble the first time around because I didn't realize just how powerful mages were and party wiped almost every time I ran into more than one at a time. Second and third times I made a priority out of teaching one of my mages mana clash to deal with them. Now that I have everything figured out I interrupt their spells with long-range power attacks then kill them normally; I stopped using mana clash because it made mages too easy to kill. Critters with overwhelm/grab were also a problem; now I almost never have a problem with it because I keep knockback powers queued up in tactics for at least two party members and just don't use those powers unless they're needed when facing anything with grab or overwhelm. On the first playthrough of an RPG, you're having the story told to you. After that, you're the one telling the story. You can learn what the game is going to do and plan for it, but the game will never know what you're gonna do. ;) Also, they patched the game. On my first playthough I was using a dual-wield rogue and couldn't for the life of me figure out why I wasn't doing enough damage even though my dex was ~40 by the end of the game. Once the daggers got fixed, they no longer sucked and it got much easier to play a dual-wield rogue.

I love my Jeep and I'd never dream of replacing her, but one of the first things I do when I've got a place of my own is purchase a scooter for getting around locally. Gas prices going the way they are, it just doesn't make sense to drive around four seats plus cargo space and burn a gallon or two of gas just to run errands that won't require any of it. I could see a huge rise in more fuel-efficient vehicles, such as scooters and smartcars and hybrids, but I do not think pure electrics or fuel cell vehicles or pure hydrogen power will catch on any time soon. Just like in any other business, automakers will not make the move into a new market until they have exhausted their existing dominant markets- they will test new markets, but not commit fully to them. Look at hybrids- they are proven now, and have been viable for over half a decade... but there is no major automaker which has shifted over to manufacture hybrid cars to the exclusion of standard cars. Nearly every major automaker (in the US anyway) has at least one hybrid model, but few have more than two in a fleet of sometimes dozens of models and variations. Electric cars are an oddity in that they have been tried and dismissed- when the first mass-produced electric cars were introduced, they flopped horribly because battery technology had not yet advanced far enough to make them a practical alternative. They took all night to charge and drained in under an hour of driving. The sad part of that is that modern batteries are far, far better and people are only just starting to realize that electric cars could be practical if there were enough interest to fully develop them. The fun fact I like to tack on to the electric car commentary is that trains have been pulled by electric motors since the early 1900s. Even diesel locomotives are actually driven by electric traction motors mounted on or between their axles- the large diesel engine under the hood is really just a portable generator. There is an unfortunate tendency for the general driving public to view electric motors as weaker than combustion engines, when in fact they are exactly as powerful as they are built to be, and high-torque electric drives that can pull thousands of times their own weight have been around for ages. It's the batteries that are still playing catch-up, plain and simple.

Sounds like Red Alert 3 to me. That had Japan as a playable faction, and there were transforming units aplenty in that game. Only ever played the demo myself, didn't like where it took the series and never bought it. EA did away with walls as of C&C3 and that was that... it crippled defensive gameplay. Up until that point in the series, it was at least possible to slap a quick wall up until you could erect more substantial defenses... heck, Tiberian Sun even let you put down pavement in generous squares to keep subterranean units from popping up right next to important facilities. Have to say that, despite the game not living up to its hype, Tiberian Sun was by far the strongest entry in the C&C series. It had the most options, a great random map generator, and the superweapons weren't stupidly overpowered as they were in every succeeding installment. Also, terrain deformation. I still haven't seen another RTS that had the feature... hell, few enough games in any genre have had that feature. It was brilliant in an RTS setting- you could use your supers and artillery to crater the landscape to prevent your enemy from expanding their base, or from replacing a particular structure. Great stuff. There were more natual hazards too- the vein hole could destroy tanks in its field unless it was killed, and you could bomb a field of blue tiberium and use it as an improvised minefield (or to cripple the economy of the guy harvesting it). Then there were ion storms... if you had those enabled, you'd get storms every few minutes that would disable flying units including hovercraft, shut down your radar, and cause random lightning strikes. Cool to see someone else mention Homeworld... that's one community I really miss. I used to go by Ion_Fury on the Sierra forums before they got shut down... dunno if the Relic forums are still there or not; I only ever lurked in that side of the community. Endlessly exploitable for maximum fun potential, especially in SP... everyone had a different way of playing through- a few guys did strike craft only runs, zero loss runs, 'pure' runs (no salvaging except mission targets), a few others did salvage only runs and subsequently broke the game... Then there was the occasional pink fleet in multiplay- and if you know why that happened, you get a cookie. :thumbsup:

The word "theory" can also be misleading to someone not familiar with how science works, as usage of the word in scientific study is different from how it is used in common discourse. What might be called a theory in conversation would be considered a hypothesis in science; a theory requires substantial and demonstrable evidence. Note that I was careful there to not mention the elephant in the room. I do not believe that schooling should be federalized, ever. That would give the federal government way too much control over what goes in in classrooms. Yes, that could- under the right leadership- lead to some good things, but it would disconnect the education system from the interests of children and parents- it would become all but impossible for the folks in the system to have meaningful input in the system, while teaching unions and lobbyists would have unfettered access. The more levels of bureaucracy you throw down between an individual and the managing authority, the more difficult it becomes for them to make their voice heard. There should be federal standards, but they should be more akin to the Constitution as opposed to the Tax Code- loosely defined and flexible enough to suit everyone's needs, not rigid and narrow with no room for minor adjustments according to local or individual needs. Local governments, despite their inefficiencies (as if the Fed is any more efficient), are much more responsive to the needs of individual districts. Anything under federal control requires input from the entire nation to set or alter policy, and it is exceedingly unlikely that any provision for 'user input' would be made in any national education system. The Federal government usually serves its own interests, tempered only by the threat of what might happen in the next election year. Local governments can be affected easily by strikes, organized protests, petitions, and recall elections which simply can't touch any federal authority- especially when that authority is appointed by the President rather than elected, as school boards are. It would be unwise to provide the exact same template for every single school district, anyway- for a small nation that might work, but variation in climate, population density, access to various services (including the distance to and from school), and other factors must be taken into account when setting school district policy. For example, how many snow days are available, when the school year starts or whether school is broken down into smaller blocks to account for local concerns... There are many districts where most of the students live an hour or more away from school; should they have the same 8-hour day as a district in which all the students live within 15 minutes of the campus? Or should they have a slightly longer school year but only a 6 hour day so that students don't spend all their waking hours on school, schoolwork, and travel between school and home? Moving on, here's one thing that I believe must change- sick day allotments. In almost every school district in the country, students are only permitted a certain number of excused absences before they may be penalized and held back. Usually that allotment is set at a percentage of the total school days in the year; in our district it was 10% which worked out to about 14 days. Now, I understand the reason for there being a limit somewhere; after you've missed a significant percentage of your classes it becomes very difficult to catch up to missed lessons and assignments. However, I do not agree with the existing policy on what to do after that limit is exceeded. If you've got a legitimate excuse, it should not matter how many days you miss- you should not automatically go from passing to being held back a year because you were sick for 15 days instead of 14 or even for 20 or more... the school district should provide an online classroom service so that you can make up your lessons even if you can't make it to school. Right now, if you're sick for too long or have to be away for some other reason, your family has to foot the bill for tutoring else you effectively lose a year of your life for nothing. Also, your allotment of sick days should be reset once you've caught up again- it makes no sense to maintain records of previous absences if you've made up the time you lost. What if you get sick again? What if there's a death in the family, and you've already used up your days but caught up on your work? Again, it's an example of penalizing students for things beyond their control. If they've put in the effort and learned the material, they should get the damn cookie no matter whether they were in the classroom physically or not. Especially when the technology to provide online lessons exists- hell, set up a webcam in every classroom and now you can record lessons so students who missed class can watch them later- or in real-time from wherever they happen to be. Many colleges already have stuff like this. The school I went to, being in hurricane country, had an entire online backup system in place so that the whole school could be run remotely if it had to be evacuated for an extended period. I don't see why similar services couldn't be extended to students in public schools- it could easily be squeezed into most budgets, as it is a one-time expenditure with only token costs for server upkeep and tech support... which is a moot point for districts which already have individual school networks. Basically, I'd propose a safety net for students who- due to forces beyond their control- miss one too many school days. An online classroom service for students who can't make it to school but are well enough to participate to some degree, and a tutoring catch-up service for those who have had to be down and out for an extended period of time. Much more worthwhile than a third gymnasium (yeah, my old HS really went there) or school-provided laptops/tablets. As an added bonus, it might even save kids from having to cut into summer when it snows one too many times, since teachers could still provide much of their curriculum online and then be able to condense classroom sessions later.

Ideally, proper education reform would have to include earlier and more options for students. I don't believe that everyone knows what they want to do with their lives by the time they're in high school, but they do know what they don't want to do. It seems rather silly to force requirements for competence in, say, classic literature if a person favors subjects like calculus or chemistry- or to force those subjects on a student who favors literature. Usually it's phys ed that catches all the flak, and it should- where is the educational value in making a kid who couldn't give a turd about sports learn how to play football? However, forcing a kid to do something they have no interest in only makes them hate it. There are some lines of study that need to be taught, IMO, but once a clear preference emerges then a student should be allowed to pursue it to the exclusion of most of what is now mandatory.

IMHO, the system is rotten to the core. The entire focus of school has been shifted from learning to testing and competition. Standardized tests are applied so frequently and carry so much weight that many districts force teachers to devote a third or more of classroom time to test prep instead of a proper curriculum. This emphasis on testing only teaches students that the test is the only thing that matters- that, if they pass, their worries will be over and they can just forget everything. That is a problem in the long term, especially with today's easy access to information via the internet. Once the test is passed, students feel that if they ever need the information they were tested on again, they can just look it up online. What students hear in schools today is: "Today we're going to learn what's on the test." What they should be hearing is: "Here's what we'll be learning today, and you will be tested on it." The second issue is the focus on competition- which has been an issue for longer than over-testing. Anything kids, especially high school kids, can use as a social status symbol, they will- grades lend themselves easily to that purpose. However, that should be between students- not encouraged by the staff and the system. Some students are driven to excel by competition; they enjoy the challenge of working under pressure and do extremely well on timed assignments or presentation projects. Other students are ruined by the same pressures. There should always be rewards for exceptional performance, but there is very little support or encouragement offered to under-performing students. The message is that if you fail, you are a failure- poorer schools have difficulty providing remedial classes, and even better public school systems that do offer such courses typically treat them as long-term detention. When a teacher calls a parent to tell them their child is having trouble in school, they do it in the same manner they would if the child were in trouble. Fear is a terrible motivator- if students fear failure, then they will be more likely to hide their grades when they perform poorly rather than working with their parents and teachers to bring their grades up. I was there; I know what that feels like. Failure is not a punishable offense; it indicates other, deeper problems like lack of interest in a subject or an incompatibility with a particular teaching or learning style. Students are told that they must learn in a particular way- I vividly remember several teachers knocking points off of my grades because I did not take pages of bulletpoint notes (one even docked me for not using a three-ring binder FFS)... when doing so made it more difficult for me to listen and pay attention. Homework is a classic example of this as well- the given reasons for assigning most homework are review and practice- but as long as the material is being learned, it serves no purpose except to pad grades and occupy time that students should be using to decompress at the end of a long school day. Out of class assignments are necessary, but they should be assigned only when necessary. TL;DR- the entire system needs to be redesigned from the ground up. It will continue to fail; every attempt to prop it up will ultimately fail, and unless there is some form of total reform, it will fall apart within our lifetime.

I gave up games entirely for most of last summer... I learned a few things: - First, that the longer I went without playing games the easier it was not to think about them. - Second, that the games themselves were not as addictive as the escape from reality they provided. - Third, that reality was still really bloody depressing and getting more so every day. - Fourth, that playing games was not having a physiological effect on me, which is more than could be said of some *other* forms of escapism. - Fifth, that while yes, I was addicted, but it was not affecting my ability to function- and was in fact helping me cope with daily life. Knowing all that, when I started getting the constant temptation to do self-destructive things like drinking heavily, smoking, or worse, I started playing games again. Quite frankly, it was a better choice than most of the alternatives. When is gaming a problem? When it interferes with your ability to function. If your grades are suffering or if you're missing work, then it's a problem. If you're neglecting your friends, family, or health, then it's a problem. For me, at least in the past year, it's been a vital coping mechanism... and one of the only social connections I currently have to most of my friends, who live hundreds of miles away. Without that outlet, I can't imagine what I'd have done to myself by now. My advice is, set aside a period of time during which you will not play any games at all. From my experience, it was much easier to also swear off internet forums because they tickle the same part of the brain. If you can, also ditch the TV. If you successfully complete that 'clean' period, double it. Don't lock up your games, don't have anyone hang onto them for you, just... don't play them. If you cannot hold yourself to not playing for, say, a week or two, then you definitely have a problem and that's when you should get yourself some outside help. Psychological addictions are nothing to sneeze at. If reality is depressing enough, the lure of escapism can be more powerful than any chemical dependence. There is also the problem of recursive depression- that is, if you fail to resolve your problem on the first attempt to do so, the very fact that you failed may drive you deeper into your dependence. Alternatively, knowledge of the chemical processes that cause a psychological dependence can weaken feelings of responsibility and leave you with the belief that there isn't anything you can do about it. Self-doubt is the single greatest perpetuating factor when it comes to addictions. In order to break the cycle, you have to believe you can do so.

I enjoy *some* RTS games. Couldn't claim to be all that great against human opponents in any strategy game, but I've always been very good at the intel side of the genre. I guess you could say my specialty was knowing what was going to kill me before it did. :P If I lived long enough to get my ducks lined up I knew exactly where to strike, what with, and how... but getting my supply lines up and functional always gave me trouble even though I knew how to do it. My early game frankly sucked, and I can't imagine it's gotten any better with all the practice I've not been getting in the past few years. :biggrin: My taste in games switches genres too often to name one or another as my all-around favorite. My RTS library: Dune 2 (yeah, old school credit!) C&C Gold + Covert Operations C&C Red Alert + Aftermath and Counterstrike C&C Tiberian Sun + Firestorm C&C Red Alert 2 + Yuri's Revenge (by far the weakest Westwood C&C) C&C 3 (playable but not really worthy of the franchise) RealWar Homeworld Homeworld: Cataclysm Homeworld 2 Total Annihilation Starcraft + Brood War Warcraft 2 Supreme Commander Sins of a Solar Empire DEFCON Darwinia ...console RTS: C&C N64 (C&C Gold, but with 3D graphics and awkward controls). Halo Wars (playable but not very deep) ...and in the RTT/TBT corner: Missionforce: Cyberstorm Cyberstorm 2: Corporate Wars MechCommander MechCommander 2 Nexus: The Jupiter Incident Chess (ancient and obligatory, both in videogame and board game form) Out of all of the above, my personal favorites were and are Homeworld, C&C Tiberian Sun, and now Sins of a Solar Empire. I can still regurgitate just about any piece of Homeworld knowledge... except maybe the damage tables, since I'm not too great with memorizing numbers and formulas.

I think it is wrong for the government to require a private citizen to purchase health insurance. It is effectively a tax on being alive- either you play money to the insurance company, or you pay it to the government because you aren't paying it to the insurance company. The general belief seems to be that paying for healthcare through insurance coverage is somehow cheaper than paying up front- it isn't. Insurance companies make their money by setting their premiums high enough that the average person will never collect more than they pay. They are, in fact, playing the odds against you- and if you do require healthcare, the higher the cost of it is the harder your insurance company will fight having to pay because every single penny cuts into their profit margins. That isn't paranoia; it's how the industry works. It is the only industry in the world that only makes a profit when it is not doing what you pay it for. They have no reason to lower their rates unless required by law to do so. Insurance rates are determined by all manner of ridiculous criteria, from your credit rating to your grades in high school- anything they can use to increase the premium, they will do so. Up until now, the only thing regulating insurance premiums has been the fact that people could drop their policies if they got too expensive. There is no competition; all of the major insurers follow the same broken game plan. That is what the government has made it illegal not to buy into, and premiums are only going to go up now that the insurance companies know their customers can't say no. Comparisons are frequently drawn between car and health insurance, but there is one key difference- you can choose not to drive a car if you cannot afford or do not want to carry a car insurance policy. In order to choose not to pay for health insurance now, your only "option" is to not be alive. Should there be a public option? I don't know. However, mandating private insurance is not the way to bring the cost of healthcare down. That provision alone makes the healthcare bill unconstitutional, and I believe that the courts will strike it down. Hopefully something better will rise in its place and make a positive change.

Covering up one's genitals and arse is a matter of hygene, and protects other people from sitting in whatever microorganisms are left behind after you've vacated a seat. Covering up one's chest is a matter of personal preference- it doesn't have anything to do with anything else. The only reason to enact laws against going topless- for men or women- is to enforce one specific, subjective code of conduct against everyone, regardless of whether they conform to its tenets or not. So you might not like the way an 80-year old granny's breasts look... well, if you see someone's face that bothers you, that's just something you have to deal with in your own head and move on. So it should be with every part of human anatomy. You know it's there anyway... you can learn to ignore it. Or do you think that folks living in cultures with no nudity taboos enjoy the sight of every single body they see? Bottom line, nobody has a right not to be offended. The only reason anti-toplessness laws exist is to keep people from being offended. It doesn't matter whether only a few people would be offended, or a whole bunch, or most... or even every single person besides the one who wants to take their shirt off. Subjective views should only be made into policy where it can be scientifically proven that not enforcing them would result in harm to the public... and thus far every attempt to prove that partial or even total nudity harms anyone has failed. The justification for these laws simply isn't there.

Oh yay, I've been trolled. Serves me right for not doing research, I guess.

A few things for consideration: - The game is/was slated to release later this year. Gaider was a writer, and most if not all of the writing is done. This isn't just going to be someone taking the man's place and changing the feel of the story; if there's any work he left unfinished it is likely just editing at this point. - Standard Hollywood practice in a situation like this is to add in a fade-to-black or an image of the deceased with text reading "In Loving Memory Of..." before or after the credits roll. The publishing industry takes a similar approach, usually with a page in the front of the book before the prologue and often in place of the regular dedication page. Nobody's ever had much of a problem with that; I don't see why the standard should be any different for a videogame. I find it to be very respectful of the deceased and a tasteful, low-key memorial gesture. - No business with half the sense of a rock is going to throw millions down the drain because one of their employees died. Might seem a bit heartless, but life and business goes on- as it must. However tragic the death of David Gaider is, Bioware can't and shouldn't just trash a big-budget sequel and disappoint millions of their customers because of his passing. It doesn't mean that Bioware is "capitalizing on his death" by releasing the game. Even for a developer as large and well-known as Bioware is, a game like DA2 is a significant investment, and canceling the project would be a serious blow to the company's revenue and reputation as a business. The man who died was not the only person with a stake in it. - Writing is an art; art endures beyond death. The best possible tribute to a writer's passing is to publish their final work. I do not think that a "Memorial Edition" is entirely appropriate- that could easily be taken the wrong way and seen as an attempt to cash in on David's passing- but canning the whole project? That's more than a little over-the-top. The show must go on, as the saying goes.

Honestly, when I first found out about the possible benefits for Alzheimer's patients, I damn near converted wholesale. A particularly nasty form of the disease runs in my family... Mom's already so far gone she can't communicate or do anything but (barely) walk on her own, and she's only 60- the first onset of symptoms was three years ago. I've literally been wiping her ass for her for over a year now. If the day comes when I get that diagnosis and find out I'll end up that way, I'll certainly not let the law tell me I can't get stoned to stave it off for a while- because my plan B is suicide. If the stuff is ever proven conclusively to have an effect, I'll start using before I even get a diagnosis. That disease scares the hell out of me.

Heh, the only two I ever played were the first two. I still have them, too, and the same old NES I had growing up. Things were built to last. Haven't played either game in ages and ages though... I always liked Kirby's Adventure and Super Mario III better, so those tend to be what I play when I get all nostalgic and dust off the NES.

Everyone seems to assume that you were captured in or near Goodsprings... I don't think it went down that way. I think you were captured and taken to Goodsprings. I didn't really question winding up in Goodsprings- after all, it is (as has been mentioned) pretty out of the way. Yeah, it would have been smarter for Benny to dump your body somewhere it'd get eaten or something, but he's not that sort of guy. The Khans call him out on the folly of showing his face to you, too, but he makes it clear that he wants to look you in the eye, and to me that suggests that he'd have gone out of his way to give you a decent burial as well. The logic behind your placement in Goodsprings goes like this, as I see it: - Knowing that the route north from Primm is blocked, anyone who came looking for you (to find the chip, of course- like they'd care about your sorry behind) would not be likely to look to the north as you would have headed to New Vegas via Nipton and Novac. - Goodsprings is to the north of Primm, and is a fair ways off the main road. - Benny & Co. put a bag over your head to keep you from seeing where they were taking you to- which means that you were likely not captured in Goodsprings, and not even necessarily anywhere nearby. Nobody between where you were captured and the graveyard would be too likely to mess with an important-looking man in a suit accompanied by several Khans and a prisoner. In a world where death is the usual penalty for everything, someone who can afford to take prisoners and is not someone to be messed with. - Benny fancies himself an honorable scumsucking douchebag, so he would have insisted (against good advice from the Khans he hired) on giving you a proper burial in addition to looking you in the eye and doing the deed himself. He's not a moral man, but he is an ethical man- he has a code, and dumping you in the middle of nowhere wouldn't satisfy that code. - Goodsprings has a graveyard, far enough outside of town so that Benny & Co. might expect to carry out their dirty doings uninterrupted. Nobody in Goodsprings knew what happened until Victor brought you into town, so if House hadn't been the paranoid crank that he is then Benny would have easily gotten away with it. Benny's plan was a good one; he just didn't know you were being followed by Victor. How the hell a 6-foot tall blue robot with a glowing TV screen for a face could possibly hide nearby while you were being murdered.... now that's a mind-bender.

I believe that the line between right and wrong where drugs are concerned lies exactly where one person's rights stop and another's begin. If a man's drug addiction results in his ruining his entire family, then he should be held accountable. If his second-hand smoke results in another person getting sick, he should be held accountable. If his habit affects nobody but him- if he steals from nobody, attacks nobody, kills nobody to support his addiction- then what he does to his own body is nobody's business but his own. Prosecuting drug users for possession and use is counterproductive, futile, and a violation of any free person's right to do with their body as they wish. Prisons in the US are stuffed full of non-violent offenders who were simply caught with a little bag of pot, or crack, or whatever- and the time and taxpayer money spent on prosecuting them is time and money not spent going after murderers, rapists, and thieves. The crimes out-of-control addicts commit to support their addictions are exactly what they are- crimes. If someone steps over the line, they are already prosecuted for that violation. It doesn't become more illegal because drugs were involved.