>> ^Quboid:

>> ^therealblankman:
>> ^gwiz665:
I can't agree with him on the last one, but otherwise fine fine.

That's because, no offense intended, like everyone else who keeps buying these games you're a sycophantic idiot who happily swallows whatever tiresome, un-original, unimaginative, over-rated swollen appendage the major publishers choose to repetitively cram down your open throat year after year.
All the best.

I must say, I'm getting pretty tired of the hipster "you've probably never heard of the games I play" attitude that is prevalent in PC gaming. The "You like Modern Warfare 3? That's cute, personally I'm more into SpaceChem but whatever" attitude. This is probably unfair on you @therealblankman but this certainly applies to a lot of people.
You know why we have BF3 and MW3? Because BFBC2 and MW2 sold well. Why was that? Because people liked them. Not because major mainstream publishers told us to like them, but because we actually did like them, in general. I don't care for MW3 but I bought Skyrim because I like "dumbed down, overly simplified RPGs" like Oblivion.
I don't think less of people who prefer MW3 to X3. I think less of people who play them on consoles, but that's because console gamers are simply genetically inferior.


Like I said to gwiz when I pm'd him: I don't begrudge these games simply because they're successful. Hell, these game's biggest crimes are that they're simply repetitive, derivative, formulaic and most egregious of all... BORING. If Twilight were a video game, it would be MWx. To quote H.L. Mencken "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people".

Shit, if nobody made money off them then we wouldn't have games to play. My favorite games of the past year are both huge hits, but at least they're fun to play... Batman: Arkham City and Portal 2. Haven't gotten into Skyrim (yet), but that's only because I'm terrified that I'll have to quit my job and not have friends any more if I start playing it- I did play Oblivion so I know of what I speak.

As for consoles vs PCs, you're right of course. At least partially- I frankly got sick of spending $400 every year or so to upgrade my graphics card to be able to even play the latest and greatest, so I've given up and joined the PS3 darkside. But you know what, there's hope for that as well. Valve software is bridging that divide in the right way. I bought Portal 2 for PS3 but using a code I can also play it on my PC, and if I want to play Co-op with someone it doesn't matter whether they're on a PC or PS3 either! Maybe other publishers will do the same going forward, but I doubt it.

>> ^therealblankman:

>> ^gwiz665:
I can't agree with him on the last one, but otherwise fine fine.

That's because, no offense intended, like everyone else who keeps buying these games you're a sycophantic idiot who happily swallows whatever tiresome, un-original, unimaginative, over-rated swollen appendage the major publishers choose to repetitively cram down your open throat year after year.
All the best.


I must say, I'm getting pretty tired of the hipster "you've probably never heard of the games I play" attitude that is prevalent in PC gaming. The "You like Modern Warfare 3? That's cute, personally I'm more into SpaceChem but whatever" attitude. This is probably unfair on you @therealblankman but this certainly applies to a lot of people.

You know why we have BF3 and MW3? Because BFBC2 and MW2 sold well. Why was that? Because people liked them. Not because major mainstream publishers told us to like them, but because we actually did like them, in general. I don't care for MW3 but I bought Skyrim because I like "dumbed down, overly simplified RPGs" like Oblivion.

I don't think less of people who prefer MW3 to X3. I think less of people who play them on consoles, but that's because console gamers are simply genetically inferior.

Suck my dick, fuckface.

>> ^therealblankman:

>> ^gwiz665:
I can't agree with him on the last one, but otherwise fine fine.

That's because, no offense intended, like everyone else who keeps buying these games you're a sycophantic idiot who happily swallows whatever tiresome, un-original, unimaginative, over-rated swollen appendage the major publishers choose to repetitively cram down your open throat year after year.
All the best.

>> ^gwiz665:

I can't agree with him on the last one, but otherwise fine fine.


That's because, no offense intended, like everyone else who keeps buying these games you're a sycophantic idiot who happily swallows whatever tiresome, un-original, unimaginative, over-rated swollen appendage the major publishers choose to repetitively cram down your open throat year after year.

All the best.

dry, boring, and flat-out hard to read (e.g. three names for every individual, all sounding so similar as to be virtually impossible to differentiate)

Reading is all in the eye of the beholder, so I won't say you're WRONG but I will say you are looking at them with an incorrect expectation (were then, and still are).

DRY & BORING: Tolkien wrote the book with a 'high' style. He makes no apologies for it. He did not write the novel in such a way as to please the varying sensibilities of people. Some people today want 'grit', others want speed, or breathless action, or any one a hundred different tastes. If you read the books and want those other things, then your experience will be lacking.

HARD TO READ: Tolkien was a professor of philology, and wrote accordingly. Like Wells, Lewis, and others of his stripe - he did not pull his linguistic punches (much). As far as the names are concerned, you just have to deal with that because he was using the same time-honored literary device as was used in Beowulf where the recitation of a person's many names/titles is done with a reverence akin to reciting one's lineage and history. He doesn't do it to be redundant or repetitive. He does it for a reason - to tell you the person's story.

I've had this conversation with many. Not everyone likes Tolkien, and that's fine. But I dispute the statement that his work was boring, hard to read, or dry. JRR was a craftsman of the language the like of which simply does not exist today. That isn't idle brag. He had a skillset that has been lost to us. No one exists that can do what he did. Many try to ape his style, but they come off as pale shadows. And not only was he a master of the language in a technical sense, but he was also highly skilled at writing as well. You only get that combination once in a thousand years.

When you read - you have to look at the beauty of the language, the power of the words, and the light and depth of the setting & themes. There are passages and words in LOTR that never fail to send chills through me from top to bottom. I have not found any modern writer who comes close to that. Yes, I've read many who told excellent stories, or could write great characters, or who could generate good atmosphere, or good settings, et al. But none have used language so powerfully or with such light in such a way as to move the soul. LOTR is a work in which there is a true 'aura' beyond the typical book trance from other works. Again, if you go in looking for something else then, brother, you're just looking at it the wrong way.

Taken at the standard of this franchise's budget and all that it could have been it is and frankly has always been a train wreck.

The original had three things for it: (1) a well realised game map, (2) a clever parkour mechanic, and (3) a novel sci-fi/fantasy story mixup concept.

What it sucked at, and continues to suck at is:

(1) Having a story with memorable characters, plot arcs and twists that make any sense or remotely have any forethought or planning involved. I can't for the life of me remember what happened in the first 3 games besides the endings. I can remember maybe 2 or 3 of the villains out of the 20323092930 people I was asked to assassinate.

(2) Missions and gameplay elements with depth, not just an endless litany of minigames and gimmicks, none of which do much to disguise the repetitiveness of your objectives & the simplicity/shallowness of the combat. For the huge amount of weapons to choose from, nothing has changed the fact that most combat is just counter-kill based, and it's been that shallow from the original. The enemies are disposable and largely approachable in the same way.

(3) Clearly being a franchise that releases unbaked games far too frequently with few gameplay additions to milk people endlessly for their money. A yearly franchise with this much environment detail in it, must have next to nil time to improve mechanics/gameplay before the pixel crunchers have to start cranking out textures. It shows.

uh what the hell were you watching? Cause I saw the Rep doing anything and everything to AVOID answering the questions presented. He was saying he was trying to answer but the second he was given a breath, he went off in a direction unrelated to the question. When asked he would never provide any kind of direct answer, which was what O'Donnell wanted. Asked about Social Security he would never answer that directly, he would just go on and on about grant programs, never actually answering the question by saying "Yes, Social Security should be repealed", and since he never actually said those words, he can worm out of it later by claiming a differing intent behind all his kerfuffle about grant programs. Typical politician bullshit.

This is the kind of thing we should be DEMANDING from our journalists, not giving the politicians an excuse to twist their words around so that later they can spin them up into something totally different according to the situation. BOTH sides should be held accountable to their words and intent and that starts by forcing them to state categorically what it is they actually want instead of allowing them to say one thing, do another and then point out "I never actually said that" like they all do. O'Donnell might have been more tactful between each repetition of the question, but he absolutely should make them actually answer the question asked, NOT some vague nonsense that relates to it but doesn't actually answer it.

Almost getting violent is not illegal.

Your link and your examples support my point completely. There are limits to free speech: when they cause harm to others. Libel, slander, yelling "fire" in a crowded theatre, or my examples of inciting violence or causing discrimination, all cause harm.

Being an asshole on the subway does not cause harm.

She never threatened anyone (so there goes any "uttering threats" charge) and harassment is almost by definition a repetitive act (which means this likely can't be called that either, legally).

With regards to freedom of speech not superseding other rights, here is a link to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Please point out which one her freedom of speech was superseding. There is no "everyone has the right to never be offended and to be sheltered from the opinions of others."
>> ^SDGundamX:

>> ^Skeeve:
While her tirade makes me sick, the fact that she was arrested for this makes me even more sick.
Freedom of speech means nothing if you don't have the freedom to offend people. The aim should be to draw the line where it causes harm - whether by inciting violence or by denying someone a job, etc.

This line of thinking always puzzles me. Freedom of speech always has (and always should have) limitations. It doesn't supersede other rights--it exists in relation to them and is not any more "special," which is why (for example) there are laws against libel and slander, laws against yelling "fire" in a crowded theater in order to start a panic, etc.
The lady in this video is clearly going beyond just voicing her opinion and harassing the other passengers. At one point she seems ready to get physical (at about the 1:00 part she's screaming that she dares someone to try to remove her from the train). She's entitled to her opinion about immigrants and she's also entitled to express her opinion, but she's not entitled to repeatedly verbally attack or threaten the people around her, who have no chance to avoid or get away from her since they're all trapped on the tram together. In other words, her right to free speech does not supersede the other passengers' rights to travel on the tram in peace.
I'm glad she was arrested and, as mentioned above by @Boise_Lib, that no violence was involved. She should be prosecuted not for expressing an offensive opinion but for repeatedly and intentionally harassing the other passengers. This is not the kind of behavior that should be rewarded with a "Oh, it's her right to free speech" pass.

Oh and the constant repetition of the mantra that Occupy has no coherent message at this point strikes me as disingenuous and a transparent talking point of the anti-Occupy politicians and corporate interests.

It's not that the "conservatives" aren't intelligent enough to be able to see that the underlying issue fueling the Occupy protest is disgust at the disproportionate power that corporate lobbyists and by extension their Wall Street funders have over politics, it's that they think that they can shape reality via the media and as long as they are unified in denying that Occupy has any message at all, their power in the media could quite possibly make this fiction a reality for the millions of Fox viewers who constitute their power base.

I agree with you in principle but s**t man, relax. It's only the internets. >> ^jackhalfaprayer:

argumentum ad hominem. it's not my job to do better; it's rockstar's job to do better. we weren't talking about me or anyone else until you changed the subject. i'd say that bethesda has been doing better open world games since the mid-to-late 90's, konami's silent hill series has been better at telling stories (read: making one feel like playing through a movie, which rockstar wishes they could accomplish), and just about any third-person game from tomb raider to max payne has a better 3-rd person targeting system than that broken-ass excuse rockstar has been trying to fix for 10 iterations or so. so pretty much everything that GTA has been mashing up into a huge meaningless sandbox of drivel has been done before in a less broken fashion, with more variety, less linearity, less repetitive gameplay, and without falling back on hopelessly cliche, hackneyed mafioso stereotypes and slipshod driving mechanics.
but if you wanted to give me money to write a game and pay some programmers and artists and designers, absolutely! i'd be happy to present to you a game that is better than anything rockstar has produced to date. until then, fanboy, defend this mediocre studio with some actual points instead an ad hominem logical fallacy... or just stfu about what i or anyone else should be doing better than rockstar. rockstar puts out unoriginal crap with semi-impressive tech and people like you eat it up, bloat their egos, and line the pockets of corporate lackeys that are afraid to do anything new with an old IP. there's better work out there. you must not hear about it because it's not mentioned in your gamepro subscription. so go preorder this re-hash bullshit, and rest ignorant of the knowledge that people like you are destroying this industry, and this community, by buying into the hype machine of some fake gangster-sim crap with nothing new to offer since version III. and don't tell me that I should put up with it because there's nothing better out there, wtf sort of defense is that?
>> ^Yogi:
>> ^jackhalfaprayer:
GTA III was the last time there was any innovation in this series. I'm tired of sandbox missions with a half-assed organized crime drama throughline. I'd rather watch Goodfellas or something where there's real writing and acting. Rockstar games are overhyped and underdeveloped.

You...or ANYONE do better. Seriously we've seen other sandbox games try and fail...this is like criticizing WoW for being what it is. Do something better or accept that this is as good as it gets right now and shut up.

argumentum ad hominem. it's not my job to do better; it's rockstar's job to do better. we weren't talking about me or anyone else until you changed the subject. i'd say that bethesda has been doing better open world games since the mid-to-late 90's, konami's silent hill series has been better at telling stories (read: making one feel like playing through a movie, which rockstar wishes they could accomplish), and just about any third-person game from tomb raider to max payne has a better 3-rd person targeting system than that broken-ass excuse rockstar has been trying to fix for 10 iterations or so. so pretty much everything that GTA has been mashing up into a huge meaningless sandbox of drivel has been done before in a less broken fashion, with more variety, less linearity, less repetitive gameplay, and without falling back on hopelessly cliche, hackneyed mafioso stereotypes and slipshod driving mechanics.

but if you wanted to give me money to write a game and pay some programmers and artists and designers, absolutely! i'd be happy to present to you a game that is better than anything rockstar has produced to date. until then, fanboy, defend this mediocre studio with some actual points instead an ad hominem logical fallacy... or just stfu about what i or anyone else should be doing better than rockstar. rockstar puts out unoriginal crap with semi-impressive tech and people like you eat it up, bloat their egos, and line the pockets of corporate lackeys that are afraid to do anything new with an old IP. there's better work out there. you must not hear about it because it's not mentioned in your gamepro subscription. so go preorder this re-hash bullshit, and rest ignorant of the knowledge that people like you are destroying this industry, and this community, by buying into the hype machine of some fake gangster-sim crap with nothing new to offer since version III. and don't tell me that I should put up with it because there's nothing better out there, wtf sort of defense is that?

>> ^Yogi:

>> ^jackhalfaprayer:
GTA III was the last time there was any innovation in this series. I'm tired of sandbox missions with a half-assed organized crime drama throughline. I'd rather watch Goodfellas or something where there's real writing and acting. Rockstar games are overhyped and underdeveloped.

You...or ANYONE do better. Seriously we've seen other sandbox games try and fail...this is like criticizing WoW for being what it is. Do something better or accept that this is as good as it gets right now and shut up.

>> ^shinyblurry:

What the administration is not telling you is that total withdrawlal of the troops was not the preferred plan. The plan was to leave a remnant of a few thousand behind to oversee training. But because our negotiaters bungled talks with the Iraqi government and failed to get immunity for the troops, they pulled them all out. Iraq also recently announced that it wouldn't be having any of our bases there either. So basically Iran has taken over, and this fledging democracy, which we completely failed to establish, is going to be overtaken by extermists and brought under sharia law. We are basically symbolically handing over the control of the country to Iran and leaving in shame and disgrace. God help the Iraqi people.
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalys
is/Article/589004/201110211900/Politicizing-Our-Exit-From-Iraq.htm


It's funny how imperialism works. The countries we occupy seem to side with the opposition, why is that?

You're correct though, the Iraqi government is kicking us out. Of course we will leave behind thousands of mercenaries and the CIA will have a shadowy presence. And the State department will be hiring 5,500 more security contractors to protect 17,000 civilians working for the American government in Iraq.

Sounds like to me this is the perfect opportunity for the US or Israel to stage an attack by Iran on Iraq or US troops. Remember the "Iran has become bolder" talking-point that was repetitively aired after the recent fake DEA-Saudi bomb plot.

@ShakaUVM: "There's a certain point after which incremental gains in money does not buy any more happiness, and the point is around $60k-$75k."

I agree there - certainly income inequality is a much smaller pain when the "low end" is higher. Overall I think our positions are probably closer than I thought they were - certainly I'd grant that income inequality is being overhyped as a current problem (in the US).

I do think, though, that the economy and general strategy for wealth distribution will have to change in the next 30-50 years. I think there's a decent chance we'll see high, stable unemployment as humans are replaced in manufacturing, manual labor, and repetitive knowledge and service industries (optometrists, etc..). Now certainly there's growing job sectors (elder care, etc..) that will absorb many of these displaced workers, but eventually if unemployment stays very high (25 or 30%) I think Western countries will need a new plan (or else we'll end up with a significant divide that will cause problems).

>> ^hpqp:

I don't know how it works in Germany, but here the garbage from public trash cans is simply dumped in landfills or burned. Besides, there could also be non-criminals making license plates, etc. The point is not to take someone else's job from them, but to make serving a prison sentence productive yet unpleasant, so people don't want to go back. Right now (in CH at least) if you get sent to jail (extremely rare; most offenders are let off with a fine, often paid for them by the state, i.e. the taxpayer) it's practically a hotel. No wonder so many people are being drawn in by the rightwing xenophobic propaganda.
<sub>This discussion is kind of derailing from the video's subject. Feel free to pm me
>> ^DerHasisttot:
>> ^hpqp:
Yes, but that's not what I meant. I meant labour that profits society, not a private run prison system. For example, they could sift through the city's trash (that from public spaces) and separate the recyclables. It's unpleasant but useful.
>> ^DerHasisttot:
>> ^hpqp:
A bit repetitive, but definitely right. The government should not be in the business of killing people, period. Besides, what's so bad about the death penalty? Instead of paying with their life (which doesn't seem to be very dear to some of them) I would much prefer to see criminals productively paying their debt to society, in the form of (very very) hard labour for example.

The problem with forced labour is that you can get a inhumane competetive economy like in the US prison-system going. http://www.workers.org/2011/us/pentagon_0609/


But there are non-criminal people employed in that line of work, in the recycling factories.</sub>



I can't remember in which country it was, but in some socialist commie utopia in Europe the criminals are basically in a high-security school, having to do school half their day 5 days a week, and this I really like. "Oh you can't get out? How about you read 3 books and do a test?" It's mild torture, they get an education, and have shit to do.

I don't know how it works in Germany, but here the garbage from public trash cans is simply dumped in landfills or burned. Besides, there could also be non-criminals making license plates, etc. The point is not to take someone else's job from them, but to make serving a prison sentence productive yet unpleasant, so people don't want to go back. Right now (in CH at least) if you get sent to jail (extremely rare; most offenders are let off with a fine, often paid for them by the state, i.e. the taxpayer) it's practically a hotel. No wonder so many people are being drawn in by the rightwing xenophobic propaganda.

<sub>This discussion is kind of derailing from the video's subject. Feel free to pm me

>> ^DerHasisttot:

>> ^hpqp:
Yes, but that's not what I meant. I meant labour that profits society, not a private run prison system. For example, they could sift through the city's trash (that from public spaces) and separate the recyclables. It's unpleasant but useful.
>> ^DerHasisttot:
>> ^hpqp:
A bit repetitive, but definitely right. The government should not be in the business of killing people, period. Besides, what's so bad about the death penalty? Instead of paying with their life (which doesn't seem to be very dear to some of them) I would much prefer to see criminals productively paying their debt to society, in the form of (very very) hard labour for example.

The problem with forced labour is that you can get a inhumane competetive economy like in the US prison-system going. http://www.workers.org/2011/us/pentagon_0609/


But there are non-criminal people employed in that line of work, in the recycling factories.</sub>