Shinmaru

I've always been pretty interested in this topic. I've been thinking about writing an article or something big on it for a while now. Maybe when I have the time lol. [quote name='James][color=#B0251E']Funny thing is, I don't regard GTA as being particularly mature. Sure, it has violence and sex and so on. But does it really deal with anything particularly mature? Generally the humor is fairly low-brow and the story is relatively devoid of anything truly compelling (although it was definitely improved in San Andreas).[/color][/quote] I think that GTA is more 'adult' than 'mature'. I don't like getting into semantics, but there's a difference between the two to me. Adult themes are violence, sex, swearing, etc. A mature game doesn't necessarily have to include those themes in them, I think. I'd consider something like Zelda to be pretty mature, because I think that you'd have to be pretty mature to be able to beat it and appreciate it. Not just any idiot is going to be able to solve the puzzles in a Zelda game lol. Gaming isn't even that old yet, and adult themes in mainstream video games is still a relatively new concept. As these themes become more and more accepted, I'd like to see the envelope pushed in newer and more creative ways. If games just become more violent, more filled with sex, and have tons more swearing in them, they will get boring eventually. Games that explore some deeper themes could be a nice kick in the balls for the industry. On the same token, like satan says, I wouldn't want to see the more lighthearted, fun games like Wind Waker and Katamari Damacy suddenly become obsolete. I'm happy that companies are embracing adult content, but I wouldn't want to see that happen at the expense of games that are fun just because they're fun.

[quote name='Semjaza Azazel']What I'm getting at is, really, how happy are people where they are in terms of schooling?[/quote] Well, I just started college back in September, so obviously I'm not very far along at all. But I am at least already taking some classes that are not only a part of my major, but are a pretty integral part of what I'd like to do after I finish school, which is to become a journalist. I'm not exactly jumping for joy about where I'm at in school, or anything, but it's gone decently well so far. [quote]Did you really bother to research ahead of time as much as you should have?[/quote] I probably didn't research quite as much as I could have, but I think that I did research enough to make a good decision on where I wanted to go. I visited a few campuses, got the whole college talk from representatives, etc. What ultimately factored most into my decision to go to the college I'm at right now is that the school is supposed to focus more on actually going out and getting experience in your major in various ways rather than just doing a bunch of research for classes, or whatever. The way that teachers made it sound, the UC schools are more research-oriented, and I wasn't really into that. Plus, the UC schools are more expensive than other state colleges, anyway. [quote]Do you feel like you've actually learned enough in school to get the job you want (or will by the time you're done with your current plan, anyway)?[/quote] Hopefully I will. I think that I'll learn enough to be able to fill in the gaps myself if need be. Obviously you'd like a college to teach you everything that you need to know, but I doubt that's the case at most places. A lot of it depends on me not just learning what I need to learn from my classes, but actually going out and getting the experience I need (from working for the school newspaper, getting internships, etc.). [quote]Do you think you'll have to go somewhere else later?[/quote] I don't know. I certainly hope that I won't have to go anywhere else, but you can never count out that possibility. I also agree with you that college isn't really [i]that[/i] drastic a change from high school, at least not from what I've experienced so far. The amount of freedom you get at college is pretty refreshing, especially in terms of being able to set up your own schedule (as long as your classes aren't already snatched up, anyway...). I probably get about the same workload that I got from my senior year of high school, but it's just so much easier to manage here. But I don't have a job, or anything, so I have a lot of free time to do things lol.

Ha, yeah, Blathers is a good choice. Good lord, the stupid bird just keeps yakking on and on and on and on. I just stopped contributing stuff to the museum after the millionth time he decided to lecture me about stuff he'd lectured me about before. I think that Tingle is more bizarre than annoying...he never really annoyed me, just kind of freaked me out. Navi, as helpful as she is, is about a million times more annoying than Tingle. [i]Especially[/i] in the first couple of dungeons where she bothers you about crap that you could've easily looked up in the instruction booklet in a few seconds. And, of course, the constant "Hey! Look! Listen!" Bah. Navi sucks.

[QUOTE=Siren]Call me crazy, but I don't think the harsh, jagged, splintery slashes of black, the inkblots/inkstains, and the ugly feel of the piece (I don't mean that as an insult, necessarily) quite exactly convey an apologetic message. I don't get a nice vibe from the image; I get more of a "Please take me back or I'm going to kill myself I can't live without you I'm in pain when you're not around can't you see what you're doing to me why won't you come back" feel. If that's what you were going for, then you succeeded. If not, however, if you were going for a more romantic, softer, truer apology, then I don't know if the piece works all that well.[/QUOTE] I don't know. The vibe I get from all that is that the person struggled mightily to find the right words to express the apology. I know that if I wanted to apologize to someone I cared about, I'd want to get it just right. I'd struggle with what I wanted to say. That's the feeling I got from this. Not really a romantic feeling, but a true feeling, nonetheless.

What's so special about La Puente? Our name is gramatically incorrect. It translates to 'the bridge' but bridge is a masculine term in Spanish, so it should be El Puente, instead (though La Puente sounds about a million times better). I always find that amusing that in a town predominantly made up of Latinos, the name of the town isn't in the correct form of Spanish. Our town's website (yes, we have a website) says that the name means 'the bridge' in old Spanish, so I guess bridge is a feminine term in old Spanish. Whatever. Also, it hasn't snowed in this area for almost one-hundred years.

If there were a bowdown emoticon here I'd be using it right now. That picture of Alex is just [i]too[/i] perfect. I mean, he always looks off his rocker, but he looked particularly nutty there. He makes a great Palpatine. And Annie looks like she's gonna teach someone a lesson in the Dark Side. Aww yeah. Great stuff, Drix. Very entertaining and well done, especially since it's apparently your first time with Photoshop. :)

[quote name='Annalisse][color=#404142']That brings me to another point that I have, I personally don't want to play video games because of all of the gore, brain matter splattering, swearing, what have you. To me, that's not creative, and it's boring. Lack of thought. I don't feel that it's a challenge to slice and dice. I would much rather play games that puzzle me, challenge my creativity and imagination. [/color][/quote] To be fair, there are a lot of M-rated games that are worth playing. Resident Evil 4 is one such game, Metal Gear Solid 3 another. Violent, yes, but great games, nonetheless. I don't think that anyone wants to suggest that they aren't worth playing, or can't be challenging, creative games because they are violent. EDIT: (in response to Annie's reply) Okay then. Just making sure that there aren't any misunderstandings, or anything. :)

[quote name='Semjaza Azazel']However, I've not read much about banning games outright in recent months. The main thing right now seems to be going after those who sell explicit games to minors with fines and jail time. I read something about this involving California the other day, but who knows if it was the same person or not. The Governor in Illinois wants to the same and I have no problem with it as he says once people are old enough (i.e., whatever it says the age group on the rating is), it's their business.[/quote] Basically. From reading a couple of articles on it, it seems to me that the bill is reinforcing what the ESRB ratings system was originally put into place for. It's not really a "ban" of violent games in California, or anything. Frankly, if people were more informed on the ratings system, then we wouldn't be having these problems, or at least they would be a bit less prominent. It's no real fault of the ESRB, anyway, since they've done as much as they can to inform people on the ratings system, really lol. Anyway, I honestly don't see that much of a problem with this. It's not like the only great games out there are the ones filled with blood, gore, swearing and whatnot. If your parents don't let you play M-rated games, just stop moping about it and play some different games. Lord knows that there are tons of great games available now that [i]aren't[/i] M-rated. But I guess the world will end if children don't get their fix of GTA!! :rolleyes: In short, buy a GameCube, and you won't have any problems with this. :D

[QUOTE=ChibiHorsewoman][color=darkviolet] in response to deathbug's comment: I'd like someone to explain to me that if Clinton had nothing to do with why we had a surplus during his [b]eight year tenur[/b] then why is it that we now have a billion dollar deficite? Also I'd like a plausible explaination for the war in Iraq. If I can receive both answers and they are sound, non biased and reasonable, then I'll pay 1 million dollars. I'll take it out of the deficite.[/color][/QUOTE] Bush isn't the end-all-be-all of the deficit (though his administration certainly has had a hand in it), and Clinton was certainly not the only reason why America had a surplus during his tenure. The economy is far too complicated for one person to be responsible for its positives and negatives. I'm certainly no fan of George W. Bush, but the lousy economy is not entirely his fault. It was pretty much common knowledge that he'd be inheriting an economy that would be on the downward spiral. His administration probably could have handled it better, but what can you do? To stay on topic, I'd give a million dollars to make sure that people don't give Presidents too much credit for things that happen during their tenures. ;)

[quote name='Manic Webb']I'd probably pay a million dollars for a house, seeing as that's how much they cost, these days.[/quote] Seriously. I live in a small town, and they gut you for houses out here, too. Not quite a million dollar-gutting, but still. It's pretty bad. I'd pay a million dollars to see Celebrity Deathmatch come back to television. But it would star real celebrities rather than clay versions of celebrities. And then all of the annoying celebrities in the world would fight each other to the death so nobody would have to hear about them anymore. (Hopefully.) I would also pay a million dollars (possibly more) to get any of these shows back on the air (new episodes, obviously, not reruns): Futurama, Rocko's Modern Life, Mystery Science Theater 3000, The Tick, and most of the shows that were on during WB's awesome run of cartoons during the 90s. And I would also like Nickelodeon to show something good besides The Fairly OddParents, which is the only reason I bother with the network anymore.

[quote name='Queen Asuka][color=hotpink][size=1]*I hate how almost every OB site out there is done in red and black because of these "gothic" kids who are so freaking depressed because their life just sucks![/color'][/size][/quote] I'll have you know that I chose my colors because I'm a Nintendo-fanboy, not because I'm depressed. :D Honestly, the crazy sex talk, or whatever, in OB chats does get a little grating after a while. It gets really boring when it's all people do in there. I haven't been in a chat in a while, and I'm not really missing it that much. I don't think it's disgusting, just a bit boring.

[quote name='BlueGender']Eternal Darkness - I dont know why but this game was only a cult hit, in my opinion it's in the top 3 Gamecube games. Resident Evil to me has never really been for anything but cheap scares and jumps. But Eternal Darkness was overall just a scary experience. It constanly had me wondering if I was playing the actual game or experiencing a sanity effect. There is enough to have you go back and play the game 3 times and even after that the game is still entertaining.[/quote] Eternal Darkness is definitely awesome, though it's pretty much outclassed in every way now by Resident Evil 4. ED has comparable puzzles, the story is about as good, and the voice acting is [i]far[/i] better than RE4's, but ED is pretty far behind in terms of everything else, especially combat. Beyond Good and Evil is great, too, as you said. I bought the XBox version for about $20. It's probably priced even lower now if you can find it. ICO is awesome, too. If I had a PS2 ICO would be among the first games I'd snatch up. I only got to play it briefly at a friend's house, but it left quite an impression on me. Fantastic game with great atmosphere.

Of the games released in 2005 so far, I've bought Zelda: Minish Cap and Resident Evil 4. Minish Cap is a solid, if slightly disappointing at first, entry into the Zelda series. I wish it had more dungeons, which seems to be my major beef with Zelda games as of late. Resident Evil 4, on the other hand, is phenomenal, and the best game released in a long while. It's certainly the best game on the GameCube, in my opinion. I'm looking forward to the new Legend of Zelda game, along with everyone else. Zelda is my favorite gaming series, and I'm eager to see the direction Nintendo goes with the more realistic, 'mature' look (though I honestly do wish that Nintendo had gone further with the cel-shaded look of Wind Waker - screw the haters, I think Wind Waker looked damn gorgeous). Also, as Tony mentioned very briefly, Castlevania DS. I liked the Castlevania games that were released on the GBA, and I'm hoping that the DS game inches ever closer to the sublime greatness that was Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. I only have one game for my DS right now, Super Mario 64 DS, so I'll be glad to see another game that's worthy of my money for the DS. Other than that, I'll wait and see what other games get a bit more buzz before I decide to spend any money. I've been buying less games for a while now, because money is a bit tight, so I have to be pretty damn careful about which games I decide to go after lol.

When feelings are a blur, you don?t know what to do. Every little action seems like the most devastating event ever. The world is out to get you, and you?re afraid that it will catch up eventually. Smile, remember, and move on. The world can only catch what moves too slowly for its own good.

I played the first Tomba! a few years back. It's a fun, solid platformer. Always got pretty good reviews from what I saw, too. I never got to play the sequel, though. Apparently it wasn't quite as good as the first, but was still fun to play in its own right. I haven't played the game in a long, long time, though, so I don't remember that much about it, honestly lol.

I think they look pretty bizarre, but whatever lol. As long as a lot of other people like 'em, it doesn't really matter too much to me. I don't use that many smilies, anyway. As for James' question, I'd support just adding more smilies. I'm sure that even a ton of smilies don't take up a great amount of space, and you won't run the risk of someone bitching and moaning if you just so happen to axe their favorite smiley. Imagine having to deal with [i]that[/i]? :rolleyes:

Plus, to add to the "cowboys >>>>> pirates" argument, you have the [i]Dark Tower[/i] novels. Roland Deschain, Eddie and Susannah Dean, and Jake Chambers would wipe the floor with any pirate you could think of, and the novels that they're in are about a million times better than any pirate-based novel I could think of. I still like the Han Solo-type the best, but I like cowboys more than pirates.

[quote name='Chaos']The Crucible, by the recently late Arthur Miller, who died just last week. It was his critique of the McCarthy trials during the fifties, of which Miller himself was a victim of. He used the same degrading and public slandering that McCarthyism put forth in this story about seventeenth century Salem, during the witch trials. He heavily favors the hypocritical side of people and the selfishness that is often hidden from prying eyes. I really enjoy the in-depth look we get just by the characters' words, and how much the can express in just a few moments of emotion. Worth a look.[/quote] I'm sure I have a copy of [i]The Crucible[/i] somewhere around my house. I've seen it laying around here, anyway lol. I've never read it before, and it would make for something good to read after I'm done with everything else on my plate. [quote name='Who?']I'm currently reading Darkness Visible by William Golding, and have been doing so for months now. Even worse, it's only a 250-300 page book. I've really only read it during any free time at school, so I've just barely been creeping along.[/quote] Your description of the novel caught my interest. Basically the only Golding I've ever read was [i]Lord of the Flies[/i], which I really liked a lot. I might look into this sometime. I finished [i]As I Lay Dying[/i] earlier this morning. Any difficulties I may have had getting through the beginning of the book were absolved by the last hundred pages or so of the novel. Absolutely brilliant writing and some of the most chilling character monologues I've ever read, [i]especially[/i] Darl's final monologue where [spoiler]he's getting hauled away to the asylum[/spoiler]. And the ending of the novel is just so depressing, because you know the life of the Bundrens is going to continue to be harsh, and you want to [spoiler]beat that shit-for-brains bastard Anse to death, because he's such an asshole. He puts Darl away without batting an eye, he takes Dewey Dell's money to buy his damn false teeth, and after acting so concerned over Addie's burial, he gets himself a new wife.[/spoiler] God, I hate him so much. I can't recommend [i]As I Lay Dying[/i] enough. It's quickly become one of my favorite novels, and I'm more than glad that I stuck with it the whole way through. EDIT: Forgot to mention what I was going to read next lol. After many months of my sister begging me to read it, I checked out [i]Alice's Adventures in Wonderland[/i] from my school library a couple of days ago. I figure that I'll read it over the weekend. Should be enjoyable, my sister and I have similar tastes when it comes to what books we enjoy. After that, I'll be starting on George Orwell's [i]1984[/i].

[quote name='Heaven's Cloud][color=indigo']Tsk, James, you took a purely satirical post as an attempt at an argument. I guess my sarcasm must have been ill conveyed. The comparison between marijuana and cigarettes is moot, because cigarettes are legal, marijuana is not. So the comparisons, health related, addiction related, cost related are more or less pointless in this argument, like fast food, automobiles and the whole lot.[/COLOR][/quote] I'm pretty sure that he was referring to earlier in the thread, when people were arguing about how just about anything you put into your body is harmful on some level. I was able to discern pretty easily that you were being really sarcastic with your post, and I'm sure James was as well. I agree with James and HC that getting into that too much is a rather silly way to go about trying to prove your point. So is arguing about grades, miscarriages, and whatever else people are pulling out of their hats. My opinion on the matter is that I don't care what most people put into their body, as long as they do it responsibly (as responsibly as one could use something like marijuana, anyway). If marijuana were to be legalized, then there would have to be very stringent restrictions placed upon it like Syk3 mentioned earlier. What those restrictions would be, I don't know. It's not my place to decide that. I've never used marijuana before, and I don't really plan to. I'm well aware that marijuana is not [i]quite[/i] as dangerous as people think, but it's still not some wonderful thing that's completely free of bad reprocussions if you use it. As Syk3, Zeta and others have been saying, I wouldn't want people to use it if they're just going to be blazed out of their mind the whole time, and become a danger to others. But whatever. Marijuana is illegal, and I don't really see that changing anytime soon. The United States is far too conservative for that to happen, I think. That doesn't affect me too much, so whatever. Anyway, I just wanted to do a quick post. No arguing with me about my grades, or my diet, or how much second-hand smoke I've inhaled in the past fifteen years. There's already too much silly arguing on the Internet to allow for more of that. :)

The story is good so far. Nice to see that the writing has improved from chapter to chapter. Stuff like the ilk line near the beginning of the first chapter bugged me a bit, mostly because I've never seen ilk used in that manner before. But I'd be lying if I said that I didn't do that sort of thing on a regular basis lol. It's a minor quibble, anyway. I find it tough to write action sequences, as well. It's hard to capture basic actions in writing without making them look completely stupid. I think that you did an admirable job with it in this latest chapter.

I don't play scary games too often, but I think that Resident Evil 4 is capable of spooking some people. What's really great about how the game goes about its scares, is that it's just as adept at building up tension as it is at swarming you with enemies and making you claw and scrape for every inch of space you need to get the hell away from the villagers. In the beginning of the game, most of the fright comes from the villagers, who are relentless in hunting you down, and will find ways to get at you wherever you go. The beginning of the game really gives you a great sense of desperation, because you're constantly on the run, weaving in and out of place in order to find a few precious moments to gather your bearings and fight back. By the time you get to the latter stages of the game, more tension is built up, because you're traversing more closed in areas. These places have more of the types of scares that RE is known for, but they're still done incredibly well. A lot of the fear is generated by the person playing the game, because there really is nothing waiting around the corners to spring upon you most of the time. Though I [i]did[/i] get a nice scare the first time a [spoiler]plague-infected dog[/spoiler] jumped on me and started mauling me. :p

[quote name='Drix D'Zanth']Alex this is vaguely familiar. I think scanning collegehumor.com linked me to a news article of an australian man who claimed to be some star (perhaps Bruce) and ended up getting himself invited to several large events posing as the star. He was eventually caught with an Australian passport. I'm not sure if this is inspired by that real event... eh...[/quote] Yeah, it was. He mentioned on his myOtaku that for an assignment he had to do a piece of fiction based on a real news event. He decided to scour through my weekly Shinmaru vs. The World feature (shill!) to find some funny news lol.

[quote name='Godelsensei']I hate obscenely warm weather and when people complain about being perpetually cold when it is anywhere above negative ten.[/quote] Yep. Though I must say that it is amusing seeing people walking around all bundled up in a thick coat, pants, beanie, and a scarf in sixty-degree weather. And here I thought shorts and a t-shirt would suffice. Random things: - People who hate things (music, video games, books, etc.) for reasons other than content. More of an annoyance than something I hate, but whatever lol. - Writing essays for high school. Pretty boring stuff. - People who dislike Futurama. Someone rip out your sense of humor when you were a kid? - Going overboard on political correctness. Makes for great fodder to make fun of, though. - My stupid VCR that stopped working after six months. Some of us still watch tapes, you know. - The two-party system. Third-party for life. - Overreacting to stuff, unless you do it in a funny way. Otherwise, it's kind of stupid. Calm down, people. - Eddie Murphy when he does family movies. Go back to being a comedic god, sir. :( - Everyone in my AP English Lit class, because none of them liked Ralph Ellison's [i]Invisible Man[/i] lol. Heathens!! - "Dude, isn't Nintendo for, like, twelve-year-olds?" - ESPN SportsCenter - The stupid bookstore at my college. On the one hand, students are practically mugged when they pay for their textbooks. On the other hand, I've bought like seven non-textbooks from them in the past month and a half. How am I supposed to love them and hate them at the same time? Bastards.

[quote name='Siren']?G?day, mate!? he exclaims as he ?ands me ?is passport. ?Oi?m Bruuce Willis, famous stah of the silvah screen and the man who put the Die Haad series on the map! I made three of them, too. I started it with the fresh, cheeky, exoiting and action-packed Die Haad won, then followed that with the tired and formulaic but still smash-hit sequel, Die Haad 2: Die Haadah! Then Die Haad 3: Die Haad with a Vengeance, a furiously high-octane and trite car-chase buddy pictah with the Frenchman Samuel L. Jackson as the loveable Negro sidekick, and dialogue so poorly written that you can see me and Sam cringe as we 'act!' The dialogue was so cheesy that my mug on the cover of the film isn't a publicity still at all! It's an actual snapshot of me during filming when oi realized just how much moi cahreah's plunked in the crappah, mate!?[/quote] I love you. It's kind of late, but will you be my Valentine? Anyway, this is very amusing lol. I almost couldn't believe that you managed to be more bizarre with this than the actual article I highlighted on my myOtaku (shill!), but did, amazingly enough. I also really like the emphasis you put on the accents of the characters - I don't know if I would be able to write like that for an extended amount of time, it's pretty commendable lol. Good work, Alex. :)

I was neither. I've always been a science-fiction nut. Not just stuff like Star Wars, but anything science-fiction related I can get into pretty easily. Star Wars was probably always my biggest love, though. I always wanted to be someone like Han Solo, exploring the universe in a kickass ship without a care in the world. How much would that rock? The universe has always been a place of wonder and mystery, to me. Looking up at the stars and the deep blue sky at night, I was always in awe of just how beautiful it was. I gobbled up everything I could learn about it, just because I was so damn [i]fascinated[/i] by it all. Hell, if I had the opportunity right now to go into space, I'd probably go for it no matter how hard I had to work at it. I think what best represents the feeling I had (and still have, actually) for outer space is the second episode of Futurama, "The Series Has Landed". The Planet Express crew had to make a delivery to the moon, and most of the crew was pretty apathetic about it, because they'd all been there before. To them, it was just a big rock floating in space. But Fry, who grew up in the 20th Century, always looked upon space with this sense of awe and majesty. He'd never had the opportunity to fly into space before, and he was positively giddy to be able to go to the moon. By the end of the episode, the rest of the crew's apathy sort of gets to Fry, and he gets a bit depressed because he's really done nothing at all during his trip to the moon. He just visited a theme park, and roamed around on the surface a bit. But at the very end of the episode, he and Leela find the original spot on the moon where Neil Armstrong landed, and they go into the lunar lander and scope out Earth rising from behind the shadow of the moon. It's a really beautiful sight, and finally Leela realizes why Fry looked upon the moon as this really romantic thing. That's the long-winded explanation of how I've always felt about space lol. Cowboys are cool, and so are pirates, but I always wanted to be a sci-fi hero.