Semjaza

[quote name='Premonition'][COLOR="Navy"]I used to like rap music, but now, it's just a waste of talent. All they do is scrutiize blacks and black women. It's our word? Screw that, if you can say that we can too. But the thing is most of us don't because we're not racist. And hen white eople dress "gangsta"... bouy I'd like to rip off their pants and reveal how shameful they look.[/COLOR][/QUOTE] I think you're just listening to the wrong groups. None of the hip hop I listen to even covers those topics... in some cases, they speak out against it. I could name off several off the top of my head, but I doubt anyone would care. The thing I'm noticing is that almost every one in here is taking their thoughts (many of which are far from objective and seem to be based on a certain period of time and very specific artists) on what they've heard of a genre and applying it to the [I]entire[/I] genre and all of its sub-genres... and that doesn't necessarily work. Plus whether or not "nigga" or whatever else is an acceptable word for [I]anyone[/I] is a whole other topic. There are blacks out there that don't think this is something that should be done either.

If you reformat, your computer will lose every thing. Including the OS. If you don't have an XP installation disc what are you planning to install instead? Linux?

[quote name='Tombstone'][font=comic sans ms][color=blue]Rephrasing. Hmm... How should I say this... It seemed like all the talk was mainly focused on the Xbox Live stuff more than anything else that's been mentioned, and so, it didn't spark anything with me. Oh yeah, before I forget, I did change the channel before the 2nd half of the conference started. :)[/font][/color][/QUOTE] Well then you mostly just saw stats, which is kind of a poor thing to base any of the conference on. If I changed out of Nintendo's while they were showing that montage of why Wii Sports and the Wii remote were awesome, I'd not be very happy either... lol.

[quote name='Bombu'][color=darkred]I've gathered that Desbreko knows what's best in a game for himself, so I won't recommend anything here. But one thing: Resident Evil 4 is by and far no way the best in the series. It doesn't even compare because it is so different to the rest.[/color]:p[/QUOTE] You're still running around and killing zombie-like enemies and solving stupid puzzles. Seems like a natural progression to me and certainly a heck of a lot less clunky. Besides which, I find it hard to believe that he has a GameCube and hasn't played through this game. Is that true?

I really don't know if I could really recommend .hack to him either. The online concept is fun and the overarcing story is OK... but it's very slowly developed, you have to buy multiple games to get the full picture and the gameplay is [I]incredibly repetitive[/I]. Actual MMORPGs have more interesting quests than those games and that's really saying something. I don't think he'll buy most of what's being brought up here anyway. He already made it sound as though his wallet is being stretched just by the handful of Wii games he wants to get.

Intelligent design, simply, is a PC way of saying creationism. It's a way to push a religious dogma without mentioning any actual religions. Most specifically, it's a way to push a Christian agenda without actually mentioning Christianity. It's a way to attempt to wedge in a version of events because the separation of Church and state otherwise stops them in their tracks for public schools. I mean, let's face it, Intelligent design requires a who. Whose design? Whose intelligence? I don't even think it should be used in the same breath as other scientific theories. I don't have a problem with its existence as an idea being addressed, but you could cover the same ideals through simply stating "religions obviously have their own beliefs", but that's so understood at this point that it's not even necessary. At least in the US, I can't take two steps outside or even watch television on the weekend without being reminded about religion. You'll notice that if someone mentions they want other "alternatives" taught to evolution, all they want is Intelligent Design to fend off Darwin's version of evolution. There's plenty of other theories out there, but none are given any credence by this group of people. I'm not even sure why it's a debate at all. Furthermore--and I don't mean this in any nasty way--how many threads does OB need about this subject in the course of a couple of months? Wasn't the last one about this just up on the front page recently?

[quote name='Tombstone'][font=comic sans ms]Now I didn't see Sony and Nintendo's conference, but I agree. I found Microsoft's conference boring. I've never been a fan of playing my games online, and Microsoft Arcade didn't spark any interest whatsoever.[/font][/QUOTE] I don't really know that most of what they showed really made any major deal about them being online any more than being offline. I mean, in terms of the games that got the motion attention, I saw videos of games like Call of Duty 4 and Assassin's Creed and the only things they really concentrated on were the single player experiences. Even the Halo 3 closing video was largely single player.

[quote name='Nerdsy'][color=deeppink]Although I'd totally un-recommend Dark Cloud 1.[/color][/QUOTE] Agreed. 2? Awesome. 1? Not really.

It looks a heck of a lot like Ragnarok Online, that's for sure.

[quote name='Desbreko'][color=#4B0082]I'm still not sure if I'm going to get Metroid Prime 3. I loved the first one but the second one was too annoying with the constant life drain in dark Aether any time you weren't in one of those stupid safe zones. I'm also wondering how well the point-and-shoot system will work, since I wasn't too impressed with Red Steel. Not to mention I'll be saving up for Mario Galaxy, Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, and SSBB. At any rate I'm going to wait and see what it's like before dropping the money on it.[/color][/QUOTE] I don't know if you've seen videos of it, but the control system appears to work very well. They have a few options, one of which is basically just like the old Prime set up with a basic lock-on. But the more advanced system is probably what you or I would use. It allows you to lock on to an enemy and strafe as normal, but you're allowed to freely move around the cursor to shoot at whatever you want. So, you can lock onto the main enemy, but pin point specific parts... or shoot at some smaller enemy coming at you while you're still locked on to another. I've not read a single bad thing about how this works, the dead zone or anything else.

[quote name='Tombstone'][font=comic sans ms] Lost Odyssey is probably the only game that I'm a bit curious about. (My first time hearing about it was yesterday watching the Microsoft press conference thing.)[/font][/QUOTE] It was announced a while ago, but that was the most anyone has ever seen of it... It's looking pretty cool. I watched all three conferences and I have to say Sony's was the most impressive. They covered some games we knew about, but they also showed a few that were completely surprises. Not to mention a couple of pretty decent timed exclusive announcements. Killzone 2 looks like a relatively normal FPS, but it's pretty and action-packed. It'ss clearly becoming a major talking point for owners of the system. The only problem, to me, is that a lot of what they've announced that was new is not coming this year (they said "fiscal year" a few times, which goes till March 2008 in most cases). A lot of people seem big on E3 showing them the future, but when I know I might possibly see some of these "new" games again at the next E3 it's not very exciting. MS's was OK. They have a really strong line up this year and concentrated on it and it alone. The new game announcements, to me, weren't exciting at all (although kids and people into trivia games might be happy). There was also some games for windows stuff in there, most specifically focused on Gears of War (and all the new **** it's getting :o). As far as press conferences go, because most of it was known ahead of time and for quite a while, it was somewhat dull. I mean, hearing about Katamari and Call of Duty 4 (as good as it looks) and Mass Effect yet again is tiresome. I think it's balanced out, at least partially, by knowing that I'll get to play what they showed this year, some titles as soon as next month. I'd say, despite this, for most people it was probably the most disappointing/dull conference, which I can understand. 2008 games like Fable 2 are being shown to some groups, at least, so it's not like there's [I]nothing[/I]. I've read some neat previews on that. Nintendo's I'm mixed on. MP3 and Mario Galaxy look awesome. We finally got dates for Mario Galaxy (November) and Brawl (December). They briefly showed off a new Mario Kart that will be online for Wii in early 2008... It looked great, very much in the style of Double Dash, but with one character per car. Seemed to take some influence from the DS title, including at least one redone track from that game. I think I saw Peach Beach too... which I kind of like since that's never been online before. At the same time, there was an awful lot of "Wii Sports!" is awesome and "Wii makes people who never play games play games!" back patting. I'd estimate 10 to 15 minutes of it. Iwata appeared with his typical speech that takes forever to deliver. Then they showed Wii Fit for about 30 minutes. It's an interesting concept, but what they showed was so slow paced that I could only see the elderly and kids getting a lot out of it exercise wise. If it can be sped up, I'll be more interested. They showed some OK looking mini-games and I'm interested in seeing more of those. Overall I think they all did OK, but Sony "won" the conference battle. How much of it will be on the show floor and playable, I have no idea, but in terms of online public opinion Sony got that one. How it'll reflect in sales in the coming months (and if this PS3 sales spike will last) remains to be seen.

I'd like to know what facts you're citing for these issues in Canada and Cuba. There's been surveys and other information for Cuba specifically that show that a vast majority of people there have no problem getting their health care and it costs them a total of $251 a year. Cuba is also listed 39th on the WHO's best health care systems list. The US is 37. We're higher than Cuba... which sounds nice at first, but we're higher than [I]Cuba[/I] by two rankings. A practically third world country with a crazy dictatorship and we're two points away from it? Come on. The thing about US health care is that a lot of people are never actually getting to "patient" status because they can't afford to. If you want to talk about people dying [I]in [/I]a system, what about all of the people who don't even get to that point? I don't think the point of the scene is simply a "movie magic" (although obviously somewhat of an exaggeration, I suppose, and definitely meant to prove a point), but I think it also servers as a direct comparison that should make people realize what a serious problem this is. I mean, to most people, Cuba is considered dirt under our shoes. It's not a question of who doesn't have problems, it's a question of why "the best country in the world" is that damn comparable. How that doesn't sicken anyone is beyond me.

[quote name='Sesshomarufan']Here's another game people might remember. Gitaroo Man. That game was awesome. The note bending and everything that went along with the game was flawless. While it's non tradiotional look and heavily Japanese influences may have been a turn off to some gamers stateside, I always enjoyed playing Gitaroo Man. They recently released it for the PSP and I have to say, beyond Lumines and MGS, that has to be one of the best games.[/QUOTE] That is an awesome game. I have the original on PS2 and I still pop it in sometimes. Also, thanks for the article link.

It was about Bush. It was surprising and probably stupid, but what can you say. I don't think two comedians being surprised by something said on live national TV makes it all that amazing, though. People are always surprised in those venues when people say stuff of political ramifications... they don't want to piss anyone off. Ratings and complaints are important. Personally, I don't usually let the personality of artists affect my interest in their music. Most of the time it doesn't matter. I'm sure I'd hate almost every one on the planet to some degree if I knew every stupid thing they've done. At the same time, Kanye has done some pretty stupid ****. I think the cake being when he sampled Diamonds are Forever and didn't credit Shirley Bassey, the singer. When asked about it he said something to the effect that he didn't know who she was, thought she was some "no name" singer. The basic idea of it is stupid in and of itself, but basically what he's saying is that if the artist isn't big he should be able to sample them without repercussions as he pleases. I find that pretty disgusting, honestly, and definitely something that puts more of a negative spin on the artform. My main problem with Kanye is that I don't think he's a good rapper. There's that whole aspect of "where did this come from?!" because his songs before breaking out were all [I]terrible[/I]. There's a conspiracy theories about that (ghost writers), but regardless... The guy is a decent producer and I think that's what wins people over. I hardly think he's a [B]worst[/B] artist, though. Most of the things I really do not care for I have a hard time calling just plain terrible. I could fill up a room with the names of bands I don't like, many of which were probably mentioned in the best artists thread lol. Opinions are opinions, though.

Please note that I do not mean for this to come off as bitchy or in any way imply that "OB SUCKS!!". If you get that from this, you're not understanding my point. My favorite moment here was when I stopped being a category moderator. Not because I hate OB or hated it then or anything in that vein. It was just because being a mod on a fairly active site is a [I]pain in the ***.[/I] It took up a lot of time, you never knew what was going to happen, you got constant PMs about who knows what (usually bitchy ones), weird people IMed you out of nowhere and sucked up to you. It was extremely tiresome and, yeah, sometimes you'd get fed up with things and say things you'd probably not say otherwise. I know I'm guilty of it and I'm a pretty patient person otherwise. When I quit, I just came off of deleting 15 threads from some guy who decided to suddenly post pictures of mutilated genitals and dead people. The game section was slowing down, I had been doing it for a long time, etc. Enough was enough. It was also an age where I just found myself a lot more active elsewhere in my general life. Afterwards, I think it puts you in a position where perhaps you appreciate the concept of a moderator more than you would have if you never were a mod. It also makes you appreciate being a normal member a Hell of a lot more. It's just a load off of your mind, I guess. I'd certainly never want to deal with it again lol. Kudos to anyone that does it now. Other than that, I have nothing specific.

[quote name='Sesshomarufan']Oh contraire my friend. Deploying star power in Rock Band will allow you to do solos in many parts of the game, including face melting guitar solos and gut busting drum solos. I read in Game Informer that you can even use the Mic as a tambourine for the solos for the lead singer role. So freestyling is encouraged.[/QUOTE] None of that sounds like free styling to me. It sounds like turning on star power to get more points. Solos don't imply getting to do whatever you want. I'd have to read whatever you're reading I guess. Even with a tambourine, you'd have to play it with the beat. No one in the world has ever had a tambourine solo of note. As for the DDR thing, I mean, sure people can do what they want to do, but hitting extra buttons in it is not something that's planned for the game. Parappa is an example of a game that actually had an idea of giving you even better scores for not exactly following the lead, assuming it was done well. I think that's kind of a different situation altogether. I mean, Hell, I can hit the bongo a few more times in Donkey Konga, but the game isn't going to reward me for it in any sense.

The best part about Parappa was that it was possible to freestyle to some extent. What I don't like a lot about a lot of modern games in the genre is that you're often held to very specific things to do... mess up and you're totally screwed. To me it kind of ruins the free spirit these games seem to otherwise have. Guitar Freaks has a freestyle aspect to it which I appreciate. It would be nice if it showed up in GH3 or Rock Band, but I doubt it will.

[quote name='2007DigitalBoy'][COLOR="DarkOrange"]Also, in the case of CoF, i haven't heard much, but I can't stand [B]Dani Filth [/B]in the slightest, nor his crappy vocals. The few songs I have heard sucked except their cover of [B]Hallowed Be Thy Name [/B]which is among my faves...[/COLOR][/QUOTE] I think I have a new favorite for you. Have you heard about this great band... Lothlorian's Ogrish Melanol? It's headed up by real live trolls, so you know it's the real deal. Someone's been working on English translations of their songs for years, but since there's no Troll Rosetta Stone it's not going so well. Their true fans call them by their Troll name, but I dare not write it here. But guess what? They hate Slipknot too. There's a whole song about it. They've managed to translate that one since there's not a troll word for Slipknot. They just say it in English. Ogres and Leprechuans do the back up. It's one of DJ Rumpelstiltskin's final productions... right before he got eaten by that dragon.

I'm kind of confused by these rules myself. I don't RP much, but I do read the things. For example, [U][URL="http://www.otakuboards.com/showthread.php?t=57066&page=7"]Survivor 4 pretty much debased into an almost completely irrelevant conversation[/URL][/U] that could have been handled in a chat room or an AIM conversation. No mod told anyone in there to stop, to stay on topic or even to [I]actually role play[/I]. It's been like this for quite a lot of posts now and is still open. I could see how it would be fine if this was in the Underground, but it wasn't. It was in the main RPing section of the site: Adventure Square. That is OK, but making an actual role playing game that does follow the numerous sticky thread rules is [I]not[/I] OK? I don't understand when and how these rules are even applied sometimes.

Yes, it is. Thank you. I knew it was some minor thing in there somewhere. Much better :).

OB is what's in its meta tags. [QUOTE] [/QUOTE] I'm fine with that. Most of these other qualities are true of any message board, I would suppose. I think it's hard to really define any community as one set of descriptors may be true of one group of people on the site, but completely wrong for another. I was actually thinking about this the other day because I remember hearing something about James being interested in advertising this place elsewhere... The thought entered my mind that that would just be incredibly hard to do because I'm not sure of a sentence that could adequately phrase what it is. Something like a Google adsense ad seems almost impossible to handle well lol.

[quote name='Molleta'][COLOR="SeaGreen"] I also want to meet Tony ... although I'm too shy to initiate anymore chats with him. .[/COLOR][/QUOTE] If I can put up with most of the people from this place that IM me (and yes, also vice versa), I don't think you have much to worry about.

I don't really think anything I said implied that I inferred anything that was remotely the equivalent of "discovering god", but OK lol. [quote name='Desbreko'][color=#4B0082]I'm not sure what you mean. When I upload an avatar, the file that gets put on the server and displayed is identical to the local file that I upload. No further compression happens in the uploading process.[/color][/QUOTE] Well, perhaps moderator settings are different from those for normal users? I have no idea... all I know is that my image is perfect before I upload it, yet full of artifacts once it is up. I mean, just look at it lol. Solid blocks of color are also handled differently than more complex imagery by JPG compression... I don't know how much of this is playing into that as I don't know what the settings are.

[quote name='James'][color=#606060]When we were talking about avatar sizes and such, I was conscious of the fact that narrowband users would have to continuously reload pages (to edit and to post responses) and that might cause some issues. This new way of only loading the relevant areas of the page without reloading the entire thing will mean that we [i]can[/i] make more use of bigger images without impacting on slower users too much. [/color][/QUOTE] I'm not entirely sure what you're saying here. If these people load the image one time, it doesn't have to be reloaded again in almost any situation. The image will be cached unless they have their browser set up to do otherwise (which would be odd if they're on a dial-up modem). It you were talking about the load that would come from loading the new page code, the posting imagery associated with it and so forth... sure, some time there is saved. But in terms of larger avatars and banners? Not really. It would be unlikely that they'd be loading much more than they normally would now. They'd still have to load up the heavier, file intensive images just the same. My point is largely that I don't think that's really a good reason to go ahead and raise any of those things. If you were going to do it anyway, obviously go ahead, but I don't think it's necessarily a major favor to narrowband visitors of this site. In any case, I know vB updating is a pain in the *** first hand. I think it's going well. The only thing I would personally suggest would be raising the compression default for uploaded avatars. Low color ones, in particular, get compressed to Hell.

I just drink black coffee with some splenda in it. Usually it's iced because I hate feeling hot after drinking something. I don't have any interesting or heartwarming tales about it. To me it's just a drink and I buy it where ever I'm at that happens to sell it.