So I've been playing Metal Gear Solid 3 (a game that I've had for a while but never actually beat). I recently saved my game sitting in a prison cell, but when I load it up today, that's not even close to what happens. Instead, I find myself controlling some weird guy in a cloak carrying some weird swords and, with a totally different gameplay system COMPLETELY, I end up going all crazy action game like Devil May Cry or something all over some vampire policemen in a warehouse, until I end up transforming into some devil mode and kicking all sorts of crazy arse. The thing is, it just totally caught me off guard. "WHY IS THIS THE GAME I'M PLAYING? THIS MAKES NO SENSE! AAAACK!" and yes I pick up on the controls pretty quickly. And then after a while, I wake up, and it turns out Snake was having some vampire nightmare just like he told Para-Medic he would if he was told about vampires before he went to sleep. That has GOT to be the most elaborate in-game joke I've ever seen, and it would also make for a fun action game in it's own right.
Part III out. It's a depressing read because it reminds me again of how truly amazing RPGs were between 1996 and 2001, particularly Interplay and their related companys' ones (Interplay/Black Isle, Bioware, Troika), and how bad the genre is now in comparision... Baldur's Gate and BGII are unmatched games with no competition, essentially. Dragon Age? We'll see, but while some things sound good, on other fronts I'm not sure if it will do it... anyway, great read, if sad because of how great the genre was and how poor it is now. :(
Quote:The period I've termed the "Modern Age" begins in 2002 with the publication of BioWare's Neverwinter Nights, and includes games like Microsoft's Dungeon Siege and Troika's The Temple of Elemental Evil. Although these games have probably sold many thousands more copies than games from earlier periods, they seem to represent more of a looking back than a looking forward, and I'm increasingly worried by the large number of CRPG fans migrating towards MMORPGs. In fact, I don't even consider these games to be part of the same genre, a point I'll get to towards the end of this article.
Dungeon Siege and NWN got good reviews, but were NOT good games...
Criticism of the article: They didn't mention Wizards & Warriors, which is a great game in the Wizardry style, but unique and original... amazing game. Flawed, but every game has flaws; the issue is whether they matter enough to disrupt the good parts. In this case, they don't.
Also (from part II), Quest for Glory is the second-best RPG series ever, after Baldur's Gate... even if they are really adventure-RPGs, not RPGs. Well, QFG V: Dragon Fire, the last one, is a much more standard RPG, but it's also the least fun game in the series... http://www.gamasutra.com/features/200702...n_08.shtml
Updated: 2 hours, 19 minutes ago
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NEW YORK - CBS fired Don Imus from his radio program Thursday, the finale to a stunning fall for one of the nation’s most prominent broadcasters.
Imus initially was given a two-week suspension for calling the Rutgers women’s basketball team “nappy-headed hos” on the air last week, but outrage continued to grow and advertisers bolted from his CBS radio show and its MSNBC simulcast, which was canceled Wednesday.
“There has been much discussion of the effect language like this has on our young people, particularly young women of color trying to make their way in this society,” CBS President and Chief Executive Officer Leslie Moonves said in announcing the decision. “That consideration has weighed most heavily on our minds as we made our decision.”
Imus had a long history of inflammatory remarks. But something struck a raw nerve when he targeted the Rutgers team — which includes a class valedictorian, a future lawyer and a musical prodigy — after they lost in the NCAA championship game.
Imus reportedly met with the Rutgers team members and coach on Thursday night. New Jersey governor Jon S. Corzine was on his way to attend the Rutgers-Imus meeting, held at the governor's mansion, when his motorcade was [b]involved in an accident[/b]. Corzine reportedly suffered several broken ribs and a broken leg in the crash.
The cantankerous Imus, once named one of the 25 Most Influential People in America by Time magazine and a member of the National Broadcasters Hall of Fame, issued repeated apologies as protests intensified. But it wasn’t enough as everyone from Barack Obama to Oprah Winfrey joined the criticism.
The Rev. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson met with Moonves on Thursday to demand Imus’ removal, promising a rally outside CBS headquarters Saturday and an effort to persuade more advertisers to defect.
Jackson called the firing “a victory for public decency. No one should use the public airwaves to transmit racial or sexual degradation.”
Said Sharpton: “He says he wants to be forgiven. I hope he continues in that process. But we cannot afford a precedent established that the airways can commercialize and mainstream sexism and racism.”
Losing Imus will be a financial hit to CBS Radio, which also suffered when Howard Stern departed for satellite radio. The program earns about $15 million in annual revenue for CBS, which owns Imus’ home radio station WFAN-AM and manages Westwood One, the company that syndicates the show nationally.
The news came down in the middle of Imus’ Radiothon, which has raised more than $40 million since 1990. The Radiothon had raised more than $1.3 million Thursday before Imus learned that he lost his job.
“This may be our last Radiothon, so we need to raise about $100 million,” Imus cracked at the start of the event.
CBS announced that Imus’ wife, Deirdre, and his longtime newsman, Charles McCord, will host Friday’s show.
Volunteers were getting about 200 more pledges per hour than they did last year, with most callers expressing support for Imus, said phone bank supervisor Tony Gonzalez. The event benefited Tomorrows Children’s Fund, the CJ Foundation for SIDS and the Imus Ranch.
Imus, whose suspension was supposed to start next week, was in the awkward situation of broadcasting Thursday’s radio program from the MSNBC studios in New Jersey, even though NBC News said the night before that MSNBC would no longer simulcast his program on television.
He didn’t attack MSNBC for its decision — “I understand the pressure they were under,” he said — but complained the network was doing some unethical things during the broadcast. He didn’t elaborate.
Sponsors that pulled out of Imus’ show included American Express Co., Sprint Nextel Corp., Staples Inc., Procter & Gamble Co. and General Motors Corp. Imus made a point Thursday to thank one sponsor, Bigelow Tea, for sticking by him.
The list of his potential guests began to shrink, too.
Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham said the magazine’s staffers would no longer appear on Imus’ show. Meacham, Jonathan Alter, Evan Thomas, Howard Fineman and Michael Isikoff from Newsweek have been frequent guests.
Okay, apparently many teachers are no longer teaching about the holocaust out of fear of offending muslims.
First of all, not all muslims are going to be offended, and second of all, I care about as much about offending the sort of muslim that would be upsetted by this as I would by offending a neo nazi.
Just teach what the evidence shows. Stop caring about people getting offended by that. Now political correctness is an important thing in an enlightened society, but this is the direction of madness. It serves no one to act like all points of view in terms of things that are actually testable and have loads of evidence are somehow equally valid. If one is going to turn school into just a place where all viewpoints are taught instead of just what the evidence shows, what is the point of school at all?
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