Since GTAIV added in drunk driving, and using hookers has always been a part of the series..... why do you still have to park to use the hooker? Why can't you drive while using the hooker? I'm sure the developers could use the drunk driving engine to make that work....
Also, I've never picked up a hooker in GTAIV, mostly because I don't think I've ever seen one.
Psycho features graphic violence and sexual images? I'm going through the movie in my mind, and nothing about it stands out as sexual or graphically violent. Maybe you're talking about a remake that I haven't seen, but those descriptors do not match the Hitchcock film I know.
So in other words, it took them less than 1 console generation to get their shit together. The PS2 was the first console they actually designed as a console.
Here's a bit of a history lesson for you. Nintendo was planning on grabbing a disk player accessory for their newest generation console to keep up with Sega. Instead of designing it in house they contracted Sony to build a disk reader for them. In the end, Nintendo decided on not using a disk for the next generation and continued with the cartridge for the N64. So Sony was sitting their with this disk read designed for a console system. They thought, what the heck, let's bundle this into our own console and sell it, so they did.
PS1 = Console adapted from accessory PS2 = Console built from ground up
In the grand scheme of things, I can forgive Sony for having a not 100% good product for the PS1, and the fact that they got good QC for the PS2 after the first production round is astounding.
Aye, Sony's QC is a lot more rigorous than Microsoft's. Plus you could factor in that if the data were smartly positioned around the BD, you could potentially decrease read times by having the data replicated multiple times across the disk.
Personally, I think people are overrating the Natal. I don't think people understand the importance of tactile feedback. Right now the natal is riding the "Wow that is really cool" wave. Nothing I've read about the natal has talked about the tactile feedback issue.
IIRC, Metal Gear Solid 4 is currently the largest game out there. It utilizes nearly the entire storage capacity of a dual-layer Blu-ray disk (50gb), and they had to cut out content to avoid needing two disks.
In other words PS3 game disk = x6 360 game disks.
Plus you could optimize how data is stored on the disk to decrease read times by replicating the data on the disk in multiple places.
To me, the best pro-piracy argument is it allows people to not reward people for making shit products. If piracy wasn't available, I'd have to pay $60 to find out that new game is absolute ass-nuggets, I'd have to pay at least $10 to see a movie in the theatres to know it was crap, not including travel time, waiting time, concessions, etc. Why should someone benefit from my enforced inability to check the quality of their product before I shell out full price? You can't tell me you've never watched a movie, or played a game, or bought a book, or *something* that made you go, afterwards, "fuck, that was a waste of $X. I wish I had that back."
That's the free market, you vote with your dollars. If a company burns you with a shit product, stop buying their products.
People like you constantly try to come up with reasons and justifications for breaking the law rather than attempting to sway the minds of people to get the law changed. Civil disobedience only works when there's an audience. Frankly your audience is just yourselves and individuals who you aren't going to sway.
Oh, but the MPAA and RIAA don't pay the artists crap for producing their crap so I'm just going to pirate the movie and music. Oh, the software has a demo, but I don't want to bother with that, I'm just going to pirate the full version. Oh, the computer game has a demo and tons of review, but I don't want to spend time reading the reviews or trying the demo, so I'm just going to pirate the full game instead.
Let me guess, you agree that I should be able to take your money and distribute it however I please because I know how to better spend your money than you?
One could describe a significant portion of Republicans as Neo-statists rather than conservatives. There are very few true conservatives in Congress. I find it funny that libertarians many times dislike conservatives while not understanding the definition of true conservatism. The truth is that when it comes to the federal government there is no difference between a libertarian and a conservative, it is only once you drill down to state and local governments where differences begin to form.
Not only that, but the author freely admits that Earthlink has their hands in it as well, but uses the opportunity to just rail on Comcast. Seeing people post in CA that they don't experience this problem with Comcast, I'm more than willing to place the blame entirely on Earthlink, and this kid (I don't care if his actual age is above 18, his choice of writing style is that of a child) is just using what is likely Earthlink's policy to hammer on Comcast.
It would be like Dell adding some annoying feature to Windows, and the people who buy Dell machines complaining and bitching about Microsoft.
I would argue that "simple fact". IMHO any pilot who decides to fly directly into a large thunderstorm when going over it is a viable alternative has already committed pilot error, the computer probably let him fly further before crashing than he would have solo.
I agree, however the thunderheads in this scenario were over 50,000ft. If I recall correctly, most commercial jets fly at around 30,000ft. I don't know if the A330 can climb fast enough to have gotten over the clouds or even operate at that altitude.
I like the new income tax brackets you guys are installing now.
First £5,715 not taxed. The next £760 is taxed at 11.5%. The next £37,400 is taxed at 31.5%. The next £56,125 is taxed at 41.5%. The next £12,950 is taxed at 61.5%. The next £37,050 is taxed at 41.5%. Everything above £150,000 is taxed at 51.5%.
So if you earn £150,000 a year. You'll lose 39% of your income to income taxes. Since a VAT is basically applied to everything (I know there's exceptions, but I'm just saying that you pay 15% additional on every £ you spend), that's another 13% of your income that you lose to that (15/115=13%). So at $150,000 a year, you'll have less than 50% of your income to spend, even though it looks like you have over 60%.
£100,000 a year and you lose 35.1% for about 48.1% total. £50,000 a year and you lose 28.8% for about 41.8% total. £32,000 a year and you lose 25.3% for about 38.3% total.
That is all just in your VAT and income taxes too. God only knows how much additional excise taxes or what not you have to spend. The VAT is such a tax on the poor, it's not even funny.
Not so. The real power in FF8 comes from leveling properly. The trick is to minimize the number of levels you get until you have a good selection of GFs, then equip the "$stat Bonus" abilities on whichever character you're going to level. By doing this method, you can get 255 of damn near every core stat, without junctions.
Exactly. That's why people hate it so much. Square said this time around that we're going to reward you for not grinding out levels. Those that did were met with a much harder game. My biggest gripe would be that if you didn't have any pre-knowledge of the game and just picked it up, there's no way to really know that you shouldn't be grinding experience.
There is a decision whether to give that Sphere to one faction or another. Which ends up with you receiving a special item that is different based on who you gave it to. You need both of those items to get 100% completion.
The characters pissed me off. They went way too far towards pop. Plus the fact that you can't get the best ending in one play through. It was bad enough to play through this bad game. It just adds insult to injury that you have to play it twice to experience the best ending.
I own Final Fantasy Anthology which contains both FF5 and FF6, but I've never gotten about to playing FF5. However, I've never considered the job system to be a clever mechanic. It's actually a rather logical system to prevent characters from being equally able. It's also something that has been in existence since the first Final Fantasy. The loss of the job makeup for character was a huge blow, and it was one of the things I liked about FF9, since they brought it back. You just didn't have it to the level of freedom that you have in FF5, FF11, or FFTactics.
Think about it. What's the difference between Cloud, Barret, Tifa, Aeria, Red XIII, Vincent, Cid, Yuffie, and Cait Sith? It's simple, their limit breaks and weapons. They're otherwise identical save how you slot materia.
What's the difference between Squall, Zell, Selphie, Rinoa, Quistis, and Irvine? Nothing except their weapons and limit breaks, and Quistis had Blue Magic.
What's the difference between Tidus, Lulu, Yuna, Auron, Kimahri, Rikku, and Wakka? Nothing except their weapons and limit breaks, and Kimahri had Blue Magic.
What's the difference between Yuna, Rikku, and Paine in X-2? Nothing at all. There's nothing keeping you from having them all wear the exact same costume and be essentially identical.
Final Fantasy VI was where they started turning away from unique characters, but at least there most of the characters had a unique ability they didn't share with anyone else.
Sure, because it hit new markets (the PS2 and the PC) for the first time, and was the first really big JRPG to hit the American consciousness since FF1 and FF2 (US name) back in the 80s.
It was released on the Playstation not the PS2. Final Fantasy X was the first Final Fantasy released on the PS2.
Unfortunately my exposure to FF1-FF6 is limited. I've only played and beaten FF1 and FF6. I've played FF4. I own FF5. I lost my FF:Origins disk so I no longer have FF2, and FF3 just hasn't been released on a platform that I own.
There was 1 Gambit I really wanted, no matter how much I try and experiment, I can't come up with an effective stealing gambit that nets me most enemies stolen from with fewest number of stealing attempts after it has been stolen from.
Foe: Has Not Been Stolen From. Right now I use Foe: HP >= 70% on two characters and then use my party leader to attack enemies that have been stolen from.
Have you played Final Fantasy VIII?
Final Fantasy VIII had few and far between weapon upgrades, and you could just buy new weapons. There was quite a bit of strategy and experimentation in figuring out the best junction stats. Not to mention the power difference between a Lv10 and Lv100 is minimized because of junctioning.
VII was good, but didn't really excel in any one area. A -lot- of it's fame comes from the fact that the Playstation brought a lot of new game players, and VII was the first RPG they ever played. If the first RPG you play is a good one, that one usually holds a slightly more elevated opinion than it should. If you really take a look at the mechanics of the material system, it's more of a constraint system rather than an augment system. FF7 was the only system (that I can remember), where your access to spells was limited which really drove it, more than other Final Fantasy games, to using a heavy melee focus. Outside of a few support materia combos that don't work when paired with master materia (and a few ultimate weapons), using anything other than a master magic, master summon, or master command materia is pointless.
I also dislike that characters earn experience when they're not in the active party, even if it is at a reduced rate.
My point is that FF7 showed a shift towards coming up with clever game mechanics. They try to make them a game within the game, which can sometimes overshadow some of the flaws with the game, or it can utterly wreck the enjoyment of it (FF9 for me). It's gotten excessively worse as well. FF12's license grid, and the limited effect that accessories have means there's very little incentive to use any accessory other than a Golden Amulet so you earn double LP for it until you've earned every license. From FF6 and before they didn't have these clever systems. Sure they had a few things, like Espers granting stat bonuses on level up and being required to use/permanently learn magic, but FF6 and early had to rely on their story. The biggest gripe people have about FF6 I believe is the major factor that prevents it from being bar-none the best Final Fantasy, and relegated instead to a debate. That gripe is that the story goes south after the world breaking. You have this grand, intricate story in the World of Balance. Then you get to the World of Ruin, where the story is lackluster. If the story in the WoR had been on par with the WoB story FF6 would be the best Final Fantasy.
Final Fantasy VIII was brilliant. The storyline was subtle, and it was good at misdirecting the player. For most people that dislike FF8 there's two major gripes, the junction system and the love story in it.
Final Fantasy IX had an awesome storyline from what I remember, but game system killed the game for me.
Final Fantasy X didn't really have that grand of a story. I think my biggest issue was that FF10 wasn't about Tidus, it was about Yuna. I personally don't like RPGs where the focus character isn't the central character.
Final Fantasy X-2? That game doesn't exist.
Final Fantasy XII has the same issue that FF10 does, though I haven't beaten it yet. The story revolves around Ashe with Basch and Balthier on perimeter, but the focus character is Vaan. At least the Basch-Gabranth and Balthier-Cid is interesting. What does Vaan have? Nothing. His only link is Reks and that is such a piss poor link it's not even worth considering. Vaan is like the red-headed step-child. Sometimes I think Penelo has a better link with what appears to be a bit of a budding crush between her and Larsa with Larsa being Vayne's brother.
Slashdot Mirror
I believe such art already exists involving Zoey and the Witch.
Hmm that gives me an idea.
Since GTAIV added in drunk driving, and using hookers has always been a part of the series..... why do you still have to park to use the hooker? Why can't you drive while using the hooker? I'm sure the developers could use the drunk driving engine to make that work....
Also, I've never picked up a hooker in GTAIV, mostly because I don't think I've ever seen one.
Psycho features graphic violence and sexual images? I'm going through the movie in my mind, and nothing about it stands out as sexual or graphically violent. Maybe you're talking about a remake that I haven't seen, but those descriptors do not match the Hitchcock film I know.
So in other words, it took them less than 1 console generation to get their shit together. The PS2 was the first console they actually designed as a console.
Here's a bit of a history lesson for you. Nintendo was planning on grabbing a disk player accessory for their newest generation console to keep up with Sega. Instead of designing it in house they contracted Sony to build a disk reader for them. In the end, Nintendo decided on not using a disk for the next generation and continued with the cartridge for the N64. So Sony was sitting their with this disk read designed for a console system. They thought, what the heck, let's bundle this into our own console and sell it, so they did.
PS1 = Console adapted from accessory
PS2 = Console built from ground up
In the grand scheme of things, I can forgive Sony for having a not 100% good product for the PS1, and the fact that they got good QC for the PS2 after the first production round is astounding.
As a NE Indiana resident, I can assure your that her policies have resulted in positive economic growth.... in NE Indiana....
Aye, Sony's QC is a lot more rigorous than Microsoft's. Plus you could factor in that if the data were smartly positioned around the BD, you could potentially decrease read times by having the data replicated multiple times across the disk.
Personally, I think people are overrating the Natal. I don't think people understand the importance of tactile feedback. Right now the natal is riding the "Wow that is really cool" wave. Nothing I've read about the natal has talked about the tactile feedback issue.
All PS3 disks are Blu-ray.
IIRC, Metal Gear Solid 4 is currently the largest game out there. It utilizes nearly the entire storage capacity of a dual-layer Blu-ray disk (50gb), and they had to cut out content to avoid needing two disks.
In other words PS3 game disk = x6 360 game disks.
Plus you could optimize how data is stored on the disk to decrease read times by replicating the data on the disk in multiple places.
To me, the best pro-piracy argument is it allows people to not reward people for making shit products. If piracy wasn't available, I'd have to pay $60 to find out that new game is absolute ass-nuggets, I'd have to pay at least $10 to see a movie in the theatres to know it was crap, not including travel time, waiting time, concessions, etc. Why should someone benefit from my enforced inability to check the quality of their product before I shell out full price? You can't tell me you've never watched a movie, or played a game, or bought a book, or *something* that made you go, afterwards, "fuck, that was a waste of $X. I wish I had that back."
That's the free market, you vote with your dollars. If a company burns you with a shit product, stop buying their products.
People like you constantly try to come up with reasons and justifications for breaking the law rather than attempting to sway the minds of people to get the law changed. Civil disobedience only works when there's an audience. Frankly your audience is just yourselves and individuals who you aren't going to sway.
Oh, but the MPAA and RIAA don't pay the artists crap for producing their crap so I'm just going to pirate the movie and music.
Oh, the software has a demo, but I don't want to bother with that, I'm just going to pirate the full version.
Oh, the computer game has a demo and tons of review, but I don't want to spend time reading the reviews or trying the demo, so I'm just going to pirate the full game instead.
Let me guess, you agree that I should be able to take your money and distribute it however I please because I know how to better spend your money than you?
One could describe a significant portion of Republicans as Neo-statists rather than conservatives. There are very few true conservatives in Congress. I find it funny that libertarians many times dislike conservatives while not understanding the definition of true conservatism. The truth is that when it comes to the federal government there is no difference between a libertarian and a conservative, it is only once you drill down to state and local governments where differences begin to form.
Not only that, but the author freely admits that Earthlink has their hands in it as well, but uses the opportunity to just rail on Comcast. Seeing people post in CA that they don't experience this problem with Comcast, I'm more than willing to place the blame entirely on Earthlink, and this kid (I don't care if his actual age is above 18, his choice of writing style is that of a child) is just using what is likely Earthlink's policy to hammer on Comcast.
It would be like Dell adding some annoying feature to Windows, and the people who buy Dell machines complaining and bitching about Microsoft.
I would argue that "simple fact". IMHO any pilot who decides to fly directly into a large thunderstorm when going over it is a viable alternative has already committed pilot error, the computer probably let him fly further before crashing than he would have solo.
I agree, however the thunderheads in this scenario were over 50,000ft. If I recall correctly, most commercial jets fly at around 30,000ft. I don't know if the A330 can climb fast enough to have gotten over the clouds or even operate at that altitude.
I fear that 'green' is becoming more about fashion than it is about the Earth
Wait, it hasn't always been about fashion?
Are we gonna freeze Lance Armstrong when he dies?
What does some bicyclist have to do with preserving the moon?
That's just the effective tax rate for VAT and income tax alone. That's not including any further taxation.
Indiana has a 7% sales tax, and I pay 3.2% income tax to the state, and 0.9% to my county. The rest of the ~22% taxes I pay is to the damn government.
I like the new income tax brackets you guys are installing now.
First £5,715 not taxed.
The next £760 is taxed at 11.5%.
The next £37,400 is taxed at 31.5%.
The next £56,125 is taxed at 41.5%.
The next £12,950 is taxed at 61.5%.
The next £37,050 is taxed at 41.5%.
Everything above £150,000 is taxed at 51.5%.
So if you earn £150,000 a year. You'll lose 39% of your income to income taxes. Since a VAT is basically applied to everything (I know there's exceptions, but I'm just saying that you pay 15% additional on every £ you spend), that's another 13% of your income that you lose to that (15/115=13%). So at $150,000 a year, you'll have less than 50% of your income to spend, even though it looks like you have over 60%.
£100,000 a year and you lose 35.1% for about 48.1% total.
£50,000 a year and you lose 28.8% for about 41.8% total.
£32,000 a year and you lose 25.3% for about 38.3% total.
That is all just in your VAT and income taxes too. God only knows how much additional excise taxes or what not you have to spend. The VAT is such a tax on the poor, it's not even funny.
http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13576151
Not so. The real power in FF8 comes from leveling properly. The trick is to minimize the number of levels you get until you have a good selection of GFs, then equip the "$stat Bonus" abilities on whichever character you're going to level. By doing this method, you can get 255 of damn near every core stat, without junctions.
Exactly. That's why people hate it so much. Square said this time around that we're going to reward you for not grinding out levels. Those that did were met with a much harder game. My biggest gripe would be that if you didn't have any pre-knowledge of the game and just picked it up, there's no way to really know that you shouldn't be grinding experience.
There is a decision whether to give that Sphere to one faction or another. Which ends up with you receiving a special item that is different based on who you gave it to. You need both of those items to get 100% completion.
The characters pissed me off. They went way too far towards pop. Plus the fact that you can't get the best ending in one play through. It was bad enough to play through this bad game. It just adds insult to injury that you have to play it twice to experience the best ending.
I own Final Fantasy Anthology which contains both FF5 and FF6, but I've never gotten about to playing FF5. However, I've never considered the job system to be a clever mechanic. It's actually a rather logical system to prevent characters from being equally able. It's also something that has been in existence since the first Final Fantasy. The loss of the job makeup for character was a huge blow, and it was one of the things I liked about FF9, since they brought it back. You just didn't have it to the level of freedom that you have in FF5, FF11, or FFTactics.
Think about it. What's the difference between Cloud, Barret, Tifa, Aeria, Red XIII, Vincent, Cid, Yuffie, and Cait Sith? It's simple, their limit breaks and weapons. They're otherwise identical save how you slot materia.
What's the difference between Squall, Zell, Selphie, Rinoa, Quistis, and Irvine? Nothing except their weapons and limit breaks, and Quistis had Blue Magic.
What's the difference between Tidus, Lulu, Yuna, Auron, Kimahri, Rikku, and Wakka? Nothing except their weapons and limit breaks, and Kimahri had Blue Magic.
What's the difference between Yuna, Rikku, and Paine in X-2? Nothing at all. There's nothing keeping you from having them all wear the exact same costume and be essentially identical.
Final Fantasy VI was where they started turning away from unique characters, but at least there most of the characters had a unique ability they didn't share with anyone else.
Sure, because it hit new markets (the PS2 and the PC) for the first time, and was the first really big JRPG to hit the American consciousness since FF1 and FF2 (US name) back in the 80s.
It was released on the Playstation not the PS2. Final Fantasy X was the first Final Fantasy released on the PS2.
FF1-FF3 : NES
FF4-FF6 : SNES
FF7-FF9 : PS
FF10-FF12 : PS2
Expect FF13-FF15 to be released / available for the PS3.
Unfortunately my exposure to FF1-FF6 is limited. I've only played and beaten FF1 and FF6. I've played FF4. I own FF5. I lost my FF:Origins disk so I no longer have FF2, and FF3 just hasn't been released on a platform that I own.
There was 1 Gambit I really wanted, no matter how much I try and experiment, I can't come up with an effective stealing gambit that nets me most enemies stolen from with fewest number of stealing attempts after it has been stolen from.
Foe: Has Not Been Stolen From. Right now I use Foe: HP >= 70% on two characters and then use my party leader to attack enemies that have been stolen from.
Have you played Final Fantasy VIII?
Final Fantasy VIII had few and far between weapon upgrades, and you could just buy new weapons. There was quite a bit of strategy and experimentation in figuring out the best junction stats. Not to mention the power difference between a Lv10 and Lv100 is minimized because of junctioning.
VII was good, but didn't really excel in any one area. A -lot- of it's fame comes from the fact that the Playstation brought a lot of new game players, and VII was the first RPG they ever played. If the first RPG you play is a good one, that one usually holds a slightly more elevated opinion than it should. If you really take a look at the mechanics of the material system, it's more of a constraint system rather than an augment system. FF7 was the only system (that I can remember), where your access to spells was limited which really drove it, more than other Final Fantasy games, to using a heavy melee focus. Outside of a few support materia combos that don't work when paired with master materia (and a few ultimate weapons), using anything other than a master magic, master summon, or master command materia is pointless.
I also dislike that characters earn experience when they're not in the active party, even if it is at a reduced rate.
My point is that FF7 showed a shift towards coming up with clever game mechanics. They try to make them a game within the game, which can sometimes overshadow some of the flaws with the game, or it can utterly wreck the enjoyment of it (FF9 for me). It's gotten excessively worse as well. FF12's license grid, and the limited effect that accessories have means there's very little incentive to use any accessory other than a Golden Amulet so you earn double LP for it until you've earned every license. From FF6 and before they didn't have these clever systems. Sure they had a few things, like Espers granting stat bonuses on level up and being required to use/permanently learn magic, but FF6 and early had to rely on their story. The biggest gripe people have about FF6 I believe is the major factor that prevents it from being bar-none the best Final Fantasy, and relegated instead to a debate. That gripe is that the story goes south after the world breaking. You have this grand, intricate story in the World of Balance. Then you get to the World of Ruin, where the story is lackluster. If the story in the WoR had been on par with the WoB story FF6 would be the best Final Fantasy.
Final Fantasy VIII was brilliant. The storyline was subtle, and it was good at misdirecting the player. For most people that dislike FF8 there's two major gripes, the junction system and the love story in it.
Final Fantasy IX had an awesome storyline from what I remember, but game system killed the game for me.
Final Fantasy X didn't really have that grand of a story. I think my biggest issue was that FF10 wasn't about Tidus, it was about Yuna. I personally don't like RPGs where the focus character isn't the central character.
Final Fantasy X-2? That game doesn't exist.
Final Fantasy XII has the same issue that FF10 does, though I haven't beaten it yet. The story revolves around Ashe with Basch and Balthier on perimeter, but the focus character is Vaan. At least the Basch-Gabranth and Balthier-Cid is interesting. What does Vaan have? Nothing. His only link is Reks and that is such a piss poor link it's not even worth considering. Vaan is like the red-headed step-child. Sometimes I think Penelo has a better link with what appears to be a bit of a budding crush between her and Larsa with Larsa being Vayne's brother.