Yep. Took Amtrak once from KC, MO to Saint Louis. Never again, until they get their own rails. What would have been a 4-5 hour trip by car or a 30 minute (1 hr. with security) flight took over NINE HOURS, about half of it sitting completely still.
It's not a propaganda technique, it's an inevitable fact of our voting system. If you vote for your favorite who has little support and, as a result, your least-favorite candidate wins instead of your second-favorite candidate, your "smart" choice has just caused a worse outcome for you than the "dumb" one. Even in cases where a third party candidate is polling well, unless they're polling well evenly across big-two party lines and there's some way for all the voters to know how everyone else is going to vote (not in polls, but when they actually get in the booth) it's still hard to say that voting for the "safe" but less desirable candidate is anything but the best play in a broken game.
It's not actually that hard to fix Social Security. Bumping up the level of income that the tax applies to would fix it.
Medicare's the real problem. Take a look at data on the projected increasing costs of both and you'll see that it's far, far worse off. It'll probably take several more rounds of healthcare reform to bring that under control--we simply can't afford to let our already-highest-in-the-world health care costs continue to increase at a greater rate than inflation.
Oh, god, I just got done complaining about some moderately bad things about the redesign in the linked-to thread, but I hadn't noticed the link color/no-underline stupidity. That's like web design 101--you don't fuck with basic text link style unless you've got a damn good reason to do it, and take special care to ensure they remain recognizable. Usually a rookie mistake, and one that even newbies don't tend to repeat after the first time; how long's their web designer been doing this sort of work?
That, and the "preview" text of collapsed replies is now almost useless, requiring direct focus to read (mid-shade gray on light gray) rather than allowing for skimming.
WTF is the point of the gray box around the whole page? If I wanted a fucking border on the left and right of my window, I'd put one there. This just reduces the usable space for the page, for no reason.
I'm also not sure why it's critical to have the search box and account buttons visible at all times; maybe other people use the site differently than I do, but I'm never in the middle of reading comments and think "gee, I want to search Slashdot, but I don't want to do it in a new tab, I want to leave the stuff I'm reading to do it, and I want to do it right now". As for the account buttons, I use those rarely enough that I'd much rather reclaim the vertical screen real estate for content and just scroll up or tap "home" for the very rare occasions that I need those buttons. Again, maybe others use it differently, but I suspect that's pretty normal.
1. A New Hope 2. The Star Wars Christmas Special 3. The Empire Strikes Back 4. The Return of the Jedi 5. Caravan of Courage: An Ewok Adventure 6. Ewoks: The Battle for Endor
Haha, that's where I suspected it was going, too. I actually didn't hate the second movie, largely because the ending was (at the time) awesome, for the very reason that it raised all kinds of questions about WTF was really going on--questions which they chose not to bother addressing in 3, opting instead for "then some magic happens; fin".
It wasn't until the third installment came out that I started to dislike 2, since I then knew it was leading up to a pile of shit and it can't really stand on its own.
Who knows, maybe they'll partially redeem 2 & 3 with the new movies. Not holding out a lot of hope, but maybe.
Re:The "two features" thread starts here ...
on
Xfce 4.8 Released
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· Score: 1
Go WindowMaker fans! *high five*
I thought I was the only one. Everyone else seems to use the hideous *box window managers for ultra-light GUI work.
Re:Cold hard facts about resource usage?
on
Xfce 4.8 Released
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· Score: 1
It used to be much lighter, I think.
Then again, I ran it on Gentoo, so who knows. When I tried it a couple years later in Ubuntu it looked way different (worse) and felt way more bloated, but I'm not sure whether it's because XFCE changed or because the Ubuntu team configured it that way.
Good idea posting AC. Lots of Slashdot posters still think the concept of natural rights can stand up to reasoned examination (generally because they've never subjected it to reasoned examination, nor seen it done)
Yes that's what I was talking about. - The Original Edition DVD is a copy of the 1988 analog Laserdisc. Literally. George Lucas claimed the laserdisc was the only copy of the OE that still existed.
Such bullshit. Wasn't the THX re-release shown in theaters? That was the 90s, not several decades ago. Pretty damn sure Lucas has a copy or four of that in his possession, and that several more are floating around somewhere. Sure, that version was very slightly changed, but it lacked all of the really bad crap and actually did improve the effects of the original a bit. I'd take that one on BluRay.
WHAT THE FUCK happened to the work that resulted from the "THX" remaster release? It fixed most of the rough bits of the original (visible mattes and such) but didn't screw with the content too much (Greedo doesn't shoot, no crappy new songs in Jedi, no worse-than-the-original-effects guy in a Wampa Halloween costume in Empire)
I can't remember whether there was a cinema re-release of those versions, but I think there was, and even if not I sincerely doubt they didn't have a higher quality copy that they used to make the VHS version. Where the HELL are those reels, Lucas?
This isn't the first post I've seen online quoting (from different occasions) Lucas saying there's somehow NO version of the originals that can be salvaged without an insane amount of restoration... but he already did that restoration back in the early or mid 90s.
Personally, I think he's a liar. Wouldn't be the first time he's lied about SW-related stuff for no damn reason.
Meh, both are full of places that exist mostly to be minor loot-gathering areas and to fill otherwise empty spaces. Churches, power stations, and those big satellite dish things, to say nothing of all the mostly-useful-only-once (or never) subway entrances in F3; shacks, gas stations, and such in NV. I tried poking around the maps and found a pretty similar level of worthless/filler locations in both; I suspect if I went through them all one at a time NV would come out on top just because so many of the F3 points are subway stations, very few of which are close to anything interesting in the tunnel system.
Personally, I didn't find many of F3's quests to be very interesting, and preferred the more interconnected quest lines of NV; I guess it's just a matter of taste.
That's fine, I'm just saying that a fan of earlier Fallout games will likely find more in common between them and NV than F3. I'm betting you'd find the first two Fallout games dull, too, even if we disregard differences in interface and play style (turn-based isometric vs. first person shooter). F3 disappoints as a Fallout game, but I'm sure it's got its own charms for plenty of people.
Or... gaming is really, really subjective. Personally, I loved FO1, FO2, FO3 (and every DLC) and FO:NV. Currently enjoying the Dead Money DLC.
Hey, I never said I hated F3, nor that it's objectively a bad game. It's not a great Fallout game, in that someone who liked the first two might find many thing missing from F3 that were key reasons they enjoyed the older games. Role-playing and character specialization is notably diminished to the point of near non-existence, which is consistent with Bethesda's Elder Scrolls series--and mind you, I like Elder Scrolls, but it's not Fallout. The writing's typical of TES games, but weak for Fallout, and the series of quest hubs and the faction dynamics that drove the earlier games are very nearly absent, with many of the best quests requiring exploration for its own sake; that's not bad necessarily, but it isn't in keeping with the F1 & 2.
I enjoyed the game, but it didn't deliver the sort of thing I wanted from an entry in the Fallout series. I can understand someone liking it, and maybe even preferring it to all of the other Fallout games including NV, but I would submit that such a person would, more often than not, prefer it because it veers so far from the typical Fallout style of play and storytelling.
Personally, I found the trail-of-quest-hubs, most (all?) related to one another in some way, and each with all sorts of problems and power struggles, to be compelling, and very much missed it in F3. I like having a character who can't do everything well, even at level 30. Others might not like that so much, though, and as you say, it's a matter of taste.
I never understood the war between Morrowind fans and Oblivion fans, either. I loved both and played both multiple times. Looking forward to Skyrim. Hopefully we can get an entertaining war on three fronts.
One thing was the "dumbing down". No more spears, armor simplified, no levitation (because it's primarily a console game now; gotta live within those bounds, so we can't load the cities and the surrounding countryside at once) etc. Personally that didn't bother me too much, but I can see why it'd bug others.
Leveled everything was a big one for me. Morrowind rewarded exploration with awesome, unique loot, and had some areas that were more dangerous than others, requiring higher levels and better equipment or creative spell/alchemy use to get through. Oblivion doesn't do any of that. It also made meta-gaming the leveling system practically required rather than optional, which IMO sucks (thank god for mods).
Personally, I found Morrowind's world to be far more interesting in general, as well. This ones probably pretty subjective, but I liked it's wildly-varying environments better than Oblivions often samey landscapes and towns. One bit that I believe is not subjective is that the dungeons/ruins in Morrowind are far more varied than Oblivion's--I'm confident that an in-depth comparison of maps and such would show that to be true. Part of the problem is the leveled loot and enemies, but the dungeons themselves are also more homogeneous in design and start to blend together in short order. Which is better? IMO, dungeons that are more distinct.
A minor nitpick of mine is that the Elder Scrolls-style "you're a god at everything by the end of the game" character development/leveling system made sense from a plot perspective in Morrowind, but not in Oblivion. This could probably have been explained away with something about dragon blood blah blah blah or any number of other ways, but IIRC the writers didn't bother, either because they didn't think of it or because they didn't care to, leaving "because you're the hero, that's why" as the implicit explanation for you amazing abilities. Minor, but it's always bugged me.
I like Oblivion (I like it a lot once properly modded) but IMO they dropped the ball in a few areas.
I used to be pretty good at games back when I was a kid...and even a young adult with things like Descent...but I feel horribly uncoordinated with this thing. I can't imagine that the Batman: Arkham Asylum or the Uncharted 2 games are going to be any easier....
Good choices, both excellent games. Not too bad to control as both employ generous auto-aim. In the case of Uncharted 2 just crank the difficulty down if the fighting gives you trouble.
Don't bother with Uncharted. 2 is faaaaaar better. Everyone I know who's played both nearly didn't bother with 2 after playing the first one, then, after they did play it, regretted not just watching the first one's cutscenes on Youtube and skipping to 2.
You might like Little Big Planet, which is a 1-4 player (simultaneous) platformer. Fun alone, VERY fun with other players. Kind of like New Super Mario Brothers Wii, if you've played that, but with far less screwing of one's fellow players (though not none). It includes a level editor, and you can play levels others have made. Pain-in-the-ass menu system, but otherwise very good.
Metal Gear Solid 4 is the best in the series IMO, if you can tolerate the typical-for-Japan painfully-repetitive and overly-long cutscenes. Might not try it until you've got a handle on 3D movement/shooting controls with dual analog sticks, though.
I'd avoid most of the JRPGs on it, if that's your thing. Best is probably Star Ocean. All the others I've played or watched my wife play have been, if not crap, then at least not worth the time. That genre's strongest releases this generation have mostly been on the two hand held systems, not the actual consoles.
Blur's awesome. Mario Kart with real (though not realistically behaving) cars. My current favorite take on the Mario Kart formula, actually, and a big hit in my group of friends.
The Scott Pilgrim game (downloadable from the Playstation Store) is a hell of a good beat-em-up if you're in to that. Not very fun (and much harder) solo, like most beat-em-ups, but great fun with others. One of the better ones I've played in that genre, actually. Probably better if you've read the comic/seen the movie, and liked them.
Braid's a terrific platformer. Downloadable, again. I think it's on the PS3. I've got the PC version, but frankly the console versions are better simply because they support gamepads out of the box, while the PC version requires screwing with Joy2Key or something as it has no built-in ability to map buttons at all.
Super Puzzle Fighter 2 Turbo (another downloadable one) is great--it's sort of like head-to-head Dr. Mario, and your combos drop extra junk blocks on your opponent. Fast-paced, and you can probably pick it up quickly if you've ever played Tetris or its many derivatives.
Fallout 3 is like if a hardcore Oblivion fan/modder were told about Fallout 1 & 2 over lunch with a friend, then decided to make a Fallout total conversion for Oblivion without actually playing the first game--maybe just reading Wikipedia and watching the intro video on Youtube. Like Morrowind and Oblivion it's sorely lacking in actual role-playing, aside from a handful of good sidequests it's full poor writing and dull fetch quests, and its overall narrative structure is Bethesda-ish rather than Fallout-ish.
I wouldn't say it sucks considered on its own and once heavily modded (it's mediocre pre-mods), but it jettisons so many of the core attributes of the Fallout games (while keeping much of the incidental shit) that it is a very poor entry in the series.
Fallout: New Vegas, on the other hand, is excellent. It's 3D Fallout done right. Great Fallout-style breadcrumb trail of a main quest that leads you through one quest hub after another, damn near every side quest is interesting, stuff you do matters for the ending (how the hell Bethesda screwed that up in F3 I have no idea--it's a voiceover and some stills, FFS!), even the most mundane quest can turn out to be far more than it seemed or take a weird twist, skill specialization is more-or-less restored, etc.
If you're a fan of Fallout 1 & 2, you'll probably like New Vegas. I'd say just skip F3--I doubt I'll ever play it again, as New Vegas is so much better, and far more to my liking as a Fallout fan. You say you don't like FPS games, and that might still turn you off as there is still a significant FPS element (obviously) but I would say it relies less on real-time combat and twitch shooting than even Mass Effect does unless you choose to play it as a pure FPS, so if you could stand ME then you can probably stomach New Vegas' combat.
It's in the worst possible place, too, and I think they screwed up the presentation somehow (no size properties in img tag? Just a guess, haven't checked). Even though it ought to be cached by now, the damn thing always loads last, and I keep trying to click on or highlight (I highlight crap when I'm reading it online, not really to help me read--just a nervous habit, I suppose) text near the top of the article and ending up at the damn appeal when it manages to load and push the text down just in time to take my click.
Real banner ads would almost certainly be less annoying than this even if I didn't adblock them, as they likely wouldn't push shit around when they load.
Keen 4-6 and Duke Nukem 2 are still awesome. The earlier games aren't bad but I can see why someone who didn't grow up with them wouldn't be able to "get" it--the later games should be enjoyable to anyone who likes the genres (platformer and platform shooter, respectively), regardless of what they grew up playing.
Steam does have Keen; I got it when the complete id collection went on sale a year or so ago. The pack doesn't include episode 6 or Keen Dreams, though, so it's not all the games.
The original trilogy hasn't aged well. The controls suck balls (and did even back then) and the graphics are horrid.
4, 5, and the elusive 6 are still excellent.
The controls are improved, the play is smooth, and they're pretty enough to be visually interesting most of the time. The graphics are in that "good enough" sweet spot where, though they may not look modern exactly, they aren't so far behind that they're a shock.
Slashdot Mirror
Yep. Took Amtrak once from KC, MO to Saint Louis. Never again, until they get their own rails. What would have been a 4-5 hour trip by car or a 30 minute (1 hr. with security) flight took over NINE HOURS, about half of it sitting completely still.
Won't be able to get it until we find the three pictures, though.
It's not a propaganda technique, it's an inevitable fact of our voting system. If you vote for your favorite who has little support and, as a result, your least-favorite candidate wins instead of your second-favorite candidate, your "smart" choice has just caused a worse outcome for you than the "dumb" one. Even in cases where a third party candidate is polling well, unless they're polling well evenly across big-two party lines and there's some way for all the voters to know how everyone else is going to vote (not in polls, but when they actually get in the booth) it's still hard to say that voting for the "safe" but less desirable candidate is anything but the best play in a broken game.
It's not actually that hard to fix Social Security. Bumping up the level of income that the tax applies to would fix it.
Medicare's the real problem. Take a look at data on the projected increasing costs of both and you'll see that it's far, far worse off. It'll probably take several more rounds of healthcare reform to bring that under control--we simply can't afford to let our already-highest-in-the-world health care costs continue to increase at a greater rate than inflation.
Oh, god, I just got done complaining about some moderately bad things about the redesign in the linked-to thread, but I hadn't noticed the link color/no-underline stupidity. That's like web design 101--you don't fuck with basic text link style unless you've got a damn good reason to do it, and take special care to ensure they remain recognizable. Usually a rookie mistake, and one that even newbies don't tend to repeat after the first time; how long's their web designer been doing this sort of work?
That, and the "preview" text of collapsed replies is now almost useless, requiring direct focus to read (mid-shade gray on light gray) rather than allowing for skimming.
WTF is the point of the gray box around the whole page? If I wanted a fucking border on the left and right of my window, I'd put one there. This just reduces the usable space for the page, for no reason.
I'm also not sure why it's critical to have the search box and account buttons visible at all times; maybe other people use the site differently than I do, but I'm never in the middle of reading comments and think "gee, I want to search Slashdot, but I don't want to do it in a new tab, I want to leave the stuff I'm reading to do it, and I want to do it right now". As for the account buttons, I use those rarely enough that I'd much rather reclaim the vertical screen real estate for content and just scroll up or tap "home" for the very rare occasions that I need those buttons. Again, maybe others use it differently, but I suspect that's pretty normal.
1. A New Hope
2. The Star Wars Christmas Special
3. The Empire Strikes Back
4. The Return of the Jedi
5. Caravan of Courage: An Ewok Adventure
6. Ewoks: The Battle for Endor
Haha, that's where I suspected it was going, too. I actually didn't hate the second movie, largely because the ending was (at the time) awesome, for the very reason that it raised all kinds of questions about WTF was really going on--questions which they chose not to bother addressing in 3, opting instead for "then some magic happens; fin".
It wasn't until the third installment came out that I started to dislike 2, since I then knew it was leading up to a pile of shit and it can't really stand on its own.
Who knows, maybe they'll partially redeem 2 & 3 with the new movies. Not holding out a lot of hope, but maybe.
Go WindowMaker fans! *high five*
I thought I was the only one. Everyone else seems to use the hideous *box window managers for ultra-light GUI work.
It used to be much lighter, I think.
Then again, I ran it on Gentoo, so who knows. When I tried it a couple years later in Ubuntu it looked way different (worse) and felt way more bloated, but I'm not sure whether it's because XFCE changed or because the Ubuntu team configured it that way.
It's arguably the best system for JRPGs this generation, including the DS and all three consoles.
If you're not in to that genre, yeah, it's probably kind of mediocre.
lol, verb from of the verb.
reasoned
Either sense would work, but I intended the first.
Since that definition is heavily dependent on another, here you go:
reason
Noun sense 7b and most of the ones from the verb from of the verb are relevant.
Good idea posting AC. Lots of Slashdot posters still think the concept of natural rights can stand up to reasoned examination (generally because they've never subjected it to reasoned examination, nor seen it done)
Such bullshit. Wasn't the THX re-release shown in theaters? That was the 90s, not several decades ago. Pretty damn sure Lucas has a copy or four of that in his possession, and that several more are floating around somewhere. Sure, that version was very slightly changed, but it lacked all of the really bad crap and actually did improve the effects of the original a bit. I'd take that one on BluRay.
WHAT THE FUCK happened to the work that resulted from the "THX" remaster release? It fixed most of the rough bits of the original (visible mattes and such) but didn't screw with the content too much (Greedo doesn't shoot, no crappy new songs in Jedi, no worse-than-the-original-effects guy in a Wampa Halloween costume in Empire)
I can't remember whether there was a cinema re-release of those versions, but I think there was, and even if not I sincerely doubt they didn't have a higher quality copy that they used to make the VHS version. Where the HELL are those reels, Lucas?
This isn't the first post I've seen online quoting (from different occasions) Lucas saying there's somehow NO version of the originals that can be salvaged without an insane amount of restoration... but he already did that restoration back in the early or mid 90s.
Personally, I think he's a liar. Wouldn't be the first time he's lied about SW-related stuff for no damn reason.
Meh, both are full of places that exist mostly to be minor loot-gathering areas and to fill otherwise empty spaces. Churches, power stations, and those big satellite dish things, to say nothing of all the mostly-useful-only-once (or never) subway entrances in F3; shacks, gas stations, and such in NV. I tried poking around the maps and found a pretty similar level of worthless/filler locations in both; I suspect if I went through them all one at a time NV would come out on top just because so many of the F3 points are subway stations, very few of which are close to anything interesting in the tunnel system.
Personally, I didn't find many of F3's quests to be very interesting, and preferred the more interconnected quest lines of NV; I guess it's just a matter of taste.
That's fine, I'm just saying that a fan of earlier Fallout games will likely find more in common between them and NV than F3. I'm betting you'd find the first two Fallout games dull, too, even if we disregard differences in interface and play style (turn-based isometric vs. first person shooter). F3 disappoints as a Fallout game, but I'm sure it's got its own charms for plenty of people.
Hey, I never said I hated F3, nor that it's objectively a bad game. It's not a great Fallout game, in that someone who liked the first two might find many thing missing from F3 that were key reasons they enjoyed the older games. Role-playing and character specialization is notably diminished to the point of near non-existence, which is consistent with Bethesda's Elder Scrolls series--and mind you, I like Elder Scrolls, but it's not Fallout. The writing's typical of TES games, but weak for Fallout, and the series of quest hubs and the faction dynamics that drove the earlier games are very nearly absent, with many of the best quests requiring exploration for its own sake; that's not bad necessarily, but it isn't in keeping with the F1 & 2.
I enjoyed the game, but it didn't deliver the sort of thing I wanted from an entry in the Fallout series. I can understand someone liking it, and maybe even preferring it to all of the other Fallout games including NV, but I would submit that such a person would, more often than not, prefer it because it veers so far from the typical Fallout style of play and storytelling.
Personally, I found the trail-of-quest-hubs, most (all?) related to one another in some way, and each with all sorts of problems and power struggles, to be compelling, and very much missed it in F3. I like having a character who can't do everything well, even at level 30. Others might not like that so much, though, and as you say, it's a matter of taste.
One thing was the "dumbing down". No more spears, armor simplified, no levitation (because it's primarily a console game now; gotta live within those bounds, so we can't load the cities and the surrounding countryside at once) etc. Personally that didn't bother me too much, but I can see why it'd bug others.
Leveled everything was a big one for me. Morrowind rewarded exploration with awesome, unique loot, and had some areas that were more dangerous than others, requiring higher levels and better equipment or creative spell/alchemy use to get through. Oblivion doesn't do any of that. It also made meta-gaming the leveling system practically required rather than optional, which IMO sucks (thank god for mods).
Personally, I found Morrowind's world to be far more interesting in general, as well. This ones probably pretty subjective, but I liked it's wildly-varying environments better than Oblivions often samey landscapes and towns. One bit that I believe is not subjective is that the dungeons/ruins in Morrowind are far more varied than Oblivion's--I'm confident that an in-depth comparison of maps and such would show that to be true. Part of the problem is the leveled loot and enemies, but the dungeons themselves are also more homogeneous in design and start to blend together in short order. Which is better? IMO, dungeons that are more distinct.
A minor nitpick of mine is that the Elder Scrolls-style "you're a god at everything by the end of the game" character development/leveling system made sense from a plot perspective in Morrowind, but not in Oblivion. This could probably have been explained away with something about dragon blood blah blah blah or any number of other ways, but IIRC the writers didn't bother, either because they didn't think of it or because they didn't care to, leaving "because you're the hero, that's why" as the implicit explanation for you amazing abilities. Minor, but it's always bugged me.
I like Oblivion (I like it a lot once properly modded) but IMO they dropped the ball in a few areas.
What about the maps make it clear? Serious question; I'm not seeing it.
Good choices, both excellent games. Not too bad to control as both employ generous auto-aim. In the case of Uncharted 2 just crank the difficulty down if the fighting gives you trouble.
Don't bother with Uncharted. 2 is faaaaaar better. Everyone I know who's played both nearly didn't bother with 2 after playing the first one, then, after they did play it, regretted not just watching the first one's cutscenes on Youtube and skipping to 2.
You might like Little Big Planet, which is a 1-4 player (simultaneous) platformer. Fun alone, VERY fun with other players. Kind of like New Super Mario Brothers Wii, if you've played that, but with far less screwing of one's fellow players (though not none). It includes a level editor, and you can play levels others have made. Pain-in-the-ass menu system, but otherwise very good.
Metal Gear Solid 4 is the best in the series IMO, if you can tolerate the typical-for-Japan painfully-repetitive and overly-long cutscenes. Might not try it until you've got a handle on 3D movement/shooting controls with dual analog sticks, though.
I'd avoid most of the JRPGs on it, if that's your thing. Best is probably Star Ocean. All the others I've played or watched my wife play have been, if not crap, then at least not worth the time. That genre's strongest releases this generation have mostly been on the two hand held systems, not the actual consoles.
Blur's awesome. Mario Kart with real (though not realistically behaving) cars. My current favorite take on the Mario Kart formula, actually, and a big hit in my group of friends.
The Scott Pilgrim game (downloadable from the Playstation Store) is a hell of a good beat-em-up if you're in to that. Not very fun (and much harder) solo, like most beat-em-ups, but great fun with others. One of the better ones I've played in that genre, actually. Probably better if you've read the comic/seen the movie, and liked them.
Braid's a terrific platformer. Downloadable, again. I think it's on the PS3. I've got the PC version, but frankly the console versions are better simply because they support gamepads out of the box, while the PC version requires screwing with Joy2Key or something as it has no built-in ability to map buttons at all.
Super Puzzle Fighter 2 Turbo (another downloadable one) is great--it's sort of like head-to-head Dr. Mario, and your combos drop extra junk blocks on your opponent. Fast-paced, and you can probably pick it up quickly if you've ever played Tetris or its many derivatives.
Fallout 3 is like if a hardcore Oblivion fan/modder were told about Fallout 1 & 2 over lunch with a friend, then decided to make a Fallout total conversion for Oblivion without actually playing the first game--maybe just reading Wikipedia and watching the intro video on Youtube. Like Morrowind and Oblivion it's sorely lacking in actual role-playing, aside from a handful of good sidequests it's full poor writing and dull fetch quests, and its overall narrative structure is Bethesda-ish rather than Fallout-ish.
I wouldn't say it sucks considered on its own and once heavily modded (it's mediocre pre-mods), but it jettisons so many of the core attributes of the Fallout games (while keeping much of the incidental shit) that it is a very poor entry in the series.
Fallout: New Vegas, on the other hand, is excellent. It's 3D Fallout done right. Great Fallout-style breadcrumb trail of a main quest that leads you through one quest hub after another, damn near every side quest is interesting, stuff you do matters for the ending (how the hell Bethesda screwed that up in F3 I have no idea--it's a voiceover and some stills, FFS!), even the most mundane quest can turn out to be far more than it seemed or take a weird twist, skill specialization is more-or-less restored, etc.
If you're a fan of Fallout 1 & 2, you'll probably like New Vegas. I'd say just skip F3--I doubt I'll ever play it again, as New Vegas is so much better, and far more to my liking as a Fallout fan. You say you don't like FPS games, and that might still turn you off as there is still a significant FPS element (obviously) but I would say it relies less on real-time combat and twitch shooting than even Mass Effect does unless you choose to play it as a pure FPS, so if you could stand ME then you can probably stomach New Vegas' combat.
It's in the worst possible place, too, and I think they screwed up the presentation somehow (no size properties in img tag? Just a guess, haven't checked). Even though it ought to be cached by now, the damn thing always loads last, and I keep trying to click on or highlight (I highlight crap when I'm reading it online, not really to help me read--just a nervous habit, I suppose) text near the top of the article and ending up at the damn appeal when it manages to load and push the text down just in time to take my click.
Real banner ads would almost certainly be less annoying than this even if I didn't adblock them, as they likely wouldn't push shit around when they load.
Keen 4-6 and Duke Nukem 2 are still awesome. The earlier games aren't bad but I can see why someone who didn't grow up with them wouldn't be able to "get" it--the later games should be enjoyable to anyone who likes the genres (platformer and platform shooter, respectively), regardless of what they grew up playing.
Steam does have Keen; I got it when the complete id collection went on sale a year or so ago. The pack doesn't include episode 6 or Keen Dreams, though, so it's not all the games.
The original trilogy hasn't aged well. The controls suck balls (and did even back then) and the graphics are horrid.
4, 5, and the elusive 6 are still excellent.
The controls are improved, the play is smooth, and they're pretty enough to be visually interesting most of the time. The graphics are in that "good enough" sweet spot where, though they may not look modern exactly, they aren't so far behind that they're a shock.