This is going to be meta as fuck -- but the only preconcieved notions I brought to that post were; that the gist of his complaint(and thus post) applies to just about everything(which a later reply addressed) both on this site and within western cultur, that Iraq is a contentious topic(confirmed by some of the replies), that bringing up your own US military service invariably will send any conversation down certain lines(also confirmed by the replies - thank you for your service, what were you expecting, yada yada), and that as a poster with an ID that low, he knew all of these things and thus knew what he was doing. And of course what is implied by the fact that both darfur, and Rwanda 2, child of rwanda, aka the congo were brought into it as well.
It was utterly irrelevant to the article(or rather only as relevant to this topic as to any other topic), only sort of relevant to the person he was replying to, and not productive except to create a derail, which it did. That's a troll -- oh, and the purpose of a troll is to generate conversation, not necessarily in a bad way. I know that definition has gone out of vogue, but sorry it's the one drilled into my brain.
"Play with 24 players online in three beautiful and destructible locations...Whether you choose Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima or the classic Wake Island, you'll experience the best balance of infantry combat complemented by land, sea and air vehicles."
So really, they've taken the original BF1942, spruced up the graphics, made trees that fall over, reduced the player numbers and removed all but three of the levels. And they want people to pay more money for this and endure more or EA's dicking about with bugs, poor updates and maybe DRM?
I've come to realize that not being able to easily take on the suffering of other "third hand" like that is actually a human survival trait. People can only barely handle the tragedies in their own lives, much less bear the burden of every tragedy the damned news media pushes in their face. I say let them have their lives of quiet desperation if they choose.
There's an old(well, relatively) article that was published in the Chicago Reader and excerpted on "This American Life" a long time ago sort of about this as it relates to war called "Losing the War". Lee Sandlin tried to figure out what his father's actual war experience was like(in of course World War 2) and that chronicles it. It's not one of those "you had to be there" type things and it's pretty long, and touches on some other stuff(like propoganda usage, yada yada), but in short, you're right.
First off it's still a game, meaning entertainment, meaning it's supposed to be fun - and anyone who takes it that seriously is an incredibly sad individual.
Secondly, really, WoW isn't comparable. It's cute that you think WoW anecdotes are relevant, but they really aren't. The mechanics do not allow stuff on this scale(or even anything really directly comparable) because it is a player versus shell script game, not a sandbox game like EVE/old UO/etc.. The closest thing to an appropriate analogue I can think of is that this is like someone not only stealing everything from the guild bank, but also causing a situation that engenders a huge likelihood of all the people in the guild losing all of their personal epics and gold, setting them back to stock level 60s(70s/80s, whatever the cap is) with absolutely NO recourse available.
Well, it was a Republican* that neutered the 2nd to the point where gun control as an issue is currently framed as pro and anti-"handguns and things what look scary".
So the debate is currently about where the line is, not some inalienable right to self-defense, armed citizenry or anything like that. Some of which would be stretching the 2nd to enshrine rights it doesn't clearly enshrine, and regardless, you gave up the ghost on that one right good almost 30 years ago.
* - St. Reagan in fact. Firearm Owner's Protection Act effectively banned private citizens from paying appropriate taxes on new select-fire and automatic weapons made after it's passage.
The fact that two people modded him up for that post is a sad fucking indicator of the state of slashdot. I may have to go away again.
Hmmmmm. The top two you've listed there have woefully inadequate administration tools, particularly Ubuntu, and nothing really compares to the universal tools that is YaST. It has a GUI front-end, and a curses one for headless people(!) that looks pretty universal and works in the same way. No, aptitude isn't a replacement.
He was specifically talking about GUI install tools, which is insane. You don't install RHEL via a GUI unless you're a very small shop, nor do you often not use a custom Windows install image. It's just not done.
Mind you, the state of GUI tools on Linux is woefully inadequate when compared to Windows 2003 for a few reasons:
1. Many people in the Linux world believe that there is no place for GUI tools at all, and everything should be done from the command line. How wrong they are. There is a place for both options, as Microsoft is finding out and trying to improve on. 2. The GUI libraries that many distributions use are just terribly inadequate when trying to create any useful user interface beyond a few buttons and checkboxes. 3. Many distributors believe that they're not competing with Windows Server, but are competing in the low-hanging-fruit world of Unix migrations. Bad mistake.
A GUI has no place on a server unless there's a damn good reason for it to be there. It takes resources, which means less resources for your applications, which means you need more hardware to do the same thing you could do without one.
IIS's nifty interface doesn't make it any better or easier to run than Apache for example.
The forced inclusion of a GUI is one of the reasons why Windows should only be used on servers in a subset of circumstances, bar lacking on-site talent to do otherwise. Especially today, with virtualization so popular, using a GUI on your servers means you get way less bang for your hardware buck.
Now what are nice are things like Oracles management console, which provides you with a GUI, but doesn't require the GUI to be running on the server. And of course web-based solutions.
This isn't an easy job. Distributors have to balance getting rid of 'unneeded services' with providing a certain level of out-of-the-box functionality. Ubuntu, for example, tried to do that whole 'no ports on by default' thing and managed to totally foul up the default set up of CUPS at one time.
You can tweak what installs and what's turned on with all the major players. Windows being the biggest pain in the ass(then again it's what I least use since I'm generally the linux monkey). By default it's pretty permissive. They're assuming you're installing on a system behind a firewall, because it's an enterprise distro.
Also Ubuntu was what, 6 months+ behind everyone else in having SELinux turned on by default?
I can't see anything that Ubuntu is doing differently to warrant that assessment. Red Hat is the market leader, and there is barely enough room for Suse at the moment.
I can think of a lot of things they aren't doing. They're a desktop distro, quite frankly they don't have the talent or R&D to offer the kind of support IBM, RedHat and Novell can. It's like calling up Dell for Windows support instead of Microsoft because they put together OpenManage.
Here's how you install RHEL. You rack your server(or build your container), hook everything up. Then you build your kickstart, generally from a template. You connect to your kvm and pxe boot it. Select the NIC from anaconda, walk away. The KS installs your package load and dependancies, and only those, turns off any relevant services, and leaves you with your clean install. No where does the GUI factor in. In fact I've only installed or used X because Oracle requires various xlibs and X applications.
You can also script installing custom applications and what not. Since you can run any script from the %post section of a kickstart.
And who the fuck cares about wifi drivers on a server? Why would you list that? Any server OS will work with server hardware, although I doubt Ubuntu's SAN driver performance, say a pretty normal QL2300 + powerpath combo.
Oh and the flaws in RPM have nothing to do with YUM.
They're two different beasts. RedHat slapped together a distro, built their own package manager, worked on improving the kernel and various other endeavors, pretty much threw everything they have together.
Canonical took debian and a bunch of shit off freshmeat, slapped a label on it, and then tweaked configs.
You pay Microsoft for access to things, so you can solve problems.
OTOH, when you call redhat for support, which is typically only when the internet and knowledge base don't fill your needs, you generally end up on the phone with one of their engineers. The person you talk to has actual hands on coding experience with whatever it is you're trying to get working. I've actually gotten custom patches and binaries out of their support in the past.
I've heard Novell is similar when it comes to SUSE.
That's why we pay for RedHat support, the binaries they provide are really just a convienance thing.
Except unlike RedHat, they haven't comparitively given shit back. Check out major project and Kernel patches for Canonical developers. You'll see there are next to no contributions.
Well, let's see, we have the car culture it's contributed to, which kills things like public transit, the ensuing loss of community from sprawl, nigh complete cultural bankruptcy as chain stores, restaurants and outlets take over since transplants into exurban and suburban areas have no real ties to the previously existing communities. Then we have the loss of farmland to unneeded vanity development. And of course the fact that one of the big reasons for the rise of suburbia was cowardice and racism re: "The great white flight".
They don't have to live in the cities, but we don't have to support infrastructure to make their lives easier. Suburbia is probably the biggest mistake of the 20th century.
The iPhone is not a business device, it's a consumer device. It may crack into corporate that way though.
Personally I looked into it when they were coming out, but the closed nature of the platform in every way completely removed it from consideration. It wouldn't work on verizon's network, and I couldn't do any of the functions I need my phone for except make and recieve calls.
I'm pretty much stuck with a now aging Samsung i730 for now.
We could, but making the US a tax haven, or cutting taxes on the "rich", in the short term reduces revenue(which means we should cut spending), and there's no guarantee of a resulting uptick in the tax base from investment to offset it. To raise spending you need to either raise taxes or raise the tax base, otherwise, government or not, once you start selling bonds to pay off previous bonds, well it just gets silly. In terms of US fiscal policy we probably should raise taxes or cut spending now, since the federal budget isn't balanced.
It's doubtful any political party is going to cut spending, so we need to raise taxes somewhere. And now we're into tax policy, where you can find dozens of economists to support just about any position you choose to take. Personally, I think it makes more sense to have a progressive tax code, for a variety of reasons, but we've drifted so far off of that there's no point in hammering that little debate out.
You presume I have no understanding of economics simply because I hold to a demand-side instead of supply-side theory. It's you who doesn't seem to have a very good grasp on it, as you're painting a rather complex issue in black&white terms, which is the most typical phallacy of the modern conservative.
First off, investment occurs wherever there is opportunity. There is no guarantee that these opportunities will be domestic, we do a lot of foreign investature and a lot of foreign moneys flow into the US(for instance a lot of the currently held bad debt due to the housing lending crisis and credit crisis is foreign). So the idea that even a majority of it will flow into the local economy is contentious at best, flat out wrong at worst. That level is global chief, and we're talking US economy here. There's a side argument here about the inequalities inherant in globalization due in large part because of barriers to free trade, and barriers to the free movement of labor, but we'll ignore that for now.
Now, what do you think happens to the money granny spends at the store? It doesn't go poof overseas. Some of it does, but hey, it's a global economy. The vast majority stays here, and more importantly stays local and encourages domestic investment in order to make money off the resulting increased money flow and uptick in demand. The difference between this and cutting taxes on the upper percent is the manner in which the money flows.
Poorer people tend to spend most of their incomes, hence stimulus at that level = greater money flow in the economy, which means more wealth for everyone. Also I seem to recall the 90s being pretty alright, why there was massive amounts of capital available for vague promises, and cutting taxes on the VC/wealthy population hasn't seemed to do jack shit, and never seems to do jack shit, so.... maybe be a bit less doom and gloom.
But hey, keep shooting for that voodoo economics gravy train that never fucking happens. Hey, I've got another great idea for you, the gold standard.
Obama's economic plan has gotten the best scores from a variety of financial publications. The stimulus portion is basically an immediate infusion of $250 per person making under I think $75,000 a year(although I'm not positive on that, it might be just a blanket check for simplicity's sake), with the option for an additional $250 if necessary. In the long term it's lowering taxes on that group, eliminating taxes on seniors making under $50,000, and adding payroll matching credits for Social Security. To make up for the budget shortfall he's going to raise capital gains, close some corporate tax loopholes/havens, remove the social security contribution cap(currently going to be $100k for the first year of his administration), and raise taxes on the upper end of the spectrum(>$250k/year). There's also been some mumbling about making Uncle Sam hate the self employed less.
Florida doesn't matter. They don't get to seat democratic delegates(and only get half delegates for the republicans), because the state moved the primary up before Febuary 5th without permission from the national parties. Same with Michigan.
I don't even think Obama is on the ballot in Florida.
The third party library has really begun to turn around. I'll go through it real quick. Zack & Wiki is great, if you can get past the style/title. Very, very solid puzzle/adventure game. Joins Ico, Okami, and a bunch of other titles in selling abysmally but being really damn good. Trauma Center: New Blood, surgery sim. Remarkably fun for what it is and the co-op is a blast. Guitar Hero 3. The Wii guitar is the best guitar. No one seems to stock the thing though(not that I would've bought it, since I already have two guitars for the PS2). Some light-gun shooters. RE:UC, Ghost Squad, etc. Nothing special there, but if you like those, they're available. RE4. Best version of the game if you never played it. Guilty Gear XX: Accent Core. Decent 2D fighter, if you're interested in those and guilty gear in particular you probably already own the PS2 version[s]. NiGHTs is.... ok.
In Febuary we get: No More Heroes. Suda51 is fucking insane. Hyper-stylized cell-shaded graphics, very adult content, and full of internet culture. Brawl. Meh, Nintendo title, but can't not list it. Okami. I believe the Okami port is slated for Febuary. Should be the best version, and I hear it's going to be budget priced.
And sometime next year is: FF:CC. The trailer looks interesting and I really liked the first one. DQ: Swords. DQ Kenshin. Tales of Symphonia sequel. Has Namco ever directly sequeled a Tales game before? I forget.
And probably a bunch of other stuff I'm not remembering/hasn't been announced.
Double AAs are still a bit more convienant for some people. I haven't run into any charge issues with an SP or DS, ever, but I can see how someone could.
The Wii library satisfies genre needs/gaming itches the other two libraries don't. It's a very different library, so I can understand why someone who views gaming through the lens of what's currently available on the 360 and PS3 as the end all be all would not find very many reasons to purchase one(I don't find much appealing about the 360/PS3 lineups either, fwiw). For instance Zack&Wiki, Trauma Center, the upcoming game No More Heroes. All niche, downright odd titles or throwbacks, and there's no equivalents really elsewhere, outside handhelds.
My parents own one. Wii Sports got them hooked, and my Dad loves Tiger Woods golf. If they ever truly nail a motion-based golf game(Tiger and it's ilk fall a bit short), I know my uncles and grandfather would snap a system up in a heartbeat.
Honestly, I picked up a Wii for novelty. I figured best case, I'd get a ton of wierd thought experiments, some genres, and some genuinely new fare. Worst case, I'd get a new way to play some older genres. So far, I'm pretty happy with it. It's not balls to the wall amazing, but I wasn't expecting it to be.
Slashdot Mirror
This is going to be meta as fuck -- but the only preconcieved notions I brought to that post were; that the gist of his complaint(and thus post) applies to just about everything(which a later reply addressed) both on this site and within western cultur, that Iraq is a contentious topic(confirmed by some of the replies), that bringing up your own US military service invariably will send any conversation down certain lines(also confirmed by the replies - thank you for your service, what were you expecting, yada yada), and that as a poster with an ID that low, he knew all of these things and thus knew what he was doing. And of course what is implied by the fact that both darfur, and Rwanda 2, child of rwanda, aka the congo were brought into it as well.
It was utterly irrelevant to the article(or rather only as relevant to this topic as to any other topic), only sort of relevant to the person he was replying to, and not productive except to create a derail, which it did. That's a troll -- oh, and the purpose of a troll is to generate conversation, not necessarily in a bad way. I know that definition has gone out of vogue, but sorry it's the one drilled into my brain.
Yea, it's pretty audacious.
There's an old(well, relatively) article that was published in the Chicago Reader and excerpted on "This American Life" a long time ago sort of about this as it relates to war called "Losing the War". Lee Sandlin tried to figure out what his father's actual war experience was like(in of course World War 2) and that chronicles it. It's not one of those "you had to be there" type things and it's pretty long, and touches on some other stuff(like propoganda usage, yada yada), but in short, you're right.
First off it's still a game, meaning entertainment, meaning it's supposed to be fun - and anyone who takes it that seriously is an incredibly sad individual.
Secondly, really, WoW isn't comparable. It's cute that you think WoW anecdotes are relevant, but they really aren't. The mechanics do not allow stuff on this scale(or even anything really directly comparable) because it is a player versus shell script game, not a sandbox game like EVE/old UO/etc.. The closest thing to an appropriate analogue I can think of is that this is like someone not only stealing everything from the guild bank, but also causing a situation that engenders a huge likelihood of all the people in the guild losing all of their personal epics and gold, setting them back to stock level 60s(70s/80s, whatever the cap is) with absolutely NO recourse available.
If things like Iraq were actually important to people, get this, we wouldn't be in Iraq and things like Iraq wouldn't happen.
Oh, and nice job pulling off the support are troops irrelevant segue troll.
It's called a fucking magazine, not a clip.
Well, it was a Republican* that neutered the 2nd to the point where gun control as an issue is currently framed as pro and anti-"handguns and things what look scary".
So the debate is currently about where the line is, not some inalienable right to self-defense, armed citizenry or anything like that. Some of which would be stretching the 2nd to enshrine rights it doesn't clearly enshrine, and regardless, you gave up the ghost on that one right good almost 30 years ago.
* - St. Reagan in fact. Firearm Owner's Protection Act effectively banned private citizens from paying appropriate taxes on new select-fire and automatic weapons made after it's passage.
I'm still boggling that "GUI install tools" and "WiFi driver support" were used as arguments for Ubuntu on a server.
But yea, right tool for the job, not ideological bullshit or flavor of the era.
The fact that two people modded him up for that post is a sad fucking indicator of the state of slashdot. I may have to go away again.
Hmmmmm. The top two you've listed there have woefully inadequate administration tools, particularly Ubuntu, and nothing really compares to the universal tools that is YaST. It has a GUI front-end, and a curses one for headless people(!) that looks pretty universal and works in the same way. No, aptitude isn't a replacement.
He was specifically talking about GUI install tools, which is insane. You don't install RHEL via a GUI unless you're a very small shop, nor do you often not use a custom Windows install image. It's just not done.
Mind you, the state of GUI tools on Linux is woefully inadequate when compared to Windows 2003 for a few reasons:
1. Many people in the Linux world believe that there is no place for GUI tools at all, and everything should be done from the command line. How wrong they are. There is a place for both options, as Microsoft is finding out and trying to improve on.
2. The GUI libraries that many distributions use are just terribly inadequate when trying to create any useful user interface beyond a few buttons and checkboxes.
3. Many distributors believe that they're not competing with Windows Server, but are competing in the low-hanging-fruit world of Unix migrations. Bad mistake.
A GUI has no place on a server unless there's a damn good reason for it to be there. It takes resources, which means less resources for your applications, which means you need more hardware to do the same thing you could do without one.
IIS's nifty interface doesn't make it any better or easier to run than Apache for example.
The forced inclusion of a GUI is one of the reasons why Windows should only be used on servers in a subset of circumstances, bar lacking on-site talent to do otherwise. Especially today, with virtualization so popular, using a GUI on your servers means you get way less bang for your hardware buck.
Now what are nice are things like Oracles management console, which provides you with a GUI, but doesn't require the GUI to be running on the server. And of course web-based solutions.
This isn't an easy job. Distributors have to balance getting rid of 'unneeded services' with providing a certain level of out-of-the-box functionality. Ubuntu, for example, tried to do that whole 'no ports on by default' thing and managed to totally foul up the default set up of CUPS at one time.
You can tweak what installs and what's turned on with all the major players. Windows being the biggest pain in the ass(then again it's what I least use since I'm generally the linux monkey). By default it's pretty permissive. They're assuming you're installing on a system behind a firewall, because it's an enterprise distro.
Also Ubuntu was what, 6 months+ behind everyone else in having SELinux turned on by default?
I can't see anything that Ubuntu is doing differently to warrant that assessment. Red Hat is the market leader, and there is barely enough room for Suse at the moment.
I can think of a lot of things they aren't doing. They're a desktop distro, quite frankly they don't have the talent or R&D to offer the kind of support IBM, RedHat and Novell can. It's like calling up Dell for Windows support instead of Microsoft because they put together OpenManage.
But anyway, SUSE is a lot more popular in Europe.
Here's how you install RHEL. You rack your server(or build your container), hook everything up. Then you build your kickstart, generally from a template. You connect to your kvm and pxe boot it. Select the NIC from anaconda, walk away. The KS installs your package load and dependancies, and only those, turns off any relevant services, and leaves you with your clean install. No where does the GUI factor in. In fact I've only installed or used X because Oracle requires various xlibs and X applications.
You can also script installing custom applications and what not. Since you can run any script from the %post section of a kickstart.
And who the fuck cares about wifi drivers on a server? Why would you list that? Any server OS will work with server hardware, although I doubt Ubuntu's SAN driver performance, say a pretty normal QL2300 + powerpath combo.
Oh and the flaws in RPM have nothing to do with YUM.
They're two different beasts. RedHat slapped together a distro, built their own package manager, worked on improving the kernel and various other endeavors, pretty much threw everything they have together.
Canonical took debian and a bunch of shit off freshmeat, slapped a label on it, and then tweaked configs.
Yea, I'm going to pay Canonical for support.
You pay Microsoft for access to things, so you can solve problems.
OTOH, when you call redhat for support, which is typically only when the internet and knowledge base don't fill your needs, you generally end up on the phone with one of their engineers. The person you talk to has actual hands on coding experience with whatever it is you're trying to get working. I've actually gotten custom patches and binaries out of their support in the past.
I've heard Novell is similar when it comes to SUSE.
That's why we pay for RedHat support, the binaries they provide are really just a convienance thing.
Except unlike RedHat, they haven't comparitively given shit back. Check out major project and Kernel patches for Canonical developers. You'll see there are next to no contributions.
So it's not like they have huge expenses.
Well, let's see, we have the car culture it's contributed to, which kills things like public transit, the ensuing loss of community from sprawl, nigh complete cultural bankruptcy as chain stores, restaurants and outlets take over since transplants into exurban and suburban areas have no real ties to the previously existing communities. Then we have the loss of farmland to unneeded vanity development. And of course the fact that one of the big reasons for the rise of suburbia was cowardice and racism re: "The great white flight".
They don't have to live in the cities, but we don't have to support infrastructure to make their lives easier. Suburbia is probably the biggest mistake of the 20th century.
The iPhone is not a business device, it's a consumer device. It may crack into corporate that way though.
Personally I looked into it when they were coming out, but the closed nature of the platform in every way completely removed it from consideration. It wouldn't work on verizon's network, and I couldn't do any of the functions I need my phone for except make and recieve calls.
I'm pretty much stuck with a now aging Samsung i730 for now.
We could, but making the US a tax haven, or cutting taxes on the "rich", in the short term reduces revenue(which means we should cut spending), and there's no guarantee of a resulting uptick in the tax base from investment to offset it. To raise spending you need to either raise taxes or raise the tax base, otherwise, government or not, once you start selling bonds to pay off previous bonds, well it just gets silly. In terms of US fiscal policy we probably should raise taxes or cut spending now, since the federal budget isn't balanced.
It's doubtful any political party is going to cut spending, so we need to raise taxes somewhere. And now we're into tax policy, where you can find dozens of economists to support just about any position you choose to take. Personally, I think it makes more sense to have a progressive tax code, for a variety of reasons, but we've drifted so far off of that there's no point in hammering that little debate out.
You presume I have no understanding of economics simply because I hold to a demand-side instead of supply-side theory. It's you who doesn't seem to have a very good grasp on it, as you're painting a rather complex issue in black&white terms, which is the most typical phallacy of the modern conservative.
First off, investment occurs wherever there is opportunity. There is no guarantee that these opportunities will be domestic, we do a lot of foreign investature and a lot of foreign moneys flow into the US(for instance a lot of the currently held bad debt due to the housing lending crisis and credit crisis is foreign). So the idea that even a majority of it will flow into the local economy is contentious at best, flat out wrong at worst. That level is global chief, and we're talking US economy here. There's a side argument here about the inequalities inherant in globalization due in large part because of barriers to free trade, and barriers to the free movement of labor, but we'll ignore that for now.
Now, what do you think happens to the money granny spends at the store? It doesn't go poof overseas. Some of it does, but hey, it's a global economy. The vast majority stays here, and more importantly stays local and encourages domestic investment in order to make money off the resulting increased money flow and uptick in demand. The difference between this and cutting taxes on the upper percent is the manner in which the money flows.
Poorer people tend to spend most of their incomes, hence stimulus at that level = greater money flow in the economy, which means more wealth for everyone. Also I seem to recall the 90s being pretty alright, why there was massive amounts of capital available for vague promises, and cutting taxes on the VC/wealthy population hasn't seemed to do jack shit, and never seems to do jack shit, so.... maybe be a bit less doom and gloom.
But hey, keep shooting for that voodoo economics gravy train that never fucking happens. Hey, I've got another great idea for you, the gold standard.
Obama's economic plan has gotten the best scores from a variety of financial publications. The stimulus portion is basically an immediate infusion of $250 per person making under I think $75,000 a year(although I'm not positive on that, it might be just a blanket check for simplicity's sake), with the option for an additional $250 if necessary. In the long term it's lowering taxes on that group, eliminating taxes on seniors making under $50,000, and adding payroll matching credits for Social Security. To make up for the budget shortfall he's going to raise capital gains, close some corporate tax loopholes/havens, remove the social security contribution cap(currently going to be $100k for the first year of his administration), and raise taxes on the upper end of the spectrum(>$250k/year). There's also been some mumbling about making Uncle Sam hate the self employed less.
Basically the opposite of trickle-down economics.
Florida doesn't matter. They don't get to seat democratic delegates(and only get half delegates for the republicans), because the state moved the primary up before Febuary 5th without permission from the national parties. Same with Michigan.
I don't even think Obama is on the ballot in Florida.
The third party library has really begun to turn around. I'll go through it real quick.
Zack & Wiki is great, if you can get past the style/title. Very, very solid puzzle/adventure game. Joins Ico, Okami, and a bunch of other titles in selling abysmally but being really damn good.
Trauma Center: New Blood, surgery sim. Remarkably fun for what it is and the co-op is a blast.
Guitar Hero 3. The Wii guitar is the best guitar. No one seems to stock the thing though(not that I would've bought it, since I already have two guitars for the PS2).
Some light-gun shooters. RE:UC, Ghost Squad, etc. Nothing special there, but if you like those, they're available.
RE4. Best version of the game if you never played it.
Guilty Gear XX: Accent Core. Decent 2D fighter, if you're interested in those and guilty gear in particular you probably already own the PS2 version[s].
NiGHTs is.... ok.
In Febuary we get:
No More Heroes. Suda51 is fucking insane. Hyper-stylized cell-shaded graphics, very adult content, and full of internet culture.
Brawl. Meh, Nintendo title, but can't not list it.
Okami. I believe the Okami port is slated for Febuary. Should be the best version, and I hear it's going to be budget priced.
And sometime next year is:
FF:CC. The trailer looks interesting and I really liked the first one.
DQ: Swords. DQ Kenshin.
Tales of Symphonia sequel. Has Namco ever directly sequeled a Tales game before? I forget.
And probably a bunch of other stuff I'm not remembering/hasn't been announced.
Double AAs are still a bit more convienant for some people. I haven't run into any charge issues with an SP or DS, ever, but I can see how someone could.
You might want to you know link to those facts. Just a thought.
Your right
It's you're. Thanks for being a big man and admitting it though.
The Wii library satisfies genre needs/gaming itches the other two libraries don't. It's a very different library, so I can understand why someone who views gaming through the lens of what's currently available on the 360 and PS3 as the end all be all would not find very many reasons to purchase one(I don't find much appealing about the 360/PS3 lineups either, fwiw). For instance Zack&Wiki, Trauma Center, the upcoming game No More Heroes. All niche, downright odd titles or throwbacks, and there's no equivalents really elsewhere, outside handhelds.
My parents own one. Wii Sports got them hooked, and my Dad loves Tiger Woods golf. If they ever truly nail a motion-based golf game(Tiger and it's ilk fall a bit short), I know my uncles and grandfather would snap a system up in a heartbeat.
Honestly, I picked up a Wii for novelty. I figured best case, I'd get a ton of wierd thought experiments, some genres, and some genuinely new fare. Worst case, I'd get a new way to play some older genres. So far, I'm pretty happy with it. It's not balls to the wall amazing, but I wasn't expecting it to be.