I think this country is screwed up because democracy is founded on the principle of civil dissent, yet lately it's become rather mainstream to believe that anyone who disagrees with the current administration is an unpatriotic traitor who hates freedom and wishes harm on our military.

I always thought of politics as the art of compromise, where two different ideologies came together to find a common middle ground that was in the best interests of the people.  Given the level of conservative venom directed at the Republicans who successfully negotiated a deal with Democrats that resulted in preserving the filibuster *and* giving Bush his judicial nominee votes, it seems that my belief is in the minority.

-Autistic Angel

George W. Bush's administration is the one that rushed our troops into war without adequately armored vehicles or modern body armor and then sought to cut their combat pay during the war, yet he was reelected based on his willingness to "support the troops."

I'm not sure what Jeb Bush could possibly do that would make him unelectable.  That isn't hyperbole -- in a world where 51% of the American people literally believe in liberal media conspiracy so vast that "journalist" becomes synonymous with "liar," I seriously can't imagine what would convince them to vote against another Bush.

-Autistic Angel

As best as I can tell, Advent Rising wasn't present at E3 -- I haven't been able to find hands-on impressions from the show anywhere.  It seems suspicious that a game would skip out on an opportunity for so much publicity immediately before its release, so I'll be very interested to see some reviews on this.

-Autistic Angel

On that note, this evening I successfully deployed my Evil Gravity Beam and used it to pick up the city of Minneapolis and throw it at the moon.  The Forces Of Justice threw up their hands pretty quickly after that.

Evil Genius was crashing *almost* constantly towards the end of the game there, but that didn't make the conclusion of the game any less satisfying.  Like I said: at a time when game development seems to be focussing on graphics and presentation at the expense of innovation, Elixir Studios will be missed.

-Autistic Angel

When Boone was using the radio in the beechcraft, he sent out a distress call identifying himself as a survivor of Oceanic Flight 815.  The response he got was unintelligable due to all the noise from the plane, but ABC later ran a promo with cleared up audio where the radio clearly -- and I mean *clearly* -- says, "We're the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815!"

I don't know if I'd go so far as to say that the addition of other Oceanic survivors is a foregone conclusion, but it seems pretty likely.

-Autistic Angel

...and last but not least -- possibly the greatest scene in the first season -- when Walt was taken from the boat. I didn't see that coming and would challenge most to admit they saw that twist ahead of time. Awesome.

I did.

Earlier in the episode, when Sayid and Charlie tracked down Danielle, she confessed to them that she'd heard The Others plotting to take "the boy" and had then kidnapped Aaron with the intention of exchanging him for her lost son Alex.  There's only two boys on the island: Aaron and Walt.

When the electric light from the motor boat came on, I commented to my friend, "This falls squarely into the 'Too Good To Be True' category.  I bet they've come for Walt."  Lost won't always be set on the island, but it won't be time to discover what's happened in the outside world until they've resolved some of the mysteries they've already got going on.

I do agree with people about one thing: I think Lost misfired by denying its audience even one concrete answer in the season finale.  I quit watching The X-Files halfway through the second season when I realized that it was *never* going to offer any sort of real resolution.  Lost, at least, suggests that we'll finally learn the contents of The Hatch next season, but I think it would have been a much stronger ending if they'd ponied up just a little bit more.

-Autistic Angel

I dont know any of them but....

Wesley Wyndham-Price was a character who appeared rather briefly in the third season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer before becoming a permenant cast member on Angel for about four-and-a-half of its five seasons.  For a short time he deemed himself to be a rogue demon hunter, but dropped the moniker when he tired of trying to answer the question, "What's a rogue demon?"

Sid the Dummy was, apparently, a master demon hunter who was cursed and turned into a ventrilloquist dummy.  That's about all there is to say about him since he appeared in only a single episode of Buffy and, for some reason, in the Chaos Bleeds video game.

Taki has appeared in every game from the Soul Edge / Soul Calibur series where her goal is ostensibly to slay the demon residing in the cursed sword wielded first by Cevantes, then by Nightmare.  Considering that Soul Calibur III is in production, I'd say she's doing a pretty piss poor job of it.

Raikoh is the protagonist of the Otogi series for the XBox.  He's technically dead, but that does little to deter him from dying some more whenever I pick up the controller.  I *guess* he's fairly successful demon hunter, but frankly, he's also a big bore.

Illidan Stormrage appears during the Night Elf campaign of WarCraft III.  He's blind and has some issues with abandonment and anger management, but if you need someone willing to single-handedly face down a horde of rampaging demons on the battlefield, he's probably your man.

Ellen Pompeo is the lead actress on Grey's Anatomy where, in addition to practicing medicine and screwing her boss, she helps her patients and her friends to conquer their inner demons through an intricate regimen of friendly advice and self-serving pity parties.

The Grue are the race of nocturnal demons who prowl the pitch blackness in the Zork games.  No one has ever seen one as the light seems to keep them at bay, but woe unto the adventurer whose lantern goes out for a prowling Grue can sweep out of the darkness in absolute silence and take him in a single snap of its jaws.

-Autistic Angel

Doesn't Vampire Hunter D spend most of his time hunting vampires?  They're really more like demon half-breeds and nowhere near as dangerous as the real thing.

I'm surprised that someone voted for Taki.  I'd be hard pressed to name a single demon she's actually defeated -- even Ellen Pompeo's quest on Grey's Anatomy to help people face their inner demons makes her a superior demon hunter to Taki.

-Autistic Angel

You have awakened in the middle of a moonless night and realized in your attempts to peer through the darkness that you are likely to be eaten by a Grue.  Who would you most trust to dash in an slay the wicked demon before it can swallow you whole...and why?

Wesley Wyndham-Price



Sid the Dummy



Taki



Raikoh



Illidan Stormrage



or Ellen Pompeo?

CBS announced last week that summer reality ratings hit Big Brother will return for it’s sixth season on Thursday July 7th at 8pm est.  The thrice-weekly reality show will also air on Saturdays and Tuesdays throughout the summer, with Thursdays once again being the live eviction show.

Often criticized for her robotic delivery and apparent lack of interest in the show, Julie Chen will return as host, a gig she likely has for the duration of the series after her recent marriage to CBS President Les Moonves.

Recognizing Big Brother as the flagship of their summer reality programming, CBS is set to air the longest of three weekly broadcasts of new reality show "Rock Star" at 10pm est, after the Tuesday edition of Big Brother.  In addition to this one hour show, there will be two half hour weekly editions of Rock Star and the hope is that this new series will benefit from the lead-in of Big Brother with fans sticking around to top up their reality fix.

Early rampant rumours that this would be celebrity or All-Star edition were quashed with the announcement in March that applications were being sought.  Prospective houseguests were invited to submit a two-minute video, two colour photos and their completed application form before the April 8 deadline, for their change to follow in the footsteps of season 5 winner, Ohio’s Drew Daniel.

Although surprises are promised, there is no indication of whether this season will succumb to the gimmick laden antics of season 5, with the twin twist and the live brother and sister reunion. According to producer Arnold Shapiro the aim was to find a memorable cast for this personality-driven show.

“Big Brother 6' has some big surprises that will soon be revealed,” said Shapiro. “Our goal this summer is to assemble the most colourful, competitive, and charismatic houseguests we've ever had”.

One such surprise is a new two-storey house for the “hamsters” to play in.
The set used through the first five series was demolished after season five wrapped and was replaced by an office building.  The new two-storey house, with a more loft-style layout has been constructed on former “Yes Dear” studio space and will once again house a myriad of camera’s to catch shots for the television show and the 24 hour live feeds.  The house will as usual have a back yard and will feature a swimming pool almost twice the size of that at the previous set for those essential bikini shots.

The description of Julie Chen's "robotic delivery and apparent lack of interest in the show" sounds about right to me.

Last year, the CBS website aired a live hour-long show called Housecalls that was hosted by Marcellas from Big Brother 4, and Gretchen, a California radio talkshow host.  They were both avid watchers of the live feeds, enabling them to offer a lot of interesting insights and to ask a lot of sharp questions of the evicted houseguests they interviewed.  It was an excellent show, and if they're not going to kick Julie Chen and her collection of camel-toe hip-huggers out on the street, I hope they'll at least bring Housecalls back again this season.

-Autistic Angel

If and when the X-Box 360 is either steeply delayed or released and shown to be profoundly flawed, I could see myself coming back here and praising T-Dub's foresight.

As it is, Microsoft delivered a excellent gaming console into a market nobody really thought they could successfully penetrate, secured some fantastic exclusive franchises like Halo, KOTOR, and Ninja Gaiden to bolster their library, and successfully implemented a unified online console gaming service that has proven to be years ahead of the competition.  Microsoft's track record in the console market is pretty solid so far, and it's going to take more than just conjecture to convince me that they're off to a bad start with the X-Box 360.

-Autistic Angel

The thing that bothered me about the death of Windu's escort wasn't the fact that they were bested by a Sith Lord, but the fact that they were each struck down in a single blow.  I'm not sure why he even feels the need for an apprentice if he can single-handedly slaughter Jedi like they were standard droids.

-Autistic Angel

I believe it was in one of the DVD extras on The Phantom Menace that George Lucas explained he'd added midichlorians because people wanted to know why some people were strong with the Force and others weren't.

My question was: who, exactly, is asking that?  Has anyone in this thread *ever* spoken with someone who was consumed by curiosity over why Luke Skywalker could make a good Jedi, but Mon Mothma didn't?

Since when did Windu be so powerful as to beat down a Sith Lord so easily?

I'd recommend watching the first volume of Clone Wars if you get a chance.  Mace Windu is no slouch.

-Autistic Angel

Yes: Spore.

-Autistic Angel

Phase out Simpsons....

I think you misspelled the word "throw."

-Autistic Angel

"The Force reduced to bacteria" is also a very inaccurate description of what midichlorians are. Midichlorians do not create the Force.

But they do channel it and grant the host organism a sensitivity to the Force.

Is there any reason why a Jedi couldn't just give a blood transfusion to someone else and create a new Force-wielder?  After all, if Jedi are typically recruited as small children and are forbidden from marriage or procreation, they've got to have *some* way to reproduce.

-Autistic Angel

How is news from the internet outdated over that of a published magazine?

I think he meant, "Here is some interesting, but perhaps outdated news: the new EGM has an article...."

In other words, the EGM article is interesting but outdated, not the reports coming out of E3.

-Autistic Angel

[**** SPOILERS BELOW ****]

It seems to me that in the years between Episode II and III, Hayden Christensen successfully evolved from the worst actor on the set to being one of the best.  Even Ewan McGregor sounded pretty flat much of the time, and although I think Obi Wan was supposed to be struggling to maintain his Jedi training and control his emotions, McGregor didn't pull this off nearly as well as Christensen.

As for Natalie Portman, I don't think she could have been worse unless she'd literally delivered her lines by telephone.  While on a shopping trip.

The movie was pretty good besides that.  The only thing that bothered me was how, at the end of the film, all the characters seemed to just accept that they'd arrived exactly where they were supposed to be.  Considering how drastically the galaxy had changed in just a few weeks, I would have expected even a jedi to be a little more shell-shocked.

**** SPOILERS BELOW ****






I also thought one of the best moments in the film was when, during the execution of Order 66 on other worlds, Yoda suddenly dropped his cane and almost fell to his knees from the disturbances in the force.

-Autistic Angel

I'd also love to see a modern day remake of X-Com.  That game remains incredibly fun to this day -- the gameplay mechanics are so solid, I can't understand why the formula has never been successfully duplicated.

-Autistic Angel

D'oh!

After thinking about it last night, I was just coming here to vote for the Sands of Time trailer; EddieA beat me to it.

I've also got to mention the Halo 2 demonstration footage that was released in June of 2003 -- the 8-minute one that had the player beating back a Covenant assault, stealing an enemy Ghost from its driver, and ended with Master Chief facing down a batallion of plasma lance-wielding Elites.  Though it's not technically a trailer, it got me way more interested in playing the game than any other footage they ever put together.

-Autistic Angel

What if Kate winds up being the true villain? Considering that with last week's episode pretty much everything "good" she's done could be considered a means to her escaping, then what if everything she does and tries is just for the sake of her getting away from everyone? Hmmm...

This is not the first time I've heard this sort of comment -- that this was the episode that "proved Kate is evil" -- but I don't really get it.  If anything, this episode proved to me that Kate isn't quite as evil as I though she was.

Prior to this episode, I was convinced Kate was an out-and-out sociopath so divorced from emotion or humanity that she was not only willing, but anxious to manipulate other people into serving her purposes.  Now it turns out that in her private moments, such as when she was in the car crying by herself, or when she risked her own freedom to see her mother for no discernable purpose, that shows a much softer, more human side of her than I've seen up to this point.

-Autistic Angel

According to the presentation, the Nintendo Revolution will be fully backwards compatible with the GameCube.

-Autistic Angel

Yeah, but....

Not to mention the fact that refusing treatment has absolutely nothing to do with sealing our border, now does it.

So you'd like us to believe that when you titled this thread, "Your Tax Dollars At Work,' quipped, "Shouldn't we be billing Mexico for this?" and linked to an article about how the federal government is going to begin helping hospitals with the financial burden of providing emergency medical care, you were *not* complaining about your tax dollars being used to save non-American lives?

The simple fact is that "your tax dollars" are used to save non-American lives all the time.  Compare the $10 billion figure in your news articles to the cost of wars throughout history, or the amount of money spent every year by the United States in relief operations around the world.  The U.S. has a long, proud history of stepping in on behalf of the famine, disease, or war-stricken people around the world, but as loudly as the conservatives rail against operations in Kosovo or the Sudan, they're never as comfortable as when they're screaming bloody murder about providing assistance to the people in our own country.

If you want to complain about the financial costs of illegal immigration, it's in your own best interest to focus on the conversation on illegal immigrants getting significant breaks on their college tuitions or suing the federal government for not providing enough water stations for people illegally crossing the border.  Choosing to grouse about "your tax dollars" being used to help out hospitals who are providing life-saving assistance to poor people -- illegal or not -- only opens another yawning hole in the self-aggrandizing Christian conservative "Culture Of Life" schtick.

-Autistic Angel

Although the new theme looks pretty cool, I'm enthused just to have word of another RTS from the team that made Rise of Nations.  That's such an incredibly well-balanced and fun game, they could have announced a game that pits the Poopitrons vs. the Vomitorians and I'd be interested.

-Autistic Angel

That's very cute. It's also not working. No one is afraid of being called names just because they want the border sealed off. You're going to have to try a new tactic, but if sarcasm is all you have, I guess you might as well throw it out there, out of desperation.

Then accept this as absolute sincerity: I strongly support your right, and the right of every other compassionate conservative to openly complain about how people should be denied access to emergency medical care.

-Autistic Angel

One of my favorite lines from Attack of the Clones is when, in the thick of the opening battle on Geonosis, Yoda cries out, "Around the survivors, a perimeter create!"  Super-obedient clone troopers or not, you're just waiting for one of them to go, "What?!?  I can't understand you; try talking f-o-r-w-a-r-d-s!"

-Autistic Angel

i had my medical school graduation ceremony on sunday and it's hard to believe all those years of schooling are really over. even worse, everyone wants to keep calling me 'doctor' now

Well, if I've learned anything about life after medical school from watching Grey's Anatomy, I think it's safe to say that your life from this point forward will be dominated by snappy dialogue, fascinating medical mysteries, diverse and complex co-workers, and beautiful women who occassionally express their frustration by strutting around in their underwear for a while.

-Autistic Angel

I haven't read the books in a long, long time either -- I have much clearer memories of some of the later books in the series than I have of The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, but that was an excellent trailer.  I'll be keeping my eye on this one; thanks for the link!  

-Autistic Angel

If Rob_Merritt is so brainwashed by the liberal press that he actually feels *good* about the idea of his tax dollars being used to provide emergency medical care to people in dire need, that's great for him.  As for me, I strongly agree with Raven and my fine conservative Republican brothers that this is an absolute outrage.  America is the greatest, most loved, most respected nation on Earth, and we earned that place by taking a hard line against helping those who are too weak or too poor to help themselves.

All I can do is to pray to Our Lord Jesus Christ that our conservative leadership fights back against this wishy-washy liberal agenda and passes sweeping new federal legislation that denies medical care to anyone who can't provide proof of citizenship in advance.

-Autistic Angel

This game has been on my radar for well over a year now.  I'll be very interested to see the reviews once it's released.

-Autistic Angel

In their hands-on impressions, GameSpot was complaining that the game is much too easy:

The combat feels fluid enough, but the game seems remarkably easy. Droids die super quickly, and the tougher droids you encounter later rarely require more than a bit of Force power to defeat. In the few instances where we engaged in some serious combat against an opponent who could actually inflict some damage, we found it altogether too easy to just hold down the block button, wait for him to finish attacking, and then slash him to death (in a lather-rinse-repeat fashion).

-Autistic Angel

Or StarCraft: Generations.

-Autistic Angel

I wish they'd make another Castles game.  Stronghold seems like a pretty poor substitute, at least according to the reviews.

-Autistic Angel

I do remember that when it was first released, I read a lot of articles about how constrained developers were by the lack of video memory (or something like that) in the PS2.  Although it's obvious that many developers have been able to work around those constrictions, I've always wondered how much better the PS2 games might look today if Sony had been a little bit more forward-thinking in their original design.

I'm really looking forward to some confirmed information about the next generation systems.  If the rumors are true and they're on track for release later this year, it's going to be a very interesting holiday season.

-Autistic Angel

It's a good thing they established Jack's severe exhaustion and Shannon's extreme grief, because I wasn't really following the jump from "Locke lied" to "Locke's a murderer."  Actually, the belief that Locke was lying was based entirely on the realization that Boone's leg was crushed, and that could easily be explained if some rocks fell on top of Boone after his tumble over the cliff, so even the accusation of dishonesty seemed a little premature.

Shannon's reaction to Boone's death was handled very well, I think.  The way she tried to rope someone else into doing her dirty work, threw a tantrum when things didn't go her way, put on a big show about what a victim she was, and successfully made Boone's death all about herself in the process was *perfectly* in keeping with her character.  It's easier to write for cool-headed, stand-up, honorable characters like Jack than it is for spiteful, mean, selfish little trollops like Shannon, and they really pulled if off masterfully in this episode.  Maggie Grace's performance in this episode deserves special mention, not because it was some great new stretch, but because she was able to keep it all within the rather limiting boundaries of the character.

Is anyone else wondering exactly how Locke knew about the radio in the airplane?  He had to have been a hundred yards away from that thing when Boone made his transmission, and even with the windows of the cockpit smashed out, the sound of the whole plane shifting and groaning under the influence of Boone's weight would have made it damn hard to hear anything happening inside.

Finally, has anyone else pointed out the similarity between the beachcraft Locke and Boone found and the pewter airplane that Kate retrieved from the air marshall's case?  I can't imagine what that might mean, but I haven't any discussion of it yet.

-Autistic Angel

As I recall, Acclaim once had a similar promotion for the first parents who would name  their child "Turok."  According to the terms of the contract, I believe he only had to legally keep the name for one year after birth.

-Autistic Angel

The only thing I watch from G4 anymore is Icons, which is great and for half hour you'd think you're watching a worthwhile channel. I'm not sure why, but they haven't screwed the show up yet. What's taking so long?

The only problem with Icons is its sense of pacing.  For example, they'll spend twenty mintues talking Richard Garriot's design process in creating Akalabeth in 1978, and then end the show by saying, "...and then twelve Ultima games were released.  The End."

Icons desperately needs to be extended to a full hour.  Even if they refuse to cover some of the more rancorous events in the gaming industry like the less-than-cordial split between Richard Garriot and Electronic Arts, I have a hard time believing there are no interesting andecdotes to share about the development of those Ultima games.

-Autistic Angel

They are Klipsch kg3.2 speakers and they are not magnetically shielded. They sit right next to the TV and have never caused a problem.

If your speakers lack any magnetic shielding, wouldn't they cause severe discoloration in your television picture?  Unless "right next to the TV" means "3+ feet to either side," or unless you need to have the speakers facing away from from the television by about 45-degrees, I'm not sure they're as poorly shielded as you believe.

In any event, I agree with the others that putting your GameCube or PlayStation 2 on top of your speaker should be just fine.  The worst thing side effect I can think of would be interference in the A/V wires, but seems pretty unlikely.

-Autistic Angel

I dunno...I don't play on easy and I find the AI challenging on later levels.

I was only trying to test the effectiveness of units from later epochs versus their predecessors.  I'll freely concede that the AI in Empire Earth II is good, especially when compared to the blatant, in-your-face cheating exhibited by the AI in the first game.

Is that because it was on easiest, or a design decision regardless of difficulty level. If HERC's can get smashed by flaming leaves all I have to say is bleh

If it were due to the difficulty level, the advantage should have been in my favor and allowed my HERCs to win the encounter.  This is a design decision: although units look different through the different ages of Empire Earth II, they don't seem to function any better or any worse than their earlier counterparts.  Older games like Civilization II has similar problems from time to time, with World War-era battleships being sunk by a coastal attack from ancient Greek phalanx units, but they eventually addressed it by giving special bonuses to newer units whenever they were fighting older ones.

It isn't very "realistic" for a 23rd-century HERC to be defeated by a 2nd-century fortress made of mud, but that isn't really the point.  "Realism" doesn't mean a damn thing if the game isn't "fun."  One of the fun things for me about games like Empire Earth and Rise of Nations was in seeing my civilization and my military grow more and more advanced as the game continued.  Empire Earth II is missing that -- the changes seem purely aesthetic.

My opinion on this is purely my own; I'm not trying to convince anyone else that they should stop having fun with Empire Earth II.  In the interest of fairness, I should point out that although I've loved Empire Earth, Rise of Nations, Homeworld 2, and Total Annihilation, there are many other very popular games like Age of Empires and Age of Mythology that I haven't liked either.  

-Autistic Angel