Way, way interested in this.  Looks like it could be great.

$50?  That's awesome.  Now I'm just waiting for my email to show up.

The funny thing I wasn't even going to bother with Game Center this year since my travel is down and I have Center Ice at home... but at $50 whatever, I'll keep it.

I switched to GameCenter over Center Ice because of the lack of HD options on cable.  HD hockey wins for me.

Heh - I moved to DirecTV years ago because when Comcast started carrying HD Center Ice feeds, they went full retard and still only offered 10 channels.  The first ten channels.  One of which was HD, one was SD... so five games.  So any of the PST start games were... actually not at all available on Comcast.  AT ALL.  Idiots.

DirecTV gives me every Center Ice channel, home/away feeds, all in HD if available (so for some reason, not one of the Canadian broadcasters).  I wish I could consolidate on just GameCenter (mobile/traveling is great, as is the condensed games), but I found their video feed less optimal versus Center Ice when I was watching on my TV, which I guess is to be expected.  Also I found Game Center had weird outages last year, whereas Center Ice was rock solid.

Anyway I'm glad they discounted things as heavily as they did.

Depends largely on what the VM setup is.  I can play just about anything pretty much lagfree using VMWare fusion, but that's a pretty good hypervisor (low overhead) and I'm building a pretty beefy VM on top of that.  There's some dropoff in performance, but it's not huge.

If the host hypervisor isn't efficient or if the VM is resource constrained, then yeah I can totally understand it being unplayable. 

Center Ice details via Twitter:

@EricFisherSBJ
NHL Center Ice to be $50 on InDemand, $60 via DirecTV. Price is a break, even on prorrated basis, on old full season price of $172.

Ken I'm pretty sure there's a $10K federal tax credit on this thing too.  That may really swing your decision towards positive, so look into it.

$50?  That's awesome.  Now I'm just waiting for my email to show up.

The funny thing I wasn't even going to bother with Game Center this year since my travel is down and I have Center Ice at home... but at $50 whatever, I'll keep it.

I just want to know what GameCenter will be doing.  There's still no update from them.

Got an email this morning:  For your convenience, your annual subscription will be automatically renewed on January 21, 2013 at the one-time price of $49.99USD with the credit card you have on file.

Guys. GUYS. Why are you even arguing? Your teams are minor league compared to what Jeremy Jacobs is doing. He's giving THREE FREE (non-alcoholic) CONCESSIONS to each fan for every game in January. I'm buying a ticket to every game because there's no way I will ever get three free $10 hot dogs again.

The amount of terrible in the second half of this game.  Jesus christ.  So terrible. 

WOOOOO.

So what was better?  Smith beating Brees last year, or today's game?  From a stadium experience standpoint.

Stadium was louder (I think) during the Brees game because it was so intense.  But from a performance standpoint, yesterday's game was the best I've ever seen the Niners play.

WOOOOO.

Off to the 'Stick.  Pray.  For.  Mojo.

And to correct the misconception, this is the Kings ownership (AEG) and McDonalds donating $1M on TOP of their normal community outreach (of which many of the Kings are huge contributors of) as their penance for the lockout.  This isn't PR for business as usual.  This isn't the players doing their normal thing (which is great, btw).  This is the Kings going 'instead of giving you bullshit like email apologies, $.50 concessions, etc... we are going to donate an additional $1M to charity as an apology.'  This is by far the best apology from a team that I've seen and makes any qualms I had (I had very little, to be honest) of supporting this organization after the lockout disappear.  Good on them.

I wish every team did this.  It's the right thing to do.

Also, 2011-2012 Stanley Cup.  Hi!

The LA Kings, not only better on the ice than everyone else, but also better off the ice than anyone else:

@LAKings
As a thank you for fans' patience, #LAKings are donating $1 million back to the LA community.

Which also goes back to my question, how and why did it become "normal" to glorify the slaughtering of people but not the sex-ing of them?  Honestly I just think it's kind of illogical and strange that a movie like Hostel can show a scene of a girl's eye getting ripped out (and fed back to her or something, I don't remember I closed my eyes lol), and be considered "OK" for general consumption, but heaven forbid we see a PENIS going into a girl, or even more ungodly, an ERECT PENIS  .  Or how ridiculous it was a few years ago that the entire country went into an uproar when Janet Jackson' pretty little titty showed up on TV.  I mean seriously, I'm gay and I'm not afraid of some boobage, what is everyone freaking out about   

We are a relatively young country founded by a violent uprising of Protestant Christians.  It's been this way since the beginning.  One Nation, under God.  Second Amendment.  All here since damn near the beginning and that wasn't too long ago.  We are our past. 

Can someone just tell me when I need to book a flight to LA to watch the banner being raised already?  COME ON PEOPLE.

Probably have to wait for the CBA to be ratified to know whether it'll be a 50- or 48-game schedule.

Yeah my biggest nightmare is that it conflicts with a 49er playoff game.  NOT COOL.

There are no NBA games at Staples on the 20th.  It's possible!

For once, I am thankful for Lady Gaga.

Can someone just tell me when I need to book a flight to LA to watch the banner being raised already?  COME ON PEOPLE.

Probably have to wait for the CBA to be ratified to know whether it'll be a 50- or 48-game schedule.

Yeah my biggest nightmare is that it conflicts with a 49er playoff game.  NOT COOL.

Can someone just tell me when I need to book a flight to LA to watch the banner being raised already?  COME ON PEOPLE.

You've clearly not met Origin's mentally disabled cousin, uPlay. 

I've always been of the perspective that the used games market is stealing from the developers and publishers. I dont want to open a can of worms, that is just my opinion. When I briefly worked at a GameStop back in the day, I always felt bad at how many times we churned those used copies of various games, especially when you are instructed to drive customers to the used games.

IMHO, used game shops should pass on a portion of those profits to the developer. every time I see a person sell Call of Duty X to GameStop for $25 credit, and then 30 seconds later the Gamestop is selling it used for a paltry $5 discount below full retail, it bothers me.

I don't think it's stealing, but it is drastically changing their business model.  That's why we saw the online pass stuff and the emphasis on online gameplay as it was the way that publishers/developers thought of to recuperate their losses from the huge increase in used games.

Candidly I think the business is going to continue moving down the path it is now:
- I think TiLT is spot on in his thoughts on how DD is going to roll out, since it is a way for those publishers to get more margin on their sales.
- More large publishers are going to fail.
- Very, very few AAA titles and even fewer that anyone would consider a risk.
- Lots more of small independent games that will be DD only.

Unfortunately for the publishers it does not seem like the market can handle a higher price per unit, so they're going to have to sort this out another way.

What interests me about this whole topic is how quickly it can slide into censorship.  

Not reviewing something is not censorship.  Censorship is preventing someone from saying something.  It is different from not guaranteeing someone access to a venue.  This is Ron's (or whatever corporate entity he represents) site.  The rules and restrictions he applied to his usage of editorial time and his advertising policies are his own to determine.  Ruling something out is not censorship.  Those denied have no guarantee of others providing them a venue.  They're free to take out ads in other media, print flyers, put up their own websites, and shout it from their office windows how great their game is.  Other actors in media have no requirement to help them disseminate their message, whether they pay for the privilege or not.  

Exactly.  The editorship of this staff needs to decide what items to review based primarily on what they think their readership wants to read.  They are not obligated to review every "game" under the sun... there's no time for that.  If Ron and crew decide their audience would not appreciate a Call of Duty game review, then they shouldn't review it.  They'd probably be wrong, but you tailor your product (content) to your market (audience).  

Thinking this is censorship is batshit.

Happy about a much needed bye week.

Without this site, I honestly would have no idea what this title is about because someone has/had already a priori deemed it not even worthy of reviewing based on what?  A personal moral code/standard?  That's as much a soapbox as anything else. 

Oh oh... I know a site where you can look up anything you want.  Let me share it with you:  www.google.com.  I'm pretty sure it's how that youtube video was found... at least I hope it was.

Maybe there was an interesting game somewhere in there or not, but a review would have given me an actual impression from someone I trusted.  Just as there are great games I would never have heard of it weren't for this site, a review of a crappy game could steer me clear from it (or toward it) as well. 

As far as movie "porn" is concerned, sure bring on the reviews - one man's porn is another man's action adventure lol.  Again, why is a violent/torture movie like Saw 7 considered "legitimate" whereas Tittyfuck 69 is not? 

Here's the thing though... the general audience for this site (I assume) has no interest in this game.  So why would the proprietors of this site waste resources to tell you that a presumably shitty game that has sex is, in fact, a shitty game that has sex.  The audience for that game knows what they are getting.  The review doesn't matter.  99% of the viewers of this site won't even click on that review.  It's nearly worthless.

Now if GT was Ron's Review Site of Porn Games, then by all means review it. 

As far as movie "porn" is concerned, sure bring on the reviews - one man's porn is another man's action adventure lol.  Again, why is a violent/torture movie like Saw 7 considered "legitimate" whereas Tittyfuck 69 is not? 

Because one has a bigger mainstream audience than the other, I guess.  Don't ask me, I'm more likely to watch Tittyfuck 69 than I am Saw 7, but I for sure don't need any website telling me whether either is worth my time.  I'd made my mind up on that already.  More importantly, this site certainly does not need to tell me whether either is worth my time.

Now I will get on my soapbox a little bit, and maybe this belongs more in the Meta forum, but I think this question even being asked speaks to a bigger issue I see with GamingTrend overall.  I'm not sure this site knows what it wants to be when it grows up.  What's the goal here?  I don't read the main page because it does not provide me *anything* that I can't get better elsewhere.  The staff, for all the hard work and effort, is really providing the same content as untold other sites on the web.  There, to me, is a lack of an overall 'voice' here.  Decisions like running this review or any other content should be made on whether or not they move towards the end goal.  The question is, what is that goal? 

Sorry I missed this thread over the holidays.  I have to agree with thFool - seems hypocritical to me that our society condemns sexuality in favor of violence.  So it's cool to play games simulating how many different ways I can kill or maim someone, but then we get morally outraged about games that simulate different ways to f someone?  

I'm right there with these guys.  We spend so much time on moral outrage when the media attacks a game as a "murder simulator" that is "corrupting our children" but often do the same when a game like this comes along.  It took violent games years to figure out how to handle violence well (and well a huge segment still seem to be made with a middle school mindset).

I'm cracking up at this argument in this thread.  While yes, certainly our society is pretty fucked up when it comes the acceptance of violence over sex, that's hardly at all the point here.  The point here is that this isn't a game worth reviewing on any site that takes itself remotely close to seriously or has any idea what it's readership is..  It's jerk off material loosely disguised as a game. Are you saying movie sites should review porn alongside the current releases?  Come the fuck on.  Get off the soapbox.

Allegedly.

So, I just did the first outpost and I'm trying to enter a vehicle to get to my next waypoint, I hit E (PC) to enter the car I hear the car start up and then it forces me to exit the vehicle.  What am I doing wrong?

I assuming its a pc bug cuz on ps3 I haven't witnessed this. You're not holding down E, are you?

It says to hold E....  I've tried both

And shortly after my last post it worked out of the blue.

Welcome to FC3, the buggiest fun game I've ever played.

I'd also recommend you turn uPlay to OFFLINE mode before it causes you to rage.

Ok, let's pretend we ban all firearms and some sort of insane secret police action removed all guns from America.  The next mass killing will be when somebody chains the doors of a movie theater and sets the place on fire, or perhaps a pair of glass jars with nails mixed with explosives, or maybe etc., etc. etc.     Banning weapons is not going to stop people from doing bad things.  Banning clips of any size won't stop people from doing bad things. 

This is an argument that bears little relation to the situation at hand. You can't stop terrorists or arsonists by banning guns. I have no idea what even made you think we were debating that. What you can stop is the person who snaps and does something crazy, the kind of person who perhaps picks up somebody else's gun (or his own) because it was easily available. You know, the kind of person who has to use a knife in other countries because that gun isn't available to him.

Also, getting rid of guns doesn't require an "insane secret police action". It requires laws that keep people from obtaining guns, and then public amnesties all over the US where guns can be handed in with no negative consequences or questions asked, with perhaps a monetary bonus. Then repeat that every year for a long while, with big ad campaigns to make the average American aware that these things are available to use. You have to realize that the US is so fucked up on the gun front already that any solution will take time and effort, and it won't be easy. There would be new school shootings within the first few years that would cause a massive outcry in the media that the gun cleaning effort has failed. Any movement to fix the issue will have to be strong enough to survive that. The only thing that can change overnight is attitude, and we've already seen that happen with the school shooting. The rest... well, you guessed it... takes time.

Exactly.  I don't think anyone is arguing that it would ever go away completely, but with Countries that have gun control laws in effect, it has been reduced quite a bit. The big thing is with how Americans view guns in general, which is something that will need to change over time. I think it's the only Country I've seen that is so adamant about gun rights, with those owning guns so proud of it. Both the attitude and the perception towards guns need to change in order for the country to change.

I will never understand two sides of the pro-gun argument:

1) It won't solve *everything*, so it's not worth doing at all!
and
2) If we had MOAR guns, things would be better.

This two arguments are completely asinine and counter to the results in literally every country with reasonable gun control.  They are better off when it comes to gun violence and fatalities, period.

Now the argument that guns are a part of American culture, 2nd Amendment, 'our freedoms', etc... I am fine with those.  Just don't try the idiot logic of 1 and 2 above.  Please.  You sound stupid.

My personal feeling on it is "It's a product.  I review products.  Somebody out there wants to know whether or not this game is worth their cash" - it's more the community reaction I'm worried about.   The review itself will fall off the front page in a day or two and fall to obscurity with a news push or two.   I just don't want somebody tearing me a new ass because their kid read it or something.

Ahahahaha no.  This isn't a game.  The only reason to 'review' it is to drive traffic to the site via controversy.  Other than that it isn't worth any time at all.

I got 7 new reusable grocery bags, a Cuisinart coffee maker to replace my dying Mr Coffee, and a nice Seiko wristwatch to replace my dead Seiko wristwatch. It's a diver's watch, very big and manly looking.

Beautiful watch.

^^^^^^^Automobile's Car of the year

Weirdly I'm actually deciding between the Tesla and the Boxter you want as my next car.  The Porsche might win simply due to it's ability to fit in my garage.

Tesla Model S Performance.  Though I don't really need that... I'd be perfectly happy with a Model S 85kWH.

[(including if the ball lands out of bounds over the sideline or end line).]

Relevant rule in question:

http://www.nfl.com/rulebook/intentionalgrounding

Intentional grounding will not be called when a passer, while out of the pocket and facing an imminent loss of yardage, throws a pass that lands at or beyond the line of scrimmage, even if no offensive player(s) have a realistic chance to catch the ball (including if the ball lands out of bounds over the sideline or end line).

I just want to know what the f that guy was thinking diving into a clearly sliding Bradford and giving them 15 yards for nothing. Also Cortland Finnegan is a dirty piece of shit.

From what the announcers said (it wasn't shown on the replay) was that Goldston had already committed when he slid.  I also don't think it was a safety.

It was a safety.  The ball has to reach the line of scrimmage when throwing it away, even when outside of the tackle box, and the ball went out of bounds 3 yards shy of the LOS.  Since it was intentional grounding in the end zone = safety.  FYI - Bradford has had that grounding call made at least 3 times against him this season, just not from his own end zone.

Incorrect.  The line of scrimmage in this case extends past the out of bounds mark.  If the ball lands at or past the line of scrimmage even 20 yards out of bounds, it is deemed to be legal.  Replays showed the ball landing past the LOS out of bounds.  The TV crew explained this during the game.

However, it was not reviewable as it was a judgement call.  Regardless, what the actual fuck was Kaepernick doing in the end zone when the LOS was the 17 yard line.

By the way, I don't mean to take anything away from the Rams.  Their D played phenomenal and it was pretty clear that Fisher and his staff outcoached Harbaugh and the 49ers coaches.  But those mistakes are what cost them the game, and they were largely unnecessary.

Kaepernick is going to shit the bed.

Sure enough.

I didn't see the game but his stats - 21/32 for 208 and 84 yards rushing - look decent enough.

In this case, stats definitely don't tell the whole story.

His overall play wasn't too bad, but he directly handed the Rams 10 of their points and indirectly gave them a better opportunity for an additional three by making not going out of bounds before the 49ers kicked their last FG. 

Kaepernick is going to shit the bed.

Sure enough.

Got that one emailed to me this week.  I laughed.

So this week's game is either going to be a complete demolition of the Rams or Kaepernick is going to shit the bed.  I don't see anything in between.

No surprise to  me. Sports Illustrated is reporting that Kaepernick was told he is starting against the Saints.

If that's the case, I hope Smith is done in San Francisco and gives them the finger on the way out the door.  Has he been a disappointment as the #1 pick?  Sure.  But he's turned things around, he's done everything the organization has asked, shown a ton of loyalty, played well within their system, took the team to the NFC title game (and looked to be well on the way to doing so again), is one of the most efficient QB's in the league...and he's going to get benched because the backup played one good game (Matt Flynn, anyone?).  Oh, and Smith is only two weeks removed from playing an almost perfect game against Arizona.
 
Nothing against Kaep, but I'm going to laugh my ass off if/when this turns into a clusterfuck for the Niners.

Prior to getting injured, Smith looked like crap against St Louis.  I would go so far to say had Smith not been injured, the Niners would have lost that game, instead of ending in a tie.

7/8 for 72 yards and a TD is "crap"?  Um...OK.  A stat line like that suggests that he's doing exactly what the coaches are asking him to do.

St Louis hasn't seen good in so long that they can't identify it when they see it.

I'm pretty confident this won't matter that much as the QB in Harbaugh's system doesn't have to do much.  I am NOT looking forward to angry Alex Smith passing to Larry Fitzgerald next year though.  That's not ideal.

From Chris Mortensen:

@mortreport: 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh on QB starter next time out, Smith or Kaepernick: We'll see.Tend to go with hot hand.

If you take Smith out now, then there's no going back.  Talk about confidence crusher.  It be one thing if Smith was playing horribly.  He's no elite QB or anything, but he's done a decent job this year.  His INT's have increased due to him passing more compared to last year when they didn't really have any targets, and the niners were game managing him (which I still don't think that's a negative term)  But to kick him out now would really screw with his confidence should he have to come back as a starter.

Play with what you have.  Colin will be around, continue to develop him.  One good game doesn't mean you're ready to go.

I agree, though I think a 70% completion rate and a QB rating of 104 is better than "decent".  He may play safely within the system, but he's executing that system very well.

Well when you are throwing passes 4-5 yards at a time all the time, it's pretty easy to have an accurate QB rating.  But that's fine, it's got them their wins.  It just makes it a boring offense.  Two QBs, two different play styles.  It's just to early to switch just because of one good game. 

Incorrect assumption is incorrect:

http://espn.go.com/nfl/statistics/player/_/stat/passing/sort/yardsPerPassAttempt

He can thank his receivers for the extra yardage.

Try again: http://hosted.stats.com/fb/tmleaders.asp?type=Receiving&range=NFL&rank=231

That stat doesn't prove anything other than 49ers are near the bottom in YAC.  According to that same site, Alex Smith is #31 ranked in Passing Attempts, so of course their YAC are going to be low.  The WR's don't get as many opportunities as other teams do.  The stat you are looking for is something that measures how many yards did a QB throw to at the spot where the completion was made.  I don't know or think there is a stat that measures that, but that's what I'm referring to when the reason why Alex's rating is that high is because he throws short passes before the WR's takes it the rest of the way (YAC).  It's pretty difficult to not be accurate when dinking and dunking.

I wasn't criticizing him at all, I'm just pointing out that there is a legitimate reason why his QB rating is high. 

Either way, I'm glad the niners are succeeding, I'm glad that we now have insurance in terms of QB (first time in a long long time).  Each QB has their own style, the coaching seems to adapt to that and succeed.  But stick with Smith until it's his job to lose (injury or performance based)

QB Rating is an entirely flawed stat, but its flawed equally.  NFL QBs in generaldon't throw a ton downfield at all anymore because the chances of succeeding downfield are marginal at best.  You don't see Jeff George or Brett Favre at QB anymore... that type of offense doesn't exist.

A guy like Aaron Rodgers doesn't throw downfield much more (thrown 20 yards or more) than Smith does (25% vs 29%) and his completion percentage is just slightly worse.  Statistically the 49er offense doesn't throw short/medium/long significantly different than any other team in the league.  They just throw a lot *less* so the sample size optics appear to be different, when in fact they really aren't.  Stats say Smith is an above average QB with less opportunities to throw than other QBs. 

Now that being said, Smith should be able to throw the ball downfield with a higher completion percentage than he is because the Niners theoretically would get better coverage downfield due to their running game.  Rodgers is throwing downfield against a lot more defenders than Smith is, on average.

From Chris Mortensen:

@mortreport: 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh on QB starter next time out, Smith or Kaepernick: We'll see.Tend to go with hot hand.

If you take Smith out now, then there's no going back.  Talk about confidence crusher.  It be one thing if Smith was playing horribly.  He's no elite QB or anything, but he's done a decent job this year.  His INT's have increased due to him passing more compared to last year when they didn't really have any targets, and the niners were game managing him (which I still don't think that's a negative term)  But to kick him out now would really screw with his confidence should he have to come back as a starter.

Play with what you have.  Colin will be around, continue to develop him.  One good game doesn't mean you're ready to go.

I agree, though I think a 70% completion rate and a QB rating of 104 is better than "decent".  He may play safely within the system, but he's executing that system very well.

Well when you are throwing passes 4-5 yards at a time all the time, it's pretty easy to have an accurate QB rating.  But that's fine, it's got them their wins.  It just makes it a boring offense.  Two QBs, two different play styles.  It's just to early to switch just because of one good game. 

Incorrect assumption is incorrect:

http://espn.go.com/nfl/statistics/player/_/stat/passing/sort/yardsPerPassAttempt

He can thank his receivers for the extra yardage.

Try again: http://hosted.stats.com/fb/tmleaders.asp?type=Receiving&range=NFL&rank=231