themainliner In reply to rotane [2006-08-21 16:13:45 +0000 UTC]

Man, quality all!

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themainliner In reply to Helioth [2006-04-23 12:45:44 +0000 UTC]

I never pretended to be a gamer. I don't fall well into that category. I like games, I play games...but not with any commitment. My friend introduced to MMORPG them end of last year with Guild Wars. I was scpetical. I like it though, I also like putting together pick up groups and going out to get slaughtered. The chat banter can be hilarious. There are the inevitable 12 years olds with manifold acronyms and constant asl requests, but they're easy to ignore and would rather buy Althea's Ashes than do the mission. So we seem to natural avoid each other without trying.

My friend graduated to WoW a few months back and I followed since his GW advice was on the money. I'm not sure, it is very catoony and I find it more difficult to break into than GW, but I'm giving it a go to see where it goes...also the support Transgaming lavish on WoW for Cedega makes it easier to run on the Linux platform, I have had problems with GW. Medal of Honour is sweet, multiplayer is still first class, so is Enemy Territory. I'm old skool and new isn't always best so QIIIA (one of the demotests) is still my multiplayer of choice.

I don't fully understand your objections to Warcraft, I think it's to RPG purest, I like Morrowind, but I have mostly ignored RPG. Doom and UFO are still my favourite games...I always have an X-COM campaign running...I've been trying to start Fallout too, which is a classic I ought to play, before I die...

LOL

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Helioth In reply to themainliner [2006-04-23 21:09:02 +0000 UTC]

I like games too, just on the whole, they don't tend to be commercial success stories, I have to tell you that if you think morrowind and warcraft are rpg puritans, Fallout, baldours gate, the elder scrolls: daggerfall, planescape torment e.t.c will blow you away Before you die would proboably be a better time to start them, at least, before there is a nuclear exchange, so you can still feel like your playing a science-fiction not a docugame. Not that I think there will be a nuclear exchange anytime soon, I hope not...

You actually get to make real decisions in them, some of them have lapidary back stories and fluff and are more of an experience than a game.

I guess it's just art capitulating under industry pressure, the sooner developers realise they can make games which play to intellectuals and 'casual' gamers the sooner we'll get better games (again). I dont think playability or pick-up-ability is exlusive, if designed well.

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themainliner In reply to Helioth [2006-04-23 22:17:02 +0000 UTC]

"...if you think morrowind and warcraft are rpg puritans..." not at all, I just meant I'm not. They are my experience of RPG.

Oh and System Shock. Which is a fantastic game, both of them. Better games would be good. Playabilty is missing from too many titles and I'm sick or zombies and genetic mutants...I want to have fun not shit myself with F.E.A.R...I like Vampire and Rome Total War to, but I don't really do RTS...

You seem to like me better now?

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Helioth In reply to themainliner [2006-04-23 22:57:29 +0000 UTC]

Yes, well to be honest my disposition never really changed, until now (omg hypocrisy).
I was just having a laugh, didn't expect to encounter any real opposition

Can't really take much on the internet seriously.
So anyway, what do you think of me ? As you've proboably gathered, I haven't studied anything yet, being 17. . .
I also haven't read very much, I tend to do more of the thinking, hence not much to back my arguments up with.
Although I have applied to the University of the Arts (udk) for fine arts and philosophy.

I'm fighting my way through plato, freud (even came up with a joke. Patient goes and sees his cockney psychiatrist, first thing he's asked "Are you afreud of something ?"), Jung, Enneagram (very interesting), martin held (german philosopher) and trying to get into richard dawkins and douglas adams. . .
As I said, trying to think more than read, say more than speak. Read shakespear and well, literature, plenty of heavy stuff, all a bit obvious though really, as If they thought they were making the most profound statments and commedy has no place in their books, actually it would proboably do a better job at delivering. A lot of it really does just seem like common sense to me. Gawd, I dont think Kafka has any redeeming features, ok well, maybe one; he was disgusting.

No doubt people taking themselves too seriously or being economical with the truth will ever be too much of a rarity.

As for f.e.a.r, well, genuinely scary at times, I dont know. Shocking, most definately, but half life2 was as well, wouldn't you define that as good clean fun ? It's even modelled on the same engine. Yeah, system shock is / was great, what do you think of the bioshock rumours ?

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themainliner In reply to Helioth [2006-04-27 09:38:59 +0000 UTC]

Hey, Thursday comes round again...no that was a fortnight ago, now. I feel like I'm coming down off an extended long weekend, waking up in a strange, empty house. I'm rambling, must be tired. Another week of internal extremes. I can't take much on the Internet seriously. With the best will in the world, even if you tried very hard to represent yourself truthfully and accurately, you would not be able to encapsulate yourself or completely rule out misunderstanding or misinterpretation of what you've written. Even in autobiography a narrator voice is constructed by the reader slightly removed from the 'reality' of the author. As soon as you try to represent yourself in any form your audience will interact with that form and actively construct meanings, quite legitimate interpretations of what you present, that you had not intended. (See John Berger's 'Ways of Seeing ').

I was impressed that someone was actually prepared to engage with me long enough for me to actually have to construct the case for abortion. My contempt for all things non-rational and dogmatic is legendary. I make no apology for meeting knee-jerk intuitionist judgements and un-Christian self-righteousness religiousness with snarling inarticulate bile. Sympathetic and considered Christians and other rational, religious debate I've always welcomed. I respect anyone who can reason and argue. Lack of reading is something you don't seem to have suffered from. At seventeen you seen peculiarly well read. If you want comedy in philosophy I suggest Nietzsche, especially Twilight of the Idols'. Herbert Marcuse 'One Dimensional Man' is very heavy if you like German philosophers', also Heidegger and Hegel. You could also read Lenin's 'State and Revolution', I reject Leninism and any idea of a vanguard party leading the working class to revolution, but 'State and Revolution' simplifies the core Marxist principles, but be aware it also vulgarises.

Rubbish jokes made up by the author: How many philosophers' does it take to change a light bulb? What's wrong with the light bulb, you're the only one in the dark.

Diakatana, Doom 3, Half-Life, Prey...Bioshock? I still can't really grasp what the fuss about Half-Life was all about. It was genre gaming, not genre defining. For me it was just another Doom game, another FPS: Linear; level based; rudimentary puzzles; obligatory shocks and jumps. So many games hyped and 'eagerly awaited'. So many games not delivering anymore than yesterday's games with today's graphics and physics engines. In the last ten years I have played (by which I mean started and rapidly lost interest in) hundred of the so-called best games. The latest is Far Cry. Excellent AI, first class level design. Until about a third of the way in and the mutant experiment (or zombie undead if you're playing an id game) start assaulting in wave after scary wave...presumably, I just stopped playing. Doom 3, haven't completed the first level, groaning in the dark, trying to remember how to switch quickly from torch to gun (a masterstroke left out of Quake 4), followed by mass damage and running away. Half-Life 2: Half-Life on the source engine. The very best games are not heavily represented in the charts now that companies the size of Sony, Nintendo, Sega and EA are hyping their wares and skewing consumer habits. The best games haven't scratched the charts forever: Grim Fandango, The Longest Journey, Beyond Good and Evil, Psychonauts...to name a few 'recent' titles.

Need more coffee, is it Friday yet?

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Helioth In reply to themainliner [2006-04-27 16:22:49 +0000 UTC]

Hey, Thursday comes round again...no that was a fortnight ago, now. I feel like I'm coming down off an extended long weekend, waking up in a strange, empty house. I'm rambling, must be tired. Another week of internal extremes. I can't take much on the Internet seriously. With the best will in the world, even if you tried very hard to represent yourself truthfully and accurately, you would not be able to encapsulate yourself or completely rule out misunderstanding or misinterpretation of what you've written. Even in autobiography a narrator voice is constructed by the reader slightly removed from the 'reality' of the author. As soon as you try to represent yourself in any form your audience will interact with that form and actively construct meanings, quite legitimate interpretations of what you present, that you had not intended. (See John Berger's 'Ways of Seeing ').

> Hmm, isn't there a term for reading texts as they were meant to be read ? Hermeneutics.

-
I was impressed that someone was actually prepared to engage with me long enough for me to actually have to construct the case for abortion. My contempt for all things non-rational and dogmatic is legendary. I make no apology for meeting knee-jerk intuitionist judgements and un-Christian self-righteousness religiousness with snarling inarticulate bile. Sympathetic and considered Christians and other rational, religious debate I've always welcomed. I respect anyone who can reason and argue. Lack of reading is something you don't seem to have suffered from. At seventeen you seen peculiarly well read. If you want comedy in philosophy I suggest Nietzsche, especially Twilight of the Idols'. Herbert Marcuse 'One Dimensional Man' is very heavy if you like German philosophers', also Heidegger and Hegel. You could also read Lenin's 'State and Revolution', I reject Leninism and any idea of a vanguard party leading the working class to revolution, but 'State and Revolution' simplifies the core Marxist principles, but be aware it also vulgarises.

> Thanks, I'll definately check those, I recently ordered a bunch of books from amazon, "Gödels, Escher, Bach a continual golden braid" So much to read, I wish I had one lifetime to just read everything we've amassed but alas, I want to get something done as well.
As I mentioned earlier, I haven't actually read very much, at all, I plan on it but as of yet I haven't even finished plato's republic.
Your stance on atheists I can only agree with, although I define myself as a ignosticist / nontheist, When it comes down to it it's what you want to believe. The way I see it, we all live in our own matrix like world and the only reason we interract is because we choose to believe in our perceptions, infact, thats what I'm writing about at the moment. Jumping to demagogues, they will most likely always exist (in our kind of civilization anyway), as Socrates said "I know of no other craft in which members are elected in this way" perhaps this is their craft ?
Ahh, infamous dogmabile, dog's and dogma's mobile and bile of choice
I find diderot very sympathetic, a lot of french intellectuals actually, I can't help wondering if they were secretly all buddhists ? Or buddha's as it were.

-
Daikatana, Doom 3, Half-Life, Prey...Bioshock? I still can't really grasp what the fuss about Half-Life was all about. It was genre gaming, not genre defining. For me it was just another Doom game, another FPS: Linear; level based; rudimentary puzzles; obligatory shocks and jumps. So many games hyped and 'eagerly awaited'. So many games not delivering anymore than yesterday's games with today's graphics and physics engines. In the last ten years I have played (by which I mean started and rapidly lost interest in) hundred of the so-called best games. The latest is Far Cry. Excellent AI, first class level design. Until about a third of the way in and the mutant experiment (or zombie undead if you're playing an id game) start assaulting in wave after scary wave...presumably, I just stopped playing. Doom 3, haven't completed the first level, groaning in the dark, trying to remember how to switch quickly from torch to gun (a masterstroke left out of Quake 4), followed by mass damage and running away. Half-Life 2: Half-Life on the source engine. The very best games are not heavily represented in the charts now that companies the size of Sony, Nintendo, Sega and EA are hyping their wares and skewing consumer habits. The best games haven't scratched the charts forever: Grim Fandango, The Longest Journey, Beyond Good and Evil, Psychonauts...to name a few 'recent' titles.

Need more coffee, is it Friday yet?

> Should be, where you are, have some of mine
I think valve like blizzard is so esteemed because they polish and correct formulae.
Half-life is to fps as World of Warcraft is to mmorpg
Bioshock is the new system shock, cant be published under system shock though because ea nabbed the license.
As for classics reaching the charts, why, that would go against the "THOU SHALT not be CHALLENGEd" system.
We cant have thinking individuals now, can we ? Not now anyway.
Guild-wars in that respect is great, its opens new doors in thought.

---

I'm trying to find things to cut my teeth on, my parents, dont like debating anymore, they just agree after a while and say
"Let's not get to deep", I've tried making a chart for them deep and light time but they weren't interested.
It's like this moronic "Whatever" saying or "Just chill", I want to argue the point, passionately, until it makes no more sense !
You can chill when your dead .

I'm not a man, I'm a rocket !!

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themainliner In reply to Helioth [2006-04-27 18:54:39 +0000 UTC]

Wow...please don't quote me verbatim again! LOL

I'll come back and do this more justice, but let me insert 'Nausea' - Jean Paul Sarte while I remember...Plato and the 'philosophical classics' can fuck off...Hegel onwards. Ahem, but I would say that. (Oh oh - Democracy by Anthony Arblaster).

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Helioth In reply to themainliner [2006-04-28 00:19:03 +0000 UTC]

Haha, brilliant new quote.

I came up with something quote worthy when talking to my dad, he's slightly forgetfull.
I said: If I didn't have a memory I'm sure I'd find you (what you have to say) interesting, everytime.

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themainliner In reply to Helioth [2006-04-28 09:19:22 +0000 UTC]

I'm sure I've seen similar before, but this quote is all mine. I like yours though, I might use that...might, LOL WILL.

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Helioth In reply to themainliner [2006-04-28 12:44:51 +0000 UTC]

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Helioth In reply to Helioth [2006-04-25 14:30:13 +0000 UTC]

^never not ever.

'I revised my joke a bit, its now "There's no need to be afreud!"

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