Off Topic Thread

[thruthefire]

http://www.celebstoner.com/200901131218 ... r-you.html

[Paydro70]

What a terrible ad... the worst part is that it doesn't even make sense... it's not your actions that would make your mom cry, and passing out is about 1000x more likely from alcohol than weed... and why wouldn't you drive your friends home? You're just a dick, not too much of a stoner...

Now THIS is an ad that might be persuasive:
http://www.abovetheinfluence.com/facts/ ... prig-flash

[fatlever]

has everyone seen this already? i just had to make sure

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCglZ4KFPWg

greg paulus hate at its best

[fatlever]

http://www.celebstoner.com/200901131218/news/marijuana-news/what-has-weed-done-for-you.html

"i drove 30MPH last night... in a 55MPH zone"
"i watched 2 straight hours of infomercials and then bought a slap chop for no reason"
"i sat next to a really hot girl for 45 minutes at a party but i couldnt even say hello"
"i went to the drive thru but by the time i got to the window, i forgot what i had ordered so i had to ask the cashier what i got"

[Paydro70]

See, now THOSE are realistic results. Don't forget that that drive thru order was probably at least 2x as much food as you should be eating.

[Walt Cronkite]

Now THIS is an ad that might be persuasive:
http://www.abovetheinfluence.com/facts/ ... prig-flash

Ironically, this one has 404'd.

[Diop]

I've always loved my country and especially my city here in Perth, Western Australia, but have become more annoyed by the attitudes and justice system of this society.
I've now had enough and am totally disgusted and extremely angry over this latest failure of our justice system.

The attached footage is of a male Police Officer who is cowardly hit from behind with a flying head butt by some angry idiot. As a result of the attack the Police Officer has permanent paralysis to the left side of his body. Forever to spend his life in a wheel chair.

The 3 family members involved in the brawl were all found not guilty of any wrong doing.
Apparently the head butter was acting in defense of his father who was getting tasered as a result of punching the officer whilst resisting arrest. The head butter was concerned for his father's heart, even though you can see from the footage that the taser hasn't worked effectively as he is walking away swinging his arms. Further if you were so concerned about your father's heart, why would you be drinking at the local pub with your father then get involved in pub brawls. Why would you then fight the coppers when they arrived!

The footage looks pretty clear to me anyhow.

Ridiculous. WA has become the softest place in the world.

OJ Simpson should have moved here as he never would have gone to jail.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=747_1236920255

[fatlever]

wow. that is disturbing. there is no justification of that.

[e4Nf6]

Just wanted to thank whoever recommended Fallout 3. ( Too lazy to check) I've been playing the game the last few days and it is fantastic. It has all the depth of an RPG without the negatives like EP grinding and Turn-based combat.

[fatlever]

i wish somebody would tell the japanese that turn based rpgs in the mold of final fantasy.... ALL SUCK. i love rpgs but i cant stand those types of games. they are a bore.

[Walt Cronkite]

fatlever, you so crazy..

[countryboi]

i wish somebody would tell the japanese that turn based rpgs in the mold of final fantasy.... ALL SUCK. i love rpgs but i cant stand those types of games. they are a bore.

man there is final fantasy fanboy that would hunt you down Cloud Strife cos-play for comments like that...they are seriously about final fantasy...but i feel you...rpgs like that are not my thing i dont have 60 hours you need to complete them

[e4Nf6]

I too am completely baffled by FF's popularity. The turn-based stuff is the worst. Attack-Attack-Attack-Attack-Heal, and repeat. Punch-out was more complicated than that.

[Paydro70]

Usually the biggest appeals with FF were graphics (one of the first games to use prerendered backgrounds on PS), story (FFVII in particular was phenomenal), sound (I think Final Fantasy games typically have some of the best music of any series), and treasure.

I understand the dislike for the combat system(s)... at best it's a rock-paper-scissors setup, there's rarely much style customization and obviously there's no real strategy or twitch skills involved. That hasn't prevented me from enjoying my time with every one of the games. I mean, Fallout 3's combat isn't exactly riveting after a certain point (aim for head, shoot at head, watch head explode) assuming you built your character to be good at shooting people. The main appeal of that game is exploration and treasure... and a true feeling of moral freedom, which is relatively rare.

Actually, I wish nearly all games (other than puzzle/platformer games or clear-cut twitch ones like FPS's) had more flexibility in how you play them... there's nearly always an "optimal" strategy to employ, rather than a stylistic decision to make.

To take Fallout 3 as an example since it actually provides some customization, frankly the only question there is what degree of handicap you're willing to accept in order to be something other than a gun-toting war machine (or, I guess, a sledgehammer-wielding war machine, but frankly that just isn't as good). I think it would be much better if a smooth-talker or engineer could actually get anything close to as many rewards as a shooter, or not be at a horrendous handicap even when simply running across the world.

Actually, sports games might be the most "versatile" in terms of player style (power run or spread passing? Run and gun or post game?).

[amcoolio]

I hate all forms of final fantasy. The only RPG I got into (in that style) is Chronotrigger on the SNES, but I haven't played that in years.

[Walt Cronkite]

I love RPGs. They rate either first or second most played for me along with basketball games. I also hate FPS and driving games, which are just soooo monotonous to me but others love, so I recognize it's a "to each his own" thing.

A good RPG has a slightly unique fight system (Square Enix gets a pass here..since they invented the Active-Time Battle system <character's speed & previous actions determine when turns are taken>) and a story worth following. Great animation/music is a plus, but often more "miss" than "hit". My favorites:

Secret of Mana
FFIV
FFVI (top 3 were my introduction to the genre with neighborhood/school friends so we pretty much obsessed about these games until we beat them.)
Chrono Trigger (Tweaked battle system, multiple endings, unlockable character)
Super Mario RPG (remember having a lot of fun, not sure how traditionally rpg it was)
Earthbound
FFVII (total package)

Then I stopped playing the genre until I got the new wave of handheld platforms and started dabbling in tactical/strategy RPGS. I tried some titles every now and then, but FFVII set a pretty high bar for rpgs in my mind. The 2k series, strategy and sim games and more recently (relatively) action rpgs (x-men legends I & II, Marvel:Ultimate Alliance and Dynasty Warriors/Samurai Warriors, KOTOR).

Final Fantasy Tactics: War or Lions and Generation of Chaos would get my recommendations for PSP, specifically GOC. Talk about in depth! It's more simulation than RPG, you have your kingdom and have to develop commerce and defense and those type of things while maintaining a strong core of generals. You need to keep recruiting troops and commanders because the cpu is pretty powerful and when they die...they're gone. No phoenix downs, revives, etc... so carelessly leaving your general in enemy territory or if they fall victim to a sneak attack or something all the time you spent developing them is lost. Terrible manual though, it's pretty long, but the game was so in depth that the developer had to make an additional downloadable 82 page pdf file because the tutorial is just a lighter version of the game. Super intimidating but also rewarding if you invest the time into it, never played a game like it. Another good PSP game was Jeanne d'Arc. It had some really awesome videos and the story/characters were really awesome. Plus, it's based on historical events! Jean, Gilles de Rais, La Hire, Henry VI, and the Duke of Bedford are main characters, IDK, pretty nerdy I know but I loved it.

DS recs would be Advanced Wars: Dual Strike, Chrono Trigger DS and FFTA2. Chrono is the SNES classic with new videos and a couple of dungeons. AW:DS was one of the better uses of the DS's dual screens. FFTactics Advanced 2 is the game I'm currently working on. I love it! Our hero, Luso, looks like me, so it's got the classic RPG "living vicariously through someone" thing going for it real strong. There are 300 unique quests, 6 races of creatures with 4-8 or so job classes each, a unique item buying system. They changed it from FFT, where it was to your benefit to attack your own units once a battle was nearly won so you could then heal them and get more xp, so that's good. Also, to make each battle more challenging there are different laws placed over each battle, so you're forced to adapt your gameplay so the battle system isn't quite as tedious. Examples include being unable to use a specific race in a battle, being unable to use magic, being unable to use basic attacks, being unable to do an attack above a certain level of damage... pretty cool wrinkle.

Anyway, Paydro pretty much knocked this one out of the park from a RPG defense standpoint, I just wanted to add my .02

[fatlever]

i give FF props since they basically have invented that genre, but i just wish there was a little more variety to the japanese rpgs.

i'm biased since i didnt really start playing rpgs until like 6 years ago. the first one i played was morrowind. i guess after playing a game that was so open-ended, so customizable, with some much treasure to be found, its just hard to go back to other rpgs.

other rpgs i liked: kotor, kotor2, mass effect, jade empire, sudeki and of course oblivion. i tried a bunch of the ps2 rpgs but never found one that i really loved.

[Paydro70]

Oh lord, starting with Morrowind? Very tough to go back to the Final Fantasies from there, they're so basic in comparison. I loved Oblivion and Fallout 3, for the reason you're saying... they're just SO BIG.

Quick update on Paydro's journey through Gamefly, I have now played through Bioshock and Dead Space, and can heartily recommend both. Dead Space is very similar to Resident Evil 4 if anyone has played that, 3rd person, and supposedly high on scares... after a while it got a little too predictable (Oh, a new room. Gee, blood on the walls, haven't seen that before... I wonder if monsters will pop out?). Still, a quality game... it's more like an attempt to put RE4 back into the previous games, meaning more fear and less action.

Bioshock was flat-out awesome. Loved the story, loved the combat system. If anyone has played System Shock, it's effectively a sequel to those in terms of gameplay (certainly not story). It's an FPS, so you have to like that genre, but it's a true standout within that genre.

[countryboi]

my game of choice right now is left 4 dead....playing that with 4 friends is insanely fun....i think i am going to end up buying this one from gamefly

[fatlever]

i loved bioshock. that was a fun game.