I don't want to comment

I have been wondering if our world is fucking insane.
won't afflict you with the entire litany because I don't think that's why people read the things I write, to be exposed to surreal political views which are completely unmoored from reality. I would, however, draw your attention to the following article, which details a congressional hearing on the links between terrorism and, um... peer-to-peer file sharing.
John G. Malcolm, deputy assistant attorney general in the criminal division of the U.S. Department of Justice, did say there seems to be some connection between illegal copying and organized crime, in that many of the groups profiting from illegal copies are highly organized and can have international distribution networks. Organized crime often supports terrorism, he suggested.
"These groups will not hesitate to threaten or injure those who tend to interfere with their operations," Malcolm said.

Statements of this kind gnaw at the sensible mind, they chew on it and try to eat it. I won't even gauge the clumsiness with which these two incongruous concepts are lashed together. If you want to see triple-x, explicit evidence of corporations with their hands up a government's ass, working the their jaws like some malevolent Poop with chilling ramifications for personal liberty, well, there you go. Peer-to-peer file sharing and Terror? Terror? Do they not have dictionaries there? There's another T word you fucks might like, too - give it a try: it's called "Tenuous." The only people terrorized by peer-to-peer file sharing are vastly potent multinational businesses, gripped by the realization that they sell carriages in a world of bullet trains.

A friend sent me a link of this survey, at the Lucasarts website. One particular question asks:
During which timeframe would you like to see the most Star Wars games in the future?
The option I selected was "after Return of the Jedi ".
Now, someone tells me that this time frame is what they call the Star Wars Expanded Universe. Digging around the official site of the Expanded Universe told me a lot of things, and I did not have to read, like, thirty six fucking books. I came across Kyle Katarn too. For the uninitiated, he is the guy you play as in Jedi Knight, and Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast, the excellent sequel by Raven Software. Nice stuff.

Cool quote time people!
"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened."
--Douglas Adams

In the event of a nuclear war with Pakistan, Okhla should be bombed by all friendly sides within the first five minutes in order to calibrate their missiles.

A thought of nesting and perchin' sheep just cracks me up every time! Actually it's the thought of them all woolly and stupid sittin' in the trees and eventually falling down like logs on the ground. It's just funny...
Flying Sheep by Monty Python's Flying Circus
(A tourist approaches a shepherd.  The sounds of sheep and the outdoors are heard.)
Tourist: Good afternoon.
Shepherd: Eh, 'tis that.
Tourist: You here on holiday?
Shepherd: Nope, I live 'ere.
Tourist: Oh, good for you.  Uh...those ARE sheep aren't they?
Shepherd: Yeh.
Tourist: Hmm, thought they were.  Only, what are they doing up in the trees?
Shepherd: A fair question and one that in recent weeks 'as been much on my mind. It's my considered opinion that they're nestin'.
Tourist: Nesting?
Shepherd: Aye.
Tourist: Like birds?
Shepherd: Exactly. It's my belief that these sheep are laborin' under the misapprehension that they're birds.  Observe their be'avior. Take for a start the sheeps' tendency to 'op about the field on their 'ind legs.  Now witness their attmpts to fly from tree to tree.  Notice that they do not so much fly as...plummet.

Tourist: Yes, but why do they think they're birds?
Shepherd: Another fair question. One thing is for sure, the sheep is not a creature of the air. They have enormous difficulty in the comparatively simple act of perchin'.

Trouble is, sheep are very dim. Once they get an idea in their 'eads, there's no shiftin' it.
Tourist: But where did they get the idea?
Shepherd: From Harold. He's that most dangerous of creatures, a clever sheep. 'e's realized that a sheep's life consists of standin' around for a few months and then bein' eaten.  And that's a depressing prospect for an ambitious sheep.
Tourist: Well why don't just remove Harold?
Shepherd: Because of the enormous commercial possibilities if 'e succeeds.

Hollywood has a habit of taking good games and making totally crap movies out of them. Somebody in Hollywood thinks that gamers are stupid. Compounded by the fact that thousands of fanboys regularly lap up their drivel, this disturbing trend continues. And that is the reason most gamers do not want to see their favourite games as pointless movies. But a truly inspired movie, which expands the franchise, instead of just sewing together action sequences, is long overdue.
A game like Max Payne, though, would make a terrible movie. The thing is games have an edge over cinema, and that is interactivity. You interact with the environment and move the plot forward. The experience of playing games thus is far more engrossing than your average Friday night action movie. And it is precisely due to this reason that the stories in games are sometimes lacking when compared to cinema.
The raison de'tre for cinema is to tell stories. For games on the other hand story is just a piece that completes the whole, gameplay being the pivot. Other factors like atmosphere, sound and graphics do affect both mediums, but in games their balanced use is paramount.
So while for a game the story of Max Payne was pretty good and did engross you, thinking cinematically, it is just B movie pulp fiction stuff. There are games with strong plotlines (Deus Ex), or the setting and gameplay (Baldur's Gate II), or even the franchise and the atmosphere (Hitman) just waiting to be made into good movies. But unless a gamer or a guy who respects games, and by extension the people who play those games, makes these movies, I am not getting excited about any game based movie that Hollywood churns out.

hmmm, first post, fresh meat