P4: Gritty Reboot

So is anyone doing Portal 2? I feel I must stand up for the true game of the year if no one else is going to take it on.

My only problem with waiting til the 31st is that I'm sure people want to buy games for themselves without wondering whether their Santa is going to pick it up for them... Which reminds me, if you plan on snagging a game for yourself make sure it's not on your wishlist. Why don't we set for the 24th and see how it goes?

So apparently last year's Steam sale did not start until the 20th. Would anybody have a problem with pushing the date back a little so we get more time with the discounted games?

Between that and the on-rails E3 demo, I'm not holding out much hope for this one. But who knows; it could surprise me.

Hilariously enough, Dean pointed out this White House tweet earlier. Classic. https://twitter.com/#!/whitehouse/status/147396050519457792

Picked up a lil Kindle novel to tide me over until Christmas when I receive A Dance WIth Dragons (if I'm lucky).

I don't think it's all that crazy. A little too idealistic, absolutely. We already transitioned back to the gold standard once before in our nation (very different times though), and it's clear the Fed's current system of printing money and monetizing debt is an utter failure. He's pretty level-headed about the Gold Standard thing and realizes it would be a long transition and an uphill battle though. See his statements here for more info. For a lot of things, yes, but he will also get to veto lots of pork and unconstitutional stuff like SOPA and NDAA. Also, things like ending wars and bringing troops home he can do day 1 without congressional approval as the Commander-in-Chief.

Sorry, my mistake--basically packing up all military bases that we occupy just to have a presence like Korea, Middle-East, etc. I assume we'd retain key ally bases. And you're right that he's polarizing; the left doesn't like his reduction of government and the warmongering right hates his foreign policy and refusal to regulate homosexual marriage and drugs.

He's philosophically a Libertarian but runs on the Republican platform. Currently tied for front-runner in Iowa (the first caucus, a pretty big deal to gain some momentum). Some of his positions are as follows: End all wars and close all foreign bases immediately. Leave Iran alone. Cut foreign aid, including Israel End the war on drugs, legalize them. Control deficit by cutting spending (eliminate and/or consolidate 5 cabinet positions and departments) Repeal the Patriot Act and oppose NDAA (which allows indefinite detainment of US citizens without trial) Opposes SOPA and other internet and communications regulation End or regulate/audit regularly the Fed, the central US bank Make Social Security an optional investment for young people As Ethan hinted at, Libertarians (some of whom label themselves anarcho-capitalists) believe in a diminished role of government in the everyday person's life. Some are more idealistic and would want privatized roads, police force, fire, etc. Paul is a little more realistic in the sense that you can't just take that kind of stuff away from people in an established nation, plus often natural monopolies mandate government intervention. Some interesting facts about the Paul campaign is that they're pretty consistently ignored by the media, he's given almost no time in national debates, and he has virtually no corporate support--some 98% of his donations come from individuals. Yet he's tied for first in the current polls in the first caucus states and consistently polls nationally in 3rd place or so for GOP frontrunners. I don't agree with him on everything but honestly believe he's the only candidate who would be able to right a lot of the wrongs in our country.

Well he is a Libertarian, and that's kinda our thing. At the very least he's the only guy who's not blatantly serving corporate interests.

Ron Paul's the only one who's not an utter farce. His outside the mainstream policies will hurt his chance at the nomination but crazier things have happened in politics.

I'm still not sure if gesture is 'geh-sture" or "jeh-sture". I always mix it up and say it wrong. Apparently I also say bagel as "bah-gel" instead of the accepted "bay-gel". I found out when I got older that I pronounce quite a few words incorrectly because I read a lot of novels when I was in elementary school and so encountered words in writing before I heard them out loud.

That jacket really brings out the color in Voldy's eyes.

GDS is a good way to pass the time on a phone. I played it a fair few hours on iPhone OS before I switched to Android. Put these in the shopping cart at Sears today and wifey bought 'em for me for Christmas (but of course I can't play til then ) ($20) ($10) ($10) EDIT: Just perused Metacritic and apparently Myst DS is appaling. Ah well.

I can still write something up for Portal 2 by tomorrow if no one else writes it (I see a few people mention it but I don't see it listed as an article).

How many hours did you spend coming up with that one? And remember, this is for posterity, so be honest.

AFFC is in the can, and I quite enjoyed it. It was more depth and nuance and less breathless action going all the time, but I can see why lots of people didn't like it. The writing is all top-notch (other than the sophomoric sex scenes of course), and I found the new POV characters pretty interesting. The book lagged about halfway through, but the second half picked things up quite a bit. This one was more about characters changing for better or worse as the story slowly progressed. Spoilered for character references:

It is kind of odd that they'd do that... I know as Dean mentioned that they had already warned torrenters of this possibility, but the blanket mailing of IP address subscribers is a poor and unfair tactic in my opinion. I mean, mailing for their $40 or $50 is one thing, but 911 euro for one game? Crazy.