Scrivener

In one word: WOW. If the next film is this good we could really just forget Episode 1 ever existed. It's not like it really ties into Episode II or anything (Seriously). You get to see Yoda do some ass kicking too!

Lots of good news today! PS2 prices drop to $199 and Matrox announces a card that slaughters anything Nvidia may be able to put out for the next year. Seriously, Matrox. Whoda thunk it. If they can put out drivers of any reasonable quality, their new Parhelia will kick GeForece ass. And this comming from an Nvidia fanboy. Check the numbers: http://www.gamersdepot.com/hardware/video_...release/001.htm [ 05-14-2002, 14:19: Message edited by: Supreme Cmdr ]

OMG, Morrowind looks unbelievable! It's a bit different than Daggerfall, though. Not quite as deep, but close enough that to most people it won't matter. Consolidated a lot of the DF skills and added some new ones. Mostly armor and combat-related skills (Boo!). Lots and lots of walking and dying. Especially dying. Fighter's guild sics me on some rats for my first foray and then sends me on a suicide mission to kill some poachers the next. Game's crashed twice so far but otherwise seems pretty clean (Bug-wise). Runs a little choppy even on my demi-cray, nothing bad... but then I DO have every option on full with 4XS antialiasing enabled. Not happy with the Forest Elf modifications (Obviously inspired by the goat-legged Pan of mythology). In short, Morrowind is not only the best looking game I have EVER seen, it is going to take the RPG game of the year from every major publication on the planet. Except for the odd boat out that will choose either Soldier of Fortune 2 or Dungeon Siege *snic*.

Great bejesus, have none of you read A Game of Thrones? For shame. Complete and utter shame. Especially if you're into Wheel of Time (Or at least until book 5. It was all downhill on rocket-skis after Shadow Rising). Not to mention that rather than the downward-spiral that WoT is on, every new SOIAF book is better than the last. Really, those of you who liked Dune or Wheel of Time really need to check this series out.

Hey, hey! I'm an ultra-conservative yahoo (Sometimes) and I love my Soldier of Fortune! I always knew "Star Whores" was alright for the yung-uns. Hitman, on the other hand, completely inapropriate! BTW, wtf is "Resident of Evil Creek?"

quote: yeah, but it still becomes boring after a little while. A month after you "win" the game you will know each and every way the AI will react and act..all the stuff in the game, etc. Tac, did you ever play Daggerfall (Or even Arena)? Seven years after it's release I'm still playing and discovering new stuff. Morrowind may be smaller scale (In terms of geography -- there's not thousands upon thousands of square miles to travers... just hundreds) but it should be no less deep. Well, maybe a little less deep. They did remove nudity and climbing. There's bound to be a fan-made patch anyway. So I won't fret.

Bethesda still supports Daggerfall like it does all of it's ES games. For those of you who have it and can't run it under WinXP, just send [email protected] an e-mail about it. They'll send you a burned CD with a special install for XP systems... free. Now THATS what I call support!

I've been waiting for Morrowind since it was just another page in the top-secret Elder Scrolls Bible in 1995, about the time Daggerfall was released. I have been playing Elder Scrolls since Arena and have even purchased (And thoroughly enjoyed) both Redguard and Battlespire. I play all four games to this day, and even have a seperate Win98SE computer set up specifically for running those older games. I am returning all the games I've bought in the last two weeks since I won't be touching anything else for the rest of the year. Like it says on the Daggerfall box "Prepare to experience your new obsession!" Huzzah! (FYI, I have the Morrowind Collector's Edition, Morrowind Standard, Morrowind Guide, and Morrowind XBox versions all pre-ordered and payed off. Does that tell you something?)

Favorite books, eh? 1) A Game of Thrones (George R.R. Martin) 2) A Clash of Kings (George R.R. Martin) 3) A Storm of Swords (George R.R. Martin) 4) Dune (Frank Herbert) 5) Dune Messiah (Frank Herbert) 6) Children of Dune (Frank Herber) 7) Call of Cthulhu (H.P. Lovecraft) 8) Beowulf: A New Verse Translation (Seamus Heaney, translator) 9) Le Mort D'Arthur 10) Contact (Carl Sagan) George R.R. Martin's "Song of Ice and Fire" series get the highest marks I can give to a story. The books are not only believable, but by the end of Book 2, you realize that there is no real good and evil, but all things are shades of grey. Not to mention that the body count is very high, and lots of main characters get the axe, especially when you least expect it. Put A Game of Thrones at the top of your list if you havn't read it yet. (BTW, Book 4 "A Dance of Dragons" is due out this summer! W00t!) [ 04-25-2002, 03:16: Message edited by: Scrivener ]

BTW, Fellowship of the Ring has a good shot at my Top 10 provided that the DVD really is FIVE AND HALF HOURS long... including all of that oh-so-obviously-cut-at-the-last-minute footage. 11. The Abyss (Special Edition ONLY) 12. Ever After 13. Run Lola Run 14. Kung Pow: Enter the Fist 15. The Thing (John Carpenter) *16. Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring [ 04-21-2002, 16:25: Message edited by: Scrivener ]

Man, I was surprised to see that some of you guys like movies on my top 10. Especially City of Lost Children. I didn't think anybody else even knew about that movie! 1. Moulin Rouge! 2. Snatch 3. Death to Smoochie 4. Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels 5. Fight Club 6. Vanilla Sky 7. City of Lost Children 8. Evil Dead 2 Dead by Dawn 9. Army of Darkness 10. Contact

It's too damn addicting for it's own good. While it's no role-playing game (Not by a longshot) it's an excellent coop stat-based action fix. Whenever Gas Powered releases the editor it should have a nice long shelf life... at least until we can get Morrowind or Neverwinter Nights. There are no levels, zones, or anything... the whole world is loaded on the fly. Stats/skills (What few they provide, 6 in all) are raised through constant use. There are no distributable level-up points at all. Like Diablo, it's all about amassing the most powerful items for your stats/skills. The engine, however, is simply stunning.

It's one of those movies that people will either love or hate. It fits nicely in a niche with movies like Snatch, Lock Stock & Two Smoking Barrels, Fight Club, and Vanilla Sky. I, for instance, thought it was bloody brilliant. Definately will be adding the DVD to my collection. Check out my (only) review at Ifilm: http://www.ifilm.com/ifilm/product/film_re...080_3_1,00.html [ 04-08-2002, 13:10: Message edited by: Scrivener ]

I'm in shock. This years Academy Awards was the the biggest flicking joke I've ever seen. A Beautiful Mind best picture? WTF!?!? That movie was absolute CRAP. Like Vanilla Sky for idiots. Ron Howard? Didn't I just explain that Beautiful Mind was crap? I believe this Ifilm review sums it up nicely: http://www.ifilm.com/ifilm/product/film_re...2402992,00.html Man. Denzel Washington? OMG! Amelie didn't win jack-squat? Did anyone in the academy even see it? It was brilliant! IMO, this is a sad, sad day for movie enthusiasts.

I agree that Ghost of Mars was absolute crap. Gory as it was, I fell asleep both time I tried to watch it. Once at the movie, then when it came out on video. What's with the "Ra ra ra ra RA RA RA!!!! Raaarrrrraaaa!!!!" ROFLMAO.

Or just limit flight eligibility to agnostic, upper-class, white folk. That always seems to do the trick. *cough*

Most of the gore was "standard" vampires catching on fire. To tell the truth, I was a little dissapointed... especially after hearing a reviewer compare it to Peter Jackson's "Dead Alive." Heh, now THAT'S gore. Hehehehe. But actually, I thought it was MUCH better than the first movie. I mean, the story wasn't just pulled out of a shake-n-bake box. Nice. Anyhoo, I like gore. It's funny. [ 03-24-2002, 05:01: Message edited by: Scrivener ]

Maybe in XP1? Eh? [ 03-22-2002, 13:02: Message edited by: Scrivener ]

Yeah. I was hoping to find a loophole; some way around it that would let me use higher res images. Keeping the point size at 1024x512, for instance. *shrug* Heh. No buju, though. The darkening was just an idea. Fortunately I realized that it wouldn't work before I put any work into it. I give up. [ 03-22-2002, 13:02: Message edited by: Scrivener ]

Looks like Lilo & Stitch has potential to be the best Disney movie since Emperor's New Groove; and the second original Disney movie ever (Also succeeding Emperor's): http://disney.go.com/disneypictures/liloandstitch/flash.html

Well, I've managed to scrounge together some new 32bit textures for Earth, Earth's Moon, Mars, and Pluto. Despite the fact that they're still a relatively low 1024x512 @ 72pix/in, they look friggin awesome. I'm considering altering some planet textures to ahve dark sides. I especially want to see the earth with all those lights shining in dark. Hehehe. Still looking for a way to have higher res textures w/o BCM crashing, though. Check out what I have so far. Just extract these into the "..Battlecruiser Milleniumpte2stetex" folder. You might want to back up your old Earth, Moonp, Mars, and Pluto files first. http://home.earthlink.net/~oceanwaves/Planets32bit1.zip [ 03-22-2002, 12:56: Message edited by: Scrivener ]

Gongrats on the job, Jag! Here's to hoping you can make a career out of it!

Ok, I'm running into a wall. I'm taking a 10800x5400 image and reducing the document size to 1024x512 (Standard planet texture size). That works like a charm until I try to increase the resolution above 72 pixels/inch. Every attempt crashes the game. Are there any files I could tweak to accept larger-sized textures... say, 5400x2700 at 72 pixels/inch? I'm looking for it right now... but hopefully someone will figure it out sooner.

Whoa! Thanks SC!

I've been tinkering with some BCM textures in my quest to patch together some ultra-mega-high-resolution planet textures. I need help finding an ultra-high resolution satellite map of earth. So far, my searches have been unsuccessful. I'm talking larger than 1600x1200. If anyone finds one, send me an e-mail. Thanks!