Col. Kurtz

In New Zealand the two world wars are remembered as significant events in our history, although World War I and the 'ANZAC' experience does seem to dominate a bit in terms of what is remembered and celebrated over WWII, even though more New Zealanders fought in WWII (more died in WWI however). Our major celebration of wars past is Anzac Day on April 25th every year, which marks the day that New Zealand soldiers of the Australia New Zealand Army Corp landed at Gallipoli, Turkey on April 25th 1915. Not only is this event celebrated, but all wars including WWII, Korea, Malaya, Vietnam, and recent as well as ongoing 'peacekeeping' operations. It is a public holiday and many people buy and wear poppies to mark the occasion and to support the Returned Serviceman's Association. Armistice Day is celebrated, but not really by the wider public. Our involvement in WWII is generally perceived to be a righteous one, leaving our shores to help defend the free world against facist tyranny, and at the time it was seen as protecting the British motherland. Veterans are given a high level of respect, and there are memorials in nearly every town no matter how small to remember those who died overseas. Unfortunately an ignorance seems to be creeping over the country, especially amongst my generation (the young one). Many youths couldn't tell you much about WWII, and the education system does not help this. At lower levels of schooling the WWI Gallipoli campaign is taught, and is thought by many to be a sign of the emerging New Zealand identity, separate from that of Great Britain. Time is also given at the age of around 14-15 to Hitler's Germany and what it did and why WWII occurred. However, at no point is WWII as a whole looked at. I am doing history through senior school which is not compulsory, and whilst we did an entire topic on the origins and outbreak of WWII, looking at it from a broad perspective, we get no closer than that. The knowledge of the war I have learnt has mainly come through my own research and occasional television documentaries. Significant anniversaries such as the 60th anniversary of the Battle of Monte Cassino do get coverage, but that is the only real time WWII is seen in the media. I just hope that people will become more aware of past events and WWII won't just become a name and something that involves American soldiers fighting evil Nazis in movies. I had quite a few relatives who fought in WWII, but most are now dead or don't like talking about it.

I have given this game a try and have found it rather amusing having now worked out the basic controls. I'm still paddling around the novice pond in H.M.S. Audacity and have had a few scraps, most which involve too many destroyers, and as a frigate, I'm quite outclassed. The only success I have had is against the AI ships in the training mission. Perserverance shall win me through though I hope

Excellent for testing reaction times and judging threats when you have four targets pop up near simultaneously! Quite fun, Oustanding work

You can give planes initial speed by going into the Scene options at the top of the screen. In the Fighter Paramters section near the bottom there should be an option named Initial Speed (Knot) where you can put in a speed. You could also load a scene where the plane has already been programmed to fly. Its is also possible by right clicking on the plane and dragging the mouse. I have not discovered what gives initital altitude though. This 'game' definately offers some quite sadistic pleasure I modified the Aces II ejection seat so the STAPAC Thrust was in the range of 999999lbs of thrust, resulting in the pilot experiancing g forces in the range of 3million, and being accelerated to speeds of about 17,000 knots. Needless to say, he was ejecting far away from the plane in an extremely short time.

This line from the website leads me to believe that there will be combat action, but it will be done through some kind of flashback system whereby someone from the USO group will start talking to someone then suddenly the viewer is taken back to their experience, thus the series is not confined to telling the narrow story of just one unit. It seems a degree of diversity is desirable to the creators of this story and hopefully we will see this reflected in the final product.

Perhaps you have a point, but I suppose it comes down to the intent of the material. Using the Red Dwarf episode as an example, they weren't really trying to present a serious theory; the sole aim was to entertain. The creators of the game on the other hand have not said 'We believe it would be fun to shoot JFK over and over again and now you can have the chance to kill him as well', they are saying they have a constructive motive of dispelling conspiracies, but they have not chosen to present this in an informative way. Instead of demonstrating their technology in a documentary, they have turned in into a game where you get points for shooting an iconic figure. But each to their own in the end.

That was a most amusing episode. Just goes to demonstrate that you should never manipulate time, no matter how much you want Indian curry or you may just end up in a country run by the mafia and dine on some dead guy. On the subject of the game, I really do wonder, how many times can you kill Kennedy? If I understand correctly the game play revolves around killing the same target in the same setting with the same weapon from the same location over and over again in the hope of getting the 'perfect kill'. Seems to be a bit limited. The developers say they want to dismiss conspiracy theories, but is it really necessary to turn such a serious and sensitive occasion into entertainment? Â

Most people in the people in the Half Life 2 community seem to waiting for official confimation before celebrating, and considering past false alerts and what Valve has said about how Half Life 2 will be announced as gold, I'm personally still waiting for Valve or Vivendi to post an official gold notice. I am hopeful that the time is now though.

Talk about mass slaughter Someone call animal welfare

Earlier on in the week a mate and myself decided to go up Little Mt. Peel, one of smaller mountains in our area (it is 1311m compared to 2400 of some) and so we had a good day of walking and got some great views-worth the pain of going up and down some steep parts. This is the view looking out to the ocean (the building at the bottom of the photo is a hut) Looking down the north side Looking along the ridge that leads to Big Mt. Peel. Â Those are the Southern Alps in the distance, one of them possibly Mt. Cook-NZ's tallest mountain.

Only years of training in the shaolin temple can give you a strong enough mind for that. I suggest you study first, then buy the game. I might have to take that advice, the exams might only be secondary school ones, but they do impact my future. R: TW might be good, but I severely doubt it's going to open many career opportunities for me. It is due to the proximity of my exams that I am none to pleased that there is a possibility of Half Life 2 coming out soon as that is another immersive game that I am looking forward to.

I am thinking seriously of getting R:TW, it is available in New Zealand now and it seems like it is an extremely well developed game. My dilemma is do I want to get it now but force myself not to overindulge in it, as I have to study for exams in November. I might be better served waiting until after exams and school is over, and hopefully by then the price will have been reduced.

Excellant, I was thinking just the other day how nice it would to have a Figure 11 target in Flashpoint

While you in the Northern Hemispere have summer, it's winter down here and today it snowed.

Everybody loves sunset pictures and it would be sacrilegious if I didn't add my own photo We get some rather nice ones here.