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xawery

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Everything posted by xawery

  1. xawery

    European Politics Thread.

    Well put Lwlooz. I couldn't believe my eyes when I read it; if there's one country that has profited from the EU, it's Ireland. What irks me are the reasons why people voted no. Worries about Irish sovereignty as well as sheer ignorance were on the top of the list. This treaty is the first to codify the subsidiarity principle! If one's worried about independence, one should vote in favour of the treaty. What really worries me is that 75% of the nay-sayers actually believe that negotiations about the treaty can be opened again and that voting no will have no negative consequences for Ireland's economy. Well, if they think they can repeat Nice 2001 I fear they're in for a nasty surprise. If anything, Ireland is losing influence. If the idea of a political two-speed Europe (something I oppose) actually takes ground, Ireland will find itself at the short end of the stick. I am against a political two-speed Europe because it would mean a victory for the Anglo-Saxon efforts to undermine European unity. I admit it does sound appealing on a basic level, kind of like "don't want to play by our rules? get the fuck out of the sandbox then". But what good will it do? Sure, we might get more things done in the short-term, but it will cost us territory and economic power. The EU has always been a long-term project; the EU would do better to stay an inclusive club and exercise its soft power to get people in line. If we can get the British to ratify the Lissabon Treaty, anything is possible given time. And we have time... It's just like with the expansion of the EU. Many people (including myself at the time) were opposed to the idea; the EU should have consolidated instead of accepting even more members. However, expansion was strategically a very sound move. Given Russia's increased assertiveness, expanding the EU was a brilliant move of snatching away the countries which Russia could try to pull into its own zone of influence. No wonder the Russians threw such a fit over Kosovo; Serbia was the last foothold of Russian influence on mainland Europe. On an unrelated note: take a look at this CNN item on . Pure gold I especially love how text blocks like "NEW TREATY" suddenly appear square in the middle of the screen. Kind of reminds me of
  2. xawery

    ROMM_IA

    I'm consistently getting this error: So, um... what am I doing wrong..?
  3. xawery

    ROMM_IA

    Cheers Sickboy, it works like a charm! Great script Rommel! The game dynamics are completely different now:)
  4. xawery

    ROMM_IA

    Forgive my noobishness but this should be added to init.sqf, right? Let's say I want to execute this script for all groups in the mission. Would it be possible to replace the group1,group2... array with a list? In other words, if I put a huge trigger on the map which is activated by anybody and then use the list command: ...would the following work then?
  5. I always wondered what the Western Front would look like in RO's realistic setting. Just downloaded it and tried it; the idea is nice but the sounds are really poor and destroy the immersion, especially when confronted with the superior Axis sounds... Then again, it's only the first version, so I'm sure it will be improved upon
  6. xawery

    S.T.A.L.K.E.R

    Jesus Christ on a bicycle... You know, I find those images very discouraging. I haver really enjoyed OL because it makes you much more vulnerable: just a few rounds of any weapon will take you down, but a well-aimed shot will take down an enemy as well. It's kind of like the OFP trade-off: you die quickly but so do the enemies. Of course, you're usually outnumbered so the game is still challenging and rewarding - you have to use cover and your wits. But this whole end-boss business... It doesn't fit the game at all. The first time I came across Burer was in version 1.3. Back than he was still indestructible so you had to use a well-placed artifact to take the bastard out. That was pretty nifty. But then I got gang-raped by two bloodsuckers right after waking up, and I thought: "did the modmaker really want to shaft the player with this or is this just some error in the scripts?" Throwing powerful enemies by the dozen is just plain frustrating. Their strength lies in the fact that they are rare. The first encounter with the bloodsucker in the Agroprom was nothing short of frightening. If cartloads of them are dumped on your head, well... they lose their appeal. Then version 2.0 came along. Packs of bloodsuckers, pseudogiants and other scum... What's the fun in that? Burer has been reduced to a heap of flesh that took a number of clips and a grenade or seven before it went down. The whole "use cover, flank" routine had been replaced with "put your most powerful weapon on auto and keep that finger on the 'use medkit' button". No fun at all. And now your screenshots... Jeez, that's just depressing. In a sudden bout of masochism I read through some of the 600+ pages of the OL thread on the Stalker forums and it appears that the maker of the mod had intended it this way. Apparantly, he thinks that impossible=hard=challanging=fun, rather than impossible=frustrating=uninstall. It's like the godlike AI in ArmA 1.0: sure, the fact that they can kill you while you're 1000 m away behind a bush makes the game hard, but fun? No.
  7. xawery

    S.T.A.L.K.E.R

    Too bloody right! In version 1.2 you only got freakish amounts of enemies after waking up, but 2.0 seems to enjoy throwing humongous packs of mutated creatures at you every chance it gets. Allow me to illustrate When I started this game I took a little detour and went straight to the Dark Valley. I scored some nice weapons there, cleaned out the hideout and went on with the game (and let me tell you, it really doesn't like it when you take a different route). After the little talk with the barkeep I went back to the hideout to get the second electronic key. The place was still squeaky clean since my last visit so I helped myself to the keycard and went on my merry way. I jumped in the truck and drove to the oh-so-secret lab. As soon as I drove through the gates I heard the tell-tale howl of a bloodsucker. Before me, all sorts of nasty little creatures skittered across the road. I drove like a madman, rushing through anomalies before they could do too much damage. I took a sharp left and planted the truck into a concrete pipe in the courtyard of the second base. I got out, dizzy and bleeding. I turned around, only to witness a pack of seven bloodsuckers, a couple of pseudo-giants and an entire horde of those damn ratlike-creatures run straight at me. Naturally, I was dead in a matter of seconds. Still, the cacophony those bloody creatures made isn't very likely to leave my mind soon.
  8. Aah, shame, I'll be attending the Luchtmachtdagen (on my girlfriend's instigation, would you believe it?). Incidentally, a friend of mine works at TNO Defensie and is involved in all sorts of virtual battlefield thingymabobs. Chances are you'll bump into him at the VBS stand Have fun!
  9. xawery

    ARMA collectibles..

    Hey, at least an M accentuates the muscles :P Of course if one has a beergut this might not be an advantage... Anyway, an M is better than some XL you could fit two people in. Two people and their dog, possibly. It has always bothered me that most complimentary t-shirts come in XL or some other ridiculous size. Makes me feel like I'm wearing a habit... I'm thus all the more surprised to hear that some publisher has finally seen the light! Just to clarify, I'm a 1m88 male and on the muscular side, so I don't fit in your dwarf/female category :P
  10. xawery

    S.T.A.L.K.E.R

    What I really hate though are the damn monsters spawning around you when you wake up from the cutscenes. There's hard and there's unfair. You're so disoriented it's you can't do anything for a second or two, and that's plenty of time for two bloodsuckers to do you in. Incidentally, it wasn't until much later in the game that I realised I was running Oblivion 1.2 rather than 2.0. With a sigh of resignation I started a new game, not exactly looking forward to trudging through the same sequences. I must say though, the difference is enormous. They've really done a massive job on tweaking the engine. Now the days are actually bright! The AI throwing nades is a very nice addition as well
  11. xawery

    triggerattachobject

    Ah, that sounds plausible. But out of sheer curiosity: how does triggerattachobject work?
  12. xawery

    triggerattachobject

    Ah, never mind. Figured how to use nearestobject. Does anyone know why the object command from OFP was removed from ArmA? It strikes me as a far more efficient way of dealing with such scenarios.
  13. xawery

    S.T.A.L.K.E.R

    Plus it unlocks content that the devs had considered but didn't implement in the end, such as driveable vehicles, Burer etc. Another thing I like is that OL reverts all voice acting to Russian (you can change it back to English if you want, of course). That's one thing that really, really bothered me about Stalker - the poor translations and the even worse voice acting (although the quality of the latter is directly influenced by the quality of the former...). The grammar was mediocre but the style was horrible. Shoddy punctuation, strange phrases, inconsistent style (do they want American or British English?), ugh... It's a pity they didn't hire a professional translator (and if they did, they should ask for their money back). To be fair, I must admit there are some hard to translate words - I don't think there's a word in English which would properly convey the contextual meaning of "malchik".
  14. xawery

    S.T.A.L.K.E.R

    Just installed it (which is quite a bitch if you bought Stalker on Steam), and I have to say... wow. The sounds are great, the weapons are awesome (finally, a 9 mm pistol actually does anything!! ), the day/night cycles are much longer, the nights look fantastic (i.e. actually dark), the A-Life is really alive... I'm still very early in the game (haven't even crossed the train viaduct yet), but I've already had tons of fun exploring. Two examples: while looking for the spot where Nimble was ambushed, you come across one of his wounded comrades. It was the middle of the night when I stumbled upon him. I gave him the medkit and he rose to thank me. Suddenly, midsentence, he stops talking and whirls around, just as a shambling zombie emerges from the darkness! The creature is much faster than you'd expect. We pump it full of lead and the damn thing finally goes down. I turn to the Loner to continue our conversation, but I see he still has his pistol drawn. What the... I turn around and watch my torch cast vivid shadows on the bloody corpse getting up! In a frenzy of left mouse clicks we put another two clips in the zombified soldier (while it begs us to kill it in Russian) and the undead finally turns dead. Zombies are nothing new in games, but combined with Stalker's eerie atmosphere, sounds and dynamic AI (this wasn't scripted, it was just a zombie drawn to our flashlights! ) it got pretty scary. I loved it I then proceeded to the old farm where Nimble was kept. We cleared out the place (with the added bonus of wild dogs dropping by! ) and freed Nimble. I decided it was too bloody dark to go on so I found a nice, sheltered spot on a second floor, grabbed my sleepingbag and went to sleep. When I woke up (disoriented from the dream ) I heard voices downstairs... Unfriendly voices. The farm had been taken over by the bandits again! They were doing house-to-house searches but hadn't found me yet. Duking it out in the reddish light of the rising sun was great fun, especially now that low-level weapon actually deal some damage. A well-placed round from an AKM put a stop to my heroics, though All in all: if this isn't the dogs bollocks, I don't know what is. PS: Ah, I knew the name CosmicCastaway sounded familiar! We had a PM discussion about the merits of British comedy back in september 2004. Boy, how time flies...
  15. xawery

    S.T.A.L.K.E.R

    The link... it does nothing?! Googling solved the problem, here's the download link from megauploads (pretty ok d/l speed): http://www.megaupload.com/?d=Z7TEHTQM. The mod sounds very promising!
  16. xawery

    Mount & Blade: PC RPG.

    I would suggest waiting for a patch. The new version is great, but the influx of new features has also introduced numerous bugs, some of which are really annoying...
  17. xawery

    USA 2008 Depression

    Yes, that's a fine example of moral hazard: if financial institutions know they will always be able to fall back on a lender of last resort, why should they act in a prudent manner? Conversely, consumers will be less inclined to invest time into looking for a sound financial institution to invest in if they know that the gov't will bail them out if things go south (adverse selection). However, let us not forget the historical perspective. The UK is one of the most laissez-faire countries when it comes to the economy. Remeber Barings? When it went belly-up the BoE didn't lift a finger, amidst feverish cries for government intervention. Nationalising Northern Rock was the lesser evil; even such a liberal paper as The Economist agrees on that. With no private investor in sight, something had to be done to keep the 27 mil GBP from evaporating. It sounds paradoxical to charge the taxpayer for safeguarding his money, but Northern Rock will repay the borrowed money as soon as it becomes stable. Of course, this does nothing to alleviate the distortion of the market. A state-backed bank is simply unfair competition. What's really worrying about this situation is the role of the FSA. The Agency has just released a report on its own shortcomings in the Northern Rock affair. The supervision was peacemeal, the reviews infrequent and the analyses too optimistic. This is the truly worrying part: the FSA is supposed to be one of the best financial supervisors in the world...
  18. xawery

    Scariest/Most atmospheric game

    Hello all, I did a search before posting but did not find any thread that would address my question. Hence this new thread. I'm interested in hearing your opinion on what are the top 3 scariest/most atmospheric games out there. I realise that "atmospheric" doesn't necessarily go hand in hand with "scary": Red Orchestra is very atmospheric and tense, but not scary at all. My question pertains specifically to games that are scary because of their atmosphere. I always enjoyed games that kept me on the edge of my seat and were able to evoke that tight-wound feeling in the pit of my stomach. Let me start off with my own top 3: 1. Penumbra Overture. The excellent sounds, the gritty graphics, the evocative lighting model and the sheer sense of abandonment make Penumbra not only the scariest game out there, but also a very good game as such. Playing this game at night in a darkened room really gave me the chills. The innovative interface (where you interact with the environment in a realistic, physics-based manner instead of just mashing the use key) really pulls you into the (sadly ethereal) body of the main character. The sheer immersiveness is amazing. 2. Penumbra: Black Plague. The sequel to Penumbra Overture ostensibly offers more of the same, but is actually quite different from its predecessor. It's as scary as Overture, but unfortunately feels a bit rushed. Penumbra was supposed to be a trilogy, but due to budget constraints the devs crammed the remainder of the story into part 2. Still, excellent chills and very good puzzles. 3. System Shock II. Until Penumbra came along, SSII was at the top of my list of scary games. I don't think it's necessary to elaborate upon this game, as any self-respecting pc gamer should know it. The sounds, the theme, the environment... Outstanding. Bioshock was nothing in comparison. It's a shame the game is so dated by today's standards. That's my list. Let's hear it from you chaps!
  19. xawery

    Scariest/Most atmospheric game

    Yeah, sorry if I sound like a fanboy, but... well, I am one There's a funny story about the techdemo. It was released by Frictional Games as (you guessed it) a demo for the engine they had developed. However, it received so much praise that they decided to develop a full game with the same feel. Thus, Penumbra was born. You can find the demo here: http://www.gamershell.com/download_18128.shtml
  20. xawery

    Scariest/Most atmospheric game

    I seem to be the only one who mentioned Penumbra 1 & 2. Hasn't anyone played it? I highly recommend boths games if you're looking for some sleepless, dread-filled nights :P
  21. xawery

    Scariest/Most atmospheric game

    Haha, glad to hear it, although it seems some people didn't exactly read my question, or I didn't explain it well. No matter though, it's always nice to read about good games. I have to say though, of all the games mentioned Shadowrun is the only one I haven't played yet. Keep it coming! And yes, Fahrenheit/Indigo Prophecy is one hell of a good game. Terribly underrated though. Apart from the unnecessary sneak-missions the game was immensly enjoyable. Speaking of French-developed adventure games, has anyone tried The Experiment/eXperience 112 by Lexis Numérique? It has a very unique premise; I can promise you that you've never played an adventure game like this before. Try the demo: http://www.gamershell.com/news/44496.html.
  22. xawery

    Scariest/Most atmospheric game

    Ah, AvP is a very good example indeed. The sound of that motion detector picking up something was a pants-filling experience. So is Stalker. The game practicaly oozes atmosphere. Bonko, the moment you mention was what also what gave me the worst fright of my life haha. Funny you should mention Fallout 2 Kegetys, I would say that part one was vastly superior when it came to the atmosphere. Not scary at all though. Perhaps this will change with Fallout 3...
  23. xawery

    European Politics Thread.

    Merkel sent a clear message to all would-be states that Kosovo is a unique case and cannot be seen as a precedent. A while ago I had the chance to talk to the Serbian ambassador here in the Netherlands. Naturally, I mentioned the Serbian politician who suggested the use of military force should Kosovo declare independence. Boy, I've never seen someone try so frantically to convince me that something wasn't true, haha. Well, there were already some empty bottles of beer on his table, but still
  24. xawery

    Any modern space combat flight sims around?

    Yep, just finished playing, hehe. It's good fun, even though it's extremely basic. Too bad only a few people play it at any given time, hunting humans with my missiles is a lot of fun I love how you can have one of your larger ships distract one of the enemy's, while the smaller fighters try and take out its turrets. Those ships are LARGE, one almost feels like L. Skywalker on the Death Star, hehe. It's also a lot of fun to gather resources on an asteroid in a tiny shuttle, and then try docking with your battleship while it's taking heavy fire. Whee!
  25. xawery

    Any modern space combat flight sims around?

    At the risk of sounding fanboyish (already?!, I must say that the more I browse the Infinity Universe site and forums, the more interesting the project becomes. An MP prototype of the combat engine has been released, and although it's quite basic, it's nice to see newtonian physics at work. A 26-page document containing the background story and a timeline has also been released, and it's actually rather well-written. It creates a lot of opportunities for all kinds of political scheming, hehe. Then there is the EXTREMELY detailed development journal. The devs really keep the fans abreast of what they're working on. Half of the time I'm not even sure what they're talking about, but still Still, it's an independent studio and the game is being developed in the dev's spare time (although you wouldn't say that judging by frequency of the updates), so I'm careful not to get too enthusiastic. On the other hand, many good full-feature games have been created by independent developers or modders (Mount & Blade, Red Orchestra). Another glimmer of hope comes from the fact that the game relies on procedural generation and the dev team contains enough programmers (their site states specifically that they aren't looking for any more coders). I've seen many a promising project die a silent death because the dev team had plenty of great 3d/2d artists and whatnot, but not enough programmers to do the dirty work that forms the backbone of any game. So yeah... I'm cautiously optimistic.
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