ViRGE wrote on Apr 3, 2013, 09:07:
Half of me wonders what Brock Sampson is doing in a video game. Then the other half of me slaps the first half for even caring, since it's Patrick Warburton being a badass. Between those characters the one-liners are going to be a riot.

Cutter wrote on Apr 3, 2013, 08:41:

Golwar wrote on Apr 3, 2013, 07:53:

Kajetan wrote on Apr 3, 2013, 04:55:
... why bother with such old crap only a few adventure fans from yesterday might be interested in?

I can tell you why: Because making a new Kings Quest is probably one of the most cost-effective ways to improve their reputation.
All that is required, is that Activision actually cares about its reputation.

They're sitting on a ton of good IPs they can milk for a lot more money. New Insterstate 76' would go over like freakin gangbusters!

Kajetan wrote on Apr 3, 2013, 04:55:

Blatz wrote on Apr 3, 2013, 00:33:

Dev wrote on Apr 2, 2013, 23:00:
I doubt they will, regardless of what they told anyone.

Yup... more than likely the case. Just like how they are being knobs and hanging on to the Space Quest licence and doing nothing with it... and sending out cease and desists.

Yepp, why would Activision do something with Kings Quest? This is small and therefore uninterestng business to them. When your bread & butter game makes 1 billion dollar in only two weeks (CoD MW3) and your other division aka Blizzard makes hundreds of millions each fiscal quarter ... why bother with such old crap only a few adventure fans from yesterday might be interested in?

Mr. Tact wrote on Apr 2, 2013, 10:58:
Yes, I admit it -- I exaggerated. May the gods forgive me!

But just one drop the gloves and fight it out prior to a game opening face-off is enough for me to ridicule this activity pretty much endlessly. Until the NHL decides to start handing out serious penalties for the fights that do occur, I have no interest in watching it.

Mr. Tact wrote on Apr 2, 2013, 09:55:
Hockey? Oh, you mean that boxing on ice. Yeah, I don't care for that either. Seems okay during the Olympics though..

Beelzebud wrote on Mar 29, 2013, 13:24:
I just hope that Blizzard actually ate some humble pie over this.

When Jay made the "Fuck that loser" comment, in regards to the man who designed Diablo, the thing that struck me was all the people who cheered him on and backed him up on facebook all worked at Blizzard. One of them even bragging that Brevik (the loser of with whom to fuck) never sold that many copies of one of his games.

This is a group of people that started their careers at Blizzard on third base, and thought they hit a triple.

No one bought Diablo 3 because of those people, they bought it because of the reputation the first two games had. When you take a close non-troll look at Diablo 3 it is an utter shell of the former games. The one thing they got right was the "feel" of the game. Combat can be fun. The problems quickly pile up beyond that.

The "randomization" in the levels is simply a joke. Haveing 2-4 ways for a map to slightly change isn't random. Being able to re-specialize your character at every whim takes any real sense of choice or individuality out of the game. Not only the item drops, but the items themselves just suck. They essentially copied the WoW item formula, and ignored everything that made items interesting in Diablo 2. The auction house was just the shitty icing on the shitty cake. They can express regret about it now, but they tuned the item drops to make the ah the only viable choice to get any upgrades at a certain point.

What happened to the game they showed in all of those early demonstrations? It actually looked fun.

If they do put out a paid expansion for this game, I will not be buying it. Nearly a year in and there isn't even the PVP game they hyped. Battle.net 2.0 is a 100% step back compared to the old system they used to run on dial-up modems FFS.

Beamer wrote on Mar 29, 2013, 13:14:

RollinThundr wrote on Mar 29, 2013, 13:13:

jdreyer wrote on Mar 29, 2013, 12:28:
Beamer vs. Thundr:

DETENTE

Not a fair fight, I have logic, common sense and economics on my side.

Well, it's a good thing you tie a hand behind your back by not using any of them! Haha.

jdreyer wrote on Mar 29, 2013, 12:28:
Beamer vs. Thundr:

DETENTE

InBlack wrote on Mar 29, 2013, 10:42:

nin wrote on Mar 29, 2013, 10:13:

I cannot fathom the fact that they believe players want simplicity over complexity when it comes to Diablo which namely Diablo 2 made it's entrance through all the customization and permanence of character development. Having multiple characters of the same class made for awesome build styles and planned paper work on character design beforehand. (not that I ever did that, lol).

Here, with the way that you can respec at will, anybody and everybody can have the exact same character build at any given time and where the hell is the fun in that? It's a bunch of cookie cutter toons running around. Blizz putting simplicity into this meant try to get as much money from all age groups and keep it simple enough that even the total unexperienced gamer can get in on the cash flow.

The theory that it was basically designed for consoles and the PC version was a giant beta test becomes more and more believable, doesn't it?

Yeah, yeah it does. Also, remember how awesome Diablo2's Battle.net lobby was? With all the little avatars which displayed items worn ingame. The large numbers of public and private chat rooms, the awesome public game system, ladder rankings etc. etc.

How the fuck do you BREAK THAT SHIT if it aint broke? I mean seriously, the only reason why they would remove that stuff would be because these kinds of keyboard + mouse friendly systems dont belong in a console game.

Blizzard can go shove their battle.net 2.0 where the sun dont ever shine! Motherfuckers....

Beamer wrote on Mar 29, 2013, 09:16:

RollinThundr wrote on Mar 29, 2013, 08:13:

Beamer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 20:02:

RollinThundr wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 18:21:

Beamer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 16:33:

PHJF wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 16:18:
Oh and this kind of stuff, like the slow fall of tobacco, isn't going to happen overnight. You can't flip a switch and suddenly everyone is on the path to good clean living. The best thing you can do is educate and condition kids and hope it sticks. This was just on CNBC:

U.S. soda consumption fell in 2012 for the eighth-straight year, this time by 1.2 percent to levels not seen since the Clinton administration, according to new beverage statistics.

Then again those putrescent "energy drinks" saw another meteoric gain.

You can't flip a switch, but you can lead people to it. Part of the reason smoking is so low is the taxation. The government didn't flip that switch, it's gradually increased.

Of course, doing that on unhealthy food is difficult. As you mention, it's socioeconomical, and food is a necessity. Feeding a family of 5 is a whole lot easier on a McDonald's Dollar Menu than on salad. And the bread that is sold in stores may be kind of gross with partially hydrogenated soybean oil, tons of salt and tons of sugar, but all that stuff makes it last longer, meaning less goes bad, it's easier to transport, etc., which lowers costs.

It's a bad situation.
I do think, though, that attacking the liquid calories isn't a bad idea. Coke just launched FruitWater, which they market as a healthy alternative to soda. It has no fruit. None. Not a drop. Hell, most "juices" in the supermarket are no more than 10% juice.
Maybe getting more strict on the crap companies produce and how they market it would be a step in the right direction.

And by leading people, you mean run their lives for them. Coax them to do what you think is right.

If consuming less complete shit ruins lives, well, let's ruin them.
Also, you're a drama queen.

It's more so calling it what it is, democrats have this whole control issue. Not sure why, maybe one of the key components to leaning to the left is have a touch of narcissism.

Oh, wait, I read "run their lives" as "ruin their lives."

I spent way too much time yesterday staring at monitors.

Beamer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 20:02:

RollinThundr wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 18:21:

Beamer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 16:33:

PHJF wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 16:18:
Oh and this kind of stuff, like the slow fall of tobacco, isn't going to happen overnight. You can't flip a switch and suddenly everyone is on the path to good clean living. The best thing you can do is educate and condition kids and hope it sticks. This was just on CNBC:

U.S. soda consumption fell in 2012 for the eighth-straight year, this time by 1.2 percent to levels not seen since the Clinton administration, according to new beverage statistics.

Then again those putrescent "energy drinks" saw another meteoric gain.

You can't flip a switch, but you can lead people to it. Part of the reason smoking is so low is the taxation. The government didn't flip that switch, it's gradually increased.

Of course, doing that on unhealthy food is difficult. As you mention, it's socioeconomical, and food is a necessity. Feeding a family of 5 is a whole lot easier on a McDonald's Dollar Menu than on salad. And the bread that is sold in stores may be kind of gross with partially hydrogenated soybean oil, tons of salt and tons of sugar, but all that stuff makes it last longer, meaning less goes bad, it's easier to transport, etc., which lowers costs.

It's a bad situation.
I do think, though, that attacking the liquid calories isn't a bad idea. Coke just launched FruitWater, which they market as a healthy alternative to soda. It has no fruit. None. Not a drop. Hell, most "juices" in the supermarket are no more than 10% juice.
Maybe getting more strict on the crap companies produce and how they market it would be a step in the right direction.

And by leading people, you mean run their lives for them. Coax them to do what you think is right.

If consuming less complete shit ruins lives, well, let's ruin them.
Also, you're a drama queen.

Beamer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 16:33:

PHJF wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 16:18:
Oh and this kind of stuff, like the slow fall of tobacco, isn't going to happen overnight. You can't flip a switch and suddenly everyone is on the path to good clean living. The best thing you can do is educate and condition kids and hope it sticks. This was just on CNBC:

U.S. soda consumption fell in 2012 for the eighth-straight year, this time by 1.2 percent to levels not seen since the Clinton administration, according to new beverage statistics.

Then again those putrescent "energy drinks" saw another meteoric gain.

You can't flip a switch, but you can lead people to it. Part of the reason smoking is so low is the taxation. The government didn't flip that switch, it's gradually increased.

Of course, doing that on unhealthy food is difficult. As you mention, it's socioeconomical, and food is a necessity. Feeding a family of 5 is a whole lot easier on a McDonald's Dollar Menu than on salad. And the bread that is sold in stores may be kind of gross with partially hydrogenated soybean oil, tons of salt and tons of sugar, but all that stuff makes it last longer, meaning less goes bad, it's easier to transport, etc., which lowers costs.

It's a bad situation.
I do think, though, that attacking the liquid calories isn't a bad idea. Coke just launched FruitWater, which they market as a healthy alternative to soda. It has no fruit. None. Not a drop. Hell, most "juices" in the supermarket are no more than 10% juice.
Maybe getting more strict on the crap companies produce and how they market it would be a step in the right direction.

jdreyer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 15:45:

RollinThundr wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 14:57:

jdreyer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 14:47:

This, exactly this. Banning outright needs to be preserved for those few most destructive things like heroin. Most things should simply have the price adjusted based on some kind of measure of the damage they do to society. Rice, apples and broccoli: 0% tax. Jam and butter: 20% Twinkies, Coke, potato chips, and MJ: 50%. Etc. Obviously how much these %s should be is up for debate, but no one doubts that "foods" like potato chips and Coke are causing a nationwide health epidemic and need to be reigned in. I'd put in place an advertising restriction on these things too, like tobacco.

We'll never see this though, not with our current government completely in hock to corporations. Get corporate advertising out of politics, and you might see some good laws. And while I hate the current trend in journalism "both sides do it" false equivalency, in the case of being coopted by corporate money, both US parties are neck deep, so you'd never get anything like this passed.

Ban everything ban breathing while you're at it. Because people can't be personally responsible to not eat potato chips all day and get fat, tax chips 500%! that will teach em! Big Daddy Obama will tell you what to eat, when to sleep, when to rub one out. Jesus you guys are really something.

Please all of you liberals, move to the UK or China.

I say ban heroin, but don't ban chips and Coke, and you interpret that as me saying ban everything? Also, Obama wouldn't be responsible for passing laws encouraging or discouraging behavior. That would be the house, and last I checked it was in Republican control.

And yeah, I'd prefer a junk food tax. Obesity related diseases are now the number one killer and the number one healthcare cost in this country. It's been proven that they are addictive, just like tobacco. And just like tobacco, they need to have their advertising restricted, and their price adjusted through taxation. Not banned, but adjusted so that their consumption can be discouraged and their price can reflect their cost to society.

jdreyer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 15:32:

RollinThundr wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 14:14:
If taxes continue to go up to the point where we have no middle class since Obozo is all about tax and spend wealth redistribution what would you call it?

The bottom 90% of income earners has had a salary increase of $59 over the past 40 years while productivity has doubled. The top 10% has increased $116,071. So, we could actually do with some wealth redistribution, thank you very much. I'm guessing you're in the 90% bracket, so you'd benefit from that.

As for taxes, they're lower than they've ever been. Given the state of our infrastructure and debt, I'd say it's time to raise them, especially on the wealthy who haven't had rates this low for a long time. It hurts the country when they don't pay enough.

jdreyer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 14:47:

InBlack wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 07:42:
Banning cigarettes is counterproductive, its a huge industry and there is a lot of money involved. Better a large tax and let people choose for themselves. Look how the alcohol ban turned out, production went underground and it powered one of the biggest crime waves the US has ever seen. IMO they should legalize marijuana as well. Its a herb, like tobbaco and could power another huge industry that would be very beneficial to the economy. Then they should tax the shit out of that too, considering the risks.

This, exactly this. Banning outright needs to be preserved for those few most destructive things like heroin. Most things should simply have the price adjusted based on some kind of measure of the damage they do to society. Rice, apples and broccoli: 0% tax. Jam and butter: 20% Twinkies, Coke, potato chips, and MJ: 50%. Etc. Obviously how much these %s should be is up for debate, but no one doubts that "foods" like potato chips and Coke are causing a nationwide health epidemic and need to be reigned in. I'd put in place an advertising restriction on these things too, like tobacco.

We'll never see this though, not with our current government completely in hock to corporations. Get corporate advertising out of politics, and you might see some good laws. And while I hate the current trend in journalism "both sides do it" false equivalency, in the case of being coopted by corporate money, both US parties are neck deep, so you'd never get anything like this passed.

Beamer wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 14:29:
We have no middle class because of low taxes, not high taxes.

Duh.

Verno wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 11:46:

InBlack wrote on Mar 28, 2013, 11:24:
Excuse me for butting in (no pun intended) into this argument I dont usually defend Rollingthundre's opinions but claiming that smoking costs more in tax dollars than the industry brings in is a rather weak argument.

When you add up all of the direct and indirect costs for smoking related health care I'm sure that's the case. That's without going into the toll it takes on families and the economy. I don't have any studies handy because I rarely care much for smoking debates but I'm sure there have been several done in NA if you get google happy. Keep in mind most of the money the Big Tobacco lobbies take in stays there. Health care in North America is insanely expensive, you have no idea man. It is not uncommon for people to get very sick and go into major debt or bankruptcy after being screwed by health insurance. Smokers get boned on that stuff too, the HMOs will use anything against you and smoking is a giant red flag on your file.

The government is pretty indifferent about the taxes, they will make it up somewhere else. The taxes also don't scale with the costs which continue to increase every year. I can't disagree with RM that the smoking industry doesn't have a very long term future ahead, it's being slowly phased out everywhere I travel. I'm on business in Canada pretty often and they don't even let them display cigarettes on the shelves there in many places, American tobacco companies have it easy.