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What, the public forum? Wouldn't it be better that we're tied up in the development forums than chit-chatting here?

obscurus: But you have just demonstrated exactly what I mean: people who buy the line that a vote for someone other than one of the two biggest parties is a waste, or people feel it is futile, and give up, and it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. You need to convince as many people as you can that, although it might seem futile, empty and pointless, voting is still essential. The status quo maintains itself by spreading FUD everywhere it can, but it can be changed provided people immunise themselves from their tactics by informing themselves as best they can. But it usually is a waste. I only voted because if he won the 5 percent he would get matching funds and I wanted that opportunity for a third party to happen, even in as weak a form as the Greens. Usually third parties in the U.S. weigh in at around 1% except for the oddballs like Ross Perot who got I cant remember. I had pretty particular reasons for voting then, and for not voting since then. So sometimes voting is a good thing and sometimes it is pissing in the wind. You have to study the situation carefully and you can still be dead wrong as I was. The majority of the voting that goes on is ritual, carefully spun pomp and circumstance. Now I have to state Im only referring to the U.S., which is a peculiar situation as the Imperial power, stinking with wealth and influence. Im sure in other places the value of a vote is different. o:The personal convinctions, morals and beliefs of politicians are irrelevant. The only thing that matters is that they listen to their electorate, and act on it. Sometimes, and never as they should, and always ready to slide back as soon as the publics eye is elsewhere. They are much more apt to respond to their wealthy donors, the folks who paid cash to get them into office not just some measly vote. Your correct that those things are irrelevent but I was not arguing that they are. o:They can and should change their minds, backflip on issues, as long as they reflect what most voters want. But the voters are fed crap information about issues, they dont read about these thing for themselves only the muck to be found in the mass media. Or worse, that and a combination of half baked websites they stumble across while surfing. Or they know an issue or two they want to see action on so they follow whoever is claiming to address that. Im guesstimating that your average informed voter is about as common as your average person who spends time digging into political issues beyond the chatterbox of popular politics, who reads history, economics, and political science books to supplement what she sees in the news and tries to form a general picture of events. My guesstimates are very very low. o: You can't complain on one hand that J. Bloe has weak leadership and on the other say he doesn't listen. I dont believe in "leadership" and they dont listen to us, not for long at least, usually right after they get your vote. o:Whether JFK personally gave a shit about black americans is not the point, the point is, he acted on obvious and overwhelming public opinion, which is what politicians should do. Agreed, the reason I mentioned it was to demonstrate the myths that modern Americans, especially liberal Democrats, hold about JFK and the kindly, baby loving Democratic party. And he didnt act on overwhelming public opinion, most Americans probably didnt really care, it was elite opinions around him and from overseas that forced his change of heart. Lynchings and riots were tarnishing the American image during the Cold War, and they wanted it to look sparkly clean to the world. o:When they don't, you should be worried. I am. o: Do you want to elect a politician to represent you, or to rule you? Given what Ive argued above, I dont really think I have a choice right now.

Proper, groundbreaking art springs from the mind of just one person, we're a team with very different ideas about whats is good and what isn't (as this thread demonstrates). Since no one person can make this mod alone, we have to find some sort of middle ground. Therefore this game is a mix and match of different ideas, not one pure artistic vision. That's partly why video games will never be superior to a good book.

Yes, I can. Rope arrows, water arrows etc are just as silly as a giant statue made of cats with their tails tied together. Probably more so, as you actually could build a statue out of cats (don't tell the RSPCA or PETA though), whereas magic arrows are pure fantasy. The player should have a minimalist inventory, which does not include absurd magic arrows or any other paraphenalia that an even half-way real Thief wouldn't carry. Revitalise art damit. Revitalise! *shakes fist angrily*

If we wanted to be really innovatoive we could build a giant statue made of cats with their tails tied together. But this is a video game, and one heavily inspired by another video game, so you can't really expect us to revitalize art as we know it.

So you have bits of crusty jelly all over the wall, torch and floor instead of some water? I see puddles of water on the floor every now again, my first instinct is not that someone has broken in, but that it's been raining/pipes leaking/etcetra. If I saw boiled animals splattered liberally all over a wall I'd be a wee bit more suspicious. Prove it. Take some haggis, attach an arrow to it and test it out. Hear the wet, sticky slap of all that goo as it hits the torch, and the blubbery fart as the sack rips open and all that yummy jelly sucks its way down into a big, nasty puddle. Then try it with a water balloon. My opinion counts because I have mastered the art of rational discourse. No matter how many models you make, if you sound like a gibbering fool people won't listen to you. Personally I prefer good sneaking gameplay and AI that act realistically to pointless tests of luck/skill. If I recall correctly some game called Thief had water crystals, but since this isn't that game our water can be stored in any anything we sit fit. The 'essence' of magic, eh? Your point being? It's fantasy; magic is there if we really need it. It's holy water. What does water have to do with it? Um, um, I can't think... * falls over from cognitive exhaustion*

The good thing about this thread is that it shows those who don't have access to the private forums exactly what happens to every single thread within said private forums.

That's the worst critique of an idea in the entire history of the universe. 'Uhh...it wouldn't work because...ummm...like, you might not hit it right and stuff' The idea works, the accuracy is up to the skill of the archer.

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showtopic=2052

A few comments about elections in the U.S... I do not agree with the argument that that U.S. voters are "responsible" for their elected officials or that those who did not vote against Bush and his filth "allowed" him to win. Here are a few reasons why: Such arguments assume that those being held responsible for these actions had access to clear, accurate information about the people running for office. this is not even remotely the case. ++HUndreds of millions of dollars++ are spent spinning stories and myths about candidates, armies of professional PR flacks, image consultants, professional liars, lawyers, focus group researchers, necromancers, celebrities, and common folk are hired or borrowed to spin the image of these people in the publics mind. Would you hold an individual responsible for doing something wrong when he or she has been lied to repeatedly about that action? The same standard has to be applied here. The average American is not extremely literate by the standards of other industrialized nations. they tend to get their news from one or two corporate owned outlets and the majority have no inkling or inclination to trust alternative sources. Remember the vast majority of households in the u.s. have no internet access at home too. So where do they go for news? The local newspaper, generally parochial in outlook and reaction ary or the boob tube, to sum up, Fox News or MSNBC. These are organs of the status quo, you will not find challenging, objective information here. As to the notion that a not voting for Bush means you helped him win, consider that the 2000 election was stolen and the 2004 election had craploads of suspicious problems plauging it. I did not vote for Bush, nor did I vote for the other pro-war candidate, Kerry. Oh, thats right, he changed his pro-war stance after finding out how unpopular the war was. Now thats backbone! I used my political energies that year to demonstrate time and again the bankruptcy of our political process, with its Good Cop/Bad Cop split between Dems and Reps, its incredibly high $$$ demands to runa campaign, its bonds to the corporate world. I successfully convinced one person, my fiancee, that voting is an empty act. Forward the Revolution! I dont think ALL voting or elections are bogus, but the presidential race is more the stuff of beauty contests rather than the will of the people incarnate. BTW did you all know about the Talk Show Host effect, political scientists at Princeton have determined that many people assume the opinions and positions about politics that their favorite talk show hosts have. Yes, thats right, their voting is effected by what David Letterman or Leno told them to laugh at the night before. Ahhh, the rational mind at work! Most folks saw the logic of my arguments but being Americans could not just "not do anything" as several of them put it, the concept of productive inaction being foreign to our culture. So they went and voted, and thats fine too, either course of action would have changed nothing of major importance. I was more interested in winning hearts and minds to my point of view. Now its true that Kerrys regime may have been a little bit prettier on the surface than the Bushies, but history has shown that democrats are every bit as bloodthirsty and ruthless as leaders as Repubs. Remember, it was Dems that got us into Vietnam (and who along with Rep. Richard Nixon kept us there for 10 years!!!) and Bosnia and it was Clinton that continued the murderous bombing and sanctions against the Iraqis AFTER the Gulf War I that claimed around a millino Iraqi lives. So my question was then and still is Why should I partake in a farcifal political event, a religious ritual, when I can engage in real politics by discussing the truth and lies of the system itself? Voting in a world dominated by wealth and power is not a tool of political freedom, its a tool of political control to keep the Beast lumbering on.

I was thinking either 1024x1024 or 2048x2048, you will never walk on this terrain or come into close contact with; it's a distance art feature.

We already have a pretty comprehensive list, broken into reasonable stages. Any animations we come up with that aren't there can be added to the list. http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showtopic=1650

Then I suggest you go to Broome in Australia (Western Australia), or perhaps The Sunshine Coast (Queensland). Or Kakadu in the NT. Very nice places, very different to what you will see in Wales, or the US for that matter. you will get all of the above (moreso in WA than Queensland - QL is more resort/tourist oriented). Broome is a great place, and has some very interesting history and quite a unique culture (a mish-mash of Anglo-Japanese as a result of the longstanding Japanese presence), loads of sun, gorgeous beaches. I'd recommend it to anyone. Bring plenty of sunscreen if you come to Australia though, your pasty Welsh skin will look like cooked bacon within minutes of getting off the plane if you don't... Personally, I would have to be paid a lot of money to go to America, and even then I would stear clear of the Eastern States. Places like California, Nevada, Arizona strike me as the least annoying parts of America, though they offer little I can't find in Australia. If you want to go to the Americas, I would suggest Mexico - cheaper than the US, interesting culture, Sun, and a good place to be lazy.

In Philly you'll get shot. In Miami you'll get shot. And everyone's either a criminal or elderly, so don't drive the roads. In Chicago you'll get shot two or three times. And I personally like the idea of going to NYC least of all. But then, I'm not a city person. Nor do I like walking around in a giant bullseye. NJ is the garden state! Strip mall indeed. Forests, rivers, mountains and the historic 66 mile canal. And we take care of our canal, thank-you-very-much, Pennsylvania. We just have a lot of erm... places to shop, too. Hey half of them are probably in the red so that should count for something. Besides, you won't go hungry. All this without mentioning most of the history of this country is right here within a 20 mile radius of the state's center. Re: Canada, I've been to Montreal, once. Was impressed by how clean the city was - not a speck of trash anywhere - and how dirty the stripclubs were. The good kind of dirty. As good as NJ strip clubs, in fact... Oh also, the weather was fantastic. It was mid summer, and we spent a week up there in the cool dry air. The 8 hour drive back to NJ was in an air conditioned car, so we didn't realize what we were coming back to, till we stepped out into the pea soup that is NJ's 100% humidity/95 degree summer weather. No wonder it's the garden state. Why Miami? Seriously, if I had the choice to instantly go anywhere in this country? I'd choose somewhere with big mountains and miles of wilderness to explore. I've only gone up a 1500 foot mountain (yes you guessed it, in NJ) and loved it - I can't imagine the 15,000 foot ones. I say to hell with beaches and amusement parks and cities and the usual attractions! Discover nature and back roads and charming towns.

Miami doesnt have a ton of attractions unless you are into overpriced restaurants, overpriced boutique shops, and overpriced hotel rooms. Its really just an enormous tourist trap, it doesnt have many museums or historic stuff or really much of anything. Im sure there is something there, but do you want to spend your vacation looking for it? The only thing worth seeing in Florida is the gators, impressive in the flesh I assure you, and the manatees, which I never got a chance to see. The rest of the state is a strip mall, like New Jersey. You should check out NYC. Its way overpriced as well, but it is at least interesting. You can find +anything+ to do in NY. DC has museums but once you leave the park area it is a ghetto. Philly is interesting for its history and thats about it. Dont even consider Orlando, its like Miami except replace the hot mommas in bathing suits with Mickey Mouse and Jesus Christ. Party. I agree with the Canadian contingent, go to Canada, its cleaner, cheaper, and if you get hurt you are covered under their public health system. Here they leave you for stray dogs to pick off.

Yes, a lot of the events described in the Bible may have happened - after all the Bible is a hodge-podge of documents cobbled together - it is a bit like walking into a library and taking random samples of books and compiling them into a new book. You get a bit of history, a bit of fiction, lots of lists, genealogies, laws etc. A fictional novel can refer to actual historical events, but that doesn't make the main plot of the work of fiction true. People with no knowledge of science might misinterpret a mirage as a vision, interpret a mentaly ill person as an angel, connect events that aren't connect. People draw on actual events and embellish and exagerate them for the sake of making a point, or telling a story and making it more dramatic. The story of Dvaid v. Goliath is a good case in point: the point of the story is an allegory used to inspire young warriors that the weak can triumph over the strong if they are brave and smart. It doesn't matter whether there actually was such a battle, or if the characters were real or not, it is the concept of the story that matters. There might have been a faily average guy named david, who possibly did manage to kill a bloke named Goliath, who happened to be six feet tall (which would have been very tall for that time and place), and whose size was later grossly exaggerated for the sake of the story. there is no reason to assume that the writers of the Bible were any more truthful or virtuous than anyone else living today - they would have lied, exaggerated, misled, dsisembled, imagined and deceived as much as any modern tabloid magazine or news media program for the sake of a good story, or to control people's behaviour. Bottom of the line: don't believe everything you read.

The whole "flood thing" is the result of very old garbled stories from around 11,000 BCE, when the last ice age retreated, causing global sea level to rise dramatically (several tens of metres) in a relatively short period of time. While the rise was generally gradual, it was punctuated with occaisinal rapid spurts, and the climate change at the time would have caused increased rainfall in many parts of the world, and increased drought in others. In Australia, very few Aboriginal tribes have flood myths, except those who have lived near the sea, and Australia became much drier at the end of the last ice age, hence the lack of flood stories. The same for most of Africa - those cultures already living far inland have no flood myths, those that were disposessed by sea level rise do. An area of land the size of the USA in coastline disappeared under the sea in a period of a few hundred years. People living on the coastline retreated inland, and relayed tales of their lands being swallowed up by the sea, as they moved futher inland. Over many generations these stories naturally were embellished, mutated, evolved and diverged. None of the people who were already living inland when this sea level rise occured have retained any stories of floods, but the people that do have wildly varying stories, with the only common theme being rising water levels. Some flood myths involve rain, some don't. Actually, in the biblical story of Noahs ark, God instructs Noah to gather "two of each beast that is unclean, and seven of each beast that is clean" (it might be the other way around, I'm quoting from memory). That is a hell of a lot of animals to pack into one little boat, considering there are an estimated 5 - 15 million species of animal, even considering that half of them are beetles. And then you have to consider that for most species, the minimum viable population size is >500. Some animals need several thousand individuals to survive. Then there is food - you need to feed these buggers, some animals consume their body weight in food each day, some have very particular diets. Most non-fundamentalist Christians are reasonable enough to concede that Genesis is a mythological story, and didn't actually happen. The story of Noah predates the Bible by several thousand years, it is found in the Sumerian myths in various forms, and these people were totally unrelated to the Semitic tribes that borrowed their mythology. It is probably based loosely on fact in the sense that some farmer noticed that the sea level was rising, and thought it might be worthwhile loading his cattle and other livestock into a boat in case it got hairy. He survives, has some kids, several thousand years later his offspring have proliferated and exagerated the story now distorted out of all proportion. Zachaeus: "If you think that any experience of any higher beings can't be anything other than a malfunction of the brain, then I guess there's not much point in any further discussions about it." I didn't say it couldn't be anything else, but that is the most liklely of all the possibilities. Many ancient societies did not recognise mental diseases like schizophrenia, instead, schizophrenics were (and still are in some societies) treated as people with a special conduit to God, or the spirit world. They didn't understand that when these people heard voices, or saw things that weren't there, that it was an error of their brain, they thought the voices were God, or spirits. Shamans, prophets, witchdoctors, priests throughout history have deliberatley induced visions (hallucinations) by starving themselves for days, weeks even, wandering around in the hot desert sun, consuming hallucinagenic compounds, and various other activities known to cause the brain to malfunction. Now, it is possible, however unlikely, that when some people say they are hearing the voice of what they think is God, that they really are hearing something and it isn't their brain being wierd. But they have no way of determining the veracity of anything that voice tells them, so to simply believe a mysterious voice or a character in a strange dream is just stupid, especially if it tells you a fanciful story that can in no way be verified. The voice could be anything - a pixie sitting in their ear, a dimensional rift, who knows. So to then be so certain about it that you construct an elaborate belief system around it requires that you depart with a fairly large chunk of reason and sanity. @ John D. : I would be curious to know what precipitated your religious epiphany, if it wasn't indoctrination as a child, or TV evangelists, or born-again cults knocking at your door. Why not Islam, or Rastafarianism? God apparently tells a lot of wildy different (not to mention contradictory) stories to different people, or so the people who claim to have spoken with him claim - on what do you base your version of belief? Or did you just keep a childhood imaginary friend into adulthood? Do you have any basis for your beliefs without reference to a Bible or Koran, or some other document? Can you follow your beliefs though a consistent line of reasoning, based soley on observations of the natural world? Did God speak to you personally? If you think He did, how do you know it wasn't an imposter (a Demonic spirit falsely claiming to be God, or a cheeky little Leprechaun trying to trick you, for example)? If you want to claim extroadinary things, like imaginary friends killing their children and thus 'saving' the world, you had better have some pretty extroadinary evidence to back it up, and no, absence of evidence for evolution in the form of something you don't understand about it does not constitute evidence for your imaginary friend creating life. You can't rely on dubious anecdotes, like "my Grandma saw an angel and it told her to move to so and so, and it all turned out well..." You need positive evidence that stands on its own, and can be independently studied and verified by anyone (at least in principle) - you can't say, "well, gee I can't quite figure this out yet, science isn't advanced enough at the moment, or we may never know, so therefore God did it!". It is a patent abuse of reason, and a cop out.

more of a technicallity then disagreement, but the whole big flood thing actually come up in quite a few places around the same time in history (I forget where I read this, but if I remember I'll refind the source), so technically it's possibel it was true :-p. That having been said I doubt there was any getting 2 of each animals invloved but hey...I don't confirm or deny it.

yes I already cleared my cache, history etc. in firefox and it doesn't help to type in the URL manually. the whole thing is quite annyoing - cgtalk used to be part of my "daily internet routine"

the headline basically says it: since about 3 days ago I can't access the cgtalk site+forums anymore. firefox tries to connect to the site for a few seconds than I get the "operation timed out" message, same thing with IE. I first thought they may have server-problems, but I asked some other guys and they don't seem to have any problems with the website. After that I tried it on another other PC and on a laptop here, which connect over the same router - they can't open cgtalk as well. Anyone an idea what's wrong?? They have actually no reason for banning me, since I probably have 10 posts per year and never had any argument over there - most of the time I'm just reading through the threads, which is quite interesting and I learned a lot over there.

Then it seems that flat screens are not for graphic art people, but for CAD people, who work with schematics and stuff like that.

Perhaps not now as an adult, but the virtuoso talet exhibited by Mozart et al is largely attributable to the fact that such people were exposed to music at a very early age, and were rigorously instructed in it on a full time basis. Sure there is a degree of natural ability in there, but you can take any 3 year old child of normal intelligence and aptitude and mould them into a virtuoso through constant childhood practise. A good example perhaps is the number of Chinese kids who are educated in this way: a child taught Wu Shu from the age of three will be a master at the age of twenty. A child taught music as soon as they can speak will be a virtuoso by the time they are a teenager. It is a matter of moulding the brain when it is at its most plastic. In general, while natural talent is certainly important, your ability to perform some task at a virtuoso level will for the most part simply be a function of how much time and effort you put into it. It takes about 15 years to cultivate a virtuoso musician (or indeed, mastery of most arts) longer if they take up the art later in life, as the brain is not as plastic as that of a child. A true natural genius is someone who reaches a higher level of ability with less training and less effort than the average person, and in that respect, a lot of musical historians now regard the abilities of Mozart and Bach as somewhat overhyped - Mozart didn't do anything that several thousand rich Chinese kids haven't done with the same level of training. You might surprise yourself oDDity, you might well be able to write music better than you think, even if your talent doesn't flower until you are in your sixties, or you don't quite meet the arbitrary standards of what you consider to be musical virtuosity. You certainly demonstrate a great deal of virtuosity when it comes to digital sculpture, and creative ability in one area often carries across to other areas. Have a go. Personally, I am not all that impressed by people who are exceptionally good at just one thing, I find polymaths who are brilliant at nearly everything they try their hand at much more interesting.

First the bad news: No landing on planets at all, except a few cut-scenes, and the physics are not very realistic - so in that respect no improvement in two decades, it's the same as the original Elite game. Apart from that, I'm really surprised that you hadn't heard of it. In fact I was surprised that I hadn't heard of it when someone at TTLG was talking about X2. Quick history: X was released years ago, then followed X2 and now X3 was released a few months ago. Gameplay: Same as Elite, free play as you fly around in first person perspective and dock at various space stations in various systems, trading goods and buying better equipemnt and better ships. Two big differences between Elite and X are that in X you can own more than one ship at the same time, and you can even buy space stations (factories) and start making serious money, if you can deal with the supply problems and such. Of course there are pirates etc and first-person space battles galore. In X2 you could fly around inside the space stations, but the trips from the station entrance to the docking bays became tiresome and so in X3 you always dock externally at space stations. You travel from star-system to star-system via 'star-gates', although later in the game you can get a jump-engine. There is an optional plot where you can accept a string of missions for the terra-corp company which make the game a bit more personal.

Well, everyone except me - I've never been near a university. Eh? You said planets should be defined solely by size - if they're big enough to form a sphere, then they're a planet. That's a stupid idea. That's like saying any living creature big enough to be a human should be called a human. What's the difference between an object that's 390km in diamater and one that's 410km in diameter? The only difference is that one becomes roughly spherical and the other doesn't. Shape is no way to define a planet. I think there should be several criteria, includng a certain mass, which means there is a certain minimum amount of gravity and therefore atmosphere, it should orbit in the same plane as the major planets and not wander in and out of another's orbit at wild angles. It should be massive enough that it does not have to share space with hundreds of similar objects, and was able to either assimilate them while it was forming, trap them as moons, or kick them out the way the major planets have done. Of course it doesn't really matter what you label them, but at the same time there has to be some kind of consistency. You can't have pluto being called a planet while a dozen other Kuiper belt objects, which are virtually identical, are not. It's just an accident of history, that pluto happened to be the first Kuiper belt object discovered, and I don't think that alone gives it the right to planetary status.

Greetings- I've been working on some SFX while I've had some downtime. Here are some samples that I think haven't been filled in yet on CVS. Start Level sound Level Start SFX test 1 (may be a bit bass heavy, but it gives me cold chills when it plays at loud volumes!) sfx_creepy_voices.ogg (similar to the creepy voices from T1/T2 - I played around until I got close)[added 1/5/6] Piano Frobs (5 samples from which to choose) frob_piano1.ogg frob_piano2.ogg frob_piano3.ogg frob_piano4.ogg frob_piano5.ogg Another possible "tension" ambient (similar to T2 style) fx_tension_orch1.ogg "Haunt" SFX (New 7 Jan 06) fx_haunt_joinus.ogg fx_haunt_soul.ogg More on the way.... I'm reposting the links to some of these from a while back. Ambients ambient_haunt_v2.ogg (this was the version with less bass - I'm learning the art of compression finally!) rain_loop.ogg (this was recorded in a light rainstorm but should be labeled for forest crickets or something similar) SFX clocktick_60_loop.ogg (for the mansion) clocktick_30_loop.ogg (also for the mansion)