sephfire

Poor guy. I hope his recovery goes ok. A wrecked hand could really take a toll on an acting career. Although I guess it never stopped this guy.

I lost it right around "*clap clap* OI!" I don't know how he manages one of these every week.

Give me a wonderful computer and I will play TF2 with all of you until you are sick of me. Also, I would like to not pay for it.

Man, I remember when I was on Wayne's little editing staff. I should check in on the guy again sometime.

You should not be allowed to be this good at this many things.

When it's good, it's good. When it's bad, it's terrifying.

There's a demo of it on Live, so you can give it a shot that way. I wasn't very impressed, but I've gotten a bit picky with my jrpgs lately.

Well, when asked who he's going after, he says "Rachel." And I thought I recalled him looking panicked when he arrived on the scene to find Dent there instead. Just another Joker mind-screw.

I kind of miss TF2, actually. And as much as I'd love to get it on the OCR fun, I run a Mac. I'll try to get on TF2 a bit this week. Gamertag is cAtf00d, if anyone else wants to add me. Good man. All pretty good choices (Gears especially). Bioshock is definitely one to check out as well. The free demo on Live will give you a good taste of what to expect. And the Orange Box is definitely worth your money if you don't have a gaming PC. And Call of Duty 4 is a top-shelf game, even if you don't usually care for war shooters. For some less conventional options, Viva Pinata is a blast. Also, Beautiful Katamari (if you aren't tired of Katamari games by now), Assassin's Creed and Civilization Revolution are fun. And, cheesy as the game is, Earth Defense Force 2017 is surprisingly awesome. Tweek and I have spent hours playing co-op. I'm just kind of rattling off suggestions at this point. They aren't necessarily must-buys. There are dozens of demos (maybe hundreds now) on Live, so you there's plenty to try out. You're in for a good time.

Also, you can buy Psychonauts off Live for like $10 now. This game is a must-have. I don't care if it's last gen. Buy it. But you're in for plenty of good times in general. The 360 has quite a few great games so far. Demos will be your friend.

While I expect Dent really is just dead, something about the whole death and funeral lacked closure. But, then, if Nolan wanted him alive for the third film, I would think he would provide some small hint that Two Face was still around. Having him just show up in film three alive would just feel a bit cheesy. Bart: "Ralph! I thought you were dead!" Ralph: "Nope."

I don't recall the source on this info, so take it with a grain of salt, but I'd heard the Nolan wanted some time before starting on a third movie. Supposedly, he put every single idea he had into this movie and wants time for new ideas to come. Again, hearsay. After Dark Knight, I whole-heartedly trust Nolan to bring us a worthy third film (or not, as the case may be).

I'm usually ok with missing a line or two if the audience is having a good time getting into the movie. I remember going to see the first Star Wars prequel opening night. As soon as the Lucasfilm logo appeared, the audience went wild. The rest of the evening was not so jubilant.

djp will soon join our exclusive "OCR Married Men" club! bgc! Get this man a club jacket.

Guys, listen. Flirt amongst yourselves in PMs. Please. Please. You're making an awesome community look like a page full of youtube comments. I beg you: stop. On topic, this is going to be one of the first movies I plan to buy on BluRay. I really can't believe how many amazing movies this summer has had.

I've loved this since Tweek let me hear the WIP in his car. Awesome work, guys.

First Kung Fu Panda, then Wall-E, then Wanted and now this?. This is the best summer ever.

Exactly. He and Penelo kind of represented the party's role in the story. With the exception of Ashe, none of them were special. They weren't secretly warriors from another dimension. They weren't amnesiacs or "chosen ones" or anything. They were completely unimportant people swept up into a conflict much greater than they were. Is that better than the standard, character driven FF plot? I'm not sure. The character-driven type is much easier to get wrapped up in than FFXII's politic-driven plot. But I like the different story approach. It's an interesting change of pace.

This is true. I loved the wide open environments, but the long travel time for side questing really wore on me after a while. Just a few more teleport points throughout the level would have been nice. They could have even waited until near end game to make them available.

You've articulated why you hate it (and your opinion is valid, XII isn't my favorite in the series either). You haven't said much to back up the bolded blanket statement, though. Why is it a "genuinely bad game"?

I found that FFXII had quite a few strengths going for it that few of the other FF games have managed. 1. Battle system Now, I'm not saying XII's real-time, gambit-based system was a better concept than the turn-based traditions, but it definitely had some strong points. We'd all like to think that every random battle in these FF games is a strategic affair. But they aren't usually. Alot of the time, we're just jamming 'x' over and over until the weak random encounter dies so we can get our XP and prizes and move on. Then we break out the strategy for the boss fights. With XII, that repetition is removed. You give your characters a series of prioritized commands to follow and guide them through the world. They follow the repetitive orders by default; orders that you would otherwise have to select over and over. They streamlined the traditional system. And the best part is that you can still play the traditional way at any time. At any point, you can pause and select a character's next action. And you'll have to do a lot of that when the tougher fights come. But if you don't need the strategy, the gambits will do the repetitive work so you can focus on the fun. 2. NO random encounters I don't think random encounters are an inherently flawed concept, but they are a bit dated. Running around an area in FFXII, the world feels so much more alive than past environments have. No jarring transitions to a battle screen. No pause in the action. It makes the whole experience much more fluid and "coordinated" somehow, and I hope more JRPGs follow XII's lead. 3. Story It's a solid story (as solid as you're likely to get in a JRPG, anyway). But it is a bit different than your average FF fare, which is why I'm not surprised it turns a lot of people off. Your standard FF story is very "hero focused". The world is in danger, and that's important, but the real focus of the story is the personal journey each main character takes. It's very character-driven. But with FFXII, it felt to me that the characters had been dropped into a conflict (and story) that was much bigger than them. Major political conflict and war loomed over the world, and this small troupe of people were trying to find a way to prevent disaster. It's not a case of "[Villain] is going to use the _______ to destroy the _______, and I'm the only one who can stop him." It's a bit different than the stock Final Fantasy story and I like it. I like that they're willing to play around with the formula and try new things. 4. Localization This is big. FFXII has the strongest translation and english performance of any FF game to date. The dialogue is strong. The writing is solid. Gone are the awkward pauses and uncomfortable "Tidus laughing" scenes. The english localization team really nailed it this time and I hope we'll keep seeing this sort of quality. 5. Art I know it's a given that Final Fantasy is going to bring great production values, but the art direction and design in this game are really top notch. I know graphics aren't everything, but just look at it. The game had issues, certainly. I don't think FFXII is the "ultimate" JRPG, but one of Square's greatest traditions with the Final Fantasy series is that they never settle on a gameplay formula and run it into the ground. Every game brings some new innovation. A unique battle system. A ground-breaking technical advance. A fresh aesthetic. I enjoy some FF games more than others, but I can definitely say that I've never played one that actually "sucked." They've just set the bar very high. I still argue that FFX-2 had the greatest battle system of the whole Final Fantasy series. I wish more JRPGs would borrow that system. I've got to learn to stop arguing on the internet.

I do the little "GamePass" thing. $20 bucks a month, hang on to a game as a long as you want and swap it out any time. The rental store is just a mile down the road, so it's an easy trip and it lets me try a lot of games I'd never bother with otherwise. And it drastically reduces the number I purchase as well.

Yeah, this pretty much sums it up, I think. At least they're kind enough to leave the ads at the end.

Explain. 123456

You have terrible taste. But if you have a Wii, I definitely can't recommend Rock Band. DLC is what makes the game so great. Wii Music does look a bit disappointing, but I'll reserve judgement until we've seen more of it.