speculative

Well, I've pretty much given up hope that even 5% of the future Wii titles will be geared toward someone with my interests (games, not waggle) so my Wii is going to Ebay. It may be replaced with a PS3, but not an Xbox 360 due to hardware failures. Big failure of MS to nab my $$ as otherwise I would have purchased a 360 as a stop-gap to play on my old SDTV without having to buy a new HDTV. Wii held good promise, but only before it was released. I did enjoy certain features in Zelda, although admittedly that was a GC game and they still haven't released a sequel. I also enjoyed certain parts of Metroid, but it got old quick because it's the same combat gameplay over and over with no variation except for bosses. I wish Excite Truck were on another console because then I could play it with proper controls. I've beat RE:4 Wii Edition 5 times now. I have no desire to play it again or even look at it for a second. It's definitely a masterpiece but now it is time to move on. The Nintendo Wii is a Wii, and if people like that fine but it is definitely not a game console... I look at the rack of about 50 titles for Wii in Wal-mart, and I just don't see anything that's recognizable to me as a video game.

Move every zig for great matrimony!

Cool, thanks for posting this. Just picked up the EE version, after waiting this long for a price drop. Patience paid off!

Lol'age! I can't wait for HotD: Overkill after seeing that trailer. I think Sega knows the scoop, seeing as how they specifically said, "This is the hardcore you've been waiting for." Now if others would only get a clue...

Listening to the podcast makes me extremely nostalgic for the Dreamcast! I had forgotten about all the launch stories, the PS2 competition, etc.

"It's thinking." Rayman 2, the DC version, is the best version, and Rayman 2 is one of the first great 3D platformers. (And it's still great comparatively.) The Dreamcast is like a Wii without motion control but with games that "gamers" would actually be interested in and play. It out-Wii'd the Wii before Nintendo ever thought up the Wii! Speaking of birthdays I registered at OCR 5 years ago this month. Guess September is a good month!

That is some horrid VA. I'm not sure who they would have even rounded up to do that, the dev's kids or something?

I picked the main character from a NES ROM I once played titled "Lickle." I'm not sure if this was the English name of a game actually released in English or a poor translation of the game's Japanese name. Anyway, it was definitely the most awesome ROM game I "stumbled" across and hadn't heard of before trying it out.

Here are my pics. I don't have much gear yet; I have all the gear I can justify at my current level of knowledge in how to use it (which isn't much). -Presonus Firebox -Mackie MR5's -Altec Lansing computer speakers (these are actually higher quality than any other computer speakers I've heard, I got them 10 years ago when computers were 10x more expensive than they are now. Spilled Mountain Dew on one of them but it's still kicking with a slightly sticky bass adjustment knob. In the far upper-right is the subwoofer for this 2.1 set.) -Audio Technica M20 cans -Novation Remote 61SL -Reason 4.1 -FL Studio 8 -Sytrus & free VSTi's -SM57 -Core 2 Duo E6550 -Tuxedo cat (no seriously, she has mad meowing skills that I am seriously going to record & sample with the mic & work into something. Never heard a cat that can meow like that...)

Casiocore? /dies from lol.... Actually, if TCM is West Coast Breaks/Chemical Breaks at least now I know what to call it...

I just heard about this through the email. Very cool. :cool:

Wii's momentum is pretty good for a launch console. Of course since Xbox 360 has been out longer there are more games coming out, but there's not much more out for the PS3. Of course, there are still great games (Rogue Galaxy, God of War 2, etc.) coming out for PS2. I wouldn't be surprised if God of War 2 for PS2, for example, has better graphics than any Wii game when it is released, even though the Wii is far more powerful...

Thanks for the tip, I'll check it out.

I am looking into a second monitor for editing writing actually. I use FL Studio, so with another monitor I would put my VST's on the second one which would be very handy actually... But yeah, if you have to choose between 2 not-so-great monitors or 1 good large one, go with the good large one. On the other hand, if you can spring for 2 good monitors, they can come in handy for regular computing tasks, or music production depending on your specific DAW setup.

The AMD move to AM2 is pretty pointless imho, especially since Intel has released its Core 2 Duo line of processors. I am die-hard AMD but if I were upgrading in the next 6 months I'd go Intel unless I wanted to wait and shell out crazy $ for AMD quad-core. Ah, the good life: AMD Barton. I'm running it at 2.4Ghz on air and benchmarking better than what used to be $300 AMD64 chips (before the Core 2 Duo caused price drops) all out of a $75 CPU. Good times. Anyway, you're asking about moving between different CPU/motherboards, not getting faster RAM per se it sounds like, since AM2 requires a whole new motherboard and CPU, plus RAM. The benefits of getting faster RAM within a generation is for overclocking. Also, don't just look at RAM speeds alone - look at RAM timing, which can be nearly equally important. So long story short: I wouldn't upgrade my RAM within the same mobo/CPU generation, but if you're moving up a generation then I probably would. (Except that I don't approve of the AMD > AM2 move.)

I got Styrus for a very reasonable price as part of one of the previous group buys, and I have had it for some time now and haven't begun to scratch the surface. There are a bazillion presets too, so it's very beginner-level friendly. I knew it for its FM sounds, but when I started going through all the presets I was amazed at the breadth of this synth...

Considering the reviews this game has received, I've heard some pretty mixed things about the story itself. I'm wondering if this is a matter of taste? For example, I'm alternately hearing people say that the story is horrible, while others say it's the best rpg story on PS2 out of all PS2 rpg's, which is quite a claim. The reviews seem consistent, but what people are posting on various boards on teh intarwebs seems to vary widely...

I've found that 90% of larges are too small for me, so I vote XL. Would definitely be interested in a link to the design when it becomes available.

Movie is out to rent today. I am seriously thinking about giving it another go to see if my opinion of it would be any different. (Well, there just isn't anything else out to rent now, either.)

Holy Schmoly! Is this to go with the anniversary deals? http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Native-Instruments-Komplete-3?sku=708222 Holy Cow! I'm not sure there's any way I can justify not purchasing this!

You should find jrpg composers you like, see if they have a homepage, and find out what tools they liked to use on their projects. That would be a good start if you are seriously looking to "recreate" that sound...

I'm surprised no one mentioned the obvious? More cowbell... Seriously though, if I were gonna play live with synths/etc., I would want to set up everything ahead of time and test it out to make sure all the connections work, etc. If you have a laptop make sure the battery is charged, etc.

Oooh! I know how! (Assuming it works the same as my Oxygen 49-key) First you click on the Fruity Wrapper menu (should be in the very top-left corner of your VSTi) and select "browse parameters". Then, you find the parameter you want (like a filter for example) then select "link to controller", then you move whichever knob/slider you want it to link to and voila. Aha! Will give that a try tonight. Thanks! I was trying out Novation's Bass-Station plug-in that is supposed to be auto-mapped, but perhaps that's only when run as stand-alone vsti...

Have figured out how to get the keys to transmit midi data, but the knobs/etc. don't seem to be transmitting to vsti's in FL6. So, time to do some research...

Handy reference.