gunnergoz

Columbine comes to mind. I'm not addressing the ordinary, healthy individual who can think for him/her self and decide what is fantasy and what is reality. I'm addressing the fact that there are thousands of mentally less stable individuals in this society too - and that they have access to these games as well. What benefit is there to egging on the mentally unstable or antisocially inclined? Just so supposedly smart, healthy people can pretend to kill innocents in a game glamorizing the criminal lifestyle? Everything is ultimately about profit and me, me, me in this society and nothing is ever about what is best for the most people. I see no particular redeeming social value to such games and I think that intelligent, socially conscious people should have enough sense to embargo such game manufacturers, to stop buying their tripe, and perhaps sales will drop off enough that the making of such stuff becomes less profitable and finally dies off. But if you wish to exercise your right to purchase crap from people who think you like crap, then have fun. Just don't be one of those people bemoaning the fact that society is going to hell in a hand basket. PS - this is not personal, it is simply an argument against a position you've taken.

If my ex-old lady was getting boned by Brad Pitt on a regular basis, I might be a wee bit crotchety too...

I can see that you found this game to have a "fantastic storyline and deep characterization" and in that sense it may be a bit like the Godfather film that garnered great critical and public acclaim for its character portraits - but unlike the film the game allows you to go off and do all this other anti-social stuff. The fact that the game allows this perambulation into lawlessness, chaos and deliberate cruelty was a design decision that, in my thinking, was the actual reason for the game's creation. I suspect that the storyline and deep characterization were added on later and that many players never bother to explore them much, if at all. By giving players the choice to explore these themes, the developers tipped their hand as simply being in business to make a profit, no matter what the social consequences. I absolutely detest that because it is the epitome of what is wrong with society today. You, as an individual, may well be able to play such a game without any side effects that would alter your perception of reality or goad your lesser angels into trying to play out such fatal scenarios in real life - but such is clearly not the case with many other players, who go on to do horrific deeds in their homes and communities, in part inspired and fired up by what they've seen and done in some game or another. And even if one argues that this is never happening, no one plays a game and then is led to go out and kill real people, the argument still remains that we are releasing such games upon youth and children (and lets face it, the ratings don't prevent this at all, and rather may encourage rebellious curiosity in children) who are still forming their internal definitions of moral right and wrong. And parents are not always there to help them through these mine fields of the mind. I would like to live in a land where a publishing company offered a potential game like this would ask itself first, "who would gain and who would lose if we were to publish this?" - and then would go on to conclude that the ethical decision would be to not publish the game so as to not impose more gratuitous violence upon the public and especially upon impressionable youth and children. Of course, it isn't going to happen anytime soon, but I am hopeful that some day we will attain enough civility that decisions to forgo profit to benefit the public, would be more common.

I don't have problems with wargames in general because I understand the interest in history that underlies the enthusiasm that many of us have for them. What I am more mystified by are the games such as Grand Theft Auto and some others like it, that basically feed whatever enthusiasm there is out there in the community for criminal thinking and amoral viciousness. I could no sooner play a game like that than I could play the game mentioned earlier about killing Jews. Of course, killing Nazis in Wolfenstein was no problem for me. So it is not about the killing, it is about the who, why and when that is the core of the problem for me.

At the same time, it is worth noting that in the Middle East, they have a series of FPS games where the objective is to kill the most Americans that you can, and the games seem to have a very large and enthusiastic fan base. Needless to say, there are absolutely no qualms or debates in public over there about the morality of these games.

If so, that's a new practice - and a potential security breach, if you think about it. Plus a deuce and a half can only carry 3 in the cab - of course a lot more in the rear, but only one or two back there? Pretty inefficient. To be honest, I've never seen a marking like it - and bumper markings are something I've always been attentive to for many years, since I started learning to read them as a kid overseas. When I was a teen, my army sergeant father was assigned to Southern European Task Force, Verona, Italy. The unit's vehicles' left bumpers were marked SE-X, which was of course a source of tittering humor amongst us teen boys. But it started a hobby for me learning to decipher what they meant and I still try to do it when I see photos or the occasional army truck on the road.

I think it means that the vehicle belonged to the 1st Civil Affairs (Battalion? Brigades would have a space or dash then an "X" following the "CA.") Then we can see it is the 108th vehicle in the HQ column but I'm not sure about the final "4" since I can't recall seeing a separate number following what is usually the company column number. Late bit of info for you: check out this site to meet other guys with trucks like yours - http://www.steelsoldiers.com/post-viet-nam-desert-storm-vehicles/ Also, you can do a wikipedia on "us army vehicle bumper markings" and you will get a pretty informative article too.

I understand that they have yet to accept any fault for what happened at Nanking, for one.

OK, so they have honor, I don't doubt your analysis. But it still does not answer why they still refuse after all these years to accept blame for their wartime atrocities, particularly against other Asians. I don't consider that very honorable, rather it is shameful.

Who wants to pay a bunch of money to see a cavalry trot?

Maybe so, but I never could suspend disbelief with Bond, but always could manage to do so with Bourne. At least as far as the character went, anyway.

Oh, say, the demonization and totally unnecessary invasion of Iraq, for one.

Yep, they should have named them "The orphans and widows express."

I think one version of B-52 carried 108 750-lb bombs...ouch!

Well, don't go starting wars then, eh? So they are not shamed by the Rape of Nanking, destruction of Manila and treatment of prisoners, but just by their own defeat? Nice. (Said with a grain of salt given, er, certain unfortunate events of the past 8 years in the US of A.)

I'll bet that's what you tell all the girls...

And it only took them 64 years to find this guy?

"And you have a pair of skis stuck up your posterior because...?"

Look out for other little software bits that may be setting sound settings and running in the background. Sometimes older sound drivers get overwritten or even deleted but the settings seem to live on in driver hell. Check your processes and apps in Task Manager and see if you can ID anything remotely to do with audio. Also could be things like chat programs or Skype-like utilities. Just my guess, mind you.

Sic transit gloria muuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuundi!

If they're firkin' government-paid programs or systems, the firkin' docs and formulas should go to some government warehousing program for just such an eventuality. And I don't mean Indiana Jone's warehouse... But then, that would be too g.d. logical for the US government, wouldn't it?

Not for me at all...I purchase the software and expect it to be on my computer, without any need to log on to the internet to use anything, or to have some other software (like Steam) running in the background. I detest all these Orwellian rights schemes that put god knows what on your computer, and expect you to be running it while they can rummage around in your machine, for all we know.

Combo stupidity and ignorance. Normally a sure winner. Unfortunately, he is survived by a wife and daughter; so he really is not eligible for the Darwin Award, having succeeded in pushing his genes into the future...

Be careful of recommendations including the phrase "and probably a bit different from how I remember it." Last time I went to DC and followed a friend's advice that included almost those exact words, I ended up in a trendy Georgetown bar & grill that was filled cheek to cheek with some very, er, cheeky fellows. I got out without getting my own cheeks pinched, but it was a very close call indeed. Not my cuppa' as they say...and my buddy back home was probably laughing his balls off about it all the while.

Concur with the mention of Ronin - it is one of my favorites and I usually watch it at least once a year.