Herr Kruger

What does Lucas have to do with this film?

Rafalski coming back would be HUGE, but I don't ever hear about him coming back?! Wings were hosed on that goal, for sure. It's NOT a reviewable play, the ref just called the play too early... where was he when he decided to blow the whistle? Those things happen, though. Been great playoffs so far... Herr Kruger

Pens and Caps could be great... would have been better to see that in the Eastern Conference Final, but oh well, at least it will happen. Caps star players need to deal with pressure better or Pens will take it in five or six. Washington was lucky to win Game 7 earlier tonight. Sharks drown again, this time in the first round. Catastrophic loss for that organization. Change must come. Flames fizzle yet again. Uninspired play from an uninspired team. Also a team that must make some changes. My read is Cammalleri will score big money elsewhere, aflter losing an arbitration decision on his current contract a few years ago. Flames can't afford him without parting with either Kipper or Phaneuf or Regehr. Boston and Carloina doesn't interest me much, how will Tim Thomas' miracle season pan out? How will Chicago's great, young team deal with Luongo? And can the battle-hardened Ducks stop Detroit?? Herr Kruger

So, I guess we'll go with 'severely misinformed' on the score of Halo 3, then. Herr Kruger

A few points : I agree, my information about co-op on that specific game is limited, however, everything I said applies. Your lost progress is no doubt an Xbox hardware problem, and not a CoD game problem. Do you own a 360? As per your claim on Halo 3, you are severely misinformed or flat-out lying. I own Halo 3 and I just tested your claim. You can't choose any level you want without having first completed the previous level. I am as I sit here signed into my Xbox and Halo 3 with two profiles that have not completed any campaign missions and I can ONLY choose "Arrival" to play, which is the beginning cut-scene that leads to the first level. Perhaps your friend has hacked his 360? Case closed on that score. A game with levels and a cohesive story to tell is very, very different from CM, a game with scenarios. If you can't see that, well, I guess it says something about you. Your comparison is nonsense. One final point, the standard price for games these days is $60, not $70. Herr Kruger

Suffer through a what, 15-sec cut scene?? LOL! Oh, the horror! Hardly a criticism worth noting. H3? Do you mean Halo 3? For the record I rented this game and played solo only, and it was good, but with all the CoD games I've played there is something missing. I don't think they are great. However, some of Kettler's criticisms seem very silly to me. I don't buy his accusations of a terrible co-op experience. Playing co-op should not mean you get to skip ahead into a game to play any level you want without having finished the previous levels. How is it that there is no Save for your progress?? I find that claim to be preposterous. Checkpoints might indeed seem few and far between to him, but I've played this game and they seemed to be adequate in my experience. Herr Kruger

Well, he did say split-screen. That's a dead giveaway. Yes, I feel the same, in some ways, about co-op being under-supported. I wouldn't call split-screen proper co-op, though. Proper co-op to me is System Link. Herr Kruger

I've played it a little on the 360. Only single-player so far. I like it, but something about all the Call of Duty games I've played feels off. It's hard to describe. Also, constantly tossing grenades back seems silly to me, it happens too much. I'm not far into it but in one of the early American missions I kept finding myself getting stuck on my fellow American soldiers, or stuck in a corner, or stuck on the environment in some way. You can't brush past your compatriots or move them at all, it seems. Frustrating b/c it happens so much. Also, I just really dislike the grenade throwing animation... Things I like... the flamethrower is way cool. The weapons sound great. It is fun! Oh yeah, Left 4 Dead looks like it could be great fun. CoD:WaW also has a Nazi Zombie survival game that looks like it could be fun. Herr Kruger

CMx1 Quick Battles were/are the bomb! It's basically all I ever played. Loved the random maps and force purchase. Incredibly fun! I'm not saying they were perfect. I'm not 'conveniently forgetting' anything about them. I loved them. CMSF QBs, not so much.

I suspect he mens the HistWar : Les Grognards subforum here on this forum. I could be wrong, though!

Renting before buying is generally good advice. As is checking out numerous reviews. I've had a 360 for awhile, and have had no major problems with it yet. I've never lost a gamesave. Armored Core may be a terrible game, I don't know, haven't played it. Indicting the 360 on the basis of one game is beyond silly, though. I expect I'll get the RROD one day, but not yet. I have an Elite. "The price jump for games in going from the X-Box to the X-box 360 has been huge, nearly a doubling." Umm, what? Are you saying it costs the consumer twice as much money to buy a new 360 game today as it did to buy a new Xbox game like four or five years ago? It's basically the same price. Herr Kruger

Some people, not all, feel that in the console market we, the gamers, are getting more for our money then ever before. Games are not that expensive to buy and the price has gone up a bit or relatively stayed the same over the last ten years, hasn't it? But games, on average, cost a whole lot more to make over that same time period, isn't that true?? Anyway, I'm not sure where I stand on the whole piracy issue. The only game I can remember pirating was Hero's Quest from Sierra, which I later bought. That was in the early 90s. Herr Kruger

Sex ed in schools is a great thing! The more information you have, the better. It's makes one better equipped to deal with situations.

That's just it, I am not biased. I have played and owned both for years. I'm glad you admit to your bias, though. I don't and won't maintain that console or PC-gaming is superior to the other one, ever. Just different. Sure, some people may choose to like one over the other. That is fine by me, that is their choice. Your original post: "f you ask me, the success of the console can be attributed to just one thing: marketing. Throw enough money at advertising something over and over, make it nice and shiny, and people will start buying it. Even if, looking at it logically, it's the most stupid thing to do: what would you say if we required you to buy a new PC (and a fairly weak one at that) each time we made a new game? Yet people do exactly this with the next gen consoles as if it was the coolest thing to do, only to re-buy and re-play the same games they already played first on the PC, then PS1, 2 and 3. That's a lot of $$$, and all you get is the same game and a few more sparkling lightning effects. Yawn" You sure didn't mention this also happens in PC-gaming, did you? I say everything you say in there is equally or almost as equally applicable to PC-gaming. You are NOT required to buy a new system for every game in the console world. You still didn't address how much it takes to buy a PC and maintain it for games for five years, either, did you? As I've said before, PC-gaming doesn't have marketing? People aren't bombarded by the exact same "new and shiny" attitude in PC-gaming? New video cards! New processors! Faster, better, more RAM! Yawn. Anyway, your weak attempts at deflecting the argument are just that. If you want to claim I'm arguing with an imaginary person by addressing items directly from your posts, well.. go ahead, I guess. And I'm not trying to bash Battlefront. Just trying to show that you do the same thing. I have loved some of your games to death and they were great. That's great CMSF only costs $45, but how much does the PC cost to play it on? And what about other PCs to play higher-end games?? You mention the cost of consoles but not PCs... strange. Anyway, I get the feeling neither of us will budge, so I'll leave it alone. Herr Kruger

Your comment is laughable BECAUSE you seemed to be saying it ONLY happens in the console world. Get it? Is CMBO essentially not the same game, at it's core, as CMBB and CMAK? Yet you claim people only come back to the same games happily in the console world. Wait, of course, BTS/BFC made those games KNOWING they wouldn't sell as well. What about your other games? Strategic Command? Theatre of War? CMSF and Marines?? Sequels, improvements just like what happens in the console world. How about a comment on that? Not a gut feeling, crystal clear EVIDENCE the SAME THING happens in PC, by your own company no less. I noticed you glossed over those details and later claimed there was nothing of substance in my post. LOL! Yeah, I am convinced. Anyway, I was responding to you in this thread. Sorry it got off-topic, everyone.

Um, I did not say that marketing has no effect. I'm quite aware marketing/advertising has a large influence. What I said was to attribute the rise of the console to primarily (solely?) marketing was silly, in my opinion. Did the PC market do the same? Is the reason PC gaming was so hot for so long due primarily to marketing, and people being told it was fun, or that it actually was fun?? Answer me that? I noticed Moon hasn't been back to comment. Especially the laughable comment about people coming back to play the same things over and over but only in the console market... sure, the PC market never did that... LOL! BFC sure as hell does. Anyway, I know BFC has been trying to tell people CMSF is fun, but that hasn't worked out in a lot of cases either, has it??

Lol, silly I say. People play what they like, not what they are told to like. If people made changes to a game system, maybe they made some good changes so a larger number of people would play it...? Is that not possible? And that *gasp* people liked it?

Wow, I think you're being pretty harsh here. Marketing? Consoles and their games are great. I really don't understand the people who say PC-gaming is high class compared to console gaming any more than I understand the people who say Microsoft is better than Sony or Nintendo or vice-versa. I play both PC games and console games. I enjoy both. Sure there are differences worth noting etc. but to attribute the success of consoles to marketing is asinine. And you don't have to buy a new console every time you buy a new game. Please. Be realistic here, how about looking at reality? You don't need to buy more RAM for it, or a new video card, or a new motherboard either. The console life-cycle is about five years. These current consoles, excepting the Wii, may very well last longer than that. So you get five years of gaming, with some great games, for what... $400 - $700 system depending on what you buy. How much is it to buy a computer that will play a great, newer game five years down the road? Marketing?? Puh! As for replaying the same game over and over, there is some truth to that... but PC games have a lot of the same problems. Oh wait, you went right from CMBO into CMSF didn't you? And Strategic Command? Theatre of War? Riiiight.

Okay, so Usain Bolt turns in another superlative performance, breaking Michael Johnson's 200m world record and winning the gold easily! At sea level, into a headwind, the announcers basically saying that was impossible to do. Very, very impressive! Herr Kruger

I'd never heard of him until now. Probably true for me for many great Olympic athletes who are not from Canada or the USA, and including some of those as well. Setting world records in the 1500 and 20k is super-impressive, in my mind. To contrast with Phelps, he'd have to set a world record in some really long swimming event to equal that feat!! Herr Kruger

There might be some truth to that, but also Thorpe is more of a middle-distance swimmer and raced some of his races in distances Phelps would not have raced in at all, right? According to Wikipedia Phelps' coach called Thorpe the 'best middle distance swimmer I've ever seen." One thing I did find curious while watching the male swimming events... I saw a couple of events in which Phelps did not participate at all? Why is that? Is it b/c those events are not important enough? Or that Phelps knew his chances of winning were too slim? Or his grueling schedule was already too much for him? Or is there a limit on how many events you can swim in? Herr Kruger

Mord, of course people will remember the 2008 Super Bowl and Stanley Cup. I used the examples of Gretzky and Montana to illustrate this point. People are going to remember that Eli Manning and the NYG beat the heavily-favored Patriots, and people who like hockey will remember that Sidney Crosby lost in his first Stanley Cup Final to Detroit. I'm not trying to take anything away from what Phelps has done, just trying to point out it doesn't matter that much in relation to the mainstream sports and also it should be looked at in the proper light. It's great he won 8 gold medals, really it is. But that alone does not make him the greatest Olympian EVAH! b/c so many other athletes simply couldn't compete in so many events (b/c they don't exist). Yes, of course competing in a lot of events is a great thing in and of itself, but don't think Phelps is the only athlete who could endure such a schedule. As much press has Phelps has received, look at how much press the Brett Favre un-retirement saga has received. Just as much, if not more. Here in Canada the 20-year anniversary of The Trade (Gretzky to Los Angeles) recently took place and it made national headlines all over again. Herr Kruger

LOL, Mord. Yeah, b/c no one ever remembers Gretzky and Montana... (20 years ago) ROFL!!!!! Baseball? Not on my radar, so I don't care. Outside of the Olympics I have zero interest in swimming as a sport to watch, like most Olympic sports. Herr Kruger PS. Phelps won't hardly be mentioned six months from now and will basically disappear from mainstream sports media until the next Summer Olympics. At least the 100m title gets some mainstream sports attention during non-Olympic years.

I'd say what Usian Bolt just did is as impressive as anything Phelps has done. Coasting to victory in THE glamour event of the Summer Olympics. He broke the world record and made it look easy.

of those who say yes, it's great what Phelps is doing but the way swimming and maybe a few other sports award medals is skewed. He's definitely a great athlete who has and is accomplishing a lot. I'm sure a lot of people will look at 'X' number of golds and that's all they care about as far as 'greatest athlete' or whatever, but people really should be aware of the sport and that people in other sports have no chance to compete against that. I think some people out there are trying to ordain him as the greatest athlete ever. They were discussing this on NBC at one point. I'd say that at most, he's the greatest athlete who doesn't really matter much. I mean, swimming? If it's not a Summer Olympics year I don't even hear Phelps' name, or any swimmer for that year (or most Olympic athletes). The Olympics are a big deal, of course, but outside of that how many people watch these sports live or even on TV that much? Not many people. Herr Kruger