Republicans On Iran

Republicans want to go to war with Iran. Like the war with Iraq, there's no good reason for it, other than the nation generally opposes us, and it would be nice if it was on our side. I've heard Reps ask, "If this revolution turns ugly, would Obama invade?" and comments along those lines. This kind of Non-Sequitor reasoning apparently makes sense to some people.

People like to describe the election as a fraud, (which it is), and a subversion of democracy (which it isn't) against a reformer (which it isn't). Iran isn't a Democracy. Imagine if prominent religious figures got to decide who was allowed to run for president, instead of only who became the Republican nominee. That isn't Democracy, and that's how Iran works. We'll never see an Iranian presidential candidate that's a true reformer, since the priesthood handpicks the candidates.

And since when do Republicans want to oppose sham democracies? I don't know if they noticed, but we support all sorts of Oligarchies (China), Aristocracies (Russia), and even Monarchies (The United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia).

To be perfectly honest, I don't understand the Republican's fascination with Iran, it's completely opaque to me.

An Open Letter To Republicans

Dear Republicans,

PLEASE nominate Sarah Palin for your presidential candidate.

Sincerely,
Carsonist

Bardcast Ep 5 is done recording

We finished Ep 5 Recording, I should have it up sometime tomorrow. Editing things sucks. From now on, no mistakes!

TF2 Updates

Yesterday night, they introduced a pretty big TF2 update. Since it improved my favorite watch, the Dead Ringer, it inspired me to do a list of the best updates that TF2 has done, in order. It will naturally start with the class updates, the updates following will be more interesting. I think that engie update will be number 6. Probably scout will be the last of the class updates, since it's lame.

#1: The Sniper/Spy update.

Of course the first update is the biggest one. It has a new gametype, two classes being updated with awesome items, (except the Cloak and Dagger and the Razorback) and the new item system. You may not like the system, but there are hats too, so I think that's a trade off I'm willing to make.

In Defence Of Assassin's Creed

I'm not the biggest fan of Assassin's creed in the world, and I'm the last person who will say it's perfect. It is, however, a fun game, and one that did things that other games didn't, and nowadays, it's probably on sale, so its short length is mitigated by the reduced cost, so if you haven't played it yet, I'd advise picking it up.

I'm mainly writing this to defend a particular part of the game: the repetitive missions that everyone complains about. I think people are complaining about them because they're not looking at them with the right mindset. First of all, if you don't like sitting on a bench and listening to people, I think the game only makes you do it once. Ever. Think of it as a brief cutscene if you absolutely can't stand it. Second, it all works if you think of it in the context of planning an assassination. You're not doing the side missions because you love to listen to people on benches; you're there because information is critical to an assassin. It's true the game doesn't sell it very well, but it's all awesome if you think of each chapter as laboring to produce the perfect assassination. If you do all the little labours, you can find out where the target will be, what his deal is, and the safest route. Getting the perfect run is tricky, but it's very rewarding.

Now, other complaints are completely legitimate: the game is far too short, with only 9 assassinations, and the first one is comically easy (still cool though, made me feel like a bad-ass to invisibly assassinate the guy, then walk away with no suspicion on me, on the first try). The cutscenes are very poorly thought out, especially having to watch the deathbed confessions of each of the targets. I've said it before and I'll say it again, cutscenes that are absolutely unskippable, even on a second run through, are a crime against humanity. Nothing kills replay value faster.

Episode 4: Authorship "Question"

We've finished recording episode 4, I'll probably have it up by sometime tomorrow.

Don't Try To Make WoW

People who look at WoW, and say, "Hey, this fantasy MMORPG is doing well, maybe we should make one!" are idiots. It's like looking around 1940 Italy, and saying, "This dictatorship in Italy is doing well, maybe we'll start a new one!"

The currently successful party will bury you.

Just Went To "The Tempest"

It's been a while since I've posted, but I assure you, nothing interesting has happened before today.

I just went to a performance of The Tempest, and it was pretty good. I guess once we're done with the the Authorship "Question" episode, we'll do The Tempest instead of the episode that people have voted for. Take that, Democracy!

BardCast: Movin' On Up!

Check this out:

That's right, BardCast is on the front page of the iTunes search for "Shakespeare"! Number 16 already. I expect that once we get our name out, we'll be in the top three in no time. Maybe even number one, since all the other podcasts on that list are either lame or defunct.

Gardening Success!

Earlier I mentioned that we started a garden here. I am glad to report that we have a thriving crop of plants coming up. I may take some photos later to show exactly how awesome it is.

Yesterday was the first time it's rained in a week, but it's the perfect rain for growing plants, a steady, light, rain that lasts all day. I've been watering them several times a day when it doesn't rain at all, which has been every other day.

The plants we're growing are: Tomatoes, Sweet Peas, Green Beans, Carrots, and Lettuce. I've been trimming the peas and beans and replanting the plants that I pull out. I'm running out of places to put them. I may have to put plants in cups or something. Fun times.

L4D 2 Outrage!

I'm only half-kidding with the title of this post. L4D is a product which the producers sold to us as being something they were going to work on like TF2. We were expecting continuous development, and now we see there is a sequel in less than a year. (364 days exactly, which seems like a taunt to me).

This game is what we were expecting from the first game. They've fixed the problem with camping in corners, and left the original game as flawed as ever.

I didn't invent these expectations of updates. There's an interview where somebody who works on the game promises new characters, new weapons, and new game modes. We got a new game mode, flawed as it is, but I doubt we're going to get anything else we were promised.

BardCast Ep 3 Is Done!

We've finished recording and editing BardCast episode 3, and I'll have it up either later today, or, at latest, early tomorrow.

I think this one is the real test of the podcast. Since half of our episodes will be about individual plays, if this isn't entertaining, we'll need to really retool the podcast.

As always, please take a listen.

Four Shots, Four Dominations

I just thought I'd brag about an awesome TF2 thing I did. I was running sniper, and I dominated 4 people in 4 shots. Later in that life, I dominated another person. This is absurdly improbable, even if you're really good. To dominate someone, you need to kill them three times without being killed in return. This means I had killed each of those persons twice in a row, and they all happened to approach me in rapid succession. This is so improbable I'd wager that it may have never happened before.

I noticed that I was on a roll on my 3 shot, and when I got my 4th domination, I felt like I had some sort of magic power. My 5th shot was a complete whiff fired at random. I guess four is good enough for me.