So...

Well, Nintendo's remaking Metroid Prime and Prime 2 for the Wii. I'll definitely be getting those.

While we're on the subject of remakes, if you could pick one game to be remade with new controls/graphics/etc., what it be? I'd definitely go for Major's Mask, as it still holds the position as my favorite video game ever.

Definitly can't wait for the Conduit. Looks like a kick-ass Wii shooter.

Hmmm...I would love to see some of the Spiderweb Software RPG's with current-level graphics.

Russell wrote:While we're on the subject of remakes, if you could pick one game to be remade with new controls/graphics/etc., what it be? I'd definitely go for Major's Mask, as it still holds the position as my favorite video game ever.

Definitely Aidyn Chronicles. It's an awesome fucking game, but it could be so much better if they updated the graphics and ironed out the bugs and glitches.

My first pick would have to be Half-Life, but a mod team is already doing a remake of Half-Life using the Half-Life 2 engine. So I guess barring that, I'd have to go with either Goldeneye (there is a Source engine mod for it, too, but it's only multiplayer), or SimEarth.

rock_nog wrote:Seriously, I really wish they'd make more shooters for the Wii.

AGREED.

:P I just got a Wii Zapper for my birthday and damn, that thing is awesome. There needs to be more games that can use it (or at least, more shooters in general!).

That, or some modsbanned Non-gimmicky RPGs. Seriously. Just make it so you can point and click your selections. That's all! No need to waggle!

So... I'm speaking to a recruiter tomorrow about joining the USCG.

Breaker wrote:So... I'm speaking to a recruiter tomorrow about joining the USCG.

Fabiano the Spy wrote:Holy shit, no kidding? When did this idea come up?

About a year and a half or so ago. About damn time too.

Coast guard, eh? Cool. Good luck with that.

I dowloaded Onslaught on my Wii this afternoon. Not a bad Wii-Ware game, if you're into FPS games. But dammit, it's PAIN to use the Wii zapper for it.
Swipe nunchuck to wipe off bug guts? Not too hard.
Electro whip? Cake!
Shake free of monsters? ...ehh...I can manage.

But the modsbanned GRENADES! UUUGH... It takes sooo much force to actually throw one that it's really hard to chuck one whne you need to. I've had, no joke, three nades blow up in my face because I couldn't throw it.

Then again...I can't play WITHOUT the zapper either, because my accuracy will drop a good solid 50% without it.

So... I'm speaking to a recruiter tomorrow about joining the USCG.

You know, I might get back into quest designing again, maybe even get into scripting -- if they made it possible to script in LOLCODE.

HAI
CAN HAS ZSCRIPT?
PLZ OPEN GFX "FFACOLOUR.ZGP"?
    AWSUM THX
        VISIBLE GFX
    O NOES
        INVISIBLE "ERROR!"
. . .
. . .
. . .
KTHXBYE

hehe I was just reading about that 2 days ago. Funny coincidence.

Sam Atoms wrote:You know, I might get back into quest designing again, maybe even get into scripting -- if they made it possible to script in LOLCODE.

HAI
CAN HAS ZSCRIPT?
PLZ OPEN GFX "FFACOLOUR.ZGP"?
    AWSUM THX
        VISIBLE GFX
    O NOES
        INVISIBLE "ERROR!"
. . .
. . .
. . .
KTHXBYE

That needs to be added to ZC's scripting language. That's hilarious! :laughing:

Okay, I know there have been some weird dreams discussed here before, but I think this one pushes the wierdness meter.
In the beginning, I'm browsing some political debate thread here on AGN, and it turns out that Obama has been posting, as part of an attempt to get in touch with the people. So, there's this huge thread, with Obama debating back and forth like any other member. Than, my mom pulls me off the computer to make me go to Church (something she does every few months or so), and says "just so you know, your father and I have decided to check your hard-drive later, to make sure you haven't downloaded any illegal MP3s", to which I'm like "...crap!" As professional artists who have "views" about that, it's just the kind of thing they would do, too.
But the wierdest part is yet to come.
At Church, turns out a guest speaker is opening todays sermon. Surprise surprise, its Obama. And how does he open the sermon? By break-dancing.
Yes.
I dreamed that Barack Obama was break dancing in my church.

You have really boring dreams.

I have to agree.

But don't feel bad, mine aren't anymore exciting than your's.

Mine usually involve me, Megan Fox and a pool full of cherry jell-o. *shrug* Pretty boring.

Amaster, just, wow. I'd give anything to see that.

I have confusing dreams too. The other night, I dreamed I was being chased by a huge bird. My brother was running too, then Moltres (the flaming Pokemon bird) swoops down and grabs him. I rush into my garage and close the door, and the bird hits its head on it. I run inside, then realize the front door's open. So I run upstairs, and I see something's behind the shower curtain. So I think "Okay, whatever's behind there is going to startle me enough to wake me up." A claw dashes out and nearly grabs me. I jump, but strangely, I didn't wake up. So I was excited. Then, the hand pulls back the curtain, and Hilary Clinton's behind there. Now this really startled me. Then, she turned into the giant bird and attacked me. I woke up trying to figure out what the heck caused that dream.

Too much chocolate syrup before bed time. Happens to me all of the time.

I just got back Washington DC from last week. To explain why I was there, my uncle had been MIA from '68 back in VietNam. In 2007, they found some of his remains, and 5 other soldiers as well. The US flew us in for a proper burial in Arlington National Cemetary. I tell you this much, I had never even met the guy (mom was only 7 when he went MIA), and I still got rather choked up from it all. The guy the drove the bus to take the 6 families to ANC, got very emotional over itan and with good reason. 2 years ago to the day, two of his best friends were killed in Iraq and he had been wounded. When we all found out, we all clapped for him to show our appreciation. This was after the funeral service on the way back.

If anyone's interested, I can show some pictures of the service. It was... I don't even know how to describe it.
We also got to meet 2 guys that had been with him. 1 guy had a picture of him and some others with my uncle 4 days before it went down. Another guy had been in the foxhole right next to him and had gotten on the first helicopter that had gotten out. The second, the one with my uncle and 25 others, was shot down. There are a lot more details to it all, but that's in short what happened.

Wow, I know what you mean. I feel sorry for you. I'd love to see pictures.

So this morning, I was opening a box of pop tarts, and there was a ten dollar Itunes gift card in it. I'm happy. 😊

Here's a picture of the funeral for my uncle and 5 other soldiers that were MIA from 6-8-1968. I'm not sure exactly who the kneeling soldier is giving the flag to, but that's what he's doing.

It was a pretty good experience, the whole thing. It's odd to describe it as "the funeral was great". But it really was great. Those that knew them, finally got closure. I'm just glad I got to be there.

Also for those that have never been there, Arlington National Cemetary is beyond HUGE. Here is only a SMALL section of a section there:

The place is just so huge!

I will never be able to describe a funeral as great. They're so sad, so depressing. I still occasionally cry from my grandmother's funeral two months ago. I'm glad that you could enjoy your uncle's though.

So how were they able to identify the remains? Dog tags? DNA testing?

They did find dog tags and some other personal items form him and others, but that's not how they do the remains. They had found several teeth and many bone fragments. Unfortunately, the soil in Viet Nam is very acidic, so DNA gets destroyed in bones (and anything else) rather quickly. Teeth have enamel on them that slow a lot of the corrosion down. Some were still unidentifiable, but many of them still were.

Another interesting thing about DNA matching is that they could only use sister family members. Brothers, even though they had the same mother and father, do not share close enough DNA ... uh, patterns?... to do a proper comparison. If the person had only brothers, or was an only child, they have to use the mother's DNA for comparison. If the mother had already passed, there could be no comparison. The lady with the VFW that told us all of this last NOV had said they had some cases where this had happened. They also had one where the soldier, whose remains had been found, had been adopted. So they tracked down the original mother and asked her for the help for his adopted family. In this stories case, she did. She also had said that they had ran into the adopted thing before, and the biological mother was unwilling to help. Which is just sad.

My uncle was 1 of 8 kids, 4 of which were his sisters. So the DNA thing was pretty easy to get a hold of.

I also only described the funeral as great meaning that it was extremely well done. I don't know how it could've gone any better. There was so much respect. Here were Marines that had never even met these 6 soldiers showing the utmost of respect for them and their families. I think that's what got to me.

So you got some free poptarts with your iTunes card, huh? I don't think I've ever won anything from poptarts.

I won a free pool cue for getting the most 8 on the breaks in this past session of league play (6 of them). It's from Cuetech and is flat black on gloss black. The shaft is an SST shaft that is flat black and super smooooooth. It's the same shaft that Allison Fisher has been promoting from what I've been told. I think I got either 3 or 4 break and runs as well. I know it was at least 3. It only took 5 years of league play to finally win something in the individual department.

The soil is that acidic? Wow, you've got me scared of Vietnam now. 😊

Interesting about the DNA. I would have guessed a brother would be a better match because they are the same sex. I'm going to do some research on this. You've got me really curious now.

We all thought the same thing.

Oy... Biology lesson, everyone. You use female DNA because in doing family DNA matching, you generally use midochondrial DNA which is passed on maternally. Because only your mother gives you your mitochondrial DNA, it isn't mixed up, making it much easier to do comparisons. Most DNA is a jumble of both your parents', which makes it incredibly difficult for matching purposes.

And to explain what mitochondrial DNA is, each of your cells contains an organelle called a mitochondria, which is responsible for converting sugar into energy for the cell. And for some reason, the mitochondria has its own DNA, separate from the rest of the human genome. It's believed that this is because far back in the mists of uncharted time, mitochondria were once bacteria that formed a symbiotic relationship with eukaryotic cells, based on the similarity of mitochondrial DNA to bacterial DNA.

Well that explains a lot. The lady with the VFW didn't go into all of those details. I think it was partly because then it would've been off subject of the more important topic at the time (and most wouldn't understand what she was even saying anyways, bringing up restrictions in DNA testing brought out the glazed over eyes from many). But that's stuff is pretty cool.

Actually, rock, mitochondria host submicroscopic tree-like beings called farandolae, with which you can communicate if you master the ability to teleport into the mitochondria and speak via telepathy.

Or so Madeleine L'Engle would have us believe.

So lately I've been into toasting marshmallows over my stove. It's delicious and awesome. You can pretty much toast a perfect marshmallow every time. Anyone else do this?

Yeah, but how do you get the "wood smoky" flavoring? You don't, do you. And therefore, NOT a perfect marshmallow!

Actually... I just never tried it.

I don't quite like marshmallows that much, (too porous.) but now you've given me the idea to do the very same with buttered toast, or the occasional tuna sandwich. 😛