Southpaw Samurai

The Halo games have quite a good story, background, and plenty of personalities to fill out a film; especially a sci-fi action flick.  Let me put it this way; compared to Doom's story, Halo looks like Lord of the Rings.

Actually, the Master Chief isn't all that massive, especially as depicted in the sequel.  He's got height and a full build, but taking into account room for the armor, he can't be Zangief inside that suit.

Have to concur on the both parts. While playing Halo, you actually wind up thinking 'This would've made a great movie.' given the storyline, the pacing, and the key action sequences. It's actually very good storytelling, particularly for a somewhat mindless first person shooter. Still, even though you're thinking it would've made a great movie (as would've the two 'book end' novels that tell the before/after story), when you think about a movie based on the game, you're almost left with a 'why?' and 'I'd rather play the second half of Halo 2...I mean, Halo 3!' .

And, yeah, given how ridiculously lean the armor was in Halo 2, Master Chief has to actually be one of those somewhat scrawny, 100% muscle, no body fat type guys to have fit in that (which I suppose does make sense....).

I'll also have to agree with those saying no full-time CGI MC. Throw a live body with a decent look costume and it'll feel much more real...a full CGI MC might as well be in a full CGI movie...in which case, just give me another game. Look at Robocop....cheesy as hell and the mobility of an 80 year old man, but he's still cool. You can CGI up the MC for when he's leaping from vehicle to vehicle, but you need that real life one to interact with people. When the marines look up at him in awe and reverence, it'll be easier if they can see the costume and not just somebody in a blue body suit.

I dunno, I mean it seemed like a nice vacant beurocratic reason to me, She might be psychic or able to read minds, high level government officials thought that perhaps she might have read their minds when they were thinking about whatever vile things they have done, jeez we better tie up that loose end, go capture or kill it!

I agree. We're talking politicians here. They have to protect the locks on their closet doors at all times. Look at our current politicians. You hint that they might have done something wrong and they'll do everything from bribing you to be quiet to attacking you on everything you might have done since you were a kid. Their paranoid and defensive.

Just remember that the Operative hasn't been the only one after River. We still have our friendly Blue Sun 'two-by-two, hands of blue' guys who want River for whatever reason they have. You might also have other factions of the Alliance government seeking to eliminate or recapture her for various purposes...most of these deparments never talking with one another. Anyone who knows of her powers will either want to get rid of her or control her.

As much as I could live with the focus not be on River, her problems with the Alliance are far from over and she is a nice little focal point to get the others into trouble (or, at least trouble of world-shattering type and not just tavern chair shattering type ).

The past few days since seeing the movie, I've been torn over something....should they have left Wash's dinosaurs with him or not? It would've been cute to see his little 'head stone head display' surrounded by the palm trees and dinosaurs. Yes, I'm concerned about Wash's toy dinos...even if one is an inevitable traitor.

A friend after the movie joked they should bring Wash back as his mirror-universe twin. While insulting to insinuate such a Star Trek-ish plot device, could you imagine an evil Wash who still has his mustache and Hawaiian t-shirt?

I unfortunately knew about Wash and Book months ago, but I have to say that I noticed something about Wash's death. As soon as he died (in the midst of one of the traditional humorous 'cool down' moments as someone has already said), I glanced at my friends' faces and you can tell that they not only were shocked by the event itself (as they are all Firefly fans and almost all like the character), but it seemed to dawn on them that Whedon may be willing to kill off the whole crew to tell the story. It made the whole holding action against the Reavers more intense for them because suddenly everyone was fair game.

That probably only works on fans of the series who don't know the results ahead of time, but it's pretty darn good story telling.

As for Book's past, I'm going to side with the old shepherd himself and say it doesn't need to be told. Look at all the other cool, mysterious sci-fi characters who had their origins destroy them. I think the series and the movie together imply that either Book was an operative or something much worse along those lines back in the day. The not knowing for sure, though, is part of what makes it cool.

Overall, it's a good enough movie and a very fitting addition to the series. If you're going to suggest it to Firefly virgins, though, do them the favor of letting them borrow your series DVDs and run through a marathon first. I think you really need to have learned to love the characters before you can truly take this in properly.

Anyone notice that Shepard Book is absolutely nowhere to be seen in any of the Serenity trailers?

I can't tell if its a plot device or they out and out clipped the guy in the movie.

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Book has a small role in the movie, unfortunately, but he is in it. I'm torn over whether they should one day tell his backstory or leave it as the cool mystery that it is....so far any time someone's tried to tell the backstory to a mysterious sci-fi character they not only de-mystify the character, but also tend to tell a pretty lame tale.

I'm still wait and see on that Hybrid Optimus. As others have said, he shares a lot with the MP Optimus in design and doesn't look like his cab mode will be much prettier. I DO like that they're not trying to hide the fuel tanks....and sort of dig if they do make them gattling cannons...having weapons on body parts a normal human wouldn't is part of the appeal of giant war machines.

I'm NOT very wait and see on the Binaltech Optimus, though. He's got everything I hate in the Prowl design, only without any of the redeeming factors. As has been said, what's with the seats dangling off his forearms? Couldn't SOMETHING been done to thin the legs? Looks like one of the larger-sized Gobots....

Mirage, however, is interesting....definitely resembles the old guy enough while not adhering to it unnecessarily. I'm even coming around to the wheel kneepads.

Those Star Wars Transformers....well, they look better than the Marvel superhero Transformer imitators, but can't say much more.

I think the whole Roadblock/Heavy Duty issue came out of Hasbro not maintaining the Roadblock name and losing it (sort of why you also have thinks like 'Autobot Jazz' and 'Hot Shot/Hot Rodimus' in the Transformers world. To me, HD has always seemed to be an inferior clone of RB. Literature is handled differently, which is why you can have both in the comics.

I'm gonna be in the VAST minority here I'm sure, but having grown up with Hama's 80's comics and file cards (although I enjoyed the cartoons), I have always had this extra sense of realism and how the Joes were relative to their time period. Because of that, everytime I see Duke these days, I'm thinking 'why do you keep getting younger? Shouldn't you be pushing sixty-something if you were kicking around in the military back in '67?' To me, a lot of the Joes' personalities came from their history and unlike the Transformers or other lines, you simply can't just change dates and keep their history intact. Are Stalker, S.E., S.S., and Wade Collins all vets of the first Gulf War now? Otherwise, they should be calling this new series: G.I.JOE: A REAL SEXAGENARIAN HERO!

It would've been a little dangerous, marketing-wise, but I sort of wish Hasbro at one point said, "Let's keep these guys historically grounded a bit. We'll keep some of the old guys around as mentors and superior officers, but let's bring in new blood." You can have Duke or Stalker still around as grizzled grey haired top dog sergeants who don't go out in the field much, but are still influential (heck, Hawk's just about the same age as Duke, so you can keep him as the overall head honcho general). You can maybe convince me that Snake-Eyes is capable of being active. You can take some of the older, later Joes like Tunnel-rat and make them the experienced vets. Then you work in new Joes.

I suppose Devil'sDue did try to throw some new blood in, but to me all their new characters were pretty sad: easily trite, stereotypical, and dull. Like we needed a new ninja...and then to name him after a region??? (anyone know which characters supposedly make up Kamakura's name? Maybe it actually makes sense, but I've tried some combinations and they mostly sound stupid in translation). And don't get me started on the computer kids....

I REALLY need someone to sell me on the Integra Prowls....a cool picture or something. Right now it just looks too awkward and blocky to me...and I've very happy with my modified Jazz Prowl custom I have...he's not exactly a Bluestreak/Smokescreen twin, but he's close enough and the fact that he and Jazz match works well as Optimus' two right hand men. I might consider the blue one just to have one of the car type, but I'd probably customize it to someone else (don't like the white arms and head). Anyone have or have a good link to some better/more dynamic Prowl pics?

Yeah...most of the issues/errors D.H. has commented on the F-16/F-18 are far beyond my own pathetic abilities to discern, but there are some nagging things. For such a detailed cockit, I'm surprised there's no full HOTAS...a nicely detailed joystick, but merely buttons and switches on the left hand side. After having fun with the P-51, I was disappointed in the lack of any articulation on the control surfaces. Still, overall it's just damn impressive...I sort of wish I had my old SkyStriker still...could have the 'X-14' (its designation, if I recall) roll up next to the substantially larger F-16 and the Falcon pilot point and laugh at Ace's Hoopty ride....of course, Ace at least has a working parachute on his ejection seat

From what I've heard, BBI's detail is better than the 21st Century stuff (which I've eyed for years, but never thought I'd catch the fever to buy such gigantic toy planes)...myk, how does the old 21st C. WW2 stuff compare to the new BBI ones? It would be nice to add some of the 21st C. birds to my collection if they're similar enough in quality. Of course, I'll also be somewhat disappointed as I would've preferred a Jolly Rogers or Black Sheep Corsair over the BBI one, but I can live with that if it means I can add a P-38 to the batch (yeah, and I was previously whining about size and not having room... ).

Speaking of sizes, my F-16 arrived today and the thing is plain HUGE! I'm sorta glad I didn't go with a Hornet first as it's bigger and now I have to figure out exactly where I'd put a second one (time to mount planes to the ceiling, perhaps...). Yeah, I could've figured out the actual dimensions through calculations, but I picked up the BBI P-51 at a ToysR'Us store closing for pennies and while big, it's not gigantic. Visually I've always remembered Falcons seeming somewhat small in real life (to be fair, their wingspans are about the same and I think that's what I had remembered the most when I saw the two together at an airshow...and otherwise my experience with Falcons was seeing them parked next to Eagles at McGuire back in my youth...so maybe that's why my sense of size comes from).

Anyway, for those who haven't seen these in comparison to other things and are thinking of buying a few, here's a picture next to two planes most people here will have some idea of the size of: a 1/60 and 1/48 Yamato VF-1. As much as an 1/18 F-14 would be awesome, I don't know if I need a coffee table.

One of my all time favorite animated gifs...surprised it hasn't been posted yet....

PLEASE tell me that's a fan made poster job. I don't have a lot of hope for this or any other Uwe Boll movie, but anyone associated with the production could at least get more dynamic shots to composite together poorly. If your main titular character is going to be overshadowed by big floating heads (and it's not Kawamori's head), she should at least draw one's attention with a look and/or pose, not be standing there like a lifeless, doped up 'lady of the night' as Guppy said.

They could've given out a bunch of costume test/preproduction shots out to fans and they would've gotten back at least two dozen better poster designs....

Don't laugh. Given all the weird stuff in anime and the fact that half the females depicted in anime could pass to the average joe as twelve year old girls, it wouldn't suprise me if someone took up a crusade to pair being an anime fan with some depravity.

The article is an interesting read, although, as someone already said, the author does seem to have a personal beef against sci-fi collectors. I find it interesting that they hypothesize that these guys collect toys in order to set an environment to snare children (much like you'd reconfigure your place to be a bit romantic when you're hoping to score with a woman). While I know having your collection on display is NOT the way to set a romantic mood for a woman (unless you've hit the jackpot and found a woman who digs toys/sci-fi), I never thought of my place as a child-snare. I just like to have physical 3-d representations of things I've enjoyed hanging around.

As others have pointed out, I'd be curious to have a better survey done to find out how what percentage of the Toronto-based Star Trek fandom these pedophiles make up. If there's a Star Trek fan pedophile for every two Star Trek fans, then there might be something, but if it's one out of every couple hundred or thousand, then you just have a trait that's common. Someone already joked that sci-fi fans are lonely losers and pedophiles tend to be lonely losers...and I think that's the more common thread rather than the actual fandom. Like any other people, there's going to be the more 'normal' lonely losers and the depraved lonely losers.

Now, everyone hide your collections! It's the Feds!

The vatican is in rome... At the time it was built Rome was the capital of Earth.

Would have been a nice gesture to let the Chinese empire, Native Americans, Zulu and whoever else in on where their capital was being built.

-Al

Sorry *civilized Earth.

If by 'civilized' you mean 'by Greco-Roman standards', then I suppose you're correct.

Anyway, what I find funny about the Owen Lars is Obi-wan's brother issue is that it originally came from the *ROTJ novelization*, not just some random EU book (I'm curious if recent reprints have changed that at all). Now, the novelizations are to be taken with a grain of salt as well, but one would think Lucas had a closer eye on what was being put into those....heck, like most novelizations, I'm betting that the Owen/Ben thing was put in the novel because it was originally in some draft of the script and/or extra notes Lucas wrote for the screenplay. Despite what some die hard fans (especially the younglings these days), Lucas has been known to change his mind from time to time. After all, according to 'canon', Greedo went from being slow on the draw to being the Stormtrooper marksmanship instructor....

Heck, maybe Owen IS Obi-wan's brother...movies don't outright say they're not. Obi-wan might be from the Lars side of the family...could be why Obi-wan suggested Tattooine in TPM and why Owen and Beru don't find it odd some bearded robed guy they never met drops off a kid for them.

Dooku was a Jedi at the time of TPM, already some what disenchanted with the Order, the Senate, and the general state of the Republic, but still a Jedi. The books and other non-movie material I think have him as one of a score of Jedi that left the Order under protest (which may have occurred prior/during TPM), but don't know the details.

The questions is, was Dooku actively courted by Sideous during this time? The alterations to the Jedi star maps would indicate such. Sounds like Sideous likes to have his little 'Future Sith Apprentices' on the side (much like his grooming of Anakin since he first met him).

Never been a big fan of the 'rule of two' thing myself. Seems either too strict or too vague in interpretations (such as my above comment on Sideous grooming 'other options').

I have been willing to accept whatever silly reasons Lucas and/or the obsessively loyal fanbase come up with for why we see a young Anakin, but what constantly irritates me about that scene isn't the fact that we see Christiansen over Shaw, but the expression.

Shaw's Anakin is a content man proud of his son. His expression is one of a man who has finally found peace and is happy. It's a great way to end the series. Christiansen, on the other hand, for some reason was directed to give his 'looking from under my brows' smirky glare. From a different actor might've been an attempt to have him shyly raise his eyes from a downcast glance, but from Hayden it's his trade mark 'I'm a serial killer' look that he uses whether he's trying to kill someone or woo a senator into bed... THAT's what really doesn't work for me in that scene. It ends Star Wars on an almost creepy note instead of the whole 'the hero family is happy and together and the old guy ghosts are happy and together too' feel the originals had.

Played UO from beta through about six months.

Played Asheron's Call through the beta.

Played SWG for about six months.

Played WoW from beta until last night of beta.

I'm sort of burned out on the monthly fees thing. I understand the costs involved in maintaining servers all too well and realize that you do get some continual support, but my biggest peeve with monthly feels is that it compels you to play to get your money's worth and the game becomes less fun and more a chore (I remember asking a girl out and then setting the time so I had time to get home, shower, get dressed, and quickly run through my SWG harvestors not because I was addicted, but because A) if I didn't, there would be a chance would would stop functioning and B) I needed to feel like I had accomplished something with my $.50 worth month fee for that day). That's sad.

LOVE Guild Wars currently. No monthly fee and non-persistent world means I can come and go when I wish. Granted, it means GW is more a very (and I mean VERY) pretty Diablo than a real MMORPG and I DO really miss the community that a more traditional MMORPG developes, but it's nice not having to feel forced. My friends and I just play whenever we feel like. We can run through missions at our leisure (has allowed my one friend's wife to play with us since we don't have to worry about PKing, camping, loot stealing or anything like that). Very relaxing, very fun...and that's what a game should be.

Mori Ranmaru has been fully converted into a girl? With bunny ears!?!? What is this world coming to? The poor guy's spirit must be wailing in agony over how his image has been treated in recent years.

I don't believe Japanese have any hate for Oda Nobunaga. He's been used in positive light in a number of films (even a Takeda-centric movie like Kagemusha displays Nobunaga with respect and even a little admiration). In video games, Kessen 3 recently made him the HERO of all things. I believe it's just because Nobunaga's as well known as, say, George Washington is in the U.S. and he's a perfect example of a ruthless authority figure that people can fight against. He's always been known as a 'demon lord' (but, then again a lot of samurai were named 'demon of....(locale)' for their ferocity, so it's not ncessarily an 'evil' name). As others have stated, Nobunga was known for being brutal (although not necessarily anymore so than other daimyo of the period), for his distasteful embrace of European culture (although he wasn't converting as much as simply placating the foreigners in order to assimilate their technology), and for turning said technology on his opponents.

Nobunaga's just a big, famous, intriguing character who happens to be easily convertible into a central villain, that's all.

As others have stated, I'm actually amazed games have stayed relatively the same price over the years. Old catridge games used to run $39-79 back in the '80s. Floppy disk games for the Commodore 64 and Amiga would generally run $19-39 (though I miss the old crappy but fun Mastertronic $9.99 games...).

So, all things considered, the relative cost value for 'a' new game has decreased. What HAS increased over the years, however, has been the average price for your middle to obviously poor games. Back in the day when Electronic Arts meant innovative, creatively unique garage games that came in 'record album' like sleeves, a new EA game generally ran @$29. These days, just about any EA game, whether a really well done game worthy of EA back before it became a corporate monstrosity or a crappy little game, will set you back $49. Games released in the $29-39 range are often avoided by people because they figure they're 'bargain games' (I've actually seen people avoid a new game because 'if it was any good they'd ask more for it').

There IS a push coming up to increase the price though. A lot of the few 'super hyped' releases the past year or so have been $55-65 at the outset as a test to see how many people would be willing to pay more and all the 'special editions' where $3 or less worth of goodies are tossed in for a $10-15+ price increase are all market tests to gauge whether the community will support a general $5 to $10 price increase across the board)

Frankly, I wouldn't mind paying $50 or even more for the really good games I enjoy and would be happy to be spending such if I knew that I was giving the money back to the guys who made the game (or paying off the publisher's upfront payment to the developers), but all too often the credits for game grow longer and longer and not just from the need for fifty graphic artists as opposed to the two in the past, but from the fifty to a hundred corporate people behind the publishing company. Those people need to eat too but it seems like a lot of the 'costs' involved with modern games are for people who support the people who support the people who support the people who make the games. Ah...the Corporate World.

Still wondering if anybody here has the Colonial Viper & Cylon Raider toys from the original series made by Joyride Studios.

Thinking of buying them and want to know if they are worth getting?

Graham

It's a bit buried now, but waaaaay back in this thread I posted some pictures and a quick review of the Joyride toys.

Here....

I have more detailed photos I took for someone here who was interested in how detailed they were...don't know if I still have the photos on my drive at home or not, if anyone is interested.

Anybody put this up yet?

http://www.defensetech.org/archives/001451.html

That thing almost looks like one of those old G.I.Joe Pack Rats...the little remote controlled/autonomous robots. Now we just need one that has a flamethrower and one that fires stinger missiles.

I've heard the 2 rule before, but were do they say this?

Episode I: The Phantom Menace.

During Qui-Gon's funeral service, Yoda and Windu are off to one side discussing recent events.

Yoda: Only two there are. A master and an apprentice.

Windu: But which was destroyed? The master, or the apprentice?

I think Yoda says 'Always two there are...', which could be used to validate the 'only 2' rule, but also may be something to the like of 'where you see one cockroach...' meaning that they never operate alone.

Not trying to argue any point on it, but just clarifying. Personally, the 'only two in the whole universe' rule seems silly to me, but so does a lot of what Lucas comes up with.

I love the color scheme on Magnificus. The black not only looks better, but suddenly he looks like a more real microscope and gives some credence to the 'tank' mode (whereas not only did the original Perceptor colors make him look tacky and cheap, but the microscope mode looked like a kid's 2x microscope and the tank mode looked like the same thing, only broken and compacted ). Actually would make me consider picking him up if I was still in the mood to replace my G1 toys that didn't survive the past twenty years.

Just Roy partying with the other half of the Autobot Alt/BTs. Note that even though Sideswipe is a bit behind him, their heads are almost the same size.

It's close...on something like Sideswipe's body, he's going to look like a pinhead. On Windcharger's body, it would probably look good.

I'm guess you're thinking a Jetfire custom, so I took the liberty of taking a couple of quick shots of Roy next to the Autobots for you to get an idea. If you want one in particular for a closer idea of how it might look in profile or something, let me know and I can take a few more tonight or tomorrow.

Not involving Superman and not a cover, but definitely one of those "They HAD to be smirking when they wrote it." type scenes.