Just wanted to log in to say thanks for all the kind words, it really means a lot. I won't be coming back for the foreseeable future, but all the well wishes definitely encourage me to do so, in time. And it's okay that people know what happened, my apologies for disappearing like that.. I did realise I would be letting down some people on here, since I promised to do certain things for them (Dorian, Mittens, Ryudo, my apologies, I'll pay you guys back one day, bet on it). Also apologies to my fellow staff members (and Dojo forum members) for bailing out like I have, if I could turn back the clock, I would have contacted you guys and the Dojo with what was going on, I feel bad about it.

I also hope ThyDarkAngel is doing fine himself, he's going through with difficulties himself also. If you're reading this, take care of yourself and all the best. Same goes for any of you going through hard times right now. I wish all the best to all of the members on here [for example: Orange (hope you have the best damn wedding there ever is and ever will be) and Kenny (keep on living the dream)] in the future.

Don't want to make a big deal out of my absence, but seeing all of the posts in here, I felt I had to.

I vote Crimson Ryan or Kenny for mod!

I'll always be on PSN or my Hotmail if any of you guys fancy a chat. Sorry if this comes off as pretentious, I was just rather touched by all the nice messages.
You guys and gals are the best there is. See you around (and maybe again, in the future).
Be well.
Henry out.

*waits for inevitable rant from yuk*

After getting my old camera dolly and tripod back, i've been contemplating a short film to do for good practice. Finally came up with an idea.

Not sure how i'm gonna do it, its gonna be ambitious, but I decided to do a short based on a complete shut-in who finds out when he concentrates real hard, he can "open his mind" and be able to bend reality to his will. Do things like levitate objects. The kicker is whenever these things happen, he does a double take--and finds things back to normal in a snap. The character is going to say everytime he finds a startling new revelation "...or maybe i'm going crazy."

Eventually he's visited by a mysterious stranger, which'll be a creepy looking being, and tells him he's there to help. But the main character is convinced it's on to him and refuses to believe it's there to do good. In the end, "demon sounds" get louder and louder and the main guy laments that he opened a realm that's slowly consuming him...or maybe he's going crazy.

It's a classic "is he succumbing to schizophrenia or is it really happening" short. I think it'll be interesting to see if it can be pulled off with a very low to non-existent budget. I need to experiment with invisible string, the lighting, and how to move the camera the way I imagine it. There are also some pretty cool free demon sounds available.

Bambi made this one some time ago.

I was watching Leo Laport's Know How... On TWiT.tv and not sure why it took me so long to notice but in the background under the TV you can see a small blue box. That blue box is the Transistor Radio I donated last year :D
http://i.imgur.com/sDZtI.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/e9MI4l.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/u25tll.jpg

Lamewad is not lame at all guys, he sent me 3 games free to me.

i hate kanji *_*

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/11/01/keep-the-faith-tornquist-talks-dreamfall-chapters/

Besides the shenmue series, one of my favorite video game francises is The Longest Journey (TLA) saga. This includes the original TLA and Dreamfall: The Longest Journey.

Much like Shenmue 2, Dreamfall ends on a very pivotal, uncertain moment in the story where gamers were left with more questions than answers. It's been 6 years since Dreamfall came out and Funcom, the original publisher, has been busy working on other projects with no clarity on Dreamfall's future.

Now the creator of TLA/Dreamfall, Ragnor Tornquist, has started his own company, acquired the license to create new TLA games, and will use a government grant (and a kickstarter campaign) to fund the sequel that fans have been clamoring for (much like the dojo community has been for Shenmue).

I don't know where Yu's head is at these days or whether there's any plan in place for Shenmue's future yet, but this feels like the most plausible way forward from where we are.

Okay, Blue. I'm really only typing this to you. I just started Deep Space 9 for the first time in my life. Now, I've only watched the pilot, and the next episode, but I've seen enough to judge the first season.

Impressions:

1. I feel like I'm on a well-deserved vacation, after watching The Next Generation. I still love the Enterprise-D, I'd still rather serve under Captain Picard, etc., but the idea of a space station is actually rather nice and relaxing. That's not to say it's not dramatically exciting, but the whole Promenade, with the saloon, the doctor, the constable, the shops, etc. is really fantastic.

2. The architecture is really awesome. I have only just begun to really appreciate the late 80's, early 90's neo-deco design of the Enterprise-D. All the shapes and lighting are pure high 20th century futura. The Captain's ready room, the blue light strips on the ceiling, the checkered textures... It's all basically deco and nouveau. The exterior is even reminiscent of the Chrysler Building (Aztec pattern) mixed with an earlier art nouveau (organic) shape, and the colors inside are all art nouveau. You get the idea. Well, DS9 continues with this tradition in a most excellent way. Commander Sisko's office door is a masterpiece. The whole station is designed to look like a darker, more art deco, setting than the Enterprise-D, something the Enterprise-E would replicate later on. Anyhow, it captures that 90's nostalgia for high 20th century noirish cosmopolitanism that defined so many shows from that time, that only now, with some distance, we can look back and distinguish as a separate style, just as the original series was thoroughly 60's. It's so thick in the first season, I half expect to see red brick somewhere on the set, and then it will turn into an episode of Early Edition. You get what I mean, right? The new uniforms, the hair, warm colors, the sets, the Cardassian computers, sunset baseball on the holodeck, everybody's got a wise old man to look up to, and there's still good in the world. It's all quite well defined 1990's 20th century nostalgia, probably because the new century was fast approaching, all taking place approximately 35 seconds before the whole world turned into unshaven cynical thick-rimmed hipsters in Q heaven. Yes, I refer to the world Apple has made since 1999.

And I liked females better when they didn't all straighten or cut off their hair. Everyone looks... younger and... happier.

alive, finally got heat and internet back.

Let me tell you something right now fella, dont make a dick outta me. Your post was edited back, because Mormons wernt the only voters in the American election, and the only reason you did it was to troll Ryudo. Wether i like him or not is irrelevant, but he has ignored you as of late in your attempts to have sly digs and troll him.
I have asked you privately to stop, and you declined so heres the deal; do it again, and your warned. Keep on doing it and your gone, pure n simple. My comment above was as scarcastic a response as you gave me, so dont re-edit a post a staff member has changed. Thats the way it is, if you dont like it then fuck off.

I'm the opposite, I don't so much mind a candidate with a religion different from my own. But I did question his leadership. It's just that he doesn't seem to want to "guide" the mob. He wants to be part of the mob. That for me is a concern when the GOP continuously shifts further and further to the right. I suspect a candidate as "Go with the flow" as Romney from one week to the next would not take the reigns of the party and get them back on course, on the contrary. I suspect it would have been the party puppeteering him.

That and whole "I have a great plan but I can't talk about it/I have tax loopholes in mind to close but I can't say what they were" ect didn't help matters. :lol: What little of his plan he did tell us anything about involved shrinking the deficit through ballooning military spending and slashing taxes. It seems so hard to reconcile from the math side of things to the point where if those were the things he was willing to talk about, what kinds of things was he planning that he wouldn't talk about? :shock: Ah well, election over. I'm glad to be 2 and a half years away from being bombarded with political ads again.

But also a lot of that should be countryside

This.

One of my favourite things to do is drive across from Los Santos to San Fierro. I did it once in a small tractor, going at snails pace, listening to K-Rose and absorbing the scenery and cars casually driving past me. I love that so much. Especially round the back of Mt. Chiliad. It was an excellent way of reflecting on the story up until that point, and also created a proper sense of excitement and achievement hen you get to your destination. RDR also did this for me, but to a lesser extent due to the limited modes of transport and more barren scenery. But countryside definitely gets my vote!

The democratic party candidate for Washington state's 4th legislative district (which covers Spokane Valley) was Amy Biviano.
http://i.imgur.com/rWdMW.jpg

Being that this is politics, somehow a topless Playboy picture of her from 1995 surfaced.

NSFW obviously.
http://i.imgur.com/HiSlM.jpg

Uncensored link

did she genuinely expect not to get found out! what the fuck was she thinking! jesus christ, are all politicians COMPLETE morons?

I for one approve of people that may have worked a very degrading line of work in their early lives later trying to make something of themselves with more reputable and respectable roles, public service among them. It breaks up the monotony of the wrinkly old geysers born with a silver spoon in their mouths telling us about how much they care about all us regular folk.




Also her ta ta's are quite nice.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vzue74y7A84[/youtube]

You are not authorised to read this forum.

After a talk with Yama, i will be staying in my post, but some things will be changing. George will reveal more when things are a bit more ironed out. But finally after 21 and a half hours i can get some sleep, and end this day a lot happier than when i started. Oh and theres a ban on registrations so there will be no more bots until the security issues are fixed.

Night Dojo'ers :nice!:

Stay thirsty my friends...

Sorry I had to edit the original image to something more appropriate. Jeff deserves special conservative treatment.

I just started playing Yakuza 3 last night. Man I forgot how much I loved these games. I didn't have a PS3 for the longest time so I just had to sit after playing Yakuza 2 all those years ago. The game looks great too. It's cool to see Okinawa. :P
You're going to love Yakuza 4 then, I've never seen the series look so good or feel as immersive. Well, until the fifth installment anyway.

Gah, I remember logging on that day in '05....was totally out of the blue and I was quite literally doing flips and somersaults around the house.

I still think Doree wasn't bullshitting us, and that - as he said - the situation changed after that article was published. He really was a big Shenmue advocate and I don't think he'd fabricate that story. I think his eagerness and excitement as a Shenmue fan clouded his judgment. It's a damn shame. That was 7 years ago! Crazy. I never would have thought it would have taken this long to play more Shenmue.

Shenmue is valuable IP. Even if it doesn't make money, there is value there. I just hope Sega finds a way to set up a realistic budget. Problem is, even if it is announced, officially....there's a huge wait from that point, and lots of time for things to take a disastrous turn. I don't even play video games at all anymore, and I'm not even too sad about it anymore (wistful and nostalgic, yes), but I do think if the day ever comes that I hold a copy of a new Shenmue game in my hand that'd it be one of the more surrealistic and memorable moments in my life.

"I feel like I've known that tree, from a long time ago.....it's a strange feeling."

Slavery was not good for black people, period. First off, the slave trade is responsible for the current condition of some of the Africa's undeveloped ares. Second, several thousand Africans died on during their boat ride, far beyond holocaust numbers. Us decedents of Africans did not need our ancestors to be captured and enslaved to have a "better opportunity". Hell, I can make allot more money if I move back to Africa (which I probably will at some point.)

Apple isn't innovative.

I have been talking about it, and planning it for a year, but today i leave Belfast and travel to Australia. To say i am nervous would be an understatement, but i will just keep powering through and try to enjoy the ride. I will be logging on as much as i can and keeping you updated, and i wont forget about here. :)

I think the worst ever was final fantasy 8 when you had to trek through a long cave with a tough random encounter gradually depleting your resources and will every step of the way to Omega Weapon. (and just when you think you can be all "Lawlz No Random skillz equipped", it bullshits you by giving you randoms anyway.) Omega weapon was some seriously ridiculous bullshit. Certainly one of the toughest bosses in video games, and the entire time the randoms EVERY SINGLE STEP wears you down. Even if you do beat him, in spite of the frantic randoms, you still have to make the trek all the way back before you can save. They must have handed out a lot of pay cuts at Square that week that content was created.

Still didn't have to put up with that randoms crap when in your airship, though.

Deep sea research lab? That was Ultima weapon, you could draw the GF Eden from him! I do know what you're talking about now though, if you did something wrong with the steam valves, you got spammed with enemies. Omega was WAY harder than Ultima though.

One thing that bothers me about Walking Dead is that, while it excels in some areas, such as characters development and well executed tension inbetween the people, it can get a tad predictable in others
For example,
The time Carl goes into the forest by himself in the 11th episode
That on its own is already stupid enough, since a kid raised up in that environment, knowing the dangers of wandering alone, would know better than that
And the fact that the kid instead of just shooting the walker, he approaches it and it was painfully obvious that something was going to happen. And as the boy escaped, I already knew that that walker was going to kill someone, and since Dale was being the main character of the episode, I figured it out it was going to be him

another thing is how the whole zombie attacks are executed, more than once they go with the sneak attack and that just does not go well with the walker theme. they're not smart, they're not cunning and they are certainly no stealth machine. They're animals that are always groaning whenever they're on camera, so it's hard to believe they can actually make a jump on someone without them noticing. However it seems to be one of the favorite ways to kill off a character and it just bugs me

This kind of things really bum me out, since I was thoroughly enjoying the show, but it prevents it from being a great show, it's just an above average one.
However, overall it was a pleasant surprise since I wasn't expecting it to be that good. I've never liked the whole zombie craze, but that's really not the strong point of the series.

All in all, I'm happy I gave this show a chance

http://i767.photobucket.com/albums/xx318/askvera/s2cd_sigbanner.png


DOWNLOAD - https://www.dropbox.com/s/8qkby011a3tkgg2/Shenmue%20II%20Character%20Database.rar

Yep. After nearly a decade, it's done, people :D

HISTORY OF THE SHENMUE II CHARACTER DATABASE PROJECT
Ever since casting my eyes upon screenshots of Shenmue published in the (now defunct) UK magazine Computer and Video Games, I have been absolutely enthralled by the series. This game was definitely something different. As the famous tagline proclaimed in the trailers before its release – RPG had changed. Sure, hailing the game as being its own exciting new “genre” with a somewhat silly acronym as its name (FREE- Full Reactive Eyes Entertainment) was being a tad overzealous perhaps, but you had to admire Yu Suzuki’s ambition for this game. When I finally got to play it on the Christmas morning of 2000, it did not disappoint. The atmosphere created was just amazing to me – a realistic, living, breathing town with over 300 individual characters – all with their own specific daily routines and, in supplementary materials, all named and given detailed biographies! Throw in the fantastic music and the engaging (if not completely original) story and you really had something special. And this was only part one of the saga...

Bundled with the game was the ‘Shenmue Passport’ disc. Through the Dreamcast’s internet connection, this enabled access to all sorts of information about the game, as well as ranking leaderboards for the various mini-games and the chance to get exclusive capsule toys. One of the best features was the character profile section however; as you met and conversed with the characters during a playthrough, their profiles would gradually be added to the Passport. Now to some, giving all 300+ characters names, stats, and biographies may seem extraneous, (especially given characters that Ryo can’t even speak to have detailed information about them!) but it really shows the love and care put into the game by the developers and the amount of depth to Shenmue that few games have matched.

PASSPORT EXPIRED
The Passport service was eventually taken offline in April 2002, but thankfully the character profiles had also been published in Prima’s strategy guide book for the game, so the information was still readily available to fans.
Which brings us to the sequel game, Shenmue II – which I got the following Christmas in 2001. This sadly could end up being the last game in the series, despite it ending on a cliffhanger and at a game-changing point in the saga’s story. Nonetheless, the sequel’s world was even bigger than the first’s– Ryo travels to Hong Kong to continue his quest, with most of its areas completely dwarfing Shenmue I’s in terms of size, as well as the amount of characters – around 700. There was also a lot more mini-games and sidequests to discover, and fans generally agree it is more action-packed and that the plot moves a lot quicker than the first game (though some will argue Shenmue I’s atmosphere has more charm) And what of these 700-odd characters? Were they all named and profiled as per the original game? As it turns out, yes – but these were not readily available to the fans outside of Japan.

Firstly, unlike the first Shenmue, there was no Passport. There was no Prima guide either, as the Dreamcast version had been cancelled in America. America eventually saw an updated version of Shenmue II on the Microsoft Xbox, and a Prima guide was finally published. However, unlike the Shenmue I book, there were only profiles on the main characters; Ryo, Shenhua, Xiuying, Fangmei, Ren, Joy, Wong, Lan Di, Dou Niu and Yuan. The Xbox version, with the new snapshot feature, did include profiles on some of the other characters; unlocked when you took pictures of them, but it didn't come close to having profiles for all the characters. Would we ever know the names and backgrounds of the reams of anonymous characters?

A FAN EFFORT
Shortly after I had completed Shenmue II, I looked around on the internet for fansites/information about the series, ultimately finding the excellent Shenmue Dojo website. I joined the forums, and this was in fact one of the first message boards I signed up to on the internet. My handle on the forum was (and still is) ‘Miles Prower’, as I am also a long-time fan of the Sonic the Hedgehog series of games (and Sega games in general). I made a lot of good friends through the Dojo community and have many fond memories associated with the forums. I think between us we have probably discussed every single aspect of the games to death, but as many fans will attest, you find or notice something new with every playthrough of these wonderful games. Not to mention the very active hacking/modding scene that developed, mostly headed by longtime member LanDC, in which reams of unused content was discovered and many interesting and or humourous modifications made to the game. I still get a warm nostalgic feeling every time I watch LanDC’s Road to Amihama videos in particular.

And indeed, the question of whether detailed character profiles existed for Shenmue II’s cast was raised in discussion. In a thread from 2003, a member named Eek the Cat shared some scans of a guidebook he owned published in Japan called the Shenmue II Perfect Guidebook. The scans showed that there were indeed names and profiles for each and every character.
Eek was even kind enough to put all of the scans together on a CD for me and mail it to me, and even threw in a couple of audio CD’s he had compiled containing music from Shenmue II (sadly the second game never had any official soundtracks released).

The problem? Being that this book was from Japan, the character names were in Chinese and the information in Japanese. Through discussion in the topic, another forum member called khien agreed to help with translating the character names as she could read Chinese. And so began the effort to translate the many character profiles. I began by gradually posting them within the topic, and then eventually creating a website (which, thanks to Web Archive, you can still view here , albeit with most of the images missing).

Continuing into 2004 and beyond, progress was quite slow, mainly due to me starting university. Khien’s life ended up becoming quite busy as well, but thanks to the efforts of another forum member, Oda Ryo, the translation work still continued. The forum member Kiyuu (possibly Japan’s biggest Shenmue fan, and often referred to as the ‘Shenmue Queen’), also informed me that another book existed, the Shenmue II Complete Guide, which contained profiles for characters not included in the Perfect Guidebook; namely those for the many pedestrians who wander the streets of Hong Kong. I made the effort to acquire this book myself and make scans for the remaining profiles.

RESSURECTING THE PROJECT
As the years went on, however, my free time became less and less. I studied for three years at university and after graduating in 2008, I was working full time; in short I was growing up. It was also looking increasingly unlikely that a Shenmue III would ever emerge. Life went on. However, my enthusiasm to complete the project was somewhat fired up again when Peter from the forums (who most likely owns the biggest Shenmue collection in Ireland) got in touch with me on Facebook asking if I was still working on it, as the Dojo staff had managed to get an interview with one of the voice actors for the English dub of Shenmue II (a very interesting read by the way, which can be found here , and they had requested that video clips be assembled of the characters he voiced, which he supplied a list of – but only by name and brief descriptions. Using the information from my project I helped with finding some of them. I then found myself wanting to get the project finished once and for all, and got back in touch with Oda Ryo who happily assisted me with getting the remaining names translated.

I had also spoken to the member ‘thegreatchai’, who had also been attempting to catalogue the character information on her wiki site, and over time we assisted each other greatly. I began transferring the information to an Excel spreadsheet with the intention of creating a complete database of all the Shenmue II characters – which after assembling a numbered list I discovered there are exactly 700 – surely a deliberate intention of the creators? At any rate, after a few months work the project was finally finished. I am glad that this information is now easily accessible to Shenmue fans, and while some may consider me obsessive or downright insane for pursuing with the project, it was worth it for a game series that I love so much and one day hope will be continued in some form. We can but hope. The saga may still go on....

DOWNLOAD - https://www.dropbox.com/s/8qkby011a3tkgg2/Shenmue%20II%20Character%20Database.rar

Please feedback and let me know if you spot any mistakes or errors, or any factoids about the characters that I may have missed. Most of all, enjoy :D

If anything, I became more impatient with games that take longer to complete. I used to hate the fact I couldn't get 40-50 hours off a single game.

Now I deride any game that takes longer than 8 hours to complete. Or even 4. I just don't have that much time to spend on them anymore.

http://kotaku.com/5964345/thq-is-so-bro ... ble-bundle

Saint's row 3
Darksiders
Company of Heroes
COH Opposing Front
COH Tales of Valor
Metro 2033
Red Faction Armageddon

Paid 6.50

I have no degrees or training in anything 3D or 2D, programming or anything real computer wise with experience and its my main strength.
I make sligs and busses :P (WIP :P)
Thats it really. wip and a kobe tower ill dig out later.
http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd493/mrslig100/sliggg.png

I'm a support worker for people with autism. Been working with learning disabilities for the past four years (since graduating from uni basically), can be very hard work at times but ultimately very rewarding

I'm a support worker for people with autism. Been working with learning disabilities for the past four years (since graduating from uni basically), can be very hard work at times but ultimately very rewarding :)

Hey I do the exact same thing! I am teaching at a school for autism, and doing support work with multiple families on the weekends. I have been doing this since I graduated in May. Very rewarding work indeed :D

Finished my degree awhile ago. I work for a telecom company now in business sales for the past 2 years. I make good money, which is important because when I move back to Japan a year from now ill need plenty to buy/recondition a house, get a hybrid car and have some kids.


Actually never talked about this one before because of NDA and I didnt care to discuss it, but I actually used to work for Sony Computer Entertainment here in San Diego for about a year in the QA dept. Went in as a temp, writing up bugs and braking games. I got promoted to full permanent within my first few projects. I worked on quite a few small and big titles out there and you can actually find my name in the credits of some games. I also worked with the Move controller in some of the launch games before it came out.
I found the work at first to be very nice. I liked Sony as a company alot and they have great offices. I got along with alot of the people there which is why I got promoted relatively quickly. But once I was in with more of the higher ups their were people that really rubbed me the wrong way, who were on power trips and one person in particular that had it in for me big time because of a misunderstanding. I felt like my job was being threatened because of it, so I found a new higher paying job somewhere else, (where I am currently) and was done with it asap. The work was getting tedious and destroying my love for games anyways. But ill always value that time cause I can say I worked in the industry and for Sony at that. Which looks great on my resume.

Its too bad that so many new RPGs are afraid to do turn based (look at how great Resonance of Fate is)

The modern idea that Action>Turn based is a bit silly considering they're just so different its all about style. I think a series that highlights this is the Ogre series, theres people who think March of the black queen is rubbish and let us cling together is brilliant, then again theres people who think the opposite too. If a player want to slow things down and have more of a plan thats one thing, if they want to run in and make quick decisions based on a small pool of actions its another. Both are fun for different reasons.

http://i.imgur.com/Kx28S.jpg


Also put actual Xmas decorations around the house. I'm very anxious and if you read last thing you bought topic my last post as of December 3rd 2012. I will have the christmas for the ages. Because I can finally give someone something they never had in thier adult life. An Adult 72 years of age. To fix something that has bothered me since 1990.

http://i.imgur.com/8UvOX.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/YJ9VU.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/YDWAg.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/73xHN.jpg


Sorry DP.

This is it for my mom. I don't really have the money but will be ok I believe. I'm overwhelming er with gifts. I never really had money to buy her anything. Also I want to do something for her she has never had in her adult life on christmas. Be showered with gifts. Esp when back in 1990 she went full out and had these massive gigantic santa bags full of toys. Gifts stacked to the ceiling for my dad and sister. I was 6 year sold. Then after were are opening all this stuff my sister says "Open one Linda" My mom said "Nobody got me anything" ..yeah...That christmas has been in my mind ever since. And this year is the year she get's that christmas back.