Ego Terrorist

Just remember that the Wii console is (according to my mates) backwards compatible with the Gamecube, from controllers, to memory cards to games. Thus my advice to you is either buy a really cheap Gamecube, or buy a new Wii, and be able to play the new games and the old games on the *dramatic voice* "Console of the Future"

Ah christmas time... its not about giving gifts to friends and family, or recieving gifts from them. Nor is it about partying, or feasting or spending time with your loved ones. Neither is it about peace and happiness, or the celebration of Jesus Christ's birthday. It's about giving gifts - to me.

Hmm, I think this calls for a few more missions into cultist territories... Meh, sounds fun!

So...I've gotten to the point where there are Wargots and cultists and I'm fighting them off... now on the loading screens I see scopes and lasers... I've got USG, gyrostabilisers, silencers, flash suppressors, accelerators and a whole host of other toys to stick onto my guns...but I havn't got any scopes, or lasers, so...er...how do I get them? Also when do I get the helmet mounted stuff? Cheers!

Go west!

I dunno... I enjoyed Starcraft, it was indeed a fine RTS up there with the best, but I've always felt that Total Annihilation was a far superior game, the balance was good, the weapons awesome. (A nuke, that nuked, huge fricking plasma cannons etc...) and the modding community that sprung up around it has made the game even better. Well thats my 2 pence anyway.

I've done a bit of editing to my post, just tidying up some errors and expanding on a few areas, no significant changes have been made though. Take this as a lesson from me, proof read and proof read when you're wide awake, as proof reading late at night isn't the best of ideas! As for finally shedding some light on the matter of the mission that fullauto sent me on...I havn't a clue, I'm just making this up as I go along. But come on people! Post!

John is a Major in X-Com and his role is Intelligence, part of the X-Inv team before the formation of X-Com. Paul Jasper is currently being borrowed by John on his lil excursion to the US, however he is a soldier with one of the squads, 2nd squad (I think...). Valerie or Val is John's secretary, she is there because she's an American and we don't exactly want to put the US Senators nose out of joint. And Mac...well... he's a bit of a mystery to everybody, with the exception of John, who doesn't exactly like Mac. Most of these guys are working in the background, lurking the shadows and getting up to various other spooky things.

Huzzah! How do think they went?

Washington DC John rubbed the back of his neck, it had been rather stiff lately, all those late nights spent at his desk, and the mornings waking up at his desk were apparently starting to take their toll. The two Senators had both asked for a break after word had been received that X-Com were engaging an alien force in Buenos Aires. Once the Senators had left the room Paul became increasingly withdrawn, the reason was obvious enough. John put a hand on Paul's shoulder. "Look Paul, you wouldn't get down there in time to make any real difference." "It still doesn't make me feel any better." Said Paul who was was stuck in a conference room in the comparative safety of Washington DC while his comrades-in-arms were fighting off an alien terror force. John nodded sympathetically. "Yeah." He didn't know what else to say. Often he would find himself observing a battle unfold via an overhead satellite from the safety of Pine Gap. His job wasn't to fight the aliens, his job was to figure out how and where to fight the aliens. Which was a hell of a problem given that the aliens couldn't be infiltrated, they didn't seem to have any form of communication, and there didn't seem to be any pattern to their attacks. What he needed was more information. Instead he was stuck here playing politics and having to deal with humanity itself. "We don't get paid enough for this crap." Said John. The doors to the conference room opened and Valerie and a rather well groomed and smart looking gentleman in a black suit strolled in sharing a joke. He leant in and whispered something in her ear which made Val go an interesting shade of red. The gentleman turned and looked directly at John. "Hi John, how are you?" John noted how Paul and Valerie exchanged a look of surprise. He forced a smile. "I'm fine Mac. Now would you like to tell me why the hell you're here?" "Is that anyway to welcome an old friend?" Said Mac as he spread his arms open and gave John a wounded look. "Yeah, well I'm still a little sore over the way you screwed me in Beloretsk-15." A wry grin started to form on Mac's face. "You got out alive didn't you?" "Barely." Was John's curt reply. "Ah, they were good times." He made his way over to the table and propped himself up against it. "So enough reminiscing. I'm here to ask you, why are you here?" "Surely Langley must have some analysts who can offer an informed guess?" "Of course we do." He took a brief pause as he rummaged through his jackets interior pockets. "However I'd like to hear it in the flesh." "Then you know why I'm here." Mac sighed. "Okay." He pulled out a pack of nicotine gum. "I gave up smoking last year. The only thing that stops the cravings is about 4 or 5 sticks of this crap." He unwrapped a few of sticks folded them and placed them into his mouth and started chewing. "Did you know that there are a handful of high ranking brass that have commented on how crashes on US soil should stay on US soil?" "No, but it doesn't exactly surprise me." For the last fifty years the US military had gotten used to being in command, and then all of a sudden a new international force had came along and started to take what should of been theirs. "But what interests me is why you're telling me this?" Mac's face lit up with a grin. "Because the alien threat is one that threatens the freedom and independence of the democratic nations of Earth, and only by presenting a unified front can we hope to be victorious." "Try saying that without the grin and I might actually take you seriously." Said John flatly. "So are you actually going to tell me why?" "I think you know me well enough to know why." With that he got up and started walking towards the door. Mac only cared about two things: The United States of America and himself. He was already hating himself for even considering this but Mac was a damn fine agent. "Mac, if you want to meet up for a drink tonight, I'll be in a bar on 34th Street called The Prince." "Maybe I will." Said Mac as he pushed the door open and left. The room fell silent as John stared at the door, thinking. Valerie was the first to break the silence. "What was that all about?" "It doesn't matter." Said John after a few more minutes of contemplation. The last person he'd thought he'd see and the last person he had wanted to see had just walked in, did what he normally did and then left. "Anyway, I thought you said you were going to get us a coffee while you stretched your legs?" Before Valerie could explain the two Senators walked back into the room. "Ms Deacon, we've been monitoring the situation in Buenos Aires, you'll be pleased to know that the alien vessel has taken off, it would appear that the X-Com force has won this battle. Now perhaps we can continue with our negotiations, and perhaps come to an agreement that satisfies both our interests." Behind John's expressionless face was a number of thoughts churning away. The terror attack on Buenos Aires was but one battle in a larger war, in the long run whether X-Com won or lost this battle would be a trivial concern. ...because at the end of the day the Soldiers that died can be replaced. Meanwhile this meeting would have a long term effect on X-Com, as it would affect how large a force it could support and how well equipped they would be, R&D budgets would be affected, thus research into new weapons and defensive technology would be affected, construction of new facilities, replacing and procuring new fighters and transports. Any sort of a budget cut would be a tragedy. Saving the Earth on a budget!

So, come on! Post more fiction!

Where does this leave Bush and the War on Terror? My view is that after these mid-term elections, the Republicans will be wanting to wrap up in Iraq and pull out of it before the next presidential elections. A move that the Democrats won't have a problem with because they sure as hell don't want to have Iraq as their problem if they win in the next presidential elections.

I remember reading this on the BBC website, it made me giggle and then cringe, poor guy probably won't be able to sit down for months.

Okay, here's my problem, as I understand it Pluto is no longer a planet (it's a small or dwarf planet) because it hasn't cleared a path in its orbit. It crosses the path of neptune... ...by that thinking... Neptune hasn't cleared a path in its orbit as it crosses Pluto's orbit... Is it me or is there a problem here?

North Korea claims that it has carried out a sucessful test of a nuclear weapon. Taken from the BBC who took it from Reuters, who got this statement from the Korean Central News Agency... Reuters According to experts the device that was detontated is believed to be a 15 kiloton nuclear weapon. (Hiroshima was hit by a 15 kiloton A-Bomb) In July 2006 North Korea tested the Taepodong-2 which failed, though is believed to be capable of reaching Alaska. Meanwhile its predecessor the Taepodong-1 tested in 1998 is believed to be capable of hitting targets as far as northern Japan. Both tests resulted in international condemation. This new development in the nuclear saga has brought internation condemation from all sides. With China, one of North Korea's cloest ally, calling this action "brazen" and has joined South Korea, Japan and Russia in expressing their opposition against North Korea's actions. Meanwhile the White House has called the test 'provocative' and that there should be an immediate reponse from the UN Security Council. Prior to the nuclear test, the UN in a statement urged North Korea to return to 6 nations talks, and GlobalSecurity.org -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Meanwhile Iran in the 6 nation talks about its nuclear enrichment programme has rejected the demands for a suspension of enrichment. BBC ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

'ello Tammy!

Oh yes. Cringing as I apply the sort of forces that should never be applied to a motherboard. After that, when I transfered the motherboard from the cheap case to the new case I left the heatsink and CPU in the motherboard, probably not the best of ways to do it, but certainly less worrying!

::does a happy dance:: Y'alright Knight! long time no see! How are you these days? ::happy dance:: We love Tammy!

After 5 long years of good and loyal service my old computer is being retired. I've finally got (almost) everything working as it should be in my new PC, it's taken four weeks because of various problems, to get it working. Originally it was intended that I'd try and cannibalize some of the more generic parts of my old PC, the spare HDD, CDRW and DVD player, wireless network card, case and PSU. So I bought a new motherboard (Asus A8V-X) CPU (AMD 64 939skt 3500) and 512 megs of ram (which I'm going to upgrade once my student loan comes in) and a graphics card that I'd gotten from a mate. All in all it came to £120-ish plus I'd pay my mate around £100 for his Nvidia 6800. And I figured I might as well get a new but cheap case, for £18. I built it in a few hours and then the problems started. The hard drive died a clicking and noisy death the morning after I'd installed windows. So I decided to buy a new HDD from ebay. The guy sent me out the wrong HDD, and didn't have the one specified in the bid in stock, so I sent that back and got a refund. Though it took a week to get in touch with him. I ended up buying a new 200GB HDD from scan.co.uk. Next problem was with the cheap case I'd bought. God that was stupid. Cheap cases are a bad idea, small, cramped, poor ventilation and rather fugly. So I bought me a Jeantech Phong for £35, they are great value for what you pay, decent looks, and very good ventilation in the form of 2 120mm fans in a push/pull set up, and rather spacious. If you're looking for this case (they're no longer produced, but the Phong II is said to be even better) try xcase.co.uk From the same place I bought a 450W PSU to replace my 350W which had replaced an old 300W PSU that had started to smoke. Reason for the 450 was that I didn't have enough molex plugs to go around. I transfered the bits from the cheap case to the new case, wired everything up and then blam. Hard drive problems. Win-d'ohs is claiming that it can't format the HDD and it seems to be having trouble detecting it. A few hours later, after trying, unsuccessfully, to use a boot CD with various Hard drive utilities to format the bugger, I come back to it and decide to see if it's the fact that it is a SATA300, so I stick a jumper in for SATA150 and it works. Still can't figure that out, though I might try and flash the BIOS see if that sorts it out. (Though the A8V should be SATA300 compatible already.) Install windows for a second time. Set up the wireless card, download avast, nvidia drivers, zonelabs, and a few other free programs and then I get ready to game. There was no bloody graphics. I could hear the game playing, and if I clicked on things I could hear the option being selected but nothing appeared on the screen. On the windows destop everything worked fine but there was nothing when I loaded the bloody games. Next day I figured that if I couldn't sort it out I'd buy a new one. Fortunately after downloading the Hyperion 4-in-1 drivers from VIA it worked! So I now have a new almost completely working computer! CPU: AMD 64bit 939SKT running at 2.2GHz (I might overclock it in the future) MB: Asus A8V-X, AGP, 939 RAM: 512 DDR PC3200 (need more!) Graphics: Gainward Nvidia 6800GTS 512MB Samsung 200GB 7200rpm SATA300 (though its set to SATA150) DVD-ROM (I havn't installed the CDRW yet) PSU: X-Power 450W Case: Jeantech Phong The end result is something I've very happy with. Roughly it's came to around £300-£350 when initially I envisioned it costing around £220. And for the first time in 3 years, when ever I look up ASUS probe, the CPU temp is at a healthy 30 degrees C instead of a worrying 60 degrees. Oh and I've finally transistioned from 98SE to XP! Ah, now I can play new games once again. The Ego Terrorist is happy. I think I'll go and play some X-Com UFO now. Anybody else care to share their computer building nightmares?

Pain

Bond

lol, I always thought the off-topic section was her pet. We love Tammy!

Transformers

Ack, sorry to hear about that man, perhaps with your next bike you could take a load of batteries, and make your own low powered taser built into the seat (not enough to paralyse their muscles, just enough to make 'em jump.) Asides from registering your bike and bigger harder bike locks and chains, not much that I know of.

Shakespere (Meh it's probably spelt wrong)