ThunderPeel2001

Haha. I didn't get it until I searched for QWOP: http://www.foddy.net/Athletics.html

Yeah, I'm pretty sure loneliness is what did it for me, too. Loneliness is a horrible thing. If you can go home or visit friends I'd seriously recommend it.

I also got it. I just didn't post about it as you already had! Sorry!

Hey, I had this recently, too! It utterly sucked! It is a scary thing, but thankfully society, friends, and relationships all give us the tools to put that thought to one side and reconnect with the fact that you're alive: Which is a wonderful thing. It may seem pointless, but you've also been given the opportunity to experience it. And believe it or not, you will experience those happy fulfilling times again. I certainly have. As Nach said: Your own mortality isn't something you can "solve", so it's best to stop yourself from doing it and try to reconnect with LIFE. On a more practical note: If you're having a heavy panic attack, try focussing on your surroundings completely. Take everything in. Stop listening to your thoughts and focus your attention entirely on everything around you. Every little detail around you, every smell, every sound. There's so much there. Be present and don't let yourself fall "inwards". Distraction is a very effective technique to calm heavy anxiety. Mild anxiety can be calmed by counting your breath, or systematically relaxing every muscle in your body. You also have your GP who can prescribe you some anti-depressants, or, if you have the money, counselling can be very effective. Something that REALLY helped me was hanging with my friends and family (even though it felt stressful at the time, I came away feeling very good). And also writing down all my darkest thoughts. It was a scary exercise, and I couldn't look at what I'd written for a few days, but I came back and eventually felt strong enough to read them. In the cold light of day they were laughably negative, and it was great to see them from that perspective. Good luck

Eek, Orvidos. I feel for you. *Virtual man hug*.

Yes, exactly And Gwardinen, BBX and I met up this evening and talked about what we meant face-to-face. It turns out we were both right and both wrong. Yes, the word "discrimination" can be technically used to describe positive things, which was his point. I personally shy away from that word as I see it surrounded with negative connotations, but I cannot deny that he's technically right.

My two examples are neither problematic or discriminatory because we don't live in a bubble without history or present day discrimination. Those two things are addressing an *imbalance*. If history had been the other way around, then you'd have a point. But that's not the reality we live in, and if you start to ignore that, then you're deliberately choosing to be ignorant. I can't believe you both think there's problems with those two examples

So I picked this up in the Steam sale and it's pretty damned sweet. No idea about what "upgrades" to get, but it's a very addictive and enjoyable game so far

If Truman Capote had been a duck, that's how I'd imagine him.

If only notch had made enough money to afford to proper dev team... etc. etc. etc.

I still don't buy it. For me, complaining that women getting lower insurance rates is "sexist" is like complaining that Gay Clubs exist ("they're not being inclusive!" -- I've actually had this argument) or that the (utterly redundant) MOBO Awards are racist ("they're not being inclusive!" -- I've also actually had this argument). I'm know you're not saying they're sexist Gwardinen, so I'm not singling you out, I'm just explaining my position -- and from here, thinking that female drivers getting lower insurance, when the market clearly shows that it's completely fair, is somehow unfair against men, is sexist in itself (in an ignorant way). If you can follow that badly formed sentence. Man, this thread... I need to spend more time doing something else. How about those video games, eh?

I'm really not getting this. It's not motivated by anything other than an algorithm. How can you get more accurate than all the things they already take into account? Your age, your sex, your car, your claim history. If they could predict exactly how much money they were going to make off you, on a person by person basis, they would... But they can't. I'm sure there's a company that specialises in selling to each of the variables they take into account, for example. (e.g. "Not a boy-racer? Drive a family saloon? Come to 'Sensible Car Insurance'", etc.)

Er, just to clarify: Women get cheaper car insurance because they're less likely to get into accidents and claim on it. Fact. Young men have the most expensive car insurance because they're most likely to get into an accident and claim on it. "Women Only" car insurance is largely a marketing gimmick, as the insurance is usually out by the same umbrella company that deals with everyone else. In other words: It's not sexist or even feminist. It's just the result of a car insurance company calculation. (But everyone already knew that, right...?)

I get what you're saying, Gwardinen. I agree, that yes, "the patriarchy" does not equal "men", so therefore hatred of a patriarchal society does not equal hatred of men, but the problems inherent in a patriarchal society are directly due to men. Even if they're continued by conditioned women and men, those problems are here because of male dominance. Secondly, I see what you're saying regarding feminism tackling male sexism, but Patters's examples of "male sexism" strike me as human incompetence; Not due to conditioned ideas of male and female roles. Also, there has to be some responsibility for our actions, otherwise it's like saying, "I'm not responsible for my actions as a man, as I've been conditioned this way by other men".

Sorry, I'm with Kingz on this one. Yes, there is *some* gender inequality towards men, but the reason Patters cited those "examples" was to try and make this point: He claims that if you're a feminist, you're against gender equality. As has been previously established in this thread, feminism (despite its literal grounding in English) means "gender equality". Yes, it's focus is on giving equal rights to women, but we still live in a patriarchal society. Does that mean that there's no inequality towards men? Of course not. The best example Patters made is how the courts treat estranged fathers. This treatment, however reportedly unfair, is not based on thousands of years of culturally ingrained and systematic subjugation of men by women. It's just the side-effect of currently not having a better way to deal with genuinely neglectful fathers. It sucks, yes. It's unfair against men, yes. But it's not a woman-controlled society abusing men. In fact, none of his examples are, which is why they're laughable -- even the ones that are serious -- because they have nothing to do with feminism or sexism. A lot of those problems are directly due to the system that men currently control. Our society and culture is currently male dominated. If we don't take male spousal abuse seriously, it's not because the female judges, and female police officers, and female controlled media empires don't think it's serious... it's because a lot of men don't think it's serious. Trying to tell a woman who is fighting against a patriarchal society for equality, to take a look at how men are being treated by this patriarchal society is beyond absurd. It actually shows a lack of understanding so deep that I can't think of another word for it besides misogyny. Yes, misogyny. And I've not even touched upon how rudely he's addressed a new member of our community, or how violently he disrupted this discussion. I sent a PM to Patters very early into this discussion, as I could already see it escalating unnecessarily. We all know what it's like to be new to a community, and how an "elder" in that community carries a lot of weight when they criticise your contributions, so those of us who have been around for several years have a responsibility to wield this "weight" sensibly. (Kamiri's Guide to Joining Idle Thumbs leaps to mind here.) His tone towards Sal was uncalled for (she was only ever polite to him) and unbalanced (he seemed to be blaming her for his frustrations with the entire thread). We all know Patters, and so consider him a good guy, but to a new user (and Sal has all of 5 posts to her name) he speaks for the community.

I guess that's true, but they didn't take issue with Lara Croft in the late 90s, either. Makes me wonder if Sarah Silverman is right, it's not a reluctance to have female characters from an audience point of view, it's just men dominate the industries, and so write what they're most familiar with: Men.

It is quite confusing. I do think BioWare is quite forward thinking, but this does seem like a step backwards for them. For me this character walks a fine line, I guess. It's interesting reading people's reactions to it, though. If enough people want a more realistic and grounded female characters, then that's undoubtedly what we'll get... eventually.

Patters, your argument is bullshit and needs to die.

Oh. Your post sounded like a continuation of the previous one about it being "all pure and stuff". Happy to play devil's advocate with anyone about this (unless it's a debate about "should you, shouldn't you"). We're just taking it one step at a time at the moment, seeing what works and what doesn't. The first thing I noticed when suddenly being given more space to add detail: The textures don't really lend themselves to it. They're very stylized and cartoony, which is great, but it means that there's no need to make them look "realistic" or anything. That said, I started looking at the close-ups of Manny's chest (when he opens his inventory), and got an idea of what "hi-res" might look like in the world of Grim Fandango. It has a very hand-drawn kind of feel, actually. Consider the following original artwork: With that in mind I tried an experiment today to see how it look, this time using 512x512 textures: (Manny's eyes and teeth are still not quite right, and his tie isn't quite working, but this is just an experiment to see how it looks. Also it's been limited to a texture palette of 256 colours, so the gradients aren't as smooth as they should be.) As for adding extra polygons, I do think it might be possible, if we're careful. My personal peeves are the hands. They could look lovely, but instead they used Xs for fingers.

There's no charm from it using a badly utilized engine, at least not for me. But mainly, why on earth are you wasting time and energy worrying something... that hasn't even been made yet? Just seems like a lot of negative energy over something that may never actually materialize. In the meantime, imagine Grim Fandango exactly how you want it. That's how the version you're going to play is going to look.

This argument has now become nonsensical to me.

Oh no! If you've just posted this earlier I wouldn't have deleted all the older versions of the game in existence. Now we'll never get it back! Ugh!

The accompanying text really helps explain this image better: "The point of contention still is, as it always was, that people are getting tired of seeing all of the female leads drawn with body language and uniforms that make them appear less heroic, powerful, legitimate, and all-around able to be taken seriously than their male counterparts."

To be fair, boob armour is completely silly.

OK, fair enough. Like I said, I don't particularly care about Mass Effect or expect it to have high standards (there was a thread about Mass Effect a while back when they introduced that new "skin head" woman character -- and everyone hated her because of all the things you were saying: She was designed to be exciting to young males). Also female characters in Mass Effect have always had shapely armour. Although I agree that it's absurd, I just wonder if we'd ever do anything else if we complained every time a female character was introduced with silly things like this. (I'd like to hope that at least FemShep has a good, believable, three dimensional character... which is rare enough in itself.) Maybe you're right, though. Maybe every transgression does deserve to be pointed out and vilified until they eventually end.