Life

[ThunderPeel2001]

Side note: Anyone know of a Cambridge (UK) based games company that has 380 staff? There can't be many of them! I'm sure some of you connected folk on this board will know immediately who they are... Thanks!

Listed as a Deloitte Technology Fast 50 (2009); a Sunday Times Top 100 fastest growing technology companies (2009) and a Sunday Times Top 100 company to work for (2008). They also employ over 380 people and sit at the very forefront of the online games industry, developing and publishing mini games and leading titles interacted by millions worldwide! The clincher... They also hold a Guinness world record to their name!

[Roderick]

I didn't realise it was getting so scary on the continent...

It's not getting scary. It's just the same as always. I'm not scared, I'm concerned that a lot of people are getting scared and thinking that they should be scared of things that are nothing to be scared about. That's what's leading to the rise of the populists (who thrive on fear -V for Vendetta anyone?) and an unwarranted pull towards nationalism.

But, I mean, don't mind anything I say, let's just throw all the gypsies out of our country and surely our perceived problems will instantly disappear?

[ThunderPeel2001]

I meant the rise of Nationalism is scary... it hasn't worked out well in the past.

[Roderick]

No, it hasn't. But it'll die down as soon as the economy gets better for most people. Or as soon as networks stop blasting news into everyone's ears 24/7.

[Orv]

No, it hasn't. But it'll die down as soon as the economy gets better for most people. Or as soon as networks stop blasting news into everyone's ears 24/7.

FOX News! 24/7 Fear mongering, for the people, by the twats!

But yes, as discussed, if you're trying to escape what you are in GB, the US might not be the best place. Botswana, maybe?

[Nachimir]

Side note: Anyone know of a Cambridge (UK) based games company that has 380 staff? There can't be many of them! I'm sure some of you connected folk on this board will know immediately who they are... Thanks!

Probably Frontier or Ninja Theory, can't be sure though.

But, I mean, don't mind anything I say, let's just throw all the gypsies out of our country and surely our perceived problems will instantly disappear?

The thing I most hate about that kind of thinking is that it usually couched as a reaction to some sort of fictitious moral decline, and will just move on to targeting one group after another.

--

In other news, I joined a rather large non-games forum recently, and it seems to be mostly unmoderated and full of twats who spend as much time posting images of heavily photoshopped women and their breasts as they do bragging about kit. I forgot what other communities were like. This place spoils us.

[circadianwolf]

No, it hasn't. But it'll die down as soon as the economy gets better for most people.

That's assuming it gets better... :tinfoilhat:

[syntheticgerbil]

Hooray, I'm supposed to start helping (in my free time) with some art for this small game some guys from Harmonix are doing on their free time. I used to work with a programmer at my old job who left to Boston to work there, but they laid him off way earlier this year.

I think it should be fun even though I'm working for free. I don't mind helping to contribute to another's pet project.

[Thompson]

So my dog got put down today. He was pretty old and his spine basically gave out, it's really depressing.

I'll miss him, but at least he doesn't have to suffer.

My avatar is an accurate representation of my face.

[DanJW]

Sorry to hear that Thompson. I had to have my dog put down a couple of years ago. I still miss him from time to time.

It's painful in a way non-dog-owners often don't appreciate. Just remember to enjoy life like he would.

[Orv]

Holy crap! There is a giant pumpkin roll in my house. Omnf nomf nomf.

In other news, Aurelius is already learning the necessary skills for world domination. Like how to be so toxically (Google tells me this is a word, but Chrome says no. Hmm) cute that everyone in the house does his bidding.

EG. I found him in the dogs bed yesterday and the dog was afraid to approach him at all. I'm not sure what to do about that.

[DanJW]

EG. I found him in the dogs bed yesterday and the dog was afraid to approach him at all. I'm not sure what to do about that.

You should follow the dog's example.

[Kolzig]

Sorry to hear about your loss Thompson, my family also had to put our old dog to sleep three years ago. She was 15 years old and just couldn't walk normally anymore. We do miss her a lot still.

I for one would welcome a move to Canada. Something like Vancouver sounds nice, I've only visited the eastern side of Canada earlier this year and everything there was awesome. My wife was in Vancouver about 10 years ago and she tells me it's a pretty sweet city.

Tough luck on getting a job though, for example Finnish and Japanese people get six months tourist visa and then we would have to go back. That's not a lot of time to get to know people and places.

England was pretty nice, though I have no idea why there was like 500 police officers around the parliament building/Big Ben on tuesday. Is it because of the student riots still?

Stonehenge was as amazing as I had imagined it to be. Basically it's just a arrangement of huge stones, but when you see it right next to you in a clear nice weather, it just feels unreal. I have no idea how those stones could've been transported from the supposed location mountains from Wales to that area where the stones are now.

Weather was nice +6 degrees celsius all the time, but very annoying that I caught cold on tuesday and now I have the flu and I need to work even if I'm sick. It's the end of the year crunch mode after all... it felt really like home when London was +6 degrees, then at Tampere in Finland the weather was -23 degrees celcius. Thankfully in Vaasa it was only -4 in the evening.

[Nappi]

Ahh.. The semi-familiar feeling of pre-Christmas stress: laser technology and microfabrication are down but history of science still remains. And after that: Christmas shopping.

(I think I could pass the courses with lot less effort but my inner need to do as good as possible in most things won't let me degrade my course average.)

Anyway, it's not that bad. My vacation starts tomorrow, unless I get trampled by the furious horde of last minute Christmas shoppers and their trollies full of electronics.

[Kolzig]

Oh yeah, forgot to add that I saw the London office building for Sega while driving the bus ride to Stonehenge.

That seemed like a nice almost futuristic building with the Sega logo on one side of it and Sonic image on the other side of it.

Is that then where Marek works at?

[Roderick]

Bah, I'm so fucking sick of the culture of mediocrity in the company I work at. The slightest display of intelligence is immediately put down as arrogant pretentiousness. You know what? Yes, I am smarter than most of the people here and I enjoy practicing that, I delight in gaining knowledge about the world of science and I read a lot of goddamn books. Just because they have been taken in with the depressing cultural suspicion against everything that reeks of elitism doesn't mean I am a bloated pedant just because I think intelligence is something to be proud of.

I am through with this bullshit company.

(Illustrating my rant: the situation that sparked this was my bosses accusing me of pedanterie because I jokingly told them they had lots to learn. Why did I do this? Because after I had explained to them (because they asked!) the principle of Shrödinger's Cat (which I assume is a universally known principle), they proceeded to deride and question the very concept of thought experiments, which is exemplary of their goddamned closed minds. Then they started demanding apologies and bullied me into a corner. They are vicious, meanspirited people, always delighting in personally assaulting people with insults and mockery. Fuck fuck fuck them, I hope they choke. ea spouse.)

[Hermie]

That sucks Rodi. =/

Here, I came to this thread to post my gingerbread cookies, have one:

[miffy495]

Having a disagreement with the person next to me: Is that a cactaur or Commander Video?

[Hermie]

That is indeed a Cactuar, that one was the pride of my girlfriend (who made most of them ^^).

[MrHoatzin]

Speaking of ginger, this year, instead of thinking what to get each individual person, I'm gonna make everyone the same thing: ginger biscotti which I have invented yesterday. I basically combined a recipe for ginger snaps with your run-o-the mill awesome, straight biscotti. The test batch was good, but it lacked something, so I think hazelnuts and cardamom and bits of crystalized ginger and a shitton of fresh ginger ought to do the trick (I had used powdered ginger alone in the test batch but that stuff lacks the punch of the real deal).

If you're anywhere near San Antoan this xmaz, drop by and try some (served with the best latte you've ever had). :tup:

[Squid Division]

Very nice work on the Bomberman.

[elmuerte]

That sucks Rodi. =/

Here, I came to this thread to post my gingerbread cookies, have one:

No Wizard!?

[Kolzig]

Where's the Idle thumb in that picture?

Great gingerbread cookies, that gives me ideas that now I need to start to be a copycat of Hermie and be a little more clever this year with my cookies than just using regular ones like every year.

[Roderick]

Fantastic cookies, they loook delish!

[pabosher]

So I've just been offered a place to read Human Sciences at St. Catherine's College, Oxford University.

Hooray =D

Would like to point out that, during the interview process, I was feeling horribly down about how it was all going, and decided to listen to Fanboy's Lament, Space Asshole, The Ballad of John Riccitiello and The Fable of Love to calm myself down before my final interview. Apparently it worked