Rant 504 / The Celebration Of Naiveté

Google's apology here kind of shocked me, then I realized I was reading Onion News.
















Baba Yetu, Swahili prayer song. Menu theme song of Civilization IV. If you don't know what the buildings are, I think you should get the hint from those that you recognize. I mean, you really must recognize some of them by the age of 15 or you're a retard. If you're interested, one of the comments on the Youtube page has them listed. Didn't check if it's complete.

A few of them no longer exist today. It's sad how war does things like this, but on the other hand people need to forget once in a while. Reminds me of the Buddha statues in Pakistan the Taliban destroyed some years back. A very regrettable loss, but if we keep everything from our past sooner or later humans are going to be overburdened with memories.

An example is Rome. Everytime they dig underground to lay pipes and stuff, they have to scan every inch of the dig site in case they uncover some precious ancient Roman artefacts. Pretty expensive in terms of manpower, but necessary in its own way.

Think about it. If we keep everything that is important forever, in another 5000 years we're going to have more than double (maybe even triple) of all the precious national treasures in existence today due to advances in preservation techniques and technology. It's either going to be very expensive to maintain all the "national heritage" or these items stop being priceless. That is just one aspect of what I refer to as a burden. You still have to think about the historians' way of studying all the records, how the people will remember their history since so much info is available and etc.













As expected, the torrent for Supreme Commander 2 was available for downloads within 24 hours of its retail release. This game was not highly anticipated, so no one really cares. According to people who have seen its trailer(s) and read about it, the developers have apparently changed a few important mechanics that made the original Supreme Commander special.

Heck, the first game didn't even have a very large fanbase because it was just a major spamfest, like the C&C series but on an even larger scale. In C&C3 it was "OMG I have 40 tanks 5mins! I have a huge army! Now you die!"; while in Supreme Commander it was closer to "I have 40 tanks... to find your bases! Here's my main force of THREE THOUSAND BOMBERS!"

I'll have to wait to try it before I type anything more.














Hollywood is interested in a Mass Effect film! But Bioware isn't going to make a shitty film to make the most out of the hype the games are getting. If they're going to make a film, they will have to finish the third and last game of the series, or make one that's unrelated to them but in the same universe. The best would be to end the game with a few loose thread (but enough to make the ending feel complete) and tie up everything with a film. But who knows what they will decide to make? I just hope they don't make the same mistake Square Enix made with Advent's Children.












Flags of our Fathers, the companion movie of Letters from Iwo Jima, isn't as good. Directed by the same director, Clint Eastwood, it's based on the same event but from the other side of the war. While the first film I watched centres around the Japanese infantryman and his general, this film is about the three members of the six in the following photo who survived the war.



This is a very historically significant photo for the Americans, not because of what was being done, but what it signifies - victory. IMO the whole story is really told in second person about Ira Hayes. Seriously, it just felt like this guy was the main character and everyone was playing support roles, even though he was the one who failed in life the most among the three.

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The movie, after watching it, was almost like a story of how a simple soldier who was at the right place at the right time got really famous and felt really guilty about it. After all the things Hayes saw there, he knew he did not deserve it. Yet people kept calling him "a hero", which made it worse. He turned to drinking to escape and was arrested frequently after the war. Eventually he died "from exposure" according to the records even though there was no autopsy.

His problems were not as traumatic as the ones the Japanese soldier experienced in the other film, but it was real and it was dragged on for decades.

The other two didn't live happily ever after either. One tried to take advantage of his fame but was completely unsuccessful. The other probably had the best life among them, owning his own business and his son wrote a book with the same title as the film and on which the film was partly based on. It was not perfect either - his buddy's fate haunted him for the rest of his life.

From Wikipedia:
According to James Bradley, as recounted in Flags of our Fathers, official reports revealed Ignatowski was captured, dragged into a tunnel by Japanese soldiers during the battle, and was later found with his eyes, ears, fingernails, and tongue removed, his teeth smashed, the back of his head caved in, multiple bayonet wounds to the abdomen, his arms broken, and his severed genitalia stuffed into his mouth.

Not a good way to die, probably even worse than the journalist who was beheaded by the Middle Eastern terrorists. Fortunately they did not display this gruesome event in the film nor did they show the body. What irony. They made us see the bodies of the Japanese soldiers who committed suicide by holding a live grenade to their chests, yet they didn't want to make us look at a rotting corpse with his balls in his mouth and his eyes gouged out. Hollywood is so full of shit.

Ever seen this picture of a woman who slit her wrists in a hot bath with the hot water tap running and whose body was not found till a very long time later? If you're religious and haven't encountered it, thank whoever you worship. If you aren't, count yourself lucky (if you believe in luck). And If you don't know what I'm talking about, here's a hint: the human skin doesn't melt easily in hot water. I'm kind of lucky too since all I saw was a thumbnail and I didn't stare for long.

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Never noticed this until today that the acronym of the name of the anime YuYu Hakusho is YYH. It's also the IATA code for an airport in Canada too! Oh shit...













The best Cyanide and Happiness short ever! The sequel to Waiting for the Bus.... Waiting for the Bus 2! Don't forget to read the credits!

On second thought, this is the best. The Man Who Could Sit Anywhere.

This is what happens if you mug too much. The chair no longer fits your ass; it's your ass that fits the chairs.












Alright, so Allods sucks (too much PvP for my tastes) and Runes of Magic is rather dead. Now it's Fantasy Earth Zero. Just trying out. Apparently it died when Square Enix released it as a subscription-based MMORPG the first time. Now it's a free-to-play game with probably a cash shop.

The new company suck at keeping schedules. They first announced that they will release the game at 3pm PST on the 3rd of March, so I didn't bother to wait. I checked this morning and guess what? They delayed it to 5.30pm PST and apparently it still isn't up at 6pm (10am at +8 GMT). The new forum was promised to go live at 4.30pm PST and it still isn't up either. Only the new website is up.

Conclusion? Frogster is probably the best company among all those that have published free MMORPGS I've tried. Their game may not be the best, but they get things done better.













A new brush suddenly appeared in the living room. It's as long as my forearm with its plastic hair as long as my index finger. Most importantly, it's excellent for cleaning my keyboard.

I'd never noticed how filthy my keyboard was until just now when I brushed it really hard with that new brush. Simply shaking never worked as well. After brushing the keys while holding it upside down, I had to sweep the floor. It's that bad. Should have done it in the bathroom.













Freakin hell. My bro brought his girlfriend home without telling me again. This time I wasn't on my computer when she arrived, but was showering. So I didn't hear the door slam and didn't think to check the network map for the extra computer. When it's just my family, I usually walk around in my boxers. Yea, so I think she saw me before I could close the door as quickly as I could without slamming it shut. =\

She didn't look me in the eye when I said "Hi" later after putting on my clothes and pretending that nothing happened. =\

I blame my bro.













Who says that there are few types of red wine that are sweet? I'm going to find a bottle of Port soon. Wonder if there are some in supermarkets or will I need to visit an actual wine store.