KoopaTroopa

Daikatana

Rocking goatee, dude. Although the mustache looks kinda silly. I'd grow it some more, but that's just me.

Thank you. And what you say makes sense, but my point is that you can't invalidate what a film critic says just because he hasn't made a movie, which seemed to be what you said in the first post you made. Also remember, especially in a medium like cinema, the movies are made for the audience and not the director (unless you are Uwe Boll I guess), so while a director may have other factors to consider when watching a film and making a more complete critic, these may not actually matter to us, the audience. For example, a professional runner can look at another one run a race and say "he has an amazing technique, balancing his muscles or whatever", which is something us enjoying the race as audience may not realize, but at the same time we wouldn't give a crap until that "amazing" racer actually wins a race. In the same way, a director may be able to look at another one and say "he has an amazing ability to connect with the actors and have them do exactly what he wants, and always manages to get the producers to allow him to do whatever he wants", which I'm sure is something they care about, but the final product, the movie, is something we can all watch and appreciate if the things we care about (does it have a good story? Does it look good? Does it convey emotions, make you feel the way you're supposed to while watching the movie?) are there. I don't need to be an ice cream maker to know whether it tastes like chocolate or shit, is what I'm saying. Hell, from a certain point of view critics may actually prove to be better at criticizing movies than directors, since they have the outsider's perspective we'll have when watching it, only with years of experience to notice subtleties that may not jump out at first sight. Directors may notice more things regarding their area of expertise, true, but generally speaking these may be things we don't care about when watching a film. Of course, but my point is, Zack Snyder, while a great director when it comes to visuals, coreography, camwork and whatever else, apparently lacks in the writing skillset. I didn't really like the way Watchmen was adapted, for example. Was it good looking? Hell yes. Faithful to the original work? Maybe even too much. But it played awkwardly, with Snyder acting as if the comic book had been the storyboard. Then comes the owl movie. Now, I normally don't like cute children's movies (my avatar notwithstanding) but this was probably the most beautiful movie I've ever seen. The visuals were simply astounding, and my eyes wanted to make sweet tender love to every shot of the landscape or the cute little critters. But the movie could have also been called "Cliche: The movie". I know it was a kids movie, not exactly room to reenact Apocalypse Now, but there are ways to make compelling stories for kids without printing out the most visited pages of TVTropes and using them as basis for your script. I knew exactly what was gonna happen at least 30 minutes before it happened for the whole movie and at the moment I had never heard of the story, never watched any trailer or, indeed, didn't even know it was directed by Snyder until someone told me later, so it wasn't some bias against him either. I just hope he doesn't turn into a new M. Night Shyamalan with bullet-time instead of twist endings. I like the way he directs, but he should consider getting some help with writing. And indeed, as you say,I all say is my opinion as well. Just fun having a discussion.

Man point Y sucks. I'm here all alone.

Don't be hatin' just 'cause I love Airsoft, yo. Here's a more casual picture. I was going to meet a friend at the casino, and decided to put this on.

All time favourite is Half-Life, with the sequel and Portal fighting a close second place. Games I spent the most time playing online are Counter Strike: Source and, lately when I have access to a computer that can run it, Team Fortress 2. The only FPS released in the last, say, 3 years that even managed to get a reaction out of me was Bullet Storm. Dear God, that game was nothing but unending glee and adrenaline from start to finish. I'm so tired of "gruff military type with M4 variant being yelled orders by superiors while trying to make a very shallow point about how war sucks by killing everyone you use". It was a great and original idea when Modern Warfare did it years ago, it got boring pretty quick when Modern Warfare 2, Modern Warfare World War II, Modern Warfare Cold War and Medal of Modern Warfare were released.

Not to sound like a douche, but that's a horrible policy. No one could basically make any critics of anything taking that idea to it's logical conclusion. You think that webcomic sucks? Well, show me your comic. What, you think that guy is not a good basketball player? Well, how long have you been a member of the NBA? What, you think "Twilight" is shallow and sucks? Win a Pulitzer and maybe then I'll pay attention to you. I don't know about you, but I'd trust a review by Roger Ebert over one made by Michael Bay any day of the week. That said, I do believe that often critics are wrong or criticize movies for misunderstood reasons, and that they shouldn't be 100% obeyed, but they do offer insight on how good a movie may be, although the final decision must be left to one alone, and not saying "Doom is terrible because the critics say so". That said I believe Doom was terrible and have no real intention of seeing Sucker Punch, until I catch it on TV or something. Don't get me wrong, I really like Zack Snyder and have enjoyed every movie he's made to date, but there's something I realized: It's all been an adaptation, nothing original from him. Dawn of the Dead was a remake, 300 and Watchmen were comic books and that Owl movie was based on children's books. Now that he has a blank check to write whatever he wants, everyone is apparently realizing "hey, this guy makes beautiful movies, but he sucks at writing". A shame, it sounded like an interesting concept, the whole "real world/insanity imagination world" thing.

So am I the only one the forums still hate? I keep getting those God forsaken "forum unavailable" messages.

Bots do this. They register, post some inane shit without links so as not to get autobanned, then advertise. SUGGESTION: Lock this thread. When a topic created by a spambot is replied to, the bot sees activity in the forum and then you start getting more and more bots invading the forum. Sort of like a more stupid zombie infection.

I do believe the forums hate me.

After a very thorough revision of this episode, watching it over and over again taking detailed notes and amplified screenshots in High Definition, with added investigation of the works referenced, I am safe to conclude that the explanation is aliens. Or demons. Or, quite possibly, the elusive alien demon.

My bet? Low bandwith or whatever, so that if too many people connect at once ("too many" apparently being more than 5 or something in this case) it gives the error. Of course, I do not actually know how these devil machines work so I'm just assuming. At least 80% of the time I try to use the forums I get the error. Whenever I try to open a forum, a thread, a new page or post a reply it's like playing russian roulette with only one empty chamber. It's quite frustrating. FAKE EDIT: Hey, I pressed "submit" and got the error again! Nice. x2: Make that seven God damned times in a row. Screw it, someone send me a memo when they fix it.

Airsofting some weeks ago

Playing mostly Counter Strike 1.6 (for the first time ever, too!) since it's the only online thing my computer can run. Oh, and yesterday played through the Half Life 1 mod "Paranoia". Really fun, great atmosphere and amazing graphics (for a GoldSrc game, I mean). Only incredibly short, about one or two HL chapters in lenght (counting the very long tutorial).

I got it twice in the last 20 seconds. Every board is like a russian roulette only, you know, with less danger. EDIT: Even got it now trying to post this very same reply! I'm sure that qualifies as ironic.