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Perhaps it could be implimented like chapter stops in a DVD, using save games.

Don't forget the fact that a couple of years from now, you'll look back on this crush and go "ARGH!!!! How embarrasing. What was WRONG with me??". Everyone has crushes on a teacher at some point (perhaps) but if you take it any further than that, there's a 99% chance that the teacher will come to fear being near you. Ever had a kid several years younger than you have a crush on you? It's awful, and you don't want to hurt them or encourage them. It mostly just makes you feel uncomfortable, and if you're in the position of a teacher, it's worse because you have a good chance of being fired if the student tries it on too much.

If you get the 1% chance that the teacher responds in kind, you'll have sex for a bit, you'll be discovered (inevitable - absolutely inevitable), he'll get fired, you'll be expelled and you might even make it to the news which will make it very hard to get new friends at whatever school you have to go to next. Plus, you'll look back on it one day in the near future and regret how you ruined your school life and got taken advantage of by a sleaze. No matter how "in control" you think you are, in the end, it's a bad teacher/person taking advantage of a typical school girl crush.

Of course, if you want to go through with this, the best way is to act all maturey on him and put yourselves in positions where you can be alone together in the classroom. Talk to him like an equal while keeping up a fascade of cute ignorance and devilish sexuality. If he's a sleaze, he'll eventually take advantage of you in a passive way, convincing himself it's okay. You'll have a brief, tumoltuous relationship of sexual tension and hatred. You'll discover that he's with you because he's actually a loser that can't get women his own age. Ã, Then all that other awful stuff will happen.

I love the Indy idea though ^_^

God damn it, Alec, now you made me look stupid! >_<

I don't even read people's names anymore o_O I just look at familiar avatars...

Eric: GREAT idea. I mean, since it's been done before, I guess it isn't original but... who cares! Sounds like heaps of fun!  I'd be interested in helping in a smallish way if you were to start something.  It could start a whole new wave of thing-making here ^_^

I wouldn't dream of making a game in photoshop. I use Paint Shop Pro and 99% of the time I'm only ever using pixel sized pens. As long as you can put a pixel on an image, you can make a great looking game.

You know, it's almost tiring having to be so right and go around correcting everyone's exaggerations all the time ^_^

Jet: Noone could predict what would have happened to that child, but it's entirely possible he may have been hurt, even seriously hurt. Just because they probably don't let their kid loose on the freeway, doesn't mean they don't neglect looking after him in smaller ways (that can be just as deadly). They may not, but they may.

"Do you think you're a good parent?"
"Sure! I do nothing for him but I NEVER let him walk on the freeway."

Sure, it's boring to listen to your parents talk about faucets but it's apart of being a child. Everyone has to put up with things like this... you know why? Because you're a child and your parents say so. Hell, it's a life skill. Try being in a long term relationship. My boyfriend has to put up with me doing all sorts of shopping and I have to do the same for him. I feel like hanging myself from boredom sometimes but I -don't- because I got somewhat uised to it as a child following my parents around in Bunnings ^_^ (which, incedentally, I had a ball at. I loved looking at the -stuff- there, like bathroom settings).

Also, Rich never implied parents should CHAIN their kids to them all the time, whether you're speaking literally or not. Parents DO need to keep a constant eye on their children. I was a very smart child when I was young. One day, my mum had to rush into a friend's house to get something and left me just outside the car so I didn't get uncomfortable and bored in the lady's house. She wasn't more than a couple of minutes, and it was a very friendly, quiet neighbourhood. I decided I wanted to go home - so I did. I just walked home, across several busy streets too. Later on, my mum came home in tears and I'll never forget how awful I felt at that moment.

I don't blame her at all for what she did, my problem was that I WAS a very intelligent, resourceful child and I "knew" I could get home okay. I can't believe how many dangers I narrowly avoided though, I was very lucky to have made it home okay. I can't have been more than 4 or 5 at the most. That, however, is exactly the kind of reason parents do need to keep a constant eye on their children. Children think they know a lot, and that can get them into a lot of trouble. They have absolutely no concept of how they're putting themselves in danger. Sure, a lot of the time, it works out okay. The risk for a little bit of freedom is not worth it though. I've had too many children related to me in some way die because of simple things.

Letting your kids play in the park while you sit to the side and chat with a friend is one thing. Letting them wander completely out of sight in a warehouse or even a shopping centre is not okay because a lot of bad things CAN happen.

How do us lowly non-moderators go about getting a suggestion up there? Should we still post a 'SUGGESTION' thread in the tech forum as per usual?

Agreed in some circumstances, but there ARE circumstances where a persons previous behavious in other areas indicates they definitely would not make good parents, or at least are at great risk of not being a good parents. I totally agree with rapists/murderers/child abusers never being allowed to have children. Not matter how reformed, the risk is too great and when you've done something as bad as that, you lose your rights in this regard for life.

What if a murdered killed someone out of revenge for them having hurt their child and got away with it (e.g. A Time To Kill movie).. would they then not be allowed to have kids? And what if a conviction was overturned? Medical technology can't guarantee that sterilisations are reversible, and they aren't 100% reliable, either. And that's before we even get into the whole punishment versus reform argument.

Seriously, SSH. Are you just inventing these circumstances for the sake of it?

A Time to Kill is a powerful movie and I'm glad the guy got off, but you know... it was still a terrible thing he did. I'm glad he did it, but the payoff he got for it is that those two rapists are dead and he can now live the rest of his life with his daughter. I don't think it's such a terrible thing that he shouldn't be having anymore children after that. Even if we do a bad thing in revenge for something horrendous, it's still a bad thing. I truly believe that if you do something that terrible, and taking a life no matter what the circumstances -IS- an enormous deal, you have to accept that you have to live with that choice in some way for the rest of your life. A rapist or a child abuser in particular, no matter how reformed, no matter how sick the thought of committing that crime again makes them... they have to pay for that mistake in some way for the rest of their lives. They can live a happy life in all other ways but they should never ever be allowed to parent or look after or work with a child again. It would be a bad decision for anyone to let them do so. It's kind of like working with animals - no matter how wonderful, good natured and sweet they are, sometimes their brain can -snap- and they can revert back to instinct. Committing a crime like a rape or child abuse is never forgotten, and even though it may be regretted, if something goes wrong with you that's beyond your control, it's much more likely that you as opposed to someone who hasn't experienced that behaviour have the possibility of reverting back to that behaviour. That's in an extreme case, and assuming that someone like that IS completely reformed.

Now, I know this sounds stupid and extreme, but those crimes are extreme and it's unfair on children to put them in constant contact with anyone like that.

Please point out to me where I said that these people should be sterilised. What you're doing is your taking one person's argument, and another person's argument, and assuming they both said both things.

I think it would be GREAT if we could just magically stop these people from having children, and magically only allow people who were good parents to have children. I don't actually think in real life this is practical whatsoever and I've said that.

I still believe that murderers, rapists, and child abusers shouldn't have children. I don't know how or even if this could ever be implimented, but it's what I believe regardless. People need to take responsibility for their actions and accept the consequences. It's not about punishing them, it's about putting children in the best environments for them.

There are some people you can just speak to and know that aren't ready for parenting. They just give off "stupidity" and "irresponsibility", and you -know-. It's a vibe... hard to measure, but in this case it's not that people should be made sterile. Just that I don't think they should have kids until they've grown up and become better people.

But since its impossible to measure and oh so very subjective, should it become law anywhere? I argree that there's some pretty irresponsible people around, but you just can't legislate for this kind of thing. And the whole idea stinks of the slippery slope to Eugenics.

Sure, look, again, I never said it should become legislation. It would be great if magically it was practical to do so, but it isn't.

What I've said the whole way is that the real key is education. When we as a society become well-rounded, good people, we as individuals can all be like that and things like legislation won't be necessary. It's a long way off, but it's the only fool-proof way to do it.

P.S. (as it were)... The comment about abortion (made by Rich) was obviously made by a person who quite clearly -doesn't- think of abortion as "murder of unborn children", as do I. I'm not saying you should change your view, but I'm sure you're intelligent enough to know that Rich doesn't share your views and quite clearly wasn't suggesting we reward people who would "murder unborn children". I mean... you -knew-, come on.

Ali: That's one of the most hilarious things I've ever heard of anyone doing ever in an adventure game. Bravo, I say! Next time I'm playing a game with a river, I'm definitely gonna do just that ^_^

Oh, DG ^_^ Show me the way!

I'm not talking about a parent who accidentally lets their kid scrape a knee, or a parent who has a shoplifting record from the age of 15, or a mother who can't say who the father is. We ALL know there ARE parents out there who just should not have ever gotten pregnant and don't under any circumstances deserve the right to raise a child. Children aren't toys, we all know that. A parent's responsibility is to raise another human being as well as that child needs to be raised. I can't say "To the best of their ability" because some parents' best isn't near good enough.

I'd LOVE the right to take people's children away from them when I saw them being raised by what I consider to be bad parents. However, what we want to do or what we feel people deserve isn't the goal, it's a world where ALL children are raised well, lead happy, healthy lives and ALL have chances in life.

Here's an important difference from what other people have said: you have to act on how parents HAVE treated their kids, not how they might. Until Minority Report comes reality, we can't judge people in advance of what they might do to their kids. The state does have the right to remove kids from their parents, but its not just a simple choice like that: care homes are crap. Having known some people who have been in them, they are awful places to be, no matter how good and caring the staff might be (and they often are not that even). So, in many cases staying with parents who are being treated for some condition (usually depression) would be much better for the kids.

Agreed in some circumstances, but there ARE circumstances where a persons previous behavious in other areas indicates they definitely would not make good parents, or at least are at great risk of not being a good parents. I totally agree with rapists/murderers/child abusers never being allowed to have children. Not matter how reformed, the risk is too great and when you've done something as bad as that, you lose your rights in this regard for life.

There are some people you can just speak to and know that aren't ready for parenting. They just give off "stupidity" and "irresponsibility", and you -know-. It's a vibe... hard to measure, but in this case it's not that people should be made sterile. Just that I don't think they should have kids until they've grown up and become better people.

I was only ever tested for IQ in primary school... I think it was some national thing, and we were never told our scores. I've never done one of these internet IQ tests but... I mean, how do they go as IQ tests? Are they a good judge of IQ?

I agree that IQ doesn't matter much, and it depends greatly on all sorts of varying factors... BUT, as far as IQ tests go, is it worth doing one on the internet?

EDIT: I just did the workout, I got 23/30. I got a couple of the maths questions wrong, and ...

Spoiler

PARACHUTE and BANALITIES

[close]

...wrong. I've never heard of that second one before so I was never gonna get that. The first is annoying ^_^

Although I totally disagreed with a lot of Darth's suggested requirements, I also completely agree with this:

I thought this was the land of oppurtunity?

Land of opportunity is great and democracy is great, but I really think that what America (can't speak for the rest of the world) is experiencing now is the dark-side of democracy.Ã,  People expect too much from their so-called 'freedom'.Ã,  They're unwilling to sacrifice ANYthing for the greater good.Ã,  People have become so spoiled by personal freedom that any sense of something bigger than their own well being is lost.Ã,  To me this is very sad.

People often ARE spoilt with freedom and it's part of the reason I usually hate almost everything that civil libertarians stand up for. It's like fighting for the right of an ant to walk over a stick, while questions over the rights of the human race to exist go unanswered. That's my stupid way of saying they always seem to fight adamantly for ridiculous rights instead of doing useful things in life.

Individually, people have the right to do whatever the fuck the want, really. I could go around slaughtering people willy-nilly because... I exist and I can. That, however, is a very primitive way to think and we've come farther than that. If any person wants the benefits of living amongst other people in a society, they have responsibilities, and they have to obey rules in order for us all to live well together and for a future.

It's SO true that in Australia, people are encouraged to have children. We have this impending retirement crisis and the government are shitting themselves about it. Their solution is a temporary population explosion that causes long term damage. Devastation, even. Because it won't be THEIR government's problem in the future though, they don't care.

I hate this solution. I think everyone in society needs to look at the larger picture of the Earth and how it's expected to support such an enormous population of humans. It can't go on forever, and it's certainly not coping now. Anyone who thinks otherwise can't see past their front gate.

We just have to accept responsibility for the baby boomers and handle the bad financial situation we'll experience with the retirees as best we can on our own, without giving birth to new people to lighten the load. We have to, excuse my language, take it up the arse for a bit before things can get better. Running away from our problems and making them worse is not the answer.

So, I think that population is at least one of if not the biggest problem we face globally right now. Plenty of people need to keep having kids, of course, but some don't deserve it and they might as well help the population crisis while they're not having kids.

I'm not talking about a parent who accidentally lets their kid scrape a knee, or a parent who has a shoplifting record from the age of 15, or a mother who can't say who the father is. We ALL know there ARE parents out there who just should not have ever gotten pregnant and don't under any circumstances deserve the right to raise a child. Children aren't toys, we all know that. A parent's responsibility is to raise another human being as well as that child needs to be raised. I can't say "To the best of their ability" because some parents' best isn't near good enough.

I, for one, don't think we need any sudden, drastic measures because as great as they sound, I -know- they won't work. We need to change things bit by bit or else there'll be a "revolution" and it'll all just be worse.

I'd LOVE the right to take people's children away from them when I saw them being raised by what I consider to be bad parents. However, what we want to do or what we feel people deserve isn't the goal, it's a world where ALL children are raised well, lead happy, healthy lives and ALL have chances in life. If you want to achieve that as opposed to giving people their just desserts (is that the phrase?), then you can't really want a radical change because it won't ever work.

Education is the key, I believe ^_^ That, and good policies in the meantime to stop completely the extreme cases of bad parenting.

Alternatively, just test is once, CTRL + ALT + DEL the window, then test again. With everyone I know that has this problem (including me)  it only does it the first time you test the game during your er... computing session. After that, it's fine.

By the by, what's your graphics card? GeForce?

God damn, I had a huge, thoughtful post that I just lost. Ah well.

Something new.

Dragon: God, it's just unbelievable how STUPID some people are!

Yeah, in principle I agree with the Chinese government trying to stop population growth (which is honestly what I consider to be the number one most important problem in the world) but there are so many horror stories related to the way it actually works, it's not a good idea. It's hard to think of an alternative though. It's really a matter of educating people MUCH better and bringing children up to be thoughtful, responsible and well-rounded people. It can be done but it's gonna take a LONG time and a lot of effort, and it that time... this problem continues.

I totally agree that there are a lot of straight out BAD parents out there who just should not have the right to have children. It's another problem I just can't think of a realistic solution to. I mean... people have babies. You can't really stop them just by creating govenment policies. I would -love- it if people had to apply to have a child and the system worked wonderfully to allow only good, responsible people suited to parenting who could afford a child to have them. This is just utterly undoable though, if you think about it.

Again, really... the ultimate solution is to raise human beings so that they become good people without financial problems. If I could see that in my lifetime, I'd die awfully happy.

In the short term, I think the best thing we can do is to set a good example for others and praise people who do a good job. Speak out when you see a parent doing something really bad but try to make them understand rather than simply accusing them. It's hard though, when I see a parent doing something really stupid, I want to hit them with a 2 by 4 and take the kid away to a better life.

I think it could be useful just for figuring out puzzles that are driving you insane. You always want to TRY to figure something out but it doesn't always work. In these cases, I'd rather get the answer rather than be stuck with that puzzle for all of eternity. There are all SORTS of great impractical uses for this thing too.

Imagine you're solving a crime involving a smudged out letter and you need to figure out what the original word was in order to solve the crime!

I think that experimentation in all these areas is great and people should use whatever aspects from whatever genre of games they like to make their own individual game better or more interesting, or just as an experiment.

I know this is just a discussion, and I think it's a really good one, but it's not like just because we agree something could be good, that it's necessarily going to take over the genre and kill adventure games as we know them. In fact, I think that most unlikely ^_^

Er... I guess I just think that all of these ideas are valid really, as long as you can make a good game out of it. There's no need to worry about whether it's an adventure game, an RPG or some crazy wacky game with that doesn't fit neatly into a genre (mm, my favourite). I like plenty of games that are COMPLETELY linear and give you no freedom. They can be great, they can be bad. I like plenty of games with lots of freedom - in fact, has anyone played a Nintendo game called Animal Crossing? My friend and I got really into it, it gives you a LOT of freedom with plenty of goals you can achieve but you don't have to. It's a game so addictive it will destroy your life. However, we'd be constantly discussing how good it would be if this, or if that... a 2D, open source version of the game would be wonderful and crazy ^_^ It's something I dream of making one day, and up until the other day, knew exactly how it could be done. Then I hit a snag I realise just won't work in 2D so... I guess I'll sit on it for a few more years.

*ahem* It's a fun game. It doesn't fit into any genre and has aspects of both adventure games, RPGs and a whole bunch of others. Giftpia is another amazing game in it's own genre altogether. Ahhh, it's like the Golden Peach of Perfection, that game.

Understood ^_^ Again, it's not like my game will suffer for it, I was just curious.

I used SetAmbientTint(255, 255, 255, 100, 100); and was really surprised that it only seemed to partially tint the picture. It was still very visible. If you want, I'll upload a picture later that demonstrates to what extent it tints (I can't just now though).

Neither of these problems are terribly important, but a white room transition would be nice (for that very much overused Hollywood effect) and a complete white "tint" would just save my game some disk space.