Messages

If people don't eat, they die. If people don't smoke... my, there's a chance they could live longer!

I mean eating too much. People who eat to much hurt their bodies, people who do too much drugs too. Where's the difference? That some fragile people can get some mental problems? That's body related too and can be caused by anything else too, like family, job, school and whatever comes to your mind..

Why isn't McDonald's banned? Money. They're a big company and employ a lot of people. That's always the crux of the matter, isn't it? That doesn't prevent my government for campaigning in favour of eating 5 fruits and vegetables per day. Oh the horror! They're meddling!

They can campaign in favor of whatever they want. They let people destroy themselves at McDonalds and I'm not for banning McDonalds. I'm for people realizing that they shouldn't eat crap of a fucked up corporation.

And I can't have my daily fix of heroin legally! So unfair! If you are for legalizing every substance then your position is coherent. Are you?

Basically, yes.

Seconded. People should have the right to damage themselves (regardless of how stupid it might be).

Then any public health campaign is pointless?

No. A good healthcare and education about health, drugs etc. is an important thing, still people should have the right to do whatever they want with their bodies.

Why should there be a problem with legalizing it then? Instead, I only see advantages, like better quality, less (drug related) crime, more tax income...

Organized crime rarely deals only in cannabis, as far as I know. Again, let's legalize hard drugs to step on the dealers' turf?

I'm not talking about organized crimes, I'm talking about the people in the streets, selling me some marijuana. They could work in a shop, legally selling good quality stuff, instead of being arrested for providing service to people like me.

I see you bring up tax income. Over here, the government started cracking down on tobacco fairly recently. Why the shift? Because the cost of all the medical problems caused by smoking finally outweighed any benefit in tax income. Legalizing cannabis means more smoking-related diseases (breathing smoke = not good), will the tax income outweigh that?

Forget that point, I just wanted to add something to that list 

And actually, not everybody that would potentially smoke weed if it was legalized smokes it now. I'm an occasional smoker. If cannabis was legalized, I'd do it. But for the amount of smoking I do, getting cigarettes instead is less of a hassle. And I know a good deal of people that simply don't break the law when it come to buying illegal stuff. Crazy people.

Okay, if it was legalized then you would do it. So what? Does that mean, you become mentally ill, get unemployed and lazy? Why should it? If it was that way you could just stop smoking it, since it isn't at all addictive. If people have problems with weed than they shouldn't take it. If they do drugs to flee from the harsh reality or something like that then prohibition doesn't help them. Prohibition of a certain drug doesn't solve any problems, it just erases one single way of dealing with / ignoring the problems.

As for the so-called "hard drugs": Yes, I'm for legalizing them too, despite not wanting to check them out myself. Regarding the demonized drug heroine for example: The main problem with that is there being a black market with bad quality, no education, lies about the drug and people being driven into stealing and looting to pay the given prizes.

Heroine does no irreversible damage to your body when taken in the right doses, it isn't dangerous to come off the drug again and the only real problem is overdose, and that's the same with the "soft drug" alcohol. I say education should be the main goal, not prohibition. Oh, and also, a society where you don't have to worry so much that you're likely to take too much drugs.. 

I doubt that a drug simply causes things like shizophrenia, unless the person already had mental problems.

Did you just ignore half of my sentence or is the meaning of "exacerbate" unclear?

Yes, sorry. It was indeed unclear.

Let me explain my train of thought better on that one:
Who smokes irresponsibly because it's cool (tobacco and/or pot)? Teenagers. Who's mentally fragile? Teenagers as well. Is it a good idea to give teenagers a drug that would potentially aggravate any mental problems they have? (If that reasoning is wrong, enlighten me.)

It's a myth that teenagers are per se (mentally) fragile. Yes, for many it's a difficult time, but it's not a difficult time because they can smoke or drink.

For the freedom of reasonable adults to smoke their fortnightly joint we should let teens be heavy smokers with possibly disastrous consequences? Hence 'tread carefully'.

If I want to smoke I want to smoke. It's my personal life choice. As it's been said already, food consumption isn't prohibited, just because it can lead to obesity (which is VERY unhealthy). Why isn't it forbidden? Because it would be crazy. Of course people should eat as much as they want to.

I don't want to do without marijuana, just because some people have problems with it - just like I don't want to do without a bread knife just because some people use it to stab people.

Instead of the "worse things are legal" argument, you should examine the benefits / disadvantages of legalizing cannabis without shaky comparisons to other drugs. I hear all of you on the possible benefits, just pointing out what in my opinion is a possibly very big disadvantage here.

I never made that argument but it is indeed valid, like Darth just pointed out. What should people think who like weed and don't like alcohol? They have to get an illegal drug from the street, while others have fun in bars and can buy their legal drugs everywhere. Isn't that a bit unfair?

The thing that concerns me most about all this is the level to which governments are starting to tell us what's good for us and what isn't.
(...)
I don't smoke at all, but I know some people do and from what I can see they're not damaging society. They may be damaging themselves, I don't know, but it's not the government's place to tell them they can't do that.

Seconded. People should have the right to damage themselves (regardless of how stupid it might be). Suicide shouldn't be a crime either.


Edit: The most obvious argument once again:

Many, many people smoke weed and everyone who wants to, does so. Why should there be a problem with legalizing it then? Instead, I only see advantages, like better quality, less (drug related) crime, more tax income...

Anyway, what I find worrying about possible findings on cannabis is that it would allegedly exacerbate existing mental conditions or render more likely to develop one, schizophrenia being the example that was given. Maybe the physical effects are less dangerous than that of tobacco or arcohol but that doesn't mean effects on mental health should be treated lightly.

I don't know anyone who got any (mental) problems due to smoking. I doubt that a drug simply causes things like shizophrenia, unless the person already had mental problems. I know people who had bad experiences with marijuana and they did the obvious thing: They stopped smoking it.

Also, the prohibition is useless, because one can buy it anyway. Who wants it, gets it.

Governments should tread carefully, is all I'm saying.

I can't understand the people here who mention the government. Who gives the government the right to decide what drugs the people should consume? Is the government some enlightened entity which knows what's best for the people? They also send young adults to senseless wars in foreign countries....

Also, as it's been mentioned before: There are lots of addictions: I don't think sitting in front of the TV for 10 hours a day is any better than being drunk every day. I doubt eating burgers and fries until you don't fit in a carseat anymore is any better than being unemployed due to excessive marijuana consumption.

That's no reason to forbid these things. People who get obsessively addicted by whatever have some problems and the answer is to solve these problems, not to ban things. Drugs (at least the soft ones) don't turn healthy, happy people into junkies. I've only had good (or mediocre) experiences with weed and so do most of the people I know. If someone has some problems, then I shouldn't smoke it either?

Yep, nice and smooth. Good work.

Plenty of my mates smoke tobacco but it is only amongst my friends who do weed/skunk that I see some people (not all by any means but those who do it more) who start losing interest in going out, seeing other people, or infact doing anything that doesn't involve crashing round a mates house, or their own and smoking it. This doesn't happen just because of tobacco or alcohol (although of course they have their problems too).

Many of my friends and acquaintances smoke weed and some of the most 'successful' ones (who study effieciently or earn money) are also the ones who smoke the most. Cannabis does not necessarily make people lazy or uninterested. The drug isn't the problem, the people are. It depends on how they deal with drugs, not if they do drugs or not. And I think every adult can decide for himself what drugs he wants to consume and how much.

As long as cannabis remains illegal it restricts the rate of consumption, which in turn lessens the overall damage it can cause to a society. Once you remove the restriction there's a potential risk, and you'll have a hard time putting the genie back in the bottle if things don't go as planned.

What couldn't possibly 'go as planned' ? Do you think all the people would start to smoke weed all day just because it's legal?

Also, why should the 'overall damage to society' increase with legalization? I myself am heavily addicted to nicotine and caffeine and I also drink much. When I smoke weed I drink and smoke less, so the damage isn't at all higher.

If people want to do drugs they do so, may it be illegal drugs or alcohol. I don't see any argument that could lead to the conclusion that legalizing another drug would result in a higher damage for society.

I really see no argument for canabis to be illegal if cigerettes and alcohol are legal.

There is no argument. The prohibition of cannabis is one of the most ridiulous things I could imagine. And if you look at the history of the prohibition (in the US for example), the reasons were always different. At some point they said it's making people aggressive, in the 70s they said it makes people pacifistic and less patriotic. Also, that it's a gateway drug and therefore dangerous. Well, all of that is just plain bullshit and Cannabis surely should be legalized.

If it were legal it could be regulated. The trade would be taken away from criminals.

Yeah, that's a point too. People who want to smoke it, do so, despite the laws. but if it would be regulated you wouldn't get low quality stuff from the street that is mixed with dangerously unhealthy additives.

The tax revenue would be a much needed boost to the economy. plus many more benefits.

I think they're planning to legalize it in California just for that reason. The state is broke so it could provide a useful income source. For that I envy the californians (but not for Schwarzenegger..)


Edit: Damn, it's snowing outside. What an odd autumn...

I'll be damned if I ever understand the idea of catgirls...I have to say I find it slightly perverted

Agreed.

Unrelated, but here, Andail: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IyU02E9bdM

The Chainsaw Maid is cooler and less perverted.

And YOU are listed too 

I saw Erin Robinson speak on an independent games panel at the Ottawa International Animation Festival. She gave a hilarious, honest, and compelling presentation about the difficulty of developing independent games and I urge you to support her work.

Thanks for reminding me of that. Someone posted that link in my uni-forum a year ago or something but I've totally forgotten about it.

Sometimes it's rather obvious but sometimes it's rather astounding how he guesses right with only a few hints.

Double posting won't help you... ever.

There's the code of the demo at the end of the first post. That's what you need.

I think String Character.Name is what you're looking for..

Yeah, the global script is the right place for that.

Sorry, I'm too lazy and tired right now to post some code but the forum search should be of great help since this is a question that has been asked about a hundred times before...

A Boolean is just a certain kind of variable.

Code: ags

bool dialogchange;

creates a boolean called dialogchange.

Code: ags

dialogchange=true;
dialogchange=false;

will set it to true or false.

If you read through the AGS manual and do its tutorial, things like these should be perfectly clear.

Finally came around to play the demo and found it enjoyable too. Simple but clean style, nice music and some funny comments. Let's see how the finished game will work out.

I like both entries, Calin Leafshade's has a nice effect and Nickel's has some facial expression and both could work very well in a game (well, both in one actually).

Since I couldn't choose a winner I flipped a coin and Nickel won.

Thanks for participating and wonkyth, I hope you'll enter the next one 


Here are your trophies:

   

Nice one, Nickel. I especially like the eye motion (and you know that  ). Also, you reminded me of the deadline which ends today.

I haven't much time now and also have difficulties to decide the winner, so I'll extend the deadline for one day and post again tomorrow.

The character control module might be of help: http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=28821.0

While clever, I doubt it would have many practical uses. Maybe for a advertising layout photoshopper to quickly prototype compositions, but not much else.

Agreed.

What I consider much cooler, is this new feature in Photoshop:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgKjs8ZjQNg

The last post on this game was couple months back, can anyone confirm an Estimated Time for Publishing? will it be commercial or public?

September 22nd is hardly a couple of months back, isn't it?

Since it's a Star Trek game, it can't be commercial without serious copyright violations.

Wow, you guys must be really bored.

But all is not lost.  I know what you can do!

Go through the dullest blog ever?

No seriously, it's nice to see the classic Obi-threads again. They're hilarious. And no, monkey, I didn't notice the links..