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What annoys you about the Games Industry these days? Anything you want to whine about? I'm interested to know what you think the flaws are in recent games etc.

For instance, I'm slightly irritated by the fact that all WWII games seem to have the same name AND the same grey/brown packaging...

Also I wanna see more designers being credited properly for their games. Authors and Directors and Musicians get their name on the cover, why shouldn't Game Designers?

Ah, Idle Thumbs... where fact X importance = NEWS!!!!

Oh my god, catweazel! I never had a TV growing up, but I read the Catweazel books... argh, I loved them!

That reminds me of a book I read when I was little... about erm... some kids who were computer wizards (starts off with this girl sitting in a tree programming a spectrum-style thing or something) and they win a competition or something... go off to this place with a mad scientist who wants to steal their brains or something... erm...  oh man does anybody remember anything like this?

Also Labyrinth was my favourite movie as a child.

Hello again my useful AGSers

I'm buying a digital camera for somebody's birthday. He uses it to take a lot of closeups of things to use in photoshop, plus at parties and of course ordinary picture taking, It needs to be small, preferably small enough that he can carry it around in his pocket, but not one of these ridiculously micro sized ones that seem to be floating about....

So, really it needs to be relatively small and excellent quality, with a good optical zoom. I'd rather it be in the e200 - e400 price range.... hey, if it's less than that, all the better! Also, a good brand name would be nice

Any recommendations?


It would be neat if you could get it in red, too

I can't believe I keep saying serial mouse... I mean PS2 mouse, sorryryryryry.

My card isn't integrated, no.

How do you reset all the cards/ram?

I've tried all the things you guys said, of course... no, no magnetic things around, I'm not silly...

I believe that the problem is coming from the actual computer, not the monitor though... especially since the monitor is fine when plugged into my dads PC

So what went wrong eh?

Not really, no... in fact, the USB ports which work just fine, are located directly beneath the serial ports, and between the serial and monitor port.

Also, why is the effing monitor tinted pink?

Also, does anybody have any idea on how I can ease the pain of this screen until I can afford to get a new PC? If you have no idea on how to fix the problem or what it might be...

Hi guys,

Yesterday I returned from a week abroad and, when I turned on my PC, the monitor displayed a "no signal input" error. No matter what I did, it seemed that the monitor just would not realize the PC was on. Anyhoo, by sheer luck I happened to unplug the mouse. Somehow, the monitor went on. wtf?

It seems that, if my (serial) mouse is plugged in, the monitor won't work at all! However, there are no problems with my USB mouse. Furthermore, even when the mouse is unplugged, the screen  is entirely pink anyway (and slightly fuzzy, and I think it's getting worse).

If I turn on the PC with the mouse plugged into the serial port, and I press the OFF button, it instantly turns off. However, if I turn on the PC WITHOUT the mouse plugged in, it takes the ordinary five-seconds to shut down, leading me to believe this is a serious fuck up and not just the monitor failing or something...

I took a screenshot and sent it to somebody, they said the colours looked perfectly normal, so I assume this rules out the graphics card as part of the problem. 

The monitor has an independent power source, the computer is about four or five years old... any ideas what's wrong? I think it may be time to buy a new PC....

Please guys, if you explore your body after reading this thread, note that it is not a massive turn-on when you tweak your nipples repeatedly as though they are volume dials.

I believe some men find can nipples quite delightfully pleasurable, should they be lavished with attention by a pretty young lady (or man, whatever).

In this modern age of technology and advanced chipsets, is one career enough?

Lots of people change careers halfway through their life. My english teacher is a 50 year old woman who studied languages to teach english and french as a student... now she's taking a part-time degree course in film something or other, and wants to get involved in theatre instead.

But, things as closely related as photography and film should be easy to study together surely... I am sure Media courses exist that cover all of that stuff, or courses that cover that in the first year and branch off into your chosen direction in the following years.

[UK plan!!]

Okay, here's the craic.

It seems that, to get into any art or design or animation course, you will need a foundation art course.

You pay a lot of money in the UK for these, and apparently you're not entitled to a grant while studying.

Plus, I really don't want to take an Art & Design foundation course, since I have already studied a wide range of artistic THINGS, and it would gall me to pay to study them again.

So! Here's my plan. Or, two of them.

UK plan!!

Portsmouth University has a degree course in Animation, which does require a Foundation. However, it also has a degree course in COMPUTER Animation which does NOT require a foundation, but from which you can transfer to the Animation course after the first year. So, one option is to take the Computer Animation course and then transfer to the Classical Animation course. And have a billion pounds of student debts when I leave *sigh*

Ireland Plan!

Take the Animation Drawing Studies foundation (I don't mind taking a specifically Animation foundation), followed by a higher national diploma in Classical/3D animation, followed by Advanced Dip in Animation.


Everybody else? What are your plans?

See, if the best option is somewhere like Dundee, I might as well just go to Uni in Ireland, where we have the best Animation courses in europe and they're FREE. We have no fees! At all! You just go to university and come out learned!

Scotch, Disco, have you considered Ballyfermot or Dun Laghoaire in Dublin, Ireland? Ballyfermot is supposedly one of the top three animation universitys in europe or something, it's really EXCELLENT. And no, there are no tuition fees or anything. I was talking to somebody from a UK uni, and they were saying a lot of people from the UK transfer to the irish uni's because they're so superior, and based a lot more on actual work instead of theory, and things like that.

I don't like Ireland so much because I'm bored of it. But if you guys all came with me, I might as well stay here. And not have a billion pounds of student loans to pay back in a few years. It's pretty much the same distance from Dublin - Brighton as it is from Dundee - Brighton...

Check out Dun Laghaoire (pronounced 'Dun Leery') Institute of Art & Design, and Ballyfermot College of Art & Design, and let me know what you think.

edit by andail: censored language...what's with the f-word usage, lassie?

Let's do university together, Scotch!

And actually it doesn't really have to be close to Brighton I guess.

Hey dudes!

Just wondering if any of you guys from the UK might know of some good animation courses AND Art Foundation courses over there? Preferably I don't want to be too far from Brighton since I'll be spending weekends there, but I guess it doesn't matter TOO much.

I want to study Traditional animation mostly, but I don't mind if the course has a mixture of 3D and traditional. Are any of you guys in good art unis at the moment?

Did anybody take the Art Foundation in Brighton? It's held in the City College of Brighton and Hove. Any good?

Day of the Tentacle and Monkey Island 2 are great examples of video game music done well... not only were the tracks memorable, good to listen to and well fitted to the game, but they also used ... what was it called? iMuse. Definitely look up more on iMuse and how that worked.

Grim Fandango had an amazing mexican-style soundtrack.

Katamari Damacy has a good sountrack too... whether it's to your tastes or not, it certainly is different and unique and catchy.  It has a lot of J-pop tunes, and a very simple hummed main theme  (Naaaa, nanana na na naaa naa na Katamari Damashii!) that's very endearing and gives the game a LOT of character. Definitely worth looking up.

Vib Ribbon is another game... if anybody remembers it, it was a game on PS1 where you made the little Vib Ribbon guy jump over shapes that were created by the bass line of the music. It only had a few tracks, but again they were unique and catchy (Don't stop now! Oh yes. Don't stop now! Ladies, and Gentlemen! Ladies, and gentlemen!)

Psychonauts is a new game with an incredible soundtrack that has massive diversity. One particular track made my mother ask why I was listening to DeBussy ¬¬

I heard the planetscape music is really fucking epic and good, but I've only heard a bit of it (and it was epic, and good!)

Space Channel five rules, ha ha, oh man... dancing off with aliens is good, no matter what the music sounds like. Thankfully, the music actually fucking FULES, so there's another one worth checking out.

Beyond Good & Evil had a very catchy and unique theme song with lyrics you might be interested in hearing, and Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles had a few tracks that were good too... particularly the end of year dance music and the opening theme.

Final Fantasy games themselves, especially VI - IX (Got a little bit shit after IX). A lot of the games had pop song theme tunes, but besides that they had a lot of distinctive music... if you played a piece of music from a final fantasy game to somebody an FF fan who'd never heard it before, chances are they'd recognise it as being from FF.

I also liked the music to RE4. Although it was nothing spectacular, it did actually suit the mood and in some instances was very, very scary. Basically it was just really well used. Thumbs up!

Now there's some research for you.

"cunt".

I went to a sushi restaurant for the first time in my life, with my boyfriend. He explained you needed to eat the things on the plates with the chopsticks by dipping them in the soy sauce and them putting the whole thing in your mouth. After doing a couple times, I exclaimed, "this is the biggest thing I've ever put in my mouth!" and then added thoughtfully, "Well, not really I suppose..."

Anyway, it was all meant perfectly innocently, but he laughed so hard he started choking ...

Also, one day he was telling me that one of his friends found a music organ one day, and he has it in his house now. So when his friend came over that day, I asked if I could 'go over to his house and play his organ'.

Whoops.

Hey Dudes!

Does anybody remember that guy who made Ignac? He had this fantastic, fairytale, whimsical art style that I absolutely adored. Anyway, I'm looking for art styles that are similar as I'm doing a project, but I can't seem to find anything. I really want that whimsical feeling to it, and those nice storybook colours. I'm probably not even making sense.

Anyway, does anybody have any pictures or links to webpages with this kind of art style?

Thanks