SR4

i need to beat Dead Space 2. Im at the point where its just a lot of fighting off zerg rushes of necromorphs. Not as foreboding.

holy shit this is amazing lol wow!!! that has to be one of the most uncanny mashups ive ever heard.

Genuine lol Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2 flol

this place has gone insane.

that's pretty much the impression i got from a few books/articles in the past. but there is danger there; the casualties incurred would be from the actual missile strikes, not from the sheer amount of infantry being thrown at one side or the other. if a peninsular war was waged by that strategy, N. Korea would be done in one to two months, if not sooner. Its the missiles and the close proximity of Seoul to the border that have everyone worried. But again, this seems like a lot of chest thumping on both sides here. I'd tend to side with Hyun-Hee. Neither side wants a war.

yeah. the interesting thing is, IF a war were to happen (and neither side really wants this), the immense numbers of casualties would likely occur in the first month or so of the war: without implicit Chinese materiel support, the N.Korean infrastructure would collapse into slow partisan chaos.....though now that I think about it....that's a possibility for high casualties too. dunno if this has been posted, interesting opinion from Kim Hyun Hee (planned bombing of a S.Korean airliner, later repudiated her actions) http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/10/kim-hyun-hee-north-korea-spy-kim-jong-un-struggling-control-military_n_3050816.html?utm_hp_ref=world

ill admit im actually pretty attracted to her

alright, Ive listened through my beautiful vinyls about 4-5 times now, and I am staying with first instinct, jatavee-c is one of the best Autechre songs ever. Absolute lushness to the nth degree. There are a few others that are amazing but tbh Im still trying to actively identify tracks with their track titles. Tess xi is amazing, Cloudline, and I think Recks On are my top faves.... as a guy that isn't constantly blowing his load over Autechre, this is seriously one of their best albums.

getting hairy here

went with my lady to see Jurassic Park 3D (Jurassic Park is her favorite movie). Man I forgot how much fun this movie is/was. It's nothing mindblowing for today, and it's not some sort of indie art-movie masterpiece, but damn Spielberg could really make a great popcorn flick. Everything moves seamlessly, and again the John Williams soundtrack is always badass. Im a huge skeptic/critic of the 3D trend, but I think this was the first movie I've seen with it that I didn't mind; in fact it increased some of the scene's notability (getting down from the car in the tree was particularly neat looking). 8/10. Great popcorn movie; if 3d wasn't so damn expensive I'd recommend everyone go see it.

dunno if this has already been posted but jesus christ this is fucking amazing. [youtubehd]DgBzF9_CQhY[/youtubehd] when those weird detuned pads come in at 1:55 is probably the fucking lushest beat ive ever heard in my life OMG why is my face melting

Regardless of who is making the threats, threats regarding nuclear action should nonetheless be taken VERY seriously, and it creeps me out that so many people/sites are openly mocking these "empty threats". Yeah it is most likely posturing, but do we take threats like this lightly from other nations? Just remember, no European nation wanted a WWI, but a couple of simple fuckups and misguided intentions taken one step too far brought it to that.

alright, i guess this thread is derailed?

I understand why the US may believe that sending bombers the other day to fly over is the 'right thing to do' - but I am challenging this assertion. Like I said before - it seems to me that N. Korea is quite aware of what the US government has within it's military capabilities. There's no need, from an outside-of-US-government standpoint to send the bombers to fly over, unless you want to provoke further issues and tensions within the N. Korean dictatorship. and also, again even after you redefine "their terms", you need to consider what "their terms" actually are. Namely, preservation of the current regime structure as it exists, and to talk otherwise about ideological/moral agreements is relatively worthless; due to Juche and the Kim dynasties unrelenting anti-American agitprop networks, they have essentially buried themselves into a hole. You can't really conduct meaningful diplomacy without some sort of threat of force; war is diplomacy by other more extreme means (and im not advocating war here, its just pragmatically expected in politics and nation-states). And it's not exactly like the U.S. is in a position to "relax" the tensions between the two Koreas. This topic is just immensely complicated, and I've often found that trying to apply seeming universals or expected rules of discussion fly out the window pretty damn quickly.

ill try to answer or expand on what i said tomorrow maybe, its late now, but might I suggest that we not get into the whole argument over religion/culture? I like this thread and don't want it to derail too far.

there are no resources in NK that amoreikkka needs save for eradicating the flow of nuclear/missile technologies proliferation to iran,pakistan,syria,the highest bidder etc. Exactly. We'll let them shoot missiles at us, that land in the sea, for a while. They may even be able to get away with taking out Hawaii before we start talking really tough. It isn't about 'talking tough' though. US, if there is any sanity in the government over there, need to think about trying to communicate with N. Korea in their terms. Though I know this may not ever happen, since the US government's standpoint on things when it comes to geopolitics is completely warped and corrupted. I don't believe there are many in the US government who truly care about human progress and having an overall social concern for people on this planet other than narrow minded, corporate interests (see Adam Curtis' films on the history of this). Simply failing to engage in productive conversation and resorting to sanctions upon sanctions will not do the job in sorting out the issue. "Their terms" is a horrible way to negotiate. Remember, you are negotiating with a dictatorship with incredible authoritarian controls over the influx of information to the rest of their citizens. Also remember that Juche philosophy and the constructs of the N.Korean government involve constant compromise or recognition of power between the great leader (Kim) and the high ranking cadre of military officers. At the same time, the ideas of national "self-reliance" are in direct contradiction to ANY form of cooperation whatsoever with the western powers, much less the U.S. itself. The people, or citizenry of N. Korea as we would think of them more or less don't factor into the N. Korean perspective of negotiation. I think that's what a lot of people are being a bit naive about here. The N. Korean gov't is interested in maintaining power and wealth that it's highest members enjoy, aka. regime stability. Period. It just so happens that West-sponsored industrialization helps increase N.Korean economic viability, thus they produce more resources that the top cadre/leader can enjoy. The fact that it might improve the rest of the citizens' lives somewhat is largely irrelevant outside of the context of maintaining the current power structure. So negotiating on "their terms" is somewhat nonsensical, because we are already doing that by co-sponsoring joint economic projects between the two Koreas, and the regime's media and cultural control more or less ensures that any success that derives from these projects will only show positively on the regime and its policies as they currently stand. Think if it in terms of the U.S. and S. Korea, China to a certain extent=hostage negotiator N. Korea= hostage taker (ie. the majority of civilians) N. Korea knows that the moral implications of millions starving and dying in a war, in addition to rapidly destabilizing the entire region is the one major chip they have in negotiations against the rest of the world. The United States and S. Korea, China have taken the position that perhaps a few million N. Koreans starving to death every year is a "better" situation comparatively speaking, to a war which would cost anywhere from 20 to over 100 million lives, and would absolutely decimate the Korean peninsula, not to mention destabilize the Chinese economy as well. chen is absolutely right in stating that this has to be an incredibly slow gradualist movement towards industrialization and economic growth, the N. Korean people need to be introduced to Westerners and thus outsider ideologies and culture in a slow, non-threatening manner so that they have increasingly direct and first-hand experience of Westerners/capitalists/S. Koreans vs. what they see or hear on propaganda networks. U.S. military posturing is just as necessary as N.Korean military posturing, but for very different reasons. N. Korea does it to appease the military ranks and inspire nationalistic sentiments in the people (this was done a LOT in the 1990s arguably to take away public attention to the massive agriculture failures put forth by Kim Jong-Il), thus regime stability. It has pretty much nothing to do with actual negotiations with the United States; pressure might scare the S. Korean gov't to put pressure on the U.S. to resume negotiations, but other than that, its a paper tiger. From the U.S. perspective, the military show of force is to continually reinforce the fact that, quite frankly, the N. Korean regime still exists because the outside powers will it, and that the Kim dynasty needs to shirk back from mouthing off too much if they want the business subsidies between the two Koreas to continue. China is an interesting third party in this, because they are stuck between distancing themselves from a very, very annoying and bi-polar and overall unreliable ally in pseudo-communist ideology and geo-strategic positioning, and sticking to quietly supporting certain aspects of the N.Korean regime to maintain stability and thus avoid direct U.S. of S. Korean military intervention. Not to mention the absolutely MASSIVE waves of poverty-ridden, starving, and in many cases ideologically opposed refugees that would flock into the Chinese borders.

WEL HURY UP!!!1!

I guess it would be rather hard to tell...I mean, the Kim dynasty is dependent on maintaining, at least in appearance, a virulently anti-American posture....and they constantly need to placate the ever growing military caste in the political system...so....shit LOL thats not a good answer, sorry.

Salo. I don't care what anyone says; it was a fucking stupid movie. Yeah yeah fascism commentary blah blah blah.

what makes you think that what you believe in is the real reality ? just because it contradicts mainstream conceptions ? the picture and its timing is great, obviously. that america is the root of all that is evil IS a mainstream conception. America as the root of all evil? Might be generalizing a bit there. But honestly, even though I think the U.S. should shift diplomatic priorities to more African conflict zones and N. Korea for future infrastructural development instead of mineral rich hotspots, for now, the best way to deal with North Korea is very very gradually and carefully. did Chen respond yet? Im still interested in what he has to say.

Konigsforst will always be my no.1. Pop is grand though.

i wasn't for the attack on Iraq either; im not sure if that comment was intended towards me.

im not gonna go into detail here, but compson, i and many others understand your moral outrage over the continued existence of the N.Korean gov't as it is. But the North Korean problem does not easily confine to any moral outcome. How would you suggest we go about stopping them? Consider that military intervention will result in the destruction of millions of lives. Are those lives a worthy sacrifice to save the lives of the children in the future? Obviously the U.S./South Korea do not support such an idea because of a Korean sense of ethnic unity as per the homogeneity of culture for thousands of years; they'd be "killing members of their own families", etc. Also consider a hypothetical situation in which the N.Korean government completely collapses, and is absorbed into S. Korea. How do you deal with, quite literally, the influx of a 3rd World agrarian economy into a fully developed industrial powerhouse? The economic and cultural effects will be at the worst massive, at the best, very unpredictable. Basically: It's more complicated than we might, or want to think. It sucks, but we have to be pragmatic and consider that the consequences of action now might irreversibly damage the lives of successive generations after.

immature as shit but i cracked the fuck up [youtubehd]sMn1mCMtTc0[/youtubehd]

Dead Space 2 is pretty fun. Pros: Revamped combat...seems smoother to turn...and I don't remember but it's nice to know that you can run backwards in a pinch. Still that good ol' shock scare and PHENOMENAL sound design. I play this damn near max volume when no one else is in the house. Plus cutting the fuck out of limbs is always satisfying. Cons: Ugh...mixing up buttons in the heat of battle.I can't tell you how many times ive died because I accidentally hit the quick stasis button instead of quick heal. Also, it has too many quicktime events, and Im only on Chapter 6. Lastly, I know its supposed to immerse you in the feeling of panic and fear, but I really, really abhor those parts where some big monster limb grabs a hold of you and you have to awkwardly aim at the big pulsating yellow weak point before it eats you or whatever. But half the time this is mixed in a cutscene, so you don't know when you are allowed to shoot and when not to, or you try to shoot and you are interrupted by the next part of the cutscene. It doesn't come off as fun or enjoyable in any way to me, just frustrating and a loss of ammo if not lives. Those tentacle grabs in the first Dead Space really got under my skin. Overall though a solid game, enjoying it almost as much as the first (the first was a magically sublime experience of space=terror).