While the media is content to let pundits just shoot off rhetoric to back their own predefined agendas, some people in the blogsphere have put some effort into analysing the actual data from Iraq. Check out this link for some really detailed analysis of what's going on. Are we winning? Who's getting killed? What's going on?  

There's been a very stimulating series of articles written by JoeUser bloggers with regards to the opinions of civilians on the sidelines making claims about what the military should and shouldn't do.  I missed some of the first ones (particularly a great one by Texas Wahine) so here's the series so far: We need to help those Iraqis!  (a civilian frustrated with those who oppose the war) If you love war so much, why not go fight it?  (frustration with non-serving civilians...

In Galactic Civilizations II, you have beam weapons, missile weapons, and mass-driver weapons. Against these weapons are corresponding defenses -- shields, anti-missile defenses, and armor.  Defenses in a different area do provide some benefit -- they are the square root of their value. So if a fighter with Blasters (beam) of 3 attacks a ship with 0 shields, 4 armor, and 0 point defense then the battle goes something like this: Fighter rolls beteween a 0 and a 3 and the defend...

The weapons in GalCiv beta 4 aren't well balanced.  We're moving towards the point when it's time to start thinking about how to balance the weapons and defenses. In general, the idea is that defense technologies will be somewhat cheaper to research and be somewhat cheaper to put on your ship than weapons. But they'll both use up costly space. So what's more important? SIZE or COST?  Cost is the pain that keeps on coming because the Maintainance cost on a military vessel is 3% it...

For Beta 5 (December) we're going to be adding a new invasion system.  I won't give away too many of the details but we still want to factor in some very simple, straight forward advantages. Here's what we've got: Advantage Description 5 Invading Army's Air Superiority 1 Tech Advantage 1 Tech Advantage>2 1 Tech Advatnage>4 1 Tech Advantage>8 1 Race is Neutral Aligned 1 Planet has Invasion Defense built ...

In the original Galactic Civilizations on OS/2, playing as good, neutral, and evil were considered to be pretty innovative concepts for a strategy game.  Depending on which moral alignment you chose, different ships, technologies, and plantary improvements would come into play.  Moreover, how races interacted with you would heavily depend on it as well. In Galactic Ciivlizations II, released over ten years after the original OS/2 version, such moral issues in strategy games are no l...

I didn't know what to expect when I went to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.  Of the books, GoF is my favorite and so I cringed at the thought of it getting messed up.  I was not happy at all with the last movie, Prisoner of Az which I think sacrificed too much of the story in order to turn in a "lean" movie.  The first two Harry Potter movies were merely okay in my opinion.  American directors, for some reason, end up making movies that look amazingly c...

The Skinning Primer A comprehensive look at Windows customization   2006 Edition   by Brad Wardell   Don't be a drone. Don't let your desktop look like this!   Be an individual! Make your desktop YOUR desktop!         Disclaimer : I work at Stardock . I'm a guy who is so into messing around with the OS that I made it a large part of my career. But since I work at a company that makes this stuff, I obvi...

I am talentless. It's true.  I have no natural talents.  I have interests though. Lots of them. And that's part of my problem.  My obsessive compulsive nature tends to allow me to focus on becoming decent at a lot of things but never attain any masterhood.  Not that I could anyway because -- like I said -- I have no natural talents and to become a master at anything, you really need to have a talent in that area. Just looking around where I work I see it all the time. ...

A friend of mine and I have debated about companies using H1B visas to get skilled technical people into the US. Stardock uses H1B visas a lot.  But only 65,000 of them are given out by the US government.  Politicians, who typically have no understanding of business, think that these tight limits will encourage companies to look harder for Americans to fill positions.  That's incredibly naive.  The reality is that companies who find talented people overseas that they can't...

So how are the different civilizations in Galactic Civilizations different? The easiest way to illustrate the difference that I can think of is how each of the civilizations would deal with the scenario in which they are driving a car down the road and there's a turtle trying to cross... The Drengin would swerve onto the shoulder in order to squash the turtle. The Arceans would run over the turtle if it were on the road, otherwise they would drive past. The Humans would swerve ...

This week we're starting to work on the Civilization Manager.  Galactic Civilizations I didn't have a Civilization manager and some people thought that was definitely something we should have.  And we agree.  BTW, the screenshot doesn't have anything to do with it, just wanted to have something pretty to go along with this blog entry. So what does the Civilization Manager have on it?  Four things: Civilization Summary This is a screen that displays in brief informat...

This email is floating around. While it's totally unfair in comparing Texas and Louisiana in terms of their handling of hurricans (after Katrina, people were taking these things more seriously) but the general reality is still pretty accurate IMO.   :: A Tale of Two States 2 States, 22 Observations Things noticed while watching media coverage of the recent hurricanes: 1. Texas: Productive industrious state run by Republicans. Louisiana: Government dependent welfar...

My younger son isn't doing so well with his academic career.  At least so far.  Luckily, it's just kindergarten.  But according to his teacher, he's at the very bottom of his class in both numbers and letters.  He's 5.  And can only count to 13.  Can't spell his name and hasn't quite gotten the whole alphabet down.  The teacher explained this to us in our parent-teacher conference. I asked, "Well, is it possible that he's...well...you know..just..dumb?"&...

Atrophe. I think that's how you spell it. I could look it up but that would be work. And that brings me to my problem - I've become so lazy that my muscles are starting to atrophe.  I think I should do something about that..but yet..the chair beckons..