MSW

Air Cavalry Chronicles eventualy became the Vision of Escaflowne (note the names of the different forces in Air Cavalry: Asturia, Fanelia, and ZaiBach Empire) ... Quote from the MAHQ site:

[Homer Simpson Voice] DOH! [/Homer Simpson Voice] Thanks!

Just a question about which of the Yahoo Japan auction bidding serices are the best? I'm not looking for the one with the cheapest fee, but the one with the best all around service, most reliable, excellent communication, good turn around time (I fully realise that these services arn't inherently fast...I find item on Yahoo Japan, place my bid with American contact -> American contact informs Japanese bidder, whom places bid -> auction closes and if I win -> Japanese seller ships item to Japanese bidder -> Japanese bidder collects several iteams then ships package to American contact -> American contact distributes package, then ships item to me...this takes time, I realise that) Just looking for the best overall service, that is easy to use, and preferably accepts paypal. Thanks

From the HLJ front page: HobbyLink Japan is closed during Japan's "Golden Week," string of national holidays now through May 5. During this time you may place orders as usual, but order confirmations will be delayed and there will be no shipping. In addition, our Customer Service department is closed and mail will not be answered until we return to full service on May 6. Thanks for your patience!

Wasn't intending to exactly offend you, sorry about that...I was trying to get you, and everyone to think... If there really were a problem with kids today, then why isn't everyone in agreement on just what that problem is? I used those two extreams in my previous post simply because they were largely opposeing viewpoints...on one hand it seems kids are falling victom to the "PC police", on the other kids are more vulgar and rude then ever before...those are seperate opposeing generalisations (If the PC police are trying to make everyone into sensitive "care bears"...but kids are more rude and vulgar...well they haven't exactly been falling victom to the PC police, now have they?)...I presented those generalisations in a binary "this or that" exclusive manner, simply because that is how the authors presented them...note that I even labeled them in my question as generalisations (note that "mostly useless" part)

and to think it only took 6 pages to come to that conclusion...Even 6 year olds have better observation skills

Yeah, I was wrong about the divoce rate thing...left out a decimal point, and used old numbers source: http://washingtontimes.com/specialreport/2...11626-9566r.htm EDIT: ewilen, Sorry about this particular post....I'm picking at straws again Sorry 'bout that...I'll leave it here for the curious though

No, I got it...the whole point of Agent One starting this thread was that TV (specificly cartoons) have been contributeing to children's problems....and much of this thread, many of the postings, have been pointing fingers at other issues from parenting to whatever...thats great and all that, if we were all of the same mind, and looking for answers...However, I don't agree with the core issue...I don't think anything is wrong with kids these days. Sorry I don't have stats to back up my claims, and can only offer anecdotes and airy generalisations...beyond that the only evidence I can show to support my viewpoint is the thread itself... Read through the postings here...Agent One and others seem to think kids are all becomeing inactive pushover "pussies", JsArclight and others seem to think kids are far more rude, greedy, arrogant, and vulger then ever before...So...which of these two greatly oversimplified (and next to useless) generalisations is it?

although the quality is pretty low (and I can't single frame step through it ) there are some tell tale signs that it is fake...the blue car is moveing faster then the red one...the blue one takes at least three car lengths to come to a smokey stop (notice where the red car is and how fast it is moveing once the camera pans)...the man barely crosses the parking line on the road, yet the car seems to hit him dead center (given his location and how fast he was walking he should have gotten knocked into the van)...I was able to pause the clip just as the car hits him, and it seems he has lost some girth (he doesn't look as overwieght)...given the speed, and the apparent weight of the man the blue car should have a smashed windshield and buckled hood...as the camera pans over to follow the action, our view isn't blocked by other cars parked along the near side of the street (yet one is parked to the left of frame, helping to mask the differences in vehical speed)... I doubt it is CG...looks to me to be the product of a seamless edit....first part of the shot shows the man...as he goes to cross the street, the camera is stationary...likely they filmed that (the man crossing the street)...called "cut"...the red car stopped...the man got out of the way as a dummy was put in his place....the second car gets a running start and "action" is called...car hits the dummy, camera pans to follow the action (picks up the red car strangely going much slower further up the road)...then back in editing the two parts were combined with a little morph...simple really

how so? Ah...So 6 year olds are applying for welfare? 6 year olds have credit cards? 6 year olds are getting divorced? 6 year olds are getting busted for drug trafficing? To me that indicates kids aren't the problem...it's the adults, our generation and previous ones, that seems to have trouble copeing... There has always been poverty, and in a capitolistic economy there always will be poverty...if the "poverty level" were lowered the poverty rate would be lower too...if it were rasied, the rate goes up... Debt has been out of control in some way or other sence the concept was first invented... The devorce rate has been greatly exagerated...the per capita rate is around 48%...what that means is that for every group of eligable people 48% of them statisticly have been divorced...marrage requires two people, and when they get divorced both of these people are counted seperately...meaning the actual divorce rate is HALF of 48%... Drugs have been a problem sense time imortal...crack houses are just the modern version of the old opient dens from long ago...if it's not modern drugs affecting kids, it was candy and sweets, or any number of things that were bad for kids... How many tantrums did you throw when mommy and daddy wouldn't buy you those transformer toys years ago?...kids are still kids...still growing up in a world that they yet have little control over...spoiled brats and appathetic snots were around long before your great, great, great grandparents were born... Both kids and adults during Shakespears time could be just as bad, if not worse...funny how the peanut gallery didn't result in the downfall of England... kids are still kids...nothing has changed about that...they will grow and adapt just like you and I have, just like our parents, and thier parents have...so what if they don't always meet your expectation now...It's not as if we always meet our parents expectations either (or they measured up to thiers, and so on)..so set the best example that you can, and remember even we didn't believe our parents were right all the time either...just let them have the space to find thier own path, and before you know it they will be bitching and moaning about the next generation to follow them

ewilen - Yes, I agree...stats can be quite troublesome, especialy when dealing with areas or time periods that never bothered to record them accuritly, if at all. However history shows that when tensions rise, people tend to worry, that worry can become fear, and that fear can be abused by others seeking power...On a small scale it happend here with the race riot I posted about...On a larger scale it happened in Germany under Hitlers rule...calm down, things arn't as bad as they seem...be rational, don't act on your fears until you can be certain they are well founded...don't take the TV, radio, newspaper's words at first glance...investigate things yourself.

By 14 William Bonnie was already a thief, associated with prostitutes, had killed a man, and fled Arizona for New Mexico...he had yet to become involved in the infamous "Lincoln County War", he had yet to become the infamous outlaw...he was not alone in all this either as he associated with other murders and thieves, some as young as he was...William Bonnie stood out from this group of hooligans because he was nice, polite, and well mannered...not because he was the meanest, cruelest of the lot... If society and it's children back then were so nice, pleasant, polite, well mannered, and well armed then how could such a society produce Billy the Kid and his band of unruley associates? Yep, and it didn't stop any of them from becomeing murderers, wife beaters, child molesters, lazy lowlifes, thieves, and a host of other examples of societal ills...just like the modern "glowing childhood" won't stop kids now from eventualy doing the same Take off the rose colored glasses and head off to your local library, give a read through the newspapers in the archives...see what society was dealing with back then, what problems it faced, what issues it had to sort through... A example of this (now largely forgotten): http://library.thinkquest.org/2986/index.html This happened within three miles of where I type this...Notice the kids in the lynching picture...notice the "yellow journalisam" of the time playing upon peoples fears...notice it was a lie, inorder to cover an affair that started all this...Notice that the rioting crowd wished to take justice into thier own hands (might this have been because they feared the justice system wasn't working?)...notice too how history has a way of overlooking such incidents (how many here on this board honestly knew this even happened?)

I got stuck for a moment trying to show the economic transfer from a agricultural society to an industial one, and now largely information basied one...In short I got sidetracked following the money I don't think the social decline is happening either...there was teen pregnancy even way back in biblical times (but hey, it wasn't uncommon to be married at 15 then either), there were backally abortions being performed in the "rose colored" moral heyday of the 1950's (don't forget the evils spoken about "rock-n-roll"...same was said during the birth of Jazz)...during the early days of the industrial revolution adults thought kids were becomeing stupid and lazy (what they failed to realise is that the adults had largely farming backgrounds, while the kids were learning the ropes within factories...simular examples exist today: kids seem to have natural abilities at programming VCRs, while some adults struggle to do so) The wild west was quite wild compared to today, it lacked the near instant easily available communication systems we now enjoy, infant mortality rates were quite high, the industrial revolution was in full swing, and you could find a cure for whatever ailes you from the local "snake oil" salesman (not to mention fairly rampent drug use that made the 60's and 70's look conservative ), illigitimate teen prenancies were fairly common as is today, law enforcement out west was fairly lax, or even non existant, the literacy rate was fairly low too...death, murder, abortion, stupidity, lazyness happened then as it does now...course then the "evil" music wasn't rock-n-roll or even Jazz, it was Polka! ...yet, the nation survived, we are still here anyway folks, there are reasons why prostitution is called "the worlds oldest profession"

Yeap, and the entire world population more then doubled from 1860 to 1950...more people means more problems In the early days of our country only registered white male land owning citizens were allowed to vote...now if you are a registered citizen over 18, you can vote...even after ajusted for inflation, elections cost many, many times more then they did back then (and people complained about the cost back then too)... In that 40 year time span many new industires have developed each with associated changes, expansion, and even removal of regulations...in 1960 there were still people liveing in rural areas without electricity (my parents were among them) heck, in some areas of the country indoor plumbing wasn't even common...we have far more roads now then we did back in 1960, we have far more roads to maintain...we have a larger more complex infrastructure to maintain....we even have more houses to deliver mail to...yet still, 40 years ago the adults bitched about kids just as we are today... Though you may not remember it (or are too young to have been alive) the government charged good old momma Bell with holding a monopoly over the phone industry and ordered her to be sliced up...hence the birth of AT&T, hence the birth of long distance phone service...and the birth of additional regulation and enforcement there of...that costs money folks, and without it you likely wouldn't be enjoying the convience of cell phones or even the internet today Hold up right there...grab your history book...and re-read it...America has survived far worse then what kids today can throw at her (formed under an original failed confederacy, the reformation ten years later into a republic under the constitution, the huge influx of generaly uneducated and illiterate imagrants, the growth of slavery, the war of 1812, the attempted succession of the south and resulting civil war, expansion to the west, the freeing of the slaves, the segregation of blacks and whites, the birth of the industrial age, the flocking of former farmers into cities to gain factory work, the birth of organised labor unions, the rise of the KKK, the push for womens right to vote, the birth of ragtime and jazz music, WWI, The automobile replaceing the horse as primary means of transportation, the great depression, Pearl Harbor, WWII, the flocking of city dwellers to the suburbs, the civil rights movement, the switch from B&W to color TV, The Kennedy assasination, race to the moon, vietnam, Nixon's resignation, oil chrisis, 9-11, and much, much more) ...and from day one, no matter how good people had it, they still complained...that hasn't changed ... Billy the Kid is an american icon, hero worshiped by many...yet you study the actual history of him, and the origins of the stories about him...well...he isn't quite the noble stand up black and white hero he is often painted as...Not to mention that he lived in a time in America's past when even his actions wern't completely out of place...He was friends with "the wrong crowd", althogh he was quite literate, many of his peers wern't, they survived by stealing horses, getting drunk, whoreing (it's been long rumered that Billy fathered at least one illigitimate child, most of his friends had fathered several)...Billy even broke one of the great and noble chiverlous laws of "Cowboys and Indians" by shooting a man in the back (couple of men actualy)...yet the nation hasn't crumbled from all the moral corruption exibited by Billys generation...hell, he and many of the kids back then would fit right in with the modern gang banger culture! Are you so sure America is in decline? Do I have to drege up stuff concerning youth during the "roaring twenties" when adults still called kids lazy and unambitious? cause if the adults were right, back in that day, well we would be liveing under Nazi German rule right now :wink:

We (Gen Xers...born 1965 to 1975) have been in politics for years now, hell, the vast majority of us will be elegable to run for president in 2008... Naw it is that way, always has been...TV sucks just as bad now as it did when we were kids...It's mighty sweet of you to be so concerned about the future well being of 6 year old sissys...but you are overlooking the obvious...6 year olds grow to become 7 year olds, then 8,9,10, and they keep growing into puberty and all the harmonal influenced changes, insecurities, confusion, incertainy, and behaviour that entales...Thier own bodies will give them that "rude awakening" long, LONG before thier entry into the "real world". Little 6 year old Billy, Jimmy, and Sally are the best of friends now, they watch the Teletubbies and are all "sissyfied"...but in a few years time...when Sally has developing boobs and gets that "not so freash feeling" every month...in a few years time when Billy and Jimmy find they have developed an extra bone each morning, and discover the "magical" properties of rubbing it...well, lets just say nature has a way of reprograming over all that "sissyfied" stuff they enjoyed when younger...

the more things change the more they stay the same...congradulations folks, you are getting old...not wise...but just getting old. Every generation whines, bitches, and complains about the generations following it...none of it has any merit, but we bitch, moan and complain all the same...it's a part of the right of passage into adulthood...you get drunk, get your cherry poped, and begin a conversation with "The problem with kids these days...." We have grown up, have gotten old, now we just gotta work on that wisdom stuff...such is the cycle of life

70.5% Pure, 29.5% Corrupt ... course that was treating the Laser Disc questions as if they were about DVDs I mainly stick with mecha anime (either "super" or "realistic" type, depending on mood...both are about the same to me ) and occasionaly go for something outside the genre as long as it's sci-fi or fantasy basied.

It's kinda ironic...people have been protected by "liquid armor" for decades now...afterall glass is nothing more then a dense slow moveing liquid

About the only insight I can give is to do a lot of web searches particularly for Japanese sites. A lot of Japanese video games have small short runs of related resin kits...the various ships from the R-Type games for example...these kits arn't typicaly produced by the larger garage kit producers like B-Club, instead they are made by much smaller groups (even individuals) produced in small numbers and sold as exclusives at the various Wonderfestival and related hobby shows... Your best bet to locateing one of them outside of traveling to Japan and searching through every hobby shop and trade show is to keep an eye on the Yahoo Japan auction site where a kit may turn up from time to time (just want to warn you that there may only be somthing like 10 of these kits in existance, maybe even less) Also you could contact the site owner where you found those images of the kit, he/she may be able to give you more info about it (who produced it, etc..) which could aid your search. Another thing you could do (this could be much easyer then getting your hands on one of those kits) is to gather as many images of the mecha as possable, maybe even locate a copy of the game to pull the 3D game models off of for refrence...and scratch build your own model of it

Another of my mecha designs, colors arn't yet final and it still needs shadeing...got a pretty good scanner this weekend so I can start working on my more recent stuff This one isn't finnalised yet, would be part of the comic book I'm attempting to put together...it's a partial tribute to the Zector mecha from the old anime Galvion (even the transformation is simular)...In my story the driver of the car is a female cyborg that becomes the head of the mecha

The Sol Bianca Cygnus from Disney's The Blackhole The Valley Forge from the film Silent running The big badguy asteroid thing shaped like a "dragon" from the old, old Saturday morning TV show Jason of Star Command The Nestromo and refinery from Alien The sword fleet ships from the Thunder Force games Most anything Nagano has designed for L-Gaim and Five Star Stories

Yeap, Good old Lambo is the John deere of Italy And they still make far more then Diablos... Ferrari is typicaly a "race on sunday sell on monday" company...they invest largely in thier raceing programs, which are subsudized through thier commercial car sales...that and the commercial car sales help legitimise thier raceing technology in the eyes of raceing officials (some raceing classes require that a minimum number of "street cars" have been produced before the involved technologyies can be used/modified for track compitition)...Enzo was always fond of V-12 front engine rear drive cars, mid engine rear drive wasn't supposedly something he was excited about...but as the cost of raceing grew, the company had to expand the commercial side of things inorder to raise enough capitol to remain competitive on the track...and thus the little V-6 powered "Dino" was born..followed by the 308 (V-8 basied in part on the V-6 in the Dino)...This helped expand thier commercial sales and allowed the raceing side of the company to expand, in effect splitting from the commercial side they had been closely tied into...the 308 was enlarged to become the 328, and all the while the Ferrari "flagship" car of the time, the V-12 front engine rear drive "Daytona" seems to have been forgotten Which is sad as it was/is an awsome GT car (recalling the awsome GTO of the 50's)...last "true" Ferrari the company produced before Enzo died...But then again Fiat purchaseing the company back when helped funnel cash to the track side of things too..course Fiat also produces farm equipment The only time Ferrari has been "picky about who they sell cars to" involves those limited production models that have been produced to legalize raceing technology...and even then these cars (like the GT-40) wern't originaly sold through Ferrari dealerships...the regular production cars...the "Dinos" 308, 328, Tesarossa, etc...well anyone could buy as long as they had the $$$ The Delorian is a neat looking car...a bit too heavy, and seriously underpowered ( factory claims of 0-60MPH in something like 10.3 seconds ) it certainly isn't a sports car despite the looks... Ah, the Vector...cool car...that picture is of one of the prototypes...the production versions are not as angular and look a bit different...but like a lot of tiny little car companies, they are still trying to "get off the ground" and establish themselves...The Vector is a great idea, and seems to be well executed (mid engine Turbo charged V-8 (usualy sourced from a Corvette)...just the people who can afford them more often then not go for the Ferrari or Porshe brand

and you keep missing my point...that vector introduced through rotation will change as the crew moves about the ship...No these little minute seemingly insignifigant forces at work won't instantly change the ships vector, but over time they will...And for short distances these changes don't amount to much...but for long distances it sure as hell does But this wouldn't be a problem if there were enough fuel onboard to perform course corrections mid flight (just like you would have to do with any ship)...but the big remaining problem for such rotateing sections is mechanical in nature, specificly the bearings and seals around the pivot point (eventualy the fricton generated by these moveing parts will effect the rotation speed...so more energy will need to be spent to compensate, cause if those rotateing sections are not spinning fast enough to counter each other then they arn't helping to maintain the flight vector...needless to say that trying to maintain or even repair such bearings mid flight could be a real chore)...The KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid) principal should never be forgotten...keep the ship in zero G, keep enough fuel on hand for flight path corrections, and provide rotateing beds for the crew to sleep in (that way if the bearings in the bed need repaired, the whole ship isn't at risk of comeing appart) the rotateing beds should simulate enough gravity that it keeps thier muscles from signifigantly weakening and heart working properly...

No, most of the detail is texturemapped...just like it was on the other VO games...the reason 2D fighting games seem to be lacking on that platform is because it needs a LOT of memory to store all the frames of animation for each character...this can use more memory then the amount required for the average 3D game (level, characters, textures..all of it) Current console systems only have to deal with 640 by 480 resolution...which is about the highest resolution one can get on regular TVs (most any higher screen resolution is a complete waste...a single white pixel on a black background in 800 by 600 shows up perfectly clear on a computer moniter or HDTV...but not on regular TVs)...simularly a 10,000 polygon 3D model is a waste of rendering time if it is only 50 pixels tall onscreen...which is why most modern game engines use different "levels of detail" depending on how far away the particular 3D model is (it doesn't make much sense to take the time to calculate and render a polygon that is less then a pixel in size, and on a 10,000 polygon model there could be many of them ... so for a game like VO:M where that characters arn't going to be in extream closeup for most of the game it doesn't make much sense to flood memory with 10,000 polygon 3D models plus sub models with varying levels of detail plus multiple 3D animation keyframes when hardware enabled mip-mapping is available

If the rider plays no part in keeping a bike balanced then give a bike a little push to send it rolling down a hill...even if you weld the front fork strait ahead so little rocks won't cause it to inadvertantly change front wheel direction mid roll...the bike will fall...it's rolling momentum will help carry it some distance, but it won't travel nearly as far before falling as it would if it was being ridden... And maybe you haven't seen stunt bikers doing thier balanceing tricks...they may not be able to keep a non moveing bike balanced indefinetely, but they can balance it longer then the non moveing bike can itself. The wheel weights used to correctly balance an automobile tire are quite insignifigant in comparision to the mass of the wheel itself, yet if they arn't placed correctly the wheel will not be balanced... I know of the rotateing physics you describe...and yep it would work...on paper...that is because it depends on absolute accuricy...the stress one rotateing section imposes on the ship have to be exactly countered by the other rotateing section...but in the real world of engineering, the world of manufactureing...that absolute accuricy is damn near impossable (which is why things are built to measure against "tolerances")...if the difference between the rotateing secton's mass is even something as small as a tenth of a gram the ship should encounter no flight path problems on the way to the moon...but if it was traveling the millions of miles to Jupiter...well then you better plan on haveing to make a few course corrections...and if the destination is even farthur away...well all those little bumps from the crew along with the "manufacturing tolerances" really start to add up...even you should realise that!