Seto Kaiba

Yeah, fun times.

Y'know what the sad part is? I think I know the guy that did those.

Well you've been busy. I got a rank-and-file Gigamesh art of Luis's ready to go up on mine. I'm hoping to have something up Tuesday, if all goes well. It shouldn't be too hard, now that our problems with the Java Runtime Environment are solved. The first items up are going to be the main index and the squadron/RPG mecha pages. There will be a separate set of mecha pages for the galleries as well.

Seriously, what was so wrong about destroying a ship that had outlived its usefulness? Its a ship for crying out loud. 398273[/snapback] Well, it was also sort of the symbol of the UN government, the UN Spacy, and one of the more recognizable ships in anime. Still, it was just a ship.

Photoshop is workin fine now. The problem is the surface of this ancient desk (made in the 1940's) is uneven, and as such the monitor stand won't sit properly, so I have to prop one end of it up with some folded papers to get it to stop shaking when I type.

lol... I'm still working out here, PR work is the pits, especially when you're trying to put a favorable spin on the decisions of a bunch of elderly businessmen who have less common sense than my eleven year old brother. Website updates comin soon, I just got to make Photoshop cooperate with me, and my monitor stop wobbling when I type.

Pawn in my game? More like jewel in our project's crown. When it comes to some of these mecha, you're damn near our definitive source of art.

He's nothing if not inventive.

Yeah, it's a real interesting piece of work. Started it's life as a VF-2SS Valkyrie II, and Luis's crazed mechanical mind fitted it with a new head unit similar in design to the original VE-1 ELINT Seeker, stripped out the portable firearms in order to fit an updated version of the VE-1's sensor FAST packs and Radome, and changed the optical sensors in the head around a little.

Heh, while I've been busy, Luis turned up an original design specifically for use in the Macross II RPG that we run on my site. A new version of the VF-2SS Valkyrie II, built with Electronic Intelligence and Electronic Warfare in mind, just like the VE-1 ELINT Seeker from DYRL. The conjectural name is the VE-2IS ELINT Cipher at the moment, we might change it later.

To me, it seems like Roy's drink of choice would either be a single-malt scotch, or maybe some half-decent brand of whiskey. Though if he's anything like most of the pilots I know, he'll drink any old thing so long as it's got enough alcohol content to justify using it to clean engine parts. Those guys live for the cheap stuff, the kind that doesn't even bother with a label. They've served me some seriously disgusting cheap hooch before, but they drink that stuff like it's water.

My gripe with the holographic cockpit isn't it's usefulness, but rather the sheer weight of problems in the implementation of it. For starters, by the look of it, you need true color video capture devices all over the plane to cover all those angles seamlessly, then you need the processing equipment to take the input from the cameras and make it into something the holographic projectors can use. Then you have to feed the data into the projectors, which would have to be all over the cockpit to achieve seamless 3D rendering all around the pilot. We're talking about adding an immensely complex system in not much space, when you're working with weight constraints. Add to that the fact that all that video processing is going to take time, at the absolute best, several fractions of a second, at worst, it might even be as much as a second behind. Ask yourself can you really afford to be fighting when all you can see is what happened a few seconds ago? A bullet or an energy beam can cover a lot of distance in those fractions of a second, so that lag could mean the death of the pilot. It's to a lesser extent than I originally stated back in the VF-2SS thread, but it IS happening, slowly but surely, the variable fighters of Kawamori's designs are taking on more and more of a gundam-like design aesthetic, and if Kawamori continues, it's likely that soon we'll start seeing that trend continue. I suppose part of it can be attributed to Gundam's status as one of the most universally recognizable animes out there. If you say gundam, even folks who've never actually watched it will at least have heard the name before. If only they'd all been there to stop Kawamori from making Macross 7 quite so damn goofy... if only... My hope is that Shoji Kawamori, as gifted as he is, will be left of out future Macross series production, for the sake of the continuity. At the moment he's rather painted them into a corner and severely damaged the credability of the series as one of the more serious and interesting sci-fi war series out there. Buddy, if I was an ATF agent, I wouldn'tve even used that crap to end the standoff at Waco, because the world does have laws against cruel and unusual punishment.

Kawamori would not let Macross II go without changing the mecha, they were one of the chief gripes about Macross II. That and that it didn't fit with Kawamori's disgustingly bad vision for the future of the Macross universe. I don't want Kawamori's designs anywhere near the Valkyrie II, the Icarus, or the Metal Siren. He can keep his wrist-lasers, his leg-mounted missile bays, and his impractical and overly-complicated holographic cockpit to himself. If we let him have at it, we'd end up with ultraman faces on the Valkyrie II, speakers EVERYWHERE, and the Macross Cannon would be fired by a little arcade-style gun on Nexx's console, just like the Battle 7's main gun. Letting Kawamori anywhere near the character design is just as bad if not worse. He'd turn Hibiki into a super-pilot civilian rockstar loser, Silvie into a brain-dead fangirl musician and give her valkyrie II breasts, and probably turn Nexx into yet another brain-fried loser like Gamlin. Plus he'd screw the music up so badly as to make the entire thing unwatchable. Of course he'd turn the Mardook into more Godzilla-like space monsters with super dimension magic and anima spirita. Personally, I think Macross is better off without Kawamori involved, and that any of the new Macross series should be done without him, and without whatever writer came up with Fire Bomber's songs. I'm not so sure about Kamjin being that allfired bad, he's at least got a sense of humor, which makes it a little easier to relate to him as a character. And Kamjin was pretty hardcore for a Zentradi, he didn't want to pull any punches, kind of like Ingues, when he went on a bombing spree across Earth, destroyed UN HQ, and generally went all Bodolzaa on the place.

Not only not likely to happen, but would you really want Kawamori getting his mitts on the Valkyrie II, Metal Siren and Icarus? I've seen where he's going with the future of mecha design in Macross Plus and Macross 7, and I think I'd much rather keep him uninvolved. The last thing we need is another VF-19 Kai.

That wouldn't be difficult, I've built custom machines to specifications given to me by clients that I would say would retail for around $13,000.00 USD. Of course me being a somewhat more savvy shopper than most, I can beat the retail average by a good $4,000.00 on a machine like that. It's all in knowing where to look for the parts you want. My first custom-built machine that I did for myself cost me exactly $200, and it outperformed computers that cost ten to twenty times that much. Every couple months the local anime & gaming society rents the fieldhouse at the local university for one of the state's largest LAN gaming sessions, some 400 people usually participate. That's why that guy needed an emergency fix, he was a major contender. Now that the horror of my final grading nightmare is upon me (see also, EXAM WEEK), I have a few days to grade several hundred exams, and yet I still find a little time to work on the site. Maybe I'll have something Thursday.

Ugh... I saw this and I just HAD to reply... before the thought makes me ill... you'd turn the Macross II Valkyries into disgusting imitations of the ones from Macross 7, adding impractical and occasionally suicidal elements to the design. Wrist mounted pulse lasers would be kind of impractical, because they wouldn't be usable in fighter mode, as the arms are on the underside and obstructed. The models that used those had the wrists in fighter mode locations where the weapons were usable. Leg-mounted missile bays raise their own problems, namely the idiocy of putting a volitile explosive device right on top of a nuclear-powered engine. If a shot were to cook off the ordinance, you'd probably not just blow the leg off, but likely blow the fighter up and kill the pilot. That and internal bays have a much lower capacity for mid-to-long range munitions than hardpoints/FAST packs, and without the option to jettison the ordinance quickly. Those few fighters with internal missile bays at least keep them well away from the engines. Also, just FYI, the VF-2JA does have what it termed by some to be it's own SAP pack system. Albiet it's just a series of wing-mounted missile launchers, since FAST packs make atmospheric flying a pain in a Valkyrie. Putting a big boxy FAST pack on a fighter designed for atmospheric dogfighting makes so little sense it borders on insanity. Personally I think most of the designs are fine just as they are. It's not like any of us know aerodynamics, combat aircraft design, or avionics better than the people who designed the fighters in the first place, so they've probably got good reasons for why things are the way they are. I might make a few cosmetic alterations, but nothing that would dramatically alter the design of the fighter, like jamming extra internal missile bays, pulse lasers and other mostly useless junk into it. I'd recess the cockpit of the VF-22 a little deeper in, so the pilot wouldn't need the cockpit bubble as much. I'd also change the profile of the VF-XX's legs a little bit, just for the sake of making them a little more uniform for walking stability. I'd strip the head laser/fin from the VF-22 as well, since it's never used and ornamental at that. I'd definately give the bridge of the Battle 7 a mute button so Max wouldn't have to listen to Basara molesting that microphone, and a self-destruct button for each of the Sound Force fighters at Max's station on the bridge, so he can get rid of them when they start screwing things up.

Well my estimate was smashed to all hell. Had a guy come to me for emergency repair on his PC. There's some huge LAN party going on tomorrow, and he needed not one, not two, but FOUR working GeForce 7900 GTX 512 video cards installed as an upgrade to his machine. The money was great, but it took me a while to get all four properly linked and configured. He's running Doom 3 at 2560x1600 at around 120fps right now, so I think he's satisfied with my work. So I'm once more behind schedule, but I've got a really light work schedule every day this week except Wednesday, so I'm not too worried.

An interesting design to say the least. I always liked the Sea Dart, and this seems like a nice testament to it's design. I also rather like the placement of the head unit during fighter mode, especially in the re-draw. Having the head mounted topside, ala VF-11, but with the cannons facing forward definately looks good. Ideally the barrels might want to be a little farther from the canopy. That aside, a very nice design. Kind of also reminds me of this...

Dude, wrong thing to say to me. I'm a M:tG player myself, and have been since the game first came out. Not to mention that my hygene is excellent, as is the hygene of many other M:tG players that I know. I frequent many game shops and never once have I experienced any kind of unpleasant odor. Some of the local gaming shops happen to be among my best customers too. I myself regularly compete in some of the local tournaments. I happen to be currently residing in Michigan, but that may or may not be subject to change without notice. I go where the money takes me, and thus far it seems to be prompting me to stay put. Of course that could change soon, since the governor is an incompotent baboon and the state's economy is sinking faster than the Edmund Fitzgerald. eBay, now there's a great way to lose lots of money quickly. I avoid them whenever possible, because there's been a lot of fraud and misrepresentation going on over there. Also, Tokyo ain't all it's cracked up to be, I've been there a few times now and I must say it's really a foriegn country... they do things exactly the same there. I'm about eight hours from having a presentable version of the web interface for my site working, though I'm hoping to find something better in the way of a texture to use for it. Right now it's a kind of flat, unpolished gunmetal texture right now, and it's really annoying me. I'm going to try for something a little more visually appealing and sci-fi-ish. Gonna try for something like enameled metal and glass, or maybe a somewhat more black plastic-like design. I'm going for a three-frame console look, so hopefully it'll turn out the way I want it to.

Well, I'm not that terribly far, not quite in Ohio, but close enough for the drive to be do-able if I'm willing to spend three hours in the car. There's lots of Macross fans out here, thankfully. So I have no shortage of people to get things done, it's just the small matter of keeping them on task. I've discovered it to be something akin to herding squirrels. Time, energy and resources? Actually if you think what I spend in terms of time on my site is excessive NOW, wait till you see how it starts becoming in the next month or so, when my number of obligations drops by one enormous load. I'll have enough idle hands around to really make a dent in the project. As for energy, I work myself to death at my job, and enjoy every last instant of it. Sort of like a hobby people give me obscene amounts of money for. This is just something I do with my free time. Resources? Well, all I've got is a bunch of overenthusiastic and overly hormonal fans who want to do something for the cause. Images... well, I'm pretty much set for images right now, Luis is doing a number on the huge mecha wishlist that we had on an almost hourly basis, and we've got a mess of stuff left to get together. I think we're pushing something like 1.6GB in resources. I hope to have some of it up by tomorrow morning, at the latest.

I second the fuzzy dice and inflatable afro. Phalanx, not every little thing needs it's own thread. Stop and consider if your thread will benefit the community before you post it, not after. It'll save you a lot of people griping at you.

Personally, I think Kevin might have been presenting the worst case scenario estimate for the damages as the actual amount in his previous claims. I doubt that Mr. Sheiring's damage to the company was quite THAT severe, if all he was doing was giving away free product every so often, or undercharging for services, not counting the stuff he supposedly stole from the company, to which a positive estimate of price cannot be assessed. The actual damages due to loss of inventory would've had to number some 71,000 or more books to even come close to reaching the outlandish amount of losses that Kevin's claiming Palladium suffered. Stealing original art, and the like might be a blow to the company, but it's hardly enough to cause that much damage to the company. The transparencies too... it's unlikely that that much damage was caused, even over the timeframe we're talking about, because they were obviously printing at least some of those titles while those transparencies were missing. That nobody noticed anything is perhaps the most unbelievable part of Kevin's story. All that inventory goes missing, and is never once accounted for, reported as lost, or even inspected over that long of a time? Unless their accounting people are dumber than the average by a goodly margin, then it just stretches his credability beyond what I and many others are willing to accept. Given common sense, and a healthy bit of reason, it's pretty obvious that either Sheiring did a LOT more than we're being told, or that Kevin is sorely overestimating the damages. I doubt that Palladium will fold because of this, I think that it's pretty likely they'll get the Robotech licence back and they'll be more or less back on their feet in about four or five years.

Let's see, even if he was secretly groomed for the operation by the military, disobeying orders, insubordination, recklessly and needlessly endangering both fellow soldiers and civilians, and running amok with an expensive and dangerious piece of experimental military hardware wouldn't just get him suspended from duty and stripped of his VF-19, it would more likely land him in the stockade, pending a court martial, and depending on the way the UN runs, possibly even a dishonorable discharge or a date with the firing squad. Plus I'm pretty sure that Basara's music violates the Geneva convention's provisions on torture. Since Basara is plainly a civilian, and therefore falls somewhat outside the bounds of military justice, it's patently ludicrous for him to be allowed to fly a variable fighter at all. Considering that he's flying a custom-built valkyrie so new that the military's elite forces don't have them yet, with a specialized control system and experimental weaponry, instead of an old clunker or a civilian model, it becomes even more odd and harder to believe. That he's doing so to fight a bunch of giant space monsters who are vulnerable to singing just stretches suspension of disbelief so far that it puts in it's two weeks notice. Though to me easily the most ludicrous thing in all Macross 7 was the manual control for the Battle 7's main gun. A little pistol with a gunsight that comes up out of the console in front of Max, like some kind of arcade. That's almost as bad as the little joystick that they used on the flop movie Star Trek Nemesis, as a manual control for the Enterprise E. Even though Macross II's storyline was admittedly taking something from DYRL and expanding on it, it still remains much more believable and relevant to the Macross timeline than Macross 7. The only civilians allowed in the combat zone are combat reporters, aka Hibiki and his cameraman Dennis. Since the military has control over what footage SNN airs, they obviously knew that Hibiki was flying up there. Combat reporters are nothing new, we have them today. The only difference is he was flying an unarmed plane instead of walking around as an unarmed reporter. His valkyrie was a civilian one, that had no battroid mode, no weapons, and was outfitted for the purpose of taking footage for the news. Hibiki never directly interfered with the combat operations, and did a few reckless things, but not nearly as many as Basara did. The only people who flew the newly constructed Metal Siren were the UN Spacy's elite, Nexx and Sylvie, who were both experienced pilots. The only time that Hibiki actually endangered military personnel was when he tried to take Ishtar back to Feff's ship, and even then, he didn't directly endanger anyone from the military or civilian populace. Never once was a civilian allowed in a military valkyrie with the intent that they fight, and only twice were civilians even allowed in at all, at the Moon Festival Airshow, which was pre-approved, and during a rescue operation, which was a necessity. For insubordination, and recklessly endangering herself, and for concealing the presence of an alien intruder, Sylvie got locked up in the stockade, pending a court martial hearing. For illegal use of emergency broadcast channels, breaking and entering into UN Headquarters, and for broadcasting combat footage not approved by the military, Hibiki got locked up in the stockade pending a hearing. That's much more in keeping with the way a military functions than what Macross 7 has. The only time they rely on singing as a weapon is when they're using Operation Minmay, and that's a sanctioned, proven military strategem that had been used against the Zentradi multiple times before with equal success. The reason it worked on the Marduk at the end was because it was one of their own emulators, and the troops were programmed to be manipulated by the songs sung by the emulators. There's nothing spiritual about it, no anima spirita, no nothing, this is a simple example of culture shock as a psychological weapon, and turning an enemy's mental conditioning against him. All told, there's a lot less in Macross II that I find hard to swallow than there is in Macross 7. Kawamori must've let his brain check out for a while.

Sounds like you keep almost as busy as I do. Today's my last official day of grading papers, then I'm free for the next four months, to pursue my goal of simply taking my mind off the hook for a while. I figure if the world wants to get in touch with me badly enough, it'll call back. At least that means not only a four-day weekend, but also the final testing of the new version of my site, and the implementation of the new interface for it. Bugtesting and validation is a cast-iron bitch at the moment, I'm not taking Dreamweaver 8's word for it and I'm double checking each page using IE6, IE7, NS7, NS8, FF1.5, and OP7. That's a consistant enough mix that if the page loads in all of them, pretty much anything running Windows, MacOS, Linux or Unix should be able to interpret it just fine. So you'll be keeping your text link to my site for a while until I can finish checking it in every browser.

For starters, USE PARAGRAPHS! It makes your writing much less of a pain to read. For each complete thought, use a complete sentence, and when you're done following one line of thought, make a new paragraph. It's not just for your sake, but for ours, so we don't go mad trying to read the super-paragraph from hell. Starting on the use of music in Macross 7 to convey emotion, that wasn't the point. In Macross 7, music generates some pseudomystical force called anima spirita that the Protodevlin feed on, and that the Varuta don't have, so the spirita breaks them from their mind controlled-zombie state. It's all pseudospiritual BS, just Kawamori's take on "The Force" from Star Wars. I know the only thing I feel listening to Basara molest that guitar and microphone is irritation at Kawamori. Emotion to do with turning the Mardook against Ingues? Maybe. I suppose introducing a relatively brutal society to the concept of love might've been what started to turn them, it's certainly what turned Feff. But then again, the introduction of emotions evoked by music has always been a part of the culture shock weapon. The defection of the Mardook fleet was more likely prompted by Ingues's destruction of entire divisions of the fleet when their emulators refused to sing the song of war. When faced with a choice between an annihilation of their own making, and one of their master's making, all they needed was something to push them over the edge and give them the courage to do away with Ingues. Your last few sentences make no sense whatsoever the way they're worded. I'm guessing you mean that the new mecha designs were radical (ie Metal Siren, Zentradi Valkyrie, new destroids), and that the other mecha were updated versions of the original models from DYRL/SDF Macross. As to it's placement in the timeline, it was INTENDED to be a part of the timeline, and Kawamori removed it because it didn't fit with his idea for the Macross timeline, which involved Macross Plus (which he was working on when II was released) and Macross 7 (which absolutely sucks).