JB0

I suggested better quality control. Given that in a half-year I had to exchange one 'bot because they glued a joint shut*, another has damage from where they tried to ram the steel pins in and missed the holes, a third required surgery to get a plastic spur out of a joint, a 4th just has a paint streamer running across the chest that isn't supposed to be there, and a fifth has damage AND a paint streamer... I'm a tad unimpressed. (Yes, I kept the damaged ones. Was purely cosmetic damage, and to be honest I just didn't care enough to go back to the store. I guess they can get away with this partially due to lazy people like me.) I rode G1 from beginning to end. I even have ActionMasters, for Pete's sake. I NEVER saw a toy that was defective out of the box(though in the interests of fairness, they WERE simpler designs). *(Actually had to return it and resume searching, because there weren't any more in stock. Anywhere. Argragagh!)

Ooooohhh... that's a fun one... *debates going on a shooter binge*

And I hadn't made it to your line of thought either. I was worried about the booster ripping loose, and didn't even THINK about the VF itself being damaged. Given they VF-X-11 supported a fold booster, but it was removed for the final product, it's also possible that the VF-11 booster either wasn't stable enough for deployment, and the Plus/7-era booster is the first reliable small-scale fold generator. The VF-17 was late enough that they could, hypothetically, be confident that a reliable fighter-sized booster WOULD be available in the near future, so the capability was included in the final design. Really hard to do more than just guess with the information available right now. ... But it's such a FUN line of thought!

I'd forgotten the 17. That torpedoes concern 3, which is the biggest one. Unless I'm mistaken about the portable fold generator's development, but I'm pretty sure that was alongside the 19 and 21.

I believe that justifies the entire production run right there.

Well... It's only independent in that it contains it's own power source and operational gear. It's still controlled by whatever it's mounted to. One would assume you need ever so slightly more data transfer capability for a fold generator than you do for "gas tanks" and missile launchers. The VF-1 could be limited by the external availability of computer IO. Could also be limited by the Valkyrie's onboard computer, if it's not powerful enough for fold navigation. ... But that assumes the fold generator doesn't carry it's own computer, which isn't beyond the realm of plausibility, even for "disposable" hardware. We already stick a good deal of compute power into our own cruise missiles, which are decidedly single-use devices. Given the fold booster DOESN'T explode, it's likely that it can be retrieved later and refurbished for another use in many situations. Third possibility is physical mounting points. The fold booster was designed to attach to the YF-19 and -21. It's highly doubtful that the attach points used exist on the VF-1, even with the 1X modifications. An adapter could PROBABLY be made, but it's hard to say without knowing anything about the physics of the fold generator or nature of the available attach points. If there's too much stress generated in-transit, it could tear right off, leaving the Valk pilot lost and stranded at an unknown point between his start and destination. Or bounced right out of the galaxy. Or stuck in "fold space" forever(if I recall, dialog in Viva Maria implies this is a "real" consequence of fold generator failure). Variations in the mount could also potentially affect the accuracy of your fold. Again leaving your pilot stranded in Middle of Nowhere, Population 1. Any way you slice it, it's not something you'd want to trust to a hack if there's even a remote possibility of it affecting anything. There's simply no way it can end well.

Ummmm.... no. For the millionth time... you have to have a reaction mass. The fusion engine CANNOT directly produce thrust. While air can be used at low altitudes, as you get higher, you will HAVE to use your Valk's internal reaction mass, which is finite(and may not even be loaded if they were planning for an atmosphere-exclusive mission). To put it simply, you cannot just say "Well, I can get away from the Earth in 50 years if I keep going 5 miles an hour" because you'll run out of gas first. As they weren't on a tight timetable for the factory satellite capture mission, there was no reason to waste the very limited post-war resources on escape boosters just to shave a few hours off the schedule. That scene is a VERY strong indicator that the VF-1 CANNOT leave Earth unassisted. The YF-19 and -21 aren't even capable of actually leaving Earth unaided, according to specs. They're only capable of attaining orbital velocity(though they can use the fold booster to "cheat").

http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey/ Seamonkey: It's properly beta-tested.

32x was a joke. It only existed because Sega Japan was trying to embarrass Sega America. Seriously. The fighting between Sega America and Sega Japan at that time was so embarassingly bad... They were basically mad that the Genesis was a success in America and not Japan and that Sega America pulled it off by directly and agressively attacking Nintendo, which Sega Japan thought was too risky. They wanted to see Sega America fall more than they wanted to make money. So, among other things, they told Sega America to design a 32-bit expansion for the Genesis console, since this would be an appealing angle for the american market(with the upgrade hypothetically being cheaper than a new system, and 100% backwards-compatible with existing software). Yes, it would be their only next-gen hardware, and they'd support it fully. Then Sega Japan started developing a new system in secret, so Sega America didn't know about it. And the day after Sega America unveils the 32x, Sega Japan goes "Oh, by the way everyone... here's the Saturn. It's our REAL next-gen hardware, we don't know WHAT those silly Americans were talking about. May as well not even bother writing 32x games." And the Virtual Boy is one of those massively under-appreciated systems. I think the fact that it died before the second wave of software hit is one of the great losses of modern gaming. It's biggest weakness, though, wasn't that it was monochrome. It was that the display had a 50Hz refresh and no phosphor persistence to mitigate it. So it had a barely perceptible flicker, which was especially pronounced at higher brightness levels and tended to cause headaches if you didn't turn the brightness down. That and there was no 3D media to advertise in.

Oh wow, who didn't see THAT coming... Maybe next time we'll see a link to something worth watching? Ah well, at least it's more than just the standard retard cursing about games. We've got DIVERSITY here!

Robo Aleste's there too. And Sonic CD kicked ass. Shining Force CD would be cooler if it didn't take basically every last byte of SRAM space. You'll have to delete every save file you have to play it, unless you have a save cartridge(or use an emulator, which wasn't available when I borrowed the game). Alas poor SegaCD... we knew not what ye were capable of 'fore ye were buried neck deep in FMV crap.

The whole Aleste series is pretty cool(J name was MUSHA Aleste). ... Aww, hell... almost everything Compile made that had a gun was pretty cool. Reminds me... The Guardian Legend. Equal parts vertical shooter and "Crystalis with a laser gun."

I just realized something... With the last 2 Alternators being Rumble and Ravage, we now have 3 cassette robot Alternators(2 different Ravages + Rumble). But they never did Soundwave. Does anyone else find that just a tad ironic?

Gaiares is awesome. I suck at it, but it's still awesome. There's an NES platform shooter called Metal Storm worth looking at, too(c'mon, you all knew I was gonna drag this out of the 16/32-bit eventually). Damn fun game. 2 really notable things: 1. You have the ability to reverse gravity, which is actually integrated nicely into the game instead of just being a gimmick. 2. It's visually impressive, especially from a technical standpoint. Well-animated sprites(the death explosion is a thing of beauty), and more importantly, has 3 independently scrolling background layers. As I understand it, the only other game to implement multiple backgrounds on the NES was Ninja Gaiden 3, and that was only in 2 stages. It puts several SNES/Genesis releases to shame, graphically speaking.

I just realized something... I watched Thundercats a LOT. But I never had a single one of their toys, and can't recall wanting them very badly. Unlike, say, Silverhawks, which I wanted but never got(Don't ask why. We've already established kids have bad taste.).

A bonus they are actively pursuing through the resurrection of a franchise that's been dead for 2 decades. Yup. Transformers, Voltron, Captain N(Oh dear god, Captain N...), SilverHawks(Captain N squared)... I've avoided HeMan, Thundercats, and GI Joe. For now. At least it was FUNNY crap, though. I can watch it and laugh instead of just wincing at how bad it was. Why do they keep selling 100$ models of Wing, X, SEED, etc? Because they want the older audience too. Creating a new fan base for a dead franchise doesn't make sense from a business perspective unless you want to resurrect the old fan base too. Which requires you treat the original concept with respect lest you alienate the old fan base. And creating a new fan base for a dead franchise doesn't make sense from a "this idea is too neat to die, kids today deserve to see the same bad-ass-itude we had" homage perspective unless you actually pay homage to the original instead of turning Thundercats into "Lion-O and the Pussycats"(or is that "Snarf and the Pussycats?" Honestly, SNARF?).

In part, it is. I never said it was targeted SOLELY at adults, but the use of an old license is intended to make it a multi-generation product.

The use of the Thundercats name says otherwise. That's a name that has no value to anyone born in the last decade. No they aren't. They're bringing Josie and the Pussycats to a new audience. Only with swords.

Actually, I think they did a good job APPEARING to conform to US law without actually doing it. Law requires a permanent modification with glue or paint. I also think it's a stupid law, so... Generations of kids managed to grow up without getting themselves killed or maimed with realistic toy guns and tiny spring-loaded projectiles. I think today's kids are a lot better at surviving than people give them credit for. Good to know they found a solution that works for all concerned parties.

Classics line was just to kill time between the end of Cybertron and the beginning of the movie toys. With the movie coming soon, Classics has served it's purpose and is ending. It's all very tragic.

I hope it's wrong. If they're gonna rob me* of my nonsensical Thrust, they can at least rob me of a Ramjet repaint instead of the real thing. *Maybe. As was pointed out, it didn't have good release odds anyways.

Wait... Thrust has the VTOL wings too? Or just something different than what Starscream/Skywarp and Ramjet have? Remember, "Magnus' head" is part of the armor. Strip that away, and he's just Albino Prime. So hypothetically, if you give him his trailer armor, he gets his head by default. Sorta like Classics Jetfire.

Yeah, I thought it was a thread bump for a second. At least this drivel STILL hasn't hit the airwaves. It may yet be cancelled.

Ya know, I was debating just turning everything off for a week to let all this crap die down, but now... I can't decide if that's inspired genius or nauseating stupidity. Especially the reworked forums.

I love it! The 1-Up over the chalkboard is a great touch.