I think meaningless, gratuitous violenece is great! ANARCHY!!! 

I respect your opinion and I would be inclined to agree with you, except for all the fun I actually had playing the game. There was a moment in the game where I had wrecked the cop cruiser I stole and as I crawled out, four men in blue tried to rush me. Just then the car exploded, taking us all out. Quite thrilling actually; kind of gave me that Young Guns II feeling, 'I'm going down in a blaze of glory.'

I see the crime oriented video games as being no different than mafia movies -- they go back a long way, and movies like the Petrafied Forest made in the 30's are as violent and cynical as any game we have today.

I watch mobster movies, and play violent games, but I could not kill or hurt anyone except in a moment of self-defense. Also, I am a polite, Natural Law abiding citizen and quite typical of the type of person who plays games, reads books, and watches movies.

Since the topic of violence has by its nature political overtones, I should add that instead of blaming violence on artistic preoccupations, books, comic books, movies, and games, we should look at the root causes of violence in our society, and that root cause is the existence of the Welfare State.

From the Welfare State a generation of lower working class Americans learned not to respect the property of others, and to focus entirely on day to day subsistance and a meager but destructive form materialism instead defering their day to day gratifications and saving towards bettering themselves.

High Crime rates did not exist significantly in America until the passing of Lyndon Baines Johnson's Great Society legislation which changed everything towards the worse for America's lower classes. 

I took a look at u2 THOUGHTS. Interesting that it took about 15 hrs (which is perfect time for a game), but many report it u2 was 4-5 hrs of playtime for them . 

they got bored and didnt finish it. Also, Shambler did say he spent time on the ship, looking around and stuff. Maybe if you skip to the mission without doing the exploration, chatting etc, it wasnt that long. 

I took a look at u2 THOUGHTS. Interesting that it took about 15 hrs (which is perfect time for a game), but many report it u2 was 4-5 hrs of playtime for them . 

both times seem possible to me, after having played it through recently. I think my time was somewhere in the middle, around 10 hours probably.

It always seems a shame that a lot of people skip every cutscene and don't bother looking around when they don't have to. I mean, sure, you can finish a lot of games in 4 or 5 hours (especially FPS). You can't expect a game to last very long if you quicksave every 5 seconds!

All that said, the game did feel a bit short, but I felt that they didn't reuse the environments much, or exploit them to consume as much player time as possible. That isn't necessarily a bad thing though, it means that your surroundings are constatly changing and you're never in one place for long.

On the flipside, a lot of RPGs will have a similar quantity of content to Unreal 2, but will give you 100+ hours of play, due to all the backtracking and reusing of locations that their type of gameplay employs. Often you are sent somewhere by someone, then you're sent back to someone else, and then you have to get something from the forest, and an hour later you've completed the sub-quest. 

re: welfare state.

You are wrong. Thank you. Drive on through. 

It is demonstrable that the welfare state has had an entirely negative impact on American culture; by changing the factors that go into the economic decisions people make in their everyday lives, you radically change there outlook. The largest factor involved in the creation of wealth is how people manage their time and resources. The welfare state alleviates the need and incentives to plan for the future, thus you create a mass group of people conditioned to think in terms of subsistance. 

what 

It is demonstrierbar that the well-being condition completely has had negative consequence in the civilizzazione American; , the factors that modify that economic people of the decisions that, take in every day its lifes, radically here perspective announce modify them. Greater the implicit factor in the creation of the abundance is like the handle of someone to its time and means operated to you. The condition of the lessenings of well-being with the necessity and the reasons, to slip during the future, you consequently produce to the group of people total conditions them, in order to think next to the subsistence of indications.

It's mostly the same thing... 

And as I cannot 'submit' without some body text, I will say it again....

Quake, Quake; my kingom for some Quake 

Mike: just hit the spacekey in the body and it'll allow an empty body 

I love blowing people heads off and blood splattering everywhere whilst listen to great 80's music. In fact this was the first game I actually bought instead of downloaded in ages, shortly followed by CM4 which didn't impress me much. 

Vice City kept me entertained for weeks. All the side missions are cool, but unfortunately there didn't seem to be as many cool stuns as there are in GTA3. Still, better than GTA3 overall, and one of my favorite games of all time. 

FUL LIKE MANHUNT -- MANHUNT REAL GAEM FOR PEOPLES WHO LIKE FUNN! HAKC< SLASH! KILLE KILL! YES! WHO THAT TALKING???? TALLKNING. 

People are not leeches. Stop pissing on those that need a helping hand. A nightwatch-state is not the answer to crime or poverty.

Do you honestly believe that private, profit-driven enterprises are more capable to provide basic human services (health-care, education, etc.) than public ones? Take a look around, when did any company do something for you without making money on it?

You stated that we didn't see crime rates worth taking notice of until 65, which was when Lyndon B. Johnson realized he needed a legacy other than thousands of young men in bodybags.
I call bullshit. 

Oh yeah, this is clearly the sort of issue which is going to be intelligently resolved on this board.

I call bullshit on everyone who comments on it. 

let's shoot this fucker! 

that's exactly what a homocidal violent video game player would say!

go play solitare. 

that's what a junkie hungarian horror star would say!

Karloff? Sidekickk? Fuck You!! 

it's just a combination of violent images in the media?

Nobody ever died before the media came around. 

...someone's been eating propaganda for breakfast, but forgetting to sprinkle it with salt. 

Well, when I originally brought up the subject, it was at least in the context of video games. I'm like Scampie, I get tired of video games and other creative mediums getting blamed for violence, when history makes clear what the greatest agency of violence in society is (<suprise>), the state.

Wrath, I'm not pissing on anyone. Have accusations of callousness ever fed a hungry child? I intentionally left all personal matters and all political agendas out of it (Rothbardian Anarchist in case you are wondering), and addressed the matter purely in its raw economic terms.
As for public education, I have too much experience in that area to let anyone try to get pass me an argument defending the wretched beast. I worked several years for a company responsible for evaluating the proficiency exams for over twenty American States, and I have to say, there was not a single one of those states (including Texas under GWB) whose student performance was anywhere near being at an acceptable level for an advanced First World Nation. The entire American School system should be hauled into a metaphorical garbage heap and junked.

The damage done every school day to the minds of America's children is a crime against humanity, and yet, you say that I'm pissing on those who need a helping hand' when I am not the one defending such a cruel, monstrous entity. 

Scampie, did you star in horror flicks? The rumor is true? 

I sure as hell don't trust the state to watch over me at night. Not with a Watchman whose yelling, 'bring it on' to every lunatic walking around in the shadows out there. One eye open at all times.