The Hidden Blade Assassin's Creed in Depth

Now you have to climb onto the nearest rooftop and yell "I AM A GOLDEN GOD!" at the top of your lungs.

Hey, it's a Led Zeppelin reference!

is it?
i've only heard that it some movie (forget what it's called) about a guy following a band hoping for an intervju or something. does it predate that?

in other news, a piece of my soul died today and here's why:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=E_gKq200EBk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWrh1axPj0M

Almost Famous. 10 points to each of you! Oh, what the heck. Make it 1000 points each.

Sorry about the soul death, Rob.

Yes, by 25 years. Robert Plant allegedly said "I am a Golden God." in 1975 from the balcony of a room at the Andaz West Hollywood hotel (known as "The Riot House" by rock bands). Almost Famous (2000) depicted this and many other actual events. It's based on Cameron Crowe's experience touring with rock bands as a teenage writer for Rolling Stone.

TLS, what exactly is that for? (For all of us in America).

How do you mean? It was a test. The average of all my made tests is going to be on my final report.

Just got back from holiday

I was disappointed with Cagliari, Sardinia but it was quite a small town so I wasn't expecting much. We also stopped in Ajaccio and Palamos, both of which were very nice. Naples looked nice but we went on an excursion to Pompeii and Vesuvius so didn't see much.

Rome of course was the standout city though. It took two hours to get there but was well worth it. We very nearly didn't see the Colosseum (my parents didn't think we had time ) but in the end we had loads and I made sure we went. Seeing the Pantheon and St. Peter's Basilica was great too

did you spend the whole trip thinking "i could climb that"?

Oh my goodness, you have no idea. Seriously. I found myself talking to my family about it as though I'd been there before as well even though I haven't.

I was saying stuff like, "Yeah Castel Sant'Angelo is great. You get to it by crossing one of the bridges over the Tiber." At one point I definitely began to say "When you climb the Colosseum-" but had to stop myself! I also kept looking for tall towers/significant landmarks, thinking, "that's a viewpoint, there'll be a feather up there somewhere, another viewpoint..." If I'm honest, I do that where I live too

I think I need help ...

Hehe. I once saw a bird flying as I walked out of my house. I was like, hey, I should get up there and sync that viewpoint! I'm fairly sure others have it too. Maybe we should organize some sort of ACAA (Assassin's Creed Addicts Anonymous)?

ACAA sounds like a great idea. I'm guessing there would be a fair few members

Anyone know if its possible to view things in first person in Brotherhood? I fancy taking some photos to compare with my real-life Rome photos from my holiday. I don't mid having Ezio's head in the way but it would be nice if he wasn't there

Push the left stick and it'll swap to first person view.

Brilliant. Thankyou!

Brilliant. I miss those ridiculous Ginuess commercials.

is anyone playing Portal 2 yet?
it's freaking awesome, and way longer than i thought.

like i thought i reached the climax yesterday, but no. major plot twist.
and that wheatley character is much better than i thought he was gonna be.

Hasn't come to stores over here yet. And since its holy week it will be in stores around next week's tuesday.
Cannot way that long without my cubeT_T

I saw Vanitas playing it today. I sent him a message about how much I hate him right now. XD

Two people were "sick" today. Turns out they were on a 24-hour Portal 2 marathon. Which is fine, I plan on doing the same thing with LA Noire.

One of them is a good friend of mine, he says the original Portal is the only game he has ever beaten twice in one sitting.

I neglected to mention that both were and still are currently absolutely blazed beyond belief in addition to half of the office today because it's 4/20.

We all went to IHOP today and got like 10 rounds of unlimited pancakes. It was the best breakfast not-during-breakfast meal I have ever had.

is 4/20 some special day/number i don't understand?

Its to do with cannabis. I can't get the full Wiki link to embed on here but her it is:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/420_(cannabis_culture)

The number 420 has a special meaning for marijuana smokers in America. I have no idea what the significance is, but it's a big deal to them. So, April 20th, 4/20, is a day when you can pretty much tell who is a pothead.

420 is the police code used to say that there are marijuana possessors or something like that. For example, "We have a 420 here at the school"; meaning someone or a number of persons are currently in possession of marijuana at a school, and the popo are about to ruin their buzz. I've studied this amazing plant for years.

Fixed.

That's one of many discredited theories on the origin of the term.

Thanks stabby I couldn't get it to work with the [url=] tags either but I presume that works now as well

Well that clears up some doubts... kind of...
Thanks anyway Joey and Stab.

You killed my buzz, stab...

did he by any chance....stab it?

that's gonna be my "play on words" pic now. whenever i wanna point out i made a funny that probably wasn't that funny at all

lmao

I guess you could say he...

STABBED his buzz

Naw. BBCode couldn't handle it so I used HTML tags instead... <a href=>

I need some unbiased advice from qualified advice-givers...

I'm about to transfer to 1 of 2 colleges: University of South Alabama (Mobile, AL) or the Herron School of Art (Indianapolis, IN).

Currently, I go to Marian University (formerly Marian College) in Indianapolis. I have a scholarship that basically gives me a free ride to any public or private school (private schools still require payment for books and/or dorm services; public schools do not).

For a while now, my current school has been attempting to grab more money from my family's thin, thin, THIN pockets. I've become annoyed and decided to transfer to a place that wasn't so greedy.

As a joke, I asked my girlfriend if there were any good schools where she's at (Alabama). She actually mentioned the University of South Alabama (USA for short). I found out that her older sister, also an artist, went there. Also, one of her former teachers whom she is good friends with works there. Another plus, my current art advisor who I've become good friends with, as well at Marian is best friends with the USA art advisor. Even my girlfriend's mother can set me up with a place in an art exhibition where I can sell my work! I have so many contacts already. Also, lots of job openings are down there.

For the Herron art school here in Indy, I have no personal links whatsoever. No jobs are open. No one wants to hire a young guy like me. Again, the only good thing about staying here is to get a free ride into an art-exclusive school. I'd have to depend on others to support me, though. I've tried to get a real job for over 3 years now!

As long as I stick with my tiny payments I have now ($25/month cell phone and Xbox Live) and save my work-earned money up for 3 more years, I'll be able to pay off most of any debt I may or may not have with USA, that is, if I don't receive a scholarship.

So, does anyone have an unbiased piece of advice to share with me? I say "unbiased", because everyone I've been with most of my life is pressuring me to stay in a seemingly unfortunate position.

As a college graduate who went to a school that was convenient for their family, and was the top pick of his father, I would say (given the supplied information) go with USA. I also came from a family that didn't have much. When I was in the 10th grade my dad told me that he couldn't help me with college, so if I wanted to go I would have to do it on my own. I went to the school he wanted for convenience, but also because I got a full ride to play baseball. I didn't want to have any loans, plus it was a great education. I can honestly say that given the chance to redo it, I would definitely not make the same choice. I am a better person for the school I chose (a military school), but I wanted to play pro ball (and should have) my choice ultimately killed that dream. I had opportunities to go to better baseball schools (pretty good ones), but chose not to. It sounds like you have some opportunities that don't come along very often if you choose South Alabama. Given the slow job market in general, especially in the art world, you would be handicapping yourself if you choose not to seize that opportunity. Your family will get over it. If they love you, they'll want you to be successful. It will mean more to them if you become successful and follow your dreams from a distance rather than settle for scraping by and being unhappy just to stay close to them.

There is my rant. Take it for what it's worth.

I don't know that I'll feel the same way when my daughter comes to me in 15 years and tells me that she wants to go to school in California or work in another country. But that's why you asked for unbiased advice.

Here's some advice my mom gave me once: "Make a decision, then see how you feel about it". If you pick one and feel excited and hopeful, that's the right one. If you don't feel that way with the other, it's the wrong one.

From the way you've described the two schools, it sounds like you've pretty much made up your mind.

Yes, Lisa, I pretty much have. I let this topic go for my whole day to get any and all contributing ideas, but GB's seemed pretty inspirational for me, also going with what I've been leaning towards.

Glad to lend some help.

I'm excited for you, Joey!

Thanks Lisa!

Also, when this all works out and I have money to spend, I was planning to focus on getting better recording equipment.

There's a lot of advice I could give in this situation, but I will keep it to this:

The future is important. You always have to consider what you're going to do tomorrow, and ensure that you can safely do it. Though Herron could set you up in a much bigger climate in a place close to Indy such as Chicago, I think that given your job opportunities available in Alabama, USA is the obvious choice.

I've been doing lots of computer programming lately. One of my paying projects has a tight deadline at the end of May. As if that wasn't enough, I've entered a programming contest!

The challenge for the first round is to write a multithreaded program to solve this kind of puzzle. Programs will be judged on a 40 core (80 thread) computer next week. The contestant whose program finds any correct solution in the shortest execution time wins 80 points. Everyone, including the winner, has an opportunity to pick up an additional 20 points if their program finds an optimal (fewest steps) solution. Points from each round accumulate toward the grand prize.

So here's the thing: My program can run in a mode where it usually finds an optimal solution (for a sure 20 points) or in another mode where it finds a sub-optimal solution much faster (a chance at 80 points). How should I configure it for the judging? Hint: Screw the 20 points, I'm going for the win!

I'll let you know how it goes next week. This is my first experience in competitive programming.

In other news, our featured member for May is late in returning his/her questionnaire. We may not have a featured member until June.

where did the Usama-thread go?
why was it removed?

Exactly what I was thinking. Surely its not some form of censorship?!

FLAE deleted it.

Gopher made a topic after it was taken off asking where it went and FLAE said "it went nowhere fast, so I deleted it".

Well, that's FLAE's right and it was going nowhere fast.

Finis.