Posted 9:59 PM by Eric
woah u just posted, Im on AIM if ya read this.

Posted 9:57 PM by Mark
What expansions for OFP do you have? Do you have both of the ones that are in the GOTY edition? I'm kinda broke right now, but for a good reason - I bought an Aerobird today. I didn't want to, because I thought I should get a real plane and not a toy, but the guy in the local hobby shop sold me on it when he said that the Aerobird was pretty slow and I could fly it in my backyard. And so I tried it today and I think he's right - but I'm not sure because I attempted three flights and two of them ended with me crashing into trees. It's pretty slow, but the control response was also really slow. I think the main reason I crashed was I didn't have enough control authority. The propeller took a chunk out of the wing on the first crash so I just taped it back on with some packing tape. On the second flight, I stayed up for like 30 seconds, did a u-turn, and brought it back gliding into a snowbank. On the third flight I crashed into some more trees and after that it stopped working. So I let it dry out and went to a movie and now I'm back and it's working fine again. I broke one of the control horns when I was trying to adjust them, so I've got to glue that back together somehow, probably with some Krazy glue or something. I think I'm gonna increase the throw by moving the fishing line that it pulls on to move the control surfaces to the higher hole in the horn. That should help a lot. Also, I was flying in the default mode, which is supposed to be for beginners but since I don't have that much room in my yard all it did was make me crash more easily. I'll try the plane's pro mode which increases the throw and should give me more control. Or maybe I'll just crash again, I don't know, lol. It's really fun, though. And since I have the Aerobird, I now already have a battery pack and the car charger for the Zig Zag, too. I saw two ZZs at the hobby shop, too. If you want, I can just buy one for you too and you can pay me back when we go to your house so we don't have to pay s+h. They were selling them for $80, the same price as online. And they had the car charger too for $20. They didn't have any extra battery packs, but the guy said they'd have some in next week. I wouldn't buy them yet, though, since I'm broke.

Posted 9:48 PM by Eric
I just remembered you can play LAN under the same CD-Key in OFP. So memorial day weekend we can try out LAN together, I can either install it on my dads, or you can bring ur moms laptop down. I think my dads would be better cause I could get the addons before you came, but you moms laptop would be cool cause we could put it right in the basement with my other computer, well actually maybe I can move my dads computer down on memorial day weekend. I doubt your mom wants you to download alot of stuff onto her computer, cause I bet I have over 300mb of addons. Hmm, if you plugged into my router could I just transfer the files over? I dunno much about networking, but I know dan can transfer stuff at his house, but maybe ya need special software. I guess you could always get the files at least downloaded, and then unzip and install them here, but I bet using my dads computer and my computer would be the easiest way (unless dave wants to play) Flashpoint has blood in it but it just is on the character model, not like going on walls and stuff, and I dont think theres much else, other than the ai say "Damn 2 is down") woah that would be cool, cause you, dave, and me could all fly around in a blackhawk, hey maybe my sister would play off her laptop too, lol. ya know it would be kinda fun to have a LAN party down here :D

Posted 9:20 PM by Eric
I was gonna give you some screens for a mission I'm making for Mulitplayer in OFP, but right now I just got roads down, so I decided not to.

But I finally found this one good screenshot capture program. I forgot the name, but it runs in the system tray and whenever you hit Ctrl-Alt-F12 it takes a picture of all of the screen, names the file (Screen01, Screen02...), and saves it to the desktop.

You know it would be pretty cool if you got Operation Flashpoint. Dan has it too, but when he went to his cousin's in Milwaukee he left it at the internet cafe his cousin works at. He told me he'd get it back soon though.

Hmmm, right now I can't seem to find OFP at many stores, but looks like amazon.com has OFP:Game of The Year editon for 49.95. Kinda pricy but its Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis plus the two expansions, Red Hammer and Resistance. I really don't know if its 49.95, cause I mean with the Zig Zags and all, thats a good deal of money, but OFP is a pretty cool game, I mean its your call.

I could only find it here:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00008K1YM/qid=1078630073//ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i2_xgl63/103-7391638-9439850?v=glance&s=videogames&n=507846

and if ya want theres some demos of OFP, tell me if you want the urls.

Posted 5:43 PM by Eric
I can play RoN tonight I'll be on AIM for now.

Posted 7:21 PM by Mark
That's cool that you got another snow day. We got a few inches and it was blowing around a lot in the morning, but we still had school. I'm probably gonna be on AIM for the rest of the night, so if you want to play RoN, just log on.

I think I'm gonna go for the ZZ. They are a lot more popular than the RR, so I've been able to find more information that I think is reliable on the ZZ than the RR. I guess the only thing that I'd really want on the RR is the pistol tx, but I guess it's not that big a deal and I could probably modify the ZZ to use a pistol tx if I really wanted to, but I guess it's not a big deal. Here are some more vids that I found: http://www.offshoreelectrics.com/videos.htm There are a bunch of RC boat vids, including a world record run for RC boats of some 32 cell electric boat going 120 mph. Anyway, there are a few vids of the stock ZZ, and then another vid of the ZZ going crazy fast with an 8 cell battery. It comes with and is designed for a 6 cell, but I've read threads where lots of guys say they've run it with a 7 cell and one guy said he'd tried an 8 cell and got it up to about 20-22 mph and not damaged the electronics. Actually, the guy who ran it with 8 cells said he stopped after like 10 runs and went back to the stock 6 cell just because he didn't want to fry anything, but it seemed safe to him because he said he never damaged a thing, so I figure that 7 cells must be pretty safe. So here's the DC peak charger, which will charge in a car cig lighter plug at 1.2 ah, so it would be a 40 min charge instead of the 3 hr wall charger:
http://h1070635.hobbyshopnow.com/products/description.asp?prod=HBZ1026

Here's the 6 cell packs that the manufacturer sells for the ZZ - they're 23 bucks here: http://h1070635.hobbyshopnow.com/products/description.asp?prod=HBZ1012

It's the same battery that Hobbyzone uses for their Aerobird rc planes. They also sell a 7 cell hopup pack for their planes for $26: http://h1070635.hobbyshopnow.com/products/description.asp?prod=HBZ1013

So then, here's another company, called Cheap Battery Packs, that sells their own version of the 7 cell Hobbyzone packs, but for only $17: http://www.unipros.com/cbpsite/packs.asp?cat=AIR&session_id=112240
With s+h, it's $20.65

So I figure that if we want to buy extra packs, we could buy from CBP. Cheaper *and* faster. I think I'd probably buy the ZZ, the car charger for sure; that's $106.97, including s+h from Hobbyzone's website. So already, that's like what we'd be paying anyway for just the RR and it's 2 hr wall charger. And then, I'd probably buy one of those 7 cell packs from CBP. So the total amount I would spend, including the CBP pack, would be $127.62. That's not so bad. But you wouldn't necessarily need to get another battery pack if you didn't want to.

Posted 9:23 AM by Eric
How expensive are the chargers? What about a 2nd battery, if its like 20 bucks I might get 2 batterys.

We got a snowday today, pretty cool.

Posted 11:38 PM by Mark
Hmm, now I'm starting to lean back toward the ZZ, lol. The ZZ comes with those buoys and an attachment that lets it push other boats back to shore. They both come with wall chargers, and the RR wall charger takes two hours. I assume that the ZZ wall charger is the same as the ones that come with the planes, which I know are also 2-3 hours. So that's 2 hrs for like a 5-10 min play time. But the ZZ has a car charger available for only like 15 bucks that will charge a pack in ~40 mins. More ZZ battery packs are also available for pretty cheap, and are widely known because they're the same as the Aerobird packs. I guess that's the good thing about Hobbyzone "toys," you know exactly what to buy to get more stuff for it. I'm not sure what type of battery pack the RR uses, looks like a 6 cell. We'd have to buy a separate charger if we wanted to charge the RR faster. That wouldn't be a problem for me because I'd buy one anyway for my RC plane, but it would be a lot more money for you.

Oh, and I read some guy who said he takes his ZZ to Lake Michigan a lot and it goes through the waves, not over it, lol. Sounds like fun. :D

So I guess I'm dead even right now between the ZZ and the RR.

I'm going to bed.

LOL.

Posted 11:28 PM by Mark
Hmm, I see now, both the ZZ and the RR have basically the same motor setup and I'm sure the ZZ could run over each other too - the prop is shielded from impact by the curve in the hull up front. Oh, btw I found another guy who said of the ZZ that, "Stock goes about 12- 15 Mph. Runs about 5 minutes full throttle and up to 15 limited." I'll see if I can find out the info for the RR.

Posted 11:20 PM by Mark
Hmm, I just found out about another boat, the Aquacraft Reef Racer. It's more expensive, $100. So maybe your mom wouldn't pay for all of that one, I dunno... I found a thread at rcuniverse.com and one guy said,

"I've actually run both the ZIG-ZAG and REEF RACER, they both have good range but I'd give AquaCraft the edge here. The ZIG-ZAG seemed a bit "twitchy", very aptly named. It comes with a 2-stick radio with an integrated RX/ESC.

The Reef Racer is a tad slower but handles a ton better. It comes with a pistol grip transmitter with a proper RX all made by Futaba. "

The thread is here:
http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_1514354/mpage_1/key_zig%252Czag/anchor/tm.htm#1514354#1514354

Hmm, so I'm not sure anymore. I think we should definitely get one of these two. Another guy in that thread says of both of the boats that,

"I don't think you will be able to touch any other electric boat, brand new, for under $99 dollars. And all of them will be just the boat, nor radio, servos, or ESC.

You could get lucky on e-bay and score, but anything new in the deep V, cats, or other electric go fast start around $99- $109 new. "

The other thing is that Hobbyzone, the company that makes the Zig Zags, generally is regarded by the hardcore RCers as making "toys." Like the Aerobird, that I was thinking of, isn't designed to be able to be rebuilt with other upgraded parts, whereas other companies make similar planes that allow you access to the servos and the motor so you can hop it up if you want to. Hobbyzone just tends to market their products as less hardcore, more like toys that anyone could have. And so the Reef Racer has a proper pistol grip radio, while the Zig Zag has a cheap, toyish two stick transmitter. Also, the Reef Racer comes with a 1100 mah battery, which will hold more charge than the 900 mah battery that the ZZ uses. That doesn't necessarily mean that it will run longer, since they could use different amounts of power, but since that guy said it goes slower, I would guess that it would run longer. So right now, I'm leaning towards the RR. The only thing I have against it is that supposedly it's slightly slower. I like fast stuff. And, it's also $20 more, but that probably wouldn't be an issue for you since your mom said she'd pay for a $80 ZZ so at most, you'd have to chip in $20 more for the RR. Here's the manufacturer's site for the RR:



There's a couple vids of it there too, take a look. It looks slower, but in the video they're running it on open water, which would make it look slower than the ZZ vid where it's running around in a pool. Plus, I guess it would be good to know the RR does well on open water for when we take it to Plum Lake, while the ZZ is marketed as a pool racer. And it shows them running into and over each other when they're racing, which looks cool. I wonder if it uses a different motor setup, since I doubt ZZs would do that since the ZZ's prop is in the open, down below the hull.

So right now, I guess I'm leaning towards the RR, mainly for the fact that it's not a Hobbyzone toyish type thing, and it has a pistol grip radio, which I like so much better than the two stick toy transmitters. What do you think?

Posted 10:54 PM by Mark
That's awesome that your mom will pay for an RC boat. I think I like those Zig Zags, they look pretty fun. Here's the listing for them on the manufacturer's site:
http://h1070635.hobbyshopnow.com/products/description.asp?prod=HBZ3305&tag=dpp#
Looking at the picture, it looks like there's a rudder and a prop that extends down below the hull, but it doesn't look like the prop extends out beyond the stern of the boat, so I don't think there'd be any problem with chewing up the pool lining. That page also has a video on it, in case you haven't seen it yet; it looks pretty fast in that vid. I think I'm probably gonna get one. I might wait a little though, since I can't really use it at my house. I might buy a Slow Stick RC plane first, and then get the Zig Zag just before Memorial Day.

About our computer. For the soundcard, if you choose the integrated audio option, then you get sound from a chip onboard the motherboard - in other words, you don't get a soundcard. I went with the Audigy2 because it has a really good reputation, and it is great for recording - it supports 192 bit recording, which is great for home musicians. But you could probably get by with the Sound Blaster 5.1, especially if you're just using the 2.1 speakers. I had a SB Live Value in my old one, and it's still a great card today. For MS Office, yeah we just choose the Basic package. And yeah, we did get a 19 inch CRT. Much cheaper than the flat panel Ultrasharps that my dad wanted at first, but I told him that CRTs are easier on my eyes, so we just got a bigger CRT and saved a ton of money. I'll try to find the system specs if my dad saved the email from Dell that they sent him with all the specs in it. Oh yeah, and DVD+RW drives also write cds. I just made a DVD last night for an English project that me and a few friends did. We did a popsicle stick puppet rendition of Milton's Paradise Lost and I spent all of last night and into the morning editing the video with AvidFreeDV (which is a great program, btw) and then burning it to a DVD. It was really cool, I made a menu for it and everything, and I added a deleted scene as a separate bonus material menu, hehe. So that's fun.

Anyway, do you want to meet online tomorrow night and play RoN or FS9? Post what time if you do.

Posted 3:10 PM by Eric
DVD-R drive make CD-Rs? Just wondering, cause Im looking at dells, and today they are running 200 dollars off all 8300s. Thats cool yester day it was 150. I think dell actually sometimes makes the rebate higher on the last day of the sale, thats what they did last time so Ill watch this one and see if it happens.

Hmm just checked, dell's site, yesterday a 8300 with P4 3.0, 1GB, 256MB ATI Radeon 9800 Pro, 2.1 speakers, 120 GB hard drive was 1668, today its 2175. Guess it just kinda luck getting a good deal, well right now dell only has 2-3 desktop offers going on, hope they add more.

My dad told me last night that he would think about buying me a computer before christmas, but then just not getting alot of stuff for christmas. But I think I'm gonna wait and see what Joint Operations' specs are, then I'd base what I should get for a computer off that.

Hey IGN wrote some hands on thing for JO, I got to read about half this morning but not all of it. I'm gonna go read the rest. But IGN said that if you would attack with the sun at your back it would be harder for people to see you because of the glare.

Posted 9:47 PM by Eric
Hmmm, im looking around the dells site to see what to get on a computer and was wondering whats a good soundcard if I'm just gonna use the Dell 2.1 speakers? I was thinking maybe I just need the base one, or should I go with the Soundblaster Live? or even go all the way to soundblaster Audigy 2?

Did you get XP home or pro?

And what about Microsoft office? Just the base one?

I dunno if you remeber what you got if ya do I could use it.

oh yeah did u get 19 inch CRT?

Posted 9:18 PM by Eric
Oh yeah BTW theres a nice little Joint Operations trailer here: http://www.johq.com/download-file-28.html its got some nice gamplay footage.

Posted 8:59 PM by Eric
Hey sweet, I was asking my mom if I could have some money for easter cause you and I were thinking about getting some RC boats for memorial day weekend and plum lake. So she like ya you can have one, and I told her I only needed like 40 bucks and I'd pay the rest and shes like no I'll pay. So thats pretty cool now I can go buy RS3 and JS with my money. But do you think we should get zig zags those look cool and seem pretty sweet, but I haven't done much looking around. Its pretty cool how the zig zags come with the 3 anchored buoys (or is it bouys?). Are they like dave's boat where its 2 props, or is it one prop with a rudder or a turning motor? I think I only saw one prop on the picture. The props also dont have gaurds around them but they wont do anything to the pool liner cause they are beneath the boat and not sticking out the back or anything. I'll probably only buy a zig zag if u decide to cause I bet you know alot more stuff about RC things than I do. Its pretty cool how the zig zags come with the 3 anchored buoys (or is it bouys?).

he he I got this one free flight blackhawk I bought for 30 bucks. It pretty much just has a base and u hit a button and it spins the rotors and it flys up, so it pretty much is just kinda a fancy glider, but its still pretty cool, I havent had time to actually use it though cause I got it for christmas and the snow hasnt melted yet.

Posted 3:25 PM by Eric
Hmm hard decision, cause the Zig zags look sweet but so does JS and RS3. Hey I got a few gift cards left so I can use those to get at least one game and I got like 300 dollars in cash, even though I'd probably never spend it :D. So maybe I can get some cash from my parents to buy a zig zag. I think I'll mow some people's yards this summer for some cash and I might be able to get at least half of what a 8300 costs...

He he the real duck and cover videos are hilarious, they never really talk about people dying, only that if u duck and cover youll be fine. In a certain area within ground zero dont people just vaporize? And theres nuclear fallout nobody talks about in the videos. Some guy for OFP made a Tactical nuke that was on an F-18. It was soooo hard to be able to drop it acuratly. first you had to fly by and make sure u were locked on that target then you had to climb to about 2500 ft (but from 2500 u cant see ground, just white) and then get up to at least speed of sound and drop nuke when targeting thing changes to say its close enough. I was going 500 knots at about 800 ft and I dropped it and your screen just turns white and then when it goes to normal ur dead :)

I'll try to get JS and RS3 bought before memorial day weekend and those both have co-op. Woah I just read Splinter cell PT on PS2 got delayed to 7/15! Thats like 8 days before my birthday. I heard in OPM that it was delayed because microsoft was all pissed off at it not being Xbox exclusive for the start just like SC was before.

He he just noticed that lifeline (by konami) and and MGS have subtitles just like the eachother, I mean on MGS it says Metal Gear Solid Sons Of Liberty: Tactical Stealth Action and then on Life line its says Lifeline: Voice Action Adventure. seems like konami likes to say what the games our about through subtitles. The ubi copyed MGS by putting Splinter Cell: Stealth Action Redefined. He he I like how lifeline has different menus just like MGS I like how Konami does that with some games.

Snake! its a snake! ohhh its a snake! Badgers badgers Badgers badgers Badgers badgers...

Posted 10:18 PM by Mark
Oh, and I found clips of the original Duck and Cover video. I think it was made in like 1951, I think I read somewhere.

http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/atomic/civildef/duckncvr.mov (the intro)
http://www.footage.net/real/film/cold_war_t1.rm (the actual vid)

Lol... Duck...and Cover...Duck...and Cover...
(dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum...)

:-D

Posted 10:16 PM by Mark
Badger badger badger badger badger badger badger...

LOL

Jungle Storm sounds really good. Hehe, I can't wait for Memorial Day weekend again when we go down to your house. Maybe we should both get a Zig Zag by then - that'd be really fun to play with in your pool. Hobbytron.net has them cheapest, I think. They're still expensive though, $80. Still, that's like the price of two new, cheap PS2 games. And it's something that we can have a lot of fun with at Plum Lake and stuff.

Posted 7:16 PM by Eric
I just got the April issue of Official Playstation Magazine, and in the demo they had some pretty cool games.

I tried Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Jungle Storm. Which is alot better than the old version of it cause now when u get shot not only does your screen go blurry for like 5 seconds you wheeze for the rest of the mission. Its cool cause its got voice commands and u can set waypoints for Bravo team to follow in the command interface. Also its got voice recognition but I don't know any of the commands that are in the game. The biggest difference I've noticed in the game is that you can't switch between your six guys anymore, but I think thats cool to have to play as one guy (Alpha team leader) for the entire mission, and u can still tell bravo where to go. I hope there is a voice command for bravo to cover while alpha moves up, that would be cool. Even though the graphics are great in JS the game is still really fun and its really realistic. I hope online is like in the Xbox version where you have to play single player to unlock good weapons for multiplayer. I bet it will be.

Rainbow Six 3 is looking pretty good on PS2. I mean graphics are kinda toned down compared to the Xbox one but its got split screen co-op which Xbx doesnt. Its got online too and voice recognition. sounds cool, I was just checking out the RS3 website and it said Dieter Weber was a specialist in assault, but then reading down farther they mentioned he was also a sniper. I would of emailed them if they got that wrong. Why dont they ever make a Rainbow six game based on the book? or have they? cause that would be awesome. Alot of those missions would be sweet. like the bank at Bern and Vienna. Thats all of read so far (up to like 228 something like that) but I bet missions like that would make a pretty cool game. I guess they would be kinda slow though, waiting around for a couple hours for like 1 minute of shooting. Hmmm now I can see why.

Ohhh, hard drive comes up this month too thats cool.

MGS TTS Comes out in 9 days.

Man there is alot of games I want.

I also tried that one Lifeline game Konami made. Its pretty cool actually. I guess the point of the game is your in the control room of this big space hotel thing and your using security cameras and a radio to guide this one person named Rio out of the space station. But it cool cause it uses all voice communication, so ur pretty much just letting her do stuff but you gotta tell her exactly what to do. For instance to go open a briefcase you'd be like "Go to living area" then she'd run there. "Open briefcase" "Take document" and stuff like that. Whats pretty cool is the combat system you can issue commands like "dodge" "left" "right" "Enemy1" "enemy2" "Head" "stomach" "mouth" "shoot" and "shoot,shoot shoot." So anyways Enemy1 and 2 is saying which enemy to target, Head/stomach/mouth is saying where to target and shoot/shoot, shoot ,shoot is saying to shoot once or a few times. Pretty cool idea and I'd at least give it a rental. One thing is you need a USB headset (like one in SOCOM, Sony CEA one, or Logitech one) and voice recognition sometimes sucks
ME: Run to living area.
RIO:Ok the living area.
ME: Look at the bottle.
RIO:Ok Ill go out in the hall
ME: No
RIO:What?
ME: Stop.
RIO: Ok
ME: go to living area
RIO:ok
ME: look at bottle
RIO: Ok the hall
ME: go to living area
Rio: Ok
ME: look at the wine bottle.
RIO: Ok

How was I supposed to know it was a wine bottle?!! Thats the only thing I dont like is trying to figure out what things are, cause sometimes its hard to tell what stuff is. I mean you cant just say look at the black thing on the right side of the table. You gotta keep guessing over and over. I think it says u can use dominant color of an object but somethings are hard to describe.

I played that one Firefighter FD 18 game too. Its pretty cool and its really realistic. You got an axe, fire extingusher and hose. And you have this water cannon thing too. Its a pretty cool game. Its got like backblasts and fires act pretty real.

Today BAS started off BAS week in OFP. They are releasing 1 addon every other day for a week. Deadmeat said it was they're way of giving the middle finger to everyone who was making rumors BAS was a dead mod. Today they released the HH-60 Pavehawk. Its cool I got it d/led already. other addons they are releasing this week are delta/rangers update, littlebird update, and the Russian OPFOR. BAS's site is at www.ballistic-studios.com if you wanna go check it out.

Im gonna go try out the one japenese import they have on the disc. He he I got that badger song on the internet stuck in my head...