https://www.gog.com/#giveaway / https://www.gog.com/en/game/sunblaze
https://www.gog.com/game/cyberpunk_2077_phantom_liberty_goodies_collection
--
"May the LORD, the God of the spirits of all mankind, appoint a man over this community to go out and come in before them, one who will lead them out and bring them in, so the LORD's people will not be like sheep without a shepherd." --Numbers 27:16-17. Still winter, BUSY, & showerless(body, not weather) since hump day.
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/ /\ /\ \ Please nuke ANT if replying by e-mail.
| |o o| |
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( )

On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 01:42:37 +0000, ant@zimage.comANT (Ant) wrote:

>https://www.gog.com/#giveaway / https://www.gog.com/en/game/sunblaze
>https://www.gog.com/game/cyberpunk_2077_phantom_liberty_goodies_collection

Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?

(Well, I was gonna report the Sunblaze giveaway. GOG's 'goodies'
give-aways aren't worth mentioning ;-)

On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

>(Well, I was gonna report the Sunblaze giveaway. GOG's 'goodies'
>give-aways aren't worth mentioning ;-)
>
Well, Ant always gives superior reports. Everything that is free must be
mentioned.

He missed "air," though. And I always appreciate a good "as in beer."

--
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
<spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

>Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?

LOL!

I am sure you will think of something. :)

On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
> <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
>
> LOL!
>
> I am sure you will think of something. :)

The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P

--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.

Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 01:42:37 +0000, ant@zimage.comANT (Ant) wrote:

> >https://www.gog.com/#giveaway / https://www.gog.com/en/game/sunblaze
> >https://www.gog.com/game/cyberpunk_2077_phantom_liberty_goodies_collection

> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?

You did talk about me beating you. :)

> (Well, I was gonna report the Sunblaze giveaway. GOG's 'goodies'
> give-aways aren't worth mentioning ;-)

Well, I posted both since they were up. Throw two stones at one bird? ;)
--
"Encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness." --Hebrews 3:13. Meh Mon. with poops (4X so far since 7 AM), aches, tiredness, Reddit's striking blackouts, etc. :(
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( )

Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
> Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

> >(Well, I was gonna report the Sunblaze giveaway. GOG's 'goodies'
> >give-aways aren't worth mentioning ;-)
> >
> Well, Ant always gives superior reports. Everything that is free must be
> mentioned.

> He missed "air," though. And I always appreciate a good "as in beer."

iPad air? Better? :P
--
"Encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness." --Hebrews 3:13. Meh Mon. with poops (4X so far since 7 AM), aches, tiredness, Reddit's striking blackouts, etc. :(
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/ /\ /\ \ Please nuke ANT if replying by e-mail.
| |o o| |
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( )

Dimensional Traveler <dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:
> On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
> > On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
> > <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
> >
> > LOL!
> >
> > I am sure you will think of something. :)

> The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
> curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P

how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P
--
"Encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness." --Hebrews 3:13. Meh Mon. with poops (4X so far since 7 AM), aches, tiredness, Reddit's striking blackouts, etc. :(
Note: A fixed width font (Courier, Monospace, etc.) is required to see this signature correctly.
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/ /\ /\ \ Please nuke ANT if replying by e-mail.
| |o o| |
\ _ /
( )

On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 3:45:13 PM UTC-7, Ant wrote:
> Dimensional Traveler <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote:
> > On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
> > > On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
> > > <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > >> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
> > >
> > > LOL!
> > >
> > > I am sure you will think of something. :)
>
> > The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
> > curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P
> how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
> maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P

There's the one I made recently, but yeah, good for maybe 5 minutes.

https://sites.google.com/site/justisaursdd/rspls.

I did a little QA on one of the patches for ToEE if we're going into that.

There's of course Werner's patch for VtM:B without which the game
really is unplayable (at least when I tried to, I got game stopping bugs
that his patch fixed.)

- Justisaur

Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 3:45:13???PM UTC-7, Ant wrote:
> > Dimensional Traveler <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote:
> > > On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
> > > > On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
> > > > <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > >
> > > >> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
> > > >
> > > > LOL!
> > > >
> > > > I am sure you will think of something. :)
> >
> > > The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
> > > curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P
> > how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
> > http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
> > maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
> > http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
> > http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P

> There's the one I made recently, but yeah, good for maybe 5 minutes.

> https://sites.google.com/site/justisaursdd/rspls.

Haha. Nice! Good job! I'll share it with others like Blue. ;)

> I did a little QA on one of the patches for ToEE if we're going into that.

What's ToEE?
--
"They preached the good news in that city and won a large number of disciples. Then they returned... strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith." --Acts 14:21-22. Finally, went out far from da old nest, showered, & chicken Nuggets won a championship after 47 yrs. Another mo. MS updates day.
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( )

On 6/13/2023 6:36 PM, Ant wrote:
> Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 3:45:13???PM UTC-7, Ant wrote:
>>> Dimensional Traveler <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote:
>>>> On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
>>>>> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
>>>>> <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
>>>>>
>>>>> LOL!
>>>>>
>>>>> I am sure you will think of something. :)
>>>
>>>> The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
>>>> curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P
>>> how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
>>> maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P
>
>> There's the one I made recently, but yeah, good for maybe 5 minutes.
>
>> https://sites.google.com/site/justisaursdd/rspls.
>
> Haha. Nice! Good job! I'll share it with others like Blue. ;)
>
>
>> I did a little QA on one of the patches for ToEE if we're going into that.
>
> What's ToEE?

Temple of Elemental Evil? A D&D game from _many_ years ago that was an
early example of a COMPLETELY FUBAR buggy release. I think it was the
only game I ever returned, the clerk originally wasn't going to accept
so I asked her if she had a trash can. She pointed at it and I cocked
my arm back to throw the game into. And I would have but she finally
believed I really, REALLY did not want the POS and gave me a refund.

--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.

On Tue, 13 Jun 2023 20:31:27 -0700, Dimensional Traveler
<dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:

>On 6/13/2023 6:36 PM, Ant wrote:
>> Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 3:45:13???PM UTC-7, Ant wrote:
>>>> Dimensional Traveler <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote:
>>>>> On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
>>>>>> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
>>>>>> <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> LOL!
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I am sure you will think of something. :)
>>>>
>>>>> The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
>>>>> curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P
>>>> how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
>>>> maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P
>>
>>> There's the one I made recently, but yeah, good for maybe 5 minutes.
>>
>>> https://sites.google.com/site/justisaursdd/rspls.
>>
>> Haha. Nice! Good job! I'll share it with others like Blue. ;)
>>
>>
>>> I did a little QA on one of the patches for ToEE if we're going into that.
>>
>> What's ToEE?
>
>Temple of Elemental Evil? A D&D game from _many_ years ago that was an
>early example of a COMPLETELY FUBAR buggy release. I think it was the
>only game I ever returned, the clerk originally wasn't going to accept
>so I asked her if she had a trash can. She pointed at it and I cocked
>my arm back to throw the game into. And I would have but she finally
>believed I really, REALLY did not want the POS and gave me a refund.

I didn't think TOEE was /that/ bad (and by-and-large it got average
reviews) but it was fairly mediocre and - as mentioned - suffered from
more than its usual share of bugs.

But I think "Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor" was worse, just
because it would DELETE YOUR WINDOWS INSTALLATION if you uninstalled
it. Even though intellectually I know that bug was fixed, to this day
I refuse to install that game on anything but an emulator.

On Wed, 14 Jun 2023 08:26:26 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

>On Tue, 13 Jun 2023 20:31:27 -0700, Dimensional Traveler
><dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:
>
>>On 6/13/2023 6:36 PM, Ant wrote:
>>> Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 3:45:13???PM UTC-7, Ant wrote:
>>>>> Dimensional Traveler <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote:
>>>>>> On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
>>>>>>> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
>>>>>>> <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> LOL!
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I am sure you will think of something. :)
>>>>>
>>>>>> The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
>>>>>> curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P
>>>>> how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
>>>>> maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P
>>>
>>>> There's the one I made recently, but yeah, good for maybe 5 minutes.
>>>
>>>> https://sites.google.com/site/justisaursdd/rspls.
>>>
>>> Haha. Nice! Good job! I'll share it with others like Blue. ;)
>>>
>>>
>>>> I did a little QA on one of the patches for ToEE if we're going into that.
>>>
>>> What's ToEE?
>>
>>Temple of Elemental Evil? A D&D game from _many_ years ago that was an
>>early example of a COMPLETELY FUBAR buggy release. I think it was the
>>only game I ever returned, the clerk originally wasn't going to accept
>>so I asked her if she had a trash can. She pointed at it and I cocked
>>my arm back to throw the game into. And I would have but she finally
>>believed I really, REALLY did not want the POS and gave me a refund.
>
>I didn't think TOEE was /that/ bad (and by-and-large it got average
>reviews) but it was fairly mediocre and - as mentioned - suffered from
>more than its usual share of bugs.
>
>But I think "Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor" was worse, just
>because it would DELETE YOUR WINDOWS INSTALLATION if you uninstalled
>it. Even though intellectually I know that bug was fixed, to this day
>I refuse to install that game on anything but an emulator.
>
I would figure that you would now have a policy of never uninstalling
games. Seems more "Spallsish."

I played through ToEE entirely, after patches. Co8 mods help even more.
Never really got too many bugs. Quirks, sure. Gamebreakers/CTD/etc, no.

--
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

On 6/14/2023 5:26 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
> On Tue, 13 Jun 2023 20:31:27 -0700, Dimensional Traveler
> <dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:
>
>> On 6/13/2023 6:36 PM, Ant wrote:
>>> Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 3:45:13???PM UTC-7, Ant wrote:
>>>>> Dimensional Traveler <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote:
>>>>>> On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
>>>>>>> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
>>>>>>> <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> LOL!
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I am sure you will think of something. :)
>>>>>
>>>>>> The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
>>>>>> curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P
>>>>> how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
>>>>> maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P
>>>
>>>> There's the one I made recently, but yeah, good for maybe 5 minutes.
>>>
>>>> https://sites.google.com/site/justisaursdd/rspls.
>>>
>>> Haha. Nice! Good job! I'll share it with others like Blue. ;)
>>>
>>>
>>>> I did a little QA on one of the patches for ToEE if we're going into that.
>>>
>>> What's ToEE?
>>
>> Temple of Elemental Evil? A D&D game from _many_ years ago that was an
>> early example of a COMPLETELY FUBAR buggy release. I think it was the
>> only game I ever returned, the clerk originally wasn't going to accept
>> so I asked her if she had a trash can. She pointed at it and I cocked
>> my arm back to throw the game into. And I would have but she finally
>> believed I really, REALLY did not want the POS and gave me a refund.
>
> I didn't think TOEE was /that/ bad (and by-and-large it got average
> reviews) but it was fairly mediocre and - as mentioned - suffered from
> more than its usual share of bugs.
>
After all these years I don't remember the details but it WOULD NOT RUN
at all for me and I think it was doing unpleasant things to my system.
IIRC I wasn't the only one having that level of problems with it.

> But I think "Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor" was worse, just
> because it would DELETE YOUR WINDOWS INSTALLATION if you uninstalled
> it. Even though intellectually I know that bug was fixed, to this day
> I refuse to install that game on anything but an emulator.
>
>

--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.

On Wed, 14 Jun 2023 10:06:43 -0500, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
wrote:

>I would figure that you would now have a policy of never uninstalling
>games. Seems more "Spallsish."

Oh, no no no. I'm a big uninstaller. Intellectually, I recognize I
have terrabytes of free disk space, but in my heart I'm still
struggling with that first 40MB HDD, where I never had enough space.
As soon as I'm done with a game, it gets pulled. There are a handful
of exceptions - games like Doom, or Eurotruck Sim - but generally,
it's game done, game be gone.

>I played through ToEE entirely, after patches. Co8 mods help even more.
>Never really got too many bugs. Quirks, sure. Gamebreakers/CTD/etc, no.

I never finished the game. I've tried multiple times, but it never
really engaged me enough to keep at it. But I'm not entirely sure
that's the fault of the game itself, my general disatisfaction with
top-down CRPGs, or because how much I didn't enjoy playing the
table-top adventure upon which the computer game is based.

On Wed, 14 Jun 2023 16:25:08 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

>On Wed, 14 Jun 2023 10:06:43 -0500, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
>wrote:
>
>>I would figure that you would now have a policy of never uninstalling
>>games. Seems more "Spallsish."
>
>
>Oh, no no no. I'm a big uninstaller. Intellectually, I recognize I
>have terrabytes of free disk space, but in my heart I'm still
>struggling with that first 40MB HDD, where I never had enough space.
>As soon as I'm done with a game, it gets pulled. There are a handful
>of exceptions - games like Doom, or Eurotruck Sim - but generally,
>it's game done, game be gone.

Ha. A 40MB HDD! I remember that. I was thrilled when I got 200MB drive
with my 486DX33.

Decades later, when I put in my first 1 TB drive, it took me a while to
get used to the idea that MB were now basically KB (and GB basically MB)
according to my well-trained older standards and instincts. I would
compare a 24GB game from today to Ultima 8's, at the time ridiculous,
24MB and giggle a little. 24_G_B isn't even ridiculous at this point.
It's smallish.

I have everything sitting on a 10TB spinning rust drive. Load times don't
bother me. Sometimes, perhaps yearly, I clean stuff up. You never know
when an uninstall is going to blow away your entire C: drive like Myth
Drannor did.

But I think that may be why my game drive is the D: drive, in fact. I
never put games on the OS drive, unless they're really old and insist on
being in the "Program Files" directory to work right.

--
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 14 Jun 2023 16:25:08 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
> Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

> >On Wed, 14 Jun 2023 10:06:43 -0500, Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com>
> >wrote:
> >
> >>I would figure that you would now have a policy of never uninstalling
> >>games. Seems more "Spallsish."
> >
> >
> >Oh, no no no. I'm a big uninstaller. Intellectually, I recognize I
> >have terrabytes of free disk space, but in my heart I'm still
> >struggling with that first 40MB HDD, where I never had enough space.
> >As soon as I'm done with a game, it gets pulled. There are a handful
> >of exceptions - games like Doom, or Eurotruck Sim - but generally,
> >it's game done, game be gone.

> Ha. A 40MB HDD! I remember that. I was thrilled when I got 200MB drive
> with my 486DX33.

Ha! I had a 30 MB HDD in my IBM PS/2 model 30 286 10 Mhz PC as my first
DOS/Windows PC when I was a teen! Also, I bought Stacker software (no
hardware) to double the disk space (only got 50 MB after compressing).

> Decades later, when I put in my first 1 TB drive, it took me a while to
> get used to the idea that MB were now basically KB (and GB basically MB)
> according to my well-trained older standards and instincts. I would
> compare a 24GB game from today to Ultima 8's, at the time ridiculous,
> 24MB and giggle a little. 24_G_B isn't even ridiculous at this point.
> It's smallish.

> I have everything sitting on a 10TB spinning rust drive. Load times don't
> bother me. Sometimes, perhaps yearly, I clean stuff up. You never know
> when an uninstall is going to blow away your entire C: drive like Myth
> Drannor did.

> But I think that may be why my game drive is the D: drive, in fact. I
> never put games on the OS drive, unless they're really old and insist on
> being in the "Program Files" directory to work right.

http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/about/toys.html for my detailed history. ;)
--
"When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things." --Mark 6:34. Lite rain overnite after a somewhat slammy flag day. Still winter. American Born Chinese is OK so far after 2 eps. so far.
Note: A fixed width font (Courier, Monospace, etc.) is required to see this signature correctly.
/\___/\ Ant(Dude) @ http://aqfl.net & http://antfarm.home.dhs.org.
/ /\ /\ \ Please nuke ANT if replying by e-mail.
| |o o| |
\ _ /
( )

On Thu, 15 Jun 2023 19:02:26 +0000, ant@zimage.comANT (Ant) wrote:
>Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> On Wed, 14 Jun 2023 16:25:08 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
>> Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

>> >Oh, no no no. I'm a big uninstaller. Intellectually, I recognize I
>> >have terrabytes of free disk space, but in my heart I'm still
>> >struggling with that first 40MB HDD, where I never had enough space.
>> >As soon as I'm done with a game, it gets pulled. There are a handful
>> >of exceptions - games like Doom, or Eurotruck Sim - but generally,
>> >it's game done, game be gone.
>
>> Ha. A 40MB HDD! I remember that. I was thrilled when I got 200MB drive
>> with my 486DX33.
>
>Ha! I had a 30 MB HDD in my IBM PS/2 model 30 286 10 Mhz PC as my first
>DOS/Windows PC when I was a teen! Also, I bought Stacker software (no
>hardware) to double the disk space (only got 50 MB after compressing).

I admit. I lied with my initial description above to enhance my point.
I wasn't limited to a 40MB HDD. It was... actually I forget. It was
either 80MB or 120MB. Which, for its time, was actually fairly
capacious. But even with all that space, it wasn't too long before I
started running out of room.

This was, in part, because I kept games installed for much longer than
I do now. Installing from floppy disks was such a PITA that I wanted
to minimize the number of times I did. Nonetheless, I have very clear
memories of having to uninstall dozens of apps and games to make room
for "Ultima VII" in the Spring 1992. It was obvious even then that
80MB (or was it 120MB?) wouldn't cut it anymore.

>> Decades later, when I put in my first 1 TB drive, it took me a while to
>> get used to the idea that MB were now basically KB (and GB basically MB)
>> according to my well-trained older standards and instincts. I would
>> compare a 24GB game from today to Ultima 8's, at the time ridiculous,
>> 24MB and giggle a little. 24_G_B isn't even ridiculous at this point.
>> It's smallish.

80 to 100GB seems to be the new standard size for games. These seems
partly because many low-end PCs have such small SSDs, but also because
100GB still takes a long time to download; even at 100mbits that's
still at least 2 hours just to download. And some games are larger
than that; MS Flight Sim takes up to 180GB, and technically it's much,
much larger (I recall that there was an unofficial option where fans
made an 'offline patch' for the game that requires several petabytes
of storage ;-)

Eventually I added a second HDD (a Western Digital 5.25" drive with a
whopping 540MB!!!), and even then it wasn't too long before I started
bumping against disk space limitations again. Gone were the days when
you could fit a 100 programs onto your hard-drive; games (and apps)
were rapidly becoming larger. Wing Commander II - with all its
expansions - sucked up 50MB all by itself!

Stacker (and later Microsoft's Drivespace/Doublespace) - both of which
I used - were a temporary solution, but imperfect ones. They were
prone to corruption, slowed down your PC, and the memory requirements
were quite steep. I used Stacker to house my applications and Windows
install; the games were on their own separate and un-Stac'd partition
that didn't require me to dedicate 50KB conventional memory just to
access them. And even with that 'bonus' space, I was still always
running short.

It was around then that my fetish toward uninstalling completed games
really began to manifest. Fortunately, by then I had also acquired an
Iomega ZIP drive, which greatly eased reinstalls (I imaged most of my
floppy-based games at that time and stashed them all on a handful of
ZIP disks. Those images followed me to CD-R, then DVD-R, and finally
still lurk on some dusty corner on the network drives).

These days I have terabytes of disk-space available, but the 'lessons'
I learned back in the late 80s and 90s still haunt me, and I start
getting antsy if any of my many drives fill up to the halfway mark.
And I still uninstall games and apps as soon as I'm done with them.

>> But I think that may be why my game drive is the D: drive, in fact. I
>> never put games on the OS drive, unless they're really old and insist on
>> being in the "Program Files" directory to work right.

My games are on H:\ (fast spinning rust) and X:\ (fast SSD). And a few
more on Q:\ (slow spinning rust for the old games). Oh, and a handful
on O:\ (a slower SSD). Plus a few recalcitrant programs that insist on
being on C:\.

Over the years I've accumulated so many extra drives and
disk-partitions that I've literally run out of drive-letters (a
process that began when I first installed that 540MB Maxtor HDD
mentioned above). I've often considered simplifying things (and in
fact had that very opportunity when I got the new PC last month), but
always decided against it. I sort of like having drives A: through Z:.
I just wish we had a longer alphabet. ;-)

>http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/about/toys.html for my detailed history. ;)

Heh. I've a spreadsheet which is very similar. It lists all my
computing devices on one sheet, then the current hardware specs (and
the change-log) of each PC on the other (and other sheets listing
other hardware and - more importantly - where I've stashed them ;-).
Unfortunately, since I only started the spreadsheet in 2015, there's a
lot of missing history and I'm not entirely sure as to the accuracy of
some of the specs on the older computers. But it's the best record
I've got.

On Thu, 15 Jun 2023 16:19:08 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

TL;DR. Spalls and Zag: do not read. Or do. We ain't getting any briefer,
though.

>On Thu, 15 Jun 2023 19:02:26 +0000, ant@zimage.comANT (Ant) wrote:
>>Zaghadka <zaghadka@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>> On Wed, 14 Jun 2023 16:25:08 -0400, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,
>>> Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
>
>>> >Oh, no no no. I'm a big uninstaller. Intellectually, I recognize I
>>> >have terrabytes of free disk space, but in my heart I'm still
>>> >struggling with that first 40MB HDD, where I never had enough space.
>>> >As soon as I'm done with a game, it gets pulled. There are a handful
>>> >of exceptions - games like Doom, or Eurotruck Sim - but generally,
>>> >it's game done, game be gone.
>>
>>> Ha. A 40MB HDD! I remember that. I was thrilled when I got 200MB drive
>>> with my 486DX33.
>>
>>Ha! I had a 30 MB HDD in my IBM PS/2 model 30 286 10 Mhz PC as my first
>>DOS/Windows PC when I was a teen! Also, I bought Stacker software (no
>>hardware) to double the disk space (only got 50 MB after compressing).
>
>I admit. I lied with my initial description above to enhance my point.
>I wasn't limited to a 40MB HDD. It was... actually I forget. It was
>either 80MB or 120MB. Which, for its time, was actually fairly
>capacious. But even with all that space, it wasn't too long before I
>started running out of room.
>
>This was, in part, because I kept games installed for much longer than
>I do now. Installing from floppy disks was such a PITA that I wanted
>to minimize the number of times I did. Nonetheless, I have very clear
>memories of having to uninstall dozens of apps and games to make room
>for "Ultima VII" in the Spring 1992. It was obvious even then that
>80MB (or was it 120MB?) wouldn't cut it anymore.
>
Same. And again for Ultima VIII, which then got uninstalled pdq because
the patch hadn't dropped yet and I was aghast at how awful it was. It
went back on eventually after the jumping patch dropped. I rolled my eyes
at the speech pack though. No way I was freeing up even more space for
*that*. I have still to date never finished the game.

>>> Decades later, when I put in my first 1 TB drive, it took me a while to
>>> get used to the idea that MB were now basically KB (and GB basically MB)
>>> according to my well-trained older standards and instincts. I would
>>> compare a 24GB game from today to Ultima 8's, at the time ridiculous,
>>> 24MB and giggle a little. 24_G_B isn't even ridiculous at this point.
>>> It's smallish.
>
>80 to 100GB seems to be the new standard size for games. These seems
>partly because many low-end PCs have such small SSDs, but also because
>100GB still takes a long time to download; even at 100mbits that's
>still at least 2 hours just to download. And some games are larger
>than that; MS Flight Sim takes up to 180GB, and technically it's much,
>much larger (I recall that there was an unofficial option where fans
>made an 'offline patch' for the game that requires several petabytes
>of storage ;-)
>
Exactly. Running these games (load times) is no longer the time
bottleneck. Downloading is. Steam is throttling me at around 180Mbps in
my region, even though I can get 330Mbps if I want*.

And incremental patching on spinning rust! Hell, I'd almost rather
uninstall and reinstall for all the time that takes. It's nuts how much
time a 1GB incremental being applied to an 80GB game takes. I wish the
community had never asked for incrementals in the first place. They're
much worse than the larger patch downloads.

Luckily, all this stuff happens in the background, though I still tend to
manually activate the patch and babysit it while playing a game of
Solitaire or Minesweeper because old-school instincts.

[snip]

>It was around then that my fetish toward uninstalling completed games
>really began to manifest. Fortunately, by then I had also acquired an
>Iomega ZIP drive, which greatly eased reinstalls (I imaged most of my
>floppy-based games at that time and stashed them all on a handful of
>ZIP disks. Those images followed me to CD-R, then DVD-R, and finally
>still lurk on some dusty corner on the network drives).
>
Oh god yes. The 100MB ZIP drive was amazing. A reliable workhorse. As was
the JAZ 1GB drive later, though less so and more finicky. I maintained a
SCSI card in my machine for ages because of them**.

>These days I have terabytes of disk-space available, but the 'lessons'
>I learned back in the late 80s and 90s still haunt me, and I start
>getting antsy if any of my many drives fill up to the halfway mark.
>And I still uninstall games and apps as soon as I'm done with them.
>
I just bought a 10TB spinning rust drive. Found out they took out the
center mount holes, and my rack needs them, so I had to mount it
improperly. Maybe I'll hot glue the thing at some point.

I get nervous at ~1TB left, when free space starts to be reported in GB,
and my 6TB drive got there. Now I have 4.49TB of space that I don't know
what to do with. It's a little over half full.

>>> But I think that may be why my game drive is the D: drive, in fact. I
>>> never put games on the OS drive, unless they're really old and insist on
>>> being in the "Program Files" directory to work right.
>
>My games are on H:\ (fast spinning rust) and X:\ (fast SSD). And a few
>more on Q:\ (slow spinning rust for the old games). Oh, and a handful
>on O:\ (a slower SSD). Plus a few recalcitrant programs that insist on
>being on C:\.
>
I hate those games that need to be on C: AMcG's: Alice is one of them.
The save files don't work unless it is in the C:\Program Files (x86)
directory. Huh? Oh well, suck it up.

Frogger 2 also needs the C: drive and the first CD-ROM drive available as
well.

I've considered putting in a SATA SSD drive for convenience on the games
with longer load times. NVMe is really not necessary for games IMHO, but
I run my OS off of one. This would necessitate an H: drive. My virtual
BD-ROM is on E: (some old games require the first optical available, such
as Frogger 2), my real optical is on F: My Google drive is on G: (they
insist on a freaking drive letter these days). My external drive is on X:
Everything else in the above paragraph sounds exactly as I expected, and
I am glad you do "hospital corners" uninstalls as soon as you finish
games to keep everything tidy***. My esteem for you has doubled****.

--
Zag

No one ever said on their deathbed, 'Gee, I wish I had
spent more time alone with my computer.' ~Dan(i) Bunten

* I used to get 220Mbps from Steam, which was my max at the time

** and my MicroTek scanner

*** With an SSD, it's nice not having to defrag too. LOL

**** as has my post length apparently, I feel a competitive TL;DR spirit
when I correspond with you

Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> looked up from reading the
entrails of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs
say:

>On Tue, 13 Jun 2023 20:31:27 -0700, Dimensional Traveler
><dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:
>
>>On 6/13/2023 6:36 PM, Ant wrote:
>>> Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 3:45:13???PM UTC-7, Ant wrote:
>>>>> Dimensional Traveler <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote:
>>>>>> On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
>>>>>>> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
>>>>>>> <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> LOL!
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I am sure you will think of something. :)
>>>>>
>>>>>> The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
>>>>>> curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P
>>>>> how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
>>>>> maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P
>>>
>>>> There's the one I made recently, but yeah, good for maybe 5 minutes.
>>>
>>>> https://sites.google.com/site/justisaursdd/rspls.
>>>
>>> Haha. Nice! Good job! I'll share it with others like Blue. ;)
>>>
>>>
>>>> I did a little QA on one of the patches for ToEE if we're going into that.
>>>
>>> What's ToEE?
>>
>>Temple of Elemental Evil? A D&D game from _many_ years ago that was an
>>early example of a COMPLETELY FUBAR buggy release. I think it was the
>>only game I ever returned, the clerk originally wasn't going to accept
>>so I asked her if she had a trash can. She pointed at it and I cocked
>>my arm back to throw the game into. And I would have but she finally
>>believed I really, REALLY did not want the POS and gave me a refund.
>
>I didn't think TOEE was /that/ bad (and by-and-large it got average
>reviews) but it was fairly mediocre and - as mentioned - suffered from
>more than its usual share of bugs.
>
>But I think "Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor" was worse, just
>because it would DELETE YOUR WINDOWS INSTALLATION if you uninstalled
>it. Even though intellectually I know that bug was fixed, to this day
>I refuse to install that game on anything but an emulator.

Never mind the deletion nonsense, the gameplay was abhorrent.

Tiny screen with no zoom out, endless criss-crossing the same areas, and
glacially slow turn based combat made the game excruciating to play.

And that was with a party of one multi-classed char, god only knows how
bad it would have been with an actual party.

Xocyll
--
I don't particularly want you to FOAD, myself. You'll be more of
a cautionary example if you'll FO And Get Chronically, Incurably,
Painfully, Progressively, Expensively, Debilitatingly Ill. So
FOAGCIPPEDI. -- Mike Andrews responding to an idiot in asr

On Sat, 17 Jun 2023 08:41:44 -0400, Xocyll <Xocyll@gmx.com> wrote:

>Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> looked up from reading the
>entrails of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs
>say:
>
>>On Tue, 13 Jun 2023 20:31:27 -0700, Dimensional Traveler
>><dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:
>>
>>>On 6/13/2023 6:36 PM, Ant wrote:
>>>> Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 3:45:13???PM UTC-7, Ant wrote:
>>>>>> Dimensional Traveler <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote:
>>>>>>> On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
>>>>>>>> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
>>>>>>>> <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> LOL!
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I am sure you will think of something. :)
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
>>>>>>> curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P
>>>>>> how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
>>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
>>>>>> maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
>>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
>>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P
>>>>
>>>>> There's the one I made recently, but yeah, good for maybe 5 minutes.
>>>>
>>>>> https://sites.google.com/site/justisaursdd/rspls.
>>>>
>>>> Haha. Nice! Good job! I'll share it with others like Blue. ;)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> I did a little QA on one of the patches for ToEE if we're going into that.
>>>>
>>>> What's ToEE?
>>>
>>>Temple of Elemental Evil? A D&D game from _many_ years ago that was an
>>>early example of a COMPLETELY FUBAR buggy release. I think it was the
>>>only game I ever returned, the clerk originally wasn't going to accept
>>>so I asked her if she had a trash can. She pointed at it and I cocked
>>>my arm back to throw the game into. And I would have but she finally
>>>believed I really, REALLY did not want the POS and gave me a refund.
>>
>>I didn't think TOEE was /that/ bad (and by-and-large it got average
>>reviews) but it was fairly mediocre and - as mentioned - suffered from
>>more than its usual share of bugs.
>>
>>But I think "Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor" was worse, just
>>because it would DELETE YOUR WINDOWS INSTALLATION if you uninstalled
>>it. Even though intellectually I know that bug was fixed, to this day
>>I refuse to install that game on anything but an emulator.
>
>Never mind the deletion nonsense, the gameplay was abhorrent.
>
>Tiny screen with no zoom out, endless criss-crossing the same areas, and
>glacially slow turn based combat made the game excruciating to play.
>
>And that was with a party of one multi-classed char, god only knows how
>bad it would have been with an actual party.

I have surprisingly little memory of the actual gameplay in "Pool of
Radiance: Ruins of Myth-Drannor". I know I played it on release, and
I've made several attempts to play it in the intervening years, but I
recall almost nothing about the game.

It was a top-down party-based RPG; I remember that. It wasn't as
engaging as "Baldur's Gate"; I remember that too (although the
specifics as to why that was have escaped me). Visually, I remember
thinking that it wasn't very impressive, although less-so because of
technical reasons and more because its artistry seemed less skilled.
And it killed your Windows install if you dared remove the game from
your computer. And that's pretty much all that remains in my memory
about the game.

My overall impression was that it was a very sad follow-up to one of
the most beloved CRPGs of PC gaming, and a poor clone to Bioware's
recent opus.

But if you tried to hammer down EXACTLY why I didn't like the game?
I've nothing except the lingering distaste from my initial
playthrough.

Perhaps that's for the best.

Anyway, I'll take your word for the faults with the gameplay.

Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> looked up from reading the
entrails of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs
say:

>On Sat, 17 Jun 2023 08:41:44 -0400, Xocyll <Xocyll@gmx.com> wrote:
>
>>Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> looked up from reading the
>>entrails of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs
>>say:
>>
>>>On Tue, 13 Jun 2023 20:31:27 -0700, Dimensional Traveler
>>><dtravel@sonic.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>>On 6/13/2023 6:36 PM, Ant wrote:
>>>>> Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>> On Monday, June 12, 2023 at 3:45:13???PM UTC-7, Ant wrote:
>>>>>>> Dimensional Traveler <dtr...@sonic.net> wrote:
>>>>>>>> On 6/12/2023 11:01 AM, Mike S. wrote:
>>>>>>>>> On Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:37:20 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson
>>>>>>>>> <spallsh...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> Dammit, Ant! I was gonna report that! Now what will I talk about?
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> LOL!
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> I am sure you will think of something. :)
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> The ultimate one-up would be to write a game of his own on one of his
>>>>>>>> curbside orphans and then announce it as free to all posters of csipga. :P
>>>>>>> how about a mod like I did for DOOM 2 back in the 90s?
>>>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/doom2/j2doom/j2doom.html :P Or
>>>>>>> maybe Red Alert 1 map as shown in
>>>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.zip and
>>>>>>> http://zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/files/games/ra/us_ra.txt? :P
>>>>>
>>>>>> There's the one I made recently, but yeah, good for maybe 5 minutes.
>>>>>
>>>>>> https://sites.google.com/site/justisaursdd/rspls.
>>>>>
>>>>> Haha. Nice! Good job! I'll share it with others like Blue. ;)
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> I did a little QA on one of the patches for ToEE if we're going into that.
>>>>>
>>>>> What's ToEE?
>>>>
>>>>Temple of Elemental Evil? A D&D game from _many_ years ago that was an
>>>>early example of a COMPLETELY FUBAR buggy release. I think it was the
>>>>only game I ever returned, the clerk originally wasn't going to accept
>>>>so I asked her if she had a trash can. She pointed at it and I cocked
>>>>my arm back to throw the game into. And I would have but she finally
>>>>believed I really, REALLY did not want the POS and gave me a refund.
>>>
>>>I didn't think TOEE was /that/ bad (and by-and-large it got average
>>>reviews) but it was fairly mediocre and - as mentioned - suffered from
>>>more than its usual share of bugs.
>>>
>>>But I think "Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor" was worse, just
>>>because it would DELETE YOUR WINDOWS INSTALLATION if you uninstalled
>>>it. Even though intellectually I know that bug was fixed, to this day
>>>I refuse to install that game on anything but an emulator.
>>
>>Never mind the deletion nonsense, the gameplay was abhorrent.
>>
>>Tiny screen with no zoom out, endless criss-crossing the same areas, and
>>glacially slow turn based combat made the game excruciating to play.
>>
>>And that was with a party of one multi-classed char, god only knows how
>>bad it would have been with an actual party.
>
>
>I have surprisingly little memory of the actual gameplay in "Pool of
>Radiance: Ruins of Myth-Drannor". I know I played it on release, and
>I've made several attempts to play it in the intervening years, but I
>recall almost nothing about the game.
>
>It was a top-down party-based RPG; I remember that. It wasn't as
>engaging as "Baldur's Gate"; I remember that too (although the
>specifics as to why that was have escaped me). Visually, I remember
>thinking that it wasn't very impressive, although less-so because of
>technical reasons and more because its artistry seemed less skilled.
>And it killed your Windows install if you dared remove the game from
>your computer. And that's pretty much all that remains in my memory
>about the game.
>
>My overall impression was that it was a very sad follow-up to one of
>the most beloved CRPGs of PC gaming, and a poor clone to Bioware's
>recent opus.
>
>But if you tried to hammer down EXACTLY why I didn't like the game?
>I've nothing except the lingering distaste from my initial
>playthrough.
>
>Perhaps that's for the best.
>
>Anyway, I'll take your word for the faults with the gameplay.

The worst bit was travel.

In Baldur's Gate, you could display part of the map without your char on
it, click and your party would go to that location.
In PoR:RoMD, your character was onscreen at all times, you could not
move the map to a distant location and click to run them there, you had
to click near the edge of the screen, walk there, click again, and so
on, made travel require a lot of tiny motions instead of one long one.

This metric also meant that when you did something like open a chest
that was trapped, your party couldn't hide around a corner or something
while the thief opened the chest and maybe got hit while they didn't,
they had to be standing right beside the chest to get hit by the trap
too.

Basically the worst possible way to implement things, which is why I
never ever had any desire to reinstall it.

The uninstall thing - never worried about it since a lot of the time I
don't uninstall, I just delete the directory for the space and don't
care about some registry entries or stuff in My Documents.

Xocyll
--
I don't particularly want you to FOAD, myself. You'll be more of
a cautionary example if you'll FO And Get Chronically, Incurably,
Painfully, Progressively, Expensively, Debilitatingly Ill. So
FOAGCIPPEDI. -- Mike Andrews responding to an idiot in asr