![]() Historically the EPA had said that race cars didn't fall under the purview of the law, but changed their interpretation last year. The EPA has now resumed its assertion (belayed last year when the US Congress entertained amending the clean air act to fix this) that the Clean Air Act does not exclude production based race cars from the rules forbidding any alteration of any emissions equipment on the car. Hopefully you begin to see both the ridiculousness of such an attack, as well as the danger it represents to any enthusiast. And furthermore, while Evans Tuning is a corporation, they have personally attached Jeff Evans to the fines, meaning even if Evans Tuning goes bankrupt, he is still liable for them personally. Evans sold products, available on the market today, that _could_ be used to bypass emissions controls on vehicles. The vast majority of these penalties were not related to Evans' tuning of various vehicles, but rather because Evans sold products to end customers that could be used to bypass emissions rules. The net penalty is somewhere in excess of US$1 million. In it, Evans was told that the EPA had identified no less than 298 violations of the clean air act, and each violation was subject to a fine of several thousand dollars. They asked for a conference call with Jeff and his attorney. ![]() After Jeff met the EPA demands he did not hear from them again, until just a couple weeks ago. It had to be submitted in an EPA mandated format and it was _not_ optional. He has a very loyal and happy customer base, and was named one of the top 20 tuning shops in the country.Īfter Cobb Tuning (and other ecu/flash tool makers) were raided last year, Evans Tuning received a demand letter from the EPA giving him one month to submit all his sales and customer data from the proceeding 3 years. Jeff is a nice guy, talented and well respected in the business. In particular, they have proceeded to come back to Evans Tuning with a ruling and fines that are, well, tyrannical might be too nice a word.Īs a refresher, Evans Tuning is a mom and pop operation run by Jeff Evans (the tuner) and his wife. Well, apparently they have some confidence back, because they have resumed their assault on the automotive aftermarket. There were fears of budget cuts and many EPA employees weren't sure if they'd be employed in 3-6 months. After Trump's election, the EPA kind of went into hiding for awhile (see articles on increases of alcoholism among EPA employees - seriously). Some of you will remember the story I relayed last year about the EPA picking on small tuning businesses along with parts makers like Cobb Tuning. Most of them would prefer the aftermarket to not exist, or at least not be able to touch their engines (witness GM's attempt to classify the software in their ECUs as licensed to the owner - ala Microsoft - so that if you altered it you'd be violating their copyright). And don't expect the OEMs to help out much. I expect there to be some court battles, lots of fines, some people going out of business and more. SEMA this year will probably feel like London during the Blitz. They are going to push hard trying to shut down the aftermarket. Never forget there are a lot of enviro zealots in the EPA and they don't like cars. Included in the list I got (but not confirmed yet) were Cobb Tuning, Vivid Racing and ModBargains among others. Now I get word that yesterday they raided a number of aftermarket companies, primarily those selling flash tools. Harley paid a $12 mil fine and agreed to buy back and destroy all the tools they could (and still had in inventory). We saw the opening salvo a little while ago when they went after Harley Davidson's aftermarket product line (Screaming Eagle) for selling flash programmers for their bikes. Well, after the VW fiasco I knew it was only a matter of time before the EPA used the public uproar about VW cheating to start pushing harder against aftermarket companies.
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This privacy notice provides an overview of our commitment to privacy and describes how we collect, protect, use and share personal information collected through this site. Once you’ve customized the Story Editor view to match your specific preferences, just sit back, relax and enter in those edits that should have been included in the draft you laid out marked “final”.Pearson Education, Inc., 221 River Street, Hoboken, New Jersey 07030, (Pearson) presents this site to provide information about Adobe Press products and services that can be purchased through this site. (Just confirming that you want to hire me as a trainer and not as a designer!) If you want to take a walk down memory lane, try out some of themes shown below:Īmber monochrome, Classic System, Terminal and a custom crazy combination I picked. There are options for setting the font, the cursor and the foreground and background colors. I normally make the text big enough to see comfortably, and to open up the line spacing. These settings will only impact the Story Editor view, and will have no effect on the Layout view: To see the Story Editor options, choose InDesign > Preferences > Story Editor Display (on Windows it’s Edit > Preferences > Story Editor Display). Story Editor allows us to customize the display to make it as comfortable to read as possible. If I’m using Track Changes, it’s the only way to see what has been modified, and to accept and reject changes one at a time.In some of my layouts, it’s easier to proof the styles by name, because they look so similar in the Layout view. I can quickly see the applied styles in the list at the left.I don’t have to scroll up and down, and change pages as I enter edits into my InDesign document.I like this view for the following reasons: Any changes you make here will appear in Story Editor view. The trick here is to remember that you are simply experiencing another view of the same file. ![]() You are no longer able to see the line breaks, column breaks, or anything else you might find distracting in Layout view. You are now looking at the same story, but in Story Editor view. Pressing Cmd Y a few times (Ctrl Y on Windows) will take you back and forth between the two views.) Once you are in Story Editor view, the command will show Edit in Layout View.
![]() We believe that the company’s highly talented employees will thrive at BlueHalo, enhancing the capabilities and culture of the overall enterprise.” Henry Albers, a Vice President at Arlington Capital Partners, said “IAI has a storied history of leading groundbreaking research and operationalizing cutting-edge technology for the national security community. The entire IAI team and I are incredibly excited about this partnership and for the opportunities for innovation, accelerated growth, and product development that lie ahead of us.” Joining forces with BlueHalo provides IAI the opportunity to not only continue its tradition of innovation, but work on a much broader set of problems and challenges. Collectively we are a culture of inspired engineering seeking to solve some of the nation’s most challenging problems. Vikram Manikonda, Chief Executive Officer of IAI, shared, “From the outset, the alignment of cultures has been clear between our two businesses. We believe that IAI is a great fit for BlueHalo as one of our core capabilities as a company is utilizing our resources, whether they be laboratories, facilities, technical reach-back, systems and processes, or intellectual property to enhance and mature promising next-generation solutions into capabilities and products to address some of the most technically demanding challenges facing the national security community.” We are confident that together they will produce an even stronger generation of significant new technology,” said Doctors Leonard and Jacqueline Haynes, founders of IAI.ĭavid Wodlinger, a Partner at Arlington Capital Partners, said “We are proud to partner with the IAI management team to continue building upon the strong foundation that they have established based on deep customer intimacy, highly technical research and development capabilities, and an extensive portfolio of proprietary products. We are pleased that BlueHalo will continue to support these pillars in its acquisition of IAI.Īlso Read: 4 Key Components of a Successful Cyber Response Capability “When we began IAI 34 years ago, we knew we wanted our business to be built around the superior quality of our technical work, outstanding service to our customers, and an impeccable work environment with an excellent professional staff. “Encapsulating BlueHalo’s mission areas with IAI’s world-class multi-domain artificial intelligence/ machine learning -based technologies will accelerate and enhance BlueHalo’s trajectory while creating a repeatable, sustainable engine of innovation.” With nearly one-third of their workforce having PhDs, IAI has an incredibly deep bench of world-class scientists, developers, and engineers, and we at BlueHalo could not be more excited to partner with the IAI management team as we continue to expand our capabilities across areas critical to national security,” said Jonathan Moneymaker, Chief Executive Officer of BlueHalo. “IAI has spent the last three decades building a premier platform focused on bringing innovation to market. With more than 30 distinct product lines, BlueHalo will continue to provide its customers with leading-edge technologies across the full spectrum of national security priority areas. IAI’s impeccable track record of productizing solutions through advanced research and development programs will enhance BlueHalo’s ability to rapidly field mission-critical technologies into the hands of the warfighter. Following the Company’s recently announced expansion of its Albuquerque operations into a new state-of-the-art 200,000 square-foot facility, the acquisition of IAI reinforces BlueHalo’s commitment to innovation, adding significant depth across the Company’s existing portfolio of products and solutions. IAI has leveraged its highly credentialed employee base, including more than 75 PhDs, and a substantial intellectual property portfolio into a repeatable model of progressing research and development and prototyping initiatives into market-focused products and customer-driven solutions serving a variety of customers across the Department of Defense and commercial markets.īlueHalo is a rapidly expanding national security platform with capabilities spanning space superiority, directed energy, missile defense, command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (C4ISR), cyber, and intelligence. (“IAI”).īased in Rockville, Maryland, IAI provides advanced technology development and productized solutions in the fields of artificial intelligence/machine learning, cybersecurity, hypersonics, space, 5G, data analytics, and radio frequency/communications. BlueHalo (the “Company”), a leading provider of advanced engineering solutions and technology to the national security community, today announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Intelligent Automation, Inc. A person loses their driver’s license after being convicted of a DUI.Parents set up a swear jar in which children must surrender a quarter or dollar immediately after swearing.A dog bites an owner while playing with a toy, and the owner immediately takes away that toy.Your football coach takes away the quarterback’s chance to play in the big game after they fail a class.Examples of negative punishment can be found everywhere! More Examples of Negative Punishment The next time you did the “bad” behavior, maybe you lied to avoid punishment or were very sneaky.Įveryone has experienced some sort of negative punishment in their life, whether it’s from a parent, teacher, coach, mentor, babysitter, sibling, or even a friend. ![]() Maybe the punishment only encouraged you to do the behavior again. You did something “bad,” you were punished, and you never did it again.īut I’m sure that other situations didn’t turn out that way. Swear jars, chore lists, and being “grounded” are all ways that a child may be punished by their parents.ĭid it work? That answer is probably more complicated than just “yes” or “no.” I’m sure you can think of a situation where punishment was effective the first time. Maybe you had to do extra chores or give away some of your allowance money. What happened when you were a child and you did something wrong? Often, I can bet you were punished. While negative punishments are not the only form of punishment, they are crucial to shaping the theory of operant conditioning and understanding the ways that people voluntarily choose to exhibit or curb certain behaviors. Operant conditioning is a way of learning behaviors through a series of punishments and reinforcements. His experiments introduced the world to operant conditioning. This American psychologist attempted to find ways that people could encourage voluntary behaviors or curb voluntary behaviors that were undesirable. So while classical conditioning showed how stimuli could be paired with involuntary behavior, there was still a long way to go before we could look at the voluntary behaviors of dogs, cats, or humans.Ībout three decades later, BF Skinner came along. Pavlov wasn’t training dogs to want to drool or ring a bell. These experiments introduced the idea of classical conditioning to the world.īut a bell is far from punishment, and the drooling induced by the bell’s ring was not voluntary. After a while, the dogs would drool at the sound of the bell. Pavlov would ring a bell every time the dogs were presented with drool-inducing food. Russian psychologist Ivan Pavlov changed the world of psychology with his famous dog experiments. Did they learn through observation? Mimicking? Or are certain behaviors simply part of our nature? In the early 1900s, behavioral psychologists were observing how people learned new things. This sounds like an obvious concept, but it wasn’t always that way. Nothing is added during negative punishment – things are only taken away. Giving someone a slap on the wrist, making them write on a chalkboard, or telling them to do 20 push-ups are all examples of positive punishment. Positive punishment occurs when a stimulus is added after a behavior is performed. ![]() Let’s contrast this with “ positive punishment.” Yup, that’s another term in behavioral psychology. ![]() The child drew on the wall (the behavior,) so you responded by removing the use of the iPad (the stimulus.) Negative punishments occur when a stimulus is removed after the behavior is performed. The term “negative punishment” has less to do with the negative feelings of being punished, and more with the stimuli that are altered after the unwanted behavior. The next time your child draws on the wall, you immediately take away the use of their iPad for the rest of the day. Let’s say your child has a habit of drawing on the walls. We’ll start by defining exactly what negative punishment is. For example, if your child is making a mess of their toys, you can take a toy away to incentivize them to pick them up next time. Negative Punishment is the act of removing a stimulus to remove a certain behavior. Can You Use Negative Punishment On Yourself? What is Negative Punishment? ![]() It was able to effortlessly blend the ice and whole strawberries in our smoothie into a creamy drinkable consistency. ![]() It quickly became our go-to for smoothies: fairly quiet, powerful and easy to use. We were impressed with the quality of this KitchenAid immersion blender - one of the more affordable ones we tested. This model also includes a food processor and whisk attachment, and all attachments are dishwasher safe. We like that it can also accommodate the chopper attachment so that you can take advantage of the blending cup's handle. The jar's lid doubles as an anti-slip mat to place under the jar while blending. In our test, we found that the jar was too large for a small-batch mayonnaise but that the blender itself made a beautiful mayo in a smaller vessel. This pick came with the largest lidded mixing jar we tested (42 ounces), which is helpful for larger batches but does require more maneuvering for smaller servings. The blender attachment clips onto the motor with ease and feels secure. ![]() The nonstick edge on the blender arm means you can blend in your pots without fear of scratching. The rubber handle is soft, narrow and comfortable to grip and the “on” button is easy to hold down. It requires more up-and-down motion to blend uniformly, but we still found it easy to operate. Some models create a vortex that pulls food into the blades and results in suction on the bottom of the container, but the Breville’s blade guard is uniquely shaped to reduce this, which allows you to raise the tool more easily as you blend and helps prevent splatters. This immersion blender offers 15 speed settings and has a lot of great features that make it our top pick. We also considered the weight, power and settings of each model to find the best options. To test each immersion blender, we blended a smoothie, pureed a soup and made a mayonnaise. The pros in the Good Housekeeping Institute Kitchen Appliances and Technology Lab tested 13 models in our most recent test to find those that are easy to assemble, comfortable to operate and delivered on performance. No matter the type, the best models can handle big jobs like blending smoothies and pureeing soups directly in the pot and smaller jobs like making mayo or salad dressing. Others are designed with a motor that can be attached to the blender arm as well as other tools like a whisk, mini food processor or beaters like those on a hand mixer. Some are constructed as a single piece - the motor cannot be removed from the blender arm that houses the blades. Immersion blenders - also called hand blenders, stick blenders or wand mixers - give you the freedom to blend and puree foods without needing to transfer them to a full-size blender. We updated this story in February 2022 to ensure all products tested and vetted by the Good Housekeeping Institute Kitchen Appliances and Innovation Lab are in stock and reflect current pricing. įor example, C:\Users\myuser\project_files>django-admin startproject MyFirstDjangoProjĬ:\Users\myuser\project_files>cd MyFirstDjangoProj To start a Django project, go to the folder where you want to start the project and use the below command: django-admin startproject. Now install Django using pip install Django. To deactivate the virtual environment, you can just type the command deactivate. Mac OS / Linux source MyProjectEnvt/bin/activate Mac OS / Linux: pip install virtualenvwrapper Windows: pip install virtualenvwrapper-win Use pip/pip3 depending on your Python version: If you wish to install Django in a specific environment instead of the whole system, you can create a virtual environment. If you have Python on your machine, you can install Django using pip. To get the integration working, you should have a Django and MongoDB setup. Which approach to connect to Django MongoDB is better? Let us explore this in the following sections. Without changing the Django ORM, Djongo transpiles all the SQL queries to MongoDB syntax queries. Djongo: If you are using a relational database like SQL and want to migrate to MongoDB, for that you can use Djongo.MongoEngine has a declarative API that is easy to learn and use. It’s similar to Object-Relational-Mapper in relational databases. MongoEngine: MongoEngine is a Python Object-Document-Mapper.Since PyMongo is available with PyPI, you can quickly install it using a pip command. PyMongo provides functionality to perform all the database actions like search, delete, update, and insert. It is the official and preferred way of using MongoDB with Python. PyMongo: PyMongo is the standard driver through which MongoDB can interact with Django.There are three ways to connect Django to MongoDB: You can easily deploy, operate, and scale MongoDB with Atlas. This is where MongoDB Atlas's ability to support limitless clusters can help. If you are going to work with big data, you will need to use a cloud-based service. Atlas is perfect to store big volumes of structured and unstructured data. Atlas provides security, scalability, and zero downtime patches and upgrades. High availability, indexing, and non-reliance on complex joins are some other benefits of using MongoDB. Whereas the default primary key in MongoDB is the _id field, we can insert the record without the medicine_id. In SQL, if we forget to provide a medicine_id, the record will fail as it is the primary key (not null). In MongoDB, if the collection doesn’t exist, it is created on the fly. Note that we inserted a record while creating the collection. Here's a side-by-side comparison showing the insertion of a medicine into a pharmacy database in SQL and MongoDB: MongoDB is a flexible, schema-less, JSON-style, document-based database. ![]() The double butted tubeset saves weight whilst also ensuring that steering is very precise. With its elaborate attention to detail, the Curve Pro's aluminium frame is one of the best quality frames in its class. For women there's even a trapeze frame version. The high quality frame and suspension fork are both built to withstand hard use, so the Curve Pro is equally at home on rough forest trails, long road rides and racking up gravity points in the hills. It's the perfect bike for weekend and fitness cyclists - and, of course, for anyone who wants to rediscover cycling. See product terms for more details.The Curve Pro is proof that a reliable and robust Country Lite Series bike can also be fun to ride - and the hydraulic disc brakes are a real highlight. Use may affect your credit score or make credit less accessible or more expensive for you. Pay in 3 is a form of credit, may not be suitable for everyone. Pay in 3 eligibility is subject to status and approval. PayPal Pay in 3: PayPal Pay in 3 is not regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Credit subject to status, UK residents only, Performance Cycling Limited acts as a broker and offers finance from a restricted range of finance providers. PayPal Credit: Terms and conditions apply. ![]() 22-24 Boulevard Royal L-2449, Luxembourg. PayPal Credit and PayPal Pay in 3 are trading names of PayPal (Europe) S.à r.l. (variable), Assumed credit limit £1,200.00. † Full Representative Example: Representative 21.9% APR (variable), Purchase interest rate 21.9% p.a. Société en Commandite par Actions Registered Office: 22-24 Boulevard Royal L-2449, Luxembourg. PayPal Credit is trading name of PayPal (Europe) S.à r.l. Performance Cycling Limited acts as a broker and offers credit from PayPal Credit. We are a credit broker not a lender – credit is subject to status and affordability and is provided by Mitsubishi HC Capital UK PLC. Performance Cycling Limited FRN: 03398601 trading as Tredz are authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Finance is subject to application, financial circumstances and borrowing history. Total amount payable will be £5.233.68 with a cost of credit of £978.16. Fixed with £0 deposit you would pay £145.38 per month. † Novuna Personal Finance Representative Example: If total purchase price is £4,255.52 and your selected term is 36 months 14.9% APR Representative, Annual Interest Rate 14.9% p.a. Occasionally, without notice, manufacturers change product design and/or specifications. Tyres: Schwalbe Smart Sam, Active, 44圆22 Front Schwalbe Smart Sam, Active, 44圆22 Rear Rims: Rims: CUBE SX24 front hub: CUBE K68R rear hub: CUBE K68F Rear Mech: Shimano Acera RD-M360, 8-SpeedĬhainset: Shimano Altus FC-M311, 48x36x26T, 175mm, Chainguardįront Brake: Tektro HD-M290, Hydr. Shifters: Shimano Altus SL-M310, Rapidfire-Plus, 8-Speedįront Mech: Shimano Altus FD-M191, Topswing, 31.8mm Cube Curve Pro hybrid sports bike available on 0% APR Financeįrame: Aluminium Superlite Trekking Cross Double Butted. ![]()
What are your thoughts on the 2023 WWE Draft and the new rosters? Which Superstars are you excited to see on their new brand, and which moves surprised you the most? Leave us a comment. 1, the annual trade deadline, is rapidly approaching. ![]() For now, check out our results and grades from Raw on Monday night. WWE WWE Superstar Shake-Up 2019 Results: Updated Roster List and Most Stunning Picks The Doctor Chris Mueller ApNaomi and AJ Styles moved to Raw while Roman Reigns and Bayley. 15 hours ago &0183 &32 The biggest transactional shake-up date of MLBs regular-season calendar is a mere 41 days away. We will be providing any late breaking changes heading into the event. WWE Superstar Shakeup 2018: 42 Wrestlers Youll Now Only See on SmackDown Live (Photos) SmackDown WWE Superstar Shakeup 2018: 54 Wrestlers Youll Now Only. CBS Sports will be back with you Tuesday updating the full list of Superstar Shakeup changes throughout the entire show. 10 hours ago &0183 &32 Its fair to question if the Celtics have other plans to shake up the roster as well, with players like Al Horford and Robert Williams III still available on the block. The remaining picks from night one of the 2023 WWE Draft were as follows:Īs always, fans can keep checking back with Ringside News as the draft is expect to continue on to Monday’s episode of RAW. The draft continued to surprise fans, with some surprising names from NXT called up and Roman Reigns as part of the top pick for the entire company. While WWE was not able to pick everyone during the SmackDown show on FOX, they made their remaining picks on the SmackDown LowDown. An element's placement on the periodic table indicates whether its chemical charge is. Chloride is an important component in ion balance in blood. Common anions are listed in the table below: Uses for Anions Fluoride ion is widely used in water supplies to help prevent tooth decay. A chemical charge can be found by using the periodic table. As is the case with cations, the charge on the anion is indicated by a superscript following the symbol. Elements in the same group form ions with the same charge. Charge density is equal to charge/volume. These elements define the electromagnetic contact between the two elements. The charge of many ions can be worked out using patterns in the periodic table. Silberberg defines it as follows: The ratio of an ion’s charge to its volume. This is a property of specific subatomic atoms. Lund (Anoka-Ramsey Community College), Melissa Alviar-Agnew, and Henry Agnew. The charge number in chemistry normally relates to an electric charge. This page is shared under a CK-12 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Lance S. Oxygen typically has a charge of -2, silicon of +4, and aluminum of +3.\): The Modern and Common System of Cation Names Element The three most abundant elements in the Earth’s crust (oxygen, silicon, and aluminum) are on the right side of the Periodic Table, in groups 13, 14, and 16. The rest of the transition metals exist in a number of ionic states, typically +2 or +3. Indulge your curiosity with our complete periodic table of elements with masses, charges, chemical types, and everything else you can think of Our mobile app. When ionized, elements in groups 3, 4, and 5 commonly have valences of +3, +4, and +5, respectively. Ionization of the transition metals in the central portion of the table (groups 3 through 12) is less predictable than ionization of elements near the table’s sides. Silicon and germanium are semimetals (metalloids), existing in compounds with either +4 or -4 charges. Elements in Group 13, Group 14, and Group 15 typically ionized to form cations with charge of +3, +4, and +5, respectively, although other valences are possible. Looking at the table, one can see that the positive charges are on the left side of the table and the negative charges are on the right side of the table. An element's placement on the periodic table indicates whether its chemical charge is negative or positive. This video discusses how to figure out charges of ions based on their position on the periodic table. A chemical charge can be found by using the periodic table. We can know the charge of an element from the periodic table by seeing its tendency to either attract or lose an electron. Metals lose electrons to form positively charged ions and nonmetallic elements gain electrons to form negatively charged ions. Oxygen and other elements in Group 16 typically form divalent anions (-2). Explanation: Atoms gain or lose valence electrons to become more stable. So, they typically become monovalent anions (charge of -1) because they acquire an extra electron to fill the shell. Elements in group 17 ( halogens) are lacking a single electron to fill their outer shells completely. ![]() Elements in Groups 16 and 17 have room for a small number of additional electrons in their outer shells and consequently accept extra electrons to become anions. Variation Of Oxidation State Along a Period While moving left to right across a period, the number of valence electrons of elements increases and varies between 1 to 8. On the other side of the chart, helium and other elements in Group 18 of the Periodic Table have completely filled outer shells and, consequently, do not ionize. ![]() Those in group 2 ( alkaline earth elements) usually have an ionic charge of +2. Elements in group 1 ( alkali elements) generally have an ionic charge of +1. Elements in groups on the left side of the table have “extra” electrons in outer shells, and readily give up those electrons to become cations. ![]() The red numbers below the columns are typical ionic charges. But, when they do, for most elements, their likely ionic form is predictable as shown. This table is not to suggest that all the elements always form ions. Common cations are shaded blue and common anions are shaded red. For example, iron(II) has a 2+ charge iron(III) a 3+ charge. The chart seen here shows the most common ions for different columns in the Periodic Table. Roman numeral notation indicates charge of ion when element commonly forms more than one ion. ![]() The following six months brought us a maelstrom of doctors, surgeons, fear, grief and life-changing consequences. It’s no wonder that the gaming industry has eclipsed Hollywood.Įight years ago, my wife was diagnosed with intramedullary astrocytoma tumors in her spinal cord. So many hours of gameplay, story, music and emotion. While a feature length film my last 140 minutes, it is not uncommon for a player to be engaged with a video game for dozens of hours over the course of weeks. You often take the role of a character in the story and have some amount of control over how the story plays out. As someone who once aspired to becoming a visual story-teller, I recognize that video games have the potential to envelop the player in their narratives – more so than film. But by today’s standards, I am a casual gamer, which means if I’m gaming, it’s usually in brief stints… while on the john. Rote characters and enemies do little to hold back the bursting personality of the game, and this one is well worth picking up and giving a go.I do not consider myself a “gamer.” Twenty five years ago I played Nintendo with my friends, had a subscription to Nintendo Power, and was caught up in the Nintendo vs. The narrator spurns you toward the end of the game, desperate to learn all you can about the universe within. Disappointing Bastion is an ambitious title that is rife with deep customization to the style of play within a well realized world. While one or two of the bosses were interesting, mostly they were just larger versions of other enemies that completely failed to leave an impact. The designs would differ, but often your tactics wouldn't. Outside the narrator, the characters have very little personality, and little to offer of interest Mixed: - While there were a variety of enemies, they often felt a bit samey. In a title dripping with personality, it's a shame that the music didn't match up - The isometric 2D view can sometimes make finding your way difficult, leading to dropping off the maps edge accidentally - Blank slate characters while the world is deep and imaginative, the characters are far less so. Blocking and rolling add some depth, but not enough - The music doesn't strike home the way you want it to. I've never before manipulated difficulty in such a customizable way that really adds to the world view - The equippable spirits (passive skills) and weapon upgrades add even more layers of customization to the experience Cons: - Combat feels basic, with only one attack per equipped weapon and a special skill. The shrines (difficulty settings) range from stronger enemy attacks to each enemy dropping bombs on death. ![]() You choose what to make harder, with the reward of extra fragments (money) and experience. Good variety of weapons, each one unique of the others - The difficulty system is ingenious. The way the world floats and drops into place is smooth and lends a great deal to the world view. The story here is basically the story of this world, and it's well worth diving into - Excellent art style the painted visuals of the isometric world are vivid and eye catching. He doesn't just dish the story, but reacts to and comments on your actions - Fully fleshed out world. Constantly cool, calm and collected, you hang on his every word. This game wouldn't be half of what it is without him. The Bastion is a unique and creative action RPG with an engaging story and perhaps the best storyteller in gaming history. ![]() … Expandīastion is a unique and creative action RPG with an engaging story and perhaps the best storyteller in gaming history. I don't think the game has a ton of replay value, but it's a decent game for a bargain basement price. In the shrine building, you can make monsters have more health or do more damage and a whole bunch of other things, and in exchange you get more experience and more money for your added trouble. Another interesting thing they did was allow you to change the difficulty on a piece by piece basis. I never thought it was out of place or annoying. One of those is the narration, which is pervasive throughout the game. The game itself has a fairly standard action RPG format, but is surprisingly polished, and adds a couple of things that you won't see in other games. It's a low budget Indie game, so I actually added a point to account for the value of the game compared to the price. It's a low budget Indie game, so I actually added a point to account for the value of This is one of the best recent games at a bargain price. This is one of the best recent games at a bargain price. |
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