tal

I still don't think that Starfield is a bad game. I can understand some of the complaints, but it really amounts to a "does not equal some prior Bethesda games relative to their release times" for me.

One of the big ones, wanting to wander around a big outdoor overmap and just stumble into things, mostly also applied to the kinda-Fallout-like The Outer Worlds, and it didn't take nearly the Steam review beating that Starfield did

I'd call The Outer Worlds a substantially worse game, myself.

Well, to some extent.

For the "fighting on a hill" thing, they didn't implement hull-down, which would be kind of an important factor in the real world. And a lot of the drawbacks to heavy tanks, like logistics issues, didn't really apply. So in practice, just place heavy tanks on hills (since you don't have to do much to maneuver them there, set them to attack, and ignore them for most of the game until the fighting dies down. It's...not super engaging.

For the ambushes, you get to pre-position your forces, knowing pretty exactly where the enemy forces are, and both sides basically transport a substantial mass into place at one time. Kinda like teleporting two sides together into close proximity, and the computer not sending out reconnaissance units to feel out the other side, just starting a rush over open ground.

According to the brigade, this may indicate that Russian troops can no longer afford to equip some strike UAVs with whole anti-tank mines.

It might also be to increase range; the weight of the payload will cut into the UAV's range. There have been weapons in the past that have had their payload cut as a way to get increased range on an existing weapons platform.

maybe it will lock on to something along the way

Assuming that this is like a Stinger, I'm pretty sure that it did have a lock on something. That's that high-pitched sound you hear shortly before the operator fires

it plays when its infrared sensor sees something bright, something hot:

Stinger lock-on tone recording:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KSJVM9Ymck

Now, it does look like it wound up heading after something other than what the operator intended, but I believe that he had something hot in its sights at the time that he squeezed the trigger.

Man, I was watching those people standing pretty much behind some of the MANPADS guys. I'd assume that Russian MANPADS (presumably this is a Verba?) are comparable to the Stinger.

https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/44-18-1/Ch2.htm

During annual service practice firing, there should be no personnel closer to a firing point than 50 meters (164 feet). Under combat conditions, personnel within 15 meters (50 feet) of the weapon run a high risk of being injured by flying glass and debris. The team chief should be close to the gunner's side to insure that he is not endangered by the weapon's backblast. Allow at least 5 meters (16 feet) safety distance from equipment. Under combat conditions, these safety distances for personnel and equipment may not always be feasible. Damage to radio equipment may result if it is within the backblast area. Always inform the unit that you are supporting of the noise and backblast safety hazards.

Wear ear protectors, helmet, and flack jacket when firing. Personnel within 125 meters (about 400 feet) should also wear ear protectors.

I can see them without issues.

If you assume that other oil tanks might act like that and that oil tanks are likely to continue to be hit, it might be worth setting up a high-res webcam aimed at one. In all honesty, it is a pretty wild bit of video, to see something like that lazily drifting through the air.

Sony-published Playstation single-player games. Not all Playstation single-player games. Substantial difference.

The Close Combat series up through maybe Close Combat III really wasn't incredibly-well balanced. Like, if you're playing on defense, a lot of the game basically consists of having a badly-outnumbered force, setting up an ambush with as much of your force as possible, opening up all at once when the other side is badly exposed and doing as much damage as possible. Then watch the game, and maybe once things have mostly died down, one moves a few units to reinforce.

In III, retreating as far as possible without losing an operation to get a ton of reinforcements, then pushing back through, is advantageous.

A lot of the game is about sticking heavy tanks on hills with good lines of sight.

I mean, there are just ways to play the game that the AI does not deal with well.

But I still had an absolute blast playing it.

The AI for Wargame: Red Dragon is pretty disappointing, and I generally don't like playing games multiplayer, but I like the game enough that I was willing to just play against the AI. There were major improvements by Eugen in Steel Division 2

it's a far better game to play single-player. So...as a single-player game, I'd say that W:RD is a pretty bad game, but...I still really enjoyed playing it single-player.

I've always had pretty good experiences with Bethesda's 3D games on the PC, but I did play Fallout: New Vegas on both the PC and the XBox 360, and the console experience did make me appreciate some of the complaints from console players. Like, the loading times were substantially worse than on the PC, and I recall the game being obnoxiously less-stable.

Bioshock Infinite is basically the Fallout 4 of Bioshock games. If you played Fallout 4 first, you’d probably think it’s a great Fallout game. The gameplay is decent, you have roleplay choices for the story, there is lots of world building, etc… But if New Vegas is already your favorite game, you probably hated FO4 for not being enough Fallout.

I think that every Fallout game other than New Vegas and maybe 2 is like this. There are things that people like, but there are also changes that fans of prior games are really upset about.

Fallout 3 came out, and it was shifting a much-loved isometric game with fully turn-based combat into a pausable 3D shooter. Part of Fallout and Fallout 2 was that it had good world-building. I believe that "Fallout" was originally a play on words, referring not just to the radioactive fallout, but to the societal fallout. It showed a post-apocalyptic society. In Fallout 3 and on, a lot of that world-building made a lot less sense in favor of building little mini-stories.

Fallout 4 shifted from a tradition of being able to drastically affect the world to having dialog paths that almost entirely had no effect other than reputation with one's companion. Fans complained because the game felt like it was on rails. The skill system went away, which a lot of people didn't like.

Fallout 76, aside from being buggy at release even by Bethesda's standards, took a series with lots of characters to interact with and basically eliminated them until later updates brought them back in. It had a weaker plot (especially at launch). Fallout 76 had a bunch of design decisions around being a multi-player game that made it a rather weaker single-player game

in a series with an immersive world, constant reminders about multi-player events and such kind of don't fit in well. There was very limited ability to mod the game, whereas prior entries in the series had been extremely moddable.

There was also good new stuff that came with each, but if you went into the game wanting prior game in series but with just what you considered to be improvements and expansion, you were likely to hit some things that you didn't like.

checks

Apparently the sharia court gave her the maximum sentence.

https://web.archive.org/web/20180310195447/http://iranhrdc.org/english/human-rights-documents/iranian-codes/1000000351-islamic-penal-code-of-the-islamic-republic-of-iran-book-five.html#18

Article 638- Anyone in public places and roads who openly commits a harām (sinful) act, in addition to the punishment provided for the act, shall be sentenced to two months’ imprisonment or up to 74 lashes; and if they commit an act that is not punishable but violates public prudency, they shall only be sentenced to ten days to two months’ imprisonment or up to 74 lashes.

Note- Women, who appear in public places and roads without wearing an Islamic hijab, shall be sentenced to ten days to two months’ imprisonment or a fine of fifty thousand to five hundred Rials.