Zelgadis

I have since been inspired to revisit some of my old favorites that I had forgotten about. Particularly some of the more obscure composers, such as Farmer, Desprez, and Marenzio. I'm listening to Chopin's Polonaise in A-flat Major now. It's funny that I never appreciated that song until I heard the version of it that Monty Python added words to. Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of England! (Puritan) Born in 1599 died in 1658... I passed a history test because of those stupid lyrics... And Musorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition is on here too. I shall have a listen. I plan to play this upon my crossing of the border into Canada. I believe it will be appropirately grandiose for the occasion. Can ANYONE listen to Wagner's Die Walkure without thinking Kill the wabbit! Also, I just realized that I have no Franz Lizst (sp?). The Elvis of his day! The man who is responsible for the steel frame piano because he would always destroy wooden frame pianos! Perhaps that would make him the Jerry Lee Lewis of his day, though I don't recall any stories of him setting fire to any of his pianos... Does anyone know any non-modern female composers? The only one I know of is Jacquet de la Guerre. (And a very nice composer for the harpsichord she was.) I sometimes wonder what would happen if some of these composers were alive today, during the movie soundtrack age. Would Mozart or Beethoven been on par with John Williams or Jerry Goldsmith? Would Giuseppe Verdi have written the soundtrack to Star Wars? Would Modeste Musorgsky have done the soundtrack to Lord of the Rings? Would they have considered that beneath them? It's a tantalizing thought. That is, for geeks like me who think about stuff like this when trying to fall asleep at night. Oh well. I'm well aware that I'm a completely hopeless geek. But it does at least give me the satisfaction of knowing that it drives my boyfriend nuts. And the fact that he stays with me despite it all is proof that he's the one! ISF

Well, I suppose I'm done recommending Japanese bands. I'm going to play only with Mallow and Ephorex from now on. Mozart is undeniably good. And perhaps part of the reason he seems generic is because he's vastly overplayed. Especially Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. However, I do enjoy Mozart's Symphony #40 very much. My favorite Beethoven symphony is #6 Pastoral Sympony. BTW, does anyone else find it odd that while Mozart was such a creative genius, he never (as far as I know) actually named any of his symphonies? Nothing is more generic than Symphony #40. ISF

Hmmm... I've no doubt that perhaps part of the reason Xbox flunked in Japan was a space problem. However, I was a teacher in Japan at the time it was introduced there, and the primary complaint about it was that there were very few games of interest to them available on it. The Xbox was built by Americans for the American market. And the kinds of games available on it are just not the kinds of games that the Japanese are generally interested in. That was what I heard most of all. Space is an issue in Japan, but it's not that critical. ISF

Date: 6/4/2005 4:27:07 PM Author: hobostank so nobody knows any singers in Japan?hmm.Sorry for posting 3 times in a row i forgot about that rule.quote> Um, did you miss my two posts on the subject? ISF

Thanks for giving it a shot. Would have been groovy if it worked. ISF

It all boils down to two things for me. 1) As long as SquareEnix maintains a near-exclusive agreement with Sony, I will have a PS3. There is no point in having a console that won't play Star Ocean, Final Fantasy, and their other wonderful games. 2) This home is a no-Microsoft zone and will stay that way. I just don't understand the point of Xbox anyway. Are there any decent games that are exclusive to Xbox besides Halo? Sony (and Nintendo to an extent) gets it right. Processor power and specs are important, but game quality trumps all. And Sony is the leader. It certainly doesn't hurt that Sony has the most intuitive controller by far either. Anyway, if power was most important, I wouldn't be playing my Atari 2600, Atari 800, NES, or SNES games anymore. That said, anyone for a game of River Raid? ISF

Date: 6/1/2005 9:31:00 PM Author: hobostank Who's a famous singer or band in Japan?Anybody know by any chance?quote> Dragon Ash, Snail Ramp, Love Psychadelico are among my favorites as I said before. Dragon Ash is quite famous and my favorite. Japanese ska and indie music is among the most interesting and bizarre. At least the CD's are cheap for those genres though. Dragon Ash CD's, on the other hand, cost $40 a pop! Hikaru Utada is massively famous in Japan and she's now trying to break into the American market. If you've played Kingdom Hearts on PS2, she sings the theme songs for it. She lived in New York City as a girl and can sing English rather well. Da Pump is sort of the Japanese version of the Backstreet Boys. It's fluff, but not too bad for what it is. I sometimes wonder if Morning Musume still exists over there... They were incredibly popular when I lived there and so phenomenally bad that I'm sure that they could induce seizures. ISF

Date: 6/1/2005 2:51:46 AM Author: MallowTheCloud Date: 6/1/2005 12:35:04 AM Author: zelgadis I enjoy both Verdi and Berlioz very much. In the latest Star Wars movie, I get the sense that John Williams might have been inspired by these two composers in creating the soundtrack. Verdi seems to come out especially in Episode I, during the fight with Darth Maul. ('Duel of the Fates' I believe it is called.) Anyway, new addtition: Any favorite conductors? I enjoy Stokowski very much. Bernstein I very much love as a conductor but can't stomach as a composer. ISFquote> Well, I do like Bernstein's Candide Overture... but I haven't really heard much more. By the way, I wasn't saying you were grouping Berlioz in with the Russian Romantics. Just saying that... Stravinsky and Mussorgsky (as well as Tchaikovsky) are Russian and Berlioz is French. Anyway... I haven't really studied much about conductors, so I can't say I have a favourite. I do have a recording of Copland conducting his Appalachian Spring. I like that recording. While we're on the subject of modern composers (Bernstein, Copland), whatd'ya think of Gershwin? As I said before, though, my all time favourite composer is Dvorak... quote> Sadly, there are a few composers that I haven't heard at all and one of them is Gershwin. Strange, but true. Also, Verdi shouldn't have fallen into my list either, as he's Italian, I believe. But I like him very much nonetheless. I've probably heard Canon in D (also ) far too many times, but I can't get enough. That one's going to be played at my wedding once we get to Canada. I've heard some Dvorak. I need to get better aquainted with him. However, I have 4 bunnies and they all huddle in the corner whenever I play my lone Dvorak CD... I guess they're not fans. ISF

Date: 5/30/2005 10:20:58 PM Author: MallowTheCloud Date: 5/30/2005 10:17:03 PM Author: zelgadis Ah, classical. Good addition! (no particular order) Verdi Berlioz Stravinsky Mussorgsky I'm a bit of a fan of the romantic period, as you can see. Beethoven is cool too. John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith are the two greatest composers of modern times. And a nice shout-out to Billie Holiday, who is (imho) the greatest singer of the 20th century. ISFquote> Ahh, Berlioz, Stravinsky, Mussorgsky... all very good. The many Russian romantic composers are all great, imho (though... Berlioz, being French, doesn't belong in that group ).quote> Well, it wasn't my intention to lump them in the group as being on equal footing. They are all Romantic-period composers. But I am in agreement that Berlioz isn't quite in the same league as the Russian composers. I like him though. I enjoy both Verdi and Berlioz very much. In the latest Star Wars movie, I get the sense that John Williams might have been inspired by these two composers in creating the soundtrack. Verdi seems to come out especially in Episode I, during the fight with Darth Maul. (Duel of the Fates I believe it is called.) Anyway, new addtition: Any favorite conductors? I enjoy Stokowski very much. Bernstein I very much love as a conductor but can't stomach as a composer. ISF

Well said. I agree totally. In the end, it all depends on what you plan on doing with your machine. Though I wouldn't buy a BMW or a Lexus to save my life. I'm an RX-8 kinda guy. Anyway, if you ever get around to seeing if you can transfer your BAT nightlighting patch to Mac, I'd love to know the results. Might be worth trying just to see if it works. ISF

Well shut my mouth and paint me red... I always accepted that as normal. I suppose it isn't. SimCity on Mac will always look that way. Nothing you can do about it. And essentially, Aspyr only cares long enough to get a rudimentary port of the game on the market. Such is the sole disadvantage of Macintosh. Almost every kind of software you could need is available on Mac, but not so much with games. Our punishment for nonconformity is crummy ports, it seems. Still, when I switched to Mac in 1998, a crummy port was often more than I could hope for. Steve Jobs tried to encourage Mac gaming a few years ago but there were no takers. You'll get used to the grids. But probably not so with the nightlighting. I hope you have good luck with that. ISF

Howdy and welcome to Mac! I was wondering what this grid problem is that you describe. I'm not quite sure I get it. Could you explain further or post a picture? Since you already have a Windows SC4 license (I assume), you might be able to fix the nightlighting problem by applying the same patch to your Mac. I'd be interested to know if that works. I do have to disagree with you on one point. SimCity 4 does belong on Mac. Just not the way Aspyr does it. Ported properly, it would have been a lot better. ISF

Ah, classical. Good addition! (no particular order) Verdi Berlioz Stravinsky Mussorgsky I'm a bit of a fan of the romantic period, as you can see. Beethoven is cool too. John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith are the two greatest composers of modern times. And a nice shout-out to Billie Holiday, who is (imho) the greatest singer of the 20th century. ISF

Let's get some Japanese bands in here. (no, not j-pop) Dragon Ash: Japanese rap-metal. Love Psychadelico: alternative Snail Ramp: Indie, and a neverending stream of totally random English words. Just. Plain. Goofy. ISF

Interesting idea. Could you explain in more detail? I've never modified a file in such a manner before, so instructions for the programming-illiterate would be very appreciated! ISF

Well, it happened. I knew it would. Fatal error. I just spent two hours reinstalling the game. I discovered that after upgrading to 10.4, SimCiy would fail while trying to obliterate a saved city. Also, the file, graphics rules.sgr, was still needed with 10.4. ISF

I'll be interested in hearing about this in case my copy of SimCity starts doing the same. The white streets aren't much of a problem, but they could be indicative of possible future issues. Also, judging from past threads where people have said they've tried to contact Aspyr, you might not get a response. Sometimes you have to call to get the desired result. ISF

A strange problem... I upgraded to 10.4 a few weeks ago and 10.4.1 a few days ago. So far, the only problem I've had is that once in awhile, my one-way streets turn white. Odd, but tolerable. Have you tried anything else, such as reinstalling? Did the copy of 10.4.1 you bought come with a free person. I know at least if you bought it at a Mac Store, it should have. They might be able to help you with combatibility issues. ISF

For a moment there, I thought it was perhaps my computer that was screwy... It shouldn't matter much where you install plugins, unless the file you download says specifically where you should put it. I usually keep the NAM in my documents plugins folder and everything else in my Applications plugins folder. Don't know why, but that's what I do... ISF

Funny that, I just had this problem yesterday. What I discovered by accident is that there are 2 region folders in the Mac version of SimCity. Make sure you create your new city in the regions folder located in the documents folder, not the one buried in the applications folder. This is the case if you installed SimCity 4 in its default location. ISF

Surprise to me that there seems to be no mention of this on the forum. I'm pretty sure this doesn't work for any other rewards, and I have no idea if it works on PC, but it certainly does for Mac. Want 2 Coca-Cola HQ's in your city? Here's how: First, download the Coca-Cola HQ from the BSC Mac archive. (duh!) And do all the usual things to install it... Second, BEFORE the Coca-Cola HQ is offered as a reward, use the all rewards cheat. (Control X and type you don't deserve it) Go to the rewards bar, select the Coca-Cola HQ, and place it in your city. Save, exit, and re-enter the city. Finally, wait for the Coca-Cola HQ to be offered as a reward. Click accept, and place it in your city. Voila, 2 Coca-Cola HQ's! Enjoy the sugar rush of double the Coke! Edit: I forgot to note that this trick doesn't work if you try it in an existing city that already meets the requirements to get the Coke building as a reward, whether you've already placed it or not. ISF

I considered that before I posted. I finally decided since I can only be sure of this working for Mac, I should post it here. However, I don't know if it was the right decision. It might not be a bad idea to re-post it in another forum for others to see, but I'm not clear on the rules for double-posting. If the moderator here could have a say, then I will do what he/she suggests. ISF

I have also noticed no performance upgrade at all in SimCity, although almost everything else runs much better. I intend to conduct an experiment by removing the file that Aspyr sent me and then putting it back to see if there is any difference. Agreed that Dashboard is pretty cool. ISF

Hi all, Now that I have Rush Hour and therefore, the route query tool, I have noticed something very strange. I have Sims that walk or drive less than two blocks to work and yet the very same buildings in which they live show a commute time of long. I even get this on commutes of less than a block away. Is this right? I have an extensive subway/expressway system in all my cities. It shouldn't take longer than 20 minutes for any Sim to go anywhere on any given city map... This is driving me crazy because perfectly good buildings are being abandoned when they shouldn't be... On a lighter note, of the MySims in one of my cities is the CEO of a subway station. Now there's something to call Mom about!