Have a Wii already, just want to banish it back to the kids playroom and replace with an XBox in the lounge – just need some family orientated facade to mask my blatant boy toy purchase.

In which case, if you’ve got the money, do it! :P

The space requirements are:

For a single player game you need to be 6ft away from the Kinect, and have 2ft on either side of the player

For a two player game you need to be 8ft away from the Kinect, and again have plenty of room between the players

These numbers will increase if you’re above average height – it tends to struggle with people who are over 6ft. If you’re 6ft 7, it’ll struggle to recognise you as human. :P It can be a bit finicky about lighting/clothing still, but most games have been designed to take into account the slight lag and occassional loss of detection.

The games vary in quality, but Dance Central, Kinectimals, Kinect Adventures and Kinect Sports are the current best of the lot. Dance Central has multiplayer, but it’s turn based, hence lessening the crazy space requirements. Kinectimals is obscenely cute.

Like the Wii it’s mostly mini-game compendiums and fitness titles, but unlike the Wii you’ve also got a huge selection of traditional FPSs, 3rd person shooters, racing games etc.

There’s a Hungarian guy at our place called Zoltan – bloody great name!

Many, many years ago, my dad got my mom an epilator for Xmas. She hated it, and was fairly cross at my dad (I think she’d asked for a razor rather than an epilator). She described it as ‘excruiating’. It was the 80s mind, technology might have come along a bit.

I’ve tried standing next to microwaves for 20 years,and I’ve yet to develop super powers. YOU LIED TO ME, STAN LEE. I WILL NOT FORGET THIS.

Anyways emsz, I find that offensive, it’s hard enough that all men think we can’t be orgnasied and that we run our lives and handbags in a confused muddle?

We can be organised. Our lives can be organised. But for those that have handbags, those handbags cannot be organised. It’s the rules.

Oh, don’t get me wrong, handbags will be meticulously organised for a week or two after purchase. This time will be different, we tell ourselves. Within the month we’re scrabbling around trying to find our wallet which is drowning in a mass of random makeup items, mobile phones, a comb and small rainforest’s worth of receipts and a random flyer that was randomly shoved at us last time we walked down the high street.

Oh hai!

I know the mods get a bit of stick for toning stuff down when it gets out of hand, but I think it’s a better place for it. Sometimes I find other forums end up a bit like the letters page of Nuts. Assuming Nuts readers can write, that is.

I’m always a bit sceptical of the claims that having kids to get houses is a widespread problem. There were 9 girls in my year who got pregnant between the ages of 13 and 16, and none of them did it to get a house, or away from their parents.

One got pregnant at 15 deliberately to stop her 26 year old boyfriend from leaving her. She’s now 30 and has 5 kids by different dads. She works full time though, and still lives with her parents.

One got pregnant at 14 because her boyfriend (same age) told her that he was sterile, so they didn’t need to use contraception. She had an abortion.

All the others got up the duff because they didn’t think it would happen to them, as if being sub-16 was a magic defence against pregnancy. None did it as a career choice.

Actually R4 cards have been illegal in the UK since July.

My friend’s mother had a Westie for about 5 years – he was a foul tempered, yappy little thing. She had to move to a rented property that didn’t allow pets, so he was rehomed with a friend’s family. The dog became a different creature, even-tempered, obedient and quiet. I think it was because both my friend’s mother and her partner worked, so the dog spent long periods alone in the house, and would go bonkers when people were about. When he was rehomed he went to a retired couple who could spend more time with him, and he’s really a lot happier now.

It’s sad, but sometimes some dogs just don’t suit particular environments, and if they or the situation can’t change, they’d be a lot happier rehomed. I hope Bingo finds a home that suits him.

For the 360:

Gears of War 2
Bayonetta
Castle Crashers
Borderlands
Super Street Fighter IV

Have you tried CGI or Photoshop?

360 + Kinect?

Aye, it’s considerably more expensive than the Wii, but you’ll have a lot more choice in terms of games, but still have a load of motion controlled fitness/sports titles (Biggest Loser and Dance Central is good if you like that sort of thing), along with cutesy molest-the-tiger stuff like Kinectimals. Main practical things to consider are:

1) You need a big living room – you need to stand 6ft away from the Kinect in single player, 8ft in two player

2) It has real trouble accurately tracking someone who’s over 6ft tall

Not sure which console you have it on? You can buy the other Guitar Hero games for the same console which will be compatible, and I think that Rock Band which tends to be less metal focused than Guitar Hero (boooo!)is also compatible with the Guitar Hero instruments. You can also buy songs/song packs off Xbox Live/PSN (not sure about the Wii).

I normally pay £38 – £46 every two or three months. But I did go from the ages of 13 – 24 without having a haircut, so it probably balances out…

Any charity that can afford to pay chuggers to harass people for their direct debit details gets an automatic ignore from me, I’m afraid. I don’t have a problem with charities, I don’t have a problem with fundraising, it’s just the way they go about it…

theres a whole section (the same size as crime) in wh smiths entitled

TRAGIC LIFE STORIES

I always find that section a bit creepy – it’s the way all of the books seem to have a generic cover – a white background with a black and white photo (normally of a child) on the front, and the title in a handwritten-style font in a bold colour.

Magritte!

A man walks into a pub with a cat and an ostrich. They find a table, and the ostrich walks up to the bar and orders a round of drinks – lager for the man, rum and coke for the cat, and a glass of wine for the ostrich. The ostrich goes back to the table with the drinks, and the three sit there chatting. After they’ve finished their drinks, the man goes up to the bar, orders another round, then goes back to the table.

The barman watches the strange party for the entire evening – the man and the ostrich take it in turns getting the drinks in, with the cat occasionally shrugging. Eventually, as the man orders the last round, the barman has to ask, “Mate, what’s going on? Why do you have a cat and an ostrich, and why does the cat never get a round in?”

The man sighs mournfully and says, “I found a genie, and he told me I could have one wish. I wished for a long legged bird with a tight pussy.”

Sweet merciful Zeus roper, where do you live?!

I like the online element, but a few years ago that was just an add on to keep you ammused once the game was completed. Now the ballance is the other way?

The problem is that for a lot of FPSs, a huge percentage of the target audience are buying only for the online multiplayer, so that mode tends to get the most attention – making sure that the maps and weapons are balanced, making sure that there’s all the obligatory modes (deathmatch, team deathmatch, capture the flag, etc).

The single player mode only needs to hit the publisher’s magic number: 8 hours. Lengthy single player FPS campaigns tend to get abandoned by a lot of players, keep it short and the player can complete it easily – normally they try and encourage replayability by having the collectibles, achievements and additional difficulty levels.

Biking 1
Biking 2
Biking 3
Lady Metal
Pomposity
Mom’s in the car

I’m waiting for my level to deploy so I can check some camera re-positioning.

Thanks for the information all! We’re really hoping it all goes ahead – we’re sick of living in an (expensive) off-road biking void, and Mr Toast misses the sea!

Before I was born, I had a brother that died when he was 16 days old. It had been a normal pregnancy, but they realised when he was born that his heart was effectively back to front. 32 years ago there wasn’t a huge amount they could do about it, so he slipped away. With my older brother asking where the baby was and my dad burying himself with work, my mother bottled her grief, tried to put on a brave face, and carried on as normal, and had me two years later. Two years after that, she had a psychotic breakdown from which she never fully recovered.

If people need/want to talk about it, then let them talk. Also, I think in a way it is particularly hard for fathers – they’re expected to be ‘strong’ for the mother, pretty much everyone’s attention is focused on the mother, and sometimes the father’s treated a bit like a spare part. Some might say that a mountain biking forum isn’t the best place, but if not here, where? Sometimes it’s easier to talk to strangers about it rather than friends or family.

i once had a cooked breakfast in Dundee that had 7 types of sausage/pork product in the plate..

OK, I’m sold.

Horrendous place with virtually no redeeming features.

It’s not Leamington Spa. This in itself is a redeeming feature.

The R4 is now illegal to sell and buy in the UK, DSi is a good console but would wait as the 3DS is due before christmas in the UK and DSi prices will drop like a stone before christmas.

The 3DS is coming out in Japan in February and in the UK in March. It’s quite a leap up from the current DS in terms of graphics and power (and obviously has the 3d functionality), but it’s still going to backwards compatible with the original DS/DSi games (much as the original DS was backwards compatible with the GBA).

My friend’s dad came out when she was 21, came as quite a surprise to the whole family, including her mother. Some people try and hide it for years.

no no no, bacon butties need mayo & brown sauce

Mayo is the work of the devil and needs to be sent to the same hell where marmite belongs!

I have to fill the car up to an round number. Sometimes I’ve ended up putting in far more than intended because I’ve gone over by 1 or 2p, and had to carry on!

I also scratch my left eyebrow when stressed, to the point where there’s a noticable gap. A bit like a distressed budgie plucking its own feathers.

+1 for Team Fortress 2. THE PYRO IS A SPY!

I’ve got an Intuos, just popped on the drivers and away I went.

Terrible news – condolences to his family and friends.

Since posting this I have looked at the price and now I am considering something cheaper. Can you still get something like the old donkey kong games that just play one game and take AA batteries?

If you go to Game or Gamestation, you’ll be able to pick up a second hand DS quite cheaply. The next generation one is out in March (the 3DS), so the prices are coming down quite a bit.

Seriously, you’ve got to love a forum that has a sub-section entitled, “Am I being unreasonable?”

And if Mumsnet scares you, I really, really recommend you stay away from any wedding/bridal forums.

It’s basically like STW, but mostly women! :P

I’m a teeth grinder, got ridges on the insides of my mouth, inverted canine on the right hand side, and now have to wear a bite guard at night! I also sometimes get chest pain, which is quite exciting.

Woman’s frames: are they a good thing, or is using a short-reach stem about as good?

Depends on the frame and depends on the woman! I’m only 5ft 2, but I don’t get on with a lot of women-specific bikes because the top tubes tend to be far too short for me. Conversely, a lot of bloke’s bikes, even in small or extra small, can be lacking in the standover department. It took a lot of demo rides for me to find something suitable.

If you want to be sneaky but still get a good idea of what she wants/needs, I’d recommend going on lots of trips to places with bike hire and seeing which bikes she gets on with.

Saddle recommendations?

Again, really down to personal preference. Very personal preference!

Anything else I need to be aware of as I spec / source components for the bike I’ll be building?

If she’s got small hands, remember to consider narrower grips and to make sure the brake levers aren’t half a mile away from the bars.

Assuming you’re not going fully rigid (not a euphemism)remember to make sure that the forks/rear shock can be adjusted for her weight. Nowt worse than riding a bike with a cheap heavy fork that doesn’t even budge!

Well, there is worse, but you get the idea.

Or find yourself a GF that’s the same height and build as you are!

T’husband failed in that department, he’s 6ft 7. He can use my bikes like they were BMXs. I can use his bikes if I get a step ladder and a pair of stilts. -_-

Guile, Streetfighter 2, 1994, My god those were some heady days.

Aye, Guile was the only character that had a 28 hit re-dizzy combo. Happy, happy days!

I know from a chap at work the cheapest childcare he could find was £600 a month, most places were £750 – £1100.