Flit

Stupidest idea ever watch: Bill O'Reilly

Bill O'Reilly thinks the problems of the world can be solved by creating an elite corps of ninjas.

Surely I don't have to explain why this is a bad bad idea.

I was taught to pronounce it "ATT-ila"

Personal opinion: with a year of fixes now behind it, Total War: Rome II is the best game yet in the Total War computer game series and an absolute pleasure to play. The newly announced Total War: Attila looks very promising, too. With the latest tweaks to slow down the battles just enough to tease out the strategy, it's become, even more than its predecessors in the series, a kind of militarized real-time chess, with intricate play at the highest levels, yet play that is grounded in a historical realism that no other RTS game has ever really matched. The single-player campaign vs the computer is very good, too, and the co-op campaign for two-player teams is a big improvement over its Shogun 2 and Napoleon predecessors if you happen to like that sort of thing.

Also, the mod support via Steam for amateurs wishing to tweak things is the best I've ever seen for a computer game of this complexity, ever. Easy to create, easy to update, easy to share. Yes, the provided game music is still god-awful, but the mod to swap that out with the original Rome:Total War score was a five-second install, solving my last real complaint with the game.

If you ever wanted to see TW:R2 played at the highest level and get what all the fuss is about, and maybe pick up some insights on how ancient fighting really worked, too, you really should watch Heir of Carthage's battle replays against other opponents on YouTube (any of the ones that say "Country X" vs "Country Y" at the top). The guy's got an OODA loop you could wrap around your pinky finger, and unlike most replays, explains his thinking in great depth, and with a chivalrous respect for opponents you rarely see, too. Top class.

Happy birthday, Lenny

Leonard Cohen turned 80 on the weekend. Many happy returns to a Canadian and international treasure.