Neat Dwarf Fortress news.

Life grinds on but here's something cool: Bay12 Games, the creators of Dwarf Fortress, are trying a new development plan. Instead of doing one huge update that will take a year or more they've set aside a small list of features that they want to get released soon. You can see the outline here.

They also did a podcast (#22) about the plan.

It's looking pretty cool. Highlights for me are the ability to play gambling minigames and the new starting scenarios for Fortress Mode.

Hello. Also; yuck.

Here's yet another "I have no idea what to do with this blog right now" post.

Here's a union we can all despise: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xylJOK3WCOc&list=UU3wKmiBpt2OzdcWft6Iz-WQ

Awkward bump

I was getting ready to start writing political stuff again, but the government meltdown here in the United States has basically made anything I could say moot.

Meaning, there is no need to point out to people that our government is a grotesque anachronism. Callous to the wants and needs of the people who it is supposedly meant to serve, all branches and sectors of the State have become dysfunctional to the point that they no longer can even cater to the elite interests- blah blah blah just look around you can you can see what I mean more clearly than if I try to explain it.

So yeah.

I've been playing a lot of EVE Online, Dota 2, XCOM and Terraria lately. Maybe I'll start blogging about that until something more profound strikes me.

Bump

Here, while I continue to neglect this blog, have some Boatmurdered.
Just something that I read the other day and found unreasonably amusing.

I never finish anything, but yet I'm still around.

Stumbled on an ancient blog of mine, remembered that I still have this one, intend to post again soon.

My brain feels fuzzy often and I'm struggling in school; occasionally I notice that I'm having serious problems with my personal life in general.

None of which makes for interesting writing, so I'll spare you for now and chime back in when I have something...... else to say.

Oh one last thing: I've been waiting for Aliens: Colonial Marines forever, but fortunately stopped having any real emotional investment in the concept about a decade ago.

Thank. Fucking. God. that I had low expectations for this game.  I'm reminded of the wisdom of Zero Punctuation's "Gamer Matrix."

http://www.splitreason.com/product/1225

Are you an African-American man? Hope your EPHB2 is healthy!

Oh, so this is what it looks like when somebody patents a piece of the human genome (emphasis added):

http://www.faqs.org/patents/app/20100120025

Abstract: 

The present invention provides compositions and methods of using the EPHB2 gene or its related signaling pathways to detect, prognosticate, assess the risk of, prevent, or treat cancers. Cancers amenable to the present invention include, but are not limited to, prostate cancer, breast cancer, and neuroblastoma. In one aspect, the present invention provides compositions which comprise an agent capable of eradicating or alleviating an abnormality in the EPHB2 gene or its related signaling pathways. This abnormality may cause or contribute to the development or progression of cancers. In another aspect, the present invention provides methods comprising detecting an abnormality in the EPHB2 gene or its related signaling pathways. The presence or absence of such an abnormality is indicative of the risk or disease status of cancer in a person of interest. 

Claims: 

1. A method of selecting a pharmaceutical composition capable of correcting the phenotype resulting from a change in expression or function caused by a 3055A→T mutation in a polynucleotide comprising an EPHB2 gene (SEQ ID NO.: 2 or 4) comprising:culturing a cell comprising a 3055A→T mutation in a polynucleotide comprising an EPHB2 gene (SEQ ID NO.: 2 or 4)contacting a candidate pharmaceutical composition with the cellevaluating the capability of the candidate pharmaceutical composition to correct the result.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the candidate pharmaceutical composition comprises a chemical compound. 

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the candidate pharmaceutical composition comprises an RNAi. 

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the candidate pharmaceutical composition comprises an antibody Fv region. 

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the phenotype comprises a change in the expression of a gene other than the EPHB2 gene (SEQ ID NO.: 2 or 4) 

6. The method of claim 5 wherein the change in the expression of a gene other than EPHB2 is measured by the detection of a change in mRNA expression. 

7. The method of claim 5 wherein the change in the expression of a gene other than EPHB2 is measured by the detection of a change in protein expression. 

8. The method of claim 1 wherein the phenotype comprises abnormal cell growth. 

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the candidate pharmaceutical composition is capable of conditionally suppressing the abnormal cell growth. 

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the cell is derived from a prostate cancer. 

11. The method of claim 10 wherein the cell is derived from an African-American man. 

12. The method of claim 43 wherein the culturing occurs within an animal.

I couldn't find any "claim 43" in the available documentation.

Basically this looks like a catch-all patent request so that they can have an exclusive market for developing medical products based off of anything they can demonstrate to be directly related to problems with the EPHB2 gene.

It is disturbing that they are including an explicitly racial component in a patent about testing for cancer.  I doubt its for anything as fucked up as back when the US government would let Black men die of syphilis for lulz.  Probably the researchers involved noted that Black Americans suffer at greater rates from diseases such as cancers and are hedging their bets that it is related to something genetic rather than environmental factors related to cyclical poverty.

That's the extent of my ability to comprehend the science involved, and is probably well past my ability to decode the legalese... if I'm mistaken please correct me!

Kingdom Under Fire 2 still under development!

I'm a huge fan of the two Xbox entries in the Kingdom Under Fire series, but I lost track of the development of Kingdom Under Fire 2 quite a while ago.  I kinda just assumed that the game was long since cancelled since I had never heard anything about it since 2009.   It turns out I was just not paying enough attention!

I'm happy enough that I'm not even going to mention how fucked up and stupid Circle of Doom was.  (The poor elf woman probably had her lobotomy at the same institution as Samus....)