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To all SSC Station occupants

Thank you for the donations over the past year (2024), it is much appreciated. I am still trying to figure out how to migrate the forums to another community software (probably phpbb) but in the meantime I have updated the forum software to the latest version. SSC has been around a while so their is some very long time members here still using the site, thanks for making SSC home and sorry I haven't been as vocal as I should be in the forums I will try to improve my posting frequency.

Thank you again to all of the members that do take the time to donate a little, it helps keep this station functioning on the outer reaches of space.

-D1-

Alpha 10 released

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 robn
(@robn)
Noble Member

The Pioneer development team are very pleased to announce the release of Pioneer alpha 10. Downloads for Windows, Linux and for the first time Mac OS X are available from the download page.

    New stuff
    Over 1200 real stars

    Supergiant stars

    Many new and more complex terrains

    Nearby ship and firing alerts

    Bulk freight ships outside starports

    More station backgrounds

    Mac OS X port

Little things

    Prettier background stars and hyperspace effects

    Reworked hyperspace ranges and durations

    Wide variation of faces in bulletin board ads

    Combat AI will give chase if the target tries to escape

    Velocity measured relative to the frame rather than the target

    Improved targetting squares and velocity indicators

    Ships and other small objects not shown beyond a certain range

    Unguided missiles work again

    Option to invert mouse look

Under the hood

    Rewritten Lua module API (with documentation!)

    Hundreds of bugfixes and code cleanups

I'd like to personally extend my congratulations and thanks to everyone who contributed. This was a huge release with some major changes both to the code and to our processes that have placed the project in a great position for the future. And to the rest of you, thank you for your patience. We hope you love it 🙂

Quote
Topic starter Posted : May 13, 2011 04:23
(@s2odan)
Noble Member

WooHoo 🙂

This is a massive release isn't it... I think we have actually given people a game this time 😉

Anyway, thanks and well done to you too Rob, you need a pat on the back as well you know 😉

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Posted : May 13, 2011 06:03
Geraldine
(@geraldine)
Famed Member

Wonderful news robn! 🙂 Looking forward to trying it out 😎

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Posted : May 13, 2011 06:19
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member

in most parts i love it, but where is italy? sunken? vanished?

that's what we had before

2011-04-02_021056.jpg

now it looks like this

2011-05-13_192824.jpg

and before someone can argue it was because of my changes

2011-05-13_194201.jpg

it looks like no more oceans and everything is into a heavy fog? are the seas dried out?

i mean the first pic it was far to clear, but now it looks not like my home...

and i guess you britons aren't really satisfied with that?

2011-05-13_195125.jpg

everything looks like desert instead of oceans, a desert planet? i never liked "the brown smudge" of FFE and it was the FIRST i wanted to get rid off.

it's not that bad at all and i will see if i can fix that myself.

after all a good new release,

and points PRO are more then CONTRA

- fixed look of gas giants (thumbs up)

- improved HUD, even for external view (thumbs up)

- control seems more smooth to me (thumbs up)

- better framerate (thumbs up)

i guess if a play a little further i will find even more positive things!

but you can always expect critics from me, i am such.

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Posted : May 13, 2011 08:30
 navi
(@navi)
Active Member

Good News. 😎


Simple Moments alpha 0.9 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4W--xjO2AWs

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Posted : May 13, 2011 08:53
(@s2odan)
Noble Member
Quote:
in most parts i love it, but where is italy? sunken? vanished?

Yes you already posted about that... its a bug and it is fixed right here: https://github.com/s20dan/pioneer/tree/sys-gen

ReplyQuote
Posted : May 13, 2011 08:54
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member

sorry, yes the post WAS doubled, due to a interrupt of my connection after "submit".

i have a very weak signal because i live upstairs, fortunately i have a very strong receiver* and can place it anywhere, but often i have to change places, because the signal changes, but i already know three or four good places to put it. but depending on weather and daytime i have to change sometimes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4W--xjO2AWs

looks better no? i mean with the preview window

you can embed videos here in a very simple manner, just mark the link and press youtube (upper right corner of the edit window).

thx D1 :mrgreen:

better then many laptop, i know my neighbor has to sit downstairs to have a connection and former i lived in zürich city, and their was one he had to sit into the stairwell to have a connection while mine was still good. i had similar problems in the beginning with WLAN, but couldn't stand it especially because my machine isn't portable, so i bought me a rather cheap receiver, but a fantastic sensitive one.

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Posted : May 13, 2011 09:51
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member

let's say i have good reasons now NOT to compile pioneer or anything on my machine.

that let's me see things like they appear to a common user of a rotten win XP machine, i guess you know already now that it is a difference if you have the redistributable to run a program or the developers version of MSVC.

a different example, 2 years ago i had the developers version of MSVC2008 installed, and TWPGA2008 wasn't running, i couldn't create a character, so i couldn't play.

took me a while to find out that it was the lib's of MSVC dev. release that hindered the game from running. again i stumbled then over that more accidentally.

apart from that, i can't recommend any developers version of anything, except you're actively developing something with it, they have some disadvantages.

simply because of the debug features that are removed from a redistributable. guess else there would be no need for a redistributable.

i don't give a dam about titles, brands or anything that is blowing my head 😉

to sad WE HAVE ALREADY A PINBACK here, it would be else my nick, for sure, that "stupid" fuel engineer, who ends up as the last normal of the whole bunch...

i am a digger and digging has to be done underground, there is no way around that!

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Posted : May 13, 2011 10:17
 robn
(@robn)
Noble Member

Just fyi, a 10.01 build has been posted for Mac OS X only. It has been rebuilt in a way that it should work on OS X back to 10.4, though this has not been tested. If you're using the OS X build and its working fine for you, then you do not need this update. Otherwise, head over to the download page and grab it.

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Topic starter Posted : May 13, 2011 19:06
 navi
(@navi)
Active Member

A Button to turn the HUD off and on would be nice. I am referring to all the HUD Stuff for a clear View. 😉

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Posted : May 14, 2011 00:11
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member
navi wrote:
A Button to turn the HUD off and on would be nice. I am referring to all the HUD Stuff for a clear View. 😉

ganz meine meinung, danke

yes, i would like such to, a configurable HUD, certain info like the relative velocity (under the selected target) are a bit annoying to me or isn't needed from my pov, but others might like it.

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Posted : May 14, 2011 01:15
 robn
(@robn)
Noble Member
navi wrote:
A Button to turn the HUD off and on would be nice. I am referring to all the HUD Stuff for a clear View. 😉

Logged as issue #82.

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Topic starter Posted : May 14, 2011 03:34
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member

before i open a new issue, (even if i guess now it's worth one, i am still experimenting)

Pioneer no longer works together with Virtual Dub in windowed mode, it freezes virtual dub

when i switch to fullscreen it acts like it's o.k

but the resulting capture is rubbish

it looks like windowed, but i ran the game fullscreen

watch this clips,

pioneer runs in 1280x1024 fullscreen, capture mode 1680x1050

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dWdkXb_VtE

and this time i set screen res. to 1024x768 for both programs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-3KoLh_6HM

all other setting are the same as when i made my clips before

except that i preferred to make them windowed because it has worked out better then fullscreen for alpha9.

i guess it would still be better, but like i said windowed won't work at all.

that's sad 😥 for all those who liked their clips of pioneer

counter test

ffed3d 1680x1050 fullscreen capture mode 1680x1050

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_7_bcjLNVM

again 1024x768 fullscreen capture mode 1680x1050, this time triple buffer and vertical sync on

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfbM1eqdvMc

i just wanted to be sure, pioneer 1680x1050 capture mode 1680x1050

has turned out to be a bit better, but unplayable (stutters) and the resulting clip has still this flickering.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLNi1w0eTBI

i managed it to capture it in windowed mode 1024x768, capture mode 1024x768 (my default settings for clips, because virtual dub needs less processing time in a lower res, for pioneer it doesn't matters much, to me at least). but still useless

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36s25ESGaTQ

would it be a treat to compile it with msvc? just to see if that changes...

i know i sworn already last year i will switch to linux, perhaps i do it, i am again frustrated about the mess MSN has produced when i installed it (i know MSN is a "killer", that's why i never installed it and removed it immediately from any new windows i had installed),

but i wanted to shorten the way to vampiretta.

of course i banned it again as soon as i recognized that it harms my OS.

i guess that's why (msn is not the only reason) my over 5 year old machine still runs like at the first day.

others that aren't aware of such like my ex, have a less old computer, but she can't run it no more, she said after 10 minutes it's game over! (not a game, the whole machine breaks down).

should i tell you what MS would suggest, buy our new crap! 😆

i know maintenance is important, not only to dust it off sometimes even from the inside (even when old faithful A2000 was running with coffee inside, it hasn't harmed that thing, but i forget sometimes that this was no computer, it was only a toy, which i bought from someone who bought himself then a "real one". lolrog).

but leave that up to no one else then yourself, watch what you need and what not and most of all, never trust a big company (any).

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Posted : May 14, 2011 15:50
 robn
(@robn)
Noble Member

I don't know VirtualDub specifically, but I could imagine a scenario where the change of compiler/linker used affects one program running under another. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who can test this specific software combination and also anyone who can do a MSVC build and test with VirtualDub, as well as testing the GCC build (ie a stock alpha 10) with some other capture program eg Fraps.

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Topic starter Posted : May 14, 2011 19:18
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member

o.k fraps results are o.k, but i don't like to invest money, which i don't have at the moment simply.

i haven't eat a bite since three days because of lack of money. 😯 i live by black coffee and sugar 😉

if i had a few nickles i would spend them for food.

free it's limited to a few seconds, not very funny, that won't work for me. it stops whenever it likes to stop, a bit strange.

further you can only record in uncompressed format and even a full version will be limited then to 1GB, and that's not much for full avi, i know from "taksi".

i will see....

maybe i find another suitable one on sourceforge

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Posted : May 15, 2011 14:05
 OSH
(@osh)
Estimable Member

Great news! Time for testing (when I have some time 🙄 )

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Posted : May 16, 2011 00:35
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member

devs, you see that skeleton, that's ME congratulating you to setting all up so fine even a chimpanzee can compile Pioneer :mrgreen:

after a first bite into it, it runs very well...

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Posted : May 16, 2011 03:36
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member

two slight fixes, one will make deliveries to barnards star possible.

i know i tried once to setup a system without a planet, but because i can't get no population there, whatever seed i tried, i pushed this idea over board.

i guess the game neither likes it to make runs to a unpopulated system, i never have let it come that far, like i said i couldn't get no population with such a combination so i left the idea aside.

to get some population to barnards star, use perhaps this script, it's generating now a "dumb" random system, therefore a populated one.

at least this allows deliveries without crashing the program.

i also changed the description somewhat and left the short description up to the game, mainly because i need that to check quick if a system has a economy type or not when i search for a seeding, the seed i used has produced to my own surprise a similar system as before.

but behind the used seed are some numbers you can try and which should work to. each results into a different system constellation.

further, personally i guess the short description should be left mostly to the game, for some like a prison colony it will be o.k, but else it gives the player no longer a hint what goods they deserve and what they offer. but with some experience and the short description you will know "mining colony... o.k they need narcotics perhaps or food" and don't have always to check the system info chart. i liked that in the earlier releases and it's a leftover behave of mine from FE2. like i said some can have a special one like a prison colony, but i wouldn't go to far with such, else you always have to check the system chart. you still will have the long desc. to write there what kind of system it is, i mean history and all that, just like good old FE2.

[attachment=701:barnards_fix.zip]

since it is stated on top of pienums.lua that it should be kept in sync with EquipType.h, i did so,

i can't tell you right now if that helps really something, but at least it didn't harms to do so.

[attachment=702:pienums.zip]

simply copy the zip to your pioneer folder and unpack it with "unpack here" it should end up in the right location.

it was a nice idea, to make this prison system, but i guess that won't work without any population in the system and without a economy, i never tried really, like i said, as soon as i noticed i can't populate such a system it was not longer of interest for me.

sometimes it still crashes when i finished a delivery, but i have to make more different runs to barnards star, to see where that comes from, of course not specifically from this system, but this allows at least some comparisons.

first i was relatively sure it has crashed when i succeeded the mission while failed (late) was working, actually i managed some successful so i guess it's something else.

there is one error message left in "stderr.txt" but i guess you know, just for completeness of my report

Quote:
opendir: couldn't open directory 'data/libs': Bad file descriptor

i haven't found out yet where that comes from...

a little bon-bon

[attachment=703:PIC003.jpg]

for all the "windows boy's and girls" (even if i am NOT specifically a windows boy, if i had the opinion i would use my A4000*) i will push here my MSVC compiled version as soon as it is cleaned.

*there is NOTHING that can replace the M68k family and when you know what has driven all arcade machines, of course no intel.... unsuitable for a high performance machine running all day and all night, being hit and pushed around like a piece of wood.

apart from that only a EPROM technology allows to setup a specific machine for a certain game and leaves all power to the game, only one of the many reasons to chose a M68000 for a arcade machine. consoles from up the sega master system until CD32 used it, i found a clip of a then revolutionary game for the CD32.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHlkqhTn1fM

with evolution of technology you couldn't have simply tuned the "overclocking", no each time it was possible to double the so called "chip mem" you gained a ^2 in power,

without overheating that poor worker inside, a M68k untuned needs no cooling vent. it's not a "frying pan". while overclocking works ^-2, means a doubling of frequency didn't means a doubling of power and each time you have to overclock it more to gain only a bit, a reason why this evolution will stop soon, or in other words the difference between a 500MHz and a 1GHz intel is far bigger, rather the difference between 1GHz and 2GHz and to gain what you have gained between 1GHz and 2GHz you will have to overclock it to 8GHz, it's a fact. you see some have simply preferred the completely wrong technology. GPU's have left the CPU far behind, because they use a different physic, simply said.

dual and quad core is only another helping solution, but not the real thing. still its a x86 that ticks inside. well you know me, that "paper tape feed waving machine controller".

for which it was good enough, to control simple dumb industrial machines. not to play games or doing graphics (it can't do much without the GFX card) or run a sophisticated GUI.

there is only one advantage of a intel, you don't need no radiators in your flat... 😆

sadly they stopped development or is left up now to some :geek: and :ugeek:, but who knows once this will come to a end, i swear!

just for the next time when you call "gernötli" a "windows boy", i can't stand such :mrgreen:

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Posted : May 16, 2011 06:44
(@subzeroplainzero)
Estimable Member

Haha I used to have a cd32 and microcosm. That was easily the most difficult game I have ever played, EVER!

Roadkill was AMAZING though! 😛 😛 😛

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfXlpSYlN_I

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Posted : May 16, 2011 08:06
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member
Quote:
That was easily the most difficult game I have ever played, EVER!

nothing to add

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Posted : May 16, 2011 08:18
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member

isn't that a much more beautiful place rather then brasilia? i mean belo horizonte would be o.k, but brasilia? 😉

[attachment=705:2011-05-16_224719.jpg]

and compare this picture

Kaltbrunn.jpg

hey, is pioneer a mirrored globe? doesn't mind, very close to reality, isn't it?

brasilia, is as far as i know a "artificial city", it's not grown, they throw it their as capitol, nothing else.

at least this is what my friend from belo horizonte told me.

why not rio, this would give you the right idea if the orientation of the map is o.k

maybe i throw the city on the airfield in mollis, this i will know like my pocket.

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Posted : May 16, 2011 11:56
 robn
(@robn)
Noble Member
potsmoke66 wrote:
i know i tried once to setup a system without a planet, but because i can't get no population there, whatever seed i tried, i pushed this idea over board.

i guess the game neither likes it to make runs to a unpopulated system, i never have let it come that far, like i said i couldn't get no population with such a combination so i left the idea aside.

You can't right now. This wasn't fully understood which led to the BB crash that has been fixed in dev. issue #96 is tracking the need to fix this.

Quote:
further, personally i guess the short description should be left mostly to the game, for some like a prison colony it will be o.k, but else it gives the player no longer a hint what goods they deserve and what they offer. but with some experience and the short description you will know "mining colony... o.k they need narcotics perhaps or food" and don't have always to check the system info chart.

The short description is not and was never intended to be a trade indicator, even if it could be predicted in the past. At some point in the future the entire trade and commodity system will become dynamic, with scripts able to define new kinds of equipment and cargo and a light economic simulation. You should get used to using the system info view to determine imports and exports as sometime soon that will be the only to tell reliably.

Quote:
since it is stated on top of pienums.lua that it should be kept in sync with EquipType.h, i did so,

i can't tell you right now if that helps really something, but at least it didn't harms to do so.

It does nothing for the mission API. pienums.lua is now only used by the model system to get equipment types for determining if missiles, scanner dishes, etc should be displayed.

ReplyQuote
Topic starter Posted : May 16, 2011 12:14
(@potsmoke66)
Noble Member
Quote:
The short description is not and was never intended to be a trade indicator, even if it could be predicted in the past. At some point in the future the entire trade and commodity system will become dynamic, with scripts able to define new kinds of equipment and cargo and a light economic simulation. You should get used to using the system info view to determine imports and exports as sometime soon that will be the only to tell reliably.

this will make selecting the right system for trading to a repetitive, go look on the system chart, not really good no?

what do you think why frontier has a rough info about economy type, in the sector map? still you have to switch often to the chart to know the exact economy.

a rough info is enough, i can decide then if i like to switch to system chart to see proper in and out, but without it will be a treat, imho. i will HAVE to check each and every systems chart.

if you haven't any info about economy or population at least, then good night. this will have nothing to do with a fine scale.

i wonder if tomm's got the same idea about what the short desc. is good for and where that comes from.

play frontier and cover this info...

or i can remove it for you from it, if you like

of course neighbor systems i will know the economy of, but only a few sectors away from home you won't know, or do you have a photographic memory?

to barnards star, so you rather like to keep it as it is and avoid missions to it?

tell that to the people who come as nubes to pioneer.

"please avoid missions to this and that system because..."

while it's

totally easy to change that whenever you like, only a few keystrokes away.

a little off topic lamento of mine

i know you told me once pioneer will be "departed" from frontier once... but that didn't mean that a good idea isn't a good (practical) idea.

further, i am not sure what the community thinks about that.

we love pioneer BECAUSE it's so close to frontier, it's our personal E4 replacement.

not only your goals count, the longings of the players count as well, maybe even more.

further it could easy lead to a gap between some long time partners, not only me.

it would be really sad if the "shame mouths" of elite-games would became right and pioneer is dedicated to vanish, only because of such misunderstandings.

you might be the captains, but we are the wind in the sails.

i ask you right here what do you think where and what would be pioneer without the SSC community, geraldine and my little self? (i guess tom knows that very well)

there wasn't much people who knew it exists at all.

there was and is still no modeler except me who understands the way of pioneers models as i do, i might not be the best choice, but a rare one.

of course you can easy change the way how to bind models in pioneer to make it more pleasing for a wider scale of modelers. using perhaps XA models that have animations set up by the CAD, but you will loose the spirit i swear it.

i will always keep my feet on the ground, further i have a big talent in keeping a good overview to all, i am not a specialist, more a allrounder, with a wide spectrum of interests and, perhaps a bit rough, knowledge.

who was the thriving forces that advertised pioneer everywhere?

even to hire developers to help the project starters fulfilling it.

we are not the only ones who started a project in this direction.

there are others i noticed, have started already something close to what pioneer was when we discovered it.

but i leave that up to the community, to the actual and future players of pioneer.

that didn't mean i didn't like you or your work, you have done a very good job, no question about that.

i don't want to split, i like to join, i am a construction worker, i build, i don't destroy.

i didn't think that there is a kind of a conspiracy against me, no. but i really see myself as a important part of pioneer, without being to proud of myself.

but sometimes it feels like someones like to take it out of our hands (tom's, JJ's and perhaps mine to precise it).

i won't say exactly you, but sometimes i feel we move into a different direction as intended.

i must say i didn't know JJ to well, i had more contacts with tom, but i know also that they are long time friends.

i know further that tom started it with JJ (or vice versa? didn't matters) as a countering to frontier, to avoid all the leaks and troubles they had with JJFFE and GL-Frontier

and of course to have something of their own, better then frontier.

i must say i will respect tom always as the "owner" of pioneer, we had always a good contact and a similar way of, let's say, feel for it.

he's a careful programmer in my eyes, who likes to go forward in small steps and has listened always to our longings, i never overloaded him with wishes and ideas even if i had a lot in the back of my mind, i guess i am (was?) a careful modeler and partner. carefully we moved together slowly forward.

i guess we never wanted it to finish tomorrow, it takes time and already i feel we stuck a little into some kind of mud because of hasting.

it can still be sorted out and we can pull that wagon out of the mud, for sure, but only together, players, devs and modelers, one alone won't work.

sorry, when i used to get some fun out of pioneer, but it's made for playing...

when think about how one will play pioneer, what motivation one has to play pioneer, when i play it often and when i argue often.

it was and it is still the frontier community that keeps this game alive.

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Posted : May 16, 2011 14:44
 robn
(@robn)
Noble Member
potsmoke66 wrote:
to barnards star, so you rather like to keep it as it is and avoid missions to it?

Its a bug. The bug has a workaround in dev, and we have an open issue to implement a more permanent fix. I don't know how to explain it better than that.

Quote:
i know you told me once pioneer will be "departed" from frontier once... but that didn't mean that a good idea isn't a good (practical) idea.

further, i am not sure what the community thinks about that.

we love pioneer BECAUSE it's so close to frontier, it's our personal E4 replacement.

not only your goals count, the longings of the players count as well, maybe even more.

Pioneer is not and never was intended to be a clone of Frontier, merely inspired by it. It will naturally diverge from Frontier as the people involved contribute their own ideas about how the game should be done. If you want to play Frontier, then go and play Frontier.

As I and others have repeatedly tried to make clear, everyone may contribute to Pioneer. The code is there, the website is there, the mailing list there, the IRC channel is there. There are myriad ways you can contribute, and we see new people with ideas and code and whatever very regularly. I don't know why you still believe that your's or anyone else's opinion doesn't count.

ReplyQuote
Topic starter Posted : May 16, 2011 15:03
(@ollobrain)
Honorable Member

noi i agree this is more than frontier the original idea is but it will go well beyond that, think of it maybe as elite 4 or what it could be if the guys that own it ever do develop it. This is its own beast and lookin good

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Posted : May 16, 2011 15:38
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