As any Nintendo fan knows, having a relationship with Nintendo can be really trying at times. Or often! It's like dating a super hot girl who knows she's super hot and thinks she can get away with anything. And she's mostly right...until one day she isn't, you dump her and she never even sees it coming.

Nintendo, as is well known, is, well, Nintendo. It does its own thing, it ignores conventional wisdom, bucks trends and forgoes the seemingly obvious choices every "expert" swears is the best for them. Stop making hardware! Make Angry Marios for iphones! Make high-end consoles to compete on horsepower!

Nintendo is gleefully oblivious to all that nonsense, with no signs of changing any time soon. Sometimes the Nintendo way fails spectacularly (N64 cartridges), sometimes it succeeds spectacularly (Wii), and Nintendo just keeps moving along. And thank god for that. A Nintendo that is the odd-man out, that tries to find its own way instead of making a carbon copy of the Playstation or leaping sight unseen at the latest gold rush, is a Nintendo that enriches the industry as a whole and makes our lives as gamers better, even for those who hate it with the fanaticism of a suicide bomber. It's easy to forget now, but many, if not most things we gamers now take for granted were either created or inspired (and I say "inspired" in the loosest sense of the word when it comes to Sony!) by Nintendo.

Still, Nintendo could use some listening skills. It doesn't have to drastically change it's business model or whatever it is quarter-obsessed analysts and investors want it to, but it can give gamers what they want without ceasing to be who they are. Or Nintendo risks being dumped by many more.

The Wii U is a fantastic console, but I'm constantly taken aback by how Nintendo seems to go out of its way to make it less interesting or clunkier at every turn. Yesterday my friend came back from the United States with a Wii U and a boatload of games, and we excitedly rushed to play Black Ops together. And it was going great... until his gamepad battery died in less than 3 hours. You know, that battery, the one that only occupies about a third of the battery slot. Fortunately, he had a power socket nearby, but it's still annoying. Some people may not have that option.

Or the voice chat. Hey, cool, the gamepad has a microphone, we don't have to talk via skype. Except... it can't be used for voice chat, for whatever boneheaded reason. Maybe it's to force people to buy licensed headsets, but it seems any headset works, so that kind of kills the purpose. I used an iPod touch headphone, and he used an old headset he'd bought for the 3DS and never used. So again, we got around the artificial limitations just fine, but it didn't have to be that way. And if one of us had to switch to the pro controller while the gamepad charged, well, no voice chat for us.

Or the Eshop. Okay, so Nintendo doesn't see digital games as "having less value". Fine, but does it see them as more value? In Europe, games are €5-10 more expensive in the Eshop than at retail, at least the MSRP is the same in the Americas.

Or online. I really like Mario. So does my friend. Hey, cool let's play Super Mario Bros U, yaaay! Hum... sorry, no online. 90% of my gaming time is spent playing single player offline, and Nintendo still manages to frustrate me with its online neglect, I can only imagine how many online-centric gamers won't go near it with a 10-foot pole. So okay, Mario has never been about online. It's a bummer for me, but online play is probably not a priority for most people when buying a Mario game, or indeed even a consideration at all. But Pikmin? Strategy games have been synonymous with online for at least 15 years, and it might actually hurt them. I hope Pikmin succeeds, naturally, but if it bombs, hopefully it will be made very clear the lack of online had a lot to do with it, and maybe, just maybe, it will bring Nintendo a step closer to getting the message.

Or achievements. I actually share Nintendo's position on this one, I feel they are largely pointless. With the sole exception of Demon's Souls, a game I played so much a got a freaking Platinum, I tend to solemnly ignore them. And yet.. getting that pop up can feel strangely satisfying. Maybe our brains are just that easy to manipulate.

But it doesn't matter what I think. What matter is that achievements are a very big deal to a great number of people. IGN once wrote about the guy with the world's highest gamerscore, and getting achievements was effectively his full time job. The lack of achievements may, and probably does, single-handedly drive away gamers who would potentially be interested in playing multiplatform releases on the Wii U thanks to the gamepad. So why not just give them what they freaking want?

Heck, Nintendo could leverage achievements to make people WANT to play multiplats on the Wii U. Imagine what they could do if they put club Nintendo and their IPs to good use. How about unlocking exclusive Nintendo costumes for your Miis through achievements? Or promotions where the first X number of people to earn Y achievement points or unlock a specific achievement get a cool club Nintendo item? Just as the lack of achievements may drive people away, such carrots could easily draw them back. And they might even bring their friends.

Or... you get the idea. Nintendo is still the beautiful girl with lots of admirers, because she's just too damn beautiful despite being a bitch, but there are now plenty of beautiful girls around, and they all want YOU! Being beautiful is no longer enough, you have to be beautiful AND nice.

Nintendo's independence and originality are truly impressive, just imagine what they could do if only they combined all that expertise with common sense!

Or: 10 hours of my life I'll never get back. It seems my DSi just died. Lovely!

Yesterday, I saved my Dragon Quest V game and went to bed. The clock stood at 09:44. So now I try to go back to it, and I'm greeted by the delightful error message above. Out of the blue, nothing works. Booting a game, options, system settings, everything runs into a black screen with those dreadful words.

That could have happened in the first couple hours, when the game was slow and I could have walked away no problem. But no, it has to wait until I start really liking the game. I'd just gotten out of slavery, for god's sake!

This is my first system ever to stop working, so now I know the feeling. Not cool. Not cool at all.

Now please join me in a moment of silence while I mourn the lost 10 hours of my life. DAMMIT!!!!!!!

Max Payne 3, as some of you may know, is set in São Paulo, Brazil's richest and biggest city. As a Brazilian myself, it was interesting to finally get to play a game set in my country. The target audience for western AAA games are largely North America and Europe, so there there is very little mention of Brazil in the game world. In fact, the only Brazilian character I can recall off the top of my head is Blanka, who of course is a green mutant.

So it was with great anticipation that I took Max through another slow-motion murderous romp. For the most part, I loved every minute of it. Max's monologues are as entertaining as ever, the game is gorgeous and the story and gun fights are (mostly) very good.

The Portuguese dialog, though, is ludicrously bad. As in, written in English, run through Google translate and voiced by foreigners bad, complete with gender mistakes. Still, there is a lot of background dialogue, which was fun to hear, and some of it was even entertaining in the right way.

Sadly, Rockstar's megalomania could mean this is the last we'll see of Payne.


Welcome to the slums.

Anyways, I'd like to share my impressions of Rockstar's São Paulo, and maybe let you guys know a little more about what Brazil is really like. I'm curious to hear what impressions, if any, did you folks get from the city or the country from the game. Even though it's a game and obviously no one expects a realistic representation of anything in a Max Payne game, pop media still influences us to some degree, especially when we are not familiar with the subject matter.

Max Payne's Brazil is marked by 3 main themes: giant social inequality, violence and corruption. The bad news is that this is, unfortunately, grounded in reality. The good news is that it is not nearly that bad, and there have been significant improvements in the past decade.

Ironically, the city Rockstar chose to depict as a lawless warzone has, in fact, one of the lowest murder rates in the country: around 10 per 100.000 inhabitants, which compares favorably to many U.S cities. It is also down a whopping 75% from its 1999 peak. Even Rio de Janeiro, probably the Brazilian city most infamous abroad for its drug violence, has managed to decrease the killings by 45%.

That's not to say the city isn't dangerous: it is. Other types of violent crime, like armed robberies and "express kidnappings", remain common, but it's far from a hellhole where the only people left are those too poor to flee or rich enough to buy armored cars and hire private security. In fact, in recent years there has been a considerable increase in immigration to Brazil, as well as in the number of Brazilians returning home.


A nation of extremes

Where Max Payne hits closest to home is regarding social inequality. The opening scene, a party for the city's elite at a fancy high-rise overlooking the slums, remains a shameful staple of our country, even though things have improved a lot in the past decade. Poverty has halved, and the number of people belonging to the upper income brackets increased nearly fivefold. Despite this impressive progress, we remain one of the most unequal countries in the world, which just goes to show how desperate our starting point was.


First-world Brazil

This contrast goes beyond individual income levels, and permeates several aspects of Brazilian society. We have one of the world's best AIDS programs, widely praised by international health organizations, while basic public health care is in shambles. The living standards in some places are not far behind Europe's, while others are closer to Somalia's. We are capable of producing airplanes, while some kids are virtually illiterate when they graduate from high school, to give just a few examples.


Fifth-world Brazil

Lastly, corruption. The game touches on political corruption, but largely showcases police corruption. Fortunately, while police corruption is pretty bad, it's nothing like Max Payne's version.

For one thing, we're not lawless. Police simply cannot go around executing people by the dozen in front of everyone with impunity. When they execute criminals (and they do), they have to do what police all over the world do: stage the scene to make it look like self defense, and if they get caught, they are prosecuted, though rarely convicted.

Which brings us to, perhaps, one of the biggest problems in our struggle against crime and corruption: the justice system is an utter, complete and total mess. It's so screwed up that, even without foul play involved, it is not difficult for a wealthy criminal to beat most charges short of murder. It is commonly said that "the police arrests, the judges set free".

Interestingly, when we start killing police in the last third of the game, for the first time ever I felt slightly uncomfortable shooting someone in a videogame. Most officers are just regular people trying to survive very difficult circumstances and doing their job the best they can, they are not sadistic psychopaths in uniform. If there was a way to advance the game without killing them, I would have.

Oh, and in case anyone was wondering, the "good cops" are not helpless like mr. Da Silva, nor would they need to rely on a foreign bodyguard to take on the bad guys for them!

All in all, playing Max Payne in São Paulo was a blast, and I hope I don't have to wait twenty years to do it again. What did you guys think? Was it just like playing in New Jersey, or did the change in setting change your game experience?

Destructoid hasn't said a word about it yet, so I'll just throw it out here: WE'LL GET A NEW TORMENT GAME!!!!!! WE'LL GET A NEW TORMENT GAME!!!!!!! WE'LL GET A NEW TORMENT GAME!!!!!!

Did I mention we'll get a new Torment game?

Check it out:http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/inxile/torment-tides-of-numenera

Now go sell your soul and back this project with everything you've got, or we're not friends anymore!

Last week, a cosmic event of cosmic proportions sent shockwaves throughout the world: some retailers jumped the gun on the price cut, and the PS Vita slightly outsold the Wii U in Japan! This week, the price cut has already gone into effect, so the next shock should be even more cosmically cosmic. At least Nintendo will have a grand funeral, or at least it should, given it's being prepared for over 10 years now. But, for the sake of argument, let's assume Nintendo doesn't return to whatever space void it came from. What's next for the house of Mario?

Let's get that out of the way: it won't go software only. That's herd mentality, and would most likely be a very bad move. There's a good case for why it's a bad move here. Plus, the article doesn't mention other good reasons, such as the fact Nintendo makes the bulk of its money from royalties, and until the Wii U, also profited from selling hardware (except during the initial months following the 3DS price cut). Even if there really was a good case for abandoning the hardware business, Nintendo is just too damn stubborn, so it's not gonna happen, at least not while Nintendo still has an $11 billion warchest.

So what can Nintendo do to have a successful next-generation, besides all the obvious stuff they messed up with the 3DS, and even worse with the Wii U, and absolutely need to get it right next time: price, lack of software for a REALLY long time, unnecessarily cumbersome "features", etc. After seeing strong profits for 30 years running (yes, even during the Gamecube years) and printing money during the DS and Wii years, Nintendo badly misfired for the first time ever with both its handheld and home console.

Until the Gamecube, Nintendo competed toe-to toe on the technology front, and its consoles were very similar to the competition's. This new Nintendo, the one that gave up the arms race and instead banks solely on innovation, is a relatively new creature. The problem with innovation is that innovating is risky. When it works, you're a hero who saw what nobody did, when it doesn't, you're stupid for not seeing what what "everybody did". It may well have been Nintendo's drive to reinvent the wheel at all costs that put it in its current predicament.

Make no mistake: as far as the gamer is concerned, Nintendo will have a very successful generation. That gimmicky, expensive 3DS with few games is a distant memory now, and Nintendo will turn the Wii U around as well. The price will drop and the games will come. Hopefully the Gamepad will also live up to its promise, though that remains to be seen. It would be a shame if it didn't. I'm a believer. It's a fantastic idea, and the (few) games so far have barely scratched the surface of what it can do. I believe gamers will be sold on the idea when they get their hands on the system, but even if the Gamepad, like 3D, doesn't become the selling point Nintendo hoped, the games and the price will do the trick. However, financially, Nintendo will struggle for the next few years. They will probably have a profitable console generation when all is said and done, but the multi-billion dollar profits of the Wii/DS heyday, are, for the time being, out of reach.

From a gamer's standpoint, both the 3D and the Gamepad are good ideas, the Gamepad more so. Everyone I've showed the 3DS to loved the 3D effect, and the Gamepad is also a hit. There's just one problem: they cost more than people are willing to pay for them. From a financial standpoint, they were very bad ideas.

The Gamepad is the biggest offender: at $350 dollars, Nintendo still loses money on each Wii U sold, launching a console at a loss for the first time in its history. Recent reports show Nintendo charging $150 for a replacement Gamepad, which suggests it costs them at least half as much. Iwata said the Gamepad was almost nixed entirely due to the cost, a decision I'm sure he now regrets. Being the only hardware manufacturer that's purely a game company, Nintendo simply cannot afford to follow in Microsoft's and Sony's footsteps and flush rivers of money down the toilet.

As for the 3D technology, it is unclear how expensive it is, but surely it contributed to the intial $250 price tag, and to the losses that followed the price drop. Therefore, it is highly unlikely Nintendo will try another money-losing innovation. So what's next?

First, the obvious: they may come up with something totally unexpected. I for one had never so much as conceived something like the Wii before I saw it. But what if they don't? What if their muse is taking a nap? My take, like the title says, is to go back to basics, to the approach that worked for them before the Wii.

The technology arms race is fast coming to an end. We aren't far from a future where a machine as powerful as the PS4 is selling for $99 (which will open up a huge, untapped market in the developing world, but that's a different conversation), and after that each upgrade will bring very small practical gains, to the point where they will eventually become irrelevant altogether. The selling points of a new hardware won't be horsepower, it will be things like games, affordability and functionality. So, unless costs drop so dramatically that Nintendo can incorporate 3D/Gamepad/next innovation without needing to hike prices, they won't be returning.

Wouldn't it be great if we could play all big third-party games AND Nintendo exclusives on a single console? With some loving Nintendo arm-twisting and a console that isn't a generation behind, third-parties would be onboard. That alone could be a bigger selling point than any "new way to play".

What about motion-controls? It may be a long-forgotten past now, but when Nintendo unveiled the Wii, it was an exciting prospect for core gamers, and it can be again. Don't run away, just let me explain! Motion controls on the Wii have two big problems: games using them in asinine ways "just because" (waggling to shimmy across vines in Skyward Sword comes to mind), and the limitations of the Wiimote, that has far from 1:1 movement.

The first can be easily solved: just stop doing it! Nintendo itself should lead way, as it certainly doesn't send the right message when third-parties see the big N itself tackling waggle onto its marquee franchises. It's simple: if its easier or better with buttons, stick with the damn buttons.

The second has already been solved. The Wiimote has limited movement recognition, severely limiting its usefulness in, say, a sword fight game. The Wii MotionPlus, on the other hand, has near 1:1 movement, and by now it's likely the technology is even better. Unfortunately, it wasn't the standard Wii controller, and it suffered the same fate nearly every single console accessory suffers: got almost no support and was quickly forgotten, but not before we got the one game that showed how it's done: Red Steel 2.

Red Steel 2 sold half-as much as its predecessor, largely on account of the required MotionPlus, and it proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that, sometimes, motion controls make a big difference. Sword fights in that game are much, much better and more intense than they would have been with a standard controller, and, as far as I remember, there's no unnecessary waggling, just pure awesomeness. If the next Nintendo console has something like the MotionPlus or better as its standard controller, we can get many more games like it.

And a game doesn't have to utilize the system "gimmick" in revolutionary ways to be effective, something 105% of developers failed to grasp with the Wii, and now again with the Wii U. Sometimes, a simple touch, such as exploring the dark hallways of Silent Hill: Shattered Memory with a Wiimote as the flashlight, is enough to take the experience to a whole new level.

Most important of all, pack the damn box with the motion controls AND a dual shock, and unless absolutely necessary, make games support both as standard. No more "optional" (meaning ignored) classic controller nonsense.

This would be attractive to core gamers as well as casuals and families. The conventional wisdom is that casuals aren't interested in consoles anymore thanks to smartphones, but I don't think it's that simple. While that market is surely smaller now, it is still there. After all, you can't gather your family and friends around a tablet for some Wii Sports fun. When people say "smartphones took away all the Wii casuals", what I hear is "the Wii casuals might still be interested in a new Wii if they weren't being asked to pay a ludicrous $50 for a game that could be on the original Playstation. AAA games may generally justify the price tag, but there is absolutely no reason why a minigame collection can't be sold for $20 or $15, other than that "that's how we've always done" mentality recently championed by Ubisoft.

Finally, online. If Nintendo overcomes its deep-seated onlinophobia and gets with the program, it could be a huge boon. Microsoft already charges for online and Sony undoubtedly will as well, giving Nintendo an opportunity to offer a free alternative. Nintendo doesn't need a revolution here either, just do at least what the others already do at least as well: cross-game chat, easy, system supported voice chat, trophies, and an online store that offers all kinds of games, from retail products all the way down to F2P. Sony showed with the PSN that it can be a free service. And if the infrastructure really becomes too expensive to be free, Nintendo could charge a fraction of the $60 Microsoft does and now Sony will, just to recoup costs instead trying to turn it into a revenue stream. Although, given Nintendo's pedigree as the company of "bad online", they would first need to prove themselves with a free service if they ever hope to charge anything.

And of course, let people actually play online. There's no reason NSMBU, Star Fox 64 or Pikmin 3, for instance couldn't be online if Nintendo wanted to.

That's my take on what the successors of the Wii U and 3DS should be like. What do you guys think?

In the past couple of weeks, the games I've been playing aligned in such a way that I finished several in row, making a good dent in the sizable backlog to the right: NSMBU, Black Ops 2, The Jak and Dexter Trilogy, Ocarina of Time 3D and Kingdoms of Amalur. It was interesting to experience so many games from such different genres and time periods in a somewhat short time frame, like watching a videogame history class, and I'd like to share my thoughts. I also crossed Jet set Radio off the list, after playing it for about 2 hours. I tried to get into it and see what's the big deal, but I really couldn't. The last straw was when, with my patience already wearing thin, the game goes and crashes just as I'm about to finish a very annoying mission, and that was that. Please don't hate me!

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D (3DS)


Some time ago, I wrote that, for the first time ever, I didn't like a Zelda game, causing me to wonder if I was on my way to becoming one of those grumpy old people who hate everything. Fortunately, I can happily say that playing Ocarina of Time again after 15 years (damn, that's nearly half my life. Damn I'm old!) was an utter blast. I definitely didn't outgrow Zelda, I just didn't like Skyward Sword.

The enhanced N64 visuals look great on the 3DS, and watching Link wake up in the game's very first scene really took me back: I couldn't believe a videogame could look that beautiful when I saw that for the first time. The boss fights, exploration, sword fights and puzzle-solving are all pure gold, though there are some old school annoyances I'm happy to see go, like going back to the beginning of the dungeon even if we die at the boss.

Also, Epona. I'm a sucker for horses in games. Developers, take note: give me a horse and let me ride around, and I'll be much more forgiving towards your game :)

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 (Wii U)


Unless they are console-exclusives, I always play shooters on PC, but I wanted to see how the Wii U Gamepad felt with a fast-paced FPS. The Answer: perfect. Mouse and keyboard is still the way to go, but compared to a standard dual shock, the Gamepad is excellent. It feels just right in my hand, it's just as comfortable as any other controller, and almost as light. That, plus the touchscreen, which allows you to quickly select scorestreaks and get a full view of the map, particularly useful when there's a UAV online, easily makes the Wii U the best console for shooters. Or at least for this particular shooter.

All that is true, but there is something else. Something that, for me, makes the Wii U the super-mega-ultimate console for shooters: my wife. She's always loved shooting stuff in on-rails shooters like Umbrella Chronicles, but give her a dual shock and, well, it's not pretty. I tried easing her into it, but she gets too frustrated. However, she fares much better with a Nunchuck and a Wiimote, and thanks to off-TV play, we can both play online together. That alone makes the Wii U the best console ever in my book!

As for the campaign, I loved it. Over the top and intense, with a decent shooter story to boot, and it got my Political Scientist mind thinking. Call of Duty is primarily aimed at Americans and (to a lesser degree) Europeans, and at the risk of being misunderstood, I wonder if Americans realize how resented the United States is across the globe, and how strongly something like Cordis Die would resonate, even in allied Western countries. When Salazar says "no wonder Menendes has so much support", I couldn't help but nod in agreement.

Don't get me wrong: killing innocents does not resonate anywhere, which is why support for organizations of religious fanatics who like to kill innocent people, like Al Qaeda, is largely limited to, well, religious fanatics who don't mind killing innocent people.

Cordis Die, though, is on a whole different level. Publicly, they have nothing to do with terrorism, and their supporters have no idea what it is they really do. And their rallying cry is not a medieval form of Islam, it's something immensely more powerful: resentment of the injustices of capitalism and of the country perceived as the main perpetrator of said injustices: The United States. Sure, Cordis Die and Menendez were far too powerful and omnipresent to be believable, but when I think about how dangerous a global terrorist organization motivated by those same principles would be, I feel a shiver down my spine.

Anyways... games, right? Yeah, let's get back to that.

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning (PC)


Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning? More like Kingdoms of Amalur: Madness. It saddens me to see a great game and very promising series like Amalur killed by the megalomania of its maker.

When all was said and done, I had completed 202 quests and played for 97 hours and 17 minutes. I'd probably have played 50 more hours or more, but by the time I reached Klurikon I was starting to feel fatigued, so I skipped the Legend of Dead Kel and literally dashed non-stop all the way to the final battle. Granted, those hours included the Teeth of Naros DLC, which is itself longer than most games, but it's still massive. Normally, when it comes to big RPGs like Amalur, the more the better as far as I'm concerned, but in this case, it didn't really work.

As good as it is, the biggest problem with Amalur is that it tries to be what it isn't. It gives us a world as vast as Skyrim's, but it doesn't feel like a real, believable world you can actually imagine yourself living in. All those myriad small touches that Bethesda does so well simply aren't there: Amalur feels more like a huge RPG level instead of a fully realized world. Which would be great if they had been clear on that and played to its strengths.

For me, Amalur has four (potential) key strengths: the combat, the colorful, gorgeous environments, a potentially good fantasy story, and a world I actually wanted to learn more about. The combat doesn't need introductions, it's what the game's famous for, and for good reason. The environments look great and have a sort of whimsical feel about them, and all those colors are a great change of space from the snowy mountains of Skyrim. Unfortunately, the same can't be said for the character models and the voice acting, and this coming from someone who, maybe on account of not being a Multi5 native speaker, often can't see what's wrong with the voice acting in games notorious for their supposedly horrible voice acting, like Resident Evil or Silent Hill.

The story looks interesting at first, and so does the world. There's only one problem: in its attempt to pass itself off as a huge, open-world playground, the game throws at you so many meaningless quests and meaningless characters that you start to lose track of what exactly it is you're doing, then starts skipping conversations and chasing map markers instead of the story.

But what's really, really bad about that isn't that they detract from the overall quality, but that it quite literally killed the developers and probably the series. We've already established that Amalur is massive, and all that "massivenes"costs money. A lot of it. Like, rivers of it. By some accounts, Amalur needed to sell as many as 2.5 million copies to start turning a profit. Alas, it "failed", selling "only" 1.4 milion in 90 days. Wait, what? Let's back up a second.

Let's compare Amalur with that other RPG series about massive worlds, The Elder Scrolls. When Oblivion launched in 2006, it sold 1.7 million copies in its first month. And this was the fourth main game in a then 12 years old franchise. So it stands to reason that, for a brand new ip, selling 1.4 million in 90 days should be an excellent performance, right? Except 38 Studios's ambitions were so lofty they literally bet the farm they'd have a mega hit right out of the gate, and they lost the bet.

It didn't have to be that way. If they had made a game 1/3 the size of Kingdoms of Amalur, they'd have spent a lot less money, the game would have benefited from the tighter focus and we'd still get 50-60 hours of solid gameplay, an extremely good value proposition for a full-priced game. Then 1.4 million copies wouldn't be so bad, and perhaps it would have bought them enough time to finish the MMO.

When I started this blog, the plan was to write about my experience with all seven games, but it turned out to be longer than expected, so I'm gonna stop here and maybe write the rest later. I hope you enjoy it!