Not completely on topic, but something I'd like to add to this. When I purchase things, usually of the food variety, I check to see where it originates from. I try to avoid purchasing things like, apples from china, oranges from brazil, etc... mainly because of the transportation costs associated with such an operation. I am in inadvertently 'Buy(ing) American', but really aiming to buy local products. I am by no means saying that people should or do purchase cars based on locality, just that some types of products lend themselves more to this type of purchase.

I can think of few RPGs (regular or MMO) where money is not an issue (for at least part of the game). From Final Fantasy VII to Everquest, Disgaea to EvE, Neverwinter Nights to WoW... All require money in some way. Some of them require more grinding than others. Investing time to improve your character(s) is just part of the genre.

As for partaking in the 'game's economy', in the case of an MMO, this is sort of required. Once you start playing a game that involves multiple people and gives some semblance of choice(items,equipment, etc), an economy is created. It isn't just in MMOs either, trading card games, tabletop miniatures, etc... There will always be 'better' cards, pieces, equipment... People will value said items differently... It just comes with playing such games.

Yes, why did you do that? Speaking of the AI X-Ray vision problem... the Farsight sort of makes that valid.

How about max NPCs, all turtle sims, with mainly shield drops. Talk about being rocket proof.

Reminds me of the 'dark sims' in Perfect Dark for N64. A dark sim would already have a shot lined up and ready to fire as it is rounding a corner. Mind you, the description of the bot included something along the lines of "isn't human, can do things humans can't".

Great game as well.

Don't forget playgrounds made of metal and concrete, lawn darts, and tree forts. I remember, for one of my early birthdays, getting a hand saw as a gift... Used it for making tree forts, cutting off branches, and generally being desctructive...

Don't forget thinking and questioning authority, though both are starting to fall on the wayside...

Which is why I can justify the money I paid for Neverwinter Nights 1, the two expansions, and the online modules... I must have spent at least a year and a half to two years just playing different types of characters. To a lesser extent, Knights of the Old Republic as well, though the variety isn't as much there... I think the last PC game I bought that wasn't in a used bin was KOTOR II. The PS2 games are a little different, I tend to grab up NIS RPGs, which actually entertain me.

Why would I pay for my linuxii and tux games when I can get them for free?

Is it by 'application' or process? If it is by process what happens to applications, like Chrome, that spawn off multiple processes? "Oh darn, I have three tabs open... *sigh*"

This does assume that the students are exposed in some form or another to programming in middle/high school, which I feel can be a bit of a stretch. I haven't been out of of high school for *that* long (Class of '01) and my high school had programming classes, clubs, or anything. There was a single 'computer' course: typing. I had to go to college to learn to program. I suppose the argument could be made that those who really want to know can dabble in their spare time, but I know in my case that I had fairly limited access to computers for a large portion of my childhood, so this wasn't very possible.