During the July 2006 Electronic Arts press conference, Valve revealed that "Team Fortress 2" would arrive as the multiplayer component of "The Orange Box". In a conference trailer, the whimsical new visual style of "Team Fortress 2" of all nine mercenary classes were shown. Managing director of Valve Gabe Newell said that the company's goal was to create "the best looking and best-playing class-based multiplayer game". On September 17, 2007, a beta release of the entire game was released to Steam. On the same date, a the same beta release of the entire "Team Fortress 2" game was made available for customers who had pre-purchased "The Orange Box", as well as for customers who had activated their "Black Box" coupon. The "Black Box" coupon was included with the ATI HD 2900XT Graphics cards. The beta of "Team Fortress 2" was also given to members of Valve's Cyber Café Program. The beta continued until the game's final release.
The game was released on October 10, 2007, both as a standalone product via Steam and at retail stores as part of "The Orange Box" compilation pack. Both the Steam version and the retail "The Orange Box" compilation packs were priced at each gaming platform's recommended retail price. "The Orange Box" also contains "Half-Life 2", "Half-Life 2: Episode One", "Half-Life 2: Episode Two", and "Portal". Valve offered "The Orange Box" at a ten percent discount for those who pre-purchased it on Steam before the October 10 release, as well as the opportunity to participate in the beta test.
Big Black
Big Black was an American punk rock band. The band formed in 1981 with Steve Albini playing all of the instruments and a drum machine for percussion.
Big Black's music was very loud and distorted. Many Big Black songs have stories about violence in them.
Company of Heroes
Company of Heroes is a strategy video game where you control soldiers in order to win. It is based on World War II.
Game &amp; Watch
The Game & Watch was a series of small, hand-held video games made by Gunpei Yokoi of Nintendo from 1980 to 1991. The games were usually simplistic (For example, "Chef" required keeping food in the air). It was the forerunner of the Game Boy (meaning it came before the Game Boy).
is the main character in Game & Watch that also appeared in "Super Smash Bros. Melee" and "Super Smash Bros. Brawl."
Fecundity
Fecundity, coming from the word "fecund", generally means the ability to reproduce.
In biology and demography, fecundity is the ability to reproduce of an organism or population, measured by the number of gametes (eggs), seed set or asexual propagules. Fecundity is under both genetic and environmental control, and is the major measure of biological fitness. "Fecundation" is another term for fertilisation.
Fecundity can increase or decrease in a population according to current conditions and certain regulating factors. For instance, in times of hardship for a population such as a lack of food, juvenile and eventually adult fecundity may decrease.
In the philosophy of science, 'fecundity' refers to the ability of a scientific theory to open new lines of theoretical inquiry. Here, the original meaning is extended by analogy.
Séan T. O'Kelly
Seán Thomas O'Kelly (; 25 August 1882 – 23 November 1966) was the second President of Ireland. He served two terms from 1945 to 1959. He was a member of Dáil Éireann from 1918 until his election as President. During this time he had been Minister for Local Government (1932–1939) and Minister for Finance (1939–1945). Ó Ceallaigh served as Vice-President of the Executive Council from 1932 until 1937 and was the first Tánaiste of Éire from 1937 until 1945.
Ó Ceallaigh was born in Dublin on Capel Street in the north inner-city Dublin. He joined the National Library of Ireland in 1898 as a junior assistant. The same year, he joined the Gaelic League, becoming a member of the governing body in 1910 and General Secretary in 1915.
In 1905 Ó Ceallaigh joined Sinn Féin. Sinn Féin then wanted a dual-monarchy. He was an honorary secretary of the party from 1908 until 1925. In 1906 he was elected to Dublin Corporation, which was Dublin's city council. He retained the seat until 1924.
Pádraig Pearse made Ó Ceallaigh his helper when Pearse was getting ready for the Easter Rising.
After the Easter Rising in 1916, Ó Ceallaigh was put in jail, released, and put in jail again. He escaped from jail in Fairfield in the UK, and came back to Ireland.
O'Kelly was elected Sinn Féin MP for College Green in the 1918 British general election. Along with other Sinn Féin MPs he refused to take his seat in the British House of Commons. Instead they set up an Irish parliament, called Dáil Éireann, in Dublin. Ó Ceallaigh wasCeann Comhairle(Chairman) of the First Dáil. He was the Irish Republic's envoy to the post-World War One peace treaty negotiations at Versailles, but the other countries refused to allow him to speak, because they did not recognise the Irish Republic
Ó Ceallaigh was a close friend of Éamon de Valera, and both he and de Valera opposed the Anglo-Irish Treaty of December 1921.
When de Valera resigned as President of the Irish Republic on 6 January 1922, Ó Ceallaigh returned from Paristo try to persuade de Valera to return to the presidency. A de Valera was furious and ordered Ó Ceallaigh to return to Paris.
During the Irish Civil War, O'Kelly was in jail until December 1923. Afterwards he spent the next two years as a Sinn Féin envoy to the United States.
In 1926 when de Valera left Sinn Féin to found his own republican party, Fianna Fáil, Ó Ceallaigh followed him, becoming one of the party's founding members. In 1932, when de Valera, was appointed President of the Executive Council (prime minister) of the Irish Free State he made Ó Ceallaigh Minister for Local Government. Ó Ceallaigh often tried to publicly humiliate the Governor-General of the Irish Free State, James McNeill. Stunts such as withdrawing the Irish Army's band from playing at diplomatic functions which the Governor-General attended, or in one notorious case the sight of O'Kelly and Defence Minister Frank Aiken storming out of a diplomatic function at the French Legation when McNeill, the guest of honour, arrived, damaged Ó Ceallaigh's reputation and image, particularly when the campaign backfired.
Before resigning, McNeill published his letters to de Valera about this. It made de Valera appear foolish, and made de Valera choose a new Governor-General. To the surprise of many, Ó Ceallaigh's was not considered for the office. Instead former Fianna Fáil TD, Domhnall Ua Buachalla from County Kildare, would be the last Governor-General.
In 1938, many thought that de Valera wanted to make Ó Ceallaigh the Fianna Fáil choice to become President of Ireland, under the new Irish constitution, Bunreacht na hÉireann. When Lord Mayor of Dublin, Alfie Byrne, said he wanted to be president there was an all party agreement to nominate Dubhghlas de hÍde, a Protestant Irish Senator, Irish language enthusiast and founder of the Conradh na Gaeilge. They thought de hÍde was the only person who might win an election against Alfie Byrne. Ó Ceallaigh was appointed Minister of Finance instead, and helped create Central Bank in 1942.
Ó Ceallaigh left the cabinet in 1945 when he was elected President of Ireland in a popular vote of the people, defeating two other candidates.
Ó Ceallaigh was re-elected unopposed in 1952. During his second term he visited many nations in Europe and spoke to the United States Congress in 1959. He retired at the end of his second term in 1959, to be replaced by his old friend, Éamon de Valera.
Ó Ceallaigh did not refer any Bills to the Supreme Court to see if they were legal, but he did ask his official advisors, called the Council of State, if he should refer the Health Bill, 1947 but he decided not to.