Magic (gaming)

Magic or mana is an attribute assigned to characters within a role-playing or video game that indicate their power to use special abilities or "spells". Magic is usually measured in magic points or mana points, shortened as MP. Different abilities will use up different amounts of MP. When the MP of a character reaches zero, the character won't be able to use special abilities until some of their MP is recovered.

Much like health, magic might be displayed as a numeric value, such as "50/100". Here, the first number indicates the current amount of MP a character has whereas the second number indicates the character's maximum MP. In video games, magic can also be displayed visually, such as with a gauge that empties itself as a character uses their abilities.

History

The magic system in pen-and-paper role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons is largely based on patterns established in the novels of author Jack Vance. In this system, the player character can only memorize a fixed number of spells from a list of spells. Once this spell is used once, the character forgets it and becomes unable to use it again.

Magic (Ladyhawke song)

"Magic" is a song performed by New Zealand recording artist Ladyhawke, released as the fifth and final single from her debut album Ladyhawke (2008). It was produced by Pascal Gabriel who co-wrote the song with Ladyhawke herself. The song was inspired to be a fantasy epic and love song. Lyrically, it tells a story about trying to coax someone over to talk to you, where in reality you feel alone.

"Magic" received critical acclaim with most critics giving the song positive reviews. The single peaked at number thirty-one in New Zealand, becoming her second most successful single and third top forty hit there to-date. It was accompanied by a music video, directed by Shelly Love and released on September 30, 2009.

Background and writing

The song was written by Ladyhawke and Pascal Gabriel. Ladyhawke wrote the song when she first went to London and she didn't know anyone. She describes it as a fantasy epic where she has someone and she is trying to coax them over to talk to her, where in reality she felt alone. She also says it is a love song, but also a 'pining' song.

Secret Time

Secret Time is the first mini album by South Korean girl group Secret. The album was released on April 1, 2010, and contains ten tracks. "Magic" was used as the promotional song for the album. The song debuted at number 2 on South Korea's Gaon Singles Chart and the album debuted at number 4 on the Gaon Album Chart on April 1.

Promotion

"Magic" was first used as a promotional track from the album. On March 29, 2010, a teaser video was released online. In the teaser, the girls were performing a dance track called "Break Time". The final music video premiered on April 1, 2010 along with Secret Time 's release. Due to printing errors, the physical release for their mini-album was delayed for five days but was released online on various music portal sites. The music video reached 1 million views on video sharing sites such as YouTube and Cyworld and the “Suspender Dance”, which was featured in the music video teaser for "Magic", gained popularity amongst netizens.

Secret had their debut performances of "Magic" on Mnet's M! Countdown, KBS's Music Bank, MBC's Show! Music Core and SBS's Inkigayo from April 8 to April 11.

Act! (Italy)

Act! (Italian: Fare!, F!) is a centre-right political party in Italy, based in Veneto.

The party is led by Flavio Tosi, mayor of Verona and former leader of Liga Veneta–Lega Nord, who was ejected from it in the run-up of the 2015 Venetian regional election, due to his opposition to Matteo Salvini's political line.

Act! was immediately joined by three deputies (Matteo Bragantini, Roberto Caon, Emanuele Prataviera), three senators (Patrizia Bisinella, Raffaela Bellot, Emanuela Munerato) and four regional councilors in Veneto (three elected with the Tosi List for Veneto and one with Il Veneto del Fare). All of them were Tosi loyalists who followed him out of the League.

In July Michele Boldrin, leader of Act to Stop the Decline, sued Act! as the names of the two parties looked too similar.

In September a fourth deputy joined the party: Marco Marcolin, also from Liga Veneta–Lega Nord.

In October Act! became an occasional supporter of the centre-left government led by Matteo Renzi, whom Tosi held in high esteem, fueling rumors that the party might either enter in stable alliance with or join Renzi's Democratic Party.

Investment Company Act of 1940

The Investment Company Act of 1940 is an act of Congress. It was passed as a United States Public Law (Pub.L. 76–768) on August 22, 1940, and is codified at 15 U.S.C. §§ 80a-1–80a-64. Along with the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Investment Advisers Act of 1940, and extensive rules issued by the Securities and Exchange Commission, it forms the backbone of United States financial regulation. It has been updated by the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010. Often known as the Company Act, the 1940 Act or simply the '40 Act, it is the primary source of regulation for mutual funds and closed-end funds, an investment industry now in the many trillions of dollars. In addition, the '40 Act impacts the operations of hedge funds, private equity funds and even holding companies.

Background

Following the founding of the mutual fund in 1924, investors welcomed the innovation with open arms and invested in this new investment vehicle heavily. Five and a half years later, the Wall Street Crash of 1929 occurred in the stock market, followed shortly thereafter by the United States entry into the Great Depression. In response to this crisis, the United States Congress wrote into law the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 in order to regulate the securities industry in the interest of the public.

ACT Music

ACT is a German, Munich-based music label which was founded in 1992 by Siegfried Loch. ACT artists include: Marius Neset, Bugge Wesseltoft, Lars Danielsson, Viktoria Tolstoy, Vijay Iyer, Leszek Mozdzer, Iiro Rantala, Nils Landgren and Esbjörn Svensson Trio.

Musicians

One of the label's main focuses is European jazz. To those artists taken under contract from Sweden you find the trombonist Nils Landgren and the deceased young pianist Esbjörn Svensson with his trio, the singers Viktoria Tolstoy and Rigmor Gustafsson, bassist Lars Danielsson and guitarist Ulf Wakenius. Artists contracted from other countries are the Norwegian saxophonists Geir Lysne, Tore Brunborg, Marius Neset and Frøy Aagre, pianist Bugge Wesseltoft, violinist Henning Kraggerud, the band In The Country, the Danish vocalist Cæcilie Norby, the Belgian guitarist Philip Catherine, the French drummer Manu Katché. The jazz musicians from Germany signed to the label include Joachim Kühn, Christian Muthspiel, Joachim Kühn, Christof Lauer, Wolfgang Haffner, and Michael Wollny (winner of the ECHO Jazz 2010 as the best national instrumentalist - Piano/Keyboards).

War (painting)

War is a painting created by Portuguese-British visual artist Paula Rego in 2003.

Description

War is a large pastel on paper composition measuring 1600mm x 1200mm. A rabbit-headed woman stands prominently in the center carrying a wounded child, surrounded by several realistic and fantastic figures recalling a style Rego describes as "beautiful grotesque".

For The Telegraph's Alastair Sooke, "The more you look at War, the curiouser and curiouser it becomes. Rego's white rabbits owe more to Richard Kelly's film Donnie Darko than Lewis Carroll's Wonderland."

Background

The painting first appeared as part of Rego's "Jane Eyre and Other Stories" exhibition at Marlborough Fine Art in London in 2003. It was inspired by a photograph that appeared in The Guardian near the beginning of the Iraq War, in which a girl in a white dress is seen running from an explosion, with a woman and her baby unmoving behind her. In an interview conducted in relation to the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía's 2007 exhibition, Rego said of this painting, "I thought I would do a picture about these children getting hurt, but I turned them into rabbits' heads, like masks. It’s very difficult to do it with humans, it doesn’t get the same kind of feel at all. It seemed more real to transform them into creatures."