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Setting up a wickedly awesome lan party for Bad Company 2.

Not that I'd recommend you seek servitude there, but it explains some of the roles in game development: https://jobs.ea.com/about/roles/role.aspx?id=1 (yeah, it's ugly. so what?)

Wait, isn't that game called Burnout?

EA is also giving away C&C: Red Alert for free as well:

http://www.ea.com/redalert/news-detail.jsp?id=62

Still one of the best RTS' I've played. =)

http://www.ea.com/redalert/news-detail.jsp?id=62

With installation instructions for XP and Vista.

They also did this a while back with Command & Conquer Gold which is still available on somewhere like filefront iirc.

Free LAN Games

Wolfenstein Enemy Territory [Download]

Cube

AssaultCube

Sauerbraten (Cube2)

Urban Terror

Nexuiz

Open Arena

More First-person shooters here

Driving Speed2

Red Alert1

Command and Conquer NOD ISO GDI ISO

Singleplayer:

Super Mario War

Don't think of just entertainment, choose games that will teach the children valuable life skills. For example:

Teach them to Rule the World: Freeciv
Teach them the value of running over hookers: GTA 1&2
Teach them the awesomeness of fighting robots: One Must Fall 2097
Teach them to conquer the world in a different way: C&C Red Alert 3
And finally, teach them to conquer the world of worms (you never know): Wormux

The original Red Alert is free now. http://www.ea.com/redalert/news-detail.jsp?id=62:.

Puzzle Pirates. Play puzzles to bilge, sail, build clothing, etc. It's a (vaguely) player driven economy with a mostly laid back group of people. And, of course, there is Viva Pinata.

I think the original poster's goals are unreachable with current technology and techniques. You can't befriend a game in any more substantive a fashion than you can befriend your television... lots of games have tried various ways of simulating human interactions, but humans are notoriously complex. Emotional simulation systems quickly break down into either simplistic grinding or laughable parodies of humanity. If you attempt to replace those computer entities with actual other online human beings... Let's just say that you can't rely upon other human beings in online games to act like human beings.

The closest thing to what the grandparent poster asked for is the sims. It's a good example of how simplified human interactions have to be made in order to work in a simulated environment.

Tag this article misunderstanding. The moderator to made the original post has since corrected himself.

Next we will kill the children.

Sorry, my bad. That should read free candy for everyone.

This isnt true... people that write these things should confirm its validity, before posting over and over.... http://forums.ea.com/mboards/thread.jspa?threadID=457006&tstart=0

This isnt true... people that write these things should confirm its validity, before posting over and over.... http://forums.ea.com/mboards/thread.jspa?threadID=457006&tstart=0

Look at this quote from here though

http://forums.ea.com/mboards/thread.jspa?threadID=457006

First the mod says that bans from the forums don't mean a ban from the games a bit later some other EA guy says this

Elearen (EA.com)
tbh I would rather that forum behaviour did affect online availability.

It would tie in with the TOS quite nicely.

http://www.ea.com/global/legal/tos.jsp

And the TOS he links to says this

EA may terminate any EA Service at any time by giving you notice of such termination within the time period specified when you joined the particular EA Service, or if no time period for notice of termination was specified, then within thirty (30) days of the date such notice is posted on the applicable EA Service.

EA may also terminate your Account(s) (and access to all related entitlements) for violation of this Terms of Service, illegal or improper use of your Account, or illegal or improper use of EA Services, products, or EA's Intellectual Property. You may lose your user names and personas as a result of Account termination. If you have more than one Account, EA may terminate all of your Accounts and all related entitlements. EA may issue you a warning, or EA may immediately terminate any and all Accounts that you have established. You acknowledge that EA is not required to provide you notice before terminating your Account(s). If EA terminates your Account, you may not participate in an EA Service again without EA's express permission. To participate in an EA Service, contact support.ea.com EA reserves the right to refuse to keep Accounts for, and provide EA Services to, any individual. You may not allow individuals whose Accounts have been terminated by EA to use your Account.

If your Account, or a particular subscription for an EA Service associated with your Account, is terminated, no refund will be granted; no online time or other credits (e.g., points in an online game) will be credited to you or converted to cash or other form of reimbursement, and you will have no further access to your Account or entitlements associated with your Account or the particular EA Service (such as points, tokens or other digital items).

Seems like the Mod announced the draconian new policy that he can ban you not just from the forums but from all the games you've bought with no refund, a shitstorm erupted and he clarified things that that was not the policy. But it is in the TOS as the other EA guy pointed out.

Look at this quote from here though

http://forums.ea.com/mboards/thread.jspa?threadID=457006

First the mod says that bans from the forums don't mean a ban from the games a bit later some other EA guy says this

Elearen (EA.com)
tbh I would rather that forum behaviour did affect online availability.

It would tie in with the TOS quite nicely.

http://www.ea.com/global/legal/tos.jsp

And the TOS he links to says this

EA may terminate any EA Service at any time by giving you notice of such termination within the time period specified when you joined the particular EA Service, or if no time period for notice of termination was specified, then within thirty (30) days of the date such notice is posted on the applicable EA Service.

EA may also terminate your Account(s) (and access to all related entitlements) for violation of this Terms of Service, illegal or improper use of your Account, or illegal or improper use of EA Services, products, or EA's Intellectual Property. You may lose your user names and personas as a result of Account termination. If you have more than one Account, EA may terminate all of your Accounts and all related entitlements. EA may issue you a warning, or EA may immediately terminate any and all Accounts that you have established. You acknowledge that EA is not required to provide you notice before terminating your Account(s). If EA terminates your Account, you may not participate in an EA Service again without EA's express permission. To participate in an EA Service, contact support.ea.com EA reserves the right to refuse to keep Accounts for, and provide EA Services to, any individual. You may not allow individuals whose Accounts have been terminated by EA to use your Account.

If your Account, or a particular subscription for an EA Service associated with your Account, is terminated, no refund will be granted; no online time or other credits (e.g., points in an online game) will be credited to you or converted to cash or other form of reimbursement, and you will have no further access to your Account or entitlements associated with your Account or the particular EA Service (such as points, tokens or other digital items).

Seems like the Mod announced the draconian new policy that he can ban you not just from the forums but from all the games you've bought with no refund, a shitstorm erupted and he clarified things that that was not the policy. But it is in the TOS as the other EA guy pointed out.

... 8. Termination of EA Services and Accounts

EA may terminate any EA Service at any time by giving you notice of such termination within the time period specified when you joined the particular EA Service, or if no time period for notice of termination was specified, then within thirty (30) days of the date such notice is posted on the applicable EA Service.

EA may also terminate your Account(s) (and access to all related entitlements) for violation of this Terms of Service, illegal or improper use of your Account, or illegal or improper use of EA Services, products, or EA's Intellectual Property. You may lose your user names and personas as a result of Account termination. If you have more than one Account, EA may terminate all of your Accounts and all related entitlements. EA may issue you a warning, or EA may immediately terminate any and all Accounts that you have established. You acknowledge that EA is not required to provide you notice before terminating your Account(s). If EA terminates your Account, you may not participate in an EA Service again without EA's express permission. To participate in an EA Service, contact support.ea.com EA reserves the right to refuse to keep Accounts for, and provide EA Services to, any individual. You may not allow individuals whose Accounts have been terminated by EA to use your Account.

If your Account, or a particular subscription for an EA Service associated with your Account, is terminated, no refund will be granted; no online time or other credits (e.g., points in an online game) will be credited to you or converted to cash or other form of reimbursement, and you will have no further access to your Account or entitlements associated with your Account or the particular EA Service (such as points, tokens or other digital items).

Check out the full TOS for the "code of conduct." I wouldn't share that No CD utility with the EA forums :)

Tag this article misunderstanding. The moderator to made the original post has since corrected himself.

"the previous statement I made recently (that's being quoted on the blogs) was inaccurate and a mistake on my part. I had a misunderstanding with regards to our new upcoming forums and website and never meant to infer that if we ban or suspend you on the forums, you would be banned in-game as well. This is not correct, my mistake, my bad." http://forums.ea.com/mboards/thread.jspa?threadID=457006&tstart=15

you may want to check out ftp://largedownloads.ea.com/pub/ for patches. I didn't look for patches for Spore, but they should be in there somewhere.

Bingo. On top of what the parent said, it should also be small (less than 12.1" screen) and lightweight with a battery life of at least 3 hours.

Bingo. On top of what the parent said, it should be small (less than 7.2" screen) and lightweight with a battery life of at least three hours...

Seriously, the best laptop I've ever had was a Toshiba Libretto 100CT. It had a screen resolution of (if I remember correctly) 1024x600, a perfectly usable (though small) keyboard, and mine ran Debian. It did everything I wanted of it, well - it even ran a full Oracle 8 database - and it fit easily into a coat pocket.

If I was designing a netbook now I'd start with the Libretto form factor, use solid state memory for backing store (definitely no hard disk) and finish it with about 2mm of rubber all round, for splash proofing and increased shock protection. It would run Ubuntu (possibly the netbook special build) and weigh not more than the Libretto - which is to say 910 grammes.

If Toshiba could build that machine in 1996, it shouldn't be difficult to do the same now, with solid state storage and better battey life. A Netbook - or a Libretto - is not meant to be your main computer. It's meant to be something you have with you virtually all the time. It needs to be robust because it's going to take knocks. It needs to be small, otherwise it's awkward to carry. It needs to be light for the same reason. If it doesn't have the graphics or the horsepower to run Crysis, well, frankly, I can live without.

Why isn't this on EA's website?
http://www.ea.com/global/legal/legalnotice.jsp

Absolutely no mention on the Spore website:
http://www.google.com/search?q=site:www.spore.com+securom&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS238US238

If you want to read what EA's explanation of SecuROM is from their support page, you can do so here. It includes information on how to remove SecuROM from your computer. Strangely, they make no mention of whether the removal process will disable the game.

All that being said, I don't imagine this lawsuit will make it very far. However, the policy that you can't return the software after it's been opened seems pretty criminal to me. The EULA should be included on the OUTSIDE of the box or a link to the EULA on the web that you can read before you open the software.

Why isn't this on EA's website?
http://www.ea.com/global/legal/legalnotice.jsp

Absolutely no mention on the Spore website:
http://www.google.com/search?q=site:www.spore.com+securom&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS238US238

If you want to read what EA's explanation of SecuROM is from their support page, you can do so here. It includes information on how to remove SecuROM from your computer. Strangely, they make no mention of whether the removal process will disable the game.

All that being said, I don't imagine this lawsuit will make it very far. However, the policy that you can't return the software after it's been opened seems pretty criminal to me. The EULA should be included on the OUTSIDE of the box or a link to the EULA on the web that you can read before you open the software.

Why isn't this on EA's website?
http://www.ea.com/global/legal/legalnotice.jsp

Absolutely no mention on the Spore website:
http://www.google.com/search?q=site:www.spore.com+securom&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS238US238

If you want to read what EA's explanation of SecuROM is from their support page, you can do so here. It includes information on how to remove SecuROM from your computer. Strangely, they make no mention of whether the removal process will disable the game.

All that being said, I don't imagine this lawsuit will make it very far. However, the policy that you can't return the software after it's been opened seems pretty criminal to me. The EULA should be included on the OUTSIDE of the box or a link to the EULA on the web that you can read before you open the software.

Enlighten me:

http://files.ea.com/downloads/commerce/eula/en/eula.pdf

Where's the part that says about installing 3rd party anty-piracy software or some stuff like that?

... because of the updated SecureROM! See this old EA Forum thred for the details. EA still won't fix it even with the fixed file. I had to use a noDVD patch. No RA3 for me since beta sucked for me (not fun and cool).

>You're not even linking to a page on the developer's website, for Christ's sake
>
Fine:
http://files.ea.com/downloads/commerce/eula/en_US/eula.pdf

What difference it could possibly make, who knows.

>I can't agree to terms if I'm not presented with them upfront.
>
That's why you are presented with them up front.

>The terms aren't visible within the product itself until you've opened it, voiding your return policy.
>
The terms don't fit on the box. Voiding the return policy is a separate issue.

>Shrink wrap EULAs are bullshit, plain and simple.
>
So when you make a product, feel free not to use them. Shrink wrap EULAs have been around for decades and have never been successfully challenged as a legal tool. They may be bullshit to you, but it's up to the creator what, how, and whether to sell any part of the product to you.

Yes, mine did too with C&C3: Kane's Wraith in its last patch! See here for the fix. It took me a few weeks to figure out what was causing. I didn't think a game patch would cause this mess.

I just* purchased "The First Decade", you insensitive clods!

* well, okay, I've had it for over a year ... and it does have a few more C&C games than just TD and RA.

This IS a serious problem because, - It is so common in the industry that there aren't lots of alternatives. - The more they work the more others (even in other countries) are forced to work. - Quitting is not a serious option unless you are rich and work for sport.

I agree whole heartedly. While not slavery the employees are being taken advantage of. Where I live a large software company lobbied the government into OKing no overtime pay for software developers. The effect? "High tech" workers in BC don't have rights to overtime pay. Companies are exempt from paying overtime and due to the legislation can not be sued (whereas a McDonald's employee could sue for the same treatment).

See here and here. Basically, Windows' Explorer.exe crashes with ntdll.dll because of C:\WINDOWS\system32\CmdLineExt.dll. There's a fix, but doesn't work for everyone. I had to use a noDVD patch and disable this DLL. I had this problem since 7/9/2008 and fixed it yesterday by disabling it with ShellViewEx. Explorer even crashed in safe mode without networking!

See here and here. Basically, Windows' Explorer.exe crashes with ntdll.dll because of C:\WINDOWS\system32\CmdLineExt.dll. There's a fix, but doesn't work for everyone. I had to use a noDVD patch and disable this DLL. I had this problem since 7/9/2008 and fixed it yesterday by disabling it with ShellViewEx. Explorer even crashed in safe mode without networking!

Since we're on the topic of games

ArenaNet (Guild wars): http://www.arena.net/contact.php

Ironclad Games (Sins of a Solar Empire) http://www.ironcladgames.com/contact.html

Blizzard Entertainment (World of Warcraft) http://us.blizzard.com/support/webform-us.xml?gameId=0

Firzxis (Civilization IV) http://www.firaxis.com/support/

Electronic Arts (lots of games) http://www.info.ea.com/company/company_prlist.php

Valve (Steam: Counterstrike, other games) http://www.valvesoftware.com/contact.html

Activision (Gun) http://www.activision.com/index.html#contact|en_US

And code for WINE.

ArenaNet (Guild wars): http://www.arena.net/contact.php

Ironclad Games (Sins of a Solar Empire) http://www.ironcladgames.com/contact.html

Blizzard Entertainment (World of Warcraft) http://us.blizzard.com/support/webform-us.xml?gameId=0

Firzxis (Civilization IV) http://www.firaxis.com/support/

Electronic Arts (lots of games) http://www.info.ea.com/company/company_prlist.php

Valve (Steam: Counterstrike, other games) http://www.valvesoftware.com/contact.html

Ask for either native Linux port or Wine-compatible Windows binaries.

While I'm all for open source and regarding hardware drivers I wouldn't want it any other way, let's not forget that open source does not have to be pushed around at the application level at the expense of usability. Professional-level applications are critical for the use and expansion of Linux, and proprietary software vendors should be encouraged to develop their software for Linux, not alienated by being badgered to give away their source code. Currently, there is a heated discussion on the Debian list regarding PCB and CAD software availability. One camp (me) is encouraging users to write to software houses and to request that they port their software to Linux, with the other camp rejecting all contact with proprietary software vendors unless it is a demand for the source code. Currently, myself and other engineers cannot use Linux at work because we must run proprietary engineering software, such as Solidworks in my case. For those who want to help, please write to these companies and let them know that we are interested in their software on Linux:

Intuit (Quicken, Quickbooks) http://www.intuit.com/contact/ (requires registration)

Adobe (Photoshop, Flash CS3 Professional, Captivate, Dreamweaver, Studio) http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/mmform/index.cfm?name=wishform

Sony (Vegas Studio) http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/corporate/contacts.asp

Autodesk (Autocad) http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/index?siteID=123112&id=1073074

SolidWorks http://www.solidworks.com/pages/company/SolidWorksOfficeWorldwide.html (requires registration)

Sage (Act!) http://www.act.com/company/contactus/

Nuance (Dragon Naturally Speaking) http://www.nuance.com/help/contact/

hardin-soft (BM-Win Plus (mailing address correction software)) http://www.hardin-soft.com//forms/feedback.html

Daz (Bryce (3D modeling and animation)) http://www.daz3d.com/i.x/support/rnlogin/-/?p_sid=vOwOJN6j&p_accessibility=&p_redirect=&p_lva=&p_sp=&p_li=&p_next_page=std_alp.php (requires registration)

ArenaNet (Guild wars): http://www.arena.net/contact.php

Ironclad Games (Sins of a Solar Empire) http://www.ironcladgames.com/contact.html

Blizzard Entertainment (World of Warcraft) http://us.blizzard.com/support/webform-us.xml?gameId=0

Firzxis (Civilization IV) http://www.firaxis.com/support/

Electronic Arts (lots of games) http://www.info.ea.com/company/company_prlist.php

My personal problem is that I need Solidworks, so for emphasis I'll repeat their address here:
http://www.solidworks.com/pages/company/SolidWorksOfficeWorldwide.html

Please write to these companies and let them know that we need their products on Linux. Copy the list and write to one company a week. Thanks.

Do you write to the game developers and let them know that you need support for Linux? Here are a few addresses to get you started:
ArenaNet: http://www.arena.net/contact.php
Ironclad Games: http://www.ironcladgames.com/contact.html
Blizzard Entertainment: http://us.blizzard.com/support/webform-us.xml?gameId=0
Firzxis: http://www.firaxis.com/support/
Electronic Arts: http://www.info.ea.com/company/company_prlist.php

I saw the system specs on EA's preorder site, http://eastore.ea.com/store/ea/DisplayProductDetailsPage/ProductID.91619200 , Monday. I thought I had merely missed them...

Does Knowing this before everyone else make me cool?

Anywho, they don't look as bad as I was thinking, and the fact that it supports onboard video with a dual-core CPU raises interesting questions about the engine.

Years ago game developers asked for, and got, OpenGL for the mac. Many developers have being developing for the Mac for years and show no sign of letting up. They have a happy and prosperous relationship with Apple.

http://www.ea.com/platform_mac.jsp

http://www.feralinteractive.com/

http://www.insidemacgames.com/

Actually, this happens, and EA does it. You may have meant it as a joke but its not.
Here's a list of thier dozens of titles including 2006 and later games they've disabled online services for already:
http://www.ea.com/information.jsp

Just look at EA's previous history then. They've turned off online service for a number of multiplayer games, some as recent as 2006.
http://www.ea.com/information.jsp

As for a lot of publishers releasing patches to remove protection, thats total nonsense. There's only a few of them that have done that. Epic did it for some unreal games, egosoft does it for thier X games series... I can't think of many more off hand, I think id did it for a few of them. There's probably only a dozen or 2 games that have done that in the past decade compared to many thousands released.

http://www.ea.com/information.jsp

On the Xbox, even though you purchase an annual subscription to Xbox Live, you still can't play multi-player titles without accessing EA's servers. To my knowledge, EA's the only company that works that way. Thus, several great titles quit working online, even though I still have an Xbox Live account. This is a really clever way to get you to upgrade.

I'll never buy another EA game again.

I wrote The Sims character animation for Maxis, and also a tool called "SimShow" that we released before the The Sims release date.

SimShow enabled players to view and create their own character skins, so that when The Sims was finally released, there were already web sites publishing hundreds of characters for the game. (Many of them would have been impossible for EA to legally publish themselves, like Spiderman, Star Trek characters, etc.)

The Sims was much to complex to release a demo version, because it required a critical mass of objects to work. We could not release a stripped down version with only a few objects or levels, like most other video games. Instead, by releasing a tool to create content instead of a hamstrung demo, it improved the game when it was eventually released, instead of delaying it.

That approach worked quite well for The Sims, so it's no wonder that EA is repeating it with Spore.

-Don

Then they sue you for use of the word 'Smartypants®'.

or one installation of Crysis ( http://www.ea.com/crysis/ ) running at decent frame rate on Windows Vista =/

Woah, which C compiler did you use for 6510 back in 1989? I seem to remember them being rather ropey back then.

Any links would be helpful! Mind you, C wasn't even standardised properly until 1990.

After all most (not all) SNES games were written in assembly (and it had a faster CPU than C64!) though the Genesis could handle C almost fast enough.

Modern GCC on hardware with enough registers is cool, but back then with just A,X and Y - I would have thought it was a nightmare!

Hmm, I think I used to know Tony Hartley/Lill (the Amstrad/ZX spectrum porter) I wonder if he can remember anything (not got his number anyway...).
I would be pretty sure he did those versions in straight Z80.

It looks like Will Wright backported it personally to c64 from the Amiga/Macintosh version (1989) which was developed from the c64 prototype (1985)

has details.

I would guess that the original (1985 and 1989) C64 versions were pure assembler, and possibly Apple2 and Atari400 versions could be ported from that, and only the later versions from 68000 (macintosh/Amiga/Atari ST) onwards were in C.

http://simcity.ea.com/play/simcity_classic.php

Does this mark the end of EA Sports games on the PS2 and other "Last-Gen" consoles? Madden NFL 2008, for example, seems to have been released on practically every console, as well as Windows and OS X. I think I've seen a few other new PS2 titles from other publishers too. When will these consoles cease to be worth developing for?

You can still play it - FREE:

http://simcity.ea.com/play/simcity_classic.php

EA already has a combination Java/Javascript version of the game online here: http://simcity.ea.com/play/simcity_classic.php

The game lends itself well to semi-fixed graphics that update on a slower basis. So making the jump from Java/Javascript to 100% DHTML would be far less of a jump than going from the original code to Python.

And don't worry about the saved games. It would be a perfect opportunity to put the Storage API (implemented in recent FireFox and SeaMonkey builds) to good use:

http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-apps/current-work/#storage

They just renamed that section to mob wars. Otherwise it looks just like San Andreas. Marge suns around a place that looks just like the grove you start out at in GTA:SA, where CJ's house is.

You can see it right here.
http://www.ea.com/simpsons/mob/

It also sound that there is a lot of bashing here:

"But of those 7,122 messages we can track, 2,976 have been authored by just 32 individuals (41.8 %). Each of these individuals has posted more than 40 times on the subject."

"Since that team was set up 2 weeks ago, we received only 12 calls to EA's North American Support Center from players looking for help with their PC's, suspecting a conflict with SecuROM. Sony DADC received just 29 calls about The Sims 2 Bon Voyage and SecuROM."

I didn't really notice an outright denial in the "offical statement". I read that 'problems happen' and if you want it fixed you need to call support.

Looking at the replies and the response, it 'sounds' like they want to help:

quote:
Guys-

If you really want to make a difference, you need to file a support ticket with Customer Support to explain what is going wrong with your PC and try to get help. Those numbers about the few number of calls to Support are not made up. I looked them up myself. There's just not enough people calling to cause change. We've received 4 times more calls with people with flashing red walls than any of the PC destruction calls about SecuROM. (and, btw, about those walls...don't forget to update your video card driver).

We want you to call. I want you to call. I work on the team that makes the game. The last thing we want to do is to make you unhappy.

To get support, follow the instructions in MaxoidVanquish's post above. The thread is here:

http://bbs.thesims2.ea.com/community/bbs/messages.php?threadID=c7bc28ba7df0b19335a3d8edb3ec9919&directoryID=211&startRow=1&openItemID=item.211,root.1,item.61,item.104,item.41,item.127,item.23

If you create a support ticket and don't get the help you need, I want you to do this: send me a note in my SimPage guestbook. Click on "View My Sim Page" right above my post and you'll find my guestbook. Tell me what happened, and if you can, cite the Incident Number you were given so a supervisor can track what happened on your case (those numbers look something like 123456-789012. Write it down when the support person gives it to you). Also please give me your email or phone number and a good time when you can be reached, so a support supervisor can get back to you.

unquote

And to the thought of "interestingly enough, the expansion pack was cracked and up on the internet less than 24 hours after it's release."

I wonder just how many of the folks that 'cracked' the pack are having the problems and are bitching?

Of course I could be wrong and DRM could just be the cause of global warming.