Slashdot Mirror
G4: The Pong Channel?
CoffeeNowDammit writes "Care to watch other people play Pong? You may be able to do so with the debut of G4, a new US cable channel (via participating Comcast cable providers) devoted entirely to video-gaming. G4 will air a marathon of Pong.. 24 hours a day.. see ball, see ball bounce.. for an entire week. Story is here . What a country." This has got to be a joke, right? A fake press release? Please, tell me it's a joke.
This HAS to be a joke..
Or are there actually people who would PAY for this?? (since it's a subscribers channel).
Who wants to watch people playing games anyway? I'd rather play thos games instead of watching.
Somehow, it just wont be as cool as the sega channel...now THAT was hot... Video games are great and all, but watching people play video games rather than playing them yourself... I just dont know. Hopefully, they'll focus more on behind the scenes, and less on famous gamers and whatnot.
Once upon a time...
At least it's a little more intellectually stimulating than, say the average "100 greatest (insert musical genre)" marathons
that heads are gonna roll before the week is out.
"Seriously sir, if we do it for a whole week, people will start tuning in every day!"
Your actions on earth echo in eternity.
I, for one, hope it's NOT a joke. I absolutly love watching others play video games. But that's probably because I suck at them myself. Either way, i'd pay for this channel in a heartbeat.
Oh wait, nevermind.... disregard the above post. I was too stoned to realize what i was typing.
In other news...grass on the median of Central Avenue grew 1" in the past ten days, and the paint dried on Mrs. Jones' living room walls in only three hours!
- Bill
This was obviously for the new Porn channel, not Pong channel. Why on Earth would someone from Slashdot submit a story that had nothing to do with porn and everything to do with nostalgia game play?
I really hate Dan Patrick.
Will there be ad breaks? I just know I'm gonna be in the bathroom when the most exciting goal is scored...
Free Java games for your phone: Tontie, Sokoban
I wouldn't want to be in the shoes of their beancounters when someone else actually reads the market study they've obviously been adhering to and notices that they've mistakenly read that a "pong-marathon" would be good for ratings instead of "porn-marathon" :-)
My Sig: SEGV
Thanks for spoiling it! chrisd: all your plotlines are belong to frontpage.
Squint in amazement at our week long marathon of text based MUD's.
All your favorites, all day, all week long. Don't touch that dial.
?
The channel plans to offer 13 original weekly series, focusing on topics like sports games, gaming reviews, and hints and tricks for winning at popular video games. It is expected to have 350 to 400 hours of original content per year.
The seven-day Pong marathon is just hype - but the channel is real.
The same people who would watch a game as boring as golf or tennis.
Okay, at least tennis gets you in shape. But golf? Please, I'd choose pong anyday.
"Adequacy.org: Where congenital stupidity is not an option, but a requirement."
I thought they were talking about Pong on the G4 (computers), as in Open Firmware Pong from the 98 MacHack Contest
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
Most attempts to do it give you the players POV, which for most games sucks just as much as, say, head mounted cameras in conventional sports. The player dashes here and there, looks left, looks right, and from the players point of view its very straightforward, but from the viewer's point of view its a confusing jerky mess.
What is needed is multi-player games with customised clients that act like camera positions. Put a "cameraman" in charge of the client with pan and zoom controls, and maybe smooth 3d traverse as well, and you would have a pleasant viewing experience.
You also need games that can do well given such a gods-eye view. Quake capture the flag games in fairly open terrain could work very well indeed.
Paul.
You are lost in a twisty maze of little standards, all different.
Porn and Pong! A delightful combination. Just display the bats and ball over the top of some quality hardcore action.
They could even rig the game so the score reads "6-9" during appropriate scenes.
"Why did they cancel my favorite Sci-Fi show? I downloaded ALL the episodes!"
Just imagine all the stoners that they will get watching this channel.
Woh its pong and its moving but I'm not doing anything
Just a joke, don't get so annoyed.
Theres one problem with reflecting your reality, sometimes your reality starts to reflect you.
Which alternates between crap and crap with a Manowar soundtrack. The main show they have involves footage from games with 'real world' music dubbed over the top. Either Eurotrash pop or Power Metal, funnily enough.
They've now started to branch out a bit by having 'review' slots, which can be quite entertaining in themselves, having two guy geeks and a girl geek flirting around and occasionally mentioning the games. But they spoil it all by intercutting the real programming with extended 3-minute-plus adverts for premium rate phone in competitions which are apparently their only source of revenue.
It's crap, but it's watchable crap.
"Why did they cancel my favorite Sci-Fi show? I downloaded ALL the episodes!"
There are a lot of other shows out there presenting the same quality viewing... They are just glorified and called names like reality, social, news...
Come to thing of it, this must be the first show on TV where you get to see what promised!
As for ads, they will just throw subliminal messages. I bet if you watch a ball bounce for a couple of hours, you are receiptive to pretty much everything they show you!
(watch the ball, Luke... (-: )
7 days of pong. Just enough time to build up an audience of people who are used to switching over from Teletubbies as they get baked in front of their TV. Then switch the programing. Hopefully the inertia built up from pure habit will maintain the audience.
Fianlly something worth watching!
"If anyone needs me, I'm in the angry dome."
Hey, pong rocks:
...
http://www.access-music.de/img/welcomejay.jpg
It's clear to me, on a daily basis, that pong is the new religion
;)
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
One whole week of Pong?
:]
That ought to be enough time for G4's top executives to flee south of the border with suitcases full of cash, wouldn't you think?
... to hear the Linux source being read out over radio.
Yes, this shit is real. Those of us that have access to the whole "Internet", and not just "Slashdot" can look things like this up.
What is so unbelieveable about someone trying this? Video games were a bigger market last year than movies. Someone is looking at the numbers and trying to figure out new ways to capitalize on the market. Same old shit, different day.
This is a tactical move.
People will be flipping through the channel and come across pong. They will stop, because everyone recognizes pong. They will see "g4, the videogame network" at the bottom corner. Many people in the target audience will go "duuude, check it out, man, a videogame network.. sweet!.. hey dont bogart that J"
They will look at their tv and say "k, videogame network is channel 42, ill scope it out later." and change the channel.
2 days later.. "what happened to that videogame network.." *flips through channels* "here it is.. woah, coverage of that new ps2 release that everyone is drooling over!"
get it?
no
There was a radio station in Louisville, KY (102.3 FM) that was re-launching back around '96 as a alternative rock station. About a week before they went on the air, they started playing the Beatles song "I Am The Walrus" over and over and over again. The rumor was that they were out to set a record. Either way, people would check in every once in a while to see if the station was up yet or maybe just out of morbid curiosity. When they did finally premier, everyone had heard of them and their ratings were sky-high.
:-)
I'm assuming that the folks at G4 are just trying to create some buzz and do something fun at the same time. So, good luck to them... of course that alternative rock station is now a "smooth-rock" station.
This has got to be a joke, right? A fake press release? Please, tell me it's a joke.
This has gotta be Ask Slashdot. I mean, do "normal" editors post stuff they're not sure of and ask readers to validate/invalidate the news??
Don't quote me on this.
There is going to be more than just pong. There is an article up at CNN about it (which, by the way, I submitted as a story yesterday afternoon, but I digress).
The channel is going to not just show video game play, but also have tips and reviews of games. I get the impression that the shows are going to be like TechTV, but focused completely on video games.
The world moves for love. It kneels before it in awe.
In Germany, NBC runs a couple of related shows under the banner Giga, one of which is called Giga Games this runs for about 2 -3 hours a night, 5 nights a weeks. The overall quality of the show is OK, but sometimes they really struggle to find content for the show, so they end up playing a game and yapping for about 10 minutes just to fill up time slots. I hope that this channel has solved the problem that there just isn't that many games coming out to fill a completly new channel.
Patriotism is the opium of the masses
With a tv card and XawTV on the root window it whould make a nice desktop background...
And it seems to be going ok, they have their own multiplayer online game apparently called Legend Of Mir even which does well.
They do things like game and hardware reviews, visit tech/game shows, interviews with designers, coders, etc etc, it can be very intresting.. Does have its extreme times of crap and theres FAR too many competitions that take up 10min slots..
Not wanting to get marked flamebait, but alot of their reviews are better than the more common web site reviews ALA Slashdot/TomsHardware/Hexus etc.
Laptop Reviews
But i've been dying to see koreans play starcraft.. i hear they already have a starcraft channel in korea! wild!
Sun is Warm, Grass is Green
Yes, in Europe, we already have dedicated game channel which show footage of video games being played. It's truly terrible.
See a typical schedule here, or check out the network's website here
He said "penetration"
Best Slashdot Co
Atari tennis? How about Tank? Space war?
It's good that they decided to pick a classic, but I would have made it a single-day marathon, not a week. That's just too much.
In the future, though, it would be great if they showed off new games as they are released, like Warcraft III, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, and so on. That way, I'd be able to see how the game actually plays before I go out and buy it. Reading the back of boxes just doesn't give enough information on what the game is really like.
The speed of time is one second per second.
All other pong player bow before the power of me ....... the PONG!
if you are not familiar with PONG. Pong is spanish for
I was at a friend's house and he was flipping through the channels and on the home shopping network they had these two guys that looked and talked like car salesman/axe murderers hawking knives at 12:00 on a saturday. They were selling sets of like 100, anyone that buys 100 knives at a time is a pretty good canidate for becoming a sociopath.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
How long beforeApple sues claiming that the "G4" Channel infringes on their trademark?
Wow, I can see some real promise for something like Unreal Tournament. Have the UT hour, where players can sign up to play for an hour, and its commented on like those crazy sports commentator people, and with spectate mode, it would be so easy to set up various "cameras" here and there to keep an eye on the game and all..
;-)
it would be cool
-J
"Software is like sex; it's better when it's free." -Linus Torvalds
I had hoped that this was a chance to watch a bunch of PINGs.
--
(if you're still looking for the point, it was back there, in the post. </sig>)
No, it's not a joke.
Radio stations and TV Channels do the same thing to warm up, testing their time slots to see if the shows end and begin at the correct times and dates.
When MTV began, the same damn video "Video Killed the Radio Star" was looped over and over and over. Now look at MTV, they sure went under didn't they?
Same with a local radio station, for 2 weeks straight they played the same song "Beastie Boys - Funky Monkey", now they're the biggest radio station around here.
Er, what's does Apple have to do with pong?
slashdot!=valid HTML
Could someone please tape this for me?
I will watch this channel as long as it can do the impossible. That is, as long as it does not become a whore for the "already trying to whore themselves" software gaming companies.
While some content will be original, I expect the infomercials to be as indistinguishable as they can manage.
Also, like the Robot wars, and excellent idea for a show, but it has very poor production. Lets hope they hire some TRUE producers even if they are students.
However, if they want me to subscribe to this, we will have a problem. My cable bill is $80+ I really cant see going over that. I already pay $45/month TO game, dont want to pay another $5 to be a voyeur. This should be free to broadband subscribers.
I think its a great way to get publicity. People who haven't heard of it will doubtless notice it, and probably start talking about it...
With that said, most of the potential viewers for this channel will probably be aware of it before it comes out.
In general, I think this idea has great potential; new games can be previewed as video, as opposed to screenshots in mags or on websites. Programmers and game designers can be interviewed, and competitions and events can be covered. Unfortunately, I can't imagine it being much more than a video game slanted infomercial...
ok, people like play with thier balls people like to play with other's balls people like to watch other's play with their balls. The problem=wrong balls
If you're going to do a game marathon to introduce a new station, you can't use Space Invaders, Pac-Man, Frogger, or any of those other games that still come out in new iterations for Windows every now and then. You've got to reach way back into the past to come up with something you can license cheaply enough to make a 24-hour 7-day marathon feasible - and Pong sounds like it fits that bill.
What's your damage, Heather?
Is this just another attempt to cash in on the current Reality Tv fad?
Move faster
Good. Maybe you'll lose some weight then, you fat bastard!
Not really heard of this cable company. What region is served by it?
I wonder if there'll be a Pacman channel next. MS could put out ads with long-haired evil h4x0rz r00ting machines, and a punch-line like "Say No to GPL".
I've heard of some weird fetishes, but whatever moves your joystick.....
Mod Karma -1: I sed bad wurds. If I cep my mouf shut, I wud be at riyses.
I can hear my parents calling me from their apartment a mile away.
"Bill! Our VCR's going crazy again"
They probably won't figure it's just a tv show about Pong. They might not remember Pong at all, even though I still have an old radio shack TV Pong that I occasionally bring to parties (Drunk Pong! Colors!). Sad.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
this one looks serious. .....Price per play for a game which has been widely cloned and is widely available for free has not as yet been disclosed.
Of course, with pause and rewind of live TV, I would never again miss a crucial shot...
Cheers,
Ian
The launch comes at a time when the video game industry is at the beginning of a multi-year growth cycle...
So, someone said this to the journalist in an interview, so he turns around and prints it as fact. Not "so and so says that the industry is..." but, in the same ways ss he would say "the sky is blue" he prints whatever prognostications some industry insider cares to share as if they were physical truth.
Yes, I'm aware that the next statement starts many analysts predict... but that doesn't impact the first statement; in fact, it makes it stronger since it implies that the only disagreement is on the intensity of growth.
That's about the quality of journalism I expect from yahoo. Snarl.
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
Ah.. we're all assuming that this game of Pong is going to take up the whole screen, right?
So.. they probably WILL have pong playing all week.. in a nice little box down the bottom right hand corner :) Nothing wrong with that, surely? Cool idea. It would make a lasting impression when you're watching the channel.
Then again.. if you've already paid for it the impression you want is that you're getting value for money :P
Move faster
Marcus is the Worlds Best TV Presenter!
use constant PERL_IS_BROKEN => $] >= 5.006;
www.allgames.com
.9.9).
www.g4media.com
I don't have cable, so I was hoping to see what this network was all about from the website.
Sadly, it is among the worst, least-usable Flash monstrosities I've ever encountered (using Windows/Mozilla
Front page is a full-screen splash screen followed by a functional full-screen pong game. After this, it then forces you to enter a zip code before continuing. Insert your improvised code and what do you get? A huge new orange window with...nothing in it!
Java/Flash error? I didn't care enough to find out. 1 visitor lost. Lame.
In May G4 takes on everyone's favorite shooter with a weeklong marathon of Duck Hunt! And after dark, we send the ducks home and show nothing but hot clay pigeon action (please, adults only).
All this and more on G4. Insert coin!
Did you ever watch your children play football.
It is all the same unless you are on the field and your body is on the line.
Pong is fine by me.
Cuiusvis hominis est errare; nullius nisi insipientis in errore perseverare.
Sit with a friend in front of the TV and tell people it's a mind-control computer game.
Pity it wasn't out at the start of the month.
Bob.
They could have been broadcasting Van Halen 24/7.
"Why did they cancel my favorite Sci-Fi show? I downloaded ALL the episodes!"
I am really getting upset at /. first they spoil X-files, and I don't get to see it until far later this year, and then this diss pong.
/. in paint on our stomachs.
Pong lovers of the world unite, if we can all get together we may beable to each take a letter and spell out BOYCOTT
Live video streaming requirements to watch G4's top quality transmission this week:
- 300 baud modem
- 6502/Z80 CPU or better
- Video card capable of displaying up to two colours
- 1,024 bytes RAM
- Piezo speaker optional
If it were the Painstation I'd watch it. The Painstation is a version of Pong where one hand controls the game and the other rests in a pain unit. Every time you miss the ball, you get some pain. The first person to remove his hand from the pain unit loses. The pain comes in three kinds: heat, whip, and electric shock.
Those wacky Germans!
Well, not pong, but video games in general. Basically they just show the game while a couple guys play and talk. They aren't especially good, they're not reviewing the game (from what I can tell, and none of the games are new releases) and they rarely show the human players. Usually just the game screen.
Now, this is in a country where I believe there are about (only) 15 channels or so (where I am). It's on during the day too. So I guess someone likes it. In the evening it gets even more interesting when the chat shows begin. 9pm or so one or two channels show what is basically just a pretty IRC console. And you watch people chat. Fun.
I leave for home on Saturday. Gonna miss this place.
I can smell the improper application of an 'offtopic' to this post already....
DataSquid.net, a little about me.
Some time ago I thought about taking older computers from the University and turning them into machines for the unfortunate in my town. The only problem I had was that Windows 95/98 costs money and normal people might not be able to use a Linux box. However, with the features X has nowadays and the idea of maybe giving them to schools instead of (or in addition to) just people/families in the city, I think it could work. Now if I could just get startup money... HAH!
2+2=5 for extremely large values of 2
Non-affiliated plug:
CleverNickName works there. Check out his website for more info.
Praying for the end of your wide-awake nightmare.
Throw a retro-style party with this playing on a bunch of TVs throughout your apartment/house/igloo. Set up the old Colecovision and 2600 to a couple more TVs and bring in the beer!
Will be an interactive game of Tetris!
And, every visitor of our site (coming up soon) will be able to take part in the game! You too will be able to participate in our poll and decide which button should be pressed now. Each hour, majority will be decided and a step of the game will happen, for all of you to enjoy!
Just don't forget to bookmark: www.g4.org!
I'd rather pay for a "Louie, Louie" marathon. Granted, it would have to be just like one of the radio stations here in town when they were down for a format change-- lasting almost 2 months. It was actually nice at times, for comedic value. :)
Nothing like the Soviet rock version of Louie, Louie... Funny stuff! Much better than watching PONG!
There are some Comcast Digital subscribers who got the channel yesterday.
More will get it on May 1st.
And all comcast networks should have it by May 31st.
The website for g4 is http://www.g4media.com
Hey. I remember a
The real question is: will it just be a 20-minute endless tape loop or are they actually going to have a live week-long game?
(Hey, someone should tell Frank Black about this channel.)
(Hamilton, Bermuda). To further enhance the viewing pleasure of couch potatoes everywhere, the Military Industrial Entertainment Complex (MIEC) has announced a new TV channel aimed at exploring the depths of the Information Superhighway!
Called "*ping*", this innovative new entertainment channel will broadcast Internet ping responses to viewers 24/7, and will include commentary by noted experts and Hollywood stars!
An excerpt from an upcoming show is shown below:
___
Professor Farnsworth: Good news everybody...there's a news item on with some very bad news! ... Lemme check." (grabs a kid) "Owww, why you're a cutie!"... (to phone): "About 35 pounds."
11 * * * Request timed out.
Bender: Well I don't have anything else planned for today, let's get drunk!
12 10 ms 10 ms 20 ms g5-1.zur01b04.sunrise.ch [195.141.183.229]
I'm gonna drink till I reboot!
13 111 ms 120 ms 120 ms p2-1.nyc02b01.sunrise.ch [193.192.225.22]
If you don't have anything nice to say, say it often. -Ed the Sock
14 130 ms 131 ms 110 ms 500.POS1-1.IG2.NYC4.ALTER.NET [157.130.22.33]
Fry: Who was that guy?
15 120 ms 120 ms 120 ms 589.at-5-0-0.XR4.NYC4.ALTER.NET [152.63.18.70]
Bender: Your mama! Now shutup and drag me to work!
16 120 ms 130 ms 130 ms 0.so-2-0-0.XL2.NYC4.ALTER.NET [152.63.18.29]
Professor Farnsworth: Everyone's always in favor of saving Hitler's brain, but when you put it in the body of a great white shark, oooooo suddenly you've gone too far.
17 120 ms 200 ms 110 ms 0.so-4-0-0.TL2.NYC9.ALTER.NET [152.63.23.129]
Bender: Would you kindly shut your noise-hole?
18 150 ms 140 ms 130 ms 0.so-6-0-0.TL2.DCA8.ALTER.NET [152.63.3.193]
Bender: I don't want people thinking we're robosexuals. So if anyone asks, you're my debugger.
19 120 ms * 120 ms 0.so-5-0-0.XL2.DCA8.ALTER.NET [152.63.35.250]
Bender: There was nothing wrong with that food! The salt level was 10% less than the lethal dose.
20 110 ms 121 ms 110 ms 188.at-5-0-0.XR2.PHL1.ALTER.NET [152.63.42.130]
Zoidberg: Uh oh, I shouldn't have had seconds!
21 110 ms 140 ms 131 ms POS7-0.GW6.PHL1.ALTER.NET [152.63.38.201]
Bender: Bite my shiny metal ass!
22 140 ms 130 ms 141 ms telebermuda-gw.customer.alter.net [157.130.22.14]
Bender (to phone): "Hello, Imperial Dragon restaurant? I've got a herd of 'you-know-what's' for sale.
____
Stay tuned for *ping* channel news as it happens!!!
-Ocelot Wreak.
"I figure you're here 'cause you need some whacko who's willing to stick his finger in the fan. So who are we helping?
I never got it to work due to lack of boxen, but Quake2 had a mod, Lavacam I think it was called, where a seperate client would connect to the server as a spectator. It would hang around and jump to where the action was. The idea is you recorded a demo while the client was running. Neat idea, I'll have to dig it up again, since I'm no longer box-deficient.
I wonder who's doing announcing? I find it hard to keep up, sometimes.
Well its american TV, so they'll probably have a blue streak following the ball, so I can figure out where it is.
This is simular to what radio stations do when they change formats. We had a station play Louie, Louie 24hrs a day for a week while they switched over. It was pretty funny when they'd ask for requests. I never knew there were that many different versions...
Also, remember MTV with the space shuttle countdown. It's all just to drum up publicity.
Sega tried this to coincide with the release of their Satun console. I believe it was a sattelite channel, but i know they had one. Yeah, it went down the tubes quick, but good luck to G4, ill watch it if its better than what Emeril is cooking.
I want 2D games back.
A pong marathon! I don't have cable so I'm going to have a friend tape it for me! I'll watch it two hours at a time so I can savor the experience longer!
There is a rather large community of competitive gamers, mostly Quake3, Counter-Strike, Unreal Tournament, and now Return to Castle Wolfenstein. Of course the koreans are heavily into Starcraft. A channel devoted to televising leagues and large LAN tournaments would help alleviate the limitations of GTV and HLTV, which are mostly related to bandwidth. Instead of having to limit viewers to the hundreds, obviously thousands would be able to view the matches. Last night over 200 people filled the available GTV slots to watch Clan Kapitol play Kung Fu Clan in the Resurrection2 Quake3 TDM finals.
I also haven't seen anyone mention that your very own "Wesley Crusher" is the host of one of the shows "The Arena".
3dlan.com --> Monthly lan parties in Western NY
Sneak preview
1 1
1 1 1
1 + 1 1
1 1
1 1
1 1
1 1
1 1 1
1 1 1
1 + 1
1 1
1 1
1 1 1
1 1+1
1 1
Match Scores
l33tp0nger vs SkriptK1dd1e 13/12
at@riking vs hax0r 13/12
ashely22 vs k1ngk0ng 13/12
Must be a big kitchen. Or lineal's exaggerating a little bit.
I can see this turning into a larger trend. Remember 'Bang the Machine' a film that some people put together to cover the 'deep' end of StreetFighter tournaments? I believe it got shown on SXSW... Believe it or not these guys play deep strategy, out-psych their opponents, and generally play at the edge of the game's envelope. It was supposed to be a surprising good look into the guys who play the game at the grand-master level and the 'culture' that has formed around them.
. .
now...
try that with pong
. .
.
.
didn't think so...
but in the meantime, check out slime volleyball!
"If I wanted your input on my pet project, I'd stick my hand up your ass and use you like a sock-puppet." - Muse
Mad Blast's Pong
ChuckyG
I remember being very frightened of the whole thing (I was in high school, but it still gave me the creeps) - and now it is one of my favorite cable networks. Go figure.
Also, around 1990, a favorite station near me (it was 93Q in Toledo) went from being a top 40 station to an oldies station (I suspect that ClearChannel bought them out to make way for their own Top 40s station). Anyhoo, they played "Louie, Louie" nonstop for a week. Their press release said that they had looked at the demographics and concluded that people weren't getting enough "Louie, Louie". They were trying to fill that gap. Cute.
All of you dissing the mighty pong should hold you heads down in SHAME! Where would we be without the forsight of [whoeverthehellitwas] hooking up two paddles to a TV screen to play... Computer tennis? No. TV hocky? No. PONG!
beboop. boop. boboop. beep. bobeep.
Pong is a subtle, yet complicated game. I remember my father used to try to give the ball 'a little english' by moving his paddle just as the ball hit. Geez - that move got me every time..
Just imagine the tricks and techniques we will be able to pick up from watching PONG MASTERS on TV!
I'm gonna tape it, if anyone needs a copy..
As soon as G4 appears on f'd company, I'll be adding it to my deadpool.
Wow!
If this is successful, it can open up some pretty cool doors.
If video game gambling ever becomes commonplace, the popularity of this broadcast will skyrocket.
Once popularity skyrockets (corprate sponsorships, anyone?) the door opens up for real professional gamers -- getting real money -- enough to support themselves (maybe a little more realistic than the failed US professional gamers league).
Say what you want about "video athletes", but I'd drop my lame-ass IT job in a heartbeat to play UT for a living.
-Turkey
-Turkey
I've often thought that this could be a good idea. Games can be programmed to have a spectator aspect to them. I mean lets face it, we can make a video game that is fun to play and pretty much looks just like two guys beating the shit out of each other. That's Entertainment!
Hopes:
I hope this will be better than that awful "GamePro" tv show on Saturday mornings many moons ago.
Maybe they will play old episodes of Starcade(I think that's the name), which, according to the web page, featured MANY videogames from the early '80s that I never even heard of before, nor are they listed on KLOV for some.
The funniest videogame tv "show"(on the net, at least) were these 2 guys reviewing Kasumi Ninja for the Atari jaguar. Your typical MK ripoff. The funniest bit, which they played again during their closing comments, was this Kilt-wearing Scotsman who's special attack was lifing up his kilt, and a fireball shot out. Good stuff.
I was hoping for a network enabled version of pong. How long will we have to wait before we can attach to pong servers and pong all night long?
What a cruel, cruel world it is...
The press release is no joke - they really are showing Pong. But the reason behind it is because EVERY cable TV network has to test their feed before they truly go live. MOST networks do something boring like color bars with a low tone. G4 decided to be CREATIVE and show Pong for ONE WEEK and everybody gets all over them. The real programming starts on May 1st.
It figures, though. The last time G4 was announced on Slashdot in November, it got a very heavy critisizm that it wouldn't work from CmdrTaco. I submitted the story it was launching 3 times last week and it was rejected. I guess they were waiting for a NEGATIVE story to come in before covering it at all. So I guess Slashdot will be unsupportive of the new network. Yet I bet if they showed Linux all the time it would be hailed as the second coming.
This may be better than my idea for a "Thesis Defense Channel" -- watch masters and PhD defenses from all over the world, 24 hours a day! Great for insomniacs.
There is a show like this on the network, called "Arena".
One of Slashdot's favorites, Wil Wheaton, is one of the commentators on the show.
Did anyone else watch Dave Attell last night? He was in Charleston, and one of the places he stopped by was someone's house where they were having a LAN party. I must say it was pretty amusing to watch him try to figure out what was going on, but he did seem interested. Probably the best part was when he had a beer with the kids mom. =]
What?
a nifty game show called Starcade was aired. All the latest games, like Pac-Man, Galaga, and Donkey Kong! Whee!
I've been following the progress of this channel for a few week. Over at their website they have been advertising "only X days till launch" and people have been clamoring for a listing of cable companies that will carry it. So the big day comes and its only on Comcast, and it isn't even beginning programming. Pretty crappy if you ask me. I didn't evpect to get it on my cable system (even though we have like 4 financial cahnnels in a rather rural ohio college town...) but I did, and I'm sure that everyone frequenting the G4 message boards were expecting actual programming to start that day.
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
This actually happens with a lot of new channels. If you're planning to show something you have to pay for, you don't want to start with real content. If your equipment gets delayed, or you have problems with it when you start, you don't want to be wasting content you paid for. On the other hand, you don't want to pay for your broadcast bandwidth if you're not going to broadcast anything.
So the usual thing to do is to broadcast something really cheap until you know it's all working correctly. Of course, you run into the danger of people actually preferring the fake content to what you actually want to show. (There was one station that broadcast a camera pointed at a fishtank until they got their studio ready, and then people called in to request the fishtank)
Who remembers "TV Pow," from an independent station in Hartford, CT, possibly channel 64, back in the early 80's?
During an afternoon cartoon commercial break, two kids would call in and play a Galaxian-like game where each time the kid yelled "POW!" into the phone, his ship would shoot. It was comical because in 30 seconds of play, rarely did anyone ever get more than 2 or 3 points.
He looked at me and said, "Kid, we don't like your kind, and we're gonna send your fingerprints off to Washington."
When I was a kid and Nickelodeon was in its early days (not 24 hours yet, and certainly no Nick at Nite), they had some show on early Sunday mornings where a group of kids would just play each other at arcade games. Maybe someone out there knows the name of the show or anything else about it? I loved that show because I dug arcade games but rarely had the money to play them. Now that I have MAME, I am making up for lost time. I was thinking of videotaping my gaming efforts to annoy my wife, but I guess that's another story...
So, is the G4 channel going to be playing Pong on a G4?
"Evil will always triumph because good is dumb." -- Dark Helmet
Lain is one of the best anime series out there - it's hard to describe, but in this context it means the computer model used in the series to connect to the Wired (futuristic Internet, obviously.)
:)
Interestingly enough, they're very very similar to Macs..
I remember this cable channel that just started playing screwed up, trippy visuals, 24 hours a day for what seemed like a month. Then the sci-fi channel premiered in it's place.
This is nothing new.
Karma: Excer..ex...excellahhh...realll good (mostly affected by drinking not done in moderation)
I wonder who the players are. I mean, seriously, with all due nostalgia, who can stand *playing* Pong several hours a day for a whole week. Or are they running the same game over and over (no one's going to notice anyway). But maybe they use computer players.
Check this poll .
Admitedly, it is a gamer site, but the results still are... disturbing...
24/7 footage of people touching up images and creating flashy effects with filters against the decadent backdrop of MacOS X.
This week, Unsharp Mask gets pushed to 150% and Blur More is upset at the arrival of a new Plugin.
I'd pay to see that. No, really.
This is my sig.
This year, when a Rochester, NY radio station was changing formats they played nothing but ABBA for a week.
It created quite a bit of buzz and eventually changed into an all-70's station.
Quoth the Penguin, "pipe grep more!"
It's no joke. It's already on my cable system.
I really have to wonder who'll watch this channel. I happen to like TechTV (which I can't get), but if that channel is falling on hard times, I can't imagine how this one is going to make it.
That light you see at the end of the tunnel might be from an oncoming train.
This might indeed bring viewers to the channel. If they wanted to alienate the viewing public, they'd run a week-long Daikatana marathon. Heh... Daikatana...
Never underestimate the potential of Human stupidity. -Heinlein
What will they come up with next?!? Considering that QuakeWorld has had such features since 1996!
Yeah, and all of that client-side prediction stuff, which reduces lag... yeah, QuakeWorld had that too, since 1996.
I swear, the gaming community has no memory, no sense of history... its all about the latest greatest "hit" game.
http://www.amd.co.at/video/pong.swf
Can I get the job as commentator?
Eventually they began to add names like James Kirk. It was successful in generating a TON of interest.
I can't help it - I'm a 19D.
I thought they were referring to the well-loved drinking game called Pong, played with cups full of beer and a ping-pong ball. At some schools it's sometimes also called beer bowling, you may even know it as something else. Mmm... beer...
I can imagine them doing this... as a tiny little logo in the lower corner where normal networks (read: obnoxious corporate machines that can only differentiate their programming by putting their logo on the screen) Sure, you'll get 24 hours of Pong, but as a little window in otherwise non-related programming.
Is it availiable on C or Ku band, or will it make it to DSS in time?
Oh, I see.
But G4 is a mark of Apple's trade, computer hardware. A television network using G4 as it's name is much different from Compaq releasing a new line of desktops called G4's. It's kind of like how Microsoft can't sue Joe's Windows Factory for using Windows in its name. Logos are a different story, though.
slashdot!=valid HTML
Why does this story sound familiar? ;-)
Those who complain about affect & effect on
http://www.liquid.se/pong/pong.html
That Jesus Christ guy is getting some terrible lag... it took him 3 days to respawn! -NJ CoolBreeze
Get the best pong players in the world (c'mon they just rounded up the best pitfall players ever, i'm sure they're around), add some color commentary, ("hey chip, did ya see the way he winged it off the edge of the paddle like that?!"), intercut the game screen with close up shots of the intense sweaty players, and call it "The 2002 World Pong Invitational". THEN you've got something!
May you be touched by His Noodly Appendage. RAmen.
Pong for windows
Message I got when i tried to go to the site...
for some reason that made my day....
i see a lot of posts of "why watch someone play, i'd rather play the games" I like to paly football, and i also watch people play football. Tka ethe previous sentence and s/football/any_other_game_or_sport/ Interesting eh? So why not watch some of hte best of the best play games online, learn a few tricks and then use those when you go a arse-whoopin online? I know many of my hours and hours belong to many of my friends that were used watching others play console games. I really don't see why this is such a bad thing.
Of course, we knew that but for those whose common sense can get rusty from time to time like me this is verification of it.
Wil talks about how they are getting the buzz out ( and it's working ) about the channel
Wil Wheaton [boldy going where no geek has gone before] is hosting a show on the G4 network
...so I'll do it:
Player on the right wins.
If I want to watch people play games, I would prefer watching in my Online Gaming environment. More Online Gaming Services are implementing this. That way, I could possibly choose to join that specific game, choose which game to watch, and quickly create a new game that others can watch.
http://pixelcort.com/
plum heard some kinda' sad bullshit on rap transista' - Horror/Sci Fi writa' Stephen Kin' wuz found wo'm food in wassups Maine crib dis a.m.. Man! Dair weren't no mo' details. I is shaw everyone in da Slashdot community will miss him - even if yo' ass didn't enjoy wassups work, dair be no denyin' wassups contribushuns t' populah' culture. Truly some American icon.
One of the local radio stations played Ton Loc's "Wild Thing" for 1 solid week. No commercials, no DJ's, no other songs. At the time I had never heard of the station but by mid week it was the topic countless conversations at work and at school. People are wierd creatures.
Simple people talk of people, better people talk of events, great people talk of ideas.
Hey, it's been a month since I posted a reply and funny, the site "claims" that it had been 14 seconds since I made a reply? Funny, cause I used a naughty word...yep a naughty word. IF you Taco commanders don't like naughty words then be a man and say so and none of these lies about how I'm sending too many posts. Pathetic!
It's out, now, in a highly entertaining and usable format. It's called HLTV, and it comes with the current version of Half Life. It is similar to some proxy programs written for Quake World way-back-when.
With HLTV, the TV server connects to the server hosting the game. Then viewers connect to the HLTV server and can watch the action. Not only can they see the game through the players eyes, but they can switch to chase cam view, and an overhead map view that looks like an animated football-play diagram, with little circles running around the map.
In addition, because the HLTV server delays what you see by several seconds, it can find the most 'exciting' content and switch you to it before it happens... did some player get 3 kills in a row? Jump to that! Is a counter terrorist defusing the bomb? Let's see if he makes it!
Imagine if car races had cameras that could be anywhere at any time, and the race was delayed by 30 seconds so they could find the coolest shots before they happened... never miss the beginning shot of the crash again!
I cannot wait to see technology like this spread to other game types other than first person shooters.
"I will trust Google to 'do no evil' until the founders no longer run it." Hello Alphabet.
http://www.blackblack.com/