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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.
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.
Pong? At least give us UT tournaments.
I'll pay only for the very best.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
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.
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.
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.
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. --
... to hear the Linux source being read out over radio.
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.
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
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
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.
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>)
anyone that buys 100 knives at a time is a pretty good canidate for becoming a sociopath.
or a cook.
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?
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.
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.
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.
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.
Hey. I remember a
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.
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.
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.
Or more likely those who want to listen to them on the radio.... :)
GreyPoopon
--
Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?
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.
Nope, it's no joke. You're just taking it the wrong way.
It's a test feed before the real programming starts on May 1st - they just decided to run Pong instead of boring color bars with a low tone for a week.
I thought it was really a creative way to get interest in the channel. Guess I was wrong.
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?
They put up these ludicrous packages of 100 pocketknives or 15 "swords" or what have you. I guess they're trying to appeal to people who think they can resell these at a flea market or something. All for just 2 Flex-Pays of $29.99!
I've been tempted to purchase one of their better-looking katanas but I know they aren't REALLY Japanese... Oh well!
GTRacer
- This space available for just 3 Flex-Pays of $24.95!
Defending IP by destroying access to it? That makes sense, RIAA/MPAA. Go to the corner until you can play nice!
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."
Check this poll .
Admitedly, it is a gamer site, but the results still are... disturbing...
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.
The Katana's are pretty sturdy though, and look nice. so if you are looking for a cheap Katana to use in a short film or a cheap display Katana, they are great. I occasionally buy a half dozen or so Katana's for use in short martial arts flicks I film. We beat the hell out of the swords and then get new ones.
These guys do sell some rather nice knives though, and I have seen people at the local fleamarket selling them for as much as 65$ apiece and getting buyers. Usually you get 1 REALLY nice knife per set of 50 or whatever you buy. That one you can sell, the rest are just crap. So people seem to sell those for like 2$ apiece, I imagine they do ok, 'cause they are ALWAYS out there...
Kintanon
Check out JoshJitsu.info for Brazilian Ji
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.
If they do, they'll just expand the channel's name to "G4M35" ;P
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
Message I got when i tried to go to the site...
for some reason that made my day....
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.