My objection is to the inherent stupidity of "ratings" schemes. They should just say what's in the games (blood, sex, violence, drugs, whatever) but leave age ranges out of it.
My main objection to ESRB is that games have varying levels of potentially offensive content, but due to the broad strokes of the ESRB ratings, there is no difference between a game like GTA IV Halo 2, and Resident Evil.
In MY family (key word, MY) there's nothing wrong with a little mindless FPS fragging. In other families, there's nothing wrong with a little scary zombie action. To each their own so screw the ESRB and their arbitrary age recommendations.
At a deeper level, the real problem with the ESRB is it gives parents a free pass from parenting. Oh, this one is rated 10+ so my emotionally unstable 11 year old can play it! I personally play all the games first, then deem what is ok for my kids.
I'm sorry if I take offense when I'm patronized by such well-meaning "boards" like the ESRB or the movie rating people, but I think I'm pretty much the norm for intelligent, free-thinkers of the world.
First, any blog on the NYT web site carries the implication that it is backed by the NYT itself. Second, the article is overtly biased positively towards the common Sense Media's list. Since the NYT allows this blog (unless there's the standard OP-ED disclaimer, which I didn't look for), then there is nothing wrong with attributing this list to the NYT.
ESRB ratings can shove it. I'm far more qualified to know what is good/bad for my kids than a bunch of bible-thumping moralist lobbyists.
America needs to get over it. We are conservative, uptight little bitches in the eyes of the rest of the western world, deservedly so for shit just like the ESRB, the fact that shit is a "dirty" word, and the fact that entire networks are nearly shut down for displaying a nipple.
...things that have been proven to have a negative effect on children
This tired argument again? I won a writing award when I was 17 debunking the myth that video games and violent cartoons have a "negative effect" on kids. Of course when I was 17, video games were: Zork, Pac-Man, Donkey Kong (super violent and sexist), and Asteroids.
If we can provide citizens with Universal Single Payer Health Care for $32.8 million over 10 years, I'd say you have a point. Something tells me that $32.8 million wouldn't last very long though.
As a 12-year vet myself, it is pretty clear to me, and the overwhelming majority of people who sign up, that our military is completely voluntary, so nobody is being sent "to their death".
$10 an hour for a recruiter? Most recruiters are in the E6-E8 range, which is a salary roughly around the $50,000 a year mark. That's a lot more than $10 an hour!
more people die every year from just car accidents, and we don't declare war on Ford or Toyota."
If Ford and Toyota willingly created devices that were meant solely to kill people for ideological reasons, we most certainly would and should declare war on them.
Probably the same reason I get pissy when I see Lady GaGa or some other garbage at the #1 spot on the charts. My standards aren't super-high, but certainly society can do better than Lady GaGa and Farmville.
Even worse are the ones who post pictures that are only a few years after high school (so you think they are current and still hot) only to find out that picture was 5 years after high school, but you graduated 20 years ago.
Women aren't any less intelligent than men, and they think they are less intelligent because they spend their entire lives being told (overtly and subliminally) that the aren't as smart as men.
You would at LEAST accept the technical and artistic merit of PBS programming, wouldn't you? It's one thing to dislike something because of its message, but you can't really criticize Frontline, Nova, et. al. for being low budget, low quality productions.
Hell, I've said the reason Fox News is so popular is because their production value is (or was, it's gone downhill over the past 8 years) was very high. The content was a bit suspect, but it LOOKED really good. I watched the 2000 and 2004 elections on that channel, simply for their technical merit. I really think Fox jumped the shark sometime around the 2004 election though, and couldn't stomach it for the last election.
Nice info! As a devout accoustic drummer, I'm not familiar with the "ION" midi kit, but I've always thought some of those expensive, realistic Yamaha electric kits would be good to plug into a game like that.
I'd be happy with having a choice of two or three alternative providers. I live in a city of 1.6 million people, yet in my part of town, there is only ONE cable provider available. I could get satellite, I suppose, but it sure would be nice for some competition, so that Time Warner can't just arbitrarily make up rates, and then lose NBC broadcast rights every fall.
Any "comment" that makes it clear you haven't inspected the game options is not a very good comment. You can disable traction and braking assist.
It's relative. Even with all assists turned off (which is the only way to play a sim for realism anyway. The only reason those options are even there is to let casual players have fun) console racing games are too easy. For reference, try Grand Prix Legends, or NASCAR 2003. Those are the two benchmarks for traction realism in racing sims (and I'm sure there are newer breeds of serious sim racers, but they aren't mass produced console games).
The best racing line in a sim may be marred in real life by worn out pavement, or an off-camber layout (only one game I've ever played has successfully simulated an off-camber turn realistically, Grand Prix Legends, the first left hander after the short chute at Watkins Glen).
Nothing can really simulate it because you cannot feel what the car is doing — there is no car. How would you know if the simulation was correct?
With tactile and visual feedback, you can "simulate" car control when confronted with something nasty like an abrupt change in banking in a NASCAR game (going from the banked turn to the flat part at the bottom of the track), or when you miss the line in Grand Prix Legends at Watkins Glen, and the off camber part of the track pulls your car to the outside. Or like how "Flugplatz" and similar humps on the Nurburgring actually make your car lighter and thus lose traction, especially taking into account the amount of throttle input that is applied. Console games rarely take this sort of physics rendering into consideration. They do, to an extent, but mostly its just a lot of engine/tire noise, with no actual negative lateral integrity applied to the sim vehicle (in other words, you can just point the steering wheel and mash the gas and brakes with relative impunity, compared to the real thing, or compared to a "good" racing sim).
Yes, the Army, especially future weapons, relies heavily on simulations. The entire point of simulations is that you can start/stop/redo when a mistake is made, and it doesn't cost any logistics. You can also program many more unexpected scenarios than can be trained in real life. My program trains the soldiers how to use the command and control computer software (not the weapon systems themselfs), but they take the training in real versions of the vehicles that the computers are in, to help duplicate the engine noise, smells, crampped quarters, etc.
My initial point is that the Army doesn't officially sanction any commercial games for use as a training tool. We have plenty of programs that use proprietary "games" (if you want to call them that) and the inclusion of something like America's Army (a recruiting tool, not a training tool) is ludicrous, wishful thinking on behalf of the slashdot readership.
Actually, you need good pedals. Race car control requires more throttle and brake control than steering wheel input. Any racer will tell you that you steer the car with the throttle.
I heard that story when it aired. The freaky part is that the UAV pilots get off duty and go back to their homes...they have more stress than guys on the ground, 24/7 engaged. The guys who pull their UAV shifts have a hard time going from "war mode" to "grocery shopping, then soccer match" mode.
Time Warner has had four public spats in Austin and San Antonio since I moved here two years ago. The first time I gave the benefit of the doubt to Time Warner. Those bastard NBC affiliates want to charge Time Warner for access...screw NBC! Then I heard the same claim in San Antonio, except it was ABC being the meanie. Then again last fall, Time Warner claimed NBC was raising rates, and they lost the NFL network for the same reason. Then I hear in San Antonio, they have the NFL network, but another NBC affiliate there wants more money.
It's time for Time Warner to take a close look and understand that when everybody is out to get you, maybe YOU are the problem.
By the way, AT&T in Austin has NFL network and has had zero conflict with NBC and ABC, no network tv outages, and they haven't raised their rates in two years. Time Warner not only lost NBC (twice) for the entire Fall, and NEVER got the NFL network back, they've also raised my rates three times, claiming they had to do so because of NBC and ABC...convenient, that.
These games DO lay the groundwork for future success...by developing interest in music/racing sims/whatever. The version that I tried didn't even have a base drum pedal (you hit the orange one on the right with a stick instead). You also ended up hitting every drum with one hand if you wanted to, which is good if you are Rick Allen.
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My objection is to the inherent stupidity of "ratings" schemes. They should just say what's in the games (blood, sex, violence, drugs, whatever) but leave age ranges out of it.
My main objection to ESRB is that games have varying levels of potentially offensive content, but due to the broad strokes of the ESRB ratings, there is no difference between a game like GTA IV Halo 2, and Resident Evil.
In MY family (key word, MY) there's nothing wrong with a little mindless FPS fragging. In other families, there's nothing wrong with a little scary zombie action. To each their own so screw the ESRB and their arbitrary age recommendations.
At a deeper level, the real problem with the ESRB is it gives parents a free pass from parenting. Oh, this one is rated 10+ so my emotionally unstable 11 year old can play it! I personally play all the games first, then deem what is ok for my kids.
I'm sorry if I take offense when I'm patronized by such well-meaning "boards" like the ESRB or the movie rating people, but I think I'm pretty much the norm for intelligent, free-thinkers of the world.
First, any blog on the NYT web site carries the implication that it is backed by the NYT itself. Second, the article is overtly biased positively towards the common Sense Media's list. Since the NYT allows this blog (unless there's the standard OP-ED disclaimer, which I didn't look for), then there is nothing wrong with attributing this list to the NYT.
ESRB ratings can shove it. I'm far more qualified to know what is good/bad for my kids than a bunch of bible-thumping moralist lobbyists.
America needs to get over it. We are conservative, uptight little bitches in the eyes of the rest of the western world, deservedly so for shit just like the ESRB, the fact that shit is a "dirty" word, and the fact that entire networks are nearly shut down for displaying a nipple.
My 13 year old has four or five L70+ WoW characters and wants Dragon Age for Christmas. Seems like a no-brainer to me.
the game features combat, decapitations and swords plunged into the chests of both people and dragons.
FTA:
...things that have been proven to have a negative effect on children
This tired argument again? I won a writing award when I was 17 debunking the myth that video games and violent cartoons have a "negative effect" on kids. Of course when I was 17, video games were: Zork, Pac-Man, Donkey Kong (super violent and sexist), and Asteroids.
If we can provide citizens with Universal Single Payer Health Care for $32.8 million over 10 years, I'd say you have a point. Something tells me that $32.8 million wouldn't last very long though.
As a 12-year vet myself, it is pretty clear to me, and the overwhelming majority of people who sign up, that our military is completely voluntary, so nobody is being sent "to their death".
$10 an hour for a recruiter? Most recruiters are in the E6-E8 range, which is a salary roughly around the $50,000 a year mark. That's a lot more than $10 an hour!
War is foolish...
Speaking of foolish...
more people die every year from just car accidents, and we don't declare war on Ford or Toyota."
If Ford and Toyota willingly created devices that were meant solely to kill people for ideological reasons, we most certainly would and should declare war on them.
Worse than the Kiss movie?
Probably the same reason I get pissy when I see Lady GaGa or some other garbage at the #1 spot on the charts. My standards aren't super-high, but certainly society can do better than Lady GaGa and Farmville.
Even worse are the ones who post pictures that are only a few years after high school (so you think they are current and still hot) only to find out that picture was 5 years after high school, but you graduated 20 years ago.
I admit it. I am addicted to Farmville. I can't stop myself from pressing the "Ignore Farmville" button.
Women aren't any less intelligent than men, and they think they are less intelligent because they spend their entire lives being told (overtly and subliminally) that the aren't as smart as men.
You would at LEAST accept the technical and artistic merit of PBS programming, wouldn't you? It's one thing to dislike something because of its message, but you can't really criticize Frontline, Nova, et. al. for being low budget, low quality productions.
Hell, I've said the reason Fox News is so popular is because their production value is (or was, it's gone downhill over the past 8 years) was very high. The content was a bit suspect, but it LOOKED really good. I watched the 2000 and 2004 elections on that channel, simply for their technical merit. I really think Fox jumped the shark sometime around the 2004 election though, and couldn't stomach it for the last election.
Nice info! As a devout accoustic drummer, I'm not familiar with the "ION" midi kit, but I've always thought some of those expensive, realistic Yamaha electric kits would be good to plug into a game like that.
I think it was Rock Band at Best Buy..no bass drum pedal setup.
I'd be happy with having a choice of two or three alternative providers. I live in a city of 1.6 million people, yet in my part of town, there is only ONE cable provider available. I could get satellite, I suppose, but it sure would be nice for some competition, so that Time Warner can't just arbitrarily make up rates, and then lose NBC broadcast rights every fall.
Any "comment" that makes it clear you haven't inspected the game options is not a very good comment. You can disable traction and braking assist.
It's relative. Even with all assists turned off (which is the only way to play a sim for realism anyway. The only reason those options are even there is to let casual players have fun) console racing games are too easy. For reference, try Grand Prix Legends, or NASCAR 2003. Those are the two benchmarks for traction realism in racing sims (and I'm sure there are newer breeds of serious sim racers, but they aren't mass produced console games).
The best racing line in a sim may be marred in real life by worn out pavement, or an off-camber layout (only one game I've ever played has successfully simulated an off-camber turn realistically, Grand Prix Legends, the first left hander after the short chute at Watkins Glen).
Nothing can really simulate it because you cannot feel what the car is doing — there is no car. How would you know if the simulation was correct?
With tactile and visual feedback, you can "simulate" car control when confronted with something nasty like an abrupt change in banking in a NASCAR game (going from the banked turn to the flat part at the bottom of the track), or when you miss the line in Grand Prix Legends at Watkins Glen, and the off camber part of the track pulls your car to the outside. Or like how "Flugplatz" and similar humps on the Nurburgring actually make your car lighter and thus lose traction, especially taking into account the amount of throttle input that is applied. Console games rarely take this sort of physics rendering into consideration. They do, to an extent, but mostly its just a lot of engine/tire noise, with no actual negative lateral integrity applied to the sim vehicle (in other words, you can just point the steering wheel and mash the gas and brakes with relative impunity, compared to the real thing, or compared to a "good" racing sim).
Yes, the Army, especially future weapons, relies heavily on simulations. The entire point of simulations is that you can start/stop/redo when a mistake is made, and it doesn't cost any logistics. You can also program many more unexpected scenarios than can be trained in real life. My program trains the soldiers how to use the command and control computer software (not the weapon systems themselfs), but they take the training in real versions of the vehicles that the computers are in, to help duplicate the engine noise, smells, crampped quarters, etc.
My initial point is that the Army doesn't officially sanction any commercial games for use as a training tool. We have plenty of programs that use proprietary "games" (if you want to call them that) and the inclusion of something like America's Army (a recruiting tool, not a training tool) is ludicrous, wishful thinking on behalf of the slashdot readership.
Actually, you need good pedals. Race car control requires more throttle and brake control than steering wheel input. Any racer will tell you that you steer the car with the throttle.
No. TFA proves that a guy with superior video gaming skills possesses a skill that is pertinent to both video gaming and race car driving.
I heard that story when it aired. The freaky part is that the UAV pilots get off duty and go back to their homes...they have more stress than guys on the ground, 24/7 engaged. The guys who pull their UAV shifts have a hard time going from "war mode" to "grocery shopping, then soccer match" mode.
Time Warner has had four public spats in Austin and San Antonio since I moved here two years ago. The first time I gave the benefit of the doubt to Time Warner. Those bastard NBC affiliates want to charge Time Warner for access...screw NBC! Then I heard the same claim in San Antonio, except it was ABC being the meanie. Then again last fall, Time Warner claimed NBC was raising rates, and they lost the NFL network for the same reason. Then I hear in San Antonio, they have the NFL network, but another NBC affiliate there wants more money.
It's time for Time Warner to take a close look and understand that when everybody is out to get you, maybe YOU are the problem.
By the way, AT&T in Austin has NFL network and has had zero conflict with NBC and ABC, no network tv outages, and they haven't raised their rates in two years. Time Warner not only lost NBC (twice) for the entire Fall, and NEVER got the NFL network back, they've also raised my rates three times, claiming they had to do so because of NBC and ABC...convenient, that.
Here's Time Warner Cable's incredibly lame attempt to persuade consumers that the networks are to blame: http://www.rolloverorgettough.com/?IID=15DC9682-3A72-4D85-BCC9-7D4D2EB8E02C
These games DO lay the groundwork for future success...by developing interest in music/racing sims/whatever. The version that I tried didn't even have a base drum pedal (you hit the orange one on the right with a stick instead). You also ended up hitting every drum with one hand if you wanted to, which is good if you are Rick Allen.