That is my point, though. I agree that it's inexcusable to develop for IE only, I just don't think it's fair to say that only lazy or stupid people use IE, as my parent post did.
How narrow-minded. Do you know why I use IE? I used Firefox 1.0, and unless they've improved it since then, it rendered some sites (Gamespot is one that comes to mind as being particularly bad) very slowly, and very inaccurately. So, since I haven't heard of Firefox's rendering improving (of course, everyone raved about how good it was at the time, so maybe my experiences were unique), I use IE 7. The only feature in Firefox that I cared about was tabs, and now IE has that. So, am I stupid or lazy, given those reasons?
You seem to indicate that the PS3 isn't fun, somehow. I bought a PS3 to replace my dying PS2, and I've found it to be just fine on the "fun" factor. Is it too expensive? Yeah, it is. That doesn't stop it from being fun, though... if you call the PS3 not fun, you're basically calling the PS2, the Xbox, and the Xbox 360 "not fun", because they have roughly the same sorts of games available. What's dragging the PS3 down is not its lack of fun, but its price.
Actually, I recently discovered an addon called SpamSentry, which blocks whispers from the farmers. It's done a good job for me thus far, no false positives, and even if there are, you can choose to see the messages it blocked. The final nice thing about said addon is that anyone who spams you is put on a list, and you can open a GM ticket reporting all of those characters with a single click.
What it is:
A stable OS which is an incremental improvement over Windows XP, doesn't sacrifice performance for said eye candy, despite popular belief, and hasn't hit me with a single DRM or activation rule yet. Oh, and, if you were going to play Halo 2 on a console, you'd have done it by now. I played it, and then started waiting for the PC version. Some of us just happen to not be able to stomach FPS games on consoles, myself included, and those are the people who care about the PC release of Halo 2.
I have experienced no sudden reboots, or BSODs, and have been using Vista since release. To be fair, I didn't have the wide variety of peripherals that the author was testing (I'm not big on peripherals), but have been quite happy with Vista's stability. The only crash I ever experienced was when my external hard drive's power connector unplugged partly (enough to give the drive power, but not enough to power it up all the way... stupid power connector), but that occured under XP too, so I find it safe to say that it isn't a Vista issue.
And my extended real-life testing has been positive for me. Is my opinion more valid than his, or his more valid than mine? It's unfortunate that the author of TFA had such problems with Vista, and I really do hope (and demand, even... such problems are not cool) that Microsoft fixes those problems in a timely manner, but the fact remains that not all Vista users are unhappy. Some are quite happy, like me. In that light, I don't think it's MS ass-kissing to say that it's excessive to claim that Vista is "unfit for any user".
When it comes to FPS games there never was a single doubt which one was the best. The Keyboard/Mouse combo will always win out in FPS games over a controller. I agree with you, but there are definitely people who argue that the controller is superior to the keyboard/mouse combo for FPS playing. Strange but true...
No, they're an anarcho-syndicalist commune. They take it in turns to act as a sort of executive officer for the week. But all the decisions of that officer have to be ratified at a special bi-weekly meeting.
Sir, I am torn between respecting the large amount of money you have available for consoles, and seething with jealousy because I can't get my hands on a damn Wii.
I don't care if it has to be sold to the public using terrorism, because it's still an improvement over what we have today. You don't care? WTF are you smoking? Your points were reasonable and clear up until that point. Do you realize what, in effect, you're saying? Let me translate:
"I don't care if our government lies to us about something to pass it, because it's better for us."
There's something horribly wrong if the government is lying to us to pass laws, because we don't think the law is beneficial, and they do. That's a phenomenon I'd rather not allow to happen, thank you very much.
Not at all, but if it's superior we should want to spread it as much as possible (well, unless you hate other people and wish an inferior product upon them... and that's fair, some of those other humans are jerks;)). To spread it as far as possible, we need to make it accessible. That doesn't necessarily mean dumbing it down... it means ensuring that basic functionality is easily understood by all, while still retaining advanced functionality for those who choose to take advantage of it.
It's not a non-issue, because it keeps anyone who's new, or isn't sure what they're doing (like my parents, although they don't use Linux so this doesn't apply to them), won't know what to do. Are you seriously suggesting that people without technical knowledge go and compile the source themselves? Or that they should be able to figure out which version they need? I hate to be the one to point this out, but it won't matter if you explicitly label it according to which distro a format goes to, because to the uninitiated, Linux is Linux is Linux. Yes, Linux isn't an OS for the faint of heart, but if we truly believe in its superiority, we need to make it as accessible as possible to those without any technical knowledge.
I didn't like FF11, but I enjoy WoW quite a bit, and find myself wondering at some of your comments. "You have to play for an hour to complete a quest," is that meant to be taken literally? I do almost all quests in the game in 10 mins, 15 mins if it's particularly difficult.
I also can't help but think that if you "can't find a nugget of story" in WoW, then you must not have paid a lot of attention. I mean, what about the story that's presented in Westfall (if you played Alliance)? There's a good example of story right there. The story in WoW may not be cohesive, but it's certainly there. You aren't going to march into the Twisting Nether and defeat Sargeras all by yourself, but this is simply an issue of not being able to make anyone that special in a game where so many play. Indeed, one of the primary reasons I play WoW is a deep appreciation for the game lore, and its story. I love seeing famous characters, visiting famous places (and making a difference there!), and doing great things in that setting (not many experience the chance to visit Naxxramas, but who doesn't want the chance to kill one of the most powerful necromancers in the world?). Contrary to what you said, WoW is chock full of story. YMMV, and I guess it did, but I will never be able to agree with the conclusion you drew.
The article seems to imply that WoW has somehow paved the way for indie games. I quote:
"Things were much simpler only a few years ago, when practically all video games were developed or published by industry giants such as Electronic Arts, TakeTwo, and Activision.... Then came World of Warcraft...."
Maybe I'm behind the times, but how has WoW made it more possible, suddently, for indie games to make it big? That might be the case if Blizzard were a small-time developer, but we know that's not true. Blizzard might not be as massive as EA, but they're one of the biggest names in gaming, a company who makes games that are universally expected to be good. How does their making WoW change the scenario the author talks about? Just don't get that.
plus the occasional "let me see where you are hiding" trip to the other teams monitors. Ironically, this is the one thing that causes me to favor online gaming over in-person gaming. I consider looking at people's screens (unavoidable to some extent on a split-screen console game, to be fair) cheating, nothing else. It's using information that your opponent doesn't have, information acquired outside the confines of the game, to gain an advantage over them. My friends who I play with don't do this, but people who do give me incentive really quickly to no longer play with them.
"Obsidian's use of pen-and-paper to develop the early areas of Neverwinter Nights 2."
Wouldn't that be considered an amazingly obvious first step, seeing how the game is based in D&D?
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No, you're not.
That is my point, though. I agree that it's inexcusable to develop for IE only, I just don't think it's fair to say that only lazy or stupid people use IE, as my parent post did.
How narrow-minded. Do you know why I use IE? I used Firefox 1.0, and unless they've improved it since then, it rendered some sites (Gamespot is one that comes to mind as being particularly bad) very slowly, and very inaccurately. So, since I haven't heard of Firefox's rendering improving (of course, everyone raved about how good it was at the time, so maybe my experiences were unique), I use IE 7. The only feature in Firefox that I cared about was tabs, and now IE has that. So, am I stupid or lazy, given those reasons?
Star Wars has nothing do do with this, dude.
Please don't give them ideas. The "think of the children" crowd has probably already come up with this, but we can't be too safe.
You seem to indicate that the PS3 isn't fun, somehow. I bought a PS3 to replace my dying PS2, and I've found it to be just fine on the "fun" factor. Is it too expensive? Yeah, it is. That doesn't stop it from being fun, though... if you call the PS3 not fun, you're basically calling the PS2, the Xbox, and the Xbox 360 "not fun", because they have roughly the same sorts of games available. What's dragging the PS3 down is not its lack of fun, but its price.
Actually, I recently discovered an addon called SpamSentry, which blocks whispers from the farmers. It's done a good job for me thus far, no false positives, and even if there are, you can choose to see the messages it blocked. The final nice thing about said addon is that anyone who spams you is put on a list, and you can open a GM ticket reporting all of those characters with a single click.
What it is: A stable OS which is an incremental improvement over Windows XP, doesn't sacrifice performance for said eye candy, despite popular belief, and hasn't hit me with a single DRM or activation rule yet. Oh, and, if you were going to play Halo 2 on a console, you'd have done it by now. I played it, and then started waiting for the PC version. Some of us just happen to not be able to stomach FPS games on consoles, myself included, and those are the people who care about the PC release of Halo 2.
I have experienced no sudden reboots, or BSODs, and have been using Vista since release. To be fair, I didn't have the wide variety of peripherals that the author was testing (I'm not big on peripherals), but have been quite happy with Vista's stability. The only crash I ever experienced was when my external hard drive's power connector unplugged partly (enough to give the drive power, but not enough to power it up all the way... stupid power connector), but that occured under XP too, so I find it safe to say that it isn't a Vista issue.
And my extended real-life testing has been positive for me. Is my opinion more valid than his, or his more valid than mine? It's unfortunate that the author of TFA had such problems with Vista, and I really do hope (and demand, even... such problems are not cool) that Microsoft fixes those problems in a timely manner, but the fact remains that not all Vista users are unhappy. Some are quite happy, like me. In that light, I don't think it's MS ass-kissing to say that it's excessive to claim that Vista is "unfit for any user".
Fool me seven times, shame on you. Fool me eight or more times, shame on me.
No, they're an anarcho-syndicalist commune. They take it in turns to act as a sort of executive officer for the week. But all the decisions of that officer have to be ratified at a special bi-weekly meeting.
Sir, I am torn between respecting the large amount of money you have available for consoles, and seething with jealousy because I can't get my hands on a damn Wii.
What crack are you smoking? Blizzard is not owned by MS, they're owned by Vivendi Universal.
The government does more than one thing, but this is a completely frivolous thing. This is nothing short of a ridiculous misuse of funds.
Er... Firebug is totally on the list.
"I don't care if our government lies to us about something to pass it, because it's better for us."
There's something horribly wrong if the government is lying to us to pass laws, because we don't think the law is beneficial, and they do. That's a phenomenon I'd rather not allow to happen, thank you very much.
Not at all, but if it's superior we should want to spread it as much as possible (well, unless you hate other people and wish an inferior product upon them... and that's fair, some of those other humans are jerks ;)). To spread it as far as possible, we need to make it accessible. That doesn't necessarily mean dumbing it down... it means ensuring that basic functionality is easily understood by all, while still retaining advanced functionality for those who choose to take advantage of it.
It's not a non-issue, because it keeps anyone who's new, or isn't sure what they're doing (like my parents, although they don't use Linux so this doesn't apply to them), won't know what to do. Are you seriously suggesting that people without technical knowledge go and compile the source themselves? Or that they should be able to figure out which version they need? I hate to be the one to point this out, but it won't matter if you explicitly label it according to which distro a format goes to, because to the uninitiated, Linux is Linux is Linux. Yes, Linux isn't an OS for the faint of heart, but if we truly believe in its superiority, we need to make it as accessible as possible to those without any technical knowledge.
I didn't like FF11, but I enjoy WoW quite a bit, and find myself wondering at some of your comments. "You have to play for an hour to complete a quest," is that meant to be taken literally? I do almost all quests in the game in 10 mins, 15 mins if it's particularly difficult.
I also can't help but think that if you "can't find a nugget of story" in WoW, then you must not have paid a lot of attention. I mean, what about the story that's presented in Westfall (if you played Alliance)? There's a good example of story right there. The story in WoW may not be cohesive, but it's certainly there. You aren't going to march into the Twisting Nether and defeat Sargeras all by yourself, but this is simply an issue of not being able to make anyone that special in a game where so many play. Indeed, one of the primary reasons I play WoW is a deep appreciation for the game lore, and its story. I love seeing famous characters, visiting famous places (and making a difference there!), and doing great things in that setting (not many experience the chance to visit Naxxramas, but who doesn't want the chance to kill one of the most powerful necromancers in the world?). Contrary to what you said, WoW is chock full of story. YMMV, and I guess it did, but I will never be able to agree with the conclusion you drew.
The article seems to imply that WoW has somehow paved the way for indie games. I quote:
"Things were much simpler only a few years ago, when practically all video games were developed or published by industry giants such as Electronic Arts, TakeTwo, and Activision.... Then came World of Warcraft...."
Maybe I'm behind the times, but how has WoW made it more possible, suddently, for indie games to make it big? That might be the case if Blizzard were a small-time developer, but we know that's not true. Blizzard might not be as massive as EA, but they're one of the biggest names in gaming, a company who makes games that are universally expected to be good. How does their making WoW change the scenario the author talks about? Just don't get that.
Here you go. FF7 script
"Obsidian's use of pen-and-paper to develop the early areas of Neverwinter Nights 2." Wouldn't that be considered an amazingly obvious first step, seeing how the game is based in D&D?