Sort of along these lines, I think games that you could watch someone play and still be entertained by might be a good litmus test. When the Silent Hill games came out, I played them with a group of 5 or so people. We'd all take turns passing around the controller, every 30 minutes because nobody really wanted to handle the stress for longer. When you weren't holding the controller you were still involved in the storyline (and of course scared and jumping with everyone else when the cat came out of the locker).
My wife decided to watch while I played windwaker. Even back as far as the Sierra adventure games my family played King's Quest 2 all together. (Very strange now that I think back on that)
Multi-user movies is where I'm going. Its the same as watching a movie except when you yell at the character on screen for being stupid and going into the deep dark hole, you can instead turn to Dan and say "Dan, you idiot, you're going to get us killed going in there!"
Any game you can watch someone play and not get bored by them fighting yet another rat-demon, or doing exactly the same combo jump, or going into a room pretty much exactly the same as last, or finding yet another key to open a door. Any game that isn't reptitive level after level and is actually fun to watch when you're not controlling it, will be an even more intense experience when you are controlling it. Imagine movie theaters where everyone plays a role... I'm off track:)
Oh and 2-3 hour video-games would be nice, too (or at least 2-3 chapters so there's a good break point you can leave it for a week or more and not forget everything about it). As long as I don't have to pay $50 for just 2 hours of game time (although movies are getting close to that anyway:). Morrowind is fun, but my wife could give a crap about watching me play that.
But there is also a strong intuitive basis for save points, akin to not being able to rest just anywhere in a dungeon in a D&D adventure.
But I like being able to rest/save just anywhere in D&D. I'm much more interested in following the story and interacting (especially playing around with different character types and alignments in D&D's case). I don't think the designer should force anything on me.
That aside I also like playing nethack, but that game's got *no* story happening and nothing else going for it than the experience of trying to ascend. (Well not nothing obviously its all about gameplay and most of the gameplay is figured out all the crazy stuff you can do. But I could give a crap about @'s girlfriend. I'm sure she's got great curves:)
In my opinion, if designers want to cater to both crowds (hardcore and not) then they should do both. Hardcore gamers don't want the savepoints for obvious reasons. One game I've heard of handling it well is Silent Hill (although I'm not sure how much it is affected.) being that the more you save the more likely you're going to get a not-so-cool ending. And maybe in the same way in a D&D dungeon you should get more experience the less often you use a quicksave. So if you go into the dungeon and lose 3 guys but make it out by the skin of your teeth and resurrect (even resurrect with D&D has built in punishment), maybe the experience reward should be standard (or bonus) there, but if you've played and fought and died and reloaded at each and every battle in the dungeon each battle after gives you that much less experience (because it wasn't as much challenge, not as much reward.) Or maybe in the specific case of D&D saving is the same as resurrecting, especially if you've reloaded. In other games, it just gives you less bragging rights. (I mean that's the point right?... "I've ascended in Nethack with the tourist")
Maybe they are already doing this (don't know), but as a casual player, I don't want to see my quicksaves disappear because someone wanted to soapbox me about how I'm not hardcore enough.
I don't think they do publish them. I was just in this weekend trying to find a gift for my nephew who's really excited that he knows how to read and figured something like that would be perfect (well maybe he'd grow into it, but still...) the woman at the bookstore gave me a weird look and said, "Yeah I think I saw one they published for adults that was a romance novel, but otherwise we just special order any of the old ones."
Too bad. At least I still have the Vampire Chronicals:)
I'm not really positive about this, but this may either aid or hinder that recent publication about the universe actually being a donut. Poincare's original question had something to do with the 3-manifold sphere being the only one of its kind (genus) or something. (See I don't know what I'm talking about.) But this proof might have some application to these recent claims about the actual shape of our universe.
And I guess, if you want some application to that, then you might want to read some of Hawkings' (maybe others as well) ruminations on how worm-holes in 4d space would beat the FTL limit on travel. The paper talks about doing "surgery" which amounts to shrinking the space down to nil, that's pretty much the same thing that worm-holes would be doing at the point in question, so perhaps if the universe is a donut worm-holes aren't a good solution (or maybe they require a torus shaped universe in order to work correctly, shrug.)
Anyway, my point is this stuff really is pretty interesting and useful.
My father-in-law is a mechanic (actually he's a service manager, but he still fixes my car)... I make no fun when he asks for computer help. Having someone get you deal on a radiator (or whatever those big dangly things are that turn and make funky noises) is nothing compared to helping him reinstall windows.
I know some geeks are car guys, but I'm sure alot of people over-using the word Idiot around here, probably look like complete jackasses talking to their mechanics
Probably "A Brief History of Time" but I remember originally hearing about the balloon thing in the 8th grade (14 years ago). Hawking and Penrose still, but it predates the book. Actually I'll just give the reference to my 8th grade teacher. If you can find her you can ask her for a reference:)
I don't think this changes anything in regard to whether or not we should be able to see something half-way around. As I always heard before the assumption was that its like being on the surface of a balloon. (I have no idea the manifold differences between a balloon and a donut other than how it maps onto a 2d plane.) But the reason for the explanation of the balloon was that as you blow up a balloon all points move away from each other. Even those half-way around (where you could potentially see 4 copies from left right up and down. (Oh, hmm, I guess if it were on a donut you'd see only two copies as opposed to 4) Anyway if we do see a greenshift then it means the universe is collapsing again and you should panic... or at least reserve your seats at the Restaurant.
Another example of the arbitrariness of the term "OS" is the way in which various applications programs are now considered to somehow be part of the OS. In Digital's glory days, these were sometimes referred to as "CUSPS"--Commonly Used System Programs. Is grep "part" of UNIX? Is Windows Explorer (not Internet Explorer, but Windows Explorer--the application that displays directory contents and that "start" button at the bottom of your screen--Windows' graphical "shell") part of Windows?
Well RMS seems to think so, at least about grep. Otherwise we wouldn't have to tiptoe on eggshells about that whole "Do you name your OS after your kernel?"... but do we name our OS after our applications?
Either way, I doubt its hard to make a patch which removes that if. Heck if it turns out they do completely remove them, I'll put the patch on my webpage (and no worries, it will be free to download or I'll send it to you for no more than the cost of the medium).
you know as far as mainstream goes, it depends on your audience. My wife came
to linux (because she didn't have a choice!) when we got married from AOL and windows and such. Most of what she did was hang out online and shop online and play games and whatever. She's told me several times she just doesn't notice the difference when she uses linux. I showed her once where to go to load konqueror and how to customize and she thought that was the coolest thing (you know setting her windows a certain way... making everything pink and such... eesh... its frightening but I have to support freedom... I have to support freedom). Anyway one of my friends and I used to play Koules for hours at a time (man that's a cool game) and now we play lbreakout and so does my wife. She thought all the games that came with kde were really neat. She didn't miss windows for that. So if my wife is anything like a number of people who aren't hardcore gamers and like to hang out online, they aren't missing much when they switch (and they probably won't notice the difference unless they make it all pink!)
Of course the only bad part about bringing her over is that she gives me a hard time when I slip and call it lihnux instead of lienux. I've always called it lienux (you know like before that recording), but I figured I'd go with the mainstream at work and call it lihnux so nobody gets confused. But it just sounds less manly, so to her I'm being a wussy when I say lihnux, and... well it is pretty funny... and nobody wants to look like a wussy to his wife, eh?
So what you're saying is that MS is basically a really crappy company that got lucky with 2 products, because for the past 15 years *everything* else is a failed investment and they've made 0 progress?
In fact, the US (if I understand correctly) has a very unusual agreement with Taiwan to jump to their defense if they should ever be invaded by China, even though at the same time the US also officially supports the "one China policy."
Originally and before 1999 (I'm not sure when policy changed) the US did recognize the independence of Taiwan. It was only around the time that China regained control of Hong Kong that the US switched (I'm probably incorrect about the timeline) from Tawain to China (including evicting Tawain from a seat in the UN).
If the defence aliance still does exist with Taiwan its a throwback to when the US officially supported their position. Of course we never did support them enough to get China off their back.
If I remember correctly, almost immediately after China reclaimed Hong Kong they picked up the fight by putting ships in the waters between the two countries and lobbing missiles over their heads (not actually hitting them of course, just "testing the range") Anyway it reminded me a bunch of kids in the backseat on a long trip yelling "I'm not touching you" while holding your finger inches from your face. The US was acting like the father in the front "Don't make me turn this car around, or both of you'll get a spanking"
You know, I like XP and all, but having a chapter title like Hype or HyperProductive (which sounds like Working Hard or Hardly Working... aka Super Lame) is just... Oh I give up, I'm just the Roadkill on the Information Super Highway and other really bad puns or office jokes.
I'm not an informed voter. I don't really read YRO, because its whiney and probably worse than the ads I get subjected to around this time talking about who stole who's cookies in the congress lunch room. (F'ing 3 year olds. The crappers I couldn't stand in highschool are *still* bugging the crap out of me, its just now their interrupting my favourite night time soap operas to do it.) Anyway, if I saw some nice reference list of the geek related issues (which I do sometimes have some leaning for) that people voted for (in the district where I can vote) then I'd actually be inclined to make the decision. Note I wouldn't vote (and probably vote opposite) of just a list of who YRO tells me for whom I should vote. But a refernce list of issues voted for in congress and who voted for what is like a good C++ reference. It probably wouldn't help you learn C++ if you've never coded, but if you have a vague clue you can work out what you need to know from the crib sheet.
Then again, I'd be happy if the world was all corporate sponsored oppressive like Necromancer, then I'd be a leet haxor elf in a trench coat and have a sword and fight corporate scumbags!
Oh man that gives me a icky feeling. You know, like that sound you get when you're listening to your smooth classical music and suddenly the net skips out and the music skids CRRRSSHHHHHHH totally jarring your ears.
So now you've got some soothing touch on your skin and then suddenly the net skips out on you... nasty.
From what I hear of my ex-patriot friends (or that canadien guy I know) the Brits tend to find it *more* funny. Where as Americans tend to laugh at things like the accents and strange situations, the British are laughing because the accents are those of the upper class, yet the activity is something of the lower class. That sort of thing.
Anyway, I don't know it entirely, so I don't want to be elitist, but Monty Python becomes even more brilliant when you put them in context. Give them a zeitgeist, and they become subtle comic genius.
Everything else really doesn't have the value-add to make it worth driving out to a mega-plex to be surrounded by the same people you see on Cops and Girls Gone Wild.
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My wife decided to watch while I played windwaker. Even back as far as the Sierra adventure games my family played King's Quest 2 all together. (Very strange now that I think back on that)
Multi-user movies is where I'm going. Its the same as watching a movie except when you yell at the character on screen for being stupid and going into the deep dark hole, you can instead turn to Dan and say "Dan, you idiot, you're going to get us killed going in there!"
Any game you can watch someone play and not get bored by them fighting yet another rat-demon, or doing exactly the same combo jump, or going into a room pretty much exactly the same as last, or finding yet another key to open a door. Any game that isn't reptitive level after level and is actually fun to watch when you're not controlling it, will be an even more intense experience when you are controlling it. Imagine movie theaters where everyone plays a role... I'm off track :)
Oh and 2-3 hour video-games would be nice, too (or at least 2-3 chapters so there's a good break point you can leave it for a week or more and not forget everything about it). As long as I don't have to pay $50 for just 2 hours of game time (although movies are getting close to that anyway :). Morrowind is fun, but my wife could give a crap about watching me play that.
But there is also a strong intuitive basis for save points, akin to not being able to rest just anywhere in a dungeon in a D&D adventure.
But I like being able to rest/save just anywhere in D&D. I'm much more interested in following the story and interacting (especially playing around with different character types and alignments in D&D's case). I don't think the designer should force anything on me.
That aside I also like playing nethack, but that game's got *no* story happening and nothing else going for it than the experience of trying to ascend. (Well not nothing obviously its all about gameplay and most of the gameplay is figured out all the crazy stuff you can do. But I could give a crap about @'s girlfriend. I'm sure she's got great curves :)
In my opinion, if designers want to cater to both crowds (hardcore and not) then they should do both. Hardcore gamers don't want the savepoints for obvious reasons. One game I've heard of handling it well is Silent Hill (although I'm not sure how much it is affected.) being that the more you save the more likely you're going to get a not-so-cool ending. And maybe in the same way in a D&D dungeon you should get more experience the less often you use a quicksave. So if you go into the dungeon and lose 3 guys but make it out by the skin of your teeth and resurrect (even resurrect with D&D has built in punishment), maybe the experience reward should be standard (or bonus) there, but if you've played and fought and died and reloaded at each and every battle in the dungeon each battle after gives you that much less experience (because it wasn't as much challenge, not as much reward.) Or maybe in the specific case of D&D saving is the same as resurrecting, especially if you've reloaded. In other games, it just gives you less bragging rights. (I mean that's the point right? ... "I've ascended in Nethack with the tourist")
Maybe they are already doing this (don't know), but as a casual player, I don't want to see my quicksaves disappear because someone wanted to soapbox me about how I'm not hardcore enough.
You are in so much trouble now. Don't you realize that code you just published was under NDA? You've got no respect for IP, pirate!
I don't think they do publish them. I was just in this weekend trying to find a gift for my nephew who's really excited that he knows how to read and figured something like that would be perfect (well maybe he'd grow into it, but still...) the woman at the bookstore gave me a weird look and said, "Yeah I think I saw one they published for adults that was a romance novel, but otherwise we just special order any of the old ones."
Too bad. At least I still have the Vampire Chronicals :)
And I guess, if you want some application to that, then you might want to read some of Hawkings' (maybe others as well) ruminations on how worm-holes in 4d space would beat the FTL limit on travel. The paper talks about doing "surgery" which amounts to shrinking the space down to nil, that's pretty much the same thing that worm-holes would be doing at the point in question, so perhaps if the universe is a donut worm-holes aren't a good solution (or maybe they require a torus shaped universe in order to work correctly, shrug.)
Anyway, my point is this stuff really is pretty interesting and useful.
My father-in-law is a mechanic (actually he's a service manager, but he still fixes my car) ... I make no fun when he asks for computer help. Having someone get you deal on a radiator (or whatever those big dangly things are that turn and make funky noises) is nothing compared to helping him reinstall windows.
I know some geeks are car guys, but I'm sure alot of people over-using the word Idiot around here, probably look like complete jackasses talking to their mechanics
Ah. That too :)
Probably "A Brief History of Time" but I remember originally hearing about the balloon thing in the 8th grade (14 years ago). Hawking and Penrose still, but it predates the book. Actually I'll just give the reference to my 8th grade teacher. If you can find her you can ask her for a reference :)
I don't think this changes anything in regard to whether or not we should be able to see something half-way around. As I always heard before the assumption was that its like being on the surface of a balloon. (I have no idea the manifold differences between a balloon and a donut other than how it maps onto a 2d plane.) But the reason for the explanation of the balloon was that as you blow up a balloon all points move away from each other. Even those half-way around (where you could potentially see 4 copies from left right up and down. (Oh, hmm, I guess if it were on a donut you'd see only two copies as opposed to 4) Anyway if we do see a greenshift then it means the universe is collapsing again and you should panic... or at least reserve your seats at the Restaurant.
The joke is on everyone. Its all invented by the same guy and he's laughing his way to the bank. :)
Well RMS seems to think so, at least about grep. Otherwise we wouldn't have to tiptoe on eggshells about that whole "Do you name your OS after your kernel?" ... but do we name our OS after our applications?
Wait, isn't that the Presidential Cabinet? Or am I confused about how corporate america works?
Either way, I doubt its hard to make a patch which removes that if. Heck if it turns out they do completely remove them, I'll put the patch on my webpage (and no worries, it will be free to download or I'll send it to you for no more than the cost of the medium).
You'd have to be, as a Mac user. :)
Of course the only bad part about bringing her over is that she gives me a hard time when I slip and call it lihnux instead of lienux. I've always called it lienux (you know like before that recording), but I figured I'd go with the mainstream at work and call it lihnux so nobody gets confused. But it just sounds less manly, so to her I'm being a wussy when I say lihnux, and ... well it is pretty funny... and nobody wants to look like a wussy to his wife, eh?
I think you're right.
Originally and before 1999 (I'm not sure when policy changed) the US did recognize the independence of Taiwan. It was only around the time that China regained control of Hong Kong that the US switched (I'm probably incorrect about the timeline) from Tawain to China (including evicting Tawain from a seat in the UN).
If the defence aliance still does exist with Taiwan its a throwback to when the US officially supported their position. Of course we never did support them enough to get China off their back.
If I remember correctly, almost immediately after China reclaimed Hong Kong they picked up the fight by putting ships in the waters between the two countries and lobbing missiles over their heads (not actually hitting them of course, just "testing the range") Anyway it reminded me a bunch of kids in the backseat on a long trip yelling "I'm not touching you" while holding your finger inches from your face. The US was acting like the father in the front "Don't make me turn this car around, or both of you'll get a spanking"
You know, I like XP and all, but having a chapter title like Hype or HyperProductive (which sounds like Working Hard or Hardly Working... aka Super Lame) is just... Oh I give up, I'm just the Roadkill on the Information Super Highway and other really bad puns or office jokes.
Then again, I'd be happy if the world was all corporate sponsored oppressive like Necromancer, then I'd be a leet haxor elf in a trench coat and have a sword and fight corporate scumbags!
So now you've got some soothing touch on your skin and then suddenly the net skips out on you... nasty.
Anyway, I don't know it entirely, so I don't want to be elitist, but Monty Python becomes even more brilliant when you put them in context. Give them a zeitgeist, and they become subtle comic genius.
This is a paraphrase from an ex-marine friend of mine. "Travel the world, meet interesting people, kill them."
Girls Gone Wild, eh? Which theatre is that again?