As nice as OpenArena is, QuakeLive will probably have thousands - if not tens of thousands - of players.
This will run in a BROWSER, meaning there's very little security policy stuff to deal with. You could theoretically play it anywhere you have internet so long as you can download a plugin.
They have also stated their support for getting it to work with most major OSes - Mac next, and then Linux I'd presume. (I'm not sure about stuff like FreeBSD or all of the dozens of flavors of Linux). I'd also presume that for the open-source stuff they'd go with the most popular builds first (Ubuntu, etc.) and then trickle down from there.
Before they get to other OSes, though, I think that they will probably be working on stuff like an Opera/Safari/$UNSUPPORTED_BROWSER plugin first as QL already works with Windows.
Some corrections from someone who joined the beta on Jan. 20th:
I tried the closed beta, too. Signup was a PITA (had to create 3 different logins, and then login to each of those to play).
It's two logins: one for the id beta center, and one for the actual site. You can "stay logged in" at the actual site, thereby making it only one login when you pop in to play (the id beta center one). However, the "remember me" checkbox for the Quake Live site has broken recently (at least for me) and you have to log in twice once more. A bit annoying, yes, but it takes only a few seconds more.
And then I couldn't play against other players.
Doesn't happen anymore... you must have been playing at a time that I presume they only had bots running. You should really come back and check it out, things have improved a lot.
It would force me to go through the "training" mode (this is how you move, this is how you jump, etc) which took about 5 minutes, then after that I could play a 1-on-1 match against a bot.
Training mode takes 10 minutes now. There's three basic parts.
1) Crash shows you basic stuff. "This is a jump pad." "This is ammo." "This is a health pickup." This can be skipped.
2) Crash asks you to complete a simple four stage, linear course. The course determines your skill level at a really basic level via three obstacles.
a) Jump onto this little ledge and then jump onto the next.
b) Rocket jump to a high ledge.
c) Use Rocket jumps and/or strafe jumping to travel across a hallway with a timed door. This part was kinda hard for me: I'm a decent rocket jumper, but I'm better with maneuvering than I am with sheer speed.
2) (cont.) This part is also essentially skippable: you can walk through a portal at any time and go right into the 10 minute match against Crash. The difficulty is determined by how far along you got in the obstacle course. id is assuming that if you can rocket jump high and rocket jump fast, then you're probably a good DM'r.
3) Practice match against Crash. This is to determine skill balancing. From what it seems, the skill balancing is adjusted in realtime - for instance, I was creaming her at the beginning (10-1 in a 15 frag match), but Crash eventually beat me 15-13. It seems that the bot got progressively more difficult as it measured my skill. I don't think you can skip this part, but it's honestly necessary for skill-matching to work.
So basically, after download and the 10 minute skill-matching determination match, you're good to go.
After the match was done, it would force me to go through the training mode again. After going through that rigamarole a few times I gave up on it. Not sure if this was a bug or if that's all it was supposed to let me do. If they actually let me play against other people this time around, I might give it a try.
My friend, I definitely think that you played Quake Live at its early stages. It is *much* better now and much more fun.
Chances that a law firm has competent people on staff - who would advise them on the folly of doing something like this, and didn't (therefor they probably don't) - who can get the site back up in a reasonable amount of time: so-so.
Paying the bandwidth bill is small compared to the losses and reputation hit from the site being down.
After all, micro-dicked weasels is a pretty hurtful term, don't you think? What if one of their potential clients see that all these people are calling them that (i.e. micro-dicked weasels)? That would reflect poorly on them and we wouldn't want that.
4. Bunch of idiot lawyers underestimate this "bandwidth" thing and their server gets hammered so hard that it changes its network name to "JAMES_HETFIELD".
Jokes aside, wouldn't this kinda make the Internet go more the way of Usenet?
Instead of alt.cherrycoke you'd have www.cherry.coke
I don't see how it's that bad of a thing. Any company that worries about their brand is going to buy every related brand under the sun. So long as the approval process is very rigorous I don't have such a big problem with it.
This opens up the possibility for a new industry, even - gTLD agents:
1) Collect a set of people with the same gTLD in mind - for example, let's say the domain is.arcade. Examples:
2) Give the equivalent of "pre-registration" for the domains. After info is collected on a certain amount, the agent goes to ICANN with the proposal as well as info on the prospective clients.
3a) If the gTLD is approved, the agent registers the domains for the parties involved (after the gTLD is created) and collects their fees and commissions.
3b) If the gTLD is not approved, most of the money is refunded to the clients. (Gotta pay the agent for making the effort, at least.
To be fair, this is just part of Britain's economic stimulus package. The George Orwell estate and inheritors get a hefty licensing fee for the themes in some of his books that are being used by the government.
True. You can find yourself cursing at them when you get a Steam Ticket error or one of the many other errors that still plague Steam, but they get points for not only making great games but continuing to support great games for years to come. None of that "Drop support after a year" EA business.
AFAIK Valve usually doesn't mess up with activation stuff like that. The biggest one in memory is the HL2 debacle.
Steam's customer support is also dicey. I can't recall ever hearing about a game license being outright revoked (although you can be banned from VAC secured servers for using hacks in game), but obviously accounts and CD-Keys are stolen.
If Valve shores up their customer service issues and makes things like "requires Games For Windows" clear before you buy, it will change Steam from a good service into an excellent service.
A lot of people say that this price increase is due to inflation etc. and that the prices we all remember are impossible today.
I can only think of the games that come out for Spectrum - 1980's, £10 for a "full-price" game, 99p for a budget game (rising to £1.99 and then £2.99 before the end of the 80's).
I grew up in the NES era and I distinctly recall new NES releases going for USD$70 at Toys R' Us. However, I could go to Cartoon Land (local game store) and buy used NES games for $5 or so.
Now a brand new game is $60, but a used game is $15-50.
Another way to do this would be to offer the standard edition for $20 and to offer a "collectors edition" at $60 which has some little thing in it that lets you prove to everyone in-game that you paid for the sucker's edition.
They already do this, except the prices are more like $60 for the standard and $100 for the collector's.
I saw my buddy's Saint's Row 2 collector's edition. The "bullet shaped" flash drive is plastic! What, was adding a few cents for real metal too expensive? I'd have done without the other shit to get better quality pieces.
4. Rather than send out "OMG we totally saw you downloaded our movie/game/etc. we're SUING YOUR ASS" letters, they should send out stuff like:
$GAME_COMPANY has recently detected that you or someone using your Internet connection have downloaded $GAME from $DOWNLOAD_SERVICE, perhaps illegally. You may be in violation of $COPYRIGHT_AND_OTHER_LAWS etc.
Did you know that you can buy $GAME at Amazon.com for $PRICE? We also offer it on Steam for $PRICE and you can download it directly to your computer as soon as you pay for it!
We work very hard on our games. If you like our game enough to keep playing it, we'd appreciate it if you'd buy it and continue to support development of our future projects. After all, the upcoming $SEQUEL_TO_PIRATED_GAME can't come out if $GAME_COMPANY goes bankrupt!
Sincerely,
$GAME_COMPANY
Anyone I know who has gotten a C&D has shredded or burned them without a second thought (except for one buddy who frames them and hangs them on the wall in his dorm room). Why not take the opportunity to try and make another sale instead of taking an accusatory, threatening position? Flies with honey etc.
You have to remember that for non-Steam games, there's additional development cost for Valve to add Steam functionality (in-game chat, game detection, etc.) That's a tiny portion of that cost.
I like how Steam's prices are as high as they are when it comes out. Valve inevitably lowers them not too long after the fact. If you really want the game, you pay a premium. If not, you can usually catch it on sale and save as much as 75%.
Moreover, Valve does a lot of cool shit with Steam, like letting you buy gifts for other people and giving you mod tools that can let you basically build a game from the ground up. They've also begun distributing a few choice mods via Steam as well.
A hell of a lot of innovative technologies were initially funded, popularized, and/or became cost-effective because of their use in the military - like the Internet, which you use to bitch about the very thing that gave it birth.
Seeing the latest and greatest technology to, you know, kill people and blow shit up isn't the happiest of circumstances, but that's reality for you. Politicians want the military to do away with their enemies, and the military wants to kill as many enemies as possible while losing as few of their men as possible and with as little collateral damage as possible. This has resulted in a plethora of technologies trickling down to the public that many of us use in our everyday lives.
So in theory not only could this plane get itself up into space, but it could refuel itself on the ground as well? I don't see how adding a few onboard air compressors for ground-based refueling would hurt.
The U.S. Marines have been looking for stuff like this so they can get around that pesky 50-mile-high airspace and deploy rapidly anywhere around the world. If it could refuel itself on the ground as well, that "12 tons of cargo" could be used to accomidate more than a few soldiers, armor, built-in countermeasures, etc. Take off, land, complete objective, and take off again after refueling.
Slashdot Mirror
And the netcode is definitely improved. Q3 ran like a pile of shit for me, even though I had:
-Cable Connection
-50-70 ping
-Decent graphics, processor, and RAM
QL is Q3 with some balance changes, the promise of new maps, stats integration, and, most importantly, netcode that has been improved by far.
As nice as OpenArena is, QuakeLive will probably have thousands - if not tens of thousands - of players.
This will run in a BROWSER, meaning there's very little security policy stuff to deal with. You could theoretically play it anywhere you have internet so long as you can download a plugin.
They have also stated their support for getting it to work with most major OSes - Mac next, and then Linux I'd presume. (I'm not sure about stuff like FreeBSD or all of the dozens of flavors of Linux). I'd also presume that for the open-source stuff they'd go with the most popular builds first (Ubuntu, etc.) and then trickle down from there.
Before they get to other OSes, though, I think that they will probably be working on stuff like an Opera/Safari/$UNSUPPORTED_BROWSER plugin first as QL already works with Windows.
Some corrections from someone who joined the beta on Jan. 20th:
I tried the closed beta, too. Signup was a PITA (had to create 3 different logins, and then login to each of those to play).
It's two logins: one for the id beta center, and one for the actual site. You can "stay logged in" at the actual site, thereby making it only one login when you pop in to play (the id beta center one). However, the "remember me" checkbox for the Quake Live site has broken recently (at least for me) and you have to log in twice once more. A bit annoying, yes, but it takes only a few seconds more.
And then I couldn't play against other players.
Doesn't happen anymore... you must have been playing at a time that I presume they only had bots running. You should really come back and check it out, things have improved a lot.
It would force me to go through the "training" mode (this is how you move, this is how you jump, etc) which took about 5 minutes, then after that I could play a 1-on-1 match against a bot.
Training mode takes 10 minutes now. There's three basic parts.
1) Crash shows you basic stuff. "This is a jump pad." "This is ammo." "This is a health pickup." This can be skipped.
2) Crash asks you to complete a simple four stage, linear course. The course determines your skill level at a really basic level via three obstacles.
a) Jump onto this little ledge and then jump onto the next.
b) Rocket jump to a high ledge.
c) Use Rocket jumps and/or strafe jumping to travel across a hallway with a timed door. This part was kinda hard for me: I'm a decent rocket jumper, but I'm better with maneuvering than I am with sheer speed.
2) (cont.) This part is also essentially skippable: you can walk through a portal at any time and go right into the 10 minute match against Crash. The difficulty is determined by how far along you got in the obstacle course. id is assuming that if you can rocket jump high and rocket jump fast, then you're probably a good DM'r.
3) Practice match against Crash. This is to determine skill balancing. From what it seems, the skill balancing is adjusted in realtime - for instance, I was creaming her at the beginning (10-1 in a 15 frag match), but Crash eventually beat me 15-13. It seems that the bot got progressively more difficult as it measured my skill. I don't think you can skip this part, but it's honestly necessary for skill-matching to work.
So basically, after download and the 10 minute skill-matching determination match, you're good to go.
After the match was done, it would force me to go through the training mode again. After going through that rigamarole a few times I gave up on it. Not sure if this was a bug or if that's all it was supposed to let me do. If they actually let me play against other people this time around, I might give it a try.
My friend, I definitely think that you played Quake Live at its early stages. It is *much* better now and much more fun.
Chances that a law firm has competent people on staff - who would advise them on the folly of doing something like this, and didn't (therefor they probably don't) - who can get the site back up in a reasonable amount of time: so-so.
Paying the bandwidth bill is small compared to the losses and reputation hit from the site being down.
It could be worse. This could be the 1st duplicate post in this thread after 1 day.
Well of course, power tools are dangerous.
I think it would be unfair to call them "micro-dicked weasels".
After all, micro-dicked weasels is a pretty hurtful term, don't you think? What if one of their potential clients see that all these people are calling them that (i.e. micro-dicked weasels)? That would reflect poorly on them and we wouldn't want that.
.
.
...
.
.
(micro-dicked weasels.)
4. Bunch of idiot lawyers underestimate this "bandwidth" thing and their server gets hammered so hard that it changes its network name to "JAMES_HETFIELD".
I'd hit it with a gavel.
Only if you live in Wisconsin.
Jokes aside, wouldn't this kinda make the Internet go more the way of Usenet?
Instead of alt.cherrycoke you'd have www.cherry.coke
I don't see how it's that bad of a thing. Any company that worries about their brand is going to buy every related brand under the sun. So long as the approval process is very rigorous I don't have such a big problem with it.
This opens up the possibility for a new industry, even - gTLD agents:
1) Collect a set of people with the same gTLD in mind - for example, let's say the domain is .arcade. Examples:
www.penny.arcade
www.play.arcade
www.buy.arcade
www.w.arcade
2) Give the equivalent of "pre-registration" for the domains. After info is collected on a certain amount, the agent goes to ICANN with the proposal as well as info on the prospective clients.
3a) If the gTLD is approved, the agent registers the domains for the parties involved (after the gTLD is created) and collects their fees and commissions.
3b) If the gTLD is not approved, most of the money is refunded to the clients. (Gotta pay the agent for making the effort, at least.
I predict that .dot will be popular.
To be fair, this is just part of Britain's economic stimulus package. The George Orwell estate and inheritors get a hefty licensing fee for the themes in some of his books that are being used by the government.
True. You can find yourself cursing at them when you get a Steam Ticket error or one of the many other errors that still plague Steam, but they get points for not only making great games but continuing to support great games for years to come. None of that "Drop support after a year" EA business.
AFAIK Valve usually doesn't mess up with activation stuff like that. The biggest one in memory is the HL2 debacle.
Steam's customer support is also dicey. I can't recall ever hearing about a game license being outright revoked (although you can be banned from VAC secured servers for using hacks in game), but obviously accounts and CD-Keys are stolen.
If Valve shores up their customer service issues and makes things like "requires Games For Windows" clear before you buy, it will change Steam from a good service into an excellent service.
With the speed of the Internet and the rapid work of game crackers, the "buy it to copy it" scheme isn't worth the time anymore.
Besides, if that was really a major concern of theirs, then they wouldn't make it possible to rent games.
A lot of people say that this price increase is due to inflation etc. and that the prices we all remember are impossible today.
I can only think of the games that come out for Spectrum - 1980's, £10 for a "full-price" game, 99p for a budget game (rising to £1.99 and then £2.99 before the end of the 80's).
I grew up in the NES era and I distinctly recall new NES releases going for USD$70 at Toys R' Us. However, I could go to Cartoon Land (local game store) and buy used NES games for $5 or so.
Now a brand new game is $60, but a used game is $15-50.
Another way to do this would be to offer the standard edition for $20 and to offer a "collectors edition" at $60 which has some little thing in it that lets you prove to everyone in-game that you paid for the sucker's edition.
They already do this, except the prices are more like $60 for the standard and $100 for the collector's.
I saw my buddy's Saint's Row 2 collector's edition. The "bullet shaped" flash drive is plastic! What, was adding a few cents for real metal too expensive? I'd have done without the other shit to get better quality pieces.
Piracy on the whole
I believe the term for that is "butt piracy".
4. Rather than send out "OMG we totally saw you downloaded our movie/game/etc. we're SUING YOUR ASS" letters, they should send out stuff like:
$GAME_COMPANY has recently detected that you or someone using your Internet connection have downloaded $GAME from $DOWNLOAD_SERVICE, perhaps illegally. You may be in violation of $COPYRIGHT_AND_OTHER_LAWS etc.
Did you know that you can buy $GAME at Amazon.com for $PRICE? We also offer it on Steam for $PRICE and you can download it directly to your computer as soon as you pay for it!
We work very hard on our games. If you like our game enough to keep playing it, we'd appreciate it if you'd buy it and continue to support development of our future projects. After all, the upcoming $SEQUEL_TO_PIRATED_GAME can't come out if $GAME_COMPANY goes bankrupt!
Sincerely, $GAME_COMPANY
Anyone I know who has gotten a C&D has shredded or burned them without a second thought (except for one buddy who frames them and hangs them on the wall in his dorm room). Why not take the opportunity to try and make another sale instead of taking an accusatory, threatening position? Flies with honey etc.
You have to remember that for non-Steam games, there's additional development cost for Valve to add Steam functionality (in-game chat, game detection, etc.) That's a tiny portion of that cost.
I like how Steam's prices are as high as they are when it comes out. Valve inevitably lowers them not too long after the fact. If you really want the game, you pay a premium. If not, you can usually catch it on sale and save as much as 75%.
Moreover, Valve does a lot of cool shit with Steam, like letting you buy gifts for other people and giving you mod tools that can let you basically build a game from the ground up. They've also begun distributing a few choice mods via Steam as well.
Psst... MAME is often used for arcade ROMs. What, do you expect him to buy a $5,000+ arcade box?
What if I want to buy BlazBlue which isn't on any consoles yet? I can't, and good luck finding a machine within walking distance.
A hell of a lot of innovative technologies were initially funded, popularized, and/or became cost-effective because of their use in the military - like the Internet, which you use to bitch about the very thing that gave it birth.
Seeing the latest and greatest technology to, you know, kill people and blow shit up isn't the happiest of circumstances, but that's reality for you. Politicians want the military to do away with their enemies, and the military wants to kill as many enemies as possible while losing as few of their men as possible and with as little collateral damage as possible. This has resulted in a plethora of technologies trickling down to the public that many of us use in our everyday lives.
So in theory not only could this plane get itself up into space, but it could refuel itself on the ground as well? I don't see how adding a few onboard air compressors for ground-based refueling would hurt.
The U.S. Marines have been looking for stuff like this so they can get around that pesky 50-mile-high airspace and deploy rapidly anywhere around the world. If it could refuel itself on the ground as well, that "12 tons of cargo" could be used to accomidate more than a few soldiers, armor, built-in countermeasures, etc. Take off, land, complete objective, and take off again after refueling.
The trick is to build the receiving stations out in the desert or places where missing by a degree or two isn't going to incinerate Small Town, USA.