I would seriously recommend turning away those bigger clients for now until you first get the staffing to handle it. You can try to pick up the clients later. Maybe they'll hire someone else, but there is a chance that they will be unhappy with that someone else and come to you. You don't want to take the clients on now and screw up and ruin your reputation. If at all possible, hire someone (or multiple people) who already have experience with larger networks and kill two birds with one stone. I don't think it is really worth it to give you advice here on how to manage larger networks. You've got staffing problems. You need to address that first.
-matthew
Re:what is up with Elder Scrolls III???
on
Game Breakers
·
· Score: 1
I've played through all the way once and found it to be entertaining throughout even with the leveling. I never dreaded a bandit, although I suppose I could have dreaded some of the bigger beasties more (since it seems they were leveled down) but it was a fun experience nonetheless.
I gave up about half way though. The game seemed very uniform and homogeneous. There was little sense that there were places/quests that I should absolutely avoid until I got a better character. But maybe that is what they were trying to accomplish. Perhaps when your choices are driven by what is and what isn't doable at any given time, the game is far less open ended. In other words, your path is determined by difficulty. Like you have to do A (because it is easier) before B (which requires lvl 3+, for example), and B before C, etc.
It just seemd very unnatural for the world to adapt to my character rather than the other way around.
-matthew
Re:what is up with Elder Scrolls III???
on
Game Breakers
·
· Score: 1
While not a perfect 10/10 game, Oblivion is an amazing game simply because it does so much right that games over the last 10 years or more have manager to do wrong over and over and over again.
Of course then they went and created a messed up leveling/skill system.
"Hey, that's funny, every time i level, so does every other creature/person in the world. What is the point of leveling again?"
I must say that is quite strange to dread the next character level... I give 'em points for being different, if nothing else.
I'm not sure about ToME's variety, reading about the game makes it seem that, like most of the Angband descendants, it is very much a player versus monsters game, without that much else. I've made the point repeatedly in the column so far that the most interesting things about roguelikes, in the end, is the item ID system and having to figure out what things do, and the 'bands tend to greatly reduce its role in the game.
Dude, have you ever even played a roguelike before? They are ALL ABOUT player versus monster. IDing items is traditionally just an obstacle to the ultimate goal of defeating the Wizard or similar. The original Rogue left very little to discover beyond identifying a fixed set of potions and scrolls. ToME increases the complexity of skills/items by an order of magitude and it adds extra dimensions such as alchemy where you can design your own artifacts using ingredients found while exploring. ToME is so complex and has so much to discover that it is nearly impossible to finish without spoilers.
I've been playing rogue-likes for 20 years, BTW. You have no idea what you are talking about.
I read the column, and it seems to make a very good case for why that game ISN'T rogue-like at all. You have like 10 paragraphs outlining the aspects that differentiate it from roguelike games and a single paragraph which makes some vague correlations to rogue-like games, e.g. the idea of not being able to revert to saved games.
While you do raise some valid points, I think you're jumping the gun in saying it "wouldn't work well", especially if you haven't checked out Dwarf Fortress, which does run in a pretty much "real time" during Fortress Mode.
Maybe Dwarf Fortress would work in multiplayer mode, but it doesn't sounds very "rogue-like" at all other than being ASCII graphics based.
Of course, since your job is to plan out and design a fortress, you go through the usual pause/plan/unpause cycle you mentioned, but I think that's because you're controlling several dwarves instead of a single one. Perhaps saying "Rogue-like MMORPG" is overstating it on my part since, as you point out, the Rogue style of gameplay would need to be modified to accomodate situations like you mentioned.
My point is that the style gameplay is one of the primary features that makes a rogue-like rogue-like. Take that away and all you have is an ASCII graphics MUD. And that is just wierd.
also can't stand spotlight. It is a resource hog and doesn't work well, plus it takes up critical real estate on the menu bar. "locate" in an xterm works much better. At least removing spotlight entirely was possible.
Except that "locate" doesn't index the contents all your files... including Email. That is what makes spotlight powerful. But yeah, it sucks what the indexer starts at really bad times. Like if you plug in a Firewire drive.
I think the next evolution of Rogue-like games is the MMORPG. You can quote me on this: we will see a Rogue-like MMORPG before the decade is done. Not a MUD, mind you, a real Rogue/NetHack-ish MMORPG, possibly with PvP. Take that, WoW!
Actually, there is already a multiplayer version of ToME: http://www.t-o-m-e.net/main.php?tome_current=1 Unfortunately Rogue-like games don't really work well in multiplayer mode because the game style is strategy, not action. In other words, you don't play in real time. You are meant to pause and plan out moves. And when you pause, the game pauses. It is very difficult to synchronize multiple players when each one is taking turns at their own pace. For example, lets say you have two players in a room. One player is doing careful, turn by turn battle with a monster and one player is just passing through. How do you resolve the different turn rates?
I had the "OMG! Multiplayer Nethack would be so awesome!" bug like ten years ago. I've given it lots of thought. It just wouldn't work well.
There's an isometric graphical version out there on the *almost* latest edition.
By "state of the art" I mean gameplay and variety of experience... not graphics. I've tried the isometric frontends to Nethack and they are awful. They are difficult to play because you can't see very much of the map on the screen at any given time. Very hard to plan moves or make escapes. Also, ascii letters are a great way to visually identify/classify monsters. ToME is actually still ASCII.. the way any self respecting Rogue-like should be.
I've been playing NetHack since the late 80's (1988 to be exact) and still have it installed on several computers (including the PocketPC version for my phone). It is a great time waster that has had me hooked for almost 20 years.
I also played Rogue/Nethack on and off for at least a decade. But then I discovered ToME. You should give http://www.t-o-m-e.net/ a try. It offers the same style of gaming with a LOT more depth and variety. Nethack is a narrow tunnel in comparison.
I haven't ascended yet. I've come close twice: I once made it to the VS without the candles [:(] and once had a very promising character blow up Lord Surtur's drawbridge while trying to clear a boulder out the way. Neither of these were my own bad luck, well, not much; the problem was my own stupidity and not paying attention.
Oh, that isn't close. Close is dying while wading through hordes of summoned monsters on the astral plane trying to find the right altar. Been there once. That was enough for me. I considered that a win and gave up Nethack.;-)
The Valkyrie was my favorite character. Combine Mjollnir and the Gauntlets of Power (can throw Mjollnir and have it return every time), get all the immunities from corpses, and you were basically unstoppable (except by stupidity, of course).
If you prayed enough at the right times and sacrificed enough monsters, Mjollnir was pretty much guaranteed. ANd I didn't have trouble finding the GoP either.
Nethack is so... mid 90's. It hasn't really evolved much over the years. I gave it up years ago in favor of ToME (angband variant). I think ToME is pretty much the state of the art of Rogue-likes these days.
Then again Nethack is kinda nice because it is relatively simple (and you get a free pet!).
If it's not really changing anything, then why do it?
I dunno. I guess maybe I just have a thing for XML.
Uh... Hello, you said XHTML would force everyone to create well-formed documents.
You're the one who used the words "force" and "everyone." My point is the XHTML isn't "forcing" anyone to do anything. You're free to write HTML4 tag-soup if you wish.
Ok, so some people write bad XHTML. Fault THEM, not just anyone who chooses to implement XHTML when they don't necessarily have to.
Fault them, and IE, for letting them do it.
Well, then I guess I can't take any of this personally because I validate all my XHTML and I don't work for Microsoft.
It does break things when sent as text/html. Not to mention it changes JavaScript when the page does get sent with the proper MIME type.
Why change your mark-up language when you can do the same thing with your current one?
That's just it, you're not really changing anything. You're just declaring that you're going to write well formed XML. Why is that so bad?
Forcing everyone to make well-formed documents doesn't mean they're suddenly going to care about semantics, or style everything with CSS.
Who is "forcing everyone" to do anything?
Well-formed is no indication of quality, just like validation isn't. It's only a step to it,
So you fault people for making that extra step?
Presumably if someone is bothering with XHTML, they are going to run it through a validator which will complain.
Many web pages on the Internet disagree with you.
Ok, so some people write bad XHTML. Fault THEM, not just anyone who chooses to implement XHTML when they don't necessarily have to.
* The web isn't ready for XHTML. The text/html MIME type is used for almost all of the documents written in it, because that strange browser from Redmond doesn't support the proper MIME type.
It has to start some time. It isn't like XHTML breaks anything.
* It offers no advantages to web designers that don't need namespaces and/or don't need to use XML tools on their documents.
It is easier, trivial even, to write valid XHTML now than to go back and fix all your pages when you do want to use XML tools or implement other namespaces such as XForms in future.
CIGS of course doesn't address other problems with solar adoption, such as durability over time,
Doesn't the relative cheapness of the panels address this? Say they aren't particularly durable. If they are cheap... and even better, recyclable... then maybe durability is moot.
Maybe if you're out in the desert with little wear, no weather damage, and no plowing/salt/sand. Most places I've lived (northern US) they can barely maintain plain ol' asphalt. I'd hate to see how poorly solar panels on roads would be maintained. They'd have to be extremely rugged.
I'd rather see house shingles made from small solar panels. You know, something that doesn't have trucks diving over it daily..:P
You can do the same thing with HTML 4.01. The difference is that XHTML forces you to.
So? Is that a problem? I think it is good that people "force" themselves to write good HTML.
Wait! What's that I hear? Sending it with the text/html MIME type renders it as HTML? Well then, even XHTML doesn't force you to write well-formed documents, as the browser won't complain.
Presumably if someone is bothering with XHTML, they are going to run it through a validator which will complain. I've got a validator extension right in my browser, so checking for valid XHTML is trivial.
I wonder why you forced users to write valid XHTML rather than adopt a more user friendly formatting system such as Textile? As a user, I'd certainly rather type "Link":http://somesite.com/ than the HTML equivalent.
The problem with XHTML is that if your code isn't absolutely perfect, the parser dies with (usually) unhelpful error messages.
Really? I've found http://users.skynet.be/mgueury/mozilla/ to be quite helpful in debugging XHTML. No less helpful than common C compilers or the Perl interpreter, anyway.
This "feature" makes it unsuitable for sites that allow users to add content.
Users should not be allowed to post HTML. Try using Textile. Most users (outside Slashdot) don't know HTML anyway.
Most people who use XHTML do so for the wrong reasons. Part of them do because it's the newest cool thing.
Yeah! People who write well formed, easy to parse XHTML documents when they don't necessarily have to are just sheep following a fad.
You know another group of people that annoy me? People who write properly indented, well documented ANSI C when everyone knows that gcc doesn't require it. Morons. I wish more people would only do the bare minimum required to compile/render their work.
While we're discussing XHTML, are there any real drawbacks to XHTML? I mean, you can't have user-submitted content (like myspace) without converting it. There's a learning curve. But are there browsers that don't render XHTML properly? If I run a web design shop, are there any risks to consider before switching to XHTML?
XHTML is more or less just a very strict implementation of HTML. You have nothing to lose by implementing it. You actually make your site more accessible and searchable that way.
The only thing you need to worry about is user submitted content, like on MySpace, as you mentioned. I don't think there is any reliable way to convert HTML to XHTML. Garbage in, garbage out, as they say. You're better off stripping user submitted content of all HTML tags (and Javascript!) and force users to use something like Textile to format content. That way you have much more control over what is sent to the browser.
Indeed. It is like software companies don't understand that a little piracy supports their dominance. Just like giving away software to schools actually helps "indoctrinate" new users.
And this is supposed to accomplish what, exactly? What is this "central location" you are talking about? Sounds like it assumes a lot about the nature of the spam and the people doing the spamming.
Slashdot Mirror
I would seriously recommend turning away those bigger clients for now until you first get the staffing to handle it. You can try to pick up the clients later. Maybe they'll hire someone else, but there is a chance that they will be unhappy with that someone else and come to you. You don't want to take the clients on now and screw up and ruin your reputation. If at all possible, hire someone (or multiple people) who already have experience with larger networks and kill two birds with one stone. I don't think it is really worth it to give you advice here on how to manage larger networks. You've got staffing problems. You need to address that first.
-matthew
I gave up about half way though. The game seemed very uniform and homogeneous. There was little sense that there were places/quests that I should absolutely avoid until I got a better character. But maybe that is what they were trying to accomplish. Perhaps when your choices are driven by what is and what isn't doable at any given time, the game is far less open ended. In other words, your path is determined by difficulty. Like you have to do A (because it is easier) before B (which requires lvl 3+, for example), and B before C, etc.
It just seemd very unnatural for the world to adapt to my character rather than the other way around.
-matthew
Of course then they went and created a messed up leveling/skill system.
"Hey, that's funny, every time i level, so does every other creature/person in the world. What is the point of leveling again?"
I must say that is quite strange to dread the next character level... I give 'em points for being different, if nothing else.
-matthew
Dude, have you ever even played a roguelike before? They are ALL ABOUT player versus monster. IDing items is traditionally just an obstacle to the ultimate goal of defeating the Wizard or similar. The original Rogue left very little to discover beyond identifying a fixed set of potions and scrolls. ToME increases the complexity of skills/items by an order of magitude and it adds extra dimensions such as alchemy where you can design your own artifacts using ingredients found while exploring. ToME is so complex and has so much to discover that it is nearly impossible to finish without spoilers.
I've been playing rogue-likes for 20 years, BTW. You have no idea what you are talking about.
-matthew
I read the column, and it seems to make a very good case for why that game ISN'T rogue-like at all. You have like 10 paragraphs outlining the aspects that differentiate it from roguelike games and a single paragraph which makes some vague correlations to rogue-like games, e.g. the idea of not being able to revert to saved games.
-matthew
Maybe Dwarf Fortress would work in multiplayer mode, but it doesn't sounds very "rogue-like" at all other than being ASCII graphics based.
My point is that the style gameplay is one of the primary features that makes a rogue-like rogue-like. Take that away and all you have is an ASCII graphics MUD. And that is just wierd.
-matthew
Except that "locate" doesn't index the contents all your files... including Email. That is what makes spotlight powerful. But yeah, it sucks what the indexer starts at really bad times. Like if you plug in a Firewire drive.
-matthew
Actually, there is already a multiplayer version of ToME: http://www.t-o-m-e.net/main.php?tome_current=1 Unfortunately Rogue-like games don't really work well in multiplayer mode because the game style is strategy, not action. In other words, you don't play in real time. You are meant to pause and plan out moves. And when you pause, the game pauses. It is very difficult to synchronize multiple players when each one is taking turns at their own pace. For example, lets say you have two players in a room. One player is doing careful, turn by turn battle with a monster and one player is just passing through. How do you resolve the different turn rates?
I had the "OMG! Multiplayer Nethack would be so awesome!" bug like ten years ago. I've given it lots of thought. It just wouldn't work well.
-matthew
In -6 years.
-matthew
By "state of the art" I mean gameplay and variety of experience... not graphics. I've tried the isometric frontends to Nethack and they are awful. They are difficult to play because you can't see very much of the map on the screen at any given time. Very hard to plan moves or make escapes. Also, ascii letters are a great way to visually identify/classify monsters. ToME is actually still ASCII.. the way any self respecting Rogue-like should be.
I also played Rogue/Nethack on and off for at least a decade. But then I discovered ToME. You should give http://www.t-o-m-e.net/ a try. It offers the same style of gaming with a LOT more depth and variety. Nethack is a narrow tunnel in comparison.
-matthew
Oh, that isn't close. Close is dying while wading through hordes of summoned monsters on the astral plane trying to find the right altar. Been there once. That was enough for me. I considered that a win and gave up Nethack.
-matthew
The Valkyrie was my favorite character. Combine Mjollnir and the Gauntlets of Power (can throw Mjollnir and have it return every time), get all the immunities from corpses, and you were basically unstoppable (except by stupidity, of course).
If you prayed enough at the right times and sacrificed enough monsters, Mjollnir was pretty much guaranteed. ANd I didn't have trouble finding the GoP either.
-matthew
Nethack is so... mid 90's. It hasn't really evolved much over the years. I gave it up years ago in favor of ToME (angband variant). I think ToME is pretty much the state of the art of Rogue-likes these days.
Then again Nethack is kinda nice because it is relatively simple (and you get a free pet!).
-matthew
I dunno. I guess maybe I just have a thing for XML.
You're the one who used the words "force" and "everyone." My point is the XHTML isn't "forcing" anyone to do anything. You're free to write HTML4 tag-soup if you wish.
Well, then I guess I can't take any of this personally because I validate all my XHTML and I don't work for Microsoft.
Since you seem to be taking every single one of your points directly from http://hixie.ch/advocacy/xhtml I'll direct you to a response: http://h3h.net/2005/12/xhtml-harmful-to-feelings/ and just leave it at that.
-matthew
That's just it, you're not really changing anything. You're just declaring that you're going to write well formed XML. Why is that so bad?
Who is "forcing everyone" to do anything?
So you fault people for making that extra step?
Ok, so some people write bad XHTML. Fault THEM, not just anyone who chooses to implement XHTML when they don't necessarily have to.
It has to start some time. It isn't like XHTML breaks anything.
It is easier, trivial even, to write valid XHTML now than to go back and fix all your pages when you do want to use XML tools or implement other namespaces such as XForms in future.
-matthew
Doesn't the relative cheapness of the panels address this? Say they aren't particularly durable. If they are cheap... and even better, recyclable... then maybe durability is moot.
-matthew
Maybe if you're out in the desert with little wear, no weather damage, and no plowing/salt/sand. Most places I've lived (northern US) they can barely maintain plain ol' asphalt. I'd hate to see how poorly solar panels on roads would be maintained. They'd have to be extremely rugged.
I'd rather see house shingles made from small solar panels. You know, something that doesn't have trucks diving over it daily..:P
-matthew
So? Is that a problem? I think it is good that people "force" themselves to write good HTML.
Presumably if someone is bothering with XHTML, they are going to run it through a validator which will complain. I've got a validator extension right in my browser, so checking for valid XHTML is trivial.
I really don't understand what your problem is.
-matthew
I wonder why you forced users to write valid XHTML rather than adopt a more user friendly formatting system such as Textile? As a user, I'd certainly rather type "Link":http://somesite.com/ than the HTML equivalent.
-matthew
Really? I've found http://users.skynet.be/mgueury/mozilla/ to be quite helpful in debugging XHTML. No less helpful than common C compilers or the Perl interpreter, anyway.
Users should not be allowed to post HTML. Try using Textile. Most users (outside Slashdot) don't know HTML anyway.
-matthew
Yeah! People who write well formed, easy to parse XHTML documents when they don't necessarily have to are just sheep following a fad.
You know another group of people that annoy me? People who write properly indented, well documented ANSI C when everyone knows that gcc doesn't require it. Morons. I wish more people would only do the bare minimum required to compile/render their work.
-matthew
XHTML is more or less just a very strict implementation of HTML. You have nothing to lose by implementing it. You actually make your site more accessible and searchable that way.
The only thing you need to worry about is user submitted content, like on MySpace, as you mentioned. I don't think there is any reliable way to convert HTML to XHTML. Garbage in, garbage out, as they say. You're better off stripping user submitted content of all HTML tags (and Javascript!) and force users to use something like Textile to format content. That way you have much more control over what is sent to the browser.
-matthew
Indeed. It is like software companies don't understand that a little piracy supports their dominance. Just like giving away software to schools actually helps "indoctrinate" new users.
-matthew
I was wondering the same thing.
And this is supposed to accomplish what, exactly? What is this "central location" you are talking about? Sounds like it assumes a lot about the nature of the spam and the people doing the spamming.
-matthew