Most people don't bother to write and say "Your banner ads annoy me." They simply stop visiting. If they are unobtrusive, then fine, but most advertising is FAR from unobtrusive and stick out like sore thumbs on ANY webpage. (Hence my very zealous use of Proxomitron.)
If you back and read my post, I said I only use Google ads. You should be able to guess what kind of ads they can tolerate:) Unlike a massive stonking banner ad, Google's can be tailored to fit almost any web design. Plus as text they're bandwidth friendly, and don't ruin the overall site design (which the majority of ads do. Like the huge one on the right hand side of Slashdot I noticed when I came here without my proxy on yesterday.
Running banner ads is a stupid way to go these days. PEOPLE ARE SICK OF THEM. I will only run Google's ads on my websites as banner ads are obtrusive and obnoxious. Any site that uses them... Well, you're gonna go the way of the steam engine. People are sick of it.
People know ad revenue is needed to run sites, but a lot of them I know won't tolerate annoying banner ads (or worse still, Flash ads) anymore and have asked me to hook them up with ad blocking software, which I gladly do.
There's also the fact that they're going to let broadband-over-powerlines through with no questions, despite the VERY vocal complaints from amateur radio enthusiasts and several other groups. (I think even NASA was one of them.)
The FCC are a joke who will give the regulations to the highest bidder. I would like someone to take the bastards to court, and CBS, so they can show how consumers rights have been pushed forward.
I'm a big motor racing fan. Formula One airs at 6am for the European races where I live. I tape them now. In a few years time, it looks like I'm going to have to get up and watch since I guarantee stations, desperate to protect ad revenue, will fuck ALL their programs with this monstrosity.
Quite how this is going to stop piracy, I'd really like to know. Hell, rips of shows sent out to network affiliates are routinely on the net before they've even aired. The people who release them rip them off the raw feed sent to the affiliate. Quite how these idiotic rules are going to stop that I'd like to know...
The pathetic thing is this will have wide ranging implications outside of the US. DTV is now fucked in Canada pretty much across the board thanks to the FCC being the MPAA's bitch.
Quite how this can be seen as a "step forward" for consumers is beyond me. CBS/Viacom must be using a WAY different dictionary to me...
Of course, it could be seen as a step forward for consumers. Kinda like the witch burnings in medieval times were a step forward for decent folk...
Hentai requires more "handwork" than other games:)
Funny the article mentions vibration, and the symptoms seen in jackhammer operators. The only video game related ailment I've ever had was being made to feel violently nauseous by... Yep, a vibrating controller. Bought a nice dual shock for my PSX and have to have the vibration off in every game I play as it makes me feel extremely sick!
Actually the general concensus I've read says that, compared to the original Extended Play, X-Play sucks.
Extended Play is the first and only VG show that I actually thought wasn't patronising or annoying. Then Kate Botello left, leaving Adam Sessler, which was still good. Then they went to five days a week, started getting crap.
Haven't actually seen X-Play myself as I dumped Tech TV early this year. (Since the station is now utterly retarded and has precious little for hardcore geeks anymore.)
If you notice, there's a smiley in my comment originally. I of course do no advocate shooting seperatists, but I do think you're all clinically insane. Canada should let you seperate, then sever all trade links with you.
Seriously, they need to get over themselves. Nobody stops to think about when the muslims or whatever are targets in a game. No, killing them is just fine. It's total hypocrisy.
As someone who lives in Alberta, blowing up Toronto and offing hardline Quebecers... Well, it'a a dream come true really innit:)
Seems familiar to me, but only because there was an almost identical article in PC Gamer a couple of years ago.
I can't remember the last game I completed, nor do I really care about completing a game. So long as I have fun. I'm getting really tired of these articles blathering on about what's wrong with games.
"Games should only allow limited saving." "Oh the stories are too long." blah blah blah... It seems every week some hack writes an opinion piece on what's wrong with games when there IS nothing wrong.
If someone doesn't know where your sig is from, they're going to wonder about you:)
I actually liked Sonic 3D. Sadly it made feel ill playing it:(
Sonic was an established character by then. Had Sonic 3D been the first effort involving the titular blue hedgehog, it would have been game over for the franchise before it even started.
That's what I meant. The last decent "within the original trilogy universe" game on the PC was Rogue Squadron. I can't remember how long ago, but it ran on my Pentium 166 which means at LEAST 5 years ago.
It looks good on the commercials. Of course, everything does:)
I really wish a DECENT SW game would come out on the PC. And yes, I know Knights of the Old Republic is coming, and it rocks from what I gather, but I mean something like the original Rogue Squadron. That game was a BLAST! I want a game set DURING the original trilogy, even if between movies (which if I recall, is when Rogue Squadron is set).
Driver 2 springs to mind in regards to console titles being released with huge problems. In Driver 2, at certain areas of the map, the framerate drops to unplayable levels and you just have to hope nothing goes wrong until you get past the area.
Now if I recall, all games for the PSX had to be cleared by Sony to be approved for release on the console. Now while there was nothing like Nintendo's seal (which I personally take with a pinch of salt), this was a huge glitch in Driver 2 that was obviously ignored as anyone playing the game for five minutes would noticed it.
Quality assurance is an oxymoron. The fact is, with the suits saying "We gotta ship game X by this date or else there shareholders will bitch", there's no way quality assurance can be taken seriously.
Games are consistently shipped with the "screw it, we can patch it later" mentality. Look back over the last few years. There have been games such as Pool of Radiance, Myth 2 etc... That shipped with fundamental bugs, not just in the game itself, but in the installer routine! The original versions of those games, if you installed to a non-default location and then used the automatic uninstall, it deleted the contents of your hard drive.
Kinda hard to believe in any quality assurance with glaring failures like that getting through.
There's always Paintshop Pro if you MUST go the commercial route, and for the tinkerers who don't use a lot of PS functions, there's always The GIMP.
I was considering switching to Paintshop Pro anyway, and Adobe pulling this shit... Well, it's just another in a long line of transgressions that show they're assholes and deserve to lose customers. (Dmitry Skylarov anyone?)
Trust me, they could easily tell. You know those color dot tests? They could easily put something in one of them and ask you to, say, tell them what it says. A color blind person either wouldn't be able too, or would see something entirely different.
Besides, most companies don't give a fuck about poor bastards like me.
As long as I can continue to tell the difference between red and black for start lights in racing games, I'm fine:) Of course, even if I couldn't, I just wait for the others to start moving:)
who gives a turkey about some piece of crap software nobody knows
Maybe you don't, but I know a ton of people into graphics that will be gagging to get their hands on this! Maya is right up there with 3D Studio and the like when it comes to 3D packages.
One game that does have a colorblind mode is Championship Manager. Not sure about CM4, but the later CM3's, you added "COLOURBLIND" to a config file and it remapped the colours. Very useful.
I was supposed to be a tester for Stars! Supernova due to colorblindness problems I had with the original Stars! but sadly, it looks like that game is never going to make it now.
But it's a shit codec! In fact it's second on my list of codecs I despise.
Think I despise it because it's MS and therefore evil? Guess again. My most despised codec is XVID, an open source project. XVID is a total mess. There's god knows how many versions floating around, it's impossible to do a straight MPEG conversion in TMPEG without first re-encoding the video (a problem which has never occured for me with ANY OTHER codec), the quality isn't that great...
OGM isn't bad, though the conversion process is increased due to the lack of programs that actually support converting OGG to other formats.
Sadly, DIVX is the best around right now, and with various people in Hollywood making ovations toward them, DIVX will, I think, become the standard.
Slashdot Mirror
Most people don't bother to write and say "Your banner ads annoy me." They simply stop visiting. If they are unobtrusive, then fine, but most advertising is FAR from unobtrusive and stick out like sore thumbs on ANY webpage. (Hence my very zealous use of Proxomitron.)
If you back and read my post, I said I only use Google ads. You should be able to guess what kind of ads they can tolerate:) Unlike a massive stonking banner ad, Google's can be tailored to fit almost any web design. Plus as text they're bandwidth friendly, and don't ruin the overall site design (which the majority of ads do. Like the huge one on the right hand side of Slashdot I noticed when I came here without my proxy on yesterday.
Running banner ads is a stupid way to go these days. PEOPLE ARE SICK OF THEM. I will only run Google's ads on my websites as banner ads are obtrusive and obnoxious. Any site that uses them... Well, you're gonna go the way of the steam engine. People are sick of it.
People know ad revenue is needed to run sites, but a lot of them I know won't tolerate annoying banner ads (or worse still, Flash ads) anymore and have asked me to hook them up with ad blocking software, which I gladly do.
There's also the fact that they're going to let broadband-over-powerlines through with no questions, despite the VERY vocal complaints from amateur radio enthusiasts and several other groups. (I think even NASA was one of them.)
The FCC are a joke who will give the regulations to the highest bidder. I would like someone to take the bastards to court, and CBS, so they can show how consumers rights have been pushed forward.
I'm a big motor racing fan. Formula One airs at 6am for the European races where I live. I tape them now. In a few years time, it looks like I'm going to have to get up and watch since I guarantee stations, desperate to protect ad revenue, will fuck ALL their programs with this monstrosity.
Quite how this is going to stop piracy, I'd really like to know. Hell, rips of shows sent out to network affiliates are routinely on the net before they've even aired. The people who release them rip them off the raw feed sent to the affiliate. Quite how these idiotic rules are going to stop that I'd like to know...
The pathetic thing is this will have wide ranging implications outside of the US. DTV is now fucked in Canada pretty much across the board thanks to the FCC being the MPAA's bitch.
Quite how this can be seen as a "step forward" for consumers is beyond me. CBS/Viacom must be using a WAY different dictionary to me...
Of course, it could be seen as a step forward for consumers. Kinda like the witch burnings in medieval times were a step forward for decent folk...
Hentai requires more "handwork" than other games:)
Funny the article mentions vibration, and the symptoms seen in jackhammer operators. The only video game related ailment I've ever had was being made to feel violently nauseous by... Yep, a vibrating controller. Bought a nice dual shock for my PSX and have to have the vibration off in every game I play as it makes me feel extremely sick!
Actually the general concensus I've read says that, compared to the original Extended Play, X-Play sucks.
Extended Play is the first and only VG show that I actually thought wasn't patronising or annoying. Then Kate Botello left, leaving Adam Sessler, which was still good. Then they went to five days a week, started getting crap.
Haven't actually seen X-Play myself as I dumped Tech TV early this year. (Since the station is now utterly retarded and has precious little for hardcore geeks anymore.)
If you notice, there's a smiley in my comment originally. I of course do no advocate shooting seperatists, but I do think you're all clinically insane. Canada should let you seperate, then sever all trade links with you.
My wife is a lefty and has no problems with any games.
If it's REALLY that hard to play an FPS, just use the mouse in your left hand and remap the keys.
Coming soon on Slashdot: "What game should I buy?"
Yeesh...
It just pisses me off that it's okay to target one group but not another.
And whoever modded me as flamebait: You obviously don't live in Western Canada. Do not mod until you know the shit we put up with here from the East.
LOL! And Alberta too:)
Seriously, they need to get over themselves. Nobody stops to think about when the muslims or whatever are targets in a game. No, killing them is just fine. It's total hypocrisy.
As someone who lives in Alberta, blowing up Toronto and offing hardline Quebecers... Well, it'a a dream come true really innit:)
Like they need to add "self destructing documents" to Word. One bad software crash, bingo, any document you were working on is destroyed.:)
So now, losing your work in a crash is not a bug, it's a feature.
Seems familiar to me, but only because there was an almost identical article in PC Gamer a couple of years ago.
I can't remember the last game I completed, nor do I really care about completing a game. So long as I have fun. I'm getting really tired of these articles blathering on about what's wrong with games.
"Games should only allow limited saving."
"Oh the stories are too long."
blah blah blah... It seems every week some hack writes an opinion piece on what's wrong with games when there IS nothing wrong.
I'd test video games all day for HALF that salary:)
Of course I'd probably get fired because I'd be bitching about bugs all the time:)
If someone doesn't know where your sig is from, they're going to wonder about you:)
I actually liked Sonic 3D. Sadly it made feel ill playing it:(
Sonic was an established character by then. Had Sonic 3D been the first effort involving the titular blue hedgehog, it would have been game over for the franchise before it even started.
You can take a potentially successful character (say Sonic) and if you stick it in a sub par game, it's going to suck.
I think the success of the character is more a result of the quality of the game.
That's what I meant. The last decent "within the original trilogy universe" game on the PC was Rogue Squadron. I can't remember how long ago, but it ran on my Pentium 166 which means at LEAST 5 years ago.
It looks good on the commercials. Of course, everything does:)
I really wish a DECENT SW game would come out on the PC. And yes, I know Knights of the Old Republic is coming, and it rocks from what I gather, but I mean something like the original Rogue Squadron. That game was a BLAST! I want a game set DURING the original trilogy, even if between movies (which if I recall, is when Rogue Squadron is set).
Driver 2 springs to mind in regards to console titles being released with huge problems. In Driver 2, at certain areas of the map, the framerate drops to unplayable levels and you just have to hope nothing goes wrong until you get past the area.
Now if I recall, all games for the PSX had to be cleared by Sony to be approved for release on the console. Now while there was nothing like Nintendo's seal (which I personally take with a pinch of salt), this was a huge glitch in Driver 2 that was obviously ignored as anyone playing the game for five minutes would noticed it.
Quality assurance is an oxymoron. The fact is, with the suits saying "We gotta ship game X by this date or else there shareholders will bitch", there's no way quality assurance can be taken seriously.
Games are consistently shipped with the "screw it, we can patch it later" mentality. Look back over the last few years. There have been games such as Pool of Radiance, Myth 2 etc... That shipped with fundamental bugs, not just in the game itself, but in the installer routine! The original versions of those games, if you installed to a non-default location and then used the automatic uninstall, it deleted the contents of your hard drive.
Kinda hard to believe in any quality assurance with glaring failures like that getting through.
There's always Paintshop Pro if you MUST go the commercial route, and for the tinkerers who don't use a lot of PS functions, there's always The GIMP.
I was considering switching to Paintshop Pro anyway, and Adobe pulling this shit... Well, it's just another in a long line of transgressions that show they're assholes and deserve to lose customers. (Dmitry Skylarov anyone?)
The "evolution" "revolution" thing is so stupid, because it bass ackwards.
Revolution: Change comes, a few people die.
Evolution: Change comes, entire species and bloodlines are wiped out.
Max Payne, the original, was lame. A slightly above par third person shooter with terrible dialog, and a gimmick stolen from The Matrix.
Trust me, they could easily tell. You know those color dot tests? They could easily put something in one of them and ask you to, say, tell them what it says. A color blind person either wouldn't be able too, or would see something entirely different.
Besides, most companies don't give a fuck about poor bastards like me.
As long as I can continue to tell the difference between red and black for start lights in racing games, I'm fine:) Of course, even if I couldn't, I just wait for the others to start moving:)
who gives a turkey about some piece of crap software nobody knows
Maybe you don't, but I know a ton of people into graphics that will be gagging to get their hands on this! Maya is right up there with 3D Studio and the like when it comes to 3D packages.
One game that does have a colorblind mode is Championship Manager. Not sure about CM4, but the later CM3's, you added "COLOURBLIND" to a config file and it remapped the colours. Very useful.
I was supposed to be a tester for Stars! Supernova due to colorblindness problems I had with the original Stars! but sadly, it looks like that game is never going to make it now.
But it's a shit codec! In fact it's second on my list of codecs I despise.
Think I despise it because it's MS and therefore evil? Guess again. My most despised codec is XVID, an open source project. XVID is a total mess. There's god knows how many versions floating around, it's impossible to do a straight MPEG conversion in TMPEG without first re-encoding the video (a problem which has never occured for me with ANY OTHER codec), the quality isn't that great...
OGM isn't bad, though the conversion process is increased due to the lack of programs that actually support converting OGG to other formats.
Sadly, DIVX is the best around right now, and with various people in Hollywood making ovations toward them, DIVX will, I think, become the standard.