While this is a pretty old concept in sci-fi it's definitely one that I've been wanting to actually live with for a while now. Even more as I've increasingly dealt with the issue of not wanting to kill animals, but not being entirely willing to stop eating meat (plus, c'mon, not to drag this further into a firestorm, but there are compelling arguments that animals killing other animals to eat is the natural way of things... nature is cruel as hell). Like others have said though, one of my biggest concerns is quality. With the way the agriculture is today flavor and quality have long, long given way to making a product that ships easily, grows quickly, reduces spoilage, and is made to conform to crazy marketing ideas (e.g. pork should be leaner to compete with chicken). All of this makes me worried that cultured meat will be dry, tasteless, and thoroughly unpleasant. A utility food for the very poor and vegetarians that's basically little more than a dry, tough tofu.
The biggest problem is that if we can culture meat with no need to kill the animals involved we really need to have human meat available. Not just for us to enjoy, but perhaps as a show of good faith to prove that it's not made from animals that have been raised for slaughter. Rudy Rucker's excellent integration of Wendy meat into his Ware series also got around one of the bigger problems to its adoption by using the oldest trick in the book: sex sells. An attractive nude woman lying on a bun with the caption "Eat Me"? Who could resist.
They did not "once" do a pirate store. The pirate store is still around located at 826 Valencia St. in San Francisco. I was in there just the other day. As such, the pirate concept is the original.
As well, while they do actually sell some items the majority of the "store" is simply to open drawers filled with appropriate bits (such as the artificial beards with a big mess of hair-like substance inside), read the amusing signs, and promote writing.
The fish tank is excellent.
It's also located next to the absolutely amazing Paxton Gate which, well, it's hard to describe exactly, except that all of the amazing things there are for sale.
While it's nice to know that idling won't be a problem I'm still concerned that street parking is going to be a major one. I hadn't considered that colder climates where warming blocks are more common would possibly provide current solutions, but I suspect that the power draw is going to be much larger if we're all driving electric cars.
Let's put it this way. How would I, as a resident of San Francisco who parks on the street because I don't have a parking lot or a garage, have a place to properly charge my car at "home"? I suspect that, in urban areas at least, this could be a true problem for electric car adoption.
One of the problems I've noticed with electrics is that they don't seem well-suited, ironically, to urban drivers in many cases. In many cases if you live in the city you rent and you park on the street (and, in my case, my neighbors with houses and garages even park on the street and fill their garages with crap). If you don't have a garage to house the car in at night and thus, easy access to recharge it this is going to be a serious problem. Prices for commercial charging are likely to be vastly higher than charging it yourself at home and with the short power life it would seem to be necessary to charge on an almost daily basis.
Likewise, the stated mileage doesn't sound like it takes into account things like being stuck on the freeway for hours while your engine is still idling and consuming power or being stuck in downtown traffic so, while you're unlikely to be driving your full range daily, it seems just as likely that with greater urban congestion you'll be running through a lot of power while you don't manage to actually go very far making the need for frequent recharging necessary.
Likely solutions will arise, but problems seem to be significant (what about jackasses just unplugging your car if it's somehow charging on the street?) regardless. It's a shame too because the urban environment is the ideal place for an electric car where it would help reduce both air and noise pollution and where trips are generally much shorter and infrequent. I can really see a car share program being able to make excellent use of electrics, but that's about it.
Yet another reason to invest exclusively in prints.
I mean, OK it's a hell of a lot less convenient to carry around the five massive cans compared to one DVD and I either have to string them all together and break them down again or get up every fifteen minutes to switch reels. Not to mention the problems in archiving the damn things correctly, but dammit I'm getting all my pixels! That is, until the restoration prints come out....
Yeah, I recalled having heard him say something to effect myself, but not having a source on it I just decided not to mention it. It'd be interesting to track that down.
So is it also the same (as far as personnel go) as it was when they canceled Arrested Development in spite of it's many, many Emmys?
Even with Firefly they only showed about seven episodes, out-of-order, and crushed it. They also canceled Family Guy, Futurama... need I go on?
Fox is just plain notorious for canceling excellent shows with a strong fanbase. I'd think that after his terrible treatment last time he'd know better than to even consider working with them. Go to somebody like the CW who at least let Buffy run for a damn long time and are desperate enough for something good to keep them afloat.
What also isn't going to help it is the name. Much like Firefly/Serenity had a name that made a lot of sense to you if you already knew the story this promises to be a case where only fans will understand the name. Everyone else will likely not be interested in the program based on the name alone and will avoid it. I mean, if I didn't already know the reasoning and that Joss was behind it I'd probably have little to no interest in a show called "Dollhouse". Hell, I'd probably assume it was some lame new reality show.
You sure it wasn't one of those Line 6 Variax guitars? Those can not only change tuning, but are designed to model the sound of various guitars as well. Of course, when you program in alternate tunings on something like that you're not physically changing the tuning like you would with this system, you're just creating the illusion of a different tuning.
I see the point, but without more space it's not doing much better than any other phone with a small, half-assed mp3 player in it. If they really want it to be a convergence device that allows me to ditch my iPod, phone, and Palm in favor of one device they need to bring the size up.
Maybe it's just not something that can technologically be done at the present, but that just means that they should be focusing on what they can do properly, rather than cramming in something that can't.
If I get a convergence device like this I want it to be able to legitimately replace my iPod. Not one of those dinky little Nano things that can hold a couple of albums either, a proper iPod. Especially since they've pushed into video more heavily.
This means that I'm going to require it meet the (modest by today's standards) requirement of at least 20 GB of space that was their top of the line 2nd Gen. Moving it up into something far more current would be nice (I barely have enough room now) but until I can fully replace my iPod with an iPhone I don't see a reason to go with it.
Want to really make it a worthwhile purchase? While third-party software is a complete necessity a Palm emulator (even if it's not available on the CD) would bring in a ton of good applications even if it would be missing the massive benefit of functional pen input (though Graffiti 2 was a distinct step backwards).
Ok, enough with the constant claims of something being a "hoax device" and prosecuting someone for it.
If it's a hoax worth prosecuting over the person involved had damned well better state or firmly imply that one object is, in fact, another. In this case as before in the Mooninite issue it was a third-party who made a mistake about an object that was never intended to be misinterpreted. This makes it a misunderstanding. You tell the person why you made the mistake, probably suggest that in light of this mistake they avoid doing it in the future (although that's entirely up to them, of course), apologize explaining that you were only trying to do the right thing, and send them on their way.
In other words: "Oh, we're very sorry, but from our laymen's point of view it looked like it might be a bomb of some sort. I'm sure you can understand where we're coming from with this and, in light of this fact, why we reacted the way we did."
The lack of an intent to deceive is really the issue here. The Piltdown Man was a hoax, this is just a misunderstanding.
Yeah, Crysis is going to lose tons of money. Not to mention all of those RTS games like Supreme Commander, Company of Heroes, Command and Conquer, all of the various iterations of Warcraft, Starcraft II... massive, massive money holes.
Not to mention the various exclusive console titles.
Re:Simply doesn't live up
on
BioShock Review
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· Score: 3, Insightful
Pardon me, I didn't intend to slight the entire console audience. I, like many, many others, cut my teeth back on the NES. The thing is that each system tends to focus on and do certain things a bit better. Console tend to be great for simpler games, platformers, fighting games, action games, JRPGs, and a variety of other game types. PCs tend to do better with things that require a more complex controller, quick, precise aim, management of deep, complex menus and such. As a result strategy games, high-end simulations, RTS, FPS, and the like tend to work better on the PC.
When you adapt a game for each system you need to keep this in mind and aim at the proper platform, not just the one that will ship the most units. System Shock or System Shock 2 wouldn't work very well on a console. It requires a bunch of keys for activating upgrades, psi-powers, weapons, and the like. Navigating an inventory, searching around the environment to pick things up and the like would be unpleasant on a console because the controllers just aren't well adapted for it. As such it feels like Bioshock was adapted to play better on consoles. In the process a lot of the depth was shift out of it to make it work more easily not only with the controls available, but also to fit the predominant styles of playing. Instead of an inventory where you can pick and choose what kind of ammunition and supplies to carry you get fixed slots for ammunition. You likewise get fixed slots for health and EVE with no ability to choose to focus on one or the other. You hold supplies in a nebulous, uncheckable space until you get to a U-Invent-It machine rather than going into the inventory and combining items there. Stats are slightly abstracted out and you can't check your current tonics without visiting a gene bank (not change, that's a game design decision, check) because it would require yet another sub-screen.
Everything is adapted to work on a gamepad with a relatively small number of buttons and no good ability to precisely pick out and move objects around.
Finally, like it or not, but the modern Xbox 360 owner is far more likely to be a more casual gamer than the current PC gamer. I'm talking about the kind of guys who own a system and maybe a couple of games (Halo, Madden, etc.) to play on occasion. While this is definitely subjective, compared to the greater depth of the earlier games and the very linear nature of the gameplay (compare to, say, Deus Ex, which almost always offered multiple paths around obstacles that catered to the various specializations) it feels like things were made to be more palatable to this sort of gamer.
One final nit to pick. Not having to make permanent decisions really hampers the game and the ability for each player to make it their own. In past games you had to make real, final decisions. If you wanted to raise up your hacking skill you'd have to neglect something. You wouldn't be able to wield, let alone carry, all of the weapons and you'd probably have a meager, at best, collection of psi-powers. In Bioshock you start out being able to use every single weapon at a very high level of effectiveness. Yeah, you can get some tonics to improve things, but it's a world of difference between "I can't equip this" and "I get 10% extra damage with this". The same goes for plasmids and for being able to do more than barely hack the simpler vending machines. There is quite simply little reason other than time or boredom to not manually hack just about every hackable machine you come across. At most the penalty is usually just a mild shock that you can walk off after a trip through the Vita-Chamber rather than destruction of the machine or the raising of an alarm. Even when you do make decisions there's no need to commit to a pathway (or end up being merely adequate at a bunch of things) because you can always just run back to the Gene Bank and change your tonics and plasmids around to reinvent your character whenever you want. So, while you have some choice (mainly which plasmids and tonics to buy) you're still mainly just lightly customizing your character rather than actually defining them.
I refer, as always in this matter, to the previous games in the series. They had an excellent mechanic that allowed regeneration, but in such a way that it didn't trivialize the process of dying. I didn't have to plug away for hours and hours to get good enough to beat the game, but I also didn't just walk through the entire thing in a couple of hours either.
There is a balance in this case and while I felt the previous games had it perfect Bioshock trends much more heavily into easy. Combined with the more linear path, lack of inventory, massive surplus of health and ammo, and all the other little things done to make it more oriented to the console audience than the PC audience have resulted in a game that feels a lot more like a ride where everyone is assured of easily reaching the end in almost exactly the same amount of time with little to no effort involved in getting there.
Simply doesn't live up
on
BioShock Review
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· Score: 3, Insightful
Frankly it wasn't over-hyped to me. I mean, yeah, there was a lot of hype, but for me the game was sold as soon as it was announced. I was a huge fan of System Shock when it was first released and while I had issues with System Shock 2 initially it was a really great game as well. Deus Ex just continued the winning streak for this loose group of games. Bioshock, though, is where they dropped the ball.
First off is the fact that it all feels dumbed down for a console audience looking for fast, simple gameplay with a few nods to complexity and story thrown in. There's no inventory so everything is just thrown up on your screen like any other shooter. No stats, because everything is handled through the plasmids. In fact, just about everything that would normally be mapped to a sub-screen is now handled in a very limited fashion by wall-mounted consoles (e.g. gun upgrades, plasmids, invention, etc.).
The game is far more linear and yes, the Vita-Chambers do make it too easy. From a console/FPS point of view getting back in the action might be desired, but this isn't a deathmatch here. Dying should feel like it has some consequence. SS and SS2 both had regen machines, but they never felt cheap or easy because there was only one per level and you had to go out and find it and activate it first. As a result dying was a concern. Until you activated the regen there was real tension and once you did, it meant that you weren't totally out of it and back to your last save, but you'd still have to trek across the entire level through hordes of enemies and with very little ammunition. Not just pop out of the chamber and go back to shooting the same enemy.
It's not a terrible game. The graphics are pretty (albeit, on a PC running at Maximum settings, not that much better than what we've gotten used to in recent years) and the setting and theme are novel and interesting even though the art direction seems to have stolen a page from Fallout more often than not. It's just that it was heavily hyped and arrived to glowing reviews when really it's more of a 7/10 sort of game. It's a low point for the series where they tried to transition into a simpler console audience and treated the PC version as the port rather than the other way around. I guess if this is the first game in the series you've ever played it might seem great, but if you've been along since the start then you'll know that it's just no match for it's deeper forebears.
I don't know... without being able to resort to broad generalizations to have a ready scapegoat to complain about for all of my problems how will I be able to function?
That is a line of logic that, while sensible for business and other areas, is almost never relevant to consumer electronics.
For one thing: listening to music on the go is hardly a need. It's a want and, as such, is going to change whenever a new product is made available. Yes, I might have some basic parameters (e.g. it must hold my entire, 50 Gig music collection), but since I'm unlikely to be buying a new model every time they come out with one I want more it makes the most sense to try to maximize your value by waiting for a product that will best fit your current and future desires.
So, to compare directly to this product line I might want an iPhone, but I want one that will have a large enough capacity to store everything on my iPod, plus video, plus well... whatever else I might need to put on it in the future. Roughly estimating this would mean a capacity of at least 60-80 Gig. At the same time I know that I also would want a touch screen and internet access. The ability to free up three devices (Palm, Phone, and iPod) into one would also be a significant advantage.
Thus, the problem is that at present none of the available devices meet my needs. So while my needs aren't being fully met at present, purchasing any of these devices would be unlikely to satisfy me making it a foolish purchase. Yes, I would have the usage of an inferior device for a year or so, but since I'm not made of money I'm going to want to purchase the one that will best meet my needs in the future.
So, yeah, this is (as with many similar issues) largely moot if you have the unlimited funds and absolute need to have a desired (but not critical) device for a year before you ditch it in favor of a newer model. Most people, however, don't work that way and instead try to optimize the best time to buy in order to get the most use for their money.
My point is that Apple is clearly trying to integrate a couple of different product lines. Rather than settling for the halfway measures that are currently available (i.e. iPhone without enough memory to replace an iPod, iPod Touch without the feature set of the iPhone or the memory of an iPod, or iPod that will likely be rolled into the others shortly) it would seem that the best position to take right now is to wait things out.
This is clearly an indication of where things are going to go and at present it would seem inadvisable to purchase any of these devices when the better integrated ones will likely drop very shortly.
Apple has a history of introducing new products or new form factors of existing products only to finally end up delivering a mature version a year or two later that is typically not backwards compatible. For example, look at the iPod. The third generation brought about the dock, the introduction of USB, and many changes in how devices connect to it. As a result while my second gen iPod still plays music on it's monochrome screen it is completely incompatible with all of the accessories available on the market.
On the other hand, if you're the sort of early adopter who is going to buy the newest product each time a new generation is announced then maybe you'll want to buy now. For the savvy consumer who plans on purchasing one device and holding onto it for a lengthy period of time, the inherent instability of this period makes it one of the worst times to buy any of these devices.
Apple really seems to be in a state of flux right now with their iPod/iPhone lines.
The release of the iPhone went well, but it's really pricey and historically first gen Apple products do little more than set the paradigm and show future promise. By the time we get second and third gen iPhones they'll probably be pretty amazing and a lot cheaper. Just comparing my second gen iPod to the advances made in say, the fourth generation (third introduced major changes, but fourth is where it stabilized design, went color, and started to move more heavily into video) are pretty staggering.
At the same time they're trying to reconcile the popularity of the iPhone with their ongoing iPod line and their iPod Nano line, but without dropping the core functionality of the iPod to such a degree that they lose business (i.e. by cutting the space to make room for the new features). As a result we have a mish-mash of product lines going on right now each of them with flaws.
If anyone out there is interested in purchasing a device now is probably the worst time. Give Apple a year or so and we'll start seeing further consolidation into a more stable product line that better integrates the features of each of their currently available products. Eventually I expect we'll be getting an 80 Gig iPhone with wi-fi and third-party apps, probably in only a year or two based on the way things have been moving so far.
When they stop making changes and start introducing only gradual improvements (like when the video iPod simply came out in a model with more storage) that's the time to go grab it. Based on their past performance though, I'd suggest waiting until then.
Frankly the exclusive content that wins out for me is the ability to use a mouse and keyboard. I've played all of the GTA3 games on the PC and I have some trouble imaging how I could possibly control it properly with a gamepad (huh... they have lock-on? Those poor bastards....) well... sometimes some of the fine motor control (e.g. flying in San Andreas) would be nice, but better aiming and movement generally make up for it. Along with consistently better graphics.
They may not have announced it yet, but the series started on the PC and based on past performance it will be coming out about six months later.
I don't care for Coke, but drinking Pepsi I find that Pepsi One (their version with Splenda) tastes much better than Diet Pepsi. I think part of this is because as with Diet Coke, I believe that Diet Pepsi uses a different forumla to achieve a different flavor profile rather than just adjusting it to make it without sugar (or rather, corn syrup). I think that the newer versions sweetened with Splenda are using something much closer to a modified original formula.
I think the more important problem is that you were drinking a very, very large amount of it. Most people don't drink nearly that much of any caffeinated beverages and thus, tend not to have serious problems with blood pressure, sleeplessness, or addiction. In short I think that your addiction (and resultant conspiracy theory that the intent is to addict you) is more related to your own usage scenario than to anything to do with the drink itself.
The "San Francisco" location is actually way the fuck out in Mountain View about 45 minutes away and much closer to San Jose than San Francisco. I mean, ok, maybe it's good if you work at Google or elsewhere in Silicon Valley, but not so much for San Franciscans.
Although it looks like they're mainly choosing locations with parking lots and such I think that converting one of the many locations along Market St. would have made a lot more sense and gotten much, much more traffic.
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While this is a pretty old concept in sci-fi it's definitely one that I've been wanting to actually live with for a while now. Even more as I've increasingly dealt with the issue of not wanting to kill animals, but not being entirely willing to stop eating meat (plus, c'mon, not to drag this further into a firestorm, but there are compelling arguments that animals killing other animals to eat is the natural way of things... nature is cruel as hell). Like others have said though, one of my biggest concerns is quality. With the way the agriculture is today flavor and quality have long, long given way to making a product that ships easily, grows quickly, reduces spoilage, and is made to conform to crazy marketing ideas (e.g. pork should be leaner to compete with chicken). All of this makes me worried that cultured meat will be dry, tasteless, and thoroughly unpleasant. A utility food for the very poor and vegetarians that's basically little more than a dry, tough tofu.
The biggest problem is that if we can culture meat with no need to kill the animals involved we really need to have human meat available. Not just for us to enjoy, but perhaps as a show of good faith to prove that it's not made from animals that have been raised for slaughter. Rudy Rucker's excellent integration of Wendy meat into his Ware series also got around one of the bigger problems to its adoption by using the oldest trick in the book: sex sells. An attractive nude woman lying on a bun with the caption "Eat Me"? Who could resist.
They did not "once" do a pirate store. The pirate store is still around located at 826 Valencia St. in San Francisco. I was in there just the other day. As such, the pirate concept is the original.
As well, while they do actually sell some items the majority of the "store" is simply to open drawers filled with appropriate bits (such as the artificial beards with a big mess of hair-like substance inside), read the amusing signs, and promote writing.
The fish tank is excellent.
It's also located next to the absolutely amazing Paxton Gate which, well, it's hard to describe exactly, except that all of the amazing things there are for sale.
While it's nice to know that idling won't be a problem I'm still concerned that street parking is going to be a major one. I hadn't considered that colder climates where warming blocks are more common would possibly provide current solutions, but I suspect that the power draw is going to be much larger if we're all driving electric cars.
Let's put it this way. How would I, as a resident of San Francisco who parks on the street because I don't have a parking lot or a garage, have a place to properly charge my car at "home"? I suspect that, in urban areas at least, this could be a true problem for electric car adoption.
One of the problems I've noticed with electrics is that they don't seem well-suited, ironically, to urban drivers in many cases. In many cases if you live in the city you rent and you park on the street (and, in my case, my neighbors with houses and garages even park on the street and fill their garages with crap). If you don't have a garage to house the car in at night and thus, easy access to recharge it this is going to be a serious problem. Prices for commercial charging are likely to be vastly higher than charging it yourself at home and with the short power life it would seem to be necessary to charge on an almost daily basis.
Likewise, the stated mileage doesn't sound like it takes into account things like being stuck on the freeway for hours while your engine is still idling and consuming power or being stuck in downtown traffic so, while you're unlikely to be driving your full range daily, it seems just as likely that with greater urban congestion you'll be running through a lot of power while you don't manage to actually go very far making the need for frequent recharging necessary.
Likely solutions will arise, but problems seem to be significant (what about jackasses just unplugging your car if it's somehow charging on the street?) regardless. It's a shame too because the urban environment is the ideal place for an electric car where it would help reduce both air and noise pollution and where trips are generally much shorter and infrequent. I can really see a car share program being able to make excellent use of electrics, but that's about it.
Yet another reason to invest exclusively in prints.
I mean, OK it's a hell of a lot less convenient to carry around the five massive cans compared to one DVD and I either have to string them all together and break them down again or get up every fifteen minutes to switch reels. Not to mention the problems in archiving the damn things correctly, but dammit I'm getting all my pixels! That is, until the restoration prints come out....
True, but since CW is the combination of WB and UPN... well, it ran on CW ;)
Yeah, I recalled having heard him say something to effect myself, but not having a source on it I just decided not to mention it. It'd be interesting to track that down.
So is it also the same (as far as personnel go) as it was when they canceled Arrested Development in spite of it's many, many Emmys?
Even with Firefly they only showed about seven episodes, out-of-order, and crushed it. They also canceled Family Guy, Futurama... need I go on?
Fox is just plain notorious for canceling excellent shows with a strong fanbase. I'd think that after his terrible treatment last time he'd know better than to even consider working with them. Go to somebody like the CW who at least let Buffy run for a damn long time and are desperate enough for something good to keep them afloat.
What also isn't going to help it is the name. Much like Firefly/Serenity had a name that made a lot of sense to you if you already knew the story this promises to be a case where only fans will understand the name. Everyone else will likely not be interested in the program based on the name alone and will avoid it. I mean, if I didn't already know the reasoning and that Joss was behind it I'd probably have little to no interest in a show called "Dollhouse". Hell, I'd probably assume it was some lame new reality show.
In America, self-tuning guitar tunes itself. In Soviet Russia, self-tuning guitar is tuned by you!
You sure it wasn't one of those Line 6 Variax guitars? Those can not only change tuning, but are designed to model the sound of various guitars as well. Of course, when you program in alternate tunings on something like that you're not physically changing the tuning like you would with this system, you're just creating the illusion of a different tuning.
I see the point, but without more space it's not doing much better than any other phone with a small, half-assed mp3 player in it. If they really want it to be a convergence device that allows me to ditch my iPod, phone, and Palm in favor of one device they need to bring the size up.
Maybe it's just not something that can technologically be done at the present, but that just means that they should be focusing on what they can do properly, rather than cramming in something that can't.
If I get a convergence device like this I want it to be able to legitimately replace my iPod. Not one of those dinky little Nano things that can hold a couple of albums either, a proper iPod. Especially since they've pushed into video more heavily.
This means that I'm going to require it meet the (modest by today's standards) requirement of at least 20 GB of space that was their top of the line 2nd Gen. Moving it up into something far more current would be nice (I barely have enough room now) but until I can fully replace my iPod with an iPhone I don't see a reason to go with it.
Want to really make it a worthwhile purchase? While third-party software is a complete necessity a Palm emulator (even if it's not available on the CD) would bring in a ton of good applications even if it would be missing the massive benefit of functional pen input (though Graffiti 2 was a distinct step backwards).
Ok, enough with the constant claims of something being a "hoax device" and prosecuting someone for it.
If it's a hoax worth prosecuting over the person involved had damned well better state or firmly imply that one object is, in fact, another. In this case as before in the Mooninite issue it was a third-party who made a mistake about an object that was never intended to be misinterpreted. This makes it a misunderstanding. You tell the person why you made the mistake, probably suggest that in light of this mistake they avoid doing it in the future (although that's entirely up to them, of course), apologize explaining that you were only trying to do the right thing, and send them on their way.
In other words: "Oh, we're very sorry, but from our laymen's point of view it looked like it might be a bomb of some sort. I'm sure you can understand where we're coming from with this and, in light of this fact, why we reacted the way we did."
The lack of an intent to deceive is really the issue here. The Piltdown Man was a hoax, this is just a misunderstanding.
Yeah, Crysis is going to lose tons of money. Not to mention all of those RTS games like Supreme Commander, Company of Heroes, Command and Conquer, all of the various iterations of Warcraft, Starcraft II... massive, massive money holes.
Not to mention the various exclusive console titles.
Pardon me, I didn't intend to slight the entire console audience. I, like many, many others, cut my teeth back on the NES. The thing is that each system tends to focus on and do certain things a bit better. Console tend to be great for simpler games, platformers, fighting games, action games, JRPGs, and a variety of other game types. PCs tend to do better with things that require a more complex controller, quick, precise aim, management of deep, complex menus and such. As a result strategy games, high-end simulations, RTS, FPS, and the like tend to work better on the PC.
When you adapt a game for each system you need to keep this in mind and aim at the proper platform, not just the one that will ship the most units. System Shock or System Shock 2 wouldn't work very well on a console. It requires a bunch of keys for activating upgrades, psi-powers, weapons, and the like. Navigating an inventory, searching around the environment to pick things up and the like would be unpleasant on a console because the controllers just aren't well adapted for it. As such it feels like Bioshock was adapted to play better on consoles. In the process a lot of the depth was shift out of it to make it work more easily not only with the controls available, but also to fit the predominant styles of playing. Instead of an inventory where you can pick and choose what kind of ammunition and supplies to carry you get fixed slots for ammunition. You likewise get fixed slots for health and EVE with no ability to choose to focus on one or the other. You hold supplies in a nebulous, uncheckable space until you get to a U-Invent-It machine rather than going into the inventory and combining items there. Stats are slightly abstracted out and you can't check your current tonics without visiting a gene bank (not change, that's a game design decision, check) because it would require yet another sub-screen.
Everything is adapted to work on a gamepad with a relatively small number of buttons and no good ability to precisely pick out and move objects around.
Finally, like it or not, but the modern Xbox 360 owner is far more likely to be a more casual gamer than the current PC gamer. I'm talking about the kind of guys who own a system and maybe a couple of games (Halo, Madden, etc.) to play on occasion. While this is definitely subjective, compared to the greater depth of the earlier games and the very linear nature of the gameplay (compare to, say, Deus Ex, which almost always offered multiple paths around obstacles that catered to the various specializations) it feels like things were made to be more palatable to this sort of gamer.
One final nit to pick. Not having to make permanent decisions really hampers the game and the ability for each player to make it their own. In past games you had to make real, final decisions. If you wanted to raise up your hacking skill you'd have to neglect something. You wouldn't be able to wield, let alone carry, all of the weapons and you'd probably have a meager, at best, collection of psi-powers. In Bioshock you start out being able to use every single weapon at a very high level of effectiveness. Yeah, you can get some tonics to improve things, but it's a world of difference between "I can't equip this" and "I get 10% extra damage with this". The same goes for plasmids and for being able to do more than barely hack the simpler vending machines. There is quite simply little reason other than time or boredom to not manually hack just about every hackable machine you come across. At most the penalty is usually just a mild shock that you can walk off after a trip through the Vita-Chamber rather than destruction of the machine or the raising of an alarm. Even when you do make decisions there's no need to commit to a pathway (or end up being merely adequate at a bunch of things) because you can always just run back to the Gene Bank and change your tonics and plasmids around to reinvent your character whenever you want. So, while you have some choice (mainly which plasmids and tonics to buy) you're still mainly just lightly customizing your character rather than actually defining them.
I refer, as always in this matter, to the previous games in the series. They had an excellent mechanic that allowed regeneration, but in such a way that it didn't trivialize the process of dying. I didn't have to plug away for hours and hours to get good enough to beat the game, but I also didn't just walk through the entire thing in a couple of hours either.
There is a balance in this case and while I felt the previous games had it perfect Bioshock trends much more heavily into easy. Combined with the more linear path, lack of inventory, massive surplus of health and ammo, and all the other little things done to make it more oriented to the console audience than the PC audience have resulted in a game that feels a lot more like a ride where everyone is assured of easily reaching the end in almost exactly the same amount of time with little to no effort involved in getting there.
Frankly it wasn't over-hyped to me. I mean, yeah, there was a lot of hype, but for me the game was sold as soon as it was announced. I was a huge fan of System Shock when it was first released and while I had issues with System Shock 2 initially it was a really great game as well. Deus Ex just continued the winning streak for this loose group of games. Bioshock, though, is where they dropped the ball.
First off is the fact that it all feels dumbed down for a console audience looking for fast, simple gameplay with a few nods to complexity and story thrown in. There's no inventory so everything is just thrown up on your screen like any other shooter. No stats, because everything is handled through the plasmids. In fact, just about everything that would normally be mapped to a sub-screen is now handled in a very limited fashion by wall-mounted consoles (e.g. gun upgrades, plasmids, invention, etc.).
The game is far more linear and yes, the Vita-Chambers do make it too easy. From a console/FPS point of view getting back in the action might be desired, but this isn't a deathmatch here. Dying should feel like it has some consequence. SS and SS2 both had regen machines, but they never felt cheap or easy because there was only one per level and you had to go out and find it and activate it first. As a result dying was a concern. Until you activated the regen there was real tension and once you did, it meant that you weren't totally out of it and back to your last save, but you'd still have to trek across the entire level through hordes of enemies and with very little ammunition. Not just pop out of the chamber and go back to shooting the same enemy.
It's not a terrible game. The graphics are pretty (albeit, on a PC running at Maximum settings, not that much better than what we've gotten used to in recent years) and the setting and theme are novel and interesting even though the art direction seems to have stolen a page from Fallout more often than not. It's just that it was heavily hyped and arrived to glowing reviews when really it's more of a 7/10 sort of game. It's a low point for the series where they tried to transition into a simpler console audience and treated the PC version as the port rather than the other way around. I guess if this is the first game in the series you've ever played it might seem great, but if you've been along since the start then you'll know that it's just no match for it's deeper forebears.
I don't know... without being able to resort to broad generalizations to have a ready scapegoat to complain about for all of my problems how will I be able to function?
That is a line of logic that, while sensible for business and other areas, is almost never relevant to consumer electronics.
For one thing: listening to music on the go is hardly a need. It's a want and, as such, is going to change whenever a new product is made available. Yes, I might have some basic parameters (e.g. it must hold my entire, 50 Gig music collection), but since I'm unlikely to be buying a new model every time they come out with one I want more it makes the most sense to try to maximize your value by waiting for a product that will best fit your current and future desires.
So, to compare directly to this product line I might want an iPhone, but I want one that will have a large enough capacity to store everything on my iPod, plus video, plus well... whatever else I might need to put on it in the future. Roughly estimating this would mean a capacity of at least 60-80 Gig. At the same time I know that I also would want a touch screen and internet access. The ability to free up three devices (Palm, Phone, and iPod) into one would also be a significant advantage.
Thus, the problem is that at present none of the available devices meet my needs. So while my needs aren't being fully met at present, purchasing any of these devices would be unlikely to satisfy me making it a foolish purchase. Yes, I would have the usage of an inferior device for a year or so, but since I'm not made of money I'm going to want to purchase the one that will best meet my needs in the future.
So, yeah, this is (as with many similar issues) largely moot if you have the unlimited funds and absolute need to have a desired (but not critical) device for a year before you ditch it in favor of a newer model. Most people, however, don't work that way and instead try to optimize the best time to buy in order to get the most use for their money.
My point is that Apple is clearly trying to integrate a couple of different product lines. Rather than settling for the halfway measures that are currently available (i.e. iPhone without enough memory to replace an iPod, iPod Touch without the feature set of the iPhone or the memory of an iPod, or iPod that will likely be rolled into the others shortly) it would seem that the best position to take right now is to wait things out.
This is clearly an indication of where things are going to go and at present it would seem inadvisable to purchase any of these devices when the better integrated ones will likely drop very shortly.
Apple has a history of introducing new products or new form factors of existing products only to finally end up delivering a mature version a year or two later that is typically not backwards compatible. For example, look at the iPod. The third generation brought about the dock, the introduction of USB, and many changes in how devices connect to it. As a result while my second gen iPod still plays music on it's monochrome screen it is completely incompatible with all of the accessories available on the market.
On the other hand, if you're the sort of early adopter who is going to buy the newest product each time a new generation is announced then maybe you'll want to buy now. For the savvy consumer who plans on purchasing one device and holding onto it for a lengthy period of time, the inherent instability of this period makes it one of the worst times to buy any of these devices.
Apple really seems to be in a state of flux right now with their iPod/iPhone lines.
The release of the iPhone went well, but it's really pricey and historically first gen Apple products do little more than set the paradigm and show future promise. By the time we get second and third gen iPhones they'll probably be pretty amazing and a lot cheaper. Just comparing my second gen iPod to the advances made in say, the fourth generation (third introduced major changes, but fourth is where it stabilized design, went color, and started to move more heavily into video) are pretty staggering.
At the same time they're trying to reconcile the popularity of the iPhone with their ongoing iPod line and their iPod Nano line, but without dropping the core functionality of the iPod to such a degree that they lose business (i.e. by cutting the space to make room for the new features). As a result we have a mish-mash of product lines going on right now each of them with flaws.
If anyone out there is interested in purchasing a device now is probably the worst time. Give Apple a year or so and we'll start seeing further consolidation into a more stable product line that better integrates the features of each of their currently available products. Eventually I expect we'll be getting an 80 Gig iPhone with wi-fi and third-party apps, probably in only a year or two based on the way things have been moving so far.
When they stop making changes and start introducing only gradual improvements (like when the video iPod simply came out in a model with more storage) that's the time to go grab it. Based on their past performance though, I'd suggest waiting until then.
Frankly the exclusive content that wins out for me is the ability to use a mouse and keyboard. I've played all of the GTA3 games on the PC and I have some trouble imaging how I could possibly control it properly with a gamepad (huh... they have lock-on? Those poor bastards....) well... sometimes some of the fine motor control (e.g. flying in San Andreas) would be nice, but better aiming and movement generally make up for it. Along with consistently better graphics.
They may not have announced it yet, but the series started on the PC and based on past performance it will be coming out about six months later.
I don't care for Coke, but drinking Pepsi I find that Pepsi One (their version with Splenda) tastes much better than Diet Pepsi. I think part of this is because as with Diet Coke, I believe that Diet Pepsi uses a different forumla to achieve a different flavor profile rather than just adjusting it to make it without sugar (or rather, corn syrup). I think that the newer versions sweetened with Splenda are using something much closer to a modified original formula.
I think the more important problem is that you were drinking a very, very large amount of it. Most people don't drink nearly that much of any caffeinated beverages and thus, tend not to have serious problems with blood pressure, sleeplessness, or addiction. In short I think that your addiction (and resultant conspiracy theory that the intent is to addict you) is more related to your own usage scenario than to anything to do with the drink itself.
The "San Francisco" location is actually way the fuck out in Mountain View about 45 minutes away and much closer to San Jose than San Francisco. I mean, ok, maybe it's good if you work at Google or elsewhere in Silicon Valley, but not so much for San Franciscans.
Although it looks like they're mainly choosing locations with parking lots and such I think that converting one of the many locations along Market St. would have made a lot more sense and gotten much, much more traffic.