Ah, but the point is that TA gets so much _bigger_ then StarCraft. TA has all the unit itinerary, work itinerary, waypoints, patrol systems... I find StarCraft's combat focuses an awful lot on the judicious use of special powers, while TA actually focusses on combat more. Plus, TA has way cooler jets.
I also feel that TA brings much more to the field of base construction and defense - the greater need to expand to all the metal sources in TA mean that players have to defend a very wide area, so the art of defense layout is much more complex.
Most of these games have a "no blood" mode. Maybe just playing Descent III or Shogo or Slave Zero instead of a conventional FPS would be good - its all mechanicle there.
There's the whole question of how legitamate this all is - these are retail products here.
Okay - Abuse is awesome, try that multiplayer, you'll be confused out of your wits why there's nothing else like it. BattleZone 1 is good on old machines, nice graphics, and gives both FPS buffs and RTS buffs good gameplay.
Play Total Annihilation for a week and you'll have army management and base construction skills that will kick the ass of any StarCraft or AoE player.
Independance War II should be added to a physics class curriculum for required playing - space fighting the way space fighting really works.
For a sheer visual orgasm of strategy, there's Homeworld. Too bad the game's not that much fun tho.
Notice that all the games I'm recommending except Abuse are about fighting vehicles, robots, etc - not killing humans. Slightly reduces the whole "violence" issues.
If you want non-violent games, theres 1/0 racing games out there to play online.... heck, there's some good violent racing games too (WipeOut XL comes to mind).
Most of those games will work fine, if not perfectly, on a pentium II with minimal video acceleration (Descent3 and IWar2 are exceptions) - a good baseline for a highschool.
While he is wrong about epII - think about epI for a minute. We don't see pilots scream in death. We dont see any Gungans die in the battle on Naboo. The only living beings that die in Ep1 are starfighter pilots and Darth Maul (and that's okay 'cause he's a Bad Guy). The fighter pilots don't count, they're not real people - they're extras, you never see their face, so to Hollywood they don't really exist.
Every Disney movie in the past 10 years has been more violent then Ep1.
The US nuclear weapons industry had scandalous waste processing procedures. The messes produced by that industry villified nuclear technology as a whole, permanently damaging the very careful and clean power industry.
The US and other countries are destroying themselves converting to combustion power systems to avoid nuclear power because of the stigma generated by the US nuclear weapons industry - tanks of waste were buried with lower standards then a tank at a gas station. Suburbs were built over atomic waste sites. There was a company in mexico that was given tons of radioactive waste to recycle into building materials - hundreds of radioactive dinner tables ended up all over the place. Consistently, these always come from the weapons industry, not the power industry.
Maybe that's not the US military, but it is a product of the US war machine. You can't disconnect them completely.
And then a large sum of money that they pay to the radio stations to get their music played. Radio stations that are already 40% advertisement jingles anyways.
And people wonder why the industry killed streaming audio? 'Cause it would hurt their racket, maybe actually getting some independants some air time (god forbid people get to hear music they want).
You see many, many people complaining their livelihood is being removed by technology - factory workers into robots, craftsmen replaced by factories.... musical groups replaced by one producer and a machine. Local businesses going under because transportation technology is good enough that importing is cheaper.
Hint - these people aren't getting a break. Now look at the size of a break these associations are getting.
Additionall, when corporations spend 60% of their revenue (not income, revenue - many expenses I need to keep alive don't get deducted, so why should theirs?) on fees to the government (I mean taxes, not contributions to their party of choice, that never makes it back to the people) then they can start getting legislation. Have you looked at your taxes lately? Wanna guess how much income tax M$ has to lose? Where's the sliding scale now?
For now, people put money into the government. No, not the government, the Country. Corporations put money into the government, so that they can decide how the Nation's money is spent. A decision they have no right to make - they don't put money into the Nation - except into the hands of their shareholders and employees - kindof a oddball Robin Hood "Rob from everyone and give it to your buddies".
Corporations should not be allowed to make campaign contributions most certainly.... individuals maybe - maybe mister Gates should be allowed to make contributions, but certainly not Microsoft. Why? Because a corporation should not be able to make unsolicited "suggestions" to the government - they are not people, and the government is supposed to represent intrests of people.
If you want to make a campaign contribution for new lower pollution standards - fine, do it, but with your own money, not that of your shareholders, customers, and employees.
Besides, this is the States. They don't believe they're responsible to the international court of justice, or any other international body, be it the Geneva convention, NAFTA, or the WTO. So, they'll just move all their businessses to Texas, claim that all crimes were committed against Texans, then fry every last media-filching evil-doer.
The rest of us will work on that gizmo that collapses weapons-grade plutonium into a hypermass at long range.
Nope. They're called "Skid rock" or alternately "Mall Rock" and generally fall into the major modern corporate category of "Metallicreed".
Here's a hint - if it was, is, or can be on Much/MTV - don't listen to it. There are a lot of damn good indies out there, and if you live in any real city (read - not an endless suburb that eats its young) you'll have plenty of places to see them and pick up their music.
Yes, but its pointless. They're after carreer criminals, stolen car rings, organised crime here. Keys in the ignition catches the wrong kind of crook - you get the casual opportunist, the "grand theft shoplifting" type of person. They kid who manages to swipe chips from the computer shop in his pants. Yeah, he's a crook, he's damaging the economy, etc. But he's probably not a menace to society. The organised car-theft ring type of person is much more dangerous.
If the keys were in the ignition, the most likely effect would be hoodlums taking it for a joyride, planning to leave it in whatever condition wherever they finish (possibly even where they found it - yes this happens). That's a criminal, but its not a car-theft ring. The police will catch people like that eventually for other crimes with much less expensive equipment. The pro is different. The pro works with a chop shop, has contacts, and can be a lead into larger organisations. The pro is the one stealing cars two times a week. The kid will do this rarely.
That's why the cops don't leave the keys in - small potatoes.
Heheh, that'd be something. Maybe, just in case the user can't read very well, the ULA should be read alloud audibly by the speakers. The amount of time is then limited by the amount of time it takes the machine to clearly (meaning slowly) read the ULA alloud. This'd really shorten them.
That's a shame... sounds like those gametypes all use the same maps - 2 bases with 1 "point" at each end, with a point int the middle for the ball to spawn. Boomball is a popular UT mod already - I'm a diehard player of that one - nice that a 3rd party mod is being incorporated into the game, although I prefer it in black flag mode, in which the ball is a graphically a more traditional flag - same gameplay though.
Assault was one of my fave parts of UT - its how I got my brother, who swore he'd never get into mouseaiming into UT. Coop AS was awesome, especially playing sniper on Overlord.
The problem with AS was a tendancy for overcomplex objectives. If they'd just made the maps have big red numbers saying "shoot me" and you have to shoot each number in order, then it all would be fine. Maybe include TFC style signs on where everything is. Instead you had to have already played the map to know the objectives - not good for newbies. DOM was similar, it was impossible to find the map points, and you never knew which name referred to which point.
You just need permission. Make it clear to the babysitter that they will be taped, and that if they don't like it they should seek employment elsewhere. Of course, you might have to make some concessions (yeah, you can raid the fridge, yeah, you can watch TV) in order to get babysitters that don't mind being watched, but otherwise it should be fine.
Yes, you can - you just have to have a sign out front informing any visitors that they're being watched. If they don't like it, they shouldn't enter.
This prevents you from legally being able to blackmail visitors with things that supposedly occured in privacy. Imagine a sex-toy shop - costomers want to feel safe knowing that they are not being taped as they enter and exit the store.
Really, I'm still worried about public places - I mean, I don't like the idea that "insert bank name here" knows every time I walk by (not into) one of their machines, which they could do with face recognition.
Yeah, why can't they all follow the greatest role models of fairness and incorruptibility in games, the International Olympic (was I allowed to use that word?) Committy.
Skeptics may want to remember that no character EVER wins in Star Wars through violence.
All the more reason for Anikin to be the first - it would be quite poignant that he be friendly, charismatic, and remorselessly violent as a child. He's Darth Vader. He kills his way to the top. What better a place to start?
And when I have a midterm in two days, I study and learn hardcore. I don't care who you are, half a day in an overcrowded lecture hall is a strain on you attention span, and computer science majors are by far the worst at that.
Idunno, I've kinda got a problem with ATI's ethics about the Radeon. Check out this, if you haven't seen it yet. ATI is the only competition, and Canadian, so I want them to be heroes, but after scams like that I have trouble doing so.
You are aware that its april fools, and that I was joking, aren't you? Please tell me you do understand this concept of "humour". Its a rather handy thing, doncha know.
I can see it now: a new deal - 100 mod points, $100 - protect your interests and your articles! Yes, here at Craaaazzzzzzyyyy Taco's, everything must go, go, go!!
And if you become our sponsor right now you'll get this fabulous one time only special bonus, auto-unmoddable-fp's for a month!!!
Yer looking at the wrong games then. Sega consistenly puts out round after round of innovative games, and Nintendo's pushed out one or two really mindblowing tricks (true, most of them are re-makes of their N64 titles, but still).
For sort-of fighting games, the Dreamcast ownz. Powerstone II handles more like a mix of Super Smash brothers with Mario 64 then a fighting game, and has four player freeplay. Virtual On Oratio Tangram is a really really unusual approach to head-to-head mecha combat.
Sonic Adventure II has some really interesting new gameplay concepts, and a nice set of multiplayer gametypes.
On the PSII, try Armored Core. It might look like a typical behind-view shooter, but it sure doesn't feel like one - the best mech design system I've ever seen on a video game, and it handles like a dream (the rocket flight system in that puts other jetpack games to shame).
Of course, this is from my personal "single player is masturbation" perspective. I guess those Metal Gear and Final Fantasy games might have something to them, but if I wanted to play on my own, I'd only be using one hand and I don't have to pay for that joystick.
Slashdot Mirror
Ah, but the point is that TA gets so much _bigger_ then StarCraft. TA has all the unit itinerary, work itinerary, waypoints, patrol systems... I find StarCraft's combat focuses an awful lot on the judicious use of special powers, while TA actually focusses on combat more. Plus, TA has way cooler jets.
I also feel that TA brings much more to the field of base construction and defense - the greater need to expand to all the metal sources in TA mean that players have to defend a very wide area, so the art of defense layout is much more complex.
Most of these games have a "no blood" mode. Maybe just playing Descent III or Shogo or Slave Zero instead of a conventional FPS would be good - its all mechanicle there.
There's the whole question of how legitamate this all is - these are retail products here.
Okay - Abuse is awesome, try that multiplayer, you'll be confused out of your wits why there's nothing else like it. BattleZone 1 is good on old machines, nice graphics, and gives both FPS buffs and RTS buffs good gameplay.
Play Total Annihilation for a week and you'll have army management and base construction skills that will kick the ass of any StarCraft or AoE player.
Independance War II should be added to a physics class curriculum for required playing - space fighting the way space fighting really works.
For a sheer visual orgasm of strategy, there's Homeworld. Too bad the game's not that much fun tho.
Notice that all the games I'm recommending except Abuse are about fighting vehicles, robots, etc - not killing humans. Slightly reduces the whole "violence" issues.
If you want non-violent games, theres 1/0 racing games out there to play online.... heck, there's some good violent racing games too (WipeOut XL comes to mind).
Most of those games will work fine, if not perfectly, on a pentium II with minimal video acceleration (Descent3 and IWar2 are exceptions) - a good baseline for a highschool.
While he is wrong about epII - think about epI for a minute. We don't see pilots scream in death. We dont see any Gungans die in the battle on Naboo. The only living beings that die in Ep1 are starfighter pilots and Darth Maul (and that's okay 'cause he's a Bad Guy). The fighter pilots don't count, they're not real people - they're extras, you never see their face, so to Hollywood they don't really exist.
Every Disney movie in the past 10 years has been more violent then Ep1.
The US nuclear weapons industry had scandalous waste processing procedures. The messes produced by that industry villified nuclear technology as a whole, permanently damaging the very careful and clean power industry.
The US and other countries are destroying themselves converting to combustion power systems to avoid nuclear power because of the stigma generated by the US nuclear weapons industry - tanks of waste were buried with lower standards then a tank at a gas station. Suburbs were built over atomic waste sites. There was a company in mexico that was given tons of radioactive waste to recycle into building materials - hundreds of radioactive dinner tables ended up all over the place. Consistently, these always come from the weapons industry, not the power industry.
Maybe that's not the US military, but it is a product of the US war machine. You can't disconnect them completely.
And then a large sum of money that they pay to the radio stations to get their music played. Radio stations that are already 40% advertisement jingles anyways.
And people wonder why the industry killed streaming audio? 'Cause it would hurt their racket, maybe actually getting some independants some air time (god forbid people get to hear music they want).
You see many, many people complaining their livelihood is being removed by technology - factory workers into robots, craftsmen replaced by factories.... musical groups replaced by one producer and a machine. Local businesses going under because transportation technology is good enough that importing is cheaper.
Hint - these people aren't getting a break. Now look at the size of a break these associations are getting.
Additionall, when corporations spend 60% of their revenue (not income, revenue - many expenses I need to keep alive don't get deducted, so why should theirs?) on fees to the government (I mean taxes, not contributions to their party of choice, that never makes it back to the people) then they can start getting legislation. Have you looked at your taxes lately? Wanna guess how much income tax M$ has to lose? Where's the sliding scale now?
For now, people put money into the government. No, not the government, the Country. Corporations put money into the government, so that they can decide how the Nation's money is spent. A decision they have no right to make - they don't put money into the Nation - except into the hands of their shareholders and employees - kindof a oddball Robin Hood "Rob from everyone and give it to your buddies".
Corporations should not be allowed to make campaign contributions most certainly.... individuals maybe - maybe mister Gates should be allowed to make contributions, but certainly not Microsoft. Why? Because a corporation should not be able to make unsolicited "suggestions" to the government - they are not people, and the government is supposed to represent intrests of people.
If you want to make a campaign contribution for new lower pollution standards - fine, do it, but with your own money, not that of your shareholders, customers, and employees.
Besides, this is the States. They don't believe they're responsible to the international court of justice, or any other international body, be it the Geneva convention, NAFTA, or the WTO. So, they'll just move all their businessses to Texas, claim that all crimes were committed against Texans, then fry every last media-filching evil-doer.
The rest of us will work on that gizmo that collapses weapons-grade plutonium into a hypermass at long range.
Nope. They're called "Skid rock" or alternately "Mall Rock" and generally fall into the major modern corporate category of "Metallicreed".
Here's a hint - if it was, is, or can be on Much/MTV - don't listen to it. There are a lot of damn good indies out there, and if you live in any real city (read - not an endless suburb that eats its young) you'll have plenty of places to see them and pick up their music.
Yes, but its pointless. They're after carreer criminals, stolen car rings, organised crime here. Keys in the ignition catches the wrong kind of crook - you get the casual opportunist, the "grand theft shoplifting" type of person. They kid who manages to swipe chips from the computer shop in his pants. Yeah, he's a crook, he's damaging the economy, etc. But he's probably not a menace to society. The organised car-theft ring type of person is much more dangerous.
If the keys were in the ignition, the most likely effect would be hoodlums taking it for a joyride, planning to leave it in whatever condition wherever they finish (possibly even where they found it - yes this happens). That's a criminal, but its not a car-theft ring. The police will catch people like that eventually for other crimes with much less expensive equipment. The pro is different. The pro works with a chop shop, has contacts, and can be a lead into larger organisations. The pro is the one stealing cars two times a week. The kid will do this rarely.
That's why the cops don't leave the keys in - small potatoes.
Heheh, that'd be something. Maybe, just in case the user can't read very well, the ULA should be read alloud audibly by the speakers. The amount of time is then limited by the amount of time it takes the machine to clearly (meaning slowly) read the ULA alloud. This'd really shorten them.
That's a shame... sounds like those gametypes all use the same maps - 2 bases with 1 "point" at each end, with a point int the middle for the ball to spawn. Boomball is a popular UT mod already - I'm a diehard player of that one - nice that a 3rd party mod is being incorporated into the game, although I prefer it in black flag mode, in which the ball is a graphically a more traditional flag - same gameplay though.
Assault was one of my fave parts of UT - its how I got my brother, who swore he'd never get into mouseaiming into UT. Coop AS was awesome, especially playing sniper on Overlord.
The problem with AS was a tendancy for overcomplex objectives. If they'd just made the maps have big red numbers saying "shoot me" and you have to shoot each number in order, then it all would be fine. Maybe include TFC style signs on where everything is. Instead you had to have already played the map to know the objectives - not good for newbies. DOM was similar, it was impossible to find the map points, and you never knew which name referred to which point.
You just need permission. Make it clear to the babysitter that they will be taped, and that if they don't like it they should seek employment elsewhere. Of course, you might have to make some concessions (yeah, you can raid the fridge, yeah, you can watch TV) in order to get babysitters that don't mind being watched, but otherwise it should be fine.
Yes, you can - you just have to have a sign out front informing any visitors that they're being watched. If they don't like it, they shouldn't enter.
This prevents you from legally being able to blackmail visitors with things that supposedly occured in privacy. Imagine a sex-toy shop - costomers want to feel safe knowing that they are not being taped as they enter and exit the store.
Really, I'm still worried about public places - I mean, I don't like the idea that "insert bank name here" knows every time I walk by (not into) one of their machines, which they could do with face recognition.
other countries? Could still end up with exotic asian scat porn on .com or .org domains. The internet is not .USA.
.prn so sex.com becomes sex.com.prn would help. But still, this would be messy.
Perhaps automatically offerening free transfer
Yeah, why can't they all follow the greatest role models of fairness and incorruptibility in games, the International Olympic (was I allowed to use that word?) Committy.
All the more reason for Anikin to be the first - it would be quite poignant that he be friendly, charismatic, and remorselessly violent as a child. He's Darth Vader. He kills his way to the top. What better a place to start?
And when I have a midterm in two days, I study and learn hardcore. I don't care who you are, half a day in an overcrowded lecture hall is a strain on you attention span, and computer science majors are by far the worst at that.
Idunno, I've kinda got a problem with ATI's ethics about the Radeon. Check out this, if you haven't seen it yet. ATI is the only competition, and Canadian, so I want them to be heroes, but after scams like that I have trouble doing so.
at least whenever you read a story relating to Apple in some way
Oh. Well there's the source of the problem. Whoops.
What the hell did they do to the slashdot logo and title bars? Please tell me it doesn't always do this for mac articles and I just didn't notice.
You are aware that its april fools, and that I was joking, aren't you? Please tell me you do understand this concept of "humour". Its a rather handy thing, doncha know.
I can see it now: a new deal - 100 mod points, $100 - protect your interests and your articles! Yes, here at Craaaazzzzzzyyyy Taco's, everything must go, go, go!!
And if you become our sponsor right now you'll get this fabulous one time only special bonus, auto-unmoddable-fp's for a month!!!
Yes, come to Slashdotland and memebomb the geeks!
Slashdot: Stuff for sale. Stuff that's modded.
Do you get the feeling that this is kinda like *them* trolling *us*? Wierd.
Yer looking at the wrong games then. Sega consistenly puts out round after round of innovative games, and Nintendo's pushed out one or two really mindblowing tricks (true, most of them are re-makes of their N64 titles, but still).
For sort-of fighting games, the Dreamcast ownz. Powerstone II handles more like a mix of Super Smash brothers with Mario 64 then a fighting game, and has four player freeplay. Virtual On Oratio Tangram is a really really unusual approach to head-to-head mecha combat.
Sonic Adventure II has some really interesting new gameplay concepts, and a nice set of multiplayer gametypes.
On the PSII, try Armored Core. It might look like a typical behind-view shooter, but it sure doesn't feel like one - the best mech design system I've ever seen on a video game, and it handles like a dream (the rocket flight system in that puts other jetpack games to shame).
Of course, this is from my personal "single player is masturbation" perspective. I guess those Metal Gear and Final Fantasy games might have something to them, but if I wanted to play on my own, I'd only be using one hand and I don't have to pay for that joystick.