Expensive flashable chips (DMS, Crystal, Matrix) - Most of these have "homebrew" only firmware available which does not violate the DMCA in any serious way (although, you might want to get a lawyer on that). These chips can be flashed to update them should the need arise, or defects in the code are found. Sometimes more reliable at booting. Can boot from the browser as well as from turning the machine on. Usually have PS1/DVD movie support without having to turn the chip off.
Cheap-n-nasty chips - All of these definately violate the DMCA. Nowadays, they all pretty much have similar rates for booting media. Very few of these can boot from the browser (only boot from turning the chip on). Almost none have PS1/DVD movie support without turning off the chip. Some of these chips are knockoffs -- many knockoffs, quite simply, don't work well at all. Suggestions: DUO2se, MAGIC, Mars Action.
you'd need to reconfigure the drive controller to make it read them from the inside out, which would break compatibility with normal games.
I doubt anyone with a "pirate" GameCube could give two farts if they had to move their purchased game library onto mini DVD-R to play the discs...
Considering most modchips, when they first come out, sell for about $200, 10 DVD-Rs (and 10 is a pretty big game library for most people) aren't going to break the bank.
Re:Betamax gets the last laugh
on
The VHS is Dead
·
· Score: 3, Informative
Betamax gets the last laugh - it seems that it was better than DVD too.
Soooory, not even close. I once did a technical comparison and Betamax is about 5% better than VHS (10%, maybe). It has a few more lines of resolution (220 vs 200, IIRC) and cleaner chroma recording. It definately does not even touch DVD for quality.
You might be talking about BetaCam, which does compete with DVD for quality (although, again, doesn't match). However, it doesn't compete on price; a decent BetaCam VTR usually being in the $1,000+ range.
BetaCam came out a long time after BetaMax was totally dead. Its VHS competition, Super-VHS, found a niche market in the homes of cheap people who wanted near DVD-level quality at a reasonable price (at the time). Also, it seems to be popular with very small TV studios. Super-VHS is not as good as BetaCam, although it is very reasonably close, and is about 1/3 the price.
Re:Actually, VHS wasn't better.
on
The VHS is Dead
·
· Score: 1
And JVC isn't getting royalties for use of the "VHS" mark?
And you have to put their stylized logo on the tape for a consumer to recognize it will play in the VCR?
"Works with VHS VTRs" doesn't cost a penny.
Re:Still for sale though
on
The VHS is Dead
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
There's a few very good reasons to use VHS.
- You don't have hundreds of dollars, but want to watch shows at a different time.
- You want to record an indefinite number of shows, but don't want to buy new units all the time, and don't want to "DIY".
- You want to record something cheaply from your video camera to a format you can play at a friends house (say, a birthday party or a vacation, whatever).
- The pricing of VHS tapes, per minute of TV recording can't be beat (yet). Even with DVD-R, at $1 per disc, recording to a standard format will only gain you up to about 4 hours of VHS quality video. A $0.99 economy VHS tape can do 6 or more hours of recording.
- Ease of use / Familiarity.
- Lack of trust with PVR companies (example, you don't want a nasty TiVO surprise of banner ads when you skip commercials, and when you learned of this, you no longer trust the company's products).
They should have laughed, waved an RFC with example.com highlighted in yellow in the face of the Government and told them to shove it up their ass. When will people learn from this stupidity?
One problem. This isn't the USA. If the Canadian government deems something foreign to be obscene they may block its import. They may also block the printing of obscene material within Canada, although that happens a lot less than the former (which happens far too often).
No, your motive for doing it cannot be considered a defence in a trial. So "common carrier" isn't particularly applicable.
Although this wasn't word from a judge, Canadian ISPs know better than to toy with a government with the power to force them follow a blocklist. So, better to block one site on request for a while than everything.
Anyway, I'm waiting for the day when some smart-ass murder suspect sprays his entire house with some iron-containing substance so that, when the CSI's show up with their luminol, everything glows.
Better yet, just write "Try Harder, Morons!" with it on the mirror.:-D
Just get HD Loader and you'll find all those problems disappear...:-D
I'm totally amazed that Sony removed the hard drive option from the re-release of the PS2. Talk about castrating the only feature that made games like GTA playable on the PS2!
What I said was "Much better Linux support", as in much better drivers and "better suport FROM open source application". Not FOR.
I'm sorry I tried to clean up your poor english.
Here's your sentence:
Much better Linux support, less problems in high-end application such as XSI, better OpenGL drivers,much larger user base, better suport from open source application (I've been a "fan" of ATI until I really started to use Nvidia cards. I don't want to go back. )
So, if I am going to take your english at face value (as you'd like it to be), you're saying that a single open source application is providing Nvidia support. I'm sorry, but normally we reserve verbs for objects, that, well, can animate. Just pretending for a second that we're talking about, oh, who cares, MS Word. MS Word supports me! You know, that sounds perfect.
If you are an IT manager, that is.
Blender runs a lot better with Nvidia cards and in general I've found that open source applications run a lot better on nvidia than on ati.
You're suggesting, I have to derive from your view of things, that should blender not exist, NVidia's drivers would be, well, not supported?
Honestly, admit you added an 'r' in by accident and be done with it. This is silly and pointless.
Until, of course, NVidia goes out of business or just chooses to stop supporting your card. Then you can throw it out at the next kernel revision.
Unlike some of you that seem to buy video cards yearly, my Radeon VIVO, which I bought the first day they were made, is till being used in my computer. I believe it's about 5 years old right now. I very highly doubt that in 5 years Nvidia will still support your super-duper-expensive video card.
Some of us would rather use a somewhat "slower" card from a manufacturer that embraces the linux open source community and doesn't abuse the kernel's licensing.
I was a "fan" of NVidia until I realized I'd have to use their soiled binaries on my machine. Then I realized I wanted to go back. So I did.
My expeience with manufacturers' soiled binaries on my linux machines has always been less than adequate. Starting with my old expensive telemann DTP-200 (or whatever the model number was) which they were still selling after kernel 2.4 but decided they'd end support at kernel 2.2, all the way to my VP-1020 card that said linux on the box, but surprise surprise, nothing at all from the manufacturer. There's, of course, an open source driver now from third parties, no thanks to Vision Plus.
better suport from open source application
This is why you were marked troll. They have no support for open source at all. This is an out and out lie.
Look, I don't expect HalfLife 2 to run on a system that doesn't live up to what necessary. But adding things in just to ruin the experience for people that have slow network connections that adds absolutely ZERO value to ANYBODY except Valve is really lame.
I could understand it, if, say, the game wasn't available on DVD, and, say, it downloaded the data dynamically from the internet as you played in Single Player mode, but it doesn't. So there's no value to the customer in doing this. It's like adding idle loops in the game. Why?
Aside from the fact that this statement is completely inapplicable, since you only need a dialup for confirmation/registration..
Awesome again. So, in addition to the crap internet the people already have (which we will assume is always-on low grade DSL/Cable/whatever) they now have to buy a dial up account to? Lame.
Is the market share of people without internet connections worth supporting? In Valve's opinion, no.
Umm, no. Valve took extra steps to ensure they couldn't use the game. Normal companies take that time to improve the game. Not Valve. Nope. Better they take that time and devote it to ruining the expereience of some of their customers. It's just so stupid, I really don't have words to describe it apart from, well, Lame.
If you've got evidence that they sold it in bad faith
Uhh, selling it to customers and not letting them play for two days isn't bad faith to you?
It is to me.
Excuses like "we were forced to do it" are total bullshit. Valve signed a contract, and that's the way it goes. Don't like the terms after you signed it? Just like nobody is forcing me to buy this terrible STEAMing crap, nobody is forcing Valve to sit there coding HL2. Paraphrashing Nike (tm), "Just Don't Do It!"
but they're free to impose any hardware/networking/dancepad requirements they want, and you're free not to buy it.
I didn't, I shan't, I won't. Oh, BTW, I have bought about $1,000 in games over the past year or two. But Valve will never see any of that money. No way.
Well, they might see some of my money *if* they make a console version (I GC, XBOX, GBA, and PS2, they can take their pick) of the game. I would assume that won't require Steam...
Yeah, I usually buy console games. It's crap like Steam that keeps me from buying PC games. I think it's been a solid year since I've bought a PC game. Huh. I bought 2 console games last week. What an odd coincidence. I suppose it's because my console games work. But my last PC game did nothing but whine about CDs. Odd that I would buy from a vendor that respects their customers, I suppose.
To expect them to cater to your situation is lunacy.
To purposely piss off a perfectly good customer without a good reason is... Lame.
Seriously, they're free to do anything they like. But Steam smells, looks, tastes, and feels like [whine]"I'M TAKING MY BALL HOME AND YOU CAN'T PLAY WITH IT ANYMORE!"[/whine]
To put it simple, this (Steam) is why PC gaming is almost dead.
Yes, I believe that "free speech zones" are unconstitutional, and even restricting speech that would incite immediate danger (i.e., shouting "fire!" in a crowded theater) is unconstitutional -- although that particular case should perhaps be disallowed via an Amendment.
AFAIK, the constitution still protects your right to yell "fire" in that theatre. However, the constitution still allows you to be held liable for the repercussions of your speech. Some speech has serious repercussions -- that's why when you find instructions that might harm you if you're an idiot (say, insturctions on fixing your CRT monitor), they always say "These instructions are for your educational use only and we are not liable for any consequences of attempting the experiments herein" or somesuch legal nonsense.
So, if you shout "fire" in said theatre when there isn't one, you will be liable for negligence or somesuch. You did people out of a movie, you probably got people hurt, you left people emotionally scarred, and at worst, you could have gotten someone trampled and killed.
Can you really not see the humungous practical, physical, emotional, medical, biological and philosophical differences between the two?
Sure, *I* can. But you started to suggest that since most people are so badly off they can't play HL2; that that was a basis for a competent argument against Steam sucking.
I only meant to show that didn't make a good argument. I hope my point is taken!:-D
Only people elite enough to have a recent PC can play. Only people elite enough to have the time to spare from gathering food can play. Only people elite enough to have $50 to spare can play. Why should being elite enough to have broadband be any different?
Great. And since most of the world doesn't have drinkable tap water, I assume that those that do should be gratified that their taps even dispense this amazing liquid for more than an hour a day?
Just because life sucks for a lot of people doesn't mean it should suck for even more.
Jesus.. look people, the world doesn't owe you a pleasant gaming experience
No, but Valve owes purchasers of their game a pleasant gaming expereience.
The world doesn't owe you anything, let alone enjoying a videogame.
Hey, I'm not talking about the world. I'm talking about valve. And yes, they most certainly do owe paying customers a fully functional game. Fully functional isn't an offline game that, should the user choose to buy crap internet, doesn't work properly. That's broken, IMHO, and in the opinions of thousands of other HL2 buyers.
I've been reading about this offline mode. Seems you have to actually not connect to the internet, and make sure the software doesn't see it.
What a pain in the ass. To unconfigure and reconfigure your stuff just to avoid their petty (and worthless) anti-piracy pro-rental software. Puke.
And no, "reaching around and disconnecting the ethernet cable" isn't easy. It's a pain in the ass to have to do that every time you use new software. Would you buy a TV where you had to unplug and replug the cable to watch it each time, especially if you could only buy it at full price? Didn't think so...
I'd take it as FUD, but there are people who have no problems running other large games (like DOOM 3) that find steam takes 100 - 1000x longer to load.
I mean, I understand as time goes on newer software will generally take longer to load on an older computer due to new requirements, but even taking twice as long to load is ridiculous. The shortest times I see reported by "happy" users is about 10 minutes. Even 10 minutes is ridiculous!
So, that leaves me to either assume Valve's Steam software is at fault, Valve are the most incompetent programmers on the face of the planet, or Valve are the biggest computer geniuses in the world and have managed to make a game so perfect that it deserves to take 10 minutes to load.
The only people who have problems with steam are people with crummy net connections and people who try to use it when traffic is very high. If you use steam on a day that isn't close to a big release day, and your bandwith isn't poop it works just fine.
Awesome. So, your "offline" experience should now be goverened by your online experience, according to you.
So what's next, you think that linux should load slower if you have a slow 'net connection, or windows should crash more if you have cheap internet?
Please, what you're saying is that only people "elite" enough in society to be lucky enough to have a top-grade internet connection deserve to enjoy things like this game.
Is it because they care about me and my car, or is it because it was a fairly unpopular model and they still have piles of parts for it?
Neither. It's because you are paying them, and they like your money.
As an example, I normally wouldn't touch a 486 in my store for repairs. But all of a sudden, my opinion on fixing them changed when the customer offered $100 towards repairs.
Everyone that has been waiting for half life 2 knows that the release date is Tuesday Nov 16
They do? How's that crystal ball working out... seems that if everyone knew then none of the copies would have sold and there'd be no reason for this discussion.
Would Vivendi have those copies if Valve hadn't given them permission to?
Nooo... that's why they have a contract.
IOW: They're both to blame. Trying to say it isn't at all Valve's fault is like trying to blame all of WWII on the Germans. There's a lot of people involved here, and the fault lies on all of them. Deciding to blind yourself from other parties isn't just disingenious, it leaves you open to be screwed over in the future.
valve had no part in having the game released before the 16th. What part of that do you not understand?
The part where Valve voluntarialy signed the rights of pre-distribution away to Vivendi. That's the part I don't understand.
You don't hand over all the eggs in the basket to someone without even a smidge of protection, and then *not* blame yourself if they have a mind of their own.
Put simply, Valve is stupid. So is Vivendi. Actually, I think they're made for each other. A match made in heaven (hell?)
It's not 30 years, but I have a C64 in the basement, and all the original games I had for it. 20 years later and they are pretty much all still working. One or two disks are getting tough to read, but still -- my software works.
Why should computing get *worse*, rather than better? I think it's fair to expect a better level of service from the PC I own today than what I get from a 20 year old C64.
But Valve seems to know better. We'll see who ends up winning (the consumer or the company). Should be interesting.
If Valve says the game is published 16th... how come NOT being able to play it before that is their fault?
Because they allowed the product to exist outside their business before the 16th.
Right of first sale and all that. Yeah, maybe there's a contract been broken, but in the end the end purchaser who, for all intents and purposes, were buying a legitimate copy of the game, has a right to demand that said software work when they bring it home.
The fact it doesn't is disgusting, quite frankly. What's next? Cars which you have to phone the manufacturer to "activate" before you can drive them home from the car lot? Ugly, ugly, ugly.
Slashdot Mirror
Can you suggest good places to look?
PS2 chips, eh?
Here's the basic rundown:
Expensive flashable chips (DMS, Crystal, Matrix) - Most of these have "homebrew" only firmware available which does not violate the DMCA in any serious way (although, you might want to get a lawyer on that). These chips can be flashed to update them should the need arise, or defects in the code are found. Sometimes more reliable at booting. Can boot from the browser as well as from turning the machine on. Usually have PS1/DVD movie support without having to turn the chip off.
Cheap-n-nasty chips - All of these definately violate the DMCA. Nowadays, they all pretty much have similar rates for booting media. Very few of these can boot from the browser (only boot from turning the chip on). Almost none have PS1/DVD movie support without turning off the chip. Some of these chips are knockoffs -- many knockoffs, quite simply, don't work well at all. Suggestions: DUO2se, MAGIC, Mars Action.
HTH!
Sorry, I don't know of any European sites.
you'd need to reconfigure the drive controller to make it read them from the inside out, which would break compatibility with normal games.
I doubt anyone with a "pirate" GameCube could give two farts if they had to move their purchased game library onto mini DVD-R to play the discs...
Considering most modchips, when they first come out, sell for about $200, 10 DVD-Rs (and 10 is a pretty big game library for most people) aren't going to break the bank.
Betamax gets the last laugh - it seems that it was better than DVD too.
Soooory, not even close. I once did a technical comparison and Betamax is about 5% better than VHS (10%, maybe). It has a few more lines of resolution (220 vs 200, IIRC) and cleaner chroma recording. It definately does not even touch DVD for quality.
You might be talking about BetaCam, which does compete with DVD for quality (although, again, doesn't match). However, it doesn't compete on price; a decent BetaCam VTR usually being in the $1,000+ range.
BetaCam came out a long time after BetaMax was totally dead. Its VHS competition, Super-VHS, found a niche market in the homes of cheap people who wanted near DVD-level quality at a reasonable price (at the time). Also, it seems to be popular with very small TV studios. Super-VHS is not as good as BetaCam, although it is very reasonably close, and is about 1/3 the price.
And JVC isn't getting royalties for use of the "VHS" mark?
And you have to put their stylized logo on the tape for a consumer to recognize it will play in the VCR?
"Works with VHS VTRs" doesn't cost a penny.
There's a few very good reasons to use VHS.
- You don't have hundreds of dollars, but want to watch shows at a different time.
- You want to record an indefinite number of shows, but don't want to buy new units all the time, and don't want to "DIY".
- You want to record something cheaply from your video camera to a format you can play at a friends house (say, a birthday party or a vacation, whatever).
- The pricing of VHS tapes, per minute of TV recording can't be beat (yet). Even with DVD-R, at $1 per disc, recording to a standard format will only gain you up to about 4 hours of VHS quality video. A $0.99 economy VHS tape can do 6 or more hours of recording.
- Ease of use / Familiarity.
- Lack of trust with PVR companies (example, you don't want a nasty TiVO surprise of banner ads when you skip commercials, and when you learned of this, you no longer trust the company's products).
They should have laughed, waved an RFC with example.com highlighted in yellow in the face of the Government and told them to shove it up their ass. When will people learn from this stupidity?
One problem. This isn't the USA. If the Canadian government deems something foreign to be obscene they may block its import. They may also block the printing of obscene material within Canada, although that happens a lot less than the former (which happens far too often).
No, your motive for doing it cannot be considered a defence in a trial. So "common carrier" isn't particularly applicable.
Although this wasn't word from a judge, Canadian ISPs know better than to toy with a government with the power to force them follow a blocklist. So, better to block one site on request for a while than everything.
Anyway, I'm waiting for the day when some smart-ass murder suspect sprays his entire house with some iron-containing substance so that, when the CSI's show up with their luminol, everything glows.
:-D
Better yet, just write "Try Harder, Morons!" with it on the mirror.
Just get HD Loader and you'll find all those problems disappear... :-D
I'm totally amazed that Sony removed the hard drive option from the re-release of the PS2. Talk about castrating the only feature that made games like GTA playable on the PS2!
What I said was "Much better Linux support", as in much better drivers and "better suport FROM open source application". Not FOR.
I'm sorry I tried to clean up your poor english.
Here's your sentence:
Much better Linux support, less problems in high-end application such as XSI, better OpenGL drivers,much larger user base, better suport from open source application (I've been a "fan" of ATI until I really started to use Nvidia cards. I don't want to go back. )
So, if I am going to take your english at face value (as you'd like it to be), you're saying that a single open source application is providing Nvidia support. I'm sorry, but normally we reserve verbs for objects, that, well, can animate. Just pretending for a second that we're talking about, oh, who cares, MS Word. MS Word supports me! You know, that sounds perfect.
If you are an IT manager, that is.
Blender runs a lot better with Nvidia cards and in general I've found that open source applications run a lot better on nvidia than on ati.
You're suggesting, I have to derive from your view of things, that should blender not exist, NVidia's drivers would be, well, not supported?
Honestly, admit you added an 'r' in by accident and be done with it. This is silly and pointless.
Much better Linux support
Until, of course, NVidia goes out of business or just chooses to stop supporting your card. Then you can throw it out at the next kernel revision.
Unlike some of you that seem to buy video cards yearly, my Radeon VIVO, which I bought the first day they were made, is till being used in my computer. I believe it's about 5 years old right now. I very highly doubt that in 5 years Nvidia will still support your super-duper-expensive video card.
Some of us would rather use a somewhat "slower" card from a manufacturer that embraces the linux open source community and doesn't abuse the kernel's licensing.
I was a "fan" of NVidia until I realized I'd have to use their soiled binaries on my machine. Then I realized I wanted to go back. So I did.
My expeience with manufacturers' soiled binaries on my linux machines has always been less than adequate. Starting with my old expensive telemann DTP-200 (or whatever the model number was) which they were still selling after kernel 2.4 but decided they'd end support at kernel 2.2, all the way to my VP-1020 card that said linux on the box, but surprise surprise, nothing at all from the manufacturer. There's, of course, an open source driver now from third parties, no thanks to Vision Plus.
better suport from open source application
This is why you were marked troll. They have no support for open source at all. This is an out and out lie.
Look, I don't expect HalfLife 2 to run on a system that doesn't live up to what necessary. But adding things in just to ruin the experience for people that have slow network connections that adds absolutely ZERO value to ANYBODY except Valve is really lame.
I could understand it, if, say, the game wasn't available on DVD, and, say, it downloaded the data dynamically from the internet as you played in Single Player mode, but it doesn't. So there's no value to the customer in doing this. It's like adding idle loops in the game. Why?
Aside from the fact that this statement is completely inapplicable, since you only need a dialup for confirmation/registration..
Awesome again. So, in addition to the crap internet the people already have (which we will assume is always-on low grade DSL/Cable/whatever) they now have to buy a dial up account to? Lame.
Is the market share of people without internet connections worth supporting? In Valve's opinion, no.
Umm, no. Valve took extra steps to ensure they couldn't use the game. Normal companies take that time to improve the game. Not Valve. Nope. Better they take that time and devote it to ruining the expereience of some of their customers. It's just so stupid, I really don't have words to describe it apart from, well, Lame.
If you've got evidence that they sold it in bad faith
Uhh, selling it to customers and not letting them play for two days isn't bad faith to you?
It is to me.
Excuses like "we were forced to do it" are total bullshit. Valve signed a contract, and that's the way it goes. Don't like the terms after you signed it? Just like nobody is forcing me to buy this terrible STEAMing crap, nobody is forcing Valve to sit there coding HL2. Paraphrashing Nike (tm), "Just Don't Do It!"
but they're free to impose any hardware/networking/dancepad requirements they want, and you're free not to buy it.
I didn't, I shan't, I won't. Oh, BTW, I have bought about $1,000 in games over the past year or two. But Valve will never see any of that money. No way.
Well, they might see some of my money *if* they make a console version (I GC, XBOX, GBA, and PS2, they can take their pick) of the game. I would assume that won't require Steam...
Yeah, I usually buy console games. It's crap like Steam that keeps me from buying PC games. I think it's been a solid year since I've bought a PC game. Huh. I bought 2 console games last week. What an odd coincidence. I suppose it's because my console games work. But my last PC game did nothing but whine about CDs. Odd that I would buy from a vendor that respects their customers, I suppose.
To expect them to cater to your situation is lunacy.
To purposely piss off a perfectly good customer without a good reason is... Lame.
Seriously, they're free to do anything they like. But Steam smells, looks, tastes, and feels like [whine]"I'M TAKING MY BALL HOME AND YOU CAN'T PLAY WITH IT ANYMORE!"[/whine]
To put it simple, this (Steam) is why PC gaming is almost dead.
I am not an american, or lawyer, but:
Yes, I believe that "free speech zones" are unconstitutional, and even restricting speech that would incite immediate danger (i.e., shouting "fire!" in a crowded theater) is unconstitutional -- although that particular case should perhaps be disallowed via an Amendment.
AFAIK, the constitution still protects your right to yell "fire" in that theatre. However, the constitution still allows you to be held liable for the repercussions of your speech. Some speech has serious repercussions -- that's why when you find instructions that might harm you if you're an idiot (say, insturctions on fixing your CRT monitor), they always say "These instructions are for your educational use only and we are not liable for any consequences of attempting the experiments herein" or somesuch legal nonsense.
So, if you shout "fire" in said theatre when there isn't one, you will be liable for negligence or somesuch. You did people out of a movie, you probably got people hurt, you left people emotionally scarred, and at worst, you could have gotten someone trampled and killed.
Can you really not see the humungous practical, physical, emotional, medical, biological and philosophical differences between the two?
:-D
Sure, *I* can. But you started to suggest that since most people are so badly off they can't play HL2; that that was a basis for a competent argument against Steam sucking.
I only meant to show that didn't make a good argument. I hope my point is taken!
Only people elite enough to have a recent PC can play. Only people elite enough to have the time to spare from gathering food can play. Only people elite enough to have $50 to spare can play. Why should being elite enough to have broadband be any different?
Great. And since most of the world doesn't have drinkable tap water, I assume that those that do should be gratified that their taps even dispense this amazing liquid for more than an hour a day?
Just because life sucks for a lot of people doesn't mean it should suck for even more.
Jesus.. look people, the world doesn't owe you a pleasant gaming experience
No, but Valve owes purchasers of their game a pleasant gaming expereience.
The world doesn't owe you anything, let alone enjoying a videogame.
Hey, I'm not talking about the world. I'm talking about valve. And yes, they most certainly do owe paying customers a fully functional game. Fully functional isn't an offline game that, should the user choose to buy crap internet, doesn't work properly. That's broken, IMHO, and in the opinions of thousands of other HL2 buyers.
I've been reading about this offline mode. Seems you have to actually not connect to the internet, and make sure the software doesn't see it.
What a pain in the ass. To unconfigure and reconfigure your stuff just to avoid their petty (and worthless) anti-piracy pro-rental software. Puke.
And no, "reaching around and disconnecting the ethernet cable" isn't easy. It's a pain in the ass to have to do that every time you use new software. Would you buy a TV where you had to unplug and replug the cable to watch it each time, especially if you could only buy it at full price? Didn't think so...
I'd take it as FUD, but there are people who have no problems running other large games (like DOOM 3) that find steam takes 100 - 1000x longer to load.
:-)
I mean, I understand as time goes on newer software will generally take longer to load on an older computer due to new requirements, but even taking twice as long to load is ridiculous. The shortest times I see reported by "happy" users is about 10 minutes. Even 10 minutes is ridiculous!
So, that leaves me to either assume Valve's Steam software is at fault, Valve are the most incompetent programmers on the face of the planet, or Valve are the biggest computer geniuses in the world and have managed to make a game so perfect that it deserves to take 10 minutes to load.
Guess which one I'm thinking is true...
The only people who have problems with steam are people with crummy net connections and people who try to use it when traffic is very high. If you use steam on a day that isn't close to a big release day, and your bandwith isn't poop it works just fine.
Awesome. So, your "offline" experience should now be goverened by your online experience, according to you.
So what's next, you think that linux should load slower if you have a slow 'net connection, or windows should crash more if you have cheap internet?
Please, what you're saying is that only people "elite" enough in society to be lucky enough to have a top-grade internet connection deserve to enjoy things like this game.
Get real.
If you look at the pics, he mounted all the LED's through cardboard with the wires soldered to the back.
:-D
If doing that burns down the dorm room he needs to take a course in EE!
Is it because they care about me and my car, or is it because it was a fairly unpopular model and they still have piles of parts for it?
:)
Neither. It's because you are paying them, and they like your money.
As an example, I normally wouldn't touch a 486 in my store for repairs. But all of a sudden, my opinion on fixing them changed when the customer offered $100 towards repairs.
Money talks. Bullshit walks.
Everyone that has been waiting for half life 2 knows that the release date is Tuesday Nov 16
They do? How's that crystal ball working out... seems that if everyone knew then none of the copies would have sold and there'd be no reason for this discussion.
Would Vivendi have those copies if Valve hadn't given them permission to?
Nooo... that's why they have a contract.
IOW: They're both to blame. Trying to say it isn't at all Valve's fault is like trying to blame all of WWII on the Germans. There's a lot of people involved here, and the fault lies on all of them. Deciding to blind yourself from other parties isn't just disingenious, it leaves you open to be screwed over in the future.
valve had no part in having the game released before the 16th. What part of that do you not understand?
The part where Valve voluntarialy signed the rights of pre-distribution away to Vivendi. That's the part I don't understand.
You don't hand over all the eggs in the basket to someone without even a smidge of protection, and then *not* blame yourself if they have a mind of their own.
Put simply, Valve is stupid. So is Vivendi. Actually, I think they're made for each other. A match made in heaven (hell?)
It's not 30 years, but I have a C64 in the basement, and all the original games I had for it. 20 years later and they are pretty much all still working. One or two disks are getting tough to read, but still -- my software works.
Why should computing get *worse*, rather than better? I think it's fair to expect a better level of service from the PC I own today than what I get from a 20 year old C64.
But Valve seems to know better. We'll see who ends up winning (the consumer or the company). Should be interesting.
If Valve says the game is published 16th... how come NOT being able to play it before that is their fault?
Because they allowed the product to exist outside their business before the 16th.
Right of first sale and all that. Yeah, maybe there's a contract been broken, but in the end the end purchaser who, for all intents and purposes, were buying a legitimate copy of the game, has a right to demand that said software work when they bring it home.
The fact it doesn't is disgusting, quite frankly. What's next? Cars which you have to phone the manufacturer to "activate" before you can drive them home from the car lot? Ugly, ugly, ugly.