"Lets be frank though. I farm for achievements myself, but evey one of these things are easy to get."
I wouldn't consider the hardest raid achievements such as "Alone in the Darkness" or "Tribute to Dedicated Insanity" all that easy to get. You could argue that the hardest part of them is getting a group of people together capable of executing the raid strategy flawlessly but they are by no means easy.
Holy crap! Almost $100 now for Endless Ocean? I'm glad I picked it up for $25. It is actually one of my favorite games for the Wii. I do have to say that it's not for everyone as there is no danger involved. It is a relaxing little undersea adventure though and I'm looking forward to the sequel.
Mad World got really hyped. I was looking forward to it. I rented it and found that while the "Sin City" graphic style was cool the game itself was pretty dull. I got bored with it within an hour or so.
"As you can imagine, the VMware Fusion team was pretty excited when Apple modified their licensing to allow Mac OS X Leopard Server to run in a virtual machine on Apple hardware."
So in order to run an OS X VM you need to run it on a Mac. Somehow I don't think that would help the original poster get rid of his Mac Mini.
Yeah the changes came out in Tier 9 (Trial of the Crusader). They caused quite a bit of fuss actually. It's possible to get Ulduar 10 man equivalent gear from one new Heroic. You can also get Naxx equivalent items from the same instance on regular mode.
The emblems that dropped previously only in Ulduar 25 now drop in all instances below tier 9 (including Heroics and Naxx). So Ulduar 25 level emblem gear is easily available to casual players.
Furthermore the daily Heroic now gives you 2 of the same emblems as the tier 9 raid. Also the base tier 9 gear is purchasable with these emblems. Meaning you can have the lowest version of tier 9, full set without ever walking into a the tier 9 raid. You can also purchase some items equivalent to the tier 9 25 man drops.
The interesting thing is that because you could conceivably get some serious gear just from running heroics over and over, the old gear check mechanism no longer works. It doesn't take a good raider to get raid equivalent epics.
Some pugs going for harder fights have started using raid kill achievements as a prerequisite for an invite.
I don't pug raids but from time to time I need to pug someone in to a guild run and it's almost impossible to make any judgement about a player's skill based on gear.
The good points in the new system are that you can gear up friends, new players and alts quickly without doing the Naxx grind and then the Ulduar grind etc.
Additionally less hardcore raiding guilds have benefitted because they can get some good gear aside from just raid drops. So guilds that raid only a couple days a week can still see overall gear improvements across the board from running heroics and what not.
To offset hardcore guild complaints, the T9 raid has a Heroic version of both 10 and 25 mans. The 25 heroic gear is only obtainable by seriously committed raiders.
Yes. You are missing the fact that XBMC does not run on Xbox 360s. It only worked on original Xbox systems. The software has since been ported to WIndows, Linux and Mac.
XBMC was originally made for hacked classic Xboxes. It doesn't run on the Xbox 360. While it was great at the time, the old Xbox didn't support HD output which limits it's use these days. XBMC has however been ported to run on Windows, Linux and Macintosh operating systems and does support HD output on these systems. This makes for a pretty good home theater PC setup and is more flexible than the built in stuff on Xbox 360.
I have all 3 current consoles and a Nintendo DS. I have to say for the most part I've enjoyed the downloadable games more than the whiz bang AAA releases with huge budgets. There are exceptions but I think I've played Pixeljunk Eden more than anything else on my PS3. The DS is great fun for older style games and I've really enjoyed it a lot. Part of the problem I have is that most modern games seem to go on forever. They usually don't hold my interest for 30 or 50 hours of gameplay.
Mostly true of mom and pop shops. The regional magazine publisher I worked for completed the transition to OS X back when 10.3 was out. Ultimately moving to a full digital work flow gave the editors more time to deadline. Since everything is direct to plate printing all proofing is done digitally aside from the final press check. That week of back and forth proofing via bluelines, color keys and whatever was cut down significantly.
No memory protection. One app crashes and your computer generally crashes. If you are lucky you get a chance to save and reboot. OS 9 didn't have preemptive multitasking either which makes it pretty slow and unresponsive feeling when running multiple programs.
BeOS was never an open source OS. It was completely commercial. It was very slick and had support. It did not require a computer science degree to operate. Keep in mind that it was born out of an ex Apple employee's company. Ease of use was one of the primary driving forces behind the design.
BeOS came out during Microsoft and Intel's massive marketing push for Windows 95 and the Pentium processor. It really didn't stand a chance as it could barely get noticed and had little third party software support. From a technical standpoint it was way ahead of its time.
This was the same time period that almost broke Apple and put a rest to any remaining alternative computers such as the Amiga and Atari ST.
Haiku is an open source clone of BeOS. It won't have huge support and will likely end up a hobbyists novelty.
"I agree on the cost issue, though. Instead of spending a million bucks to develop a space pen that writes in zero-G, The Ruskies used pencils. Duh."
Of course that's not true. The designer of the space pen spent a million dollars developing it. The reason for developing it was because pencils could be hazardous in zero gravity and high oxygen environments. They were sold to NASA for $2.95 a piece. Before the pen was developed NASA used lead pencils.
What we do have is copies of his birth recorded in the Honolulu newspaper at the time. If he wasn't born in Hawaii why were those printed? Was it a secret conspiracy started right at his birth to provide proof just in case he grew up to be president?
Amigas, Macs and STs predate the advent of cheap PC clones by a number of years. It wasn't until the end of the 80s that sub $1000 pc clones hit the market and dominated it.
Really? Those crappy PC clones were leaps and bounds ahead of the Macs, Amigas and Atari STs available at the time? It was not about being better. It was about being affordable and compatible with the software you ran on computers at your work place.
"to the point that it can't engage a single impoverished 3rd-world nation without running up a $3-trillion tab"
Bullshit. There's a difference between engaging and occupying. In case you didn't notice the US destroyed the previous Iraqi government and military in record time. Now if you want to occupy a country and the population doesn't want you present you will find that cruise missiles and aircraft carriers don't help all that much when suicide bombers and IED represent the threats you face.
The sales and market performance of a previous generation console mean nothing for the current generation. See the sales impact of the Atari 5200 or hell even the Gamecube vs Wii.
Slashdot Mirror
"Lets be frank though. I farm for achievements myself, but evey one of these things are easy to get."
I wouldn't consider the hardest raid achievements such as "Alone in the Darkness" or "Tribute to Dedicated Insanity" all that easy to get. You could argue that the hardest part of them is getting a group of people together capable of executing the raid strategy flawlessly but they are by no means easy.
Holy crap! Almost $100 now for Endless Ocean? I'm glad I picked it up for $25. It is actually one of my favorite games for the Wii. I do have to say that it's not for everyone as there is no danger involved. It is a relaxing little undersea adventure though and I'm looking forward to the sequel.
Is it just me or has the WoW is dying meme replaced the BSD is dying one?
Why shouldn't they? They can't lift the real balls anymore without putting their backs out.
The closer I get to 40, the more the "mature" games bore the shit out of me.
Mad World got really hyped. I was looking forward to it. I rented it and found that while the "Sin City" graphic style was cool the game itself was pretty dull. I got bored with it within an hour or so.
From your link:
"As you can imagine, the VMware Fusion team was pretty excited when Apple modified their licensing to allow Mac OS X Leopard Server to run in a virtual machine on Apple hardware."
So in order to run an OS X VM you need to run it on a Mac. Somehow I don't think that would help the original poster get rid of his Mac Mini.
It's not a joke. I've been handed Chick tracts on the street by little old ladies. It's the real deal.
Yeah the changes came out in Tier 9 (Trial of the Crusader). They caused quite a bit of fuss actually.
It's possible to get Ulduar 10 man equivalent gear from one new Heroic. You can also get Naxx equivalent items from the same instance on regular mode.
The emblems that dropped previously only in Ulduar 25 now drop in all instances below tier 9 (including Heroics and Naxx). So Ulduar 25 level emblem gear is easily available to casual players.
Furthermore the daily Heroic now gives you 2 of the same emblems as the tier 9 raid. Also the base tier 9 gear is purchasable with these emblems. Meaning you can have the lowest version of tier 9, full set without ever walking into a the tier 9 raid. You can also purchase some items equivalent to the tier 9 25 man drops.
The interesting thing is that because you could conceivably get some serious gear just from running heroics over and over, the old gear check mechanism no longer works. It doesn't take a good raider to get raid equivalent epics.
Some pugs going for harder fights have started using raid kill achievements as a prerequisite for an invite.
I don't pug raids but from time to time I need to pug someone in to a guild run and it's almost impossible to make any judgement about a player's skill based on gear.
The good points in the new system are that you can gear up friends, new players and alts quickly without doing the Naxx grind and then the Ulduar grind etc.
Additionally less hardcore raiding guilds have benefitted because they can get some good gear aside from just raid drops. So guilds that raid only a couple days a week can still see overall gear improvements across the board from running heroics and what not.
To offset hardcore guild complaints, the T9 raid has a Heroic version of both 10 and 25 mans. The 25 heroic gear is only obtainable by seriously committed raiders.
That example is actually shown in the demonstration video. Pressure controls run speed and jump height.
Yes. You are missing the fact that XBMC does not run on Xbox 360s. It only worked on original Xbox systems. The software has since been ported to WIndows, Linux and Mac.
It's worth noting that the PS3 Slim doesn't support Linux either. So if you want your relish you'd have to buy the older model.
XBMC was originally made for hacked classic Xboxes. It doesn't run on the Xbox 360. While it was great at the time, the old Xbox didn't support HD output which limits it's use these days.
XBMC has however been ported to run on Windows, Linux and Macintosh operating systems and does support HD output on these systems. This makes for a pretty good home theater PC setup and is more flexible than the built in stuff on Xbox 360.
I have all 3 current consoles and a Nintendo DS. I have to say for the most part I've enjoyed the downloadable games more than the whiz bang AAA releases with huge budgets. There are exceptions but I think I've played Pixeljunk Eden more than anything else on my PS3.
The DS is great fun for older style games and I've really enjoyed it a lot.
Part of the problem I have is that most modern games seem to go on forever. They usually don't hold my interest for 30 or 50 hours of gameplay.
Mostly true of mom and pop shops. The regional magazine publisher I worked for completed the transition to OS X back when 10.3 was out. Ultimately moving to a full digital work flow gave the editors more time to deadline. Since everything is direct to plate printing all proofing is done digitally aside from the final press check. That week of back and forth proofing via bluelines, color keys and whatever was cut down significantly.
No memory protection. One app crashes and your computer generally crashes. If you are lucky you get a chance to save and reboot.
OS 9 didn't have preemptive multitasking either which makes it pretty slow and unresponsive feeling when running multiple programs.
BeOS was never an open source OS. It was completely commercial. It was very slick and had support. It did not require a computer science degree to operate. Keep in mind that it was born out of an ex Apple employee's company. Ease of use was one of the primary driving forces behind the design.
BeOS came out during Microsoft and Intel's massive marketing push for Windows 95 and the Pentium processor. It really didn't stand a chance as it could barely get noticed and had little third party software support. From a technical standpoint it was way ahead of its time.
This was the same time period that almost broke Apple and put a rest to any remaining alternative computers such as the Amiga and Atari ST.
Haiku is an open source clone of BeOS. It won't have huge support and will likely end up a hobbyists novelty.
Windows 95. The version that came on 13 floppy disks. Especially if you got a "lucky" bad sector on disk 13.
"I agree on the cost issue, though. Instead of spending a million bucks to develop a space pen that writes in zero-G, The Ruskies used pencils. Duh."
Of course that's not true. The designer of the space pen spent a million dollars developing it. The reason for developing it was because pencils could be hazardous in zero gravity and high oxygen environments.
They were sold to NASA for $2.95 a piece. Before the pen was developed NASA used lead pencils.
NASA Space Pen
What we do have is copies of his birth recorded in the Honolulu newspaper at the time. If he wasn't born in Hawaii why were those printed? Was it a secret conspiracy started right at his birth to provide proof just in case he grew up to be president?
Amigas, Macs and STs predate the advent of cheap PC clones by a number of years. It wasn't until the end of the 80s that sub $1000 pc clones hit the market and dominated it.
Really? Those crappy PC clones were leaps and bounds ahead of the Macs, Amigas and Atari STs available at the time?
It was not about being better. It was about being affordable and compatible with the software you ran on computers at your work place.
"to the point that it can't engage a single impoverished 3rd-world nation without running up a $3-trillion tab"
Bullshit. There's a difference between engaging and occupying. In case you didn't notice the US destroyed the previous Iraqi government and military in record time.
Now if you want to occupy a country and the population doesn't want you present you will find that cruise missiles and aircraft carriers don't help all that much when suicide bombers and IED represent the threats you face.
Yeah we are terrible. What with being the number one donator of foreign aid in the world.
The sales and market performance of a previous generation console mean nothing for the current generation. See the sales impact of the Atari 5200 or hell even the Gamecube vs Wii.