Since you know XBox Live, does it feature a [directed] Web of Trust or some such? Maybe it's not considered as necessary on a console network.
To me a middleware that adds a WoT-aspect to game lobbies (as in "I trust X, X trust Y, therefore I trust to play with Y" and that is end-user controllable (I decide who/what attributes of a player to trust) is a worthwhile project for some entrepreneur to explore.
I've never used XBox Live, but if it features 'seat-reservation' for groups of players then color me impressed.
If it doesn't it's just another free-standing gaming lobby, of which there are many on the PC (gamespy, allseeingeye, and another popular 'what's my friend playing'-thingy which I've forgotten the name of just now...
A "tier"-system is certainly possible, but I believe there are some problems with it that needs to be taken into account.
The biggest problem is that while it MATCHES players based on skill, it SEPARATES based on the social web. When I play BF2 I want to play it with friends, I almost never go out and play it by myself (though I'm sure many do and maybe even prefer it that way). This can be alleviated by not treating "a player" as the atomic unit, but maybe a "a small team" -- creating a whole new class of [interesting] problems (idea: Teams form "outside of the game", are ranked as a unit and passed of to a suitable server as a unit).. Also, we're very close to the structure already in place with clan gaming, only there humans (I gather) decide what teams will compete, not a computerized scoring system.
I also believe that while many players will enjoy such a system, it will mostly be the players that are already very competetive. Why? Because it adds a stress element: We can all have a bad day. If you're not very good, AND have a bad day, AND this results in you going down a tier, that might not be fun. Possible solution? You can only ever get bumped down from the absolute top tier, not the ones below (and you probably don't want more than three or four?)
Just by playing a lot of games I've identified many improvements that could be made in this area, it's therefore kind of sad to see a game like BF2 screw it up by not picking off some of that low-hanging fruit that would propel it from 'very good' to possibly 'greatness of historical proportions'. I especially don't like how hard it is for a group of friends to play together on a server that they don't run.
In NWN there's an in-game service ("lobby", whatever) whereby you can register your friends and then see what server they're on, and join it with a click of a mouse. That ought to be standard in all MP games, and also I'd like to see a mechanism whereby a team will look for a server as a unit. If me and a friend "band up", then I want the system to have the property that if one of us is accepted by a server, that will reserve -- for a limited time -- a slot on the same team for the rest of the gang (i.e me). The lobby would then say to me "Your friend XXX was accepted to the server Y, there's a spot reserved for you. Join?". Voila, instant MP'ing with friends.
I've been playing a little BF2, and I'm not very good (but I enjoy it nonetheless). With games like BF2 having user accounts and tracking all kinds of stats, it came to me that it would be possible for the server to give handicap to a team based on the stats of the players in it. Say in BF2 for instance, the server will have access to the player's kill-to-death ratio, not only for the current session, but back to the beginning. Based on this it could, for instance, open additional slots on a team -- effectively giving them a handicap -- if they're "too low" in this ratio. Or give that team an extra vehicle, etc.
This could be fun for both good players who might enjoy and even seek out the opportunity to play the 'underdog' to a team with a numerical advantage, and for new players who risk getting frustrated and even bored if they're on the losing side all the time.
As it is now, the server relies on the random allocation of players to a side to 'balance things out', but I postulate that it might actually make the game more fun to bias this to give it that 'skilled underdogs vs overwhelming force' tint. As a server option, of course.
Please learn to read. Here, let me help you: NON-MP3 vorbis-player. All current players also support mp3, so you're paying the mp3-tax or at the very least strengthening their percieved stanglehold of the market.
Let's designate any DAP which doesn't play mp3s as pure. That's what I'm waiting for.
Full Vorbis (incl q < 1) and FLAC (though I personally don't see the point on a portable) + flash-mem + memory card + gapless + replaygain + good radio --> me buy.
It's called Ogg Vorbis, is superior in quality to mp3, encodes faster, use a sane tagging system, and I'm eagerly awaiting an non-mp3 vorbis-player. Would be fucking HARDCORE.
Please note that the score for Panasonic DVD-S97, 68, is actually correct as per their table, even if the text says "the score of the most best performing DVD player we tested (the Marantz DV6600) was only 63". Don't shoot the messenger.
The total score for nVidia ends up being 93, where the total ATI score is 118. Both scores [ed.] are extremely high, considering the score of the most best performing DVD player we tested (the Marantz DV6600) was only 63. The majority of the standalone players we used did not score more than 40 points in the test. The most expensive ones, the Denon DVD-3910 and Marantz DV9600 scored only 58 and 61 points.
For European readers the cadence tests are not of real importance, so we only take the first eight tests into consideration. The score then is slightly different, nVidia scored 58 in these tests, where as ATI scored 53. A pretty close result, and the slight advantage for nVidia is mainly due to the excellent PureVideo performance in the detail tests.
People must understand that Crysis is in the "Top Fuel" genre of games. Sure, one can make reasonable arguments for Volvos and Pintos which everyone can buy, but there are people who are into the extreme high-end, and not everyone gets to drive.
(Speaking of Crysis, I'm intrigued by the apparent difference (even disconnect) in fidelity between the 'Carrier' section seen in one trailer and the 'Jungle' section shown in the tech-demo. The 'Carrier' section looks like Just Another Boring Shooter, while the 'Jungle' section is definite Next Gen stuff. I'm hoping the game will be more Jungle than Carrier.)
Re:New slogan for YouTube
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Bob Saget 2.0
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They're free to do it, but the OP was suggesting we're wrong in not elevating it beyond a rating of "crap"
That a site offers freedom to totally fuck up in the presentation department doesn't automatically make it great. I think that's the point here.
Actually I'm not sure I agree there even is 'freedom'. All the pages (which are not many, I admit) I have seen look the same. Plack, pink or purple and crazy font sizes. Couple this with a complete void of interesting content, completely mindless user comments and page after page of 'myspace friends'. Ugh.
Both iriver and my personal current favourite iaudio produce very good players, it's just that the masses waggle along and buy shit like ''Sony'' (because of brand) or ''Noname'' (because of price)
>mp3 is the standard and although it has its flaws isn't all that bad.
The same thing can be said about Internet Explorer vs Other Browsers. "Bohoo, IE isn't all that bad. Installing alternative browsers is a pain (notice I said pain, not impossible). Bohooo, life is so hard, I might have to plan one step ahead, push one more mouse button, bohoo..". Man, that's just fucking lazy. Nobody said having a sense of quality and a little fire for what's right would be the easiest way to glide through life.
Feels pretty darn good to not be a punter of the mp3 licensing consortium though. YMMV.
Slashdot Mirror
I guess that's why TFA say "This build (5728) has a number of improvements and updates from RC1"?
Then go to Hydrogenaudio and check out/join the [discussions on] listening tests.
Since you know XBox Live, does it feature a [directed] Web of Trust or some such? Maybe it's not considered as necessary on a console network.
To me a middleware that adds a WoT-aspect to game lobbies (as in "I trust X, X trust Y, therefore I trust to play with Y" and that is end-user controllable (I decide who/what attributes of a player to trust) is a worthwhile project for some entrepreneur to explore.
I've never used XBox Live, but if it features 'seat-reservation' for groups of players then color me impressed.
If it doesn't it's just another free-standing gaming lobby, of which there are many on the PC (gamespy, allseeingeye, and another popular 'what's my friend playing'-thingy which I've forgotten the name of just now...
A "tier"-system is certainly possible, but I believe there are some problems with it that needs to be taken into account.
The biggest problem is that while it MATCHES players based on skill, it SEPARATES based on the social web. When I play BF2 I want to play it with friends, I almost never go out and play it by myself (though I'm sure many do and maybe even prefer it that way). This can be alleviated by not treating "a player" as the atomic unit, but maybe a "a small team" -- creating a whole new class of [interesting] problems (idea: Teams form "outside of the game", are ranked as a unit and passed of to a suitable server as a unit).. Also, we're very close to the structure already in place with clan gaming, only there humans (I gather) decide what teams will compete, not a computerized scoring system.
I also believe that while many players will enjoy such a system, it will mostly be the players that are already very competetive. Why? Because it adds a stress element: We can all have a bad day. If you're not very good, AND have a bad day, AND this results in you going down a tier, that might not be fun. Possible solution? You can only ever get bumped down from the absolute top tier, not the ones below (and you probably don't want more than three or four?)
Just by playing a lot of games I've identified many improvements that could be made in this area, it's therefore kind of sad to see a game like BF2 screw it up by not picking off some of that low-hanging fruit that would propel it from 'very good' to possibly 'greatness of historical proportions'. I especially don't like how hard it is for a group of friends to play together on a server that they don't run.
In NWN there's an in-game service ("lobby", whatever) whereby you can register your friends and then see what server they're on, and join it with a click of a mouse. That ought to be standard in all MP games, and also I'd like to see a mechanism whereby a team will look for a server as a unit. If me and a friend "band up", then I want the system to have the property that if one of us is accepted by a server, that will reserve -- for a limited time -- a slot on the same team for the rest of the gang (i.e me). The lobby would then say to me "Your friend XXX was accepted to the server Y, there's a spot reserved for you. Join?". Voila, instant MP'ing with friends.
I've been playing a little BF2, and I'm not very good (but I enjoy it nonetheless). With games like BF2 having user accounts and tracking all kinds of stats, it came to me that it would be possible for the server to give handicap to a team based on the stats of the players in it. Say in BF2 for instance, the server will have access to the player's kill-to-death ratio, not only for the current session, but back to the beginning. Based on this it could, for instance, open additional slots on a team -- effectively giving them a handicap -- if they're "too low" in this ratio. Or give that team an extra vehicle, etc.
This could be fun for both good players who might enjoy and even seek out the opportunity to play the 'underdog' to a team with a numerical advantage, and for new players who risk getting frustrated and even bored if they're on the losing side all the time.
As it is now, the server relies on the random allocation of players to a side to 'balance things out', but I postulate that it might actually make the game more fun to bias this to give it that 'skilled underdogs vs overwhelming force' tint. As a server option, of course.
Any MP games out there doing this already?
I once experimented and added a machine to the Tor network as an exit point for web traffic.
A couple of hours later I wasn't welcome at slashdot any more. You can guess where that experiment ended.
I flunked a course in discrete mathematics in part due to Oblivion, which was released in the week before the final.
Can't even say I feel bad about it :-)
They need to google "False Dilemma"
>operator new never returns a null pointer, so checks on it aren't needed.
Well, except if you use nothrow new, then.
Ctrl-Alt-X (or whatever it was) would have been your friend then.
Please learn to read. Here, let me help you: NON-MP3 vorbis-player. All current players also support mp3, so you're paying the mp3-tax or at the very least strengthening their percieved stanglehold of the market.
Let's designate any DAP which doesn't play mp3s as pure. That's what I'm waiting for.
Full Vorbis (incl q < 1) and FLAC (though I personally don't see the point on a portable) + flash-mem + memory card + gapless + replaygain + good radio --> me buy.
So does my iAudio. What's your point?
It's called Ogg Vorbis, is superior in quality to mp3, encodes faster, use a sane tagging system, and I'm eagerly awaiting an non-mp3 vorbis-player. Would be fucking HARDCORE.
Seriously people, if you have the cash for a 2K 1K or even a $500 player you probably dont feel like building one.
If you pay $2000 for a standalone DVD-player you probably DO expect it to be competitive in image quality though.
Please note that the score for Panasonic DVD-S97, 68, is actually correct as per their table, even if the text says "the score of the most best performing DVD player we tested (the Marantz DV6600) was only 63". Don't shoot the messenger.
Might aswell as I have the page up...
Denon DVD-1920 (58)
Denon DVD-3910 (58)
Marantz DV6600 (63)
Marantz DV9600 (61)
Panasonic DVD-S97 (68)
Philips DVP 5900 (35)
Philips DVP 9000S (53)
Pioneer DV-989AVi (59)
Samsung DVD-HD850 (30)
Samsung DVD-HD950 (30)
Sony DVP-NS92V (35)
Yamaha DVD-S2500 (53)
Hope I matched those up right...
"Final scores
The total score for nVidia ends up being 93, where the total ATI score is 118. Both scores [ed.] are extremely high, considering the score of the most best performing DVD player we tested (the Marantz DV6600) was only 63. The majority of the standalone players we used did not score more than 40 points in the test. The most expensive ones, the Denon DVD-3910 and Marantz DV9600 scored only 58 and 61 points.
For European readers the cadence tests are not of real importance, so we only take the first eight tests into consideration. The score then is slightly different, nVidia scored 58 in these tests, where as ATI scored 53. A pretty close result, and the slight advantage for nVidia is mainly due to the excellent PureVideo performance in the detail tests.
[score matrix breakdown omitted]"
>Many, many people may buy them purely based on this brand recognition.
Let's play it out:
"Hi, I want to buy a PS3 based purely on brand recognition."
"OK. That'll be $499, Sir."
"Umm... how much is the Nintendo offering?"
People must understand that Crysis is in the "Top Fuel" genre of games. Sure, one can make reasonable arguments for Volvos and Pintos which everyone can buy, but there are people who are into the extreme high-end, and not everyone gets to drive.
(Speaking of Crysis, I'm intrigued by the apparent difference (even disconnect) in fidelity between the 'Carrier' section seen in one trailer and the 'Jungle' section shown in the tech-demo. The 'Carrier' section looks like Just Another Boring Shooter, while the 'Jungle' section is definite Next Gen stuff. I'm hoping the game will be more Jungle than Carrier.)
The P3 might become a flop of E.T proportions.
They're free to do it, but the OP was suggesting we're wrong in not elevating it beyond a rating of "crap"
That a site offers freedom to totally fuck up in the presentation department doesn't automatically make it great. I think that's the point here.
Actually I'm not sure I agree there even is 'freedom'. All the pages (which are not many, I admit) I have seen look the same. Plack, pink or purple and crazy font sizes. Couple this with a complete void of interesting content, completely mindless user comments and page after page of 'myspace friends'. Ugh.
Both iriver and my personal current favourite iaudio produce very good players, it's just that the masses waggle along and buy shit like ''Sony'' (because of brand) or ''Noname'' (because of price)
No, in the name of "Rights Management". Security is something completely different, and much less important (apparently)
>mp3 is the standard and although it has its flaws isn't all that bad.
The same thing can be said about Internet Explorer vs Other Browsers. "Bohoo, IE isn't all that bad. Installing alternative browsers is a pain (notice I said pain, not impossible). Bohooo, life is so hard, I might have to plan one step ahead, push one more mouse button, bohoo..". Man, that's just fucking lazy. Nobody said having a sense of quality and a little fire for what's right would be the easiest way to glide through life.
Feels pretty darn good to not be a punter of the mp3 licensing consortium though. YMMV.