"...people have never heard of Netscape, think that the Internet is the blue E icon..."
This is as precise a statement on the state of computer users as I have yet seen. Ever since we eliminated the seperate dialer programs (IE now auto-dials), the only thing people know about the internet is that blue e. When I tell my father to connect to the internet he instinctively boots up IE, despite the big connection icon I have labeled CONNECT TO INTERNET. Same goes for email. Outlook = email.
This is not necessarily a bad thing, but it shows how users really don't care what the program is called, only that it does what they need it to do. People don't think about computers like cars, they are more like toasters, defined by what services they offer, not who makes them or how they do what they do.
This is an excellent reason for PC demos. I actually upgraded quite a bit of my PC to play Soldier of Fortune II. I played the multiplayer demo (one map) for about 3 months. Bought the game, never looked back.
As far as buggy demo's go, that's why you can release them as 'alpha' or whatever. Let the community sort it out. I'd far rather voluntarily help a developer fix bugs *before* a release then sluggishly wait for patches *after*.
"...the N-Gage had so many design flaws and stupid decisions I can't even begin to count them..."
My problem is with the poor design decisions, not with the design flaws. The N-Gage doesn't seem to have any real flaws, just conscious improper choices. The original PS2 had design flaws, i.e. with not playing DVDs, lasers going bad etc. However, having to disassemble the phone to change games is something they actually discussed and felt comfortable with.
That's what I can't stand. It's one thing to hear someone say something stupid. They may not know better, but when a group of people choose to be ridiculous, well, my sympathy goes way down.
Perfectly on point. Especially the your point on EB price fixing. Every time I walk into one of those stores I can't help but be astounded that the price for a new game (ps2/cube etc) will be around $50. However, the same game "preowned" without box, manual, or any other documentation sells for $4 less.
Is that what all that extra business is worth, $4? Tell that to the people who wrote the manuals, and designed the posters and other material packaged with the game. Perhaps this is why most manuals these days are 4 pages long. 1 page of controller mapping, 2 pages of 'this may cause siezures, carpal tunnel, death' and one page for 'notes'.
Arrgh. I can't even respond intelligently to this. The situation bothers me too cerebrally.
I'm glad someone said this. If you read the article, it says the dual-screen is best used for exactly the types of things that people are suggesting for the DS.
That and the nice shout-out for Square's requirement of GBA for FF:CC from penny-arcade, hmm.....
"... and for ladies that want to keep it in their purse, be prepared to keep some of your makeup or other essentials at home, since there won't be room for them."
Exactly what is that demographic like? The one that includes early-adopting, high disposable income, avid gaming women?
I suppose that's like 4 people, including those in American Samoa. I tried to find some
girl gamers but Yahoo won't let me talk to them without verifying my age. Damn you Ashcroft.
(a sucky game can't be salvaged with bunch of cutscenes though, even if they had porn).
Ever look into the stunning array of Japanese arcade/console games that feature what amounts to soft porn? Or how about anal intrusion as an entire *game*?
Yeah, 10% is pretty high. But it depends on the game itself. Vice City is a good example. I'm not sure on it's entire length, but there is a lot of complex control there, with all the different weapons and autos/cycles. Probably takes a good 2 - 2.5 hours for a non-casual gamer to master. I guess that's probably more like 5%, figuring that the game is 40 hours or so. However, for Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, I'm about 15 hours in and I'm *still* figuring out little bits of the control mechanisms on managing the party and such.
On the other point, Payne is a great example of how to do character development in-game, without removing the player from the experience. I think another excellent example is Metroid Prime. The only game I know of that has good character dev *without* characters. If you scan all the computers, which you do while playing, there is a huge story that you are finding out about along with Samus. That gives the game a great feel of investigation and suspense.
Yeah, this goes with yesterday's article on episodic content. Games are still very much technology demos. Players want to see new graphics and cool new gameplay elements with each iteration. However, if we had a game that settled those up front, then released the story later, maybe then we could do more with character development.
Keep in mind that a significant part of any game (10% or so) still must be devoted to teaching the player how to control the main character. This would actually be an excellent time to start fleshing out the details of the story. Most games do this today, but some still offer the tried and true "training ground" which is exactly what it says it is, nothing more.
Have you ever sat there and watched your girlfriends favorite soap opera? Or someone else's girlfriends if need be. You can't understand a thing that's going on because of the massive amount of story development has gone in the years that you never saw. However, watch for a few weeks and you have a character that keeps people returning for *years*. Too bad most of the soaps out there have a story so bad I wind up watching Sesame Street to fill my mind with a more believable story. Anyway, episodic content would allow give the player more time in the story, and hence, character development.
I completely agree that there is currently no need for a new generation of consoles. The key demographic in the last few years has been the 18-25 (male of course) range that Sony has tapped into. Those "kids" are getting older and are not as impulsive as they used to be despite having more disposable income. Frankly, I'm tired of upgrading my console faster than my PC only to have to wait another year after release for quality games.
All three consoles have plenty of horsepower, are for the most part net-enabled, and developers have created the tools to make excellent games on them. Unless someone can give me an irrefutable reason why the current crop of consoles *can't* do something, I'm sticking with these. Prettier faces and industry buzzwords don't count.
Yep it is. I got my kit last Wednesday. However, it is only available from the sony website for $200 plus shipping. To be official, what you get is
2 PS2 Linux DVDs 1 40GB Hard Drive 1 10/100 Ethernet Adaptor 1 Sony Black USB Keyboard with 1 USB Port 1 Sony Black USB 3 Button Mouse 1 VGA Cable only for use with SYNC-ON-GREEN capable monitors
1400 pgs of manuals in PDF form. These are assembly language manuals for the EE (emotion engine) core of the playstation. You get no printed versions of these, only install documentation)
Remember, you have to add $25 to the cost for an extra memory card, as it will be formatted to contain your linux kernel.
And I used the 'Blind-Install' with absolutely no problems. You simply must be a little careful. Hope this helps.
This is ridiculous. At my school the honor code is shoved down our throat. And I mean shoved. Every class I take the professor takes a whole class meeting to tell everyone that even if you 'see' someones code, for a minute, you are cheating.
Look, I don't like it when one guy does the work and everyone else cheats either. Guess what though, that's how the world works. I'm sorry, but we pay these professors quite a good deal, and a lot of them give me little to no direction, and I am going to talk with my classmates as much as possible. No, I am not going to *copy* their code, but I see absolutely no problem with cooperation.
And then there is groups, this is perfect. Yeah, there is always some guy who does all the work. I say too bad for that guy, because if he let's everyone do the work now, he'll be doing all the work for the rest of his life. Go talk to the teacher and tell him/her what's going on, then leave it up to the teacher to mediate. THIS IS HOW THE REAL WORLD WORKS.
I'm one of those 'too old to be in college' guys, so I've seen both sides. In the real world, you almost always work in groups. You have to learn how to manage them, and how to be a part of them.
Let student's cooperate and enforce more tracking on who is contributing how much, moderated by the teacher.
I've posted this same issue before on slashdot. At my university (Mississippi State) they practically cram the academic honesty policy down our throats. What they have said to me, in very clear terms, is this.
If your code is seen by another, that person must cite you as a reference.
If you look at anothers code, that is (point blank) plagiarism.
Discussing an assigment is OK, provided you do not talk about actual implementation. Which, IMHO, is the major POINT of CS, but who am I to say)
This is wrong for a number of reasons. First of which is that the university should encourage cooperation, not discourage it. In the workforce, you're expected to work in a team, not alone. We have a couple of classes which *force* us to work in teams, but wouldn't be nice if we could actually come up with our own?
I don't have time for more details, but I think this whole policy is detrimental to the CS field in general. I'm pretty certain that I've "plagiarized" a number of times no matter how hard I tried not to. There is a common feeling among student that this is just some form of big joke. No one takes it seriously because of the scope of the specification.
My university has the usual approach toward any engineering discipline. Let me outline it right quick...
1.) Make it impossible to get everything done by having the difficult projects due immediately and the simple projects vague and unspecified.
2.) Throw the research guys in to teach the difficult courses. That way, the students learn that being near brilliance makes you brilliant and grading, like life, is subjective.
3.) Discourage cooperation. I don't know if this applies to other colleges, but mine (Mississippi State) shoves the academic honesty policy down my throat every time they assign something. Then, when I ask the teacher privately he says "Maybe you could ask a friend?"
4.) Don't attempt to learn the material, since understanding concepts is useless. Memorize these few examples and regurgitate them on a test. That way, you'll have something to compare to in real life. You won't understand it then, but you kept the book the professor wrote and charged you megabucks for right?
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What? So if I download IE/WMP from microsoft, then use them on a Linux box with Wine, then I am technically violating the EULA?
This is news to me. Any idea where in the EULA that is? I don't think anyone has ever read that entire document, including it's designers.
"...people have never heard of Netscape, think that the Internet is the blue E icon..."
This is as precise a statement on the state of computer users as I have yet seen. Ever since we eliminated the seperate dialer programs (IE now auto-dials), the only thing people know about the internet is that blue e. When I tell my father to connect to the internet he instinctively boots up IE, despite the big connection icon I have labeled CONNECT TO INTERNET . Same goes for email. Outlook = email.
This is not necessarily a bad thing, but it shows how users really don't care what the program is called, only that it does what they need it to do. People don't think about computers like cars, they are more like toasters, defined by what services they offer, not who makes them or how they do what they do.
This is an excellent reason for PC demos. I actually upgraded quite a bit of my PC to play Soldier of Fortune II. I played the multiplayer demo (one map) for about 3 months. Bought the game, never looked back.
As far as buggy demo's go, that's why you can release them as 'alpha' or whatever. Let the community sort it out. I'd far rather voluntarily help a developer fix bugs *before* a release then sluggishly wait for patches *after*.
"...the N-Gage had so many design flaws and stupid decisions I can't even begin to count them..."
My problem is with the poor design decisions, not with the design flaws. The N-Gage doesn't seem to have any real flaws, just conscious improper choices. The original PS2 had design flaws, i.e. with not playing DVDs, lasers going bad etc. However, having to disassemble the phone to change games is something they actually discussed and felt comfortable with.
That's what I can't stand. It's one thing to hear someone say something stupid. They may not know better, but when a group of people choose to be ridiculous, well, my sympathy goes way down.
Perfectly on point. Especially the your point on EB price fixing. Every time I walk into one of those stores I can't help but be astounded that the price for a new game (ps2/cube etc) will be around $50. However, the same game "preowned" without box, manual, or any other documentation sells for $4 less.
Is that what all that extra business is worth, $4? Tell that to the people who wrote the manuals, and designed the posters and other material packaged with the game. Perhaps this is why most manuals these days are 4 pages long. 1 page of controller mapping, 2 pages of 'this may cause siezures, carpal tunnel, death' and one page for 'notes'.
Arrgh. I can't even respond intelligently to this. The situation bothers me too cerebrally.
Actually, you can buy just the toy you know. :) You only get it 'free' with the meal. Just a little FYI. :)
I'm glad someone said this. If you read the article, it says the dual-screen is best used for exactly the types of things that people are suggesting for the DS.
That and the nice shout-out for Square's requirement of GBA for FF:CC from penny-arcade, hmm.....
Perhaps the big N isn't as crazy after all?
"... and for ladies that want to keep it in their purse, be prepared to keep some of your makeup or other essentials at home, since there won't be room for them."
Exactly what is that demographic like? The one that includes early-adopting, high disposable income, avid gaming women?
I suppose that's like 4 people, including those in American Samoa. I tried to find some girl gamers but Yahoo won't let me talk to them without verifying my age. Damn you Ashcroft.
(a sucky game can't be salvaged with bunch of cutscenes though, even if they had porn).
Ever look into the stunning array of Japanese arcade/console games that feature what amounts to soft porn? Or how about anal intrusion as an entire *game*?
Yeah, 10% is pretty high. But it depends on the game itself. Vice City is a good example. I'm not sure on it's entire length, but there is a lot of complex control there, with all the different weapons and autos/cycles. Probably takes a good 2 - 2.5 hours for a non-casual gamer to master. I guess that's probably more like 5%, figuring that the game is 40 hours or so. However, for Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, I'm about 15 hours in and I'm *still* figuring out little bits of the control mechanisms on managing the party and such.
On the other point, Payne is a great example of how to do character development in-game, without removing the player from the experience. I think another excellent example is Metroid Prime. The only game I know of that has good character dev *without* characters. If you scan all the computers, which you do while playing, there is a huge story that you are finding out about along with Samus. That gives the game a great feel of investigation and suspense.
Yeah, this goes with yesterday's article on episodic content. Games are still very much technology demos. Players want to see new graphics and cool new gameplay elements with each iteration. However, if we had a game that settled those up front, then released the story later, maybe then we could do more with character development.
Keep in mind that a significant part of any game (10% or so) still must be devoted to teaching the player how to control the main character. This would actually be an excellent time to start fleshing out the details of the story. Most games do this today, but some still offer the tried and true "training ground" which is exactly what it says it is, nothing more.
Have you ever sat there and watched your girlfriends favorite soap opera? Or someone else's girlfriends if need be. You can't understand a thing that's going on because of the massive amount of story development has gone in the years that you never saw. However, watch for a few weeks and you have a character that keeps people returning for *years*. Too bad most of the soaps out there have a story so bad I wind up watching Sesame Street to fill my mind with a more believable story. Anyway, episodic content would allow give the player more time in the story, and hence, character development.
I completely agree that there is currently no need for a new generation of consoles. The key demographic in the last few years has been the 18-25 (male of course) range that Sony has tapped into. Those "kids" are getting older and are not as impulsive as they used to be despite having more disposable income. Frankly, I'm tired of upgrading my console faster than my PC only to have to wait another year after release for quality games.
All three consoles have plenty of horsepower, are for the most part net-enabled, and developers have created the tools to make excellent games on them. Unless someone can give me an irrefutable reason why the current crop of consoles *can't* do something, I'm sticking with these. Prettier faces and industry buzzwords don't count.
Yep it is. I got my kit last Wednesday. However, it is only available from the sony website for $200 plus shipping. To be official, what you get is
2 PS2 Linux DVDs
1 40GB Hard Drive
1 10/100 Ethernet Adaptor
1 Sony Black USB Keyboard with 1 USB Port
1 Sony Black USB 3 Button Mouse
1 VGA Cable only for use with SYNC-ON-GREEN capable monitors
1400 pgs of manuals in PDF form. These are assembly language manuals for the EE (emotion engine) core of the playstation. You get no printed versions of these, only install documentation)
Remember, you have to add $25 to the cost for an extra memory card, as it will be formatted to contain your linux kernel.
And I used the 'Blind-Install' with absolutely no problems. You simply must be a little careful. Hope this helps.
This is ridiculous. At my school the honor code is shoved down our throat. And I mean shoved. Every class I take the professor takes a whole class meeting to tell everyone that even if you 'see' someones code, for a minute, you are cheating.
Look, I don't like it when one guy does the work and everyone else cheats either. Guess what though, that's how the world works. I'm sorry, but we pay these professors quite a good deal, and a lot of them give me little to no direction, and I am going to talk with my classmates as much as possible. No, I am not going to *copy* their code, but I see absolutely no problem with cooperation.
And then there is groups, this is perfect. Yeah, there is always some guy who does all the work. I say too bad for that guy, because if he let's everyone do the work now, he'll be doing all the work for the rest of his life. Go talk to the teacher and tell him/her what's going on, then leave it up to the teacher to mediate. THIS IS HOW THE REAL WORLD WORKS.
I'm one of those 'too old to be in college' guys, so I've seen both sides. In the real world, you almost always work in groups. You have to learn how to manage them, and how to be a part of them.
Let student's cooperate and enforce more tracking on who is contributing how much, moderated by the teacher.
I've posted this same issue before on slashdot. At my university (Mississippi State) they practically cram the academic honesty policy down our throats. What they have said to me, in very clear terms, is this.
If your code is seen by another, that person must cite you as a reference.
If you look at anothers code, that is (point blank) plagiarism.
Discussing an assigment is OK, provided you do not talk about actual implementation. Which, IMHO, is the major POINT of CS, but who am I to say)
This is wrong for a number of reasons. First of which is that the university should encourage cooperation, not discourage it. In the workforce, you're expected to work in a team, not alone. We have a couple of classes which *force* us to work in teams, but wouldn't be nice if we could actually come up with our own?
I don't have time for more details, but I think this whole policy is detrimental to the CS field in general. I'm pretty certain that I've "plagiarized" a number of times no matter how hard I tried not to. There is a common feeling among student that this is just some form of big joke. No one takes it seriously because of the scope of the specification.
My university has the usual approach toward any engineering discipline. Let me outline it right quick...
1.) Make it impossible to get everything done by having the difficult projects due immediately and the simple projects vague and unspecified.
2.) Throw the research guys in to teach the difficult courses. That way, the students learn that being near brilliance makes you brilliant and grading, like life, is subjective.
3.) Discourage cooperation. I don't know if this applies to other colleges, but mine (Mississippi State) shoves the academic honesty policy down my throat every time they assign something. Then, when I ask the teacher privately he says "Maybe you could ask a friend?"
4.) Don't attempt to learn the material, since understanding concepts is useless. Memorize these few examples and regurgitate them on a test. That way, you'll have something to compare to in real life. You won't understand it then, but you kept the book the professor wrote and charged you megabucks for right?