I think it depends on the camera angle. If you just saw their legs and feet, the actors would be suspended from wires in a harness, with the board attached to their feet.
No. I am kidding. There
was a rumour when the film came out. In a "making of" feature, Zemeckis came out with a joke that they do really exist. Lots of kids took it seriously.
Hover technology has been around for over a decade. The basic principle was used for the hoverboards in Back To the Future, but unforunately the hoverboards were not made avaialable because of safety concerns.
But still - The technology is there. It shouldn't require a lot of extra work to have these hovering much higher. I'm surprised there isn't more inniovation in this area. I suspect that the rubber manufacturers have been suppressing the technology, because they know it will put an end to their business.
What a crap argument. What is your point? Are reviewers no longer entitled to criticise books unless they're a published author? I'm criticising because these people can't come up with a new idea. Once you have a spec as complete as a full published game, it makes life a lot easier.
Who measures difficulty based on how many lines of code there are anyway?
Welcome to capitalism. Undercutting competitors' prices is a fair way of competition.
Why bother writing the code then? Why not just copy the CD directly? Even cheaper.
Coming up with a new idea costs money. It takes time. If they wanted, whoever owns the rights to Civilization probably have good grounds to sue for copyright infringement.
As to copying ideas, the makers of the proprietary Civ game haven't independently invented turn-based games,
No. There are many turn based games that are similar but clearly not the same game.
In short, everybody is constantly relying on previous ideas.
Of those, only 2 are not actually sequels or expansion packs to last year's popular games:
But they're not the same game. They may not be shockingly new or original, but they add some variety over the previous version.
Freeciv is not retreading ground. It's a total copy. It's making no effort to be different at all.
Those "new" games are a team FPS, a MMORPG, and an FPS. Do you really think those are innovative?
Depends whether they've done anything to extend the genre or added something clever, or perhaps used some imaginative level design.
And if you were to actually work in a games company you'd know how low a value is actually put on innovation.
I do. The spec for the game I've been working on is virtually identical to the spec for the previous game. I'm highly critical of that as well,and looking for a job with a company where I might actually be able to do something new.
The company I worked for before actually put a lot of effort into coming up with new ideas, and while they were all twists on an existing idea, we did at least push the genre forward. We could have been a lot more creative too, if the publishers were more willing to take a risk.
Duke Nukem extended the concept to add more puzzles and a 3d map. Quake gave a proper 3D map, totally new levels, and better weapons. Half Life added a story element to it. Even Quake 3 had some advances over Quake 2. Different levels, improved graphics. And all people wanted was more of the same. At least they created a new game, even if it was the same basic concept, they expanded on what came before.
Freeciv looks to be exactly the same game as Civ 2.
Really, what is it with free softweare developers? Is it really that hard to find someone with an original new idea for a game? Freeciv is not only a copy of an existing game, but it's a copy of an existinggame that's so old the sequal has been available at a budget price for at least half a decade.
Where are all the talented games designers? I'll tell you where - In games comapnies. These guys know the value of their ideas and concepts. They know that if thye give their stuff away they'll be out of a job. Programmers don't seem to care though. More and more developers go under, and it gets harder and harder for programmers to get a job doing anything creative, because these idiots are copying other peoples' ideas and giving it away.
Totalyl pointless. Probably going to be unsuccesful, and would probably be irritating if it succeeded, but still, it's really quite geeky. And geeky is good.
I agree. This is the way I see it. (My opinions may change).
I think advertising - and modern business in general - creates a new social contract.
I bought some stuff from a friend. I offered him a certain amount of cash. I knew he would accept less, and I was willing to pay more, but I gave him a fair price. This was a social relationship between friends. It was a social contract that I'd give him a fair price, and he'd accept it.
If I was a business, I'd have tried to maximise my profit. He would have tried to maximise his profits, I would have tried to minimise my cost. The simplest way to do this would be to haggle. It's still a fair system, and the end result will be about the same, but there's no longer a social contract. It's a business relationship where we both try to get the best for ourselves.
It doesn't work like that. You don't make an implicit agreement to see the ads. You don't agree to anything at all. They offer a website. You read it. They are perfectly entitled to try to sell you stuff, but you're not under any obligation to assist them.
Once they start trying to make money from you in any manner that isn't directly related, it changes the relationship entirely. They're trying to maximise their profits. that is their right. I'm not going to inconvenience myself or annoy myself for their benefit.
There are quite a few jokes remaining. This one was in the trailer.
Slartibartfast: "I'd rather be happy than right anyday".
Arthur: "And are you?"
Slartibartfast: "No. That's where it all falls down of course."
But I think they've tried to turn it into a movie... Where stuff actually happens. The radio play was simply a canvas for jokes. Events occured largely to link to new settings for comedy dialogue.
It is possible that the movie will be good. MJ Simpson's review was very damning, but this is a man who knows the entire radio script backwards, and wants all of DNA's dialogue to be in there. As long as you're not expecting it to be a copy of the radio series or the books, it may well be a very good comedy sci-fi film.
If Adams wrote it, grilling the producer about it seems pointless.
He didn't write all of it. Look at the writing credits. Douglas Adams and Karey Kirkpatrick. According to the Writers Guild, to get a credit, he had to have written a reasonable proportion of the script himself.
I think the reference was to NETWORK. In this there is really not one that you can call a network
There's a network run by National Rail.
I never understood how you can have competition on a rail service. I mean how does a london to dover serveice compete with a london to brighton service.
Presumably if people get so sick of travelling from London to Brighton, they'll drive up to Dudley, get a train to Birmingham, and then drive from there to London.
Curiosuly though, in the early days of steam travel, the different companies were competing with each other. It didn't matter that they went to different places. Affordable long distance travel was such a novelty that the rail companies could compete on the quality oif the desinations and the speed of the means of getting there.
I've recently figured out why the South East is sticking to the ancient third rail system in use, despite the low maximum speed possible using it. It's so when we finally become a fully fledged third world country people will be able to ride on the roof of trains, just like you see in travel documentaries.
There is no British Rail network, but there is still a British rail network. Check the capitalisation. The first implies a network for "British Rail". The second implies a rail network that is British.
Since when has Brighton been a "high-tech media-savvy remote suburb of London"?
Since the mid 90's. It has a considerable prescence of internet providers and web based companies, as well as the European HQ of American Express.
As for "a remote suburb of London" - No idea where that came from. Probably ignorant Londoners who are unable to comprehend that something interesting might happen outside of London.
Slashdot Mirror
I think it depends on the camera angle. If you just saw their legs and feet, the actors would be suspended from wires in a harness, with the board attached to their feet.
No. I am kidding. There was a rumour when the film came out. In a "making of" feature, Zemeckis came out with a joke that they do really exist. Lots of kids took it seriously.
Hover technology has been around for over a decade. The basic principle was used for the hoverboards in Back To the Future, but unforunately the hoverboards were not made avaialable because of safety concerns.
But still - The technology is there. It shouldn't require a lot of extra work to have these hovering much higher. I'm surprised there isn't more inniovation in this area. I suspect that the rubber manufacturers have been suppressing the technology, because they know it will put an end to their business.
What a crap argument. What is your point? Are reviewers no longer entitled to criticise books unless they're a published author? I'm criticising because these people can't come up with a new idea. Once you have a spec as complete as a full published game, it makes life a lot easier.
Who measures difficulty based on how many lines of code there are anyway?
Welcome to capitalism. Undercutting competitors' prices is a fair way of competition.
Why bother writing the code then? Why not just copy the CD directly? Even cheaper.
Coming up with a new idea costs money. It takes time. If they wanted, whoever owns the rights to Civilization probably have good grounds to sue for copyright infringement.
As to copying ideas, the makers of the proprietary Civ game haven't independently invented turn-based games,
No. There are many turn based games that are similar but clearly not the same game.
In short, everybody is constantly relying on previous ideas.
And the idea is they extend those ideas.
Of those, only 2 are not actually sequels or expansion packs to last year's popular games:
But they're not the same game. They may not be shockingly new or original, but they add some variety over the previous version.
Freeciv is not retreading ground. It's a total copy. It's making no effort to be different at all.
Those "new" games are a team FPS, a MMORPG, and an FPS. Do you really think those are innovative?
Depends whether they've done anything to extend the genre or added something clever, or perhaps used some imaginative level design.
And if you were to actually work in a games company you'd know how low a value is actually put on innovation.
I do. The spec for the game I've been working on is virtually identical to the spec for the previous game. I'm highly critical of that as well,and looking for a job with a company where I might actually be able to do something new.
The company I worked for before actually put a lot of effort into coming up with new ideas, and while they were all twists on an existing idea, we did at least push the genre forward. We could have been a lot more creative too, if the publishers were more willing to take a risk.
Someone with mod points please send this bullshit to -1.
Why?
What's wrong with "anti-free software flamebait"? Are we all obliged to approve of all free software, no matter how poor?
Not only it's completely off-topic,
It's about Freeciv in a freeciv article.
but it's clearly written to give rise to an endless stream of replies. Shame on those who modded this up for being so stupid.
You're just a Troll.
In what way?
I was critical of Open source developers releasing software with no originality.
I have not done this, because I know I have no originality.
I don't rip off other people's ideas and expect people to be impressed though.
Duke Nukem extended the concept to add more puzzles and a 3d map. Quake gave a proper 3D map, totally new levels, and better weapons. Half Life added a story element to it. Even Quake 3 had some advances over Quake 2. Different levels, improved graphics. And all people wanted was more of the same. At least they created a new game, even if it was the same basic concept, they expanded on what came before.
Freeciv looks to be exactly the same game as Civ 2.
There's a big difference between unoriginality (e.g. most FPS), and out and out plaigerism.
Take The sims 2. Not a remoteley original game, but expands on the original so much that it's quite clearly different.
Anyone can write a clone of an existing game. It's not hard. All the problems have already been solved.
Free to distribute
Free to modify
Free from original ideas.
Really, what is it with free softweare developers? Is it really that hard to find someone with an original new idea for a game? Freeciv is not only a copy of an existing game, but it's a copy of an existinggame that's so old the sequal has been available at a budget price for at least half a decade.
Where are all the talented games designers? I'll tell you where - In games comapnies. These guys know the value of their ideas and concepts. They know that if thye give their stuff away they'll be out of a job. Programmers don't seem to care though. More and more developers go under, and it gets harder and harder for programmers to get a job doing anything creative, because these idiots are copying other peoples' ideas and giving it away.
Totalyl pointless. Probably going to be unsuccesful, and would probably be irritating if it succeeded, but still, it's really quite geeky. And geeky is good.
I agree. This is the way I see it. (My opinions may change).
I think advertising - and modern business in general - creates a new social contract.
I bought some stuff from a friend. I offered him a certain amount of cash. I knew he would accept less, and I was willing to pay more, but I gave him a fair price. This was a social relationship between friends. It was a social contract that I'd give him a fair price, and he'd accept it.
If I was a business, I'd have tried to maximise my profit. He would have tried to maximise his profits, I would have tried to minimise my cost. The simplest way to do this would be to haggle. It's still a fair system, and the end result will be about the same, but there's no longer a social contract. It's a business relationship where we both try to get the best for ourselves.
It doesn't work like that. You don't make an implicit agreement to see the ads. You don't agree to anything at all. They offer a website. You read it. They are perfectly entitled to try to sell you stuff, but you're not under any obligation to assist them.
Once they start trying to make money from you in any manner that isn't directly related, it changes the relationship entirely. They're trying to maximise their profits. that is their right. I'm not going to inconvenience myself or annoy myself for their benefit.
Newbie.
My keyboard doesn't have Windows keys.
People working together to benfit the communitity as opposed to working for capital. Communism does not have to imply a totalitarian government.
Now that that's established, can we stop using "communist" as an insult, and focus on the actual issues?
There are quite a few jokes remaining. This one was in the trailer.
Slartibartfast: "I'd rather be happy than right anyday".
Arthur: "And are you?"
Slartibartfast: "No. That's where it all falls down of course."
But I think they've tried to turn it into a movie... Where stuff actually happens. The radio play was simply a canvas for jokes. Events occured largely to link to new settings for comedy dialogue.
It is possible that the movie will be good. MJ Simpson's review was very damning, but this is a man who knows the entire radio script backwards, and wants all of DNA's dialogue to be in there. As long as you're not expecting it to be a copy of the radio series or the books, it may well be a very good comedy sci-fi film.
If Adams wrote it, grilling the producer about it seems pointless.
He didn't write all of it. Look at the writing credits. Douglas Adams and Karey Kirkpatrick. According to the Writers Guild, to get a credit, he had to have written a reasonable proportion of the script himself.
I think the reference was to NETWORK. In this there is really not one that you can call a network
There's a network run by National Rail.
I never understood how you can have competition on a rail service. I mean how does a london to dover serveice compete with a london to brighton service.
Presumably if people get so sick of travelling from London to Brighton, they'll drive up to Dudley, get a train to Birmingham, and then drive from there to London.
Curiosuly though, in the early days of steam travel, the different companies were competing with each other. It didn't matter that they went to different places. Affordable long distance travel was such a novelty that the rail companies could compete on the quality oif the desinations and the speed of the means of getting there.
Most of the rolling stock is so old, it probably predates the invention of Metric units.
True.
However, the London-South Coast trains are limited to about 60mph. Might be a bit higher but nowhere near 140.
I've recently figured out why the South East is sticking to the ancient third rail system in use, despite the low maximum speed possible using it. It's so when we finally become a fully fledged third world country people will be able to ride on the roof of trains, just like you see in travel documentaries.
hmmm... Are you aware of tunnels?
There is no British Rail network, but there is still a British rail network. Check the capitalisation. The first implies a network for "British Rail". The second implies a rail network that is British.
Since when has Brighton been a "high-tech media-savvy remote suburb of London"?
Since the mid 90's. It has a considerable prescence of internet providers and web based companies, as well as the European HQ of American Express.
As for "a remote suburb of London" - No idea where that came from. Probably ignorant Londoners who are unable to comprehend that something interesting might happen outside of London.