F*ck you all who voted for this nanny state. You get what you deserve.
I'm looking at you Democrats, who have never seen a government program you didn't want to throw MORE money at, or a single issue that you didn't think some bureaucrat in Washington couldn't resolve better than the people directly involved.
I'm ALSO looking at you Republicans, who have invented your own version of the nanny state and labeled it "The War On Terror" where (for our own good, of COURSE) you've turned on its head the Founding Fathers' basic concept that power flows FROM the people and that the government SHOULD be afraid of its populace.
"Would you buy a car that didn't have a steering wheel?"
Yes, if the alternative (perhaps a center-console joystick?) promised better responsiveness, control, or some other benefit that exceeded the pain of the learning curve.
You & the OP have a point, and that sometimes it's hard to differentiate between users complaining because something is simply unfamiliar, and something is ACTUALLY difficult. There's room for both in a piece of software, frankly.
As a developer, you have to make the choice: if you're going to simply follow the paradigm, then you can at least get past the familiarity issue, albeit sometimes here I sense there's a bit of an 'uncanny valley' as well. If the software runs 95% like something the user is familiar with, that 5% might be REALLY uncomfortable or challenging to understand. Something totally new, OTOH, the expectation will be that no assumptions can be made and thus fewer surprises.
Basically, I don't think it's the best idea to NEVER innovate in terms of UI, for example. Otherwise we'd never get anything any better. Change paradigms when you sincerely think you have a better mousetrap, and understand that the majority of changes probably will go under the Darwinian bus. A certain % of users (early adopters) will try it, and if they accept it, you may have defined something new and useful. But also understand that the simple fact that it's different WILL drive away a large number (perhaps the bulk) of users who simply don't have time/interest to learn something different if they're basically ok with what they are currently using.
Actually, the free demo has great graphics and sound; the sucky part about it is that you only get one life and you have to play with a randomly-generated character that can often be gimped from the beginning.:(
It's an astonishing lack of reportorial (?) rigor that the article doesn't even address the likely reality: that Mr Levine either is angling for a better payment for the cell tower (the article doesn't SPECIFICALLY say that the tower is or isn't on his property, it just says "near his farm"), angling to prevent some neighbor he dislikes from getting $$ for the tower (most likely, IMO, if you consider the Nova Scotians I know...), or equally likely, the provincial government 'grandfathered' out the land for this tower, and the fact that THEY are getting the $$ for it and/or the simple government 'taking' annoys him.
The "OMG the radiation is going to mutate my crops" sounds to me like a convenient wrapper, but unlikely to be the real reason he's blocking it.
(And you can see that the BBC, in a nice (circular?) demonstration of long-period orbital return, even USED THE IMAGE from the Wiki article from 12 years ago.)
I look forward to reading about this cool new calculation of low-energy orbital pathways again in 2015!
We tried CFL's in our 1907 home and they didn't last as long as incandescents, much less the inflated lifespan we were expecting. Further, their light degraded BADLY over time, we ended up replacing them not when they burned out, but when the light they threw was deeply yellowed and about as bright as 20w bulbs.
I'm genuinely hoping that LEDs are the real future.
It's simple ass covering by the school. With declining Phy Ed budgets (meaning more students per teacher) and more and more obese kids, the school feels it's in its best (legalistic) interest to introduce heart monitoring, and I'm sure there's a procedure for saying "If Chubby Chuck's heart rate goes over 150, he needs to stop."
That way, when Chubby Chuck, Chubby Charlene, and Chubby Kenny all keel over because their hearts exploded, not used to any physical strain despite hours of Facebook, really exciting Montel Williams shows, and regular running (all over Azeroth), the school can be seen to have taken 'reasonable precautions' and not get sued.
That's all. They don't give a crap about the numbers or even who your kid is...unless their heart rate hits their lawyer-inspired target.
...which then suggests that the problem isn't the generation of green energy, it's in the storage and efficient lossless TRANSMISSION of same.
Arguably, the primary research efforts of 'green' activists should be in that direction, not in begging governments to subsidize otherwise inefficient or uneconomic 'sustainable' generation technologies.
Perhaps someone should point out to Mr. Nunberg (if one can get past his ceaseless caterwauling) that the books digitized come from LIBRARIES, and if scholars find their digitization, cataloging, or other minutiae somehow insufficient, they can always go back to said LIBRARIES and do their research the old fashioned way?
Some complaints just ring with irrelevance in immaturity. Complaining when someone has gone to great effort and expense to GIVE you something where you had nothing before, simply because they didn't organize it the way you might have, or because of some errors in the process seems...weak. Very weak.
"Just because something is valuable doesn't mean public education has to teach it. "
+infinity, wise
Seriously, though: I was just thinking the other day that there was hardly a more useless class in the High School schedule than to teach typing. What prompted this was watching kids do some of the online typing tests.
I watched kids score horribly on these tests. These are the SAME kids who routinely run (not participate in, but lead) 25-man instances in WoW, with the complicated key gyrations required for that, plus conducting 2 or more simultaneous chat conversations on the chat bar or even other applications. These kids were scoring 15-20 wpm on the typing tests, yet can spin out two or three paragraphs of chat text in moments without batting an eye.
Granted, the chat text omits the niceties of punctuation and often capitalization. But still, the proof is there: it's not that these kids CANNOT type, it's the context that allows them to ignore the grammatical and notational finery.
So it's a utility thing. If the young NEED to type, they will. And they'll develop proficiency and their own method. Making kids go through typing exercises is a waste of school time and resources better spent elsewhere. (Besides, soon enough you'll have to even explain where the term 'typing' even comes from, I haven't seen/used a typewriter in years.)
Seriously, though: if you need 45 days to break your addiction to the web, for quite a bit lower sum you could just go get a tent and hang out in the Boundary Waters for 45 days.
I *guarantee* that you would come back and while you might enjoy reconnecting to the web again, none of the virtual world would seem nearly as important as before you left.
There's always a lot of political hay to be made out of comparisons of this or that factor of American life to "3rd world country" quality. The unstated (or baldly stated) point being: why can't the world's wealthiest country take care of its underclass better? Why can't it be improved (and, in a pointed comment toward conservatives/Republicans who tend to oppose such 'improvements' wholesale), why are you so heartless?
This is, in my experience, particularly baffling to Europeans who live with a social support system generally unparalleled in the modern world.
Here's the secret: it's about CHOICE, and the consequences of your decisions.
Speaking generally, people in poverty are there because of some shitty life choice that they made along the way. Have a baby before age 18. Have a baby out of wedlock. Do drugs. Commit crime. Drop out of school. There are exceptions, but the HUGE majority of the chronic poor fall into one of these categories. And, born from the 'self-reliant' protestant ethic that founded the country, there used to be a cultural reluctance to help these 'free-riders' in any way.
(The only broad exception to this would be the poor little buggers BORN to parents who made similar crappy choices. They didn't really have any say in the matter, and their futures are pretty much doomed. Unfortunately, really the best situation for them would be to be taken AWAY from their stupid parent (generally there's only still one around) and put into a boarding school where they could get a good education without their biological role models; this is seen to be 'inhumane' in today's society, so instead we leave them to grow in a horrid environment, really just enabling the cycle to continue indefinitely.)
This is why the US has so many poor, and cares so little for them generally; starting with free public education through high school, it's been proven repeatedly that in the US you can become a success with simple hard work, determination, and self-discipline. You probably won't become rich, but you can work 2 jobs and build your child a better foundation from which THEY can climb, ultimately improving the lives of your grandchildren and greatgrandchildren. CHOOSING to live a life of narcissistic self-interest an immature egoism, why should I (the argument goes) help you with a damn thing?
Every problem is ultimately about killing stuff. (Aside from the occasional red key - red door quest)
Your point about D&D is apt. The possible threats are infinite. A warrior is built precisely along MMO lines, and may be quite survivable in those terms, but gives up flexibility. What if you need to climb walls to get out of danger? Whups, fighter's dead. But the thief (who is sub-optimal for fighting) has an alternative that WOULD allow him to survive.
As long as MMO's measure performance along a 1-dimensional scale, they shouldn't be surprised that players work out 1d-optimal builds. It's once you get to 2d, 3d, or (in the case of PnP RPGs) Nd problems where there IS no best-in-all-circumstances (and in fact the circumstances themselves are not finite) option that it will actually feel like a roleplaying (and not video) game.
That would be conventional wisdom, but I had a very illustrative talk with Jack Emmert (creator of City of Heroes) before that game was released. Apparently well into beta they had followed that idea, that classes were bad and restrictive, and 'unrealistic'. Ironically, what they discovered (with a good, aggressive set of beta testers) is that within hours of releasing a newly-balanced client, the most intense theorycrafters would have parsed out the formulaic details (increasing skill x meant y more hp or z more dps) and posted this as a 'best spec' and (aside from some dissention between theorycrafters) the bulk of other players uninterested in crunching numbers would simply copycat those builds.
So you ended up with a 'skill based, classless' game system, where ironically everyone was nearly identical in powers, skills, and capabilities. After butting heads against this trend for much (most?) of beta, it was a relatively late-design decision to go back to ground zero and implement a class-based structure, ironically to promote in-game diversity among players.
I've thought about this for a LONG time, personally being a devotee of skill-based RPGs (Runequest, etc.) compared to level-based RPGs (D&D, etc.). It's really counterintuitive.
What I've realized is that where the "that's unrealistic" criticism breaks down is the fundamentals: what's REALITY is that you DON'T get to choose ANYTHING fundamental about yourself, not really. You're born with a skin color, a set of genetics that predisposes you to a host of characteristics (appearance, height, build, even sexual orientation*), and you get to "play" real life with the good, mediocre, or shitty hand you're dealt. (I have gamer friends with severe birth defects that have said they would love to get a t-shirt saying "yeah, I'd reroll if I could, but for now I'm stuck with this character".) Sure, you can work out (+1 STR), get plastic surgery (+1 CHA), or sit at a computer all day (+1 INT, -1 CON, -1 STR, -1 CHA), but your life skills are really just tweaking the basics you started with.
* I don't know whether the current politically correct thought is that it is or isn't genetically based, I don't really care, it's just another example of a possible predisposition.
So my point is, the minute you allow the players free will in the creation of their toons, you've already sorely broken any connection with realism. Think about it in real life, if we had that capability we'd all probably be a monochromatic bland sea of beautiful, smart, strong, healthy people. too.
Writing this, it's occurred to me the irony of the original D&D system - where you rolled 3d6 per stat in order, and 'lived with' the result of your rolls, meaning some characters were simply better than others - probably needed 'classes' the least, and would have worked with a skill-based system even better. But CRPGs and MMOs, which start out with a fundamental predisposition toward equivalence, it's almost inevitable that you have to channel the players early into very DISTINCT courses, lest they all choose the same 'best option' path identically.
Lowered survivability in the long term offsets the superficial advantages.
I've never needed more than about 4 hours of sleep a night, my wife is a mess if she gets less than 8.
I can say from my field experiments, that some days (particularly where we both only get about 5-6 hours, but it's REALLY evident after several nights of short-sleep due to babies or whatever) she's far more likely to murder me.
Even if she doesn't kill me, the likelihood that my progeny will survive or that I'll get another chance to mate anytime soon is far, far lower...of course after 20 years together you get asymptotic numbers approaching zero ANYWAY but that's another post....
Thanks for the tip! I'm unfortunately hostage to US magazines generally, but that one looks good enough to pursue.
What's interesting is that the current online version - there's almost NO overlap to the 'feature titles' covered in most US gaming mags. Interesting, and very positive sign of depth.
How many times has it happened now that yesterday's idealist liberals grow up to be conservative fascists themselves? And the more liberal/hippy, the worse they are later.
Is this the negative side to the old aphorism (attributed to Churchill) "if you're not a liberal when you're young, you have no heart; if you're not a conservative when you're older you have no brain"?
I've been part of the 'gaming media' for nearly 20 years now, writing game reviews occasionally for print magazines, but mostly for websites.
My take is that gaming magazines miss their target completely.
Firstly, gaming magazines are nothing more than previews, reviews, and columns. When's the last time you opened a gaming magazine and actually saw a STORY about UI developments, the moral stance in violent videogames, or something that wasn't a poorly-camouflaged (if they bother) extended preview of something in development? Frankly, it would not be a bad move for a gaming magazine to publish the sort of thing that is on Gamasutra, as some of those articles are in-depth, technical, and worthy of mental digestion, instead of just extended adverts?
Second, their credibility is universally shot. In the real world of journalism, there's at least some degree of credibility to the print media (although that's fading too), with formal fact-checking offices and editors that review the stories for meaning in value. Gaming mags ape the worst habits of the cheapest websites. Their review scales (1-10, stars, whatever) are meaningless, as games fall clearly into three categories: the uber-mega hit, the merely interesting, or the scapegoat category. Their scores will be (on a 1-100 scale) 97+, 89-96, or 50 or lower, respectively. Generally the whole thing is a quiet circle-jerk, where the gaming companies provide free games and buy copious advertising space, while the magazines quietly agree to make sure that the review is generally good but in any case always contains a few hyperbolic quotes that are good for box text. There are a *few* games that even the publishers regard as stinkers, and are so obviously bad, they serve as useful 'credibility' anchors, because pretty much everyone agrees to pile on and downrate it, so there's no danger of a publisher/developer getting their feelings particularly hurt. You might think that mags could buy their titles, but this would put them MONTHS behind their peers, who all get pre-release gold copies for their reviews. They are already hostage to their print schedules, distribution, etc which handicaps them in breaking any new information vs. websites.
Third, even if the reviews are genuine, the nature of reviewing is personal and very subjective. I'd suggest that most gamers browse reviewers widely, until they land on a handful that seem to mirror their own opinions closely enough. There is a quite natural advantage to websites that can be hotlinked, browsed widely, and cost nothing to sample widely (they're not really free, you as a gamer are paying a microtransaction in every game purchase to subsidize the free review games and advertising fees, but it's nearly invisible).
Fourth, in regards to pretty much any modern game aside from Dwarf Fortress, a huge selling point of any game is the graphics. Websites can simply link a screenshot, and you can see what the game will look like at full resolution (boo to the retarded game sites that display their graphics in some sort of non-capturable popup so this is impossible). That's tremendously important to most players who either want to see the pretty flashes and chrome, or have a more tangible question about whether the UI is readable, etc. Magazines are stuck with (good resolution but) usually smaller than 4x6 images, which simply can't carry the details. Websites can also carry video clips which SHOW gameplay (boo again to the websites that accept the bullshit cutscene videos which show neither actual gameplay nor game resolution).
Finally, there's the matter of space: while editorial review is a good thing (don't ever let my editors hear me say that), magazine editors are more about the chopping than the refining. A good editor helps a writer be more succinct and convey their points more clearly. Magazines like all print media have a zero-sum hard cap on the amount of space stories can take up - if a game is alloted 18 column-inches, or 750 words, or whatever, that can't be changed with
I've been using Windows since DOS days in the early 80's. I'd say I'm moderately skilled with Windows. Nevertheless, I've tried a few different Linux distros - first Knoppix, then OpenSUSE, then Ubuntu G, then Ubuntu H.
Mainly I've quit bothering trying to use Linux, despite it running much faster than Win on any comparable hardware, and despite my personal PREFERENCE to move away from the ever-hungry machine of MS's licensing dept (oh, so I get to pay you every YEAR now?)...
Why? 1) simple laziness. Not really interested in climbing a learning curve at 41. Got better things to do with my time. 2) mimic Windows ease of use in terms of installs. If I want to install a program that's not on the "add application" list of programs that I get from whatever install server is my default, it should be no more complicated than downloading a file, and running it. If there are dependencies, add them to the damn install file. 3) much better automated hardware detection and support. I want to install a USB device? The OS needs to recognize the device and install drivers, or at least tell me where I need to go to get them. I was sick of DIP switch settings and dicking around with config files in DOS...I don't want to go back to that. 4) here's the killer: build in an invisible WINE-like function. Let me run native apps, and I'm sure they'll be faster. But if I want to run WoW and they don't have a linux client? Let me run it with the performance hit of some sort of shell, but let it RUN.
That said, the main hesitations for me are twofold: - that installing Stepmania on a linux box for my kids to play on was absolutely AGONY. It wasn't just a matter of downloading, extracting, and double-clicking the Stepmania icon. - I'm unwilling to adopt an OS that means that I can't play the entire bookshelf of computer games next to me without major screwing around. Yes, I do go back and play a fair number of Win95 games, as well as current cutting-edge ones.
So, I don't think my experience is that odd; if they want me to try ChromeOS, there's what I'd need to see.
Is Kepler in some sort of particularly vulnerable orbit?
Granted the electronics in Kepler are probably more sophisticated than many spaceborne systems, but I'd imagine the protections would have been planned to match.
I mean, we've been shielding spacecraft from Cosmic Rays for a LONG time, why would this suddenly be an issue? I don't hear of similar reboots in anything from Apollo to Cassini.
Slashdot Mirror
F*ck you all who voted for this nanny state. You get what you deserve.
I'm looking at you Democrats, who have never seen a government program you didn't want to throw MORE money at, or a single issue that you didn't think some bureaucrat in Washington couldn't resolve better than the people directly involved.
I'm ALSO looking at you Republicans, who have invented your own version of the nanny state and labeled it "The War On Terror" where (for our own good, of COURSE) you've turned on its head the Founding Fathers' basic concept that power flows FROM the people and that the government SHOULD be afraid of its populace.
"Would you buy a car that didn't have a steering wheel?"
Yes, if the alternative (perhaps a center-console joystick?) promised better responsiveness, control, or some other benefit that exceeded the pain of the learning curve.
You & the OP have a point, and that sometimes it's hard to differentiate between users complaining because something is simply unfamiliar, and something is ACTUALLY difficult. There's room for both in a piece of software, frankly.
As a developer, you have to make the choice: if you're going to simply follow the paradigm, then you can at least get past the familiarity issue, albeit sometimes here I sense there's a bit of an 'uncanny valley' as well. If the software runs 95% like something the user is familiar with, that 5% might be REALLY uncomfortable or challenging to understand. Something totally new, OTOH, the expectation will be that no assumptions can be made and thus fewer surprises.
Basically, I don't think it's the best idea to NEVER innovate in terms of UI, for example. Otherwise we'd never get anything any better. Change paradigms when you sincerely think you have a better mousetrap, and understand that the majority of changes probably will go under the Darwinian bus. A certain % of users (early adopters) will try it, and if they accept it, you may have defined something new and useful. But also understand that the simple fact that it's different WILL drive away a large number (perhaps the bulk) of users who simply don't have time/interest to learn something different if they're basically ok with what they are currently using.
Actually, the free demo has great graphics and sound; the sucky part about it is that you only get one life and you have to play with a randomly-generated character that can often be gimped from the beginning. :(
It's an astonishing lack of reportorial (?) rigor that the article doesn't even address the likely reality: that Mr Levine either is angling for a better payment for the cell tower (the article doesn't SPECIFICALLY say that the tower is or isn't on his property, it just says "near his farm"), angling to prevent some neighbor he dislikes from getting $$ for the tower (most likely, IMO, if you consider the Nova Scotians I know...), or equally likely, the provincial government 'grandfathered' out the land for this tower, and the fact that THEY are getting the $$ for it and/or the simple government 'taking' annoys him.
The "OMG the radiation is going to mutate my crops" sounds to me like a convenient wrapper, but unlikely to be the real reason he's blocking it.
Ironically you're right on. The orbital period for this story is 6 years.
BBC posts article in 2009, repeating Slashdot posting of 2003, which is actually rehashing something that was NEWS in 1997: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interplanetary_Transport_Network
(And you can see that the BBC, in a nice (circular?) demonstration of long-period orbital return, even USED THE IMAGE from the Wiki article from 12 years ago.)
I look forward to reading about this cool new calculation of low-energy orbital pathways again in 2015!
*PRECISELY*
We tried CFL's in our 1907 home and they didn't last as long as incandescents, much less the inflated lifespan we were expecting. Further, their light degraded BADLY over time, we ended up replacing them not when they burned out, but when the light they threw was deeply yellowed and about as bright as 20w bulbs.
I'm genuinely hoping that LEDs are the real future.
I don't think there's any need for paranoia.
It's simple ass covering by the school.
With declining Phy Ed budgets (meaning more students per teacher) and more and more obese kids, the school feels it's in its best (legalistic) interest to introduce heart monitoring, and I'm sure there's a procedure for saying "If Chubby Chuck's heart rate goes over 150, he needs to stop."
That way, when Chubby Chuck, Chubby Charlene, and Chubby Kenny all keel over because their hearts exploded, not used to any physical strain despite hours of Facebook, really exciting Montel Williams shows, and regular running (all over Azeroth), the school can be seen to have taken 'reasonable precautions' and not get sued.
That's all. They don't give a crap about the numbers or even who your kid is...unless their heart rate hits their lawyer-inspired target.
...which then suggests that the problem isn't the generation of green energy, it's in the storage and efficient lossless TRANSMISSION of same.
Arguably, the primary research efforts of 'green' activists should be in that direction, not in begging governments to subsidize otherwise inefficient or uneconomic 'sustainable' generation technologies.
Perhaps someone should point out to Mr. Nunberg (if one can get past his ceaseless caterwauling) that the books digitized come from LIBRARIES, and if scholars find their digitization, cataloging, or other minutiae somehow insufficient, they can always go back to said LIBRARIES and do their research the old fashioned way?
Some complaints just ring with irrelevance in immaturity. Complaining when someone has gone to great effort and expense to GIVE you something where you had nothing before, simply because they didn't organize it the way you might have, or because of some errors in the process seems...weak. Very weak.
"Just because something is valuable doesn't mean public education has to teach it. "
+infinity, wise
Seriously, though: I was just thinking the other day that there was hardly a more useless class in the High School schedule than to teach typing. What prompted this was watching kids do some of the online typing tests.
I watched kids score horribly on these tests. These are the SAME kids who routinely run (not participate in, but lead) 25-man instances in WoW, with the complicated key gyrations required for that, plus conducting 2 or more simultaneous chat conversations on the chat bar or even other applications. These kids were scoring 15-20 wpm on the typing tests, yet can spin out two or three paragraphs of chat text in moments without batting an eye.
Granted, the chat text omits the niceties of punctuation and often capitalization. But still, the proof is there: it's not that these kids CANNOT type, it's the context that allows them to ignore the grammatical and notational finery.
So it's a utility thing. If the young NEED to type, they will. And they'll develop proficiency and their own method. Making kids go through typing exercises is a waste of school time and resources better spent elsewhere. (Besides, soon enough you'll have to even explain where the term 'typing' even comes from, I haven't seen/used a typewriter in years.)
So if something can't feel pain, it's now "ok" to hurt it?
I mean seriously, I'm not a PETAnut or animal rights activist, I'm not even a vegetarian but c'mon, that's ludicrous.
By that logic, you can cheerfully stick a pin over & over into your coworker that has leprosy - he can't feel it, it's ok!
Can I get a room with decent wireless?
Seriously, though: if you need 45 days to break your addiction to the web, for quite a bit lower sum you could just go get a tent and hang out in the Boundary Waters for 45 days.
I *guarantee* that you would come back and while you might enjoy reconnecting to the web again, none of the virtual world would seem nearly as important as before you left.
Probably because someone told him "But Bill, we named it after you!"
Which didn't help either.
There's always a lot of political hay to be made out of comparisons of this or that factor of American life to "3rd world country" quality. The unstated (or baldly stated) point being: why can't the world's wealthiest country take care of its underclass better? Why can't it be improved (and, in a pointed comment toward conservatives/Republicans who tend to oppose such 'improvements' wholesale), why are you so heartless?
This is, in my experience, particularly baffling to Europeans who live with a social support system generally unparalleled in the modern world.
Here's the secret: it's about CHOICE, and the consequences of your decisions.
Speaking generally, people in poverty are there because of some shitty life choice that they made along the way. Have a baby before age 18. Have a baby out of wedlock. Do drugs. Commit crime. Drop out of school. There are exceptions, but the HUGE majority of the chronic poor fall into one of these categories. And, born from the 'self-reliant' protestant ethic that founded the country, there used to be a cultural reluctance to help these 'free-riders' in any way.
(The only broad exception to this would be the poor little buggers BORN to parents who made similar crappy choices. They didn't really have any say in the matter, and their futures are pretty much doomed. Unfortunately, really the best situation for them would be to be taken AWAY from their stupid parent (generally there's only still one around) and put into a boarding school where they could get a good education without their biological role models; this is seen to be 'inhumane' in today's society, so instead we leave them to grow in a horrid environment, really just enabling the cycle to continue indefinitely.)
This is why the US has so many poor, and cares so little for them generally; starting with free public education through high school, it's been proven repeatedly that in the US you can become a success with simple hard work, determination, and self-discipline. You probably won't become rich, but you can work 2 jobs and build your child a better foundation from which THEY can climb, ultimately improving the lives of your grandchildren and greatgrandchildren. CHOOSING to live a life of narcissistic self-interest an immature egoism, why should I (the argument goes) help you with a damn thing?
I guess internet publishing really is mainstream now. This clearly makes Flikr no more biased than say, CBS, NBC, ABC, or PBS.
Absolutely, I agree with you.
Of course, the *ROOT* of the problem (that has no ETA on being solved) is that MMO's use a single equation to solve every problem:
If (Player Hitpoints)+(Player healing) - (Monster Damage) > (Monster Hitpoints)+(monster healing) - (Player Damage), then Victory = 1, else Ignominious Defeat
That's it.
Every problem is ultimately about killing stuff.
(Aside from the occasional red key - red door quest)
Your point about D&D is apt. The possible threats are infinite. A warrior is built precisely along MMO lines, and may be quite survivable in those terms, but gives up flexibility. What if you need to climb walls to get out of danger? Whups, fighter's dead. But the thief (who is sub-optimal for fighting) has an alternative that WOULD allow him to survive.
As long as MMO's measure performance along a 1-dimensional scale, they shouldn't be surprised that players work out 1d-optimal builds. It's once you get to 2d, 3d, or (in the case of PnP RPGs) Nd problems where there IS no best-in-all-circumstances (and in fact the circumstances themselves are not finite) option that it will actually feel like a roleplaying (and not video) game.
That would be conventional wisdom, but I had a very illustrative talk with Jack Emmert (creator of City of Heroes) before that game was released.
Apparently well into beta they had followed that idea, that classes were bad and restrictive, and 'unrealistic'. Ironically, what they discovered (with a good, aggressive set of beta testers) is that within hours of releasing a newly-balanced client, the most intense theorycrafters would have parsed out the formulaic details (increasing skill x meant y more hp or z more dps) and posted this as a 'best spec' and (aside from some dissention between theorycrafters) the bulk of other players uninterested in crunching numbers would simply copycat those builds.
So you ended up with a 'skill based, classless' game system, where ironically everyone was nearly identical in powers, skills, and capabilities. After butting heads against this trend for much (most?) of beta, it was a relatively late-design decision to go back to ground zero and implement a class-based structure, ironically to promote in-game diversity among players.
I've thought about this for a LONG time, personally being a devotee of skill-based RPGs (Runequest, etc.) compared to level-based RPGs (D&D, etc.). It's really counterintuitive.
What I've realized is that where the "that's unrealistic" criticism breaks down is the fundamentals: what's REALITY is that you DON'T get to choose ANYTHING fundamental about yourself, not really. You're born with a skin color, a set of genetics that predisposes you to a host of characteristics (appearance, height, build, even sexual orientation*), and you get to "play" real life with the good, mediocre, or shitty hand you're dealt. (I have gamer friends with severe birth defects that have said they would love to get a t-shirt saying "yeah, I'd reroll if I could, but for now I'm stuck with this character".) Sure, you can work out (+1 STR), get plastic surgery (+1 CHA), or sit at a computer all day (+1 INT, -1 CON, -1 STR, -1 CHA), but your life skills are really just tweaking the basics you started with.
* I don't know whether the current politically correct thought is that it is or isn't genetically based, I don't really care, it's just another example of a possible predisposition.
So my point is, the minute you allow the players free will in the creation of their toons, you've already sorely broken any connection with realism. Think about it in real life, if we had that capability we'd all probably be a monochromatic bland sea of beautiful, smart, strong, healthy people. too.
Writing this, it's occurred to me the irony of the original D&D system - where you rolled 3d6 per stat in order, and 'lived with' the result of your rolls, meaning some characters were simply better than others - probably needed 'classes' the least, and would have worked with a skill-based system even better. But CRPGs and MMOs, which start out with a fundamental predisposition toward equivalence, it's almost inevitable that you have to channel the players early into very DISTINCT courses, lest they all choose the same 'best option' path identically.
And a liberal is a conservative who's been arrested. :)
It's not the advantage you think.
Lowered survivability in the long term offsets the superficial advantages.
I've never needed more than about 4 hours of sleep a night, my wife is a mess if she gets less than 8.
I can say from my field experiments, that some days (particularly where we both only get about 5-6 hours, but it's REALLY evident after several nights of short-sleep due to babies or whatever) she's far more likely to murder me.
Even if she doesn't kill me, the likelihood that my progeny will survive or that I'll get another chance to mate anytime soon is far, far lower...of course after 20 years together you get asymptotic numbers approaching zero ANYWAY but that's another post....
Thanks for the tip!
I'm unfortunately hostage to US magazines generally, but that one looks good enough to pursue.
What's interesting is that the current online version - there's almost NO overlap to the 'feature titles' covered in most US gaming mags. Interesting, and very positive sign of depth.
Bookmarking it now.
Thank you!
Color me unsurprised.
How many times has it happened now that yesterday's idealist liberals grow up to be conservative fascists themselves? And the more liberal/hippy, the worse they are later.
Is this the negative side to the old aphorism (attributed to Churchill) "if you're not a liberal when you're young, you have no heart; if you're not a conservative when you're older you have no brain"?
I've been part of the 'gaming media' for nearly 20 years now, writing game reviews occasionally for print magazines, but mostly for websites.
My take is that gaming magazines miss their target completely.
Firstly, gaming magazines are nothing more than previews, reviews, and columns. When's the last time you opened a gaming magazine and actually saw a STORY about UI developments, the moral stance in violent videogames, or something that wasn't a poorly-camouflaged (if they bother) extended preview of something in development? Frankly, it would not be a bad move for a gaming magazine to publish the sort of thing that is on Gamasutra, as some of those articles are in-depth, technical, and worthy of mental digestion, instead of just extended adverts?
Second, their credibility is universally shot. In the real world of journalism, there's at least some degree of credibility to the print media (although that's fading too), with formal fact-checking offices and editors that review the stories for meaning in value. Gaming mags ape the worst habits of the cheapest websites. Their review scales (1-10, stars, whatever) are meaningless, as games fall clearly into three categories: the uber-mega hit, the merely interesting, or the scapegoat category. Their scores will be (on a 1-100 scale) 97+, 89-96, or 50 or lower, respectively. Generally the whole thing is a quiet circle-jerk, where the gaming companies provide free games and buy copious advertising space, while the magazines quietly agree to make sure that the review is generally good but in any case always contains a few hyperbolic quotes that are good for box text. There are a *few* games that even the publishers regard as stinkers, and are so obviously bad, they serve as useful 'credibility' anchors, because pretty much everyone agrees to pile on and downrate it, so there's no danger of a publisher/developer getting their feelings particularly hurt. You might think that mags could buy their titles, but this would put them MONTHS behind their peers, who all get pre-release gold copies for their reviews. They are already hostage to their print schedules, distribution, etc which handicaps them in breaking any new information vs. websites.
Third, even if the reviews are genuine, the nature of reviewing is personal and very subjective. I'd suggest that most gamers browse reviewers widely, until they land on a handful that seem to mirror their own opinions closely enough. There is a quite natural advantage to websites that can be hotlinked, browsed widely, and cost nothing to sample widely (they're not really free, you as a gamer are paying a microtransaction in every game purchase to subsidize the free review games and advertising fees, but it's nearly invisible).
Fourth, in regards to pretty much any modern game aside from Dwarf Fortress, a huge selling point of any game is the graphics. Websites can simply link a screenshot, and you can see what the game will look like at full resolution (boo to the retarded game sites that display their graphics in some sort of non-capturable popup so this is impossible). That's tremendously important to most players who either want to see the pretty flashes and chrome, or have a more tangible question about whether the UI is readable, etc. Magazines are stuck with (good resolution but) usually smaller than 4x6 images, which simply can't carry the details. Websites can also carry video clips which SHOW gameplay (boo again to the websites that accept the bullshit cutscene videos which show neither actual gameplay nor game resolution).
Finally, there's the matter of space: while editorial review is a good thing (don't ever let my editors hear me say that), magazine editors are more about the chopping than the refining. A good editor helps a writer be more succinct and convey their points more clearly. Magazines like all print media have a zero-sum hard cap on the amount of space stories can take up - if a game is alloted 18 column-inches, or 750 words, or whatever, that can't be changed with
I've been using Windows since DOS days in the early 80's.
I'd say I'm moderately skilled with Windows.
Nevertheless, I've tried a few different Linux distros - first Knoppix, then OpenSUSE, then Ubuntu G, then Ubuntu H.
Mainly I've quit bothering trying to use Linux, despite it running much faster than Win on any comparable hardware, and despite my personal PREFERENCE to move away from the ever-hungry machine of MS's licensing dept (oh, so I get to pay you every YEAR now?)...
Why?
1) simple laziness. Not really interested in climbing a learning curve at 41. Got better things to do with my time.
2) mimic Windows ease of use in terms of installs. If I want to install a program that's not on the "add application" list of programs that I get from whatever install server is my default, it should be no more complicated than downloading a file, and running it. If there are dependencies, add them to the damn install file.
3) much better automated hardware detection and support. I want to install a USB device? The OS needs to recognize the device and install drivers, or at least tell me where I need to go to get them. I was sick of DIP switch settings and dicking around with config files in DOS...I don't want to go back to that.
4) here's the killer: build in an invisible WINE-like function. Let me run native apps, and I'm sure they'll be faster. But if I want to run WoW and they don't have a linux client? Let me run it with the performance hit of some sort of shell, but let it RUN.
That said, the main hesitations for me are twofold:
- that installing Stepmania on a linux box for my kids to play on was absolutely AGONY. It wasn't just a matter of downloading, extracting, and double-clicking the Stepmania icon.
- I'm unwilling to adopt an OS that means that I can't play the entire bookshelf of computer games next to me without major screwing around. Yes, I do go back and play a fair number of Win95 games, as well as current cutting-edge ones.
So, I don't think my experience is that odd; if they want me to try ChromeOS, there's what I'd need to see.
I'd like to see Mr Gore's financial connections to Dot Eco.
See, your message of world-saving altruism is corrupted when everything you're preaching ends up somehow making you the big $$ personally.
Is Kepler in some sort of particularly vulnerable orbit?
Granted the electronics in Kepler are probably more sophisticated than many spaceborne systems, but I'd imagine the protections would have been planned to match.
I mean, we've been shielding spacecraft from Cosmic Rays for a LONG time, why would this suddenly be an issue? I don't hear of similar reboots in anything from Apollo to Cassini.