See also in this vein: the game adaptation of Christian Gosset's The Red Star. This was one of the projects Akklaim had pretty much ready to go - reviews and a demo version were already out and about - when they folded back in '04.
Fast-forward two years. XS Games picks up this property, claims an August ship date. Which then slips into September... October... November... and now early January.
It turns out there is something resembling an explanation for this (something about making premature claims before actually signing the paperwork), but what's really galling about this - aside from the repeated slipping on a game which is by all accounts done - is the total lack of any explanation from XS Games (and their apparent distributor, Jack of All Games) for this behavior.
Let me see if I understand this correctly: Fox wants, as you put it, "another 'Star Wars' cash cow", but isn't willing to put in the effort LucasArts did in this vein. Note to Fox: look how much work Relic's put into Dawn of War (and Company of Heroes); or the care with which Westwood treated the C&C franchise...
"Anime-style arcade video games." Waitasec, you mean there were more aside from Capcom's AvP (which wasn't bad per se, but I wouldn't mind seeing it redone using the engine/mechanics from the ever-upcoming Red Star adaptation); Konami's own adaptation of Aliens (tidbit: the game's Ripley is for some reason a blonde); and Alien^3: The Gun (only saw this once, and my reaction to the 'super facehugger' came to 'what the...?!')?
On the home front, Akklaim's take on Alien^3 for the SNES worked fairly well (archived 1up article); can't say as much for its Genesis counterpart (created by, as I recall, some other entity).
For refrence purposes, here's IGN's profile for the abovementioned Red Star game, along with the official capsule from the game's current custodians. Interestingly, this was one of the games Akklaim had pretty much ready for release when they folded up...
I then got a witness to watch me going through the same method of opening and reading the data, then powered down the box and took the hdd out then smashed it to bits on some concrete outside, completely. Everything was witnessed.
Seems a lot of bother to go through when you could have simply quietly zero'd the drive in question; if you were planning to install a second drive, you could then use the original as a secondary unit. Either way, waste of a perfectly good drive.
These will come both from people who believe that RPGs are inherently evil (due to magic use, witchcraft, etc.), and from people who believe that any potentially addictive thing is too harmful to be permitted.
Okay, the first group strikes me as folks who can't distinguish fiction from reality... something the vast majority of people can do just fine, thank you very much. And if the second group is so concerned about additcions, perhaps they should focus their concerns on things like, oh I don't know, methamphetamines...
But the politicians you then mention, the ones who'd exploit such misguided perceptions to get (re)elected, are more worrisome. Seems that they've long forgotten their own youth... and we know what happens to folks who forget history.
On an unrelated note, I agree with an AC elsewhere in this discussion: the use of 'gay' as an insult needs to be phased out. In that vein, I can think of a few things spawned over on 4chan's/b/ whose stepping out the proverbial airlock sans spacesuit would not be an unfortunate occurence.
I had initially thought this a mispelling of 'leeches'. Of course, if it turns out that Interlink (and/or the alleged patent troll Anascape) did, indeed, purposely delay proceedings in the hope of greater monetary gain, then one could, indeed, compare them to those aquatic bloodsuckers.
I picked this up from the discount bin a few months back out of sheer curiousity. There's a lot of potential - they get bonus points for including a comprehensive bestiary inside the game proper - but I'll have to agree with most of your points (haven't gotten far enough into it to be able to comment on #2).
That said, Extinction would become awesome if they let Massive Entertainment (Ground Control series) or Relic Studios (Dawn of War series; Company of Heroes) have go at it...
Hmmm, is Capcom's AvP game included in any of their anthologies? But it and that Alien^3-based shooter aren't the only representatives of the franchise in the arcades: Konami put out their take on Aliens back in '90, and that proved a great deal of fun to play (Protip: if you're playing this solo, it's better to forego the powerloaders, with the obvious exception of the final battle with the queen).
Now, just to make things interesting: imagine an AvP FPS developed by the Rainbow Six development team.
In a novel, the tension of having to wait minutes to know if you scored a hit works whereas in a movie it would be boring as hell.
I don't know; there're a few submarine movies that would beg to differ...
Speaking of sci-fi; it's my opinion that the Wing Commander movie, for all its other faults, is actually half-decent with respect to capital ship combat. Hint: given the vastness of space compared to the sensor footprint of a starship, it plays out much like submarine warfare. See also the USCM Technical Manual written by Lee Brimmicombe-Wood. More generally, though, I sometimes wonder when we'll see a capital ship battle which involves all three axes... something for which I will be forever greatful to the Homeworld series' developement team(s) for helping me appreciate.
Then we have the whole 'sound-in-space' thing. Really, wouldn't that space battle be just as dramatic, if not more so, if the only things you're hearing are comm traffic/voiceovers/other-such-things and BGM?
The poster to whom you are responding says, "It seems to be pretty much the accepted order in American high schools for the jocks to physically threaten and intimidate the other students." Assuming for argument's sake that this is ineed the case, the question that then needs to be asked is 'why is this so?'. I can't recall it being asked much lately.
Kids are being educated by the schools that it is not ok to protect yourself...
An ironic message, given that self-defense and retaliation are not only understandable and natural reactions, but are themselves the subject of much in the way of popular fiction... take as examples the exploits of Paul Kersey or Frank Castle. One cannot help but think that the people doing the 'educating' you refer to have forgotten their own experiences and observations of high school.
I hope nobody actually implements the permanent solution I saw suggested once, which is to send out booby-trapped "enlargement pills" that take all spam customers out of circulation and leave spammers without a market.
I wonder how big that particular pool of 'spam customers' is... and how long before some tangos (pick your favorite kind) decide that hey, the abovecited suggestion is workable.
As a matter of fact, if I recall '24' correctly, much of season three involved some enterprising folks trying this; just substitute for ''enlargement pills' advertised through spam', 'tainted cocaine passed off to unsuspecting distributors'.
Bottom line though, its airplanes used as weapons like 10 years before 9/11.
I'll see 'like ten years' and raise you another fifty-seven or so... specifcally, here's the precedent-in-principle for the incident referred to in 'Debt of Honor'.
That said, though, I agree with LocoMan that the resemblance between real-life and fiction in this regard is amusing (when the business with lasers and airplane cockpits came up here a ways back, I pointed out the paralell there). The sole difference being that Clark and Chavez didn't use a true laser, but rather a custom high-collimation halogen lamp, which was (very plausibly) disguised as, not a camera, but its associated lighting equipment.
What all this does point out is this: if this sort of thing is surprising to security agencies, it shows quite the lack of imagination on their part, doesn't it?
Just like his ridiculous plot where terrorists hijack an airliner and crash it into the Capitol building.
If you're talking about the end of 'Debt of Honor'... you, sir, are incorrect. That particular act was perpetrated by an embittered JAL pliot as an act of revenge for the death of his son and brother.
(a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt_of_Honor"> Wikipedia reference; reference to the external links in the entry on Tom Clancy himself as well is recommended)
Things like this make me nostalgic for things like the 'Xbox 360 Prem Retail Box' auction... now that was an amusing example of truth in advertising. Not to mention a good illustration of people's willingness to jump to conclusions.
Heh, that's exactly what I did for the final Protoss mission in Brood War, figuring that it'd be easier to hold the temple for 15(?) minutes if the Zerg presence is first substantially degraded. A great deal of mind control was perpetrated here, along with the discovery that you can Parasite the local fauna for free recon.
As I recall, the stats went something to the order of nine-plus hours, 113 losses to over a thousand kills...
Cybernator (originally known as Assault Suit(s?) Valken - why'd they bother changing the name?) is full of generally fun moments like that. And having good music doesn't hurt, either.
So, I'll second that level you mentioned, and place right behind it the ass-kicking of Arc Nova that immediately preceeds it. More specifically, the associated boss battle. You know: the OPFOR has decided to execute a colony drop, and there's only so much time to knock it off course by destroying a trio of large thrusters... oh, and let's not forget that the station commandant has taken to his personal mech and is hounding you the whole time. Bonus points for whether or not you divert the falling station having some effect later in the game (if only in the background immediately after you make landfall).
Then again, de_dust proves me wrong. 2 paths, one of them sorta splits, with 2 bomb locations. Why dust has managed to stay as one of the most popular CS maps I have no clue. (admitedly I don't know why CS has managed to stay so popular...)
According to a colleague of mine, de_dust has managed this precisely because of its simplicity. But then, he also opines that CS itself remains popular because it's very forgiving of run-and-gun, kick-in-the-front-door gameplay... you know, the sort of thing which in a franchise like Rainbow Six or Splinter Cell, leads far more often than not to quick death.
One interesting way to solve the 'everyone-and-their-dog-knows-this-map' problem is presented by the planned Rogue Warrior game (reference URL escapes me at present, but it's an IGN article). Therein, each MP map is comprised of three segments: one choice by each involved team, and a third chosen randomly.
But then, I'm one of those people who was glad to see silenced weapons and stealth kills introduced in GTA: San Andreas (and, conversely, disappointed that they didn't make it into Saint's Row).
...create a Red PS/3 and give $5 to African Aids research for everyone sold. Bono would hawk it for him and people would get on a six month waiting list to get one.
The moderation is spot-on here: the above is an interesting idea. Can anyone tell me how this is working out in terms of sales for Gap (I think that's the store running this deal on some clothing)?
If I read this correctly, these Red PS3s would be part of the first wave - in that case, the per-unit donation (note to accounting weasels: don't even think of passing this cost on to the consumers) might need to be raised some, given the size of the early-adopter base. This also means that there will be less tolerance for defects.
I think the analyst quoted has it backwards: implementing a new OS and new application suite at the same time is just asking for difficulties. Do that, and 'OS-specific issues' could be masked by 'issues specific to combination of OS and suite'. Implement your new OS, get that squared away, then - and only then - deploy the new app suite.
I recall a certain famous individual - the name escapes me at present - stating that all evil needed to triumph was for good men to do nothing. Now, if I read the gist of many comments correctly, 'the system' is ready and eager to punish the good man who does something... ...so what does that say about the system, I wonder...?
For the person asking the question: I'd hang on to all that information, if I were you. Find some way for it to get (discreetly) into the right hands, but keep backups.
Just in case.
When I heard about this, my first reaction was "why wasn't this case laughed out of court?". Right next to "how on Terra can anyone confuse an environmental organization with a sports-entertainment empire?". The fact of the court in question being British boggles a bit more - as I recall, both Scandinavian Airlines System and Her Majesty's Special Air Service coexist quite well, thank you very much. (check out the Wiki entry for the acronym itself)...
Reading the relevant section in the Wikipedia article makes mention of "a 1994 agreement regarding use of the WWF initials"... but provides neither details of nor a link to said agreement.
With these in mind, I ask: how, in the name of all which does not hug face, can anyone confuse utube.com with youtube.com?
I knew that this idea was something that was needed to bring all the real details about today's politics to peoples attention.
I am reminded of an argument Michael Moore makes in one of his books ('Stupid White Men', I think): basically, he looks at the amazing retention and attention to detail that is associated with sports and concludes that it would be a good thing for civic involvement if politics could be as interesting and engaging.
In today's middle-America, you're missing out on some essential water cooler conversations if you didn't watch the latest episode of Lost, Grey's Anatomy, or $SPORTS_EVENT.
If that's the entire substance of a given 'water cooler conversation'... well, it doesn't sound like missing out on said conversation is any great loss.
Slashdot Mirror
It does not pass any judgement on the aptness of said comparison.
See also in this vein: the game adaptation of Christian Gosset's The Red Star. This was one of the projects Akklaim had pretty much ready to go - reviews and a demo version were already out and about - when they folded back in '04.
Fast-forward two years. XS Games picks up this property, claims an August ship date. Which then slips into September... October... November... and now early January.
It turns out there is something resembling an explanation for this (something about making premature claims before actually signing the paperwork), but what's really galling about this - aside from the repeated slipping on a game which is by all accounts done - is the total lack of any explanation from XS Games (and their apparent distributor, Jack of All Games) for this behavior.
Let me see if I understand this correctly: Fox wants, as you put it, "another 'Star Wars' cash cow", but isn't willing to put in the effort LucasArts did in this vein. Note to Fox: look how much work Relic's put into Dawn of War (and Company of Heroes); or the care with which Westwood treated the C&C franchise...
"Anime-style arcade video games." Waitasec, you mean there were more aside from Capcom's AvP (which wasn't bad per se, but I wouldn't mind seeing it redone using the engine/mechanics from the ever-upcoming Red Star adaptation); Konami's own adaptation of Aliens (tidbit: the game's Ripley is for some reason a blonde); and Alien^3: The Gun (only saw this once, and my reaction to the 'super facehugger' came to 'what the...?!')?
On the home front, Akklaim's take on Alien^3 for the SNES worked fairly well (archived 1up article); can't say as much for its Genesis counterpart (created by, as I recall, some other entity).
For refrence purposes, here's IGN's profile for the abovementioned Red Star game, along with the official capsule from the game's current custodians. Interestingly, this was one of the games Akklaim had pretty much ready for release when they folded up...
But the politicians you then mention, the ones who'd exploit such misguided perceptions to get (re)elected, are more worrisome. Seems that they've long forgotten their own youth... and we know what happens to folks who forget history.
On an unrelated note, I agree with an AC elsewhere in this discussion: the use of 'gay' as an insult needs to be phased out. In that vein, I can think of a few things spawned over on 4chan's
I had initially thought this a mispelling of 'leeches'. Of course, if it turns out that Interlink (and/or the alleged patent troll Anascape) did, indeed, purposely delay proceedings in the hope of greater monetary gain, then one could, indeed, compare them to those aquatic bloodsuckers.
I picked this up from the discount bin a few months back out of sheer curiousity. There's a lot of potential - they get bonus points for including a comprehensive bestiary inside the game proper - but I'll have to agree with most of your points (haven't gotten far enough into it to be able to comment on #2).
That said, Extinction would become awesome if they let Massive Entertainment (Ground Control series) or Relic Studios (Dawn of War series; Company of Heroes) have go at it...
Hmmm, is Capcom's AvP game included in any of their anthologies? But it and that Alien^3-based shooter aren't the only representatives of the franchise in the arcades: Konami put out their take on Aliens back in '90, and that proved a great deal of fun to play (Protip: if you're playing this solo, it's better to forego the powerloaders, with the obvious exception of the final battle with the queen).
Now, just to make things interesting: imagine an AvP FPS developed by the Rainbow Six development team.
Speaking of sci-fi; it's my opinion that the Wing Commander movie, for all its other faults, is actually half-decent with respect to capital ship combat. Hint: given the vastness of space compared to the sensor footprint of a starship, it plays out much like submarine warfare. See also the USCM Technical Manual written by Lee Brimmicombe-Wood. More generally, though, I sometimes wonder when we'll see a capital ship battle which involves all three axes... something for which I will be forever greatful to the Homeworld series' developement team(s) for helping me appreciate.
Then we have the whole 'sound-in-space' thing. Really, wouldn't that space battle be just as dramatic, if not more so, if the only things you're hearing are comm traffic/voiceovers/other-such-things and BGM?
An ironic message, given that self-defense and retaliation are not only understandable and natural reactions, but are themselves the subject of much in the way of popular fiction... take as examples the exploits of Paul Kersey or Frank Castle. One cannot help but think that the people doing the 'educating' you refer to have forgotten their own experiences and observations of high school.
As a matter of fact, if I recall '24' correctly, much of season three involved some enterprising folks trying this; just substitute for ''enlargement pills' advertised through spam', 'tainted cocaine passed off to unsuspecting distributors'.
That said, though, I agree with LocoMan that the resemblance between real-life and fiction in this regard is amusing (when the business with lasers and airplane cockpits came up here a ways back, I pointed out the paralell there). The sole difference being that Clark and Chavez didn't use a true laser, but rather a custom high-collimation halogen lamp, which was (very plausibly) disguised as, not a camera, but its associated lighting equipment.
What all this does point out is this: if this sort of thing is surprising to security agencies, it shows quite the lack of imagination on their part, doesn't it?
(a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt_of_Honor"
Things like this make me nostalgic for things like the 'Xbox 360 Prem Retail Box' auction... now that was an amusing example of truth in advertising. Not to mention a good illustration of people's willingness to jump to conclusions.
(Reference: 'Flight of the Old Dog' by Dale Brown)
Heh, that's exactly what I did for the final Protoss mission in Brood War, figuring that it'd be easier to hold the temple for 15(?) minutes if the Zerg presence is first substantially degraded. A great deal of mind control was perpetrated here, along with the discovery that you can Parasite the local fauna for free recon.
As I recall, the stats went something to the order of nine-plus hours, 113 losses to over a thousand kills...
Cybernator (originally known as Assault Suit(s?) Valken - why'd they bother changing the name?) is full of generally fun moments like that. And having good music doesn't hurt, either.
So, I'll second that level you mentioned, and place right behind it the ass-kicking of Arc Nova that immediately preceeds it. More specifically, the associated boss battle. You know: the OPFOR has decided to execute a colony drop, and there's only so much time to knock it off course by destroying a trio of large thrusters... oh, and let's not forget that the station commandant has taken to his personal mech and is hounding you the whole time. Bonus points for whether or not you divert the falling station having some effect later in the game (if only in the background immediately after you make landfall).
One interesting way to solve the 'everyone-and-their-dog-knows-this-map' problem is presented by the planned Rogue Warrior game (reference URL escapes me at present, but it's an IGN article). Therein, each MP map is comprised of three segments: one choice by each involved team, and a third chosen randomly.
But then, I'm one of those people who was glad to see silenced weapons and stealth kills introduced in GTA: San Andreas (and, conversely, disappointed that they didn't make it into Saint's Row).
If I read this correctly, these Red PS3s would be part of the first wave - in that case, the per-unit donation (note to accounting weasels: don't even think of passing this cost on to the consumers) might need to be raised some, given the size of the early-adopter base. This also means that there will be less tolerance for defects.
I think the analyst quoted has it backwards: implementing a new OS and new application suite at the same time is just asking for difficulties. Do that, and 'OS-specific issues' could be masked by 'issues specific to combination of OS and suite'. Implement your new OS, get that squared away, then - and only then - deploy the new app suite.
In way of reply to this, I will simply point to a previous comment of mine, as opposed to repeating it verbatim.
I recall a certain famous individual - the name escapes me at present - stating that all evil needed to triumph was for good men to do nothing. Now, if I read the gist of many comments correctly, 'the system' is ready and eager to punish the good man who does something...
...so what does that say about the system, I wonder...?
For the person asking the question: I'd hang on to all that information, if I were you. Find some way for it to get (discreetly) into the right hands, but keep backups.
Just in case.
When I heard about this, my first reaction was "why wasn't this case laughed out of court?". Right next to "how on Terra can anyone confuse an environmental organization with a sports-entertainment empire?". The fact of the court in question being British boggles a bit more - as I recall, both Scandinavian Airlines System and Her Majesty's Special Air Service coexist quite well, thank you very much. (check out the Wiki entry for the acronym itself)...
Reading the relevant section in the Wikipedia article makes mention of "a 1994 agreement regarding use of the WWF initials"... but provides neither details of nor a link to said agreement.
With these in mind, I ask: how, in the name of all which does not hug face, can anyone confuse utube.com with youtube.com?
And from where was this statistically dubious conclusion drawn...?