Exclusivity = I dont buy them unless it's for the one I own...I bought a Xbox and it ticks me off that the Kirby game is Nintendo only.
Ports cost money. Most of the time, they use completely different hardware archetectures, but then there's the X-box. Most of the games use the same API as a modern PC (DirectX), the console is a modern PC, and MS buys out companies and/or pays them to release exclusive games when a port would have been easy. If you were so concerned about exclusivity, you'd either own a PS2 (doesn't pay nearly as much to people for exclusive games) or just use your PC (no money is paid for exclusive rights).
The n00b players are the sniper campers. If you're playing counterstrike...I'm here to tell you, if a player's always camping in the same place, and good player will unload a couple ak rounds and kill them.
I have played as an offensive sniper and I rather enjoyed it. I played de_train as a terrorist and help lead my team to a 10-0 defeat of the CTs on a temple server. Rather than rely on "camping", I spent the majority of the time rushing through the map, using a pistol for close quarters and switching to a sniper rifle in closer areas.
And how is using a sniper rifle less skill? What defines skill anyway? Good aim? I guess not. I guess it must be quake style bunny jumping.
Laptop systems cost 2x as much as an evenly powered desktop. Keep that in mind when buying/upgrading your system.
As far as 64 bit archetecture, the 64 bit part is not the big improvement. The extra registers are the huge improvement while the 64 bit part will become useful in memory addressing the in near future.
The other part of Athlon 64 is that you can use your old 32 bit apps indefinitely. Most benchmarks show they are about the same (if not better) than the P4 in 32 bit mode.
So you could install a 32 bit version of gaim running with a 64 bit kernel and 64 bit X-windows.
Pretty nifty if you ask me.
Upgrade now if you've got time, and build your own as you'll learn more.
Marvel could do very well with it's properties but the problem is they've not really utilized them effectively.
You could make a metroid prime-like version of spiderman for example. You go through his early history and as you do so, you unlock his powers or learn to use them better (Start as normal, get spider reflexes (high jump, good dodge), web (grapple technique), etc).
The fantastic 4 could do something like secret of mana, where there's computer (or co-op multiplayer) control for the other characters.
The problem with the Marvel games is that they go with a frequently used formula (sort of like romantic comedies or action flicks in Hollywood) and fail to capitalize on their singular stregnth as marvel games -- the ability to have a storyline and likeable characters.
Statistics about sales are all well and good, but sometimes they don't paint a realistic picture. I got a 'cube for X-mas with no memory card, so I attempted to find one.
My first stop was my local Walmart. Despite the large volume of games for PS2 and X-Box, the gamecube shelf was completely bare, not a single game was left. Needless to say, they didn't have any memory cards.
I went to my local mall and visited every store that carried the cube and found similar situations. I finally stopped at EB Games who had 3rd party cards (the Nintendo brand was sold out).
If anyone asks why weren't 'cube sales weren't higher in my area, it's pretty simple. No one had any left. I suspect other people in other areas may have similar stories, but at this point, Nintendo beat the sales predictions of every retail chain to the point of clearing their inventory. And that's a good season.
I actually like product placement in games. Outright advertisements I tend to dislike. But a mountain dew billboard or a getting a golf sponsership from Nike (rather than a nonexistant company) increases the feel of immersion into the game and helps the game feel more realistic. Having fake companies is sort of like if CS had fake gun names. But that's my 2 cents.
My friend and I were attempting to put together a computer for him about a year ago. The first motherboard we got was faulty (couldn't get a post), so we got a new one. The first few times we tried it we got some system beeps, so we looked them out and got rid of them. Finally, the bios screen came up and we both threw up our arms in jubilation, then the screen went black like it was shut off. I asked "I didn't shut it off did you?" "No" "What's that smell?" "Hrmm...looks like the fan's loose. Oh well, I guess I fried the processor"
But that's not something I realized when I first started to play it.
Consider this comment I made on slashdot a couple weeks ago: " I was sitting in 6th grade class and my teacher was talking about pirates during the Spanish empire. Someone asked why they didn't use large warships like galleons and instead preferred smaller vessels. I raised my hand and answered that larger vessels are often at the mercy of the wind. Smaller vessels, like Sloops, typically had oars. Even if the wind weren't going your way, it was possible to board a ship.
The teacher asked where I learned that, and I felt kind've embaressed. I couldn't really say a Nintendo game could I?"
Aside from maritime combat history, I also learned the name of most of the towns and islands in the Carribean. When's the last time a game did that for you=)
One thing a lot of people don't realize is that the communication lag between mars and earth is over 30 minutes. Imagine trying to play quake with that kind of lag.
Just glorious. It has even moved into the mainstream now with a WIERD song. Think hard rock Zelda theme, its terrible in my opinion, but its worth listening to if you like game music and want to laugh at it.
I believe the song you are talking about is Legend of Zelda by System of the Down. It's the first track on Steal this Album. I love System because they're not serious all the time and enjoy making fun of themselves. If you ever listen to their most popular album (Toxity), they go from a song about suicide and depression (Chop Suey) to a song about Pogo sticks on the very next track.
Humorous songs are sometimes needed to re-establish a neutral mood after a serious song.
I said "kinda useless". Not "completely useless". I happen to dislike crossplatform releases for the X-box because I think out of the 3 major systems, it has the worst controller and although I've played with 3rd party ones, none of them (that I've seen) compare with either the GC or PS2. (And even then, I despise playing FPS games without a keyboard and a mouse.) Graphically, I don't give a damn. (I stop noticing graphics after the first 5 minutes of playing). I want good gameplay. I'd rather play tetris than dead or alive beach volleyball. Online stuff is mostly superior on PC as its been around longer and doesn't have a subscription fee.
I also didn't about half these games on X-box. One of my friends has an X-box and I've played all the games he has for it and they were wholly unimpressive. But then again, he prolly has bad taste in games (doesn't even own any of the nintendo games for GC...except Luigi's mansion).
No, I don't hate MS as is apparent by my sig. However, I do think of all the consoles, their games are currently the weakest. PS2 has sheer market share (lots of variety) while GC has the best multiplayer of any console (I use PC for online so no X-Box draw there) and has won the Gamespot game of the year two years in a row for its single player offerings. A couple good racing games (I've never tried them as I mentioned) and a decent flight sim (again, wouldn't an actual flight stick be better?) don't make it the best console.
The first part is to get wireless controllers for your gamecube assuming you've got one.
The second thing you can do is get a universal adapter which runs for like $15 at radio shack. It has one output (S-Video and RCA) for the TV but 3 inputs (X-Box, GC, and PS). Simply plug the adapter into all three and you've now replaced the 3 wires going from your TV to your consoles with one.
You can get rid of consoles you don't use. For example, I think the X-box is kinda useless. Since its best two games (KoTR and Halo) are both out on PC (and there's no other good exclusive games), it's a great reason to turn it into a Linux box.
If all the students signed something to delete the copyrighted works in question after the class was over, it would be fair use, since the purpose would be educational and non-profit. It's the same as if someone showed a movie during class.
Most real time strategy games only require use of the mouse. Though the keyboard can be useful occasionally, you can generally get through a game without ever using it.
I'm expecting a Gamecube tomorrow so I'm curious. I've heard there's lots of issues with lag in this program. Has it been resolved or lessened in any way?
I haven't read the books in a while, but I remember someone (a king or something) ordering themselves executed by firing squad as they thought the war was lost and they didn't want to become slaves of the victor. I can't seem to find any information on this via google, so I'm wondering if my head just made this information up.
Unlike other distributions, Mandrake doesn't use proprietary setup tools (SuSe's SAX is proprietary for example as is some of Red Hat's stuff I believe). IMHO, rolling your good tools and releasing them open-source and making a 100% OSS distro is as purist to OSS as you can get.
Replays for networked games are incredibly simple, or so I'd think. If one simply stores the content of the packets sent to and from the machine, you should be able to reconstruct the game. The video method you suggest would require much more memory. However, the packets sent out by networked games are designed to be small.
You've got no way of knowing this, but it'd actually be incredibly unhelpful. If you're looking for the teammates talking about the other team, they pretty much say they think they're both good but think they're team is better. As for in game strategy, it's a lot of pointing at the monitor and saying "We decided to rush here [points], but that didn't work, so we camped out here[points]."
I don't know if Halflife has replay files (ala WC3, SC, etc), but if it did, giving those replays along with an mp3 of audio (start them at the same time as the replay and they should sync) could be a very good way to watch these that doesn't require lots of bandwidth.
I watched the video and it was really entertaining...but that's probably because I love counterstrike.
I kept wanting to watch some other perspective but instead had to watch whoever the camera crew was watching. This made me wonder: how do more traditional sports deal with this problem? They don't. In every other sport, there's a ball of some sort. If you follow the ball you follow the action.
In counter-strike, there is no ball. It's harder to present a visual image that captures the beauty of a well-executed pincer attack or the stealth of a hiding sniper.
I think this perspective problem could doom pro-gaming. The only suggestion I have is to provide audio commentary while allowing the viewer to switch perspectives at will or else follow the producer's.
I tried the Savage demo and thought it was initially pretty neat. After about an hour, I realized that although the idea wasn't bad, the FPS gameplay felt clunky and random. I tried the commander mode and it didn't seem to have much depth. The tech tree was fairly linear and there wasn't really a way to rush vs tech common to other RTSs.
Why play Savage? If you want a good FPS, go pick up Counterstrike or Unreal Tournament. A good RTS? Warcraft 3. You like the mixture of both? Natural Selection provides solid FPS gameplay (Half-life engine) while having 2 distinct races each with a commander (and it's a free mod to half-life).
I don't understand the appeal behind the game. Anyone who thinks it's revolutionary hasn't played natural selection.
We used to play monopoly all the time, it was almost a tradition. Then, our gaming group tried settlers and fell in love. The reasons I like it so much are as follows:
*It's not really a cut-throat game like monopoly where your main sorce of income is from making other players pay. Instead, the game is heavily focused on trading with other players for mutual benefit.
* It's also fairly simple. Most people learn the game about halfway through their first game though learning to master it is a different story.
* Close games. The game is played to points and games are usually close until the end. I dislike lots of games, both computer and boardgames, because there comes a point when a player's really lost and the game's over but it goes on anyway because some player still thinks he has a shot or always plays until the end.
* Expansions. Though I don't like seafarers so much, Cities and Knights is a great expansion which adds complexity and additional levels of strategy.
* Staying power. This game was released almost 10 years ago. It's still very popular (see here). That's the sign of a classic.
From the article: The police do have the names of the players and teams associated with the actions and we assume that this will reach a quick conclusion. I can tell everyone that the person that pulled the gun was not part of the BZ team, rather, friends of a certain member of that team.
I live in a country where people have riots and burn cars because their basketball team loses. Heck, sometimes when their team wins. No one ever blames the violence on basketball. Some nutcase friend of player pulls a gun and it's counter-strike's fault?
Slashdot Mirror
Exclusivity = I dont buy them unless it's for the one I own...I bought a Xbox and it ticks me off that the Kirby game is Nintendo only.
Ports cost money. Most of the time, they use completely different hardware archetectures, but then there's the X-box. Most of the games use the same API as a modern PC (DirectX), the console is a modern PC, and MS buys out companies and/or pays them to release exclusive games when a port would have been easy. If you were so concerned about exclusivity, you'd either own a PS2 (doesn't pay nearly as much to people for exclusive games) or just use your PC (no money is paid for exclusive rights).
The n00b players are the sniper campers. If you're playing counterstrike...I'm here to tell you, if a player's always camping in the same place, and good player will unload a couple ak rounds and kill them.
I have played as an offensive sniper and I rather enjoyed it. I played de_train as a terrorist and help lead my team to a 10-0 defeat of the CTs on a temple server. Rather than rely on "camping", I spent the majority of the time rushing through the map, using a pistol for close quarters and switching to a sniper rifle in closer areas.
And how is using a sniper rifle less skill? What defines skill anyway? Good aim? I guess not. I guess it must be quake style bunny jumping.
The price law I've seen:
Laptop systems cost 2x as much as an evenly powered desktop. Keep that in mind when buying/upgrading your system.
As far as 64 bit archetecture, the 64 bit part is not the big improvement. The extra registers are the huge improvement while the 64 bit part will become useful in memory addressing the in near future.
The other part of Athlon 64 is that you can use your old 32 bit apps indefinitely. Most benchmarks show they are about the same (if not better) than the P4 in 32 bit mode.
So you could install a 32 bit version of gaim running with a 64 bit kernel and 64 bit X-windows.
Pretty nifty if you ask me.
Upgrade now if you've got time, and build your own as you'll learn more.
Marvel could do very well with it's properties but the problem is they've not really utilized them effectively.
You could make a metroid prime-like version of spiderman for example. You go through his early history and as you do so, you unlock his powers or learn to use them better (Start as normal, get spider reflexes (high jump, good dodge), web (grapple technique), etc).
The fantastic 4 could do something like secret of mana, where there's computer (or co-op multiplayer) control for the other characters.
The problem with the Marvel games is that they go with a frequently used formula (sort of like romantic comedies or action flicks in Hollywood) and fail to capitalize on their singular stregnth as marvel games -- the ability to have a storyline and likeable characters.
Statistics about sales are all well and good, but sometimes they don't paint a realistic picture. I got a 'cube for X-mas with no memory card, so I attempted to find one.
My first stop was my local Walmart. Despite the large volume of games for PS2 and X-Box, the gamecube shelf was completely bare, not a single game was left. Needless to say, they didn't have any memory cards.
I went to my local mall and visited every store that carried the cube and found similar situations. I finally stopped at EB Games who had 3rd party cards (the Nintendo brand was sold out).
If anyone asks why weren't 'cube sales weren't higher in my area, it's pretty simple. No one had any left. I suspect other people in other areas may have similar stories, but at this point, Nintendo beat the sales predictions of every retail chain to the point of clearing their inventory. And that's a good season.
I actually like product placement in games. Outright advertisements I tend to dislike. But a mountain dew billboard or a getting a golf sponsership from Nike (rather than a nonexistant company) increases the feel of immersion into the game and helps the game feel more realistic. Having fake companies is sort of like if CS had fake gun names. But that's my 2 cents.
My friend and I were attempting to put together a computer for him about a year ago. The first motherboard we got was faulty (couldn't get a post), so we got a new one. The first few times we tried it we got some system beeps, so we looked them out and got rid of them. Finally, the bios screen came up and we both threw up our arms in jubilation, then the screen went black like it was shut off. I asked "I didn't shut it off did you?"
"No"
"What's that smell?"
"Hrmm...looks like the fan's loose. Oh well, I guess I fried the processor"
There's a native windows version here while there's also a Nintendo version (the state of NES emulation is extremely good).
But that's not something I realized when I first started to play it.
Consider this comment I made on slashdot a couple weeks ago:
" I was sitting in 6th grade class and my teacher was talking about pirates during the Spanish empire. Someone asked why they didn't use large warships like galleons and instead preferred smaller vessels. I raised my hand and answered that larger vessels are often at the mercy of the wind. Smaller vessels, like Sloops, typically had oars. Even if the wind weren't going your way, it was possible to board a ship.
The teacher asked where I learned that, and I felt kind've embaressed. I couldn't really say a Nintendo game could I?"
Aside from maritime combat history, I also learned the name of most of the towns and islands in the Carribean. When's the last time a game did that for you=)
One thing a lot of people don't realize is that the communication lag between mars and earth is over 30 minutes. Imagine trying to play quake with that kind of lag.
Just glorious. It has even moved into the mainstream now with a WIERD song. Think hard rock Zelda theme, its terrible in my opinion, but its worth listening to if you like game music and want to laugh at it.
I believe the song you are talking about is Legend of Zelda by System of the Down. It's the first track on Steal this Album. I love System because they're not serious all the time and enjoy making fun of themselves. If you ever listen to their most popular album (Toxity), they go from a song about suicide and depression (Chop Suey) to a song about Pogo sticks on the very next track.
Humorous songs are sometimes needed to re-establish a neutral mood after a serious song.
I said "kinda useless". Not "completely useless". I happen to dislike crossplatform releases for the X-box because I think out of the 3 major systems, it has the worst controller and although I've played with 3rd party ones, none of them (that I've seen) compare with either the GC or PS2. (And even then, I despise playing FPS games without a keyboard and a mouse.) Graphically, I don't give a damn. (I stop noticing graphics after the first 5 minutes of playing). I want good gameplay. I'd rather play tetris than dead or alive beach volleyball. Online stuff is mostly superior on PC as its been around longer and doesn't have a subscription fee.
I also didn't about half these games on X-box. One of my friends has an X-box and I've played all the games he has for it and they were wholly unimpressive. But then again, he prolly has bad taste in games (doesn't even own any of the nintendo games for GC...except Luigi's mansion).
No, I don't hate MS as is apparent by my sig. However, I do think of all the consoles, their games are currently the weakest. PS2 has sheer market share (lots of variety) while GC has the best multiplayer of any console (I use PC for online so no X-Box draw there) and has won the Gamespot game of the year two years in a row for its single player offerings. A couple good racing games (I've never tried them as I mentioned) and a decent flight sim (again, wouldn't an actual flight stick be better?) don't make it the best console.
The first part is to get wireless controllers for your gamecube assuming you've got one.
The second thing you can do is get a universal adapter which runs for like $15 at radio shack. It has one output (S-Video and RCA) for the TV but 3 inputs (X-Box, GC, and PS). Simply plug the adapter into all three and you've now replaced the 3 wires going from your TV to your consoles with one.
You can get rid of consoles you don't use. For example, I think the X-box is kinda useless. Since its best two games (KoTR and Halo) are both out on PC (and there's no other good exclusive games), it's a great reason to turn it into a Linux box.
If all the students signed something to delete the copyrighted works in question after the class was over, it would be fair use, since the purpose would be educational and non-profit. It's the same as if someone showed a movie during class.
Most real time strategy games only require use of the mouse. Though the keyboard can be useful occasionally, you can generally get through a game without ever using it.
I'm expecting a Gamecube tomorrow so I'm curious. I've heard there's lots of issues with lag in this program. Has it been resolved or lessened in any way?
I haven't read the books in a while, but I remember someone (a king or something) ordering themselves executed by firing squad as they thought the war was lost and they didn't want to become slaves of the victor. I can't seem to find any information on this via google, so I'm wondering if my head just made this information up.
I think this dynamic holds true for software as well. Embrace and extend anyone?
Unlike other distributions, Mandrake doesn't use proprietary setup tools (SuSe's SAX is proprietary for example as is some of Red Hat's stuff I believe). IMHO, rolling your good tools and releasing them open-source and making a 100% OSS distro is as purist to OSS as you can get.
Replays for networked games are incredibly simple, or so I'd think. If one simply stores the content of the packets sent to and from the machine, you should be able to reconstruct the game. The video method you suggest would require much more memory. However, the packets sent out by networked games are designed to be small.
You've got no way of knowing this, but it'd actually be incredibly unhelpful. If you're looking for the teammates talking about the other team, they pretty much say they think they're both good but think they're team is better. As for in game strategy, it's a lot of pointing at the monitor and saying "We decided to rush here [points], but that didn't work, so we camped out here[points]."
I don't know if Halflife has replay files (ala WC3, SC, etc), but if it did, giving those replays along with an mp3 of audio (start them at the same time as the replay and they should sync) could be a very good way to watch these that doesn't require lots of bandwidth.
I watched the video and it was really entertaining...but that's probably because I love counterstrike.
I kept wanting to watch some other perspective but instead had to watch whoever the camera crew was watching. This made me wonder: how do more traditional sports deal with this problem? They don't. In every other sport, there's a ball of some sort. If you follow the ball you follow the action.
In counter-strike, there is no ball. It's harder to present a visual image that captures the beauty of a well-executed pincer attack or the stealth of a hiding sniper.
I think this perspective problem could doom pro-gaming. The only suggestion I have is to provide audio commentary while allowing the viewer to switch perspectives at will or else follow the producer's.
I tried the Savage demo and thought it was initially pretty neat. After about an hour, I realized that although the idea wasn't bad, the FPS gameplay felt clunky and random. I tried the commander mode and it didn't seem to have much depth. The tech tree was fairly linear and there wasn't really a way to rush vs tech common to other RTSs.
Why play Savage? If you want a good FPS, go pick up Counterstrike or Unreal Tournament. A good RTS? Warcraft 3. You like the mixture of both? Natural Selection provides solid FPS gameplay (Half-life engine) while having 2 distinct races each with a commander (and it's a free mod to half-life).
I don't understand the appeal behind the game. Anyone who thinks it's revolutionary hasn't played natural selection.
We used to play monopoly all the time, it was almost a tradition. Then, our gaming group tried settlers and fell in love. The reasons I like it so much are as follows:
*It's not really a cut-throat game like monopoly where your main sorce of income is from making other players pay. Instead, the game is heavily focused on trading with other players for mutual benefit.
* It's also fairly simple. Most people learn the game about halfway through their first game though learning to master it is a different story.
* Close games. The game is played to points and games are usually close until the end. I dislike lots of games, both computer and boardgames, because there comes a point when a player's really lost and the game's over but it goes on anyway because some player still thinks he has a shot or always plays until the end.
* Expansions. Though I don't like seafarers so much, Cities and Knights is a great expansion which adds complexity and additional levels of strategy.
* Staying power. This game was released almost 10 years ago. It's still very popular (see here). That's the sign of a classic.
From the article:
The police do have the names of the players and teams associated with the actions and we assume that this will reach a quick conclusion. I can tell everyone that the person that pulled the gun was not part of the BZ team, rather, friends of a certain member of that team.
I live in a country where people have riots and burn cars because their basketball team loses. Heck, sometimes when their team wins. No one ever blames the violence on basketball. Some nutcase friend of player pulls a gun and it's counter-strike's fault?