I really would love to see a Slashdot interview with someone in the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office that can explain the process and how things like this happen. They probably cannot comment on a specific case like this, but typically we get two of these ridiculous patent claims a week mentioned on slashdot.
Are they overworked and understaffed and forced to just rubberstamp things?
Are they untrained in technology to recognize things like this?
Are they in need of being hit over the head with a clue by four?
Something is seriously wrong at the USPTO (now more then ever seemingly).
The problem with government control is 'which' government? How do they agree? A lot of governments wouldn't want anything opposing the dominant political group/party/mindset. Other governments wouldn't want any religious references to anything other then Jesus/Buddah/Muhammed/etc.
If a government wants to impose restrictions on servers in their own countries, fine, but not outside.
I run a mail server with 13000 users! Getting every bounce of these things to postmaster no matter who sent it would make me route postmaster to/dev/null
I think according to the rules set down by the American Cinematographers Association, since all three films were filmed as once, and since Fellowship of the Ring got nominated, it didn't qualify for another nomination (same with The Two Towers).
NO! The reason Looking Glass is out of business is because Eidos siphoned money from them into Ion Storm to save the company during and after the debacle that was Ion Storm.
All of Looking Glasses games (or at least the majority) were profitible.
Snipers only have a significant advantage if the map is designed to give them such advantage. If there is no alternate way to reach the flag/objectives/enemy_bases, and you have to go through a wide open space, then snipers do have an unfair advantage.
If on the other hand, there is the 'main way' to get to the enemy, around the snipers (though having to deal with other enemies), it is MUCH better and more then fair.
When playing Quake 3 Team Fortress (Q3F), I was a bane of snipers. I always played the Agent (the Spy class), and would sneak in the base with half of my mission to be stab snipers in the back.
What I'm saying here is only valid for Team Based Capture the Flag/Attack the Enemy Base/Mission Objective based FPS games.
No matter what though, newbies are torn to pieces by even average snipers.
Since when are Strategy RPGs taking a chance? Final Fantasy Tactics, Ogre Battle, and a host of others all sold well.
Not to mention, did this title you mention make it to the US/Europe? Japanese developers DO take more risks when releasing for Japan, but will RARELY do so when bringing it to non-Japanese markets.
Though hard drives and network adapters have long been PC advantages, those aren't what I think consoles need before I will take them over PC gaming:
1) Wide spread High Definition TV ownership in the home, and support for this on consoles. Could you imagine playing a strategy game on a TV compared to on a monitor? The same goes for many RPGs and FPPs in my opinion
2) Availability AND use of keyboards and mouse on Consoles. I don't mean just having them available as an option for a game. I mean games that are designed for them from the start and require their use.
3) Developers that will take a chance on making a game that MAY not be a huge seller on a console, but may be for a niche market. This is rare with console developers (but is sadly becoming rarer wih PC developers as well).
Get these three and maybe I won't miss my PC gaming. Don't get it, and I'll stick it out on the PC, and still avoid the consoles (at least until they drop to $100 per machine).
I don't think PC gaming will ever die, just as mac gaming has never died.
I'm sorry but that scares the hell out of me. Mac gaming is not dead, but it has been on life support for about a decade. The occasional first person shooter or Blizzard game does NOT qualify as alive.
I TRULY fear the day that PC gaming becmes like mac gaming.
The spam filter I run for large mail server recently contained a rule update that adds points to any message mentioning the CAN-SPAM law (or the H.R. Bill number of CAN-SPAM).
If someone puts that in their message they are either a semi-legitimate spammer trying to comply with the law (but still a spammer), or a completely illegitimate spammer trying to give themselves some semblance of legality.
There is a big difference here. Operating systems are something everyone who uses computers would deal with. A great deal more people that want to program open source are going to program something for an operating system (be it the kernel, device drivers, etc.), then something for a much narrower audience.
I'm not saying an open source Mathematica type software package wouldn't be nice, but there isn't the same drive for it as for an OS. There are already software packages that run on UNIX/Linux. They aren't freely available, but if you are in Academia, or in industry you probably have access to a package like this already.
If you are speaking of RPGs, long can mean different things. Is the game long because of a random battles every six steps (Skies of Arcadia)? Is it long because of endless cutscenes (Xenosaga)? Or is it so freeform that you could spend a year doing everything and not be done (Morrowind)?
Or is the game long because it has a lot to do, a great plot, great gameplay, (Crono Trigger, Baldur's Gate series, etc.)
There are games on both sides of the pond that fit either case.
Way back in the olden days before Windows 95, was my favorite game ending. Might and Magic 5, had an amazing end game sequence for more reasons then one.
First, and most importantly, it was the conculsion of the struggle between Corak and Sheltem. The two creations of the 'Ancients' that your various parties of adventurers have been following/aiding/thwarting through Might and Magics 1 through 5. When fighting in this end sequence, Corak was losing, and was about to be defeated, but he sacrificed himself to destroy Sheltem.
Story aside, the graphics were very well done for the ending, and the speech was amazing both in its quality and length (this was around 1993-1994 if I recall correctly).
Definatly the highest point in video gaming endings in my opinion.
Actually, though Weis and Hickman do still write in the Dragonlance world, Hasbro (which bought WotC which bought TSR) DO own the rights to the world.
There have been some times where Weis and Hickman did NOT like how things were done in their world but were overrulled since they didn't really own it anymore.
That said they do have a lot of creative control over it since their Dragonlance novels have probably outsold the combined total of all other authors works in the DL world.
Does anyone realize just how AWFUL this will be? Take Verant's atrocious customer service record, add in tons of StarWars fanboys, and add the highest monthly fee around for a MMORPG (Everquest Legends excluded) and you get the train wreck that will be Star Wars Galaxies!
I'll be avoiding this like the plague thank you very much, though I will keep up on it to watch the train wreck develop. This could be a worse launch then Anarchy Online!
You talk about scrapping the whole client-server model all together. There are a LOT of problems with that.
Do you want to trust 'joe user' to have an SMTP/POP server installed, configured correctly, and patched? The average person doesn't/can't patch their system as is, even when they aren't running a server. Activating things by default as you propose is what gets systems hacked.
Also, most people do not leave their computers on all the time. Where would their e-mail go then when the computer is off?
Not to mention most people have asymmetric internet connections with much less upload then download capacities.
The client-server model will never be obsolete unless everyone can run their computers as well as a systems administrator, OR they give complete control of their computers to an outside source (Microsoft would love this option, I'm sure).
And also, if you have a crappy ISP with a slow e-mail server and faulty DNS then get a new ISP! I NEVER have DNS problems with my ISP at home, and we almost never have DNS problems on campus at my university.
The 97,000 active subscribers means how many are currently paying the monthly fee. The 28,000 others could have bought the game, used the free month then canceled because they didn't like it.
>> How much better would things be now if Richard Garriott never sold (or had to sell) Origin to EA?
>Things wouldn't be any better. As Richard Garriott said himself, Origin wasn't big enough to survive by itself because Origin didn't have the muscle and deep pockets to grease the distribution channels well enough.
I understand that, that's why I wished he never had to sell. Sadly, I knew he couldn't keep it on his own, I just think (financial considerations aside) that Origin, Sierra, and others would be making much better games if they were still under control of people willing to take risks to make a great game. A far cry from EA who will not publish a game it does not think will be a bestseller
This has been happening too often...
on
Dynamix Closed Down?
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
In the past year or two, the following has happened:
Sierra shuts down their Yosemite division, firing some great programmers, game designers, and others. This was the group (for the most part) responsible for the great Kings Quest, Quest for Glory (earlier Hero's Quest), Police Quest, and many others.
Origin systems closes down in two phases. They went "Online Only" after Ultima IX, and those that stayed with the company were assigned to work on Ultima Online 2. Earlier this year, with the game a good deal finished, Electronic Arts stopped production on the game and fired all the employees.
Looking Glass studios, the maker of great, revolutionary titles like Thief I and II, and Ultima Underworld I and II shuts down due to lack of funds (mostly because Eidos had to sink so much money into Ion Storm to keep Daikatana afloat).
And now, as this story mentions, the gutting of Sierra is almost over, with Dynamix (the source of my favorite game of all time: Betrayal at Krondor and may others) being shut down.
I really worry about where the industry is going.
There are many other companies that are wholly owned by larger companies that have had the quality of their products go down hill - New World Computing (of Might and Magic fame) has been taken down that road by 3DO, not to mention others.
How much better would things be now if Richard Garriott never sold (or had to sell) Origin to EA? The same could be said of Ken Williams selling Sierra. This list goes on and on.
Well, I'm done rambling on about the game industry. I'll go back to browsing the game stores for real games while avoiding "Who Want's to be a Gazillionaire 12" or "The Sims 15th Expansion Pack", or whatever crap the industry makes money on.
Incedentally my first word-processing software was Sierra's Homestar Plus for the Commodore 64. Yes, Sierra made a Wordproccessor!
I don't necessarily think this is a bad idea. For years, I have listened to the Real Audio broadcasts of New York Mets games. Though I live in NY, the SUNY New Paltz campus is kind of a radio black hole due to the mountains and the buildings on campus.
My question is, what will we hear in-between innings? Advertisements? Silence? Or even better, commentary on the game. Radio is paid for through the ads. This should have some added benefit over radio, such as commentary regarding the game, updates/news about other games going on at the same time, etc. I don't want to pay AND get ads, but to be honest I probably will anyway.
I listen to these games enough that I wouldn't mind the fee at all. I just don't want to have to buy Real Player Plus as well...
The actual situation is that Black Isle has a contract that gives them rights to make D&D games for the next year to two years. After that, Infogrames has exclusive rights to produce computer games based on Hasbro properties (including D&D) for 10 to 15 years.
Though they can in turn, license those rights to another company - black isle for example, they won't because Interplay which Black Isle Studios is affiliated with is a direct competitior to Infogrames.
For those interested in the issue, check out Desslock's RPG News. Recently he has had a lot of news/editorials regarding it.
I was considering DDR RAM for my new system for a while, but I decided against it. Many places I have seen (anandtech.com, tomshardware, and others that I can't recall at the time) say that if you use PC2100 DDR RAM, you can expect a 10% to 15% increase in speed over using PC133 SDRAM. If you have money to burn, it is worth it, but don't bother with the PC1600 DDR RAM. Most placed I've seen reviewing it say there is very little difference between that and PC133 SDRAM.
If you are not sure, then get a motherboard that supports both SDRAM and DDR RAM. That way, you can get SDRAM real cheap now (256 MB of PC 133 RAM picked up last weekend for $85 - no shipping). When prices go down later in the year (as they are expected to), then you can have a painless upgrade.
Reuters is reporting that Intel will releasing the new Pentium V. It will be built with new neutrino technology
We have finally broken the 1 atom barrier! Who needs heavy, charged particles for transistors! By altering the spin of the neutrino, we can achieve digital 1 and 0 values.
Slashdot Mirror
I really would love to see a Slashdot interview with someone in the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office that can explain the process and how things like this happen. They probably cannot comment on a specific case like this, but typically we get two of these ridiculous patent claims a week mentioned on slashdot.
Are they overworked and understaffed and forced to just rubberstamp things?
Are they untrained in technology to recognize things like this?
Are they in need of being hit over the head with a clue by four?
Something is seriously wrong at the USPTO (now more then ever seemingly).
Just make sure you 'other' countries pay your internet licensing fees to SCO, since I'm sure it is some how their property.
The problem with government control is 'which' government? How do they agree? A lot of governments wouldn't want anything opposing the dominant political group/party/mindset. Other governments wouldn't want any religious references to anything other then Jesus/Buddah/Muhammed/etc.
If a government wants to impose restrictions on servers in their own countries, fine, but not outside.
ABSOLUTELY NOT!
/dev/null
I run a mail server with 13000 users! Getting every bounce of these things to postmaster no matter who sent it would make me route postmaster to
I think according to the rules set down by the American Cinematographers Association, since all three films were filmed as once, and since Fellowship of the Ring got nominated, it didn't qualify for another nomination (same with The Two Towers).
NO! The reason Looking Glass is out of business is because Eidos siphoned money from them into Ion Storm to save the company during and after the debacle that was Ion Storm.
All of Looking Glasses games (or at least the majority) were profitible.
Snipers only have a significant advantage if the map is designed to give them such advantage. If there is no alternate way to reach the flag/objectives/enemy_bases, and you have to go through a wide open space, then snipers do have an unfair advantage.
If on the other hand, there is the 'main way' to get to the enemy, around the snipers (though having to deal with other enemies), it is MUCH better and more then fair.
When playing Quake 3 Team Fortress (Q3F), I was a bane of snipers. I always played the Agent (the Spy class), and would sneak in the base with half of my mission to be stab snipers in the back.
What I'm saying here is only valid for Team Based Capture the Flag/Attack the Enemy Base/Mission Objective based FPS games.
No matter what though, newbies are torn to pieces by even average snipers.
Since when are Strategy RPGs taking a chance? Final Fantasy Tactics, Ogre Battle, and a host of others all sold well.
Not to mention, did this title you mention make it to the US/Europe? Japanese developers DO take more risks when releasing for Japan, but will RARELY do so when bringing it to non-Japanese markets.
Though hard drives and network adapters have long been PC advantages, those aren't what I think consoles need before I will take them over PC gaming:
1) Wide spread High Definition TV ownership in the home, and support for this on consoles. Could you imagine playing a strategy game on a TV compared to on a monitor? The same goes for many RPGs and FPPs in my opinion
2) Availability AND use of keyboards and mouse on Consoles. I don't mean just having them available as an option for a game. I mean games that are designed for them from the start and require their use.
3) Developers that will take a chance on making a game that MAY not be a huge seller on a console, but may be for a niche market. This is rare with console developers (but is sadly becoming rarer wih PC developers as well).
Get these three and maybe I won't miss my PC gaming. Don't get it, and I'll stick it out on the PC, and still avoid the consoles (at least until they drop to $100 per machine).
I don't think PC gaming will ever die, just as mac gaming has never died.
I'm sorry but that scares the hell out of me. Mac gaming is not dead, but it has been on life support for about a decade. The occasional first person shooter or Blizzard game does NOT qualify as alive.
I TRULY fear the day that PC gaming becmes like mac gaming.
The spam filter I run for large mail server recently contained a rule update that adds points to any message mentioning the CAN-SPAM law (or the H.R. Bill number of CAN-SPAM).
If someone puts that in their message they are either a semi-legitimate spammer trying to comply with the law (but still a spammer), or a completely illegitimate spammer trying to give themselves some semblance of legality.
There is a big difference here. Operating systems are something everyone who uses computers would deal with. A great deal more people that want to program open source are going to program something for an operating system (be it the kernel, device drivers, etc.), then something for a much narrower audience.
I'm not saying an open source Mathematica type software package wouldn't be nice, but there isn't the same drive for it as for an OS. There are already software packages that run on UNIX/Linux. They aren't freely available, but if you are in Academia, or in industry you probably have access to a package like this already.
If you are speaking of RPGs, long can mean different things. Is the game long because of a random battles every six steps (Skies of Arcadia)? Is it long because of endless cutscenes (Xenosaga)? Or is it so freeform that you could spend a year doing everything and not be done (Morrowind)?
Or is the game long because it has a lot to do, a great plot, great gameplay, (Crono Trigger, Baldur's Gate series, etc.)
There are games on both sides of the pond that fit either case.
Way back in the olden days before Windows 95, was my favorite game ending. Might and Magic 5, had an amazing end game sequence for more reasons then one.
First, and most importantly, it was the conculsion of the struggle between Corak and Sheltem. The two creations of the 'Ancients' that your various parties of adventurers have been following/aiding/thwarting through Might and Magics 1 through 5. When fighting in this end sequence, Corak was losing, and was about to be defeated, but he sacrificed himself to destroy Sheltem.
Story aside, the graphics were very well done for the ending, and the speech was amazing both in its quality and length (this was around 1993-1994 if I recall correctly).
Definatly the highest point in video gaming endings in my opinion.
Actually, though Weis and Hickman do still write in the Dragonlance world, Hasbro (which bought WotC which bought TSR) DO own the rights to the world.
There have been some times where Weis and Hickman did NOT like how things were done in their world but were overrulled since they didn't really own it anymore.
That said they do have a lot of creative control over it since their Dragonlance novels have probably outsold the combined total of all other authors works in the DL world.
Does anyone realize just how AWFUL this will be? Take Verant's atrocious customer service record, add in tons of StarWars fanboys, and add the highest monthly fee around for a MMORPG (Everquest Legends excluded) and you get the train wreck that will be Star Wars Galaxies!
I'll be avoiding this like the plague thank you very much, though I will keep up on it to watch the train wreck develop. This could be a worse launch then Anarchy Online!
You talk about scrapping the whole client-server model all together. There are a LOT of problems with that.
Do you want to trust 'joe user' to have an SMTP/POP server installed, configured correctly, and patched? The average person doesn't/can't patch their system as is, even when they aren't running a server. Activating things by default as you propose is what gets systems hacked.
Also, most people do not leave their computers on all the time. Where would their e-mail go then when the computer is off?
Not to mention most people have asymmetric internet connections with much less upload then download capacities.
The client-server model will never be obsolete unless everyone can run their computers as well as a systems administrator, OR they give complete control of their computers to an outside source (Microsoft would love this option, I'm sure).
And also, if you have a crappy ISP with a slow e-mail server and faulty DNS then get a new ISP!
I NEVER have DNS problems with my ISP at home, and we almost never have DNS problems on campus at my university.
The 97,000 active subscribers means how many are currently paying the monthly fee. The 28,000 others could have bought the game, used the free month then canceled because they didn't like it.
>> How much better would things be now if Richard Garriott never sold (or had to sell) Origin to EA?
>Things wouldn't be any better. As Richard Garriott said himself, Origin wasn't big enough to survive by itself because Origin didn't have the muscle and deep pockets to grease the distribution channels well enough.
I understand that, that's why I wished he never had to sell. Sadly, I knew he couldn't keep it on his own, I just think (financial considerations aside) that Origin, Sierra, and others would be making much better games if they were still under control of people willing to take risks to make a great game. A far cry from EA who will not publish a game it does not think will be a bestseller
In the past year or two, the following has happened:
Sierra shuts down their Yosemite division, firing some great programmers, game designers, and others. This was the group (for the most part) responsible for the great Kings Quest, Quest for Glory (earlier Hero's Quest), Police Quest, and many others.
Origin systems closes down in two phases. They went "Online Only" after Ultima IX, and those that stayed with the company were assigned to work on Ultima Online 2. Earlier this year, with the game a good deal finished, Electronic Arts stopped production on the game and fired all the employees.
Looking Glass studios, the maker of great, revolutionary titles like Thief I and II, and Ultima Underworld I and II shuts down due to lack of funds (mostly because Eidos had to sink so much money into Ion Storm to keep Daikatana afloat).
And now, as this story mentions, the gutting of Sierra is almost over, with Dynamix (the source of my favorite game of all time: Betrayal at Krondor and may others) being shut down.
I really worry about where the industry is going. There are many other companies that are wholly owned by larger companies that have had the quality of their products go down hill - New World Computing (of Might and Magic fame) has been taken down that road by 3DO, not to mention others.
How much better would things be now if Richard Garriott never sold (or had to sell) Origin to EA? The same could be said of Ken Williams selling Sierra. This list goes on and on.
Well, I'm done rambling on about the game industry. I'll go back to browsing the game stores for real games while avoiding "Who Want's to be a Gazillionaire 12" or "The Sims 15th Expansion Pack", or whatever crap the industry makes money on.
Incedentally my first word-processing software was Sierra's Homestar Plus for the Commodore 64. Yes, Sierra made a Wordproccessor!
I don't necessarily think this is a bad idea. For years, I have listened to the Real Audio broadcasts of New York Mets games. Though I live in NY, the SUNY New Paltz campus is kind of a radio black hole due to the mountains and the buildings on campus. My question is, what will we hear in-between innings? Advertisements? Silence? Or even better, commentary on the game. Radio is paid for through the ads. This should have some added benefit over radio, such as commentary regarding the game, updates/news about other games going on at the same time, etc. I don't want to pay AND get ads, but to be honest I probably will anyway. I listen to these games enough that I wouldn't mind the fee at all. I just don't want to have to buy Real Player Plus as well...
The actual situation is that Black Isle has a contract that gives them rights to make D&D games for the next year to two years. After that, Infogrames has exclusive rights to produce computer games based on Hasbro properties (including D&D) for 10 to 15 years. Though they can in turn, license those rights to another company - black isle for example, they won't because Interplay which Black Isle Studios is affiliated with is a direct competitior to Infogrames. For those interested in the issue, check out Desslock's RPG News. Recently he has had a lot of news/editorials regarding it.
I was considering DDR RAM for my new system for a while, but I decided against it. Many places I have seen (anandtech.com, tomshardware, and others that I can't recall at the time) say that if you use PC2100 DDR RAM, you can expect a 10% to 15% increase in speed over using PC133 SDRAM. If you have money to burn, it is worth it, but don't bother with the PC1600 DDR RAM. Most placed I've seen reviewing it say there is very little difference between that and PC133 SDRAM.
If you are not sure, then get a motherboard that supports both SDRAM and DDR RAM. That way, you can get SDRAM real cheap now (256 MB of PC 133 RAM picked up last weekend for $85 - no shipping). When prices go down later in the year (as they are expected to), then you can have a painless upgrade.
Reuters is reporting that Intel will releasing the new Pentium V. It will be built with new neutrino technology We have finally broken the 1 atom barrier! Who needs heavy, charged particles for transistors! By altering the spin of the neutrino, we can achieve digital 1 and 0 values.