Although I agree with the fact that letting players run their own dedicated servers is a good way to handle online play, I also believe that this is one of the reasons that Nintendo has not jumped headfirst into the online market. Let's face it, most Cube players don't have ultra-fast computers/bandwidth that they can spare to host online games. This would lead to the majority of their "hosts" probably being on something like a 512k down/128k up connection. I really doubt that Nintendo wants this reflected on their image when it comes to online play. In other words, I believe they see it better to have LAN-only play, or no online at all, then thousands of buggy, lagged-out servers out there that nobody wants to play on.
Just for the record, my younger brother's PC has a 900MHz celeron, and a GF2MX, and it runs UT2004 just fine. And it's one of those craptacular $400 Wal-Mart Special HP Pavilions, from about 3 years ago. The only adjustments that have been made for it are upgrading from WinME to XP Pro, moving up from 128 to 384MB PC133, and adding the aforementioned GF2MX. You didn't mention how much RAM yours had, but it sounds like the machine should be able to run UT2K4 without too many problems. I'd suggest getting the demo and giving it a try.
Actually, I don't think it would be that difficult to emulate an XBox live server, including writing some sort of frontend that could be run on a networked PC, similar to XBConnect.
In theory, all it would take is some clever DNS spoofing on the PC side (a la' the GameCube PSO Exploit), a modified/etc/hosts or WINDOWS/SYSTEM32/DRIVERS/ETC/HOSTS file, and maybe some packet-sniffing software like Iris logging down the protocols to get some information on the workings of Xbox Live. Honestly, I'm surprised we haven't heard of somebody trying this yet. I'd try it myself, but I've been too lazy to fix my XBox BIOS after Micro$oft's little XBox Live/Linux fiasco.
Actually, Wal-Mart still sells the M-Rated games. I actually like the way they handle it. When an M-Rated game or R-Rated movie is scanned at the register, the register stops and asks for confirmation of whether or not the customer is 17 years of age or older, just like they would require proof of being 18 or 21 to buy cigarettes or alcohol respectively. It's up to the cashier to check the customer's ID. If they just press the "Yes" key on the register without checking, well, that's the cashier's fault, and they can be held responsible.
At least, that's the way it works where I come from.
Does anybody remember the European release of "Biker Mice From Mars" on the SNES? SNICKERS ADS EVERYWHERE! Talk about out of place advertising... And how about the 7-UP Spot video games? Or the game starring Chester the Cheetah? At least they're not making games like that anymore. Oh well. At least "Yo Noid!" was somewhat fun.
"defrauded Google"? No, clicking on banners is not fraud. When will this abuse of criminal terms ever end? It is a losing battle with the liars who says "copyright infringment = theft" already.
It's comments like this that make me wish I could mod them "-1, Dumbass".
I can agree with you there. Macromedia totally half-assed their Linux plugin. One way to watch flash animations bearably (although a little tedious) is to download this extension for Firefox and set it to overlay Flash animations. Then, when you open a page with animation (like a web cartoon), click the "Adblock" tab. Copy the URL to the flash to your clipboard, and open the Windows Standalone Player (which seems to work flawlessly in Wine, outside of some small clipboard glitches). Press Ctrl+O, and paste the URL into the open dialog. The flash plays fine then.
Slashdot Mirror
Although I agree with the fact that letting players run their own dedicated servers is a good way to handle online play, I also believe that this is one of the reasons that Nintendo has not jumped headfirst into the online market. Let's face it, most Cube players don't have ultra-fast computers/bandwidth that they can spare to host online games. This would lead to the majority of their "hosts" probably being on something like a 512k down/128k up connection. I really doubt that Nintendo wants this reflected on their image when it comes to online play. In other words, I believe they see it better to have LAN-only play, or no online at all, then thousands of buggy, lagged-out servers out there that nobody wants to play on.
(please link the obligated penny arcade reference)
Done.
The alignment is fucked in Gecko. Some of the text graphics don't line up properly.
Better yet, we could send this guy in to Square/ENIX's booth as an undercover reporter.
Hey, if the women "don't know", then how would Square/ENIX?
Just for the record, my younger brother's PC has a 900MHz celeron, and a GF2MX, and it runs UT2004 just fine. And it's one of those craptacular $400 Wal-Mart Special HP Pavilions, from about 3 years ago. The only adjustments that have been made for it are upgrading from WinME to XP Pro, moving up from 128 to 384MB PC133, and adding the aforementioned GF2MX. You didn't mention how much RAM yours had, but it sounds like the machine should be able to run UT2K4 without too many problems. I'd suggest getting the demo and giving it a try.
Whoa, dude. We just got Goth-Served.
Actually, I don't think it would be that difficult to emulate an XBox live server, including writing some sort of frontend that could be run on a networked PC, similar to XBConnect.
/etc/hosts or WINDOWS/SYSTEM32/DRIVERS/ETC/HOSTS file, and maybe some packet-sniffing software like Iris logging down the protocols to get some information on the workings of Xbox Live. Honestly, I'm surprised we haven't heard of somebody trying this yet. I'd try it myself, but I've been too lazy to fix my XBox BIOS after Micro$oft's little XBox Live/Linux fiasco.
In theory, all it would take is some clever DNS spoofing on the PC side (a la' the GameCube PSO Exploit), a modified
Actually, Wal-Mart still sells the M-Rated games. I actually like the way they handle it. When an M-Rated game or R-Rated movie is scanned at the register, the register stops and asks for confirmation of whether or not the customer is 17 years of age or older, just like they would require proof of being 18 or 21 to buy cigarettes or alcohol respectively. It's up to the cashier to check the customer's ID. If they just press the "Yes" key on the register without checking, well, that's the cashier's fault, and they can be held responsible.
At least, that's the way it works where I come from.
Does anybody remember the European release of "Biker Mice From Mars" on the SNES? SNICKERS ADS EVERYWHERE! Talk about out of place advertising... And how about the 7-UP Spot video games? Or the game starring Chester the Cheetah? At least they're not making games like that anymore. Oh well. At least "Yo Noid!" was somewhat fun.
When they set loose a big-ass flock of shriekbats.
"defrauded Google"? No, clicking on banners is not fraud. When will this abuse of criminal terms ever end? It is a losing battle with the liars who says "copyright infringment = theft" already.
It's comments like this that make me wish I could mod them "-1, Dumbass".
I can agree with you there. Macromedia totally half-assed their Linux plugin. One way to watch flash animations bearably (although a little tedious) is to download this extension for Firefox and set it to overlay Flash animations. Then, when you open a page with animation (like a web cartoon), click the "Adblock" tab. Copy the URL to the flash to your clipboard, and open the Windows Standalone Player (which seems to work flawlessly in Wine, outside of some small clipboard glitches). Press Ctrl+O, and paste the URL into the open dialog. The flash plays fine then.
Yes, but if you click on the one link they redirect you to, it's all porn. IMO, that's a blatant act of sabotage.
that Wine might ACTUALLY WORK in the near future?