The article doesn't mention why there were two joysticks for the game: one to control movement, the other to control direction of fire. So you could travel in one direction while firing in another. Great freedom of movement that made the game very popular because it was such a diversion from most other games.
This is probably one of the coolest bits of trivia from the era: Jarvis had been in an accident, and his arm was in a cast when they started work on the game. It would have been impossible for him to work on the game with a typical "stick and button" approach and he decided the dual-stick design made it easier for him to design and play the game.
[...] The dual joystick control design resulted from two experiences in Jarvis's life: an automobile accident and playing Berzerk. Prior to beginning development, Jarvis injured his right hand in an accident--his hand was still in a cast when he returned to work, which prevented him from using a traditional joystick with a button. While in rehabilitation, he thought of Berzerk. Though Jarvis enjoyed the game and similar titles, he was dissatisfied with the control scheme; Berzerk used a single joystick to move the on-screen character and a button to fire the weapon, which would shoot the same direction the character was facing. Jarvis noticed that if the button was held down, the character would remain stationary and the joystick could be used to fire in any direction. This method of play inspired Jarvis to add a second joystick dedicated to aiming the direction projectiles were shot.[10] Jarvis and DeMar created a prototype using a Stargate system board and two Atari 2600 controllers attached to a control panel. In retrospect, Jarvis considers the design a contradiction that blends "incredible freedom of movement" with ease of use.
I married my high school sweetheart (dated through high school, college, got married after we both graduated.) We're both 37 now, still very happy!
We're like you: I graduated with a BA in physics but am now an IT geek, she studied literature then went on to get a Master's in theology.
I didn't realize they had books on marriage. We didn't even consider them. But over the years we realized some important things:
You both need your own space. If that means you have your gaming/Linux stuff in the basement while she gets a quiet reading nook in the upstairs, fine.
Realize that you're both geeks, just in different areas. My gaming & computer interests really used to bother my wife until she realized gaming & working on free software were basically the same as "sitting and reading a book" to me.
Find ways for both of you to interest the other in what you do (share your hobbies) but drop it if the other isn't interested. My wife suggested a few authors for me to read, so now there's a whole bunch of stuff we both like to read. In turn, I found some video games she likes to play, although mostly she sits with me and wants me to run the controller, and she figures out the puzzles for me. I also got her interested in Linux, and after she turned in her Master's thesis, she used Linux full-time, still does today.
Do something fun every month. Preferably, only one of you (at most) should have been to or done that thing before. This has been great for us. See a play, attend a ballet, an opera, try a new restaurant, visit a comedy club, etc. Just make it the two of you. It's a great way to share time together.
The toilet seat has a "neutral" position: both the seat and the lid are closed. Agree that no matter who uses the bathroom, you return the toilet to the neutral position when you're done. That way there's no complaining that the guy always has to remember the put the seat down.
Most importantly, realize you are both smart, clever adults. Talk honestly with each other about everything - even problems, as soon as they come up. You'll save yourself a lot of stress later.
Oh, and can we reserve use of the term "hacker" for someone with at least a modicum of technical skills? This guy isn't even a cracker. All he did was talk on a stolen radio.
Mr Barn, I'd like to introduce you to Mr Horse. Oh, sorry - he seems to have run away already.
Use an exploit to "own" a server? Hacker. Break into your school's computer system and change a grade? Hacker. Impersonate the transit authority hub station using a radio? Hacker.
I know it's popular to hate on Word around here, but if you know what you're doing, it's not all that bad. I used Word to write my master's thesis, and by consistently using styles, along with Zotero, cross-referenced fields, and bookmarks, it came out very nice looking.
Sure, Word isn't bad... but it's not that great, either. The big offender lately: sharing documents. We are a large enterprise, and not everyone is on Office 2007. And due to the environment, some people run Windows, and some run Mac. I work in an office, and we've found that Word doesn't always format it's own document formats the same across different versions and different platforms (Mac vs Windows.) Here's a comment I posted a few weeks ago about this:
It's true that sometimes Word will fail to render a document properly. But it's not the fault of OpenOffice - sometimes, Microsoft Word fails to properly display other Microsoft Word files. Just this morning, I saw an example in action in a meeting:
Last night, one of the attendees sent out some notes for us to read before the meeting. We all dutifully printed out our copy of the document, and brought it with us to the meeting.
Despite the fact that the document was created with Microsoft Office, and that we all run Microsoft Office, there were 3 different versions of the printed document at the meeting. You could tell by looking around the table that one version of the notes (printed from Microsoft Office for Macintosh) arranged the text around a table in a weird way. Another version (printed by Microsoft Office 2007) put a page break in a different place and put an extra blank line between a table and its caption. The original version (Microsoft Office 2003) was formatted as intended.
This was a simple 3-page document in "DOC" format, with an enumerated list of paragraphs, so it didn't take long for us to realize our copies printed out differently, and to figure out the correlation between versions of Word and how the document printed out.
I think it just goes to show: if you have a document that absolutely must preserve formatting, send it as a PDF.
I used to work with Charlie Nutter and Tom Enebo years ago, when we worked on the same Web team. And I was thrilled to hear when they moved to Sun, really was the best deal you could imagine. Note that JRuby wasn't actually bought by Sun, but remained a separate project, only the developers were paid by Sun to work on JRuby. So I wish them the best as they move to their new digs.
I think what we should be looking for is games that had a great idea but went off in the wrong direction. Where the original idea was novel, stunning, the foundation of a truely great game, but the game itself was lacking in some way. Or games where the first installment was awesome but they botched it with the sequels.
Agree. I think two games in dire need of a reboot:
Beyond Good and Evil. And yes, I'm really looking forward to the sequel this year. I've only seen the teaser, but it looks interesting! The original game had a great story, decent combat mechanic,... but what was truly innovative was the added camera. It had the same effect that "trophies" and "achievements" have today, but it was woven into the story.
Kya: Dark Lineage. This was a good PS2 game, decent story with plot arc, and I liked that the combat was something you had to learn and evolve (enemies would get better at blocking moves you used a lot, so you had to keep learning new moves, but somehow never [really] became a button-masher.) This game introduced a lot of cool game mechanics in one game (freefall, etc.) and clearly was the set up for a game series. But the first game didn't sell well, so no sequels were made. I imagine this is partly due to the stupid names. The friendly native people are called "Nativs", the wolf-like bad guys are "Wolfen", the money system is based on "nooties",... Fortunately, the end of the game sees Kya transported to a new world, so a reboot could easily escape the dumb names.
I think Kya would do well in a reboot. I've occasionally thought about this, and believe the game might do well as a series of games on the PSP. I even emailed a few PSP game developers, encouraging them to get the rights/license to this game and see if they could re-use their existing platforming engine to make a "Kya 2: PSP" game. But I think the first game stank to the point that no developer wants to pick this up.
I use velcro strips in our house, too. Very handy for cable neatness!
One thing I'll mention here: my wife is an avid gardener, so one day when I ran out of velcro strips (brazenly taken from work years ago, when we retired a bunch of servers) my wife gave me her velcro spool that she uses to tie back the roses.
It's cheap: only $4 from most garden centers. Just cut the length you need, depending on the size of the cable bundle, or what you're attaching it to. Compare that $4 for 45 feet of green velcro to buying "custom" pre-cut velcro strips from most PC suppliers, which would run about $20 for the equivalent length.
Just as Alton Brown often recommends shopping at the hardware store for many cooking supplies, I might recommend stopping by the garden store to get velcro strips.
Don't forget Desert Bus for Hope where they raised $70,423.79 in a little over 5 days. As long as you keep paying them (during the pledge drive) they play.
I'm actually much more impressed with this, since it requires constant attention or you veer off the road, and get towed back to your starting point in real time.
As others have already pointed out on this thread, use encryption. If you're booting Linux, use LUKS encryption on all of/(root). For Windows, use TrueCrypt. Use a strong passphrase! If a thief ever gets your laptop, they won't be able to access anything on the drive.
I do this on all the laptops I have access to. Makes it very secure. I even have an 8GB flash drive that I use to boot my subnotebook (runs Windows when I'm at work, now runs Linux when I'm at home.) Works great.
If you're really paranoid, create a multi-boot system. You have a netbook, so you don't have a lot of hard drive space to install a (second?) Linux distro. You need something tiny like FreeDOS or a really minimal Linux install. Then set it up to nuke the entire drive without prompting the user first. (Linux can easily do an unattended shred, but FreeDOS will need a third party program to do it.) Set the bootloader to not boot an operating system by default but instead to just prompt the user. The default option should be the "nuke" instance, labeled something obvious like 'Microsoft Windows XP'. Label your real operating system something less obvious like 'Tools'. Guess what option the thief would choose?
Just don't forget and choose the wrong one yourself, or you're going to spend some time rebuilding your system.
Think about it, the alphanumeric keyboard even predates the steering wheel by about 20 years!
Yes, but the "steering wheel" is a limited analog controller. It works only in 1 dimension (left-right.)
I think over time we'll see the steering wheel controller evolve, especially as game controllers become more advanced. Consider the influence the Wiimote controller has had on gaming. To think that in 5 years we may all laugh that we ever used a "steering wheel" to drive to work, instead of flapping our arms to turn, making motorboat noises to accelerate, etc.
We live in amazing times. The future of tomorrow is today!
I'm afraid I don't know what you are talking about. Never played BF2. I only "got into" the series at Bad Company. It was awesome, and I got totally addicted to the online play. The new B'43 uses the BC engine, not the BF2 engine - so the new B'43 is more like BC set in the Pacific Theatre of World War 2.
I actually find the 2D graphics of Pixeljunk Monsters to be a nice feature. It means the graphics aren't distracting. I can concentrate on the point of the game: to build towers to defend my objective. That's all the game is about, fun gameplay. Graphics are secondary.
Monsters was very popular on PSN, so much so that the developers are re-releasing the game for PSP. It's pretty much the same game, plus some bonus levels. The same 2D graphics are there. If anything, looks like they emphasized the black outline around game objects (probably to make them easier to see on the smaller screen.) And it will probably sell very well on the PSP.
Most of the games that are coming out, suck.
Plain and simple. The problem with developers is that they are confusing great technology with great games. They can go hand in hand, but largely speaking -- games need story, innovation, depth.
I'd like to disagree - but I can't. I definitely consider myself a gamer, but many of the games that have come out recently just aren't that compelling.
Tomb Raider Underworld? Not that interesting - and too short, even though they helpfully added extra rooms just to give you something to traverse.
I thought Mirror's Edge would be more awesome than it is. Oh, it's a very pretty game, visually amazing, with great FPS platforming. Unfortunately, most of the platforming requires 100% perfect timing. Repeated failures just made me quit.
The Ghostbusters demo is way cool, but I suspect it's all nostalgia-value. I'll pick it up again in a month and see if the demo still makes me want to play more.
Killzone 2 was a ton of fun, but has little re-play value. Still, I'd rate this as the last really good game I've played. And that's going back a few months now.
The games I'm really waiting for are the next Ratchet & Clank and the next Uncharted.
Honestly, I'm having more fun with PlayStation Network titles. The price point is certainly lower, but I also don't expect as much out of a $10 or $15 game - compared to the punch a $55 game should bring. As a result, I'm not that disappointed if a cheap PSN game doesn't turn out that great. So I'm willing to take more of a risk for a PSN title than a $55 retail title.
Battlefield 1943 is entirely an online multiplayer game, but mildly addicting.
I thought Burn Zombie Burn was fun for the first level, then kind of stunk. But I don't regret buying it, because it was so cheap.
Flower was (and continues to be) awesome. I went back and re-played a few stages just last weekend.
I'm almost finished with Last Guy (and have been since the week after I got it) and just can't work up the excitement to go back and finish the game. I've gotten my fun-value out of it.
I got hooked by Pixeljunk Monsters, bought the expansion, then played about one stage of that before I lost interest. But I definitely got my money's worth on that game.
>> Ballmer and Gates also echoed the note Business Division President Stephen Elop sounded in an interview with CNET News last week--that Microsoft really doesn't know what Chrome OS will look like.
"Who knows what this thing is?" Ballmer said.
> It's the Linux kernel with a new UI. Probably will have some other beefed up parts (security or graphics) along with better hardware support on select devices as they throw their weight around.
On the subject of the analog stick, I think it needs to be an either or situation. Either two analog sticks or none. The problem with a single analog stick is that it invites developers to attempt console style 3D games, but doesn't provide a means to control the camera. If Sony can't find a way to comfortably integrate both sticks then I would prefer them just to ditch them both altogether, then at least developers would be forced to design games for a specific control scheme instead of porting conventions from the PS2 that don't fit on the platform.
You clearly have not played 'Daxter' or 'Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters'. Both are action/platformers, and traditionally you'd think "two analog sticks". But the games were designed and implemented in a way that you just don't need two sticks. One stick is fine, you never miss the second analog stick. If only some PS3 games had camera systems like that.
As far as flashed based media goes, I'm aware of the reasons why Sony chose to stick with disks originally. But that was 5 years ago, it's time to rectify the situation. [...]
They have rectified the situation - Sony is moving to digital downloads. Several recent games have been digital download only ('Patapon 2' for example.) Many games have re-released as digital downloads ('Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters', 'SOCOM', etc.) So yeah, Sony has already been providing a path that doesn't solely rely on UMD's for playing games on the PSP.
Why should I have to go to a store to pick up a PSP game, these days? Either as UMD or (your suggestion) flash stick? The games aren't that big (1.8GB at most... often much smaller) so I'd rather buy them online and push them to my PSP. It's faster, and I don't ever have the issue games being "sold out".
I guess Sony has an additional incentive, in that if you buy games from the PSN Store, you can "tie" the game to the person, so can reduce piracy. But I don't really care about the anti-piracy thing - for me, it's about having games I want to play at a price I'm willing to pay. Digital downloads are much cheaper - I mentioned in my other comment that digital downloads (obviously) don't include the cost of physical media like UMD.
As an example (on the PS3, etc.) look at 'Battlefield 1943'. I played the demo, then bought the game online. I didn't even have to leave my basement and go into the Big Blue Room (aka "outside") to pick up a copy. I just bough it. That's the way it ought to be, especially for a game like B'43 that isn't very big. Don't force gamers to go to some brick-and-mortar store to buy things.
This "buying things off the Internet" thing did eventually catch on. Learn to embrace it.:-)
As a gamer, I'm behind this as a general idea, no matter the platform. I'd also like to suggest the following to Sony:
Release (at least) the top 50% of your PSP game catalog as PSP digital downloads. Go through your PSP games sales records, look at which games sold best, and sell those games. Also, look at the review scores for your PSP games, sell anything that scored 7.5/10 or higher.
Just put them on PlayStation Network so we can buy them. Make it easy for us to give you our money.
Here's why that's important: PSP owners who already own the game may feel a little ripped off, since digital downloads are probably going to be cheaper than the UMD version of the game, because you aren't paying for physical media distribution. However, PSP owners who already own the game are not the primary target of this move. Instead, the target is all the people who haven't bought the game, and/or the people who may buy a PSP Go.
Those are the people that would be most interested in buying games via digital download. The PSP Go doesn't even have a UMD drive, anyway.
And it would help all the current PSP owners (like me!) who may not have bought that game (or missed it) when it came out and might like to play it.
It doesn't address new games, but it helps build up the available library of games.
I'm glad to see that Sony's trying to court developers, but it just seems like too little too late for the PSP. The PSP is just too dated as a platform to hold much appeal to me at this point. The PSP Go managed to ditch some of the legacy problems of the PSP that were holding it back, but missed a lot of obvious updates the platform could have used (2nd analog stick, capacitive touchscreen, flash based physical media, longer battery life), and it came at the cost of a ridiculous price increase.
I own a PSP (1001) and I can say that the decision to not have a second analog stick was a good idea. Holding a personal game system just isn't the same as holding a standard console controller. With a controller, you're able to grab the whole device at once, fully in both hands, leaving both your thumbs free to run the analog sticks.
With a mobile game device like the PSP (or DS), you are holding it essentially, from the edge. With one analog stick, you can hold the system with your right hand and run the analog control nub with your left hand. This actually works well, even when you need to tap the action buttons - like in a platformer (Daxter, for example.)
To be honest, stuff like the second stick, touchscreen, etc aren't going to happen.
On your other points:
Flash-based media.
Yes, it would have been really cool to distribute all games on MemStick Duo or some such, back when the PSP was first released. But the UMD can hold 1.8GB of data. Now think back to when the PSP was new - how many 2GB flash drives did you see, and how expensive were they? For any that you found at the time, they were massively expensive. Sony would never have been able to sell games on MS Duo then. Sure, they can do it now - which is why you are seeing Sony change to move more PSP games to digital download.
Longer battery life
The main reason the PSP's battery doesn't last as long as the DS or GBA is because it uses spinning media (UMD). I have a bunch of games for PSP - some on UMD, some as digital download. The system runs much longer when I'm playing a digital download game (like Hot Shot Golf: OT... playing it again now) than when I am playing a UMD-based game. You'll see longer battery life get advertised as more games are pushed to digital download.
My own wishlist:
Support WPA2 in the wireless stack.
A few months ago, I moved my home wireless AP to use WPA2, then realized my PSP couldn't get on the network. Had to change the AP to use WPA again.
Give me a better browser.
The browser in the PSP looks and feels a lot like the browser in the PS3 - so points given for consistency. But both are pretty crappy browsers. Some sites don't render properly at all on the PSP. My local news station just did a site redesign, and now I can't view the local weather forecast. Which is (was) my PSP homepage. I'd love to see a stripped-down Gecko browser in there. Or Opera. Something better than what I have now.
Support plain SD instead of MS Duo. Is that what the other memory slot is in the PSP Go?
Not sure what this would mean to Sony and copy protection - I suspect that's a key reason they put MS Duo in the PSP.
I already buy few PSP games. Are you trying to make me completely stop? Digital distribution is a guaranteed way to do it.
Actually, I prefer digital distribution. But maybe that's because I also have a PS3, so I buy PSP games from PlayStation Network, then push them to my PSP to play there. With the PS3, I don't really care how long it takes to download the game. I hear you can do the same with your PC.
But yeah, for digital distribution direct to the PSP over wireless... I can see why this would be a pain.
In short: Yes, it's very easy to capture keystrokes over bluetooth, even when the device isn't paired with you. Google for "bluetooth keyboard sniffing".
But there are easier, more reliable ways to get information. Let's say you were involved in corporate espionage, and you wanted to capture the keystrokes of a company's CEO. Here's the easy way to do it:
Bribe the local cleaning staff:
"I'll give you $1000 (or whatever) to connect this to Mr Guy Smiley's computer, where the keyboard plugs in. Here's how you do it..."
Insert on Monday, collect on Friday.
It's a sad fact, but almost no one notices the cleaning staff. And the cleaning people are there when you aren't.
So for $300-$350 for the keylogger, plus $1000 (or whatever) for the bribe, and waiting a week, you now have lots of information about what the CEO has been typing. Usernames/passwords, private memos, etc.
While I have never done this, I know a tech support person in another IT department who discovered a USB keylogger had been installed on the Director's laptop dock. But I guess the Director had dropped his laptop that morning, and the techs were replacing it with a new one, including a new dock. That's how they found it, pure luck. They suspected someone was doing that to catch the Director's username/password.
I know an IT Director in another organization (a small company) and they had an incident a few years ago where the IT Manager (who also did tech support as part of a staff of 3... small company) installed a software keylogger on the Director's and CIO's computers as they were deployed. I understand he used this to get their passwords and read their email.
zOMG! I forgot "barrel roll". I think I'd assign this to X, and let triangle toggle between "nearest enemy" and "attacking enemy" (which may the same in a dogfight, anyway - very convenient.) The controls still make sense that way.
Ok, I know it's bad form to reply to this, especially since no one is probably looking at comments on this story anymore, but... I had an idea:
I have thought about this, though. Maybe too much. Using the PS3 controller, I would pick:
L stick - flight control, with option to use sixaxis instead (L3 - lock onto target in reticle)
R stick - look around (R3 - center view)
R1/L1 - primary/secondary weaps
R2/L2 - throttle up/down (smooth increments, so player would have to manually match speed to other crafts)
left/right - power recharge distribution to shields/weaps
up/down - power to front/rear shields
That leaves only the four face buttons (X, square, O, triangle) to give commands to flight group, toggle fire mode (dual/single cannons), select nearest enemy as target, manually cycle to different targets, switch to last target, show extended details of target, etc.
I figure at some point, you have to create a mini-menu (flight group commands? targets?) to fit in all the commands, which could be distracting and slow in a dogfight. Or else you need to dumb down the controls, so you drop some of the advanced targeting that made TIE Fighter such an enjoyable sim. Whichever a developer chooses, the outcome wouldn't be anything like the same sim experience.
Let's modify my suggested control list, really get into the mindset of PS3 menus. Make the R stick context-sensitive:
Move the R stick, and you get a semi-transparent circular window that pops up on the lower-right of the screen. Not enough to be distracting or cover your cockpit window. It has the flight group commands at various points - there were 8 commands you could issue, so make 9 points around the circular menu:
Head home
Report in
Evasive maneuvers
Wait for orders
Engage
Cover me
Attack target
Ignore target
(Exit menu)
Just point the R stick to the menu action you want, and you get that action. If you don't move to an action (maybe you tapped the R stick by mistake) then the menu goes away after a second or so.
Click R3, and the R stick becomes "look around". Click R3 again to exit "look" mode and center your view out the cockpit.
So that means you have the face buttons and left for targeting, and Start/Select for game controls:
X - nearest enemy
triangle - attacking enemy
square - previous enemy
O - next target
Select - target details
Start - config menu, also showing briefing and "overhead" tactical map
Unless I've forgotten something from the original TIE Fighter game, I think this control scheme would actually work!
Careful what you wish for--a modern version would probably be released for consoles, too, and would therefor lack the deep controls that made those games what they were. Shield (and perhaps power management in general) would probably be totally gone, for one thing.
I miss those dual "dot" monitors to show other craft. It was a really inventive way to give you an idea of what's around you, without cluttering the HUD. With a little practice, the dual monitors became like second nature to me - watching someone's replay and I instantly know what other ships are around, where they are, and relative distance. And it took me years before I could no longer remember the keyboard layout. But I agree, you can't go home again on this one. Any new release would have to include the console, and I don't see how it would work.
A few months ago, I found myself thinking about what a "re-vamp" of the TIE Fighter game would look like today, on the console. You just don't have the necessary buttons to manipulate weaps/shields power transfer (don't forget "front/back"), speed (including "match speed of target"), lock-on (including "lock onto nearest enemy"), flight group commands, etc. Sure, you can get quite far by mapping buttons, but to map everything from the game, I think you'd eventually need to introduce a small menu. And that would get really distracting during a dogfight.
I have thought about this, though. Maybe too much. Using the PS3 controller, I would pick:
L stick - flight control, with option to use sixaxis instead (L3 - lock onto target in reticle)
R stick - look around (R3 - center view)
R1/L1 - primary/secondary weaps
R2/L2 - throttle up/down (smooth increments, so player would have to manually match speed to other crafts)
left/right - power recharge distribution to shields/weaps
up/down - power to front/rear shields
That leaves only the four face buttons (X, square, O, triangle) to give commands to flight group, toggle fire mode (dual/single cannons), select nearest enemy as target, manually cycle to different targets, switch to last target, show extended details of target, etc.
I figure at some point, you have to create a mini-menu (flight group commands? targets?) to fit in all the commands, which could be distracting and slow in a dogfight. Or else you need to dumb down the controls, so you drop some of the advanced targeting that made TIE Fighter such an enjoyable sim. Whichever a developer chooses, the outcome wouldn't be anything like the same sim experience.
While you could make the game so it required a keyboard, no developer is likely to do this because so few gamers connect a keyboard to their console.
"Classic DOOM and DSL Linux Desktop inside your Java-enabled browser! The latest JPC, the fast 100% Java x86 PC emulator, is now available with online demos and downloads. JPC is open source [...] Visit the website to try out some classic games and [...]"
Where it mentions playing DOOM and other DOS games, JPC is booting FreeDOS. So yes, this can run FreeDOS.
Here's a screenshot of FreeDOS in action on JPC, if you need one.
In fact, we've discussed the Java PC emulator on the FreeDOS web site since JPC was first released. We even link to it on our "About" page and "Links" page. It's a great way to introduce new users to the idea of running DOS, without asking them to install their own PC emulator, or even install FreeDOS at all.
Java PC has been released under the GNU GPL since May 2007, so to answer your question: source code is available. We mirrored an old copy of the source code from 2007, but looks like we haven't made further copies. But maybe it's enough to interest folks who don't want to wait for the JPC site to recover from its slashdotting today.
Slashdot Mirror
The article doesn't mention why there were two joysticks for the game: one to control movement, the other to control direction of fire. So you could travel in one direction while firing in another. Great freedom of movement that made the game very popular because it was such a diversion from most other games.
This is probably one of the coolest bits of trivia from the era: Jarvis had been in an accident, and his arm was in a cast when they started work on the game. It would have been impossible for him to work on the game with a typical "stick and button" approach and he decided the dual-stick design made it easier for him to design and play the game.
[...] The dual joystick control design resulted from two experiences in Jarvis's life: an automobile accident and playing Berzerk. Prior to beginning development, Jarvis injured his right hand in an accident--his hand was still in a cast when he returned to work, which prevented him from using a traditional joystick with a button. While in rehabilitation, he thought of Berzerk. Though Jarvis enjoyed the game and similar titles, he was dissatisfied with the control scheme; Berzerk used a single joystick to move the on-screen character and a button to fire the weapon, which would shoot the same direction the character was facing. Jarvis noticed that if the button was held down, the character would remain stationary and the joystick could be used to fire in any direction. This method of play inspired Jarvis to add a second joystick dedicated to aiming the direction projectiles were shot.[10] Jarvis and DeMar created a prototype using a Stargate system board and two Atari 2600 controllers attached to a control panel. In retrospect, Jarvis considers the design a contradiction that blends "incredible freedom of movement" with ease of use.
I married my high school sweetheart (dated through high school, college, got married after we both graduated.) We're both 37 now, still very happy!
We're like you: I graduated with a BA in physics but am now an IT geek, she studied literature then went on to get a Master's in theology.
I didn't realize they had books on marriage. We didn't even consider them. But over the years we realized some important things:
Oh, and can we reserve use of the term "hacker" for someone with at least a modicum of technical skills? This guy isn't even a cracker. All he did was talk on a stolen radio.
Mr Barn, I'd like to introduce you to Mr Horse. Oh, sorry - he seems to have run away already.
Gone are the days when "hacker" meant free-spirited computer programmer of the 1960's. Also long gone are the days when it meant home computer hobbyist. These days, assume "hacker" means simply breaks into stuff, or more generally "does something wrong using technology."
Use an exploit to "own" a server? Hacker. Break into your school's computer system and change a grade? Hacker. Impersonate the transit authority hub station using a radio? Hacker.
I know it's popular to hate on Word around here, but if you know what you're doing, it's not all that bad. I used Word to write my master's thesis, and by consistently using styles, along with Zotero, cross-referenced fields, and bookmarks, it came out very nice looking.
Sure, Word isn't bad ... but it's not that great, either. The big offender lately: sharing documents. We are a large enterprise, and not everyone is on Office 2007. And due to the environment, some people run Windows, and some run Mac. I work in an office, and we've found that Word doesn't always format it's own document formats the same across different versions and different platforms (Mac vs Windows.) Here's a comment I posted a few weeks ago about this:
It's true that sometimes Word will fail to render a document properly. But it's not the fault of OpenOffice - sometimes, Microsoft Word fails to properly display other Microsoft Word files. Just this morning, I saw an example in action in a meeting:
Last night, one of the attendees sent out some notes for us to read before the meeting. We all dutifully printed out our copy of the document, and brought it with us to the meeting.
Despite the fact that the document was created with Microsoft Office, and that we all run Microsoft Office, there were 3 different versions of the printed document at the meeting. You could tell by looking around the table that one version of the notes (printed from Microsoft Office for Macintosh) arranged the text around a table in a weird way. Another version (printed by Microsoft Office 2007) put a page break in a different place and put an extra blank line between a table and its caption. The original version (Microsoft Office 2003) was formatted as intended.
This was a simple 3-page document in "DOC" format, with an enumerated list of paragraphs, so it didn't take long for us to realize our copies printed out differently, and to figure out the correlation between versions of Word and how the document printed out.
I think it just goes to show: if you have a document that absolutely must preserve formatting, send it as a PDF.
I used to work with Charlie Nutter and Tom Enebo years ago, when we worked on the same Web team. And I was thrilled to hear when they moved to Sun, really was the best deal you could imagine. Note that JRuby wasn't actually bought by Sun, but remained a separate project, only the developers were paid by Sun to work on JRuby. So I wish them the best as they move to their new digs.
Good luck, guys!
I think what we should be looking for is games that had a great idea but went off in the wrong direction. Where the original idea was novel, stunning, the foundation of a truely great game, but the game itself was lacking in some way. Or games where the first installment was awesome but they botched it with the sequels.
Agree. I think two games in dire need of a reboot:
Beyond Good and Evil. And yes, I'm really looking forward to the sequel this year. I've only seen the teaser, but it looks interesting! The original game had a great story, decent combat mechanic, ... but what was truly innovative was the added camera. It had the same effect that "trophies" and "achievements" have today, but it was woven into the story.
Kya: Dark Lineage. This was a good PS2 game, decent story with plot arc, and I liked that the combat was something you had to learn and evolve (enemies would get better at blocking moves you used a lot, so you had to keep learning new moves, but somehow never [really] became a button-masher.) This game introduced a lot of cool game mechanics in one game (freefall, etc.) and clearly was the set up for a game series. But the first game didn't sell well, so no sequels were made. I imagine this is partly due to the stupid names. The friendly native people are called "Nativs", the wolf-like bad guys are "Wolfen", the money system is based on "nooties", ... Fortunately, the end of the game sees Kya transported to a new world, so a reboot could easily escape the dumb names.
I think Kya would do well in a reboot. I've occasionally thought about this, and believe the game might do well as a series of games on the PSP. I even emailed a few PSP game developers, encouraging them to get the rights/license to this game and see if they could re-use their existing platforming engine to make a "Kya 2: PSP" game. But I think the first game stank to the point that no developer wants to pick this up.
In answer to that, let me ask: Ever been to Stonehenge? I hear it's really neat.
Well, I thought it was funny, anyway ... ;-)
I use velcro strips in our house, too. Very handy for cable neatness!
One thing I'll mention here: my wife is an avid gardener, so one day when I ran out of velcro strips (brazenly taken from work years ago, when we retired a bunch of servers) my wife gave me her velcro spool that she uses to tie back the roses.
It's cheap: only $4 from most garden centers. Just cut the length you need, depending on the size of the cable bundle, or what you're attaching it to. Compare that $4 for 45 feet of green velcro to buying "custom" pre-cut velcro strips from most PC suppliers, which would run about $20 for the equivalent length.
Just as Alton Brown often recommends shopping at the hardware store for many cooking supplies, I might recommend stopping by the garden store to get velcro strips.
Don't forget Desert Bus for Hope where they raised $70,423.79 in a little over 5 days. As long as you keep paying them (during the pledge drive) they play.
I'm actually much more impressed with this, since it requires constant attention or you veer off the road, and get towed back to your starting point in real time.
Let Pen Jillette explain it!
As others have already pointed out on this thread, use encryption. If you're booting Linux, use LUKS encryption on all of /(root). For Windows, use TrueCrypt. Use a strong passphrase! If a thief ever gets your laptop, they won't be able to access anything on the drive.
I do this on all the laptops I have access to. Makes it very secure. I even have an 8GB flash drive that I use to boot my subnotebook (runs Windows when I'm at work, now runs Linux when I'm at home.) Works great.
If you're really paranoid, create a multi-boot system. You have a netbook, so you don't have a lot of hard drive space to install a (second?) Linux distro. You need something tiny like FreeDOS or a really minimal Linux install. Then set it up to nuke the entire drive without prompting the user first. (Linux can easily do an unattended shred, but FreeDOS will need a third party program to do it.) Set the bootloader to not boot an operating system by default but instead to just prompt the user. The default option should be the "nuke" instance, labeled something obvious like 'Microsoft Windows XP'. Label your real operating system something less obvious like 'Tools'. Guess what option the thief would choose?
Just don't forget and choose the wrong one yourself, or you're going to spend some time rebuilding your system.
Do you seriously believe that the steering wheel will be replaced as a control for a car? It won't.
"flapping our arms to turn, making motorboat noises to accelerate" and you ask if I seriously believe that the steering wheel will be replaced??
Think about it, the alphanumeric keyboard even predates the steering wheel by about 20 years!
Yes, but the "steering wheel" is a limited analog controller. It works only in 1 dimension (left-right.)
I think over time we'll see the steering wheel controller evolve, especially as game controllers become more advanced. Consider the influence the Wiimote controller has had on gaming. To think that in 5 years we may all laugh that we ever used a "steering wheel" to drive to work, instead of flapping our arms to turn, making motorboat noises to accelerate, etc.
We live in amazing times. The future of tomorrow is today!
:-)
I'm afraid I don't know what you are talking about. Never played BF2. I only "got into" the series at Bad Company. It was awesome, and I got totally addicted to the online play. The new B'43 uses the BC engine, not the BF2 engine - so the new B'43 is more like BC set in the Pacific Theatre of World War 2.
Too bad the graphics of pixeljunk monsters suck ass.
Yet, good games don't necessarily need good graphics.
I actually find the 2D graphics of Pixeljunk Monsters to be a nice feature. It means the graphics aren't distracting. I can concentrate on the point of the game: to build towers to defend my objective. That's all the game is about, fun gameplay. Graphics are secondary.
Monsters was very popular on PSN, so much so that the developers are re-releasing the game for PSP. It's pretty much the same game, plus some bonus levels. The same 2D graphics are there. If anything, looks like they emphasized the black outline around game objects (probably to make them easier to see on the smaller screen.) And it will probably sell very well on the PSP.
Most of the games that are coming out, suck. Plain and simple. The problem with developers is that they are confusing great technology with great games. They can go hand in hand, but largely speaking -- games need story, innovation, depth.
I'd like to disagree - but I can't. I definitely consider myself a gamer, but many of the games that have come out recently just aren't that compelling.
The games I'm really waiting for are the next Ratchet & Clank and the next Uncharted.
Honestly, I'm having more fun with PlayStation Network titles. The price point is certainly lower, but I also don't expect as much out of a $10 or $15 game - compared to the punch a $55 game should bring. As a result, I'm not that disappointed if a cheap PSN game doesn't turn out that great. So I'm willing to take more of a risk for a PSN title than a $55 retail title.
>> Ballmer and Gates also echoed the note Business Division President Stephen Elop sounded in an interview with CNET News last week--that Microsoft really doesn't know what Chrome OS will look like. "Who knows what this thing is?" Ballmer said.
> It's the Linux kernel with a new UI. Probably will have some other beefed up parts (security or graphics) along with better hardware support on select devices as they throw their weight around.
Maybe Ballmer just sucks at explaining things?
:-)
On the subject of the analog stick, I think it needs to be an either or situation. Either two analog sticks or none. The problem with a single analog stick is that it invites developers to attempt console style 3D games, but doesn't provide a means to control the camera. If Sony can't find a way to comfortably integrate both sticks then I would prefer them just to ditch them both altogether, then at least developers would be forced to design games for a specific control scheme instead of porting conventions from the PS2 that don't fit on the platform.
You clearly have not played 'Daxter' or 'Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters'. Both are action/platformers, and traditionally you'd think "two analog sticks". But the games were designed and implemented in a way that you just don't need two sticks. One stick is fine, you never miss the second analog stick. If only some PS3 games had camera systems like that.
As far as flashed based media goes, I'm aware of the reasons why Sony chose to stick with disks originally. But that was 5 years ago, it's time to rectify the situation. [...]
They have rectified the situation - Sony is moving to digital downloads. Several recent games have been digital download only ('Patapon 2' for example.) Many games have re-released as digital downloads ('Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters', 'SOCOM', etc.) So yeah, Sony has already been providing a path that doesn't solely rely on UMD's for playing games on the PSP.
Why should I have to go to a store to pick up a PSP game, these days? Either as UMD or (your suggestion) flash stick? The games aren't that big (1.8GB at most ... often much smaller) so I'd rather buy them online and push them to my PSP. It's faster, and I don't ever have the issue games being "sold out".
I guess Sony has an additional incentive, in that if you buy games from the PSN Store, you can "tie" the game to the person, so can reduce piracy. But I don't really care about the anti-piracy thing - for me, it's about having games I want to play at a price I'm willing to pay. Digital downloads are much cheaper - I mentioned in my other comment that digital downloads (obviously) don't include the cost of physical media like UMD.
As an example (on the PS3, etc.) look at 'Battlefield 1943'. I played the demo, then bought the game online. I didn't even have to leave my basement and go into the Big Blue Room (aka "outside") to pick up a copy. I just bough it. That's the way it ought to be, especially for a game like B'43 that isn't very big. Don't force gamers to go to some brick-and-mortar store to buy things.
This "buying things off the Internet" thing did eventually catch on. Learn to embrace it. :-)
> Make games that are fun.
As a gamer, I'm behind this as a general idea, no matter the platform. I'd also like to suggest the following to Sony:
Release (at least) the top 50% of your PSP game catalog as PSP digital downloads. Go through your PSP games sales records, look at which games sold best, and sell those games. Also, look at the review scores for your PSP games, sell anything that scored 7.5/10 or higher.
Just put them on PlayStation Network so we can buy them. Make it easy for us to give you our money.
Here's why that's important: PSP owners who already own the game may feel a little ripped off, since digital downloads are probably going to be cheaper than the UMD version of the game, because you aren't paying for physical media distribution. However, PSP owners who already own the game are not the primary target of this move. Instead, the target is all the people who haven't bought the game, and/or the people who may buy a PSP Go.
Those are the people that would be most interested in buying games via digital download. The PSP Go doesn't even have a UMD drive, anyway.
And it would help all the current PSP owners (like me!) who may not have bought that game (or missed it) when it came out and might like to play it.
It doesn't address new games, but it helps build up the available library of games.
I'm glad to see that Sony's trying to court developers, but it just seems like too little too late for the PSP. The PSP is just too dated as a platform to hold much appeal to me at this point. The PSP Go managed to ditch some of the legacy problems of the PSP that were holding it back, but missed a lot of obvious updates the platform could have used (2nd analog stick, capacitive touchscreen, flash based physical media, longer battery life), and it came at the cost of a ridiculous price increase.
I own a PSP (1001) and I can say that the decision to not have a second analog stick was a good idea. Holding a personal game system just isn't the same as holding a standard console controller. With a controller, you're able to grab the whole device at once, fully in both hands, leaving both your thumbs free to run the analog sticks.
With a mobile game device like the PSP (or DS), you are holding it essentially, from the edge. With one analog stick, you can hold the system with your right hand and run the analog control nub with your left hand. This actually works well, even when you need to tap the action buttons - like in a platformer (Daxter, for example.)
To be honest, stuff like the second stick, touchscreen, etc aren't going to happen.
On your other points:
Flash-based media. Yes, it would have been really cool to distribute all games on MemStick Duo or some such, back when the PSP was first released. But the UMD can hold 1.8GB of data. Now think back to when the PSP was new - how many 2GB flash drives did you see, and how expensive were they? For any that you found at the time, they were massively expensive. Sony would never have been able to sell games on MS Duo then. Sure, they can do it now - which is why you are seeing Sony change to move more PSP games to digital download.
Longer battery life The main reason the PSP's battery doesn't last as long as the DS or GBA is because it uses spinning media (UMD). I have a bunch of games for PSP - some on UMD, some as digital download. The system runs much longer when I'm playing a digital download game (like Hot Shot Golf: OT ... playing it again now) than when I am playing a UMD-based game. You'll see longer battery life get advertised as more games are pushed to digital download.
My own wishlist:
Support WPA2 in the wireless stack. A few months ago, I moved my home wireless AP to use WPA2, then realized my PSP couldn't get on the network. Had to change the AP to use WPA again.
Give me a better browser. The browser in the PSP looks and feels a lot like the browser in the PS3 - so points given for consistency. But both are pretty crappy browsers. Some sites don't render properly at all on the PSP. My local news station just did a site redesign, and now I can't view the local weather forecast. Which is (was) my PSP homepage. I'd love to see a stripped-down Gecko browser in there. Or Opera. Something better than what I have now.
Support plain SD instead of MS Duo. Is that what the other memory slot is in the PSP Go? Not sure what this would mean to Sony and copy protection - I suspect that's a key reason they put MS Duo in the PSP.
I already buy few PSP games. Are you trying to make me completely stop? Digital distribution is a guaranteed way to do it.
Actually, I prefer digital distribution. But maybe that's because I also have a PS3, so I buy PSP games from PlayStation Network, then push them to my PSP to play there. With the PS3, I don't really care how long it takes to download the game. I hear you can do the same with your PC.
But yeah, for digital distribution direct to the PSP over wireless ... I can see why this would be a pain.
In short: Yes, it's very easy to capture keystrokes over bluetooth, even when the device isn't paired with you. Google for "bluetooth keyboard sniffing".
But there are easier, more reliable ways to get information. Let's say you were involved in corporate espionage, and you wanted to capture the keystrokes of a company's CEO. Here's the easy way to do it:
It's a sad fact, but almost no one notices the cleaning staff. And the cleaning people are there when you aren't.
So for $300-$350 for the keylogger, plus $1000 (or whatever) for the bribe, and waiting a week, you now have lots of information about what the CEO has been typing. Usernames/passwords, private memos, etc.
While I have never done this, I know a tech support person in another IT department who discovered a USB keylogger had been installed on the Director's laptop dock. But I guess the Director had dropped his laptop that morning, and the techs were replacing it with a new one, including a new dock. That's how they found it, pure luck. They suspected someone was doing that to catch the Director's username/password.
I know an IT Director in another organization (a small company) and they had an incident a few years ago where the IT Manager (who also did tech support as part of a staff of 3 ... small company) installed a software keylogger on the Director's and CIO's computers as they were deployed. I understand he used this to get their passwords and read their email.
So yeah, this stuff does happen.
zOMG! I forgot "barrel roll". I think I'd assign this to X, and let triangle toggle between "nearest enemy" and "attacking enemy" (which may the same in a dogfight, anyway - very convenient.) The controls still make sense that way.
Yes, I think about these things way too much.
Ok, I know it's bad form to reply to this, especially since no one is probably looking at comments on this story anymore, but ... I had an idea:
Let's modify my suggested control list, really get into the mindset of PS3 menus. Make the R stick context-sensitive:
Move the R stick, and you get a semi-transparent circular window that pops up on the lower-right of the screen. Not enough to be distracting or cover your cockpit window. It has the flight group commands at various points - there were 8 commands you could issue, so make 9 points around the circular menu:
Just point the R stick to the menu action you want, and you get that action. If you don't move to an action (maybe you tapped the R stick by mistake) then the menu goes away after a second or so.
Click R3, and the R stick becomes "look around". Click R3 again to exit "look" mode and center your view out the cockpit.
So that means you have the face buttons and left for targeting, and Start/Select for game controls:
Unless I've forgotten something from the original TIE Fighter game, I think this control scheme would actually work!
Now, we just need someone to give it a try ... :-)
Careful what you wish for--a modern version would probably be released for consoles, too, and would therefor lack the deep controls that made those games what they were. Shield (and perhaps power management in general) would probably be totally gone, for one thing.
I miss those dual "dot" monitors to show other craft. It was a really inventive way to give you an idea of what's around you, without cluttering the HUD. With a little practice, the dual monitors became like second nature to me - watching someone's replay and I instantly know what other ships are around, where they are, and relative distance. And it took me years before I could no longer remember the keyboard layout. But I agree, you can't go home again on this one. Any new release would have to include the console, and I don't see how it would work.
A few months ago, I found myself thinking about what a "re-vamp" of the TIE Fighter game would look like today, on the console. You just don't have the necessary buttons to manipulate weaps/shields power transfer (don't forget "front/back"), speed (including "match speed of target"), lock-on (including "lock onto nearest enemy"), flight group commands, etc. Sure, you can get quite far by mapping buttons, but to map everything from the game, I think you'd eventually need to introduce a small menu. And that would get really distracting during a dogfight.
I have thought about this, though. Maybe too much. Using the PS3 controller, I would pick:
That leaves only the four face buttons (X, square, O, triangle) to give commands to flight group, toggle fire mode (dual/single cannons), select nearest enemy as target, manually cycle to different targets, switch to last target, show extended details of target, etc.
I figure at some point, you have to create a mini-menu (flight group commands? targets?) to fit in all the commands, which could be distracting and slow in a dogfight. Or else you need to dumb down the controls, so you drop some of the advanced targeting that made TIE Fighter such an enjoyable sim. Whichever a developer chooses, the outcome wouldn't be anything like the same sim experience.
While you could make the game so it required a keyboard, no developer is likely to do this because so few gamers connect a keyboard to their console.
"Classic DOOM and DSL Linux Desktop inside your Java-enabled browser! The latest JPC, the fast 100% Java x86 PC emulator, is now available with online demos and downloads. JPC is open source [...] Visit the website to try out some classic games and [...]"
Where it mentions playing DOOM and other DOS games, JPC is booting FreeDOS. So yes, this can run FreeDOS.
Here's a screenshot of FreeDOS in action on JPC, if you need one.
In fact, we've discussed the Java PC emulator on the FreeDOS web site since JPC was first released. We even link to it on our "About" page and "Links" page. It's a great way to introduce new users to the idea of running DOS, without asking them to install their own PC emulator, or even install FreeDOS at all.
Java PC has been released under the GNU GPL since May 2007, so to answer your question: source code is available. We mirrored an old copy of the source code from 2007, but looks like we haven't made further copies. But maybe it's enough to interest folks who don't want to wait for the JPC site to recover from its slashdotting today.