I remember playing the TMNT underwater level over and over again for weeks. I kept dying on the part where you had to navigate through the narrow tunnel with electrified seaweed, defuse the bomb and get out again. When I finally managed to get through there alive, I was elated for about 5 minutes until I died. I then realized that I would have to run that same stupid seaweed gauntlet over and over again just to get back to where I'd left off. Along with Leonardo, a little bit of my innocence died that day.
I own both Enter The Matrix and Path of Neo. Path of Neo is very linear and doesn't have a whole lot of replay value, but it has decent graphics and is somewhat entertaining to play through once (mostly for the different moves and combo visuals). I'd say it has rental value. Enter The Matrix was much the same way, except its graphics weren't the best, it's even more linear than Path of Neo and the combos/moves weren't very impressive. I'd say it has rental value as well, but less so than Path of Neo. IMO, Enter The Matrix was worse than Path of Neo.
People still play Matrix Online. I still have a subscription with a level 47 (out of 50) character. However, there isn't a whole lot of things to do once you hit level 50 besides pointless pvp and a few high-level small group combat scenarios, so I imagine that customer retention is low. Starting a new character isn't really an option, as the class system in place allows any character to play any class as long as you have the cash to level up the abilities. I'm really only playing until I hit 50, as I'm so close right now and I've never maxed out a character in an MMORPG before. Unless they get some more high level content in, I probably won't be staying for long.
Presentation helps people understand your content easily. For instance, considerthissentencewhichhasnopsaces or ThIsSeNTeNsWIChhaSMIxTCaPZaNDmiSpeLynGSAnDnOSpAcEz . Understandable but harder to read, so I wind up having to spend a bit more time to consume its content. Some of the net grammar/spelling out there is bad enough that I won't bother to take the time to decipher and read it, which means that your content has lost a potential consumer. Of course, some people take this principle to an extreme and become grammar nazis, which is the sort of person I think you're complaining about.
I'm a fan of the comics, and I thought the movie was ok. They didn't make Constantine's character quite as close to the comics as I would have liked, but I didn't go in there expecting utter fidelity.
I liked the Hellblazer series from Vertigo, so of course I wanted to watch the movie. I went into it expecting utter crap, and came out thinking it wasn't too bad. Not the best movie in the world, but it wasn't "Nick Fury" with David Hasslehoff.
It takes maybe 10 seconds to ask, "What does STFU mean?" and get a reply. It takes maybe a bit more time to Google it yourself. The aggregate time savings for acronym users, especially with popular phrases like "STFU", is more than 10 seconds. It doesn't always take you 10 seconds to figure out what STFU means if you've already learned what it means, right?
As far as being a barrier to people outside the acronym subculture, I don't expect that I'll immediately understand physics terminology by listening to two physics professors speaking for a few minutes. If I care enough about the subject, I'll look it up and learn the vocabulary.
I remember writing a batch file in DOS 5 before I knew what they were. I looked at the contents of a batch file, saw they were sequential commands, and proceeded to write my own batch file. It took me couple tries before I realized it had to have a.bat extension, but I eventually got it working. Loom.bat swapped to the Loom directory and ran the exe:) Later on I wrote little batch files to load TSRs and memory managers into memory.
Funny how some of the stupidest things can be some of your fondest memories.
Perhaps something from the Diablo series, if you consider them RPGs? There were a bunch of uber-weapons that weren't swords.
I think Shadowhearts for the PS2 might count, as the main character is a hand to hand melee fighter.
Ultima VII Part 2: Serpent Isle would probably count, as the best weapon in that game was the Swordstrike drop (just like the spell) that you could get in Moonshade by using Vibrate on one of the mages. It had insane damage, was ranged/AOE (I think), and had unlimited uses with no reagents necessary. I think the glass sword did more damage, but it was a single use weapon, whereas you could use Swordstrike indefinitely. It had swords in it, but it's more like a spell than the standard uber-sword you're complaining about.
Entomorph: Plague of the Darkfall had no weapons, just more powerful mutations for the main character. Would that count?
What about Fallout 1 and 2, everyone's favorite post-apocalyptic CRPGs? I think the best weapons in there were the guns.
I wasn't overly impressed with it, as it was a little long and uneventful for my tastes. It does have an interesting portrayal of the future, and it's not a BAD movie. Lots of people seem to like the movie, so don't avoid it just because of me.
I wouldn't require a sense of history before you could consider yourself a gamer. To be a gamer you just have to enjoy games as a significant part of your life. Anything beyond that is mere elitism, like the music snobs in your analogy.
At what point are you not considered a gamer? Am I somehow not a gamer because I've never heard of the original Doom (which I did, gotta heart IDKFA), but I thoroughly enjoyed Doom 3 and Half Life 2 (which I didn't, because I've never played them)? What if I'm only 13 and I've played games religiously since I was 7? Am I not a gamer just because I've played every FF game since VII but know nothing about I-VI (I played I and II on the NEs consoles, but nothing else)? Imposing a history requirement is discrimination on the level of record store guy snobbery.
If you wanted to give her money, you could just have sex with her and then not kill her (imagine that!) You could do this multiple times to give her lots of money. Hell, you could even just drive around with her in the car while your money depletes, then get out when you've given her enough money. That way, you wouldn't even be encouraging prostitution.
I'm not sure how much of the GTA series is limited by hardware. Maybe a few years down the road hardware will improve, and someone at Rockstar will take the time to implement non-violent alternatives like arbitration/negotiation, soup kitchens and inter vivos trusts for hookers. I'd like to see that, actually. It'd be kinda cool to sponsor a hooker through college and see what she does with her life. Maybe she'll start a family and have a "normal" life, or maybe she'll use the money to start a criminal empire. The possibilities are vast.
Because society tells people that they have to be an individual. If you're an individual, then your cell phone ring tone must be unique and not sound like everyone else's. It doesn't matter that thousands of other people chose to have the same ring tone you do. What matters is that you took the initiative to set yourself apart from the reeking masses of people who use the standard ring tones. You must not conform, for conformity is death. Be an individual or die.
IANAL. You'd have to go even further than marketing non-infringing use. You'd have to make damn sure that it looks like you ONLY intended to market yourself for non-infringing uses, as that was apparently a big factor in this case. That means you can't have discussions about taking people away from the p2p piratefest network du jour, you have to actively police your network, you can't talk about copyright infringement on the network, etc. Basically, you'd have to give off the appearance that not only were you marketing for non-infringing uses, you were actively trying to discourage illegal use. It's all an evidentiary thing. There apparently was lots of evidence in this case the the P2P companies knew and encouraged piracy. If you can avoid creating any evidence that you knew and/or did nothing about piracy on your network, you MAY have a chance of surviving a lawsuit. Of course, the ethics of doing such a thing when you actually intended to encourage piracy are another question entirely. It would be much safer to be idealistic and ACTUALLY not intend/attempt to encourage piracy, but even then I wouldn't feel completely safe.
It's an appellate case, which means the only interesting part of the proceedings would be oral argument. There won't be any new evidence or witnesses, just the appellate court trying to determine if the trial court committed any reversible errors.
If open to the public, you could watch the judges grill each lawyer on the merits of their case. As a practical matter, however, the appellate court has already made up its mind by the time oral argument occurs. Oral argument is (generally) where the judges ask for clarification and the lawyers pimp their side as much as possible.
That's exactly how it works. A character will privately contact "special" people (usually members of high-profile factions) and have them meet somwhere. He'll talk at them, they'll give some responses, then he goes away. In beta, there were a couple of open meetings where Morpheus showed up in a park and started ranting against the machine oppressors. Seraph also dueled a couple of people at some of the dueling tournaments.
The crafting system uses code bits as its base resource. There are 8 types of code bits, each labeled as code bit 1, code bit 2, etc. You combine code bits into code fragments, then use the code fragments to make an item code (similar to a template). You then compile the item code into a usuable item, which costs a certain amount of money. Each item code can only be used 15 times before it vanishes and you have to craft another one.
Re:Crafting (Coding) in MxO is horrible!
on
24 Hours In The Matrix
·
· Score: 2, Informative
You can somewhat gauge your chances of success by looking at your WriteCode skill. If an item requires a WriteCode skill of 15 and your skill is at 15, I've seen a 50/50 shot at creating the item. You can boost this by coding near the booster antennas (although a small part of me wonders if the rumors of the antennas helping coding are true or not)
The rarity of bits 1-8 isn't an issue at all. The best way to obtain a bit stock pile, as well as some of the less common bits, is to decompile Redpill Specials and Black Beanies (or whatever they're called). The Redpill Specials have a good chance of getting you every bit except 8, and the Black Beanies have a good chance of getting you every bit except 3 or 5, I think. Once you learn the recipe for both items, just make an item code, compile 15 times and decompile. I filled up storage space this way. The only downside to this method is the time it takes to compile/decompile.
The big differences, as I understand it, are the supposed level of detail in the simulation (authetic sound, handling, etc.) and the amount of customization you can perform on your car.
This is somewhat offtopic, but there was no real continuity of consciousness in Morgan's books. The consciousness that inhabited a particular body was, as I understood it, an exact electronic copy of a person. The previous consciousness died, but to the rest of the world the copy was exactly like the old consciousness. IMO, this isn't really immortality because my current consciousness (the me that is me without the meat) doesn't continue on into the new body.
It would seem like the Cthulhu series supports their contention that they do this for their own reasons. As you stated, no one really thought it was interesting and there was better material available. If that trend continues, the readers go away and they have to get real jobs. It would seem like that would be enough incentive to avoid posting things like the Cthulhu series, but they do it anyway and thus appear consistent with their stated motivation.
For me, it's the quality of their other material that keeps me reading when they do boring continuity bits like this. If I wanted Cthulhu skits, I'd go to Userfriendly. From a cynical perspective, perhaps this means that they do the normal material to keep the money rolling in, and every once in a while they do the bizarre/lame projects like Cthulhu's Christmas or Twisp and Catsby to keep themselves interested. For another possible instance of this, see Ctrl-Alt-Del's Chef Brian.
The more a player is killed, the less experience s/he is worth. The more a player kills, the _more_ s/he is worth. This discourages people from getting killed, and encourages people to kill "griefers" (aka, jerks). This works very well in conjunction with no-looting.
This system does not solve the problem of pure grief kills, where higher-level characters kill newbies just to hear them complain. I had someone do that to me in a mud once. The mud had no real player death, just unconsciousness when you lost all hp followed by a set time where you sat in a dream world until you woke up again. I was attacked and knocked unconscious, then when I woke up I was attacked until I went unconscious, ad nauseum. My body was looted when I first got knocked out, but the griefer stayed around and knocked me out again and again until I got sick of it and logged off.
Slashdot Mirror
I remember playing the TMNT underwater level over and over again for weeks. I kept dying on the part where you had to navigate through the narrow tunnel with electrified seaweed, defuse the bomb and get out again. When I finally managed to get through there alive, I was elated for about 5 minutes until I died. I then realized that I would have to run that same stupid seaweed gauntlet over and over again just to get back to where I'd left off. Along with Leonardo, a little bit of my innocence died that day.
IIRC, the particular spot they gathered in had some sentimental value to the deceased. Something to do with fishing in the pond, I believe.
I own both Enter The Matrix and Path of Neo. Path of Neo is very linear and doesn't have a whole lot of replay value, but it has decent graphics and is somewhat entertaining to play through once (mostly for the different moves and combo visuals). I'd say it has rental value. Enter The Matrix was much the same way, except its graphics weren't the best, it's even more linear than Path of Neo and the combos/moves weren't very impressive. I'd say it has rental value as well, but less so than Path of Neo. IMO, Enter The Matrix was worse than Path of Neo.
People still play Matrix Online. I still have a subscription with a level 47 (out of 50) character. However, there isn't a whole lot of things to do once you hit level 50 besides pointless pvp and a few high-level small group combat scenarios, so I imagine that customer retention is low. Starting a new character isn't really an option, as the class system in place allows any character to play any class as long as you have the cash to level up the abilities. I'm really only playing until I hit 50, as I'm so close right now and I've never maxed out a character in an MMORPG before. Unless they get some more high level content in, I probably won't be staying for long.
Presentation helps people understand your content easily. For instance, considerthissentencewhichhasnopsaces or ThIsSeNTeNsWIChhaSMIxTCaPZaNDmiSpeLynGSAnDnOSpAcEz . Understandable but harder to read, so I wind up having to spend a bit more time to consume its content. Some of the net grammar/spelling out there is bad enough that I won't bother to take the time to decipher and read it, which means that your content has lost a potential consumer. Of course, some people take this principle to an extreme and become grammar nazis, which is the sort of person I think you're complaining about.
I'm a fan of the comics, and I thought the movie was ok. They didn't make Constantine's character quite as close to the comics as I would have liked, but I didn't go in there expecting utter fidelity.
I liked the Hellblazer series from Vertigo, so of course I wanted to watch the movie. I went into it expecting utter crap, and came out thinking it wasn't too bad. Not the best movie in the world, but it wasn't "Nick Fury" with David Hasslehoff.
It takes maybe 10 seconds to ask, "What does STFU mean?" and get a reply. It takes maybe a bit more time to Google it yourself. The aggregate time savings for acronym users, especially with popular phrases like "STFU", is more than 10 seconds. It doesn't always take you 10 seconds to figure out what STFU means if you've already learned what it means, right?
As far as being a barrier to people outside the acronym subculture, I don't expect that I'll immediately understand physics terminology by listening to two physics professors speaking for a few minutes. If I care enough about the subject, I'll look it up and learn the vocabulary.
I remember writing a batch file in DOS 5 before I knew what they were. I looked at the contents of a batch file, saw they were sequential commands, and proceeded to write my own batch file. It took me couple tries before I realized it had to have a .bat extension, but I eventually got it working. Loom.bat swapped to the Loom directory and ran the exe :) Later on I wrote little batch files to load TSRs and memory managers into memory.
Funny how some of the stupidest things can be some of your fondest memories.
True, but there ARE other classes besides barbs in D2, and they have uber weapons that aren't swords.
Perhaps something from the Diablo series, if you consider them RPGs? There were a bunch of uber-weapons that weren't swords.
I think Shadowhearts for the PS2 might count, as the main character is a hand to hand melee fighter.
Ultima VII Part 2: Serpent Isle would probably count, as the best weapon in that game was the Swordstrike drop (just like the spell) that you could get in Moonshade by using Vibrate on one of the mages. It had insane damage, was ranged/AOE (I think), and had unlimited uses with no reagents necessary. I think the glass sword did more damage, but it was a single use weapon, whereas you could use Swordstrike indefinitely. It had swords in it, but it's more like a spell than the standard uber-sword you're complaining about.
Entomorph: Plague of the Darkfall had no weapons, just more powerful mutations for the main character. Would that count?
What about Fallout 1 and 2, everyone's favorite post-apocalyptic CRPGs? I think the best weapons in there were the guns.
Read it. Found it to be similar to the movie, just with the usual movie/book plot differences.
I wasn't overly impressed with it, as it was a little long and uneventful for my tastes. It does have an interesting portrayal of the future, and it's not a BAD movie. Lots of people seem to like the movie, so don't avoid it just because of me.
I wouldn't require a sense of history before you could consider yourself a gamer. To be a gamer you just have to enjoy games as a significant part of your life. Anything beyond that is mere elitism, like the music snobs in your analogy.
At what point are you not considered a gamer? Am I somehow not a gamer because I've never heard of the original Doom (which I did, gotta heart IDKFA), but I thoroughly enjoyed Doom 3 and Half Life 2 (which I didn't, because I've never played them)? What if I'm only 13 and I've played games religiously since I was 7? Am I not a gamer just because I've played every FF game since VII but know nothing about I-VI (I played I and II on the NEs consoles, but nothing else)? Imposing a history requirement is discrimination on the level of record store guy snobbery.
The remix isn't by Fatboy Slim. According to Amazon and some official-looking place, it's by Philip Steir.
If you wanted to give her money, you could just have sex with her and then not kill her (imagine that!) You could do this multiple times to give her lots of money. Hell, you could even just drive around with her in the car while your money depletes, then get out when you've given her enough money. That way, you wouldn't even be encouraging prostitution.
I'm not sure how much of the GTA series is limited by hardware. Maybe a few years down the road hardware will improve, and someone at Rockstar will take the time to implement non-violent alternatives like arbitration/negotiation, soup kitchens and inter vivos trusts for hookers. I'd like to see that, actually. It'd be kinda cool to sponsor a hooker through college and see what she does with her life. Maybe she'll start a family and have a "normal" life, or maybe she'll use the money to start a criminal empire. The possibilities are vast.
Because society tells people that they have to be an individual. If you're an individual, then your cell phone ring tone must be unique and not sound like everyone else's. It doesn't matter that thousands of other people chose to have the same ring tone you do. What matters is that you took the initiative to set yourself apart from the reeking masses of people who use the standard ring tones. You must not conform, for conformity is death. Be an individual or die.
IANAL. You'd have to go even further than marketing non-infringing use. You'd have to make damn sure that it looks like you ONLY intended to market yourself for non-infringing uses, as that was apparently a big factor in this case. That means you can't have discussions about taking people away from the p2p piratefest network du jour, you have to actively police your network, you can't talk about copyright infringement on the network, etc. Basically, you'd have to give off the appearance that not only were you marketing for non-infringing uses, you were actively trying to discourage illegal use. It's all an evidentiary thing. There apparently was lots of evidence in this case the the P2P companies knew and encouraged piracy. If you can avoid creating any evidence that you knew and/or did nothing about piracy on your network, you MAY have a chance of surviving a lawsuit. Of course, the ethics of doing such a thing when you actually intended to encourage piracy are another question entirely. It would be much safer to be idealistic and ACTUALLY not intend/attempt to encourage piracy, but even then I wouldn't feel completely safe.
It's an appellate case, which means the only interesting part of the proceedings would be oral argument. There won't be any new evidence or witnesses, just the appellate court trying to determine if the trial court committed any reversible errors.
If open to the public, you could watch the judges grill each lawyer on the merits of their case. As a practical matter, however, the appellate court has already made up its mind by the time oral argument occurs. Oral argument is (generally) where the judges ask for clarification and the lawyers pimp their side as much as possible.
That's exactly how it works. A character will privately contact "special" people (usually members of high-profile factions) and have them meet somwhere. He'll talk at them, they'll give some responses, then he goes away. In beta, there were a couple of open meetings where Morpheus showed up in a park and started ranting against the machine oppressors. Seraph also dueled a couple of people at some of the dueling tournaments.
The crafting system uses code bits as its base resource. There are 8 types of code bits, each labeled as code bit 1, code bit 2, etc. You combine code bits into code fragments, then use the code fragments to make an item code (similar to a template). You then compile the item code into a usuable item, which costs a certain amount of money. Each item code can only be used 15 times before it vanishes and you have to craft another one.
You can somewhat gauge your chances of success by looking at your WriteCode skill. If an item requires a WriteCode skill of 15 and your skill is at 15, I've seen a 50/50 shot at creating the item. You can boost this by coding near the booster antennas (although a small part of me wonders if the rumors of the antennas helping coding are true or not)
The rarity of bits 1-8 isn't an issue at all. The best way to obtain a bit stock pile, as well as some of the less common bits, is to decompile Redpill Specials and Black Beanies (or whatever they're called). The Redpill Specials have a good chance of getting you every bit except 8, and the Black Beanies have a good chance of getting you every bit except 3 or 5, I think. Once you learn the recipe for both items, just make an item code, compile 15 times and decompile. I filled up storage space this way. The only downside to this method is the time it takes to compile/decompile.
The big differences, as I understand it, are the supposed level of detail in the simulation (authetic sound, handling, etc.) and the amount of customization you can perform on your car.
This is somewhat offtopic, but there was no real continuity of consciousness in Morgan's books. The consciousness that inhabited a particular body was, as I understood it, an exact electronic copy of a person. The previous consciousness died, but to the rest of the world the copy was exactly like the old consciousness. IMO, this isn't really immortality because my current consciousness (the me that is me without the meat) doesn't continue on into the new body.
It would seem like the Cthulhu series supports their contention that they do this for their own reasons. As you stated, no one really thought it was interesting and there was better material available. If that trend continues, the readers go away and they have to get real jobs. It would seem like that would be enough incentive to avoid posting things like the Cthulhu series, but they do it anyway and thus appear consistent with their stated motivation.
For me, it's the quality of their other material that keeps me reading when they do boring continuity bits like this. If I wanted Cthulhu skits, I'd go to Userfriendly. From a cynical perspective, perhaps this means that they do the normal material to keep the money rolling in, and every once in a while they do the bizarre/lame projects like Cthulhu's Christmas or Twisp and Catsby to keep themselves interested. For another possible instance of this, see Ctrl-Alt-Del's Chef Brian.
The more a player is killed, the less experience s/he is worth. The more a player kills, the _more_ s/he is worth. This discourages people from getting killed, and encourages people to kill "griefers" (aka, jerks). This works very well in conjunction with no-looting.
This system does not solve the problem of pure grief kills, where higher-level characters kill newbies just to hear them complain. I had someone do that to me in a mud once. The mud had no real player death, just unconsciousness when you lost all hp followed by a set time where you sat in a dream world until you woke up again. I was attacked and knocked unconscious, then when I woke up I was attacked until I went unconscious, ad nauseum. My body was looted when I first got knocked out, but the griefer stayed around and knocked me out again and again until I got sick of it and logged off.