If the game's actually good (the WoW one actually sounds this way), then I'll give it a shot. At least the whole "raid" dungeon decks will be interesting, with the co-op focus.
If the game's horrible, then the only people who'll be buying it will be the obsessive collectors who gotta have the "phattest" cosmetic character upgrades in game.
Of course, a CCG being crap doesn't necessarily mean people will not buy it. See: Yu-Gi-Oh.
Actually, from what I hear, they're able to deal with DirectX pretty well.
It's really just Havok that's causing problems, since they're asking at the very minimum six digits for the Mac version, which would completely *kill* any port's budget.
Let's not forget that the chance of actually seeing a OS X port of Halo 2 is about as slim as a monofiliment wire, due to the "Havok" problem. (Halo 2 uses it.)
Not really anyone's fault for trying... but, Valve's asking for both arms, legs, and a few organs for the rights for it, pretty much takes up the entire development budget.
And, then, on top of that, Havok's asking for several *MORE* organs for the rights to *use* the OS X version of Havok. (According to a article over at IMG, they want six figures.) It exists... but, no one wants to pay it. See above about development budget.
Thankfully, with M1A1 (the conversion of the original Marathon to the open-source Aleph One), they've re-done the music as MP3 files, so it should sound fine on just about anything...
I bet the reason is the same as it is with just about every other game. The cost of a Macintosh port and support would be more then the money made from the Macintosh market.
Someone should tell the companies doing ports that. There sure seems to be a lot of them... Heck, even TransGaming did a few, working with MacPlay to do the Tron port. If they're not making money on them, why do they keep on doing it?
Because they are. Making money, I mean. I never knew that companies didn't *like* to make money, and take losses just for kicks...
We know that NCSoft's got a few Mac programmers, due to them having done a Mac port of Lineage 1. Let's see 'em get on a Mac port of COH, and see what happens.
At this moment, the only people who want to take my money is Blizzard, with World of Warcraft, and Sony with EQ1. (Plus a few of the smaller ones, like Second Life & A Tale in the Desert.) *holds up a wad of cash* It's there... don't you want it?
Indeed, Apple products being sold at Wal-Mart would be a great idea.
I mean, they've already got a machine that's almost in the price range as those computers: the eMac. If they were able to knock the price down to around $600-800, it'd be great. You should see what they're going up against. Our store gets at least two to three of the Gateway/HP/Whatever we sell as returns every day. I always see 'em in the Claims department when I pass by there. If the word gets out that they're selling a machine that doesn't... well, suck, that could be a big draw....But, we're talking about Wal-Mart here. The type of customers are the people who'd shove old ladies down to save a buck.
The other problem is that they'd have to somehow convince Wal-Mart to carry the *software* as well. People aren't going to buy the machines if they can't get the software. Think back to the target audience for a moment. There's people who are paranoid about buying things online, or don't want to deal with the "hassle" of ordering online, etc. At the moment, the only two pieces of software that I can think of that are Mac-Compatible are Warcraft 3 (and expansion), and Shadowbane. (It burns!) If they were to do this, they'd have to either throw their weight around a bit so that there are more hybrid CD's, or set up a whole separate section with the Mac-devoted software in it.
Indeed, Soul Calibur's a good thing to bring up when we talk about fighting games.
I believe the Soul Calibur line's a great example of a good arcade fighting game, since everyone can play it. It's perfectly possible to play through it by just button-mashing, but it's also possible to learn how the moves system works. You can do a lot of rather cool moves by just using the basic "push in a direction and hit a button" method. Of course, it's harder for random button mashers to compete with people who know what the moves do, but it's still possible to win.
I agree, I'd love to see an xbox version of YDKJwith a monthly(weekly?) new question file, then have questions picked based on last time they came up.
Guessing you didn't get a chance to play YDKJ: Online, back in the days of Bezerk (or whatever it was called). They had a thing going where several times a week, they'd put up new "episodes", containing new questions you can play through, and they had prizes for high scores. It didn't take the questions and add them all together to make a game like the normal ones, though.
It'd actually be kinda a cool idea nowadays, but they'd have to get the Jellyvision team back to work on it, otherwise if Sierra tried to do it themselves they'd just mess it up horribly.
The console idea's not too bad, either, since each player would get their own buzzer and not have to worry about crowding around a keyboard. Imagine a 'Cube version, and all the players having Wavebirds...
Re:Or, if this doesn't interest you
on
Paranoia
·
· Score: 1
Only for a little while longer. The original authors, after getting the rights back a couple years ago, are shopping it around for a brand-new edition.
Read the interview...
http://www.paranoia-live.net/modules.php?op=modl oa d&name=Sections&file=index&req=viewarticle&artid=7 &page=1
My personal holy grail that I wish Sony would come out with is...
The PS two.
Think of it like the re-release of the PSX. The new, smaller form factor. Bugs fixed.
What the PS two would have: Smaller form factor. NO DVD-movie playback (why in a second). The ability to play PS1 and PS2 games. The kicker: $100-150 price tag.
To get it down that low, they'll probably have to cut some other things, but hell, some things are just cruft anyway. Ditching the DVD playback could bring the price down, and could help with those people like myself who already have a better DVD player than what's in the PS2.
There's really only eight games I want to play on the PS2 (the 4.hack games, Gungrave, DDRMAX, Frequency, and Amplitude), so the $200 price point has been keeping me away. I know I *could* just get a refurbished one, but if Sony provided a *new* product at that price point... yay for them!
Not necessarilly (on the "dead" comment). Remember, the D'ni live a *lot* longer than normal humans. We're talking about 200-300+ years, if memory from the books have survived. It's still a good possibility that they're alive & kickin'.
A little tidbit for those college students/those with parents/friends in the education industry. Try going to the Education Apple Store, things are cheaper for 'ya.
The problem with the Gamespot review, IMO, is that they only played the first episode or two, then wrote the review. They didn't wait until the end of the season before wriring the review (which, admittingly, would have been several months later.) Most of the problems that the Gamespot review talked about were gone/dimished in 3 and 4. #4, IMO, was excellent. Tough at times puzzles, the Revelations puzzles beating the hell out of everyone's brain (one took several weeks, if memory serves)...those chapters alone should boost the game up to a 8.5/10.
And, $120? The first season was only 5 months, so it would've been $50. I'd pay $50 for five months of gameplay out of a game. Hell, we've paid more for less.
If you saw the page where you set up the phone numbers, you would know that they warn against doing that exact thing. First, they could suspend your account if they discover you did that. Second, they could take legal action against you. It's a real no-no.
Re:The gameplay was too slow
on
Goodbye, "Majestic"
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Unfortunately, you missed out on the later chapers, #'s 3 and 4 then. They took the feedback from the first two chapters, and improved on it. There's a noticable difference in the game by the end of Chapter 4. I was getting calls about once or twice a day for most of a chapter, was on Act more than Standby, and some of the points were around twelve to thirteen posts on the Progress screen. It really did pick up near the end, unfortunately, most people didn't stick on to see what would happen.
I don't think it's that, but from more of a legal standpoint. Think NDA's. Plus, it's a lot cheaper shipping inside of the US and Canada than it is for them to ship overseas.
Actually, game companies aren't forced to use any DirectX. They're actually using alternatives more nowadays. One example is Myth 3:The Wolf Age. It uses OpenGL instead of DirectX. I believe id's been using OpenGL for Quake3 and straight TCP/IP for Q3 networking.
One of the big games that just came out's lead programmers (I think that's the title of the person who was talking about it) (I think it's Civ3) was talking about how he and others at the company leveraged their way into not using DirectPlay in the latest game, since they knew it was going to go cross-platform, and they didn't want to screw the consumers by using DirectPlay so that they couldn't play with each other.
Boy, wish I could remember some more on that topic. If I find the URL's, I'll be sure to post 'em...
Nope, it's 10.1. Try saying " OS X" to a Apple Genius at one of the stores some time. You'll love their responce.;-)
When I talked to one and accidently said "X", they said "It's TEN, not "X". Say it with me now, Ten..Ten...Ten... {we pretty much chanted Ten over and over until I got it right, guess they have a course in training on "50 Different Ways to Tell Customers It's 'Ten', Not 'X'".
One of the other ones that I remember was:
AG:"How many fingers total do you have?"
Customer:"Uh, ten."
AG: "There 'ya go."
Cheers,
Paul
--------
The day that Microsoft makes a product that doesn't suck will be the day they start to make vacuum cleaners.
Slashdot Mirror
It really depends on if the game sucks or not.
If the game's actually good (the WoW one actually sounds this way), then I'll give it a shot. At least the whole "raid" dungeon decks will be interesting, with the co-op focus.
If the game's horrible, then the only people who'll be buying it will be the obsessive collectors who gotta have the "phattest" cosmetic character upgrades in game.
Of course, a CCG being crap doesn't necessarily mean people will not buy it. See: Yu-Gi-Oh.
Actually, from what I hear, they're able to deal with DirectX pretty well.
It's really just Havok that's causing problems, since they're asking at the very minimum six digits for the Mac version, which would completely *kill* any port's budget.
Let's not forget that the chance of actually seeing a OS X port of Halo 2 is about as slim as a monofiliment wire, due to the "Havok" problem. (Halo 2 uses it.)
A note on the HL2 part:
D =351
Not really anyone's fault for trying... but, Valve's asking for both arms, legs, and a few organs for the rights for it, pretty much takes up the entire development budget.
And, then, on top of that, Havok's asking for several *MORE* organs for the rights to *use* the OS X version of Havok. (According to a article over at IMG, they want six figures.) It exists... but, no one wants to pay it. See above about development budget.
Article: http://www.insidemacgames.com/features/view.php?I
Thankfully, with M1A1 (the conversion of the original Marathon to the open-source Aleph One), they've re-done the music as MP3 files, so it should sound fine on just about anything...
http://orbitalarm.bungie.org/ for the files.
I bet the reason is the same as it is with just about every other game. The cost of a Macintosh port and support would be more then the money made from the Macintosh market.
Someone should tell the companies doing ports that. There sure seems to be a lot of them... Heck, even TransGaming did a few, working with MacPlay to do the Tron port. If they're not making money on them, why do they keep on doing it?
Because they are. Making money, I mean. I never knew that companies didn't *like* to make money, and take losses just for kicks...
We know that NCSoft's got a few Mac programmers, due to them having done a Mac port of Lineage 1. Let's see 'em get on a Mac port of COH, and see what happens.
At this moment, the only people who want to take my money is Blizzard, with World of Warcraft, and Sony with EQ1. (Plus a few of the smaller ones, like Second Life & A Tale in the Desert.) *holds up a wad of cash* It's there... don't you want it?
Indeed, Apple products being sold at Wal-Mart would be a great idea.
...But, we're talking about Wal-Mart here. The type of customers are the people who'd shove old ladies down to save a buck.
I mean, they've already got a machine that's almost in the price range as those computers: the eMac. If they were able to knock the price down to around $600-800, it'd be great. You should see what they're going up against. Our store gets at least two to three of the Gateway/HP/Whatever we sell as returns every day. I always see 'em in the Claims department when I pass by there. If the word gets out that they're selling a machine that doesn't... well, suck, that could be a big draw.
The other problem is that they'd have to somehow convince Wal-Mart to carry the *software* as well. People aren't going to buy the machines if they can't get the software. Think back to the target audience for a moment. There's people who are paranoid about buying things online, or don't want to deal with the "hassle" of ordering online, etc. At the moment, the only two pieces of software that I can think of that are Mac-Compatible are Warcraft 3 (and expansion), and Shadowbane. (It burns!) If they were to do this, they'd have to either throw their weight around a bit so that there are more hybrid CD's, or set up a whole separate section with the Mac-devoted software in it.
Indeed, Soul Calibur's a good thing to bring up when we talk about fighting games.
I believe the Soul Calibur line's a great example of a good arcade fighting game, since everyone can play it. It's perfectly possible to play through it by just button-mashing, but it's also possible to learn how the moves system works. You can do a lot of rather cool moves by just using the basic "push in a direction and hit a button" method. Of course, it's harder for random button mashers to compete with people who know what the moves do, but it's still possible to win.
Guessing you didn't get a chance to play YDKJ: Online, back in the days of Bezerk (or whatever it was called). They had a thing going where several times a week, they'd put up new "episodes", containing new questions you can play through, and they had prizes for high scores. It didn't take the questions and add them all together to make a game like the normal ones, though.
It'd actually be kinda a cool idea nowadays, but they'd have to get the Jellyvision team back to work on it, otherwise if Sierra tried to do it themselves they'd just mess it up horribly.
The console idea's not too bad, either, since each player would get their own buzzer and not have to worry about crowding around a keyboard. Imagine a 'Cube version, and all the players having Wavebirds...
Only for a little while longer. The original authors, after getting the rights back a couple years ago, are shopping it around for a brand-new edition.
l oa d&name=Sections&file=index&req=viewarticle&artid=7 &page=1
Read the interview...
http://www.paranoia-live.net/modules.php?op=mod
Easilly... The Fool and his Money.
My personal holy grail that I wish Sony would come out with is...
.hack games, Gungrave, DDRMAX, Frequency, and Amplitude), so the $200 price point has been keeping me away. I know I *could* just get a refurbished one, but if Sony provided a *new* product at that price point... yay for them!
The PS two.
Think of it like the re-release of the PSX. The new, smaller form factor. Bugs fixed.
What the PS two would have:
Smaller form factor.
NO DVD-movie playback (why in a second).
The ability to play PS1 and PS2 games.
The kicker: $100-150 price tag.
To get it down that low, they'll probably have to cut some other things, but hell, some things are just cruft anyway. Ditching the DVD playback could bring the price down, and could help with those people like myself who already have a better DVD player than what's in the PS2.
There's really only eight games I want to play on the PS2 (the 4
There's my $0.02...
Not necessarilly (on the "dead" comment). Remember, the D'ni live a *lot* longer than normal humans. We're talking about 200-300+ years, if memory from the books have survived. It's still a good possibility that they're alive & kickin'.
A little tidbit for those college students/those with parents/friends in the education industry. Try going to the Education Apple Store, things are cheaper for 'ya.
Example: 5 GB iPod: $369 (Normally $399)
10 GB iPod: $469. (Normally $499)
Hey, $30 off isn't too bad. Just trying to get the word out.
Although, *I'm* a CS college student, and I want one hardcore. ;-) Go figure.
Actually, on that day, they turned the game off for about a week or so. No one' s account was charged for that time, if memory serves.
Just lettin' you know, in case you didn't know.
The problem with the Gamespot review, IMO, is that they only played the first episode or two, then wrote the review. They didn't wait until the end of the season before wriring the review (which, admittingly, would have been several months later.) Most of the problems that the Gamespot review talked about were gone/dimished in 3 and 4. #4, IMO, was excellent. Tough at times puzzles, the Revelations puzzles beating the hell out of everyone's brain (one took several weeks, if memory serves)...those chapters alone should boost the game up to a 8.5/10.
And, $120? The first season was only 5 months, so it would've been $50. I'd pay $50 for five months of gameplay out of a game. Hell, we've paid more for less.
Ooh..
If you saw the page where you set up the phone numbers, you would know that they warn against doing that exact thing. First, they could suspend your account if they discover you did that. Second, they could take legal action against you. It's a real no-no.
Unfortunately, you missed out on the later chapers, #'s 3 and 4 then. They took the feedback from the first two chapters, and improved on it. There's a noticable difference in the game by the end of Chapter 4. I was getting calls about once or twice a day for most of a chapter, was on Act more than Standby, and some of the points were around twelve to thirteen posts on the Progress screen. It really did pick up near the end, unfortunately, most people didn't stick on to see what would happen.
I don't think it's that, but from more of a legal standpoint. Think NDA's. Plus, it's a lot cheaper shipping inside of the US and Canada than it is for them to ship overseas.
The whole...
"the companies say advantages include smaller file size, better image and sound quality, and more advanced digital rights management software."
section is referring to Microsoft and Real, not Apple. Just turn the words over in your head a couple times, and it makes sense.
Update on the previous post (just found it), it was The Sims Online. Believe it or not, one of the Maxis guys posted on /. about it.
4 91 410
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=23108&cid=2
Actually, game companies aren't forced to use any DirectX. They're actually using alternatives more nowadays. One example is Myth 3:The Wolf Age. It uses OpenGL instead of DirectX. I believe id's been using OpenGL for Quake3 and straight TCP/IP for Q3 networking.
One of the big games that just came out's lead programmers (I think that's the title of the person who was talking about it) (I think it's Civ3) was talking about how he and others at the company leveraged their way into not using DirectPlay in the latest game, since they knew it was going to go cross-platform, and they didn't want to screw the consumers by using DirectPlay so that they couldn't play with each other.
Boy, wish I could remember some more on that topic. If I find the URL's, I'll be sure to post 'em...
Nope, it's 10.1. Try saying " OS X" to a Apple Genius at one of the stores some time. You'll love their responce. ;-)
When I talked to one and accidently said "X", they said "It's TEN, not "X". Say it with me now, Ten..Ten...Ten... {we pretty much chanted Ten over and over until I got it right, guess they have a course in training on "50 Different Ways to Tell Customers It's 'Ten', Not 'X'".
One of the other ones that I remember was:
AG:"How many fingers total do you have?"
Customer:"Uh, ten."
AG: "There 'ya go."
Cheers,
Paul
--------
The day that Microsoft makes a product that doesn't suck will be the day they start to make vacuum cleaners.
Although I'm not sure if this is still the same GT series he's talking about, but... http://www.gameboy.com/gtadvance/index.html