While I really appreciate your terminology, that isn't the reason.
I switched to OS X in college because I wanted something that "just worked", and it did (my windows/linux gaming rig developed some chronic hardware problems, which pretty much drove me insane). I admit, I hated Apple before that point, but pretty much fell instantly in love. But after college I made the mistake of buying a first generation Intel Mac Mini, which was a dreadful mistake, that thing was a peice of shit, and much, MUCH, slower than my "old" PPC Macbook with the same specs. Further, Apple includes very minor API changes in every new version, which developers incorporate meaning that most apps aren't backwards compatible with previous releases, forcing me to upgrade if I want my software to updated. Further, after college my leisure time expanded greatly so I wanted something I could tinker with and play games on again. This is obviously not Apple's strong suit. My girlfriend, a lifelong Apple supporter, also had some truly horrible support experiences with Apple in this time frame (burnt out mainboard on a brand new, very expensive, laptop... followed by the same again... followed by it happening out of Apple Care's time frame... Followed by a "Genius" saying "you're out of luck, GG").
Moving to the present... If I still had a hankering of Apple now, which I don't, I wouldn't because I don't support their business practices and current direction. The things I liked about OS X are probably going to die off thanks to them wanting everything to be a silly mobile device. I don't have any faith in them.
I still miss the OS X ecosystem though. I don't miss Apple (much of their software is a horrible mess... I'm looking at you iTunes), but I do miss OS X.
I agree though, I am platform agnostic. Right now I'm using Windows because it fits my needs (Gaming, and photo editing). If Steam on Linux takes off, and it gets something comparable to Photoshop (Gimp doesn't count, for me at least) and Lightroom (I hear Darkroom is good); I'll probably hop back over. If Apple gets it shit together, or releases OS X standalone (HA!) I'd be open to moving back over there. I find picking favorites to be a bit silly though, all of the big three are very competent, and mature now, and all of them have strengths and weaknesses over their competition.
There are still a couple things I miss from back when I used OS X (around 5-6 years ago now). Adium is by far the best IM client. Quicksilver was beyond brilliant. Omni Outliner helped me right many a long paper in college, and Onenote isn't quite as good. Textmate and Textwrangler was also very good. I haven't found replacements for these in Windows or Linux land yet, or replacements that can match their level of usability and polish.
Granted, none of these could woo me back to OS X, especially now, but they were better than anything I've found on any other platform.
OS X is the king of productivity apps, and the people who generally make OS X apps actually pay attention to their usability and interface, unlike most devs in Linux land.
DISCLAIMER: I've never even seen a Metro app, so I have no problem ignoring Metro entirely unless I need to open something else.
Pretty much the same here. Metro apps suck. There are exactly two apps I use, Pulse and Groove. Pulse is pretty nice in Metro, since it fits how I use it, and I don't mind music players docking to 20% of my screen most of the time. Everything else I've tried has been crap. I do like live-tiles though, even if I never open their attached apps.
I don't get the new Start screen hate though. I actually like it better than the start menu, it can can store more programs in priority locations, before I have to dig into a menu and hunt. Though I pretty much only searched in Win 7, and still pretty much only do; I've never actually had to dig into the messy, unorganized (and inferior) "all apps" menu. I think it looks nice, and I can organize it in very useful ways.
Obviously different strokes for different strokes, it works for me, but might not work for others, this is fine. I just don't get people stating their opinion like some objective fact, and that all who disagree must be idiotic blinding "fan boys".
This isn't to say I don't have complaints. Whoever was doing usability, consistency, and ergonomics must have been on vactaion when they designed some things. I don't mind hot corners, I used them on OS X and in KDE, but having alt-tab and top-left corner display different things, but with overlap is annoying. Accessing power/sleep is annoying. The bottom right hot-corner is a mess, since it can hide windows, OR open the inanely named "charm bar", which again duplicates the functions of the bottom left corner, but with more arbitrary options. Metro apps are dumb, I wouldn't mind them if I could arbitrarily scale them (or at least have a 50/50% option), but 20% is rarely useful. In app ads, for MS apps, in an OS that I paid for is dumb.
Though I might actually start utilizing apps more, when iGoogle dies.
I like both of these services, and use them... but they are very different from Reader. Reader is for feeds that I read over 60% of, and want to read every day. Pulse and Taptu are for things I browse, where I might want to read a single article from in a week or so, time willing.
I'm getting a bit sick of Google. I still don't know what to do when they kill iGoogle, I like having my mail, (soon to be dead) feeds, weather. and Slashdot on one page, along with the always useful search. I'm guessing I'm going to have to just use Windows 8 tiles instead, which probably isn't Google's preferable action. I'm sure they want me to use Google+ for all this, or something else (Chrome apps) that they will kill in another year, or just can't be bothered to support (like Reader, at this moment).
What really irks me is that Reader is about all I use my Nexus 7 for these days outside of IMDB and stupid searches.
Supreme Commander and Forged Alliance were very fun. I keep meaning on reinstalling them, even if I didn't like the AI very much (I'm very much a slow build turtle, which isn't really possible with its AI). They weren't as fun as TA though, TA has an awesome community, and one of the best mod scenes I've ever seen. I think I actually spent more time on the TA boards than actually playing. TA, and Supreme commander were more my style than Starcaft, since it got rid of all the economy stuff ("you need more vespene gas, spawn more overlords, mine more minerals!") and focused on just combat.
Planetary Annihilation looks fun, I've thrown a couple bucks their way. I generally avoid Kickstarter, but I'd give various important parts of my anatomy to get some decent RTS games. Right now its pretty much just Starcraft. Generals, or whatever its called now, is going to suck. Everything else is softcore, social, and based on microtransactions. The Dawn of War series almost did it, but I consider its squad based tactics to be a different beast altogether, fun, but different. I miss multi-hour fights with 4 players on a large map, with stalemates, desperate rushes, and nukes, to the point where wreckage was causing choke-points, and forest fires brought my (then very good) computer to its knees.
If you have more than 3 people in the same room, you can forget about you all playing SC2 at the same time.
Perhaps I'm missing something here, since I've never attempted to play SCII in the same room with people, but why couldn't you play it? We have more than three network enable devices using the internet at once in our house and no issues, even when being used at the same time. At one point we've had five PCs, 3 tablets, a network enabled bluray, and two consoles all concurrently sharing a 15mb connection, with no issues besides Netflix being unhappy.
The LAN battles in Starcraft created an **entire professional gaming industry**
And now most of the competitive games don't have LAN play anymore, LOL is probably one of the biggest ones out there, and no LAN play. SCII is a big one on professional tournaments, despite not having LAN play.
Times change, technology moves one.
But for some reason saying that LAN is now a niche market is somehow trolling.
Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't complain if they included it. And they're are plenty of things I dislike about where the market is moving (always online single player, being the biggest, DLC and microtransactions being the next in the list). Blizzard has made some boneheaded moves, and pretty much lost me as a fan. LAN mode isn't on the list of reasons though.
It isn't trolling pointing out that the amount of people who won't buy a game because of the lack of LAN functionality is pretty much insignificant. Yes, LAN was important in the history of gaming and esports, but it isn't anymore. Yes, some portions of the population want it, or even need it, but these people don't matter to the bottom line anymore. Ten years ago they did. But not anymore.
Not since the early 2000s, and even then it was there, but only in the form of dial-up. Later they were all in college, with a very decent university connection. Oddly, then we'd all play mostly online, but in the same set of rooms (two dorm rooms with a shared bathroom, one room for one team, the other for the other). Though this devolved into doing WoW crap together, but in the same vicinity.
Generally if I'm somewhere without internet I've got better things to do than play games. And if internet isn't available I have board games and a well stocked cooler of beer.
Yes, it really is. Just because some people do it, doesn't mean that the majority (or even sizable minority) do it. You have a fringe case there, probably. It sounds fun, though.
The fact that you don't understand the difference between being online with someone and being in the same room is pretty damn sad.
I don't? Could you please point to where I said that. I didn't. I play games with people in the room, though these are generally console or board games. I haven't really done that LAN thing since back when FPS didn't suck (Q3A, and UT were mainstays) I could, if I wanted to, play Starcraft II with someone in the room as well, since I have decent internet and a nice wireless router, as does everyone else I know.
Your right when it comes to team play... But I've pretty much completely adapted to using vent or teamspeak thanks to years of online gaming and MMOs. This is making me a bit nostalgic, I would try to get a good old LAN party going if all my friends didn't have jobs and families and generally stopped paying attention to modern hardware.
So you'd have rather either waited an extra year or two, or accepted around 1/3 less content for the same price?
Pretty rational, if you ask me.
Don't get me wrong, Blizzard has been on my shit-list for a while now, and I probably won't be buying this expansion, but I really can't complain. Its a full length game, as big as the original, for less money. Back before this DLC bullshit that we accept now, games released giant $40 expansions, as opposed to miniscule $10 DLC. This was an accepted practice. And it is a practice I wish we could return to.
Remember Starcraft? The one that was such a big success? The one with local LAN games and dedicated servers?
Fun facts; SCII is a big success as well, at least in terms of amount of players and amount of profit made. Further, I remember Starcraft, I enjoyed it (not as much as TA, but still), and never once played it on a LAN. I did play on Battle.net, though, even with my friends in same city. So, really, Blizzard game me what I wanted. Sure, not you, but perhaps its time to realize that you're a minority, and companies have no reason whatsoever to cater to your wishes.
LAN is irrelevant these days. There is no real reason for a majority of people to want it anymore. If it has a LAN feature, a miniscule fraction of people would use it, so why bother? Sure, I could lug my giant computer to a friends house, and futz with networks... or I could just hop into a game with them, over my more than adequate internet connection. Which would I rather do? The quick and easy one. I can still lug my computer to their house and play, by the way. LAN gives no real benefit over the internet these days. When the original Starcraft came out, my internet sucked, this isn't true for the majority of people (or at least people who can blow $60 on a game, and $600+ on a rig that can play it) anymore.
Sure, I'd prefer it, more options and more features are always good. But in this day and age constant internet access is pretty much a given.
Unless, after launching, it continued to fly under its own power. At that point we can safely call it a plane. Unless many "planes" launched off carriers are actually "glorified gliders" as well, of course.
The big difference is that out here, not in prison, I'm free to do many, many, things. In prison I'm free to sit and stare at a wall, and perhaps, if I'm lucky, watch some TV or read an accepted book. Out here, I'm free to go for a long walk with my camera, or go hiking, or hang out in a pub with friends, or have a nice BBQ with my family.
If I had free money, and no obligations I'd probably go on a nice long road-trip with my camera and a couple good books (and a good bottle of bourbon).
I am younger, as well (mid-30s). I might not be typical (posting to/. might be proof of that), though. I have no idea what typical is. When I was a kid I probably would have spent it all on drugs and video games, so... who knows.
You're right, I should have popped a qualifier in there. I'm sure there was one in my head, but I probably (dumbly) took it as implied, or thought I threw it in. My basic premise is that different groups would do different things in this scenario, and that there probably isn't a univeral action that would be shared by all cultures. This magical post-scarcity economy would be more or less effective depending on culture and region. Obviously this isn't universal within cultures either, but I don't really feel that I need to state that. The internet is much more cynical than me.
I suppose it all hinges on what we consider to be useful or productive. I probably wouldn't clean toilets, but I would fully devote myself to my hobbies, which could be useful in some sense.
If I were a multi-millionaire, I'd still work...
Me too, but the difference is that I'd work for myself and not others, on my terms, and only on my terms. I also wouldn't be productive in a traditional sense, I'd work on my hobby, which is an art and not "useful" in a pragmatic sense.
don't believe you can say that with any kind of authority based on that statement alone, no. Within your city, you may find that there are significant differences between the hispanic residents and the non-hispanic residents; however that in and of itself has no bearing on the culture of hispanic people in general - only on the hispanic culture within your city, which likely has many other influencing factors beyond the culture from which these people (or their forebears) came.
Obviously, I didn't figure I needed to include two pages of caveats over not being able to say things about things I don't know, or the fact that I accept that my experiences aren't universal and are purely anecdotal. Or that individual differences exist, as well as regional ones, and sub-cultural ones, within any large culture. Including all these caveats would make it very annoying to say anything, about anything, ever. I figure that people will take it as a given, and not just jump to the conclusion that I'm a racist or bigot.
We can go farther and say that I only have experienced a small subset of the hispanic community in my city, and this I can't say anything about any other area of my city. We can subdivide this to the point where no one can say anything about anyone, or anything, except themselves. Eventually you have to accept that generalizations are useful, and accept that they always have implied caveats and conditions. They are useful for the point of this discussion, but they aren't authoritative or scientific. In a informal internet discussion about a science fiction thought experiement bought on about the business practices of a silly game publisher, I'd say it is good enough.
Again, the internet has a far more cynical take on thing than I do, or ever could have.
Who said the safety net got you a middle class lifestyle?
This is in response to a hypothetical "post-scarcity" economy, where most jobs are done cheaply by machines, and resources are magically plentiful and not really limited, and not about welfare states or safety nets. There would be no "down and outers" in this hypothetical scenario, since most jobs would be purely optional.
This isn't ever going to happen, but it is an enlightening and interesting thought experiment.
It has nothing to do with our current reality, or probably with any future reality, so my background has nothing to do it (I'm not rich, and eggs are way too damn expensive).
It broke down long before that. Imagine what would happen to the price of goods and services overnight. The inflation would be astounding, and we'd probably end up where we were before the change, except we'd need more currency (worth much less) to do the same thing.
It's very clear what you meant by "sitting on their butts."
Clear to everyone but me, which is odd, since I said it. I meant no negative connotation, and that isn't "back pedalling" since it wasn't meant in the first place. It was a phrase, nothing more, nothing less. I'm sitting on my but right now. In my job I sit on my butt a good deal as well. My girlfriends job involves her sitting on her but for 8 hours a day, as do many other people's.
The phrase also has the connotation of "not doing anything regarded as constructive". Which in the context of this discussion would include "frivolous" things like spending time with your family instead of pursuing vast sums money for the sake of having money, or being productive for the sake of being productive.
If I was misunderstood, or didn't take time to clarify (I forgot that the internet is hyper-sensitive), I apologize.
Just because there's a phrase "The protestant work ethic" does not actually mean that protestants want to or do work any harder than any other group
Never said they do. Its a term. Most of my family is either Catholics, lapsed Catholics, or rabid atheists, and I can proudly say they all have the "Protestant work ethic". The term has long been divorced from actually being a Protestant, and is more a nod towards the cultural roots of the phrase. The fact remains, that history leaves an imprint on culture, and culture effects the present. You can't deny that extreme sects of Protestantism (mainly Calvinism) has a large impact on America, what is was, and what it is today. This, obviously is true in other places, mostly in northern Europe.
HOW THE HELL IS SAYING THAT DIFFERENT CULTURES HAVE DIFFERENT VALUES BIGOTED?! I feel live I'm sitting in a freshman sociology or anthropology class right now. Different things are different. Different cultures are different. How is that bigoted or offensive? And no, living in a city with a large hispanic culture doesn't make me an "expert", but I can make observations, especially since I lived with them, in the same conditions, in the same part of town, and mainly associated with them, and their families for the first 20 years of my life, and still count them as the large majority of my adult friend group. I guess I'm a white guy, so I'm not allowed to say anything about anything but white guys. Further, I can't say anything about white guys out of my region. Or of different cultural milieus, or backgrounds, or religions of social classes, or... screw it.
I never said that Americans are superior. I never said anyone else is inferior. And I find it absolutely bizarre that people putting a higher value on family than on mostly-meaningless activity is somehow supposed to be negative. My point was that cultures have different values (big surprise), and that Americans, and others with our Calvinistic roots, are not representative.
As a person who lives in a large city, with a fairly large Hispanic population, I can say with authority that cultural differences exist. Saying things are different doesn't equate to saying that one thing is better than another. Different is different. Other cultures don't have the same historical roots as the US (and northern Europe), and thus have different value systems. That is NOT a bigoted statement.
In some cultures; work is a means to an end. In some other cultures work is an ends to itself. If you freed people from the need to work, the latter cultures would continue to work; while the former would have no reason to since the ends are met.
I'm glad that spending time with your family is considered a bad thing by some. I live in a city with a large Hispanic population, and the cultural differences are pretty obvious. Americans are somewhat strange in how little we value our extended families (certain areas of the country differ in this, obviously) That isn't a value judgement, and those who read it as one have some baggage of their own.
Further, that statement wasn't about America being good, or special. We just have a culture that was formed, in part, by Calvinism and certain sects of Prostentism, which hold that work is one of the most important things in the universe. Work, any work, is Godly. This is the "protestant work ethic", we have it, and others don't share the same cultural and historic roots as Americans.
How the hell is pointing out differences between cultures bigoted? Have we gotten that PC or has cultural relativism taken off to that point already?
That wasn't a "fuck yeah" comment, more of one based on our cultural values. The ones springing from, mostly, Calvinism and certain flavors of Protestantism. Certain cultures in America are very big on the "Protestant work-ethic" still. It is so ingrained that there are people like my family who think the answer to every problem (not just economic) is more work, it doesn't matter what work, just work. Oddly my family is mostly Irish and catholic in heritage. My father is a rather extreme atheist, and he still holds this philosophy. I'm guessing parts of Europe would have the same trait as well, especially the northern bits with the same historical antecedents.
at that point the system collapsed and took the Roman empire with it.
So it wasn't the Germanic tribes? Or the Christians? Or over-extending their military followed by Germanic tribes and Christians? Or deforestation and spoiling natural resources? It wasn't a massive bureaucracy that grew from having the first continental empire? It wasn't a series of inept and mad leaders? It wasn't lead pipes?
I'm glad you solved it. This also ignores the fact that it is nearly impossible to actually point at a moment in time and say; "this is when Rome fell!", since they never did. They just shrunk to insignificance.
Perhaps. I might do that for the first year, but then I'd be bored again.
The thing is, in a hypothetical future give everyone a living wage, with enough money to basically be the equivalent of today's middle class, but don't bar them from making money doing other things, if others find it valuable.
Though in the way this idea is commonly used, it says that we all will end up doing useful labor anyway, since we can't stand being idle. I find this absurd, though it might hold true for Americans, since we inherited a fair amount of our work ethic from our Protestant forebears. For the rest of the world? I'm sure they'd be content to sit on their butts, and spend time with their families.
Hell, I'm not even sure that I'd do anything useful. I might devote my full time to pastimes I love, or just sit on my ass eating cheetos and playing video games... Who knows?
Actually, from what you described, you had disposable income back then too. As you said, you managed to save and beg your way to buy games. The difference is more about where the money came from, not the amount of money that went to the industry.
Technically you are correct. Though back in the Atari and NES days, I couldn't save, and had no income being pretty young. So It was more of a disposable handout, since my parents really didn't get, or like those video game things. More often than not all the neighbor kids would just trade games, or play in someone elses living room. My "spending" was really around $60-120 a year. Later, in the 90's, when Interplay and Blizzard were at their primes, I was old enough to do odd jobs, and actually had my own money. This later part I'd consider disposable income, technically, at least.
As you also admitted, you don't buy a $60 game a month these days, even if you could. And remember inflation: even if you didn't buy games frequently back then, the few times you did you were giving them good money.
It would be interesting to see how much money I shove into the industry now, versus then including inflation. Poking around a bit, it looks like $60 in 1984, is around $104 now. I'm not sure how accurate this is. So I'd have to spend around $200 to break even with my past self (or rather my parents). I know last year I probably beat it, but that was a rare year, and back when I played WoW, I far exceeded it. Its hard to tell, with incidentals like micropayments, small purchases during Steam sales and GoG, and factoring in upgrades and peripherals.
I do see your point though. I'm also a smaller part because the market has grown exponentially since then. Gaming is everywhere, it is ubiquitous and accepted now.
2) Do something about it yourself. Invest or start yourself companies who make the type of games you want. Don't just be the guy funding Kickstarter projects when they show up on the site. Be the guy who's giving money (or doing the work himself) before a Kickstarter page even existed.
This would be nice, but sadly I lack the skills, or enough money to actually fund at the ground-floor. If I did know some folks making a good indie game, I'd buy them a beer, though.
I really don't think everything as as doom-and-gloomy as we think it is. I really do think that we are living in the golden age of gaming, right now. Yes, the big studios are moving to the darkside, but thanks to good distribution networks, and people who grew up on games coding, the market has diversified further than it ever has been. Its getting like music, where it is very rare that I buy something from a big publisher, more and more of my money is going to smaller studios. Sure its less money per purchase, but it feeds more fish now. Which is always a good thing.
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So, why aren't you running it? Religious reasons?
While I really appreciate your terminology, that isn't the reason.
I switched to OS X in college because I wanted something that "just worked", and it did (my windows/linux gaming rig developed some chronic hardware problems, which pretty much drove me insane). I admit, I hated Apple before that point, but pretty much fell instantly in love. But after college I made the mistake of buying a first generation Intel Mac Mini, which was a dreadful mistake, that thing was a peice of shit, and much, MUCH, slower than my "old" PPC Macbook with the same specs. Further, Apple includes very minor API changes in every new version, which developers incorporate meaning that most apps aren't backwards compatible with previous releases, forcing me to upgrade if I want my software to updated. Further, after college my leisure time expanded greatly so I wanted something I could tinker with and play games on again. This is obviously not Apple's strong suit. My girlfriend, a lifelong Apple supporter, also had some truly horrible support experiences with Apple in this time frame (burnt out mainboard on a brand new, very expensive, laptop... followed by the same again... followed by it happening out of Apple Care's time frame... Followed by a "Genius" saying "you're out of luck, GG").
Moving to the present... If I still had a hankering of Apple now, which I don't, I wouldn't because I don't support their business practices and current direction. The things I liked about OS X are probably going to die off thanks to them wanting everything to be a silly mobile device. I don't have any faith in them.
I still miss the OS X ecosystem though. I don't miss Apple (much of their software is a horrible mess... I'm looking at you iTunes), but I do miss OS X.
I agree though, I am platform agnostic. Right now I'm using Windows because it fits my needs (Gaming, and photo editing). If Steam on Linux takes off, and it gets something comparable to Photoshop (Gimp doesn't count, for me at least) and Lightroom (I hear Darkroom is good); I'll probably hop back over. If Apple gets it shit together, or releases OS X standalone (HA!) I'd be open to moving back over there. I find picking favorites to be a bit silly though, all of the big three are very competent, and mature now, and all of them have strengths and weaknesses over their competition.
There are still a couple things I miss from back when I used OS X (around 5-6 years ago now). Adium is by far the best IM client. Quicksilver was beyond brilliant. Omni Outliner helped me right many a long paper in college, and Onenote isn't quite as good. Textmate and Textwrangler was also very good. I haven't found replacements for these in Windows or Linux land yet, or replacements that can match their level of usability and polish.
Granted, none of these could woo me back to OS X, especially now, but they were better than anything I've found on any other platform.
OS X is the king of productivity apps, and the people who generally make OS X apps actually pay attention to their usability and interface, unlike most devs in Linux land.
DISCLAIMER: I've never even seen a Metro app, so I have no problem ignoring Metro entirely unless I need to open something else.
Pretty much the same here. Metro apps suck. There are exactly two apps I use, Pulse and Groove. Pulse is pretty nice in Metro, since it fits how I use it, and I don't mind music players docking to 20% of my screen most of the time. Everything else I've tried has been crap. I do like live-tiles though, even if I never open their attached apps.
I don't get the new Start screen hate though. I actually like it better than the start menu, it can can store more programs in priority locations, before I have to dig into a menu and hunt. Though I pretty much only searched in Win 7, and still pretty much only do; I've never actually had to dig into the messy, unorganized (and inferior) "all apps" menu. I think it looks nice, and I can organize it in very useful ways.
Obviously different strokes for different strokes, it works for me, but might not work for others, this is fine. I just don't get people stating their opinion like some objective fact, and that all who disagree must be idiotic blinding "fan boys".
This isn't to say I don't have complaints. Whoever was doing usability, consistency, and ergonomics must have been on vactaion when they designed some things. I don't mind hot corners, I used them on OS X and in KDE, but having alt-tab and top-left corner display different things, but with overlap is annoying. Accessing power/sleep is annoying. The bottom right hot-corner is a mess, since it can hide windows, OR open the inanely named "charm bar", which again duplicates the functions of the bottom left corner, but with more arbitrary options. Metro apps are dumb, I wouldn't mind them if I could arbitrarily scale them (or at least have a 50/50% option), but 20% is rarely useful. In app ads, for MS apps, in an OS that I paid for is dumb.
Though I might actually start utilizing apps more, when iGoogle dies.
I like both of these services, and use them... but they are very different from Reader. Reader is for feeds that I read over 60% of, and want to read every day. Pulse and Taptu are for things I browse, where I might want to read a single article from in a week or so, time willing.
I'm getting a bit sick of Google. I still don't know what to do when they kill iGoogle, I like having my mail, (soon to be dead) feeds, weather. and Slashdot on one page, along with the always useful search. I'm guessing I'm going to have to just use Windows 8 tiles instead, which probably isn't Google's preferable action. I'm sure they want me to use Google+ for all this, or something else (Chrome apps) that they will kill in another year, or just can't be bothered to support (like Reader, at this moment).
What really irks me is that Reader is about all I use my Nexus 7 for these days outside of IMDB and stupid searches.
Supreme Commander and Forged Alliance were very fun. I keep meaning on reinstalling them, even if I didn't like the AI very much (I'm very much a slow build turtle, which isn't really possible with its AI). They weren't as fun as TA though, TA has an awesome community, and one of the best mod scenes I've ever seen. I think I actually spent more time on the TA boards than actually playing. TA, and Supreme commander were more my style than Starcaft, since it got rid of all the economy stuff ("you need more vespene gas, spawn more overlords, mine more minerals!") and focused on just combat.
Planetary Annihilation looks fun, I've thrown a couple bucks their way. I generally avoid Kickstarter, but I'd give various important parts of my anatomy to get some decent RTS games. Right now its pretty much just Starcraft. Generals, or whatever its called now, is going to suck. Everything else is softcore, social, and based on microtransactions. The Dawn of War series almost did it, but I consider its squad based tactics to be a different beast altogether, fun, but different. I miss multi-hour fights with 4 players on a large map, with stalemates, desperate rushes, and nukes, to the point where wreckage was causing choke-points, and forest fires brought my (then very good) computer to its knees.
If you have more than 3 people in the same room, you can forget about you all playing SC2 at the same time.
Perhaps I'm missing something here, since I've never attempted to play SCII in the same room with people, but why couldn't you play it? We have more than three network enable devices using the internet at once in our house and no issues, even when being used at the same time. At one point we've had five PCs, 3 tablets, a network enabled bluray, and two consoles all concurrently sharing a 15mb connection, with no issues besides Netflix being unhappy.
Yep. Hence the disclaimer: "...or at least people who can blow $60 on a game, and $600+ on a rig that can play it".
The LAN battles in Starcraft created an **entire professional gaming industry**
And now most of the competitive games don't have LAN play anymore, LOL is probably one of the biggest ones out there, and no LAN play. SCII is a big one on professional tournaments, despite not having LAN play.
Times change, technology moves one.
But for some reason saying that LAN is now a niche market is somehow trolling.
Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't complain if they included it. And they're are plenty of things I dislike about where the market is moving (always online single player, being the biggest, DLC and microtransactions being the next in the list). Blizzard has made some boneheaded moves, and pretty much lost me as a fan. LAN mode isn't on the list of reasons though.
It isn't trolling pointing out that the amount of people who won't buy a game because of the lack of LAN functionality is pretty much insignificant. Yes, LAN was important in the history of gaming and esports, but it isn't anymore. Yes, some portions of the population want it, or even need it, but these people don't matter to the bottom line anymore. Ten years ago they did. But not anymore.
It does suck for those people who need it though.
Not since the early 2000s, and even then it was there, but only in the form of dial-up. Later they were all in college, with a very decent university connection. Oddly, then we'd all play mostly online, but in the same set of rooms (two dorm rooms with a shared bathroom, one room for one team, the other for the other). Though this devolved into doing WoW crap together, but in the same vicinity.
Generally if I'm somewhere without internet I've got better things to do than play games. And if internet isn't available I have board games and a well stocked cooler of beer.
not really.
Yes, it really is. Just because some people do it, doesn't mean that the majority (or even sizable minority) do it. You have a fringe case there, probably. It sounds fun, though.
The fact that you don't understand the difference between being online with someone and being in the same room is pretty damn sad.
I don't? Could you please point to where I said that. I didn't. I play games with people in the room, though these are generally console or board games. I haven't really done that LAN thing since back when FPS didn't suck (Q3A, and UT were mainstays) I could, if I wanted to, play Starcraft II with someone in the room as well, since I have decent internet and a nice wireless router, as does everyone else I know.
Your right when it comes to team play... But I've pretty much completely adapted to using vent or teamspeak thanks to years of online gaming and MMOs. This is making me a bit nostalgic, I would try to get a good old LAN party going if all my friends didn't have jobs and families and generally stopped paying attention to modern hardware.
So you'd have rather either waited an extra year or two, or accepted around 1/3 less content for the same price?
Pretty rational, if you ask me.
Don't get me wrong, Blizzard has been on my shit-list for a while now, and I probably won't be buying this expansion, but I really can't complain. Its a full length game, as big as the original, for less money. Back before this DLC bullshit that we accept now, games released giant $40 expansions, as opposed to miniscule $10 DLC. This was an accepted practice. And it is a practice I wish we could return to.
Remember Starcraft? The one that was such a big success? The one with local LAN games and dedicated servers?
Fun facts; SCII is a big success as well, at least in terms of amount of players and amount of profit made. Further, I remember Starcraft, I enjoyed it (not as much as TA, but still), and never once played it on a LAN. I did play on Battle.net, though, even with my friends in same city. So, really, Blizzard game me what I wanted. Sure, not you, but perhaps its time to realize that you're a minority, and companies have no reason whatsoever to cater to your wishes.
LAN is irrelevant these days. There is no real reason for a majority of people to want it anymore. If it has a LAN feature, a miniscule fraction of people would use it, so why bother? Sure, I could lug my giant computer to a friends house, and futz with networks... or I could just hop into a game with them, over my more than adequate internet connection. Which would I rather do? The quick and easy one. I can still lug my computer to their house and play, by the way. LAN gives no real benefit over the internet these days. When the original Starcraft came out, my internet sucked, this isn't true for the majority of people (or at least people who can blow $60 on a game, and $600+ on a rig that can play it) anymore.
Sure, I'd prefer it, more options and more features are always good. But in this day and age constant internet access is pretty much a given.
Unless, after launching, it continued to fly under its own power. At that point we can safely call it a plane. Unless many "planes" launched off carriers are actually "glorified gliders" as well, of course.
The big difference is that out here, not in prison, I'm free to do many, many, things. In prison I'm free to sit and stare at a wall, and perhaps, if I'm lucky, watch some TV or read an accepted book. Out here, I'm free to go for a long walk with my camera, or go hiking, or hang out in a pub with friends, or have a nice BBQ with my family.
If I had free money, and no obligations I'd probably go on a nice long road-trip with my camera and a couple good books (and a good bottle of bourbon).
I am younger, as well (mid-30s). I might not be typical (posting to /. might be proof of that), though. I have no idea what typical is. When I was a kid I probably would have spent it all on drugs and video games, so... who knows.
Robots (cheetos) and hobbyists (games).
This is the "post scarcity" economy, so some rather large logical leaps must be made, since nothing has it has ever existed (nor probably will).
... certainly sounded as such to me.
You're right, I should have popped a qualifier in there. I'm sure there was one in my head, but I probably (dumbly) took it as implied, or thought I threw it in. My basic premise is that different groups would do different things in this scenario, and that there probably isn't a univeral action that would be shared by all cultures. This magical post-scarcity economy would be more or less effective depending on culture and region. Obviously this isn't universal within cultures either, but I don't really feel that I need to state that. The internet is much more cynical than me.
I suppose it all hinges on what we consider to be useful or productive. I probably wouldn't clean toilets, but I would fully devote myself to my hobbies, which could be useful in some sense.
If I were a multi-millionaire, I'd still work...
Me too, but the difference is that I'd work for myself and not others, on my terms, and only on my terms. I also wouldn't be productive in a traditional sense, I'd work on my hobby, which is an art and not "useful" in a pragmatic sense.
don't believe you can say that with any kind of authority based on that statement alone, no. Within your city, you may find that there are significant differences between the hispanic residents and the non-hispanic residents; however that in and of itself has no bearing on the culture of hispanic people in general - only on the hispanic culture within your city, which likely has many other influencing factors beyond the culture from which these people (or their forebears) came.
Obviously, I didn't figure I needed to include two pages of caveats over not being able to say things about things I don't know, or the fact that I accept that my experiences aren't universal and are purely anecdotal. Or that individual differences exist, as well as regional ones, and sub-cultural ones, within any large culture. Including all these caveats would make it very annoying to say anything, about anything, ever. I figure that people will take it as a given, and not just jump to the conclusion that I'm a racist or bigot.
We can go farther and say that I only have experienced a small subset of the hispanic community in my city, and this I can't say anything about any other area of my city. We can subdivide this to the point where no one can say anything about anyone, or anything, except themselves. Eventually you have to accept that generalizations are useful, and accept that they always have implied caveats and conditions. They are useful for the point of this discussion, but they aren't authoritative or scientific. In a informal internet discussion about a science fiction thought experiement bought on about the business practices of a silly game publisher, I'd say it is good enough.
Again, the internet has a far more cynical take on thing than I do, or ever could have.
Who said the safety net got you a middle class lifestyle?
This is in response to a hypothetical "post-scarcity" economy, where most jobs are done cheaply by machines, and resources are magically plentiful and not really limited, and not about welfare states or safety nets. There would be no "down and outers" in this hypothetical scenario, since most jobs would be purely optional.
This isn't ever going to happen, but it is an enlightening and interesting thought experiment.
It has nothing to do with our current reality, or probably with any future reality, so my background has nothing to do it (I'm not rich, and eggs are way too damn expensive).
And here's where the equation breaks down.
It broke down long before that. Imagine what would happen to the price of goods and services overnight. The inflation would be astounding, and we'd probably end up where we were before the change, except we'd need more currency (worth much less) to do the same thing.
It's very clear what you meant by "sitting on their butts."
Clear to everyone but me, which is odd, since I said it. I meant no negative connotation, and that isn't "back pedalling" since it wasn't meant in the first place. It was a phrase, nothing more, nothing less. I'm sitting on my but right now. In my job I sit on my butt a good deal as well. My girlfriends job involves her sitting on her but for 8 hours a day, as do many other people's.
The phrase also has the connotation of "not doing anything regarded as constructive". Which in the context of this discussion would include "frivolous" things like spending time with your family instead of pursuing vast sums money for the sake of having money, or being productive for the sake of being productive.
If I was misunderstood, or didn't take time to clarify (I forgot that the internet is hyper-sensitive), I apologize.
Just because there's a phrase "The protestant work ethic" does not actually mean that protestants want to or do work any harder than any other group
Never said they do. Its a term. Most of my family is either Catholics, lapsed Catholics, or rabid atheists, and I can proudly say they all have the "Protestant work ethic". The term has long been divorced from actually being a Protestant, and is more a nod towards the cultural roots of the phrase. The fact remains, that history leaves an imprint on culture, and culture effects the present. You can't deny that extreme sects of Protestantism (mainly Calvinism) has a large impact on America, what is was, and what it is today. This, obviously is true in other places, mostly in northern Europe.
HOW THE HELL IS SAYING THAT DIFFERENT CULTURES HAVE DIFFERENT VALUES BIGOTED?! I feel live I'm sitting in a freshman sociology or anthropology class right now. Different things are different. Different cultures are different. How is that bigoted or offensive? And no, living in a city with a large hispanic culture doesn't make me an "expert", but I can make observations, especially since I lived with them, in the same conditions, in the same part of town, and mainly associated with them, and their families for the first 20 years of my life, and still count them as the large majority of my adult friend group. I guess I'm a white guy, so I'm not allowed to say anything about anything but white guys. Further, I can't say anything about white guys out of my region. Or of different cultural milieus, or backgrounds, or religions of social classes, or... screw it.
I never said that Americans are superior. I never said anyone else is inferior. And I find it absolutely bizarre that people putting a higher value on family than on mostly-meaningless activity is somehow supposed to be negative. My point was that cultures have different values (big surprise), and that Americans, and others with our Calvinistic roots, are not representative.
As a person who lives in a large city, with a fairly large Hispanic population, I can say with authority that cultural differences exist. Saying things are different doesn't equate to saying that one thing is better than another. Different is different. Other cultures don't have the same historical roots as the US (and northern Europe), and thus have different value systems. That is NOT a bigoted statement.
In some cultures; work is a means to an end.
In some other cultures work is an ends to itself.
If you freed people from the need to work, the latter cultures would continue to work; while the former would have no reason to since the ends are met.
I'm glad that spending time with your family is considered a bad thing by some. I live in a city with a large Hispanic population, and the cultural differences are pretty obvious. Americans are somewhat strange in how little we value our extended families (certain areas of the country differ in this, obviously) That isn't a value judgement, and those who read it as one have some baggage of their own.
Further, that statement wasn't about America being good, or special. We just have a culture that was formed, in part, by Calvinism and certain sects of Prostentism, which hold that work is one of the most important things in the universe. Work, any work, is Godly. This is the "protestant work ethic", we have it, and others don't share the same cultural and historic roots as Americans.
How the hell is pointing out differences between cultures bigoted? Have we gotten that PC or has cultural relativism taken off to that point already?
That wasn't a "fuck yeah" comment, more of one based on our cultural values. The ones springing from, mostly, Calvinism and certain flavors of Protestantism. Certain cultures in America are very big on the "Protestant work-ethic" still. It is so ingrained that there are people like my family who think the answer to every problem (not just economic) is more work, it doesn't matter what work, just work. Oddly my family is mostly Irish and catholic in heritage. My father is a rather extreme atheist, and he still holds this philosophy. I'm guessing parts of Europe would have the same trait as well, especially the northern bits with the same historical antecedents.
at that point the system collapsed and took the Roman empire with it.
So it wasn't the Germanic tribes? Or the Christians? Or over-extending their military followed by Germanic tribes and Christians? Or deforestation and spoiling natural resources? It wasn't a massive bureaucracy that grew from having the first continental empire? It wasn't a series of inept and mad leaders? It wasn't lead pipes?
I'm glad you solved it. This also ignores the fact that it is nearly impossible to actually point at a moment in time and say; "this is when Rome fell!", since they never did. They just shrunk to insignificance.
Perhaps. I might do that for the first year, but then I'd be bored again.
The thing is, in a hypothetical future give everyone a living wage, with enough money to basically be the equivalent of today's middle class, but don't bar them from making money doing other things, if others find it valuable.
Though in the way this idea is commonly used, it says that we all will end up doing useful labor anyway, since we can't stand being idle. I find this absurd, though it might hold true for Americans, since we inherited a fair amount of our work ethic from our Protestant forebears. For the rest of the world? I'm sure they'd be content to sit on their butts, and spend time with their families.
Hell, I'm not even sure that I'd do anything useful. I might devote my full time to pastimes I love, or just sit on my ass eating cheetos and playing video games... Who knows?
Actually, from what you described, you had disposable income back then too. As you said, you managed to save and beg your way to buy games. The difference is more about where the money came from, not the amount of money that went to the industry.
Technically you are correct. Though back in the Atari and NES days, I couldn't save, and had no income being pretty young. So It was more of a disposable handout, since my parents really didn't get, or like those video game things. More often than not all the neighbor kids would just trade games, or play in someone elses living room. My "spending" was really around $60-120 a year. Later, in the 90's, when Interplay and Blizzard were at their primes, I was old enough to do odd jobs, and actually had my own money. This later part I'd consider disposable income, technically, at least.
As you also admitted, you don't buy a $60 game a month these days, even if you could. And remember inflation: even if you didn't buy games frequently back then, the few times you did you were giving them good money.
It would be interesting to see how much money I shove into the industry now, versus then including inflation. Poking around a bit, it looks like $60 in 1984, is around $104 now. I'm not sure how accurate this is. So I'd have to spend around $200 to break even with my past self (or rather my parents). I know last year I probably beat it, but that was a rare year, and back when I played WoW, I far exceeded it. Its hard to tell, with incidentals like micropayments, small purchases during Steam sales and GoG, and factoring in upgrades and peripherals.
I do see your point though. I'm also a smaller part because the market has grown exponentially since then. Gaming is everywhere, it is ubiquitous and accepted now.
2) Do something about it yourself. Invest or start yourself companies who make the type of games you want. Don't just be the guy funding Kickstarter projects when they show up on the site. Be the guy who's giving money (or doing the work himself) before a Kickstarter page even existed.
This would be nice, but sadly I lack the skills, or enough money to actually fund at the ground-floor. If I did know some folks making a good indie game, I'd buy them a beer, though.
I really don't think everything as as doom-and-gloomy as we think it is. I really do think that we are living in the golden age of gaming, right now. Yes, the big studios are moving to the darkside, but thanks to good distribution networks, and people who grew up on games coding, the market has diversified further than it ever has been. Its getting like music, where it is very rare that I buy something from a big publisher, more and more of my money is going to smaller studios. Sure its less money per purchase, but it feeds more fish now. Which is always a good thing.