And the reason for this is because the honor system in the game doles out titles automatically. They don't want people taking titles that shouldn't be theirs, essentially.
I have a Sandisk Cruzer Titanium, and I use TrueCrypt in order to keep an encrypted archive. Inside that, I have a spreadsheet that contains all my passwords.
The USB drive is always in my pocket, but in the strange instance I forget it, I have a readme file on the drive that tells anyone who finds it that they can keep it, as long as they send me (or arrange transfer for) the contents.
I also keep regular backups of the archive on my home computer.
Fact of the matter is, PC gaming isn't dying. PC gaming is losing the big budget focus that consoles are going to receive. However, this will have a double result: Yes, PC gaming will decline. Will it be the end of PC gaming? Absolutely not. Next gen console games are going to take absurd budgets to create. This amount limits creativity, and in fact, will cause the game industry to largely regress in to well known "safe" games.
However, the PC as a platform will remain inexpensive to develop on, and easily accessible to developers wishing to make original games. And in not too long of time, a standard budget videocard will be able to do most of the cool effects that devs want to be able to use, so price isn't going to be a gigantic deal.
Nevertheless, there will be backwards movement on the tech scale. PC games won't be as pretty, but in the end, the PC will be the last bastion of true innovation. It will allow developers (especially indie developers and small developers) to play freely. A new market will spring up to embrace innovation.
So ultimately, this isn't a death, but a rebirth. It may take a few years, but it's coming.
The specific wording of the Copyright act essentially treats all music no matter the format the same, thus MP3s are included. Here is the exact wording:
"audio recording medium" means a recording medium, regardless of its material form, onto which a sound recording may be reproduced and that is of a kind ordinarily used by individual consumers for that purpose, excluding any prescribed kind of recording medium;
"blank audio recording medium" means
(a) an audio recording medium onto which no sounds have ever been fixed, and
Section 80 subsection B specifically invalidates subsection A if the copies made are being used for distribution. Since P2P filesharing is technically distribution, it would mean that sharing your mp3s in a P2P app is still copyright infringement.
Did you guys really think that Microsoft's not profiling the Slashdot users, or the Linux kernel contributors or anyone they deem as a valuable target?
Yes yes, standard anti-MS linux-zealot paranoia. I'd think it would be more likely they'd mark people whose opinion is a valid form of criticism, so they can see what is said about MS products, and then use that knowledge for improvement.
How about next time that happens to windows, in those numbers, you let me know. In the meantime, why don't you be a little more realistic and a little less biased in your numbers?
Also, just to clarify, that assumes a job programming console games for a western company. I can't speak for japanese companies because obviously, I'm not japanese nor have I worked there. But from what I've heard, it's a lot more corporate in Japan, where games are a business, not a hobby. I'd imagine you'd just have to get in on the bottom rung and climb the ladder in that case.
Actually, it's hard to get in because the market is saturated. I've been a game programmer for four years now, and luckily I haven't been out of a job. But I have multiple friends with game development experience who are unemployed after being layed off. Since people with experience are looking for jobs, they are going to snap up open positions before someone fresh out of school will, which is why it's harder to get game programming jobs nowadays.
With the industry in a slump (not a financial slump, more of a philosophical one), small devs are folding and forcing their talented employees to look elsewhere, large companies are laying off people with good experience when their latest clone doesn't break the charts, and all of this combined means there is plenty of talent looking for jobs. And having experience on your resume gets you there first, unfortunately.
Now, on to the question asked:
I'm a game programmer who's been doing this for four years, and so far I've worked on the PC, the Dreamcast, the PS2, and now I'm working on the XBox. There is nothing specifically that you need to know for working on a console game. Except for the few people forced to work directly with the hardware, it's not much different than making any other game. There are a few differences in discipline when it comes to working on console games, but those are easy to keep in mind: Keep dynamic memory allocation to a minimum, keep data loading to a minimum. That's a large part right there.
What you need to do is get hired at a company that makes console games. Then you'll work on the console. That's about all there is to it. But again, it's easier to get where you want to go if you have experience that'll make you more desirable to a company. But even for a company making console games, actual game industry experience is what you'd need.
My advice is to just get a game programming job, any job, then slowly work your way to where you are going.
I think it was 1996, a major newspaper (Either the Sun or the Journal) in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada ran a full front page story with a headline to the tune of "Meteor found heading for earth, will strike northern Saskatchewan in mid-september". The story contained a whole lot of "explanations" from experts about how it would kill 98% of the population or whatnot.
The joke caused such a panic, that the next two days they had to run a full front page retraction. It made national news too.
I know I'm jumping on this one a little late, but I have a 100mbit fiber connection to my apartment, and it only costs me 50$CAN per month. That's about 32$ to you americans.
It's unlimited, they let me run servers and whatever else I want. It's a pipe set up for the condo complex I live in, in downtown Toronto.
Name your favorite distro, and I can download it in a minute or two. If their pipe is big enough.
Min/maxers and powergamers are a minority. Perhaps not as much in MMORPGs, but compared to the mainstream, they are a drop in an ocean. As long as these games continue to cater to the power gamers, they'll never come in to their own as a widespread gaming experience.
Or they just want a map that should have been in the first place.
Umm, what? I'm sorry, but gamers don't know what they want, and half of what they do want, they won't like once they get. The developers choose to make things certain ways for certain reasons, regardless of if you understand it or not.
Let us dissect this argument a bit. The map should have been there in the first place. Why? So you know where things are. Therefore, you shouldn't have to search for things. If you shouldn't have to search for things, things should just be given to you. In fact, you shouldn't have to explore at all, you should be able to click a button and be teleported to where something is.
And while we are at it, lets make all monsters die in one hit, make all monsters raise you a level when you kill them, make a big pile of weapons so you can just go take what you want.
If gamers got exactly what they wanted, they'd have nothing but flavor of the week. And like flavor of the week, by next week, it will have changed.
The entire point of his article is flawed. It seems he wants to open source just so that people can point out the 'bad design' or 'coding gaffes'. Now, I write a lot of code in a day, some good, some bad, and probably even a bit brilliant, but if it gets the job done properly and well, nitpicking over 'bad design' is just that.
I'd imagine a lot of really great code is fugly as hell, and just because code is design well doesn't mean it will do its job well. The two are relatively independant, unless you like to take a holier than thou stance, which it appears this article is doing.
I can just see their automated support line for FreeDOS.
"Thank you for calling Dell Technical support. If your question is about FreeDOS, please press 1" 1 "If your question about FreeDOS pertains to "-pause-"anything, please press 1" 1 "We are sorry, FreeDOS doesn't do that. Thank you for using Dell Technical Support, goodbye!"
The content creation time for realistic realtime graphics is prohibitive. The further in to the future we get, the more realtime graphics (especially games) will lean towards stylization, rather than realism. Not only that, but no matter how 'real' graphics get, it's unlikely that they'll fool the human mind.
In the end, rather than everything looking the same (real), things will spread out and go with more of an artistic look. The better hardware gets, the more stylization will be required to make your realtime app stand out compared to all the others.
Everyone says OS X, OS X...where is OS X for x86? Please do not trouble x86 users with comments like this. I would much rather upgrade my desktop than buy a bunch of Mac hardware to see OS X in action.
But then again, for the most part, a switch between linux and windows is roughly equivalent to a switch between either and macos X. Hardware costs aside, you still end up needing mostly new software, and the chances of software common between the platforms is pretty low.
Although now that I actually think about it, there is a greater chance of common software/games between windows and macos than between linux and windows.
But in the end, MacOS X on x86 wouldn't be the solution. Like it's been said elsewhere, most of the problems on PCs are caused by the x86 architecture itself. It's much easier to make a stable, reliable platform when you have a mostly closed box.
Law of averages. They call so often, it's really no surprise that they'd call at a point where you'd need someone to call. Has to happen sooner or later.
I wonder though... since it's a one EXE file, would the file not infect your system before you are forced to accept the EULA? An interesting point. Still, how do you prove that a specific file infected your system? Difficult at best.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, this would make discovering harddrive problems much easier.
And the reason for this is because the honor system in the game doles out titles automatically. They don't want people taking titles that shouldn't be theirs, essentially.
I have a Sandisk Cruzer Titanium, and I use TrueCrypt in order to keep an encrypted archive. Inside that, I have a spreadsheet that contains all my passwords.
The USB drive is always in my pocket, but in the strange instance I forget it, I have a readme file on the drive that tells anyone who finds it that they can keep it, as long as they send me (or arrange transfer for) the contents.
I also keep regular backups of the archive on my home computer.
Fact of the matter is, PC gaming isn't dying. PC gaming is losing the big budget focus that consoles are going to receive. However, this will have a double result: Yes, PC gaming will decline. Will it be the end of PC gaming? Absolutely not. Next gen console games are going to take absurd budgets to create. This amount limits creativity, and in fact, will cause the game industry to largely regress in to well known "safe" games.
However, the PC as a platform will remain inexpensive to develop on, and easily accessible to developers wishing to make original games. And in not too long of time, a standard budget videocard will be able to do most of the cool effects that devs want to be able to use, so price isn't going to be a gigantic deal.
Nevertheless, there will be backwards movement on the tech scale. PC games won't be as pretty, but in the end, the PC will be the last bastion of true innovation. It will allow developers (especially indie developers and small developers) to play freely. A new market will spring up to embrace innovation.
So ultimately, this isn't a death, but a rebirth. It may take a few years, but it's coming.
As a game developer, I must say that that post is quality.
The specific wording of the Copyright act essentially treats all music no matter the format the same, thus MP3s are included. Here is the exact wording:
"audio recording medium" means a recording medium, regardless of its material form, onto which a sound recording may be reproduced and that is of a kind ordinarily used by individual consumers for that purpose, excluding any prescribed kind of recording medium;
"blank audio recording medium" means
(a) an audio recording medium onto which no sounds have ever been fixed, and
(b) any other prescribed audio recording medium;
I don't believe this makes P2P filesharing legal.
Section 80 subsection B specifically invalidates subsection A if the copies made are being used for distribution. Since P2P filesharing is technically distribution, it would mean that sharing your mp3s in a P2P app is still copyright infringement.
Here is the relevant section
Did you guys really think that Microsoft's not profiling the Slashdot users, or the Linux kernel contributors or anyone they deem as a valuable target?
Yes yes, standard anti-MS linux-zealot paranoia. I'd think it would be more likely they'd mark people whose opinion is a valid form of criticism, so they can see what is said about MS products, and then use that knowledge for improvement.
Sorry, the world doesn't revolve around linux.
How about next time that happens to windows, in those numbers, you let me know. In the meantime, why don't you be a little more realistic and a little less biased in your numbers?
Wow, I guess windows users aren't the only 'stupid' ones to get hit by an exploit from forgetting to patch.
Oops!
Also, just to clarify, that assumes a job programming console games for a western company. I can't speak for japanese companies because obviously, I'm not japanese nor have I worked there. But from what I've heard, it's a lot more corporate in Japan, where games are a business, not a hobby. I'd imagine you'd just have to get in on the bottom rung and climb the ladder in that case.
Actually, it's hard to get in because the market is saturated. I've been a game programmer for four years now, and luckily I haven't been out of a job. But I have multiple friends with game development experience who are unemployed after being layed off. Since people with experience are looking for jobs, they are going to snap up open positions before someone fresh out of school will, which is why it's harder to get game programming jobs nowadays.
With the industry in a slump (not a financial slump, more of a philosophical one), small devs are folding and forcing their talented employees to look elsewhere, large companies are laying off people with good experience when their latest clone doesn't break the charts, and all of this combined means there is plenty of talent looking for jobs. And having experience on your resume gets you there first, unfortunately.
Now, on to the question asked:
I'm a game programmer who's been doing this for four years, and so far I've worked on the PC, the Dreamcast, the PS2, and now I'm working on the XBox. There is nothing specifically that you need to know for working on a console game. Except for the few people forced to work directly with the hardware, it's not much different than making any other game. There are a few differences in discipline when it comes to working on console games, but those are easy to keep in mind: Keep dynamic memory allocation to a minimum, keep data loading to a minimum. That's a large part right there.
What you need to do is get hired at a company that makes console games. Then you'll work on the console. That's about all there is to it. But again, it's easier to get where you want to go if you have experience that'll make you more desirable to a company. But even for a company making console games, actual game industry experience is what you'd need.
My advice is to just get a game programming job, any job, then slowly work your way to where you are going.
I think it was 1996, a major newspaper (Either the Sun or the Journal) in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada ran a full front page story with a headline to the tune of "Meteor found heading for earth, will strike northern Saskatchewan in mid-september". The story contained a whole lot of "explanations" from experts about how it would kill 98% of the population or whatnot.
The joke caused such a panic, that the next two days they had to run a full front page retraction. It made national news too.
I know I'm jumping on this one a little late, but I have a 100mbit fiber connection to my apartment, and it only costs me 50$CAN per month. That's about 32$ to you americans.
It's unlimited, they let me run servers and whatever else I want. It's a pipe set up for the condo complex I live in, in downtown Toronto.
Name your favorite distro, and I can download it in a minute or two. If their pipe is big enough.
No, seriously. What?
This has to be the worst pick for news I've seen on slashdot yet.
Min/maxers and powergamers are a minority. Perhaps not as much in MMORPGs, but compared to the mainstream, they are a drop in an ocean. As long as these games continue to cater to the power gamers, they'll never come in to their own as a widespread gaming experience.
Or they just want a map that should have been in the first place.
Umm, what? I'm sorry, but gamers don't know what they want, and half of what they do want, they won't like once they get. The developers choose to make things certain ways for certain reasons, regardless of if you understand it or not.
Let us dissect this argument a bit. The map should have been there in the first place. Why? So you know where things are. Therefore, you shouldn't have to search for things. If you shouldn't have to search for things, things should just be given to you. In fact, you shouldn't have to explore at all, you should be able to click a button and be teleported to where something is.
And while we are at it, lets make all monsters die in one hit, make all monsters raise you a level when you kill them, make a big pile of weapons so you can just go take what you want.
If gamers got exactly what they wanted, they'd have nothing but flavor of the week. And like flavor of the week, by next week, it will have changed.
The entire point of his article is flawed. It seems he wants to open source just so that people can point out the 'bad design' or 'coding gaffes'. Now, I write a lot of code in a day, some good, some bad, and probably even a bit brilliant, but if it gets the job done properly and well, nitpicking over 'bad design' is just that.
I'd imagine a lot of really great code is fugly as hell, and just because code is design well doesn't mean it will do its job well. The two are relatively independant, unless you like to take a holier than thou stance, which it appears this article is doing.
You've discovered that what was probably a joke, was faked! Congratulations!
Make fun of Apple's Switch ads all day, but when Microsoft joins in, quick, better find a reason to bash them.
Better hurry and mod this post down too, before someone sees it and ruins your 'victory'.
I can just see their automated support line for FreeDOS.
"Thank you for calling Dell Technical support. If your question is about FreeDOS, please press 1"
1
"If your question about FreeDOS pertains to "-pause-"anything, please press 1"
1
"We are sorry, FreeDOS doesn't do that. Thank you for using Dell Technical Support, goodbye!"
The content creation time for realistic realtime graphics is prohibitive. The further in to the future we get, the more realtime graphics (especially games) will lean towards stylization, rather than realism. Not only that, but no matter how 'real' graphics get, it's unlikely that they'll fool the human mind.
In the end, rather than everything looking the same (real), things will spread out and go with more of an artistic look. The better hardware gets, the more stylization will be required to make your realtime app stand out compared to all the others.
Everyone says OS X, OS X...where is OS X for x86? Please do not trouble x86 users with comments like this. I would much rather upgrade my desktop than buy a bunch of Mac hardware to see OS X in action.
But then again, for the most part, a switch between linux and windows is roughly equivalent to a switch between either and macos X. Hardware costs aside, you still end up needing mostly new software, and the chances of software common between the platforms is pretty low.
Although now that I actually think about it, there is a greater chance of common software/games between windows and macos than between linux and windows.
But in the end, MacOS X on x86 wouldn't be the solution. Like it's been said elsewhere, most of the problems on PCs are caused by the x86 architecture itself. It's much easier to make a stable, reliable platform when you have a mostly closed box.
I doubt slashdot could slashdot a canadian government page. Canada has bandwidth up the wazoo, and the gov't gets to use as much as they want of it.
Law of averages. They call so often, it's really no surprise that they'd call at a point where you'd need someone to call. Has to happen sooner or later.
I wonder though... since it's a one EXE file, would the file not infect your system before you are forced to accept the EULA? An interesting point. Still, how do you prove that a specific file infected your system? Difficult at best.