Shakespeare would have been a terrible First Person Shooter game designer.
You'r right. The arsenal available in his pieces is pathetic. On the other hand, I thought the adaptation of Othello turned out pretty good (although the game was a bit different from the book)... (c:
I once read an article about Half-Life's development where someone (Gabe Newell, perhaps) explained how they worked: Whenever a new level of the game was completed, they ran it through several playtesters, and recorded several things such as how long they took in each section, what was their health in each section, how much ammo they had, etc..
In the end, they asked them their opinion, but tuned the game based mainly on the statistics, and not the testers' perception. This way they made sure no sections of the game were too hard or too easy, always keeping the player on his toes without ever becoming too frustrating. They also made sure the player never spent too long in the same place (boring) or moved across an area too quickly (no time to appreciate the level design, etc.).
These changes were often done right after a testing session, and the new version was tested on the same day (I think the engine actually allowed them to load a save from an old version of a level into the new version).
The auto-save system (based not on time, but on markers put into the maps right before "hard" sections) and the quick-save system (with two alternating slots, so that even if you hit the quicksave key accidentally, you don't lose your previous quicksave) were probably also a result of watching people play, and seeing their frustration as they had to repeat the same thing over and over again when they made a mistake.
It really was a victory of common sense and objective thinking where "genius" and ego (cough*romero*cough*molyneux*cough) often fail.
The rest (the atmosphere) was mainly a matter of realism and consistence. A lab should look like a lab, a parking lot should look like a parking lot. The player should feel that he is exploring a real environment, with a purpose of its own, rather than some sort of playground constructed only for him. Another game that does that quite well, IMO, is System Shock 2.
Back to HL2:
I've seen some screenshots supposedly from HL2 (some of them quite convincing) and again they show very "normal" environments. Factories and shipyards and city streets. No weird crosses between gothic cathedrals and space stations (cough*quake*cough).
Judging from those screenshots (if they are real and current), I would say the story will be something along these lines:
Earth is being controlled by the "agency" (the one the G-man belonged to), thanks to a pact with the aliens (that now have vehicles and buildings).
For some reason, a conflict breaks out between the agency (or a section of the agency) and the aliens. My guess is this will happen during the game, not at the beginning.
It's up to the player to seize this opportunity to save mankind (again), probably with help from some underground human resistence (think cynical chicks with machine guns).
The player may or may not be taking the role of Gordon Freeman (I couldn't find any evidence pointing either way).
I have a vague suspicion that the G-man will turn out to be your ally, and possibly Gordon Freeman's ally, as well (even if you don't play him). Elaborating: at the end of the first game, the G-man knew the aliens were far from defeated. He used his influence to "infiltrate" Gordon into the agency, giving him the possibility of a real victory later. He may or may not turn out to be Queen Amidala's nephew.
Now, all of this is complete speculation on my part, but I think it makes some sense; it would fit in well with the first game's spirit, and it would explain some of the (supposedly real) screenshots I've seen. I guess we'll know soon enough.
Pale thin guys in dark suits are much worse than all the aliens put together. Don't you watch the X-Files (*)? With aliens you know where you stand. The worst they can do to you is tear you apart with their clawed tentacles (hmm... aliens, tentacles, that rings some other bells, okay, maybe they can do other things). But pale guys in thin glasses can turn out to be from the IRS. They can audit.
And he wants Gordon to turn on him. Evil masterminds are like that, they always leave a set of handcuff keys or an unguarded exit somewhere. You see, they might be evil but they're not stupid; they know that the moment they kill the hero they'll be out of a job.
RMN ~~~
(*) I did, for a while, and thought it was great comedy.
Thank you for the English lessons. However, neither the dictionary not common usage support your claim that "persistently refuse" and "did not" are synonyms (let alone "excellent synonyms", as you say above). If, when faced with the question:
"Did you build the Eiffel Tower?"
You find it appropriate to answer with:
"I persistently refuse to build the Eiffel Tower!"
Then perhaps it is you who are in need of some English lessons.
Refusal only exists as a response (to a request or a proposal). Most things that don't happen simply don't happen; they are not refusals. I've never written a symphony. Not because I've refused to; simply because I don't have the time nor the knowledge to do so.
To the best of my knowledge (and, it appears, yours as well), no-one ever approached Valve with a concrete proposal or even a request for a Linux version (note that "approaching Valve" means a bit more than "posting a few messages on a newsgroup saying how cool it would be to have a Linux version", and hoping they read it). Nor have I ever seen any official statement from Valve saying they would not release a Linux (or Mac) version. In other words, there are no proposals and no refusals. It's just something that never happened.
Turning a non-event into an active (and "persistent") refusal is a typically paranoid behaviour. Just because someone doesn't say "hello" doesn't mean they are deliberately snubbing you.
The various "versions" of Half-Life you mention are in fact simply packs with the original game plus some new levels or mods. The original game's code and map design were never changed (apart from some minor bug fixes). The only version of Half-Life besides the original one is the PlayStation 2 version, which Valve really had nothing to do with apart from granting the rights; it was done by Gearbox Studios and financed by Sierra. Linux ports of the server(s), on the other hand, are made by Valve, without any external financing. In fact, they started handling the CS server Linux port long before CS was bought by Valve.
As far as I know, Valve's original licensing of the Quake engine was for a single game on the Windows platform (licensing does not give you the right to use the engine in all your future games). Ports to other platfroms would probably have required a new license. Something that I'm sure Sierra wouldn't have a problem paying for if they thought those ports would be profitable, and their quality would be satisfactory. Apparently they didn't. The article you linked to (which does not contain any Valve announcement, contrary to what you say) makes it perfectly clear that the Mac port was not being done by Valve. Some relevant quotes from that same article that seem to contradict your theory that Half-Life would be easy to port to Linux / Mac:
"Significant sections of the code are so closely tied to Windows (and MFC) that it's easier to rewrite them from scratch than attempt to convert them over to another OS"
"Due to the architecture of the Half-Life add-on [TFC] it would need to be ported separately"
I suspect the same would apply to HLDM, DMC and CS (not to mention all 3rd party mods, or any mod that Valve decided to release in the future). To the money and time required for these conversions, you would have to add the cost of training all the support personnel in all countries to deal with support requests from Mac and Linux users. All this for a market that would be (in 1997), at best, about 4% the size of the Windows market (and this is assuming that the people running Linux and Mac OS did not have any way of running the Windows version).
I think only someone with a serious deathwish would try to support three platforms (two of which clearly unprofitable) with their first title ever.
Later (say, in 2001, when the PlayStation 2 version was released), could a Linux or Mac version have been viable? Maybe. Personally I doubt it. 2001 was the year Loki went bankr
From what I've read, originally, the girl was going to be a playable character. Eventually she became the hologram, because Valve didn't have the time / money to make and test two versions of all the dialogues (well, monologues). Who knows, maybe she'll make a comeback in HL2... (c:
As to the ending, well, life isn't fair. A game (or movie, or book) that acknowledges that fact scores some points with me. The almost inevitable (and often logic-defying) happy endings are one of the main problems I have with "mainsteam" american books and films. So cheers to Valve for the "unexpected" realism of the ending. A smart Gordon Freeman would have realised the consequences of his choice.
What I didn't like was all the jumping around in HL's last 2 or 3 levels, especially after a game that was so realistic in terms of environment. I realise it was supposed to be an alien planet, but it still felt silly.
So in your opinion, any company that does not port product X to system Y, is "persistently refusing to release a Y version of product X"...? Strange way of looking at free will and business decisions. Using that definition of "persistent refusal" (which, apparently, means the same as "did not") I guess Adobe is also "persistently refusing" to release a version of Photoshop with support for HDR, and ATI is "persistently refusing" to give me a Radeon 9800 Pro for free. The bastards.
Ignoring other factors (such as licensing, lack of resources, lack of experience, etc.), there is still one important dimension you forgot in your little comparison: time. Neverwinter Nights and UT2003 were released less than one year ago. Half-Life was released in 1997. If you don't see the fundamental differences in the market, you must have been on prolonged vacations from reality. And if you read the NwN forums and see the amount of flak Bioware took for not releasing the Linux patches at the same time as the Windows patches, and for not releasing a Linux toolset, and then compare that with their Linux sales, you have to wonder if they'll decide to support Linux with their next products.
I'm sick of this attitude of certain Linux users that anyone who doesn't cater to their personal wishes is attacking "the Linux community" and / or is on Microsoft's payroll. Not only do these jerks have the arrogance to consider themsevles superior to everyone else, they also have the arrogance to assume they represent the entire Linux community.
Imagine if everyone whose native language isn't English decided to come to Slashdot and insult you (personally) for not translating your messages into their various languages.
I speak, read and write in five different languages. But you don't see me describing myself as part of a "linguistic elite" or as an "influential language user", nor do I think that people who speak exclusively English are a bunch of idiots (despite the fact that English has just about the most primitive grammar of any human language). Nor do you see me protesting that anyone who doesn't translate their software into, say, German is deliberately attacking "the German-speaking community".
If you feel that you're able to port Half-Life to Linux, and sell enough copies to cover the conversion (the easy part), the distribution (establish contacts with local distributors worldwide, make localised versions for other countries, etc.), and product support (hire or train staff to answer support calls for the Linux version in all the countries where Half-Life is sold), go ahead and make Valve an offer. If it's such a great deal (financially) as you seem to think, then look at it as an opportunity. Invest your own money into that project and get rich. Or are you also "lazy"...? Or perhaps you just remember Loki Games...?
If you approach Valve (or any other company, for that matter) with a credible business plan (or one that you're willing to finance yourself), and they say no, then yes, they are refusing to release a Linux version. If you insist (presumably with progressively better deals for them) and they keep refusing, then they are persistently refusing it. Otherwise, they didn't "persistently refuse to release a Linux version" any more than they "persistently refused to release" a Nintendo or Xbox or OS/2 version.
Oh, and from now on please provide a Portuguese version of your messages. I do understand English, and I realise you may need to spend time and money on the translation, but seeing as I'm part of a linguistic elite, I feel it's my right to decide how you employ your time and money.
What? You're persistently refusing to release a Portuguese translation? Vou tomar isso como uma ofensa a todas as pessoas lusófonas...
So, did someone approach Valve to do a Linux / Mac port, and did Valve refuse to let them do it? Still waiting for any evidence of that. Without it, I have to interpret your claim that "Valve persistently refused to release a Linux or Mac version of the game" as a troll.
Other statements in your posts show that you are either extremely uninformed or, again, deliberately lying (I'd bet on the latter, since they are so easy to verify). But without clearing the one above, I won't even bother to address the rest.
It's sad that some Linux users spend so much of their time thinking (and foaming at the mouth) about Windows. Linux is a tool, not a religion. Zealots like you give the rest of us a bad name, and frankly you give Microsoft a lot more attention than they deserve. I would tell you to go troll on Slashdot, along with the rest of the imaginary "technical elite" that you seem to think you're part of, but I just realised you already are.
They "persistently refused"...? What is that supposed to mean? Did anyone approach them to make the ports? With a sane financial project (ie, we want $$ to make, test, market and distribute the Mac / Linux ports and we expect to make $$$ in sales)? If not, you might as well say they "persistently refused" to port it to Solaris, OS/2, BeOS and ZX Spectrum.
Valve is a relatively small company, and I doubt they had people who could do the conversion in-house (the PS2 version, for example, was not made by Valve), especially since they were busy with the new netcode, voice integration, HLDM, TFC, DMC, CS, HLTV, VAC, Steam, HL2 and TF2. Also, a lot of the code in HL's graphics engine was licensed from Id, and Valve was limited in what they could do with it (assuming they were familiar enough with it to make a port in the first place).
The fact that they released a Linux server (where all the code was developed by Valve) and helped convert several mods to Linux (ex., the CS server) speaks for itself.
TFC, DMC and CS, for example, are not "third-party add-ons". They are financed and supported by Valve. Care to mention any "3rd party add-ons" that are supported by Microsoft? For free?
Of course, Valve doesn't do it out of the kindness of their hearts. They do it because these mods extend the life of the original product and because they give Valve a chance to do a "public beta" of several concepts (voice, cheat detection, latency-compensated netcode, spectator servers, etc.). I suspect they'll soon start actively suporting NS (Natural Selection), because it gives them a chance to refine the commander interface that will probably be used in TF2.
Gordon Freeman is a specialist in anomalous materials. That's an elegant way of saying "he's a specialist in very advanced physics" without a) feeding you bogus science or b) boring you to death with real advanced physics (which can be fun, but not when you're in the mood ot kill some aliens with a crowbar).
Deux Ex was made by a lot of people who worked on Ultima Underworld, and their experience in RPG and storytelling shows. It's a lot more complex and not as polished as HL, but it's also a very good game. Looking forward to DE2. I'm sick of "RPG"s (I use the term loosely here) where all you do is "power up" (i.e., increase your attributes and get more armor and bigger weapons until your character becomes a tank) and follow instructions. Hopefully, DE2 will give you plenty of freedom and require you to (or at least reward you if you) use your brain.
Didn't you play the game? If so, why are you asking questions that have such obvious answers?
Initially, the character (Dr. Gordon Freeman) wants to settle into his new job. At this point, there is no-one standing in the way of his goals.
The first unexpected event happens when the experiment goes wrong. Part of the lab is destroyed, and what remains is infested with aliens. At this point, the aliens and the destruction stand in his way and his goal is to contact people on the outside.
Eventually, he manages to find his way outside, and that's when another unexpected event takes place: the people who were supposed to save him and the other scientists are in fact trying to kill them to keep the whole affair secret. At this point, the soldiers stand in his way, and his goal is to try to learn as much as possible about the situation, and how to solve it.
Eventually, he finds a way to teleport to the alien's planet (which must count as another "unexpected event"). Now his enemies are once more the aliens, and his goal is to destroy them.
Finally, at the very end of the game, there's a final "unexpected event".
So there.
Half-life's story isn't "great" in the sense that it's very original (it's not). The great thing about it is not the story itself, it's the way it flows so naturally and feels so much part of the game, despite the fact that the game's genre is not one typically associated with "a story".
Half-life is essentially an action game. It's not an adventure, it's not a RPG. There are no dialogues and no items. Just guns, monsters, puzzles and the occasional scripted "scene". Given these building blocks, I think HL manages to create a great atmosphere and (apart from the rather weak and predictable ending) to tell a pretty entertaining story (a lot better - more interesting and more consistent - than some movies).
HL's great strength is not its originality, it's the level of perfection and polishing of every single of its elements, from the gameplay to the default keyboard layout to the auto-save system. Things that stem not from great technology or brilliant ideas but from a lot of playtesting, a good dose of common sense, and a refusal to settle for "good enough" just to meet the deadline.
As someone wrote at the time, "Half-life restored my faith in gaming". After fiascos like Black & White and Neverwinter Nights (not exactly bad, but very disappointing nonetheless), I could definitely use a new injection of Valve fluid.
It's ironic that the company that created such a perfect game (and later created and financed so many great free updates and mods) was founded by ex-Microsoft employees...
Oh, SCSI is great, and definitely worth the extra money... when you have 10 or 20 simultaneous read & write operations going on in the same drive.
For desktop use (and even for video editing / workstations / etc.), it's a complete waste of money. Top ATA drives give you more than 50 GB/s on a single read, and can even handle simultaneous reads quite well. Get one with a big cache (8 MB), and you can even get away with a couple of mixed read and write operations.
Get one of those nice big 3Ware ATA RAID controllers, and you get basically the same performance as with SCSI RAID, for one fifth of the price. Unless you're really hammering your disks, accessing a ridiculous number of different files all the time (in other words, unless it's for a pretty busy server), SCSI simply doesn't pay off right now.
Of course, some people will always say SCSI is "better", just like some people will always say Intel is better and some will always say Apple is better. But that's religion. In the real world, it boils down to bang for the buck. And SCSI costs a lot more buck, and the extra bit of bang you get is useless in 99% of cases.
When the CPU is idle, the power consumption is lower. Just because an Athlon or P4 can draw (and dissipate) up to 75 watts that doesn't mean they do it all the time.
You're right, most people don't need a high-end P4 or Athlon. And that's why the vast majority of systems being sold today have mid- and low-end CPUs. Having the "top performer" is good for Intel or AMD's marketing, but doesn't really translate directly into sales.
P.S. - You "feel sorry" for people who "waste" money on fast CPUs (which do make a difference in games and high-end DCC applications) and then you say you use SCSI drives to code, watch DVDs and download movie trailers...? Oh boy... ~:)
For the masses, 64-bit is a marketing gimmick. It's useless and will continue to be useless for several months (programs need rewriting, retesting, etc., assuming the authors bother to do it in the first place). This is for the 64-bit registers.
The 64-bit memory controller (which doesn't actually support 64-bit addressing, BTW) is even less relevant for normal users. Most people don't have any use for more than 512 MB. Even workstations can work perfectly with 2 GB or so (unless you're working with floating-point / HDR HD streams, or massive prints, anyway - I do sometimes, and in that situation memory is worth its weight in plutonium).
While "the real point of a 64 bit chip" is its 64-bitness, the real point of the Athlon 64 is not that it's a 64-bit chip.
Much more important to its success in the mass market (and the Athlon 64, unlike the Opteron, is aimed at the mass market) is its performance with generic, existing applications. And for those, the extra registers, the improved branch prediction, the integrated memory controller and (hopefully) the higher clock speed matter at least as much (in fact a lot more) than the fact that the registers are 64 bits wide.
The chip used in this "review" is very odd. From its low clock speed and big cache, it looks more like an Opteron than like an Athlon 64. The Athlon 64 was expected to launch at "3200+" (around 2 GHz) and have 256 or 512 KB of (L2) cache. With the Athlon 64 scheduled to come out in September, I wouldn't be very surprised if this "engineering sample" was in fact an Opteron 242 packaged as an Athlon 64 (socket 754 instead of 940), sent to motherboard / chipset makers so they could test their Athlon 64 boards (remember, the socket is different, but apart from SMP support and the respective HT links, the Athlon 64 and the Opteron are almost exactly the same).
With AMD's recent manufacturing problems (hopefully solved with the IBM deal) and with the Opterons launch approaching, I doubt they'd be wasting time and fab space making "real" Athlon 64s.
This is pure speculation, of course, but I think it makes some sense. I expect the final Athlon 64s to run at a higher clock speed and have less cache (meaning they'll perform much better than this "sample" in most tasks, and slightly worse in some - namely the compression test, which relies heavily on the big cache).
Actually, the great part is the extra registers. That, along with the integrated memory controller and the improved branch prediction should help make it significantly faster than the Athlon XP, even in 32-bit code (it requires recompilation but no rewriting). The bigger cache is also nice, but I suspect most Athlon 64 models will have 512 KB L2, like the Barton XP.
64-bit registers and bigger-than-32-bit addressing (40-bit for now, I think, with higher models using 48-bit) are there mainly to give AMD a foothold in the server market. For most of us, they will not have an immediate impact.
RMN ~~~
So is everybody else, I guess...
on
Genome Surprise
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· Score: 1
You sound a lot like minister al-Sahhaf. "There is no race, I tell you. We have destryed the race, the race is commiting suicide. The infidels are saying there is a race but they are lying, we will destroy them. Do you see any race here? I don't see any race. There is no race. Good day."
Nuclear physicists can "agree there is no such thing as chemistry" all they like. But it's still a meaningful word that describes a lot of tools and processes that human society uses daily. So "chemistry" is real. Since no-one can prove there is a god, "religion" can also be said to be "meaningless". But clearly it's not. People pray, people make speeches, people read their holy books, so clearly "religion" is also real, and so is god, in a way. And since different groups of people tend to have different characteristics, the concept of "human race" is clearly real too (as are the concepts of "height", "gender", "beauty", "strength", "intelligence", and so on - some more subjective than others, but all very much real).
There are very few things (none, atually) that you can establish as being "the ultimate truth". Cells aren't real, they're just groups of molecules. Molecules are just groups of atoms, atoms are just electrons and protons and neutrons, and so on. But it's not very practical, when I'm describing another person, to say "the superstrings that define the area of this universe's membrane that [...etc....]". It's easier to just say "she's white, with green eyes".
I doubt you can came up with a sentence of less than 6 words that gives more information about what "she" looks like.
As I said, if you have a problem with the word "race", feel free to come up with a different one (you don't like "frex", try "nabo"). As Humpty Dumpty said, "when I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less". To me, "race" is simply a way to quickly and broadly define a large group of physical characteristics, that would take too long to describe one by one. It's not 100% accurate, but usually it doesn't need to be. I really couldn't care less about "how many genes define a race" (which is meaningless, anyway), just as I couldn't care less about the chemical composition of marron glacé.
As to the migrations, I think this is pointless. You seem to think that a group of 10 or 20 people (or even 100) moving from one country to another over a generation (say, 20 years) will have a significant impact on "interracial breeding". Which is clearly wrong (see my messages above for why it's wrong, or just try looking at the real world). But hey, you also say "races don't exist" in the first place, so I guess the whole thing is irrelevant.
Maybe then you'd care to explain why - if people have been migrating and interbreeding in huge numbers for tens of thousands of years - the various human races (or "ethnicities", if you prefer) haven't all blended together into a single, worldwide race (or "ethnicity", or "frex", or "nabo", or whatever you want to call it).
Trade plays a very small role in the mixing of cultures and races. A handful of guys travelling from one country to another, dropping off some spices, taking some swords, and going back home don't cause any significant effects, race- or culture-wise (apart from the effect the trade itself has). Sure, some of them may leave a pregnant woman behind, but that woman's child is likely to marry someone in his or her own society (and culture, and race) and his or her "difference" becomes diluted, and unnoticeable after a couple of generations.
It wasn't until quite recently that significant communities from one country (and race) started moving to, and mixing with, other races and cultures. Not a dozen traders going back and forth - one thousand people immigrating.
Or do you think that the place where you're born determines what you look like, and that's why you have mostly blacks in Africa, mostly whites in Europe, etc.? According to your theory that "races have been mixing since pre-history", shouldn't we all look pretty much the same by now?
Maybe you should read some books about anthropology.
> Have to disagree. How many "black" people in this > country (US) are "pure black"? Even if you assume that > there is such a thing as "pure" white or black (and know > how to define it),
Basically a guy is "pure" black when he says he's black and most people in his society agree he's black (same thing for white, indian, etc.). It's not an exact science. I don't mean pure as in "racially pure" (whatever that means), just as in "unambiguously X".
> By your definition, there are actually very few > "black" people in America.
And what definition would that be?
> if at least one of your parents is black, then you are black, > too. It is true because society will treat you that way, > and through your life you'll have the experiences of a > black person.
Well, depends on the society, I guess. I live in Portugal, and racial alchemy has always been a hobby of ours. For example, there's a country in Africa (Cabo Verde) that was basically used for "natural genetic engineering" during the 16th / 17th century. It consisted of several desert but fertile islands, and was colonised by "hand-picked" individuals from Portugal and mainland Africa (Angola, Guiné, São Tomé e Príncipe, etc.). The result was a country where everyone looked like Hale Berry (ie, somewhere between "white" and "black", and very, very good-looking). Yes, the portuguese navigators did trade slaves (mostly african), but the justification was always more "cultural superiority" (religion playing a big role in that) than racial superiority.
> West Africans look "different" than East Africans, but > few white Americans would make the distinction.
It's not a matter of "would", it's a matter of "need to". When you have a very obvious difference, you tend to ignore the details. It's like saying a PC is "Intel" or "AMD", when in fact there are a lot more differences than just the brand of the CPU (there's the model, the chipset, the type of RAM, etc.).
One thing that annoys me about the US of A is this new trend to refer to blacks as "african-americans". Were they born in Africa? They weren't? They were born in America? Then they're americans, period. Might as well refer to white americans as "euro-americans", and in fact to europeans as "afro-europeans", because they certainly had some african ancestors. So maybe a black american should be an "afro-american-euro-african" or something like that.
I keep remembering a line from a movie (can't rememeber which movie) where, during a boxing match, some character said "look at this, you have a white guy fighting a black guy and the commentator can only distinguish them by the colour of their trunks".
> Some people are tall and some are short, but we don't > consider them racially different just because of that
Because height tends to vary too much within a society. Certain societies where all individuals are significantly shorter than in neighbouring societies (ex., pygmies) are usually considered as separate "races".
> ?? Until 400 to 500 years ago? Then how did the > Americas get populated well over 10,000 years ago? > And what about all of those modern humans who came > out of Africa to populate the earth more than 40,000 > years ago?
All that happened very, very slowly. No single individual travelled across the world (that only started in the 15th century, and only became really common in the 20th). 20 thousand years ago, everyone lived their life in groups of similar people. Races changed very slowly, based on their environment, not based on mixes between clearly distinct races. It was precisely that isolation and localised reproduction that gave birth to our current "big" races. If you go back 500 or 1000 years you'll find that between each two "big races" there is usually a significant natural barrier (sea, desert, mountains, etc.), that made those two groups evolve more or less independently.
> Race, socially, is a culturally constructed > concept and most anthropologists and sociologists no > longer accept the term as meaningful or valid > (e.g. race is semanitically void).
Hey, for some catholics "contraception" is not a meaningful concept because, in their view of reality, people only have sex when they want children. Doesn't mean that - in the real world - contraception (and race) aren't pretty relevant concepts. Don't make me quote the Iraqi information minister again.
> there are NO EXISTING SUB-SPECIES among homo sapiens.
In one word: lawyers. Oh, ok, you said homo sapiens.
Define "sub-species". The concepts of "species", "phylum", "family", etc., are completely artificial. They basically describe groups of beings with similar characteristics, they're not based on any deep genetic similarities or even on evolutionary paths. Taxonomy is a practical thing, not some sort of "mathematics of life". Some people are now adoptimg a more systematic approach to it, but personally I think it's a bit of a waste of time. Biology (like physics) needs tools, it doesn't need "the truth"; that's for tormented philosophers and for information ministers.
> This lack of race has been supported, so far, by > the results of the genome project.
What is your problem? The word? Stop calling it "race" and start calling it "frex", then. Better? People of different frex (physical / anatomical / physiognomical / capillary characteristics) look different, and we need a simple way to tell them apart without having to describe every single aspect of their bodies. Just as we have "man" and "woman", although men and women belong to the same species. And just as we have "coal" and "diamond" although, deep down, both are made of carbon. Reality is an interpretation. Raw data is useless and meaningless.
> Perhaps a more useful is the term ETHNICITY,
So it seems you problem is the word. You should read Alice in Wonderland (especially the part with Humpty Dumpty). I'm sticking with frex.
> When one "race" is socially dominant over the other, the > child will be classified with the subjugate race.
Yes. A child of, say, a white and a black, will tend to be seen as black by the "pure" whites and as white by the "pure" blacks (I mean "pure" as in "someone who belongs to a clearly defined 'large' race"). But this is because he or she will look different. When you start to have enough people with similar features, you have a new "race", and both "pure" blacks and "pure" whites will start seeing him / her as a "pure gray".
> Generally the association between genes and > specific physical characteristics (like nose length) > isn't one-to-one.
Not that anyone has a clue.:^)
> They are socially relevant because we are taught > that they are socially relevant.
No, they are socially relevant because if you have a village where everyone's black and one guy is white, he's going to look different. And that alone is socially relevant. Just as being extremely tall is relevant. It won't necessarily make people treat you better or worse, but it will make you "stand out"; it will make you more noticeable.
> Hard as it is, if you look objectively at the > clusters of characteristics that we use for racial > classification, they're really fairly minor,
And my point is: so what? Going back to the digital world, if you compare a picture to another where every pixel is 1% brighter, you're unlikely to notice the difference. But if you compare it to a picture where a group of 4 or 5 pixels in the middle of the sky is red, you'll notice the difference immediately. And yet (in bits and bytes) this picture is a lot more "similar" to the first one than the picture that was 1% brighter.
The difference in "the number of genes", or whatever, is irrelevant. It's the influence they have on our appearance and behaviour that counts. And if a gene makes you a different colour from the people around you (or twice as tall, or gives you three noses instead of the usual two:=), it's still a big difference, even if it's controlled by a single gene and all other genes are exactly the same.
> Our culture trains us to amplify our perception > of these diffences and their importance.
It's not our culture, it's our brain. As I wrote in another message in this thread, human language (data processing and communication) is based on hints. When I say, "I had dinner", your brain automatically decodes that into a sequence of actions (me sitting down with a plate in front of me, eating with a knife and fork, etc.). I don't need to describe the entire process, I trust your brain to do the "decompression" and reconstruction. But if there was something unusual about my dinner (ex., I ate lying down on the floor), and if I want you to know that, I'll have to specify it (I don't need you to ask me). Likewise, if I'm white and you're white and I'm telling about this hot chick I met, you'll tend to assume that she's white too, and I'll tend to omit that, because it's "unnecessary network traffic". If she was in fact black, I would tend to mention that, because I knew that you would probably assume she was white.
Some people see this as discrimination and say "Why did you have to mention she was black? Does it make any difference?" But they're wrong. Mentioning she was black is perfectly normal (after all, I was describing her to you); the "strange" thing is why wouldn't I mention it if she was white. And the answer is: optimisation. If I know (or at least believe) that you will automatically fill in the blanks with the correct information, I won't bother to transmit that information. There is nothing "wrong" or bad about this, it's simply the way our brains work, and we're actually starting to make our computers work the same way. When you have a lot of processing power on each end, and a very slow communications channel between the
I think you didn't understand what that sentence meant. A "social construct" does not means that people's races are determined by culture; it means that societies (cultures) determine what consitutes "a race". In other words, "races" are just a simplified (and not necessarily accurate) way to define large sets of characteristics.
But in fact culture does shape races, up to a point. For example, if you have a tribe (or country, or religion, etc.) where green-eyed women are considered "better", they will have a better chance to reproduce and green yees will tend to become more dominant in that culture. Same goes for any other characteristic. Call it "evolution by cultural selection". Cultures change faster than continents drift, though, so the influence of cultural selection (in the long term, at least) is not as big as that of the natural environment.
A race (in humans as in other animals, or even vegetables) is a set of characteristics. Characteristics that evolved mainly as a consequence of environment and culture. If a large number of people share a common set of (physical, anatomical, etc.) characteristics, they can be said to be of the same race. These races (large groups of similar people) were defined during a time when people tended to live their whole lives in one place, and therefore have children with people of the same (or a very similar) group.
As people started to travel across continents (which didn't really happen until some four or five hundred years ago), new "races" were created. Some of these combinations of the "traditional" races became so common that they got their own names (ex., a child of a caucasian and a central or southern african is usually called a mestiço or mulato).
So to answer your question: if a child is born to an interracial couple (meaning two people of clearly identifiable and distinct races), that child will usually inherit characteristics of both races. The child's race? Since you don't say which two races you're talking about, what kind of answer do you expect? It's like asking "if I mix two colours, what colour do I get?"... well, depends on the colours you mix, doesn't it?
As global travel becomes more common, and as cultures influence each other, more and more "races" will be created. Instead of a rainbow with 7 well-defined colours, you'll have a smooth spectrum. The original colours will still be there, but the boundaries between them will be so blurred that it won't be possible to tell where one ends and the other begins. But this doesn't mean that we won't be able to distinguish red from orange, or orange from yellow. It just means that some colours could be classified as either (or we could give them fancy new names and charge extra).
I have no idea what you mean by "the genetic difference between races". A race is a set of many different characteristics. It's a "meta-characteristic". You won't find a gene that determines your "race". But you will probably find a gene (or a small group of genes) that determines the tone of your skin, and another that determines the colour of your hair. And another that determines the colour of your eyes. And another that determines how curly your hair is. And another that determines how long your nose is. And so on. And if a large group of people share a significant amount of features, voilá, you have a race.
A "race" is simply an easy way to refer to a large set of similar elements. Take cars and bikes, for example (two "races" of personal transportation). What distinguishes a car from a motorcycle? The car has four wheels, the motorcycle only has two. But a bicycle also has two wheels, and it's not the same as a motorcycle. And a van has four wheels and it's not a car. To make things even more complicated, a car may not share a single part with another car, but it's still a car, just like the first one. So what defines something as "a car"? A lot of different things, some more important than others. Generally, you know one when you see it. And when something new comes up, it doesn't take long for people to come up with a new name, like "SUV" or "mini-van". Is this wrong, or pointless? I don't think so; it's an easy way to transmit information. If you say something is "a mini-van", people will not automatically know what it looks like or how it drives, but they will know more about it than if you say pretty much any other seven-letter word. Human language (and "mental filing") is based on hints, not complete descriptions. It's not terribly accurate, but it's very fast and, since the receiver has a pretty good processor (brain), you can usually trust him to "decompress" your hint into meaningful data.
So what if a person's basic "racial" features (hair, eye and skin colour, etc.) are determined only be a handful of genes? They're still very visible and (socially) very relevant differences. If you think the discove
Can't believe no-one posted this one yet (but I couldn't find it):
If, in the real world, soldiers with thermal vision and satellite targetting kill other soldiers that are armed with nothing but a rifle (sometimes not even that), does that make it OK to use wallhacks and aimbots on Counter-Strike?
One of the things I liked about Ultima was precisely that sense that there weren't any "quests". There was information, action and consequences. Sometimes I'd completely forget about what a certain NPC had asked me to do, and then I'd remember it while reading a book that had some information about it, or while talking to another character. In other words, a bit more like Real Life (TM) than an automatic journal that tells you exectly where to go and what to do next.
1st person view was possible for people who have tunnel-vision and insist on torturing themselves with it. (Really, what's wrong with over-the-shoulder??? Bloody immersive...)
The same that's wrong with the "cutscenes" in many FPS games (ex., AvP2): they take you out of your character. In RPGs with a party, a 3rd person view is a necessity (because you are expected to control all members of the party). In games where you are supposed to be a specific character, and control only that character, it doesn't make much sense to see that character from a ghostly floating viewpoint. Unless you eat some funny mushrooms, anyway.
Yes, it makes the game visually more attractive, and helps to sell (especially in a game that's so much about collecting items, weapons and armor), but it's definitely not "immersive".
Mmyeah, the official campaign obviously wasn't Bioware's focus
That's the optimistic view. The pessimistic view (supported by Baldur's Gate) is that they really think (and perhaps they're right) that people like "RPGs" where they're not required to think, but simply follow instructions and kill monsters for 40 hours of gameplay.
are you saying people shouldn't pay extra for the official campaign if it sucks?
Exactly. Same problem I have with MSIE being included in Windows. I don't want it, therefore I shouldn't have to pay for it (they can say it's "free", but obviously it's included in the price of Windows).
Half-Life has great user-made mods, and great (free) Valve mods, but the original (SP) game is also excellent. Still, they did release a "stand-alone" version of CS, for people who are only interested in the MP side of things (note: I don't know if the stand-alone CS also lets you run TFC, NS, etc., but I assume it does).
The story in U7 is light-years ahead of NwN's. To start with, it makes a lot more sense. The NwN "plot" sounds like something written by James Cameron (or worse, by a committee of James Camerons, each writing a separate "quest", without checking if it rhymes with the other ones).
One thing that really annoys me (in games, books, and movies) is lack of consistency; things that don't make sense (they don't have to be realistic, but they have to be consistent). And that's why I hate most James Cameron movies, and that's why I don't like NwN's original campaign. MP does have potential, but most modules still play a lot more like Diablo ("let's get together and kill all the monsters in this dungeon") than like a RPG.
The engine isn't bad (looks nice) but it's not exactly brilliant, either. No 1st person view, no sky, no swimming, no jumping, no climbing, no horses / carts / ships / etc., no pushing / moving objects, not really 3D (you can't walk over a bridge and under it, for example), etc..
The whole "chapter" thing is another aspect I don't like (and that BG shares). It makes me feel like I'm playing a pre-determined story (i.e., an "adventure" game) instead of creating my own (i.e., a RPG). Of course, the story is always pre-determined (possibly with some variations), but again using U7 as an example, you had access to the whole "world" since the beginning of the game, and could in fact "solve" a lot of "quests" before anyone asked you to do so (or before reading about them in a book, or hearing about them in a song, etc.).
Oh well, I suppose it's still better than this... (c:
You've just reminded me of another issue: during the whole game I never came even close to dying. I could take on 4 or 5 enemies at the same time and I consistently wiped them out with a couple of slashes. What is this, a Charles Bronson RPG...?
I bet someone, somewhere, is working on a remake of U7 using the NwN engine. But I suspect that, despite all the amazing shadows and reflexes and shiny water (BTW, why can't anyone seem to make decent refractive water, like in Tomb Raider?), they are still finding that a lot of what U7 did (back in, what was it, 1956?) can't be done in NwN.
> NWN is not so much a game as it is a game engine
My point exactly. When I buy a RPG, I expect a good SP campaign, not just the possibility that someone, some day, might use the same engine to make one (in which case I'd prefer to pay the person that makes it, not the people who made the engine - and the very poor original campaign).
Regarding the tools: yes, now there are some tools available (as long as you happen to have 3dsmax, which luckily I do, because I work in post-production). When the game was released, there were no tools to create 3rd party content (just the basic map editor), and there wasn't even any information from Bioware about file formats, etc.. It's still not exactly easy for an average person to create, say, a statue or a sundial and add it to the game (even if he or she is a competent 3D modeller).
Slashdot Mirror
You'r right. The arsenal available in his pieces is pathetic. On the other hand, I thought the adaptation of Othello turned out pretty good (although the game was a bit different from the book)... (c:
I once read an article about Half-Life's development where someone (Gabe Newell, perhaps) explained how they worked: Whenever a new level of the game was completed, they ran it through several playtesters, and recorded several things such as how long they took in each section, what was their health in each section, how much ammo they had, etc..
In the end, they asked them their opinion, but tuned the game based mainly on the statistics, and not the testers' perception. This way they made sure no sections of the game were too hard or too easy, always keeping the player on his toes without ever becoming too frustrating. They also made sure the player never spent too long in the same place (boring) or moved across an area too quickly (no time to appreciate the level design, etc.).
These changes were often done right after a testing session, and the new version was tested on the same day (I think the engine actually allowed them to load a save from an old version of a level into the new version).
The auto-save system (based not on time, but on markers put into the maps right before "hard" sections) and the quick-save system (with two alternating slots, so that even if you hit the quicksave key accidentally, you don't lose your previous quicksave) were probably also a result of watching people play, and seeing their frustration as they had to repeat the same thing over and over again when they made a mistake.
It really was a victory of common sense and objective thinking where "genius" and ego (cough*romero*cough*molyneux*cough) often fail.
The rest (the atmosphere) was mainly a matter of realism and consistence. A lab should look like a lab, a parking lot should look like a parking lot. The player should feel that he is exploring a real environment, with a purpose of its own, rather than some sort of playground constructed only for him. Another game that does that quite well, IMO, is System Shock 2.
Back to HL2:
I've seen some screenshots supposedly from HL2 (some of them quite convincing) and again they show very "normal" environments. Factories and shipyards and city streets. No weird crosses between gothic cathedrals and space stations (cough*quake*cough).
Judging from those screenshots (if they are real and current), I would say the story will be something along these lines:
Now, all of this is complete speculation on my part, but I think it makes some sense; it would fit in well with the first game's spirit, and it would explain some of the (supposedly real) screenshots I've seen. I guess we'll know soon enough.
RMN
~~~
Pale thin guys in dark suits are much worse than all the aliens put together. Don't you watch the X-Files (*)? With aliens you know where you stand. The worst they can do to you is tear you apart with their clawed tentacles (hmm... aliens, tentacles, that rings some other bells, okay, maybe they can do other things). But pale guys in thin glasses can turn out to be from the IRS. They can audit.
And he wants Gordon to turn on him. Evil masterminds are like that, they always leave a set of handcuff keys or an unguarded exit somewhere. You see, they might be evil but they're not stupid; they know that the moment they kill the hero they'll be out of a job.
RMN
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(*) I did, for a while, and thought it was great comedy.
Thank you for the English lessons. However, neither the dictionary not common usage support your claim that "persistently refuse" and "did not" are synonyms (let alone "excellent synonyms", as you say above). If, when faced with the question:
"Did you build the Eiffel Tower?"
You find it appropriate to answer with:
"I persistently refuse to build the Eiffel Tower!"
Then perhaps it is you who are in need of some English lessons.
Refusal only exists as a response (to a request or a proposal). Most things that don't happen simply don't happen; they are not refusals. I've never written a symphony. Not because I've refused to; simply because I don't have the time nor the knowledge to do so.
To the best of my knowledge (and, it appears, yours as well), no-one ever approached Valve with a concrete proposal or even a request for a Linux version (note that "approaching Valve" means a bit more than "posting a few messages on a newsgroup saying how cool it would be to have a Linux version", and hoping they read it). Nor have I ever seen any official statement from Valve saying they would not release a Linux (or Mac) version. In other words, there are no proposals and no refusals. It's just something that never happened.
Turning a non-event into an active (and "persistent") refusal is a typically paranoid behaviour. Just because someone doesn't say "hello" doesn't mean they are deliberately snubbing you.
The various "versions" of Half-Life you mention are in fact simply packs with the original game plus some new levels or mods. The original game's code and map design were never changed (apart from some minor bug fixes). The only version of Half-Life besides the original one is the PlayStation 2 version, which Valve really had nothing to do with apart from granting the rights; it was done by Gearbox Studios and financed by Sierra. Linux ports of the server(s), on the other hand, are made by Valve, without any external financing. In fact, they started handling the CS server Linux port long before CS was bought by Valve.
As far as I know, Valve's original licensing of the Quake engine was for a single game on the Windows platform (licensing does not give you the right to use the engine in all your future games). Ports to other platfroms would probably have required a new license. Something that I'm sure Sierra wouldn't have a problem paying for if they thought those ports would be profitable, and their quality would be satisfactory. Apparently they didn't. The article you linked to (which does not contain any Valve announcement, contrary to what you say) makes it perfectly clear that the Mac port was not being done by Valve. Some relevant quotes from that same article that seem to contradict your theory that Half-Life would be easy to port to Linux / Mac:
"Significant sections of the code are so closely tied to Windows (and MFC) that it's easier to rewrite them from scratch than attempt to convert them over to another OS"
"Due to the architecture of the Half-Life add-on [TFC] it would need to be ported separately"
I suspect the same would apply to HLDM, DMC and CS (not to mention all 3rd party mods, or any mod that Valve decided to release in the future). To the money and time required for these conversions, you would have to add the cost of training all the support personnel in all countries to deal with support requests from Mac and Linux users. All this for a market that would be (in 1997), at best, about 4% the size of the Windows market (and this is assuming that the people running Linux and Mac OS did not have any way of running the Windows version).
I think only someone with a serious deathwish would try to support three platforms (two of which clearly unprofitable) with their first title ever.
Later (say, in 2001, when the PlayStation 2 version was released), could a Linux or Mac version have been viable? Maybe. Personally I doubt it. 2001 was the year Loki went bankr
From what I've read, originally, the girl was going to be a playable character. Eventually she became the hologram, because Valve didn't have the time / money to make and test two versions of all the dialogues (well, monologues). Who knows, maybe she'll make a comeback in HL2... (c:
As to the ending, well, life isn't fair. A game (or movie, or book) that acknowledges that fact scores some points with me. The almost inevitable (and often logic-defying) happy endings are one of the main problems I have with "mainsteam" american books and films. So cheers to Valve for the "unexpected" realism of the ending. A smart Gordon Freeman would have realised the consequences of his choice.
What I didn't like was all the jumping around in HL's last 2 or 3 levels, especially after a game that was so realistic in terms of environment. I realise it was supposed to be an alien planet, but it still felt silly.
RMN
~~~
So in your opinion, any company that does not port product X to system Y, is "persistently refusing to release a Y version of product X"...? Strange way of looking at free will and business decisions. Using that definition of "persistent refusal" (which, apparently, means the same as "did not") I guess Adobe is also "persistently refusing" to release a version of Photoshop with support for HDR, and ATI is "persistently refusing" to give me a Radeon 9800 Pro for free. The bastards.
Ignoring other factors (such as licensing, lack of resources, lack of experience, etc.), there is still one important dimension you forgot in your little comparison: time. Neverwinter Nights and UT2003 were released less than one year ago. Half-Life was released in 1997. If you don't see the fundamental differences in the market, you must have been on prolonged vacations from reality. And if you read the NwN forums and see the amount of flak Bioware took for not releasing the Linux patches at the same time as the Windows patches, and for not releasing a Linux toolset, and then compare that with their Linux sales, you have to wonder if they'll decide to support Linux with their next products.
I'm sick of this attitude of certain Linux users that anyone who doesn't cater to their personal wishes is attacking "the Linux community" and / or is on Microsoft's payroll. Not only do these jerks have the arrogance to consider themsevles superior to everyone else, they also have the arrogance to assume they represent the entire Linux community.
Imagine if everyone whose native language isn't English decided to come to Slashdot and insult you (personally) for not translating your messages into their various languages.
I speak, read and write in five different languages. But you don't see me describing myself as part of a "linguistic elite" or as an "influential language user", nor do I think that people who speak exclusively English are a bunch of idiots (despite the fact that English has just about the most primitive grammar of any human language). Nor do you see me protesting that anyone who doesn't translate their software into, say, German is deliberately attacking "the German-speaking community".
If you feel that you're able to port Half-Life to Linux, and sell enough copies to cover the conversion (the easy part), the distribution (establish contacts with local distributors worldwide, make localised versions for other countries, etc.), and product support (hire or train staff to answer support calls for the Linux version in all the countries where Half-Life is sold), go ahead and make Valve an offer. If it's such a great deal (financially) as you seem to think, then look at it as an opportunity. Invest your own money into that project and get rich. Or are you also "lazy"...? Or perhaps you just remember Loki Games...?
If you approach Valve (or any other company, for that matter) with a credible business plan (or one that you're willing to finance yourself), and they say no, then yes, they are refusing to release a Linux version. If you insist (presumably with progressively better deals for them) and they keep refusing, then they are persistently refusing it. Otherwise, they didn't "persistently refuse to release a Linux version" any more than they "persistently refused to release" a Nintendo or Xbox or OS/2 version.
Oh, and from now on please provide a Portuguese version of your messages. I do understand English, and I realise you may need to spend time and money on the translation, but seeing as I'm part of a linguistic elite, I feel it's my right to decide how you employ your time and money.
What? You're persistently refusing to release a Portuguese translation? Vou tomar isso como uma ofensa a todas as pessoas lusófonas...
RMN
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So, did someone approach Valve to do a Linux / Mac port, and did Valve refuse to let them do it? Still waiting for any evidence of that. Without it, I have to interpret your claim that "Valve persistently refused to release a Linux or Mac version of the game" as a troll.
Other statements in your posts show that you are either extremely uninformed or, again, deliberately lying (I'd bet on the latter, since they are so easy to verify). But without clearing the one above, I won't even bother to address the rest.
It's sad that some Linux users spend so much of their time thinking (and foaming at the mouth) about Windows. Linux is a tool, not a religion. Zealots like you give the rest of us a bad name, and frankly you give Microsoft a lot more attention than they deserve. I would tell you to go troll on Slashdot, along with the rest of the imaginary "technical elite" that you seem to think you're part of, but I just realised you already are.
RMN
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They "persistently refused"...? What is that supposed to mean? Did anyone approach them to make the ports? With a sane financial project (ie, we want $$ to make, test, market and distribute the Mac / Linux ports and we expect to make $$$ in sales)? If not, you might as well say they "persistently refused" to port it to Solaris, OS/2, BeOS and ZX Spectrum.
Valve is a relatively small company, and I doubt they had people who could do the conversion in-house (the PS2 version, for example, was not made by Valve), especially since they were busy with the new netcode, voice integration, HLDM, TFC, DMC, CS, HLTV, VAC, Steam, HL2 and TF2. Also, a lot of the code in HL's graphics engine was licensed from Id, and Valve was limited in what they could do with it (assuming they were familiar enough with it to make a port in the first place).
The fact that they released a Linux server (where all the code was developed by Valve) and helped convert several mods to Linux (ex., the CS server) speaks for itself.
TFC, DMC and CS, for example, are not "third-party add-ons". They are financed and supported by Valve. Care to mention any "3rd party add-ons" that are supported by Microsoft? For free?
Of course, Valve doesn't do it out of the kindness of their hearts. They do it because these mods extend the life of the original product and because they give Valve a chance to do a "public beta" of several concepts (voice, cheat detection, latency-compensated netcode, spectator servers, etc.). I suspect they'll soon start actively suporting NS (Natural Selection), because it gives them a chance to refine the commander interface that will probably be used in TF2.
RMN
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Gordon Freeman is a specialist in anomalous materials. That's an elegant way of saying "he's a specialist in very advanced physics" without a) feeding you bogus science or b) boring you to death with real advanced physics (which can be fun, but not when you're in the mood ot kill some aliens with a crowbar).
Deux Ex was made by a lot of people who worked on Ultima Underworld, and their experience in RPG and storytelling shows. It's a lot more complex and not as polished as HL, but it's also a very good game. Looking forward to DE2. I'm sick of "RPG"s (I use the term loosely here) where all you do is "power up" (i.e., increase your attributes and get more armor and bigger weapons until your character becomes a tank) and follow instructions. Hopefully, DE2 will give you plenty of freedom and require you to (or at least reward you if you) use your brain.
RMN
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Didn't you play the game? If so, why are you asking questions that have such obvious answers?
Initially, the character (Dr. Gordon Freeman) wants to settle into his new job. At this point, there is no-one standing in the way of his goals.
The first unexpected event happens when the experiment goes wrong. Part of the lab is destroyed, and what remains is infested with aliens. At this point, the aliens and the destruction stand in his way and his goal is to contact people on the outside.
Eventually, he manages to find his way outside, and that's when another unexpected event takes place: the people who were supposed to save him and the other scientists are in fact trying to kill them to keep the whole affair secret. At this point, the soldiers stand in his way, and his goal is to try to learn as much as possible about the situation, and how to solve it.
Eventually, he finds a way to teleport to the alien's planet (which must count as another "unexpected event"). Now his enemies are once more the aliens, and his goal is to destroy them.
Finally, at the very end of the game, there's a final "unexpected event".
So there.
Half-life's story isn't "great" in the sense that it's very original (it's not). The great thing about it is not the story itself, it's the way it flows so naturally and feels so much part of the game, despite the fact that the game's genre is not one typically associated with "a story".
Half-life is essentially an action game. It's not an adventure, it's not a RPG. There are no dialogues and no items. Just guns, monsters, puzzles and the occasional scripted "scene". Given these building blocks, I think HL manages to create a great atmosphere and (apart from the rather weak and predictable ending) to tell a pretty entertaining story (a lot better - more interesting and more consistent - than some movies).
HL's great strength is not its originality, it's the level of perfection and polishing of every single of its elements, from the gameplay to the default keyboard layout to the auto-save system. Things that stem not from great technology or brilliant ideas but from a lot of playtesting, a good dose of common sense, and a refusal to settle for "good enough" just to meet the deadline.
As someone wrote at the time, "Half-life restored my faith in gaming". After fiascos like Black & White and Neverwinter Nights (not exactly bad, but very disappointing nonetheless), I could definitely use a new injection of Valve fluid.
It's ironic that the company that created such a perfect game (and later created and financed so many great free updates and mods) was founded by ex-Microsoft employees...
RMN
~~~
Oh, SCSI is great, and definitely worth the extra money... when you have 10 or 20 simultaneous read & write operations going on in the same drive.
For desktop use (and even for video editing / workstations / etc.), it's a complete waste of money. Top ATA drives give you more than 50 GB/s on a single read, and can even handle simultaneous reads quite well. Get one with a big cache (8 MB), and you can even get away with a couple of mixed read and write operations.
Get one of those nice big 3Ware ATA RAID controllers, and you get basically the same performance as with SCSI RAID, for one fifth of the price. Unless you're really hammering your disks, accessing a ridiculous number of different files all the time (in other words, unless it's for a pretty busy server), SCSI simply doesn't pay off right now.
Of course, some people will always say SCSI is "better", just like some people will always say Intel is better and some will always say Apple is better. But that's religion. In the real world, it boils down to bang for the buck. And SCSI costs a lot more buck, and the extra bit of bang you get is useless in 99% of cases.
RMN
~~~
When the CPU is idle, the power consumption is lower. Just because an Athlon or P4 can draw (and dissipate) up to 75 watts that doesn't mean they do it all the time.
You're right, most people don't need a high-end P4 or Athlon. And that's why the vast majority of systems being sold today have mid- and low-end CPUs. Having the "top performer" is good for Intel or AMD's marketing, but doesn't really translate directly into sales.
P.S. - You "feel sorry" for people who "waste" money on fast CPUs (which do make a difference in games and high-end DCC applications) and then you say you use SCSI drives to code, watch DVDs and download movie trailers...? Oh boy... ~:)
RMN
~~~
For the masses, 64-bit is a marketing gimmick. It's useless and will continue to be useless for several months (programs need rewriting, retesting, etc., assuming the authors bother to do it in the first place). This is for the 64-bit registers.
The 64-bit memory controller (which doesn't actually support 64-bit addressing, BTW) is even less relevant for normal users. Most people don't have any use for more than 512 MB. Even workstations can work perfectly with 2 GB or so (unless you're working with floating-point / HDR HD streams, or massive prints, anyway - I do sometimes, and in that situation memory is worth its weight in plutonium).
While "the real point of a 64 bit chip" is its 64-bitness, the real point of the Athlon 64 is not that it's a 64-bit chip.
Much more important to its success in the mass market (and the Athlon 64, unlike the Opteron, is aimed at the mass market) is its performance with generic, existing applications. And for those, the extra registers, the improved branch prediction, the integrated memory controller and (hopefully) the higher clock speed matter at least as much (in fact a lot more) than the fact that the registers are 64 bits wide.
The chip used in this "review" is very odd. From its low clock speed and big cache, it looks more like an Opteron than like an Athlon 64. The Athlon 64 was expected to launch at "3200+" (around 2 GHz) and have 256 or 512 KB of (L2) cache. With the Athlon 64 scheduled to come out in September, I wouldn't be very surprised if this "engineering sample" was in fact an Opteron 242 packaged as an Athlon 64 (socket 754 instead of 940), sent to motherboard / chipset makers so they could test their Athlon 64 boards (remember, the socket is different, but apart from SMP support and the respective HT links, the Athlon 64 and the Opteron are almost exactly the same).
With AMD's recent manufacturing problems (hopefully solved with the IBM deal) and with the Opterons launch approaching, I doubt they'd be wasting time and fab space making "real" Athlon 64s.
This is pure speculation, of course, but I think it makes some sense. I expect the final Athlon 64s to run at a higher clock speed and have less cache (meaning they'll perform much better than this "sample" in most tasks, and slightly worse in some - namely the compression test, which relies heavily on the big cache).
RMN
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Actually, the great part is the extra registers. That, along with the integrated memory controller and the improved branch prediction should help make it significantly faster than the Athlon XP, even in 32-bit code (it requires recompilation but no rewriting). The bigger cache is also nice, but I suspect most Athlon 64 models will have 512 KB L2, like the Barton XP.
64-bit registers and bigger-than-32-bit addressing (40-bit for now, I think, with higher models using 48-bit) are there mainly to give AMD a foothold in the server market. For most of us, they will not have an immediate impact.
RMN
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You sound a lot like minister al-Sahhaf. "There is no race, I tell you. We have destryed the race, the race is commiting suicide. The infidels are saying there is a race but they are lying, we will destroy them. Do you see any race here? I don't see any race. There is no race. Good day."
Nuclear physicists can "agree there is no such thing as chemistry" all they like. But it's still a meaningful word that describes a lot of tools and processes that human society uses daily. So "chemistry" is real. Since no-one can prove there is a god, "religion" can also be said to be "meaningless". But clearly it's not. People pray, people make speeches, people read their holy books, so clearly "religion" is also real, and so is god, in a way. And since different groups of people tend to have different characteristics, the concept of "human race" is clearly real too (as are the concepts of "height", "gender", "beauty", "strength", "intelligence", and so on - some more subjective than others, but all very much real).
There are very few things (none, atually) that you can establish as being "the ultimate truth". Cells aren't real, they're just groups of molecules. Molecules are just groups of atoms, atoms are just electrons and protons and neutrons, and so on. But it's not very practical, when I'm describing another person, to say "the superstrings that define the area of this universe's membrane that [...etc....]". It's easier to just say "she's white, with green eyes".
I doubt you can came up with a sentence of less than 6 words that gives more information about what "she" looks like.
As I said, if you have a problem with the word "race", feel free to come up with a different one (you don't like "frex", try "nabo"). As Humpty Dumpty said, "when I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less". To me, "race" is simply a way to quickly and broadly define a large group of physical characteristics, that would take too long to describe one by one. It's not 100% accurate, but usually it doesn't need to be. I really couldn't care less about "how many genes define a race" (which is meaningless, anyway), just as I couldn't care less about the chemical composition of marron glacé.
As to the migrations, I think this is pointless. You seem to think that a group of 10 or 20 people (or even 100) moving from one country to another over a generation (say, 20 years) will have a significant impact on "interracial breeding". Which is clearly wrong (see my messages above for why it's wrong, or just try looking at the real world). But hey, you also say "races don't exist" in the first place, so I guess the whole thing is irrelevant.
Maybe then you'd care to explain why - if people have been migrating and interbreeding in huge numbers for tens of thousands of years - the various human races (or "ethnicities", if you prefer) haven't all blended together into a single, worldwide race (or "ethnicity", or "frex", or "nabo", or whatever you want to call it).
RMN
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Trade plays a very small role in the mixing of cultures and races. A handful of guys travelling from one country to another, dropping off some spices, taking some swords, and going back home don't cause any significant effects, race- or culture-wise (apart from the effect the trade itself has). Sure, some of them may leave a pregnant woman behind, but that woman's child is likely to marry someone in his or her own society (and culture, and race) and his or her "difference" becomes diluted, and unnoticeable after a couple of generations.
It wasn't until quite recently that significant communities from one country (and race) started moving to, and mixing with, other races and cultures. Not a dozen traders going back and forth - one thousand people immigrating.
Or do you think that the place where you're born determines what you look like, and that's why you have mostly blacks in Africa, mostly whites in Europe, etc.? According to your theory that "races have been mixing since pre-history", shouldn't we all look pretty much the same by now?
Maybe you should read some books about anthropology.
RMN
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> Have to disagree. How many "black" people in this
> country (US) are "pure black"? Even if you assume that
> there is such a thing as "pure" white or black (and know
> how to define it),
Basically a guy is "pure" black when he says he's black and most people in his society agree he's black (same thing for white, indian, etc.). It's not an exact science. I don't mean pure as in "racially pure" (whatever that means), just as in "unambiguously X".
> By your definition, there are actually very few
> "black" people in America.
And what definition would that be?
> if at least one of your parents is black, then you are black,
> too. It is true because society will treat you that way,
> and through your life you'll have the experiences of a
> black person.
Well, depends on the society, I guess. I live in Portugal, and racial alchemy has always been a hobby of ours. For example, there's a country in Africa (Cabo Verde) that was basically used for "natural genetic engineering" during the 16th / 17th century. It consisted of several desert but fertile islands, and was colonised by "hand-picked" individuals from Portugal and mainland Africa (Angola, Guiné, São Tomé e Príncipe, etc.). The result was a country where everyone looked like Hale Berry (ie, somewhere between "white" and "black", and very, very good-looking). Yes, the portuguese navigators did trade slaves (mostly african), but the justification was always more "cultural superiority" (religion playing a big role in that) than racial superiority.
> West Africans look "different" than East Africans, but
> few white Americans would make the distinction.
It's not a matter of "would", it's a matter of "need to". When you have a very obvious difference, you tend to ignore the details. It's like saying a PC is "Intel" or "AMD", when in fact there are a lot more differences than just the brand of the CPU (there's the model, the chipset, the type of RAM, etc.).
One thing that annoys me about the US of A is this new trend to refer to blacks as "african-americans". Were they born in Africa? They weren't? They were born in America? Then they're americans, period. Might as well refer to white americans as "euro-americans", and in fact to europeans as "afro-europeans", because they certainly had some african ancestors. So maybe a black american should be an "afro-american-euro-african" or something like that.
I keep remembering a line from a movie (can't rememeber which movie) where, during a boxing match, some character said "look at this, you have a white guy fighting a black guy and the commentator can only distinguish them by the colour of their trunks".
> Some people are tall and some are short, but we don't
> consider them racially different just because of that
Because height tends to vary too much within a society. Certain societies where all individuals are significantly shorter than in neighbouring societies (ex., pygmies) are usually considered as separate "races".
RMN
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> ?? Until 400 to 500 years ago? Then how did the
> Americas get populated well over 10,000 years ago?
> And what about all of those modern humans who came
> out of Africa to populate the earth more than 40,000
> years ago?
All that happened very, very slowly. No single individual travelled across the world (that only started in the 15th century, and only became really common in the 20th). 20 thousand years ago, everyone lived their life in groups of similar people. Races changed very slowly, based on their environment, not based on mixes between clearly distinct races. It was precisely that isolation and localised reproduction that gave birth to our current "big" races. If you go back 500 or 1000 years you'll find that between each two "big races" there is usually a significant natural barrier (sea, desert, mountains, etc.), that made those two groups evolve more or less independently.
> Race, socially, is a culturally constructed
> concept and most anthropologists and sociologists no
> longer accept the term as meaningful or valid
> (e.g. race is semanitically void).
Hey, for some catholics "contraception" is not a meaningful concept because, in their view of reality, people only have sex when they want children. Doesn't mean that - in the real world - contraception (and race) aren't pretty relevant concepts. Don't make me quote the Iraqi information minister again.
> there are NO EXISTING SUB-SPECIES among homo sapiens.
In one word: lawyers. Oh, ok, you said homo sapiens.
Define "sub-species". The concepts of "species", "phylum", "family", etc., are completely artificial. They basically describe groups of beings with similar characteristics, they're not based on any deep genetic similarities or even on evolutionary paths. Taxonomy is a practical thing, not some sort of "mathematics of life". Some people are now adoptimg a more systematic approach to it, but personally I think it's a bit of a waste of time. Biology (like physics) needs tools, it doesn't need "the truth"; that's for tormented philosophers and for information ministers.
> This lack of race has been supported, so far, by
> the results of the genome project.
What is your problem? The word? Stop calling it "race" and start calling it "frex", then. Better? People of different frex (physical / anatomical / physiognomical / capillary characteristics) look different, and we need a simple way to tell them apart without having to describe every single aspect of their bodies. Just as we have "man" and "woman", although men and women belong to the same species. And just as we have "coal" and "diamond" although, deep down, both are made of carbon. Reality is an interpretation. Raw data is useless and meaningless.
> Perhaps a more useful is the term ETHNICITY,
So it seems you problem is the word. You should read Alice in Wonderland (especially the part with Humpty Dumpty). I'm sticking with frex.
RMN
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> When one "race" is socially dominant over the other, the
:^)
:=), it's still a big difference, even if it's controlled by a single gene and all other genes are exactly the same.
> child will be classified with the subjugate race.
Yes. A child of, say, a white and a black, will tend to be seen as black by the "pure" whites and as white by the "pure" blacks (I mean "pure" as in "someone who belongs to a clearly defined 'large' race"). But this is because he or she will look different. When you start to have enough people with similar features, you have a new "race", and both "pure" blacks and "pure" whites will start seeing him / her as a "pure gray".
> Generally the association between genes and
> specific physical characteristics (like nose length)
> isn't one-to-one.
Not that anyone has a clue.
> They are socially relevant because we are taught
> that they are socially relevant.
No, they are socially relevant because if you have a village where everyone's black and one guy is white, he's going to look different. And that alone is socially relevant. Just as being extremely tall is relevant. It won't necessarily make people treat you better or worse, but it will make you "stand out"; it will make you more noticeable.
> Hard as it is, if you look objectively at the
> clusters of characteristics that we use for racial
> classification, they're really fairly minor,
And my point is: so what? Going back to the digital world, if you compare a picture to another where every pixel is 1% brighter, you're unlikely to notice the difference. But if you compare it to a picture where a group of 4 or 5 pixels in the middle of the sky is red, you'll notice the difference immediately. And yet (in bits and bytes) this picture is a lot more "similar" to the first one than the picture that was 1% brighter.
The difference in "the number of genes", or whatever, is irrelevant. It's the influence they have on our appearance and behaviour that counts. And if a gene makes you a different colour from the people around you (or twice as tall, or gives you three noses instead of the usual two
> Our culture trains us to amplify our perception
> of these diffences and their importance.
It's not our culture, it's our brain. As I wrote in another message in this thread, human language (data processing and communication) is based on hints. When I say, "I had dinner", your brain automatically decodes that into a sequence of actions (me sitting down with a plate in front of me, eating with a knife and fork, etc.). I don't need to describe the entire process, I trust your brain to do the "decompression" and reconstruction. But if there was something unusual about my dinner (ex., I ate lying down on the floor), and if I want you to know that, I'll have to specify it (I don't need you to ask me). Likewise, if I'm white and you're white and I'm telling about this hot chick I met, you'll tend to assume that she's white too, and I'll tend to omit that, because it's "unnecessary network traffic". If she was in fact black, I would tend to mention that, because I knew that you would probably assume she was white.
Some people see this as discrimination and say "Why did you have to mention she was black? Does it make any difference?" But they're wrong. Mentioning she was black is perfectly normal (after all, I was describing her to you); the "strange" thing is why wouldn't I mention it if she was white. And the answer is: optimisation. If I know (or at least believe) that you will automatically fill in the blanks with the correct information, I won't bother to transmit that information. There is nothing "wrong" or bad about this, it's simply the way our brains work, and we're actually starting to make our computers work the same way. When you have a lot of processing power on each end, and a very slow communications channel between the
I think you didn't understand what that sentence meant. A "social construct" does not means that people's races are determined by culture; it means that societies (cultures) determine what consitutes "a race". In other words, "races" are just a simplified (and not necessarily accurate) way to define large sets of characteristics.
But in fact culture does shape races, up to a point. For example, if you have a tribe (or country, or religion, etc.) where green-eyed women are considered "better", they will have a better chance to reproduce and green yees will tend to become more dominant in that culture. Same goes for any other characteristic. Call it "evolution by cultural selection". Cultures change faster than continents drift, though, so the influence of cultural selection (in the long term, at least) is not as big as that of the natural environment.
RMN
~~~
A race (in humans as in other animals, or even vegetables) is a set of characteristics. Characteristics that evolved mainly as a consequence of environment and culture. If a large number of people share a common set of (physical, anatomical, etc.) characteristics, they can be said to be of the same race. These races (large groups of similar people) were defined during a time when people tended to live their whole lives in one place, and therefore have children with people of the same (or a very similar) group.
As people started to travel across continents (which didn't really happen until some four or five hundred years ago), new "races" were created. Some of these combinations of the "traditional" races became so common that they got their own names (ex., a child of a caucasian and a central or southern african is usually called a mestiço or mulato).
So to answer your question: if a child is born to an interracial couple (meaning two people of clearly identifiable and distinct races), that child will usually inherit characteristics of both races. The child's race? Since you don't say which two races you're talking about, what kind of answer do you expect? It's like asking "if I mix two colours, what colour do I get?"... well, depends on the colours you mix, doesn't it?
As global travel becomes more common, and as cultures influence each other, more and more "races" will be created. Instead of a rainbow with 7 well-defined colours, you'll have a smooth spectrum. The original colours will still be there, but the boundaries between them will be so blurred that it won't be possible to tell where one ends and the other begins. But this doesn't mean that we won't be able to distinguish red from orange, or orange from yellow. It just means that some colours could be classified as either (or we could give them fancy new names and charge extra).
I have no idea what you mean by "the genetic difference between races". A race is a set of many different characteristics. It's a "meta-characteristic". You won't find a gene that determines your "race". But you will probably find a gene (or a small group of genes) that determines the tone of your skin, and another that determines the colour of your hair. And another that determines the colour of your eyes. And another that determines how curly your hair is. And another that determines how long your nose is. And so on. And if a large group of people share a significant amount of features, voilá, you have a race.
A "race" is simply an easy way to refer to a large set of similar elements. Take cars and bikes, for example (two "races" of personal transportation). What distinguishes a car from a motorcycle? The car has four wheels, the motorcycle only has two. But a bicycle also has two wheels, and it's not the same as a motorcycle. And a van has four wheels and it's not a car. To make things even more complicated, a car may not share a single part with another car, but it's still a car, just like the first one. So what defines something as "a car"? A lot of different things, some more important than others. Generally, you know one when you see it. And when something new comes up, it doesn't take long for people to come up with a new name, like "SUV" or "mini-van". Is this wrong, or pointless? I don't think so; it's an easy way to transmit information. If you say something is "a mini-van", people will not automatically know what it looks like or how it drives, but they will know more about it than if you say pretty much any other seven-letter word. Human language (and "mental filing") is based on hints, not complete descriptions. It's not terribly accurate, but it's very fast and, since the receiver has a pretty good processor (brain), you can usually trust him to "decompress" your hint into meaningful data.
So what if a person's basic "racial" features (hair, eye and skin colour, etc.) are determined only be a handful of genes? They're still very visible and (socially) very relevant differences. If you think the discove
Can't believe no-one posted this one yet (but I couldn't find it):
If, in the real world, soldiers with thermal vision and satellite targetting kill other soldiers that are armed with nothing but a rifle (sometimes not even that), does that make it OK to use wallhacks and aimbots on Counter-Strike?
RMN
~~~
One of the things I liked about Ultima was precisely that sense that there weren't any "quests". There was information, action and consequences. Sometimes I'd completely forget about what a certain NPC had asked me to do, and then I'd remember it while reading a book that had some information about it, or while talking to another character. In other words, a bit more like Real Life (TM) than an automatic journal that tells you exectly where to go and what to do next.
1st person view was possible for people who have tunnel-vision and insist on torturing themselves with it. (Really, what's wrong with over-the-shoulder??? Bloody immersive...)
The same that's wrong with the "cutscenes" in many FPS games (ex., AvP2): they take you out of your character. In RPGs with a party, a 3rd person view is a necessity (because you are expected to control all members of the party). In games where you are supposed to be a specific character, and control only that character, it doesn't make much sense to see that character from a ghostly floating viewpoint. Unless you eat some funny mushrooms, anyway.
Yes, it makes the game visually more attractive, and helps to sell (especially in a game that's so much about collecting items, weapons and armor), but it's definitely not "immersive".
RMN
~~~
Mmyeah, the official campaign obviously wasn't Bioware's focus
That's the optimistic view. The pessimistic view (supported by Baldur's Gate) is that they really think (and perhaps they're right) that people like "RPGs" where they're not required to think, but simply follow instructions and kill monsters for 40 hours of gameplay.
are you saying people shouldn't pay extra for the official campaign if it sucks?
Exactly. Same problem I have with MSIE being included in Windows. I don't want it, therefore I shouldn't have to pay for it (they can say it's "free", but obviously it's included in the price of Windows).
Half-Life has great user-made mods, and great (free) Valve mods, but the original (SP) game is also excellent. Still, they did release a "stand-alone" version of CS, for people who are only interested in the MP side of things (note: I don't know if the stand-alone CS also lets you run TFC, NS, etc., but I assume it does).
The story in U7 is light-years ahead of NwN's. To start with, it makes a lot more sense. The NwN "plot" sounds like something written by James Cameron (or worse, by a committee of James Camerons, each writing a separate "quest", without checking if it rhymes with the other ones).
One thing that really annoys me (in games, books, and movies) is lack of consistency; things that don't make sense (they don't have to be realistic, but they have to be consistent). And that's why I hate most James Cameron movies, and that's why I don't like NwN's original campaign. MP does have potential, but most modules still play a lot more like Diablo ("let's get together and kill all the monsters in this dungeon") than like a RPG.
The engine isn't bad (looks nice) but it's not exactly brilliant, either. No 1st person view, no sky, no swimming, no jumping, no climbing, no horses / carts / ships / etc., no pushing / moving objects, not really 3D (you can't walk over a bridge and under it, for example), etc..
The whole "chapter" thing is another aspect I don't like (and that BG shares). It makes me feel like I'm playing a pre-determined story (i.e., an "adventure" game) instead of creating my own (i.e., a RPG). Of course, the story is always pre-determined (possibly with some variations), but again using U7 as an example, you had access to the whole "world" since the beginning of the game, and could in fact "solve" a lot of "quests" before anyone asked you to do so (or before reading about them in a book, or hearing about them in a song, etc.).
Oh well, I suppose it's still better than this... (c:
RMN
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You've just reminded me of another issue: during the whole game I never came even close to dying. I could take on 4 or 5 enemies at the same time and I consistently wiped them out with a couple of slashes. What is this, a Charles Bronson RPG...?
I bet someone, somewhere, is working on a remake of U7 using the NwN engine. But I suspect that, despite all the amazing shadows and reflexes and shiny water (BTW, why can't anyone seem to make decent refractive water, like in Tomb Raider?), they are still finding that a lot of what U7 did (back in, what was it, 1956?) can't be done in NwN.
RMN
~~~
> NWN is not so much a game as it is a game engine
My point exactly. When I buy a RPG, I expect a good SP campaign, not just the possibility that someone, some day, might use the same engine to make one (in which case I'd prefer to pay the person that makes it, not the people who made the engine - and the very poor original campaign).
Regarding the tools: yes, now there are some tools available (as long as you happen to have 3dsmax, which luckily I do, because I work in post-production). When the game was released, there were no tools to create 3rd party content (just the basic map editor), and there wasn't even any information from Bioware about file formats, etc.. It's still not exactly easy for an average person to create, say, a statue or a sundial and add it to the game (even if he or she is a competent 3D modeller).
RMN
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