Ico? Maybe a bit of Zelda. Actually, what it reminded me of was Solstice for the NES. Old game
Space Channel 5? Samba de Amigo? Don't make me laugh.
Were these games complete knock offs? Of course not. They each added something new to their respective genre. Rez was lots of fun, the combination of the music with your surroundings was totally intense. Ico was a new style of game play, and the two rythem games had a sytle all their own.
In the same way, GTA VC added a Noir style that was cool, Final Fantasy X had a very innovative Sphere Grid system. Mario Sunshine's water cannon added a lot of options.
By their own nature, video games are rarely revolutionary. Even Animal Crossing has at its roots an RPG background.
However, what we hopefully get is a series of evolutionary steps. Where games take established genres and add a twist to make them special. Style and twists. That is where the true creativity lies.
Seriously. All it does is spam unaffected individuals, considering that in the post Klez days, all e-mail viruses spoof the sending address, clogging up e-mail servers and causing more annoyances than spam!
When you start getting these, you can get at least 200 a day. It's not a good thing.
Actually, that does happen, and that is why all the jokes about the MPAA banning text messaging are silly.
Movies that have benefited greatly from word of mouth in the last year or so?
Spider-Man the LotR movies (past the geeks, the movies got a lot of play among mainstream movie goers because of word of mouth) Pirates of the Caribeean (sp?) This more than likely is the best example. This was expected to be filler, instead good word of mouth turned it into one of the biggest hits of the summer That Greek Wedding movie
At least as many movies are helped by word of mouth as are hurt by it.
Considering the consolidations in the radio industry, and the hostility against webradio, People such as myself find no place other than P2P to turn to for new music. In your mind, what is the best potential copyright-friendly solution to the problem of a lack of venues for new (and classic) music exploration?
I disagree. The producer is an integral part of the music process. A lot of the time the producer/mixer adds just as much to the sound as the artists themselves.
Exactly..Rare is a lot more than just the N64 games. You forgot two games 'tho.
Pinbot: The best pure pinball game in the 8-bit and most of the 16-bit generation IMO.
Killer Instinct:Amazing graphics for the time, and an interesting style.
The sad thing is, GbtG more than likey will be slammed by the X-Box fanboys, and be an amazingly big flop. At the same time, it'll more than likely be a lot of fun.
They're still trying to be the best. It's just from an artistic side as opposed to a strictly commercial side.
That's their philosophy, believe it or not, and that goes behind everything.
Maybe eventually the flow will get back behidn them, and to be honest I think it will. But the style is non-Nintendo, right now, and they don't want to sell out.
Halo is kinda fun, although not best of breed. It's too repetitive, even though it has great AI. It's fun for sure..but I think it's more of a cause of positive echo chamber (as opposed to Enter The Matrix, a similar game to be honest that was killed by negative echo chamber)
It's a big disappointment for me personally as well. It was supposed to be a squad based shooter in a semi-persistant battlefield. Obviously that is not what we got.
The best console FPS IMO is Time Splitters 2, a game which has a lot more interesting things to do to get around the limitations of the console.
Actually, that was my biggest problem with Halo. No bots for multiplayer. Made things rather sparse.
I don't really have the time to read your article right now, (but I'm sure it's insightful.). However, I hope that you also mention for people to contact hte SEC as well. This pump and dumb scheme as well can not be rewarded.
My feeling is the heads of SCO will be in FPMAP by the end of this.
I'll admit. I read through the first half, and it had the facts pretty much on. I thought..wow. A good article coming from the National Post. One of the biggest rags in the western world.
But then the second half..
FUD FUD FUD.
It raises the spectere of FUD about Linux and GPL in particular. Stating that Linux distrubitors need to cover companies over potential copyright violations (none is needed).
As well, it completely misrepresents the GPL. Giving the absurd idea that somehow a future copyright holder could revoke their code, throwing everything into a huge legal battle yet again.
The funny thing is that it actually mentions FUD in spreading FUD..teehee..*sigh*..
Lightning does not strike even once for the National Rag.
Cable modems have a (not-so) annoying habit of keeping track of MAC IDs and giving the IP address to a specific IP address.
It's not a bug. It's a feature. Seriously. Get a few extra IP addresses and a hub and it's great. You can count on the same IP address for the same computer.
As someone who works this beat, let me tell you that most of the problems that tech support hear, the typical/. would never have. Over 99.9% of the problems, to be honest.
Network Outages and Hardware Failure. That is the two problems that technically adapt people have.
Both of these are the same problem, just in different ways./. is a fairly libertarian community. Think of all the problems you have with government. How big and cumbersome and expensive it is. That is just as relevent for corporate beauacracy as well. There are always rules and guidelines that have to be followed. It's not just that it's because of bad companies. It can't be avoided. It just can't.
For every time you have difficulty reporting an outage, at least 100 times are saved where a customer convinces him/herself it's an outage when it is a simple fix.
For every time you have difficulty replacing a piece of hardware, it can be fixed about 20 times with a simple fix.
Tech support, unfortunately is not aimed at the/. crowd. It is aimed at the LCD. It's good that at least here we have enough intelligent people who are willing to share information (that's the kicker. It's more fun than flipping burgers, to be honest..stupid economy) that we can handle the more advanced issues that would normally fall through the cracks. I'm lucky to work for a company that allows that. Not all are that lucky. (and if you are signed up with one, run away fast IMO). As well, there is just too much demand for TS to have all tech agents be technically aware. You just need to have a good ratio..say 1:5 or 1:10. The information will filter down..fast.
A couple of more common complaints:
"They made me unplug the modem". Modems, both DSL and cable have an annoying habit of locking up. Trust me on this. We can see it from our end and it happens more than you think. Especially if there was some maintenence done in the area overnight.
Uninstalling anti-virus for e-mail issues. It's simple, Anti-virus for e-mail frankly is trying at best, and downright russian roulette at worst. It will mess up your e-mail transimission. It's not a matter of if, but when.
Routing issues are a pain for everybody, but I don't want to think about the alternative.
That's about it. I hope that makes you think a bit differently about what you're dealing with in TS.
What it will be, is a sort of WiFi networking option for your GC. It will either work thorugh game imputs, to make any game multiplayer over a wide period, or with specific games.
A not-so hot idea if you live in the boondocks, but if you live in the middle of a college campus or the like, this could easily be the next big thing if it catches on.
If they include a voice chat system, frankly all bets are off.
However, I think what you're looking for is Skies of Arcadia Legends. That is a very good deep RPG that I think you are looking for. The ship-to-ship battles are especially fun.
PS2 had a massive lead going in. Nobody would ever catch them.
The X-Box has higher sales in US, while the GC has higher sales overseas. Overall, both are about equal, with the GC with a slight edge.
The idea that somehow the GC is far in third-place, is frankly strage. There is a lack of third-party games for it, which is true. (Although, to be honest I don't miss much, at least when it comes to X-Box).
The unwritten rule, I suspect is that third-party companies want to keep out of the way of Nintendo..which one can't really blame them over.
My problem with that is 20 years is way too much. Plenty of things go the way of the dodo in 2-3 years time. I think that commercial relevence is a good way to factor it in. (But extend it for actual commercial competition)
Actually no, companies just need to make it not worth people's whiles to need to go to non-commercial sources, and that they can provide a better product. This would involve not pissing off their customers.
As for the GPL, Frankly, I do not think that the GPL has much to worry about. There would always be distrubition, so the commercial copyright would maintain itself. Frankly, non-commercial violations are NOT a major concern.
Copyright is absolute (except for fair use) for a period of 2 years. After that, non-commercial use/sharing is allowed. When the copyright holder neglects the copyright, the whole thing goes to public domain.
That is a very good balance between the rights of the copyright holder and the public for the digital era. Maybe it's a too much in favour of the public, but frankly, they've made their bed.
Actually, it is because I like to handle more than one thing at a time that I tend to not like the WRPG battle systems. They tend to be so plain and vanilla.
Too much hack n' slash, not enough options.
JRPGs tend to go overboard in the option department, at least the newer ones. Brings tweaking to a high level.
Lunar and Grandia, some of the most entertaining and challenging JRPGS ever made.
But yea, people tend to forget that there is more than Square in this genre. In fact, there is more than Final Fantasy. Want a non-linear JRPG? Try the Saga series. It's not that GOOD, but it's something.
Slashdot Mirror
Ha! I don't think so.
Rez? Space Harrier? Panzer Dragoon?
Ico? Maybe a bit of Zelda. Actually, what it reminded me of was Solstice for the NES. Old game
Space Channel 5? Samba de Amigo? Don't make me laugh.
Were these games complete knock offs? Of course not. They each added something new to their respective genre. Rez was lots of fun, the combination of the music with your surroundings was totally intense. Ico was a new style of game play, and the two rythem games had a sytle all their own.
In the same way, GTA VC added a Noir style that was cool, Final Fantasy X had a very innovative Sphere Grid system. Mario Sunshine's water cannon added a lot of options.
By their own nature, video games are rarely revolutionary. Even Animal Crossing has at its roots an RPG background.
However, what we hopefully get is a series of evolutionary steps. Where games take established genres and add a twist to make them special. Style and twists. That is where the true creativity lies.
Please stop doing this!!!
PLEASE!!
Seriously. All it does is spam unaffected individuals, considering that in the post Klez days, all e-mail viruses spoof the sending address, clogging up e-mail servers and causing more annoyances than spam!
When you start getting these, you can get at least 200 a day. It's not a good thing.
Actually, that does happen, and that is why all the jokes about the MPAA banning text messaging are silly.
Movies that have benefited greatly from word of mouth in the last year or so?
Spider-Man
the LotR movies (past the geeks, the movies got a lot of play among mainstream movie goers because of word of mouth)
Pirates of the Caribeean (sp?) This more than likely is the best example. This was expected to be filler, instead good word of mouth turned it into one of the biggest hits of the summer
That Greek Wedding movie
At least as many movies are helped by word of mouth as are hurt by it.
Err...no
One side is right, the other side is wrong. Now, there can be areas of gray, but this CAN happen.
Frankly, SCO has no credibilty at this point. If they want to be taken serious...show the source.
Considering the consolidations in the radio industry, and the hostility against webradio, People such as myself find no place other than P2P to turn to for new music. In your mind, what is the best potential copyright-friendly solution to the problem of a lack of venues for new (and classic) music exploration?
I disagree. The producer is an integral part of the music process. A lot of the time the producer/mixer adds just as much to the sound as the artists themselves.
The answer is..he has and he has..
Well..if the site is down and never comes back up...
I would say that's pretty permament:)
Exactly..Rare is a lot more than just the N64 games. You forgot two games 'tho.
Pinbot: The best pure pinball game in the 8-bit and most of the 16-bit generation IMO.
Killer Instinct:Amazing graphics for the time, and an interesting style.
The sad thing is, GbtG more than likey will be slammed by the X-Box fanboys, and be an amazingly big flop. At the same time, it'll more than likely be a lot of fun.
Too bad.
They're still trying to be the best. It's just from an artistic side as opposed to a strictly commercial side.
That's their philosophy, believe it or not, and that goes behind everything.
Maybe eventually the flow will get back behidn them, and to be honest I think it will. But the style is non-Nintendo, right now, and they don't want to sell out.
Good for them I say.
Halo is kinda fun, although not best of breed. It's too repetitive, even though it has great AI. It's fun for sure..but I think it's more of a cause of positive echo chamber (as opposed to Enter The Matrix, a similar game to be honest that was killed by negative echo chamber)
It's a big disappointment for me personally as well. It was supposed to be a squad based shooter in a semi-persistant battlefield. Obviously that is not what we got.
The best console FPS IMO is Time Splitters 2, a game which has a lot more interesting things to do to get around the limitations of the console.
Actually, that was my biggest problem with Halo. No bots for multiplayer. Made things rather sparse.
I don't really have the time to read your article right now, (but I'm sure it's insightful.). However, I hope that you also mention for people to contact hte SEC as well. This pump and dumb scheme as well can not be rewarded.
My feeling is the heads of SCO will be in FPMAP by the end of this.
Not a good or a positive article.
I'll admit. I read through the first half, and it had the facts pretty much on. I thought..wow. A good article coming from the National Post. One of the biggest rags in the western world.
But then the second half..
FUD FUD FUD.
It raises the spectere of FUD about Linux and GPL in particular. Stating that Linux distrubitors need to cover companies over potential copyright violations (none is needed).
As well, it completely misrepresents the GPL. Giving the absurd idea that somehow a future copyright holder could revoke their code, throwing everything into a huge legal battle yet again.
The funny thing is that it actually mentions FUD in spreading FUD..teehee..*sigh*..
Lightning does not strike even once for the National Rag.
Cable modems have a (not-so) annoying habit of keeping track of MAC IDs and giving the IP address to a specific IP address.
It's not a bug. It's a feature. Seriously. Get a few extra IP addresses and a hub and it's great. You can count on the same IP address for the same computer.
As someone who works this beat, let me tell you that most of the problems that tech support hear, the typical /. would never have. Over 99.9% of the problems, to be honest.
/. is a fairly libertarian community. Think of all the problems you have with government. How big and cumbersome and expensive it is. That is just as relevent for corporate beauacracy as well. There are always rules and guidelines that have to be followed. It's not just that it's because of bad companies. It can't be avoided. It just can't.
/. crowd. It is aimed at the LCD. It's good that at least here we have enough intelligent people who are willing to share information (that's the kicker. It's more fun than flipping burgers, to be honest..stupid economy) that we can handle the more advanced issues that would normally fall through the cracks. I'm lucky to work for a company that allows that. Not all are that lucky. (and if you are signed up with one, run away fast IMO). As well, there is just too much demand for TS to have all tech agents be technically aware. You just need to have a good ratio..say 1:5 or 1:10. The information will filter down..fast.
Network Outages and Hardware Failure. That is the two problems that technically adapt people have.
Both of these are the same problem, just in different ways.
For every time you have difficulty reporting an outage, at least 100 times are saved where a customer convinces him/herself it's an outage when it is a simple fix.
For every time you have difficulty replacing a piece of hardware, it can be fixed about 20 times with a simple fix.
Tech support, unfortunately is not aimed at the
A couple of more common complaints:
"They made me unplug the modem". Modems, both DSL and cable have an annoying habit of locking up. Trust me on this. We can see it from our end and it happens more than you think. Especially if there was some maintenence done in the area overnight.
Uninstalling anti-virus for e-mail issues. It's simple, Anti-virus for e-mail frankly is trying at best, and downright russian roulette at worst. It will mess up your e-mail transimission. It's not a matter of if, but when.
Routing issues are a pain for everybody, but I don't want to think about the alternative.
That's about it. I hope that makes you think a bit differently about what you're dealing with in TS.
That is exactly right on the money.
Tech Support (and often Customer Support..read Billing) is not about giving the customer what they want.
It's about giving the customer what they realistically can have..and then having them be happy with it. That's the trick.
It was already on /. for crying out loud!
What it will be, is a sort of WiFi networking option for your GC. It will either work thorugh game imputs, to make any game multiplayer over a wide period, or with specific games.
A not-so hot idea if you live in the boondocks, but if you live in the middle of a college campus or the like, this could easily be the next big thing if it catches on.
If they include a voice chat system, frankly all bets are off.
Evolution Worlds is a fun beginner level RPG.
However, I think what you're looking for is Skies of Arcadia Legends. That is a very good deep RPG that I think you are looking for. The ship-to-ship battles are especially fun.
PS2 had a massive lead going in. Nobody would ever catch them.
The X-Box has higher sales in US, while the GC has higher sales overseas. Overall, both are about equal, with the GC with a slight edge.
The idea that somehow the GC is far in third-place, is frankly strage. There is a lack of third-party games for it, which is true. (Although, to be honest I don't miss much, at least when it comes to X-Box).
The unwritten rule, I suspect is that third-party companies want to keep out of the way of Nintendo..which one can't really blame them over.
My problem with that is 20 years is way too much. Plenty of things go the way of the dodo in 2-3 years time. I think that commercial relevence is a good way to factor it in. (But extend it for actual commercial competition)
Actually no, companies just need to make it not worth people's whiles to need to go to non-commercial sources, and that they can provide a better product. This would involve not pissing off their customers.
As for the GPL, Frankly, I do not think that the GPL has much to worry about. There would always be distrubition, so the commercial copyright would maintain itself. Frankly, non-commercial violations are NOT a major concern.
How to fix it? Lots of desire..little ideas...
Here's one.
Copyright is absolute (except for fair use) for a period of 2 years. After that, non-commercial use/sharing is allowed. When the copyright holder neglects the copyright, the whole thing goes to public domain.
That is a very good balance between the rights of the copyright holder and the public for the digital era. Maybe it's a too much in favour of the public, but frankly, they've made their bed.
Actually, it is because I like to handle more than one thing at a time that I tend to not like the WRPG battle systems. They tend to be so plain and vanilla.
Too much hack n' slash, not enough options.
JRPGs tend to go overboard in the option department, at least the newer ones. Brings tweaking to a high level.
You forgot Game Arts.
Lunar and Grandia, some of the most entertaining and challenging JRPGS ever made.
But yea, people tend to forget that there is more than Square in this genre. In fact, there is more than Final Fantasy. Want a non-linear JRPG? Try the Saga series. It's not that GOOD, but it's something.
Actually I agree with you on the battle systems.
I have yet to play a WRPG that has a half-decent battle system. They all seem to spawn from the D&D ruleset, which, to be honest is boring.
Nothing gives you the options of a good JRPG I find.