If you're asking about the M rating you're not even looking at the NR rating, which is a fair percentage of titles in advertised in popular media. Titles advertised with the NR rating may be inappropriate for children, but an alarming amount of titles with the NR rating later end up in the hands of children.
Ah, yes, the design that worked so great for platform games in the 80's. Jump with the button and shoot with the space bar, what could be simpler?
I think good software design does not rely on the hardware features but on the features (and avoidance of feature creep) available to the user. If a gamer have only a fishrod controller for a console he can still play any game using that controller.
The reason apple likes one-button mice is that they look better.
You can't compare PSP previews with DS reviews - reviews have a much stricter standard simply because previews relate to unfinished product and any fault found with a preview product may be something that is not yet finished. In reviews however you have all details in the game you're playing and this is the final word your publication will have on this game.
Personally I feel that the DS is just an upgrade to the gameboy series, Mario 64 DS is the only game I'm interested in so far whereas the PSP has more games I'm looking forward to like Wipeout and WRC, and that Mercury game looks really interesting too.
Ok, deciding to *publish* M.U.L.E and Archon and paying a sports celebrity to use the name in a game title does NOT constitue creative genius or even a hint of game design, and whatever Trip Hawkins ever did in that field it will pale next to his creative accounting to keep 3DO alive for as long as he did.
"Who needs another version? Why not play the original online?"
I'd like to have the same game with more features and options and better AI and I could make it myself and I could call it 'A.S.S' to avoid using their trademark and.. no maybe I shouldn't name it that.
I think the form factor is the best feature in the shuffle, and also having a built in battery and not wasting space with an extra battery compartment. I declined a different flash player given as a gift because the form factor was crap and there was no internal battery (and the information displayed on the screen was so useless I'd rather have skipped the screen).
I think because Konami's ESPN games were not very popular, therefore SEGA making the ESPN game instead was a win for Customers. (although I regret never having seen Konami's ESPN NBA HangTime for SEGA CD or PS1 or something like that, if it was in any way similar to Midway's NBA Hangtime).
Although Slashdot users do procreate (anecdotal evidence only I'm afraid) and enjoy games, a story about the design goals and focus testing of a young kids videogame doesn't quite seem to fit in with most stuff on this site.
However, there were some valid points in the article: 1. Kids don't like dumb games (dumb as in low quality) 2. Game reviewers working for game review publications don't care for kids games as much as kids do (I doubt Family Fun Magazine would rate half-life 2 very high). 3. Lower priced games sell more than if they were more expensive.
Analysis of the code was surprisingly simple on the SEGA Genesis (probably same system on the other consoles). Everyone was storing a byte per button press with a single bit set in each byte (with a bit representing the button) and all codes were usually bunched together, almost as if they wanted people to find the codes.
the ps2 cpus has 128 bit registers, which are usually used as 32 bit registers (no real need for a 128 bit pointer), the main memory bus is still 32-bit but the graphics hardware has something ridiculous like 2048 bit bus..
"They're both on my right-hand-side... is there another of these?"
Maybe if you said use the button on the right side of the mouse it would be clearer, not the right-hand side (which is confusing because that sounds like you're talking about the actual hand). Or just saying left mouse button and right mouse button (after explaining that the thing is called a mouse) would be fairly clear.
"Blaming the project manager is a cop-out. It's like saying a plane crashed because of "pilot error." Yes, probably the pilot made an error, but he certainly didn't intend to crash the plane"
That is not a good analogy, a pilot would never try to change a bug-reporting tool mid-air or suddently try to increase speed by adding another propeller to the airplane because the flight got delayed in wind turbulence. Also, if there is a big red button that says stop engines and the pilot mistakenly presses that and the plane crashes that is a crash caused by the pilot, intentionally or not.
I think the project manager is a sizable part of the risk involved in running any project, but not the only one. Apart from other team failures, more senior management than project managers are usually to blame for utterly risky decisions that project managers would not have the authority to do or prevent (like I promised the customer we'd be done in half the time at half the budget over lunch).
Well, given how well Ubi managed to turn around Prince of Persia (after PoP 3D), maybe now they can do the same for M.U.L.E? Apart from that I can't see much benefit in cross-licensed EA-UBI games.
You are forgetting that in addition to their pinball games DI has also developed a number of rally games (Motorhead, rallisport challenge series, midtown madness 3) and some sort of horse-game series and a military sim (battlefield or something). They also made Shrek 1, let's not forget that!
I don't know about that, the previous owners (the Bonnier media group) voted yes to sell, and so did employees with a large number of shares. The share holders that vote no to sell simply want more money because they feel shortchanged by the suggested price.
(in Swedish: di.se)
There are a number of easily digestible items I can put together in less time than any fast food line during a busy lunch hour. Now, if I could only shop faster than that too...
(Ok, this was off-topic, but not nearly as off-topic as the spike tv video game awards were in the first place)
Different countries have different requirements for what to include with your resume, in northern Europe you're likely to be required to include letters from your prior employers and referrals are usually not accepted. Some jobs allow negotiable salary, others are fixed salary so you might want to refrain from including salary expectations (or having them at all in some cases). The reason that companies in the US is more willing to hire skilled professionals is that there is likely still a higher skilled-worker-to-job-ratio in the EU than the US. Many companies will not consider employing people that are not fully fluent in the native language, northern Europe tends to have high requirements on your accent as well.
"That's a great idea if everyone will do it...problem is there will always be someone who will stay behind and in this day there are plenty of people waiting in line to take over. I've seen contracted developers try this only to find themselves looking for another contract."
But right now is a good time - go around the job listing pages for videogame developers on the west coast. There are a lot of openings for people with enough experience.
Yes, but even if you know the differance between a good and a bad manager you can't simply trade them. That would be a neat solution though, I'll give you 2 grade C managers for your grade A manager and a lunch.
Is there really such a large leap between licensing a microsoft OS and being owned by them? Pocket PCs are pretty much the same thing between brands, give or take the odd button and clock frequency, so how much control is there of the Gizmondo that is out of microsofts little hands? If the thing catches on and has better performance than the PSP I wouldn't be surprised if it gets rebranded as the xbox portable.
So what about the hundreds of 3D Amiga demos (and ST, c64, etc.) that used exactly that technology before 1988? There is a lot of published source code (and how-to guides) for those around. The patent is essentially an obvious re-implementation of something that already existed in published form way before the patent was applied for.
Slashdot Mirror
If you're asking about the M rating you're not even looking at the NR rating, which is a fair percentage of titles in advertised in popular media. Titles advertised with the NR rating may be inappropriate for children, but an alarming amount of titles with the NR rating later end up in the hands of children.
(I'm kidding)
Ah, yes, the design that worked so great for platform games in the 80's. Jump with the button and shoot with the space bar, what could be simpler?
I think good software design does not rely on the hardware features but on the features (and avoidance of feature creep) available to the user. If a gamer have only a fishrod controller for a console he can still play any game using that controller.
The reason apple likes one-button mice is that they look better.
You can't compare PSP previews with DS reviews - reviews have a much stricter standard simply because previews relate to unfinished product and any fault found with a preview product may be something that is not yet finished. In reviews however you have all details in the game you're playing and this is the final word your publication will have on this game.
Personally I feel that the DS is just an upgrade to the gameboy series, Mario 64 DS is the only game I'm interested in so far whereas the PSP has more games I'm looking forward to like Wipeout and WRC, and that Mercury game looks really interesting too.
Ok, deciding to *publish* M.U.L.E and Archon and paying a sports celebrity to use the name in a game title does NOT constitue creative genius or even a hint of game design, and whatever Trip Hawkins ever did in that field it will pale next to his creative accounting to keep 3DO alive for as long as he did.
"Who needs another version? Why not play the original online?"
I'd like to have the same game with more features and options and better AI and I could make it myself and I could call it 'A.S.S' to avoid using their trademark and.. no maybe I shouldn't name it that.
I think the form factor is the best feature in the shuffle, and also having a built in battery and not wasting space with an extra battery compartment. I declined a different flash player given as a gift because the form factor was crap and there was no internal battery (and the information displayed on the screen was so useless I'd rather have skipped the screen).
I think because Konami's ESPN games were not very popular, therefore SEGA making the ESPN game instead was a win for Customers. (although I regret never having seen Konami's ESPN NBA HangTime for SEGA CD or PS1 or something like that, if it was in any way similar to Midway's NBA Hangtime).
ESPN 2kX = Sega 1, Customers 1
Although Slashdot users do procreate (anecdotal evidence only I'm afraid) and enjoy games, a story about the design goals and focus testing of a young kids videogame doesn't quite seem to fit in with most stuff on this site.
However, there were some valid points in the article:
1. Kids don't like dumb games (dumb as in low quality)
2. Game reviewers working for game review publications don't care for kids games as much as kids do (I doubt Family Fun Magazine would rate half-life 2 very high).
3. Lower priced games sell more than if they were more expensive.
Analysis of the code was surprisingly simple on the SEGA Genesis (probably same system on the other consoles). Everyone was storing a byte per button press with a single bit set in each byte (with a bit representing the button) and all codes were usually bunched together, almost as if they wanted people to find the codes.
the ps2 cpus has 128 bit registers, which are usually used as 32 bit registers (no real need for a 128 bit pointer), the main memory bus is still 32-bit but the graphics hardware has something ridiculous like 2048 bit bus..
"They're both on my right-hand-side... is there another of these?"
Maybe if you said use the button on the right side of the mouse it would be clearer, not the right-hand side (which is confusing because that sounds like you're talking about the actual hand). Or just saying left mouse button and right mouse button (after explaining that the thing is called a mouse) would be fairly clear.
"Blaming the project manager is a cop-out. It's like saying a plane crashed because of "pilot error." Yes, probably the pilot made an error, but he certainly didn't intend to crash the plane"
That is not a good analogy, a pilot would never try to change a bug-reporting tool mid-air or suddently try to increase speed by adding another propeller to the airplane because the flight got delayed in wind turbulence. Also, if there is a big red button that says stop engines and the pilot mistakenly presses that and the plane crashes that is a crash caused by the pilot, intentionally or not.
I think the project manager is a sizable part of the risk involved in running any project, but not the only one. Apart from other team failures, more senior management than project managers are usually to blame for utterly risky decisions that project managers would not have the authority to do or prevent (like I promised the customer we'd be done in half the time at half the budget over lunch).
Don't forget spark unlimited who left EA after making MOH games to make Call of Duty games for activision...
Well, given how well Ubi managed to turn around Prince of Persia (after PoP 3D), maybe now they can do the same for M.U.L.E? Apart from that I can't see much benefit in cross-licensed EA-UBI games.
You are forgetting that in addition to their pinball games DI has also developed a number of rally games (Motorhead, rallisport challenge series, midtown madness 3) and some sort of horse-game series and a military sim (battlefield or something). They also made Shrek 1, let's not forget that!
I don't know about that, the previous owners (the Bonnier media group) voted yes to sell, and so did employees with a large number of shares. The share holders that vote no to sell simply want more money because they feel shortchanged by the suggested price. (in Swedish: di.se)
"Cooking takes longer than fast food."
There are a number of easily digestible items I can put together in less time than any fast food line during a busy lunch hour. Now, if I could only shop faster than that too...
(Ok, this was off-topic, but not nearly as off-topic as the spike tv video game awards were in the first place)
More like "My significant other that I share with EA in holy matrimony worked himself to death programming the title screen of an EA sports game"..
Working on a physics engine would be a lot more fun and they probably wouldn't try to kill you.
Different countries have different requirements for what to include with your resume, in northern Europe you're likely to be required to include letters from your prior employers and referrals are usually not accepted. Some jobs allow negotiable salary, others are fixed salary so you might want to refrain from including salary expectations (or having them at all in some cases). The reason that companies in the US is more willing to hire skilled professionals is that there is likely still a higher skilled-worker-to-job-ratio in the EU than the US. Many companies will not consider employing people that are not fully fluent in the native language, northern Europe tends to have high requirements on your accent as well.
I figure it is more like: This relates to a class action lawsuit against us, so maybe we should not make a public statement on this issue.
"That's a great idea if everyone will do it...problem is there will always be someone who will stay behind and in this day there are plenty of people waiting in line to take over. I've seen contracted developers try this only to find themselves looking for another contract."
But right now is a good time - go around the job listing pages for videogame developers on the west coast. There are a lot of openings for people with enough experience.
Yes, but even if you know the differance between a good and a bad manager you can't simply trade them. That would be a neat solution though, I'll give you 2 grade C managers for your grade A manager and a lunch.
Is there really such a large leap between licensing a microsoft OS and being owned by them? Pocket PCs are pretty much the same thing between brands, give or take the odd button and clock frequency, so how much control is there of the Gizmondo that is out of microsofts little hands? If the thing catches on and has better performance than the PSP I wouldn't be surprised if it gets rebranded as the xbox portable.
So what about the hundreds of 3D Amiga demos (and ST, c64, etc.) that used exactly that technology before 1988? There is a lot of published source code (and how-to guides) for those around. The patent is essentially an obvious re-implementation of something that already existed in published form way before the patent was applied for.
These are not cheap knock-off brands. I know a Panaphonics when I see one.. Is that a Sorny I see over there?