Check out the economic theory called The Hotelling Effect -- if there are only two options, each will become more similar to the other in order to grab the people who are in the middle ground.
A good example is a beach, X units long, with two snack carts on it. Assume one is at.25X and one is at.75X -- they each have access to.5X and will get half the consumers on the beach who want snacks (assuming people walk to the nearst carts, prices, selection and service are the same, etc.). Now say the first guy moves to.33X. He still gets everyone from 0 -.33X coming to him, but now gets half the people from.33X -.75X, stealing business from guy 2, who promptly moves to.66X to make up for it. Eventually they end up at.49X and.51X (or both at.50X if you want), glaring at each other, each still getting 50% of the business, any intermediate gains lost.
And of course, the people at the ends of the beach get screwed. Now think of the snack shops as Republicans and Democrats. There ya go.
The reality is that most of the little kids who get GTA or Manhunt get them because their parents, who are IDIOTS, ignore the MANY, MANY obvious warnings posted on the products, in the stores, etc, and buy them anyway. Then they're surprised later to see the games are violent, write nasty letters and get stupid, granstanding, politicians to tout these ridiculous laws.
I couldn't give two figs about the ESRB rating of a product, as I am over 18. But I can't go into a store without seeing and noticing the rating signs. Why don't parents see these signs? I've seen clerks at EB flat out tell parents that a game is now OK for their kids, and the parents buy the game anyway.
The game industry does a far, far, far better job of clearly rating the content of its products than the movie industry, the music industry, or the TV networks. And yet, you don't see these do-gooder politicians trying to regulate movies more, do you?
This is ridiculous -- the problem isn't a lack of regulation among game stores, or violent games, it's a total lack of parental responsibility. (And yes, I am a parent -- and I pay close attention to what media my son consumes.)
It sounds a *lot* like a mini expansion pack kind of deal. But what's the big deal?
I bought MechAssault when it came out, understanding what I was gonna get, based on reviews and the back of the box. I also knew there'd be a CTF and new maps released a couple of months later. All that happened. I was happy. I got what I paid for.
Why should I care that MS is now charging for additional content? It's not like they're charging me for stuff I was expecting for free.
Sorry, a correction. You do need to pay for the repair, but it's a nominal cost. See http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/systems/nes/index.jsp for details.
Not so much an innovation as a really awesome hack, in my opinion...
As much as I am an Apple fan (I have no less than six Apple IIs in my basement at the moment), the Apple II's graphics paled in comparison to the C64's. Bitmapping is great, but it didn't allow fast graphics w/o top level programming, and with no sprites (shape tables don't count!), by the mid to late 1980s, the Apple II just couldn't keep up with the C64.
That all said, the Apple II's graphics (which use two-part sub pixel rendering to create colors) are a LANDMARK of efficiency and elegance of design (or a really awesome hack, depending on your point of view). Although the screen's resolution is 280 x 192, when using color graphics, it was effectively 140 x 192.They also look great in monochrome, and stunning ugly in color. But they kick the sh*t out of any other PC from 1977 (see also: TRS-80 Model 1)!
Re:TRS-80 Z-80 chip far superior to the Apple 6502
on
Top 10 Personal Computers
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· Score: 2, Informative
The original Game Boy and Game Boy Color both use Z80 workalikes (doubt Nintendo paid any royalties to Zilog), although they don't have any index registers, which I believe straight Z80s have (not sure becuase I am mostly familiar with the GBC).
Just to add my two cents: the Z80 is a really fantastic chip, very easy to get your head around and understand at the register level.
Uh, perhaps you haven't heard this saying:
"Give a man a fish, he eats for a day, Teach a man to fish and he eats for the rest of his life."
The idea is that even if it's a little more inefficient at getting the hungry people food that very second, if you give them some sustainable livestock, you reduce the chances that they'll be hungry in the future.
Of course, these days that saying should probably be updated to "Give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man to fish and he'll be dead of mercury poisoning in five years" but it's the thought that counts...
My son has sea monkeys and I swear I've seen them having sex. Well, at least co-joined for long periods, followed a few days later by the presence of new, tiny, sea monkeys in the tank. So, are those X-rated sea monkeys? Maybe I can sue...
Call me when the computer can put the board away when it's done, or have the desire to play a game and suggest playing a game to me. And do well at that game -- regardless of what game it is -- based only on reading the rules insdie the box top.
Kasparov only made one real error in the match, in game 2. If things had been just a bit different -- if he had taken a few more seconds, if a butterfly in Siberia had flapped its wings, etc -- Fritz probably would not have won any matches. Kasparov played excellent anti-computer chess; but a human (well, one who was really good at chess) could have beaten him in game three.
Of course you should buy nothing. You should spend Friday playing all the RPGs you haven't had time to play. Or polishing off Prince of Persia. Thursday is for multiplayer gaming, Friday is for single player gaming. It's the perfect videogaming holiday.
It's called a "bike." Lots of manufacturing facilities and trade show spaces have tons of cheap, one-speed cruiser bikes kicking around, which solve the problem the Segway would solve, only are cheaper, less harmful to the environment, and easier to run and maintain.
You may say: "Harmful to the environment? The Segway, but it's electric!" To which I can only say, that electricity has to come from somewhere, and where ever it is, its probably from burning something. And once that stuff gets burned, it needs to get transfered over wires. Then stored. Then put in the Segway. Electric engines end up being much less efficient at producing motion than even inefficient two-stroke gas engines. So when I see a tree hugger with an electric car, it makes me sad, because they *think* they are helping the environment -- and they may be reducing polution in their immediate area -- but they're actually doing more damage than if they were just on a motorcycle or a cheap, light car like a Geo Metro.
Amen to that. The problem is, most people in the margins of society, who get busted for drugs, etc. are too irresponsible to get it together to do their community service, so a sentence of working every weekend is really just a delayed prison sentence for screwing up the terms of their parole.
That all said, for first time offenders, non-jail options should be tried.
Also, I'd like to note that the California system is designed to punish people. It should be designed to rehabilitate people convicted of non-murder/rape/child molestation type crimes.
California used to be famous for sentences that were like "Five Years to Life" and bascally it was then incumbent on the prisoner to get his shit together so he could get out. Former governor Jerry Brown, who now regrets his actions, go things changed to the present system where you get a set sentence per crime, with no real help to ensure you don't have to (or want to) commit crimes again when you get out.
In Calfornia, even vehicular manslaughter can be a misdemeaner!
This is a sidetrack to the main discussion, but please realize this if you ever get in an accident and it's your fault. Crash into another car and kill someone and you may only have to pay a fine. Get into a fender and flee and it can be a felony.
Of course if you're drunk or otherwise have some bonus modifiers, all bets are off.
First off, dumbshit, I didn't mention what my political beliefs are, so don't make assumptions -- they're probably a lot closer to Michael Moore's than Rush Limbaugh's.
Second, did you read the link, or are you too much of a narrow-minded, judgmental, fascist to bother ever actually thinking for yourself? It really doesn't spew hate, it just kind of points out factual flaws with Bowling for Colombine, any of which can be checked out by someone, who, I don't know, geez, was interested in finding out the facts, not just worshiping someone with blind faith. This is what you accuse others of doing, but exactly what you have done by refusing to consider research that others have done. I don't buy into Michael Moore's lies precisely because I have taken the time to research them -- not looking at his explanations or justifications, just researching the facts.
Second, the notion that no rational person could ever come to a similar idea to one espoused by Rush Limbaugh is retarded on its face. Are you against rape? Wow, so is Rush Limbaugh! Oops. Does that mean people who are against rape are rabid morons?
Or, for example, take the notion that high taxes are not a great idea. This concept is espoused by people like Rush Limbaugh. But, gosh, dumbass, other people have come to that conclusion rationally. Does that mean they're all hate spewing morons? I don't think so.
Check your anger at the door and try to see if your world view is internally consistent before you lash out next time.
Flamebait on: By contrast, a lot of high-profile "conservatives" like to apply faith and demagoguery(sp?) to making themselves and people like themselves richer and more powerful. I doubt this is representative of members of the Republican Party as a whole, since I know a lot of self-professed Republicans who seem to be decent people, but for some reason they seem to be led around by the nose by those same conservative "leaders". Maybe that's why there's such an emphasis on "faith" - it makes it a lot easier for those conservative leaders when their followers have been conditioned to turn off their brains & blindly follow orders.
This is an interesting point. I disagree somewhat. I have found it weird that the conservative movement in general supports both your kind of "thinking" pundits (say National Review) and your kind of "unthinking, demagogue" pundits (uh, Rush Limbaugh comes to mind).
But I wouldn't say that self-styled republicans are "led" by people like Limbaugh, though -- it's probably more likely that they just like to hear him talking up views that they came to rationally in the first place.
This is, I assume, why democrats like people like Michael Moore, who while a total liar , is still well liked by a lot of self-styled liberals.
And of course, if you stump it, you get to add a discriminating question. It's very easy to make up questions that while technically true, don't help the learning aspect. (Think "Is it a turnip?" with the answer "no" for the animal "camel".)
I've got a 386 ThinkPad running Windows 3.1 (and more importantly, DOS) which I use to serve and backup.dsk images to and from my Apple IIc (1Mhz, 8-bit 65C02), where I use Bank Street Filer (planning on switching to AppleWorks at some point) to keep track of my classic games collection. There's something about a dot-matrix printout list of stuff that's just so much better than an ink-jet or laser-printed list...
Uh, PS was referring to Phantasy Star, not PlayStation, as your reply seems to indicate.
He was saying that Phantasy Star 1 was emulated, and Phantasy Star 2 and 3 were translated.
When trying to emulate a classic game, the goal is to emulate everything -- even the bugs, even the inefficient ways it may have done things. So, there may not be an attempt made to optimize the game for modern hardware at all. Just duplicate the inefficient functions of the original to ensure that the final product is as close to the original as possible.
I find that the keyboard is much more important than the screen or WP program. To that end i use a micro-swicth Silicon Graphics branded keyboard. Just can't type on a new-fangled keyboard! I'm always amazed at how much *faster* I type at the office than when I am using (my otherwise rad) ThinkPad.
I think the ThinkPad actually looks pretty great. I have a new R40, and a 1000-year-old 386 one I bought for $20 to serve Apple II.dsk images, and it's amazing how at first glance they look the same, but when you look closer the design has really evolved a ton. It isn't a machine that calls attention to itself, but everything about it seems very well thought out. A PowerBook may *look* better, and a Dell or Alienware may be flashier, but having tested a lot of them, I have to say the ThinkPad works better than any of them.
A lot of people (not many who post on Slashdot, though) find having a PC a giant intrusion to their office or desk. It's ugly, it takes up too much desk space, they simply don't *like* the giant tower case, they've no need to ever upgrade, etc. For these people, laptops as desktops are a great option, and these new IBMs really speak to that trend. Sure, you can take them around, but it seems that their primary job is to be very small desktop computers.
I used my thinkpad at work, home, travel, etc, and it would be neat to be able to put it on a desk when I'm at work (to get the typing angle comfortable, I usually have it on my lap when I am working with it). I'd buy one of these in a heartbeat.
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A good example is a beach, X units long, with two snack carts on it. Assume one is at .25X and one is at .75X -- they each have access to .5X and will get half the consumers on the beach who want snacks (assuming people walk to the nearst carts, prices, selection and service are the same, etc.). Now say the first guy moves to .33X. He still gets everyone from 0 - .33X coming to him, but now gets half the people from .33X - .75X, stealing business from guy 2, who promptly moves to .66X to make up for it. Eventually they end up at .49X and .51X (or both at .50X if you want), glaring at each other, each still getting 50% of the business, any intermediate gains lost.
And of course, the people at the ends of the beach get screwed. Now think of the snack shops as Republicans and Democrats. There ya go.
I couldn't give two figs about the ESRB rating of a product, as I am over 18. But I can't go into a store without seeing and noticing the rating signs. Why don't parents see these signs? I've seen clerks at EB flat out tell parents that a game is now OK for their kids, and the parents buy the game anyway.
The game industry does a far, far, far better job of clearly rating the content of its products than the movie industry, the music industry, or the TV networks. And yet, you don't see these do-gooder politicians trying to regulate movies more, do you?
This is ridiculous -- the problem isn't a lack of regulation among game stores, or violent games, it's a total lack of parental responsibility. (And yes, I am a parent -- and I pay close attention to what media my son consumes.)
I bought MechAssault when it came out, understanding what I was gonna get, based on reviews and the back of the box. I also knew there'd be a CTF and new maps released a couple of months later. All that happened. I was happy. I got what I paid for.
Why should I care that MS is now charging for additional content? It's not like they're charging me for stuff I was expecting for free.
Sorry, a correction. You do need to pay for the repair, but it's a nominal cost. See http://www.nintendo.com/consumer/systems/nes/index .jsp for details.
Nintendo will still service (that is, fix) a front loading NES if you're willing to pay S&H. Nintendo's product support is amazing.
As much as I am an Apple fan (I have no less than six Apple IIs in my basement at the moment), the Apple II's graphics paled in comparison to the C64's. Bitmapping is great, but it didn't allow fast graphics w/o top level programming, and with no sprites (shape tables don't count!), by the mid to late 1980s, the Apple II just couldn't keep up with the C64.
That all said, the Apple II's graphics (which use two-part sub pixel rendering to create colors) are a LANDMARK of efficiency and elegance of design (or a really awesome hack, depending on your point of view). Although the screen's resolution is 280 x 192, when using color graphics, it was effectively 140 x 192.They also look great in monochrome, and stunning ugly in color. But they kick the sh*t out of any other PC from 1977 (see also: TRS-80 Model 1)!
Just to add my two cents: the Z80 is a really fantastic chip, very easy to get your head around and understand at the register level.
The idea is that even if it's a little more inefficient at getting the hungry people food that very second, if you give them some sustainable livestock, you reduce the chances that they'll be hungry in the future.
Of course, these days that saying should probably be updated to "Give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man to fish and he'll be dead of mercury poisoning in five years" but it's the thought that counts...
My son has sea monkeys and I swear I've seen them having sex. Well, at least co-joined for long periods, followed a few days later by the presence of new, tiny, sea monkeys in the tank. So, are those X-rated sea monkeys? Maybe I can sue...
Call me when the computer can put the board away when it's done, or have the desire to play a game and suggest playing a game to me. And do well at that game -- regardless of what game it is -- based only on reading the rules insdie the box top.
Kasparov only made one real error in the match, in game 2. If things had been just a bit different -- if he had taken a few more seconds, if a butterfly in Siberia had flapped its wings, etc -- Fritz probably would not have won any matches. Kasparov played excellent anti-computer chess; but a human (well, one who was really good at chess) could have beaten him in game three.
Of course you should buy nothing. You should spend Friday playing all the RPGs you haven't had time to play. Or polishing off Prince of Persia. Thursday is for multiplayer gaming, Friday is for single player gaming. It's the perfect videogaming holiday.
You may say: "Harmful to the environment? The Segway, but it's electric!" To which I can only say, that electricity has to come from somewhere, and where ever it is, its probably from burning something. And once that stuff gets burned, it needs to get transfered over wires. Then stored. Then put in the Segway. Electric engines end up being much less efficient at producing motion than even inefficient two-stroke gas engines. So when I see a tree hugger with an electric car, it makes me sad, because they *think* they are helping the environment -- and they may be reducing polution in their immediate area -- but they're actually doing more damage than if they were just on a motorcycle or a cheap, light car like a Geo Metro.
That all said, for first time offenders, non-jail options should be tried.
Also, I'd like to note that the California system is designed to punish people. It should be designed to rehabilitate people convicted of non-murder/rape/child molestation type crimes.
California used to be famous for sentences that were like "Five Years to Life" and bascally it was then incumbent on the prisoner to get his shit together so he could get out. Former governor Jerry Brown, who now regrets his actions, go things changed to the present system where you get a set sentence per crime, with no real help to ensure you don't have to (or want to) commit crimes again when you get out.
This is a sidetrack to the main discussion, but please realize this if you ever get in an accident and it's your fault. Crash into another car and kill someone and you may only have to pay a fine. Get into a fender and flee and it can be a felony.
Of course if you're drunk or otherwise have some bonus modifiers, all bets are off.
Second, did you read the link, or are you too much of a narrow-minded, judgmental, fascist to bother ever actually thinking for yourself? It really doesn't spew hate, it just kind of points out factual flaws with Bowling for Colombine, any of which can be checked out by someone, who, I don't know, geez, was interested in finding out the facts, not just worshiping someone with blind faith. This is what you accuse others of doing, but exactly what you have done by refusing to consider research that others have done. I don't buy into Michael Moore's lies precisely because I have taken the time to research them -- not looking at his explanations or justifications, just researching the facts.
Second, the notion that no rational person could ever come to a similar idea to one espoused by Rush Limbaugh is retarded on its face. Are you against rape? Wow, so is Rush Limbaugh! Oops. Does that mean people who are against rape are rabid morons?
Or, for example, take the notion that high taxes are not a great idea. This concept is espoused by people like Rush Limbaugh. But, gosh, dumbass, other people have come to that conclusion rationally. Does that mean they're all hate spewing morons? I don't think so.
Check your anger at the door and try to see if your world view is internally consistent before you lash out next time.
This is an interesting point. I disagree somewhat. I have found it weird that the conservative movement in general supports both your kind of "thinking" pundits (say National Review) and your kind of "unthinking, demagogue" pundits (uh, Rush Limbaugh comes to mind).
But I wouldn't say that self-styled republicans are "led" by people like Limbaugh, though -- it's probably more likely that they just like to hear him talking up views that they came to rationally in the first place.
This is, I assume, why democrats like people like Michael Moore, who while a total liar , is still well liked by a lot of self-styled liberals.
And of course, if you stump it, you get to add a discriminating question. It's very easy to make up questions that while technically true, don't help the learning aspect. (Think "Is it a turnip?" with the answer "no" for the animal "camel".)
I've got a 386 ThinkPad running Windows 3.1 (and more importantly, DOS) which I use to serve and backup .dsk images to and from my Apple IIc (1Mhz, 8-bit 65C02), where I use Bank Street Filer (planning on switching to AppleWorks at some point) to keep track of my classic games collection. There's something about a dot-matrix printout list of stuff that's just so much better than an ink-jet or laser-printed list...
Uh, PS was referring to Phantasy Star, not PlayStation, as your reply seems to indicate. He was saying that Phantasy Star 1 was emulated, and Phantasy Star 2 and 3 were translated.
When trying to emulate a classic game, the goal is to emulate everything -- even the bugs, even the inefficient ways it may have done things. So, there may not be an attempt made to optimize the game for modern hardware at all. Just duplicate the inefficient functions of the original to ensure that the final product is as close to the original as possible.
I find that the keyboard is much more important than the screen or WP program. To that end i use a micro-swicth Silicon Graphics branded keyboard. Just can't type on a new-fangled keyboard! I'm always amazed at how much *faster* I type at the office than when I am using (my otherwise rad) ThinkPad.
I think the ThinkPad actually looks pretty great. I have a new R40, and a 1000-year-old 386 one I bought for $20 to serve Apple II .dsk images, and it's amazing how at first glance they look the same, but when you look closer the design has really evolved a ton. It isn't a machine that calls attention to itself, but everything about it seems very well thought out. A PowerBook may *look* better, and a Dell or Alienware may be flashier, but having tested a lot of them, I have to say the ThinkPad works better than any of them.
I used my thinkpad at work, home, travel, etc, and it would be neat to be able to put it on a desk when I'm at work (to get the typing angle comfortable, I usually have it on my lap when I am working with it). I'd buy one of these in a heartbeat.