I read a very interresting article a few days ago. (sorry, it's only in french, read it here) It talked about a recent trend in Hollywood movies and TV shows. It seems that the good guys uses Apple while the bad guys uses a PC with Windows. Recent example are obviously 24 where in the first season CTU used Macs while Ira Gaines, the bad guy for the first half of the season used a PC with Windows. In Legally Blonde, every boring lawyer has a PC, while Reese has a Mac. In MI-5, the secret agent agency uses MacOSX while bad guys often use PCs.
It's not a rule of thumb, but it seems some show writers have decided to give the evil roles to PCs and the good and righteous roles to Macs.
Yeah, but for how long? As long as something is added to the hardware, I'm pretty sure there is a way to find out something is tampering with the system. After that, it's only a matter of time before Xbox Live updates it.
There is no such thing as a 100% secure app, and there is no such think as an unbreakable hack.
For about 30CAN$ a month, you had illimited access to the features of the unit, which were games, interactive TV, TV guides, news, horoscope, stock rates, magazines made expressly for the device, and access to the movie channel, called Super Ecran (which has been around now for 25 years and plays movies a few week after they've played on the Pay-Per-View channel).
There were all sort of games : card games, crossword puzzles, one adventure game like the old Sierra games, action, and solo card games like Solitaire. It even had classic board games like backgammon. You could play with a friend in the living room or againt the unit.
It was pretty popular for a few years, maybe 5 or 6, but then the interest dissipated. Now the same cable company is rolling out Scientific Atlanta digital boxes and are riding the all digital wave right now. We have a digital PVR at home which is nice. I think there are games on it somewhere, but I haven't looked yet, though I know they are free of charge. Once again, you can get news from it, browse web sites adapted for the TV (it's not WebTV, but some proprietary system), and if you have the keyboard (sold separately) , then you can access the "real" Internet.
A couple of years ago, we had a terminal from our cable provider in Quebec, Canada, called Videoway. It was revolutionary because it used a normal analog cable (not a digital signal) to send you TV guides, games, news and other info. The games were pretty lame, mostly because the hardare was slow. But the main gripe with the system was how you played the game. You needed to use the remote. Sure, the remote was more or less designed so you could play games, but using a numerical keypad to play games felt weird, especially since you held the remote with both hands, one on the keypad, and one at the bottom where there were other buttons that could be used in the game. (buttons that normally had other functions when watching TV). It felt VERY awkward, especially in action games like Burger Time, Qbert or Styx.
One big feature though was interactive television. In essence, you had the choice between 4 different choices and when prompted to make a choice, you pressed on one of the "F" key. Underneath, the unit in fact changed the channel for you and played another part of the show. This became apparent when you browsed with a normal TV the higher channels and you heard the same TV show playing over 10 channels, each reflecting the choices you made. What was nice though is that the unit remembered your choice and kept a score that was at the end translated to a channel where you were told if you won or lost in the game. One really nice game was Black Jack 21, and the other was Roulette. Watching a hockey game was fun for a while because when the star of the team was on ice, you had the option to follow only him. But it got old real fast.
Anyway, the point I'm trying to get across here is that these companies are trying to do something that has already been tried before. And guess what? Interactive TV failed misserably here, even though it's always superior to everything else that seems to come out these days. As for games over digital cable, well a remote really feels weird to play games. Unless they come up with a custom controller, I'm pretty sure it won't become popular.
Yes, but you won't be able to access the Xbox Live community of HalfLife 2, only the PC one. In order to access the Xbox Live Community, you'd need a legit Xbox, and from what you're suggesting, modding is involved, thus preventing you from accessing Live.
I mean, with people badly wanting to become a Jedi, and no one a Jedi yet, it's amazing that nobody on the development team posted anonymously on a forum how to become a Jedi. If only one person did such a thing, I think it would truly ruin the game.
Like it or hate it, a LOT of people are becoming suspicious of other countries. I'd say the United States and Great Britain are becoming more suspicious of other countries. The rest of the world is becoming more and more suspicious of the US and GB.;)
After reading it a few times in the forums here, I have to ask, what is T&A? A quick search on Google tells me that is has nothing to do with games and more with sex, but I never found what the abreaviation actually means. Please, enlighten me.:)
I'm sure that after a while, when the young boy realizes the game is only about fan service, he'll get bored with it. Though I find it odd that some are literally aroused by that. I mean, it's just graphics, it's not even a real woman. These kids are going to be in shock when they see the resolution and polygon count of real breasts.
... of 15 year old girls in miniskirts casting spells? That's the main reason why I stopped playing Final Fantasy games. Every other Japanese game is about some teenage girl where the camera occasionnaly makes a close-up of her breasts or gives off a camera angle that let's you see under the skirt. Okay, okay, maybe I exagerate, but still, I've found Japanese games more and more about great FMV's and girls in miniskirts and less and less about, well, games. I'm not saying there are no good Japanses games. Of course there are good Japanese games, but the one I always see on TV or people talk to me about seem to be these kind of games. Which makes me wonder if people play anything else on the PS2 in Japan...
That why I couldn't care less if Japan doesn't dig the Xbox or produce game for it.
The Xbox does support 5.1, and in fact, it supports 5.1 in-game, contrary to what I've heard from PS2 games who support 5.1 only in FMVs. Hearing a covenant creaping up behind you in Halo or someone coming in on you from behind in Splinter Cell is just great.
there) work conditions where generaly not that good at Ubisoft I was told once that Ubisoft was kind of the McDonald of the Game Industry, low wages, work hard, then move to somewhere else and be accepted because you have experience.
I never said PCs had a monopoly on crappiness.;) I'm sure there are some buggy games on consoles out there, but console games generally have a lot more of polish than PC games.
Personally, I run Reget Deluxe. I just click on the link, and the client connects up to 20 times to the ftp server until I hit 300k/sec, my cable modem download speed. Beats using bitorent in any case.
I understand that it needed to be shot uncompressed, but what I'm wondering is why they didn't compress it when the editing was done. Movies filmed digitally are shot uncompressed but when they are released on DVD they are compressed. Why not compress the video before displaying it in this case? This way, they would need a lot less bandwidth to read the video from the HD. Maybe it could fit on a single HD. The only think you have to watch out for tought ae transfer speeds. If your HD can read it's own content under 18 minutes, you have a winner here.
Someone else replied that the compression algorithms may not scale well on large pictures, maybe that's the problem.
Then if you have to pick up an Xbox, then buy also SW:KOTOR from Bioware. I know it comes out on the PC later this year, but if you buy the Xbox now, you'll be able to play KOTOR while waiting for Jade Empire.:)
I mean, at 33 million pixels for a picture, let's say 25 (it's the number of PAL FRAMES, not fields, per seconds) times per second at 32 bits of depth and you get 3.3gigs per second.
Which makes you wonder if they used compression at all? Even if their system was doing 60 non-interlaced frames, you get roughly 8 gigs of uncompressed video per second. Compressed, it would have to be way less that 3.3GB/s.
And based on the numbers, you can see that they either didn't use audio, or it was included in the 3.3GB/S figure because 3.5TB / 18 minutes / 60 seconds = 3.3GB/S.
So, is there someone I forgot, or are these guys really using uncompressed video? And if they did, WHY? I know, uncompressed video will always be cleaner, but come on, this might be a little too much in this case.
I don't know if it's the same in the US, but in Canada, if some company offers you something that is not legal or contrary to the bills of Canadian right (or whatever they call it) in a contract, even if said person agreed to it, the seller can't tell you "but you accepted the terms even thought they were below standards."
Now, since these people work in Canada, I'm pretty sure there is some Canadian right, heck, this might even be in the Internation Humans right, that someone can't be restrained in their will to earn their life. (The way I put this, it seems criminal should be allowed to earn a living, but my english is limited so I don't really know how to say this otherwise.)
So these people should be ok. Is there a canadian lawyer in here?
Slashdot Mirror
I read a very interresting article a few days ago. (sorry, it's only in french, read it here) It talked about a recent trend in Hollywood movies and TV shows. It seems that the good guys uses Apple while the bad guys uses a PC with Windows. Recent example are obviously 24 where in the first season CTU used Macs while Ira Gaines, the bad guy for the first half of the season used a PC with Windows. In Legally Blonde, every boring lawyer has a PC, while Reese has a Mac. In MI-5, the secret agent agency uses MacOSX while bad guys often use PCs.
It's not a rule of thumb, but it seems some show writers have decided to give the evil roles to PCs and the good and righteous roles to Macs.
Yeah, but for how long? As long as something is added to the hardware, I'm pretty sure there is a way to find out something is tampering with the system. After that, it's only a matter of time before Xbox Live updates it.
There is no such thing as a 100% secure app, and there is no such think as an unbreakable hack.
... wasn't this thing supposed to be a handheld?
For about 30CAN$ a month, you had illimited access to the features of the unit, which were games, interactive TV, TV guides, news, horoscope, stock rates, magazines made expressly for the device, and access to the movie channel, called Super Ecran (which has been around now for 25 years and plays movies a few week after they've played on the Pay-Per-View channel).
There were all sort of games : card games, crossword puzzles, one adventure game like the old Sierra games, action, and solo card games like Solitaire. It even had classic board games like backgammon. You could play with a friend in the living room or againt the unit.
It was pretty popular for a few years, maybe 5 or 6, but then the interest dissipated. Now the same cable company is rolling out Scientific Atlanta digital boxes and are riding the all digital wave right now. We have a digital PVR at home which is nice. I think there are games on it somewhere, but I haven't looked yet, though I know they are free of charge. Once again, you can get news from it, browse web sites adapted for the TV (it's not WebTV, but some proprietary system), and if you have the keyboard (sold separately) , then you can access the "real" Internet.
A couple of years ago, we had a terminal from our cable provider in Quebec, Canada, called Videoway. It was revolutionary because it used a normal analog cable (not a digital signal) to send you TV guides, games, news and other info. The games were pretty lame, mostly because the hardare was slow. But the main gripe with the system was how you played the game. You needed to use the remote. Sure, the remote was more or less designed so you could play games, but using a numerical keypad to play games felt weird, especially since you held the remote with both hands, one on the keypad, and one at the bottom where there were other buttons that could be used in the game. (buttons that normally had other functions when watching TV). It felt VERY awkward, especially in action games like Burger Time, Qbert or Styx.
One big feature though was interactive television. In essence, you had the choice between 4 different choices and when prompted to make a choice, you pressed on one of the "F" key. Underneath, the unit in fact changed the channel for you and played another part of the show. This became apparent when you browsed with a normal TV the higher channels and you heard the same TV show playing over 10 channels, each reflecting the choices you made. What was nice though is that the unit remembered your choice and kept a score that was at the end translated to a channel where you were told if you won or lost in the game. One really nice game was Black Jack 21, and the other was Roulette. Watching a hockey game was fun for a while because when the star of the team was on ice, you had the option to follow only him. But it got old real fast.
Anyway, the point I'm trying to get across here is that these companies are trying to do something that has already been tried before. And guess what? Interactive TV failed misserably here, even though it's always superior to everything else that seems to come out these days. As for games over digital cable, well a remote really feels weird to play games. Unless they come up with a custom controller, I'm pretty sure it won't become popular.
And there you are, browsing the games forum on Slashdot. If you loathe them so much, don't come here and troll.
Yes, but you won't be able to access the Xbox Live community of HalfLife 2, only the PC one. In order to access the Xbox Live Community, you'd need a legit Xbox, and from what you're suggesting, modding is involved, thus preventing you from accessing Live.
I mean, with people badly wanting to become a Jedi, and no one a Jedi yet, it's amazing that nobody on the development team posted anonymously on a forum how to become a Jedi. If only one person did such a thing, I think it would truly ruin the game.
Isn't there an Xbox version already planned anyway?
Hum... somebody is SOOOOOOOOOOOO fired!
Like it or hate it, a LOT of people are becoming suspicious of other countries. ;)
I'd say the United States and Great Britain are becoming more suspicious of other countries. The rest of the world is becoming more and more suspicious of the US and GB.
After reading it a few times in the forums here, I have to ask, what is T&A? A quick search on Google tells me that is has nothing to do with games and more with sex, but I never found what the abreaviation actually means. Please, enlighten me. :)
I'm sure that after a while, when the young boy realizes the game is only about fan service, he'll get bored with it. Though I find it odd that some are literally aroused by that. I mean, it's just graphics, it's not even a real woman. These kids are going to be in shock when they see the resolution and polygon count of real breasts.
... of 15 year old girls in miniskirts casting spells? That's the main reason why I stopped playing Final Fantasy games. Every other Japanese game is about some teenage girl where the camera occasionnaly makes a close-up of her breasts or gives off a camera angle that let's you see under the skirt. Okay, okay, maybe I exagerate, but still, I've found Japanese games more and more about great FMV's and girls in miniskirts and less and less about, well, games. I'm not saying there are no good Japanses games. Of course there are good Japanese games, but the one I always see on TV or people talk to me about seem to be these kind of games. Which makes me wonder if people play anything else on the PS2 in Japan...
That why I couldn't care less if Japan doesn't dig the Xbox or produce game for it.
The Xbox does support 5.1, and in fact, it supports 5.1 in-game, contrary to what I've heard from PS2 games who support 5.1 only in FMVs. Hearing a covenant creaping up behind you in Halo or someone coming in on you from behind in Splinter Cell is just great.
there) work conditions where generaly not that good at Ubisoft
I was told once that Ubisoft was kind of the McDonald of the Game Industry, low wages, work hard, then move to somewhere else and be accepted because you have experience.
I never said PCs had a monopoly on crappiness. ;) I'm sure there are some buggy games on consoles out there, but console games generally have a lot more of polish than PC games.
Personally, I run Reget Deluxe. I just click on the link, and the client connects up to 20 times to the ftp server until I hit 300k/sec, my cable modem download speed. Beats using bitorent in any case.
I did think about that.
Should preview more before posting... I meant "I didn't think about that"
nd it's possible these algorithms scale poorly with a 16x increase in image area
;)
Interresting point. I did think about that.
1MB/s or 20MB/s when you have terabytes for a few minutes of video
Silly me.
I understand that it needed to be shot uncompressed, but what I'm wondering is why they didn't compress it when the editing was done. Movies filmed digitally are shot uncompressed but when they are released on DVD they are compressed. Why not compress the video before displaying it in this case? This way, they would need a lot less bandwidth to read the video from the HD. Maybe it could fit on a single HD. The only think you have to watch out for tought ae transfer speeds. If your HD can read it's own content under 18 minutes, you have a winner here.
Someone else replied that the compression algorithms may not scale well on large pictures, maybe that's the problem.
Then if you have to pick up an Xbox, then buy also SW:KOTOR from Bioware. I know it comes out on the PC later this year, but if you buy the Xbox now, you'll be able to play KOTOR while waiting for Jade Empire. :)
I mean, at 33 million pixels for a picture, let's say 25 (it's the number of PAL FRAMES, not fields, per seconds) times per second at 32 bits of depth and you get 3.3gigs per second.
Which makes you wonder if they used compression at all? Even if their system was doing 60 non-interlaced frames, you get roughly 8 gigs of uncompressed video per second. Compressed, it would have to be way less that 3.3GB/s.
And based on the numbers, you can see that they either didn't use audio, or it was included in the 3.3GB/S figure because 3.5TB / 18 minutes / 60 seconds = 3.3GB/S.
So, is there someone I forgot, or are these guys really using uncompressed video? And if they did, WHY? I know, uncompressed video will always be cleaner, but come on, this might be a little too much in this case.
The thing is, console games are rarely buggy, compared to computer games. So patching a console game rarely has been needed.
I don't know if it's the same in the US, but in Canada, if some company offers you something that is not legal or contrary to the bills of Canadian right (or whatever they call it) in a contract, even if said person agreed to it, the seller can't tell you "but you accepted the terms even thought they were below standards."
Now, since these people work in Canada, I'm pretty sure there is some Canadian right, heck, this might even be in the Internation Humans right, that someone can't be restrained in their will to earn their life. (The way I put this, it seems criminal should be allowed to earn a living, but my english is limited so I don't really know how to say this otherwise.)
So these people should be ok. Is there a canadian lawyer in here?