But at the same time, so many fans have been clamoring for years for a sequel to be made (I'm not one of them; I wanted the remake ^_~). Square has been avoiding doing so for just as long... so you can't blame all of this on the company, really.
Look on the bright side-- with all the renewed focus on FF7, lots of shiny new collectables have been coming out. And DigiCube finally got off their ass and released a FF7 Piano Collections:D
I don't know about that... think of all the marketing and such that took place when the original Final Fantasy VII sold out. There were a lot of PlayStations that were sold back then just because of that one game. And that's not to mention all the other Final Fantasy games exclusive to Sony consoles that have come afterwards.
With the fan base for the game firmly entrenched in Sony hardware, I really don't see why exclusivity would be a major issue. Wouldn't the vast majority of people who are interested in Advent Children have a PS2 anyway?
...is the even cooler trailer from FFX-2 International + Last Mission. Just to warn you now: you're going to need an up-to-date DivX codec to be able to play it.
I bitched about this on Slashdot awhile ago: UT2K4's system requirements appeared to be too steep for my computer, but when I looked up those for UT2K3 on the official website, those were inflated as well! The original minimum requirements for the older game called for a 733mHz Pentium while the new ones for both games ask for 1gHz Pentium as the bare minimum. Taking some advice (thanks MachDelta), I downloaded the demo for UT2K4 when it came out and played it on my aging 733mHz PC. Despite some very minor lag/loading issues that I believe could be taken care of with a new graphics card, the demo ran fine, and I expect no huge problems once I install the full version of the game.
I'd imagine pretty much any new hardware you can get nowadays should be fine. One thing I highly recommend if you're doing any sort of modding-- if the OS you're using can run Maya, then it should run UnrealEd with no problems (I know this for sure when it comes to Windows. Not so sure about Mac and Linux).
Nope, I think he's talking about the preorder for the UT2K4 collector's edition. They were doing this deal at EBGames.com (with the $40 price and the free car thingie), but it seems like they're currently out of stock... bah.
You know, once Steven Spielberg came on stage to announce the Best Picture winner, I knew that it was a foregone conclusion; after all, we're talking about this generation's most successful director of fantasy and sci-fi films announcing the Best Picture award... HMMM...
Irregardless of ROTK's sweep prior to The Big Moment, I couldn't envision any other film but ROTK getting the award after that.
Yeah, I very much agree with you about Black Mages, and I hope they do put out a sequel (there's enough good battle themes that they missed the first time around to warrant it...). I do check out OC Remix every so often; some of the FF stuff is great, but I have a particular liking for the Sonic remixes:) VGMix has some good stuff as well-- not as much as OC Remix, but still worth checking out.
I'd assumed the language was Finnish since a good chunk of the album was recorded in Helsinki. Thanks for the info!
Dear Friends does sound awesome, I'll agree. Along with The Black Mages, it's one of my favorite FF arrange albums. The music from FF5 was always a bit underrated, IMHO...
(Do you by chance know what that other language is that's sung in "My Home, Sweet Home"? I think it might be Finnish, but I'm not sure...)
If you can find it, check out 20020220: Music From Final Fantasy-- it's the live concert album from the Tokyo performance mentioned in the post (I believe there's a review to the album linked there as well). It is absolutely brilliant, though one could make the argument that the pieces chosen are the more popular ones (how many more arrangements of Aerith's Theme does anyone need?!).
And if you're anything like me, listening to that album will only make you want to go the the L.A. concert even more...
Try GameMusic.com. I recently got the FF7 Piano Collections there. The prices are pretty good... for Japanese imports (admit it-- you're always going to have to pay through the nose for the legit stuff), and the shipping's prompt, too.
Yeah, and the interviews are usually excellent. Even if they're interviewing someone I have little interest in (like Amy Sedaris or The RZA), I'll still read it, because I know it'll be interesting. The A.V. Club's reviews are usually pretty good too, though their "Films That Time Forgot" sometimes get thematic from week to week.
Disney just bought the rights to make money off of Spirited Away's theatre runs in the US, that's all.
...and nearly everywhere else in the world (including Japan), let's not forget. Spirited Away was the top-grossing film in Japan that year, and it also did rather well in Europe. I bet Disney's making a mint on the Tokuma Shoten/Studio Ghibli deal... just not necessarily in the United States;)
Is 2D animation dead? I think not, and neither some studios.
Isn't The Polar Express a CG film? I don't see your point, unless you meant to say The Iron Giant...
But you're right-- 2D animation is far from dead. Most people also tend to overlook television animation, where 2D has long reigned, and continues to flourish.
True, but it did win the Oscar that Disney Feature Animation's been clamoring after ever since the Best Feature Animated Film category was created. Maybe that's what that post was trying to say.
Because of the parody elements, I think I might actually like this Bard's Tale game (it's true, I can't stand PC-style RPGs:P).
I love that console RPG list and am hoping that someday a game developer might do it justice. The closest thing I've seen to a CRPG that pokes fun at a lot of the genre's conventions is the PS2 game Okage: Shadow King. It's a pretty funny game, but at the same time, it falls prey to some of these very same conventions.
This was how I found out about the demise of SNK-- in a review of this Dreamcast rhythm game that was reported to be their last game. It seems that the rhythm game genre is kind of a weird one for SNK to have taken up, but the music is good, and supposedly the game itself ain't too shabby either.
I'm thinking of starting a collection of import DC games... Cool Cool Toon's one of those at the top of my list.
I read this, and that Wired article, and now I don't know what to think, or feel.
I work in a professional industry that was affected by offshoring years ago (animation). The grunt work (animation, inbetweening, coloring, etc.) went to places like South Korea (and now India) and the more creative work (character design, background painting, layout) stayed in the U.S. It used to be that this was the case just for television animation, but some feature work has gone overseas as well.
When computer animation came along, it was a boon to studios in the U.S. and Canada-- many in-house jobs were created where one could animate. Studios could keep the work in the country; the only downside for workers is that there's less of them needed, so the competition's a bit fiercer. Until recently I held one of these jobs. Now, I didn't get laid off because my job was going elsewhere-- the project just ended. That's what the business is like. Now I'm looking for something else, but of course I can't limit myself to just animation. Still, I'm confident I'll find something, as some of my former coworkers already have, and considering that I have some experience in the preproduction (more creative) side of the business. Still, I love to animate... so what are you gonna do? Me, I'm working on an indie thing on the side.
The only downside of this lack of work is that there's a lot of animators-- many fresh out of school-- that can't find a job for months... or years. Considering the past few years, though, one can't really blame outsourcing; it was the bust after the animation boom of the mid-nineties. All these Disney and Fox people out of work are going elsewhere and starting their own studios. And, to be fair, in the late 90s there were lots of stories of people getting into animation strictly for the money. As any serious animation professional can tell you, LOVE and DEDICATION to the medium comes first.
It's all economics, I guess. What worries me about the tech thing is that my future husband is a computer science major, and he's graduating soon-- graduating to this volatile market. He's already gotten some good advice about the sorts of jobs he might want to take (and from what he's told me, they do sound like "higher paying, more creative, more value generating jobs"), and I know that he has the talent to get such work, just as I believe I have the talent to continue on in this demanding field (demanding both when working, and when not). I even suggested the other night that we should go into business together; he's been really helpful in assisting me with the backend code for a webspace I have, while I like to design the pages themselves. We could be the ultimate creative team...
This country is a demanding place; it only demands the best out of its people. I think that's the hard lesson of outsourcing.
Anyways, my advice to May Kasahara is this: Wait for the demo. The UT community is buzzing with activity right now, as last week Epic announced that the demo would be out within two weeks.
Good idea. I'm assuming the guys I play with will probably be doing the demo thing anyway until everyone's hooked up with the game (either that, or play Halo?).
As for the system requirements thing, I have a GeForce 2 installed (which shocks the hell out of the game admin) and 256 MB RAM. I've been wanting to upgrade both for awhile now (to a Radeon, and at least 512 MB of RAM), not only for gaming, but also for the graphics and animation apps I use. Still, both Maya and UT run rather smoothly on my current configuration; thus I continue to procrastinate.
Yes, definately! I had problems with the official SNES9X port after upgrading to Panther. My boyfriend redirected me to this version and it works like a charm.
Coolest part: in SNES9X Custom, the icon in the dock isn't an SNES console (as in the official version), but a Super Famicon!
Unreal Tournament 2004 (which is basically UT2003 with lots of new stuff) is coming out soon (for the PC and Mac simultaneously). Might want to hold off getting UT until then;)
Slashdot Mirror
Look on the bright side-- with all the renewed focus on FF7, lots of shiny new collectables have been coming out. And DigiCube finally got off their ass and released a FF7 Piano Collections :D
With the fan base for the game firmly entrenched in Sony hardware, I really don't see why exclusivity would be a major issue. Wouldn't the vast majority of people who are interested in Advent Children have a PS2 anyway?
...is the even cooler trailer from FFX-2 International + Last Mission. Just to warn you now: you're going to need an up-to-date DivX codec to be able to play it.
I'd imagine pretty much any new hardware you can get nowadays should be fine. One thing I highly recommend if you're doing any sort of modding-- if the OS you're using can run Maya, then it should run UnrealEd with no problems (I know this for sure when it comes to Windows. Not so sure about Mac and Linux).
Nope, I think he's talking about the preorder for the UT2K4 collector's edition. They were doing this deal at EBGames.com (with the $40 price and the free car thingie), but it seems like they're currently out of stock... bah.
Irregardless of ROTK's sweep prior to The Big Moment, I couldn't envision any other film but ROTK getting the award after that.
As an aside, I guess we can add "Nintendo is dying/dead" alongside the other Slashdot staples-- "Apple is dying", "BSD is dying", etc. o_O
All they would need to do then is put her in costume and give her a pet like Nausicaa's Teto, and they'd be all set :)
A Cafepress shop? Wow... how, uhh... impressive... Is that for real?! If it is, then now I know these Phantom people don't exactly have it together...
I'd assumed the language was Finnish since a good chunk of the album was recorded in Helsinki. Thanks for the info!
Dear Friends does sound awesome, I'll agree. Along with The Black Mages, it's one of my favorite FF arrange albums. The music from FF5 was always a bit underrated, IMHO...
(Do you by chance know what that other language is that's sung in "My Home, Sweet Home"? I think it might be Finnish, but I'm not sure...)
And if you're anything like me, listening to that album will only make you want to go the the L.A. concert even more...
Try GameMusic.com. I recently got the FF7 Piano Collections there. The prices are pretty good... for Japanese imports (admit it-- you're always going to have to pay through the nose for the legit stuff), and the shipping's prompt, too.
Yeah, and the interviews are usually excellent. Even if they're interviewing someone I have little interest in (like Amy Sedaris or The RZA), I'll still read it, because I know it'll be interesting. The A.V. Club's reviews are usually pretty good too, though their "Films That Time Forgot" sometimes get thematic from week to week.
...and nearly everywhere else in the world (including Japan), let's not forget. Spirited Away was the top-grossing film in Japan that year, and it also did rather well in Europe. I bet Disney's making a mint on the Tokuma Shoten/Studio Ghibli deal... just not necessarily in the United States ;)
Isn't The Polar Express a CG film? I don't see your point, unless you meant to say The Iron Giant...
But you're right-- 2D animation is far from dead. Most people also tend to overlook television animation, where 2D has long reigned, and continues to flourish.
True, but it did win the Oscar that Disney Feature Animation's been clamoring after ever since the Best Feature Animated Film category was created. Maybe that's what that post was trying to say.
I love that console RPG list and am hoping that someday a game developer might do it justice. The closest thing I've seen to a CRPG that pokes fun at a lot of the genre's conventions is the PS2 game Okage: Shadow King. It's a pretty funny game, but at the same time, it falls prey to some of these very same conventions.
I'm thinking of starting a collection of import DC games... Cool Cool Toon's one of those at the top of my list.
No reserve? ;)
I work in a professional industry that was affected by offshoring years ago (animation). The grunt work (animation, inbetweening, coloring, etc.) went to places like South Korea (and now India) and the more creative work (character design, background painting, layout) stayed in the U.S. It used to be that this was the case just for television animation, but some feature work has gone overseas as well.
When computer animation came along, it was a boon to studios in the U.S. and Canada-- many in-house jobs were created where one could animate. Studios could keep the work in the country; the only downside for workers is that there's less of them needed, so the competition's a bit fiercer. Until recently I held one of these jobs. Now, I didn't get laid off because my job was going elsewhere-- the project just ended. That's what the business is like. Now I'm looking for something else, but of course I can't limit myself to just animation. Still, I'm confident I'll find something, as some of my former coworkers already have, and considering that I have some experience in the preproduction (more creative) side of the business. Still, I love to animate... so what are you gonna do? Me, I'm working on an indie thing on the side.
The only downside of this lack of work is that there's a lot of animators-- many fresh out of school-- that can't find a job for months... or years. Considering the past few years, though, one can't really blame outsourcing; it was the bust after the animation boom of the mid-nineties. All these Disney and Fox people out of work are going elsewhere and starting their own studios. And, to be fair, in the late 90s there were lots of stories of people getting into animation strictly for the money. As any serious animation professional can tell you, LOVE and DEDICATION to the medium comes first.
It's all economics, I guess. What worries me about the tech thing is that my future husband is a computer science major, and he's graduating soon-- graduating to this volatile market. He's already gotten some good advice about the sorts of jobs he might want to take (and from what he's told me, they do sound like "higher paying, more creative, more value generating jobs"), and I know that he has the talent to get such work, just as I believe I have the talent to continue on in this demanding field (demanding both when working, and when not). I even suggested the other night that we should go into business together; he's been really helpful in assisting me with the backend code for a webspace I have, while I like to design the pages themselves. We could be the ultimate creative team...
This country is a demanding place; it only demands the best out of its people. I think that's the hard lesson of outsourcing.
Good idea. I'm assuming the guys I play with will probably be doing the demo thing anyway until everyone's hooked up with the game (either that, or play Halo?).
As for the system requirements thing, I have a GeForce 2 installed (which shocks the hell out of the game admin) and 256 MB RAM. I've been wanting to upgrade both for awhile now (to a Radeon, and at least 512 MB of RAM), not only for gaming, but also for the graphics and animation apps I use. Still, both Maya and UT run rather smoothly on my current configuration; thus I continue to procrastinate.
No idea. And I myself am still waiting for the Mac version of TeamSpeak and/or RogerWilco @_@
Coolest part: in SNES9X Custom, the icon in the dock isn't an SNES console (as in the official version), but a Super Famicon!
Unreal Tournament 2004 (which is basically UT2003 with lots of new stuff) is coming out soon (for the PC and Mac simultaneously). Might want to hold off getting UT until then ;)