In Guild Wars, you buy the expansions (and if you play GW, you'll probably buy them). Expansions come once a year or so, and cost as much as a full game.
In this game (that supposedly is basically Diablo 3 in future-day London with a 1st person view, as opposed to isometric), you get the game the same way you'd get any other single-players game (yeah, unlike GW, this one is offline too, just like Diablo 1&2)... and instead of waiting ONE year for "new stuff", you pay a subscription fee and get all "new stuff" delivered as soon as it's implemented.
Now, how often this "new stuff" will come to you, they don't exactly say, but they almost imply a weekly release schedule for new content, if not daily. Add to that the fact you DO get a fully functional MMO subscription to go with it (you get a "basic" one FOR FREE), and I don't see why you'd have anything to complain about.
Actually, those would be "brutal" sysadmins. A truly evil sysadmin would have root access and rootkits installed on all user's home computers already ("here, have this software for home, you'll love it") and have them all zombified under his command.;)
Read all the books, seen all the movies that came out. Conclusion ? Screw the movies, they went from great to ok to meh-ok to ohwell. I don't want to know how the 5th is going to be like.
The comment was meant as atheist = opposing religion while agnostic = not caring either way, but I guess I was a bit too "subtle" in response to a funny (at least that's what I thought) post.
Actually, they SPECIFICALLY said on a couple of occasions that the DX10 version will be merely visual bells and whistles, that will keep maintaining the DX9 version, which will be (functionally, if not visually) identical to the DX10 version.
I was just about to say the same thing... but then again, in single-player mode, it can become annoying, the true "fun" in MoO2 was hotseat multiplayer.
I'm a long-standing EVE player myself (including several RL friends in the same corp). All I can say is that what the grandparent post wants, he gets it almost 100% in EVE. Point-by-point, here is it.
1, 2 and 3. Client is freely downloadable. LIMITLESS number of 14-day trials available (upgradeable at any time to full accounts), characters NEVER get deleted (theoretically, they should be eligible for deletion after 6 months of inactivity, but no purge was ever made and it's not planned to ever happend). You only pay the monthly fees, and "expansions" are automatically (and 100% free of charged) applied to everybody. Works just fine in WINE, is supposed to also work on Macs (no idea about the details)... and a native Linux/Mac client is "in the works"
4. Well, about coop/deathmatch... there really isn't a differentiation between one and the other in EVE. Each coop can turn in a deathmatch or vice-versa (both less likely, but possible).
5. Science-fiction, check. Can't get more sci-fi than spaceships, clones, neural implants and all that.
6. EULA is more than lenient (except against real-money-traders), and even when you DO break the EULA, you're usually not punished unless it was something serious. Oh, and "griefing" is not an EULA breach, it's actually "expected behaviour". Heh. Exceptions to the rule exist, but only to reinforce the rule.
7. Well, it works so-so on old hardware, but it scales poorly for "mass encounters". If you have a PC that was "cutting edge" 5 years ago, EVE should work quite fine.
Oh, and you get another bonus with EVE: there are no "shards". Everybody lives in the same universe (i.e. server "cluster"), so you don't ever have to worry about not being able to play with friends (unless they're from China, long story, not for here). Downside is that it CAN get laggy, and it can become quite unpleasant in "hotspots". Also, there's aprox. 1h downtime every day.
The other GoodThing you get with EVE is that you really, really don't have to be online to progress, you're only required to be online and take action at certain "milestones" in developement, and you can pretty much pick the (approx.) time of the next milestone to fit your schedule.
Sure, it has a lot of other shortcomings, but overall, IMO, it is the best game money can buy time in;)
Imagine a LAN party. Now imagine that LAN party comes with free hardware, you don't have to bring your own. Now, imagine that LAN party has free Internet access, is open all day long, and you HAVE to go attend it each and every day. So, how much work are you doing ? Yup, right, almost none at all.
Suddendly, schools realize that LAN party I describe above is on school grounds, with school hardware, and it goes on all schoolday long. What a big surprise...
Naaah... US companies will just keep "importing" brainpower. Just the way they did for the past 50+ years while their school system kept on getting lower and lower standards. It's the way USA still keeps afloat (and will keep afloat a while longer). And to think they go "boo, immigrants, stealing our jobs". Heh.
The patent basically looks like it covers anthing resembling a modern user interface. The patent more specifically stresses mechanics like the Opera/IE/Mozilla browser tabs, spreadsheet "workbooks", the Windows taskbar, you name it. So, in other words, just about any software on the market today. Well, that's what I seemed to gather from the passing glance I gate the patent text. So I might be wrong. Please correct me if that's the case.
Assuming I'm right, this is a "blanket patent" that can be sicced on anybody they chose to. One would expect them to go after several small companies at once, with several lesser damage claims, companies that might not afford to pay a lawyer.
Instead, they go after a rather large company (again, correct me if I'm wrong, but Apple is a pretty big company), and claim a relatively unimpressive sum (20+ mil). I could only suppose again that damage claims must be related to number of users that the product was sold to (or somesuch). Still, going after Microsoft and claiming damage for... heh... EVERYTHING Windows and Windows-based Microsoft ever made and sold, now that would be a huge sum we're talking about. Claiming Apple wouldn't have the money to go into court for this is pretty ridiculous... well, unless, maybe they're counting on Apple settling out of court for such a paltry sum ?
I can only hope they get smashed in court, and smashed good.
"Or reality as we perceive it is the interaction of particles, rather than the particles themselves?"
Funny you should say that. Ever since I started studying physics/chemistry in high-school (at about the same time, 5th grade or so), I stopped thinking of "matter" as the defining issue, and started focusing on interactions between them almost exclusively. It makes no difference wether a particle/molecule/object actually "exists" or what "internal make-up" it has, the only thing you should ever care about is what types of interactions it can have with other particles/molecules/objects... nothing more, nothing less.
Well, the "knowing about possible types of interaction" issue kind of makes it almost mandatory to understand exactly what any entity is actually "made of", but that's a secondary issue... if you know how something behaves in any possible situation, regardless of what's inside... do you really need to know what's inside ? Or, rather, if you know how something reacts to any imaginable interaction, would you have any actual means to determine without the shadow of a doubt "what's inside" ? My personal answers are both negative: you don't need to know, and there's no way to know for sure.
Heh, here's the craziest thory: what if "space", "time" and "energy" don't actually exist (or worse, what if they're ALL discrete, not continuous) ? Would we even be able to notice ? Or have we noticed that already (Planck's h) but can't grasp the concept ?
For all intents and purposes, the entire universe actually existing (on one hand) or being a completely fictional construct/simulation (on the other hand) makes no difference whatsoever. So, basically, all what's left of reality is simply interactions between entities, not any of the entities themselves.
And kids, this is probably the best sign you would be so much happier with a freshly cracked Vista downloaded off the 'net... when available. Ok, so it comes with a free botnet or other zombified software pre-installed, but at least it: a) never requires an activation b) is probably safer as the commercially available Vista c) might even have *gasp* some levels (or ALL levels) of DRM disabled
Ok, ok, so I'm being saracastic... still... is it only me, or does Windows mainly survive BECAUSE of the pirates, and not vice-versa ? I mean... hell... if everybody that had XP (or will have Vista in the future) would have to actually PAY for it... how many computers with Windows ** would be around on the net ? My guess is, significantly less. Oh, and you can bet your ass that whoever has a pirated copy of Windows *WOULDN'T* have bought it anyway.
On second thought, maybe the FOSS community should support the fight against software piracy more actively:)
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Vampires, rejoice ! Soon, the artificial blood project will be complete !
New, in Italian, Mexican and Indian flavors.
In Guild Wars, you buy the expansions (and if you play GW, you'll probably buy them).
Expansions come once a year or so, and cost as much as a full game.
In this game (that supposedly is basically Diablo 3 in future-day London with a 1st person view, as opposed to isometric), you get the game the same way you'd get any other single-players game (yeah, unlike GW, this one is offline too, just like Diablo 1&2)... and instead of waiting ONE year for "new stuff", you pay a subscription fee and get all "new stuff" delivered as soon as it's implemented.
Now, how often this "new stuff" will come to you, they don't exactly say, but they almost imply a weekly release schedule for new content, if not daily.
Add to that the fact you DO get a fully functional MMO subscription to go with it (you get a "basic" one FOR FREE), and I don't see why you'd have anything to complain about.
Actually, those would be "brutal" sysadmins. ;)
A truly evil sysadmin would have root access and rootkits installed on all user's home computers already ("here, have this software for home, you'll love it") and have them all zombified under his command.
"Trying to explain why masturbating fruit fuckers are funny[...]"
Just say "it's funny, laugh" *evil grin*
I, for one, welcome our 4-fingered, yellow overlords ?
Nah, doesn't have a very impressive ring to it...
I'm fairly sure it's not entirely VMWare's fault ;)
Read all the books, seen all the movies that came out.
Conclusion ? Screw the movies, they went from great to ok to meh-ok to ohwell.
I don't want to know how the 5th is going to be like.
The comment was meant as atheist = opposing religion while agnostic = not caring either way, but I guess I was a bit too "subtle" in response to a funny (at least that's what I thought) post.
That's why the word hate was between quotes... I thought people know what quotes mean when you add them to a word.
Damn you, I wasted one and a half hour of my life, and my belly hurts from laughing !
Actually, atheists "hate" ALL religions.
The agnostics, those are the "tolerant" ones.
Actually, they SPECIFICALLY said on a couple of occasions that the DX10 version will be merely visual bells and whistles, that will keep maintaining the DX9 version, which will be (functionally, if not visually) identical to the DX10 version.
I was just about to say the same thing... but then again, in single-player mode, it can become annoying, the true "fun" in MoO2 was hotseat multiplayer.
I'm a long-standing EVE player myself (including several RL friends in the same corp).
;)
All I can say is that what the grandparent post wants, he gets it almost 100% in EVE.
Point-by-point, here is it.
1, 2 and 3.
Client is freely downloadable. LIMITLESS number of 14-day trials available (upgradeable at any time to full accounts), characters NEVER get deleted (theoretically, they should be eligible for deletion after 6 months of inactivity, but no purge was ever made and it's not planned to ever happend).
You only pay the monthly fees, and "expansions" are automatically (and 100% free of charged) applied to everybody.
Works just fine in WINE, is supposed to also work on Macs (no idea about the details)... and a native Linux/Mac client is "in the works"
4. Well, about coop/deathmatch... there really isn't a differentiation between one and the other in EVE. Each coop can turn in a deathmatch or vice-versa (both less likely, but possible).
5. Science-fiction, check. Can't get more sci-fi than spaceships, clones, neural implants and all that.
6. EULA is more than lenient (except against real-money-traders), and even when you DO break the EULA, you're usually not punished unless it was something serious. Oh, and "griefing" is not an EULA breach, it's actually "expected behaviour". Heh. Exceptions to the rule exist, but only to reinforce the rule.
7. Well, it works so-so on old hardware, but it scales poorly for "mass encounters". If you have a PC that was "cutting edge" 5 years ago, EVE should work quite fine.
Oh, and you get another bonus with EVE: there are no "shards".
Everybody lives in the same universe (i.e. server "cluster"), so you don't ever have to worry about not being able to play with friends (unless they're from China, long story, not for here).
Downside is that it CAN get laggy, and it can become quite unpleasant in "hotspots". Also, there's aprox. 1h downtime every day.
The other GoodThing you get with EVE is that you really, really don't have to be online to progress, you're only required to be online and take action at certain "milestones" in developement, and you can pretty much pick the (approx.) time of the next milestone to fit your schedule.
Sure, it has a lot of other shortcomings, but overall, IMO, it is the best game money can buy time in
Imagine a LAN party.
Now imagine that LAN party comes with free hardware, you don't have to bring your own.
Now, imagine that LAN party has free Internet access, is open all day long, and you HAVE to go attend it each and every day.
So, how much work are you doing ? Yup, right, almost none at all.
Suddendly, schools realize that LAN party I describe above is on school grounds, with school hardware, and it goes on all schoolday long.
What a big surprise...
"Are you implying that ALL forms of DRM have been cracked? Care to back that up?"
Reverse that... care to present any DRM that remained uncracked for long ?
No... Soylent Green is people !
How about this: a global road system that only a lot of very small, very fast mail trucks use ?
What do you mean ? ;)
I find "addicting" to be a very cromulent word, one that really embiggens the English language...
Naaah... US companies will just keep "importing" brainpower.
Just the way they did for the past 50+ years while their school system kept on getting lower and lower standards.
It's the way USA still keeps afloat (and will keep afloat a while longer).
And to think they go "boo, immigrants, stealing our jobs". Heh.
IANAL, so let me rephrase that in layman's terms.
The patent basically looks like it covers anthing resembling a modern user interface.
The patent more specifically stresses mechanics like the Opera/IE/Mozilla browser tabs, spreadsheet "workbooks", the Windows taskbar, you name it.
So, in other words, just about any software on the market today.
Well, that's what I seemed to gather from the passing glance I gate the patent text. So I might be wrong. Please correct me if that's the case.
Assuming I'm right, this is a "blanket patent" that can be sicced on anybody they chose to.
One would expect them to go after several small companies at once, with several lesser damage claims, companies that might not afford to pay a lawyer.
Instead, they go after a rather large company (again, correct me if I'm wrong, but Apple is a pretty big company), and claim a relatively unimpressive sum (20+ mil).
I could only suppose again that damage claims must be related to number of users that the product was sold to (or somesuch).
Still, going after Microsoft and claiming damage for... heh... EVERYTHING Windows and Windows-based Microsoft ever made and sold, now that would be a huge sum we're talking about.
Claiming Apple wouldn't have the money to go into court for this is pretty ridiculous... well, unless, maybe they're counting on Apple settling out of court for such a paltry sum ?
I can only hope they get smashed in court, and smashed good.
Why not against IE7/Microsoft ? :)
They certainly got more cash
"Or reality as we perceive it is the interaction of particles, rather than the particles themselves?"
Funny you should say that.
Ever since I started studying physics/chemistry in high-school (at about the same time, 5th grade or so), I stopped thinking of "matter" as the defining issue, and started focusing on interactions between them almost exclusively.
It makes no difference wether a particle/molecule/object actually "exists" or what "internal make-up" it has, the only thing you should ever care about is what types of interactions it can have with other particles/molecules/objects... nothing more, nothing less.
Well, the "knowing about possible types of interaction" issue kind of makes it almost mandatory to understand exactly what any entity is actually "made of", but that's a secondary issue... if you know how something behaves in any possible situation, regardless of what's inside... do you really need to know what's inside ?
Or, rather, if you know how something reacts to any imaginable interaction, would you have any actual means to determine without the shadow of a doubt "what's inside" ?
My personal answers are both negative: you don't need to know, and there's no way to know for sure.
Heh, here's the craziest thory: what if "space", "time" and "energy" don't actually exist (or worse, what if they're ALL discrete, not continuous) ?
Would we even be able to notice ? Or have we noticed that already (Planck's h) but can't grasp the concept ?
For all intents and purposes, the entire universe actually existing (on one hand) or being a completely fictional construct/simulation (on the other hand) makes no difference whatsoever.
So, basically, all what's left of reality is simply interactions between entities, not any of the entities themselves.
And kids, this is probably the best sign you would be so much happier with a freshly cracked Vista downloaded off the 'net... when available.
:)
Ok, so it comes with a free botnet or other zombified software pre-installed, but at least it:
a) never requires an activation
b) is probably safer as the commercially available Vista
c) might even have *gasp* some levels (or ALL levels) of DRM disabled
Ok, ok, so I'm being saracastic... still... is it only me, or does Windows mainly survive BECAUSE of the pirates, and not vice-versa ?
I mean... hell... if everybody that had XP (or will have Vista in the future) would have to actually PAY for it... how many computers with Windows ** would be around on the net ? My guess is, significantly less.
Oh, and you can bet your ass that whoever has a pirated copy of Windows *WOULDN'T* have bought it anyway.
On second thought, maybe the FOSS community should support the fight against software piracy more actively
Cleverly disguised "Idiocracy" reference...
No, they go to Starbucks to GET porn. Well, handjobs. Whatever. Huh, "I like money". Yeah.