I can answer this honestly, I've been 'programming' nearly 30 years now, I make a very comfortable living, and I actually consider myself to be one of the best at what I do. But I have absolutely horrible math skills.
My math history consist of failing pre-algebra in 9th grade, having to suffer thru remedial math in 10th, an advancing all the way back to pre-algebra again in 11th grade. Where I went to school (GA in the 80's), the only required class in 12th grade was English, so no more math I took. Not that I was dense, I was actually in the gifted programs until I stopped caring about what school was teaching me, and was way more interested in what I was doing in my spare time on the computer.
Now I get paid to solve problems. Mainly big business problems that are worth millions of dollars to my clients. This rarely involves much math. My expertise lies in automating processes, integrating existing systems, and creating simple interfaces for people to work efficiently, with even less skills then myself.
I did eventually spend quite a bit of time teaching myself all the things I missed out on, like geometry and trig, but this was purely for personal reasons, I never use that kind of math in a business environment.
I agree, still using ICQ in message mode also.
I had no idea ICQ had lost so many users, all my geek friends and business contacts from the last 5-7 years are still on ICQ. I have a user number in the 100k range, never get spam, and never had a reason to switch to anything else.
G4TV, the video game channel (on cable/satelite) actually does run a weekly series made almost entirely in games. It's called Portal, and is 'filmed' in a number of the MMORPG's out there like Everquest and Dark Age of Camelot. Pretty funny stuff, but some MMORPG experience may be needed to appreciate.
It does seem to be a double-edged sword in this case. It's hard to compete with $free. I've been using Delphi as an individual developer for about 8 years (since 1.0 in 16 bit Windows), and I or the companies I've worked for have bought several components over the years, but I've had no need to recently. Free code often means more money in my pocket, but it does seem someone is loosing.
Yep Halo gets alot of hype.. but it's true, if you only played the first few episodes, then you don't know Halo =) It gets better and better.
The vehicle aspect was doing something new, as I bet the best selling PC FPS this season will be Battlefield 1942, where vehicles are a huge part of the gameplay.
Back in the day, I won several national Quake 1/2 tourneys, and used to think I would never play a FPS on a console without a mouse, but Halo's dual analog setup feels really good. I play it over the internet with Gamespy tunnel, and to me it's also a plus that everyone I play with is using the same hardware and controls for a level playing field and good competition. Yes split screen sucks, but thats what sys link and Xbox live are for.
And as far as graphics... I grew up watching NTSC like most people, and when I play a DVD, I really don't notice the low resolution of my set, it's the standard of realistic moving images as most people know it. Halo and most of my Xbox games look better then anything I can play on my Geforce3 with my 21" $1900 monitor.
PC games are dying, well, in comparison to the mainstreaming of consoles. Only 1 PC game made it into the top 10 sales list last week. PC's are too expensive for average joe to keep updated, or even keep running.
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I can answer this honestly, I've been 'programming' nearly 30 years now, I make a very comfortable living, and I actually consider myself to be one of the best at what I do. But I have absolutely horrible math skills.
My math history consist of failing pre-algebra in 9th grade, having to suffer thru remedial math in 10th, an advancing all the way back to pre-algebra again in 11th grade. Where I went to school (GA in the 80's), the only required class in 12th grade was English, so no more math I took. Not that I was dense, I was actually in the gifted programs until I stopped caring about what school was teaching me, and was way more interested in what I was doing in my spare time on the computer.
Now I get paid to solve problems. Mainly big business problems that are worth millions of dollars to my clients. This rarely involves much math. My expertise lies in automating processes, integrating existing systems, and creating simple interfaces for people to work efficiently, with even less skills then myself.
I did eventually spend quite a bit of time teaching myself all the things I missed out on, like geometry and trig, but this was purely for personal reasons, I never use that kind of math in a business environment.
I agree, still using ICQ in message mode also. I had no idea ICQ had lost so many users, all my geek friends and business contacts from the last 5-7 years are still on ICQ. I have a user number in the 100k range, never get spam, and never had a reason to switch to anything else.
I think you missed a point too, the XBox IS a console and online.
G4TV, the video game channel (on cable/satelite) actually does run a weekly series made almost entirely in games. It's called Portal, and is 'filmed' in a number of the MMORPG's out there like Everquest and Dark Age of Camelot. Pretty funny stuff, but some MMORPG experience may be needed to appreciate.
It does seem to be a double-edged sword in this case. It's hard to compete with $free. I've been using Delphi as an individual developer for about 8 years (since 1.0 in 16 bit Windows), and I or the companies I've worked for have bought several components over the years, but I've had no need to recently. Free code often means more money in my pocket, but it does seem someone is loosing.
Yep Halo gets alot of hype.. but it's true, if you only played the first few episodes, then you don't know Halo =) It gets better and better.
The vehicle aspect was doing something new, as I bet the best selling PC FPS this season will be Battlefield 1942, where vehicles are a huge part of the gameplay.
Back in the day, I won several national Quake 1/2 tourneys, and used to think I would never play a FPS on a console without a mouse, but Halo's dual analog setup feels really good. I play it over the internet with Gamespy tunnel, and to me it's also a plus that everyone I play with is using the same hardware and controls for a level playing field and good competition. Yes split screen sucks, but thats what sys link and Xbox live are for.
And as far as graphics... I grew up watching NTSC like most people, and when I play a DVD, I really don't notice the low resolution of my set, it's the standard of realistic moving images as most people know it. Halo and most of my Xbox games look better then anything I can play on my Geforce3 with my 21" $1900 monitor.
PC games are dying, well, in comparison to the mainstreaming of consoles. Only 1 PC game made it into the top 10 sales list last week. PC's are too expensive for average joe to keep updated, or even keep running.