I'd like to see how many of those dreadfully decorated Rocker McMansions on MTV's "Cribs" are furnished rentals, and how many of those Bentleys are owned outright.
Remember that the Academy hates any kind of Genre film, be it Western [Unforgiven, 1992]
Crime [The Godfather, 1972; The French Connection, 1971]
Horror [Got me on that one, but I'd say "Forrest Gump" for personal reasons *shudder*, but you could argue for Silence of the Lambs, 1991]
Sci-Fi or Fantasy [Right there, but you never know. I mean, who would have thought Marisa Tomei would have won for "My Cousin Vinnie"? I'll keep my fingers crossed.
Titanic, overarching shitfest that it was, had no acting wins (and two acting nominations - Kate Winslet and Gloria Stuart), but still managed to win because, basically, it was long.
Braveheart, Titanic, The English Patient, Dances with Wolves, etc. The Academy loves epics, and very well may let Fellowship of the Ring walk away with this one. I'll keep my fingers crossed, since it was better than any of the other Best Pictures I mentioned.
On another note, there's a 60% chance that one of my favorite directors will win this year, which means that either Ridley Scott or Ron Howard will win, of course. Sigh.
...film on Sony digital cameras, master to DVD on Sony kit, play it back on a Sony TV with a Sony DVD player.
I'm disturbed by seeing kids decked out in head-to-toe Tommy Hilfiger logo clothes, but they have every right to dress that way if they want to.:) Sony has a number of products - some of which are very good - in the electronics market, and if you find their product to be superior, nobody's forcing you to buy it. Now, if I buy a PC from Dell or Micron or - yes - Sony, I'm forced to have Windows Whatever installed on it; I have no choice (until I get it home) what OS to put on it.
Sony can put out all they want, and if people like what they put out and choose to buy it (be it for the quality or something petty like the label or color), then so be it - that's the market for you.
I think the point the poster was making was that while 64 megs isn't a whole lot of space in terms of consumer media devices, very large capacity solid-state WORM devices will probably be the next major step in that field.
Right now, Memory Sticks and flash memory aren't large enough to hold much more than medium sized picture catalogs or short MPG's, but if you can pack 4+ gigs on a chip the size of a stick of gum, you'll see a major shift in size and focus of all kinds of consumer electronics (which will, of course, be equipped with SSSCA anti-piracy voodoo chips).
I'm with you on that one - I think FFVII established the PSX more than any of the sports titles or platformers did at the time. It convinced me to purchase one, that's for sure.
I totally dismissed it as another company with no gaming experience trying to get a piece of the home video game pie.
This sounds somewhat familiar for today's market as well - although notably not Sony this time. Will the rabid Xbox dismissives vaporize if MS or a third party produces a killer app for this dark horse? Nintendo can cruise for a while - Mario Sunshine, Zelda, Metroid, Resident Evil, and anything Pokemon or whatever Rareware decides to put out will be the bread and butter for the system in the near future. Sony's library is already excellent, and I don't see it faltering anytime soon.
All I know is that this previously low-key hobby of console collecting is getting hellaciously expensive, and I'm loving every minute of it:)
I bet more people will buy an Atari 2600 this week than an Xbox. Neither one is available at any store around here
I recently got permission from my financial advisor (ok, my wife) to buy a GameCube, so I lighted out to see what I could find. I live in the suburbs of Chicago, and there are scores of places to get consoles. After hitting every Funcoland, Best Buy, CompUSA, Target, Wal-Mart, K-Mart, Circuit City, etc. etc. etc. within a 20-mile radius, I couldn't find a GameCube anywhere (this was about a week ago). Hell, there weren't even memory cards or S-Video hookups. However, I'd estimate about 60% of the stores I went to had at least one Xbox in stock, and a plethora of games and accessories. I was tempted - but I blew my Xmas money on PS2 games instead. Sweet, sweet Grand Theft Auto 3. Well, off to assassinate more pedestrians...
I don't believe short loading times are somehow inherent to GC, I think it's all about the developer
You're absolutely right about that. On the PS2 for example, Devil May Cry is a fast-loading game with scads of gorgeous textures and effects. Crash Bandicoot 4, on the other hand, take as long as a full minute to load a level, during which time you're treated to the game engine rendering Crash falling through some floating lights. I've heard Munch's Oddysee on the Xbox has some horrible load times as well, but I'm off-topic enough here:)
The test of a good movie, to me, is when I've seen it 100 times, and then watch it again and come up with a new theory that suddenly re-explains everything
You may be right, but if I could watch "Planet of the Apes" 100 times, I'd probably have 100 different explanations as to how they came up with that loopy ending, but it wouldn't make it a better movie.:)
Actually, this is a good thing, Taco. Would you rather have a tiny, swallowable camera looking at your prostate, or a proctologist with a very large hand feeling around for it?
You're right - I'd remembered reading about the Charley Pride thing a few months ago, and figured this is what the article was about. My bad:) I should have suspected there would be competing copy-protection schemes.
Saving some face, at least the Amazon link has some nicely annoyed feedback and - I should point out - there are no goats anywhere in my previous links.
...Hero's Quest (later called Quest For Glory, for some reason)...
Just a quick aside regarding the name change: Sierra had to change the name from "Hero's Quest" because a game company (Milton Bradley, I think) had dibs on the title "Hero Quest" for a neato hack-and-slash dungeon crawl board game.
Another odd Sierra story. I saw Al Lowe (creator of Leisure Suit Larry) on "Name That Tune" years ago. He sheepishly said his job was "Computer Programmer" and went on to win the game, if I remember correctly.
Captain Amazing points out that he's an intranet developer (and knows how to use a bold tag) and won't support Netscape. Inflammatory comments aside, it's fairly obvious that after years of intranet-only (read: enforcable browser) development, he's completely succumbed to IE - specific tags, functions and script wierdness. I know - I've bowed to the false god of before, and it's easy to get sucked in.
who would read 300-500 pgs, only to not finish the book?
Oh, that's an easy one - ladies and gentlemen, may I present Battlefield Earth. I got about 500 pages into it before I couldn't bring myself to read another paragraph.
I'll happily download and pay $1 for this. It may not be perfect, but it's a worthy experiment. And, if it sucks, I've only spent a dollar on one chapter.
Digital projection has benefits over standard 35mm film, but the format Ebert and Scorsese have a woody over is called MaxiVision - it's a new format of film projection that has a slightly wider aspect ratio and higher line count than standard film, and moves at 48 frames/second, smoothing out those jittery pans and horizontal dolly shots. Apparently, its picture quality is far better than digital (at this particular time).
The biggest problem with MaxiVision, as far as I can tell, is that anything digital is automatically *better* in most peoples eyes, and since this particular format is still celluloid, it's probably going the way of Betamax, which is unfortunate. I'm sure digital distribution will catch on, and the picture quality will improve exponentially, but right now, this is the leader in projected picture technology right now.
Right - modems DO suck, but there are still far more places where DSL/ISDN/Cable access is unavailable, and won't be for another year at least. It's at the point where I can't even play Unreal Tournament online anymore, since I get lag fragged more than I can return the favor to anyone. People will migrate to broadband if it's available to them, and really impressive multiplayer isn't that far away, it's just got to wait for local telcos and cable outlets to get a clue.
If you've ever played old-syle Capcom fighting games, the female characters (Chun-Li springs to mind) were always (I found) the easiest to play with, insofar as they were usually the quickest players, and were able to execute moves with considerably more speed. This sort of stereotype carries over even into Soul Calibur. Play as Taki and compare her to Nightmare or Astaroth. The female characters are almost exclusively lithe, quick and more fun to play.
In Everquest, if you're a female character, the players are usually chivalrous to a fault, and even the lowliest newbies can get twinked by complete strangers, simply because of their feminine avatar.
I don't think it has a whole lot to do with gender experimentation - although I'm certainly not discounting the article - but, in general, the programmers of these games are male, and maybe it's an odd sort of respect - coding chivalry? - to make their female characters the most fun to play (in my book, at least).
I remember (vaguely) a quote from the lead programmer of Tomb Raider when it was released. The interviewer asked him why they chose the woman, and he quite frankly replied that due to how the camera was situated, he'd rather spend 40 hours staring at a female bum than a bloke's.
Actually, there was a teensy little bit; at the climax, our young Yardale alumnus wraps up his Les Mis parody:
They may cut your dick in half, And serve it to a pig. And though it hurts, you'll laugh, And dance a dickless jig. But that's how it goes, In war you're shat upon. Though you die, La Resistance lives on!
I doubt you ever will ever get that old feeling back. I know exactly what you mean - I still consider Phantasy Star (SMS) to be the greatest game ever released, just because I was 11 when I got it, and It completely changed my view of videogames. The last game I played that left me speechless was Super Mario 64. Now, I may not be left in awe of games anymore, and I doubt I'll have that holy epiphany feelin' again until I see a realtime, photorealistic game, and that's not happening for a long time, I think.
I don't regret it, though. I'm older now, and I can appreciate the technological aspect of eye-candy games (Soul Calibur, Crazy Taxi), and allow myself to be immersed in a fantastic story (Zelda 64, Final Fantasy Anything, Soul Reaver) the developers have spent a lot of time meticulously putting together.
Games don't look as good as movies yet, but a well crafted game can be just as satisfying, if not moreso that some movies.
Honestly, I have better things to do that pine over an Episode 1 DVD. Admittedly, I'll happily pick up a super-duper special edition Star Wars DVD (or whatever technology has stolen the DVD spotlight in another 6 or 7 years) since they were such an integral part of my childhood. However, if Lucas doesn't want to put out a definitive digital collection until the next two are done, more power to him, I'd prefer a cohesive, finished product any day.
I registered inomi.com basically because a friend of mine and I thought "Infinite Number Of Monkeys Incorporated" was a great name for a software consulting business, and once I had some cash to register a domain, I went ahead and did it - more for the hell of it than for any entreprenurial means. Admittedly, there's only a placeholder page on the site (my time is presently taken up by work, my wife and Nocturne), but I've recieved several e-mails asking about selling the site name. One of them was from one of those "Corporate Identity" companies who basically puts Scrabble pieces in a food processor and charges clients $100k for their work ("Agilent", anyone?). I guess I'm in the wrong line of work...
Slashdot Mirror
I'd like to see how many of those dreadfully decorated Rocker McMansions on MTV's "Cribs" are furnished rentals, and how many of those Bentleys are owned outright.
Remember that the Academy hates any kind of Genre film, be it Western
[Unforgiven, 1992]
Crime
[The Godfather, 1972; The French Connection, 1971]
Horror
[Got me on that one, but I'd say "Forrest Gump" for personal reasons *shudder*, but you could argue for Silence of the Lambs, 1991]
Sci-Fi or Fantasy
[Right there, but you never know. I mean, who would have thought Marisa Tomei would have won for "My Cousin Vinnie"? I'll keep my fingers crossed.
Braveheart, Titanic, The English Patient, Dances with Wolves, etc. The Academy loves epics, and very well may let Fellowship of the Ring walk away with this one. I'll keep my fingers crossed, since it was better than any of the other Best Pictures I mentioned.
On another note, there's a 60% chance that one of my favorite directors will win this year, which means that either Ridley Scott or Ron Howard will win, of course. Sigh.
I'm disturbed by seeing kids decked out in head-to-toe Tommy Hilfiger logo clothes, but they have every right to dress that way if they want to. :) Sony has a number of products - some of which are very good - in the electronics market, and if you find their product to be superior, nobody's forcing you to buy it. Now, if I buy a PC from Dell or Micron or - yes - Sony, I'm forced to have Windows Whatever installed on it; I have no choice (until I get it home) what OS to put on it.
Sony can put out all they want, and if people like what they put out and choose to buy it (be it for the quality or something petty like the label or color), then so be it - that's the market for you.
Right now, Memory Sticks and flash memory aren't large enough to hold much more than medium sized picture catalogs or short MPG's, but if you can pack 4+ gigs on a chip the size of a stick of gum, you'll see a major shift in size and focus of all kinds of consumer electronics (which will, of course, be equipped with SSSCA anti-piracy voodoo chips).
I totally dismissed it as another company with no gaming experience trying to get a piece of the home video game pie.
This sounds somewhat familiar for today's market as well - although notably not Sony this time. Will the rabid Xbox dismissives vaporize if MS or a third party produces a killer app for this dark horse? Nintendo can cruise for a while - Mario Sunshine, Zelda, Metroid, Resident Evil, and anything Pokemon or whatever Rareware decides to put out will be the bread and butter for the system in the near future. Sony's library is already excellent, and I don't see it faltering anytime soon.
All I know is that this previously low-key hobby of console collecting is getting hellaciously expensive, and I'm loving every minute of it :)
I recently got permission from my financial advisor (ok, my wife) to buy a GameCube, so I lighted out to see what I could find. I live in the suburbs of Chicago, and there are scores of places to get consoles. After hitting every Funcoland, Best Buy, CompUSA, Target, Wal-Mart, K-Mart, Circuit City, etc. etc. etc. within a 20-mile radius, I couldn't find a GameCube anywhere (this was about a week ago). Hell, there weren't even memory cards or S-Video hookups. However, I'd estimate about 60% of the stores I went to had at least one Xbox in stock, and a plethora of games and accessories. I was tempted - but I blew my Xmas money on PS2 games instead. Sweet, sweet Grand Theft Auto 3. Well, off to assassinate more pedestrians...
You're absolutely right about that. On the PS2 for example, Devil May Cry is a fast-loading game with scads of gorgeous textures and effects. Crash Bandicoot 4, on the other hand, take as long as a full minute to load a level, during which time you're treated to the game engine rendering Crash falling through some floating lights. I've heard Munch's Oddysee on the Xbox has some horrible load times as well, but I'm off-topic enough here :)
Technews was slashdotted before any comments went up! Now that's effeciency, folks!
Germany, Switzerland or Austria (thats all in Europe)
News for nerds. Stuff that matters. Geography for geeks.
I assumed they meant that only Germany, Switzerland and Austria were the only countries eligible for the contest...
The test of a good movie, to me, is when I've seen it 100 times, and then watch it again and come up with a new theory that suddenly re-explains everything
:)
You may be right, but if I could watch "Planet of the Apes" 100 times, I'd probably have 100 different explanations as to how they came up with that loopy ending, but it wouldn't make it a better movie.
Actually, this is a good thing, Taco. Would you rather have a tiny, swallowable camera looking at your prostate, or a proctologist with a very large hand feeling around for it?
You're right - I'd remembered reading about the Charley Pride thing a few months ago, and figured this is what the article was about. My bad :) I should have suspected there would be competing copy-protection schemes.
<flogging_self>Read references first!</flogging_self>
<flogging_self>Read references first!</flogging_self>
Saving some face, at least the Amazon link has some nicely annoyed feedback and - I should point out - there are no goats anywhere in my previous links.
This is the link to the SEC filing mentioning the CD...
http://www.secinfo.com/d1157k.43b.htm
And, of course, here's a link to buy it at Amazon.
Just a quick aside regarding the name change:
Sierra had to change the name from "Hero's Quest" because a game company (Milton Bradley, I think) had dibs on the title "Hero Quest" for a neato hack-and-slash dungeon crawl board game.
Another odd Sierra story. I saw Al Lowe (creator of Leisure Suit Larry) on "Name That Tune" years ago. He sheepishly said his job was "Computer Programmer" and went on to win the game, if I remember correctly.
Captain Amazing points out that he's an intranet developer (and knows how to use a bold tag) and won't support Netscape. Inflammatory comments aside, it's fairly obvious that after years of intranet-only (read: enforcable browser) development, he's completely succumbed to IE - specific tags, functions and script wierdness. I know - I've bowed to the false god of before, and it's easy to get sucked in.
Oh, that's an easy one - ladies and gentlemen, may I present Battlefield Earth. I got about 500 pages into it before I couldn't bring myself to read another paragraph.
I'll happily download and pay $1 for this. It may not be perfect, but it's a worthy experiment. And, if it sucks, I've only spent a dollar on one chapter.
The biggest problem with MaxiVision, as far as I can tell, is that anything digital is automatically *better* in most peoples eyes, and since this particular format is still celluloid, it's probably going the way of Betamax, which is unfortunate. I'm sure digital distribution will catch on, and the picture quality will improve exponentially, but right now, this is the leader in projected picture technology right now.
Information from the horse's mouth is here:
MaxiVision's website
Uh, it's spelled wrong...it's "Malkovich" I'll send a note to the guy who put it up.
Right - modems DO suck, but there are still far more places where DSL/ISDN/Cable access is unavailable, and won't be for another year at least. It's at the point where I can't even play Unreal Tournament online anymore, since I get lag fragged more than I can return the favor to anyone. People will migrate to broadband if it's available to them, and really impressive multiplayer isn't that far away, it's just got to wait for local telcos and cable outlets to get a clue.
If you've ever played old-syle Capcom fighting games, the female characters (Chun-Li springs to mind) were always (I found) the easiest to play with, insofar as they were usually the quickest players, and were able to execute moves with considerably more speed. This sort of stereotype carries over even into Soul Calibur. Play as Taki and compare her to Nightmare or Astaroth. The female characters are almost exclusively lithe, quick and more fun to play.
In Everquest, if you're a female character, the players are usually chivalrous to a fault, and even the lowliest newbies can get twinked by complete strangers, simply because of their feminine avatar.
I don't think it has a whole lot to do with gender experimentation - although I'm certainly not discounting the article - but, in general, the programmers of these games are male, and maybe it's an odd sort of respect - coding chivalry? - to make their female characters the most fun to play (in my book, at least).
I remember (vaguely) a quote from the lead programmer of Tomb Raider when it was released. The interviewer asked him why they chose the woman, and he quite frankly replied that due to how the camera was situated, he'd rather spend 40 hours staring at a female bum than a bloke's.
Actually, there was a teensy little bit; at the climax, our young Yardale alumnus wraps up his Les Mis parody:
They may cut your dick in half,
And serve it to a pig.
And though it hurts, you'll laugh,
And dance a dickless jig.
But that's how it goes,
In war you're shat upon.
Though you die,
La Resistance lives on!
I don't regret it, though. I'm older now, and I can appreciate the technological aspect of eye-candy games (Soul Calibur, Crazy Taxi), and allow myself to be immersed in a fantastic story (Zelda 64, Final Fantasy Anything, Soul Reaver) the developers have spent a lot of time meticulously putting together.
Games don't look as good as movies yet, but a well crafted game can be just as satisfying, if not moreso that some movies.
Honestly, I have better things to do that pine over an Episode 1 DVD. Admittedly, I'll happily pick up a super-duper special edition Star Wars DVD (or whatever technology has stolen the DVD spotlight in another 6 or 7 years) since they were such an integral part of my childhood. However, if Lucas doesn't want to put out a definitive digital collection until the next two are done, more power to him, I'd prefer a cohesive, finished product any day.
I registered inomi.com basically because a friend of mine and I thought "Infinite Number Of Monkeys Incorporated" was a great name for a software consulting business, and once I had some cash to register a domain, I went ahead and did it - more for the hell of it than for any entreprenurial means. Admittedly, there's only a placeholder page on the site (my time is presently taken up by work, my wife and Nocturne), but I've recieved several e-mails asking about selling the site name. One of them was from one of those "Corporate Identity" companies who basically puts Scrabble pieces in a food processor and charges clients $100k for their work ("Agilent", anyone?). I guess I'm in the wrong line of work...