Here is where I pulled the data. You may search to cross verify it. I'm only going to pull the basics, the link has a great chart with complete breakdowns on PS2, GC, Xbox, and DC. Worth a look if you really want to know. You should probably ignore it if you want to continue to personally think that the big three don't have indisputable power differences..
PlayStation 2
CPU: 295 MHz
Video: 150 MHz
Polygon Count: 66 Million
RAM: 32 MB
Xbox
CPU: 733 MHz
Video: 300 MHz
Polygon Count: 125 Million
RAM: 64 MB
Listed from weakest to most powerful. When presented with the facts, it's clear which machine is superior and which machine is using latent technology. The only quirk point is the poly count on GC, but it's still deserving of second fiddle due to the dominance over PS2 in the other categories.
That has nothing to do with how the power is used. Currently the Xbox has the most power, but the least utility. Granted DOA Beach Volleyball is impressive graphically, but nobody has really pushed the box to it's limits in a game. When that happens, the PS2 and GC will look like N64 in comparison.
I submitted for a patent in 97. A simple extrapolation of LowJack service for cars.
Instead of calling the cops and having them use GPS trace to find your cars, they would use it to find your kids.
I didn't want to go the route of implants, so I devisded a number of ways to hide a sattelite chip on the child's garments so it could travel with them, but not stand out.
Further I tied it to a companion response to the parents pager/mobile device that would alert them if the child exceeded a specific radius (well within the ability of a GPS system to find) so parents could find their kids if they were wandering, or get a quick alert if they were assisted in their wanderings.
As a parent, I wanted this device.
Patent office told me it was too common of a concept.
So did the multiple VC people I pitched it to.
Yet message boards are more unique than a use of GPS technology? Not that my idea was incredibly innovative (I liked it and still want the service if anyone out there cares to take the idea and run with it), but message boards are not that innovative either.
That is my entire point though. Something like this should not require a patent. Patenting message boards on the internet is akin to patenting walking as a method of travel for humans. It's an intrinsic function at this point.
Just because something can be patented does not mean it should.
It's a very sad statement on human nature and greed when something like this has to be done to protect companies from patent disuptes. Further, at some point the future, this patent could be abused.
The thefts of Hotmail addresses accounts for a lot of their issue...
My yahoo gets spam. Things like offers to help Nigerians with banking problems. Despite me not having a history of being interested in such affairs.
Ah well. Perhaps I can get a huge government grant to research the issue and prove that spam is actually a terrorist plot...
I don't think either company sells it's addresses. The backlash from exposure would be a bad thing. Plus MS makes plenty of profit. They don't need to sell email addresses to stay afloat.
I wouldn't put it past a middle manager who is desperate to find something positive to put on their annual review ("Anally manipulated all Hotmail account holders for a few cheap bucks! I make profit, promote me! Please!"), but as a deliberate plan for profit? Nah.
Better to loose money on the bandwith and use that as a writeoff against the profits made elsewhere.
If Microsoft is smart enough to realize that a little action and expense on their part will save them long term expense, I still applaud them for two reasons:
1. They are working to reduce the spam. 2. Saving money is a good thing in my neighborhood.
I'm also a Yahoo Mail user. I have been since 2000.
Last fall I decided that I either had to subscribe to a third free mail service (I hid the address I pay for, thank you very much) or try to work with the filtering tools. Both accounts were flooding with spam to the point of tediousness.
First Step: I spent a week unsubscribing out of every spam that came into my inbox at both accounts.
Expected Result: I expected the spam to increase. I was proving that not only was the address valid, but it was read.
Actual Result: Spam did decrease. Some of the spammers actually are good for their word. Others are not.
Second Step: Identify who is spamming me despite my requests. Block them, and filter them with the tools at both websites.
Expected Result: I expected to be able to stop some of the spam, but not much. They are crafty bastards after all.
Actual Result: A good portion of them dropped off.
Short Term Prognosis: After two weeks of work (Step One and Two) the volume of spam at both accounts fell about 66%. Roughly. Unscientifically. Hotmail went from 100 daily spams to 30. Yahoo went from 30 to 10. Give or take.
Mid Term Results: After a month of time passing, I encountered a spike in spam. On both accounts. My addresses had been sold.
Mid Term Actions: I repeated steps One and Two. After a short bit of work, both accounts settled back down.
Long Term Results: It's been about 6 months. I still get spam, at a much reduced rate. I dedicate one day out of every month to opt out of spam mails in my inbox. I dedicate another day to working my filters and blocks (when I say "day" I mean about an hour of work on a single day).
I get less spam. It's not all gone, but I get less. Both Hotmail and Yahoo send me "user updates". About once monthly. Sometimes I read them. Sometimes I delete them. I am not overly concerned about it. One letter per month is not something to quit a free service over. Unless I want to grandstand with my important indignation.
The point of all of this, and how it relates to the actual discussion:
If you aren't paying for the service, you get what you pay for. I don't pay for either, and it costs me about 4 hours each month to keep each one useful. Fair trade.
If Microsoft is going to endeavor to get rid of unwanted spam from outsiders. I applaud them. It might not impress the anti-MS crowd, but I'm ok with that. I don't pay for the service, and they are trying to do something to make it better. In a fashion that costs them money. With a method that no other free email service is attempting.
I'm sure it will somehow go all wrong and I will be forced to wear my MSYou! Implant Chip05 at the end of it all, but that's the price of working with the Evil Empire. So long as I get less spam with my Soilent Green, I can live with it.
I think that the "rah rah" club for Linux needs to get over their "underdog" status.
Linux might not be Windows (concerning market saturation), but it's not a joke, or a temporary thing. Yeah, I'm jaded and cynical for not being excited when I hear that the Girl Scouts used Linux to host their cookie sales website, but let's get real... Linux is more than good enough for use in business production and nobody should be surprised when anyone in the mainstream figures this out.
You want me to get excited about someone using Linux? Get Asia Carrera to host her website with Linux...
Otherwise let's get over the "Gee willikers Mr. Peabody, someone else is a nerd too!" response and get to the "It's about damn time these idiots saw a good thing for what it is!" response.
(Sorry if I sound offensive nathana, it's cool and all, but sheesh)
Yeah, lose. Sorry. My wife is an English professor no less. I'm too busy making children to ask her to read over my/. posts though, so you'll have to forgive my poor typing.
RE: the other AC
Insightful? Got no clue. I paid the people with mod points to bump me. Somehow I'm going to acheive perfect karma and then take Bill Gates on kung-fu style...
Actually, my friend, I read your reply, and every reply to and from you in the thread before making my post.
Quite simply, you are wrong. MMORPG's easily sell 50K boxes, on the average. Widescale MMORPG's. If you want to include little games like 'The Realm' or 'Seducity' (check that one out, you'll die laughing) you can fault my numbers, but they are not the same product, with the same scale of intended audience.
I spent the time to bring up some data and show it; you didn't. Boiling it down to a 'do too' vs. 'do not' arguement might make it easy for you to say 'call me in a year and let's compare' but it does not refute anything.
Ultima Online, EverQuest, Asheron's Call, World War II Online, Anarchy Online, Dark Ages of Camelot, Neocron, Earth and Beyond, Asheron's Call II, The Sims Online... these games are the market I refer too. They each sold over 50k. Easily.
I'll check the statistics for Motor City Online. It's the only widescale MMORPG failure I know of that has gone to market to date that hasn't really moved boxes. I don't know how many it has moved yet either way... but it failed to make a market. So far the averages are with me. Perhaps you'd care to find a few more widescale games that released and sold under 50k? I'll do a bit more digging to see if I can refute myself, but I've done the work before and came out a winner.
I'll see you in a year, no problem at all... no anger either.
Let's hope FOX is the winner. Yeah I might loose CNN or something, but if SBC gets my DirectTV I'll order Porn for the weekend and end up with soccer or something.:(
Hate to break it to you, but 250,000 * $50 = $12.5 million
I see that you are on a similar level of ability in mathematics as my son. Congratulations!
Now then, let's look again and factor in some more of the realities of the market (I had assumed, initially, that your opinion was more than a kneejerk, and that you might actually know a bit about the industry. My bad).
There's less than 30 games that have ever sold a million copies. You'd recognize every single name (and a substantial amount of the list is from our friends at Blizzard:) ) A game that sells a half million is a huge hit. In fact, a game that sells lifetime 250,000 is doing really, really well. The vast majority of games released do not break 50,000 units, and the vast majority of games released do not make back the money it cost to make them. To my knowledge, only two MMOs have ever sold over 300,000.
Here's the direct link to the article I pulled that paragraph from. While Raph is not the all knowing vizier of all gaming information, this data can be referenced elsewhere, with some work. Enjoy it (the work) if you want to cast doubt upon Raph.
So the average gaming title barely hits the 50K mark. Sure, blockbusters exceed this, and sometimes wildly so; but if we are going to cite blockbusters I'll gladly base all my fancy math on EverQuest and we can both pretend that it's tangible.
Being that it's not. Your average PC game sells 50K units at $50US. That's $2,500,000. Period. MMORPG's hit the 50K mark easy. Hell, the average title (including the stinkers to balance out EQ) float between 50K and 100K active subscribers (those who stay after the free month) so the average MMORPG tends to sell more copies than the average single player game. For the sake of sanity, we will stick with the 50K figure and assume that both segments of the market sell at the same generic volume. It's false, but I'm actually giving a little boost to the non-MMORPG titles (by holding the MMORPG stats down) so it's fair enough in that my side is weakened by this.
Box sales of a PC title: 50K*$50=$2,500,000.
Box sales of MMORPG title: 50K*$50=$2,500,000.
Interesting, when you sell the same volume at the same price you get the same profit. Oh wait! MMORPG's have a monthly fee that I didn't factor in. Oops!
50K*$10=$500,000. Monthly.
The average active player keeps an account open for about a year. Average. Meaning that some people have played UO for 5 years, and some people have never paid for a single month after the free trial. The average active subscriber puts up with at least a year of fees.
$500,000*12=$6,000,000.
6,000,000+2,500,000=$8,500,000.
Exceeding the profts of any three PC titles on the average.
Admittedly, putting out a PC title is a one shot affair. You pitch it to the wind, and forget it. Maybe someone in the company patches one or two items, but it's low cost for maintenance. MMORPG's are high cost. Hosting, and all kinds of fun (read what Raph has to say...). So the profits are slimmer, for now.
Further, every successful MMORPG (success being defined by still operating more than one year after release) has designed (or announced plans for) 'expansions' for their game. EQ is quite notorious for this. This generates another 'box sale' for instant profits, and gives the players new content to explore, increasing the time that the average user plays the game, by months. Increasing overall long term profits.
With time, the business model for MMORPG's will generate more profit. Not less. More and more people are trying the genre and finding it worth the fees. I played Asheron's Call for 2 years. I paid $240 for that pleasure. In that time I bought one PC title, the Sims, for my wife. Normally I'd buy a title every other month. 12 Titles. At $50 each. Do the math. I saved cash didn't I? What a rip off.
In short: There is proft to be found in the MMORPG market, and it's not going away. Wish all you want. Or insist that reality as you perceive it, is the only possible way things could be. If you do that, I strongly suggest that you avoid gaming stores. You are going to see more and more online/pay games and less of your better stand alone games. Enjoy the 80's my friend. Communists ignore profits, Capitalists exploit them.
Oh! Be sure to cite flaws in my spelling and grammar. That's a sure way to discredit good information.
ivan256 was cleared by the Communist Party and allowed to write:
All I have to say is I hope this pay-to-play trend ends quickly
Heh, Communists... they never can grasp that capitalism always wins can they?;)
This is not a 'trend'. It's a proven market that brings in good money. Have some games flopped? You bet, but even moderately successful games bring in money (at $10/month with 50K subscribers you are bringing in half a million per month) when most games only sell for a few short months and don't move 100K units.
For all the added startup costs and time (not much more than a normal game - everything is getting expensive these days) - an online game offers the relative profit of a hot seller over the course of about 10 months. If the MMOG goes hog wild with 100K subscribers (Aheron's Call, Dark Ages of Camelot, Anarchy Online - I think, and now TSO) you start to beat the standalone game. If it becomes a market force (Ultima - 200K accounts, EQ 400K+ accounts) you can whip arse on a handful of such titles.
There is some big profit to be made in this market. Solid profit. You are going to see "multiplayer with pay" games slowly take over the shelves at the stores. Money breeds imitation.
The West Coast activist group, Californians Remove Air's Sensless Simplifications, has begun to lobby the Californian senate to pass a resolution banning the public use of the word 'air', supporting the use of 'atmosphere' as a better term.
"We feel that people don't take the levity of the atmosphere serious enough." said Nancy Pender, President of CRASS, "They are always saying things like "The sky is falling." and yet they still pollute the atmosphere. We seek to force them to use a larger word, so they have to think harder before they pollute."
*****
This is stupid. 'Scientist' is now going to have to be filed next to 'Sanitation Engineer' as another politically correct job description? Phoey! I think it's a conspiracy. Those eggheads never stop to pull their lame brains out of books and computers! Someone must have formed a PAC around them while the geek squad was not looking. I suspect the Barvarians...
Oh man oh man oh man!
on
Got Sleep?
·
· Score: 2, Funny
I cant wait for them to figure this out and make a commercial version for the public......my EQ character would ROCK if I could play for a week without sleep!;)
I've worked way too much retail/serivce as a youth, so I've got a line on this one.
If the service/product you have been given is not up to par, or you have been cheated (our movie example is a great one), your first stop is the manager. If they are a good manager who is worth their pay they will take care of you, knowing that you are their paycheck.
If they are an idiot who is in retail/service management because they hung out too long and got promoted without merit you have to work a little. When they rebuff you, restate your position, and the importance of the issue to you as a continuing customer. If they still do not treat you properly, don't get mad and yell and scream. That makes you look like an irrational idiot. You want to make the manager look like an irrational idiot...
Go home. Look up another store in the chain/franchise. Call that store and ask for the manager. When you get the manager on the phone, tell them that you have a customer service issue where you were treated poorly and would like their help. Immediately let them know that it was not at their store but at a different location. This will take that manager off the defensive.
Then explain the situation, why you feel you were treated wrong, and how the manager responded when you went to them for help. Be sure to use that managers name. When you are finished telling them your story (and be brief, they have their own store to run) ask them if you can have a corporate customer serice number, and the store number for the other store if they can find it.
Usually the other manager will be more than happy to help you because you are not causing them a problem, or their store. They will tell you that you were treated wrong, how sorry they are, and then give you someone to call for further help. Heck, some of them will do it just to see their competetion for District Manager take a few knocks.
Now that you have the number to the real person you need, be sure to thank the manager who did help you, and tell them that all of your transactions with "STORE X" will be at their location from here out. They like that because it sounds like money in the bank. Then ask for their name/store # so you can tell the higher up's how well that manager did to help you despite not being a part of the problem.
Now, call the higher ups. Explain your situation. Be sure to tell them the name of the manager who screwed you, and the manager who helped you. Know what city each store/location is in. The store #'s if possible. Stay calm. From this point your case will be handled or escalated to someone who can handle it.
If you are feeling punitive, request that the store be audited. Most chains have 'secret shoppers' who go in and inspect things without identifying themselves. This can cause lots of troubles. Also give your area 'Weights & Measures' office a call. Tell them that the product they sold was not marked correctly (this was a BIG fine when I worked in California).
At the end of the day, if you can get someone at the corporate level, you will be taken care of, possibly given something extra for your inconvenience, and the manager in quesiton who did you wrong will have a note in their file that says "asshead to customer on xx/yy/20zz" which hurts their long time promotion status (don't feel guilty, jerks should not get promoted in a customer serivce industry).
Of course, if it's a mom & pop shop and not a chain/franchise, you are pretty much at their mercy. Slash their tires!
if I'm just crazy for thinking that this would be the wise thing to do at the expense of my children's computing experience
I would not worry about that at all. Children do not have some intrinsic right to a 'computer experience'. While it is beneficial for them to grow up comfortable in front of a computer. It's less important for them to be able to get 'Putt Putt Goes to the Moon' running because they put the disk in the tray.
I'm in a similar position. When my son was 3 I started letting him use the computer (mainly because he exhibited the ability to mimic what he saw me doing). While I did pick up a few children's titles that were games and 'educational software' (YMMV) I also put an shortcut to a chess game on his desktop. He played chess as often as the 'child' titles without me prompting either way.
In other words, your kids will live without their windows based software if you can't get it to run on Linux.
I'm about to set up my first Linux based machine. I have many of the same motivations to do so, plus I just want to play with it. If things go well, my existing Windows based PC will likely be my last. Even though that means that I have to give up some of the games near and dear to my heart. It'll be worth it in the long run, I hope.
Those Euro's sure are crafty.
on
Micro Tetris
·
· Score: 3, Funny
They take a powerful instrument and make a game out of it. Next week we will discover that someone did a porno stick figure with the same technology after hours.
It's almost a natural progression. Develop technology. Make game. Make porn.
Factor in the European influence and you have a bonafide gurantee of porn right?
You ever try to play some of these games on an emulator? That Klondike bar is a missing part of the experience. Plus my hands have gotten a lot bigger in the last 20 years. It'll be fine, until it wears out.
Our security team is really going to be confused by the hits Avon is getting from our general IS department... funny thing is that it's not porn, but the result is the same:
A bunch of guys sitting in front of computers with a dazed but happy look on their faces.
Someone link the Activision one. I must have Pitfall!
I live in Chicagoland, but grew up in SW Michigan.
Driving home to visit the family involves 4 hours of highway torture. If I could just head down LakeShore Drive, cut across the beach, and boat my way across at least I wouldn't waste my time on the Dan Ryan developing road rage. I don't know if I'd save time, but the stress reduction would be awesome.
Well, either that or working mass transit that is affordable, clean, and speedy. Likely that we won't see either in our lifetimes eh?
P.S. I traded my SUV for a van. Surburban police don't understand that it's an ORV either. I got too many tickets/warnings for driving in the ditch to get around traffic. I tried to explain how I was helping the gridlock by getting out of the lane and making room for others, but nobody bought it...:(
Slashdot Mirror
Here is where I pulled the data. You may search to cross verify it. I'm only going to pull the basics, the link has a great chart with complete breakdowns on PS2, GC, Xbox, and DC. Worth a look if you really want to know. You should probably ignore it if you want to continue to personally think that the big three don't have indisputable power differences..
PlayStation 2
CPU: 295 MHz
Video: 150 MHz
Polygon Count: 66 Million
RAM: 32 MB
GameCube
CPU: 485 MHz
Video: 202.5 MHz
Polygon Count: 6 - 12 Million
RAM: 43 MB
Xbox
CPU: 733 MHz
Video: 300 MHz
Polygon Count: 125 Million
RAM: 64 MB
Listed from weakest to most powerful. When presented with the facts, it's clear which machine is superior and which machine is using latent technology. The only quirk point is the poly count on GC, but it's still deserving of second fiddle due to the dominance over PS2 in the other categories.
That has nothing to do with how the power is used. Currently the Xbox has the most power, but the least utility. Granted DOA Beach Volleyball is impressive graphically, but nobody has really pushed the box to it's limits in a game. When that happens, the PS2 and GC will look like N64 in comparison.
Winner! :)
I submitted for a patent in 97. A simple extrapolation of LowJack service for cars.
Instead of calling the cops and having them use GPS trace to find your cars, they would use it to find your kids.
I didn't want to go the route of implants, so I devisded a number of ways to hide a sattelite chip on the child's garments so it could travel with them, but not stand out.
Further I tied it to a companion response to the parents pager/mobile device that would alert them if the child exceeded a specific radius (well within the ability of a GPS system to find) so parents could find their kids if they were wandering, or get a quick alert if they were assisted in their wanderings.
As a parent, I wanted this device.
Patent office told me it was too common of a concept.
So did the multiple VC people I pitched it to.
Yet message boards are more unique than a use of GPS technology? Not that my idea was incredibly innovative (I liked it and still want the service if anyone out there cares to take the idea and run with it), but message boards are not that innovative either.
So why did they get the patent?
That is my entire point though. Something like this should not require a patent. Patenting message boards on the internet is akin to patenting walking as a method of travel for humans. It's an intrinsic function at this point.
Just because something can be patented does not mean it should.
It's a very sad statement on human nature and greed when something like this has to be done to protect companies from patent disuptes. Further, at some point the future, this patent could be abused.
That business and government do not require Common Sense. Just greed and low standards.
I'm going to patent Common Sense, but I probably won't get too much $$ out of it. Seems that there really isn't much need for it in recent times.
If they cut my Asian porn off I'll kill them! ;)
The thefts of Hotmail addresses accounts for a lot of their issue...
My yahoo gets spam. Things like offers to help Nigerians with banking problems. Despite me not having a history of being interested in such affairs.
Ah well. Perhaps I can get a huge government grant to research the issue and prove that spam is actually a terrorist plot...
I don't think either company sells it's addresses. The backlash from exposure would be a bad thing. Plus MS makes plenty of profit. They don't need to sell email addresses to stay afloat.
I wouldn't put it past a middle manager who is desperate to find something positive to put on their annual review ("Anally manipulated all Hotmail account holders for a few cheap bucks! I make profit, promote me! Please!"), but as a deliberate plan for profit? Nah.
Better to loose money on the bandwith and use that as a writeoff against the profits made elsewhere.
Points granted.
If Microsoft is smart enough to realize that a little action and expense on their part will save them long term expense, I still applaud them for two reasons:
1. They are working to reduce the spam.
2. Saving money is a good thing in my neighborhood.
I am a Hotmail user. I have been since 1997.
I'm also a Yahoo Mail user. I have been since 2000.
Last fall I decided that I either had to subscribe to a third free mail service (I hid the address I pay for, thank you very much) or try to work with the filtering tools. Both accounts were flooding with spam to the point of tediousness.
First Step: I spent a week unsubscribing out of every spam that came into my inbox at both accounts.
Expected Result: I expected the spam to increase. I was proving that not only was the address valid, but it was read.
Actual Result: Spam did decrease. Some of the spammers actually are good for their word. Others are not.
Second Step: Identify who is spamming me despite my requests. Block them, and filter them with the tools at both websites.
Expected Result: I expected to be able to stop some of the spam, but not much. They are crafty bastards after all.
Actual Result: A good portion of them dropped off.
Short Term Prognosis: After two weeks of work (Step One and Two) the volume of spam at both accounts fell about 66%. Roughly. Unscientifically. Hotmail went from 100 daily spams to 30. Yahoo went from 30 to 10. Give or take.
Mid Term Results: After a month of time passing, I encountered a spike in spam. On both accounts. My addresses had been sold.
Mid Term Actions: I repeated steps One and Two. After a short bit of work, both accounts settled back down.
Long Term Results: It's been about 6 months. I still get spam, at a much reduced rate. I dedicate one day out of every month to opt out of spam mails in my inbox. I dedicate another day to working my filters and blocks (when I say "day" I mean about an hour of work on a single day).
I get less spam. It's not all gone, but I get less. Both Hotmail and Yahoo send me "user updates". About once monthly. Sometimes I read them. Sometimes I delete them. I am not overly concerned about it. One letter per month is not something to quit a free service over. Unless I want to grandstand with my important indignation.
The point of all of this, and how it relates to the actual discussion:
If you aren't paying for the service, you get what you pay for. I don't pay for either, and it costs me about 4 hours each month to keep each one useful. Fair trade.
If Microsoft is going to endeavor to get rid of unwanted spam from outsiders. I applaud them. It might not impress the anti-MS crowd, but I'm ok with that. I don't pay for the service, and they are trying to do something to make it better. In a fashion that costs them money. With a method that no other free email service is attempting.
I'm sure it will somehow go all wrong and I will be forced to wear my MSYou! Implant Chip05 at the end of it all, but that's the price of working with the Evil Empire. So long as I get less spam with my Soilent Green, I can live with it.
You got me. Thanks for the clairification on Tk.
:\)
Thanks.
Did this change how they taste?
;)
If it's "Just like turkey!" or "bison!" I'm going to have to file a complaint with Darwin.
Don't mess with "Just like chicken!"
I work on a Help Desk, that's my excuse...
Don't get me wrong... but "incredible!"?
I think that the "rah rah" club for Linux needs to get over their "underdog" status.
Linux might not be Windows (concerning market saturation), but it's not a joke, or a temporary thing. Yeah, I'm jaded and cynical for not being excited when I hear that the Girl Scouts used Linux to host their cookie sales website, but let's get real... Linux is more than good enough for use in business production and nobody should be surprised when anyone in the mainstream figures this out.
You want me to get excited about someone using Linux? Get Asia Carrera to host her website with Linux...
Otherwise let's get over the "Gee willikers Mr. Peabody, someone else is a nerd too!" response and get to the "It's about damn time these idiots saw a good thing for what it is!" response.
(Sorry if I sound offensive nathana, it's cool and all, but sheesh)
Yeah, lose. Sorry. My wife is an English professor no less. I'm too busy making children to ask her to read over my /. posts though, so you'll have to forgive my poor typing.
RE: the other AC
Insightful? Got no clue. I paid the people with mod points to bump me. Somehow I'm going to acheive perfect karma and then take Bill Gates on kung-fu style...
Actually, my friend, I read your reply, and every reply to and from you in the thread before making my post.
Quite simply, you are wrong. MMORPG's easily sell 50K boxes, on the average. Widescale MMORPG's. If you want to include little games like 'The Realm' or 'Seducity' (check that one out, you'll die laughing) you can fault my numbers, but they are not the same product, with the same scale of intended audience.
I spent the time to bring up some data and show it; you didn't. Boiling it down to a 'do too' vs. 'do not' arguement might make it easy for you to say 'call me in a year and let's compare' but it does not refute anything.
Ultima Online, EverQuest, Asheron's Call, World War II Online, Anarchy Online, Dark Ages of Camelot, Neocron, Earth and Beyond, Asheron's Call II, The Sims Online... these games are the market I refer too. They each sold over 50k. Easily.
I'll check the statistics for Motor City Online. It's the only widescale MMORPG failure I know of that has gone to market to date that hasn't really moved boxes. I don't know how many it has moved yet either way... but it failed to make a market. So far the averages are with me. Perhaps you'd care to find a few more widescale games that released and sold under 50k? I'll do a bit more digging to see if I can refute myself, but I've done the work before and came out a winner.
I'll see you in a year, no problem at all... no anger either.
SBC = horrible. Horrible.
:(
Let's hope FOX is the winner. Yeah I might loose CNN or something, but if SBC gets my DirectTV I'll order Porn for the weekend and end up with soccer or something.
I see that you are on a similar level of ability in mathematics as my son. Congratulations!
Now then, let's look again and factor in some more of the realities of the market (I had assumed, initially, that your opinion was more than a kneejerk, and that you might actually know a bit about the industry. My bad).
Let's look at some simple facts, I will direct you to Raph, since he works in the industry for some simple statistics.
Here's the direct link to the article I pulled that paragraph from. While Raph is not the all knowing vizier of all gaming information, this data can be referenced elsewhere, with some work. Enjoy it (the work) if you want to cast doubt upon Raph.
So the average gaming title barely hits the 50K mark. Sure, blockbusters exceed this, and sometimes wildly so; but if we are going to cite blockbusters I'll gladly base all my fancy math on EverQuest and we can both pretend that it's tangible.
Being that it's not. Your average PC game sells 50K units at $50US. That's $2,500,000. Period. MMORPG's hit the 50K mark easy. Hell, the average title (including the stinkers to balance out EQ) float between 50K and 100K active subscribers (those who stay after the free month) so the average MMORPG tends to sell more copies than the average single player game. For the sake of sanity, we will stick with the 50K figure and assume that both segments of the market sell at the same generic volume. It's false, but I'm actually giving a little boost to the non-MMORPG titles (by holding the MMORPG stats down) so it's fair enough in that my side is weakened by this.
Box sales of a PC title: 50K*$50=$2,500,000.
Box sales of MMORPG title: 50K*$50=$2,500,000.
Interesting, when you sell the same volume at the same price you get the same profit. Oh wait! MMORPG's have a monthly fee that I didn't factor in. Oops!
50K*$10=$500,000. Monthly.
The average active player keeps an account open for about a year. Average. Meaning that some people have played UO for 5 years, and some people have never paid for a single month after the free trial. The average active subscriber puts up with at least a year of fees.
$500,000*12=$6,000,000.
6,000,000+2,500,000=$8,500,000.
Exceeding the profts of any three PC titles on the average.
Admittedly, putting out a PC title is a one shot affair. You pitch it to the wind, and forget it. Maybe someone in the company patches one or two items, but it's low cost for maintenance. MMORPG's are high cost. Hosting, and all kinds of fun (read what Raph has to say...). So the profits are slimmer, for now.
Further, every successful MMORPG (success being defined by still operating more than one year after release) has designed (or announced plans for) 'expansions' for their game. EQ is quite notorious for this. This generates another 'box sale' for instant profits, and gives the players new content to explore, increasing the time that the average user plays the game, by months. Increasing overall long term profits.
With time, the business model for MMORPG's will generate more profit. Not less. More and more people are trying the genre and finding it worth the fees. I played Asheron's Call for 2 years. I paid $240 for that pleasure. In that time I bought one PC title, the Sims, for my wife. Normally I'd buy a title every other month. 12 Titles. At $50 each. Do the math. I saved cash didn't I? What a rip off.
In short: There is proft to be found in the MMORPG market, and it's not going away. Wish all you want. Or insist that reality as you perceive it, is the only possible way things could be. If you do that, I strongly suggest that you avoid gaming stores. You are going to see more and more online/pay games and less of your better stand alone games. Enjoy the 80's my friend. Communists ignore profits, Capitalists exploit them.
Oh! Be sure to cite flaws in my spelling and grammar. That's a sure way to discredit good information.
This is not a 'trend'. It's a proven market that brings in good money. Have some games flopped? You bet, but even moderately successful games bring in money (at $10/month with 50K subscribers you are bringing in half a million per month) when most games only sell for a few short months and don't move 100K units.
For all the added startup costs and time (not much more than a normal game - everything is getting expensive these days) - an online game offers the relative profit of a hot seller over the course of about 10 months. If the MMOG goes hog wild with 100K subscribers (Aheron's Call, Dark Ages of Camelot, Anarchy Online - I think, and now TSO) you start to beat the standalone game. If it becomes a market force (Ultima - 200K accounts, EQ 400K+ accounts) you can whip arse on a handful of such titles.
There is some big profit to be made in this market. Solid profit. You are going to see "multiplayer with pay" games slowly take over the shelves at the stores. Money breeds imitation.
Anyone who expects the military to produce a device that is 100% safe for humans, or safe from unintended results is fooling themselves.
The West Coast activist group, Californians Remove Air's Sensless Simplifications, has begun to lobby the Californian senate to pass a resolution banning the public use of the word 'air', supporting the use of 'atmosphere' as a better term.
"We feel that people don't take the levity of the atmosphere serious enough." said Nancy Pender, President of CRASS, "They are always saying things like "The sky is falling." and yet they still pollute the atmosphere. We seek to force them to use a larger word, so they have to think harder before they pollute."
*****
This is stupid. 'Scientist' is now going to have to be filed next to 'Sanitation Engineer' as another politically correct job description? Phoey! I think it's a conspiracy. Those eggheads never stop to pull their lame brains out of books and computers! Someone must have formed a PAC around them while the geek squad was not looking. I suspect the Barvarians...
I cant wait for them to figure this out and make a commercial version for the public... ...my EQ character would ROCK if I could play for a week without sleep! ;)
I've worked way too much retail/serivce as a youth, so I've got a line on this one.
If the service/product you have been given is not up to par, or you have been cheated (our movie example is a great one), your first stop is the manager. If they are a good manager who is worth their pay they will take care of you, knowing that you are their paycheck.
If they are an idiot who is in retail/service management because they hung out too long and got promoted without merit you have to work a little. When they rebuff you, restate your position, and the importance of the issue to you as a continuing customer. If they still do not treat you properly, don't get mad and yell and scream. That makes you look like an irrational idiot. You want to make the manager look like an irrational idiot...
Go home. Look up another store in the chain/franchise. Call that store and ask for the manager. When you get the manager on the phone, tell them that you have a customer service issue where you were treated poorly and would like their help. Immediately let them know that it was not at their store but at a different location. This will take that manager off the defensive.
Then explain the situation, why you feel you were treated wrong, and how the manager responded when you went to them for help. Be sure to use that managers name. When you are finished telling them your story (and be brief, they have their own store to run) ask them if you can have a corporate customer serice number, and the store number for the other store if they can find it.
Usually the other manager will be more than happy to help you because you are not causing them a problem, or their store. They will tell you that you were treated wrong, how sorry they are, and then give you someone to call for further help. Heck, some of them will do it just to see their competetion for District Manager take a few knocks.
Now that you have the number to the real person you need, be sure to thank the manager who did help you, and tell them that all of your transactions with "STORE X" will be at their location from here out. They like that because it sounds like money in the bank. Then ask for their name/store # so you can tell the higher up's how well that manager did to help you despite not being a part of the problem.
Now, call the higher ups. Explain your situation. Be sure to tell them the name of the manager who screwed you, and the manager who helped you. Know what city each store/location is in. The store #'s if possible. Stay calm. From this point your case will be handled or escalated to someone who can handle it.
If you are feeling punitive, request that the store be audited. Most chains have 'secret shoppers' who go in and inspect things without identifying themselves. This can cause lots of troubles. Also give your area 'Weights & Measures' office a call. Tell them that the product they sold was not marked correctly (this was a BIG fine when I worked in California).
At the end of the day, if you can get someone at the corporate level, you will be taken care of, possibly given something extra for your inconvenience, and the manager in quesiton who did you wrong will have a note in their file that says "asshead to customer on xx/yy/20zz" which hurts their long time promotion status (don't feel guilty, jerks should not get promoted in a customer serivce industry).
Of course, if it's a mom & pop shop and not a chain/franchise, you are pretty much at their mercy. Slash their tires!
I'm in a similar position. When my son was 3 I started letting him use the computer (mainly because he exhibited the ability to mimic what he saw me doing). While I did pick up a few children's titles that were games and 'educational software' (YMMV) I also put an shortcut to a chess game on his desktop. He played chess as often as the 'child' titles without me prompting either way.
In other words, your kids will live without their windows based software if you can't get it to run on Linux.
I'm about to set up my first Linux based machine. I have many of the same motivations to do so, plus I just want to play with it. If things go well, my existing Windows based PC will likely be my last. Even though that means that I have to give up some of the games near and dear to my heart. It'll be worth it in the long run, I hope.
They take a powerful instrument and make a game out of it. Next week we will discover that someone did a porno stick figure with the same technology after hours.
It's almost a natural progression. Develop technology. Make game. Make porn.
Factor in the European influence and you have a bonafide gurantee of porn right?
...and acted upon the wisdom they have but usually ignore.
You will always have nay-sayers. Anything you do to answer their fears will immediately be taken out of context and ran with.
Better that they just shut their mouths and laugh at the conspiracy freaks.
You ever try to play some of these games on an emulator? That Klondike bar is a missing part of the experience. Plus my hands have gotten a lot bigger in the last 20 years. It'll be fine, until it wears out.
Our security team is really going to be confused by the hits Avon is getting from our general IS department... funny thing is that it's not porn, but the result is the same:
A bunch of guys sitting in front of computers with a dazed but happy look on their faces.
Someone link the Activision one. I must have Pitfall!
If it would work, I'd buy it.
:(
I live in Chicagoland, but grew up in SW Michigan.
Driving home to visit the family involves 4 hours of highway torture. If I could just head down LakeShore Drive, cut across the beach, and boat my way across at least I wouldn't waste my time on the Dan Ryan developing road rage. I don't know if I'd save time, but the stress reduction would be awesome.
Well, either that or working mass transit that is affordable, clean, and speedy. Likely that we won't see either in our lifetimes eh?
P.S. I traded my SUV for a van. Surburban police don't understand that it's an ORV either. I got too many tickets/warnings for driving in the ditch to get around traffic. I tried to explain how I was helping the gridlock by getting out of the lane and making room for others, but nobody bought it...