Not sure if you or the poster read the reviews or actually played the demo. Its a good idea and a great implementation of first person perspective but the game play is flat and you don't get to explore the city as promised.
I was already getting a little bit bored after the second play through of the demo. I played it though a second time 'cause I thought I may have missed something the first time through. For example my second play through of the BioShock demo took an hour as I missed the hacking and search everything side of that game the first time through. All I got on the second play through the Mirror's Edge demo was that I got it done quicker.
A real disappointment as I wanted to LOVE this game. Not worth oe50 IMHO.
I grew up with a software developing father who cannot teach, and gets irritated with someone who does not grok the concepts he is trying to communicate in 5 nanoseconds.
He was teaching me Boolean logic at the same time I was learning to add and subtract at school, taught me about how CPUs work, made me memorise the ASCII table and then how to program shortly after. He gave me Logo to play with on and Apple IIe and then later Basic.
Although I now wish that I had been given an introduction to C from a young age this could not have happened as my Dad is a business application developer so he sees all that nitty gritty as a waist of time. He has the same attitude toward computer games. I on the other had would have loved to learn some of that stuff but growing up on the southern tip of Africa didn't have access to that kind of stuff till I was as tall as I am now.
However the main thing that my Dad passed on to me that I am grateful for is a passion for using computers to solve problems in a practical way. I have found that this translates into any programming language.
So my advice would be show him what's out there and that there are no boundaries. There is nothing that is "too difficult" or for him to write. (I was well into my 20's before I realised that although I was not the best kid in the class at maths I could write OpenGL games if I put my mind to it.) It also sounds to me like you are in a good position to introduce him to the community of developers so that he can find answers to his questions and inspiration from things that you might not have an interest in.
As far as languages are concerned show him why there are different languages. If there is a problem that can be solved easily and elegantly with a high level scripting language then use than. If assembler is required to squeeze the last little bit of performance out of the CPU then he should feel confident enough to dive straight into it.
That, I feel, is probably the best you can do and your son will have to do the rest himself.
>He [David Icke]... believes that the world is controlled by a cartel of alien lizards
As loony as this sounds, especially considering recent events. Its closer to the truth than believing the world is controlled by some benign humans with the good of the world at heart.
He talks about how, since we where sitting around the fire telling stories, we've been creating external memory that can out live one person. However he misses the fact that it goes way further back than that, all the way back to single celled organisms. In fact probably all the way to when viruses were the most inelegant life in the universe
They found a way to create a communication system and memory that could out live any one cell. They created us.
The human race didn't start this project. Its the project of life. To create a system that will support life beyond the boundaries of any one living entity. Educating itself about how to live in a hostile environment and, with any luck, slipping a little bit of enjoyment in there for itself while its at it.
Taking this to its next logical step. In the same way that we do not think of ourselves as a collection of bacteria. the "nameless, single, non-physical meta-artifact we've been constructing" will not see itself as something created by, run by and constructed for the general good of humans but as something completely else.
I feel that this is where we are really heading in the long run. Its both scary, awsome and vital to the continuation of the human race. It will change us for ever.
Don't freak out though. We'll never see it in our life time although it already exists.
[rantMode=on]
i'm going to patent masturbation/ then these eejts are going to have to pay me for something that i didn't think/ that's not a new idea and everyone's doing anyway
people used to patent things like the light bulb or telephonic communication/ you know that things are getting bad then this is as good as it gets
[rantMode=off]
Why aren't NASA working on some sort of strong electromagnetic field that could surround the shuttle or other misc space vehicle and deflect, or at least slow, space debris before impact? This would probably help work as most space debris is has some iron in it.
It might also help protect the astronauts from those cosmic rays that start to cause a problem once you get out of the earths own magnetic field.
If you don't think this is a good idea please say why.
Is it just me or has anyone else thought that putting all these satelites into orbit around earth is really short sighted?
future generations are going to have a hard time doing all the launches we think they're going to do, if the have to wait for a gap in the space junk before they go. I wouldn't like to hit a little satalite at over escape velicity. Maybe he should build a space hotel instead;)
1st Iain Banks/ a good consistent universe/ i always wonder if he isn't a member of "the culture" of which he wrights/ how else could he be so authoritative and open minded;)
2nd William Gibson/ this man could make chewing gum stuck to the pavement sound cool and the universe in he first three books shown amazing fore sight
3rd Jeff Noon/ in this man's universe the line between drugs and technology are very blurred/ in fact most lines are blurred;) i get my writing style from his book "needle in the groove"/ especially good if you live in manchester/ england/ where all his books are set;)
writers like Heilein and Asimov make a good read but in a lot of cases science has moved on and makes their writing seem dated/ so what i do when i read them is emagine that the tech they use in these books is something so advanced that the science has almose come full circle/ giving everthing a retro feel/ helps me enjoy the books anyway:)
They call it: "the pagan festival of mid-winter that christain losers adopted in an attempt to get the newly converted pagans into church when they would otherwise be having an orgy of a party fuled by mistletoe wine." or bolloks
I think that most genetics is missing the point completeley. And lets hope they don't kill us all while we're at it.
Firstly modern genetics is just hacking!
I remember doing this exact kind of process on code, in my yonger years. You knock out some code and see what happens. Then knock out some more untill you get an idea of what the areas of code do. Then you try and see what you can do by substatusing areas of code.
Only problem is that genetic scientists seems to be missing the fact that DNA is just data. The actual code that processess the data lives somewhere else. Inside the living cells. While loads is known about DNA, not much is known about the systems that process it.
If you liken moding Quake3 to Genetics. Genetic science can change the maps, models and textures easy but they haven't even started playing with the server code. until they do they're just taking shots in the dark. They can make some changes but they don't really know the full effects of thier changes or why the work the way they do.
And this is why modern genetics science really scares me. They are bringing products to market and they understand very little about how the whole system works. Never mind that they seem to think that they can solve problems in a few years that the very powerful genetic algorithm couldn't solve in millions of years.
Humans are way to carried away with their own importance.
---
All the opinions in this document are my not so humble opinion. I would really like to hear that I am wrong but I want good reasons;)
Slashdot Mirror
Not sure if you or the poster read the reviews or actually played the demo. Its a good idea and a great implementation of first person perspective but the game play is flat and you don't get to explore the city as promised. I was already getting a little bit bored after the second play through of the demo. I played it though a second time 'cause I thought I may have missed something the first time through. For example my second play through of the BioShock demo took an hour as I missed the hacking and search everything side of that game the first time through. All I got on the second play through the Mirror's Edge demo was that I got it done quicker. A real disappointment as I wanted to LOVE this game. Not worth oe50 IMHO.
Hi
I grew up with a software developing father who cannot teach, and gets irritated with someone who does not grok the concepts he is trying to communicate in 5 nanoseconds.
He was teaching me Boolean logic at the same time I was learning to add and subtract at school, taught me about how CPUs work, made me memorise the ASCII table and then how to program shortly after. He gave me Logo to play with on and Apple IIe and then later Basic.
Although I now wish that I had been given an introduction to C from a young age this could not have happened as my Dad is a business application developer so he sees all that nitty gritty as a waist of time. He has the same attitude toward computer games. I on the other had would have loved to learn some of that stuff but growing up on the southern tip of Africa didn't have access to that kind of stuff till I was as tall as I am now.
However the main thing that my Dad passed on to me that I am grateful for is a passion for using computers to solve problems in a practical way. I have found that this translates into any programming language.
So my advice would be show him what's out there and that there are no boundaries. There is nothing that is "too difficult" or for him to write. (I was well into my 20's before I realised that although I was not the best kid in the class at maths I could write OpenGL games if I put my mind to it.) It also sounds to me like you are in a good position to introduce him to the community of developers so that he can find answers to his questions and inspiration from things that you might not have an interest in.
As far as languages are concerned show him why there are different languages. If there is a problem that can be solved easily and elegantly with a high level scripting language then use than. If assembler is required to squeeze the last little bit of performance out of the CPU then he should feel confident enough to dive straight into it.
That, I feel, is probably the best you can do and your son will have to do the rest himself.
As loony as this sounds, especially considering recent events. Its closer to the truth than believing the world is controlled by some benign humans with the good of the world at heart.
He talks about how, since we where sitting around the fire telling stories, we've been creating external memory that can out live one person. However he misses the fact that it goes way further back than that, all the way back to single celled organisms. In fact probably all the way to when viruses were the most inelegant life in the universe
They found a way to create a communication system and memory that could out live any one cell. They created us.
The human race didn't start this project. Its the project of life. To create a system that will support life beyond the boundaries of any one living entity. Educating itself about how to live in a hostile environment and, with any luck, slipping a little bit of enjoyment in there for itself while its at it.
Taking this to its next logical step. In the same way that we do not think of ourselves as a collection of bacteria. the "nameless, single, non-physical meta-artifact we've been constructing" will not see itself as something created by, run by and constructed for the general good of humans but as something completely else.
I feel that this is where we are really heading in the long run. Its both scary, awsome and vital to the continuation of the human race. It will change us for ever.
Don't freak out though. We'll never see it in our life time although it already exists.
Sweat dreams...
Ra-el Peters
f.[rantMode=on] i'm going to patent masturbation/ then these eejts are going to have to pay me for something that i didn't think/ that's not a new idea and everyone's doing anyway people used to patent things like the light bulb or telephonic communication/ you know that things are getting bad then this is as good as it gets [rantMode=off]
Why aren't NASA working on some sort of strong electromagnetic field that could surround the shuttle or other misc space vehicle and deflect, or at least slow, space debris before impact? This would probably help work as most space debris is has some iron in it.
It might also help protect the astronauts from those cosmic rays that start to cause a problem once you get out of the earths own magnetic field.
If you don't think this is a good idea please say why.
Is it just me or has anyone else thought that putting all these satelites into orbit around earth is really short sighted?
;)
future generations are going to have a hard time doing all the launches we think they're going to do, if the have to wait for a gap in the space junk before they go. I wouldn't like to hit a little satalite at over escape velicity. Maybe he should build a space hotel instead
1st Iain Banks/ a good consistent universe/ i always wonder if he isn't a member of "the culture" of which he wrights/ how else could he be so authoritative and open minded ;)
;) i get my writing style from his book "needle in the groove"/ especially good if you live in manchester/ england/ where all his books are set ;)
:)
2nd William Gibson/ this man could make chewing gum stuck to the pavement sound cool and the universe in he first three books shown amazing fore sight
3rd Jeff Noon/ in this man's universe the line between drugs and technology are very blurred/ in fact most lines are blurred
writers like Heilein and Asimov make a good read but in a lot of cases science has moved on and makes their writing seem dated/ so what i do when i read them is emagine that the tech they use in these books is something so advanced that the science has almose come full circle/ giving everthing a retro feel/ helps me enjoy the books anyway
They call it: "the pagan festival of mid-winter that christain losers adopted in an attempt to get the newly converted pagans into church when they would otherwise be having an orgy of a party fuled by mistletoe wine." or bolloks
No offense...
I think that most genetics is missing the point completeley. And lets hope they don't kill us all while we're at it. Firstly modern genetics is just hacking! I remember doing this exact kind of process on code, in my yonger years. You knock out some code and see what happens. Then knock out some more untill you get an idea of what the areas of code do. Then you try and see what you can do by substatusing areas of code. Only problem is that genetic scientists seems to be missing the fact that DNA is just data. The actual code that processess the data lives somewhere else. Inside the living cells. While loads is known about DNA, not much is known about the systems that process it. If you liken moding Quake3 to Genetics. Genetic science can change the maps, models and textures easy but they haven't even started playing with the server code. until they do they're just taking shots in the dark. They can make some changes but they don't really know the full effects of thier changes or why the work the way they do. And this is why modern genetics science really scares me. They are bringing products to market and they understand very little about how the whole system works. Never mind that they seem to think that they can solve problems in a few years that the very powerful genetic algorithm couldn't solve in millions of years. Humans are way to carried away with their own importance. --- All the opinions in this document are my not so humble opinion. I would really like to hear that I am wrong but I want good reasons ;)