I see your point, but that's not entirely accurate. You can render a 3D scene to a memory buffer and then do anything you want with it. It's all a matter of whether or not you can do things fast enough...
The provided definition of HDR isn't very accurate. From Game Developer magazine's August 2005 issue:
"High Dynamic Range (HDR) rendering is a technique used to retain color precision of a rendered scene as it goes through the rendering pipeline...
For applications, especially games, this means that our scenes will be rendered in a more realistic manner in terms of lighting. Using high dynamic range rendering we can add a great deal of detail to our applications by retaining as much light information as possible. This will then cause our objects and surfaces to be displayed in a way that comes closer to resembling real life than ever before.
The problem with non-HDR games is that traditionally, the color precision of a rendered scene is lost, and the rendered display is limite to a low dynamic range of color values between 0 and 255. In the past, this limitation was mainly a result of PC or console hardware only supporting integer buffers, which has a limited range of precision when compared to floating point buffers. Thus, to perform HDR rendering we will need to render our scene to an off-screen floating-point surface, so that the data can be manipulated and made ready to be displayed on the screen."
Also, it's not Valve's technology. They've implemented it in the Source engine now, but they didn't invent it and I'm pretty sure they're not the first to use it.
Of course, that also opens up scary possibilites. Hacked cartridges? Government brainwashing? Hm. It would have to be regulated very carefully... but by whom?
Yup. And has anyone else here ever played the original Halo over XBConnect (tunneling software for XBox games)? It was laggy. Very, very laggy. So very laggy.:'(
Probably, though it would depend on the game. That wasn't my point, though. My point was that the controls don't matter when everyone's using the same stuff, because outside of personal preference, it's all the same. If you suck with dual sticks, it's your fault, not the controller's.
Which is another reason I prefer consoles. When everyone's using the same hardware, I know that my performance is based on my skill rather than my CPU.
If you can honestly find me a PC (or the components thereof) that will cost me $500 including the operating system and all necessary peripherals and is capable of running Age of Empires III decently, I will be forever grateful.
I don't think being the "best FPS available for a console" would mean 5 million copies sold if all FPS suck on consoles. The shiniest piece of shit is still a piece of shit, and generally, pieces of shit don't sell.
Also, just because you don't enjoy and/or aren't good at console FPS doesn't mean they suck. I know there are around 2 million Counter-Strike players who would disagree, but I don't think too highly of their opinions. Nothing against you if you play CS, but as the Steam forums prove, there are a lot of stupid CS players. Not that there aren't a lot of stupid Halo 2 players.
That said, I don't see what the big deal is. I like FPS on both consoles and PC. I tend to prefer consoles simply because they're cheaper, but in terms of controls, using two thumbsticks instead of a mouse honestly doesn't bother me. It's less accurate, sure, but when everyone is using the same configuration it's not like you're at a disadvantage.
Actually, both publishers and developers are strongly looking at the possibilities of episodic content - you build a game engine, create a few levels, and sell it online for a relatively low price. Then, you keep releasing new content - episodes, so to speak - for low prices, and eventually you've essentially created a new game, except that it's broken up into episodes. Sort of like TV versus movies.
The Xbox 360 will have a "marketplace" which will help publishers make this a successful business model.
The reason developers and publishers are excited about episodic content is that it greatly reduces the risk in creating a game without necessarily reducing the reward. It costs millions to create a full-length current gen game, and if it doesn't sell well, the publisher is out millions of dollars. With episodic content, you're not spending as much money at once, and since it's all online less time (and therefore money) has to be spent on production of discs, boxes, etc. If something doesn't sell well, it can be dropped, whereas big hits could have more time and money put into them.
I am a bit suspicious about this, because it could result in a lot of mediocre titles (not that episodic content means that there won't be any regular full length games distributed on optical media.) However, it could also be a very good thing for gamers. Personally, I don't have much of a problem with the level of innovation in today's gaming market, but I know lots of people are always complaining about boring games that have been done over and over again and are really just slight variations on the same genre. The reason for this is that when you've got to put millions of dollars down on financing the development of a game, you don't really want to take risks. You want to go with what you know will sell well. This certainly does stifle creativity. Episodic content could help publishers move away from that mindset since it would cost a lot less to produce a single game "episode." Hence, it could lead to a lot more innovation. So there's an upside and a downside.
FPS doesn't suck on consoles. I'm sure you hate Halo 2, but there is a reason it's sold over 5 million copies. RTS... well, fair enough. If you're into RTS, you're definitely going to need a PC. However, chances are it's gonna cost you more than $500.
Darwinian evolution obviously isn't perfect. I don't doubt that someday we'll have better theories about the nature of life, although I think it's likely that they'll mostly be refined versions of Darwinian evolution. But if you're honestly suggesting that any kind of real scientific research is going to disprove Darwinism in favor of Intelligent Design, you're an idiot.
I always find it amusing when people say that blogs are inaccurate. It's true, there's plenty of inaccurate information out there on blogs and websites in general. But who in their right mind thinks that they're getting better information from magazines or newspapers? All this stuff is written by humans. Some of it is accurate, some isn't. That doesn't change with the medium. If you think that "professional" publications do more fact checking, you're wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Is this the same guy who was soliciting sex from underage or barely of age males via the internet despite the fact that politically he was extremely opposed to homosexuals? Am I thinking of the right guy, or am I mixed up here?
"Surprisingly, anti-Microsoft sentiment had less to do with the choice than one might imagine."
Who honestly thinks that "anti-Microsoft sentiment" is going to motivate people to switch to Linux? Linux has more to offer than the fact that it's not Windows (and not Mac), and that shouldn't be a key point in why people switch. Assuming otherwise is frankly a mockery of all the work that's been put into Linux....Although "it's good because it's not MS" certainly does seem to be the attitude of some zealots.
Capital punishment is still really big in China. One can be sentenced to death not only for murder, but also for crimes such as embezzling, etc.
So what happens when they catch someone who they can prove has seeded hundreds of movies or other copyrighted content? I'm certainly not an expert on Chinese law, but I can imagine it getting to the point where someone might be executed for sharing copyrighted content.
So, when someone dies as a direct result of the actions of the *AA, will people finally realize how ridiculous this shit is? Will the right wingers get off their moral high horses on this issue? Or will it just be swept under the carpet?
Am I missing the point, or does this just seem like another version of the internet, except loosely categorized and all stored on Google's servers? What are they planning to achieve with this? I realize that they're integrating a lot of existing Google functionality into it, and I guess that could be useful, but it still seems like it's just Google Internet or something.
Writing captchas is super easy in PHP. Well, depending on how complex you want the captcha to be, of course. You can make a basic one in 5 minutes, though. Those things don't really stop people, but they do make things much more difficult.
Slashdot Mirror
Most people I know who could be considered "average users" find Windows' drive lettering a whole lot easier to understand than *nix filesystems.
I see your point, but that's not entirely accurate. You can render a 3D scene to a memory buffer and then do anything you want with it. It's all a matter of whether or not you can do things fast enough...
The provided definition of HDR isn't very accurate. From Game Developer magazine's August 2005 issue:
"High Dynamic Range (HDR) rendering is a technique used to retain color precision of a rendered scene as it goes through the rendering pipeline...
For applications, especially games, this means that our scenes will be rendered in a more realistic manner in terms of lighting. Using high dynamic range rendering we can add a great deal of detail to our applications by retaining as much light information as possible. This will then cause our objects and surfaces to be displayed in a way that comes closer to resembling real life than ever before.
The problem with non-HDR games is that traditionally, the color precision of a rendered scene is lost, and the rendered display is limite to a low dynamic range of color values between 0 and 255. In the past, this limitation was mainly a result of PC or console hardware only supporting integer buffers, which has a limited range of precision when compared to floating point buffers. Thus, to perform HDR rendering we will need to render our scene to an off-screen floating-point surface, so that the data can be manipulated and made ready to be displayed on the screen."
Also, it's not Valve's technology. They've implemented it in the Source engine now, but they didn't invent it and I'm pretty sure they're not the first to use it.
It's a Hitchhiker's Guide reference, dammit! Don't mod it if you don't get the joke.
I just skimmed that article, but as far as I can tell it's basically saying "It's not perfectly accurate so it must be wrong." Uh, okay.
Good God, I could do with a cup of tea.
Of course, that also opens up scary possibilites. Hacked cartridges? Government brainwashing? Hm. It would have to be regulated very carefully... but by whom?
Yup. And has anyone else here ever played the original Halo over XBConnect (tunneling software for XBox games)? It was laggy. Very, very laggy. So very laggy. :'(
1Tb/s? Waste of money, if you ask me. 640K/s should be enough for anybody.
Probably, though it would depend on the game. That wasn't my point, though. My point was that the controls don't matter when everyone's using the same stuff, because outside of personal preference, it's all the same. If you suck with dual sticks, it's your fault, not the controller's.
Which is another reason I prefer consoles. When everyone's using the same hardware, I know that my performance is based on my skill rather than my CPU.
If you can honestly find me a PC (or the components thereof) that will cost me $500 including the operating system and all necessary peripherals and is capable of running Age of Empires III decently, I will be forever grateful.
I don't think being the "best FPS available for a console" would mean 5 million copies sold if all FPS suck on consoles. The shiniest piece of shit is still a piece of shit, and generally, pieces of shit don't sell.
Also, just because you don't enjoy and/or aren't good at console FPS doesn't mean they suck. I know there are around 2 million Counter-Strike players who would disagree, but I don't think too highly of their opinions. Nothing against you if you play CS, but as the Steam forums prove, there are a lot of stupid CS players. Not that there aren't a lot of stupid Halo 2 players.
That said, I don't see what the big deal is. I like FPS on both consoles and PC. I tend to prefer consoles simply because they're cheaper, but in terms of controls, using two thumbsticks instead of a mouse honestly doesn't bother me. It's less accurate, sure, but when everyone is using the same configuration it's not like you're at a disadvantage.
Actually, both publishers and developers are strongly looking at the possibilities of episodic content - you build a game engine, create a few levels, and sell it online for a relatively low price. Then, you keep releasing new content - episodes, so to speak - for low prices, and eventually you've essentially created a new game, except that it's broken up into episodes. Sort of like TV versus movies.
The Xbox 360 will have a "marketplace" which will help publishers make this a successful business model.
The reason developers and publishers are excited about episodic content is that it greatly reduces the risk in creating a game without necessarily reducing the reward. It costs millions to create a full-length current gen game, and if it doesn't sell well, the publisher is out millions of dollars. With episodic content, you're not spending as much money at once, and since it's all online less time (and therefore money) has to be spent on production of discs, boxes, etc. If something doesn't sell well, it can be dropped, whereas big hits could have more time and money put into them.
I am a bit suspicious about this, because it could result in a lot of mediocre titles (not that episodic content means that there won't be any regular full length games distributed on optical media.) However, it could also be a very good thing for gamers. Personally, I don't have much of a problem with the level of innovation in today's gaming market, but I know lots of people are always complaining about boring games that have been done over and over again and are really just slight variations on the same genre. The reason for this is that when you've got to put millions of dollars down on financing the development of a game, you don't really want to take risks. You want to go with what you know will sell well. This certainly does stifle creativity. Episodic content could help publishers move away from that mindset since it would cost a lot less to produce a single game "episode." Hence, it could lead to a lot more innovation. So there's an upside and a downside.
(/me waits to be modded "Offtopic.")
FPS doesn't suck on consoles. I'm sure you hate Halo 2, but there is a reason it's sold over 5 million copies. RTS... well, fair enough. If you're into RTS, you're definitely going to need a PC. However, chances are it's gonna cost you more than $500.
Darwinian evolution obviously isn't perfect. I don't doubt that someday we'll have better theories about the nature of life, although I think it's likely that they'll mostly be refined versions of Darwinian evolution. But if you're honestly suggesting that any kind of real scientific research is going to disprove Darwinism in favor of Intelligent Design, you're an idiot.
A quarter of Americans? A third of Europeans? Is anyone else feeling suicidal right now?
I always find it amusing when people say that blogs are inaccurate. It's true, there's plenty of inaccurate information out there on blogs and websites in general. But who in their right mind thinks that they're getting better information from magazines or newspapers? All this stuff is written by humans. Some of it is accurate, some isn't. That doesn't change with the medium. If you think that "professional" publications do more fact checking, you're wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Is this the same guy who was soliciting sex from underage or barely of age males via the internet despite the fact that politically he was extremely opposed to homosexuals? Am I thinking of the right guy, or am I mixed up here?
"Surprisingly, anti-Microsoft sentiment had less to do with the choice than one might imagine."
...Although "it's good because it's not MS" certainly does seem to be the attitude of some zealots.
Who honestly thinks that "anti-Microsoft sentiment" is going to motivate people to switch to Linux? Linux has more to offer than the fact that it's not Windows (and not Mac), and that shouldn't be a key point in why people switch. Assuming otherwise is frankly a mockery of all the work that's been put into Linux.
How many kids do you know who have a choice about where they go to school? What are they supposed to do, run away from home?
I don't like Catholic bullshit either, but to be fair, have you ever been to a MySpace site? *shudder*
Clearly you don't know the definition of the word "hyperbole." You obviously didn't read the whole comment, either. Good job.
Capital punishment is still really big in China. One can be sentenced to death not only for murder, but also for crimes such as embezzling, etc.
So what happens when they catch someone who they can prove has seeded hundreds of movies or other copyrighted content? I'm certainly not an expert on Chinese law, but I can imagine it getting to the point where someone might be executed for sharing copyrighted content.
So, when someone dies as a direct result of the actions of the *AA, will people finally realize how ridiculous this shit is? Will the right wingers get off their moral high horses on this issue? Or will it just be swept under the carpet?
Am I missing the point, or does this just seem like another version of the internet, except loosely categorized and all stored on Google's servers? What are they planning to achieve with this? I realize that they're integrating a lot of existing Google functionality into it, and I guess that could be useful, but it still seems like it's just Google Internet or something.
Writing captchas is super easy in PHP. Well, depending on how complex you want the captcha to be, of course. You can make a basic one in 5 minutes, though. Those things don't really stop people, but they do make things much more difficult.