I would say there are many languages that are taking developers away from Java not just C#. An example of this is how all the students at the local Universities are petitioning to have Java removed as the core programming language as they are complaining that is just not applicable enough compared to other languages such as C#.
I still see more Java Development jobs than any others here in the Northeast/tri-state area in the USA.
I don't see why any school would want to drop Java as a core programming language, it's one of the most used languages out there, and it's abstraction and large API makes it possible to do pretty cool things easly. I couldn't see a first year comp sci student writing an internet chat room in C++, where as it's easy in Java.
The current combat system is turn-based but the space expansion is supposed to be FPS-style combat, which will appeal to many.
No it wont, they are dropping the ball on this one too. I thought that the space expansion would steal away many FPS players when it was first announced. Then they mentioned that space combat will only be "consent" drivent PvP. In another words, it's a FPS where you can't kill someone without their permission. What FPS player is going to want to deal with this:
Hand Solo: Hahah your ship sucks! {WEED}CSMastah: i pwn u!
{WEED}CSMastah is requesting a duel
Hand Solo denies duel
Hand Solo: bwhaha luser
that should hold the mainstream FPS players attention for all of two days.
I will leave alone the idea of someone named "JavaLord" commenting on programming in the game industry.
And what exactly is wrong with the name "JavaLord"? Do you have some kind of preconsieved notion that Java can't be used to make games? If you do, it's sad you are basing assumptions on what Java was in 1997-1998.
You are touching on an important point, but are missing the core: The pay is crap.Game programmers work startup-type crunches (sometimes for years) without the same dream of a payout as a reward.
I wouldn't say the pay is "crap", game programmers make good money, especially when compaired to business application developers. I would say the pay is crap when it comes to pay vs work accompished and skill.
Working in the industry is supposed to be it's own reward, but that doesn't do it after you get a good idea of just how fucked up the biz is.
Agreed, I think people have this grand idea of game programming and how cool it will be until they end up writing some small piece of code in a game that no one will ever see or care about.
And so the best programmers are payed crap,
I don't think all the best programmers are paid crap, certanly the ones who are "name" programmers aren't paid crap, although most of them own their own companies.
despite being in a very competitive field with not nearly enough qualified people, because there is always some young fool behind you who is willing to pick up your rifle when you fall...
I'll agree with you there, I think game devolpers who work death schedules are underpaid, and that there aren't enough people qualified in the field.
1)there weren't so many hard core game idiots (with dreams of turning out more crap) dying to get into the industry in much the same fashion as the girls from oklahoma getting off the bus in hollywood.
It's kind of silly to think you are going to turn out "more crap" as a programmer nowadays odds are you won't be on the design team also unless you work in a small company. I don't think it's bad that "hardcore" gamers want in, I think it's bad when hardcore gamers want in that have no idea how to program. I learned how to program on the Apple IIC by taking apart other programs and learning from them. Was I able to program myself? Yes. Where my programs utter shit? Yes. There really is something to be said for learning to do things the right way.
2)game programming wasn't regarded as the most manly of the programming fields (along with kernel programming among slashdot losers) - then those macho retards would go somewhere else.
Geez, today is borderline troll day.:) Game programming is highly regarded, but in reality it depends on what you are working on. Sure if you are doing AI for some complex game, or writing a 3d engine it's hard. If you are making 'breakout' for a mobile phone, it's really not. You are right though, there is a notion that game programmers are 'the brightest' programmers.
Then you plan for that and include it in the schedule. If it "always happens", then you'd better always include it in the schedule. There is no excuse for doing otherwise -- forty years of software engineering history gives us a pretty strong indication that the belief "maybe everything will go perfectly this time" is a horrible fallacy.
Think you could call my boss and have a talk with him?:) Maybe you could get him to schedule in some slashdot time also.
The game industry is finally coming to terms that the long work hours caused by inadequate planning and management is driving away many talented workers and programmers.
If you are a member of IGDA I'm sure you know that there is no lack of programmers that want to work in the game industry. The problem is the game industry has no method to bring in programmers who have experence programming, but not programming games. Basically you need a CS Degree, plus a hell of a working demo to get hired somewhere and the jobs are very limited. Once you are hired, and you are good enough then you can hang around, but most people in the gaming industry are very good programmers and at some point after working 80 hours a week they are going to say "I don't need this shit". Lack of programmers who want in isn't the problem, lack of an ability to keep them in might be.
Maybe if the gaming industry brought on more low level programmers at the start of a project, they would have enough people so insane crunch time wouldn't be as insane. Of course then they would have to pay their salaries, which gets in the way of Profit!
Anyone who has ever worked as a programmer can tell you that as a deadline creeps up they usually end up working more hours. Spec's change, deadlines get moved up and back, other developers quit, etc. In the video game market, where you MUST hit certain deadlines such as christmas, or before a certain quater to make your company look good for stockholders this is always going to exist. Unless you give yourself an extra 6 months to a year of slack time, you are always going to have suicide hours near deadlines because shit always happens.
You mean personal computing stalled 20 years ago. Except for the web, you will not find one idea in computers today that didn't exist 20 years ago.
PDA's? MP3 players? I know portable/wearable computing was talked about back then but I don't recall seeing anything implemented. It's hard to look back at it in this way since personal computing looks forward so far. It's like if we had flying cars 10 years from now and then 15 years from now someone said "You know, there are really no new innovative ideas in the automobile industry, sure we've got flying cars, but we've been talking about that for 50 years"
NeXT was about as far as personal computing ever
I never had the chance to use a NeXT Machine, but I do use their programming tools. (WebObjects). I wouldn't call it innovative, or even desirable.
Unix still reigns supreme in OSes after over 30 years.
Uhh no, Unix might reign supreme in servers, but windows reigns supreme as far as OS usage goes. I will grant you that unix is more stable (in my experence) but windows is clearly the OS that more people are familiar with/has the market.
GUIs still use a 25-year-old MVC model. Object oriented programing is approximately 25 years old, yet it's still considered by "professionals" as an "immature" technology.
That is because it's only been used in practice (ie business apps) for maybe the last 15 years, if not less (it's more like the last 8-10 years).
I think saying that PCs have stalled is putting it lightly. They're not even out of the starting gate yet.
I agree that PC's have a long way to go as far as usability, and creation tools (ie programming languages), but I don't think it has stalled. Ideas take time. Take OOP for example. Sure it's been around forever, but how long has it been the business standard/mainstream? It takes a long time in personal computing for an idea to turn into something that is practical and used by the masses.
You're confusing the ability to create with the ability to innovate. And quantity (of PC's) does not say anything about the quality of work being accomplished.
I'd venture that in almost every industry, the PC has helped them work in a more efficant manner, and produced better quality work. Just a simple tool like a spell checker and a word processor can turn a person with questionable spelling skills and bad handwriting into an capable assistant.
I'll grant you that not everyone is innovating that is using a PC, but not everyone is innovating that is using a pen and paper either.
And you're using your PC for commnication? Of what?
Of everything, I get my news when I want it, the way I want it on the PC. I can talk to my friends, or I can talk to peers in my field that are continents away that I would never have met otherwise. I can find out interesting things about a hobby I might have or might want to purse. Sure, I could have gone to the library in the past, but all of this is at your fingertips nowadays. I learn about things that I wouldn't have had the time or desire to pursue before.
Are you using your PC to innovate or create anything new or are you just iterating things you normally do, only faster?
It depends what you mean by create. It's an akward question for me to answer, because as a programmer I like to think I create things. For joe public, maybe it is mostly iteration, but I think they use the internet for learning as well and perhaps to create webpages.
I'd argue that usability has not progressed very far. Usability of the internet in particular. HTML was a nice start but we haven't seen much progress since then.
Look at any website designed in 1994 compaired to 2004. I would say the web may not be more usable, but webpage design has definatly advanced. Also, if you want to look at the use of the internet you should take into account the number of pages available. I would say there is much more information available on the net than there was in 1994 (although much of it is utter shit), and we have made strides as far as making high bandwith connections available to people. In 1994, I was dialing up at 2400 baud, I had one or two "real life" friends online and I never bought anything online. Now in 2004 I have a cable connection, I do almost all of my shopping for gifts online, and everyone I know at least has an email account. Even a guy I know from high school who is on welfare has a hotmail account and checks his mail from the library.
Think of how fast PC's went from text to GUI. The internet is still struggling to get there.
It seemed dreadfully slow to be honest. While Gui's had been around for a long time, the first mainstream OS that was GUI only was Windows 95. Really, I could make an arguement that there wasn't a stable GUI OS until Windows 2000. I'm not sure what the progression was on the mac side of the ball, although I've used OS 9 in the past and it seemed about as stable as windows 3.1. I recall my cousin who had an apple 2 GS when I was younger (the lucky bastard, I had a IIC) had some kind of windowing system on it, but it was more like a toy than any kind of functional OS.
I think things are progressing, I never expected computing to changed the world, make everyone scientists, cause a revolution, or bring about peace on earth. I do expect it to improve the quality of life for it's users, and I would say over the past 10 years it has delivered for the everyday man/woman.
The personal computing revolution has stalled with the advent of the WWW. Excluding the MS virus, personal computing was making a lot of progress up until the mid 90's. Since then we've failed to truly exploit the power of both a computing platform and a means of communication.
I have to disagree. The real leap from 1995 until now has been usability and people getting connected the the internet. The number of PC's that are "out there" have increased dramatically. I'm 1995 I could talk to a few of my nerdier friends online. Now I can talk to just about everyone. Communication VIA computers has really taken off in the past 10 years. PC's over the past 15 years have come to the point where a person with minimal knowledge can use them for online communication.
I would also say we should look at the business world, where there is a PC on every desktop. It wasn't like that in the 70's or 80's. Sure, maybe the PC isn't being used for some great learning experence for the world, but it is being used so people can do their jobs better including doctors and scientists. How much do you think PC's helped with mapping the genome? It probably worked out a lot more nicely than trying to get some timesharing system on a mainframe.
The chances that in the last week or year or month you've used the computer to simulate some interesting idea is zero--but that's what it's for.
Dude, I use it every night to simulate a girlfriend, and that is pretty damn interesting.
Kay should take a break from all of this research BS and check out some of the great porn on the internet. He wouldn't be so down on the state of the industry then.
The article raises a few interesting questions, such as 'how much longer until an explicitly 'gay' game comes out?',
How about when a game comes out that has a story where the character is gay, and the characters sexuality adds something to the storyline? I'm sure it won't end up being like that, some game developer will do it just to be 'edgy' and it probably will have no bearing on the game whatsoever.
but oddly focuses on male homosexual relationships,
Of course, because they are more shocking/disturb more people.
claiming them to be a way to entice female players;
Not....likely. It's more likely that you can entice male players with female homosexuals.
and mentions that while the main purveyors of homosexual content in games are Japanese companies like Squaresoft and NEC
Of course, because their culture is more open (or depraved, depending on your point of view) when it comes to sex.
and Will Wright's The Sims not balking at same-sex couples adopting a child character."
Why not, it's only someone else they can market the Sims to. Personally I hope when the first "gay" character comes out of the closet it actually has something to do with the storyline of the game, rather than it be just window dressing.
This article is way behind the times. I play CS and all I ever here are people telling each other how gay they are. Maybe that is what all those terrorists and CT's are fighting over. It's all pent up homoerotic sexual frustration.
Most "evil rich western" countries are rich precisely because they DONT HAVE BOOMING POPULATIONS.
While America, Japan and most of "white" europe have declining populations and are under reproduction rates this isn't what makes them rich. The US was a rich country long before it was under the reproductive replacement rate. What causes the lack of booming populations in western civilizations is Women in the workforce, abortion and birth control. These things may be liberating for women, but they are slowly killing western society.
Most of the "developed world" suffers from lower fertility and an aging population that barely replaces itself.
All of the "white" nations aren't replacing themselves. Really, the only places with high birthrates are China, some parts of India, Africa, and Islamic countries.
it's because there is an inverse relationship between standard of living and the size of a family
This is part of the reason, but I think it has more to do with the "liberation" of women and the promotion of birth control.
*sigh*
Who the wants to pay to go to NYC, and get harassed by facist policemen searching for bin Laden in every subway car ?
I work in NYC, and I ride 3 different subways to get to and from work. I have never been harassed or seen anyone harassed on the subway. If anything the security on the subway systems in NYC is lax. I'm fairly dark skinned, with a buzz cut in my 20's, etc. If you think the police in NYC are 'facist' you are living in a fantasy world. They are way to busy fighting REAL crime in NYC to harass innocent people. It isn't like a small country town where roscoe has nothing to do so he's going to bust your balls/boobs.
If I were holding a conference like this, I'd find some depressed mid-western or just rural city that is cheap as shit and as easy as possible to get to.
Oh yeah, because cheap mid-western cities are easy to get to. Did you ever think large events are held in major cities because most people live near them? Why make EVERYONE travel? If you live near any state bordering NYC, NYC is very accessable and cheap to get to.
Finally, you have to be close to a Motel 6 and within driving distance of cheap-ass RV parks.
We can call it WHAT, "Whitetrash Hackers Avoiding Terrorists" that will rock.
With that setup, you could run a slightly longer conference and do some more interesting things. Like a "best mod to bzFlag written in 48 hours" contest. Or whatever.
Yeah, and when 1000 people want to take a break to go eat, and the local dennies has only 2 waitresses staffed and isn't equipped for that sort of thing you can watch everyone be pissed off. Or how about the nightlife in those midwestern towns? I'm sure going to club cattle must be a lot more interesting than the variety of clubs in NYC.
I think we've proven to the publishers that games on demand (don't) cannibalize anything," says Exent's Tzruya. "We approach a different set of gamers who don't go into the stores that sell games. More than 50% of the games on demand customers are women, and we have quite a few who are 25-plus years old. We are approaching different decision makers and different budgets.
Oh no, here come the bunk statistics about women and video games again. Just because 50% of your on demand downloads come from women, doesn't mean that women don't want to "Go into stores that sell games". Gamestop isn't a porn store or anything. The more logical conclusion I can draw from more women buying games on demand is that the genre of the games available to download are more to their liking. I think an over 25 women is more likely to play snood or a tetris variation for $10 than to go to a video game store and drop $40 on farcry.
After all this -- how can CS still be the most popular online FPS?
I'm a casual cs player, I usually play CS while I'm waiting for other games to come out. For example, when I was waiting for UT2K3 I played CS, and when I was disappointed with that I went back to CS and have been playing ever since. I expect I'll stop playing CS when doom 3, or the new CS comes out. The fact that it is popular is one of the reasons I play, you can always find a game with new people, and many of my friends play. Rock solid, fun gameplay is another reason. CS isn't at all scrub friendly, and the stealth factor makes it a lot of fun.
So -- I repeat the original question -- is CS still THAT popular? What keeps it going?
The same thing that kept street fighter popular all those years even though the gameplay barely changed until the end...It's a good game, with solid gameplay and people will latch on to a good game when it comes along.
Are the 5:00 minute team-based rounds w/ a post-mortem waiting period still the keys to the game?
If I can point to one thing I hate about CS, it's waiting after I die for the round to end!
As great as BF1942
I thought this game was fun, but a bit quirky. It held my attention for about 2 weeks.
UT2K4,
I was really into the original UT, I played in the OGL ladders (for first place!:)), was in a clan, etc, etc. But I hate UT2k3 and 2k4. The characters are too small, the weapons suck and it's even more scrub friendly that the original UT.
and other MP FPS games have been, how has CS remained on top? Particularly with the major issue of cheating (if it's still a major issue) hovering over the game like a black cloud?
Good gameplay can overcome everything.
One last thought -- if CS IS still as popular as it has been in the past, do other gaming companies shudder in fear at the thought of a REVISED, REVAMPED CS game coming out with HL2? Is there concern that semi-full BF1942 or UT2K4 servers will start losing players in droves as everyone flocks to CS to see what's new?
Maybe, but I think it's more likely that they screw the pooch and the original CS remains half alive, and half the original CS people move to CS source. Sequels after smash hit games usually don't live up to their hype.
I think BF1942 and UT2K4 are doomed (har har) if Doom 3 and HL2 manage to come out around the same time at the end of this summer/early fall.
with them came the cheaters. After years of ignoring it valve decided to implement cheat detection, but it was too little too late.
Actually, just now is Valve starting to really get their act together with cheating. Steam allows for auto updates, so a bot can be rendered useless quickly. More importantly they have started pursing legal action against popular counter strike "hacking" sites such as befeared.com and cs-hacked.com. While hosing a CS cheat website might be "cool" to some people, it's not cool enough to go to jail over, or have to pay fines and/or lawyers
Trying to secure the half life engine is a losing battle, but valve is really trying to fight that battle now. Half-Life has got to be at least 6 years old. I'm sure when these newer CS games such as CS Source and CS 2 come out it probably won't be the aimbotters paradise that CS is. There will probably be aimbots, there are for all the FPS games, but it won't be as widespread.
I am a Democrat, and I enjoy violent video games as much as the next guy. In fact, if I had been asked to guess, I would have guessed the Republicans were against it.
Republicans who haven't been hijacked by the religious right wouldn't care what video games you play either. Real republicans are for less government involvments, it's too bad there haven't been any real republicans in my lifetime.:)
I'm sure congressmen and senators on both sides of the political platform are against violence in videogames. Why? It's a sexy issue to draw women voters to them. "Look we are protecting the CHILDREN!". They should focus their attention on eliminating violence/bullying in schools if they really want to protect children. Do they really think that colombine was cause by doom, or because two kids were teased until they couldn't take it anymore?
But a few days of playing Ghost Recon or America's Army might make you more knowledgeable than the average reporter (or even lawmaker), as the writer argues that 'the spread of military knowledge via wargaming might lead to political changes in the way war is perceived by Americans'."
A few points about this.
1. Games can also spread military disinformation. For example an AK in CS might have bad recoil, but the recoil isn't as bad as an AK in real life. I actually asked a friend in the military about this and he said the only real way to fire an AK accurately is to lay down with it. A far cry (no pun intended) from CS where an AK fires accurately for the first 1 to 2 shots no matter what. Of course, this doesn't make for good CS gameplay so realism is thrown away in the name of gameplay. Which is the way it should be, with the exception of America's Army, video games are ment to be fun first, realistic simulators second (or third, or not all).
2. I think if anything games might desensitize people to war, or make war seem more glamourous. Sure you might play a war game where you storm a hut in Iraq full of insurgance but do you see the innocent people in the background who are hurt or killed? Maybe you work as a sniper, medic, or soldier in the game, but do you ever spend time rebuilding the enemies schools or water supplies? Do you ever face situations like the US soldiers do where most of the time you aren't shooting anything, but anyone can be a terrorist and if shoot the wrong person you don't just 'lose a frag', you might end up in a military court?
War simulators IMO do not simulate the wars of today. They may be accurate portrayals of WWI and WWII where all the soldiers had to do was find and kill the bad guys which was anyone that was part of the "bad" country you are at war with. Wars nowadays almost always involve "nation building" which doesn't translate into fun video games.
War games are just another genre of games. They are fun, but I wouldn't expect them to 'educate' the American public about war any more than I would expect the American public to become better drivers from playing Mario Kart or learn martial arts from playing Mortal Kombat.
Can any Tekken fans enlighten me on what exactly the draw is with this game?
Being a tekken fan, and having played in (and won) quite a few tournaments for tekken 2 and 3 I can tell you the draw
for most of the tournament going players is that gameplay basically stays the same with minor enhancments, all of the old characters get new moves, along with new characters being added for each sequel, and tekken gameplay is pretty solid. "Scrubbing it" with eddie gordo won't cut it at high level play.
I've played and enjoyed the game in the past, but I'm at a loss as to why there are so many sequels.
Tekken 1 was ok, Tekken 2 was a big improvement, and tekken 3 was a large improvement in depth over 2. Tekken tag is seen by some as an improvment over 3, but Many players hated Tekken 4 because they made large changes in the combo system. Tekken 5 will play more like the older tekken games.
In general, Tekken Sequels are a lot like the old Street Fighter Sequels where they add some characters and features but gameplay stays the same. It's not like Mortal Kombat where they change the way the game plays with each sequel (not a good idea),
What would you consider the major selling point of the franchise?
For me it was always competitve, deep gameplay and a nice juggle combo system. There are always graphical upgrades, but I don't really care about that.
Does this mean we'll ever see the game outside of Japan
No, they announced a US release earlier. I would expect a US Arcade release within 3-4 months of the Japanese arcade release, possibly sooner.
The US still has a bit of a tekken scene, at least here in the NY/NJ area. Tekken 4 really blew chunks though, hopefully tekken 5 will set everything right.
Vader's targeting computer swings around into position. Vader
takes careful aim on Luke's X-wing fighter.
VADER: I have you now.
He pushes the fire buttons.
EXTERIOR: SURFACE OF THE DEATH STAR.
The three TIE fighters move in on Luke. As Vader's center
fighter unleashes a volley of laserfire, one of the TIE ships
at his side is hit and explodes into flame. The two remaining
ships continue to move in.
INTERIOR: LUKE'S X-WING FIGHTER -- COCKPIT.
Luke looks about, wondering whose laserfire destroyed Vader's
wingman.
INTERIOR: DARTH VADER'S COCKPIT.
Vader is taken by surprise, and looks out from his cockpit.
VADER: What?
INTERIOR: DARTH VADER'S WINGMAN -- COCKPIT.
Vader's wingman searches around him trying to locate the
unknown attacker.
INTERIOR: MILLENNIUM FALCON -- COCKPIT.
Han and Chewbacca grin from ear to ear.
HAN: (yelling) Yahoo!
EXTERIOR: SPACE AROUND THE DEATH STAR.
The Millennium Falcon heads right at the two TIE fighters.
It's a collision course. Then out of no where comes 'bluntbacca' in his weedwing fighter. He shoots down the millenium falcon, bumps luke out of the way and blows up the Death Starr
BluntBacca: W00t pwage!!!!!!!!!!!! eye can't wait 2 show thiz to mah clanniez
All of the MMO's lately have the same story.....
'we're cancelled before launch!'
I hope one of them can break the mold sometime soon. I enjoy MMO's launchs, it's kinda like watching a car wreck.
Slashdot Mirror
I would say there are many languages that are taking developers away from Java not just C#. An example of this is how all the students at the local Universities are petitioning to have Java removed as the core programming language as they are complaining that is just not applicable enough compared to other languages such as C#.
I still see more Java Development jobs than any others here in the Northeast/tri-state area in the USA.
I don't see why any school would want to drop Java as a core programming language, it's one of the most used languages out there, and it's abstraction and large API makes it possible to do pretty cool things easly. I couldn't see a first year comp sci student writing an internet chat room in C++, where as it's easy in Java.
The current combat system is turn-based but the space expansion is supposed to be FPS-style combat, which will appeal to many.
No it wont, they are dropping the ball on this one too. I thought that the space expansion would steal away many FPS players when it was first announced. Then they mentioned that space combat will only be "consent" drivent PvP. In another words, it's a FPS where you can't kill someone without their permission. What FPS player is going to want to deal with this:
Hand Solo: Hahah your ship sucks!
{WEED}CSMastah: i pwn u!
{WEED}CSMastah is requesting a duel
Hand Solo denies duel
Hand Solo: bwhaha luser
that should hold the mainstream FPS players attention for all of two days.
I will leave alone the idea of someone named "JavaLord" commenting on programming in the game industry.
:) Game programming is highly regarded, but in reality it depends on what you are working on. Sure if you are doing AI for some complex game, or writing a 3d engine it's hard. If you are making 'breakout' for a mobile phone, it's really not. You are right though, there is a notion that game programmers are 'the brightest' programmers.
And what exactly is wrong with the name "JavaLord"? Do you have some kind of preconsieved notion that Java can't be used to make games? If you do, it's sad you are basing assumptions on what Java was in 1997-1998.
You are touching on an important point, but are missing the core: The pay is crap.Game programmers work startup-type crunches (sometimes for years) without the same dream of a payout as a reward.
I wouldn't say the pay is "crap", game programmers make good money, especially when compaired to business application developers. I would say the pay is crap when it comes to pay vs work accompished and skill.
Working in the industry is supposed to be it's own reward, but that doesn't do it after you get a good idea of just how fucked up the biz is.
Agreed, I think people have this grand idea of game programming and how cool it will be until they end up writing some small piece of code in a game that no one will ever see or care about.
And so the best programmers are payed crap,
I don't think all the best programmers are paid crap, certanly the ones who are "name" programmers aren't paid crap, although most of them own their own companies.
despite being in a very competitive field with not nearly enough qualified people, because there is always some young fool behind you who is willing to pick up your rifle when you fall...
I'll agree with you there, I think game devolpers who work death schedules are underpaid, and that there aren't enough people qualified in the field.
1)there weren't so many hard core game idiots (with dreams of turning out more crap) dying to get into the industry in much the same fashion as the girls from oklahoma getting off the bus in hollywood.
It's kind of silly to think you are going to turn out "more crap" as a programmer nowadays odds are you won't be on the design team also unless you work in a small company. I don't think it's bad that "hardcore" gamers want in, I think it's bad when hardcore gamers want in that have no idea how to program. I learned how to program on the Apple IIC by taking apart other programs and learning from them. Was I able to program myself? Yes. Where my programs utter shit? Yes. There really is something to be said for learning to do things the right way.
2)game programming wasn't regarded as the most manly of the programming fields (along with kernel programming among slashdot losers) - then those macho retards would go somewhere else.
Geez, today is borderline troll day.
Then you plan for that and include it in the schedule. If it "always happens", then you'd better always include it in the schedule. There is no excuse for doing otherwise -- forty years of software engineering history gives us a pretty strong indication that the belief "maybe everything will go perfectly this time" is a horrible fallacy.
:) Maybe you could get him to schedule in some slashdot time also.
Think you could call my boss and have a talk with him?
The game industry is finally coming to terms that the long work hours caused by inadequate planning and management is driving away many talented workers and programmers.
If you are a member of IGDA I'm sure you know that there is no lack of programmers that want to work in the game industry. The problem is the game industry has no method to bring in programmers who have experence programming, but not programming games. Basically you need a CS Degree, plus a hell of a working demo to get hired somewhere and the jobs are very limited. Once you are hired, and you are good enough then you can hang around, but most people in the gaming industry are very good programmers and at some point after working 80 hours a week they are going to say "I don't need this shit". Lack of programmers who want in isn't the problem, lack of an ability to keep them in might be.
Maybe if the gaming industry brought on more low level programmers at the start of a project, they would have enough people so insane crunch time wouldn't be as insane. Of course then they would have to pay their salaries, which gets in the way of Profit!
Anyone who has ever worked as a programmer can tell you that as a deadline creeps up they usually end up working more hours. Spec's change, deadlines get moved up and back, other developers quit, etc. In the video game market, where you MUST hit certain deadlines such as christmas, or before a certain quater to make your company look good for stockholders this is always going to exist. Unless you give yourself an extra 6 months to a year of slack time, you are always going to have suicide hours near deadlines because shit always happens.
You mean personal computing stalled 20 years ago. Except for the web, you will not find one idea in computers today that didn't exist 20 years ago.
PDA's? MP3 players? I know portable/wearable computing was talked about back then but I don't recall seeing anything implemented. It's hard to look back at it in this way since personal computing looks forward so far. It's like if we had flying cars 10 years from now and then 15 years from now someone said "You know, there are really no new innovative ideas in the automobile industry, sure we've got flying cars, but we've been talking about that for 50 years"
NeXT was about as far as personal computing ever
I never had the chance to use a NeXT Machine, but I do use their programming tools. (WebObjects). I wouldn't call it innovative, or even desirable.
Unix still reigns supreme in OSes after over 30 years.
Uhh no, Unix might reign supreme in servers, but windows reigns supreme as far as OS usage goes. I will grant you that unix is more stable (in my experence) but windows is clearly the OS that more people are familiar with/has the market.
GUIs still use a 25-year-old MVC model. Object oriented programing is approximately 25 years old, yet it's still considered by "professionals" as an "immature" technology.
That is because it's only been used in practice (ie business apps) for maybe the last 15 years, if not less (it's more like the last 8-10 years).
I think saying that PCs have stalled is putting it lightly. They're not even out of the starting gate yet.
I agree that PC's have a long way to go as far as usability, and creation tools (ie programming languages), but I don't think it has stalled. Ideas take time. Take OOP for example. Sure it's been around forever, but how long has it been the business standard/mainstream? It takes a long time in personal computing for an idea to turn into something that is practical and used by the masses.
You're confusing the ability to create with the ability to innovate. And quantity (of PC's) does not say anything about the quality of work being accomplished.
I'd venture that in almost every industry, the PC has helped them work in a more efficant manner, and produced better quality work. Just a simple tool like a spell checker and a word processor can turn a person with questionable spelling skills and bad handwriting into an capable assistant.
I'll grant you that not everyone is innovating that is using a PC, but not everyone is innovating that is using a pen and paper either.
And you're using your PC for commnication? Of what?
Of everything, I get my news when I want it, the way I want it on the PC. I can talk to my friends, or I can talk to peers in my field that are continents away that I would never have met otherwise. I can find out interesting things about a hobby I might have or might want to purse. Sure, I could have gone to the library in the past, but all of this is at your fingertips nowadays. I learn about things that I wouldn't have had the time or desire to pursue before.
Are you using your PC to innovate or create anything new or are you just iterating things you normally do, only faster?
It depends what you mean by create. It's an akward question for me to answer, because as a programmer I like to think I create things. For joe public, maybe it is mostly iteration, but I think they use the internet for learning as well and perhaps to create webpages.
I'd argue that usability has not progressed very far. Usability of the internet in particular. HTML was a nice start but we haven't seen much progress since then.
Look at any website designed in 1994 compaired to 2004. I would say the web may not be more usable, but webpage design has definatly advanced. Also, if you want to look at the use of the internet you should take into account the number of pages available. I would say there is much more information available on the net than there was in 1994 (although much of it is utter shit), and we have made strides as far as making high bandwith connections available to people. In 1994, I was dialing up at 2400 baud, I had one or two "real life" friends online and I never bought anything online. Now in 2004 I have a cable connection, I do almost all of my shopping for gifts online, and everyone I know at least has an email account. Even a guy I know from high school who is on welfare has a hotmail account and checks his mail from the library.
Think of how fast PC's went from text to GUI. The internet is still struggling to get there.
It seemed dreadfully slow to be honest. While Gui's had been around for a long time, the first mainstream OS that was GUI only was Windows 95. Really, I could make an arguement that there wasn't a stable GUI OS until Windows 2000. I'm not sure what the progression was on the mac side of the ball, although I've used OS 9 in the past and it seemed about as stable as windows 3.1. I recall my cousin who had an apple 2 GS when I was younger (the lucky bastard, I had a IIC) had some kind of windowing system on it, but it was more like a toy than any kind of functional OS.
I think things are progressing, I never expected computing to changed the world, make everyone scientists, cause a revolution, or bring about peace on earth. I do expect it to improve the quality of life for it's users, and I would say over the past 10 years it has delivered for the everyday man/woman.
The personal computing revolution has stalled with the advent of the WWW. Excluding the MS virus, personal computing was making a lot of progress up until the mid 90's. Since then we've failed to truly exploit the power of both a computing platform and a means of communication.
I have to disagree. The real leap from 1995 until now has been usability and people getting connected the the internet. The number of PC's that are "out there" have increased dramatically. I'm 1995 I could talk to a few of my nerdier friends online. Now I can talk to just about everyone. Communication VIA computers has really taken off in the past 10 years. PC's over the past 15 years have come to the point where a person with minimal knowledge can use them for online communication.
I would also say we should look at the business world, where there is a PC on every desktop. It wasn't like that in the 70's or 80's. Sure, maybe the PC isn't being used for some great learning experence for the world, but it is being used so people can do their jobs better including doctors and scientists. How much do you think PC's helped with mapping the genome? It probably worked out a lot more nicely than trying to get some timesharing system on a mainframe.
The chances that in the last week or year or month you've used the computer to simulate some interesting idea is zero--but that's what it's for.
Dude, I use it every night to simulate a girlfriend, and that is pretty damn interesting.
Kay should take a break from all of this research BS and check out some of the great porn on the internet. He wouldn't be so down on the state of the industry then.
(If you're at all interested, I saw White as being female and Black as being male.)
Then you would definatly love blacksonblondes.com Wait until you are home from work/school to check it out though.
The article raises a few interesting questions, such as 'how much longer until an explicitly 'gay' game comes out?',
How about when a game comes out that has a story where the character is gay, and the characters sexuality adds something to the storyline? I'm sure it won't end up being like that, some game developer will do it just to be 'edgy' and it probably will have no bearing on the game whatsoever.
but oddly focuses on male homosexual relationships,
Of course, because they are more shocking/disturb more people.
claiming them to be a way to entice female players;
Not....likely. It's more likely that you can entice male players with female homosexuals.
and mentions that while the main purveyors of homosexual content in games are Japanese companies like Squaresoft and NEC
Of course, because their culture is more open (or depraved, depending on your point of view) when it comes to sex.
and Will Wright's The Sims not balking at same-sex couples adopting a child character."
Why not, it's only someone else they can market the Sims to. Personally I hope when the first "gay" character comes out of the closet it actually has something to do with the storyline of the game, rather than it be just window dressing.
This article is way behind the times. I play CS and all I ever here are people telling each other how gay they are. Maybe that is what all those terrorists and CT's are fighting over. It's all pent up homoerotic sexual frustration.
Most "evil rich western" countries are rich precisely because they DONT HAVE BOOMING POPULATIONS.
While America, Japan and most of "white" europe have declining populations and are under reproduction rates this isn't what makes them rich. The US was a rich country long before it was under the reproductive replacement rate. What causes the lack of booming populations in western civilizations is Women in the workforce, abortion and birth control. These things may be liberating for women, but they are slowly killing western society.
Most of the "developed world" suffers from lower fertility and an aging population that barely replaces itself.
All of the "white" nations aren't replacing themselves. Really, the only places with high birthrates are China, some parts of India, Africa, and Islamic countries.
it's because there is an inverse relationship between standard of living and the size of a family
This is part of the reason, but I think it has more to do with the "liberation" of women and the promotion of birth control.
Go ahead, show up. What better way is there to end up on an FBI watch list?
*sigh* Who the wants to pay to go to NYC, and get harassed by facist policemen searching for bin Laden in every subway car ?
I work in NYC, and I ride 3 different subways to get to and from work. I have never been harassed or seen anyone harassed on the subway. If anything the security on the subway systems in NYC is lax. I'm fairly dark skinned, with a buzz cut in my 20's, etc. If you think the police in NYC are 'facist' you are living in a fantasy world. They are way to busy fighting REAL crime in NYC to harass innocent people. It isn't like a small country town where roscoe has nothing to do so he's going to bust your balls/boobs.
If I were holding a conference like this, I'd find some depressed mid-western or just rural city that is cheap as shit and as easy as possible to get to.
Oh yeah, because cheap mid-western cities are easy to get to. Did you ever think large events are held in major cities because most people live near them? Why make EVERYONE travel? If you live near any state bordering NYC, NYC is very accessable and cheap to get to.
Finally, you have to be close to a Motel 6 and within driving distance of cheap-ass RV parks.
We can call it WHAT, "Whitetrash Hackers Avoiding Terrorists" that will rock.
With that setup, you could run a slightly longer conference and do some more interesting things. Like a "best mod to bzFlag written in 48 hours" contest. Or whatever.
Yeah, and when 1000 people want to take a break to go eat, and the local dennies has only 2 waitresses staffed and isn't equipped for that sort of thing you can watch everyone be pissed off. Or how about the nightlife in those midwestern towns? I'm sure going to club cattle must be a lot more interesting than the variety of clubs in NYC.
I think we've proven to the publishers that games on demand (don't) cannibalize anything," says Exent's Tzruya. "We approach a different set of gamers who don't go into the stores that sell games. More than 50% of the games on demand customers are women, and we have quite a few who are 25-plus years old. We are approaching different decision makers and different budgets.
Oh no, here come the bunk statistics about women and video games again. Just because 50% of your on demand downloads come from women, doesn't mean that women don't want to "Go into stores that sell games". Gamestop isn't a porn store or anything. The more logical conclusion I can draw from more women buying games on demand is that the genre of the games available to download are more to their liking. I think an over 25 women is more likely to play snood or a tetris variation for $10 than to go to a video game store and drop $40 on farcry.
After all this -- how can CS still be the most popular online FPS?
:)), was in a clan, etc, etc. But I hate UT2k3 and 2k4. The characters are too small, the weapons suck and it's even more scrub friendly that the original UT.
I'm a casual cs player, I usually play CS while I'm waiting for other games to come out. For example, when I was waiting for UT2K3 I played CS, and when I was disappointed with that I went back to CS and have been playing ever since. I expect I'll stop playing CS when doom 3, or the new CS comes out. The fact that it is popular is one of the reasons I play, you can always find a game with new people, and many of my friends play. Rock solid, fun gameplay is another reason. CS isn't at all scrub friendly, and the stealth factor makes it a lot of fun.
So -- I repeat the original question -- is CS still THAT popular? What keeps it going?
The same thing that kept street fighter popular all those years even though the gameplay barely changed until the end...It's a good game, with solid gameplay and people will latch on to a good game when it comes along.
Are the 5:00 minute team-based rounds w/ a post-mortem waiting period still the keys to the game? If I can point to one thing I hate about CS, it's waiting after I die for the round to end!
As great as BF1942
I thought this game was fun, but a bit quirky. It held my attention for about 2 weeks.
UT2K4,
I was really into the original UT, I played in the OGL ladders (for first place!
and other MP FPS games have been, how has CS remained on top? Particularly with the major issue of cheating (if it's still a major issue) hovering over the game like a black cloud? Good gameplay can overcome everything.
One last thought -- if CS IS still as popular as it has been in the past, do other gaming companies shudder in fear at the thought of a REVISED, REVAMPED CS game coming out with HL2? Is there concern that semi-full BF1942 or UT2K4 servers will start losing players in droves as everyone flocks to CS to see what's new?
Maybe, but I think it's more likely that they screw the pooch and the original CS remains half alive, and half the original CS people move to CS source. Sequels after smash hit games usually don't live up to their hype.
I think BF1942 and UT2K4 are doomed (har har) if Doom 3 and HL2 manage to come out around the same time at the end of this summer/early fall.
with them came the cheaters. After years of ignoring it valve decided to implement cheat detection, but it was too little too late.
Actually, just now is Valve starting to really get their act together with cheating. Steam allows for auto updates, so a bot can be rendered useless quickly. More importantly they have started pursing legal action against popular counter strike "hacking" sites such as befeared.com and cs-hacked.com. While hosing a CS cheat website might be "cool" to some people, it's not cool enough to go to jail over, or have to pay fines and/or lawyers
Trying to secure the half life engine is a losing battle, but valve is really trying to fight that battle now. Half-Life has got to be at least 6 years old. I'm sure when these newer CS games such as CS Source and CS 2 come out it probably won't be the aimbotters paradise that CS is. There will probably be aimbots, there are for all the FPS games, but it won't be as widespread.
I am a Democrat, and I enjoy violent video games as much as the next guy. In fact, if I had been asked to guess, I would have guessed the Republicans were against it.
:)
Republicans who haven't been hijacked by the religious right wouldn't care what video games you play either. Real republicans are for less government involvments, it's too bad there haven't been any real republicans in my lifetime.
I'm sure congressmen and senators on both sides of the political platform are against violence in videogames. Why? It's a sexy issue to draw women voters to them. "Look we are protecting the CHILDREN!". They should focus their attention on eliminating violence/bullying in schools if they really want to protect children. Do they really think that colombine was cause by doom, or because two kids were teased until they couldn't take it anymore?
But a few days of playing Ghost Recon or America's Army might make you more knowledgeable than the average reporter (or even lawmaker), as the writer argues that 'the spread of military knowledge via wargaming might lead to political changes in the way war is perceived by Americans'."
A few points about this.
1. Games can also spread military disinformation. For example an AK in CS might have bad recoil, but the recoil isn't as bad as an AK in real life. I actually asked a friend in the military about this and he said the only real way to fire an AK accurately is to lay down with it. A far cry (no pun intended) from CS where an AK fires accurately for the first 1 to 2 shots no matter what. Of course, this doesn't make for good CS gameplay so realism is thrown away in the name of gameplay. Which is the way it should be, with the exception of America's Army, video games are ment to be fun first, realistic simulators second (or third, or not all).
2. I think if anything games might desensitize people to war, or make war seem more glamourous. Sure you might play a war game where you storm a hut in Iraq full of insurgance but do you see the innocent people in the background who are hurt or killed? Maybe you work as a sniper, medic, or soldier in the game, but do you ever spend time rebuilding the enemies schools or water supplies? Do you ever face situations like the US soldiers do where most of the time you aren't shooting anything, but anyone can be a terrorist and if shoot the wrong person you don't just 'lose a frag', you might end up in a military court?
War simulators IMO do not simulate the wars of today. They may be accurate portrayals of WWI and WWII where all the soldiers had to do was find and kill the bad guys which was anyone that was part of the "bad" country you are at war with. Wars nowadays almost always involve "nation building" which doesn't translate into fun video games.
War games are just another genre of games. They are fun, but I wouldn't expect them to 'educate' the American public about war any more than I would expect the American public to become better drivers from playing Mario Kart or learn martial arts from playing Mortal Kombat.
Just a quick update: Tekken Zaibatsu has late October/early November as the scheuled US arcade release date.
Can any Tekken fans enlighten me on what exactly the draw is with this game?
Being a tekken fan, and having played in (and won) quite a few tournaments for tekken 2 and 3 I can tell you the draw for most of the tournament going players is that gameplay basically stays the same with minor enhancments, all of the old characters get new moves, along with new characters being added for each sequel, and tekken gameplay is pretty solid. "Scrubbing it" with eddie gordo won't cut it at high level play.
I've played and enjoyed the game in the past, but I'm at a loss as to why there are so many sequels.
Tekken 1 was ok, Tekken 2 was a big improvement, and tekken 3 was a large improvement in depth over 2. Tekken tag is seen by some as an improvment over 3, but Many players hated Tekken 4 because they made large changes in the combo system. Tekken 5 will play more like the older tekken games.
In general, Tekken Sequels are a lot like the old Street Fighter Sequels where they add some characters and features but gameplay stays the same. It's not like Mortal Kombat where they change the way the game plays with each sequel (not a good idea),
What would you consider the major selling point of the franchise?
For me it was always competitve, deep gameplay and a nice juggle combo system. There are always graphical upgrades, but I don't really care about that.
Does this mean we'll ever see the game outside of Japan
No, they announced a US release earlier. I would expect a US Arcade release within 3-4 months of the Japanese arcade release, possibly sooner. The US still has a bit of a tekken scene, at least here in the NY/NJ area. Tekken 4 really blew chunks though, hopefully tekken 5 will set everything right.
INTERIOR: DARTH VADER'S COCKPIT.
Vader's targeting computer swings around into position. Vader
takes careful aim on Luke's X-wing fighter.
VADER: I have you now.
He pushes the fire buttons.
EXTERIOR: SURFACE OF THE DEATH STAR.
The three TIE fighters move in on Luke. As Vader's center
fighter unleashes a volley of laserfire, one of the TIE ships
at his side is hit and explodes into flame. The two remaining
ships continue to move in.
INTERIOR: LUKE'S X-WING FIGHTER -- COCKPIT.
Luke looks about, wondering whose laserfire destroyed Vader's
wingman.
INTERIOR: DARTH VADER'S COCKPIT.
Vader is taken by surprise, and looks out from his cockpit.
VADER: What?
INTERIOR: DARTH VADER'S WINGMAN -- COCKPIT.
Vader's wingman searches around him trying to locate the
unknown attacker.
INTERIOR: MILLENNIUM FALCON -- COCKPIT.
Han and Chewbacca grin from ear to ear.
HAN: (yelling) Yahoo!
EXTERIOR: SPACE AROUND THE DEATH STAR.
The Millennium Falcon heads right at the two TIE fighters.
It's a collision course. Then out of no where comes 'bluntbacca' in his weedwing fighter. He shoots down the millenium falcon, bumps luke out of the way and blows up the Death Starr
BluntBacca: W00t pwage!!!!!!!!!!!! eye can't wait 2 show thiz to mah clanniez
All of the MMO's lately have the same story..... 'we're cancelled before launch!' I hope one of them can break the mold sometime soon. I enjoy MMO's launchs, it's kinda like watching a car wreck.