The thread is dead, but I figured it would be somewhat worthwhile to defend myself to an obvious troll.
I do not live at home. I live on my own.
I have a real job. I work at an engineering firm. I'm also in a band. I also have a life outside of mocking the honesty of others.
I have not found any "worthwhile" women. Most women my age are pernicious money-grubbers or drug addicts. I live in hope, though.
I do not have a 401(k) because I didn't want to deal with the tax issues this year. I plan to invest in this fiscal year. I do, though, have a Roth, and an independent asset-allocation investment program set asside for retirement.
I do have health insurance. See above full-time job.
I do not have life insurance. I'm 27 with no family. Are you that much of a moron?
I already vote Republican (and have consistently since I was 18) because everyone else on the ticket is a moron.
You are the reason for the decline of Western civilization.
Gaming as a whole (or even in its component parts) is far more satisfying and edifying than television. Gaming is an active, social (if online) experience, whereas TV tends to be a soul-crushing passive experience.
If my mind is going to be innundated with crass pop-culture, it's better that I take an active role in the process. With gaming, you are required to make choices constantly, to keep your mind questioning the possibilities. You have your guard up, so to speak. With TV, you just sit there like a lump, feeding from the trough whatever slop gets shunted into your brain.
Thanks, dethwulf. I'm trying to do exactly that. I haven't gotten into any kind of modding as I don't really play any FPSs to speak of. I have thought about getting into map-creation in NWN, though.
Do you have any useful resources for NWN to help me get started?
What I would really love to do is build a mid-level game engine for Python using Pygame and PyOpenGL. Most of the workhorse code would be in C, but the rest would be scriptable in Python. Perhaps what I'm talking about has already been done, and I could help the developers? I know about Crystal Space, but it's more like a fully-formed 3D FPS engine with Python scripting added onto it.
Thanks. I don't completely agree on the music part, as I still respect the bands I listened to when I was young (Rush, U2, Fugazi, Primus), but you make a good point on gaming and the importance of gameplay.
I, too, get hacked off with the constant battle to keep up with the state of graphics in games. It's probably the biggest logistical reason I don't game that much anymore.
No, I'm not, and I find it a little odd that you would respond with such vehemence to my question. Perhaps this isn't a question of childishness at all.
Perhaps this is a question of what is it to see the world through a child's eyes and a man's mind. Games are not the last bastion of the lost or lonely. They are the place where the mind becomes active and seeks solutions to problems, safe from destructive consequences. Games sharpen the mind, if played with wisdom, and bring out the best in you, if played with charity.
That you attach a meaningless adjective to the word game (i.e. video) does not make it intrinsically any different.
If someone wishes to talk to me about their new house, their job, or their wedding, I'd be happy to listen to them. Those things are beautiful unto themselves, and honorable. I don't think, though, that they make very good measures of adulthood. They are simply measures of responsibility.
Being an adult does not mean that you seek out responsibility. It is being prepared, and willing, to take on responsibility when it comes. And frankly, most of the 28yr olds [sic] I know that have the things you speak of are usually in the process of getting divorced because of debt accrued from buying a house that they can't afford because they're losing their job.
I see what you're saying, and it makes good sense. I imagine I'm in much the same place as you, with some exceptions (getting laid regularly being the most heinous).
What is it with computers that lead some to suspect sociopathic tendicies of others when they use them? For some reason, TV doesn't get this kind of abuse. I suppose TV has simply become the societal norm. We are expected as a culture to link into the mothership, so to speak, whenever we get a chance, and download the current newspeak.
I haven't given up on gaming. Quite the contrary, I'm beginning to find the time to build new worlds for others to enjoy. It isn't easy; not many people would support a twenty-something gamer to create new games, unless he'd been in the business since he was 18. But, maybe I'll be able to do it in time. Otherwise, I'll just keep plugging away and keep creating as best I may until I'm dead.
Thanks. I can see where you're coming from being a QA tester. That would suck the life out of Zha-Zha Gabor, along with whatever sanity she might have had.
I've also found that RPG's and strategy games tend to be more satisfying, given that my wrists are a lot less capable of twitching than they used to be.
I found that out with the Escape Velocity series recently. I downloaded the game and, funnily enough, in about 20 mins I was hooked. It was like I was playing Trade Wars again.
I think the key here has more to do with my statement about wanting to build my own game. This is where I part from some folks that identify themselves as gamers.
As I've gotten older, I find myself wanting to build something of my own, not just enjoy the fruits of others' labors. This manifests itself in different ways for different people, I suppose. In the gaming community, some folks start by enjoying the fruits of the Carmacks and the (down boy) Romeros and eventually come to the end of it, desiring the earthier pleasures and responsibilities (career, home, family) to the exclusion of gaming. Others, like myself, begin wanting to continue the work of the founding fathers, so to speak, and build new worlds for others to play in.
This brings up an important point. Playing is necessary to living. We see this in the natural world, as well as in ours. In a time when sports stars and movie moguls are like uncrowned monarchs over our culture, it's easy to rush to asceticism and utilitarianism as a "solution" to the fragmentation of culture, but jeez does it suck. We have to play. Where do mid-life crises come from except the false dichotomy between life and play?
So, if we are to play, and play well and truly, someone's got to be there to help build the playground and keep things interesting. That's probably were I am personally. I want to use what skills and talents I have to help us get along in this world, playing as we go.
If classic rock counts as "oldies," they already are.
And yes, I have done that on many occasions. In fact, one of my favorite games of all time was bought on the $10 rack, Homeworld. I friggin love that game.
Thanks for responding to the question. Though I haven't had a chance to read everything (I definitely will), I appreciate what honesty and bluntness I've seen so far. That's why I read/.
I've just been noticing over time that I have less and less patience for all the fuss of gaming. For starters, gaming isn't really a "buy a computer and play King's Quest IV until you vomit" kind of experience anymore. Between the graphics cards, Barton chips, drivers and lag-times, gamers are required to be a little more like combatants in an arms-race than fun-seekers.
Also, there seems to be polarization in gaming genres. Most games these days are either "throw-away" games (Tetris, Solitare, etc.) or massively multiplayer black holes (you fill in the blank).
In a way, I suppose I've been missing the happy medium between the two. The older console systems seemed to capture this middle-way with some level of consistency, whereas newer systems seem to be rushing towards the great Everquest-FPS panacea, replete with alternate economies and Stephenson-esque realities.
My addled brain is getting worn out with the seemingly endless drama of code-leaks, postponements and screenshots. In a way, I could just sit back and live vicariously through Tycho and Gabriel and never even pick up a joystick.
Long story short, gaming is starting to become a full time job that I don't have time for, so, yeah, maybe it is just age. But, dangit, Doom III and Half-Life II look so good!
I'm currently an AT&T Wireless customer living in the Southeastern US. Does anyone have any opinions on where I should go from here? Stay with Cingular, go with Verizon? What?
You haven't explained anything except just how bitter life can be. His question was how the economy will survive when there is no middle class. All of the men you described in your philippic were (and continued to be) members of a growing middle class. The middle class in America is slowly dying. This death is being accelerated by unpatriotic corporations that place their own profit margins above American economic health.
That this fact has been true since the 70's does not make it right, or acceptable. Nor does it absolve us of the responsibility of getting off our apathy-encrusted asses and doing something about it.
Life sucks. So what? It is we who do nothing to help our fellow man that make it suck.
Smaller software companies will survive.
This is the only thing you said which remotely gets to the point, and as such is interesting. Please elaborate.
If someone walks into my unlocked house and walks out with my TV, no "force" was applied in that instance, either.
If you were stupid enough to get a fax machine that recieves all faxes sent to it, it's your own fault when it does precisely that. If you don't blindly accept every stupid thing that arrives, your resources will not be used.
So, when a consultant is working on a rush job at 3am in the morning at, say, some random CopyCow, he shouldn't be allowed to send a fax from that location? Obviously not, if I have call restrictions on my fax machine. That's the point of the fax machine: to allow communication to arrive at the office at any time, from anywhere.
And, no, this is not the same for all forms of advertising. It's a matter of scale. With the exploited business, there is a significant level of expense. With the exploiting business (the fax-spammer), there is next to none. To use your door-to-door analogy, what you are requiring a business to do is hire a bouncer to watch their door to keep the salesman from barging in anytime he feels, rifling through the office-supply cabinet and taking some ball-points for his trouble while crooning the glories of Viagra at the top of his lungs.
Those are _your_ expenses, not theirs.
Uh, that's the point. I'm willing to take on these expenses for those with which I do business already. If a company wishes to advertise to me, mail me a brochure. Or,..gasp.., make an appointment to see me. Otherwise, piss off.
it's overall safer and better for the recipient to have to actively reject ads rather than to have a tolitarian regime where ads cannot be sent in the first place
Ok. Sounds nice. Restricting the pathways of advertising (i.e. free speech), though, does not a totalitarian regime make. Exploitative speech is not protected by the Constitution. You have the right to swing your fists as much as you wish until they get in my space. That's when "free" speech becomes a matter of debate, more specifically a matter for the courts.
Thought I think you have a good point, I take issue with one statement: rather than push the boundaries of filmmaking, which movies are supposed to.
I can't disagree with this strongly enough. Movies are supposed to tell stories. Those that "push the boundaries" are great films. It's like saying every scientific discovery is supposed to be a paradigm shift.
Writers and artists must find their voice in the process. It isn't their job to push boundaries, unless they have to to get the message across the message of their art.
I wouldn't piss on Cold Mountain just because it doesn't have thousands of CG trolls mucking about in loincloths.
Slashdot Mirror
I can talk!
Prolly just inspire a bunch of "Soviet Russia" jokes here on /.
Climate Change! Nostradamus predicted this already! Bat Boy's Revenge!
So, uh, piss off.
If my mind is going to be innundated with crass pop-culture, it's better that I take an active role in the process. With gaming, you are required to make choices constantly, to keep your mind questioning the possibilities. You have your guard up, so to speak. With TV, you just sit there like a lump, feeding from the trough whatever slop gets shunted into your brain.
Do you have any useful resources for NWN to help me get started?
What I would really love to do is build a mid-level game engine for Python using Pygame and PyOpenGL. Most of the workhorse code would be in C, but the rest would be scriptable in Python. Perhaps what I'm talking about has already been done, and I could help the developers? I know about Crystal Space, but it's more like a fully-formed 3D FPS engine with Python scripting added onto it.
I, too, get hacked off with the constant battle to keep up with the state of graphics in games. It's probably the biggest logistical reason I don't game that much anymore.
Perhaps this is a question of what is it to see the world through a child's eyes and a man's mind. Games are not the last bastion of the lost or lonely. They are the place where the mind becomes active and seeks solutions to problems, safe from destructive consequences. Games sharpen the mind, if played with wisdom, and bring out the best in you, if played with charity.
That you attach a meaningless adjective to the word game (i.e. video) does not make it intrinsically any different.
If someone wishes to talk to me about their new house, their job, or their wedding, I'd be happy to listen to them. Those things are beautiful unto themselves, and honorable. I don't think, though, that they make very good measures of adulthood. They are simply measures of responsibility.
Being an adult does not mean that you seek out responsibility. It is being prepared, and willing, to take on responsibility when it comes. And frankly, most of the 28yr olds [sic] I know that have the things you speak of are usually in the process of getting divorced because of debt accrued from buying a house that they can't afford because they're losing their job.
I see what you're saying, and it makes good sense. I imagine I'm in much the same place as you, with some exceptions (getting laid regularly being the most heinous).
What's with that?
Thanks. Probably the best explaination of the situation I've heard yet.
You didn't?
I haven't given up on gaming. Quite the contrary, I'm beginning to find the time to build new worlds for others to enjoy. It isn't easy; not many people would support a twenty-something gamer to create new games, unless he'd been in the business since he was 18. But, maybe I'll be able to do it in time. Otherwise, I'll just keep plugging away and keep creating as best I may until I'm dead.
I've also found that RPG's and strategy games tend to be more satisfying, given that my wrists are a lot less capable of twitching than they used to be.
I found that out with the Escape Velocity series recently. I downloaded the game and, funnily enough, in about 20 mins I was hooked. It was like I was playing Trade Wars again.
If you knew my mom, you wouldn't be saying that.
I think the key here has more to do with my statement about wanting to build my own game. This is where I part from some folks that identify themselves as gamers.
As I've gotten older, I find myself wanting to build something of my own, not just enjoy the fruits of others' labors. This manifests itself in different ways for different people, I suppose. In the gaming community, some folks start by enjoying the fruits of the Carmacks and the (down boy) Romeros and eventually come to the end of it, desiring the earthier pleasures and responsibilities (career, home, family) to the exclusion of gaming. Others, like myself, begin wanting to continue the work of the founding fathers, so to speak, and build new worlds for others to play in.
This brings up an important point. Playing is necessary to living. We see this in the natural world, as well as in ours. In a time when sports stars and movie moguls are like uncrowned monarchs over our culture, it's easy to rush to asceticism and utilitarianism as a "solution" to the fragmentation of culture, but jeez does it suck. We have to play. Where do mid-life crises come from except the false dichotomy between life and play?
So, if we are to play, and play well and truly, someone's got to be there to help build the playground and keep things interesting. That's probably were I am personally. I want to use what skills and talents I have to help us get along in this world, playing as we go.
And yes, I have done that on many occasions. In fact, one of my favorite games of all time was bought on the $10 rack, Homeworld. I friggin love that game.
Thanks for responding to the question. Though I haven't had a chance to read everything (I definitely will), I appreciate what honesty and bluntness I've seen so far. That's why I read /.
I've just been noticing over time that I have less and less patience for all the fuss of gaming. For starters, gaming isn't really a "buy a computer and play King's Quest IV until you vomit" kind of experience anymore. Between the graphics cards, Barton chips, drivers and lag-times, gamers are required to be a little more like combatants in an arms-race than fun-seekers.
Also, there seems to be polarization in gaming genres. Most games these days are either "throw-away" games (Tetris, Solitare, etc.) or massively multiplayer black holes (you fill in the blank).
In a way, I suppose I've been missing the happy medium between the two. The older console systems seemed to capture this middle-way with some level of consistency, whereas newer systems seem to be rushing towards the great Everquest-FPS panacea, replete with alternate economies and Stephenson-esque realities.
My addled brain is getting worn out with the seemingly endless drama of code-leaks, postponements and screenshots. In a way, I could just sit back and live vicariously through Tycho and Gabriel and never even pick up a joystick.
Long story short, gaming is starting to become a full time job that I don't have time for, so, yeah, maybe it is just age. But, dangit, Doom III and Half-Life II look so good!
Time will tell, I guess....
I'm currently an AT&T Wireless customer living in the Southeastern US. Does anyone have any opinions on where I should go from here? Stay with Cingular, go with Verizon? What?
A decidedly silly and pointless rant, but one nonetheless.
You haven't explained anything except just how bitter life can be. His question was how the economy will survive when there is no middle class. All of the men you described in your philippic were (and continued to be) members of a growing middle class. The middle class in America is slowly dying. This death is being accelerated by unpatriotic corporations that place their own profit margins above American economic health.
That this fact has been true since the 70's does not make it right, or acceptable. Nor does it absolve us of the responsibility of getting off our apathy-encrusted asses and doing something about it.
Life sucks. So what? It is we who do nothing to help our fellow man that make it suck.
Smaller software companies will survive.
This is the only thing you said which remotely gets to the point, and as such is interesting. Please elaborate.
Between Fred Durst and Kid Rock, this sound isn't new. Now, maybe could we replace the actual Fred Durst with a simulated turnip from Yamaha?
It's not theft, and there is no force employed.
..gasp.., make an appointment to see me. Otherwise, piss off.
If someone walks into my unlocked house and walks out with my TV, no "force" was applied in that instance, either.
If you were stupid enough to get a fax machine that recieves all faxes sent to it, it's your own fault when it does precisely that. If you don't blindly accept every stupid thing that arrives, your resources will not be used.
So, when a consultant is working on a rush job at 3am in the morning at, say, some random CopyCow, he shouldn't be allowed to send a fax from that location? Obviously not, if I have call restrictions on my fax machine. That's the point of the fax machine: to allow communication to arrive at the office at any time, from anywhere.
And, no, this is not the same for all forms of advertising. It's a matter of scale. With the exploited business, there is a significant level of expense. With the exploiting business (the fax-spammer), there is next to none. To use your door-to-door analogy, what you are requiring a business to do is hire a bouncer to watch their door to keep the salesman from barging in anytime he feels, rifling through the office-supply cabinet and taking some ball-points for his trouble while crooning the glories of Viagra at the top of his lungs.
Those are _your_ expenses, not theirs.
Uh, that's the point. I'm willing to take on these expenses for those with which I do business already. If a company wishes to advertise to me, mail me a brochure. Or,
it's overall safer and better for the recipient to have to actively reject ads rather than to have a tolitarian regime where ads cannot be sent in the first place
Ok. Sounds nice. Restricting the pathways of advertising (i.e. free speech), though, does not a totalitarian regime make. Exploitative speech is not protected by the Constitution. You have the right to swing your fists as much as you wish until they get in my space. That's when "free" speech becomes a matter of debate, more specifically a matter for the courts.
Thought I think you have a good point, I take issue with one statement: rather than push the boundaries of filmmaking, which movies are supposed to.
I can't disagree with this strongly enough. Movies are supposed to tell stories. Those that "push the boundaries" are great films. It's like saying every scientific discovery is supposed to be a paradigm shift.
Writers and artists must find their voice in the process. It isn't their job to push boundaries, unless they have to to get the message across the message of their art.
I wouldn't piss on Cold Mountain just because it doesn't have thousands of CG trolls mucking about in loincloths.