Players must install VMWare to play
ALL NETWORK TRAFFIC MUST BE DIRECTED TO VMWARE
Players must subscribe to a dynamic DNS name pointing to the PC in gameplay
All players join a predetermined IRC channel
Players break into groups of up to 6
Players declare their OS
Players agree on game type (deathmatch, team deathmatch, capture the flag, etc.) and duration
Players must locate eachother via DNS and try to crack or disable the opposing players' virtual machines (shut down a service, obtain an encrypted text file, etc.)
Last PC or team standing is the winner
HONOURABLE PLAY ONLY
Would our ISP's be alarmed by this? This game is for consenting parties only, of course.
Anyone interested? crackers@hush.ai
I haven't bought a new album from a retail record store in years and years. Whenever I desire a peice of plastic (which is frequent enough) I'll pick it up at a used store, earning the artist and label no money anyway. How long until second hand shops are shut down by CRIA?
Anyone who thinks Canada is freer than the States is full of crap. We are simply 1 or 2 years behind our big fat brother downstairs. We'll adopt every law they enact (file swapping) and maintain every nonsensical law they uphold (marijuana posession) until the end of time. Why? Because we don't want Dubya to drop a W-bomb on our various beaver hatcheries.
All hail America Jr., land of the slightly freer (until 1 year later).
In the mean time, keep doing what you do. Make a statement by defying the law. Protect yourself while you do it. Use PeerGuardian 2.
My favourite was You Don't Know Jack Netshow from the now-defunct bezerk.com. Ordinary YDKJ fare, but free and updated with new questions weekly. In lieu of subscription, the user was forced to watch a few short TV-style flash commercials between each of the 3 rounds. The commercials were very tolerable considering the quality of the game, but I guess they didn't pay the bills.
Another fine, free, episodic game is (was) Wing Commander Prophecy. I believe this game, the same in gameplay to other WC titles, was intended to be a commercial product but, like Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory, development could not conform to schedule and\or budget and was released to the public pro bono. Episodes were released incrementally (I forget the span as I didn't try it until all 6 episodes were available) and professionally written story text and fanfiction could be downloaded to whet one's appetite between releases. The game can be downloaded but the game originally required registration and the website is now gone so I can't promise it will work for you (plus it's a Win98 game - Direct3D).
Too bad the world will never see Full Throttle 2. Lucasarts axed it because it did not meet their high quality standards. Also, the actor who voiced the protagonist Ben passed away a year or two ago. Shame. The original was a cool, cool game.
Exactly. Games don't even have to be based on reality to be successful and popular. E.g.,
Q-bert
Tetris
Bubble Bobble
Dig Dug
Doom
Other games are half realism and half fantasy. These games are extremely striking and have the potential to spark a lot of contraversy and anger.
Mortal Kombat
Lethal Inforcers
After Burner
Operation Wolf
This question is phrased too broadly. What makes a game realistic? Why is realism important? Sometimes a caricature of realism is more impactful than a simulation of reality (for example After Burner vs. Chuck Yeager's Combat Flight Simulator) and sometimes it is completely irrelevant (Checkers, Go, Solitaire). Different games for different purposes\moods\audiences.
How long before games your actual emotions are incorporated into a game? With devices like the PS2's Eyetoy, a game could interpret your facial expression and change the game accordingly:
Game character's facial expressons reflect yours
Game gets easier as you get more frustrated
Game gets harder as you get more frustrated
NPC love interest consoles you when you are sad
NPC nemesis taunts you when you are flustered
Cutesy characters jump all over the screen and scream when you smile (wai wai!)
Ghosty figures and strobe lights flash when you are afraid
Spooky huh? How many people would literally fall in love with NPCs because of this? How many would have seizures? Nightmares? Game addictions? Paranoia?
I've been beta testing an MMOG called There for several months and it is a much more sociable experience than almost any other MMOG out there. All the "leveling up" is performed by talking, organizing events, and riding vehicles. No killing, no NPCs. Really it's just glorified IRC but with one fewer degree of separation because you and your friends have a lifelike customizeable avatar. Sexist stereotyping is beneath us all so I'll just say that the game has paintball guns, a variety of wheeled, flying, and riding vehicles, and lots and lots of shopping and outfits for whomever might enjoy such activities.
Call me a pessimist but I have very high expectations of games (it's the 21st bleedin' century here). We've seen some really awesome titles this year, but some of the best ones have a common problem.
Call of Duty - amazing game, perfect control, secondary fire mode (barrel aiming) revolutionalizes FPS... but I finished it in 2 days and the levels are almost totally unrelated.
Max Payne 2 - excellent control, very nice sharp texturing, runs at a better frame rate than some 4 year old games... but I finished it in a day!
Postal 2 - decent control, awesome premise (normal guy in a normal town), creative goals, hilarious execution... but I finished it in a day!!
See where I'm going with this? Granted, these VERY SHORT GAMES are super fun and truly have set a benchmark (for better or for worse) in graphics, gameplay, and content. But it's just plain unfair to charge full fare for 1 or 2 days of entertainment.
I think game companies are getting lazy and\or misdirected. They are pouring all their resources into graphics, sound, and presentation and coming up empty on substance. The titles I've mentioned are action games, but action without contrast is pretty dry. It's okay for there to be a suspenseful lull in gameplay to pad the story a little.
At least Max and Postal developed their own engines. CoD just rehashed the Quake3 engine! I suspect gaming companies are starting to ride on their laurels - leaping off the blocks with a bang but coming up short in depth. My opinion is that they are waiting for the mod community to do their job for them.
SC2, the game with the wackiest aliens, cleverest dialogue, bleepiest music, and kickassingest combat has been remade! Freeware, open source!! Go fetch NOW because it's a real beauty to behold!! The Ur-Quan Masters
Skill level adjustment is not a linear argument. It depends on the type of game. While auto-adjustment may make sense for an arcade-style game like Max Payne (where you do the same thing throughout the whole game) but it is unwelcome for simulators (racing, sports).
What I really appreciate (thanks, KoTOR) are games that let you change the difficulty level at any time. I also appreciate games that offer you hints (Popcap's Bejeweled, Sierra's Phantasmagoria) to keep the pace from lulling.
Indeed, the purpose of games is entertainment! Some people are willing to spend 8 hours every consecutive day until a game is finished, while others would prefer to spend 3 hours a week. Neither party should be penalized. I'm sure these demographics are related to the article I read about the average age of gamers rising ever closer to 25.
I think massively multiplayer online games should offer a trial basis - 1 free or inexpensive month. Paying $70 for a CD and $15 for the first month is a hefty investment for a buggy piece of crap.
MMOG is a fledgeling genre that is dominated by relatively few products right now. Little competition equals little effort. It's a pretty safe bet any MMOG will be quite imperfect in the first 6 months of its operation. 2004 will introduce dozens and dozens of new games, each contesting for the same pool of potential subscribers. The strong will prevail, the weak will disappear.
When old DOS games started losing their novelty I used to wreak havoc on the WAV files. My squealy prepubescent tenor made for a pretty foulmouthed baseball announcer.
Nuff respect to groups like ACiD and ICE for doing what they do with pride. While these two are arguably the biggest players in the ANSI and now "VGA" scene, they're certainly not the only ones still doing it and actively discussing it.
Be sure to check out telnet BBS's - same as the old POTS equivalent but with way more lines and generally better bandwidth (althogh displaying ANSI's is smoother via dialup). A list of active telnet BBS's can be found at The BBS Corner.
Before there was ANSI art there was ASCII. It's a little cheesy and rudamentary but it takes a lot of talent to represent visual art as typographic characters. IRC-ers will dig the ASCII block fonts. For some info on the history of PC art check out Textfiles.com Art.
Parallel to the art scene were the MOD (music module) and demo (megademo\intro\loader) scenes. These disciplines all began in the C64 days, most often seen accompanying cracked games with chippy SID tunes. Warez and demo began together as a sort of cyber-Pangea and though they have separated and flourished in their own way, they still occasionally accompany oneanother to this day. Thanks to products like Sk@le Tracker and ModPlug Tracker the MOD scene is still kicking.
While the popularity of ANSI has declined over the years, megademos are more popular than ever (particularly in Finland, Belgium, Germany, and thereabouts). Demo parties are bigger and badder than ever and are even covered on national television. For a very entertaining primer on the demo scene pick up a copy of the Mind Candy DVD Vol. 1. It's the best $16 you'll ever spend.
ANSI and demos seem to have shared a similar fate. ANSI, in all its blocky glory, is a testement to the speed and limitations of its time - the very definition of zeitgeist. As artists grew in number and in skill, more advanced techniques such as shading and emulating texture were implemented, but there's only so much that can be done with the medium. Demos, by definition, have much more freedom and were, in earlier times, a competition to code the newest, coolest, most efficient realtime effects. 3D video accelerators all but destroyed this pursuit and now the megademo has become more of a demonstration of design than coding. For all the demos you could ever hope to watch, check out The Hornet Archive.
I can't speak for the Pro, but the original Gravis' circular thumbpad is very precise and "snappy". It takes a good push to get the direction to "click". My dual analog Logitech Wireless Wingman Rumble has a circular thumbpad that really blows. With my Gravis I never ever miss.
The original Gravis Gamepad is a very precise, simple gamepad. The directional thumbpad is equally as good as the Nintendo SNES controller (plus you can screw a little joystick into it but I don't know why anyone would) and the buttons are big, easy to press, have a good feel, and are far enough apart that you won't press the wrong one by accident. You can actually do Street Fighter uppercuts to the left and right with this gamepad.
The only downside is that it's only got 4 buttons. It's perfect for NES-and-earlier systems, and even for simpler SNES and Genesis games.
Plus, it's serial-only so if you want to connect 2 of them via Y-splitter you'll only get 2 buttons per player.
You should be able to find one on eBay for the price of a stale sandwich.
---
Life is a video game and I've got the high score
Spyrochaete
Slashdot Mirror
ALL NETWORK TRAFFIC MUST BE DIRECTED TO VMWARE
Players must subscribe to a dynamic DNS name pointing to the PC in gameplay
Would our ISP's be alarmed by this? This game is for consenting parties only, of course.
Anyone interested? crackers@hush.ai
I haven't bought a new album from a retail record store in years and years. Whenever I desire a peice of plastic (which is frequent enough) I'll pick it up at a used store, earning the artist and label no money anyway. How long until second hand shops are shut down by CRIA?
Anyone who thinks Canada is freer than the States is full of crap. We are simply 1 or 2 years behind our big fat brother downstairs. We'll adopt every law they enact (file swapping) and maintain every nonsensical law they uphold (marijuana posession) until the end of time. Why? Because we don't want Dubya to drop a W-bomb on our various beaver hatcheries.
All hail America Jr., land of the slightly freer (until 1 year later).
In the mean time, keep doing what you do. Make a statement by defying the law. Protect yourself while you do it. Use PeerGuardian 2.
I've played a few games similar to this concept.
My favourite was You Don't Know Jack Netshow from the now-defunct bezerk.com. Ordinary YDKJ fare, but free and updated with new questions weekly. In lieu of subscription, the user was forced to watch a few short TV-style flash commercials between each of the 3 rounds. The commercials were very tolerable considering the quality of the game, but I guess they didn't pay the bills.
Another fine, free, episodic game is (was) Wing Commander Prophecy. I believe this game, the same in gameplay to other WC titles, was intended to be a commercial product but, like Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory, development could not conform to schedule and\or budget and was released to the public pro bono. Episodes were released incrementally (I forget the span as I didn't try it until all 6 episodes were available) and professionally written story text and fanfiction could be downloaded to whet one's appetite between releases. The game can be downloaded but the game originally required registration and the website is now gone so I can't promise it will work for you (plus it's a Win98 game - Direct3D).
Too bad the world will never see Full Throttle 2. Lucasarts axed it because it did not meet their high quality standards. Also, the actor who voiced the protagonist Ben passed away a year or two ago. Shame. The original was a cool, cool game.
- Q-bert
- Tetris
- Bubble Bobble
- Dig Dug
- Doom
Other games are half realism and half fantasy. These games are extremely striking and have the potential to spark a lot of contraversy and anger.- Mortal Kombat
- Lethal Inforcers
- After Burner
- Operation Wolf
This question is phrased too broadly. What makes a game realistic? Why is realism important? Sometimes a caricature of realism is more impactful than a simulation of reality (for example After Burner vs. Chuck Yeager's Combat Flight Simulator) and sometimes it is completely irrelevant (Checkers, Go, Solitaire). Different games for different purposes\moods\audiences.- Game character's facial expressons reflect yours
- Game gets easier as you get more frustrated
- Game gets harder as you get more frustrated
- NPC love interest consoles you when you are sad
- NPC nemesis taunts you when you are flustered
- Cutesy characters jump all over the screen and scream when you smile (wai wai!)
- Ghosty figures and strobe lights flash when you are afraid
Spooky huh? How many people would literally fall in love with NPCs because of this? How many would have seizures? Nightmares? Game addictions? Paranoia?I've been beta testing an MMOG called There for several months and it is a much more sociable experience than almost any other MMOG out there. All the "leveling up" is performed by talking, organizing events, and riding vehicles. No killing, no NPCs. Really it's just glorified IRC but with one fewer degree of separation because you and your friends have a lifelike customizeable avatar. Sexist stereotyping is beneath us all so I'll just say that the game has paintball guns, a variety of wheeled, flying, and riding vehicles, and lots and lots of shopping and outfits for whomever might enjoy such activities.
I apologize - Postal 2 uses the Unreal Warfare engine. And sorry about the bold.. didn't close my tag right.
Call me a pessimist but I have very high expectations of games (it's the 21st bleedin' century here). We've seen some really awesome titles this year, but some of the best ones have a common problem.
Call of Duty - amazing game, perfect control, secondary fire mode (barrel aiming) revolutionalizes FPS... but I finished it in 2 days and the levels are almost totally unrelated.
Max Payne 2 - excellent control, very nice sharp texturing, runs at a better frame rate than some 4 year old games... but I finished it in a day!
Postal 2 - decent control, awesome premise (normal guy in a normal town), creative goals, hilarious execution... but I finished it in a day!!
See where I'm going with this? Granted, these VERY SHORT GAMES are super fun and truly have set a benchmark (for better or for worse) in graphics, gameplay, and content. But it's just plain unfair to charge full fare for 1 or 2 days of entertainment.
I think game companies are getting lazy and\or misdirected. They are pouring all their resources into graphics, sound, and presentation and coming up empty on substance. The titles I've mentioned are action games, but action without contrast is pretty dry. It's okay for there to be a suspenseful lull in gameplay to pad the story a little.
At least Max and Postal developed their own engines. CoD just rehashed the Quake3 engine! I suspect gaming companies are starting to ride on their laurels - leaping off the blocks with a bang but coming up short in depth. My opinion is that they are waiting for the mod community to do their job for them.
SC2, the game with the wackiest aliens, cleverest dialogue, bleepiest music, and kickassingest combat has been remade! Freeware, open source!! Go fetch NOW because it's a real beauty to behold!! The Ur-Quan Masters
Skill level adjustment is not a linear argument. It depends on the type of game. While auto-adjustment may make sense for an arcade-style game like Max Payne (where you do the same thing throughout the whole game) but it is unwelcome for simulators (racing, sports).
What I really appreciate (thanks, KoTOR) are games that let you change the difficulty level at any time. I also appreciate games that offer you hints (Popcap's Bejeweled, Sierra's Phantasmagoria) to keep the pace from lulling.
Indeed, the purpose of games is entertainment! Some people are willing to spend 8 hours every consecutive day until a game is finished, while others would prefer to spend 3 hours a week. Neither party should be penalized. I'm sure these demographics are related to the article I read about the average age of gamers rising ever closer to 25.
I think massively multiplayer online games should offer a trial basis - 1 free or inexpensive month. Paying $70 for a CD and $15 for the first month is a hefty investment for a buggy piece of crap.
MMOG is a fledgeling genre that is dominated by relatively few products right now. Little competition equals little effort. It's a pretty safe bet any MMOG will be quite imperfect in the first 6 months of its operation. 2004 will introduce dozens and dozens of new games, each contesting for the same pool of potential subscribers. The strong will prevail, the weak will disappear.
When old DOS games started losing their novelty I used to wreak havoc on the WAV files. My squealy prepubescent tenor made for a pretty foulmouthed baseball announcer.
Nuff respect to groups like ACiD and ICE for doing what they do with pride. While these two are arguably the biggest players in the ANSI and now "VGA" scene, they're certainly not the only ones still doing it and actively discussing it.
Be sure to check out telnet BBS's - same as the old POTS equivalent but with way more lines and generally better bandwidth (althogh displaying ANSI's is smoother via dialup). A list of active telnet BBS's can be found at The BBS Corner.
Before there was ANSI art there was ASCII. It's a little cheesy and rudamentary but it takes a lot of talent to represent visual art as typographic characters. IRC-ers will dig the ASCII block fonts. For some info on the history of PC art check out Textfiles.com Art.
Parallel to the art scene were the MOD (music module) and demo (megademo\intro\loader) scenes. These disciplines all began in the C64 days, most often seen accompanying cracked games with chippy SID tunes. Warez and demo began together as a sort of cyber-Pangea and though they have separated and flourished in their own way, they still occasionally accompany oneanother to this day. Thanks to products like Sk@le Tracker and ModPlug Tracker the MOD scene is still kicking.
While the popularity of ANSI has declined over the years, megademos are more popular than ever (particularly in Finland, Belgium, Germany, and thereabouts). Demo parties are bigger and badder than ever and are even covered on national television. For a very entertaining primer on the demo scene pick up a copy of the Mind Candy DVD Vol. 1. It's the best $16 you'll ever spend.
ANSI and demos seem to have shared a similar fate. ANSI, in all its blocky glory, is a testement to the speed and limitations of its time - the very definition of zeitgeist. As artists grew in number and in skill, more advanced techniques such as shading and emulating texture were implemented, but there's only so much that can be done with the medium. Demos, by definition, have much more freedom and were, in earlier times, a competition to code the newest, coolest, most efficient realtime effects. 3D video accelerators all but destroyed this pursuit and now the megademo has become more of a demonstration of design than coding. For all the demos you could ever hope to watch, check out The Hornet Archive.
And check out my MODs!
I can't speak for the Pro, but the original Gravis' circular thumbpad is very precise and "snappy". It takes a good push to get the direction to "click". My dual analog Logitech Wireless Wingman Rumble has a circular thumbpad that really blows. With my Gravis I never ever miss.
The original Gravis Gamepad is a very precise, simple gamepad. The directional thumbpad is equally as good as the Nintendo SNES controller (plus you can screw a little joystick into it but I don't know why anyone would) and the buttons are big, easy to press, have a good feel, and are far enough apart that you won't press the wrong one by accident. You can actually do Street Fighter uppercuts to the left and right with this gamepad.
The only downside is that it's only got 4 buttons. It's perfect for NES-and-earlier systems, and even for simpler SNES and Genesis games.
Plus, it's serial-only so if you want to connect 2 of them via Y-splitter you'll only get 2 buttons per player.
You should be able to find one on eBay for the price of a stale sandwich.
---
Life is a video game and I've got the high score
Spyrochaete
Same quality as vinyl, but VBR means I can't record mix sets in Traktor. ----- Life is a video game and I've got the high score Spyrochaete