If you read the article, it actually dosn't blame video games for the shooting. Furthermore, video games aren't even singled out as a bad influence; violent video games are lumped together with violent movies. In the discussions of violent video games influencing violent behaviour, people often say such things as "violent movies have been around for x years, why don't they cause people to go on rampages, Mr. Smarty Pants?" Well, it looks like someone out the agrees with them. It's violent culture that's blamed, and not for causing the violence, but for giving them a role model to emulate. Dr. Newman knows that these children are disturbed to begin with. "What it tends to reinforce in the shooter's mind is not so much a violent impulse as a template for how to be notorious and alluring and cool as a shooter" She's acknowledging right there that video games don't cause the violence, the kid would have gone on the rampage anyway. He just would have had to use a little imagination to look cool while he did it. The real problem here is the title that MSNBC gave to the article. The hyper-reactionary slashdot community took the bait and, as usual, got up in arms. "Faded Columbine reality kept warning signs from being taken seriously" would have been a much more appropriate title for the article, as it spends more time on that subject that nthe subject of video games.
My question is, is this just a level from the final HL2, or is it a little bit of new content? I remember back when they released Half-Life they had a demo available that actually wasn't part of the game - Half-Life:Uplink, I believe they called it. It was a pretty fun 30 minute or so mission, if I remember correctly. Anyone try out the demo yet?
I'd have to disagree. Sure, it takes some time to download the demo, but unless you have to sit in front of the computer and pedal it to make it go, this really isn't an arduous task. Why download the demo? Because the full game costs $50 or $60. Once people do this, however, they may see how simple the Steam process is and decide to buy the game. But that's a different story altogether than "You need to get a Steam account so you may as well buy the game, so the demo is a stupid idea."
As far as your understanding, I'm not sure you'r equite aware of what Steam is... you don't buy Steam games per month, like internet porn, but you purchase a particular game. There are no accounts which are "paid through the 30th." You buy a game, and you play it. You play it this month, you play next month.
If this is true, it actually could end up hurting Valve in the end. For instance, lets say someone downloads a copy of HL2 and plays it. In the process, they are banned from Steam. They decide that they like the game and perhaps would like to play CS:Source or DoD:Source, and so they try and purchase the game. Valve, having locked the potential customer out of Steam, will have lost a customer. Now, you're probably saying that people who download games have no reason to buy them, but this is not true, especially in this case, considering that many people buy the game for CS:Source and DoD:Source. I myself first played an illegal copy of Half-Life, but then bought the game because I liked it and wanted to play TFC. This is only considering the fact that Valve could track the users... Now, how is Valve going to track the user? Look on their computer for a Steam account and ban all accounts found? What if one of their friends had been over playing on their box, logged into steam, and there were two accounts on the machine? Ban both accounts? I know I was showing my friend the CS:Source beta when he didn't have it, I saw my account directory still on his machine last week. What if the user of the pirated software didn't even have Steam? Ban his IP? Not practical due to dynamic IP's. I know, many people have broadband connections with static IPs, but still many don't. Also, if a user owns a steam account, it's a good bet that they have purchased a product, such as HL or CS:CZ. If someone can find in the Steam EULA where it allows Valve to revoke use of a product that a user already owns, please post it in reply to this. Direct quotes only please. So, in summary, this is either bullshit or a pretty stupid plan... I'm betting on the former.
We can reasonably assume that performance in HL2 will be similar to that of CS:Source. On my p4 2.4Ghz (clocked @ 2.79) / Radeon 9800 Pro / 512Mb RAM, the source engine gets between 45 and 65 FPS, whereas Doom 3 barely pushes 40 at its good moments. With the exception of the lighting, Source looks better on top of this.
I suppose there is always a chance that VU will sell the physical game at a lower price than Valve... but it is likely that it will be around the same price on DVD. You would think that Valve would do better to sell the game for a little cheaper, since this is really the first major game to try and utlilize a distribution system like this and have potential success. Valve has a lot to prove with this delivery method, to not only the game developers and publishers, but to the buyers too. It needs to work for us in order to be successful as much as it works for them. Does anyone have an approximation on the average cost to produce a DVD copy of the game (media, box, shipping, etc.)?
It would seem that at this point, we shouldn't continue to worry about Valve's extensions of the Quake engine, what with their having just delivered one of the 2 best engines on the market? I personally am glad that they did not waste time on the dying engine and instead allocated their resources to the Source engine.
Well, it really isn't CS mods you enjoy, it's HL mods. CS is an HL mod, so if you enjoy the current HL mods, try and imagine what the HL mods will be like. And besides, HL deathmatch pretty much sucked anyway.
Only problem is that everyone can see your secret objective... and they will no longer wonder why the guy with the cure ring is always whining to be cured.
Exactly. If the games didn't allow modding, we would never have come to this problem. Think about it. If Half-Life hadn't ever been modded, we wouldn't have Counter-Strike. Therefore, nobody would be able to hack Counter-Strike, and our Counter-Strike fun would never be ruined, leaving us... happier? I guess we'd all be playing HL deathmatch. And I think there's a pretty good reason we don't do that.
is the Sanford Uniball Vision, micro point. Well balanced with or without the cap on, perfect weight, nice for a quick jot of a note or good for the long haul. Also, there's a certain sweet spot on this pen where you can scratch off the paint and make a stylish racing stripe. This makes it go faster.
So far in this discussion, a lot of outsiders have been telling us all how NASA's internals work. Are there any NASA employees out there who feel they could add to the discussion?
As far as his quote about exploiting pop culture is concerned, when in the past have games ever actually been pop culture? Gaming has traditionally been an underground sport, with only a small population actually being gamers. It's only since the 32 bit era that the average jock you'd find living in a dorm room would spend any significant amount of time gaming. The reason the industry has lost its cultural edge is because it lost its culture.
Slashdot Mirror
MS seems to be fixing this problem.
This is correct, just use the /DOD switch and it will make 7 passes over the disk, overwriting with random data.
Finally, they would be paying me.
If you read the article, it actually dosn't blame video games for the shooting. Furthermore, video games aren't even singled out as a bad influence; violent video games are lumped together with violent movies. In the discussions of violent video games influencing violent behaviour, people often say such things as "violent movies have been around for x years, why don't they cause people to go on rampages, Mr. Smarty Pants?" Well, it looks like someone out the agrees with them. It's violent culture that's blamed, and not for causing the violence, but for giving them a role model to emulate. Dr. Newman knows that these children are disturbed to begin with. "What it tends to reinforce in the shooter's mind is not so much a violent impulse as a template for how to be notorious and alluring and cool as a shooter" She's acknowledging right there that video games don't cause the violence, the kid would have gone on the rampage anyway. He just would have had to use a little imagination to look cool while he did it. The real problem here is the title that MSNBC gave to the article. The hyper-reactionary slashdot community took the bait and, as usual, got up in arms. "Faded Columbine reality kept warning signs from being taken seriously" would have been a much more appropriate title for the article, as it spends more time on that subject that nthe subject of video games.
My question is, is this just a level from the final HL2, or is it a little bit of new content? I remember back when they released Half-Life they had a demo available that actually wasn't part of the game - Half-Life:Uplink, I believe they called it. It was a pretty fun 30 minute or so mission, if I remember correctly. Anyone try out the demo yet?
I'd have to disagree. Sure, it takes some time to download the demo, but unless you have to sit in front of the computer and pedal it to make it go, this really isn't an arduous task. Why download the demo? Because the full game costs $50 or $60. Once people do this, however, they may see how simple the Steam process is and decide to buy the game. But that's a different story altogether than "You need to get a Steam account so you may as well buy the game, so the demo is a stupid idea."
As far as your understanding, I'm not sure you'r equite aware of what Steam is... you don't buy Steam games per month, like internet porn, but you purchase a particular game. There are no accounts which are "paid through the 30th." You buy a game, and you play it. You play it this month, you play next month.
Where?
If this is true, it actually could end up hurting Valve in the end. For instance, lets say someone downloads a copy of HL2 and plays it. In the process, they are banned from Steam. They decide that they like the game and perhaps would like to play CS:Source or DoD:Source, and so they try and purchase the game. Valve, having locked the potential customer out of Steam, will have lost a customer. Now, you're probably saying that people who download games have no reason to buy them, but this is not true, especially in this case, considering that many people buy the game for CS:Source and DoD:Source. I myself first played an illegal copy of Half-Life, but then bought the game because I liked it and wanted to play TFC. This is only considering the fact that Valve could track the users...
Now, how is Valve going to track the user? Look on their computer for a Steam account and ban all accounts found? What if one of their friends had been over playing on their box, logged into steam, and there were two accounts on the machine? Ban both accounts? I know I was showing my friend the CS:Source beta when he didn't have it, I saw my account directory still on his machine last week. What if the user of the pirated software didn't even have Steam? Ban his IP? Not practical due to dynamic IP's. I know, many people have broadband connections with static IPs, but still many don't. Also, if a user owns a steam account, it's a good bet that they have purchased a product, such as HL or CS:CZ. If someone can find in the Steam EULA where it allows Valve to revoke use of a product that a user already owns, please post it in reply to this. Direct quotes only please. So, in summary, this is either bullshit or a pretty stupid plan... I'm betting on the former.
Maybe I can pretend this is the ending to FFVII that I was gypped out of...
We can reasonably assume that performance in HL2 will be similar to that of CS:Source. On my p4 2.4Ghz (clocked @ 2.79) / Radeon 9800 Pro / 512Mb RAM, the source engine gets between 45 and 65 FPS, whereas Doom 3 barely pushes 40 at its good moments. With the exception of the lighting, Source looks better on top of this.
Word from Valve is that textures will not be updated, it's just a port to the Source engine. Beyond that, it's all just speculation.
I suppose there is always a chance that VU will sell the physical game at a lower price than Valve... but it is likely that it will be around the same price on DVD. You would think that Valve would do better to sell the game for a little cheaper, since this is really the first major game to try and utlilize a distribution system like this and have potential success. Valve has a lot to prove with this delivery method, to not only the game developers and publishers, but to the buyers too. It needs to work for us in order to be successful as much as it works for them. Does anyone have an approximation on the average cost to produce a DVD copy of the game (media, box, shipping, etc.)?
It would seem that at this point, we shouldn't continue to worry about Valve's extensions of the Quake engine, what with their having just delivered one of the 2 best engines on the market? I personally am glad that they did not waste time on the dying engine and instead allocated their resources to the Source engine.
As a clarification, that should have read "try and imagine what the HL2 mods will be like."
I really think this is more of a matter of people trying to buy HL2 than it is of /. effect.
Well, it really isn't CS mods you enjoy, it's HL mods. CS is an HL mod, so if you enjoy the current HL mods, try and imagine what the HL mods will be like. And besides, HL deathmatch pretty much sucked anyway.
Can an entire story be moderated down as redundant?
Only problem is that everyone can see your secret objective... and they will no longer wonder why the guy with the cure ring is always whining to be cured.
How about NARC for NES?
Exactly. If the games didn't allow modding, we would never have come to this problem. Think about it. If Half-Life hadn't ever been modded, we wouldn't have Counter-Strike. Therefore, nobody would be able to hack Counter-Strike, and our Counter-Strike fun would never be ruined, leaving us... happier? I guess we'd all be playing HL deathmatch. And I think there's a pretty good reason we don't do that.
is the Sanford Uniball Vision, micro point. Well balanced with or without the cap on, perfect weight, nice for a quick jot of a note or good for the long haul. Also, there's a certain sweet spot on this pen where you can scratch off the paint and make a stylish racing stripe. This makes it go faster.
So far in this discussion, a lot of outsiders have been telling us all how NASA's internals work. Are there any NASA employees out there who feel they could add to the discussion?
there are plenty of other successfull wars that could have been covered instead of the Vietnam War
Just remember that from the point of view of the North Vietnamese, The Vietnam War (I'm sure that they call it something different) was successful.
As far as his quote about exploiting pop culture is concerned, when in the past have games ever actually been pop culture? Gaming has traditionally been an underground sport, with only a small population actually being gamers. It's only since the 32 bit era that the average jock you'd find living in a dorm room would spend any significant amount of time gaming. The reason the industry has lost its cultural edge is because it lost its culture.