I'm actually all for the ESRB actually being required to play the games they rate. I always thought it was silly for them to just watch an abreviated video of the game and then come up with a rating somehow. Although, on the negative side, this could easily raise the cost of getting your game rated.
What I'm particularly worried about is this government agency "over seeing" the ratings... nothing good will come from that, at least not from our current government...
"Um, seems pretty comparable to the Playstation 2, to be honest. It might be that you're buying into it more this time, or just that you're more connected to gamer buzz on the net these days."
No it seems bigger than the PS2's buzz was when it came out (I should know, I was working at EB back then, during its launch). One of the key differences is that I'm seeing a lot more "non-gamers" and casual gamers that are already excited about it than there were for the PS2. And just to make it clear, No.. I'm certainly no Nintendo fan boy. Perhaps if anything, it could be just because there's a larger number of people playing games today than there were back in 2000.;)
I wonder if the Wii will be able to blow those numbers out of the water? (the correct numbers I mean);)
The hype for the Wii, silly/stupid name or not, seems bigger than any I've ever seen for a single console. DS didn't really have a huge number of early adopters, it had to prove itself to many before it really started to take off...
It's sad that there are such a rare few number of games that do a good combination of narrative and interaction... If only more developers and designers thought like this maybe we wouldn't have people like Roger Ebert saying that games aren't an artform:/
While I also suggest using some sort of local jabber server with Gaim, it'd probably be a good idea to install some sort of encryption plugin, like Off The Record, to make sure no one's intercepting conversations from the inside of the network even.
I'm well aware of the fact that a computer can only read machine code, but the whole point of the main article is whether or not it's worthwhile for programs to be written in Interpreted/JIT/Managed/whatever type languages... What something is written in, and what it is compiled/interpreted down to are two completely different things;)
You need to watch the GDC video to get a good idea of the gameplay. To put it briefly, it's a universe simulator. You start off controlling a single microbial organism, and evolve it up to a cognitive level as a human brain, then you control a community of the creatures and it's sort of like sim city for a while, then you can battle other civilizations, and eventually travel to other planets...
As long as they continue down their current path, the Xbox360 should do much better than the orginal Xbox. As long as they don't repeat the same mistakes.... Japanese gamers want Japanese made games (most of the time), and with things like Final Fantasy XI, the Mist Walker games and others they've announced, they may actually have a shot. Will they be number one? I seriously doubt it....they'll probably still be third place, but it shouldn't be quite as abysmal as their last go round.
PS. Just to elaborate a little more on my idea. By restricting the copyrights like that, all a buyout would accomplish is the big company obtaining the name of your company pretty much, thus making a buyout unattractive and most likely, fairly unprofittable to anyone trying to bully you through your shares.
If "publishers" want to make money off the games you make, then they should invest in funding particular those particular games, not gobbling up your whole studio... Diversity in the game industry is dying out while the EA's and Microsoft's of the world are killing it with their boring in-bred sequels:(
OK, so here's another idea. When creating your games, make sure to contract everything where the rights to any franchises and whatnot go back to the original employee who came up with them in the event that your company goes out of business or is bought by another one;)
Self-publishing really is the only way to go if you're an independent developer and you'd actually like to make a sizable percentage of the profits. Although I hate to use the term publish, as it has become so ambiguous in the game industry. The common perception of a "publisher" is the company who pays for the development and marketing of the game, as while the industry would be much better off if publishers just published, ie...print and distribute the physical media the games are stored on.
As for Valve, steam would be great if it were open source, cross platform, and DRM free....it's a shame no one's came up with an alternative yet...
Well, first off Easy Ubuntu is just easier....so if you're new to Linux that's a very good thing. Secondly, Easy Ubuntu strives to not mess up or change too much with your system like Automatix does. Let's just say if you do it wrong, I've heard many tales of automatix majorly screwing up people's system, while never heard to many problems from E.U. users...
Here's what I'm curious about though... If you buy a game off the Live Marketplace/Arcade/whatever... and then your Xbox dies and you have to get a new one, are you capable of redownloading all the games you already paid for again or does Microsoft want you to have to buy them all over again now?
If you installed from one of the "flight" releases (aka development snapshot), then yes...it will attempt to download the latest packages for things during installation, but if you install from a final release CD it will not download anything during the install (or at least that's how it's worked for all the prior versions). I'm pretty sure that if you were not connected to the net during installation that it would have just went with the versions found on the disc. So no, the net is not required.
Ubuntu does not setup a root password by default specifically so novice/beginner users will not use they're root account by default as many screw up and do. All you have to do to setup the password though is to goto a commandline and put in "sudo passwd" from the main account;)
I'm not sure how EasyUbuntu's ATI driver installation would mesh with a custom kernel...but I know it works pretty well with the prebuilt kernel(s) that come with Ubuntu. I would perhaps install the ATI drivers with the default kernel, and then try compiling your own after you know it's working...
To answer you question, Yes....with distros like Ubuntu, it's almost that easy. The installer holds your hand and guides you through everything you need to do, and you can even keep your old Windows partition in case you're not ready to commit;)
As for jumping through hoops to configure things, this is exactly what Automatix, or Easy Ubuntu (which I personally prefer) are there for....so you can get all the proprietary/non-free drivers and whatnot installed with little to no hassle.
So, there you have it, Linux is ready for you....are you ready for it?;)
Agreed.... as while disabling the root account is a good idea for newbs, so they don't get in the habbit of trying to use it for daily use, if you have any Linux experience it's perfectly fine to enable it.
For anyone who doesn't know, since the Slashdot article doesn't even explain what these two programs do, they setup all the restricted/proprietary stuff for the user that Ubuntu can not legally distribute by default like 3d video drivers, mp3 playback and such.
I'm pretty sure other games have had this functionality before too....this is bullsh*t. Hopefully some "prior art" creators will be contacting the patent office real soon...
Slashdot Mirror
I'm actually all for the ESRB actually being required to play the games they rate. I always thought it was silly for them to just watch an abreviated video of the game and then come up with a rating somehow. Although, on the negative side, this could easily raise the cost of getting your game rated.
What I'm particularly worried about is this government agency "over seeing" the ratings... nothing good will come from that, at least not from our current government...
"Um, seems pretty comparable to the Playstation 2, to be honest. It might be that you're buying into it more this time, or just that you're more connected to gamer buzz on the net these days."
;)
No it seems bigger than the PS2's buzz was when it came out (I should know, I was working at EB back then, during its launch). One of the key differences is that I'm seeing a lot more "non-gamers" and casual gamers that are already excited about it than there were for the PS2. And just to make it clear, No.. I'm certainly no Nintendo fan boy. Perhaps if anything, it could be just because there's a larger number of people playing games today than there were back in 2000.
I wonder if the Wii will be able to blow those numbers out of the water? (the correct numbers I mean) ;)
The hype for the Wii, silly/stupid name or not, seems bigger than any I've ever seen for a single console. DS didn't really have a huge number of early adopters, it had to prove itself to many before it really started to take off...
...don't you mean Here Wii Go! ;)
It's sad that there are such a rare few number of games that do a good combination of narrative and interaction... If only more developers and designers thought like this maybe we wouldn't have people like Roger Ebert saying that games aren't an artform :/
"Doing GUI's is not the strength of any scripting language..."
;)
This is why projects like pyGTK exist
"Underlying technology: PyPy"
I could see this Python > C++ > Machine code project being something PyPy was built on top of, but not the other way around? Please explain...
While I also suggest using some sort of local jabber server with Gaim, it'd probably be a good idea to install some sort of encryption plugin, like Off The Record, to make sure no one's intercepting conversations from the inside of the network even.
I'm well aware of the fact that a computer can only read machine code, but the whole point of the main article is whether or not it's worthwhile for programs to be written in Interpreted/JIT/Managed/whatever type languages... What something is written in, and what it is compiled/interpreted down to are two completely different things ;)
And yet there are projects in the works like PyPy, where a Python interpretor is being written in Python itself.
You need to watch the GDC video to get a good idea of the gameplay. To put it briefly, it's a universe simulator. You start off controlling a single microbial organism, and evolve it up to a cognitive level as a human brain, then you control a community of the creatures and it's sort of like sim city for a while, then you can battle other civilizations, and eventually travel to other planets...
I'm gonna lose about 3 years of my life when this comes out...
;)
I just hope that it works well with WINE
As long as they continue down their current path, the Xbox360 should do much better than the orginal Xbox. As long as they don't repeat the same mistakes.... Japanese gamers want Japanese made games (most of the time), and with things like Final Fantasy XI, the Mist Walker games and others they've announced, they may actually have a shot. Will they be number one? I seriously doubt it....they'll probably still be third place, but it shouldn't be quite as abysmal as their last go round.
PS. Just to elaborate a little more on my idea. By restricting the copyrights like that, all a buyout would accomplish is the big company obtaining the name of your company pretty much, thus making a buyout unattractive and most likely, fairly unprofittable to anyone trying to bully you through your shares.
:(
If "publishers" want to make money off the games you make, then they should invest in funding particular those particular games, not gobbling up your whole studio... Diversity in the game industry is dying out while the EA's and Microsoft's of the world are killing it with their boring in-bred sequels
Ahhh....wouldn't the world be so much better off without publicly traded companies?
;)
OK, so here's another idea. When creating your games, make sure to contract everything where the rights to any franchises and whatnot go back to the original employee who came up with them in the event that your company goes out of business or is bought by another one
Self-publishing really is the only way to go if you're an independent developer and you'd actually like to make a sizable percentage of the profits. Although I hate to use the term publish, as it has become so ambiguous in the game industry. The common perception of a "publisher" is the company who pays for the development and marketing of the game, as while the industry would be much better off if publishers just published, ie...print and distribute the physical media the games are stored on.
As for Valve, steam would be great if it were open source, cross platform, and DRM free....it's a shame no one's came up with an alternative yet...
Well, first off Easy Ubuntu is just easier....so if you're new to Linux that's a very good thing. Secondly, Easy Ubuntu strives to not mess up or change too much with your system like Automatix does. Let's just say if you do it wrong, I've heard many tales of automatix majorly screwing up people's system, while never heard to many problems from E.U. users...
Here's what I'm curious about though... If you buy a game off the Live Marketplace/Arcade/whatever... and then your Xbox dies and you have to get a new one, are you capable of redownloading all the games you already paid for again or does Microsoft want you to have to buy them all over again now?
If you installed from one of the "flight" releases (aka development snapshot), then yes...it will attempt to download the latest packages for things during installation, but if you install from a final release CD it will not download anything during the install (or at least that's how it's worked for all the prior versions). I'm pretty sure that if you were not connected to the net during installation that it would have just went with the versions found on the disc. So no, the net is not required.
Ubuntu does not setup a root password by default specifically so novice/beginner users will not use they're root account by default as many screw up and do. All you have to do to setup the password though is to goto a commandline and put in "sudo passwd" from the main account ;)
I'm not sure how EasyUbuntu's ATI driver installation would mesh with a custom kernel...but I know it works pretty well with the prebuilt kernel(s) that come with Ubuntu. I would perhaps install the ATI drivers with the default kernel, and then try compiling your own after you know it's working...
To answer you question, Yes....with distros like Ubuntu, it's almost that easy. The installer holds your hand and guides you through everything you need to do, and you can even keep your old Windows partition in case you're not ready to commit ;)
;)
As for jumping through hoops to configure things, this is exactly what Automatix, or Easy Ubuntu (which I personally prefer) are there for....so you can get all the proprietary/non-free drivers and whatnot installed with little to no hassle.
So, there you have it, Linux is ready for you....are you ready for it?
Agreed.... as while disabling the root account is a good idea for newbs, so they don't get in the habbit of trying to use it for daily use, if you have any Linux experience it's perfectly fine to enable it.
Easy Ubuntu's pretty nice as well....
For anyone who doesn't know, since the Slashdot article doesn't even explain what these two programs do, they setup all the restricted/proprietary stuff for the user that Ubuntu can not legally distribute by default like 3d video drivers, mp3 playback and such.
I'm pretty sure other games have had this functionality before too....this is bullsh*t. Hopefully some "prior art" creators will be contacting the patent office real soon...