... in the artistic style of doom 1 + 2, they could also do a lot to augment/enhance the game without breaking it. It would be interesting.
The thing that I didn't like about Doom 3 was that the original Dooms had a toon/original artistic style to them, where Doom 3 tried to be all "Realistic". Theres a part of me that wishes the game industry would go back to using it's imagination.
"The bad air quality is a prime example of an externalized cost."
This is how capitalism _works_ without any kind of subsidy, corporations always try to dump risk and externalize where they can get away with it. Note the nation debt is a form of corporate control of government allowing them to externalizing cost in the form of national debt.
Another form is offshoring, externalizing costs onto workers in one nation and saddling that nation with all the risk because the jobs aren't coming back and there is no guarantee that new jobs will be created in sufficient enough numbers to offset the losses due to technological advancement and consolidation.
"It otherwise felt like you were smoking all the time."
Kind of like in most cities. When you live away from the city for an extended period of time and then come back to it you notice how different the air quality is in all heavily populated cities. People who grow up in cities are acclimated to the level of dirtiness in the air so they don't notice it as much.
The reverse also may be true though, i.e. someone going from the city to the country side may notice the huge difference in air quality.
Sigh.. It's not about raw calculation it's about conceptual frameworks and relationships, and being taught how to observe and relate things to one another which is sorely lacking at all levels. You simply don't have the requisite wide range of understanding from many disciplines to connect the dots thats why I put the books up to begin with.
"What's the solution? Change the way teachers teach?"
Yes, but a curriculum has to be based off the research not just "changing teaching". i.e. a curriculum developed off the research itself. The whole point is that you have to teach people how to observe the world first and understand the process of "mathematization", this is the key thing, imagine you are observing a ball bouncing straight up and down in the world and you want to express and copy the relationships this ball bouncing is communicating to your senses.
This is where the observation process begins by looking at something and going over the process of conceptualization of abstractions, the whole process of conceptualization (translation) from our natural observations into any kind of abstraction we find illuminating to our particular mind (anything we want/prefer). This is the kind of stuff that is needed.
The idea that our observations of things and motion (and other things as well) must be conceptualized in a particular format is the great sin of mathematical education. Of course that's why I'm doing the research.
Then once one has the process of how to observe down and the process of conceptualization of abstractions, this can be taught finally to teachers. Since it's ultimately about observing the world and having a keen eye for how things are related to one another.
"I still think you should try to briefly elaborate on what you're talking about rather than just dumping links to books"
If it were possible I would already have done it, this is why I said it cannot be explained without BOOK LENGTH treatment.
You are still under the illusion that reasoning operates in a UNIVERSAL MANNER, the whole point in reading those books is to see that reasoning is NOT UNIVERSAL i.e. I can know things that are prefectly rational that you cannot understand given the unique configuration of your mind without time consuming conversion.
See here for commentary from a cognitive linguistics professor himself:
If you're serious about understanding what I said... It's not something that can possibly be communicated easily without book length treatment and requisite reading of a lot of literature.
Without which, you won't get it because you won't be able to see the relationships because you don't have the requisite conceptual framework in your head to see how different areas link to one another.
But It has to do with how human languages and mathematics basically use a more basic language in the mind - see: cognitive linguistics, and how our mind are able to map any arbitrary system onto any other arbitrary system of things. To be able to interpret one thing in terms of other things, which is very powerful the implications of which you will understand if you read enough.
... the way math developed and was taught is not the only way to teach "math", this is one thing that I've learned as I've grown up. And I'm still doing much research in this area.
There are better ways to teach people how to do those computations but it requires a conceptual understanding that there is not a "Set" way of thinking about "numbers" (really our alphabet for communicating distinction and differences) linking the way we naturally think with foreign languages developed by a narrow set of minds. see: Mayan numerals.
Notice how mayan numerals rerepsent themelves as geometric objects that are easily discerned at a glance versus our our highly compressed representational notation (1,2,3,4). Mayans knew that all numbers are made of distinct geometric distinctions and hence they used simple uniform geometric objects as representation to communicate numbers "at a glance", representation _matters_ to how we think about concepts and how we can use them and map them between systems of thinking that only SEEM different on the surface.
You have to understand the numbers can be rethought as natural ratio of shape and size in the real world, when we measure things in the real world we use arbitrary ratios of an object in regards to our own visual system.
For instance 357 by 289 can be broken down to
3.57 x 2.89
What you're trying to do is limited the # of elements by changing the ratio you have to see "lots of things" as merely representations of smaller scale things and things get a lot easier once you understand this principle.
The whole way math is taught is really fucked up and made for a narrow range of particular minds that function and "Get" how our mathematical system developed. If you begin studying the history of math, you realize that representation and HOW YOU THINK about how we mathematize nature matters a hell of a lot more then just throwing stuff other people figured out at kids in a symbolic format developed for a narrow subset of human minds.
Math is just a symbolic language to communicate our observation of distinctions and differences in regards to space, matter and time in the world.
"You're taking potshots at Wii games that you don't like,"
I'm not taking pot shots. I'm seriously discussing wide acknowledgement of LOWER GAME QUALITY, I must have played them to know they are of lower quality compared to past games, not only that I bought them on launch day. So please take your "fanboy defense" elsewhere. I'm trying to have a serious discussion about the merits and drawbacks of the Wii you come along taking it as a personal attack and "defend".
Perhaps you would like to see other M's Metacritic score? (79 FYI)
It's quote obvious that a lot of people are aware of the decline of many of Nintendo's franchises and the evidence is abundant on the net.
I'm not merely taking "pot shots" at these games, many gamers feel the exact same way. That the quality of games is going down in GENERAL across platforms. See: Supcom 2, Civ 5, etc, and look at user reviews and metacritic ratings.
"Wii was the first console I've bought since Atari 5200. Made a 9 year old really happy!"
I understand that but what you're referring to is demographic shift - i.e. everything old is new again, bot for long time gamers who've grown up with games, the quality has been going down and that is quite worrisome, for those who are new and whose first games are recent releases, they do not have the experience to judge what has occurred.
"It's best to ignore the echo chamber, they never learn."
It's not that the Wii was a revolution it was that most people got it for Wii sports and Wii fit. The original NES pad was more simple then the Wii mote.
The Wii has had a profitable run, but a profitable run does not mean bad things are not happening to the gaming market, the lack of games on the Wii due to not having competitive hardware power hurt its gaming library for cross platform games. Nintendo may have been profitable, but in the eyes of true gamers many of us vacated to the Xbox 360 and PS3 since once again The Wii ended up being like the gamecube, except this time the games over all are crappier and of lower quality then in the gamecube with the exception of Galaxy 1+2 era.
All of Nintendo's properties this era have been disappointing, from Metroid Other M, to Twilight princess. You can feel Nintendo is losing it's Mojo for anyone who has been playing the last 20+ years of gaming.
Gaming is about the games, not the hardware, and we have yet to see whether Wii "market expansion" means there are more gamers for developers to make money off of or if they just end up playing Wii sports / Wii fit and ignore most everything else.
... invaded gaming. Gaming used to be a hobby for those dedicated to it (would finish the games) they are the conniseurs of gaming, but the masses have infected gaming and the masses aren't really "that into games". So only those who are passionate about what games are about (challenge, systems, rules, rewards, etc) will go the extra mile because deep down they get games.
Average gamers who give up half-way through or are interrupted by life-stuff and just never get back to it just aren't all that interested in games.
This does not mean how-ever that the content is wasted. The problem with statistics and numbers is that it's used to justify cost and corner cutting an we're already seeing that in major franchises, this is only going to lead to the core abandoning gaming altogether because it's been infected by the masses who of flies who will eat shit in large numbers (Call of duty 5/6 I'm looking at you).
The games industry *IS* a hit driven business though, lets face it. In our youth we rented all the average games and only bought *the best*. The game industry model is a harsh one.
"have no reason to believe that he did not work for his money"
Don't confuse success with the laws of large numbers, the transactional volume and population size, coupled with a whole host of other hugely complicated historical factors play a large part in "earnings". There are many people more intelligent and hardworking then ballmer but do not have the same opportunities.
You are under the false impression that opportunities are not scarce, and that there are huge amount of other reasons related what one can earn in income beyond your comprehension.
"An educated nation is one that is more productive, more aware, and ultimately happier than its massively illiterate counterparts"
This assumes way too much about human nature, most human beings want to take the path of least resistance and whats emotionally and otherwise comforting. Education for the vast majority is just another job which people are happy to finish so they can enjoy their leisure time and irrational animal impulses. Only a minority enjoy work and learning for its own sake. Most people hate work.
Productivity and education with compulsion is not a recipe for a "happy productive society", North americans are some of the most productive people and yet among the most unhappy, time stressed, increasingly economically insecure and unhealthy.
Social and intimate relationships have declined and are increasingly unstable as people are obsessed with viewing social relationships through materialism, money and power. If you doubt this, see celebrity culture.
I probably sound like an elitist jerk, but the fact is, I’m right. I’m old enough to have seen it change, and it’s very clear to see. Modern games and dumbed down, because modern gamers are dumb and lazy. There is no denying it either, and unless you have played old games from the past, you can’t even appreciate it. Even 15 years ago they were very different. I remember games like the original Rainbow Siz. One shot and you were dead, game over. You also had to plan the missions out beforehand too. Look at that compared to modern games where your health is infinite and it’s constantly regenerating. You can get shot 20 times and all you do is stand by a wall for a few seconds and you are good to go again. You can then get shot another 20 times and it’s no problem. This is modern gaming, and it’s pretty pathetic.
"When I was young, everything was better. Today, everything is worse."
Except in this case it is true. In terms of gaming things are not the same. We'll take JRPG battles as a example. Final fantasy used to have a decent battle system after FF8-9 things start to go down hill startin with FF10 when weapons and armor have no stats and skills and item sets are massively reduced as well as the # of unique monsters, levels and secrets.
Old gamers can OBJECTIVELY point out where games today are inferior, that is a huge difference because they can point out what in the game that was once there but been removed due to cutting corners.
"How do I get better? Just walk around and hopefully someone misses so I can fire my weapon once?"
This is exactly what is wrong with gaming, nobody wants to put in any effort to practice getting better.
The whole point of _competitive_ multiplayer is to compete you only get better by playing people better then yourselves. The same way you build muscle by lifting weights until exhaustion.
Back in the quake days everyone got their ass handed to them and we found this FUN and together on private servers with skillful people you get better.
That's the only way to get better at games, gamers these days want a win button, and to that I say "Fuck that", if you don't like competitive multiplayer games then don't play them. Why should a developer have to dumb down FPS games for people who don't like the competitive aspect at all? I mean why not just play single player against bots on easy if you are so hard up? Seriously.
Because most blizzard fans are idiots, it's true. The connoisseurs of gaming are a minority.
Now blizzard is just running on blind fandom and demographic change, remember a lot of gamers are gamers young/new, many didn't grow up on classic games and ever since games went more mainstream the masses taste in games tends to be awful.
This is why we see first person shooter as a dominant gaming genre, and why older franchises ditched their roots - like how Fallout 3 went first person.
Not quite, Voyager started getting good after a few seasons, it took a while to ramp up their stilted acting but probably about halfway through everything starts coming together a lot better.
I was one of the ones that really disliked voyager at first as well.
... as well as software. Most operating systems and programs still operate under the assumption of hard disk IO kinds of access times and things of such nature.
The biggest problem is the interfaces aren't wide enough to give speeds that would justify buying SSD's at current prices. There needs to be a huge speed increase and interfaces and current SSD transfer rates at the present time limit that in a large way.
We need new interfaces for SSD's and have to wait a few generations of SSD's before speed justifies moving away from hard disks at all for the price premium.
Data redundancy at low cost and ease of backup matters more then speed.
Slashdot Mirror
Problem is if you have a relatively fixed IP (and many do) they can track you via IP and domain name, cookies aren't the only way to track you.
... in the artistic style of doom 1 + 2, they could also do a lot to augment/enhance the game without breaking it. It would be interesting.
The thing that I didn't like about Doom 3 was that the original Dooms had a toon/original artistic style to them, where Doom 3 tried to be all "Realistic". Theres a part of me that wishes the game industry would go back to using it's imagination.
"The bad air quality is a prime example of an externalized cost."
This is how capitalism _works_ without any kind of subsidy, corporations always try to dump risk and externalize where they can get away with it. Note the nation debt is a form of corporate control of government allowing them to externalizing cost in the form of national debt.
Another form is offshoring, externalizing costs onto workers in one nation and saddling that nation with all the risk because the jobs aren't coming back and there is no guarantee that new jobs will be created in sufficient enough numbers to offset the losses due to technological advancement and consolidation.
"It otherwise felt like you were smoking all the time."
Kind of like in most cities. When you live away from the city for an extended period of time and then come back to it you notice how different the air quality is in all heavily populated cities. People who grow up in cities are acclimated to the level of dirtiness in the air so they don't notice it as much.
The reverse also may be true though, i.e. someone going from the city to the country side may notice the huge difference in air quality.
Sigh.. It's not about raw calculation it's about conceptual frameworks and relationships, and being taught how to observe and relate things to one another which is sorely lacking at all levels. You simply don't have the requisite wide range of understanding from many disciplines to connect the dots thats why I put the books up to begin with.
"What's the solution? Change the way teachers teach?"
Yes, but a curriculum has to be based off the research not just "changing teaching". i.e. a curriculum developed off the research itself. The whole point is that you have to teach people how to observe the world first and understand the process of "mathematization", this is the key thing, imagine you are observing a ball bouncing straight up and down in the world and you want to express and copy the relationships this ball bouncing is communicating to your senses.
This is where the observation process begins by looking at something and going over the process of conceptualization of abstractions, the whole process of conceptualization (translation) from our natural observations into any kind of abstraction we find illuminating to our particular mind (anything we want/prefer). This is the kind of stuff that is needed.
The idea that our observations of things and motion (and other things as well) must be conceptualized in a particular format is the great sin of mathematical education. Of course that's why I'm doing the research.
Then once one has the process of how to observe down and the process of conceptualization of abstractions, this can be taught finally to teachers. Since it's ultimately about observing the world and having a keen eye for how things are related to one another.
"I still think you should try to briefly elaborate on what you're talking about rather than just dumping links to books"
If it were possible I would already have done it, this is why I said it cannot be explained without BOOK LENGTH treatment.
You are still under the illusion that reasoning operates in a UNIVERSAL MANNER, the whole point in reading those books is to see that reasoning is NOT UNIVERSAL i.e. I can know things that are prefectly rational that you cannot understand given the unique configuration of your mind without time consuming conversion.
See here for commentary from a cognitive linguistics professor himself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYmi0DLzBdQ
"I'm not really sure what you're getting at."
If you're serious about understanding what I said ... It's not something that can possibly be communicated easily without book length treatment and requisite reading of a lot of literature.
Without which, you won't get it because you won't be able to see the relationships because you don't have the requisite conceptual framework in your head to see how different areas link to one another.
But It has to do with how human languages and mathematics basically use a more basic language in the mind - see: cognitive linguistics, and how our mind are able to map any arbitrary system onto any other arbitrary system of things. To be able to interpret one thing in terms of other things, which is very powerful the implications of which you will understand if you read enough.
Some good books for you to read:
http://www.amazon.com/Philosophy-Flesh-Embodied-Challenge-Western/dp/0465056741/
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/presssite/metadata.epl?mode=synopsis&bookkey=3637992
http://www.amazon.com/Where-Mathematics-Comes-Embodied-Brings/dp/0465037712/
... the way math developed and was taught is not the only way to teach "math", this is one thing that I've learned as I've grown up. And I'm still doing much research in this area.
There are better ways to teach people how to do those computations but it requires a conceptual understanding that there is not a "Set" way of thinking about "numbers" (really our alphabet for communicating distinction and differences) linking the way we naturally think with foreign languages developed by a narrow set of minds. see: Mayan numerals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_numerals
Notice how mayan numerals rerepsent themelves as geometric objects that are easily discerned at a glance versus our our highly compressed representational notation (1,2,3,4). Mayans knew that all numbers are made of distinct geometric distinctions and hence they used simple uniform geometric objects as representation to communicate numbers "at a glance", representation _matters_ to how we think about concepts and how we can use them and map them between systems of thinking that only SEEM different on the surface.
You have to understand the numbers can be rethought as natural ratio of shape and size in the real world, when we measure things in the real world we use arbitrary ratios of an object in regards to our own visual system.
For instance 357 by 289 can be broken down to
3.57 x 2.89
What you're trying to do is limited the # of elements by changing the ratio you have to see "lots of things" as merely representations of smaller scale things and things get a lot easier once you understand this principle.
The whole way math is taught is really fucked up and made for a narrow range of particular minds that function and "Get" how our mathematical system developed. If you begin studying the history of math, you realize that representation and HOW YOU THINK about how we mathematize nature matters a hell of a lot more then just throwing stuff other people figured out at kids in a symbolic format developed for a narrow subset of human minds.
Math is just a symbolic language to communicate our observation of distinctions and differences in regards to space, matter and time in the world.
"You're taking potshots at Wii games that you don't like,"
I'm not taking pot shots. I'm seriously discussing wide acknowledgement of LOWER GAME QUALITY, I must have played them to know they are of lower quality compared to past games, not only that I bought them on launch day. So please take your "fanboy defense" elsewhere. I'm trying to have a serious discussion about the merits and drawbacks of the Wii you come along taking it as a personal attack and "defend".
Perhaps you would like to see other M's Metacritic score? (79 FYI)
http://www.metacritic.com/game/wii/metroid-other-m
It's quote obvious that a lot of people are aware of the decline of many of Nintendo's franchises and the evidence is abundant on the net.
I'm not merely taking "pot shots" at these games, many gamers feel the exact same way. That the quality of games is going down in GENERAL across platforms. See: Supcom 2, Civ 5, etc, and look at user reviews and metacritic ratings.
"Wii was the first console I've bought since Atari 5200. Made a 9 year old really happy!"
I understand that but what you're referring to is demographic shift - i.e. everything old is new again, bot for long time gamers who've grown up with games, the quality has been going down and that is quite worrisome, for those who are new and whose first games are recent releases, they do not have the experience to judge what has occurred.
"It's best to ignore the echo chamber, they never learn."
It's not that the Wii was a revolution it was that most people got it for Wii sports and Wii fit. The original NES pad was more simple then the Wii mote.
The Wii has had a profitable run, but a profitable run does not mean bad things are not happening to the gaming market, the lack of games on the Wii due to not having competitive hardware power hurt its gaming library for cross platform games. Nintendo may have been profitable, but in the eyes of true gamers many of us vacated to the Xbox 360 and PS3 since once again The Wii ended up being like the gamecube, except this time the games over all are crappier and of lower quality then in the gamecube with the exception of Galaxy 1+2 era.
All of Nintendo's properties this era have been disappointing, from Metroid Other M, to Twilight princess. You can feel Nintendo is losing it's Mojo for anyone who has been playing the last 20+ years of gaming.
Gaming is about the games, not the hardware, and we have yet to see whether Wii "market expansion" means there are more gamers for developers to make money off of or if they just end up playing Wii sports / Wii fit and ignore most everything else.
... invaded gaming. Gaming used to be a hobby for those dedicated to it (would finish the games) they are the conniseurs of gaming, but the masses have infected gaming and the masses aren't really "that into games". So only those who are passionate about what games are about (challenge, systems, rules, rewards, etc) will go the extra mile because deep down they get games.
Average gamers who give up half-way through or are interrupted by life-stuff and just never get back to it just aren't all that interested in games.
This does not mean how-ever that the content is wasted. The problem with statistics and numbers is that it's used to justify cost and corner cutting an we're already seeing that in major franchises, this is only going to lead to the core abandoning gaming altogether because it's been infected by the masses who of flies who will eat shit in large numbers (Call of duty 5/6 I'm looking at you).
The games industry *IS* a hit driven business though, lets face it. In our youth we rented all the average games and only bought *the best*. The game industry model is a harsh one.
"have no reason to believe that he did not work for his money"
Don't confuse success with the laws of large numbers, the transactional volume and population size, coupled with a whole host of other hugely complicated historical factors play a large part in "earnings". There are many people more intelligent and hardworking then ballmer but do not have the same opportunities.
You are under the false impression that opportunities are not scarce, and that there are huge amount of other reasons related what one can earn in income beyond your comprehension.
"An educated nation is one that is more productive, more aware, and ultimately happier than its massively illiterate counterparts"
This assumes way too much about human nature, most human beings want to take the path of least resistance and whats emotionally and otherwise comforting. Education for the vast majority is just another job which people are happy to finish so they can enjoy their leisure time and irrational animal impulses. Only a minority enjoy work and learning for its own sake. Most people hate work.
Productivity and education with compulsion is not a recipe for a "happy productive society", North americans are some of the most productive people and yet among the most unhappy, time stressed, increasingly economically insecure and unhealthy.
Social and intimate relationships have declined and are increasingly unstable as people are obsessed with viewing social relationships through materialism, money and power. If you doubt this, see celebrity culture.
"Now we just need to enforce it rather than ignore it."
Money buys laws. So it's little better then democracy since it's the money democracy (Free market) that allows law to be bought and sold.
I probably sound like an elitist jerk, but the fact is, I’m right. I’m old enough to have seen it change, and it’s very clear to see. Modern games and dumbed down, because modern gamers are dumb and lazy. There is no denying it either, and unless you have played old games from the past, you can’t even appreciate it. Even 15 years ago they were very different. I remember games like the original Rainbow Siz. One shot and you were dead, game over. You also had to plan the missions out beforehand too. Look at that compared to modern games where your health is infinite and it’s constantly regenerating. You can get shot 20 times and all you do is stand by a wall for a few seconds and you are good to go again. You can then get shot another 20 times and it’s no problem. This is modern gaming, and it’s pretty pathetic.
"But you don't start with a weight that you can't lift for even one repetitions"
Apples to oranges, they are not comparable.
"When I was young, everything was better. Today, everything is worse."
Except in this case it is true. In terms of gaming things are not the same. We'll take JRPG battles as a example. Final fantasy used to have a decent battle system after FF8-9 things start to go down hill startin with FF10 when weapons and armor have no stats and skills and item sets are massively reduced as well as the # of unique monsters, levels and secrets.
Old gamers can OBJECTIVELY point out where games today are inferior, that is a huge difference because they can point out what in the game that was once there but been removed due to cutting corners.
BIG DIFFERENCE.
"How do I get better? Just walk around and hopefully someone misses so I can fire my weapon once?"
This is exactly what is wrong with gaming, nobody wants to put in any effort to practice getting better.
The whole point of _competitive_ multiplayer is to compete you only get better by playing people better then yourselves. The same way you build muscle by lifting weights until exhaustion.
Back in the quake days everyone got their ass handed to them and we found this FUN and together on private servers with skillful people you get better.
That's the only way to get better at games, gamers these days want a win button, and to that I say "Fuck that", if you don't like competitive multiplayer games then don't play them. Why should a developer have to dumb down FPS games for people who don't like the competitive aspect at all? I mean why not just play single player against bots on easy if you are so hard up? Seriously.
The whole point of fun is challenge.
Because most blizzard fans are idiots, it's true. The connoisseurs of gaming are a minority.
Now blizzard is just running on blind fandom and demographic change, remember a lot of gamers are gamers young/new, many didn't grow up on classic games and ever since games went more mainstream the masses taste in games tends to be awful.
This is why we see first person shooter as a dominant gaming genre, and why older franchises ditched their roots - like how Fallout 3 went first person.
Not quite, Voyager started getting good after a few seasons, it took a while to ramp up their stilted acting but probably about halfway through everything starts coming together a lot better.
I was one of the ones that really disliked voyager at first as well.
... as well as software. Most operating systems and programs still operate under the assumption of hard disk IO kinds of access times and things of such nature.
The biggest problem is the interfaces aren't wide enough to give speeds that would justify buying SSD's at current prices. There needs to be a huge speed increase and interfaces and current SSD transfer rates at the present time limit that in a large way.
We need new interfaces for SSD's and have to wait a few generations of SSD's before speed justifies moving away from hard disks at all for the price premium.
Data redundancy at low cost and ease of backup matters more then speed.
"Blizzard literally took away people's games for not playing them in the way they decided was right."
Businesses are tyrannies after all.