Some 2D games provided non-linearity. You could take many routes and finish the game how you wanted. In some games like Commander Keen you could go around picking the maps you want first. Today's Prince of Persia is similiar to this in a way but the length of exploration puts you off.
Those games had a variety of environments with different characteristics which changed quite easily. Partly because the designers thought it would be cool to have a lava or snow level. Dungeon Siege I brought in elements from this and is partly a reason why I enjoyed that particular game.
2D platform games didnt provide repetitive, mundane, exploratory tasks. Many games had nice challenges in every segment of the level. But partly some segments were really hard to play and if they didn't have a save feature, you'd be put off by them. Some people however like this feature and say that it gives you a sense of achievement when you finish them.
2D games provided different, weird characters. Not weird like the scary creatures in Quake 4, but funny, entertaining and weird. They weren't like Quake where you had to gnash one monster after another. You wouldn't be too involved in trying to kill an imp that would jump out from nowhere.
The level characters are easy to play. Not like Quake where you have to keep firing at a creature and not get nuked by it. This makes 2D games unrealistic but somewhat easier to play. The bosses were hard to play. And you had to think how to hit the boss. Mostly today's bosses just have a huge amount of health points. That sucks.
2D games had level physics which you could enjoy, experience while jumping, flying or swimming. It doesnt feel the same way in 3D games.
The games were bright and lively. Not sophisticated lighting in dark rooms. It had a feel good factor to it. For example, many people might prefer Quake 4 to Doom 3.
2D games were small, didn't demand too many things. They were and are fun to make. Nobody needs to spend a fortune creating the characters or textures or environments in a 2D game. Nobody needs to spend involve themselves in advanced graphics techniques which involve shaders and lighting and what not. It's not something many programmers would like to handle. Even the most advanced 2D games are simpler to program. Today, an individual with MS Paint (or the more advanced GIMP) and a free compiler (C/C++/C#/Pascal or whatever) can create a simple 2D game which he can play, share with his friends and distribute. This isn't possible with a professional 3D game anymore.
Today, 3D games with a lot of realistic visuals always compromise on realistic physics for playability. Which brings me to the point that 2D games defined how 3D games must be played. The amount of complexity needed in rendering a 3D game doesnt justify its' playability.2D games were always about playability.
Well. Being from a university myself, these are my observations and opinions:
A. You can not stop students from "bad" content. The internet isn't the ONLY source of all this. You can't really stop people from going outside IITB, and you wouldn't want to ransack every visitor at the gate.
B. I am not sure if the argument is against copyrighted content, but otherwise, I definitely believe that students must be given the freedom to watch what they have and what they want. And doing this ransacking business makes the university look terribly cheap. The students should at least get together and sue, i'd say!
C. Having tight firewalls and proxies is a great way to limit access to the internet. But refer to point A.
D. A lot of institutions have lately come up with sandboxing students' interests in the excuse of increasing productivity (if by that you mean jail time or slave labor, sure). It has the risk of making students go mad in line with notorious university schedules. And a lot of students are definitely not into sports nor into geek entertainment, if you're making a point about friendlier alternatives. It just doesn't work.
E. For those who would want to get deep into religious beliefs, hinduism couldn't care less if your child did the "wrong" thing at the right time. It does go against foolish, ignorant and orthodox people who can't reason why they do what they do. And by suppressing your child more, you'll only force him/her into rebellion, causing more damage than otherwise.
F. The only real way to stop it all is if students by themselves learn to regulate their lives. It is not going to work by suppressing them. It actually works the other way round.
CPUs are inherently good at doing serial jobs. and GPUs are good at doing parallel jobs.
GPUs can be though of as the extreme enhanced graphical equivalent of DSP chips.
So basically, any combination of a controlling and parallel execution processor can give you the supercomputing
environment you need. Which again brings us back to our traditional supercomputing model; Except for one change, that the mathematical units have grown faster and massively parallel in nature!
We haven't done much past anything turing computable anyway: chips growing faster, doing the same thing.
So, you first had the CPU. Then you wanted faster graphics. So you seperate it and have the GPU (which is more than a video adapter). Then you want faster computation. So you put it together ('cept the video adapter). It's crazy, but they keep shuffling things over the years, people aren't bored of it anyway, everybody buys stuff and everybody wins.
Now again: what does a GPU do that a CPU can't?
A game engine usually consists of many components including the graphics engine. While many people have pointed out Ogre as a game engine, it is to be noted that Ogre does not claim to be a game engine in itself. It only strives to do what it does best: Graphics.
Yake, on the other hand, integrates Ogre and ODE (a physics engine)
Ideally, today's games require that a game engine would need these components:
Slashdot Mirror
Harry Potter? Fuck it.
Some 2D games provided non-linearity. You could take many routes and finish the game how you wanted. In some games like Commander Keen you could go around picking the maps you want first. Today's Prince of Persia is similiar to this in a way but the length of exploration puts you off. Those games had a variety of environments with different characteristics which changed quite easily. Partly because the designers thought it would be cool to have a lava or snow level. Dungeon Siege I brought in elements from this and is partly a reason why I enjoyed that particular game. 2D platform games didnt provide repetitive, mundane, exploratory tasks. Many games had nice challenges in every segment of the level. But partly some segments were really hard to play and if they didn't have a save feature, you'd be put off by them. Some people however like this feature and say that it gives you a sense of achievement when you finish them. 2D games provided different, weird characters. Not weird like the scary creatures in Quake 4, but funny, entertaining and weird. They weren't like Quake where you had to gnash one monster after another. You wouldn't be too involved in trying to kill an imp that would jump out from nowhere. The level characters are easy to play. Not like Quake where you have to keep firing at a creature and not get nuked by it. This makes 2D games unrealistic but somewhat easier to play. The bosses were hard to play. And you had to think how to hit the boss. Mostly today's bosses just have a huge amount of health points. That sucks. 2D games had level physics which you could enjoy, experience while jumping, flying or swimming. It doesnt feel the same way in 3D games. The games were bright and lively. Not sophisticated lighting in dark rooms. It had a feel good factor to it. For example, many people might prefer Quake 4 to Doom 3. 2D games were small, didn't demand too many things. They were and are fun to make. Nobody needs to spend a fortune creating the characters or textures or environments in a 2D game. Nobody needs to spend involve themselves in advanced graphics techniques which involve shaders and lighting and what not. It's not something many programmers would like to handle. Even the most advanced 2D games are simpler to program. Today, an individual with MS Paint (or the more advanced GIMP) and a free compiler (C/C++/C#/Pascal or whatever) can create a simple 2D game which he can play, share with his friends and distribute. This isn't possible with a professional 3D game anymore. Today, 3D games with a lot of realistic visuals always compromise on realistic physics for playability. Which brings me to the point that 2D games defined how 3D games must be played. The amount of complexity needed in rendering a 3D game doesnt justify its' playability.2D games were always about playability.
Anybody could buy SGI for peanuts.
I had preordered one :-) thanks to a slashdot post
I'm sure there is an explanation for the remaining 74c.
they are paranoid about losing money.
maybe 'take it as a truckload of crap', perhaps? :-)
or put it up on their site for 15 cents a song, they'd earn way more than they do now. I mean, as of now, is RIAA of any value to the society at all?
A. You can not stop students from "bad" content. The internet isn't the ONLY source of all this. You can't really stop people from going outside IITB, and you wouldn't want to ransack every visitor at the gate.
B. I am not sure if the argument is against copyrighted content, but otherwise, I definitely believe that students must be given the freedom to watch what they have and what they want. And doing this ransacking business makes the university look terribly cheap. The students should at least get together and sue, i'd say!
C. Having tight firewalls and proxies is a great way to limit access to the internet. But refer to point A.
D. A lot of institutions have lately come up with sandboxing students' interests in the excuse of increasing productivity (if by that you mean jail time or slave labor, sure). It has the risk of making students go mad in line with notorious university schedules. And a lot of students are definitely not into sports nor into geek entertainment, if you're making a point about friendlier alternatives. It just doesn't work.
E. For those who would want to get deep into religious beliefs, hinduism couldn't care less if your child did the "wrong" thing at the right time. It does go against foolish, ignorant and orthodox people who can't reason why they do what they do. And by suppressing your child more, you'll only force him/her into rebellion, causing more damage than otherwise. F. The only real way to stop it all is if students by themselves learn to regulate their lives. It is not going to work by suppressing them. It actually works the other way round.
I'm sorry but that link didn't work. This one should.
Just before reading this, I happened to receive a Sun newsletter, with something about Xeon-fried chicken. Can't believe it's all reduced to this!
CPUs are inherently good at doing serial jobs. and GPUs are good at doing parallel jobs. GPUs can be though of as the extreme enhanced graphical equivalent of DSP chips. So basically, any combination of a controlling and parallel execution processor can give you the supercomputing environment you need. Which again brings us back to our traditional supercomputing model; Except for one change, that the mathematical units have grown faster and massively parallel in nature! We haven't done much past anything turing computable anyway: chips growing faster, doing the same thing. So, you first had the CPU. Then you wanted faster graphics. So you seperate it and have the GPU (which is more than a video adapter). Then you want faster computation. So you put it together ('cept the video adapter). It's crazy, but they keep shuffling things over the years, people aren't bored of it anyway, everybody buys stuff and everybody wins. Now again: what does a GPU do that a CPU can't?
A game engine usually consists of many components including the graphics engine. While many people have pointed out Ogre as a game engine, it is to be noted that Ogre does not claim to be a game engine in itself. It only strives to do what it does best: Graphics.
.. you may call that a game engine. :)
Yake, on the other hand, integrates Ogre and ODE (a physics engine)
Ideally, today's games require that a game engine would need these components:
1. Graphics engine
2. Sound engine
3. AI/Gameplay/Scripting engines
4. Common Client/Server/Game framework
5. Networking
6. Physics (someone saw Novodex/PhysX coming? )
7. Content Creation / Editing / Deployment Tools
Optionally:
8. Dedicated server (web apps) for multiplayer games
So, if you've put all of them together