It's still available, and it's not that distracting. More - why would you think it's horribly distracting in a car, but all forms of military aircraft use it and it's beneficial there? The idea is so that you don't have to look away from the road to see important info like shift point, tach, and speed.
Do something, especially if you can think of something constructive that may help. But please, do NOT tie yourself into this so much that it takes you down as well. Many times I have seen people fighting addictions - drugs, alcohol, compulsive gambling, and yes religious cults and video games. I've also seen many cases where the people who care about the addict go through a hell almost as bad as the addict themselves, running on a combination of guilt and disappointment and a lot of other factors when the "treatments" don't work immediately or at all. Yes, he has a problem. Make sure it stays as HIS problem, and doesn't become your crusade.
And then the Neo Geo was spawned, where we all found out that there is indeed an upper limit to what the "average gamer" is willing to pay.
You know, this is an attitude that ticks me off that is being championed. "Ganers" do not have unlimited wallets or the desire to have those wallets vacuumed. Yes, I am willing to pay more for hardware or software that is substantially different or more advanced. No, I am not willing to pay more for something that is extremely similar but has a "gamer" label slapped on it. Sound cards and system cases are not inherently better because of a blue LED and the word "Gamer" in the title.
Just put out a quality product, compete in the market, and gamers will notice and buy your stuff. Promise.
I always wondered why for what was supposed to be Toys R'Us online presence, you could generally find the same crap cheaper through the same website. Interesting to hear; interesting how long it will take TRU to get their act together and start selling themselves.
On the other hand, after Master of Orion 1 and Master of Orion 2, my friends and I were all desperately waiting for MoO3. As far as I'm concerned, I'm still waiting, and I seriously will be reading reviews and looking for demos before I hand over money for anything else based on the series. Once burned, etc etc etc
Absolutely bugfree code is expensive, yes, and the cost of developing code ramps up as you attempt to make the "bug rate" lower... however, console games have been out for years. While there are some very well-known examples of bugs in consoles, and I acknowledge that console games by nature are simpler.. the overall quality that is expected and received of console games tends to be higher, IMHO. Having the safety line of "ship it and we'll patch it later" encourages shipping code with glaring errors and inadequate testing. In many cases, you can argue that the customers ARE the beta testers even though they've paid for a gold product. That isn't right.
If you drive long distances often enough, you will inevitably find that sometimes you start to nod off or even fall asleep. Yes, this can result in accidents. No, I'm not condoning sleeping at the wheel or driving will tired in the first place. But the accidents are far less common than you'd think - ask any long distance driver and they'll tell you about ten times more close calls than actual crashes. Just saying. And driving with your eyes off the road isn't even as intrusive as this scenario, because you can still hold the car in a lane and hold your speed relatively steady while doing so.
"This is not 'real'. In real live the heavy would take on the heavy and the low levels would take on lower level enemies. One on One. Just imagine how different fights would look. Rather then a dozen models all meshed together they would be spread out more. Rather like a big fight in the movies."
What real fights do you watch, where people end up slugging it out one on one? Beatdowns in the street are usually gang vs solo. Police and other people trained to fight wait until they have overwhelming numbers before going in to subdue even the weakest prisoner. Military tactics emphasize dropping one enemy through mass fire before turning to engage others. Even barfights turn out to be "gang up on one guy" rather than the bare knuckles stuff you see on TV. Your last line says it best, there - "Rather like a big fight in the movies" That's because movies need to be entertaining, not realistic.
Funny, my real job is as a nurse, and though I count myself as a nerd I still see CAD as Coronary Artery Disease before I think of the other applications.
And yet it is an analogy, because while we all know and understand how much a floppy will hold in sheer terms of physical memory size, your average user knows how much a floppy will hold in terms of "about this many files". For instance, my mom - who is a fledgling user - knows that her collection of "papers" from a month at work generally fits onto three floppies. She doesn't recognize that there's 20k left on each disk - she just drags and drops until "the thing says" that the disk is full. Same concept - if she knew that each USB key was about 16 floppies, she could deduce that she would be able to pull around 5 months of work using the simple equation:
In New Jersey, USA there are several laws regarding the possession of the physical documents when operating a vehicle... doesn't matter if you can hand draw a beautiful rendition of your license including the picture done in charcoal, you'll still get hit with a $180 ticket for not being able to present the actual license, registration, and insurance card on demand.
Then they can start signing the loyalty oaths to get to the mess tent... I do so love it when the world starts emulating something that was once a "dystopian nightmare"
Hi, my name is Ray and I'm a Comcast Cable Modem user. For my basic forty beans a month I get a decently fast cable connection, but they stick me with a dynamic IP. The bottom two levels of Comcast's business choices don't even offer static - you have to go to "Enhanced" which is 200/month. I used to like running an FTP server sometimes, but it's just a PITA now for anything except my own personal uses.
If you agree with the ideas, but not the delivery, check out a little book called "1984" where the televisions are also cameras into the home. Don't think it's possible? Give them an opportunity. Call it "your own personal trainer who will comment on your workout style" and see how many people will jump at the chance. Systems are never put in with the abuse marketed on the front, it's snuck in through a back door once everyone loves the overt attack. For further info, reference the car-rental company that surcharged people who speed, or the infamous "EZ-Pass" system and the idea of issuing violations based on time / distance. Or the Pentium 3 chips that debuted with an identifier chip so websites could see who was visiting. Or the public cameras that are "just there to catch criminals". Etc etc etc .
I was at Verizon's store today, and witnessed one of the counter guys saying that everything from a phone that randomly turned off to poor signal reception to a BROKEN LCD were all from "overcharging the battery". Four people in a row got this line about how you should only charge the phone for four hours even if you have a trickle charger because overcharging the battery evidently is responsible for the Earth spinning out of orbit and crashing into the sun. Arrrgh.
You aren't? Funny, every time I see MS getting closer and closer to Skynet I cringe. "Where do I want to take you today?" is only a few years off. And trust me, Bill would LOVE to plant a little spy in your house that could go screaming back to him if you run a pirated Office or god forbid, you're one of those stinking Mac users.
I really don't see a downside to the project... if you had a few people you trusted to help upgrade the systems, you could assembly line the upgrade and get things up and running in a couple weekends. The only things that I would see as a concern would be the age of power supplies, hard drives, etc. But if you do regular backups, that risk is minimized.
I still want the one that Tim Taylor installed for Tool Time... that's more a "bathroom system" than just a toilet, though, complete with high pressure steam cleaning EVERY surface... cause some people can't aim, y'know. Besides, it looked cool.
Congratulations, guys... always nice to see people find each other for that moment of happiness. Everyone, you realize this is going to be printed out and shown off at the reception, right? Be nice to them!
PS - next time, maybe hide the cleavage shot before proposing... it seems to be the most popular part of her site at the moment....
My biggest problem with FFX is that so far, I've played about an hour and a half into it and I've had maybe - four battles. An hour and a half into it and I've been in control of the character maybe fifteen minutes. I like pretty CGI as much as the next guy, but this is suffering from Metal Gear Solid 2-itis so far and it's irritating me.
I sincerely hope there will be a way to turn OFF the portion of the program that transmits your coordinates at any given time. Standard GPS receivers don't transmit anything, so you get the useful information without having to give up your location. But the day when my cell phone becomes a stool pigeon to my every activity is the day I go back to two cans and a string. Beyond just government things (which are bad enough) could you imagine, say, some criminals learning your code and finding out how close you are to your car or house so they can rob you? How about the stalker guy/girl being able to track your daily movements? How about your boss finding out that you go hang out at strip clubs on your lunch break? Any of these things COULD happen if you have the GPS receiver connected to a transmitter like they describe.
"Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get me."
Here's something that I've not heard mentioned at all - does anyone make or plan to make some sort of a module that could connect to either a laptop HD or a standard IDE drive, and let you play media files on it? With drive prices as cheap as they are, I'd be pretty happy with having something that clipped onto a normal, full size IDE drive and played the media files contained within. Then, you could unclip that module and plug it back into your home IDE channel in your system to transfer files, etc.
Yeah, that law is still valid... HOWEVER, if someone is prosecuted under that law, their defense could be that the law is unconstitutional. In that case, the various levels of courts have to agree/disagree until it reaches the Supreme Court and could be overturned.
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It's still available, and it's not that distracting. More - why would you think it's horribly distracting in a car, but all forms of military aircraft use it and it's beneficial there? The idea is so that you don't have to look away from the road to see important info like shift point, tach, and speed.
Do something, especially if you can think of something constructive that may help. But please, do NOT tie yourself into this so much that it takes you down as well. Many times I have seen people fighting addictions - drugs, alcohol, compulsive gambling, and yes religious cults and video games. I've also seen many cases where the people who care about the addict go through a hell almost as bad as the addict themselves, running on a combination of guilt and disappointment and a lot of other factors when the "treatments" don't work immediately or at all. Yes, he has a problem. Make sure it stays as HIS problem, and doesn't become your crusade.
And then the Neo Geo was spawned, where we all found out that there is indeed an upper limit to what the "average gamer" is willing to pay.
You know, this is an attitude that ticks me off that is being championed. "Ganers" do not have unlimited wallets or the desire to have those wallets vacuumed. Yes, I am willing to pay more for hardware or software that is substantially different or more advanced. No, I am not willing to pay more for something that is extremely similar but has a "gamer" label slapped on it. Sound cards and system cases are not inherently better because of a blue LED and the word "Gamer" in the title.
Just put out a quality product, compete in the market, and gamers will notice and buy your stuff. Promise.
As a dedicated Kevin Smith fan, I thought they meant A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi. My bad.
I always wondered why for what was supposed to be Toys R'Us online presence, you could generally find the same crap cheaper through the same website. Interesting to hear; interesting how long it will take TRU to get their act together and start selling themselves.
On the other hand, after Master of Orion 1 and Master of Orion 2, my friends and I were all desperately waiting for MoO3. As far as I'm concerned, I'm still waiting, and I seriously will be reading reviews and looking for demos before I hand over money for anything else based on the series. Once burned, etc etc etc
Absolutely bugfree code is expensive, yes, and the cost of developing code ramps up as you attempt to make the "bug rate" lower... however, console games have been out for years. While there are some very well-known examples of bugs in consoles, and I acknowledge that console games by nature are simpler.. the overall quality that is expected and received of console games tends to be higher, IMHO. Having the safety line of "ship it and we'll patch it later" encourages shipping code with glaring errors and inadequate testing. In many cases, you can argue that the customers ARE the beta testers even though they've paid for a gold product. That isn't right.
If you drive long distances often enough, you will inevitably find that sometimes you start to nod off or even fall asleep. Yes, this can result in accidents. No, I'm not condoning sleeping at the wheel or driving will tired in the first place. But the accidents are far less common than you'd think - ask any long distance driver and they'll tell you about ten times more close calls than actual crashes. Just saying. And driving with your eyes off the road isn't even as intrusive as this scenario, because you can still hold the car in a lane and hold your speed relatively steady while doing so.
"This is not 'real'. In real live the heavy would take on the heavy and the low levels would take on lower level enemies. One on One. Just imagine how different fights would look. Rather then a dozen models all meshed together they would be spread out more. Rather like a big fight in the movies."
What real fights do you watch, where people end up slugging it out one on one? Beatdowns in the street are usually gang vs solo. Police and other people trained to fight wait until they have overwhelming numbers before going in to subdue even the weakest prisoner. Military tactics emphasize dropping one enemy through mass fire before turning to engage others. Even barfights turn out to be "gang up on one guy" rather than the bare knuckles stuff you see on TV. Your last line says it best, there - "Rather like a big fight in the movies" That's because movies need to be entertaining, not realistic.
Funny, my real job is as a nurse, and though I count myself as a nerd I still see CAD as Coronary Artery Disease before I think of the other applications.
And yet it is an analogy, because while we all know and understand how much a floppy will hold in sheer terms of physical memory size, your average user knows how much a floppy will hold in terms of "about this many files". For instance, my mom - who is a fledgling user - knows that her collection of "papers" from a month at work generally fits onto three floppies. She doesn't recognize that there's 20k left on each disk - she just drags and drops until "the thing says" that the disk is full. Same concept - if she knew that each USB key was about 16 floppies, she could deduce that she would be able to pull around 5 months of work using the simple equation:
1 month = 3 floppies
1 USB = 16 floppies.
16 / 3 = 5 months.
No silly k or Mb needed.
In New Jersey, USA there are several laws regarding the possession of the physical documents when operating a vehicle... doesn't matter if you can hand draw a beautiful rendition of your license including the picture done in charcoal, you'll still get hit with a $180 ticket for not being able to present the actual license, registration, and insurance card on demand.
Then they can start signing the loyalty oaths to get to the mess tent... I do so love it when the world starts emulating something that was once a "dystopian nightmare"
Hi, my name is Ray and I'm a Comcast Cable Modem user. For my basic forty beans a month I get a decently fast cable connection, but they stick me with a dynamic IP. The bottom two levels of Comcast's business choices don't even offer static - you have to go to "Enhanced" which is 200/month. I used to like running an FTP server sometimes, but it's just a PITA now for anything except my own personal uses.
If you agree with the ideas, but not the delivery, check out a little book called "1984" where the televisions are also cameras into the home. Don't think it's possible? Give them an opportunity. Call it "your own personal trainer who will comment on your workout style" and see how many people will jump at the chance. Systems are never put in with the abuse marketed on the front, it's snuck in through a back door once everyone loves the overt attack. For further info, reference the car-rental company that surcharged people who speed, or the infamous "EZ-Pass" system and the idea of issuing violations based on time / distance. Or the Pentium 3 chips that debuted with an identifier chip so websites could see who was visiting. Or the public cameras that are "just there to catch criminals". Etc etc etc .
I was at Verizon's store today, and witnessed one of the counter guys saying that everything from a phone that randomly turned off to poor signal reception to a BROKEN LCD were all from "overcharging the battery". Four people in a row got this line about how you should only charge the phone for four hours even if you have a trickle charger because overcharging the battery evidently is responsible for the Earth spinning out of orbit and crashing into the sun. Arrrgh.
You aren't? Funny, every time I see MS getting closer and closer to Skynet I cringe. "Where do I want to take you today?" is only a few years off. And trust me, Bill would LOVE to plant a little spy in your house that could go screaming back to him if you run a pirated Office or god forbid, you're one of those stinking Mac users.
I'll pay shipping, definitely drop me an email.
I really don't see a downside to the project... if you had a few people you trusted to help upgrade the systems, you could assembly line the upgrade and get things up and running in a couple weekends. The only things that I would see as a concern would be the age of power supplies, hard drives, etc. But if you do regular backups, that risk is minimized.
I still want the one that Tim Taylor installed for Tool Time... that's more a "bathroom system" than just a toilet, though, complete with high pressure steam cleaning EVERY surface... cause some people can't aim, y'know. Besides, it looked cool.
Congratulations, guys... always nice to see people find each other for that moment of happiness. Everyone, you realize this is going to be printed out and shown off at the reception, right? Be nice to them!
PS - next time, maybe hide the cleavage shot before proposing... it seems to be the most popular part of her site at the moment....
My biggest problem with FFX is that so far, I've played about an hour and a half into it and I've had maybe - four battles. An hour and a half into it and I've been in control of the character maybe fifteen minutes. I like pretty CGI as much as the next guy, but this is suffering from Metal Gear Solid 2-itis so far and it's irritating me.
I sincerely hope there will be a way to turn OFF the portion of the program that transmits your coordinates at any given time. Standard GPS receivers don't transmit anything, so you get the useful information without having to give up your location. But the day when my cell phone becomes a stool pigeon to my every activity is the day I go back to two cans and a string. Beyond just government things (which are bad enough) could you imagine, say, some criminals learning your code and finding out how close you are to your car or house so they can rob you? How about the stalker guy/girl being able to track your daily movements? How about your boss finding out that you go hang out at strip clubs on your lunch break? Any of these things COULD happen if you have the GPS receiver connected to a transmitter like they describe.
"Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get me."
Here's something that I've not heard mentioned at all - does anyone make or plan to make some sort of a module that could connect to either a laptop HD or a standard IDE drive, and let you play media files on it? With drive prices as cheap as they are, I'd be pretty happy with having something that clipped onto a normal, full size IDE drive and played the media files contained within. Then, you could unclip that module and plug it back into your home IDE channel in your system to transfer files, etc.
Yeah, that law is still valid... HOWEVER, if someone is prosecuted under that law, their defense could be that the law is unconstitutional. In that case, the various levels of courts have to agree/disagree until it reaches the Supreme Court and could be overturned.