As a computer scientist, you also realize that you're putting yourself at the mercy of *TWO* development teams, and *TWO* release schedules in the event that a major exploit or bug is found? In theory it's a good way to ensure security, but it also means that you have to wait for Motorola to release an update that Google patched and released already.
I think what you're getting at is that Rock Band gives you the "benefit" of feeling like you're playing the guitar without nearly the amount of effort that the real guitar takes.
The thing is, learning other people's songs is still just learning other people's songs. The people who play Rock Band aren't going to cut into the profits of those who play real instruments, and they aren't going to make actual guitarists any worse at their instruments.
So while it does seem to give people the illusion that they can approach actual guitar skills, they still can't pick up a guitar and start making music without putting the same kind of effort in as a real musician. I don't think anybody has anything to worry about.
There are actually some pretty good open source engines out there these days.
That said, this is yet another case of the "vicious cycle". Modders make mods mostly to catch a break. Every modder hopes to be part of the next team that makes it big. The best way to do that is to go where the players are. And sadly, the players aren't really playing on Linux.
I hold high hopes that when Source hits linux, that a whole slew of HL2 mods will become linux native, and people will get used to the idea of programming games for linux.
And ultimately, as you say, assets are a problem. Most artists I've met aren't terribly keen on making art for free, much less providing license for anybody and everybody to use their art as they see fit.
You don't have to live *in* a city. I live 30 miles away from my nearest city as a crow flies, but an actual 50 miles by interstate. I've invested in a $30 antenna at my local cheap brick-and-mortar, and have amazing HDTV reception.
Also, I have fairly cheap DSL. It's only 3 megabit per second. But it's fast enough to watch Hulu, and it's fast enough for Netflix on Demand. To be honest, there are times where we're not in the mood to watch whatever's on, or to watch a movie on Netflix. But that's not any different than having 160 channels for $80 bucks a month, and STILL being bored with television.
Moving off of Cable/Sattelite is just smart these days. There are cheaper alternatives. And you can pick and choose what you want, on your own time, instead of wasting time trying to find something to watch.
I noticed this story on Endgadget a few days ago, and they mentioned Microsoft in the blurb. But I don't really see that connection in the video, or in this article.
So did Microsoft fund this?
The article notes that the accuracy of input origin is within 95%. So casual bumps shouldn't work, considering the input is in the inside of your arm.
Hand input is trickier of course, but maybe you can set the sensitivity pretty low, so casual taps wouldn't work?
I figure all the time. It's good business to keep track of your competitors.
Or, alternatively, it's always tempting to read the bad press about whatever you're working on, so you can set the record straight when people (invariably) misunderstand you.
Does "You can't legally sign away any of your basic freedoms in a contract" hold true in Canada as well? Remember, the story isn't about something going on in the U.S.
I think that Blizzard approached this from a business standpoint rather than a "100% fair to everyone and true to real life" standpoint.
Consider: 1: This decision takes far fewer man hours to police than it would to police the trolls and attackers. Fewer man hours means fewer men, and thus fewer GMs you have to pay. 2: Blizzard makes everyone agree to a EULA, and they own your character and are able to set all rules and interpret them as they wish. And while anyone can argue and point their fingers, Blizzard still has millions of subscribers and will still make a hojillion dollars. If everyone started quitting WoW they might change their stance (since it hits them where it hurts), but I don't see that happening.
The point was made in a previous thread that Race (which you do not choose) is equally as charged, and if a guild was started that advertized itself as "Black friendly" or "Hispanic only", they would probably receive the same warning.
No, you missed his point. His point isn't "EA puts out more sequels", it is "EA puts out the same game with a new lineup and calls it a sequel, and does it every year."
The point is, EA doesn't take chances until it has to compete. Nintendo tries to do something genuinely different with most of their sequels. One of the only sequel machines that Nintendo hasn't really changed fundamentally is their Mario Party lineup, but even then it's hard to say that they just do more of the same. Often times, the mini-games (the heart and soul of those games) are totally different for each game. Pokemon I guess could be formulaic as well (I don't know, to be honest) but the gameplay at least fundamentally changes with the addition of new Pokemon. It's not like adding new football players.
The Southern Baptist preachers that I know actually read from many translations, and hold that nothing is sacred about the original King James translation. In fact, a good number of them go back to the original Greek and Hebrew for nitpicky translation arguments.
I was under the impression that "First world" encompassed all of those countries that supported democracy during the Cold War, and that "Second world" encompassed all of the pro-communist countries. "Third world" just meant everyone else. Australia, by these terms, would then be a "First world" country.
All of the cases that I've seen where a company fires an employee for smoking tobacco (yes, even in their own home) have not been unwarranted. In these cases, the employee signed a contract saying "I won't smoke". While it is absurd for a company to say "I want you to sign this agreement", the employee didn't have to sign it. But since they did, and they breached the contract, the employer is well within their rights to fire their employee.
I see what you're saying about invasion of privacy, and I agree that some of the methods employers use to ensure that you are keeping your end of the bargain are intrusive. But if you sign a contract, it's your fault as much as theirs.
I didn't read any bias, all I read was speculation and "We'll see how it goes off".
However, I'd hope that we were all adult enough here to realize that this is a hype-building tactic. Hype is a very good salesman, and video game players love demos.
I say it's a good idea, but he has a point. Games sell a console, and if they're hyping their console with low-quality games, they're going to have an uphill climb. Same goes for any other console.
If they're anything like the Wal-Mart displays of current consoles I've seen, someone will break the controller in most of these displays before you know it.
According to imdb, she's older than me (I'm 23 as of now). And Firefly was on in 2002. Which means that she was at least 20 when Firefly the series aired.
I think that one of the more comfortable shapes for the human hand is the gun-type shape. A controller that was remote-ish would look something like a phaser, for instance. Angled. But I bet you anything they wanted to stick to a neutral shape to avoid the obvious "Oh My God, it's a gun teaching our children to shoot!" parallels.
This got me thinking about how any fighting game would be controlled. I mean really. Button combinations for the Mortal Kombat-esque will be hard to transfer. What would you do? Hand gestures? Seems like there's a lot of possibilities, but that can be good or bad. I mean, imagine memorizing hundreds of gestures just to master a few characters.
And suppose they go the Punch-Out route. Fighting games would get downright tiring.
For all other types of games though, I see the potential. But fighting games with this controller? I remain cautiously skeptical...
Congratulations, you took the rest of my quote out of context. If you stop and look at the next sentence, you would see that this porn channel would have the most boring porn ever. Everyone would have clothes on.
Not much to sue for, huh?
GTA I didn't make an analogy for, however. I was just pointing out the flaw in the initial analogy, and how ludicrous a situation you would have to have to sue Maxis/EA for.
Your Television analogy is a bit off. If someone created a mod to your TV to remove those black bars, the person who made the modification is responsible.
If, however, all TV's secretly had the ability, and someone smart enough just told you how to make them disappear, that would be what this is like. Except, behind the black bars, all you would see is a strapless bra.
The Sims 2 came with the capability to remove the blur, it is something done in game for the Sims 2. And anyone who read the article can surmise that the labia wasn't visible with the "cheat". The allegations against EA (and Maxis) are clearly wrong, and EA isn't going to be responsible because their original content is innocuous.
As for GTA, they are very much at fault for their game's problem. Just because you have to get a mod doesn't belay the fact that they wrote the code for the sex game, and designed it to be in the game.
This is a link to Gamespot's "Rumor Control" feature. It generally goes through three or four rumors a week, depending on how many came out, and addresses their feasibility. In this case, the above summary is about Rumor #4 only, and it is ruled to be bogus.
The other rumors surround the X Box 360, and aren't addressed in the summary.
I mean really man, Mona's only wearing a towel at one point. That's pretty gratuitous. There's even a suggestive drawing of her in the shower. Mona's a guy gamer's fantasy of a girl if I ever saw one. Very comic-book like, not like she was in the first Max Payne.
Not retarded, just greedy. A lot of news sites these days (especially ones involving video games) will generate ad pages, and insert some variable into the PHP to indicate that you have passed through the advertizement. I don't know if it is the case for this particular page, but it doesn't seem unlikely.
Slashdot Mirror
As a computer scientist, you also realize that you're putting yourself at the mercy of *TWO* development teams, and *TWO* release schedules in the event that a major exploit or bug is found? In theory it's a good way to ensure security, but it also means that you have to wait for Motorola to release an update that Google patched and released already.
I think what you're getting at is that Rock Band gives you the "benefit" of feeling like you're playing the guitar without nearly the amount of effort that the real guitar takes. The thing is, learning other people's songs is still just learning other people's songs. The people who play Rock Band aren't going to cut into the profits of those who play real instruments, and they aren't going to make actual guitarists any worse at their instruments. So while it does seem to give people the illusion that they can approach actual guitar skills, they still can't pick up a guitar and start making music without putting the same kind of effort in as a real musician. I don't think anybody has anything to worry about.
There are actually some pretty good open source engines out there these days. That said, this is yet another case of the "vicious cycle". Modders make mods mostly to catch a break. Every modder hopes to be part of the next team that makes it big. The best way to do that is to go where the players are. And sadly, the players aren't really playing on Linux. I hold high hopes that when Source hits linux, that a whole slew of HL2 mods will become linux native, and people will get used to the idea of programming games for linux. And ultimately, as you say, assets are a problem. Most artists I've met aren't terribly keen on making art for free, much less providing license for anybody and everybody to use their art as they see fit.
You don't have to live *in* a city. I live 30 miles away from my nearest city as a crow flies, but an actual 50 miles by interstate. I've invested in a $30 antenna at my local cheap brick-and-mortar, and have amazing HDTV reception. Also, I have fairly cheap DSL. It's only 3 megabit per second. But it's fast enough to watch Hulu, and it's fast enough for Netflix on Demand. To be honest, there are times where we're not in the mood to watch whatever's on, or to watch a movie on Netflix. But that's not any different than having 160 channels for $80 bucks a month, and STILL being bored with television. Moving off of Cable/Sattelite is just smart these days. There are cheaper alternatives. And you can pick and choose what you want, on your own time, instead of wasting time trying to find something to watch.
I noticed this story on Endgadget a few days ago, and they mentioned Microsoft in the blurb. But I don't really see that connection in the video, or in this article. So did Microsoft fund this?
The article notes that the accuracy of input origin is within 95%. So casual bumps shouldn't work, considering the input is in the inside of your arm. Hand input is trickier of course, but maybe you can set the sensitivity pretty low, so casual taps wouldn't work?
I figure all the time. It's good business to keep track of your competitors. Or, alternatively, it's always tempting to read the bad press about whatever you're working on, so you can set the record straight when people (invariably) misunderstand you.
Does "You can't legally sign away any of your basic freedoms in a contract" hold true in Canada as well? Remember, the story isn't about something going on in the U.S.
I think that Blizzard approached this from a business standpoint rather than a "100% fair to everyone and true to real life" standpoint.
Consider:
1: This decision takes far fewer man hours to police than it would to police the trolls and attackers. Fewer man hours means fewer men, and thus fewer GMs you have to pay.
2: Blizzard makes everyone agree to a EULA, and they own your character and are able to set all rules and interpret them as they wish. And while anyone can argue and point their fingers, Blizzard still has millions of subscribers and will still make a hojillion dollars. If everyone started quitting WoW they might change their stance (since it hits them where it hurts), but I don't see that happening.
The point was made in a previous thread that Race (which you do not choose) is equally as charged, and if a guild was started that advertized itself as "Black friendly" or "Hispanic only", they would probably receive the same warning.
No, you missed his point. His point isn't "EA puts out more sequels", it is "EA puts out the same game with a new lineup and calls it a sequel, and does it every year."
The point is, EA doesn't take chances until it has to compete. Nintendo tries to do something genuinely different with most of their sequels. One of the only sequel machines that Nintendo hasn't really changed fundamentally is their Mario Party lineup, but even then it's hard to say that they just do more of the same. Often times, the mini-games (the heart and soul of those games) are totally different for each game. Pokemon I guess could be formulaic as well (I don't know, to be honest) but the gameplay at least fundamentally changes with the addition of new Pokemon. It's not like adding new football players.
The Southern Baptist preachers that I know actually read from many translations, and hold that nothing is sacred about the original King James translation. In fact, a good number of them go back to the original Greek and Hebrew for nitpicky translation arguments.
I was under the impression that "First world" encompassed all of those countries that supported democracy during the Cold War, and that "Second world" encompassed all of the pro-communist countries. "Third world" just meant everyone else. Australia, by these terms, would then be a "First world" country.
All of the cases that I've seen where a company fires an employee for smoking tobacco (yes, even in their own home) have not been unwarranted. In these cases, the employee signed a contract saying "I won't smoke". While it is absurd for a company to say "I want you to sign this agreement", the employee didn't have to sign it. But since they did, and they breached the contract, the employer is well within their rights to fire their employee.
I see what you're saying about invasion of privacy, and I agree that some of the methods employers use to ensure that you are keeping your end of the bargain are intrusive. But if you sign a contract, it's your fault as much as theirs.
Of course we can't! If we don't buy it, someone else will first, and THEN what do we do? WAIT?!?!?!
I didn't read any bias, all I read was speculation and "We'll see how it goes off". However, I'd hope that we were all adult enough here to realize that this is a hype-building tactic. Hype is a very good salesman, and video game players love demos. I say it's a good idea, but he has a point. Games sell a console, and if they're hyping their console with low-quality games, they're going to have an uphill climb. Same goes for any other console.
If they're anything like the Wal-Mart displays of current consoles I've seen, someone will break the controller in most of these displays before you know it.
According to imdb, she's older than me (I'm 23 as of now). And Firefly was on in 2002. Which means that she was at least 20 when Firefly the series aired.
I think that one of the more comfortable shapes for the human hand is the gun-type shape. A controller that was remote-ish would look something like a phaser, for instance. Angled. But I bet you anything they wanted to stick to a neutral shape to avoid the obvious "Oh My God, it's a gun teaching our children to shoot!" parallels.
This got me thinking about how any fighting game would be controlled. I mean really. Button combinations for the Mortal Kombat-esque will be hard to transfer. What would you do? Hand gestures? Seems like there's a lot of possibilities, but that can be good or bad. I mean, imagine memorizing hundreds of gestures just to master a few characters.
And suppose they go the Punch-Out route. Fighting games would get downright tiring.
For all other types of games though, I see the potential. But fighting games with this controller? I remain cautiously skeptical...
Congratulations, you took the rest of my quote out of context. If you stop and look at the next sentence, you would see that this porn channel would have the most boring porn ever. Everyone would have clothes on. Not much to sue for, huh? GTA I didn't make an analogy for, however. I was just pointing out the flaw in the initial analogy, and how ludicrous a situation you would have to have to sue Maxis/EA for.
Your Television analogy is a bit off. If someone created a mod to your TV to remove those black bars, the person who made the modification is responsible. If, however, all TV's secretly had the ability, and someone smart enough just told you how to make them disappear, that would be what this is like. Except, behind the black bars, all you would see is a strapless bra. The Sims 2 came with the capability to remove the blur, it is something done in game for the Sims 2. And anyone who read the article can surmise that the labia wasn't visible with the "cheat". The allegations against EA (and Maxis) are clearly wrong, and EA isn't going to be responsible because their original content is innocuous. As for GTA, they are very much at fault for their game's problem. Just because you have to get a mod doesn't belay the fact that they wrote the code for the sex game, and designed it to be in the game.
This is a link to Gamespot's "Rumor Control" feature. It generally goes through three or four rumors a week, depending on how many came out, and addresses their feasibility. In this case, the above summary is about Rumor #4 only, and it is ruled to be bogus. The other rumors surround the X Box 360, and aren't addressed in the summary.
I mean really man, Mona's only wearing a towel at one point. That's pretty gratuitous. There's even a suggestive drawing of her in the shower. Mona's a guy gamer's fantasy of a girl if I ever saw one. Very comic-book like, not like she was in the first Max Payne.
Not retarded, just greedy. A lot of news sites these days (especially ones involving video games) will generate ad pages, and insert some variable into the PHP to indicate that you have passed through the advertizement. I don't know if it is the case for this particular page, but it doesn't seem unlikely.