It's really scary that some people feel the need to go all Cathartic and use the term "White Lie" as if they meant it. Jo Hos go as far to call their lies Theocratic War Strategy. I'm starting to suspect that it's really true that hardly anyone in (the densly populated parts of) the U.S.A. can't cope with life without lying at least once or twice a day?
Haven't you ever had a corporate job? Have you ever had two or three managers giving you conflicting deadlines or different interpretations of the same instructions? Managers don't tend to like it when you favor one over the other in your priorities.
Have you ever tried to be honest and say "I'm too busy, I can't do this now?" or "I can't meet your deadline, I need more time?" You can only do that so many times before someone who doesn't use the word "can't" is there to fill your job.
Have you ever been given a completely arbitrary deadline that you just don't have time to meet, and know that it's not really urgent that it's due then anyway? I have a boss who ALWAYS wants projects finished by 5pm-- even though she's at the office at the other side of down most afternoons, and never actually looks at the work until the next morning. If I need a few extra hours and finish at 7 or 8 but backdate it to 5, she doesn't notice. But if I don't fudge the dates she calls me on it. It's not that the project is actually needed by 5-- it's that she set a time she wanted it by, and if I couldn't meet it she perceives it as disrespect to her authority. And I wish that was an isolated example...
It's unfortunate, but fudging send dates here or there or creative use of voicemail is mandatory when dealing with real-world egos. Call it lying if you will, but see how long you really last if you're completely honest all the time.
Commentary on/. trends aside, is there any particular reason for America's tendency to send many, many more unmanned than manned missions into space? Surely the fact that unmanned missions are cheaper alone did not result in the creation of this policy.
Unmanned missions are a necessity with the present-day American mindset. Haven't you noticed that every time one of our astronauts dies, our space program grinds to a halt for years?
We (the USA) have lost the pioneer spirit... If we're really going to stay ahead of the Chinese (and Indians, and Russians, and whoever else) the USA as a country has to understand that tregedies will happen, and some brave souls will die in the name of progress, and they knew the risks of that happening when they signed on for the job. Because a Shenzhou crash will not slow the Chinese down for a second (really, we likely wouldn't even know it happened.)
The first thing I think about when I hear this story is Big Brother is finally here, 666 and the Rapture and all that tinfoil stuff.
But the second is, how many times a day are those fingerprint scanners cleaned? Do I really want to stick my fingers in some machine that 5,000 snotty brats have just touched? Can you imagine what a disgusting petri dish of festering bio-germs from all over the world are growing on those things?
WHat are you talking about? There are plenty of immersive single-player games available right now. There are plenty of great single-player games with lackluster multiplayers tacked on (or no multi at all.) If that's what you want, it's not hard to find.
As for "fun", that's the most subjective term there is. I'm at the point where single player games aren't "fun" to me. Enemy AI in single player games is improving, but it's still not to the point where it can't be predicted after playing for a while. And I don't have 40+ hours to traverse whatever levels, puzzles and cut scenes the designers have in store. I want to play against challenging opponents for a half hour then get back to my life, and that's why I love games likee Unreal Tournament.
That doesn't mean I'm right and you're wrong, but you seem to be taking offense that some companies are focusing more on multiplayer.
This is marketing, plain and simple. It's showmanship. There's no security risk, there's no threat of damage if some books fall into greedy hands early, and any retailer who wants to stay in business will respect the release date without locks and armed guards.
Why do they do it? Could the flood of news reports give you a hint? Would we be discussing Harry Potter on Slashdot right now if they shipping business as usual?
You could accomplish the same thing by tatooing users' passwords to their foreheads.
They've been trying to do this for years, but there are only so many variations of "666."
The problem, explained commission chairman Matthew W. Daus, is that people like their cabs big, and hybrids do not have the legroom and large trunks of the fleet's current workhorse, an extra-long version of the Ford Crown Victoria.
Right, but keep in mind we are talking about taxis... Which, in a city where many if not most of the population doesn't have a car, is the major (if not only) way to transport luggage to and from the airport, or a heavy item or even more than two sacks of groceries from the store to their house. Not to mention, they need to be able to accomodate four people (plus the driver) and their stuff in reasonable comfort. It's not quite the same to say "People like their cabs big" as "Big fat Americans love their big fat cars."
Well said. It's funny how many of us work for large organizations and see the chaos and bureaucracy that comes with all the mangled tiers of management, but still talk about other companies as a single-minded entity. Companies are made of people, not robots, and people make mistakes, get confused, misinterpret their duties and some times hate their jobs.
For a Christian game to be successful, the first two thing it should NOT do is preach. The second thing it shouldn't do is educate. Kids will sense both of these coming a mile away and run in the opposite direction.
And that's the biggest problem with most Christian entertainment, a total lack of subtlety. It doesn't have to be about hitting you over the head with the message. IMHO the best Christians live by setting an example, not by brow-beating you into submission.
I remember when the console market crashed back in the 80s and Atari carts were a couple of bucks apiece. We amassed quite a library of decent games at those prices.
The key work is "crashed." As in, the games were worthless and retailers would do anything to dump them because no one was buying. When the Atari-Intellivision-Coleco-etc. craze was in its heydey, games went for $25-$60... Same as now, and that's in early 80's dollars.
Well... The Power Mac (even single processor) gives you quite a few things the iMac doesn't. Dual monitor support without a hack, a larger ram ceiling, firewire 800, PCI... Not to mention it's a more solid machine, and it's much easier to swap out hard (or optical) drives.
Oh, and refurb single processor G5's (with warranty) can be had for as little as $1000 if you know where to look. If you already have a good monitor it's a deal.
don't think OSX will have any more penetration into the desktop market than Linux has had for one simple reason -- the desktop market is the noob market. Plain and simple. Noobs are too preconditioned to Windows right now.
You keep using that word "noob." I do not think it means what you think it means.
Everquest has been around for five years, Starcraft is seven years old, there are even still people playing Warcraft 2 and Quake 1... I think the perception of computer games is that they come and go in a flash but that's not always the case. It's also possible if Second Life stays profitable that it will evolve with technology and that virtual space will be there through the next generation or two. But yeah it's most likely Second Life won't be around in a couple of years, so it's not exactly a wise investment to dump a lot of cash into an online "investment." Expecially since this isn't exactly Nintendo we're dealing with... I don't know what else the parent company does, but I wouldn't trust them to be around if the fans are there but the profit isn't.
On the other hand I don't think someone spending a few bucks to buy a "virtual house" is necessarily a bad thing if it's kept in the realm of entertainment. The price of owning that virtual house and buying the virtual goods (if kept within reason) may even out to the monthly costs of other MMORPGs. Of course the danger (and the genius of the game developers) is that we humans always want better stuff than our neighbors have, even if we have to go into debt to get it.
There's a difference here because if you're paying someone to be your webhost, you have the rights to the content on the site-- and if the hosting company goes under, or if you are dissatisfied, you can transfer those contents to another host. It's a hassle, but you wouldn't lose your content (assuming you're smart enough to keep a backup offline.)
Now when Second Life goes under-- and it probably will at some point, though it could be a year or two decades from now-- your investment in their "land" and "property" is gone. It's not like you can carry it over to Everquest...
Now, I don't know the terms of the Second Life contract (if any) or what backup plans they might have if the project is no longer profitable, but if hey have any sense there's a provision that protects them from damage claims (and I wouldn't blame them if they did.) If it's a success, it will probably be bought out by EA or the like and live on, if not it will fold. The real danger is to the die-hards who still want to play when the game loses popularity... And since they're the ones most likely to have substantial investments, they're the ones most likely to sue.
Coming soon... the great new game where Nintendo lawyers jump up and down on the heads of indie developers, while using their "Cease and Desist" orders to make foes flee in terror. Find all the magical writs and win the Super Lawsuit Challenge to collect all the shiny gold coins!
I won't shed a tear if it happens. These indie developers should know better than to put months of hard work into developing a game around a property that they have no rights to use. A property worth millions, maybe billions of dollars to Nintendo, today and in the future, and a property that they have to protect the rights to.
Would it have been that hard to put some of that effort into creating original characters, making it essentially the same game but just different enough that we wouldn't be having this discussion. Of course "There's a new freeware platform game featuring characters you've never heard of" probably wouldn't make Slashdot news... But doesn't that prove the point that the Mario characters have value?
As for "shiny gold coins"... The most that would likely happen is a C&D letter, which means the work they did would be for naught... Hardly a major financial hit.
... you can't really compare Open Office and MS Office, since OO doesn't run natively on OS X.
I will say that Word opens nearly instantly on this platform. It's up in about a second -- perhaps a bit less -- and feels lighter than most of the "minimalist" word processor alternatives I've tried.
I don't use Office unless I have to (once every couple of months at most) and haven't bothered to search through the settings so there may be something obvious that I'm missing to correct this... But in on both my Powerbook and iMac the Mac version takes forever to open, sometimes up to five minutes because I have over a thousand fonts installed.
Tell your dad to buy what he wants to buy. Next year may be a great time to purchase both PowerPC Macs and software. Of course hewon't be on the bleeding edge of technology (and thus won't have the bragging rights with his friends, and if they're anything like my dad they talk about their computers like their parents did muscle cars) but unless he really needs the cutting edge in HD video editing and motion graphics he'll have a fine system that will be supported for years to come.
Apple will take a hit, sure, because of all of the customers like your dad. Myself, I think next year and beyond will be a great time to buy the last of the PowerPC systems, which (hopefully) will be sold off at substantial discounts. And the used market will be even cheaper... And the now-worthless PowerPC-only versions of software can be had for a song.
No. In fact, anyone can go and take a picture of anything in public.
Now, if it was taking pictures of *inside* your house, you might have an issue.;)
I was making a bad joke about the roof, of course, but I do want to point out that photography in public isn't a copyright issue, it's more of a nebulous "do you have the right to use my image?" issue that isn't completely defined in the law.
It's not quite as simple as "you can photograph anyone or anything in public"... Using anyone's image (or an image of their business or property, outside or in) for commercial purpose without permission leaves you open for a civil suit. That goes for everything from advertising to hollywood movies to art gallery exhibition to porn on the web. Journalism isn't even excluded, though it would be difficult to win a case against a news outlet. But even photojournalists try to get personal and location releases when they can.
You're inviting trouble, for example, to use a photo of a woman subathing or the exterior of a business without the subject's written consent. It's not techincally illegal-- but you're also not covered by a law that says you CAN do it. Not unless the subject is a celebrity or politician.
Also, there are actually few areas that are truly "in public." A strip mall or shopping mall, for example, belongs to someone-- and that includes everything, even the parking lot. A city street is public, but you don't have the explicit freedom to use a picture of a business' storefront.
They do not seem to be using the maps, but rather the satellite photos, which cannot be copyrighted.
No... All photographs are copyright the photographer who took them. Even satellite photos. If you check Google Satellite it says so right on the map-- "(c) 2005 DigitalGlobe, EarthSat"
Now, my question is, I never signed a release for Goole/DigitalMaps to use the image of my house, which is private property. Can I sue them for showing my roof?
So... You're saying you want Final Fantasy, then? Because that does exist, y'know.
Nintendo wisely chose to go light on the dialogue with Zelda, which was smart IMO. Dialogue and story heavy RPGs are naturally linear and kind of cold. It's third person. I feel like I'm reading a book or watching a movie with a fixed story, where I get to help a bit in the fights between cutscenes. Zelda's much more immersive-- Link doesn't speak, so it's easier to "become him" rather than watch him. And since you have to figure out everything on your own through trial and error, I feel like I'm much more a part of the story.
Besides... The dialogue would be written in Japanese and translated. The charm of that-- and trying to explain weird-to-us Japanisms-- wore off quite a while ago.
I know you're trolling, but for the benefit of anyone who cares...
Image comics has nothing to do with this discussion. It was a group of well-known superhero artists who wanted to get away from Marvel and keep all the royalties to themselves. Of course, they stuff they turned out was more expensive and no better written or drawn than the typical Marvel book, and they tried to maintain a market saturation that couldn't last forever, so they failed and failed big.
Blank is comprised of cartoonists, not superhero comic book writers and artists. It's a pretty big difference that I won't go into, if you don't understand it then you probably don't care. But these guys are like an indie band who's in it because they love what they do and I don't think it could be considered a "failure" if they don't turn a profit... As long as they can generate a fan base that makes it worth doing. After all, what's the cost, the domain name and web space?
And, Image is hardly the only independant comic book publisher. There are quite a few who've been around for a while and do pretty well-- Fantagraphics for one (Eightball by Dan Clowes, or have you not seen Ghost World?), Slave Labor (haven to all the teens who shop at Hot Topic), Drawn and Quarterly... They may not be huge successes or household names, but they have quite a few loyal readers.
As for "getting syndicated"... That's one route, yes. But not a likely one. The funny pages are incredibly hard to break into and editors are notorious for censoring any joke that wouldn't play on "Leave it to Beaver." An occasional Bloom County or Calvin and Hobbes slips through the cracks but that's maybe once every five or six years. And frankly, no one reads them any more anyway. There are a handful of Village Voice/Your-City-Weekly alternative papers for more eclectic strips, but that's also a tough nut to crack. It's a limited and slowly dying market and I don't think many aspiring cartoonists (who do comic strips) are even trying to go these routes any more. It's certainly not the end-all, be-all that you seem to think it is.
Did you assemble the system yourself? It's pretty darn rare to find anything but the lowest of low end systems without a DVD drive these days (and these would be completely unsuitable for gaming anyway.)
Regardless, you're the exception. Most potential gamers have DVD drives, and it really does not make sense to release games on CD. It's simply much more convenient-- swapping disks is a PITA, and I can't tell you how many times over the years I've had disk 3 of a 5 disk set fail making the whole package useless.
Though I could see the PITA factor being some sort of anti-piracy tactic, where it's more of a hassle to share multiple disks or disk images than one DVD...
Slashdot Mirror
It's really scary that some people feel the need to go all Cathartic and use the term "White Lie" as if they meant it. Jo Hos go as far to call their lies Theocratic War Strategy. I'm starting to suspect that it's really true that hardly anyone in (the densly populated parts of) the U.S.A. can't cope with life without lying at least once or twice a day?
Haven't you ever had a corporate job? Have you ever had two or three managers giving you conflicting deadlines or different interpretations of the same instructions? Managers don't tend to like it when you favor one over the other in your priorities.
Have you ever tried to be honest and say "I'm too busy, I can't do this now?" or "I can't meet your deadline, I need more time?" You can only do that so many times before someone who doesn't use the word "can't" is there to fill your job.
Have you ever been given a completely arbitrary deadline that you just don't have time to meet, and know that it's not really urgent that it's due then anyway? I have a boss who ALWAYS wants projects finished by 5pm-- even though she's at the office at the other side of down most afternoons, and never actually looks at the work until the next morning. If I need a few extra hours and finish at 7 or 8 but backdate it to 5, she doesn't notice. But if I don't fudge the dates she calls me on it. It's not that the project is actually needed by 5-- it's that she set a time she wanted it by, and if I couldn't meet it she perceives it as disrespect to her authority. And I wish that was an isolated example...
It's unfortunate, but fudging send dates here or there or creative use of voicemail is mandatory when dealing with real-world egos. Call it lying if you will, but see how long you really last if you're completely honest all the time.
Commentary on /. trends aside, is there any particular reason for America's tendency to send many, many more unmanned than manned missions into space? Surely the fact that unmanned missions are cheaper alone did not result in the creation of this policy.
Unmanned missions are a necessity with the present-day American mindset. Haven't you noticed that every time one of our astronauts dies, our space program grinds to a halt for years?
We (the USA) have lost the pioneer spirit... If we're really going to stay ahead of the Chinese (and Indians, and Russians, and whoever else) the USA as a country has to understand that tregedies will happen, and some brave souls will die in the name of progress, and they knew the risks of that happening when they signed on for the job. Because a Shenzhou crash will not slow the Chinese down for a second (really, we likely wouldn't even know it happened.)
The first thing I think about when I hear this story is Big Brother is finally here, 666 and the Rapture and all that tinfoil stuff.
But the second is, how many times a day are those fingerprint scanners cleaned? Do I really want to stick my fingers in some machine that 5,000 snotty brats have just touched? Can you imagine what a disgusting petri dish of festering bio-germs from all over the world are growing on those things?
WHat are you talking about? There are plenty of immersive single-player games available right now. There are plenty of great single-player games with lackluster multiplayers tacked on (or no multi at all.) If that's what you want, it's not hard to find.
As for "fun", that's the most subjective term there is. I'm at the point where single player games aren't "fun" to me. Enemy AI in single player games is improving, but it's still not to the point where it can't be predicted after playing for a while. And I don't have 40+ hours to traverse whatever levels, puzzles and cut scenes the designers have in store. I want to play against challenging opponents for a half hour then get back to my life, and that's why I love games likee Unreal Tournament.
That doesn't mean I'm right and you're wrong, but you seem to be taking offense that some companies are focusing more on multiplayer.
This is marketing, plain and simple. It's showmanship. There's no security risk, there's no threat of damage if some books fall into greedy hands early, and any retailer who wants to stay in business will respect the release date without locks and armed guards.
Why do they do it? Could the flood of news reports give you a hint? Would we be discussing Harry Potter on Slashdot right now if they shipping business as usual?
You could accomplish the same thing by tatooing users' passwords to their foreheads. They've been trying to do this for years, but there are only so many variations of "666."
The problem, explained commission chairman Matthew W. Daus, is that people like their cabs big, and hybrids do not have the legroom and large trunks of the fleet's current workhorse, an extra-long version of the Ford Crown Victoria.
Right, but keep in mind we are talking about taxis... Which, in a city where many if not most of the population doesn't have a car, is the major (if not only) way to transport luggage to and from the airport, or a heavy item or even more than two sacks of groceries from the store to their house. Not to mention, they need to be able to accomodate four people (plus the driver) and their stuff in reasonable comfort. It's not quite the same to say "People like their cabs big" as "Big fat Americans love their big fat cars."
I have a policy of paying late fees only if/when I actually go back and rent another movie.
Well, see, there's the problem. Blockbuster doesn't have to respect your policies, but if you rent a movie from them you have to respect theirs.
Well said. It's funny how many of us work for large organizations and see the chaos and bureaucracy that comes with all the mangled tiers of management, but still talk about other companies as a single-minded entity. Companies are made of people, not robots, and people make mistakes, get confused, misinterpret their duties and some times hate their jobs.
For a Christian game to be successful, the first two thing it should NOT do is preach. The second thing it shouldn't do is educate. Kids will sense both of these coming a mile away and run in the opposite direction.
And that's the biggest problem with most Christian entertainment, a total lack of subtlety. It doesn't have to be about hitting you over the head with the message. IMHO the best Christians live by setting an example, not by brow-beating you into submission.
I remember when the console market crashed back in the 80s and Atari carts were a couple of bucks apiece. We amassed quite a library of decent games at those prices.
The key work is "crashed." As in, the games were worthless and retailers would do anything to dump them because no one was buying. When the Atari-Intellivision-Coleco-etc. craze was in its heydey, games went for $25-$60... Same as now, and that's in early 80's dollars.
Well... The Power Mac (even single processor) gives you quite a few things the iMac doesn't. Dual monitor support without a hack, a larger ram ceiling, firewire 800, PCI... Not to mention it's a more solid machine, and it's much easier to swap out hard (or optical) drives.
Oh, and refurb single processor G5's (with warranty) can be had for as little as $1000 if you know where to look. If you already have a good monitor it's a deal.
don't think OSX will have any more penetration into the desktop market than Linux has had for one simple reason -- the desktop market is the noob market. Plain and simple. Noobs are too preconditioned to Windows right now.
You keep using that word "noob." I do not think it means what you think it means.
Everquest has been around for five years, Starcraft is seven years old, there are even still people playing Warcraft 2 and Quake 1... I think the perception of computer games is that they come and go in a flash but that's not always the case. It's also possible if Second Life stays profitable that it will evolve with technology and that virtual space will be there through the next generation or two. But yeah it's most likely Second Life won't be around in a couple of years, so it's not exactly a wise investment to dump a lot of cash into an online "investment." Expecially since this isn't exactly Nintendo we're dealing with... I don't know what else the parent company does, but I wouldn't trust them to be around if the fans are there but the profit isn't.
On the other hand I don't think someone spending a few bucks to buy a "virtual house" is necessarily a bad thing if it's kept in the realm of entertainment. The price of owning that virtual house and buying the virtual goods (if kept within reason) may even out to the monthly costs of other MMORPGs. Of course the danger (and the genius of the game developers) is that we humans always want better stuff than our neighbors have, even if we have to go into debt to get it.
There's a difference here because if you're paying someone to be your webhost, you have the rights to the content on the site-- and if the hosting company goes under, or if you are dissatisfied, you can transfer those contents to another host. It's a hassle, but you wouldn't lose your content (assuming you're smart enough to keep a backup offline.)
Now when Second Life goes under-- and it probably will at some point, though it could be a year or two decades from now-- your investment in their "land" and "property" is gone. It's not like you can carry it over to Everquest...
Now, I don't know the terms of the Second Life contract (if any) or what backup plans they might have if the project is no longer profitable, but if hey have any sense there's a provision that protects them from damage claims (and I wouldn't blame them if they did.) If it's a success, it will probably be bought out by EA or the like and live on, if not it will fold. The real danger is to the die-hards who still want to play when the game loses popularity... And since they're the ones most likely to have substantial investments, they're the ones most likely to sue.
Coming soon... the great new game where Nintendo lawyers jump up and down on the heads of indie developers, while using their "Cease and Desist" orders to make foes flee in terror. Find all the magical writs and win the Super Lawsuit Challenge to collect all the shiny gold coins!
I won't shed a tear if it happens. These indie developers should know better than to put months of hard work into developing a game around a property that they have no rights to use. A property worth millions, maybe billions of dollars to Nintendo, today and in the future, and a property that they have to protect the rights to.
Would it have been that hard to put some of that effort into creating original characters, making it essentially the same game but just different enough that we wouldn't be having this discussion. Of course "There's a new freeware platform game featuring characters you've never heard of" probably wouldn't make Slashdot news... But doesn't that prove the point that the Mario characters have value?
As for "shiny gold coins"... The most that would likely happen is a C&D letter, which means the work they did would be for naught... Hardly a major financial hit.
I will say that Word opens nearly instantly on this platform. It's up in about a second -- perhaps a bit less -- and feels lighter than most of the "minimalist" word processor alternatives I've tried.
I don't use Office unless I have to (once every couple of months at most) and haven't bothered to search through the settings so there may be something obvious that I'm missing to correct this... But in on both my Powerbook and iMac the Mac version takes forever to open, sometimes up to five minutes because I have over a thousand fonts installed.
Tell your dad to buy what he wants to buy. Next year may be a great time to purchase both PowerPC Macs and software. Of course hewon't be on the bleeding edge of technology (and thus won't have the bragging rights with his friends, and if they're anything like my dad they talk about their computers like their parents did muscle cars) but unless he really needs the cutting edge in HD video editing and motion graphics he'll have a fine system that will be supported for years to come.
Apple will take a hit, sure, because of all of the customers like your dad. Myself, I think next year and beyond will be a great time to buy the last of the PowerPC systems, which (hopefully) will be sold off at substantial discounts. And the used market will be even cheaper... And the now-worthless PowerPC-only versions of software can be had for a song.
No. In fact, anyone can go and take a picture of anything in public.
Now, if it was taking pictures of *inside* your house, you might have an issue.
I was making a bad joke about the roof, of course, but I do want to point out that photography in public isn't a copyright issue, it's more of a nebulous "do you have the right to use my image?" issue that isn't completely defined in the law.
It's not quite as simple as "you can photograph anyone or anything in public"... Using anyone's image (or an image of their business or property, outside or in) for commercial purpose without permission leaves you open for a civil suit. That goes for everything from advertising to hollywood movies to art gallery exhibition to porn on the web. Journalism isn't even excluded, though it would be difficult to win a case against a news outlet. But even photojournalists try to get personal and location releases when they can.
You're inviting trouble, for example, to use a photo of a woman subathing or the exterior of a business without the subject's written consent. It's not techincally illegal-- but you're also not covered by a law that says you CAN do it. Not unless the subject is a celebrity or politician.
Also, there are actually few areas that are truly "in public." A strip mall or shopping mall, for example, belongs to someone-- and that includes everything, even the parking lot. A city street is public, but you don't have the explicit freedom to use a picture of a business' storefront.
They do not seem to be using the maps, but rather the satellite photos, which cannot be copyrighted. No... All photographs are copyright the photographer who took them. Even satellite photos. If you check Google Satellite it says so right on the map-- "(c) 2005 DigitalGlobe, EarthSat" Now, my question is, I never signed a release for Goole/DigitalMaps to use the image of my house, which is private property. Can I sue them for showing my roof?
So... You're saying you want Final Fantasy, then? Because that does exist, y'know.
Nintendo wisely chose to go light on the dialogue with Zelda, which was smart IMO. Dialogue and story heavy RPGs are naturally linear and kind of cold. It's third person. I feel like I'm reading a book or watching a movie with a fixed story, where I get to help a bit in the fights between cutscenes. Zelda's much more immersive-- Link doesn't speak, so it's easier to "become him" rather than watch him. And since you have to figure out everything on your own through trial and error, I feel like I'm much more a part of the story.
Besides... The dialogue would be written in Japanese and translated. The charm of that-- and trying to explain weird-to-us Japanisms-- wore off quite a while ago.
While I applaud their efforts, isn't this how the RIAA/MPAA got started for music and movies?
Can I just give you the short answer?
"No, not at all."
I know you're trolling, but for the benefit of anyone who cares...
Image comics has nothing to do with this discussion. It was a group of well-known superhero artists who wanted to get away from Marvel and keep all the royalties to themselves. Of course, they stuff they turned out was more expensive and no better written or drawn than the typical Marvel book, and they tried to maintain a market saturation that couldn't last forever, so they failed and failed big.
Blank is comprised of cartoonists, not superhero comic book writers and artists. It's a pretty big difference that I won't go into, if you don't understand it then you probably don't care. But these guys are like an indie band who's in it because they love what they do and I don't think it could be considered a "failure" if they don't turn a profit... As long as they can generate a fan base that makes it worth doing. After all, what's the cost, the domain name and web space?
And, Image is hardly the only independant comic book publisher. There are quite a few who've been around for a while and do pretty well-- Fantagraphics for one (Eightball by Dan Clowes, or have you not seen Ghost World?), Slave Labor (haven to all the teens who shop at Hot Topic), Drawn and Quarterly... They may not be huge successes or household names, but they have quite a few loyal readers.
As for "getting syndicated"... That's one route, yes. But not a likely one. The funny pages are incredibly hard to break into and editors are notorious for censoring any joke that wouldn't play on "Leave it to Beaver." An occasional Bloom County or Calvin and Hobbes slips through the cracks but that's maybe once every five or six years. And frankly, no one reads them any more anyway. There are a handful of Village Voice/Your-City-Weekly alternative papers for more eclectic strips, but that's also a tough nut to crack. It's a limited and slowly dying market and I don't think many aspiring cartoonists (who do comic strips) are even trying to go these routes any more. It's certainly not the end-all, be-all that you seem to think it is.
Did you assemble the system yourself? It's pretty darn rare to find anything but the lowest of low end systems without a DVD drive these days (and these would be completely unsuitable for gaming anyway.)
Regardless, you're the exception. Most potential gamers have DVD drives, and it really does not make sense to release games on CD. It's simply much more convenient-- swapping disks is a PITA, and I can't tell you how many times over the years I've had disk 3 of a 5 disk set fail making the whole package useless.
Though I could see the PITA factor being some sort of anti-piracy tactic, where it's more of a hassle to share multiple disks or disk images than one DVD...
You sure about that? The largest tablet Wacom makes is 9x12.
I apologize, the largest is 12x18.
Though I still think my point about the price is still valid. Wacoms ain't cheap.