MDG is crap. I made the mistake several years ago of buying a system from them that came preloaded with Windows ME of all things! It's hard to say which was worse, Windows ME or the computer.
I read the paper almost daily, and there's always a misleading MDG ad in there somewhere. They advertise a 2.8ghz dual core as being a "5.6ghz processor equivalent".
In any event, I don't feel like paying more money just to enjoy my goddamn game. What's a gamer to do, between "booster packs," episodic content, microdownloads, and online play fees.
Only buy games that are a one time payment, boycott everything else. There are still lots of games out there that aren't MMORPGs.
There's no way I'm paying monthly to play Guild Wars or Diablo II all over again. This is just a money grab IMO. I was actually looking forward to this game, but not anymore. Why the hell would they wait till now to decide if they want to make it subscription based? I'm sick of MMOs, if I wanted to play a MMO, i'd go back to playing WoW. This decision is going to piss off a lot of people that were expecting Hellgate to be a hack and slash, not an MMORPG.
It's probably because gamers now use the internet for all their gaming news, there are several dozen free review sites, etc.. Gaming mags are a dying business model IMO.
Further, there are access restrictions for viewing, plus a one time fee paid in Microsoft Points (thanks for creating your own private currency, Microsoft... that helps).
To be fair, Nintendo has Wii Points. So what's so bad about Microsoft Points, or is it just because it's Microsoft?
This is not a good situation for Opera. It shows they have a total disregard for the security of my PC. What other security issues are lurking in the Opera browser? Why isn't Opera telling us about them?
I would agree, Opera messed up big. They were trying to avoid bad press, and it backfired, big time. Lying or hiding facts will never win you customer.
Why does a security patch need to be kept secret? Why hide security problems (which have been patched)?
You fix things secretly when you want to hide the fact that your product has security holes, obviously to avoid bad press. Of course it can always backfire and then you have a story on slashdot about it.
There is a video of the N800 in action on this guys blog (I'm not promoting this guys blog, just found it through google). It looks pretty cool, but one of my concerns is the battery life, previous models suffered from a short battery life (3-4 hours between recharges). Hopefully Nokia addressed the battery life with this model.
Also, that blogger was playing a video on youtube on his N800 and he said, and I quote, "UPDATE: I forgot to mention that Youtube videos play at a brutal 1 or 2 frames per second. Yuck."
for twenty games. I wish I knew more about some on the list.
I'll try and help you out where I can.
20: Left 4 Dead (Turtle Rock Studios: Sometime In 2007)
A first person shooter involving zombies.
19. Pirates of the Burning Sea (Flying Lab Software: Mid 2007)
Looks like a Pirate based MMORPG. I hope it's good because I love pirate games.
18. Medal of Honor: Airborne (Electronic Arts: Mid 2007)
Never heard of it, but from the title, it sounds like a World War 2 fighter pilot game.
17. Age of Conan (Funcom-Eidos: First Half of 2007)
Had to google it. It's another MMORPG!
16. Frontlines: Fuel of War: (Kaos Studios-THQ: Summer 2007)
Never heard of it. A first person shooter or a strategy game, most likely.
15. Shadowrun (FASA Studios-Microsoft: Sometime in 2007)
I loved the old Shadowrun for SNES and Genesis, but I've heard bad things about this one, let's hope FASA & Microsoft don't ruin what could be a great game.
14. Vanguard: Saga of Heroes (Sigil Games: First Quarter of 2007)
Never heard of it. Let's hope it's not another MMORPG!
13. Command and Conquer 3 (Electronic Arts: March 2007)
Looks promising, hopefully EA doesn't muck it up. Graphics are impressive if that's any consolation.
12. Lord of the Rings Online (Turbine-Midway: First Half Of 2007)
A LOTR MMORPG, could this be a replacement for those WoW addicts?
11. Hellgate London (Flagship Studios-Namco: Late 2007)
Looks good. It's supposed to be a FPS/RPG similar to Diablo.
10. Warhammer Online (Mythic-EA: Late 2007)
Yet another fantasy MMORPG. Great if you're a Warhammer fan...
9. Bioshock (Irrational Games-2K Games: First Half of 2007)
Never heard of it.
8. S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow Of Chernobyl (GSC GameWorld-THQ: March 2007)
A post chernobyl FPS. This game won Wired's Vaporware award in 2006, will it be vapor this year aswell?
I'm guessing they had to do a reorg on their databases every tuesday since they probably have a few billions entries for all the items in everyones backpacks, etc.
There are pros and cons to Web apps just like there are pros and cons to Desktop apps.
This article does a good job of explaining the pros and cons of Web & Desktop apps.
Here's the full text:
Pros and Cons to Web and Desktop Applications by S. Housley
There has been a long running debate about web applications replacing desktop software applications. While some functions are better suited to web applications. It is my belief that security concerns and legacy systems will prevent desktop software from becoming obsolete.
Some argue that the debate between web applications and desktop applications is pointless; as their is no clear answer. While still others argue that the issue at hand is as much a business and marketing issue, as it is a technological issue.
What Defines a Web Application Vs a Desktop Application? A web application is an application delivered to users from a web server like the Internet. Some businesses run web applications on an intranet, as well. Web applications are becoming more popular due to the widespread use of the web browser as a client.
Some applications are better suited and more likely to become successful as web applications. Web applications designed specifically for search engine optimization, have become increasingly popular. It is easy to understand why web applications that relate to the Internet would prosper, while business applications may have less appeal in a web environment.
A desktop application is a self-contained program that performs a defined set of tasks under the user control. Desktop applications run from a local drive and do not require a network or connectivity to operate or function properly, though if attached to a network desktop applications might use the resources of the network.
Pros and Cons to Desktop and Web Applications:
Easily Accessible Web applications can be easily accessed from any computer or location that has Internet access. Travelers especially benefit from the accessibility. This often means that if a traveler has access to a computer, phone or handheld with Internet connectivity they can utilize the web application.
Low Maintenance & Forced Upgrades Desktop applications need to be individually installed on each computer, while web applications require a single installation. Many web applications are hosted by a 3rd party and the maintenance fall under the applications hosts responsibility. The ability to update and maintain web applications without distributing and installing software on potentially thousands of client computers is a key reason for the popularity of web based applications. This can be a blessing and a curse as users of web applications on hosted systems are at the mercy of the host, if an upgrade does not go well, or the individual user doesn't want or need the new features the upgrade will still go forward.
Increased Security Risks There are always risks involved when dealing with working online, regardless of how secure a host might say a web application is, that fact of the matter stands that the security risk of running an application of the Internet is more significant than when running an application on a standalone desktop computer. Some applications require more security than others, playing Sudoku on a web application would cause little concern, but dealing with sensitive corporate formulas or accounting details in a web environment might be determined risky.
Cost Over the life of the software use, web applications are typically significantly more expensive over time. Desktop applications are purchased outright and rarely is their a recurring fee for the software use. Some desktop applications do have maintenance fees or fee based upgrades associated with them, but rarely is there a subscription fee associated with the software's ongoing use.
Many corporate web applications use a different model, users typically are charged monthly service f
With the intel chip set there is only 2 x8 pci-e lanes coming out of the north bridge and sas / sata-2 , pci-x, networking, as well as the pci-e slots on the board have to share them.
So with a lot of network use and disk use you can choke up that bus.
How did you come to the conclusion that AMD has better chipsets? I can get an nforce/crossfire/via motherboard for either AMD or Intel with pretty much identical specs. Intel has the advantage of making their own chipset, so Intel is the one that has the chipset advantage IMO.
Most of the actual LCD screen manufacturing is done by few companies
Very true. For example, pretty much every 22" LCD panel is made by Chi Mei (in Taiwan). Samsung, Viewsonic, Benq, Acer, Asus, etc all use Chi Mei panels, the only real difference is the packaging and inputs. I happen to have a 22" Chi Mei, an Acer that I got for $400 Canadian a few months ago and I'm very happy with the quality so far.
>Why don't we get USEFUL numbers. Sony launches a console, Microsoft has a console that's been out for a year. Why do we expect Microsoft's console to sell as many? Wait, what about the PS2 number which is a 4:1 ratio with the Xbox/Xbox360's number? The PS2 has been out for how long, 5 years, why is it outselling the xbox360's number with a huge ratio still?
That's not really a fair comparison to make. The newer, slim PS2 costs around $130, where as the xbox 360 is $400 or more. Also, a lot of the older PS2 games are $20 or less. If you are a parent with young kids, are you going to spend $200 for a PS2 with 3-5 games, or $400+ for a xbox 360 with no games.
I am well aware of using ODE with Ogre3D, it's still pretty buggy at this point (I use them both). Why would NASA want to enter the software developement business? They want a tool so they can get a job done, they don't want/need the additional task of building the tool aswell. Do you really think they want to spend several months or years bug testing and adding features to Ogre + ODE when they can just purchase an already feature-complete engine? They have better things to do with their time than work on a graphics engine.
I love Ogre3D, I use it myself for small game projects, but I don't think you could compare it to the Unreal 3 Engine. NASA would have to spend over $350k just to bring the Ogre3D engine upto spec with the Unreal engine, so why not just buy the Unreal engine and save a lot of time and money by not reinventing the wheel.
Ogre3D is mainly a graphics engine (Ogre stands for Object-Oriented Graphics Rendering Engine), where as the Unreal Engine is a complete game engine with graphics, AI, networking code, physics, sound, etc..
Slashdot Mirror
MDG is crap. I made the mistake several years ago of buying a system from them that came preloaded with Windows ME of all things! It's hard to say which was worse, Windows ME or the computer.
I read the paper almost daily, and there's always a misleading MDG ad in there somewhere. They advertise a 2.8ghz dual core as being a "5.6ghz processor equivalent".
There's no way I'm paying monthly to play Guild Wars or Diablo II all over again. This is just a money grab IMO. I was actually looking forward to this game, but not anymore. Why the hell would they wait till now to decide if they want to make it subscription based? I'm sick of MMOs, if I wanted to play a MMO, i'd go back to playing WoW. This decision is going to piss off a lot of people that were expecting Hellgate to be a hack and slash, not an MMORPG.
I feel the same way, I was actually interested in Hellgate London, but not anymore.
It's probably because gamers now use the internet for all their gaming news, there are several dozen free review sites, etc.. Gaming mags are a dying business model IMO.
That's hot.
I mentioned this already elsewhere, so I will just link to my previous comment: http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=21551 4&cid=17498444
Youtube videos run at 1-2 frames per second if that's any indicator of processing power.
There is a video of the N800 in action on this guys blog (I'm not promoting this guys blog, just found it through google). It looks pretty cool, but one of my concerns is the battery life, previous models suffered from a short battery life (3-4 hours between recharges). Hopefully Nokia addressed the battery life with this model.
Also, that blogger was playing a video on youtube on his N800 and he said, and I quote, "UPDATE: I forgot to mention that Youtube videos play at a brutal 1 or 2 frames per second. Yuck."
1920x1080i 42" Pioneer Plasma. A nice boxing day gift for myself :)
A first person shooter involving zombies.
Looks like a Pirate based MMORPG. I hope it's good because I love pirate games.
Never heard of it, but from the title, it sounds like a World War 2 fighter pilot game.
Had to google it. It's another MMORPG!
Never heard of it. A first person shooter or a strategy game, most likely.
I loved the old Shadowrun for SNES and Genesis, but I've heard bad things about this one, let's hope FASA & Microsoft don't ruin what could be a great game.
Never heard of it. Let's hope it's not another MMORPG!
Looks promising, hopefully EA doesn't muck it up. Graphics are impressive if that's any consolation.
A LOTR MMORPG, could this be a replacement for those WoW addicts?
Looks good. It's supposed to be a FPS/RPG similar to Diablo.
Yet another fantasy MMORPG. Great if you're a Warhammer fan...
Never heard of it.
A post chernobyl FPS. This game won Wired's Vaporware award in 2006, will it be vapor this year aswell?
Looks like Valve is finally coming out with Team Fortress 2, and only half as late as Duke Nukem Forever.
I've been waiting for this game for a while now. Hopefully it's addicting as UT2004, which I still have installed...
A real-time strategy set in the future. Don't know much other than that.
Looks good. From the people that made (the free) Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory.
Wasn't this supposed to be released in 2006? I lost interest in WoW over a year ago...
If you haven't heard of this game, you've been living under a rock. Hopefully it lives up to the hype.
A first person shooter set in the future. From the guys that did Far Cry. Looks good.
I'm guessing they had to do a reorg on their databases every tuesday since they probably have a few billions entries for all the items in everyones backpacks, etc.
This article does a good job of explaining the pros and cons of Web & Desktop apps.
Here's the full text:
How did you come to the conclusion that AMD has better chipsets? I can get an nforce/crossfire/via motherboard for either AMD or Intel with pretty much identical specs. Intel has the advantage of making their own chipset, so Intel is the one that has the chipset advantage IMO.
That's not really a fair comparison to make. The newer, slim PS2 costs around $130, where as the xbox 360 is $400 or more. Also, a lot of the older PS2 games are $20 or less. If you are a parent with young kids, are you going to spend $200 for a PS2 with 3-5 games, or $400+ for a xbox 360 with no games.
I am well aware of using ODE with Ogre3D, it's still pretty buggy at this point (I use them both). Why would NASA want to enter the software developement business? They want a tool so they can get a job done, they don't want/need the additional task of building the tool aswell. Do you really think they want to spend several months or years bug testing and adding features to Ogre + ODE when they can just purchase an already feature-complete engine? They have better things to do with their time than work on a graphics engine.
I love Ogre3D, I use it myself for small game projects, but I don't think you could compare it to the Unreal 3 Engine. NASA would have to spend over $350k just to bring the Ogre3D engine upto spec with the Unreal engine, so why not just buy the Unreal engine and save a lot of time and money by not reinventing the wheel.
Ogre3D is mainly a graphics engine (Ogre stands for Object-Oriented Graphics Rendering Engine), where as the Unreal Engine is a complete game engine with graphics, AI, networking code, physics, sound, etc..
Take a look at the list of Unreal Engine features and a look at the Ogre3D Engine features.