Yes, yes! SMAC is my favorite game of all time. I'd even be content with (read: willing to pay $60 for) a new version that just updated the graphics to something more like Civ IV (or even Civ III -- just having more than 256 colors and some higher resolutions would be nice).
But what I'd truly love to see is a civ-like game that carried on from the "transcendence" ending to SMAC -- something where the entire solar system, now a hive-mind made up of millions of separate entities, engaged in the 4E (Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate) race. Imagine battling OTHER hive-mind systems for control of energy-rich primordial black holes and uninhabited terrestrial worlds. "World wonders" or "secret projects" could be replaced with feats of mega-engineering: Ringworlds, dyson spheres, O'Neill cylinders, planetary rosettes, etc.
A SMAC-like game on another kind of world would be neat too... how about one where you build settlements in the oceans under Europa's icy surface? You could give the world different map layers (sea floor, ice underside, ice topside), throw in some alien sea monsters, whatever. Ooh, or how about setting it out in the Kuiper belt -- you could build cities on asteroids and comets and make your own modular space stations.
Anyway, another SMACish game has tons of potential. I could go on and on.
Woops! Before anyone corrects me, Andromeda is the nearest spiral galaxy. There are some closer galaxies, but they're irregular, dwarf, or elliptical. Andromeda's the closest thing to us that's on par with the Milky Way in terms of size.
>> I wonder where, on your scale, the closest galaxy would be. Maybe the sun?
Assuming it was a 12" record, Andromeda (the nearest galaxy) would be about 4.1 AU (~381 million miles) away. This is roughly the distance from Earth's orbit to Jupiter's orbit, or about four times the distance between Earth and the sun.
jimmyfergus wrote: It is "those like them in other countries" that these computers are going to be sent to. Didn't you just contradict your own point? Or are the kids in Brazil etc. somehow not like American kids? Who exactly are the inappropriate targets of this plan, and how are they inappropriate? ***
He was just unaware of the OLPC's actual target group. I think it's obvious he wasn't trying to say the laptops should only be given to white American children. He certainly didn't deserve your accusations. Next time you might try making an effort to understand someone's message before you call them a racist.
"Connection to database could not be made."
Great post. You'd think that when people submit stuff like this they'd think ahead and provide mirror links...
It's a discussion about (at least in part) people who are attracted to other people of the same sex. What would you have us call them? I suppose we could replace each instance of "gays" with "people who are probably well-adjusted, productive members of society but just happen to have a gender-based sexual preference contrary to the majority." But that's a lot of crap to type.
Daemon Toolz alone won't do it... you have to use Anti-Blaxx as well (which, for some reason, makes my system unstable). Eh, I'm just gonna go back to disc swapping and resent Firaxis a little bit more...
Comparing the space elevator to the lifts in multi-story buildings is just stupid. Beyond the fact that both involve cables of some sort and are meant to raise and lower things, there's very little similarity. And to think that an Otis employee would have anything useful to contribute because of his/her job is laughable.
I didn't know that was possible... hot air is just kind of "wobbly" looking, right? I don't think I've ever seen it reflect light unless it was on the road and at least 100' away.
With as much as these guys must know about graphic design, you'd think they could make a web site where you wouldn't have to scroll from side to side... and I'm at 1280x1024... man.
VoIP providers don't know what's gonna happen. Lots of lawyers try to pretend they know. FCC sticks with "no comment." In the end, everyone does whatever they want.
Perhaps I should have been more specific: In terms of "ability to cause the extinction of the human race," strangelets are more dangerous. I didn't mean to say anything about the actual likelyhood of it happening.
Though, as an aside, 1 in 10 billion is more probable than the odds I'd imagined.
Antimatter isn't as dangerous as you seem to think it is. Even 5 kg of the stuff would only produce a 100-megaton blast. And would cost $125 trillion. Nukes are still more dangerous.
If you want some kind of doomsday device to worry over, consider strangelets and particle accelerators instead.
Slashdot Mirror
Who wrote this article? It reads like it was written by a hurried high school student...
"Blizzard North may be history, but Diablo remains to be one of the biggest RPG properties in existence."
"The game still has a regularly Planet site, believe it or not."
Yes, yes! SMAC is my favorite game of all time. I'd even be content with (read: willing to pay $60 for) a new version that just updated the graphics to something more like Civ IV (or even Civ III -- just having more than 256 colors and some higher resolutions would be nice).
But what I'd truly love to see is a civ-like game that carried on from the "transcendence" ending to SMAC -- something where the entire solar system, now a hive-mind made up of millions of separate entities, engaged in the 4E (Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate) race. Imagine battling OTHER hive-mind systems for control of energy-rich primordial black holes and uninhabited terrestrial worlds. "World wonders" or "secret projects" could be replaced with feats of mega-engineering: Ringworlds, dyson spheres, O'Neill cylinders, planetary rosettes, etc.
A SMAC-like game on another kind of world would be neat too... how about one where you build settlements in the oceans under Europa's icy surface? You could give the world different map layers (sea floor, ice underside, ice topside), throw in some alien sea monsters, whatever. Ooh, or how about setting it out in the Kuiper belt -- you could build cities on asteroids and comets and make your own modular space stations.
Anyway, another SMACish game has tons of potential. I could go on and on.
Or worse.
It's become hip to do so ever since he appeared on South Park (having sex with a bald transexual).
>> they reek of jerry-rigged fixes
Jury-rigged.
Woops! Before anyone corrects me, Andromeda is the nearest spiral galaxy. There are some closer galaxies, but they're irregular, dwarf, or elliptical. Andromeda's the closest thing to us that's on par with the Milky Way in terms of size.
>> I wonder where, on your scale, the closest galaxy would be. Maybe the sun?
Assuming it was a 12" record, Andromeda (the nearest galaxy) would be about 4.1 AU (~381 million miles) away. This is roughly the distance from Earth's orbit to Jupiter's orbit, or about four times the distance between Earth and the sun.
jimmyfergus wrote:
It is "those like them in other countries" that these computers are going to be sent to. Didn't you just contradict your own point? Or are the kids in Brazil etc. somehow not like American kids? Who exactly are the inappropriate targets of this plan, and how are they inappropriate?
***
He was just unaware of the OLPC's actual target group. I think it's obvious he wasn't trying to say the laptops should only be given to white American children. He certainly didn't deserve your accusations. Next time you might try making an effort to understand someone's message before you call them a racist.
"Connection to database could not be made." Great post. You'd think that when people submit stuff like this they'd think ahead and provide mirror links...
It's a discussion about (at least in part) people who are attracted to other people of the same sex. What would you have us call them? I suppose we could replace each instance of "gays" with "people who are probably well-adjusted, productive members of society but just happen to have a gender-based sexual preference contrary to the majority." But that's a lot of crap to type.
Daemon Toolz alone won't do it... you have to use Anti-Blaxx as well (which, for some reason, makes my system unstable). Eh, I'm just gonna go back to disc swapping and resent Firaxis a little bit more...
How ironic that these angsty teenagers no longer have a place to whine about their opression... :P
Comparing the space elevator to the lifts in multi-story buildings is just stupid. Beyond the fact that both involve cables of some sort and are meant to raise and lower things, there's very little similarity. And to think that an Otis employee would have anything useful to contribute because of his/her job is laughable.
> It's all crap, and it isn't worth consideration.
Well at least you're not generalizing or anything...
I didn't know that was possible... hot air is just kind of "wobbly" looking, right? I don't think I've ever seen it reflect light unless it was on the road and at least 100' away.
Sorry, forgot where I was... how many days at the pillory is it again for using IE? :P
But seriously, when 85%+ of your audience uses a particular browser, doesn't it make sense to design pages with it in mind?
(FTR, I don't use vanilla IE; I use the Avant shell. So I still get tabbed browing, mouse gestures, ad-blocking, etc.)
With as much as these guys must know about graphic design, you'd think they could make a web site where you wouldn't have to scroll from side to side... and I'm at 1280x1024... man.
Heeeey... were you a writer for Who's the Boss? Charles in Charge? Gotta be one of those.
VoIP providers don't know what's gonna happen. Lots of lawyers try to pretend they know. FCC sticks with "no comment." In the end, everyone does whatever they want.
Like a whale it hears singing.
Wait a second... I think I saw this in Star Trek IV.
Perhaps I should have been more specific: In terms of "ability to cause the extinction of the human race," strangelets are more dangerous. I didn't mean to say anything about the actual likelyhood of it happening.
Though, as an aside, 1 in 10 billion is more probable than the odds I'd imagined.
Antimatter isn't as dangerous as you seem to think it is. Even 5 kg of the stuff would only produce a 100-megaton blast. And would cost $125 trillion. Nukes are still more dangerous.
If you want some kind of doomsday device to worry over, consider strangelets and particle accelerators instead.
Huh?
Uh... why did you call the US route "Fred"?
You know, "astro" is just a prefix that means "outer space." It doesn't indicate nationality.