I really have to wonder if it's actually CS majors who are into this.
Many, if not most, non-majors I've seen in programming courses--lots of engineers--absolutely hate to program. They aren't good at it; they don't think like a coder; they write poor code and go to pains to do it. It's unrewarding for them, and they have a difficult time seeing the point to their struggles. The temptation is probably very high to buy your way out of a difficult course that you don't think you need to bother with in the first place, especially if you aren't one of those people who enjoys learning just for the sake of being scholarly.
Of course, looking at the article, I can't imagine most elementary coding classes worrying about PHP or threads--we never did. Are these management-tracking software engineers, or what?
This is a secondary point: when I was in college (very recently, I admit), I didn't know too many people who could probably afford to buy off their assignments regularly. Well, I should say that I didn't in one place, and that I probably did in the second--the former seemed to be full of people who enjoyed learning and were not exactly brimming with spare cash (lots of old clothes, crappy cars, and cheap greasy food); the latter, too many folks with other people's money in their wallets and other peoples' jobs in their sights (new cars, trendy cell phones, Starbucks).
Do you ever wonder if there's some player out there with lots of money and little sense, a figure or group that so hates video games that they go out of their way to fund or publish or otherwise create and promote games that make even real _gamers_ cringe?
Like other entertainment industries, the games they're turning out these days are more and more glitzy, formulaic crap; development prices are increasing due to new technology, risk is feared, and the gamer loses in the end. Nobody takes chances because nothing is new and exciting anymore. There's no trepidation about whether people want _any_ games at all, and they've hooked onto exactly what generates the highest number of net dollars in their pockets.
Hell, you could also say that other industries have now noticed the games industry--like AMD and their $1100 processors that cater to the gamers who MUST HAVE that extra 40 fps in Doom 3, even though they could run it at 75 and be happy. Let's not forget the video card folks, who've figured out that people out there are willing to buy _two_ of their enormously expensive high-end cards.
I _hated_ D2, mostly because I was always strapped for cash and items. I never even considered playing it online because of the seemingly very limited number of viable character builds. Well, that and all the cheaters/hackers. Is it so hard to make a game where ANY build is useful? I mean, I'd like to see an MMO where people don't try as hard as they can to get their damage per second as high as possible--I don't want to plan my character's _items_ and _equipment_ levels in advance. Hell, my character shouldn't even _know_ what's out there for him to find!
I also hated NWN--for some reason, D&D games are just incredibly repetitive and boring. I had the same issues with D&D Online: skills _felt_ too weak, and the fights (even with dodging and such) were just nauseatingly repetitive--and this coming from a guy who loves FF's turn-based systems.
I always thought that the THz band of the spectrum was a difficult place to find _any_ sort of sources, so isn't a tunable, non-lasing THz emittier a very significant discovery in and of itself, to say nothing of another source of coherent light?
Territory was supposed to be one of FFXI's big selling points--fight bad guys and take over areas for your nation--but it never seemed to me that anyone was paying very close attention to it.
On an unrelated note: I don't think I would like GW. It seems like it would be much the same play experience as Diablo 2, only in 3D and with an in-game lobby.
Man, maybe you're right. I forget who said it, but Frank Herbert did the same thing: build up characters just for the sake of knocking them down.
Still, it's not so much heart-wrenching or moving as it is just irritating when it happens over the course of ten minutes instead of a thousand pages. If Gun's doing the same thing, it's doing it even more poorly than what you describe.
Some games don't even feel like they're trying for a story. Quake, for instance, gave you some text at the beginning and some text at the end. There was no pretense of plot or of a development of a plot other than "You killed them; Earth wins."
Gun, though, felt like it really, really wanted to have a plot: the fastest plot in the West. You meet an important character, one who has traits and characteristics--not a throwaway--and two scenes later they're dead. I can understand if they wanted to go for the "death is ugly" Wild West theme; maybe by, say, having a character you've traveled with for half the game suddenly die without any drama: they're just shot dead, no chance for farewells or dramatic scenes. You _want_ that kind of suddenness, at times, because things can happen that way--people just die in real life, they don't always get to cough out a final message. Still, the game as it was felt too, too rushed. I was out of Dodge in the span of two missions, and out of Empire just as quickly. Considering that there're only two real towns in the entire game, that's some awfully fast progression.
Bull. I'm willing to bet that antimatter is the most expensive material on the planet, and if I remember correctly, we haven't produced more than nanograms. Since this is Slashdot, I'll let someone else to the research for me.
Wrist crossbow with USB-enabled darts. Shoot an update over to the guys down the hall. Writes once, reads once (more if you're lucky and/or have good aim). It's perfect: violent AND disposable, so everyone wins. Well, except the consumer, but since when has anyone cared about THEM?
Don't feel too bad. I had to Google Leeroy Jenkins before I "got" what it was about. I kept seeing it pop up everywhere out of context, but somehow never saw the source. Maybe it's because I don't play WoW.
Now _that's_ something that makes _no_ sense if you aren't on the inside. Some nerd types up "LEEEEEEEERROY JENNNNKINS," and it's just completely opaque--is it a battlecry? This is especially true when it's just thrown in a sig or something. How does the average Internet user google that, anyhow?
Frankly, I think it's sad to see people _afraid_ of asking questions. Everyone was a n00b at some point, and it's not like you can google "LFG WoW" and get an instant and up-to-date list of all the abbreviations everyone uses. It's not like you're asking a complex or involved question (how I mine for fish?); all someone has to do is type out "LFG = looking for group."
I played until about 30RDM - 5WHM or so. I knew about "Convert," and it frankly didn't seem like the solution I wanted. I bailed on FFXI (and MMOs) a long time ago.
I also don't call having one extra (if vital) debuff (Dispel is a debuff, no matter how it's used) and one extra heal function exactly a wealth of opportunity for the class, especially when all it does is allow a party to maximize a number. I sorta LIKED downtime, because it's the only time the party members would actually TALK with one another.
What I'd like to see is a party of _specialized_ Red Mages being able to basically get along as well as any other party, if at a slower pace.
No, scratch that. I'd like to see an MMO where people aren't _happy_ that they only have to grind 40 levels before grinding levels becomes less tedious.
I've got "RDM-itis" from FFXI. Red Mages wore real armor, swung a real sword, and could cast damage-causing spells in addition to heals, debuffs, and (crappy) buffs. Problem is that they didn't do any of these well: they couldn't tank, they couldn't manage Hate, they couldn't do crap for damage with sword or spell. In most parties, they were basically a backup healer and debuff manager: they took one load partially off of the White mage and one almost totally off the Black mage. They sure as hell couldn't solo very well, although I had all indications that this is something at which they should be quite good--imagine a warrior that can heal himself _enough to keep himself alive._ They were better than white mages, at least. (They also had the wrong class ability--since they have such low MP but NEED to cast lots of spells in a row, they should have had infinite MP instead of Chainspell--but that's beyond the scope of this rant.)
I don't like to see classes hobbled in this way. I realize that a class can't be good at everything, but when you give someone a good set of armor, a good weapon, healing AND attack spells, you kinda expect that they should at LEAST be able to solo a mob at their level. Couldn't with my RDM. If you're going to let a player make a fighter/mage, then that character should at least be able to grind at a rate comparable to a pure mage or pure fighter.
Then again, balance is hard.
I understand the comparative damage aspect. We all understand, though, that an MMO is about maximizing numbers--damage per second or whatever. If a party can grind through mobs faster because their Wizard can pour out damage at a stupid--not merely a ludicrous--rate, then they'll go with that. Nobody wants to grind forever, so this is understandable. Still, if a Paladin is being told "your damage is worthless: hide in the front lines, tank, cast, and do crap for damage with your weapon," they aren't doing what a traditional Paladin should do, and should probably be named something else.
Why call them paladins if they can't swing a sword or a mace or whatever? Call them Priests in Plate or Hateful Healers or something. Paladins are traditionally (in game terms) the folks who the men of the cloth turn to when they need someone to go out and _hurt_ something. Why rely on the expectations and the weight of the _name_ of a familiar gaming Job when you're not willing to work in the familiar idiom of that Job? Why pass up the chance to bolster your "lore" with a little creative license? If you want Paladins to run around half-naked with a sword in each hand, fighting for some greater cause using the art of War Dancing--fine! They're still un/holy warriors fighting for a higher power. By calling Doctor Tank a "Paladin," you're giving new players the idea that they will be able to play one out as a traditional paladin. I'm not saying that they should be in a party to do _all_ the damage or to manage Hate (through Provoke, or whatever WoW uses)--if they were, why have Warrior classes?
Everything I read about WoW makes it out to be the most nonsensical number crunch yet, wrapped up all pretty in the famous Blizzard brand name.
A humoristic and personable genius figure--or at least he comes off as such in his books. Maybe it's all crap--I don't know. I seriously think that his image could bolster the reputation of physicists the world over.
That's a HUGE incentive for Blizzard to ban farmers/cheaters--they'll go out and buy another copy of the game (barring piracy). Why would they put a stop to guaranteed repeat customers?
You need to ask yourself how many people bought Half-life 2, Halo 2, and GTA:SA. Even a sequel can be great; it just has to not suck.
This just happened to be a year when nothing that captured everyone's attention was released. Not even the DS games you mentioned. They sound fun, and the two-screen idea is interesting, but I personally hate playing portables, so I didn't buy them.
Slashdot Mirror
I really have to wonder if it's actually CS majors who are into this.
Many, if not most, non-majors I've seen in programming courses--lots of engineers--absolutely hate to program. They aren't good at it; they don't think like a coder; they write poor code and go to pains to do it. It's unrewarding for them, and they have a difficult time seeing the point to their struggles. The temptation is probably very high to buy your way out of a difficult course that you don't think you need to bother with in the first place, especially if you aren't one of those people who enjoys learning just for the sake of being scholarly.
Of course, looking at the article, I can't imagine most elementary coding classes worrying about PHP or threads--we never did. Are these management-tracking software engineers, or what?
This is a secondary point: when I was in college (very recently, I admit), I didn't know too many people who could probably afford to buy off their assignments regularly. Well, I should say that I didn't in one place, and that I probably did in the second--the former seemed to be full of people who enjoyed learning and were not exactly brimming with spare cash (lots of old clothes, crappy cars, and cheap greasy food); the latter, too many folks with other people's money in their wallets and other peoples' jobs in their sights (new cars, trendy cell phones, Starbucks).
Do you ever wonder if there's some player out there with lots of money and little sense, a figure or group that so hates video games that they go out of their way to fund or publish or otherwise create and promote games that make even real _gamers_ cringe?
Like other entertainment industries, the games they're turning out these days are more and more glitzy, formulaic crap; development prices are increasing due to new technology, risk is feared, and the gamer loses in the end. Nobody takes chances because nothing is new and exciting anymore. There's no trepidation about whether people want _any_ games at all, and they've hooked onto exactly what generates the highest number of net dollars in their pockets.
Hell, you could also say that other industries have now noticed the games industry--like AMD and their $1100 processors that cater to the gamers who MUST HAVE that extra 40 fps in Doom 3, even though they could run it at 75 and be happy. Let's not forget the video card folks, who've figured out that people out there are willing to buy _two_ of their enormously expensive high-end cards.
God, but PC gaming is screwed.
I _hated_ D2, mostly because I was always strapped for cash and items. I never even considered playing it online because of the seemingly very limited number of viable character builds. Well, that and all the cheaters/hackers. Is it so hard to make a game where ANY build is useful? I mean, I'd like to see an MMO where people don't try as hard as they can to get their damage per second as high as possible--I don't want to plan my character's _items_ and _equipment_ levels in advance. Hell, my character shouldn't even _know_ what's out there for him to find!
I also hated NWN--for some reason, D&D games are just incredibly repetitive and boring. I had the same issues with D&D Online: skills _felt_ too weak, and the fights (even with dodging and such) were just nauseatingly repetitive--and this coming from a guy who loves FF's turn-based systems.
I always thought that the THz band of the spectrum was a difficult place to find _any_ sort of sources, so isn't a tunable, non-lasing THz emittier a very significant discovery in and of itself, to say nothing of another source of coherent light?
Territory was supposed to be one of FFXI's big selling points--fight bad guys and take over areas for your nation--but it never seemed to me that anyone was paying very close attention to it.
On an unrelated note: I don't think I would like GW. It seems like it would be much the same play experience as Diablo 2, only in 3D and with an in-game lobby.
Man, maybe you're right. I forget who said it, but Frank Herbert did the same thing: build up characters just for the sake of knocking them down.
Still, it's not so much heart-wrenching or moving as it is just irritating when it happens over the course of ten minutes instead of a thousand pages. If Gun's doing the same thing, it's doing it even more poorly than what you describe.
That mistakenly implies that Walmart cares about everyone else. I don't think Walmart cares about anyone.
Some games don't even feel like they're trying for a story. Quake, for instance, gave you some text at the beginning and some text at the end. There was no pretense of plot or of a development of a plot other than "You killed them; Earth wins."
Gun, though, felt like it really, really wanted to have a plot: the fastest plot in the West. You meet an important character, one who has traits and characteristics--not a throwaway--and two scenes later they're dead. I can understand if they wanted to go for the "death is ugly" Wild West theme; maybe by, say, having a character you've traveled with for half the game suddenly die without any drama: they're just shot dead, no chance for farewells or dramatic scenes. You _want_ that kind of suddenness, at times, because things can happen that way--people just die in real life, they don't always get to cough out a final message. Still, the game as it was felt too, too rushed. I was out of Dodge in the span of two missions, and out of Empire just as quickly. Considering that there're only two real towns in the entire game, that's some awfully fast progression.
Yeah, the kind that get them around legal restraints. I don't want to hear my spy agencies going "oops."
Bull. I'm willing to bet that antimatter is the most expensive material on the planet, and if I remember correctly, we haven't produced more than nanograms. Since this is Slashdot, I'll let someone else to the research for me.
Wrist crossbow with USB-enabled darts. Shoot an update over to the guys down the hall. Writes once, reads once (more if you're lucky and/or have good aim). It's perfect: violent AND disposable, so everyone wins. Well, except the consumer, but since when has anyone cared about THEM?
For Fsck's Sake.
Don't feel too bad. I had to Google Leeroy Jenkins before I "got" what it was about. I kept seeing it pop up everywhere out of context, but somehow never saw the source. Maybe it's because I don't play WoW.
Now _that's_ something that makes _no_ sense if you aren't on the inside. Some nerd types up "LEEEEEEEERROY JENNNNKINS," and it's just completely opaque--is it a battlecry? This is especially true when it's just thrown in a sig or something. How does the average Internet user google that, anyhow?
Frankly, I think it's sad to see people _afraid_ of asking questions. Everyone was a n00b at some point, and it's not like you can google "LFG WoW" and get an instant and up-to-date list of all the abbreviations everyone uses. It's not like you're asking a complex or involved question (how I mine for fish?); all someone has to do is type out "LFG = looking for group."
I still don't know what the hell "ffs" means.
I played until about 30RDM - 5WHM or so. I knew about "Convert," and it frankly didn't seem like the solution I wanted. I bailed on FFXI (and MMOs) a long time ago.
I also don't call having one extra (if vital) debuff (Dispel is a debuff, no matter how it's used) and one extra heal function exactly a wealth of opportunity for the class, especially when all it does is allow a party to maximize a number. I sorta LIKED downtime, because it's the only time the party members would actually TALK with one another.
What I'd like to see is a party of _specialized_ Red Mages being able to basically get along as well as any other party, if at a slower pace.
No, scratch that. I'd like to see an MMO where people aren't _happy_ that they only have to grind 40 levels before grinding levels becomes less tedious.
I've got "RDM-itis" from FFXI. Red Mages wore real armor, swung a real sword, and could cast damage-causing spells in addition to heals, debuffs, and (crappy) buffs. Problem is that they didn't do any of these well: they couldn't tank, they couldn't manage Hate, they couldn't do crap for damage with sword or spell. In most parties, they were basically a backup healer and debuff manager: they took one load partially off of the White mage and one almost totally off the Black mage. They sure as hell couldn't solo very well, although I had all indications that this is something at which they should be quite good--imagine a warrior that can heal himself _enough to keep himself alive._ They were better than white mages, at least. (They also had the wrong class ability--since they have such low MP but NEED to cast lots of spells in a row, they should have had infinite MP instead of Chainspell--but that's beyond the scope of this rant.)
I don't like to see classes hobbled in this way. I realize that a class can't be good at everything, but when you give someone a good set of armor, a good weapon, healing AND attack spells, you kinda expect that they should at LEAST be able to solo a mob at their level. Couldn't with my RDM. If you're going to let a player make a fighter/mage, then that character should at least be able to grind at a rate comparable to a pure mage or pure fighter.
Then again, balance is hard.
I understand the comparative damage aspect. We all understand, though, that an MMO is about maximizing numbers--damage per second or whatever. If a party can grind through mobs faster because their Wizard can pour out damage at a stupid--not merely a ludicrous--rate, then they'll go with that. Nobody wants to grind forever, so this is understandable. Still, if a Paladin is being told "your damage is worthless: hide in the front lines, tank, cast, and do crap for damage with your weapon," they aren't doing what a traditional Paladin should do, and should probably be named something else.
Why call them paladins if they can't swing a sword or a mace or whatever? Call them Priests in Plate or Hateful Healers or something. Paladins are traditionally (in game terms) the folks who the men of the cloth turn to when they need someone to go out and _hurt_ something. Why rely on the expectations and the weight of the _name_ of a familiar gaming Job when you're not willing to work in the familiar idiom of that Job? Why pass up the chance to bolster your "lore" with a little creative license? If you want Paladins to run around half-naked with a sword in each hand, fighting for some greater cause using the art of War Dancing--fine! They're still un/holy warriors fighting for a higher power. By calling Doctor Tank a "Paladin," you're giving new players the idea that they will be able to play one out as a traditional paladin. I'm not saying that they should be in a party to do _all_ the damage or to manage Hate (through Provoke, or whatever WoW uses)--if they were, why have Warrior classes?
Everything I read about WoW makes it out to be the most nonsensical number crunch yet, wrapped up all pretty in the famous Blizzard brand name.
Kirk: Fix the WMF hole!
...
Let me guess: Tuesday?
Who exactly is going to spend billions on cancer research if they have no market share following their discovery of the cure?
There's humanity in a nutshell for you. If reading that doesn't make you sick, then I feel very, very sorry for you.
Nobody has mentioned the late Richard Feynman?
A humoristic and personable genius figure--or at least he comes off as such in his books. Maybe it's all crap--I don't know. I seriously think that his image could bolster the reputation of physicists the world over.
Leeroy Jenkins?
"To start press any key... Where's the 'any' key?"
That's a HUGE incentive for Blizzard to ban farmers/cheaters--they'll go out and buy another copy of the game (barring piracy). Why would they put a stop to guaranteed repeat customers?
I'd write a clever add-on to your response, but I'm too busy playing Morrowind, since there's nothing good on the shelves for PC gamers.
You need to ask yourself how many people bought Half-life 2, Halo 2, and GTA:SA. Even a sequel can be great; it just has to not suck.
This just happened to be a year when nothing that captured everyone's attention was released. Not even the DS games you mentioned. They sound fun, and the two-screen idea is interesting, but I personally hate playing portables, so I didn't buy them.