Google plans to unveil their new software aptly named 'Google Solar System', which sews the surface maps of the planets together for an interactive flythrough.
"Users have to download and install it themselves"
Don't download and install it. It's not like they can creatively name an email attachment, and if it is turning PSP's into bricks, then you are not going to get it from another PSP.
Aside form all of that, it is interesting that there is already a virus out there at all for this handheld device. Although 'brick'ing a psp is just completely malicious, and has no effective purpose.
I give this virus a 2 out of 5 on the creative scale. (+1 for being the first)
$15.6m is what the production costs are on a high end 'AAA' title (ususally a bit less) in which would pay them back 100 times that. So EA didn't lose $15.6m for overworking these artists, they lost a potential of $1.4b.
The quality of life for EA employees has gone way up, and don't think for a second that EA is bitter, and going ot drive their employees out over this, because talent who is capable of performing to EA's standards is harder to find than one would think. Besides, EA has many different studios with the same parent name, which have nothing to do with each other. EA Stormfront has only one thing in common with EA Tiburon, they both make games for EA.
EA is not a bad company at all, and for being the biggest publisher/developer of video games in the world, I would say they are not the huge ugly corporate monster that most make them out to be.
[pwned by the html selection, new and improved comment, now with more carriage returns]
From the perspective of a Game Developer, there are quite a few myths that buzz about the game industry, and the majority of the complaints about the quality of games these days fall on deaf ears.
My favorite is "This game would be so much better if X was done instead of Y". X = a pretty damn good idea which chances are was already thought of, and more times than not, in the original design doc to begin with but had to be cut. Y = what the developers settled for due to time constraints / engine shortcomings / limited funds from publishers etc...
The developers of the games you play know that X would be super sweet, but they also have a chain of command which unless followed to the letter results in best case, termination of employment, and worse case, the plug pulled on the title completely. The designers know that enough X's would put the game quality over the top, and change a sub-par 'b' title to a 'AAA'. Unfortunately for games, features are cut early, and cut often to save production time and costs. And in the end, you have just another clone of a game you played last year, and not much to offer otherwise. But strangely enough, this is what pays the bills, and as long as the boss can pay his employees, they can all stay in business.
Not that X ideas are bad, in fact they are what keeps the game industry bringing in more revenue than Hollywood year after year. If there were no good ideas realised, there would be no reason to buy new games... but just because a good idea didn't make it into a game, doesn't mean the game was any less difficult to make it into your console.
Another myth is that to make games more real, X should be implemented. X = some realistic physics, or models, or anything along that nature.
The answer to this is pretty simple, who wants to play "Real Life 2.0?" The reason games are fun, is because they do not follow the real world too closely. This is the same reason action heroes never get hit by the flurry of bullets through chain link fence.
Sure, bullets do not fire in a straight line, as per suggested by just about every FPS out there. Have you ever calculated the physics of a bullet? Did you calculate in everything including wind resistance and gravity? And because I know this will reach at least one person who has done this, how long did it take you to do the math? Could you imagine doing it 60 times a second? Even if you simplified it greatly, you can't argue that it will still take up a considerable amount of processing power to do it that often, not to mention the bandwidth to transfer it. This is why a 'ray to cylinder' collision is used instead.. its fast and easy.. and aside from the select few who want physics to feel even more realistic, its good enough for the mass audience.
From the perspective of a Game Developer, there are quite a few myths that buzz about the game industry, and the majority of the complaints about the quality of games these days fall on deaf ears.
My favorite is "This game would be so much better if X was done instead of Y".
X = a pretty damn good idea which chances are was already thought of, and more times than not, in the original design doc to begin with but had to be cut.
Y = what the developers settled for due to time constraints / engine shortcomings / limited funds from publishers etc...
The developers of the games you play know that X would be super sweet, but they also have a chain of command which unless followed to the letter results in best case, termination of employment, and worse case, the plug pulled on the title completely. The designers know that enough X's would put the game quality over the top, and change a sub-par 'b' title to a 'AAA'. Unfortunately for games, features are cut early, and cut often to save production time and costs. And in the end, you have just another clone of a game you played last year, and not much to offer otherwise. But strangely enough, this is what pays the bills, and as long as the boss can pay his employees, they can all stay in business.
Not that X ideas are bad, in fact they are what keeps the game industry bringing in more revenue than Hollywood year after year. If there were no good ideas realised, there would be no reason to buy new games... but just because a good idea didn't make it into a game, doesn't mean the game was any less difficult to make it into your console.
Another myth is that to make games more real, X should be implemented.
X = some realistic physics, or models, or anything along that nature.
The answer to this is pretty simple, who wants to play "Real Life 2.0?" The reason games are fun, is because they do not follow the real world too closely. This is the same reason action heroes never get hit by the flurry of bullets through chain link fence. Sure, bullets do not fire in a straight line, as per suggested by just about every FPS out there. Have you ever calculated the physics of a bullet? Did you calculate in everything including wind resistance and gravity? And because I know this will reach at least one person who has done this, how long did it take you to do the math? Could you imagine doing it 60 times a second? Even if you simplified it greatly, you can't argue that it will still take up a considerable amount of processing power to do it that often, not to mention the bandwidth to transfer it. This is why a 'ray to cylinder' collision is used instead.. its fast and easy.. and aside from the select few who want physics to feel even more realistic, its good enough for the mass audience.
While strolling through the EA Tiburon campus, I overheard a few things about the XBox 360 development units. It seems out of the 10 (or so) Dev Kits that Tiburon recieved, 7 of them had something serious wrong with them. Now granted these are beta kits, and not expected to function perfectly, but 7 out of 10 that could not so much as operate at all is a bad sign for even betas.
I also overheard this quote, "If the release version is even twice as good as these beta dev kits, you will never see me throwing down for one."
I am praying that there was just a bad string of chips, or the parcel was run over by a forklift before being delivered, but if they are correct, then I forsee a very rocky release.
Until there is only one chain I can buy/sell/trade with, driving the price of pre-played games through the roof. Currently, being able to pick up a copy of a 6 year old title up for less than $5 is blasphemy! The data hasn't eroded, and the game still plays the same as it did then! Why not charge slightly less than retail for it?
Anything that is wireless is subjectable to malicious behaviour. I haven't seen a wireless device yet that couldn't be hijacked itself starting with something as simple as a frequency counter.
You may think to yourself, "Who would want to clone the functionality of a wireless hijack button?" But think about how many virii are floating around this very minute.
Slashdot Mirror
Hmm.. Interesting. Who manufactures Artificial Hip's? I am looking to make an investement.
Google plans to unveil their new software aptly named 'Google Solar System', which sews the surface maps of the planets together for an interactive flythrough.
"Users have to download and install it themselves"
Don't download and install it. It's not like they can creatively name an email attachment, and if it is turning PSP's into bricks, then you are not going to get it from another PSP.
Aside form all of that, it is interesting that there is already a virus out there at all for this handheld device. Although 'brick'ing a psp is just completely malicious, and has no effective purpose.
I give this virus a 2 out of 5 on the creative scale. (+1 for being the first)
$15.6m is what the production costs are on a high end 'AAA' title (ususally a bit less) in which would pay them back 100 times that. So EA didn't lose $15.6m for overworking these artists, they lost a potential of $1.4b.
The quality of life for EA employees has gone way up, and don't think for a second that EA is bitter, and going ot drive their employees out over this, because talent who is capable of performing to EA's standards is harder to find than one would think. Besides, EA has many different studios with the same parent name, which have nothing to do with each other. EA Stormfront has only one thing in common with EA Tiburon, they both make games for EA.
EA is not a bad company at all, and for being the biggest publisher/developer of video games in the world, I would say they are not the huge ugly corporate monster that most make them out to be.
[pwned by the html selection, new and improved comment, now with more carriage returns]
From the perspective of a Game Developer, there are quite a few myths that buzz about the game industry, and the majority of the complaints about the quality of games these days fall on deaf ears.
My favorite is "This game would be so much better if X was done instead of Y".
X = a pretty damn good idea which chances are was already thought of, and more times than not, in the original design doc to begin with but had to be cut.
Y = what the developers settled for due to time constraints / engine shortcomings / limited funds from publishers etc...
The developers of the games you play know that X would be super sweet, but they also have a chain of command which unless followed to the letter results in best case, termination of employment, and worse case, the plug pulled on the title completely. The designers know that enough X's would put the game quality over the top, and change a sub-par 'b' title to a 'AAA'. Unfortunately for games, features are cut early, and cut often to save production time and costs. And in the end, you have just another clone of a game you played last year, and not much to offer otherwise. But strangely enough, this is what pays the bills, and as long as the boss can pay his employees, they can all stay in business.
Not that X ideas are bad, in fact they are what keeps the game industry bringing in more revenue than Hollywood year after year. If there were no good ideas realised, there would be no reason to buy new games... but just because a good idea didn't make it into a game, doesn't mean the game was any less difficult to make it into your console.
Another myth is that to make games more real, X should be implemented.
X = some realistic physics, or models, or anything along that nature.
The answer to this is pretty simple, who wants to play "Real Life 2.0?" The reason games are fun, is because they do not follow the real world too closely. This is the same reason action heroes never get hit by the flurry of bullets through chain link fence.
Sure, bullets do not fire in a straight line, as per suggested by just about every FPS out there. Have you ever calculated the physics of a bullet? Did you calculate in everything including wind resistance and gravity? And because I know this will reach at least one person who has done this, how long did it take you to do the math? Could you imagine doing it 60 times a second? Even if you simplified it greatly, you can't argue that it will still take up a considerable amount of processing power to do it that often, not to mention the bandwidth to transfer it. This is why a 'ray to cylinder' collision is used instead.. its fast and easy.. and aside from the select few who want physics to feel even more realistic, its good enough for the mass audience.
From the perspective of a Game Developer, there are quite a few myths that buzz about the game industry, and the majority of the complaints about the quality of games these days fall on deaf ears. My favorite is "This game would be so much better if X was done instead of Y". X = a pretty damn good idea which chances are was already thought of, and more times than not, in the original design doc to begin with but had to be cut. Y = what the developers settled for due to time constraints / engine shortcomings / limited funds from publishers etc... The developers of the games you play know that X would be super sweet, but they also have a chain of command which unless followed to the letter results in best case, termination of employment, and worse case, the plug pulled on the title completely. The designers know that enough X's would put the game quality over the top, and change a sub-par 'b' title to a 'AAA'. Unfortunately for games, features are cut early, and cut often to save production time and costs. And in the end, you have just another clone of a game you played last year, and not much to offer otherwise. But strangely enough, this is what pays the bills, and as long as the boss can pay his employees, they can all stay in business. Not that X ideas are bad, in fact they are what keeps the game industry bringing in more revenue than Hollywood year after year. If there were no good ideas realised, there would be no reason to buy new games... but just because a good idea didn't make it into a game, doesn't mean the game was any less difficult to make it into your console. Another myth is that to make games more real, X should be implemented. X = some realistic physics, or models, or anything along that nature. The answer to this is pretty simple, who wants to play "Real Life 2.0?" The reason games are fun, is because they do not follow the real world too closely. This is the same reason action heroes never get hit by the flurry of bullets through chain link fence. Sure, bullets do not fire in a straight line, as per suggested by just about every FPS out there. Have you ever calculated the physics of a bullet? Did you calculate in everything including wind resistance and gravity? And because I know this will reach at least one person who has done this, how long did it take you to do the math? Could you imagine doing it 60 times a second? Even if you simplified it greatly, you can't argue that it will still take up a considerable amount of processing power to do it that often, not to mention the bandwidth to transfer it. This is why a 'ray to cylinder' collision is used instead.. its fast and easy.. and aside from the select few who want physics to feel even more realistic, its good enough for the mass audience.
While strolling through the EA Tiburon campus, I overheard a few things about the XBox 360 development units. It seems out of the 10 (or so) Dev Kits that Tiburon recieved, 7 of them had something serious wrong with them. Now granted these are beta kits, and not expected to function perfectly, but 7 out of 10 that could not so much as operate at all is a bad sign for even betas.
I also overheard this quote, "If the release version is even twice as good as these beta dev kits, you will never see me throwing down for one."
I am praying that there was just a bad string of chips, or the parcel was run over by a forklift before being delivered, but if they are correct, then I forsee a very rocky release.
Until there is only one chain I can buy/sell/trade with, driving the price of pre-played games through the roof. Currently, being able to pick up a copy of a 6 year old title up for less than $5 is blasphemy! The data hasn't eroded, and the game still plays the same as it did then! Why not charge slightly less than retail for it?
TGF Ebay.
Anything that is wireless is subjectable to malicious behaviour. I haven't seen a wireless device yet that couldn't be hijacked itself starting with something as simple as a frequency counter. You may think to yourself, "Who would want to clone the functionality of a wireless hijack button?" But think about how many virii are floating around this very minute.