Just like there will never be another Doom
on
Can Anyone Beat WoW?
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· Score: 5, Interesting
There will always be that one game that defines a genre. Doom was not the first FPS, but it was the FPS that made the genre a sensation. Command & Conquer did the same for RTS. WoW is just that defining game for MMORPGs; it built upon the pioneers and has reached that critical mass where MMOs stop being a niche genre and have become mainstream.
The question is: do we really want a single dominant game in any genre?
Generally the sticking point for creationists is the idea that a species can diverge, or become two distinct species. By the definition of evolution that you give, I can't find any reasonnot to think that over a long enough period of time a species can diverge if two isolated populations exist. So by conceding evolution, a creationist must concede divergence.
As for the natural history as accepted by scientists, it's tenuous and ever-changing. It's based on a very incomplete fossil record that may have significant gaps; it's a best guess and should not be considered absolute in any way.
What we need is to divide more, at least politically. The current two-party system in the U.S. is stifling political expression at any level above local. When people stop running the party line and actually speak their minds, compromise is much more easily reached and things actually get accomplished.
What is macroevolution but microevolution on a larger time scale?
If you take two populations of the same species and place them in significantly different environments, microevolution will obviously change the populations to suit their new environs. Given enough time, then, doesn't it stand to reason that the two groups could diverge enough to be two distinct species, unable to produce viable offspring when the species come in contact again?
It's true that the vast majority of people in America have the same goals: Be safe, protect our rights, educate our children, and ensure they have the same or better opportunities than we do. What you don't seem to get is that we all have different ideas on how to go about doing that.
Just look at education: A lot of people are just fine with the status quo. Plenty more would rather see our public school system converted into religious schools. I've also seen movements to bring back single-room schooling or privatize all schooling. There are plenty of parents who practice conventional homeschooling as well as such varieties as "unschooling" that abandon the typical structure of an education environment. Nearly everyone will agree that providing an education to children is necessary for the advancement of our nation and our children, but the ideas on how to do this are so radically different that education alone could break up your utopian "one party" idea.
Then why has the Bush administration cut taxes to the wealthiest people
Because they pay most of the taxes, and so when taxes are cut they're the one who see most of the cuts. I'm far from wealthy, but benefited from Bush's tax cuts.
and raised spending, sending the deficit higher than it's ever been before?
Because Bush's dad never taught him to balance a check book?
Under Clinton we were paying it off.
Under Clinton we had a propped-up economy full of ongoing accounting scandals like Enron. I'm not saying that's Clinton's fault. I doubt he discouraged such behavior since the soaring market looked good for his ratings, but I certainly don't think he was complicit in some attempt of inflating the economy beyond what it could sustain. I do know, though, that in 1998 my father was already predicting a sharp fall at the end of Clinton's presidency. He certainly wasn't the only person to expect it.
The republican party seems intent on keeping everyone a functional christian through the legal system.
Gay people can't get married,
I'm a fan of civil unions myself. Let's stop fighting over the word marriage and just give them the rights and privileges legally extended by marriage. We can sort out just what "marriage" means later.
sodomy is illegal in some places. Even fornication (an unmarried couple having sex) is technically illegal in some localities, even if only used against prostitutes and their customers.
Such laws collapse in court. Quite a few lawmakers are surprised when they are told that such laws still exist in their area; they've been on the books for decades, if not longer.
A creationist-friendly way to segue into evolution (I've seen this done, it works in most cases):
1) Start with an explanation of what science is. At its core, science is the ongoing effort to understand our world and the universe around it, how it works, and how it came to be. Specifically, science is intended to look at the world impartially and judge it only on proveable, repeatable observations. Science is the practice of observing facts and forming opinions based solely on those facts.
2) Define a scientific theory. It's not "just a guess". A true theory is supported by all the available facts, and can be used to predict further observations. When a theory is proven wrong, it is either modified (as evolution has been many times) or thrown out entirely.
3) Explain the basics of evolution. Point out that it describes a system of nature, and not just an order of progression. The theory of evolution is not the idea that man evolved from monkeys. The idea comes from the theory, but is not an integral part of it. Evolution at its most basic level is simply stated as "life changes".
I've put it this way before: Would you agree that every generation of humanity is somehow different than the last? That with each generation, some individuals never reproduce and some are far more successful (have more kids) than others? Does that not change the gene pool for the entire species? Every generation, the gene pool changes a little bit. When those changes are cumulative, that's evolution.
4) If the subject comes up, address the fact that evolution has never been meant as a direct challenge to any faith or belief. It is simply the best model for explaining the scientific observations available. It can be contradicted tomorrow, should sufficient observations be made.
"Paying for home desktop Linux just strikes me as....bizarre...."
I can only think of one valid reason to pay for Linux: support.
If a company sold Linux for a reasonable price and offered competent phone support, it would be worthwhile for people looking for a Windows alternative who don't have the time to invest in getting to know Linux well enough to be comfortable with it as their only operating system.
It's not in use at my work (except in a few dedicated roles using live CDs) because the adminstrator doesn't know Linux well enough to be comfortable with relying on it. There isn't a support structure comparable to Microsoft's; their knowledge base alone trumps any support offerings I've ever seen for Linux.
It's a no-brainer that the PS3 *will* sell. But with its high price tag, lackluster performance (to date), and late release, it's not going to be anything special. The PS3 fanboys will be good little consumer whores and run out and buy it as soon as it hits the shelves, just like the Nintendo and MS fanboys.
Console RPGs tend to be more adventure games than real RPGs. Just look at that shining flagship example called Final Fantasy: it barely qualifies as an RPG to those of us who have played true RPGs.
Some PC RPGs: Fallout Baldur's Gate Neverwinter Nights Ultima
And of course there's that annoying lack of a mouse, which I've come to be quite fond of in RPGs.
1. Actually, the PC boasts far more genres than console. It's just that there are a handful of genres that the PC has always done better than consoles, and those are the genres I like.
2. It really depends on what kind of gamer you are. If you're the kind that owns all three console brands plus a handul, I'd wager I spend less on my hardware than you do. If you're the kind satisfied with just one console, you're also more likely to be the kind of PC gamer to not spend as much on hardware, and wait til games and hardware drop in price rather than pay the brand-spanking-new price. I've always found the price argument against PC gaming to be fragile at best; I've seen gamers spend far more on consoles. Especially since all the people arguing that consoles are cheaper than PCs already own a PC.
3. I make a hardware change to my PC once a year on average, and it takes me less than an hour to the most extensive job (changing out a motherboard).
I share your concern about Crysis not being anything more than a shinier version of Far Cry. That's why I tend to give a game some time to be reviewed by the masses before I run out and buy it. And if it does require Windows Vista, Crytek is going to be sorely disappointed that even those who have the hardware won't be willing to spend several hundred dollars to upgrade their OS just to play a handful of games that require.
They're probably making the arguement that the 360 and PS3 will never be able to show the game as they intend it to look (kind of like Doom 3 on the XBOX will never have the quality of a good PC) and they don't want to release to a medium that would force them to compromise.
As in my example of HL2, the game would work on lower-end systems by stepping down the graphics until it performed as desired, but when run on a good system it could open its graphics engine up and look quite stunning. Crysis could do the same for PC, but consoles will never benefit from upgrades or better replacements. Five years from now, the game would look exactly the same on the console.
Either you're fairly new to console gaming, or you're lucky to not remember the NES/SNES/N64 lockups. I can't comment on the Gamecube, I abandoned consoles before it hit the market.
And I for one and not accustomed to crappy games on the PC. If the game is crap, I don't play it. I know, I know...you're wondering how I know it's crap if I haven't played it. It's because I actually wait a month or two from release and see how the game is reviewed by my peers before I touch it (I do make exceptions to this rule, and will for Supreme Commander among others due next year).
I've never paid $500 for a video. My current spending limit is $250 every two years, which is more than sufficient for running the newest games, albeit not at the highest resolutions or detail settings (they'll still look better than anything the PS2 can deliver).
I play games on the PC because the PS2,or any other console, doesn't deliver as well on the genres I like: RTS, FPS, and RPG. I spend roughly the price of a new console every year keeping my system current enough to run the games I want to play.
And who uses a $350 PC to play games? I couldn't buy a motherboard, processor, and memory for $350 if I was building a gaming system. I think I found the source of your problem:)
Valve made Half-Life 2 run quite well on an aging PC. When I upgraded and played through the game a second time, I realized just how much different it looked with the better system. Here's hoping Crytek is willing to do the same thing. It doesn't have to be shiny for it to be fun.
Seriously. They aren't funny. They aren't accurate. They aren't even good marketing. I don't know a single person swayed by those ads, and that includes a customer base of some fairly technology-challenged people. Hey Apple...how about the truth some time, not a bunch of commercials that leave us PC users asking "who has a computer like that?"
Well that's simple. Just get yourself a Portable Hole. If those are out of stock, see if there are any Pocket Universes available. Push comes to shove, a Bag of Holding will work, though it would be much harder to retrieve items from the Bag than the former two solutions.
Filing cabinets, empty paper boxes, and CD envelopes.
Yes, filing cabinets. The kind made for hanging folders. I've got one drawer at home full of CDs. Several hundred, in fact.
Put the CDs in paper envelopes and stack them into the lid from a 10-ream box of paper. I think one box lid will hold around 500 CDs in this manner; I've never tried to fill one up this way so actual results may vary. Stack two filled box lids into a drawer. 10 four-drawer cabinets should be sufficient for storage, and help you keep organized without the stupid CD books.
It will work with jewel cases as well, though obviously require a lot more space.
I'm not part of the "Sony makes crap" crowd. I've got a digital camera from Sony, and it's great. I love some its features...specifically that it runs on AA batteries and can recharge them when it plugged in. That means spare batteries are cheap and plentiful in the event I forget to plug my camera in for a month. My home stereo is also a Sony, and has worked perfectly for years.
That said, I think Sony is really going to screw up the consumer electronics market if they have their way. Rather than play along and make things easy on consumers, they are once again pushing their own proprietary standard (Blu Ray) that I fully expect to see beat out by HD-DVD just because the latter has the right name. Sony thinks they can dictate their will to the market. They want to decide what is best for us and shove it down our throats until we love it. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't...but it always muddies the waters and makes it harder for Joe Sixpack to make sense of a market that changes rapidly enough without competing standards.
AT&T, back when they were SBC (the name change still irks me, I hated AT&T but have always had positive experiences with SBC), was pushing a project that would have made rural broadband a much more profitable venture...they were pushing for a state-wide license in Texas to distribute television programming over their system. The more they can deliver to each household, the more households they can afford to reach.
That's the big question. That, and how organized does this need to be? I can think of a couple of surprisingly simple solutions that are easy to keep organized, but it's hard to make recommendations without knowing exactly what they have to work with.
Every exchange in my county is DSL capable now. Nearly 35% of the population still has no broadband availability due to line distance from the equipment.
You're absolutely right. I thought I made it pretty clear throughout my post that the single thing keeping it from happening was the lack of profitability for the companies. They don't wire rural areas because there's not enough money in it for them. There are a lot of areas where it would cost them so much to upgrade that they would spend years just trying to break even, and there are a lot more where the small profit doesn't justify the expense. If they can stick the money in an investment account and make the same or better profit, don't expect them to bend over backwards to extend service.
My point still stands, though: the US has a lot of rural areas, so it's harder and more expensive to extend broadband to the same percentage of the population as many of the nations listed in TFA.
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There will always be that one game that defines a genre. Doom was not the first FPS, but it was the FPS that made the genre a sensation. Command & Conquer did the same for RTS. WoW is just that defining game for MMORPGs; it built upon the pioneers and has reached that critical mass where MMOs stop being a niche genre and have become mainstream.
The question is: do we really want a single dominant game in any genre?
Generally the sticking point for creationists is the idea that a species can diverge, or become two distinct species. By the definition of evolution that you give, I can't find any reasonnot to think that over a long enough period of time a species can diverge if two isolated populations exist. So by conceding evolution, a creationist must concede divergence.
As for the natural history as accepted by scientists, it's tenuous and ever-changing. It's based on a very incomplete fossil record that may have significant gaps; it's a best guess and should not be considered absolute in any way.
What we need is to divide more, at least politically. The current two-party system in the U.S. is stifling political expression at any level above local. When people stop running the party line and actually speak their minds, compromise is much more easily reached and things actually get accomplished.
What is macroevolution but microevolution on a larger time scale?
If you take two populations of the same species and place them in significantly different environments, microevolution will obviously change the populations to suit their new environs. Given enough time, then, doesn't it stand to reason that the two groups could diverge enough to be two distinct species, unable to produce viable offspring when the species come in contact again?
This one party idea is bad. Very bad.
It's true that the vast majority of people in America have the same goals: Be safe, protect our rights, educate our children, and ensure they have the same or better opportunities than we do. What you don't seem to get is that we all have different ideas on how to go about doing that.
Just look at education: A lot of people are just fine with the status quo. Plenty more would rather see our public school system converted into religious schools. I've also seen movements to bring back single-room schooling or privatize all schooling. There are plenty of parents who practice conventional homeschooling as well as such varieties as "unschooling" that abandon the typical structure of an education environment. Nearly everyone will agree that providing an education to children is necessary for the advancement of our nation and our children, but the ideas on how to do this are so radically different that education alone could break up your utopian "one party" idea.
Then why has the Bush administration cut taxes to the wealthiest people
Because they pay most of the taxes, and so when taxes are cut they're the one who see most of the cuts. I'm far from wealthy, but benefited from Bush's tax cuts.
and raised spending, sending the deficit higher than it's ever been before?
Because Bush's dad never taught him to balance a check book?
Under Clinton we were paying it off.
Under Clinton we had a propped-up economy full of ongoing accounting scandals like Enron. I'm not saying that's Clinton's fault. I doubt he discouraged such behavior since the soaring market looked good for his ratings, but I certainly don't think he was complicit in some attempt of inflating the economy beyond what it could sustain. I do know, though, that in 1998 my father was already predicting a sharp fall at the end of Clinton's presidency. He certainly wasn't the only person to expect it.
The republican party seems intent on keeping everyone a functional christian through the legal system.
Gay people can't get married,
I'm a fan of civil unions myself. Let's stop fighting over the word marriage and just give them the rights and privileges legally extended by marriage. We can sort out just what "marriage" means later.
sodomy is illegal in some places. Even fornication (an unmarried couple having sex) is technically illegal in some localities, even if only used against prostitutes and their customers.
Such laws collapse in court. Quite a few lawmakers are surprised when they are told that such laws still exist in their area; they've been on the books for decades, if not longer.
A creationist-friendly way to segue into evolution (I've seen this done, it works in most cases):
1) Start with an explanation of what science is. At its core, science is the ongoing effort to understand our world and the universe around it, how it works, and how it came to be. Specifically, science is intended to look at the world impartially and judge it only on proveable, repeatable observations. Science is the practice of observing facts and forming opinions based solely on those facts.
2) Define a scientific theory. It's not "just a guess". A true theory is supported by all the available facts, and can be used to predict further observations. When a theory is proven wrong, it is either modified (as evolution has been many times) or thrown out entirely.
3) Explain the basics of evolution. Point out that it describes a system of nature, and not just an order of progression. The theory of evolution is not the idea that man evolved from monkeys. The idea comes from the theory, but is not an integral part of it. Evolution at its most basic level is simply stated as "life changes".
I've put it this way before: Would you agree that every generation of humanity is somehow different than the last? That with each generation, some individuals never reproduce and some are far more successful (have more kids) than others? Does that not change the gene pool for the entire species? Every generation, the gene pool changes a little bit. When those changes are cumulative, that's evolution.
4) If the subject comes up, address the fact that evolution has never been meant as a direct challenge to any faith or belief. It is simply the best model for explaining the scientific observations available. It can be contradicted tomorrow, should sufficient observations be made.
"Paying for home desktop Linux just strikes me as....bizarre. ..."
I can only think of one valid reason to pay for Linux: support.
If a company sold Linux for a reasonable price and offered competent phone support, it would be worthwhile for people looking for a Windows alternative who don't have the time to invest in getting to know Linux well enough to be comfortable with it as their only operating system.
It's not in use at my work (except in a few dedicated roles using live CDs) because the adminstrator doesn't know Linux well enough to be comfortable with relying on it. There isn't a support structure comparable to Microsoft's; their knowledge base alone trumps any support offerings I've ever seen for Linux.
It's a no-brainer that the PS3 *will* sell. But with its high price tag, lackluster performance (to date), and late release, it's not going to be anything special. The PS3 fanboys will be good little consumer whores and run out and buy it as soon as it hits the shelves, just like the Nintendo and MS fanboys.
It's Godwin's cousin, only about 1984 instead of Nazis?
While this is obviously a bad thing for science and public education, any similarity to 1984 is sketchy at best.
Console RPGs tend to be more adventure games than real RPGs. Just look at that shining flagship example called Final Fantasy: it barely qualifies as an RPG to those of us who have played true RPGs.
Some PC RPGs:
Fallout
Baldur's Gate
Neverwinter Nights
Ultima
And of course there's that annoying lack of a mouse, which I've come to be quite fond of in RPGs.
1. Actually, the PC boasts far more genres than console. It's just that there are a handful of genres that the PC has always done better than consoles, and those are the genres I like.
2. It really depends on what kind of gamer you are. If you're the kind that owns all three console brands plus a handul, I'd wager I spend less on my hardware than you do. If you're the kind satisfied with just one console, you're also more likely to be the kind of PC gamer to not spend as much on hardware, and wait til games and hardware drop in price rather than pay the brand-spanking-new price. I've always found the price argument against PC gaming to be fragile at best; I've seen gamers spend far more on consoles. Especially since all the people arguing that consoles are cheaper than PCs already own a PC.
3. I make a hardware change to my PC once a year on average, and it takes me less than an hour to the most extensive job (changing out a motherboard).
I share your concern about Crysis not being anything more than a shinier version of Far Cry. That's why I tend to give a game some time to be reviewed by the masses before I run out and buy it. And if it does require Windows Vista, Crytek is going to be sorely disappointed that even those who have the hardware won't be willing to spend several hundred dollars to upgrade their OS just to play a handful of games that require.
They're probably making the arguement that the 360 and PS3 will never be able to show the game as they intend it to look (kind of like Doom 3 on the XBOX will never have the quality of a good PC) and they don't want to release to a medium that would force them to compromise.
As in my example of HL2, the game would work on lower-end systems by stepping down the graphics until it performed as desired, but when run on a good system it could open its graphics engine up and look quite stunning. Crysis could do the same for PC, but consoles will never benefit from upgrades or better replacements. Five years from now, the game would look exactly the same on the console.
Either you're fairly new to console gaming, or you're lucky to not remember the NES/SNES/N64 lockups. I can't comment on the Gamecube, I abandoned consoles before it hit the market.
And I for one and not accustomed to crappy games on the PC. If the game is crap, I don't play it. I know, I know...you're wondering how I know it's crap if I haven't played it. It's because I actually wait a month or two from release and see how the game is reviewed by my peers before I touch it (I do make exceptions to this rule, and will for Supreme Commander among others due next year).
I've never paid $500 for a video. My current spending limit is $250 every two years, which is more than sufficient for running the newest games, albeit not at the highest resolutions or detail settings (they'll still look better than anything the PS2 can deliver).
:)
I play games on the PC because the PS2,or any other console, doesn't deliver as well on the genres I like: RTS, FPS, and RPG. I spend roughly the price of a new console every year keeping my system current enough to run the games I want to play.
And who uses a $350 PC to play games? I couldn't buy a motherboard, processor, and memory for $350 if I was building a gaming system. I think I found the source of your problem
Valve made Half-Life 2 run quite well on an aging PC. When I upgraded and played through the game a second time, I realized just how much different it looked with the better system. Here's hoping Crytek is willing to do the same thing. It doesn't have to be shiny for it to be fun.
Seriously. They aren't funny. They aren't accurate. They aren't even good marketing. I don't know a single person swayed by those ads, and that includes a customer base of some fairly technology-challenged people. Hey Apple...how about the truth some time, not a bunch of commercials that leave us PC users asking "who has a computer like that?"
I read PA in FireFox all the time.
Well that's simple. Just get yourself a Portable Hole. If those are out of stock, see if there are any Pocket Universes available. Push comes to shove, a Bag of Holding will work, though it would be much harder to retrieve items from the Bag than the former two solutions.
Filing cabinets, empty paper boxes, and CD envelopes.
Yes, filing cabinets. The kind made for hanging folders. I've got one drawer at home full of CDs. Several hundred, in fact.
Put the CDs in paper envelopes and stack them into the lid from a 10-ream box of paper. I think one box lid will hold around 500 CDs in this manner; I've never tried to fill one up this way so actual results may vary. Stack two filled box lids into a drawer. 10 four-drawer cabinets should be sufficient for storage, and help you keep organized without the stupid CD books.
It will work with jewel cases as well, though obviously require a lot more space.
I'm not part of the "Sony makes crap" crowd. I've got a digital camera from Sony, and it's great. I love some its features...specifically that it runs on AA batteries and can recharge them when it plugged in. That means spare batteries are cheap and plentiful in the event I forget to plug my camera in for a month. My home stereo is also a Sony, and has worked perfectly for years.
That said, I think Sony is really going to screw up the consumer electronics market if they have their way. Rather than play along and make things easy on consumers, they are once again pushing their own proprietary standard (Blu Ray) that I fully expect to see beat out by HD-DVD just because the latter has the right name. Sony thinks they can dictate their will to the market. They want to decide what is best for us and shove it down our throats until we love it. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't...but it always muddies the waters and makes it harder for Joe Sixpack to make sense of a market that changes rapidly enough without competing standards.
AT&T, back when they were SBC (the name change still irks me, I hated AT&T but have always had positive experiences with SBC), was pushing a project that would have made rural broadband a much more profitable venture...they were pushing for a state-wide license in Texas to distribute television programming over their system. The more they can deliver to each household, the more households they can afford to reach.
That's the big question. That, and how organized does this need to be? I can think of a couple of surprisingly simple solutions that are easy to keep organized, but it's hard to make recommendations without knowing exactly what they have to work with.
Every exchange in my county is DSL capable now. Nearly 35% of the population still has no broadband availability due to line distance from the equipment.
You're absolutely right. I thought I made it pretty clear throughout my post that the single thing keeping it from happening was the lack of profitability for the companies. They don't wire rural areas because there's not enough money in it for them. There are a lot of areas where it would cost them so much to upgrade that they would spend years just trying to break even, and there are a lot more where the small profit doesn't justify the expense. If they can stick the money in an investment account and make the same or better profit, don't expect them to bend over backwards to extend service. My point still stands, though: the US has a lot of rural areas, so it's harder and more expensive to extend broadband to the same percentage of the population as many of the nations listed in TFA.