I actually decided to turn my response into a blog intry on my... uh... myspace page. Read the blog entitled "Playing Halo in Church?" at www.myspace.com/moogaloonie and message me if you still wish to discuss anything. (There's no guidelines against this, I hope!)
The Old Testament approves of a lot of things that modern people Christians or otherwise would find shocking, even barabaric. According to the story, God had not yet incaranted as a man and was therefore much more intolerant of man's faults. God took revenge, urged vengeance and urged the righteous to smite the wicked. Then, after continual disappointment God comes to earth as a man, suddenly realises how effed up humanity actually is and changes his mind on most of it. "Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" becomes "Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord" and "turn the other cheek". Why modern evangelicals in the US insist on displaying the ten commandments in Caesar's courtrooms, but ignore the laws of Leviticus as "fulfilled by Christ", then act like hawks at the prospect of a world-ending holy war has never made much sense to me.
I always thought that was part of the industry's reliance on Microsoft. "Damn, they've got this thing using 98% of the CPU at idle. Looks like we're going to move loads of dual cores this year!"
You left out the part about PS2 games looking better on the PS3. Why should anyone have to settle for less than the best because they just suddenly decide to stop offering it? Is there going to be a new hi-def PS2? Most likely not. If they take it out now, and no one cares, we will someday have no choice but to play those titles at their discretion through their version of a virtual console. I'm in the position myself of having to buy a replacement Dreamcast. How long will those be available?
I think it just topok a really long time for them to come up with a workable camera. In the 2D days, one character didn't really obscure the other, and it was relatively easy for players to stay together (except maybe for that impossible chasm jump in Cyborg Justice for Genesis). It looks like there are still similar problems with there camera mechanism in trying to keep the characters on screen at the same time. Not surprising, as the first few generations of 3D games had camera problems with only one character.
I remember getting up and watching Robotech on TV and I loved it. So much so that I joined a fanclub and would mail VHS tapes across country to get obscure anime movies and shows. I quickly learned that Robotech isn't just three unrelated shows packaged together, but that its story largely replaces the originals. There have been several awesome Macross series that won't find an audience in America because Robotech has ruined Macross for Americans. Try to explain protoculture to a Robotech fan, and they will tell you it's an energy source despite the word itself clearly implying "ancestors". Proto-culture. So much more intriguing.
Matchbox made the huge mistake od trying to mix the figures and mecha into the same toyline. In Japan, a large percentage of Macross merchandise came from model companies, and was mixed between large scale figures (1/12 and up) and the mecha kits (1/72 and smaller). Matchbox didn't want to re-release the same kits Revell had already put out under their Robotech name (Harmony Gold got the name from them) as many stores still had these kits for sale years after their initial release. So, Matchbox, targeting an age group they were more familiar with, put out some ridiculous stuff like the non-transforming VF-1S with the horribly proportioned nose that was just barely able to accomodate one of the 3 3/4" figures from the line. In Japan there were indeed many non-transforming kits released, and the makers usually took the opportunity to "enhance" them respective to their modes, i.e. the legs are smaller on the plane kits but larger on the robot ones, vice-versa for the wings. Matchbox's non-transforming plane didn't look right at all. Their non-transforming Cyclone ride armour was awesome though.
Sorry, but as a long time gamer and CG fan I have to disagree. Even back in the 16-bit days people claimed there was no need for a more powerful console because TVs were the limiting factor. I certainly think the 32-bit generation looked better than the 16-bits. There are countless shader effects available to the 360 and PS3 that weren't around last generation, as well as significant increases in polygon counts and in most case frame rates. Anyone who can't distinguish between, for example, Transformers for 360 and the Wii-d down version, on the same TV, needs an eye exam.
O Canada!
Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!
From far and wide,
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land glorious and free!
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
The problem that some see is progress is moving too fast now, faster than before as advancement occurs on an ever smaller scale. The future as seen in movies like Blade Runner made sense at their time because we had just had several decades of very rapid mechanical advance culminating with the space race. For the most part we hadn't yet collectively realised that as our focus shifted from mechanical advancement to information advancement we'd start seeing the signs some interpret as an impending singularity. The future of a few years ago looks ridiculous now. We imagined the flying cars but just barely the internet. We got teh interwebz and lost the will to make the flying cars.
I've heard a lot of ST owners claim they bought it because they couldn't afford an Amiga. I noticed alot of Amiga games did not use more than 16 colours, use co-processors, or recognise extra ram because they were ported from the ST. I'm only familiar with early models, and later models that either did not come out or did so in very small numbers. So, let me ask, how was the ST actually better than an Amiga 500? (it certainly wasn't the OS) Were there really any models better than the 1200? (I'm not a fan boy, as I'm aware that the Atari Jaguar easily beats any stock Amiga released.)
Maybe Linux users should try this now? "Boss, I see were upgrading to Vista. Aren't we too important of a company to be using a consumer-oriented OS that people play games on? We should switch to a solid, serious OS like..." Because that was how Microsoft/IBM were able to fool people into thinking the Amiga/ST were inferior to DOS boxen with amber displays.
There are certainly 2D and 3D purists, who especially balk at seeing one mixed with the other. I think in Nintendo's case it's concerning a type of player. The purists are the gamers who've beaten insanely difficult games, find secrets and glitches, master 5-10 button combos (kombos?) and complain that a 40 hour game is too short. Nintendo, in trying to appeal to a larger market, are making easier, more immediately satisfying games which often don't even have endings in the traditional sense.
I dunno. Why don't FPS players stick with Doom II? Or maybe they are still playing those games. I've put in a bit of time with Aero Fighters and Darius Twin lately, and I'd love to play RayStorm again. I'd probably get this game if I had a 360.
That was pretty much my guess. They probably knew internally what did and did't work properly, and would've had to fix it on a case-to-case basis to keep their GoW targets. To keep world+dog from seeing the bad side of it, they likely killed any functionality that could cause a loss of faith among liscensees in real-world situations (outside their own facilities).
But yeah, I'm guessing too.
Sorry to hear that. As one of those guys who grew up on Mad magazines, Wacky Packages and SNL commercial parodies I'm a huge fan of fake products. I'd rather play GTA with its imaginary cars, stores, and products that were created by the writers/designers than a similar game with references to real products. Don't even tell me you don't like Slurm.
next-gen has always meant next-gen...
on
What is Next-Gen?
·
· Score: 1
Why is everyone trying so hard to re-define the obvious? I remember ColecoVision being advertised as 3rd generation because it was preceded by the 2nd generation (Intellivison, Arcadia etc.) and before that the 1st generation (Atari 2600, Odyssey 2). The first generation refers to the first wave of programmable systems, the ones before that mostly had their games built in. By the time of the NES and Master System, it was unclear what generation had been reached. Was Intellivision II still a 2nd gen system? What about the Atari 5200, and 7800? Since the late 80's the term next-gen has always referred to any console available or under development which is architecturally more advanced than what was previously available in that market. The question shouldn't be what is next-gen, but rather which systems at their launch technically were not. There aren't very many really to consider. The gameGear may have been old SMS technology, but it was certainly next-gen compared to the gameboy. The Atari 5200 and AmigaCD32 were both superior to their intended competitors from the previous gen though both used technology from more expensive computers which had been available for some time. The TurboGrafx/PCEngine is certainly more advanced than the NES, despite an 8-bit processor that was primitive compared to the Genesis/Megadrive which launched at about the same time. Despite this, the NEC system could still display more colours on screen and move larger sprites. The Jaguar, which was in most every way inferior to the 3D0 multiplayer of the same gen as it, was still tremendously more powerful than the SNES/Genesis generation which preceded it.
Slashdot Mirror
I know! Microsoft collaborating? Can you believe it?!
I actually decided to turn my response into a blog intry on my... uh... myspace page. Read the blog entitled "Playing Halo in Church?" at www.myspace.com/moogaloonie and message me if you still wish to discuss anything. (There's no guidelines against this, I hope!)
The Old Testament approves of a lot of things that modern people Christians or otherwise would find shocking, even barabaric. According to the story, God had not yet incaranted as a man and was therefore much more intolerant of man's faults. God took revenge, urged vengeance and urged the righteous to smite the wicked. Then, after continual disappointment God comes to earth as a man, suddenly realises how effed up humanity actually is and changes his mind on most of it. "Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" becomes "Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord" and "turn the other cheek". Why modern evangelicals in the US insist on displaying the ten commandments in Caesar's courtrooms, but ignore the laws of Leviticus as "fulfilled by Christ", then act like hawks at the prospect of a world-ending holy war has never made much sense to me.
I always thought that was part of the industry's reliance on Microsoft. "Damn, they've got this thing using 98% of the CPU at idle. Looks like we're going to move loads of dual cores this year!"
Not for long you don't.
You left out the part about PS2 games looking better on the PS3. Why should anyone have to settle for less than the best because they just suddenly decide to stop offering it? Is there going to be a new hi-def PS2? Most likely not. If they take it out now, and no one cares, we will someday have no choice but to play those titles at their discretion through their version of a virtual console. I'm in the position myself of having to buy a replacement Dreamcast. How long will those be available?
I think it just topok a really long time for them to come up with a workable camera. In the 2D days, one character didn't really obscure the other, and it was relatively easy for players to stay together (except maybe for that impossible chasm jump in Cyborg Justice for Genesis). It looks like there are still similar problems with there camera mechanism in trying to keep the characters on screen at the same time. Not surprising, as the first few generations of 3D games had camera problems with only one character.
Was Godzilla originally female?
I remember getting up and watching Robotech on TV and I loved it. So much so that I joined a fanclub and would mail VHS tapes across country to get obscure anime movies and shows. I quickly learned that Robotech isn't just three unrelated shows packaged together, but that its story largely replaces the originals. There have been several awesome Macross series that won't find an audience in America because Robotech has ruined Macross for Americans. Try to explain protoculture to a Robotech fan, and they will tell you it's an energy source despite the word itself clearly implying "ancestors". Proto-culture. So much more intriguing.
Matchbox made the huge mistake od trying to mix the figures and mecha into the same toyline. In Japan, a large percentage of Macross merchandise came from model companies, and was mixed between large scale figures (1/12 and up) and the mecha kits (1/72 and smaller). Matchbox didn't want to re-release the same kits Revell had already put out under their Robotech name (Harmony Gold got the name from them) as many stores still had these kits for sale years after their initial release. So, Matchbox, targeting an age group they were more familiar with, put out some ridiculous stuff like the non-transforming VF-1S with the horribly proportioned nose that was just barely able to accomodate one of the 3 3/4" figures from the line. In Japan there were indeed many non-transforming kits released, and the makers usually took the opportunity to "enhance" them respective to their modes, i.e. the legs are smaller on the plane kits but larger on the robot ones, vice-versa for the wings. Matchbox's non-transforming plane didn't look right at all. Their non-transforming Cyclone ride armour was awesome though.
Sorry, but as a long time gamer and CG fan I have to disagree. Even back in the 16-bit days people claimed there was no need for a more powerful console because TVs were the limiting factor. I certainly think the 32-bit generation looked better than the 16-bits. There are countless shader effects available to the 360 and PS3 that weren't around last generation, as well as significant increases in polygon counts and in most case frame rates. Anyone who can't distinguish between, for example, Transformers for 360 and the Wii-d down version, on the same TV, needs an eye exam.
O Canada! Our home and native land! True patriot love in all thy sons command. With glowing hearts we see thee rise, The True North strong and free! From far and wide, O Canada, we stand on guard for thee. God keep our land glorious and free! O Canada, we stand on guard for thee. O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
Don't forget the CD-R variant for music which costs more to compensate the RIAA against piracy!
The problem that some see is progress is moving too fast now, faster than before as advancement occurs on an ever smaller scale. The future as seen in movies like Blade Runner made sense at their time because we had just had several decades of very rapid mechanical advance culminating with the space race. For the most part we hadn't yet collectively realised that as our focus shifted from mechanical advancement to information advancement we'd start seeing the signs some interpret as an impending singularity. The future of a few years ago looks ridiculous now. We imagined the flying cars but just barely the internet. We got teh interwebz and lost the will to make the flying cars.
I've heard a lot of ST owners claim they bought it because they couldn't afford an Amiga. I noticed alot of Amiga games did not use more than 16 colours, use co-processors, or recognise extra ram because they were ported from the ST. I'm only familiar with early models, and later models that either did not come out or did so in very small numbers. So, let me ask, how was the ST actually better than an Amiga 500? (it certainly wasn't the OS) Were there really any models better than the 1200? (I'm not a fan boy, as I'm aware that the Atari Jaguar easily beats any stock Amiga released.)
Maybe Linux users should try this now? "Boss, I see were upgrading to Vista. Aren't we too important of a company to be using a consumer-oriented OS that people play games on? We should switch to a solid, serious OS like..." Because that was how Microsoft/IBM were able to fool people into thinking the Amiga/ST were inferior to DOS boxen with amber displays.
There are certainly 2D and 3D purists, who especially balk at seeing one mixed with the other. I think in Nintendo's case it's concerning a type of player. The purists are the gamers who've beaten insanely difficult games, find secrets and glitches, master 5-10 button combos (kombos?) and complain that a 40 hour game is too short. Nintendo, in trying to appeal to a larger market, are making easier, more immediately satisfying games which often don't even have endings in the traditional sense.
I dunno. Why don't FPS players stick with Doom II? Or maybe they are still playing those games. I've put in a bit of time with Aero Fighters and Darius Twin lately, and I'd love to play RayStorm again. I'd probably get this game if I had a 360.
That was pretty much my guess. They probably knew internally what did and did't work properly, and would've had to fix it on a case-to-case basis to keep their GoW targets. To keep world+dog from seeing the bad side of it, they likely killed any functionality that could cause a loss of faith among liscensees in real-world situations (outside their own facilities). But yeah, I'm guessing too.
Sorry to hear that. As one of those guys who grew up on Mad magazines, Wacky Packages and SNL commercial parodies I'm a huge fan of fake products. I'd rather play GTA with its imaginary cars, stores, and products that were created by the writers/designers than a similar game with references to real products. Don't even tell me you don't like Slurm.
Why is everyone trying so hard to re-define the obvious? I remember ColecoVision being advertised as 3rd generation because it was preceded by the 2nd generation (Intellivison, Arcadia etc.) and before that the 1st generation (Atari 2600, Odyssey 2). The first generation refers to the first wave of programmable systems, the ones before that mostly had their games built in. By the time of the NES and Master System, it was unclear what generation had been reached. Was Intellivision II still a 2nd gen system? What about the Atari 5200, and 7800? Since the late 80's the term next-gen has always referred to any console available or under development which is architecturally more advanced than what was previously available in that market. The question shouldn't be what is next-gen, but rather which systems at their launch technically were not. There aren't very many really to consider. The gameGear may have been old SMS technology, but it was certainly next-gen compared to the gameboy. The Atari 5200 and AmigaCD32 were both superior to their intended competitors from the previous gen though both used technology from more expensive computers which had been available for some time. The TurboGrafx/PCEngine is certainly more advanced than the NES, despite an 8-bit processor that was primitive compared to the Genesis/Megadrive which launched at about the same time. Despite this, the NEC system could still display more colours on screen and move larger sprites. The Jaguar, which was in most every way inferior to the 3D0 multiplayer of the same gen as it, was still tremendously more powerful than the SNES/Genesis generation which preceded it.