Vista Annoyances- it is like they read my mind
on
Windows Vista Annoyances
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· Score: 4, Interesting
I had to replace my home laptop a few months back and Vista was the only OS offered by Dell. Since it is our wireless 'internet and email only' computer, I opted for a not-so-powerful build. My experience w/ XP led me to believe that I could fairly quickly tune the machine how I wanted and get by just fine for the low impact tasks I wanted to achieve.
So, now my wife and I both say "I hate this f*cking computer" on a daily basis. First boot of the day often takes 5-10 minutes to simply stabilize and remain consistantly responsive with nothing but Firefox running. I am completely clueless as to what the hell this machine is doing on it's own that takes up all of its processing power that it can't handle simultaneously opening perezhilton.com. Additionally, the security package keeps annoying me over and over that my computer is not fully protected!!! because I turned off features that don't apply to our usage of it.
I would love to know a good resource to consult on how to tune the OS to get better performance w/o having to get into non-novice registry tweaks. I doubt this book could help me. Can anyone recommend a good resource for some more basic level Vista tweak advice?
I think you are missing the point. I just googled the Munchkin game and it is clearly a satire of D&D- right down to the Players Guide, DMs Guide and Monster Manual cover art parodies. It is a COMEDY game about killing monsters AND the rest of your party.
I agree. I am eager to finally get my robot that looks like kind of a mix between a vacuum cleaner and a chrome pig with marital aids stuck all over it. It would need to be made in Germany, cuz a lot of really good ones come from over there. Yet another reason Frank Zappa was a visionary. http://www.seeklyrics.com/lyrics/Frank-Zappa/A-Token-Of-My-Extreme.html
Why not build the entire game around being a Mech pilot? If the game and gameworld is primarily about mech combat, why even screw around with anything else? The best option to succeed in the crowded MMO world is to offer a game that doesn't adhere to the same old structure. Who says it even needs to be an MMO? What about a Battlefield type combat games w/ a COD4 style experience/upgrade/class system for Mech's and their loadouts?
It is criminal that Katamari Damacy is nowhere to be found on that list. The principle theme is one of the stickiest (pun intended) melodies I have heard in a game. I am listening to the soundtrack right now! That simple catchy melody is transformed into such a wide array of styles and arrangements, and remains catchy and fun in every form. It is the only game I have ever sought out a soundtrack for. If only I could get the creepy red pandas out of my subconcious when I listen to it...
There is absolutley no comparison between welfare and education to the literal shipments of billions of dollars in 100 dollar bills to Iraq- to be handed out to anyone with no accountability. They literally flew pallets full of 100 dollar bills that have disappeared. People may disagree about the philosophy behind welfare, or just how we should go about fixing public education, but the monumental waste and clear cut corruption of shipping billions in cash into a warzone and then not paying attention to who is getting it is completely w/o defence, logic or decency.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2008189,00.html
They, more than likely, see it as a colossal waste of taxpayers money. Unlike, say..., sending millions of dollars in cash into a warzone with no accountability whatsoever.
Meanwhile, Infinity Ward managed to put out a rock solid multi-platform FPS- COD4. If they can make it look and play so great on the PS3, why can't Valve?
Plus, while this happens rarely, there are times when I get a gaming mag in the mail and there is an article on a game that I haven't heard of from checking the normal sources online...again, doesn't happen often, but it does happen.
That is a very good point. Magazines are great for stumbling across a game that you might not click-through to on a gaming blog. If your only exposure to a game is through the banner ads that most of us disable, or the single sentence link on a game-sites front page; you might be overlooking something.
If you read my post- I talked about PREviews. Anyway, I have the basic understanding of the concept of "opinion" to know that reviews, and even previews, are presented from a subjective point of view and thusly may not be reflective of my own tastes. Any time you purchase a game, there is a chance you might not like it- even if it is rained upon with critical favor. As far as covering a Beta- a good writer will disclose that they aren't playing a finished build- something I routinely see in both print and online articles.
Magazine publishers say that readers want longer features and in-depth articles as a counterpoint to the short, bloglike pieces they find online. But Kyle Orland, a freelance journalist who writes a media coverage column for Gamedaily.com, wondered if that strategy was working, saying that when a large feature is published, it doesn't get read. 'Attention spans are just getting so small that readers don't know what they want,' Mr. Orland said."
That is just plain ridiculous. If I am eagerly anticipating game X, and a magazine has an in-depth 8 page preview- of course I am going to read it. Are we all such twitchy ADD zombies that nobody can maintain their attention for more than a page? I call bullshit on that...
RTFA- the game ships with a guitar, a mic, and the drum perph.
On the $169.99 (USD) price point
"$100 is asking quite a lot for just a guitar and a game, we think asking $70 more for the drums and microphone that change the experience is an amazing value."
I cannot wait for this one. I have no problem getting the bundle. I know that if I bought the game and only one peripheral, odds are I would be back at the store a week later for the others.
I am psyched that they are appearing to do some whole albums rather than just singles. I would kill to get Dark Side of the Moon or The Wall.
I wonder if they will ever allow midi to work as a controller as my Roland V-Drums would be totally beyond awesome to use in place of the pack-in drum controller.
I bought a PS3 last December, the 60GB version, primarily because I had gotten a new 42" plasma and didn't want to spring for the expense of digital cable to get some HD content. The PS3 Blu-Ray/ combo was the best value for the money. I rarely play games over again once I have moved on to new ones. I still have my PS2 and can hook it up at any time, but I never have. Granted, I have a backward compatible capable PS3, but I only once ever even ran a PS2 title on it.
Resistance, the Marvel beat-em-up RPG, Tiger Woods, Skate, GRAW2 have all taken up my gaming time.
Ultimately, the lack of backwards compatability would not have kept me from buying one. Most TVs these days make it very easy to hook up a device through the front panel. Hooking up a dormant PS2 occasionally wouldn't be any problem.
I must disagree. The golden age of TSR 1st Edition AD&D worked because they weren't just printing rulebook after rulebook as 'content.' There were lots of great series of modules that worked as standalones (The S series in particular is full of classics) as well as some realy great interconnected series (Against the Giants, Underdark etc.)
They had a slow trickle of hardcovers after the main 3, but these were more sourcebooks than rulebooks. Deities & Demigods & Fiend Folio, for example, simply gave DMs more resources for the system.
Once TSR foolishly introduced 2nd edition, their content became rulebooks instead of modules. When they had 200 page books covering minutia of 'Underground Adventures" rules the game just got needlessly complex, and more expensive for less actual content. For the price of one more codex of rules complications, one could have bought 2 or 3 great modules. How many "classic" modules are there from 2nd edition?
WOC seems determined to kill the franchise via the same mistakes that TSR made.
I couldn't care less about Castlevania; but Warren Ellis is, hands down, required reading. No self respecting Slashdot reader should pass up reading Transmetropolitan. It is truly fantastic futurist fiction, and damn funny to boot. Spider Jerusalem is my hero.
What do consumers do about patches if they have no internet? At least with PC gaming, you can download a patch somewhere else, burn it to a disc, and run the patch later. Will consoles allow updates via some sort of hard copy install?
Your hyperbole aside, many people play games because of story- otherwise we'd all still be playing pretty versions of Tetris. To deny that games and movies don't share some of the same territory in visual storytelling is naive. Most games nowadays do tell a story one way or another. Storytelling in games SHOULD be interactive, but that doesn't mean that the storytelling should be ham-handed and clumsy. RPGs with poor storytelling are inherently broken.
Not every game is a 1st person shooter clone. You cite GTA which is 3rd person- and does quite a bit of cinematic storytelling. I would argue that the storytelling and cutscenes in GTA are part of it's charm and success. Rockstar understands how to weave cinematic storytelling into a hugely interactive setting. Sure you don;t play the cutscenes in GTA, but they are entertaining and contribute to the immersion in the story and game-world.
Not every game uses a free camera either. Resident Evil 1, 2 & 3, for example, made excellent use of a fixed camera- and did so in a nicely cinematic way.
I am not suggesting that games become movies- I am suggesting that movies have a refined and well developed visual language that we all inately understand and that games can use that to their advantage. When you complain that cutscenes interrupt play, I submit it is because the cutscenes are poorly executed, distracting and ineffective specifically because they are created without an understanding of how visual storytelling works.
As for creating objects and light in a realistic fashion- that is just ridiculous. Reality is boring- we experience it every day. Games, like movies, represent a heightened state of reality- where the unexpected can happen- where the unreal unfolds plainly before our eyes- where we can experience the fantastic as if it were real. You can't tell me that World of Warcraft is succesful because of it'srealism. Precisely the opposite. Games and movies create worlds. The escape from what is real is exactly the point.
I see film theory missing from that list. The movies have been around for long enough that the form has distilled a very effective common language for visual storytelling. It never ceases to amaze me how poorly many games work story-wise that could be improved with basic film storytelling techniques.
Cut scenes alone are mini-movies, and yet often are missing out on the use of good editing and shot set-up. Any game that is attempting to tell a story needs to be concerned not only with script, but with visual compisition, editing and pacing, lighting, camera movement etc.
I do think that there is a subset of retail jobs- mainly game/record/movie rental stores- that can be interesting due to ones own excitement about the medium.
I have wokred in record stores in my late teens and early 20's for very low wages- but still enjoyed the job because I could have interesting and meaningful conversations with regulars- pass on recommendations to them and in return be turned on to things I otherwise wouldn't have heard. I think, with not much effort, one can find a record store in most any city with a staff of relatively cool people who will gladly talk music, make recommendations etc.
I have never been to a game store where I experienced that kind of 'vibe.' Perhaps it is the larger corporate dominance in that subset of retail store. I certainly never fealt the same in a Sam Goody as I did in a local indie store. Are there local indie game stores that manage to compete with the chains?
Slashdot Mirror
Will there be cake? (oops, wrong Portal)
So, now my wife and I both say "I hate this f*cking computer" on a daily basis. First boot of the day often takes 5-10 minutes to simply stabilize and remain consistantly responsive with nothing but Firefox running. I am completely clueless as to what the hell this machine is doing on it's own that takes up all of its processing power that it can't handle simultaneously opening perezhilton.com. Additionally, the security package keeps annoying me over and over that my computer is not fully protected!!! because I turned off features that don't apply to our usage of it.
I would love to know a good resource to consult on how to tune the OS to get better performance w/o having to get into non-novice registry tweaks. I doubt this book could help me. Can anyone recommend a good resource for some more basic level Vista tweak advice?
I think you are missing the point. I just googled the Munchkin game and it is clearly a satire of D&D- right down to the Players Guide, DMs Guide and Monster Manual cover art parodies. It is a COMEDY game about killing monsters AND the rest of your party.
I agree. I am eager to finally get my robot that looks like kind of a mix between a vacuum cleaner and a chrome pig with marital aids stuck all over it. It would need to be made in Germany, cuz a lot of really good ones come from over there. Yet another reason Frank Zappa was a visionary. http://www.seeklyrics.com/lyrics/Frank-Zappa/A-Token-Of-My-Extreme.html
Why not build the entire game around being a Mech pilot? If the game and gameworld is primarily about mech combat, why even screw around with anything else? The best option to succeed in the crowded MMO world is to offer a game that doesn't adhere to the same old structure. Who says it even needs to be an MMO? What about a Battlefield type combat games w/ a COD4 style experience/upgrade/class system for Mech's and their loadouts?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpFFzWPzA2c
There is absolutley no comparison between welfare and education to the literal shipments of billions of dollars in 100 dollar bills to Iraq- to be handed out to anyone with no accountability. They literally flew pallets full of 100 dollar bills that have disappeared. People may disagree about the philosophy behind welfare, or just how we should go about fixing public education, but the monumental waste and clear cut corruption of shipping billions in cash into a warzone and then not paying attention to who is getting it is completely w/o defence, logic or decency. http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2008189,00.html
They, more than likely, see it as a colossal waste of taxpayers money. Unlike, say..., sending millions of dollars in cash into a warzone with no accountability whatsoever.
But isn't Valve ultimately responsible for handing development over to EA to begin with? In this case "can't" extends to outsourcing.
Meanwhile, Infinity Ward managed to put out a rock solid multi-platform FPS- COD4. If they can make it look and play so great on the PS3, why can't Valve?
That is a very good point. Magazines are great for stumbling across a game that you might not click-through to on a gaming blog. If your only exposure to a game is through the banner ads that most of us disable, or the single sentence link on a game-sites front page; you might be overlooking something.
If you read my post- I talked about PREviews. Anyway, I have the basic understanding of the concept of "opinion" to know that reviews, and even previews, are presented from a subjective point of view and thusly may not be reflective of my own tastes. Any time you purchase a game, there is a chance you might not like it- even if it is rained upon with critical favor. As far as covering a Beta- a good writer will disclose that they aren't playing a finished build- something I routinely see in both print and online articles.
That is just plain ridiculous. If I am eagerly anticipating game X, and a magazine has an in-depth 8 page preview- of course I am going to read it. Are we all such twitchy ADD zombies that nobody can maintain their attention for more than a page? I call bullshit on that...
Oh yeah, and it sees WiFi local networks so my PC can serve my entire music and photo collection wirelessly to the PS3.
I am psyched that they are appearing to do some whole albums rather than just singles. I would kill to get Dark Side of the Moon or The Wall.
I wonder if they will ever allow midi to work as a controller as my Roland V-Drums would be totally beyond awesome to use in place of the pack-in drum controller.
Resistance, the Marvel beat-em-up RPG, Tiger Woods, Skate, GRAW2 have all taken up my gaming time.
Ultimately, the lack of backwards compatability would not have kept me from buying one. Most TVs these days make it very easy to hook up a device through the front panel. Hooking up a dormant PS2 occasionally wouldn't be any problem.
Or maybe it is because the link doesn't go to TFA, but to an unrelated Gamespot story. Nobody ever posts on /. without RTFA right?
They had a slow trickle of hardcovers after the main 3, but these were more sourcebooks than rulebooks. Deities & Demigods & Fiend Folio, for example, simply gave DMs more resources for the system.
Once TSR foolishly introduced 2nd edition, their content became rulebooks instead of modules. When they had 200 page books covering minutia of 'Underground Adventures" rules the game just got needlessly complex, and more expensive for less actual content. For the price of one more codex of rules complications, one could have bought 2 or 3 great modules. How many "classic" modules are there from 2nd edition?
WOC seems determined to kill the franchise via the same mistakes that TSR made.
I couldn't care less about Castlevania; but Warren Ellis is, hands down, required reading. No self respecting Slashdot reader should pass up reading Transmetropolitan. It is truly fantastic futurist fiction, and damn funny to boot. Spider Jerusalem is my hero.
What do consumers do about patches if they have no internet? At least with PC gaming, you can download a patch somewhere else, burn it to a disc, and run the patch later. Will consoles allow updates via some sort of hard copy install?
I use the vibrating razor. I don't think the vibration helps with the shave, but it does wonders on the prostate.
Your hyperbole aside, many people play games because of story- otherwise we'd all still be playing pretty versions of Tetris. To deny that games and movies don't share some of the same territory in visual storytelling is naive. Most games nowadays do tell a story one way or another. Storytelling in games SHOULD be interactive, but that doesn't mean that the storytelling should be ham-handed and clumsy. RPGs with poor storytelling are inherently broken. Not every game is a 1st person shooter clone. You cite GTA which is 3rd person- and does quite a bit of cinematic storytelling. I would argue that the storytelling and cutscenes in GTA are part of it's charm and success. Rockstar understands how to weave cinematic storytelling into a hugely interactive setting. Sure you don;t play the cutscenes in GTA, but they are entertaining and contribute to the immersion in the story and game-world. Not every game uses a free camera either. Resident Evil 1, 2 & 3, for example, made excellent use of a fixed camera- and did so in a nicely cinematic way. I am not suggesting that games become movies- I am suggesting that movies have a refined and well developed visual language that we all inately understand and that games can use that to their advantage. When you complain that cutscenes interrupt play, I submit it is because the cutscenes are poorly executed, distracting and ineffective specifically because they are created without an understanding of how visual storytelling works. As for creating objects and light in a realistic fashion- that is just ridiculous. Reality is boring- we experience it every day. Games, like movies, represent a heightened state of reality- where the unexpected can happen- where the unreal unfolds plainly before our eyes- where we can experience the fantastic as if it were real. You can't tell me that World of Warcraft is succesful because of it'srealism. Precisely the opposite. Games and movies create worlds. The escape from what is real is exactly the point.
I see film theory missing from that list. The movies have been around for long enough that the form has distilled a very effective common language for visual storytelling. It never ceases to amaze me how poorly many games work story-wise that could be improved with basic film storytelling techniques. Cut scenes alone are mini-movies, and yet often are missing out on the use of good editing and shot set-up. Any game that is attempting to tell a story needs to be concerned not only with script, but with visual compisition, editing and pacing, lighting, camera movement etc.
I do think that there is a subset of retail jobs- mainly game/record/movie rental stores- that can be interesting due to ones own excitement about the medium. I have wokred in record stores in my late teens and early 20's for very low wages- but still enjoyed the job because I could have interesting and meaningful conversations with regulars- pass on recommendations to them and in return be turned on to things I otherwise wouldn't have heard. I think, with not much effort, one can find a record store in most any city with a staff of relatively cool people who will gladly talk music, make recommendations etc. I have never been to a game store where I experienced that kind of 'vibe.' Perhaps it is the larger corporate dominance in that subset of retail store. I certainly never fealt the same in a Sam Goody as I did in a local indie store. Are there local indie game stores that manage to compete with the chains?