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| Siteseeing Link » /news/siteseeingarticle.asp?searchid=4222 |  larsig (503) Jun 15, 2007 - 02:49 am
| | Dontcha know man? The squirrels are preparing to take over. They've been probing our defenses for years looking for weak spots. A couple years back one sacrificed itself gnawing through a power cable to knock out the power to the entire town for a day. This is just the beginning of it man. They're starting to put their plans in motion. Hell, the squirrel population here is already huge and they've killed off most of the rabbits. They don't even show fear for humans anymore. Sure laugh now, but they'll rise and take over!!! You'll see! They thought I was crazy, but this proves it! The squirrels are planning our doom!!! Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15926 | larsig (503) Jun 12, 2007 - 10:52 pm
| | I dunno, might have something to do with my system, but I've found firefox to take up much more memory, mostly in the case where I leave it running for long periods of time/show a lot of activity using it, particularly when I'm debugging a Liferay portal at work. Seems like random bits of data from previous pages just builds up and never gets cleaned up. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15930 | larsig (503) Jun 12, 2007 - 10:31 pm
| Your second sentence doesn't make any sense, you're implying that the PS3 and 360 don't have standard hardware. Plus I'd have to argue that the specs computers have to meet have little or no negative impact on the computer gaming industry. Gamers get to learn what the numbers on the minimum requirements box means quickly enough, half an hour of googling and you got all the answers you need. Even if you don't know, you can usually ask someone at the store that could tell you easily. As for meeting the hardware specs, it's not all that hard. It's not like the next game that comes out needs the newest $700 graphics card just to start the main screen. Most developers keep in mind that people have older PCs and try to keep the min requirements as low as possible. The flexibility of PCs are probably one of the strongest points of computer gaming. It gives the consumer choice in what he wants in his rig and how much he wants to pay for it.
Besides, I doubt that Square's CEO is saying that the PS3 and 360 are gonna fail cause they are more like PCs(Which they are, not gonna deny that). He's saying they need more time for the market to catch up since they require newer things that most people don't have, ie hd tvs. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15908 | larsig (503) Jun 12, 2007 - 07:13 am » Edited on Jun 12, 2007 - 07:20 am
| Running those games under linux needs a windows emulator type thing (ie wine) to run. More than anything it has to do with their use of the registry, filesystem access, directx, etc. The usual cross OS differences. You neglected to mention the number of bugs and problems running oblivion under linux has. There are numerous rendering glitches/instability with certain hardware and settings that users under windows don't have to worry about. Of course some games run perfectly well, so I guess it's a matter of time for oblivion to be there too.
And depending on how much Mac copied from linux fro their os, then yeah, making games playable on Linux wouldn't be hard. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15908 | larsig (503) Jun 11, 2007 - 06:05 pm
| | I'm pretty sure it's external. If i remember right a year ago or something like that EA had an external company port C&C Generals to Mac. Only reason I know this is cause one of my friends got excited cause he finally got to play Generals on his computer, which is a mac. Made me pity him cause he was stunned by the graphics in that game while I was playing Oblivion on near max settings on a PC that cost less than his Mac. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15914 | larsig (503) Jun 11, 2007 - 06:05 pm
| | "bring up web pages twice as fast as Microsoft's Internet Explorer 7" I don't think that really matters when I can bring up pages in fractions of a second on IE7 as is. Well, I guess if you were using dial-up (snicker) and it loaded twice as fast it would make a difference. As for why they are bringing Safari to Windows... huh? Seriously, IE7 is part of Windows so it's not like you're buying it directly. And you can get Firefox for free, which I use whenever I can, and is a great browser already. I hope they're not planning on charging for Safari. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15908 | larsig (503) Jun 11, 2007 - 05:53 pm
| | Or pay half the price for a PC and get the newest games instead of getting ports of games 1+ years or older. Macs have a long way to go before they get near the gaming capabilities of PCs. Only reason we see any porting now is cause they started using Intel processors. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15909 | larsig (503) Jun 11, 2007 - 05:48 pm
| | Not really 1st amendment violations since these are incentives, they're not forcing developers to not do those things. Personally, I'd make a game making fun about rednecks just to spite the tax incentive. Money is money, but 5% is not much of an incentive, particularly when you gotta restrict what you make and probably have to go through all the bureaucratic crap to get the money in the first place. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15893 | larsig (503) Jun 09, 2007 - 12:30 pm
| "They sue because they object to the association in the game between their church and violence." Heh, sorry man, but all I gotta say is they should be happy. Violence is all over the church, and this violence is pointless killing of people who refused to believe in them. It's not limited to the English church, just about any religion in the world has a bloody and violent period (Believers killing/torturing non-believers) associated with it (Makes you lose hope in humanity doesn't it?). The violence in Resistance is probably "better" than the historical violence associated with the English church since in Resistance they are fighting off invading aliens that are trying to kill them instead of random slaughter/oppression of non-believers.
Even better is the wording in that article. Wonder when Jack Thompson's gonna get in touch with them so they can go off to England to help the church. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15780 | larsig (503) Jun 03, 2007 - 02:29 pm » Edited on Jun 03, 2007 - 02:54 pm
| | The guy is obviously chickening out. Only people that worships the very ground he stands on wouldn't see that. The organizers should be bastards about it and ask again and make the debate public and see what reason he comes up with to back out of it. Flag this | Edit this post |
| Siteseeing Link » /news/siteseeingarticle.asp?searchid=4163 | larsig (503) May 31, 2007 - 10:11 pm
| | Wow... Java... That was easy compared to C/C++. You have so much stuff that you have to worry about in C/C++ that Java takes care of automatically. Don't take automatic garbage collection, or the easy to debug part of Java, for granted, I miss those old days. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15700 | larsig (503) May 31, 2007 - 01:25 pm
| Hm, where to start. Well, first of all, Dead Rising is not just a boring zombie game, you just lack the open mindedness to accept it as a great game. DOA X2 is not a fighting game. X2 does not mean 4, need I say more? And by your reasoning with Gears, I'd take it you're not a fan of the FF series. Those games don't have much new to offer for the second time around except for seeing the story again or achieving some goal like getting every item in the game. Gears you would replay for the story and the gameplay.
As for replayability on the Wii... That kinda has to exist otherwise most games that you would pick up would last for an hour tops.
I have more to say, but I'd rather not type a small paper here. I'll leave saying that you got your own opinions about what good games are and other people have theirs. I prefer games that provide more substance than just swinging around a controller trying to scratch my own back on the TV screen. I don't dislike the Wii cause of crappy hardware, I dislike it cause all you do is act like an idiot playing mini games, and there are few games on the Wii that provide any depth. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15700 | larsig (503) May 30, 2007 - 07:49 am
| Tsk tsk, not really been paying attention to the games now have we? The 360 has several top games aside from Halo, including Dead Rising and Gears of War, or even DoA X2(You know you wanna play it)?. These games are definitely not the same old WWII shooter. Where in a WWII shooter do you go through a mall killing zombies with anything you find? Where in a WWII shooter do you get the awesome cinematic look and feel of Gears of War? How about the physics defying bouncy boobs of DoA X2? The PS3 is lacking though, but at least Resistance takes a new twist on WWII shooters so that you don't shoot Nazis anymore, you shoot mutants/aliens/whatever. And how much has the Wii done with the FPS genre? Oh yay, the 21st WWII shooter, but using the Wii mote!!! Oh... It's still the usual boring WWII shooter, never mind. You, my poor Nintendo fanboy, are missing out on a lot in the world of games.
The 360 has many game going for it, and it will continue to release great games. The PS3 we have yet to see, but I get the feeling that once Sony drops the price and more developers have time to adjust to the PS3's processors we're gonna see it take off. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15700 | larsig (503) May 30, 2007 - 07:37 am
| | True, high development costs are becoming a pain in the ass, but that is inevitable considering how technology is advancing. As for the PS3, I'm well aware that many developers have left the PS3 for the 360 due to its complex nature and companies not wanting to invest the resources to teach developers to write games on it. And where is the innovation for games that come out on the Wii? I haven't seen anything new on it at all, at least not anything newsworthy. Seriously, mini games? That's it? If people only buy it for the mini games the console is gonna die, it's not gonna last for half a decade+ like the PS2 did. Right now it's nothing more than what's 'in' and unless Nintendo does something to change that then they're gonna have a failed console on their hands. True, it's not gonna kill the company, but any loss is a bad thing. The fanboys are gonna stay and viciously defend the target of their affection, but the mainstream which Nintendo was targeting is gonna move on to other things once the novelty of the system wears off unless something more than mini games draws their attention. Flag this | Edit this post |
| Siteseeing Link » /news/siteseeingarticle.asp?searchid=4157 | larsig (503) May 29, 2007 - 07:25 pm
| | Huh... Can't say the guy didn't deserve it. This is yet another sign that China still has a long way to catch up to the US in terms of social issues. Hell, people think pollution is bad in the US, you can't walk an hour outside in Beijing without coughing up a lung. Go a couple hundred miles out to the Great Wall and the yellow smog layer is still thicker than at the heart of LA. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15700 | larsig (503) May 29, 2007 - 07:17 pm
| | I'm not trying to argue that the large part of the mainstream doesn't like mini games, but a rather significant part of the market still wants games that are more in depth. Nintendo is gonna start losing that if people start to find that all the Wii is good for is mini games. The Wii isn't as much a revolution in the gaming industry as a regression. They are going back to the old days of the arcades, although with a few new bells and whistles. Those were great times, but there's a reason the industry has become what it is today where companies find it very profitable to invest millions in games like Oblivion and Halo. What many people are probably waiting for is for the Wii to make new strides with genres like shooters or RPGs. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15700 | larsig (503) May 29, 2007 - 06:42 pm » Edited on May 29, 2007 - 06:45 pm
| | I never made any claim about the graphics... I was talking about the kind of games they released. Going by my point, the PS2 continuing to do very well, maybe more than the PS3, makes sense since the PS2 has a HUGE selection of good games there while the PS3 is lacking right now. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15700 | larsig (503) May 29, 2007 - 03:13 pm
| | I get the feeling that their success is gonna be short lived with this console. Yeah, their ideas are unique and their wii mote is pretty cool, but once the novelty of it wears off Nintendo's gonna be in a world of hurt. Unless, of course, if they pull out more good games that are more complex than their mini games that use the wii mote to its full capabilities. Mini games are great and all but they tend not to hold your attention for long like Oblivion or other games that microsoft and sony are pulling out left and right. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15522 | larsig (503) May 18, 2007 - 10:13 am
| Concede what point? Concede that you were wrong and that you can get laptops without a Windows OS? All right, I'll concede to that.
As for building a custom computer, I misinterpreted your post and thought that you moved on to talk about computers in generals. To that I will concede, but I still don't see what you read my post as conceding to.
As for your argument that there is a "Windows Tax" on laptops.. what the hell are you smoking man? It's something called demand. People want laptops with Windows. Most of the market does not want a laptop that has only linux on it. If they wanted linux they would dual boot with windows or something. Most companies will only support one OS because it takes quite a few resources just to maintain one OS. A lot of companies even have to write their own drivers for the hardware. Guess what? If a company has to choose one OS to provide support for, are they gonna choose an obscure one that almost no one would want? No, they're gonna go with the most popular choice, or at least one that would allow them to turn a profit. Your argument seems to try to argue that Microsoft is forcing us to buy laptops with Windows. They're not, we're forcing ourselves to. If we demanded laptops with Linux, I'm sure that companies like IBM and Dell would be more than happy to comply. But, we don't.
Bring an argument that would actually make me take a moment to think of a response plz, this is starting to get boring. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15522 | larsig (503) May 17, 2007 - 05:53 pm
| | How often do you see the big monopoly company being portrayed as the good guy? :) Note, the word monopoly has a negative connotation, but its denotation implies neither good nor bad. Monopolies are everywhere in the US, just look at your public transportation system or local power provider. All of those are monopolies, but we don't usually see them as monopolies because they are a necessity and are natural monopolies. What I was trying to describe with my big=evil comment was our irrational mentality that a company that controls a large share of the market is a monopoly, and all monopolies are bad and evil. Basically, the reason people are on a witch hunt with Microsoft is because they are large, and through history we have witnessed very abusive monopolies. Hence, we start to associate large controlling companies with unethical business practices, even if they don't perform such acts. Now, I'm not saying Microsoft never did any of that, I'm sure they have, but my comment wasn't about that. Unfortunately, our system will always result in corporate bullying, it's inherent in a capitalist system with corporations. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15522 | larsig (503) May 17, 2007 - 05:10 pm
| I agree, but theres a lot of barriers in the way. The competition between Intel and AMD is a bit different, they both use the x86 ISA. The ISA is a layer that isolates the software from the hardware, making it so software can run regardless of how the transistors in the CPU are laid out and such. That general of a layer doesn't exist between the OS and applications. I think its more for historical reason than anything else. Writing an OS just ended up including the API for system calls without any sort of standard between them. The OS equivalent of Intel allowing AMD to use the x86 ISA is Microsoft allowing OSX to use their API, which includes everything from system calls to do things like file access to the GUI system calls. I dunno what Microsoft would think of it, and Apple would probably never do it since they would essentially bow to Microsoft's power and would make them depend on Microsoft to an extent.
Oh yeah, Java actually provides that cross platform capability although at a pretty significant performance hit. It takes the ISA idea to an extreme by completely isolating the program from the hardware and OS, essentially running programs on an emulator. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=15533 | larsig (503) May 17, 2007 - 08:24 am » Edited on May 17, 2007 - 08:27 am
| | Yeah, I've read a few articles on it too. Pretty nice idea since if you think about it, cable and stuff are pretty much power lines too. Just not a high enough capacity to actually work well as one. Hopefully the tests they do prove it to be commercially viable and it starts to show up everywhere. Flag this | Edit this post |
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