Posts by GameCoder
264 posts • joined Saturday 25th August 2007 09:14 GMT
Posted in The Secret of Monkey Island
Yarr!
LOL Just seeing the title of this article made me smile with happy memories. They literally don't make them like this anymore...
Its all microsofts fault...blah blah,,,
Predictable posts. Microsoft is doing some excellent work here, credit where credit is due. And I suspect that were billions of the worlds fools to use Linux on a daily basis, botnets and virii etc would be similarly widespread.
Worth $millions eh?
How much does this moon pebble weigh? If they brought just one average astronauts weight in moon rock back per trip, they could pay for the whole mission!
I'm going to stand myself corrected, as it seems that its moslty bad reporting at fault here, and the paper itself isnt so bad.
http://media.spong.com/g/games-transfer-phenomena.pdf
Theres a BIG difference between thinking of something, especially in an abstract or idle manner, and believing-in or trying-to-do something, as was implied in at least one shoddy reporting example.
Self reporting ftl
A pretty useless study when you just ask people for stories and accept them at face value. I'm sure theres good evidence for psychic phenomena, ghosts etc if you were to just ask random people to tell you a story "from personal experience" that might relate to the area in question. You'll get even better results if you pre-select your study group eg question 42 priests on 'the power of prayer' ...
ALL YOUR BASE-PAIR ARE BELONG TO US
Nice to hear some pro-gamer stories.
Agreed. And its 'gods' not 'God', people. Hawkings doesn't believe in *gods*, and probably not in dragons or ghosts either. And nor do I
Posted in Sweden rolls out invisible infrared tank
Death from Above
Given most tanks are killed by air-to-ground, I'm not sure this is all that useful.
As pointed out, 60 tonnes of gas turbine powered metal is pretty fracking hard to conceal. Stealthing it to make it look like a car/truck? Em.... probably sounds cool to the guy in the pub, but seriously? Whats the point? Look at recent conflicts. UK forces put big flags on top of jeeps etc so as not to get blasted by passing 'friendly' aircraft (not gonna point the finger at any nation in particular here...) You think fighter aircraft are going to pass up an enemy vehicle because it looks vaguely like a (very odd shaped) truck on IR?
Posted in LA Noire developer goes titsup
And people at my work ask me why I left games...
The games industry, as a place to work, sucks. I'm sure someone somewhere made a lot of money on LA Noire. I'm also sure it wasn't the guys who put in the hours to create it.
What did this allow them to do?
The faked certificates allowed websites to pretend to be authentic? Does anyone know how these were actually used? I see Iran mentioned, but no details of what was really done with these certs.
And I also dont see the usual finger pointing we see everytime the US is targettted by an intrusion. Who would want to target Iranians? Hmmm....
Remember, remember, Crypto AG...
@I must have read...
Sure, sure, no smoke without fire right? Guilty by association?
Sometimes (often?) the autorities are plain wrong and abusive. See the post about the naked rambler above.
The question is, what to do about it?
And I just mailed BT...
...as it seems to me Knight-Ridder are infringing their 'HyperLink' patent...
Is Nothing Sacred?
FFS can't they film something new?
Ridley Scott, go stand in the corner/lift-to-hell with George Lucas.
Not so fast on the levy though please
Some countries already bowed to pressure years ago and added tax to writable media. Wheres this money going now? Adding any form of tax or 'levy' is stupid. Give it ten years and it will be absorbed by the greedy system.
The correct option is to let people buy what they need/want, somehow. I think he is correct about the 'people want convenience', its been my own experience. Once something is within a reasonable price range, its becomes all about convenience. Go down to the store or buy it on Steam? Chances are very high Ill buy it on Steam, even if its dearer. People drive to shops nearby, even though the cost is much higher than walking.
@NO, NO, NO....
Don't be silly! Those sounds like CAUSES. Here in the UK we only address SYMPTOMS.
What this needs is a ban on facemasks, and new laws controlling use of a couple of social messaging and telephone networking (not Facebook, natch), maybe some further controls on freedom of assembly, and some waffle about spirit of the blitz and a photo of Dave with a broom with a few minority types. And then maybe a quick world tour reassuring sponsors about the Olympics.
Posted in First smut site erected on .xxx address
U O me
Already did, 'accidentally'. I also 'accidentally' clicked on the "OK Enter" button... Yupp, there is smut in them there hills....
Remind me to check later from home, I need to verify that the smut therein actually work properly.
"A square metre of game space"
"The application of this technique with point-cloud data can pack up to 15 million converted polygons in each square metre of game space."
Well this isnt really hard given that the area is purely virtual. I can pack 15 million polygons into a square *millimetre* in my engine :) :)
Posted in Ubisoft insists DRM 'a success'
2010's games industry = Music Industry 10 years ago
EA withdrew Crysis 2 from Steam, Blizzard forces you to play its games via its Battlenet even and will require a similar "always on" even for solo play in Diablo 3, Ubisoft is similarly dumb with its "always on" connection, and Microsoft Windows fails to capitalise on its value as a gaming platform. The PC games industry, with the exception of Steam, is lost and doesn't know its ass from its elbow (I worked within it for years). Whats interesting now is the rise of the truly indie games scene (check out Minecraft, Terraria, Frozen Synapse and many more).
It reminds me a little of the way the music industry failed to comprehend and adapt to the changes due to digital media. The big names in PC arent "getting it" right now.
They arent selling games as a thing in itself as they once did, instead they want *your* data, hence the insistance on signing up and logging in for many "services".
Second, they want a slice of the "micropayment" action too, even if you already paid once or more for the game. Blizzard got greedy with this, and others watched them enviously, including CCP which led to their recent fiasco with online goods in Eve Online. Blizzard will be taking a slice of all transactions in both directions in Diablo 3, in a shared marketplace even for single player. And where Blizzard leads, the money hungry execs of every other "AAA" company follow like sheep.
Third, they all know store sales are dead, but they cant yet abandon the old ways, they still rely on that store presence, for now, and have a pact with the devil which means they cant move to online distribution just yet. Marrry this with a complete ignorance of their customers (with the exception of Steam), and you get the mess we have now.
Posted in Microsoft strategy chief quits Redmond
Haven't I seen this guy somewhere before?
But maybe not in Poland:
http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/25/microsoft-sucks-at-photoshop/
It might be when....
If you live in the UK, the UK gov decides you need to use Facebook as some form of identity, or need to go to some crappy facebook/whatever to get information you need. Ive noticed already in marketing billboards a surprising number of adverts (unrelated to Facebook) which list only Facebook URLs. I refuse to use Facebook, and this trend concerns me.
Actually...
They just reversed the polarity. The switches then go from 'Off' to 'On'...
Posted in Moderatrix kisses the Reg goodbye
Good enough for me Sarah!!!
...*fap*fap*fap*fap*...
Take care, hope you are moving somewhere excellent and geekless :)
Fantastic Site, 5/5
Another great article from The Register. I love it. I use this site a lot and its never wrong!!!1! Its always got interesting articles and thoughtful commentators, and even the ads are tasteful and dont interfere with the overall enjoyment of the site. Its classic Red/White styling is bold, distinctive and easy on the eye, and navigation within the site is so simple even my mom can do it. I showed it to all my friends and now they all use it too.
Posted in Alice: The Madness Returns
Price drop? Just sell the original
The original game, if you have the box and good condition, etc, is actually a collectors item. You could easily sell it to pay for this edition.
And all only 6000 years old
*snigger*
What is that stuff?
OK, so it looks like dust/Guiness from here, but what actually is that 'dust'? The NASA text is "dark lanes of dust crisscross the giant elliptical galaxy Centaurus A." but somehow I suspect 'dust' is a simplification...
Boffins only please....
Double plus ungood
I think this is the icon you were looking for....
I think I smell the next bubble....
*Rushes out to get cheap MSc in IT Security*
^^^^ this
Enquiring minds want to know. And I expect this thread to be dominated by similar replies....
But does it blend?
Any know for sure this really works? Any way to verify that your data is really scrubbed?
Seconded
My friend works as an NHS psychologist, often working to help difficult and violent people, and increasingly, brain injured soldiers. She earns half of my salary, despite the fact that my jobs contribution to society is zero (or possibly even negative now I am a 'Bank'Coder...). I am humbled when I speak with her and hear about the stress and genuine difficult decisions you must make in that job.
I also know that to reach that position it wasnt a 'soft' path. Studying on a good (BPS accredited) psychology course is like a cross between studying statistics and law, and its a *science*, based upon observation, hypothesis, and mathematical analysis of experimental results, possibly even more so than many IT courses are. Competition for final places is cut-throat towards the end of the degree too.
BPS
Its also a case of apples and oranges, both in comparing the UK and US, and also comparing within the UK. Many "soft" courses in the UK are NOT accredited by the British Psychology Society (http://www.bps.org.uk/) and so are dangerously hand-waving bums-on-seats courses, and too late the student realises that this course doesnt actually lead onto the professsion of being a Doctor of Psychology with for example the NHS, where such a person may actually have to make life impacting decisions.
So, some courses are worth less than the paper they are written on, and others are respectable, statistics heavy science courses: caveat emptor. The UK is in fact world leading in transforming Psychology from its quacky dream interpreting roots into the modern science that it is, with careful control groups, ethical approval boards for scientific, repeatable experiments, and peer reviewed statistical analyisis of the results, and a very biology "how the mind works" approach (which has many paralells with computing science). I'm not sure how they USoA compares, but the good UK courses are very good, but the many "soft" uncredited courses might be dragging down the average salary (and rightly so).
We had Spitfires you know...
2nd most powerful? Huh? Spain and Italy each have twice as many aircraft carriers as we do, and as carriers are the core of a fleet its a pretty useful metric. The french have a very modern one and they are also pretty good at missile tech (we buy theirs).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_carrier#Aircraft_carriers_in_service
Petition to stop petitions
They refused my petition to stop the use of petitions :)
Yeah, seconded
I was thinking the same. When I was young stories I heard and people I met made it seem like some "salt of the earth" rough-neck cold-beer drinking no nonsense honest sun-kissed BBQ nation, with butch guys and hot gals, fed up of monarchs and with straight talking politicians. Now? It seems like its populated by right wing, technologically challenged, sexually repressed Daily Mail readers. What changed?
Btw...
If you have read all the novels and are still looking for a Culture-esque fix of reading, you could do worse then try "Alastair Reynolds" stuff - with the added advantage that he has a strong science background and it shows in the novels.
Probably can be done...
...by a clever director. Lots of films use devices that surprisingly work, like the old "start at the end" where you see the protagonist die in the opening sequence, but then by the magic of cinema they somehow contrive to make you "forget" this until 90 minutes later where you suddenly realise whats coming and where its been going. Of course, this relies on having a truly *good* director capable of carefully manipulating the audience, in the same way good authors do. I think too often lately hollywood has been relying on the visual spectacular to get bums on seats. I can't remember the last good film I saw. And although I would love to see a *good* version of any of the books in the poll, holy fuck I so much do NOT want to see a Hollywooded version of any of them. That would ruin it for me... For example "I, Robot"....sigh...
Hmm...Good Idea
What are you guys doing next May 1st, London? :)
Wheres my Guy Fawkes icon btw?
Weapons of Mass Destruction
Perhaps they will find out the reasons for invading Iraq on this Pakistani-suburb dwelling Saudi Arabian?
Poor bloke
He is also gay. Traitor charges aside, I'd guess thats a safety risk in its own right when in military prison.
Posted in Deleting 'innocent' DNA will cost £5m
Probably
<quote>So: £5m pounds is ~ AU$7.75m - does this mean the UK has 775,000 "innocent DNA" samples?</quote>
Could have indeed. Everyone arrested has their DNA taken, and never removed no matter what the outcome. And its been going on for 16 years already. But somehow I suspect this figure of £5m is bullsh1t.
Every figure the government tells you seems to be weighted towards their preferred outcome. Minimum wage? Too expensive, will cost us <£ Big Number>.
Privatisation? Extremely cost effective and good for everyone, will only cost <£ Small Number>
Etc.
Critical Triumph
I think its hard to call this fiasco a triumph for Nuclear Energy. Had the plant shut down and been easy to restore, I would have been convinced, and indeed I initially was. However as the days went by, and with the steps being taken being obviously desperate measures (seawater and helicopter water drops) as opposed to planned contingencies, I would say that we are just lucky there hasnt been a more major catastrophe.
It may well be true that the reactors themselves never risked a Chernobyl style incident, however the warning that "The possibility of re-criticality is not zero" from TEPCO (1), combined with the poor communications to the media and even their own government (2), along with a history of falsifying safety records (3) suggests to me that this plant was being mismanaged. All credit to those who are likely to be riking their health to make it safe, however is it really standard practise to store fuel rods such that the possibility of criticiality is acceptable? I hope Japan and the worlds nuclear industry pays attention. The human factor can screw anything up.
1) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12762608
2) http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2011-03/15/c_13780133.htm
3) http://www.theaustralian.com.au/fukushima-nuclear-plant-owner-falsified-inspection-records/story-fn84naht-1226023073141
WTF?
Really? :( Meh and there I was thinking I couldn't get more cynical....
Posted in Fukushima reactor core battle continues
Hilltop Nukes
Yes, my initial homebrew attempt at reactor site design made me wonder why such plants are not built high up, but my guess is that a reliable source of nearby water is a vital design component, and the proximity to the sea in this case seems to have been useful for emergency cooling. A mountain top nuclear power plant is probably a lot harder to access (everything needs to be airlifted) and you couldnt easily guarantee water when you really needed it.
I'm bored programming shit. Nuclear power plant design seems to be where its at. Where do I sign up? Ill bet after this General Electric and the japs will design and build plants verging on sci-fi levels of safety (I'm already impressed / jealous at the fantastic job they appear to have done already, I hope the guys who designed it get medals).
Posted in Turing Collection saved for the nation
Chemically Castrated because he was Gay???
Huh? Seriously wtf... A public apology from Gordon Brown? He should go deeper and f*cking name and shame whoever was responsible for this kind of mindset.
Posted in Discovery poised for final mission
Tempting Fate
Careful now. Final mission? STS-133? Two planned space walks? A crew of retiring astronauts embark on a swansong mission and bring along an experimental robot "to demonstrate how dexterous robots behave in space"? Uh-oh..
Quote: "Everything is on track and going beautifully with the countdown. We're really looking forward to a very ACTION-PACKED, successful mission and everything is on track."
Why not just say "Nothing can go wrong"?
Posted in Passport office loses applications
21? In one month?
Ask Mossad to stop and give them back.
Q & As
Humanities humiliating defeat, questions, answers and graphs here http://www.j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=3577
Where is our Mycroft in our hour of need? :)
Q&As
http://www.j-archive.com/showgame.php?game_id=3576
I for one...
