My Archives: May 2003
Saturday, May 31, 2003
I think we should hand out torpor accs to everyone and anyone, to get the flow of updates going.
And in other news, I have decided to try a 100% internal reuse/recycle policy. My aim is to learn just how feasible such a thing is, and better comprehend the predicament our society is in regarding waste management. [more]
Posted by JonD @ 04:54 AM CST [Link]
preface: i was writing this for someone's livejournal, but it became too long and pretentious for me to consider putting into his journal. i'm not even quite sure what point i was trying to argue, i was just trying to provide some of the insights into computer games that i have developed due to my conversations with various doominati. i'm posting it here hoping that there's at least some value in my thoughts, and i'd also like to see if anyone disagrees with me on any of these points. well, here goes:
pardon my limited experience, but i believe the most important thing in team programming, and i guess most cooperative projects, is the art of compromise.
compromise is hard when you are working with code because a programmer usually has the best idea as to the most efficient method of tackling a problem. a conflict arises when this programmer is not understood, ignored, or just plain wrong regarding their views.
i know the halflife code was "bad" (extra emphasis on the quotation marks), but the results are unmistakably superior if you compare it to other games on the merits of enjoyable gameplay.
.. gameplay vs. technology is a cliche argument but i think anyone can sense a spectacular game with substandard programming (half-life, probably and unfortunately halflife2) versus spectacular programming with substandard gameplay (q3a, probably and unfortunately doom3)
apparently carmack rewrites his code like a fucking madman -- when the half-life interns had finished their hacks for a monster behavior and gone home for the night, carmack was on his fifth experimental algorithm for an aspect of fundamental engine behaviour.
do i have a point? both sides of the cliche are critically important to the success of a game. spectacular gameplay based on painfully dated technology makes the player fantasize about what could have been achieved using current technology.
spectacular technology with painfully dated gameplay makes the player fantasize about what could have been achieved using current gameplay.
it's unfortunate that the gameplay element is so much more of an inexact science than the technology of PC games. technology is unabashedly imitated throughout the entire industry -- within a couple years following doom3, every game in the world will be released with volumetric shadows, and most of them will use carmack's reverse. this is not considered abnormal, that's just the name of the game with gaming technology. the idea-borrowing from gameplay has to be a lot more subtle.
let's compare counter-strike with RTCW because i'm lazy and they're the highest on my mind right now. RTCW's teamplay came a couple of years following counter-strike, and the gameplay was deceptively similar.
- choice of weapons CS: based on team/money RTCW: based on team/class
- map objectives CS: assassination, defuse, hostage RTCW: map-based and better disguised, always consists of "secure this area" or "steal this item" or "bomb this" or "defend that"
- weapon balance CS: some sniper rifles, some assault rifles, some heavy weaponry, varied explosives RTCW: some sniper rifles, some assault rifles, some heavy weaponry, varied explosives (ooo, lets add some proximity mines stolen from duke3d for variety)
- death punishment CS: wait out the round RTCW: wait until next spawn timerecognizing the elements of strong gameplay is very hard for programmers because programmers talk the language of efficient mathematics. worse yet, programmers misunderstand gameplay to the extent that they are disgusted when they think about lifting gameplay elements directly from other games, because they think their project will end up as a clone.
ok, i just had to help my half-drunk uncle into the house so i guess i'm going to stop ranting now.
"design is law"? carmack basically dismissed this idea by stating that romero worked too hard creating his fantasy world instead of putting hard work into the development process, and i'd agree with this. also, however, i'd say that carmack's games are seriously lacking in (again, horribly cliched) "fun factor" -- gameplay elements are few, overused, and as a result, tedious in id titles.
some of the most fun in games comes from simple allowances. that is, allowing the player to create scenarios that are original, weird, interesting, funny, and fun. counter-strike allows these scenarios through its different weapons and objectives.
detour: here are a couple of examples of intensely enjoyable gaming experiences: first, i was playing counterstrike with a couple of my friends (we just started playing again a week or two ago), we were playing cs_office and there were three players left: a CT, my teammate and i. my teammate was killed, and because i was watching my radar, i knew the approximate location of the CT. i silently walked towards this location and turned a corner to see the CT silently walking in a direction away from me. instead of gunning him down on the spot i decided to get in a little closer.
after following him around about three corners, with the rational part of my brain screaming "HE'S GOING TO CHECK BEHIND HIM ANY SECOND," i mastered my fears and drew my knife. when he turned to the left, i stepped to the right to avoid accidentally falling into his field of vision.
finally, with tension at its breaking point, i caught up to him and dug my knife into his back. luckily, he died instantly, and was reminded always to check behind him even if he doesn't hear anything.
Posted by mewse @ 02:08 AM CST [Link]
Thursday, May 29, 2003
Wow, its been a while since I posted an update at this place. Now that I do of course, I remember why its been so long: I have a whole lot of nothing to update about. My life continues much as ever, I'm in the middle of exams which I'll probably fail though lack of revision, I'm broke with no money to pay next months rent (which means I'll have to borrow money off my parents again). Nothing really exciting, I don't even have a love interest to wax lyrical about. It says something about the state of your life when the best thing on the horizon is going home from uni so you can get back to playing the piano. For whatever reason the guitar, nice as it is, just isn't as much fun as the piano, it's a lot easier to take one to university though.
Now that Buffy and Angel have ended I don't even have the thrill of downloading a new episode of them every week. I've been downloading some Futurama episodes instead, but getting them from Kazaa is such a pain. One episode I downloaded was entirely in Spanish, another was normal, except halfway through some kid had recorded himself going "urghhhhhhhhhh" over the soundtrack. Hilarious, and so meaningfully un-insane. EDIT: Actually it turns out it was some retarded Something Awful forums thing, seems I left an ie window open on the FYAD forum, which has this urghhh sound set to play after half an hour or something.
I don't know if this is of interest to anybody (Fraggle maybe), but I ripped all the Origin of Symmetry B-Sides to Ogg (I have all the CD Singles from the album). I'll upload them to alkali if anyone wants them?
Thats it.
Posted by JonR @ 09:13 PM CST [Link]
the shoes at walmart have two separate barcodes on them: one attached to the actual shoes and one on the shoebox. to discount your shoes, take the box from a cheaper pair of the same brand, and put your more-expensive shoes into them after ripping the tag off them.
here is the cashier's thought process:
"ooo.. have to scan some shoes, lets open the box"
"hmm, there is no tag on these shoes"
"should i call for a price check? fuck it, there's a barcode on the box"
your cashier will then happily scan the box and drop the shoes into a bag for you to take home.
muha! trade secrets!
Posted by mewse @ 12:00 AM CST [Link]
Monday, May 26, 2003
in my endless struggle to be different, i have not bothered to see the matrix reloaded. and in efforts to keep my contrarian nature i opted to read all the spoilers just to prove to people it sucks. I was going to write without capitalization but that's so overdone these days I'm better off alternating if I want to keep some semblance of individuality. [more]
Posted by mantra @ 04:48 PM CST [Link]
Sunday, May 25, 2003
The machines are self-aware, and so may have different motivations, allegances, and beliefs. Humanity is enslaved to this concept which puts them into an utterly convincing simulation of ~1999, where the rules can be bent. This is both a prison, and a playground: inside the matrix, you can be whatever you want to be, whereas outside the matrix you're stuck with grubby jumpers and plugs all over your body.
The first film left us with some pretty good loose ends to tie up and I thought there was a lot of potential for a great sequel.
(more text for spoilers) [more]
Posted by JonD @ 06:03 AM CST [Link]
Monday, May 19, 2003
So yeah, uh, mewse convinced me it'd be a good idea to run a torrent tracker for our own little group, so that we can share certain files amongst ourselves. So, now I've got a tracker running on despayre.
The announce url for the tracker is http://despayre.org:7000/announce ... when you create torrent files, point them here. That is all.
Posted by arioch @ 07:40 PM CST [Link]
Friday, May 16, 2003
have you guys been sucked into some retarded flamewars lately? i have, and i dont feel very good about it.
one of them, some guy decided he was going to defend that fat star wars kid from being ridiculed, and i decided to try and lend a voice of reason and tell him that it isn't that big a deal. holy shit, did that ever turn sour.
another one is that stupid doom 64 thing. those guys bugged the hell out of me, and the worst part is that one of the rational team members has now made a post, and he doesn't understand why everyone is complaining.
then there's this gem, which i don't see going anywhere but south since my city is so full of idiots it would take a thresher to clear a path for an intelligent thought.
what am i on crazy pills? whats wrong with these people and why do i feel like i'm trying to build a house of cards in the dark
Posted by mewse @ 06:55 AM CST [Link]
Monday, May 12, 2003
i'm hanging around bookwarez shit, trying to gather some summer reading, but it seems theres a lot of shit out there that hasnt been OCRed yet. such as "the terminal experiment" by robert j. sawyer, which won a nebula and i really want to read.
also, i'd like to get my hands on a copy of "the constant gardener" by john le carre. i read about 10 le carre books last summer, so i'd like to look at some of the others this year, heh.
i cant think of any of the other books i was looking for, anyone else have any ideas? this guy robert j. sawyer has a website named sfwriter.com, so i think i'm going to read some of his fav books, also of interest is where he talks about how wordstar is the perfect writer's word processer, he mentions things i never knew about like comments for documents (instead of code, heh).
i am burning up in fascination!
for serious, i need some books to read, i'm thinking of buying a shitty old palm because the screens larger than a gameboy and it has better reading softwarez. meh.
oh i guess i should've mentioned i've been reading ebooks using my gameboy, and this thing called "gameboy book reader" which i'm not going to dig out the URL for right now. it's kinda cool but nothing like a real book, i dunno. i was first able to read cory doctorows disneyland book on it, which was fun. whuffie and shit. r0x0rs.
Posted by mewse @ 12:42 AM CST [Link]
Friday, May 9, 2003
last night was pretty intense, we had a friend arrive from out west, and he seems to have adopted their lifestyle with his whole being. complete hippy stoner, but the best part is he seems genuinely happy. i'm giving a lot more serious thought to moving out there.
the second major thing was that i ran into the cutest girl i have ever known, after i hadn't seen her for maybe three or four years. i actually reached out and touched her hair to check that i wasn't dreaming, it was nuts.
i was completely drunk at that point, as well.
i'm quitting subway, i think i'm going to go hand in my uniform tomorrow. wal-mart beckons me, my shift starts in 25 minutes. ttfn fuckwards
Posted by mewse @ 02:24 PM CST [Link]
Fucking Canucks.
Posted by afterglow @ 12:18 AM CST [Link]
Thursday, May 8, 2003
i haven't really uncovered any earth-shattering secrets about wal-mart. still, i thought it would be cool to relay some of the more interesting stuff that happens at the "world's largest company".
1) stealing is easy. getting caught would suck, but stealing is easy. cashiers have these training acronyms -- BOB and LISA that stand for "Bottom Of Basket" and "Look InSide Always" which means, check the bottom of the shopping cart for merchandise and open up any containers that come through to check for merchandise. we had a fake customer come through with a thermos full of dremel bits and shit, and a boxed coffee grinder packed with men's ties, and apparently all the cashiers did pretty horrible. if you don't put all your merchandise on the counter, the cashier might just plain forget to ring it through, and if you are stopped, you can play dumb and act like you thought the cashier *had* rung it through (especially if its a somewhat large item, then you can say you thought the cashier had seen it).
2) any decent counterfeit bill will get through. a cashier running the express lane with a line down the aisle is not going to stop to check every 10 dollar bill against a list of known counterfeits. when i went to the movie theatre last night, they had more security than we have at walmart, because they checked my $10 with a UV light to confirm authenticity. we don't have UV lights at walmart.
now, what they MIGHT do is check a videotape to see if they can identify the person who passed the counterfeit money. but, that's practically impossible because they have no idea which bills in the till came from which people in line, and the cameras practically look straight down at the lineup.
3) security tags on jeans are practically useless, as they can be ripped off in half a second. i started doing this with customer's new jeans, the stupid things wouldnt deactivate so i just started ripping them off. they're only attached with a few of those plastic doohickeys that usually attach brand labels to new jeans.
4) don't try to use counterfeit USA money in canada -- its standard procedure to get them checked out with one of those special pens that disappear if the bill is real or whatever. i guess this is because all canadian cashiers are retards and won't be able to identify counterfeit USA money.
6 i mean 5) the *best* scam to pull is to have a cashier scan your order except for one big-ticket item. not TOO big ticket because if it's a big box it might have a security tag in it that the cashier can miss. the reason this is a great scam is that it just isn't possible for them to check the receipts on every person leaving the store, so they have to rely on their cashiers being honest. because of the ease with which this scam could be pulled off, there is a policy that says cashiers cannot serve family or friends. the line is pretty fucking blurry on who could be considered a "friend", heh. as with any theft, if you go overboard, you will be caught. if they notice that merchandise has been disappearing more-than-usual, they might start a rat hunt.
6) an item is useless without a barcode. completely fucking useless. we don't even have a "quantity" button at my store, and we can't type in barcodes manually. this is why walmart is scared of that site called re-code.com or whatever, because it fucks over their entire system. half the time, the cashier doesnt even look at the barcode, so they wont see if its just a sticker you put on, and if it is, a lot of the merchandise has barcode stickers on it because of store specials or wahtever. printing out a bunch of barcodes for your purchases is like printing out your own coupons if you know which barcodes will drop the prices of what merchandise. i can practically guarantee the cashiers will not notice, they are slaves to whatever the computer system tells them the price is.
Posted by mewse @ 01:30 AM CST [Link]
Thursday, May 1, 2003
I think I am doomed to be unhealthy. I never eat salad, I've never liked it since I was a kid and when I eat in a restaraunt and they give me a giant heap of salad (which they always do) I am forced to leave it behind and look like I've only eaten half my meal. Given I hardly eat fruit or vegtables this is not a recipe for great vitamin intake.
So a few days ago I was at the supermarket and decided to buy a porition of salad. Thinking maybe I could give it a go and maybe even learn to like it, or at least tolerate it. I finally got around to eating it today. To cut a short story shorter, it wasn't a success. For whatever reason the taste of salad is not just unpleasant, it actually makes me start to gag and almost vomit involuntarily. I barely got three or four mouthfuls into the salad portion before being forced to dump it in the bin.
Am I some kind of salad freak? I don't think I've ever met another person who has even disliked salad, let alone been made sick by the smallest taste of it. It just seems weird to have such a reaction to what most people seem to think is fairly tasteless and is like 90% water.
Well aside from eating salad, I also sent some time today in the library. I was reading a music magazine I'd bought from the campus shop a half hour ago. While I was reading some guy walks past the desk I'm sitting at and spots a girl he knows on the one behind me. So he comes over and has a chat with her. They're in the library of course and not wanting to disturb anyone they try to communicate in whispers. Except they're not really whispering, whispering is for talking to someone who is only inches away from you and they were standing a couple of metres apart at least. So they stood there talking at a more or less normal volume, only in a stupid raspy tone of voice. And they didn't just talk for a minute or so, they hung around talking about shit for half a goddamn hour. Half an hour. I constantly felt like turning aroud and saying: "Will you shut the fuck up! This is a fucking library and your retarded conversation is made doubly annoying by your apparent belief that talking in a raspy voice somehow makes you quieter, you stupid fuckheads."
Of course I was only reading a music magazine so I didn't really feel it was worth the trouble such an exclamation would have undoubtedly entailed, so I kept quiet.