What if you had a user interface where the buttons changed size based on how often you used their buttons?
The buttons you use the most would be the biggest, placed in the center and the buttons you use the least would radially placed in a circle away from the buttons you use the most. The buttons you don't use would be the smallest.
Would this be difficult to make?
As the user would you like having buttons that change size based on how often you use them?
Low-Priced Mobile games among biggest risks for game industry
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/32855/Nintendos_FilsAime_LowPriced_Mobile_Games_Among_Biggest_Risks_To_Industry.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+GamasutraNews+(Gamasutra+News)&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher
My response for Fils-Aime:
Big companies are like lions and can't take many risks, because if they don't catch food they will go hungry, so they release quality games based on pricipals that worked well in the past. Small companies are like mosquitoes, their advantage is that there are so many of them.
I have seen what both the Nintendo and Sony stores have to offer. There could be improvement in the rate of releases to the stores or in price. I can't speak for the Microsoft store.
I don't think the iPad is bad for gaming, it will merely shake things up. Hey, we might even get more indie games. Below I made a list of what games the iPad does well.
--games that work well on the iPad--
multiplayer on the same device
Examples:
Multipong
Strategery
Carcassonne
Small World
Neuroshima Hex
Also some touch games are just better on the iPad:
Infinity Blade
World of Goo
Land Air Sea Warfare
In comparison my PS3 I have better looking games with compelling stories, and lots of content: pretty sure Mass Effect 2 and LBP 2 trump anything on the iPad, now or anytime in the forseeable future. Bad Company 2 and Killzone 2 exist if I ever had a competative itch.But in general neither have splitscreen anymore, so I can't play with my friend in the same room even if I wanted to (with some exceptions).
The iPad I have found is terrible for shooters, I mean c'mon the latest console controllers have been designed with the shooter in mind (dual analog sticks).While consoles maybe good for shooters, the iPad is great for strategy games (something PCs are good at, but not consoles, especially not portables), point/click adventure, and board games. When was the last time you could bring a console with you and play a game with three other people?
If the iPad was merely a game console, then one could say, but gam3r3OOO the Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft products are far superior. But consider that I can watch movies, surf the web, and do my homework (math on wolfram, research on wikipedia). And there is no limit to the games in the app store (I am looking at you Playstation Store). What is worth mentioning is that most iPhone/iPad apps are $1 or $2 each. Compare that to (in my opinion) overpriced obsolete virtual console software priced at $6, $8, $10, and $12. It is true Square Enix has potentially a solid RPG for the iPad/iPhone at $16 (I haven't played it so it might actually be garbage).
I do agree though, many of the titles for the iPad are throw away, but if you are willing to look you can find jems like some of games I currently own. Infinity Blade was something like $6 and it makes a case for touch controls (I like Infinity Blade more then Demon's Souls), I think that says a lot. It just controls so well, is simple, and if I hadn't leveled up most every piece of armor in the game I would probably still be playing it (I guess this contradicts my previous statement).
Apple has effectively taken over the portable market with exclusively software applications, where there is no physical cartridge or UMD required. You can have one device for consumption (purchase and viewing): music, movies, games (well sort of).
Also one more thing: I can play with anonymous strangers online with the iPad (I'm looking at you Nintendo).
I apologize if this reads like an iPad commercial (I'm sure those who can't afford one either hate me or are rationalizing why they don't want one).What the world needs is a real iPad competitor. I want something of similar cost that I can write on for notes (reflexive, or both reflexive and capacitive).Think Cintiq or Modbook, but as its own standalone device that boots up and has device specific software. Or maybe Wacom could make a bluetooth stylus for the iPad (for quick precise notes).Why does it need a competitor? Simple...Innovation. The android persuaded Steve to give us multitasking.
I respect all the current platforms, I would buy a Microsoft, Sony, or Nintendo tablet if it was a good product that was concerned with ergonomics and workflow.
Fils Aime if you are reading this: please make a Nintendo Tablet. Think of the possibilities: Mario Party with 4 people on one device, Mario RPG with touch controls, Legend of Zelda with Infinity Blade swipe/block/parry.
@subyman: To answer your original question: Mainly complexity, nostalgia, that and the brain loses plasticity with age so we become more set in our ways. Look at RTS games, once everyone made them with base building, resource collection and combat it came to be expected. Now companies experiment with the formula and people think it is a worse game because there is less complexity now (enter combat only RTS games). Older gamers like their games to be complex. Recent games have taken steps backwards: reducing the number of things to juggle, reducing depth. I think there are two kinds of gamers: (ones who want a game to play right now) and (ones who are willing to immerse themselves in the story, complexities, rules, strategies). The mainstream gamer is some where inbetween, closer to (I want to play right now). The same could be said about short stories vs novels. Games are becoming more immersive, but take longer to make, and require bigger teams. A small company has the freedom to apply good and original ideas. In a big company there is a lot of friction, some would be good ideas get scrapped, things get simplified, deadlines have to be met and at the end of the day your game needs to have the latest graphics to sell. As games become more realistic, the time manpower overhead will take priority to apply basic HD, or 3D or (other immersive technology) before applying original ideas, and the individuals who make those individual parts have the final say in their part of the project (they might choose to make vanilla content instead of the style that was originally intended). So it is no surprise that many games the story and complexity of the game (the parts that made the classics great) take a back seat to immersion and presentation.
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1: Authenticity Score- For fans a review to compare to other games made by the same company (in this case compare to Starcraft)
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2: Genre Score- compared against all past strategy games (or games of that genre), how it stacks up
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3: Strategy Ingenuity Score- how many different interesting strategies are possible? Or do games just come down to who can rush better?
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4: Balance Score- are the teams Balanced? are there games in the same genre that are more balanced?
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5: Backwards Compatibility Score: For people with old computers that can barely play Warcraft 3, or people who don't have the latest version of Windows (a game that requires one to have Windows 7)
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6: Lan Party Score: highest score if you can use one copy for a lan party. If the game requires 1 copy of the game per player then it gets a lower score, if it cannot be played over a network it gets a zero (score should only be applied to multiplayer games)
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7: AI Score: can a computer player pass a gaming Turing Test? Can a computer compete at both noob level and a hardened veteran level? Could I play against a bot in an online match and think it was a human player?
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8: Match Customizability Score: no rush option? Tech levels? Different win criteria other than elimination? Color options? Length of name (can it be a 30 characters long)? Auto balancing? Handicap? Replays? Observers?
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9: Graphics Score: compared to the best looking strategy games
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10: Music Score:
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11: Creative Outlet Score: how much freedom does the level editor allow?
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This is what I presume going in without having played the final game
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1:Authenticity: 9 (just like the first one, but lacking LAN, fans will love the game)
2:Genre: 7 (do all units level up in combat? does it do anything new for the genre? Does it feel fresh and new or stale?)
3:Strategy Ingenuity: 9 (quantity of viable strategies)
4:Balance: 9 (if teams are asymmetric how can they ever be balanced?)
5:Backwords Compatibility: 8 (don't think it will run on my Pentium M laptop)
6:Lan Support: 0 (nope)
7:AI: 5 (this is a guess, they had pretty dumb AI last time, there is no motivation to make the AI really good, this game has a pvp emphasis)
8:Match Customizability: 8 (do they have no rush options? variety? more than elimination matches?)
9:Genre Graphics: 8 (How does it compare to company of heroes, World in Conflict?)
10:Music: 10 what I have heard has been phenomenal
11:Creative Outlet: 9 with the level editor you can change the Hud, and almost make Starcraft Ghost, nevermind this is no substitute for going to school and learning how to do game design, planning still takes a considerable amount of effort
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I don't want to give an overall score, because different people look for different things in a review.
What.. did you expect a blog?...
Well I delivered.
Educational: This is what happens when you put a metal chair by an MRI machine
This blog is Sexy
Funny
And Awesome
The word of the month is: Philistine. Yeah, its a great derogatory term to call someone. A Philistine: "is said to despise or undervalue art, beauty, intellectual content, or spiritual values. Philistines are also said to be materialistic, to favor conventional social values unthinkingly, and to favor forms of art that have a cheap and easy appeal." Its a pretty heavy word to use can describe a lot of people for sure. You're probably not a Philistine. You're probably highly intelligent, and have exquisite taste:P.
word;)
I was contemplating getting Sam and Max Season 3 for $24.99 from the PSN store. By the way is that game really good? I don't know as I've never played a Sam and Max game. I've heard the series is really funny. Lots of good one liners.
Is that Elmo from Sesame street? CL4SSY
I've never liked a shooter as much as I have liked Battlefield: Bad Company 2... EA, if you're listening you can use this...
Note: my blog has been sensored all words that are **** are the word CL4SS.
The game got an 88%ish from Gamerankings (probably because of its lackluster Single player). I wouldn't know, I haven't played single player yet.
Bad Company 2 is like if Modern Warfare and Red Faction: Guerilla and Battlefield 2 got cooked by some cRaZY Mad Scientist....
1) I love destructible physics. After this game my standards are such that I won't buy another FPS if it doesn't have destructible physics. I won't care about Killzone 3 if you can't blow up walls.
Look at all the holes in those walls. Its a beautiful thing.
Theres nothing like firing a rocket at a building wall to make a quick escape. Or taking down a building with a tank. Or breaking through a fence with a machine gun.
Everything is destructible in this game, short of the concrete blocks, Hills, and buildings that are "out of bounds" of the battlefield. As Yatzee said on his Zero Punctuation, smoke goes up as the game renders the destructible physics like a curtain that goes up before a magician performs.
I liked Red Faction, but the guns just didn't feel right. Red Faction: G has a great destructible physics engine. Theres nothing like using the blackholes to rip apart a group of buildings or any number of other crazy weapons in that game.
Before
After
2) the game handles well (Bad Company 2). It controls like: Modern Warfare 2 or Starwars: BattleFront 2 (PS2/Xbox) or MAG
The joystiq clicks for running, the gun buttons are triggers (what you expect), the control pad lets you select your ****s special weapon:
The Medic gets health pack and magical reviving paddles that bring back even the most cold dead corpse. The medic specializes in a machine gun with a ridiculous clip size of about 100 bullets, so you can take out quite a few bad guys before you have to reload. The Recon gets C4 or Airstrike depending on how you are spec'd, and a sonar/radar/see-through-walls-radar/motion-sensor that reveals enemies for about 20 seconds.
The Recon is your traditional sniper, they get crazy long range scopes and can reveal enemy positions by just scoping them out (with a certain ability). The Assualt ****gets a grenade addition to their regular Machine Gun.
Assualt ****can also get additional gun equipment like a shotgun attachment or a smoke grenade attachment. Every Assualt ****gets Ammo packs which can refill their ammo as well as other soldier's ammo.
The Engineer specializes in submachineguns and wears a balaclava. He looks like hes gonna rob a bank or something. The engineer has a repair tool which can also "disassemble" enemy tanks instantly. The engineer also wields a rocket of 3 different flavors: RPG, urban-warfare, and guided (for taking out helicopters).
3) You regenerate health like Master Chief. I hate having to search for health packs. And if you want to refill your health completely and quickly a medic can do that.
4) Multiplayer is awesome! There soon will be coop (Onslaught mode). This game has better uptime for me than Uncharted 2 Multiplayer (I actually stopped playing Uncharted online because I lost levels from losing my connection with their server). Oh yeah, you don't lose levels if you disconnect
5) "Most" Downloadable content is free (the maps) you get a VIP code if you purchase a new copy (I wonder if this is to cut down on second hand sales). They do have "other" downloadable content you have to pay for, they seem pretty minor so far (I'm not paying $5 for minor content). Who knows maybe they'll add a Portal gun
6) Its a TEAM game. So you don't have to be the greatest marksman to ever have weilded the rifle to... eh play the gun game. Having a mic makes it better but I play and I don't have a mic (I'm a lone wolf).
7) Camping and Sniping can bring down your success as a team. I hate being sniped. What I hate more is when half my team is sniping, and not going for the point. This also works to your advantage, if your opponent is all snipers. You only need so many snipers.
(I always forget "8 )" is actually 8) awesome sunglasses, gets me every time )
8: The sniper rifle is more realistic than say... Halo. No precise sniping, bullets actually arc, and you have to compensate for that. I don't know if wind is in play though (I suppose it could be more realistic).
Tips: Some of my favorite specs:
-Recon with Shotgun and C4 (kind of counter intuitive, but trust me its awesome **** they won't see it coming)
-Recon with the submachine gun sniper with a 4x zoom on it (the sniper works better close range than the Engineer's SMG)
-Engineer with RPG and all the rocket upgrades (for maximum damage and rocket sniping)
-Assult with F2000 with 4x zoom and body armor
-Medic with almost any setup (my favorite ****because: the machine gun has the biggest clip and revives give you as many points as a kill)
*Well this was certainly better use of my time than studying for a final thats worth 50% of my grade.
**What was I thinking a better use of my time would have been to just play the D4MN game instead of tell you all how awsome it is.
Oh did you know in LItTle BIG plaNet you can can paste objects onto sackboy's face and add it to your costumes. I didn't know that either. So one time I stuck an egyptian pillar on sackboy's face. Oh one more thing, you can place objects on resurrection portals so the player doesn't know where they will come back. Very Sneaky...
Oh I think Brain Chips are awesome. I'm not talking about the food (cuz that would be gross). You see I just got one installed and now I have double the short term memory I used to. Just imagine in a few years we'll be torrenting for knowledge or understanding that we install directly into our brains. I would hate to download someones nightmares though. Hey I just gave you all an idea (oh wait kind of an old Idea: aka Neuromancer by Gibson).
Stay in school, don't do drugs, play games until your hands hurt from blisters and your eyes get bloodshot from lack of blinking. May you get skinny because you were having so much fun playing games you forgot to eat. Oh one more thing; stay away from World of Warcraft, (read carefully) I used to have friends who played that game. Hint: they still play World of Warcraft.
One more thing I composed another song. Go and listen to it if you like music. I'm Aeos if someone happens to post another song (after the one I posted). Its short, slightly over 3 minutes (I once did a song that was longer than 10).
If you don't like music. Well um... I don't have anything for you. I have a brother who doesn't like music, he happens to be very good at math, I wonder if theres a coorelation... hmm.. a thought for another day I suppose. If you don't like music and aren't good at math :lol:... (runs away)
STAY CL4SSY,
Gam3r3OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
If you read this far... stop reading. The shows over. Go home. Take a nap. I give you one thing. You're persistent. This like staying after the credits. And then after the bonus scene about something crazy that happens after the cliff hanger ending of the movie. What ever you do don't read the spoiler. I warned you. Do not under any circumstances read that spoiler. Now I bet you really wonder what is under there. I'm sure you're very curious, I know I would be. If I were you I would highly recommend NOT looking at the spoiler. If you want to get any sleep tonite or the nite after that or the rest of your life. This would be a moment I would recommend you practice the utmost self-control. Don't look at it. DOn't even THINK of looking at it. Who knows what could be lurking under there.
[spoiler] 
And the EYES have it. [/spoiler]
How well did we predict what the year 2000 would be like (in 1900)?
Some predictions of the year 2000.
Heres a list of predictions that didn't make it:
And some offtopic, unrelated but still interesting outcomes:
In conclusion: are we any different than we were 100 years ago.
Is the world better off?
A) We have a bunch of new toys but we are still flawed, we make mistakes. Human nature comes down to the least common denominator who inturn ruins life for the rest of us (eg commercials, lawyers, politicians,...whatever)
B) We are much smarter, have much better capacity to do things than 100 years ago. Things could be better, but they could also be MUCH WORSE.
C) This current outcome couldn't be much better than it already is. We have the Internet, which trumps flying cars. Why fly when you can be somewhere instantly (virtually there)?
D) The world is in the brink of collapse. So many bad things are happening simultaneously.
E) All of the Above (just a joke...hehe)
F) None of the Above
I've got a fun fact for you all.
The DSi is not the DS.
Nope, its a completely new console.
I suppose its the same kind of thing as the Gameboy Color was for the original Gameboy.
Funny thing is: since all they added was that 'i' to the end of the original name it creates quite a bit of confusion.
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Specs for the DS and DS Lite:
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CPUs: 1x67 MHz & 1x33 MHz
RAM: 4 MB
STORAGE: 256 kB
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...
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Specs for the DSi
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CPU: 1x133 MHz (x2 the fastest processor of DS)
RAM: 16 MB (x4 that of the original DS)
STORAGE: 256 MB + SD card (potentially 2GB or more with SD card alone)
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So I guess it makes sense that it will have exclusives that you can't play on your DS and DS lite. :|
Disclaimer: I appologize for anyone who already knew this. I only came to this realization after I read about it on Wikipedia...:D I was just so excited I just had to blog about it.
You know a concept I really like in games? The Lens of Truth.
For those who never played Ocarina of Time or Major's Mask: The Lens of Truth was an artifact that let Link see "the truth"; that is, to see things that are not normally visible to the naked eye. It shows which walls, floors and objects are fake, and it allows the user to see things such as invisible ladders, platforms, enemies and ghosts.
Its pretty epic.
I like the idea of illusions in my games. It makes for a new aspect you could not explore in real life. I mean when was the last time you walked through a wall that wasn't there?
What if you had vision to see through things that didn't exist. Or see them differently altogether?
Another picture just because
Appart from merely the moving aspect of a game like using a lens of truth to find secret areas. What if you could find double meaning from everyday objects or signs like from the Movie: They Live.
Would look like this:
And just because this picture looks so cool:
But if you think about it this concept isn't so much different from that of Secret areas in Super Mario Bros.
The movie was great.
I read the graphic novel before I saw the movie and the movie stayed pretty true to the novel (which I liked). There were a couple minor changes and cuts to the story so that it wouldn't exceed the 2 and a half hour length. The movie overall was pretty compact like The Dark Knight. There wasn't a scene that seemed like it was drawn out.
The acting was meh.
What made the movie good was the special effects, camera angles and all those thought provoking ideas present in the original graphic novel.
Also, there was an unnecessary amount of love scenes in the movie.
For those who saw the movie:
[spoiler] "Who watches the watchmen"...I was never sure if that was a pun, or if they were thinking the watchmen wasn't going to be popular.... I thought of Rorschach like a kind of psycho Jack Bauer and Ozymandias was a bad guy through and through. I liked the quote where they mentioned that Ozymandias was a pacifist and vegetarian. Rorschach replies: Hitler was a vegetarian. The giant squid alien thing was noticably missing from the end of the movie (instead Dr. Manhattan inadvertantly exploded on his way back to New York City). [/spoiler]
I am not here to explain why. I'm just going to explain what it is and show you some examples (via links).
Augmented reality basically creates an illusion using what exists in real life. Lets say you wore some kind of e-glasses that drew things over what you already see based on what you see.
For example in real life augmented reality in a war could label all your friends in green and foes in red. Augmented reality could also help make things visible to you that sensors could notice but not a human eye (and it would give a visual representation of it).
A new technology has become available where cameras, projectors and your computer can track pieces of paper. You can create images that follow the paper or you can project an image steming from that paper. This is kind of cool.
Now just imagine you have a webcam that can see this piece of paper. A black block of ink remains in the center for a reference point to the computer. From that point 3D images can be generated.
Now I don't have to tell you what this could mean for the future of gaming.
Wouldn't you much rather hold an object with your hands to rotate it than use a thumbstick or mouse when controls of all 3 dimensions are not always easy?
I'm sure in the future we will see more durable devices (than a piece of paper) that the computer can see that you can hold in your hand; for example: a clear globe with a black sphere in the center.
This is only the beginning.
Links:
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