7/31/2003
For me, there's nothing like a little security hole to give me a chuckle. And the fact that's it in Half-Life makes it even a heartier a chuckle. Why I might actually smile!
Seriously, what really stinks is:
"PivX said it had alerted Valve, the Kirkland, Wash.-based developer of "Half-Life," about this issue in April. Valve responded by saying a patch was in the works, but it has failed to provide an update so far, PivX said."
I'm pretty sure it wouldn't take 3 months to patch something like this. Just call that a hunch though.
7/29/2003
Update: Ok.. Two links of interest now. Half-Life 2 Delayed. Y'know, we should start a pool about how far off or how delayed a game will be from it's announced release date. There would be no need to place bets on it being released the day it's originally announced.
This is the only link of interest I found today. But since it deals with Transformers, that's cool enough.
7/28/2003
Ok. Let's get right to it. I'm staying focused on local Dallas news today. If you're in the Dallas area or are heading here. Pay attention. In fact, you should pay attention anyway since Quakecon will be here soon which makes Dallas > your town.
First up, Doom 3 to be unveiled at Quakecon. Multi demo. Nice. It's only one booth/kiosk thing. If they really had stones they'd give each attendee a CD with the demo. I double dog dare ya Carmack!!!
And the Ms. Quakecon tourney. Will it be sueperior to standard Quakecon similar to how Ms. Pac-Man was better than standard Pac-Man. In fact, I read that all the Quakecon women in the tourney not over 150 pounds will be required to wear pink bows. And that's it.
Finally, Levelord's Leaky Liver party. Sounds like debauchery en masse, geek style. Must go!! Must attend!
7/27/2003
Was out of town. Let's pick it up tomorrow. Thanks
7/22/2003
No Doom 3 this year apparently
7/21/2003
How bad is the lull in gaming news before Quakecon? So bad that ArmChair Empire has posted a review for Iron Storm, one of the worst games ever and, even more odd, it came out nearly a year ago and they're just now getting around to it? In fact, don't read their review, read mine which I wrote in a timely fashion which gets right to the heart of the matter.
And lookie here! A game called NAVY Seals, Weapons of Mass Destruction. Hunt for weapons and not find anything. Can all the Wolfenstein players gimme a "v583 v583!" Wait, I got it, they need to use their special tricorder Elite Force II-like to find weaknesses in the walls.
Is that Sarin or Anthrax?
7/17/2003
God bless Penny-Arcade. Their viewpoint on MMORPG summed up in three colorful panels.
No taxes on Internet purchases? Fine by me
64 Bit AMD chip soon? Just in time for Doom3? heh.. I wish.
7/15/2003
Dallas is a great place for gaming. Not only do we get Quakecon in August, and such well known development companies like id and Ritual but there's also the GuildHall, one of the first true game development certification courses. In fact, the Carmack himself spoke at the first inagural meeting for the class. Here's the article in the DMN and here's more info about the course itself. Kudos to Levelord and his crew who are active participants in the course.
ATi Catalyst Drivers out today.
Nothing super huge on the gaming front. Guess things are just calming down before the geek orgy fest that is Q-Con. Haven't signed up yet, have you? Well get there and do it citizen!
7/12/2003
7/11/2003
Map editor for Enemy Territory forthcoming from Activision. Custom maps.. yeah!!
Never heard of this till now. A "Phantom" console/PC hybrid? Interesting.
"All game keys are held on Infinium Labs' servers, so even if the kind of people who do Xbox mods do their thing on a Phantom, they won't be able to play games for free, unless they're some of the many "play before you buy" trials Roberts plans to offer or some of the games that might be included with the $9.95 per month (or whatever; this is still being worked out) extra fee you pay your broadband ISP for access to Infinium Labs' game library, which Roberts confidently predicts will be one of the largest in the world, not only because the Phantom will play any game that will run on Windows XP, but because Infinium plans to offer developers help in porting games originally written for dedicated consoles to the Phantom (really Windows XP) platform."
Not a bad idea as long as you're willing to sift through their catalog of games and choose the ones you like. But I wonder about the feasibility. I mean, after all, you can get a pretty decent (maybe not completely game ready) rig for under $1000 and then you could rip whatever games you want if you're so inclined.
"The obvious, first one is subscriptions. Roberts told me it will probably take somewhere between 750,000 and one million subscribers to start turning a profit, based on $9.95 per month."
Isn't it something like over half of all households have a PC right now anyway so is one million households feasible? Could the system do more than just games? Could I do word processing, surf the web? Hook up a printer?
Finally, you'd have to change your ISP to one of the ones that supports the plan so you can securely hook up to the Phantom servers and download the stuff.
7/9/2003
Yeah, gone for a few days but did you check out the Elite Force 2 Review? You didn't? Shame on you!
Ok, so what's been missed in the gaming world these past few days?
- More Sims crap. Hopefully, the last one. Oh wait, there'll probably be a Sims 2.
- Someone asked a developer about Thief 3. Their answer about the question if you can kill stuff all the way through:
"Randy: You can finish this game without ever getting caught, and you can finish this game by killing everyone you meet. Okay, that last part isn't strictly true in every single case, maybe, but I can't go into details. Let's adjust to say you can kill practically everybody you meet, if that's your thing, you sick, violent Garrett, you."
Yes, I'm a sick, violent Garret. Thanks
- Gangland? What's this?
"As you progress through the game building up your own empire by setting up protection rackets, threatening locals, prostituting women and where necessary, murdering people, you gain respect from both your peers and family."
I didn't even get past that quote. You just read that fine quality of a sentence and you realize this game will have everything a game needs.
I know it's probably not ethical in a journalistic standpoint to rant about other person's reviews. But dang it, get your tech straight before railing on a game. Friggin n00bs. This comes from LoadedInc review of Elite Force 2:
"There are a few oddities to the game play. Ladders seem to be 'one sided'; if there's a ladder to a mezzanine level you can only climb the side that has the hole above your head in the floor above. While this does stop you from climbing the wrong side it can make you wonder if you're going mad because your character isn't climbing the ladder!"
Hello!! dum dum!! Ever play any other Q3 games? Perhaps Wolf or Enemy Territory? It's inherent in the engine! Yeesh.. get a clue.
7/4/2003
Interesting news from the science world today. Wired reports that scientists have found a solar system with a composition similar to ours. By that they mean they found a gas giant in the same orbital area as our own Jupiter. This is important somehow so go read the article and learn all about it.
And excuse me while I scratch my head on this one. Another Diablo II patch? Come on folks, put down the robe and wizard hat for a while and come back. In fact, today's a holiday here in the US of A. Get some sun, eat some red meat and drink beer. Forget about trying to get that +2 head armor out of your system for one day.
7/2/2003
Look, I don't care what you think, my older sister wanted to see Charlie's Angels and so I took her. I liked the first one and I liked the second. It's totally camp and even better in this second one, Demi Moore is so completely hot it's painful. There, I admitted it.
7/1/2003
Well, first of July and let the legal fur fly! Better yet, set phasers on litigate! Yup, Activision is about to sue the pants off Viacom for not putting out more Trek stuff.
"Activision accused Viacom of breaching its fundamental promise to continue exploiting the Star Trek franchise consistent with its practice at the time the agreement was signed in 1998"
On the one hand Activision has a point. To sell product you gotta have some marketing and if Viacom doesn't keep selling it then Activision won't sell as much. On the other hand, Berman's a jerkweed and nothing good has been created for Star Trek since Ds9 or First Contact. Voyager stunk and Enterprise has yet to catch on. The well has run dry. Let it die dang it. Please hang Berman and company out in effigy
Yet, I still bought Elite Force II. And I like it. Go figure.
6/30/2003
Holy crap folks, Sphinx has original content! Yup, an honest to gosh interview with the originator of the fine ND80 Wolfenstein/ET community. I just felt that game admins don't get the recognition they deserve and should be given the appropriate "props". Here's another link to the interview. Thanks ND80 and crew for the email interview.