Upcoming games that makes me glad I'm a species born with opposabl

[Lissa]

Last financial report I can find from Sony:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070726/bs_...lectronics

Or were you forgetting how successful MS as a whole is even though the Game division is one giant money pit itself?

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070...x-ravaging.html

Take a look at the following Quark:

Sony's Numbers over the years

Sony has lost a lot of cash on hand over the past 2 years. While they have gained some back, it's not where they were. They are hurting and if Blu-ray goes down, Sony is going to be in even worse shape as they have tied so much of their market to Blu-ray. Microsoft knows this and if they can force Sony out of the console market by trying to get HD more noticed, they will do so. Sony is wounded and MS is going after them like they always do with others.

[Lissa]

Thinking more about the issue of the next generation of storage has me torn. On one hand I think a lot of technology (science for that matter) is done for the sake of science alone. But on the other hand, more often than not its necessity that lights the fire that makes technology spill into the main stream. But in this case, really where is the fire?

I'm sure I'll be looking back at this post sooner than I expect and thinking, god did I really say that? But here goes:

What real market is there going to be for large capacity discs in the foreseeable future? 100+ Gig video games are possible if you bump texture quality higher, but there's still significant bottle necks to displaying all those textures at once. The hardware bottlenecks that aren't likely to resolve themselves before more space is needed. 100+ gig movies? Hrm. Not until 'high def' goes through the roof. The only market I can see is for TV series to be released on one disc. Putting all seasons of Seinfeld on one disc would certainly call for some monstrous storage.

Internal HD's are already at 1TB (what are they up to now, +200 gig plus single platters?). Solid State drives promise more reliable backup than their spinning counterparts, and better long term storage than plastic cds/dvds/hddvds/blu-rays.

All of this is to say, I give up on speculating on the future technology. I don't think the need for a new data storage type will come soon enough, and with the fast (and set-back haunted) pace of technology these days the next true storage may be something entirely incomprehensible to me at this date.

Cheers,

Munk

PS. I'm getting old - I still can't get over how cool the idea of a blue laser is!:P

I think part of the problem is you're looking specifically at the home market. Data warehousing is starting to really take off in business. In order to have a good data warehouse you need space, lots of it. This is why things like SANs, NAS, and DAS have taken off (espeically SAN). As various business applications get more and more intricate, the need for more space becomes apparent (I've worked with SQL databases that were growing at 500% per year after routine compression done daily and sometimes hourly). While the general home user may not need this kind of space, business are screaming for it to try and keep down the foot print of their equipment in their data centers (along with the operating costs as less equipment requires less power, less personnel, and less maintenance).

[Bun-Bun]

Going with HD is them trying to gain control over the console market.

I think this is the core of our disagreement. You think people pick consoles based on what HD format they support. If that is the case, then backing HD-DVD will help them dominate that space, "bury Sony", etc.

I don't think that's a significant factor. I think folks get consoles to play games. The content of those games is the determining factor. I can't imagine someone picking an XBox over a PS3 because the PS3 won't play "300". I can imagine picking an XBox to play Halo.

To support my point, http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070...pabilities.html

If they want to eat Sony's lunch, forcing them to use Microsoft technology and services to distribute their movies would be a nice way to do it. So much better than winning the format war and watching all that money go to Toshiba, no? So, the Paramount deal could be taken as a swipe at Sony, but I don't think it has much effect on the console war.

[Lissa]

I think this is the core of our disagreement. You think people pick consoles based on what HD format they support. If that is the case, then backing HD-DVD will help them dominate that space, "bury Sony", etc.

I don't think that's a significant factor. I think folks get consoles to play games. The content of those games is the determining factor. I can't imagine someone picking an XBox over a PS3 because the PS3 won't play "300". I can imagine picking an XBox to play Halo.

To support my point, http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070...pabilities.html

If they want to eat Sony's lunch, forcing them to use Microsoft technology and services to distribute their movies would be a nice way to do it. So much better than winning the format war and watching all that money go to Toshiba, no? So, the Paramount deal could be taken as a swipe at Sony, but I don't think it has much effect on the console war.

I think you're missing what I'm saying Bun. MS is supporting HD to hurt Sony, not just in the console market, but in other markets too. Sony and MS share more than just the console space where each company's finger touch different pies. If MS can get Sony to go under, that gives them more ability to sell in those area that the two are competitors. This is MS going after Sony to get them out of markets they share (and it's more than consoles). Sony has wrapped up a lot of their monies in Blu-ray and if it fails, Sony is going to fail as well (this is just like the VHS/Betamax war, the Betamax people ended up dying off because of Sony who was the originator of VHS).

[Chesspiece_face]

I think this is the core of our disagreement. You think people pick consoles based on what HD format they support. If that is the case, then backing HD-DVD will help them dominate that space, "bury Sony", etc.

I don't think that's a significant factor. I think folks get consoles to play games. The content of those games is the determining factor. I can't imagine someone picking an XBox over a PS3 because the PS3 won't play "300". I can imagine picking an XBox to play Halo.

To support my point, http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070...pabilities.html

If they want to eat Sony's lunch, forcing them to use Microsoft technology and services to distribute their movies would be a nice way to do it. So much better than winning the format war and watching all that money go to Toshiba, no? So, the Paramount deal could be taken as a swipe at Sony, but I don't think it has much effect on the console war.

As for my part, i believe that you and I agree on most of these points. I think people do choose consoles based on what games they have, price, etc. the problem for sony, and the reason that this generation of consoles and HD media are intertwined is that for the PS3 to be successful not only does it need to be a good console, but Blu-ray also needs to end up the dominant media. There was a thread on these boards about a year ago in which i detailed my thoughts on why the PS3 would have problems getting a foothold in the next gen market (presently i'm having trouble finding the link, but i may add it later.) And one issue i enumerated was that last gen the PS2 was able to ride the upswell of DVDs by being a gaming console as well as a DVD player. A lot of people bought a PS2 because not only was it a good console but also because they could get into DVDs along with it (good value proposition).

Fast forward to current gen consoles and Sony is looking to do a repeat by riding the advance of HD to push their console into homes. Problem is when the PS2 came out DVD had been around for a year or two and was past the point of early adoption and at the point that the mass market was starting to eye it. Not the case for Blu-ray or HDdvd. Both of these are still sitting in the early adopter markets.

Sony's whole 10 year plan for the PS3 is to ride the upsurge of HD by pushing Blu-ray as the dominant next gen media. If blu-ray does become the next gen media than Sony will be able to use the same strategy that worked for the PS2, people will buy a PS3 not only because it is a gaming system, but because they also can have an HD player. If Blu-ray fails as the next gen media, however, Sony loses this added inroute into the homes as well as has a gaming system that is crippled by having it's main media drive based on a failed technology. Thus if Blu-ray fails the PS3 fails. There is no way that the PS3 will last 10 years if HDdvd becomes the dominant media. Which puts Sony in a major pickle. They have lost an absurd amount of money into the production of the PS3, if in 3 years (instead of 10) it looks like they need to drop the PS3 and come up with a new console it's a very real possibility that they won't be able to pull it off.

Edit: Link included. Main argument is about halfway down the first page.

[Chesspiece_face]

I think you're missing what I'm saying Bun. MS is supporting HD to hurt Sony, not just in the console market, but in other markets too. Sony and MS share more than just the console space where each company's finger touch different pies. If MS can get Sony to go under, that gives them more ability to sell in those area that the two are competitors. This is MS going after Sony to get them out of markets they share (and it's more than consoles). Sony has wrapped up a lot of their monies in Blu-ray and if it fails, Sony is going to fail as well (this is just like the VHS/Betamax war, the Betamax people ended up dying off because of Sony who was the originator of VHS).

Correction: Sony was the creator of Betamax. which makes the parallels to this next gen battle all the more ironic if Blu-ray fails.

Link.

[Bun-Bun]

I think you're missing what I'm saying Bun. MS is supporting HD to hurt Sony, not just in the console market, but in other markets too. Sony and MS share more than just the console space where each company's finger touch different pies. If MS can get Sony to go under, that gives them more ability to sell in those area that the two are competitors. This is MS going after Sony to get them out of markets they share (and it's more than consoles). Sony has wrapped up a lot of their monies in Blu-ray and if it fails, Sony is going to fail as well (this is just like the VHS/Betamax war, the Betamax people ended up dying off because of Sony who was the originator of VHS).

I think we're almost in agreement now.:)

My original point was that MS cut their deal not to create HD-DVD dominance, and not to sell more consoles, but to undermine the entire generation of physical-delivery media in favor of digital downloads.

You may think this is more aimed at Sony than I do; that's a matter of degree. MS in control certainly does Sony no good. If Sony is destroyed, that certainly removes a competitor in many markets. I'm skeptical as to the viability of "destroying" Sony, since, as Chesspiece pointed out, your VHS/Betamax example is backwards, and Sony is still around.

[Wyrm]

Starting a new tangent, does anybody have anything good to say about this game? From what I've read, I won't be picking it up, partly because of their draconian anti-pirate measures but also the overall look of the game if you're not lucky enough to have DX10. I'd love to hear from anyone who got the game and is loving it :)

Link to massive complaints about anti-pirate measures:
http://forums.2kgames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5527

Mind you, it's a public company-run forum, so it reads sorta like blizzard's WoW-General:P

Wow... just reading the original post (aka the quote from the securom site) in that link makes me not even want to install the demo for the game. Oh well.

Anyone heard anything about Two Worlds? Looks to be almost Morrowind/Oblivion like (in the non-linear, go wherever and do whatever sense) but with an online component.

[Munkay]

I think part of the problem is you're looking specifically at the home market. Data warehousing is starting to really take off in business. In order to have a good data warehouse you need space, lots of it. This is why things like SANs, NAS, and DAS have taken off (espeically SAN). As various business applications get more and more intricate, the need for more space becomes apparent (I've worked with SQL databases that were growing at 500% per year after routine compression done daily and sometimes hourly). While the general home user may not need this kind of space, business are screaming for it to try and keep down the foot print of their equipment in their data centers (along with the operating costs as less equipment requires less power, less personnel, and less maintenance).

I don't think we're in disagreement. I should have been more clear from the start, I was talking specifically about the home market. Although there are plenty of business technologies that have jumped ship and gone into the public everyday market, there are also a good number of technologies designed for the corporate world which remain corporate. I have no doubt the needs in the corporate world will keep up demand for bigger/faster/better storage options. I've seen examples of Oracle DB's that make my head want to explode (btw, a 500% per year growth rate on an SQL db is pretty mind blowing to me).

But the corporate world that demands these technologies won't think twice at high hardware costs if it saves them space, time, and as you mentioned maintenance/personnel. So while a new technology may be great in the corporate world, a $1000+ player just isn't going to effect my life that much - unless I jump ship from servicing small corporations SQL db's to ones like you see, an unlikely and scary idea to me!

Cheers,

Munk

[NiteFox]

Link to massive complaints about anti-pirate measures:
http://forums.2kgames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5527

Mind you, it's a public company-run forum, so it reads sorta like blizzard's WoW-General:P

Um, that SecureROM warning looks pretty legitimate to me. I'm pretty sure that pops up in the fineprint of every SecureROM-protected game.

Of course, if you want to forego all that copy protection malarky and have the game available for you on whatever number of computers you have access too (And are meaty enough to run it), then buy it on Steam. Simple as that. Set up a Steam account if you haven't got one already, buy Bioshock, then run a Steam backup of Bioshock and only Bioshock, burning the backup file on a DVD-R.

Reviews of Bioshock have been pretty glowing, I've yet to find a seriously bad word about it. Minimum specs state it'll run on a GeForce 6600, which is hardly a top of the line card. Just so long as you've got the processor, haven't skimped on RAM (Who manages with less than a gig these days? Seriously?) and have a videocard from the last year or so, you should be fine.

Anyone heard anything about Two Worlds? Looks to be almost Morrowind/Oblivion like (in the non-linear, go wherever and do whatever sense) but with an online component.

Yes. "Decidedly average" is the general opinion of the PC brigade, whereas those degenerate pad-gropers will probably think it the best thing since someone decided to cut up bread before selling it.

[Pantalaimon]

Of course, if you want to forego all that copy protection malarky and have the game available for you on whatever number of computers you have access too (And are meaty enough to run it), then buy it on Steam. Simple as that. Set up a Steam account if you haven't got one already, buy Bioshock, then run a Steam backup of Bioshock and only Bioshock, burning the backup file on a DVD-R.

Of course, the problem with that is the additional copyprotection is still in place with the Steam version. So you get pay a bit of a premium to get a game that's supposed to be easily transferable between computers with steam, except... you don't.

The other problem that's reared its head is that if you're, for whatever reason, unable to do a proper uninstall, that game will forever count towards your only 2 installations allowed (halfway down the page) quota until you call SecureROM yourself. The most frequent encounter with this problem is people formatting to clean up their systems to play the game, and then being unable to install. Also, for some silly reason, if you dual boot XP and Vista, that counts as both your installs, so if you have that + a laptop, too bad.

The ultimate irony is the 360 version already has a crack out:P

That's my major concern. The other is DX9, because all the reviewers undoubtedly have DX10 versions, and the other people I've talked to running DX9 are "meh" about the "uber graphics", and choppy. But I was interested in hearing from anyone here who's played it and loved it, c'mon I know you have to exist :lol:

[Chesspiece_face]

That's my major concern. The other is DX9, because all the reviewers undoubtedly have DX10 versions, and the other people I've talked to running DX9 are "meh" about the "uber graphics", and choppy. But I was interested in hearing from anyone here who's played it and loved it, c'mon I know you have to exist :lol:

I have played the game although on the 360. I love it. it is undoubtably the best game of the year. the problems with the PC however put me in the category that if i was looking into the PC version, i would not purchase it. the only real problem with the 360 version is the Widescreen issues that are in both PC and 360 version. (that being that the widescreen isn't really widescreen. just fullscreen with the top and bottom chopped off. Which is absurd that they would pull something like that in this day and age.)

My personal rating scores:

Xbox 360: 9.2ish (would be higher if they give an update fixing the widescreen issues. but probably not much)

PC: 6ish (only because the copyright etc. etc. etc. I would give it the same rating as the 360 version but this copyright stuff is totally getting out of hand. SecureROM, StarForce, it's all BS. it doesn't stop the cracks and the only people it hurts are the real customers. That being the case, i cannot recommend the PC version to anyone.)

[Pantalaimon]

I have played the game although on the 360. I love it. it is undoubtably the best game of the year. the problems with the PC however put me in the category that if i was looking into the PC version, i would not purchase it. the only real problem with the 360 version is the Widescreen issues that are in both PC and 360 version. (that being that the widescreen isn't really widescreen. just fullscreen with the top and bottom chopped off. Which is absurd that they would pull something like that in this day and age.)

My personal rating scores:

Xbox 360: 9.2ish (would be higher if they give an update fixing the widescreen issues. but probably not much)

PC: 6ish (only because the copyright etc. etc. etc. I would give it the same rating as the 360 version but this copyright stuff is totally getting out of hand. SecureROM, StarForce, it's all BS. it doesn't stop the cracks and the only people it hurts are the real customers. That being the case, i cannot recommend the PC version to anyone.)

Gah, that's pretty much what I expected. I think it's time for me to finally pony up for a console... been thinking about a 360 for a while now, and the game looks great, so might hafta go that route:)

Thanks chesspiece!

[Chesspiece_face]

From the Cult of Rapture website:

UPDATES ON SECUROM™, PC ACTIVATION, AND A TECHNICAL FAQ
August 23, 2007
We have been reading and listening to your frustrations over SecuROM, PC activation problems, and technical support issues since BioShock launched on Tuesday, and we've devised a plan to help.

Starting immediately, we will be upping the activation count to a 5 by 5 plan. We will be raising the maximum amount of computers a user can have BioShock installed on simultaneously from 2 to 5, and allowing a user to reinstall BioShock on each of those computers from 3 times to 5 times. Also, we have in the works a revoke tool which you will be able to run on your machine if you want to free up that key and move it to to another computer (this works very much like Steam or iTunes system). We are also working with SecuROM and 2K customer service, so that when you do need to call in support problems, you get answers to your questions faster, without much waiting or being bounced around. SecuROM has been given much more autonomy to help fix your problems quickly and effectively. I am personally sorry for anyone who got bounced around in the past couple days (I even think I contributed to this problem) and we're going to make sure that does not happen in the future.

As for other technical issues, we are bringing on a team of tech support that will be on the 2K forums 24/7 to help people resolve their technical issues. Our QA guys are in the offices and on the forums, too, reproducing issues and looking for workarounds and compiling information that they can put towards making you a patch and updating the knowledge base.

Also, we are aware that our activation server went down last night, stopping some of you from finishing your installs. The server is up and running now and we have corrected the problem that caused that crash.

Finally, we have released a FAQ, which you can view in full below (and will also be posted on the 2K Forums in the Technical Support area) that will help clear up a lot of questions and misinformation that has been floating around about SecuROM and PC activation.

And as for widescreen, we also want to say we completely understand a user's desire to augment their FOV. BioShock is a harrowing experience, but we don't want anyone to feel limited (or motion sick!). So we are in the process of working on an official PC patch to give widescreen PC users a choice to expand their horizontal FOV, and are investigating creating a similar update for the 360.

And finally, I want to personally congratulate Racer_S from the Widescreen Gaming Forums, and his awesome user patch to expand the widescreen FOV in BioShock. I'm currently tracking him down via email, but hopefully, he'll accept my gratitude, and maybe an Nvidia 8800 to boot.

I'm still not sure if this is good enough to sway me on the PC version of BioShock. But i suppose for individuals solely interested in playing it on the PC it is something.

Edit: P.S. in other BioShock news you can download the full score on the Cult of Rapture website. Definately worth picking up.

[Guest]

Banned for gold spamming

-Bolty

[Munkay]

An article from Arstechnica.com, fresh off the digital presses:

You can read it here, or read the quoted version below.

New DVD-sized disc to hold 1 to 5 terabytes of data

The optical disc revolution started with CDs and then moved on to DVDs, and we're in the midst of the next-gen battle between HD DVD and Blu-ray. Since the birth of the CD 25 years ago, we've gone from 600MB to a whopping 50GB of storage capacity on these little, convenient and versatile discs.
Related Stories

But for those who desire more space on a highly portable medium, a new technology from a company called Mempile in Jerusalem promises to blow these limits away. The company claims that they can store up to 1TB (1,000GB) on an optical disc with the same dimensions—only slightly thicker—than a regular DVD and will be able to store 5TB once the jump to blue lasers is made.

The 1TB disc is divided into 200 different layers, each comprising 5GB of storage space. Unlike standard multilayer DVDs, the layers aren't physically stacked and stuck together. The Mempile discs are solid and use a specially developed variant of the polymer polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA)—a mixture of Perspex, Lucite, and Plexiglass—known as ePMMA. It's this polymer that gives the discs a distinctive yellow color.

When recording data to the disc, the laser focuses on one of the virtual layers and, using a photochemical reaction, modifies only a part of the plastic to represent a "1" or leaves it alone to represent a "0". This approach uses three dimensions in the polymer to store data rather than the two dimensions used by DVD. The technology is currently limited to WORM (write once, read many) although the company hopes to have read/write drives available in the future.

Mempile was incorporated as a company in 2000 in both the US and Israel, and it received an initial funding of $1 million from private investors and $3 million from the investment firm Millennium Materials Technologies. Further funding to the tune of $11.6 million came in 2004 from Kodiak Ventures, Israel Seed Partners, JVP, Hitachi CSK, Portview, and Alta Berkeley, so there is clearly some outside interest in the technology.

However, the key for Mempile will be whether or not the company can get the discs and drives to market in a reasonable timeframe. The idea itself is not new: other firms have been claiming to be developing this sort of technology for a few years now, but Mempile says that its prototypes are reaching 600-800GB now with 1TB coming soon, and it plans to follow the product up with a blue-laser version that could store up to 5TB. According to a company spokesperson, the discs have a life span of 50 years, and the drives themselves could be on the market in two to three years. By that time, either HD DVD or Blu-ray may have captured the optical storage market, so Mempile has its competition cut out for it.

Whatever the new technology may be in the future, it looks like blue lasers are going to breath a little more life (and a few more generations) into the CD-type format.

Cheers,

Munk

[Taem]

An article from Arstechnica.com, fresh off the digital presses:

You can read it here, or read the quoted version below.
Whatever the new technology may be in the future, it looks like blue lasers are going to breath a little more life (and a few more generations) into the CD-type format.

Cheers,

Munk

Just remember VHS vs. Betamax (Sony)... This is pretty much Deja Vu all over; who will win? The media hyping giant Microsoft who is making every retailer and media distributer use their HD-DVD, or Sony with it's new age blue ray devise? Will history repeat itself? Stay tuned for this exciting episode of, "Why can't consumers use their brains and support the better of the two technologies?"

[NiteFox]

Stay tuned for this exciting episode of, "Why can't consumers use their brains and support the better of the two technologies?"

Simply because, at this stage, 90% of consumers aren't clear on which is the better of the two technologies. Heck, it seems that this time both sides of the argument are relying on pure obfuscation and chicanery.

HD-DVD has the largest storage capacity and better layer reading than Blu-Ray, that's hardly a factor to the average Joe Schmoe on the street. Hell, people today still don't know the storage capacity of a regular DVD. Or even a CD. Go on, try it: Get a clipboard and do some "market research" for as long as the authorities don't Rodney you. The CD just celebrated its 15th birthday, and I bet a huge number of the folks that still buy and use them don't know or in fact don't care how many megagigabytepixels it can store.

Aside from to the technologically competent, the grass on both sides of the fence of the debate is the same shade of green. Both camps have been remarkably cagey about putting the merits of their particular product in layman's terms that would appeal to the average consumer aside from the whole "whoo, hi-def" reason. Until they do, then neither side will gain a significant advantage over the truly superior technology, the humble DVD.

And don't get my started on what a huge crock the entire hi-def movement is.

[[wcip]Angel]

Starting a new tangent, does anybody have anything good to say about this game? loving it :)

Oh dear God yes!

After reading this post, you might want to check out the reviews over at Gametrailers (click) and Gamespot (click). Both websites praise the game for its engrossing storyline, vivid and detailed atmosphere, fantastic graphics and great gameplay.

Although Bioshock isn't quite the sandbox FPSRPG Deus Ex was, it still avoids linearity by allowing the player to roam freely in the great underwater city of Rapture. Speaking of the setting, the city of Rapture *feels* like a genuine city. Also, it's easy to lose oneself and let oneself be swept away by the very decent acting, writing and pacing of the story. It's just so damn good!

Not only is the game a great deal of fun with some degree of replayability (exploring aread you missed the first time around, playing around with different character 'buids', choosing between the 'good' and 'evil' sides), it is ultimately also quite touching. It really didn't strike me until that very final word narrated by one of the game's characters (literally the last word, (on the good ending mind you)), but I was actually moved by this game. It's easy to miss it while you're running around killing people with machine guns or setting them on fire with techno-magic ("plasmids"), but the choices you make have an impact on the outcome of the game, and if you choose the good option, you really *do* get a sense of closure and warmth. Few games manage to pull this off. The suspension of disbelief is required, and in Bioshock, the graphics, plot, atmosphere, acting and writing compose a vivid and rich tapestry in which it is easy to lose oneself.

Game of the year? (07 that is) Maybe... I haven't finished Crysis yet.

Also, check out Zero Punctuation's review: (the funny...).