Comment Re:Dear Blizzard... (Score 1) 145
This comes from a company with a fantasy IP?
Blizzard Rolls Out Real ID Privacy Options 145
tacarat writes "The last time Blizzard mentioned their new Real ID system, there was a strong backlash from users over privacy issues. Blizzard reconsidered their plans to require real names for forums, and little has been heard about it since. Now, they've announced new privacy settings, allowing users to limit how their name gets shared or to disable the system entirely. Quoting: 'These options provide Real ID users with additional tools for customizing the service based on their preferences, enabling the ability to opt in or out of the Real ID "Friends of Friends" and "Add Facebook Friends" features or to turn off Real ID altogether.'"
Submission + - Infinite Mario with Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment (ucsc.edu)
bgweber writes: There's been a lot of discussion about whether games should adapt to the skills of players [http://games.slashdot.org/story/09/10/13/078247/Should-Computer-Games-Adapt-To-the-Way-You-Play]. However, most current techniques limit adaptation to parameter adjustment. But if the parameter adaptation is applied to procedural content generation [http://games.slashdot.org/story/10/04/24/2327249/IEEE-Introduces-Mario-Level-Generation-Competition], then new levels can be generated on-line in response to a player's skill. In this adaptation of Infinite Mario (with source [http://users.soe.ucsc.edu/~bweber/mario/AdaptiveMario.jar]), new levels are generated based on the performance of the player [http://users.soe.ucsc.edu/~bweber/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=infinite_adaptive_mario]. What other gameplay mechanics are open for adaptation when games adapt to the skills of specific players?
Submission + - Internet Petitions Stephen Colbert To Hold 'Restor (huffingtonpost.com)
jamie writes: "A grassroots campaign has begun to get Stephen Colbert to hold a rally on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to counter Glenn Beck's recent "Restoring Honor" event. The would-be rally has been dubbed "Restoring Truthiness" and was inspired by a recent post on Reddit, where a young woman wondered if the only way to point out the absurdity of the Tea Party's rally would be if Colbert mirrored it with his own "Colbert Nation.""
Nanoresonators Create Ultra-High-Res Displays 231
TuurlijkNiet writes with this excerpt from Linux for Devices:
"Eat your heart out, 'Retina display.' A new technology unveiled yesterday will allow creating pixels eight times smaller than the ones on Apple's iPhone 4, eliminate the need for polarizer layers, and allow screens to make much more efficient use of available light, say University of Michigan researchers. ... The pixels in the nanoresonator displays are about ten times smaller than those on a typical computer screen, and about eight times smaller than the pixels on the iPhone 4, which are about 78 microns, according to Guo. Such pixel densities could make the technology useful in projection displays, as well as wearable, bendable or extremely compact displays, according to the researchers."
Comment Zerg!!! (Score 1) 133
Have we not learned from the errors of the Xel'Naga?
Do Gamers Want Simpler Games? 462
A recent GamePro article sums up a lesson that developers and publishers have been slowly learning over the last few years: gamers don't want as much from games as they say they do. Quoting:
"Conventional gaming wisdom thus far has been 'bigger, better, MORE!' It's something affirmed by the vocal minority on forums, and by the vast majority of critics that praise games for ambition and scale. The problem is, in reality its almost completely wrong. ... How do we know this? Because an increasing number of games incorporate telemetry systems that track our every action. They measure the time we play, they watch where we get stuck, and they broadcast our behavior back to the people that make the games so they can tune the experience accordingly. Every studio I've spoken to that does this, to a fault, says that many of the games they've released are far too big and far too hard for most players' behavior. As a general rule, less than five percent of a game's audience plays a title through to completion. I've had several studios tell me that their general observation is that 'more than 90 percent' of a game's audience will play it for 'just four or five hours.'"
IEEE Introduces Mario Level-Generation Competition 114
bgweber writes "Last year, the IEEE conference on Computational Intelligence and Games hosted a competition to determine who could write the best AI for playing Mario levels (YouTube video). This year, the conference has expanded the competition to include a track on level generation as well, where the goal is to generate new levels online procedurally. Submitting an entry is as easy as implementing a Java interface that performs procedural content generation. The implications of this competition are techniques for greatly increasing the replayability of games, since each gameplay session could present new levels to the player."
Submission + - Mario Level Generation Competition
bgweber writes: Last year, the IEEE conference on Computational Intelligence and Games hosted a competition to determine who could write the best AI for playing Mario levels (http://games.slashdot.org/story/09/08/05/0438241/Mario-AI-Competition, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlkMs4ZHHr8). This year, the conference has expanded the competition to include a track on level generation as well, where the goal is to procedurally generate new levels online (http://www.marioai.org). Submitting an entry is as easy as implementing a Java interface that performs procedural content generation. The implications of this competition are techniques for greatly increasing the replayability of games, since each gameplay session could present new levels to the player (http://eis-blog.ucsc.edu/2010/04/infinite-fun-mario/).
Submission + - Russian Hacker Selling 1.5M Facebook Accounts (nzherald.co.nz)
Sir Codelot writes: A hacker who calls himself Kirllos has obtained and is now offering to sell 1.5 million Facebook IDs at astonishingly low prices — $25 per 1000 IDs for users with fewer than 10 friends and $45 per 1000 IDs for users with more than 10 friends. Looking at the numbers, Kirllos has stolen the IDs of one out of every 300 Facebook users.
Submission + - Branson Says Flight Ban an Overraction (yahoo.com) 1
HaymarketRiot writes: Richard Branson has claimed that the flight ban, due to the eruption of the volcano Eyjafjallajokull, was an overraction on the part of the authorities. Britain's government has even called for the airlines to be compensated. This does look like a perfect excuse for already greedy airlines to try and get more money...any experts care to comment on the effect of volcanic ash on planes?
Submission + - AIIDE 2010 StarCraft AI Competition 2
bgweber writes: The 2010 conference on Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment (AIIDE 2010) will be hosting a StarCraft AI competition as part of the conference program. This competition enables academic researchers to evaluate their AI systems in a robust, commercial RTS environment. The competition will be held in the weeks leading up to the conference. The final matches will be held live at the conference with commentary. Exhibition matches will also be held between skilled human players and the top performing bots.
Competition details are available at: http://users.soe.ucsc.edu/~bweber/starcraft.html
Competition details are available at: http://users.soe.ucsc.edu/~bweber/starcraft.html
