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Cellphones

Duke Nukem 3D Ported To Nokia N900 95

Posted by Soulskill from the all-outta-gum dept.
andylim writes "It looks as if Duke Nukem isn't completely 'nuked' after all. Someone has ported the 90s classic on to a Nokia N900. As you'll see in the video, you control Duke using the Qwerty keypad and shoot using the touchscreen. I'm wondering how long it will take for this to get on other mobile platforms." In other Duke news, reader Jupix points out that 3D Realms' CEO Scott Miller recently said, "There are numerous other Duke games in various stages of development, several due out this year. We are definitely looking to bring Duke into casual gaming spaces, plus there are other major Duke games in production."
Bug

Are Complex Games Doomed To Have Buggy Releases? 362

Posted by Soulskill from the where-did-my-face-go dept.
An anonymous reader points out a recent article at Gamesradar discussing the frequency of major bugs and technical issues in freshly-released video games. While such issues are often fixed with updates, questions remain about the legality and ethics of rushing a game to launch. Quoting: "As angry as you may be about getting a buggy title, would you want the law to get involved? Meglena Kuneva, EU Consumer Affairs Commissioner, is putting forward legislation that would legally oblige digital game distributors to give refunds for games, putting games in the same category in consumer law as household appliances. ... This call to arms has been praised by tech expert Andy Tanenbaum, author of books like Operating Systems: Design and Implementation. 'I think the idea that commercial software be judged by the same standards as other commercial products is not so crazy,' he says. 'Cars, TVs, and telephones are all expected to work, and they are full of software. Why not standalone software? I think such legislation would put software makers under pressure to first make sure their software works, then worry about more bells and whistles.'"
Image

Jetman Attempts Intercontinental Flight 140

Posted by samzenpus from the a-jetwing-and-a-prayer dept.
Last year we ran the story of Yves Rossy and his DIY jetwings. Yves spent $190,000 and countless hours building a set of jet-powered wings which he used to cross the English Channel. Rossy's next goal is to cross the Strait of Gibraltar, from Tangier in Morocco and Tarifa on the southwestern tip of Spain. From the article: "Using a four-cylinder jet pack and carbon fibre wings spanning over 8ft, he will jump out of a plane at 6,500 ft and cruise at 130 mph until he reaches the Spanish coast, when he will parachute to earth." Update 18:57 GMT: mytrip writes: "Yves Rossy took off from Tangiers but five minutes into an expected 15-minute flight he was obliged to ditch into the wind-swept waters."
PlayStation (Games)

US Air Force Buying Another 2,200 PS3s 144

Posted by Soulskill from the quick-who-knows-a-good-ps3-flight-sim dept.
bleedingpegasus sends word that the US Air Force will be grabbing up 2,200 new PlayStation 3 consoles for research into supercomputing. They already have a cluster made from 336 of the old-style (non-Slim) consoles, which they've used for a variety of purposes, including "processing multiple radar images into higher resolution composite images (known as synthetic aperture radar image formation), high-def video processing, and 'neuromorphic computing.'" According to the Justification Review Document (DOC), "Once the hardware configuration is implemented, software code will be developed in-house for cluster implementation utilizing a Linux-based operating software."
Graphics

What's the Importance of Graphics In Video Games? 506

Posted by Soulskill from the not-all-pixels-are-created-equal dept.
An anonymous reader writes "I develop games as a hobby. I've experimented with games on almost every platform available. For me, the gameplay is the most influential factor of a game, with history and graphics dividing second place. But, for some reason, it's not the technical beauty of the graphics that appeal to me. I have played Crysis, and I've played Pokémon games. The graphics of the Pokémon games entertain me as much as the graphics of Crysis. I think both are beautiful. So, why is the current generation of games giving so much importance to the realism in graphic games? I think it is sufficient for a game to have objects that are recognizable. For example, while the water in some games may not look as good as in Crysis, I can still tell it's water. What are your opinions on the current direction of game graphics? Do you prefer easy-to-render 3D scenes that leave space for beautiful effects, like with Radiosity, or more complex 3D scenes that try to be realistic?"

Comment Patience, Usefulness and english language (Score 0) 257

by adokink (#28605769) Attached to: 10 Business Lessons I Learned From Playing D&D
After many hours playing RPG I learnt, and I am still learning 3 main things: -Patience: Sometimes you just do not know how many times you will have to redo an incredibly boring routine until you earn what you deserve. Call it money, experience or just jumping through that damn rock path (this appeals to many platform games too). -Usefulness: I used to carry everything I found until my players where full of junk. Spetially important in games as Oblivion. If junk can be just sold out, some real hard times were when you had a great orc killer item and an in general terms better item, but you had to choose. Sometimes you just can bury it and get back to it later. When I was 12 years old it taught me to take decisssions in terms of usefulness for the future. It now looks naif, but hey, it has helped me a lot in real life. - English language: For non native english speakers, when no game was translated to our languages, RPG, as they have lots of dialogues and backline stories, were quite difficult (remember I was 12 back then). I say, with no doubt, that Betrayal at Krondor and those damn chest games taught me more english vocabulary than Sesame St., Muzzy, English lessons and Oxford's dictionaries together. Yee olde english language! - Why not saying this! I have a pretty good orientation sense when I get lost in dungeons!
Programming

Erlang's Creator Speaks About Its History and Prospects 48

Posted by timothy from the still-coy-on-the-meaning dept.
Seal writes "Erlang, originally created at Ericsson in 1986, is a functional programming language which was released as open source around 10 years ago and flourished ever since. In this Q&A, Erlang creator Joe Armstrong talks about its beginnings as a control program for a telephone exchange, its flexibility and its modern day usage in open source programs. 'In the Erlang world we have over twenty years of experience with designing and implementing parallel algorithms. What we lose in sequential processing speed we win back in parallel performance and fault-tolerance,' Armstrong said. He also mentions how multi-core processors pushed the development of Erlang and the advantages of hot swapping."

Comment Use nature to frighten nature! Falcons! (Score 1) 368

by adokink (#28290719) Attached to: For Airplane Safety, Trying To Keep Birds From Planes
I thought it was was worldwide used, but it looks like it is not as usual as I previously thought. In Spain, where I live, it is traditional to have one or more trained falcons in airports. Minutes before an airplane leaves or arrives, the falcon makes a few flying courses around the landing area and other birds just fly away scared to the creeps! Looks simple and it is simple, but I do no know if it is useful for BIG airports as JFK or Heathrow.
Input Devices

Microsoft Working On Motion-Sensing Camera For the Xbox 360 68

Posted by Soulskill from the and-they-promise-not-to-watch-you-and-laugh dept.
The Wall Street Journal reports on the motion-capture technology Microsoft is rumored to be working on for the Xbox 360. "Unlike the Wii, the Microsoft camera won't require users to hold any hardware to control on-screen action, the people familiar with the matter said. The camera would sit near the television and capture when players move their hands, legs or head." The Guardian Games Blog points out that we've gotten a look at this technology before, from a company called 3DV, which was reported to be talking with Microsoft earlier this year. Many expect the specifics of this technology to be revealed at E3 early next month.
Games

The Frontier of the MMO Genre 92

Posted by Soulskill from the they-don't-even-have-regular-socks dept.
Eurogamer is running a feature about what they call "frontier" MMOs, games that are on the fringe of a market flooded with attempts to replicate the success of Everquest and World of Warcraft. Many publishers already have more MMO projects than they know what to do with, and often leave the more unusual and unique games out in the cold, preferring to stick with familiar IP or a tried-and-true approach. "Like any gold-rush, the MMO market also attracts a different kind of adventurer: the fearless, inexperienced, determined and solitary dreamer, making a go of it on nothing but their own resources and pluck. The online distribution and direct revenue streams — be they subscriptions or micro-transactions — make it theoretically possible to make a mint in MMOs without any help from the gaming establishment at all." They take a brief look at several such games currently in development, including Earthrise, Gatheryn, and Global Agenda.

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