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Comment Still does not come close to licensing UT3-engine (Score 4, Interesting) 121

I've seen this described as Crytek taking on the likes of the UT3-engine, though I find there's one very important difference:
The UT3 engine can currently also be used to sell commercial games: Up to the first 50k of sales, it's completely free for developers. After that, Epic will take 25% of the earnings.
The cool things is that this 50k only works for the share that people get -after- the app stores get their cut. Have a look at their site to see their licensing agreement.

Not related to Epic in any way; Just a happy 'customer', and hopefully a published indie developer in the near future.

Comment Re:Wow... (Score 1) 119

Way to show you just don't care.. "hey, fill out this survey so a computer can determine how to rate your game. No, we aren't going to play it."

Erm, they already don't play the games. Instead, they have the same list of questions that have to be filled in by the developers, on which they base their judgement. Developers also supply videos of gameplay, to clarify some of the answers/explanations.

I really don't see too much wrong with this: I think it makes it much clearer for developers how to target the rating they have in mind: If, for instance, they try to shoot for a PG13, they can fill in the survey/test beforehand, and clearly see if it's on the mark.

Overall, I think it's good for them to have a clear rating system, to remove any of the bias that some of the reviewers might have.

Comment Ohyes, this makes sense... (Score 4, Interesting) 235

This makes sense: All the leveldesigners, modelers, texture- and concept artists; They all work on Steam...

I assume that the sarcasm is noticed.

There's no need for Valve to work on Episode 3 in a hurry; Whenever it will be released, it will be sold by the millions.
And to be honest; I rather wait some more (actually, I'm not missing it), and get yet another awesome game, whereas I don't get the feeling that something is incomplete because of rushing it out for a certain date.

Other than that, I also have a theory in which I think that right now, they might be working on HL3, and just skip the whole Episode 3.
Then again, pure speculation of course.

Comment So what if a legitimate customer gets hit? (Score 3, Interesting) 365

I'm not too sure if I condone this behaviour, nor do I think this is a 'fun' way to catch pirates: A fun way was how the Nintendo DS version of Michael Jackson: The Experience made copied versions of the game unplayable and taunts gamers with the blaring sound of vuvuzelas: See here

The problem I have with these kinds of protections is that they also might affect paid customers; Same as with strict DRM.

I already bought Garry's Mod after having played it for free (as the HL2 mod).
It was less than 10 dollars, so a real bargain. But I would have reconsidered it if I heard of this beforehand.
Nonetheless, all power to the developer to protect their property.

Comment I can sort of understand why he settled... (Score 1) 469

I can sort of understand why he settled: Hell, I'd settle if I realised it would likely take years of my life, if not thousands of dollars to fight.
But still, the rant, as seen on Geohot's site, still gives me a bit of a feeling of dealing with a hypocrite.

Then again, I'm a big hypocrite for wanting someone else to pursue something, which I would probably also settle as soon as possible.

Comment Re:Performance? I'd rather worry about comfort (Score 1) 283

It also has the advantage of being pretty cheap, which is handy since the wheel tends to gum up after 18 months or so in a way that I've never been able to fix, requiring periodic replacements.

I don't own a Razer-mouse, but I do recognise your problem here. Have you ever tried opening the mouse, and cleaning the interior?
I've been doing this myself for about five years now, and I'm still on the same mouse after all those years.
Since I'm on a Logitech mouse, I don't know if it's the same as a Razer mouse, but you can open the mouse by unscrewing the screws on the bottom of the mouse. The tricky bit here is (at least for my mouse) that those screws are hidden under the little tevlon-stickers.
So what I did was remove those stickers, unscrew it, and then give it a thorough clean. I could re-attach the stickers the first few times I did this, but after some time they just don't hold anymore. To counter that I bought a roll of tevlon tape a few years ago, and just use a tiny strip of this on the bottom of the mouse.
As said, this might be a Logitech-only thing, but I would assume that at least every mouse can be opened, and cleaned, like the steps written before.
Hope it helps.

Comment Re:Use a real alarm clock (Score 1) 405

I'm not too sure about other phones, but my N900 will power itself off once the battery is empty; yet still leaves enough power for it to trigger the alarm in the morning.
The only time this 'feature' annoyed me when I once was unable to turn the alarm off once my battery was empty (and I didn't have my charger with me); Then again, it also saved me a few times, because I forgot to charge it.

Comment Officially dead for Windows too (Score 5, Informative) 190

Well, that's a coincidence: It's officially dead for Windows too. And has been since almost three months after launch.

I really liked the Unreal Tournament games (even though I'm an id Software fanboy), and definitely the first part was a lot better than its counterpart at the time; Quake 3. Whereas Quake 3 had obvious masterlike AI-bots, the AI in Unreal Tournament always seemed to resemble a bit more humanlike play-style.
UT2004 was great too, and had some awesome new gametypes, which really worked well. They were planning on releasing a new update for it every year (hence the 2004 addition to the title), but failed at doing that (probably because they discovered their new cash cow; Gears of War).
Unreal Tournament 3's figures were very bad: Already after a month of release, the servers got less and less. As of today there's only a handfull of servers left (for the UK at least), with even less players.
I must admit myself that I also didn't play UT3 as much as I played the previous titles.

So to be honest, I can't really see too much of a loss in this (except that it would have been easier for other Unreal engined games to be ported over to Linux).

Comment Re:I think they overvalue themselves... (Score 5, Insightful) 191

They should have been smart enough to realize that anyone who needs their services already knows who they are.

So, you're saying that pretty much any big brand might as well stop advertising?
Everyone knows Coca Cola by now... They might as well stop advertising, because anyone feels like cola, they just buy Coca Cola!

And most commercials don't work directly: It's just for those moments when the consumer actually wants to buy a domain, the name will ring a bell. At such time, GoDaddy is more likely to be chosen by someone with not enough knowledge of what is important in a webhost; but they'll be remembered by those 'funny' commercials at the Superbowl.

Comment Re:They are willing to do the needful (Score 1) 534

I don't get it why you would think that asking where "please do the needful" comes from; I can't see anything racist about asking that.
Being afraid of asking such an, imho, genuine curious question is something which shamefully the overly political correctnss has brought us.
Since I moved to England, I heard certain areas use terms which I had never heard of before in English class (I'm Dutch). I never considered asking where those terms originated from as being racist.
I realise it's a bit of a different situation than yours (for one, those questions were asked to people of the same race), but I think it's in the same line.

Actually, I think it's quite an interesting question, and you're silly not allowing yourself to ask it.

Comment Re:Wow, thanks for sharing. (Score 1) 148

To their credit: It's one of the first reviews I see who doesn't give it an automatic 9/10. I feel this is warranted (disclaimer: I haven't played it yet), as it seems to be yet another rehash, albeit in another setting, of the Grand Theft Auto series.

Whereas I really enjoyed the GTA-games, most of my fun was to be had in the sandbox itself. I played GTA IV for about 50%, then got very bored with it: The missions in the end got really boring, as they were all small variations on the 'go to A, kill/smash X, go back to B for your reward'-gamemechanic.

This game seems to have much less going for it with regards to the sandbox (if not only because the scenery is much more empty)... But nevertheless, I will prolly buy it (secondhand), as it's still a lot better than most of the games out there.

The multiplayer (roaming mode) looks kinda cool though.

Coming back to my initial point: I think it's refreshing to see them give a 7/10, as even though the game is quite good as all the other crap that is out there, it doesn't warrant an automatic 9/10 just because it's Rockstar.

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