Erkki

I'm mostly waiting for: Fallout 3 GTA4 BioShock Half-Life 2 Ep. 2 & Portal Assassin's Creed Also: Spore Mass Effect Something good for the Wii (I'm not sure that I really like anything that's already been announced)

Warning: there may be spoilers ahead This game is absolutely brilliant and a totally fucked up piece of shit at the same time. The atmosphere is incredible at times, with all the anomalies, roaming monsters, weather effects and stuff. Especially in the beginning of the game, the strangeness of the world really hit me, and going deeper into the zone really felt like adventuring, probably more than anything in Oblivion or Morrowind. This feeling obviously waned towards the end, but it still felt like getting off the beaten path was an adventure every time. It's also scary. Not at all times, but some moments make it probably the scariest game I've played. I haven't played a lot of survival horror games so I don't know how it compares to those, but it's definitely right up there with the Thief series (kind of). But these are just moments that eventually get marred by overall lack of quality. Such as bugs in the AI, ridiculous respawning times for enemies. The game is also rather short, and supringsingly linear. The linearity is a really really bad surprise after all the hype of how open ended this game was going to be. I rushed through the end a bit so I might have missed something, but it seemed like the town of Pripyat got ridiculously little play time and visibility compared to what all the previews led me to believe. From all the screenshots and movies released over the years, Pripyat seemed like one of the coolest places in the game, so it was another really bad disappointment to find out that you just rush through it once (and half of it during a battle!) and practically don't spend any time there at all. Another disappointment at first was that driveable vehicles didn't make it into the final game, but in the end that is completely understandable considering the linearity and other things and I'm glad they left that out. The combat in the game can be interesting and I liked the weapons, but actually it gets quite repetitive at times. You really have to worry about running out of ammo some times and other times you have to think about which weapons and ammo to carry because you can't carry everything you'd want. The story, characters and the plot -- all are kind of lame, and in the end it feels like it's all about removing obstacles on your way to the center of the zone. The endings are somewhat crappy. Some endings you choose right at the end, but some endings are affected by your actions during the game. I think this could work well theoretically, but this implementation feels kind of random and the movies themselves are somewhat unsatisfying. In conclusion: S.T.A.L.K.E.R. hints at greatness, and has an overall level of quality that is almost suitable for an AAA title, but the many flaws mar the experience. It makes me sad thinking about how much potential this had. I would like to see another treatment of this, but I'm afraid that it would get something else wrong.

I played through all the episodes in a row this week. They are awesome! I totally agree with Toblix, except about that particular puzzle. I enjoyed the fact that most of the time there weren't any puzzles that would make me get stuck for long periods of time -- that kept up the pace very well. And on the 5-6 occasions that I did get stuck (most of them in the last episode), I turned to a walkthrough before allowing myself to become too frustrated. I too would have liked an option to skip some of the walking (but a running Sam would be less cool) -- walking to Bosco's and back was getting annoying.

PoP and Alley Cat were the first graphical games I played. At the time the only places where I could play computer games were at my uncles work. I remember going there many times over a couple of years and there was some competition going between the men there -- who could complete PoP faster. I think I nailed it in something like 25 minutes in the end (or maybe it was 35). Hmm... that makes me want to go find if there are any speedrun videos.

There's a new text editor program in town, and it's name is Padclipse: http://padclipse.sf.net/ I just released the first version, which is officially pre-alpha quality, but should be quite usable really. It's cross platform (Win, Mac, Linux) and based on Eclipse. I took Eclipse and ripped out all the extra parts until only the text editor was left. Then I added some salt & pepper. Next releases may add other spices.

I think Nachimir is mostly right. Many Linux users I personally know are elitist bastards (at least partially) and they somehow can't grasp that for Linux to get more adopted, it has to be a lot more user friendly, which some see as "dumbed down". I see this simply as smart developers realizing that the average computer user does simply not need to know and should not have to deal with all the things that we are used to knowing about computers. Computers need to make it simpler for ordinary people to take advantage of what they have to offer (while maintaining the possibility for advanced users to tweak things). I think such developements have been kept from having a big effect so far because the technology has been advancing too fast, but we are seeing more and more a movement towards user friendliness and simpicity happening now. Über-linux-geeks like Linus Torvalds will probably complain a lot about the effects of these movements in the future, but not many will listen. Lately I've even started doubting that maybe I should drop using Ubuntu and go back to using only windows, but then I use Windows a couple of days and will soon start missing some of the things that linux has. And my other computer that the other family members mostly use has been running Ubuntu for 2 years and I must say that's the least amount of problems I've had maintaining a computer. Hmm.. considering what I just said... I might have understated the differences I feel Linux and Windows have in my previous post in this thread. But I think currently all the major OS-s have problems, not just Linux. PS. I can't help but wonder if it's a vicious circle -- if Linux would have more adoption, there would be more money in it and all of the problems would be solved already. PPS. Saying that Linux is not Gnome or KDE or whatever is just looking at the issue from another direction. If you look from the average-computer-user point of view, then Linux is exactly what is most common and usable for such users (Gnome, I think).

Hmm... that would make it bigger again. But I plan to add a plugin site for optional features in some future versions so I might add it.

It's actually 20MB. Why instead of Eclipse: * you can open files from the command line (currently somewhat buggy), and they will all be opened in a single instance of the application. * it will generally behave more like a simple text editor instead of a big IDE. * startup time is comparable to other text editors (but some of them are faster and leaner of course). * it will be integrated with the OS eventually, like other text editors (context menus etc.). * if you are used to Eclipse, it will be good to have a text editor with a similar interface * if you are not used to Eclipse, it will be good to have a text editor that has comprehensive local history, file comparison and other useful stuff built in (and supports extending by existing Eclipse plugins)

For the past year or so, my time on my PC is split about 50/50 between Ubuntu and Windows XP. When I've worked a few days in Windows, I'm starting to miss Linux, and vice versa. I think fonts are prettier on Windows, and GTK seems to have some keyboard issues, and I like Windows Explorer a lot more than Nautilus, but that's about it for the benefits.

I started playing Dark Messiah and I must say it is totally awesome so far and I don't understand why it has gotten so low review scores (metascore 73). The fighting is really cool, especially with the hardcore difficulty (added by the latest patch I think) where you can die easily from a few hits. So you really have to think strategically and use the environment against the enemies as much as you can. Thanx to the "kick" mechanic, this is one of the few games where standing on top of a staircase becomes a real advantage (in Gothic 3 for example, it was distrubingly a disadvantage). It's awesome to send the guards flying down the stairs.

Very well said, Nachimir!

Otherwise I agree with you mostly, but I don't think there's anything close to even 90% agreement. I know a lot of local scientists here don't agree with it, but well, some of them are full of shit. Really full of shit. And it may be that just the ones who have some personal cause to be against that consensus are more vocal. I of course believe in climate change (we are also seeing all kinds of weather-related records broken in Estonia) and that it's partially caused by human activity, but I'm not really seeing that kind of consensus you are talking about anywhere. A year or so ago it seemed more like 50/50. Maybe 70/30 now... Maybe I just don't look in the right places? Anyway, I'm still waiting for some kind of final proof before taking the certain position that it's caused by humans and not sunspots or something like that. On the other hand, I'm all for being more green and environment friendly. I voted for the green party (electronically) in the elections, I've donated some to local environmental NGO-s, I started using more public transport. I almost don't use any paper (except TP ). etc. [edit] then again, maybe I tried to diminsh the numbers too much because you exaggerated with 100 / 99,9%

Yes, thanks, that's the word I was looking for I guess my motherboard (ASUS A8N-SLI Deluxe) is old enough that they thought video cards would never get that big. Anyway, after sawing half that thing off, I'm finally happy with the upgrade because even the most demanding games seem to run just fine now. Of course, Intel would probably be better ATM, but I just didn't feel like replacing everything... even though in hindsight, that could have actually been both cheaper and easier... and I would have had another almost complete second computer... now it's just random pieces of hardware to sell at a ridiculously low price or put in a box and shove under the bed or something... damn ... I'm getting depressed now

It seems the OS itself is becoming less and less important as many of the apps we use everyday are cross platform, and platforms like Eclipse or Netbeans RCP making cross-platform developement even easier. I'm using dual boot Ubuntu / Windows XP and recently just got the same Firefox and Thunderbird profiles working on both OS-es (they're on a shared FAT32 partition). Pretty cool.

Upgrade complete: Athlon XP 3000+ (1.8 GHz) -> Dual Core Opteron 185 (2.6 GHz) ATI Radeon X800 GTO -> NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTS 320 Mb (overclocked to 575 MHz core) 1GB Crappy Memory -> 2GB fast CL2 memory I started with the graphics card at first, but it didn't have much effect. Then I upgraded the CPU, then memory, and still the effect was a lot less than I expected. Thankfully then I discovered that the GeForce was running at PCI Express 1x instead of 16x, because it was in the second slot (didn't fit in the first one). Today I sawed off half of the chipset radiator (or what do you call those?) and moved hard drives around to make room for the card in the first slot and make it run at 16x -- that made about 2-4 times performance change! 1) In Company of Heroes, the performance test jumped from avg. 40 FPS to 140 FPS. 2) Stalker became very playable. 3) 3DMark06 jumped from 3794 -> 8820 I wish I had done that (saw off half the chipset cooler) earlier, maybe I could have skipped the CPU and memory upgrade altogether.

I've also been thinking about getting a MacBook, but this time I'll just upgrade my dekstop PC with more/faster memory, a new processor and a new video card. The next time I have that kind of money to spend on hardware, I may also get a MacBook. I've actually already got a portable computer(-ish thingie) -- replaced my cell phone with a Fujitsu-Siemens Pocket Loox T830 and so far I'm pretty happy with it -- it's got almost everything you'd want from a device of that size: 3G phone, good calendar (Windows Mobile 5), camera, SD card slot, WiFi, GPS, Bluetooth, USB host etc. now only if it would sync with Linux/Thunderbird.... (and seems like it might soon)

I'm probably going to get a new computer as well, or at least upgrade it. Bought S.T... oh for fuck's sake... Stalker yesterday and it just runs way too slow. I've always been an ATI user (currently X800 GTO), but I think this time I'm going to get a Geforce 8800 GTS (320MB) as NVIDIA seems to have better Linux support (I really want Beryl). I'm not getting Vista though, sticking with Ubuntu + XP dual boot.

I still hope some kind of splinter group will form inside Rockstar and produce Grand Theft Horse, while maintaining all the scale and quality aspects of GTA. That would be awesome. Still, GTA IV seems pretty good too -- GTA III was definitely a positive surprise by handling the jump to 3D very well (at the time it was questionable whether it would) and this looks like it might be a jump of a similar scale. But then again, GTA 2 was a flop*, and this one is also evenly numbered... * I personally kind of liked it though.

I agree completely. I think S.T.A.L.K.E.R. stands for Stalker: The Acronymised Label Kiev Excogitated Rashly

Damn it. Just as I thought I finally had a somewhat original idea for a simple game that is relatively easy to program, it turns out it has been done in at least three games already. The idea was radial breakout. Your paddle would be moving around in a circle or ellipse and the blocks would be in the middle. Any games I've tried to make before have always been too complex to actually be completed and for a while I've been trying to think of a small game that would be easy to do by myself and would be fun to make. I might still make this, though. Maybe I can do it better than the previous ones

I agree.

Same here.

Whoa: http://www.unscrewedarmy.com/

Happy birthday!

Yes, I agree. It's not bad at all, and in fact I said I liked the controls. The only point I was arguing was wether the controls are "tacked on" or not. Maybe the language barrier is at work again, but I see "tacked on" as meaning they are not an essential part of the experience.