Technology – Page 102

Siggraph 2008: The Year of Softimage?

It may be difficult to comprehend now, but it was only two years ago that many in the video game world had given Nintendo up for dead. Despite the early success of the DS handheld, the company’s Gamecube had finished in distant third vs. its same generation competitors. And with the next generation of consoles dawning, the XBox 360 was lighting up the charts and the Playstation 3 was about to become reality. Then at E3 2006, Nintendo unveiled the Wii and the rest is history.

While nothing unveiled at this week’s Siggraph conference in Los Angeles will have that level of mainstream consumer impact, the event may feature a similar underdog story that will have far-reaching consequences for the business of video game development.

Continue reading “Siggraph 2008: The Year of Softimage?”

Star Trek Online Coverage

The game that was flip flopping all over the place, apparently is actually being made. Yeah and it doesn’t look that bad either!

I honestly can’t wait. The game takes place 30 years after Nemesis. You get to work your way up to Captain. You get to control your character across planets, go aboard your ship, and then fly it around space.

Create your own race or go with a race we’ve already seen (Humans, Vulcans, and everyone else). Customize your ships and characters. At launch you can be part of Star Fleet or the Klingon Empire. Combat, exploration, tactical actions are all here.

The graphics look solid for an MMO.

Still no news on when it will be released. Below is the video conference held by the developer Cryptic Studios at the Star Trek Convention in Las Vegas.

Star Trek Online Las Vegas Webcast from Cryptic Studios on Vimeo.

PWN or Die

From the makers of FunnyorDie.com, comes their latest spin-off PWNorDie.com. What’s great about this video site is that it’s geared towards techies at large and of course fanboys are welcome! They’ve already got tons of video game companies putting content up there. They also have Chris Pirillo, Fatal1ty, and yours truly StuffWeLike.

Know you, I’m sure you’ll enjoy it. The only thing that’s annoying about the site is the low video resolution. Why would any hardcore gamer want to watch trailers that aren’t in high definition?

YouTube Auto Plays ALL User’s Channel Videos

[Update: Ok seemed like a glitch. Only Partner accounts have the auto-play feature.]

I don’t know if this is a glitch or if YouTube is keeping this feature. Previously only YouTube Partner videos auto-played, but now all user channels auto-play.

YouTube has been under scrutuny for how it measures views. Auto-plays used to count as a view, but now that every channel has auto-play enabled, I would imagine that auto-plays no longer count as a view.

I was pretty pissed off when I went to my channel and saw the video auto-play. At first I thought I had become a Partner. Nope.

Now anytime I visit my channel I’ll have to hear myself. How annoying.

The Mojave Experiment

People can be easily persuaded by others. I mean lets face it, why would you be reading this if you didn’t want my thoughts and opinion?

For a long time now, Apple has been giving Microsoft a run for its money with an amazing PR campaign. I’d imagine that everyone reading this right now has seen the Mac vs. PC commercials. Sometime after Windows Vista came out, Apple started airing commercials that smeared Vista for crashing and not being secure.

I’ve been using Windows Vista since it came out and while I have had issues with the operating software at times, it is a big improvement over previous Windows platforms.

Microsoft has come up with a way to ‘fight’ back against the bad rep Vista received in its earlier days with The Mojave Experiment. The website claims that these are all ‘regular people’ who don’t like Windows Vista, but who have also never used it.They are given copies of Microsoft’s newest operating system codenamed Mojave, while in reality it’s simply a copy of Windows Vista.

Obviously the website shows people who actually enjoy Mojave, and then are revealed that it’s just Vista.

Even if these people are paid actors, not saying that they are, it’s a great experiment. It goes to remind everyone, that you have to be wary of the source that you’re receiving information from. Remember that the best source for information is you. Only you can decide if something is good or bad. Please don’t be ignorant and base a judgment on something before you’ve actually tried it out.

And with that in mind, enjoy your weekend!

QuakeCon: Quake Live, Quake Arena 2 and more

We reported on Quake Live some time ago, but now we have lots more, since QuakeCon is on! For the lazy, Quake Live is a project from id, where they are going to take the classic Quake III: Arena and turn it free, tournament-style and browser-based. Just hit the goddamn link above already.

Quake Live was originally titled Quake Zero at last year’s E3, but its name was changed not long after to Quake Live. Now we know why: shortly after the announcement, a domain squatter registered domains around Quake Zero, demanding good cash for the names. id being the smart asses that they are, decided to change the game name itself, seeing as it wasn’t so deep into development.

Carmack also hinted at the possibility of a Quake Arena 2, or essentially, a full-fledged sequel to Quake III: Arena. But he says that it’s possible only if Quake Live ends up being unsuccessful. Not a bad idea, to be honest, if you ask me. If it ends up being really good, it might even give Epic a run for their money. But Carmack also notes that not many publishers out there are looking for a multiplayer-centric game right now. Hmm.

Meanwhile, it looks like id actually got around to updating their Quake Live website since our last update. Right now it looks like a standard official game info site, but if all goes well, it will be a huge tournament centre with detailed stats, charts and well, you get the idea.

The Beta idea still seems to be on, so drop in your e-mail address and you might be the first in your neighbourhood to be in on this whole thing!