User comment history
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| News Comments > Rainbow Six 4 Announced |
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| 5. |
Play as Ding OR Dieter? |
Nov 30, 2004, 13:44 |
Blackhawk |
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Great - now we get to sit back and watch Ubisoft turn another classic Clancy franchise into a mindless arcade action game. It will, no doubt, but thoroughly simplified for 'accessibility' and bear absolutely no resemblence to the core gameplay that established the series.
Tom Clancy is rolling over in his grave. Well, he would be if he were dead. For now, he's probably just wondering what he was thinking when he signed the contract with Ubi.
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| News Comments > Shellshock Sequel Plans |
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| 21. |
Re: No subject |
Nov 27, 2004, 09:21 |
Blackhawk |
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Corporate double-speak, probably. They likely 'sold' 800,000 copies for both platforms (PC and XBox) to the retailers. That may be how many they shipped - only 10% of that may have then been purchased by consumers. PR firms take liberties with reality like that from time to time. That's the whole point of PR - to determine which aspects of truth to emphasize.
Unfortunately, the only reliable source for sales statistics online is a professional service. In other words, you only get to view their data if you pay for it - and it isn't cheap.
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| News Comments > Out of the Blue |
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| 86. |
Re: rehab Gone Gold? |
Oct 15, 2004, 23:17 |
Blackhawk |
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Rich is a great guy - I'v had lunch with him a couple of times and talked shop.
Just to set the record straight - Rich was injured in a scuffle, hand to hand, with a criminal. He wasn't shot - he twisted around while wrestling with the bastard and had something go 'pop'. He ended up with a lower spinal injury that prevented him from walking almost completely. He was doing much better for a while, able to walk with a cane, then things went back downhill for him - hip problems, the later the possibility of esophogal cancer. He has been in more or less constant pain for years because of it.
As to Gone Gold being gone - the entire staff that has been running the site since Rich had to back off has begun work on a new site, and the majority of the Gone Gold community has gone with them. The temporary URL is http://www.pcgamesforum.com
Right now it is just a forum for the refugee community, but a full site is in the works.
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| News Comments > Blizzard vs. BnetD Decision |
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| 2. |
Re: no more first sale rights |
Oct 3, 2004, 09:42 |
Blackhawk |
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At its worst, saying that an EULA can waive both First Sale and Fair Use rights means that the lots of things could potentially be legally prohibitted:
~Reselling a game
~Giving away a game
~Posting screenshots of a game
~Posting movies of a game
~Making a backup of a game
~Modding a game
~Fan patches
~Renting a game
I'm not saying that these are illegal now - I am saying that with this decision, a company can prohibit these things in their EULAn - which many companies have done before - but it will now be legally enforceable.
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| News Comments > Axis & Allies Demo Plans |
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| 6. |
Not so bad... |
Sep 21, 2004, 11:39 |
Blackhawk |
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The RTS portion is optional. It plays a bit like the Total War series - the overland/world map plays like the traditional boardgame. When two armies meet, you have the option of going into the RTS mode and fighting it out yourself. You can also autoresolve and get right back to the grand strategic aspect.
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| News Comments > Axis & Allies Beta Status |
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| 4. |
Re: lame |
Jul 13, 2004, 12:22 |
Blackhawk |
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From what they have said publicly, there are two games in one - a turn based version of the board game, and an RTS battle mode that you can skip if you'd like. Think of it like playing the board game with the option of acting the battles out (the same idea as the Total War series).
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| News Comments > D-Day Demo |
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| 17. |
Re: No subject |
Jul 10, 2004, 00:25 |
Blackhawk |
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Hey, Digital Reality, if you are checking this (and I know lots of devs do), go check around to the various public gaming forums for the response that your demo has garnered.
Maybe it will make you think twice before using a piece of unethical software like StarForce on a product you actually want to sell.
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| News Comments > Painkiller Patch |
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| 14. |
Re: pffft |
Apr 14, 2004, 22:54 |
Blackhawk |
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What people don't like is game publishers telling them that they aren't allowed to operate legal, legitimate software.
How would people react if a game came out that made you disable your antivirus? What if it wouldn't run if you had a CD burner installed? It is one thing to prevent piracy by altering your sotware. It is another to prevent piracy by forcing me to alter my computer.
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| News Comments > Painkiller CD Woes |
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| 109. |
Re: |
Apr 11, 2004, 01:20 |
Blackhawk |
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I don't think most rational people would call it useless. Some degree of copy protection is absolutely necessary. The thing is, the people who know how to bypass the simplest form of copy protection also know how to bypass the most complex.
In other words, while some copy protection is necessary and effective, Ultra Mega Protection isn't any more effective than just a simple, single hidden data thread that wouldn't affect performance. There is no additional benefit to bigger protection, but there are additional problems.
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| News Comments > Game Guidance |
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| 8. |
Re: Wow! |
Apr 1, 2004, 09:05 |
Blackhawk |
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There was a .pdf version available, but we underestimated the demand. We had about ten times as many visitors yesterday as on a typical day, and between the page views and the thousands downloading the .pdf (at 7.5 MB), we used as much bandwidth just yesterday as we normally do in an entire month.
Don't worry, the pdf will be back in a few days. 
Thanks for the input on the guide - I will make sure the comments get to the authors.
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| News Comments > Game Guidance |
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| 3. |
Re: Wow! |
Mar 31, 2004, 14:15 |
Blackhawk |
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We think the thoroughness and quality are typical of our work, although it is the largest guide we have written. (Most games don't have 100 maps or as many functional modes, so most don't require 72,000 words to cover fully.)
In any case, we are glad you like it.
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| News Comments > D-Day Unveiled |
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| 9. |
No, we would be much better off with... |
Mar 23, 2004, 11:31 |
Blackhawk |
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Oh, I agree - it would be much better to have another modern-military-versus-terrorists game, or another near-future-scifi-shooter.
I mean, yeah, we have seen a lot of Garands lately, but we are certainly running short on M16s or Space Marine Assault Rifles!
/end sarcasm
Now, give me a high quality World War 1 or Civil War shooter and you will have a customer!
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| News Comments > Game Guidance |
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| 1. |
Just a note |
Mar 19, 2004, 10:07 |
Blackhawk |
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I wanted to clarify something about the guide before anyone cried 'foul'. While the guide is already huge, it is not yet entirely complete. As you might guess, writing detailed strategies for all 90+ maps takes a while or two.
Instead of making everyone wait for the massive guide to be complete, we went ahead and made everything except the maps available. When the individual map strategies are complete in a couple of weeks, they will be added in.
It is still well worth the read, though. What is up right now is the equivilant, in word count, of most other full guides, going into detail on weapons, vehicles, general strategies, mutators, and so forth.
The authors hope it is helpful, and comments are, of course, invited.
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| News Comments > DX: Invisible War Patch |
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| 59. |
Re: Why crappy games get good reviews |
Feb 28, 2004, 13:37 |
Blackhawk |
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This classic 'conspiracy theory' goes too far, and is invoked far too often. It does happen that way - very, very rarely.
More often it is caused by more mundane factors. When you get the net's first review out, everybody flocks to your site to read it. When you get the tenth review of a particular title out, you only get a tenth of the people who haven't already gotten what they need from the nine that beat you to the scoop. In other words, the tenth review of Game X gets a tiny fraction of the readers that the first two or three reviews get.
Readers are what pay the bills - not the advertisers themselves. Lots of readers, massive numbers unique hits on your site are what bring the advertisers to begin with. If a site wants to stay big, it has to have the review on the market as soon as possible. That is the cause of most shoddy early reviews - the reviewers are put in front of a PC and are told to have the review done before the competition. That means lots of coffee, not much sleep, and rushed impressions that come from speeding through the game (often with a walkthrough, which some game companies include with their review copies). If it is longer than a ten-hour game, the chances are the reviewer will not have time to finish it. That's where the famous Black & White example comes from - B&W is fun for the first five to ten hours (the amount of time most 'big site' reviewers can devote to a single title). They just didn't play it long enough to see the problems! Seriously - how many Baldur's Gate II reviewers do you think played the entire thing before they started writing?
This is also why the smaller sites that cannot compete with the big name sites often have more accurate reviews - without the pressure of having to get a review up the day after (or of) release, they are able to take their time with the game. They can stop an smell the roses, and have the leisure to decide wheter they smell like roses are supposed to smell.
They also rarely make a profit, don't have offices, full-time employees, or 'special features'.
As to previews - when you write a preview, you are usually, as the original poster said, looking at alpha or beta preview code. You can see the good things that will be there in the final game (good models, acting, animation, level layout, etc), and it is fair to comment on them.
On the other hand, the bad things can't really be commented on because a conscientious writer knows that they are playing an alpha build. You can't bash them for incomplete features, imperfect programming, or lack of optimization when you are not playing a finished product. It would be like test driving a car before the windshield is installed and then complaining that it was too drafty! You can only criticize features that you know, with absolute certainty, are complete - and you rarely ever know what those features are. Therefore, most previews discuss the potential good points of the games.
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| News Comments > Hidden & Dangerous 2 MP Demo |
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| 11. |
Re: COOL@)(%*& |
Feb 10, 2004, 09:52 |
Blackhawk |
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Yes, and Rainbow Six is exactly like Soldier of Fortune - they are both games with modern guns! No need to make one when you already have the other - just no need!
/end sarcasm
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312 Comments. 16 pages. Viewing page 15.
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