appalachian_fox

I want next in line if Playaa's friend isn't interested. I'll ask permission tonight, and would be glad to save you the trouble of shipping, too, since I'll see you this weekend.

Idiots Array! Four days away!

Mmm, Mac OS 10. How does UT2k4 benchmark on that, anyway?

Doesn't matter how "salable" it is. Pong wasn't salable when it was first wired up to an oscilloscope (and it wasn't called Pong then, either, but I digress...). However, it sparked the imagination of many people and caught the attention of several companies who all wanted to make it :salable". Now, that took awhile, but my point is that (1) you should be doing it because you have something you feel passionate about and want to share it, and (2) you never know who will see the passion in your work and might want to work with you / hire you. A lot of commercial games these days are team efforts, so if you wanted to make a commercial project later you don't need to do everything, and as you already recognize there are lots of things that make a game good. Go for it, man! Keep us posted! I didn't intend to knock their business practices, since they've been "customer-centric" for a long time, I'm just saying at the end of the day a big company has huge bills to pay (such as cutting paychecks for programmers). However they choose to run their company, they have to bring in the income (show their customers lots o' lovin', tell customers to work overtime to buy your product, whatev). I happen to think that taking care of your customers is a good business model, but I'm no MBA, so what do I know? I'm just a guy with money to exchange for goods and services.

But that's part of the charm I imagine it would do at least as well as the FFIV remake...

Good point. The way I see it, the original is good enough and a remake is unnecessary, though two generations of consoles have passed, so we're in remake territory, and I have enjoyed other remakes, so I could get on the boat here. Personally, I'd like a portable version as well, but then that puts Squeenix into a tight spot -- Which one do they make first, and do they make both? Money is a big factor. First off, they have to not tick off their shareholders. Second, those cash reserves go into producing the next game. They tie up a lot of money in a product and they won't see a dime for it until its all finished and on shelves. They have to be risk averse to a certain extent. If there are enough fans, sure, then fans = money, because you know they'll buy it. Otherwise, they have the fans' money, they're looking for new markets. Sucks, yes, but I can see their point. Doesn't mean we have to like it And they don't have a large fan base and an incredible amount of income from their little 'social experiment'. Hopefully they will come back to the old-school style games that gave FF games their cult following, but honestly, if their markets are larger, why would they want to? We're way past the point of a small business trying to do what it loves. Now, it's a large company trying to maximize some combination of tax advantage / profits / shareholder value / obscure metric #12. They don't need us anymore, now that there's a larger pool of consumers they can tap. Though this brings me to a question -- Why not make your own game? I know that makes it sound simple, but in all seriousness you seem to have a passion for the genre. Maybe you have no interest in coding or whatnot, sure, that's understandable. Maybe you have enough going on and don't want to dedicate that kind of time. Heck, there's any number of good reasons not to. However, with .NET, C#, XNA (and if you're a Linux guy, Mono or *ugh* gcc and graphics libraries) game creation isn't a huge pain anymore. It's not like you have to be John Carmack and optimize your raytracing routines with special-case math and assembler. Just a thought

No, I just try to back up my statements. When I'm lazy (which is most of the time) I use Wikipedia so I don't have to find an authoritative source. Most people seem to just accept Wikipedia. Though honestly, yeah, a little bit. I was going to say 1986, because it wasn't available in my area until 1986 and I didn't realize that the limited release spanned all the way back to 1985. Okay, a little bit of cheating, but I was only off by one.

As long as we get another season of Heroes and 24. And maybe a good season of Lost.

Do you need a car? -No: Don't fix it, don't buy a car. Keep saving and looking. -Yes: Are you ready to buy a car in the next week? ---Yes: No, don't fix it. Buy a new car. ---No: Can you borrow a car for the near future that will cost less than $200? -----Yes: Borrow the car. Don't fix the current one. Step up your efforts regarding buying a new car to minimize costs. -----No: Fix it. You need a car and it's going to cost you more to borrow a car for the near future. Keep saving.

Someone wasn't around for the early 80s, I see. Eh? I said that mainly because everyone I knew has a NES and that was the mainstream console (excluding the Atari 2800 and it's crappy brother the 5200 and the "prominent" controller that doesn't work and looks like it was designed to be a little like a phone that you can stab your ear with). Then the Genesis and SNES pop out and the console war begins... even though more people owned a SNES than a Genesis. That's all well and good, but the NES didn't come out in America until later in 1985, and that was a limited release. It didn't hit a national release until 1986. Hardly early 80s. Long before the NES (heck, before the NES was even released in Japan) there were somewhere around a dozen consoles vying for shelf space up until around 1983. Of course, most of them weren't very popular either, and I'm just busting your bowls.

Sorry, something about the words "harmlessly" and "INTO THE BRAIN" that don't sit well with me...

Agreed. A handheld console has one major advantage that your home theatre doesn't...You can hold it in your hand. If that's not your cup of tea, well, okay then. I have no use for a tampon, but that doesn't mean the majority of people in America won't find a use for one. I see your point about getting games exclusively on the handheld, but I also have to ask: What do you want for a port? The nature of the design would make it look (and probably sound) terrible on your fancy-pants home theatre. Are you suggesting they abandon handhelds altogether? That they make two (or more?) versions of every game they release? The first one is unlikely, given the DS sales numbers, and the second one, while becoming more common with the loss of exclusives, really calls into question what is a game and where we draw the line. A version of a game for the PS3 and one for the XBox 360? Sure, they're probably almost identical. An XBox 360 and a DS? When you shift to the DS, the input scheme is totally different (nowhere near the same amount of buttons and a stylus), the feedback scheme is different (two screens, lower resolution, lower image quality, lower sound quality) and there is much less storage and processing power, just to name a few things. Could you honestly consider a game that was butchered so much to fit into a handheld the same game? Same question goes the opposite way: Could you consider any game ripped from a handheld and displayed on a big screen worthy of a modern console? I really don't like it when, for example, I see Splinter Cell games for the GBA/DS which share names with their grown cousins. It's a totally different game. However, there is room for compromise. You picked the FFs in particular, which happen to be one of my favorite series of games. Yeah, sequels exclusive to a handheld do inhale. And yes, if they're doing remakes, it would be nice to see them on other platforms as well. Though, as I recall, many of those games have PS1 remakes, most of which are readily available, and hopefully they're backwards compatible with the PS3. If not, I hate to say it, but look into a PS2. I know it's seemingly redundant, but it's really a machine every console gamer should have access to, anyway. Someone wasn't around for the early 80s, I see. I agree, though, exclusivity is not in our best interest. I think software companies are starting to wise up, though. Hopefully big-name games will be more available. I await the hardware companies' next salvos, though I'm at a loss as to what they can do. Free developer's kits wouldn't be enticing enough with what modern games bring in.

They keep using that word. I do not think it means what they think it means.

What? Are you nuts? The SNES debuted at $249 in 1990. Even adjusting for inflation, they don't compare. I'd seriously like to know what wires got crossed...The NeoGeo was pretty expensive (though not that much), wasn't it? Sony's getting picked on because it's the most expensive console. Nintendo's getting picked on because it's the lowest-powered console (read, least expensive). Microsoft is getting picked on because it's Microsoft, though rest assured that's only because people are always looking for a reason to complain. If it was most expensive, they'd complain about that, too. I think the big thing with the PS3 is, if one is going to dish out the extra money over, say, an XBox 360, what are you getting for that cash? Rather, what is the value of the console upgrade? Some people look at it in terms of the cost of the silicon, some look at it in terms of comparative products (This BluRay player costs $1000 and it doesn't play games, PS3 is a steal!) but in the end from the perspective of the individual consumer it all comes down to what it's worth to you. For example, a console with BluRay, HD-DVD or even DVD (everything has one built in already) for that matter has no value to me. I own a few DVDs and have no intention in the near future to move to high-def plastic discs. To me, that part of the PS3 is worth exactly $0. A friend of mine, however, who happens to be a home theatre person and has not only the inputs but the equipment to take full advantage of such a thing, has told me he sees it as a next-gen DVD player with a cash rebate for early adopters. For him, it was a no-brainer, and he's not even a gamer! Exclusives are worth something to me, as well. Metal Gear is one of my favorite franchises since the first MG to hit the NES. If Metal Gear: Solid 4 remains exclusive, well, that makes a difference. Can I put a dollar value on that? That'd be tough. Maybe I'd be willing to pay $100 to play it, so that's $30-$40 more than the cost of the game which is in part some of that added value of the console. Also, I can't go out and buy the game on another platform. If I find value in a game console at $400, and I find an added value of $40 in a game, maybe I can justify the total cost if there are other things that I also value enough to justify the price. If it doesn't remain exclusive, however, and I can pick it up for the 360 for $60, you need to give me something I can't get on the 360 to pull me to the PS3. Maybe I'd pay $5 or $10 more if it looked significantly better, maybe. Also, not only is the value diminished, but there's also the fact that I would have to buy a whole new console at once, and spending $660 (maybe less at that time, say $560) to get better graphics I valued at $5-$10...well, I'd need some more compelling reasons. That's not to say there aren't any, but that's just part of the equation. And of course, all of that applies to "rational economic men (and women)". Some people will trash Sony on price because they hate Sony for this or that reason. Also, anything I've said has the potential pitfall of being completely wrong. I'm not an economist, just an armchair consumer scientist. Maybe some of that helped put the price-trashing in perspective. Probably not.

You could resample it to something really really small...

queitly = quietly --> gentle?

So, the question I have, say the poll of the day without the nuisance of creating an actual poll... Is it worth $3 more to see it in Imax?

minnneSOda? Sure, I'd love to, but my travel to Tampa is business related. I wouldn't come here otherwise. Florida's too hot for my tastes and I don't care for sand. Tomorrow evening we get the local aquarium all to ourselves for a reception, with food and drinks. No word on whether or not we will be fishing, but there is no dress code so I imagine while business casualish is expected swimsuits are not forbidden. Also, they have Spider Man 3 in Imax here. $11, which is $9 more than I like to pay to see a movie but only $3 more than I actually pay when I get "dragged" out back home, so I'm really tempted. I mean, it's Spider Man 3. It's gotta be good...right? *snoops around the other forums for SM3 reviews*

That's even better than getting a check that says, "For sexual favors" on the comment line, because nobody reads the comment line anymore.

The Keyhole/Google Earth guy is here at the ASPRS conference, and rumor is he has a homemade 4 gigapixel camera. I'll have to see if I can corner him at the reception tonight. Maybe I can get him and the Virtual Earth guy to square off...

Sweet! I'm actually looking for anything that can kill some time, evening or day. I'm near Harbor Island and all I know of is the Channelside place which is pretty small and not really noteworthy (but close by!) and the Aquarium, which I am going to Thursday night as part of that conference thingie. I hear there's a WWII merchant vessel that's now a museum, so I figure I'll see that as well. Ybor city looks to be easily accessible by streetcar, so score!

I will be in the Tampa area real soon and am looking for suggestions for things to do. As I understand it, I should be right in the heart of "downtown". Anyone been around and know what's up? I will not have a car, so if I can't get there by walking or public transit, I can't get there. Thanks!

Seriously. Do you have pictures of the sock? Can you guarantee that the sock is still functional? Does it keep feet warm and cushioned? Can I return it for a refund if I am not satisfied?

Is there an Interstate commerce law about transporting that much alcohol? That might be something you want to look in to in case you get pulled over as it would be a nasty surprise.

Get a guy fired? Over $225? And have this community lie to do it? No offense, but I'm with the general sentiment I'm feeling in the thread. This isn't our business, I hope your friend can be very patient and level-headed while he seeks his restitution and hopefully he can be happy with what Best Buy will offer. The guy may be a jerk, I don't know him, but if your friend pursues this through the proper channels in a calm fashion I'm sure something will be offered. And if it was paid for by credit card, have the card holder issue a chargeback, or whatever it's called.