Geek Swagger.
Archive for April, 2008
What’s next for the PC gaming industry
Apr 3rd
It's no secret that PC gaming has been hurting lately. There are less PC-specific titles anymore, and franchises that were built for PC exclusivity ( for example) are going platform independent and are being released for consoles as well. Why? Because there aren't as many PC gamers as there used to be and the cost of game development keeps going up. Therefore to recoup the money spent on development publishers are forced to make console versions. It's sad actually...I've been a PC-gaming stalwart since middle school. I still believe today that, in general, I have way better gaming experiences behind a PC than I do across the room from a TV. Take for example - F.E.A.R. on the PC? Engrossing and scary. F.E.A.R. on my 360? Cheesy and overdone. There's just something about being a few inches from your monitor with a keyboard, mouse and headphones playing a game that is unlike any console gaming experience.
So then, PC gaming is dead. Right? No. At least I don't think so. PC gaming will never die in my opinion, instead it will just have to evolve. The #1 reason why people abandon their PC as a gaming machine and instead turn to consoles is the cost. Now I'm not trying to incite an argument here but it's true - you can spend $400 on an Xbox 360 or you can spent $1500 on a gaming PC. Of course there are caveats, for instance if you take the cost of the high definition TV you'll need to get the most out of your console the overall cost is much higher. Still, at the most basic level, console gaming is viewed as being a cheaper alternative to receive basically the same content. What that means is that for PC gaming to become relevant again the entrance cost has to be significantly lower. I'm happy to say that this change is already being made.
DICE is one of my favorite developers of great PC games, particularly the Battlefield franchise (, , , ). For their next game though, they're making a light-weight game that will be completely free and it will run inside of a web browser. That means that if you have a computer that is even remotely modern you'll be able to play what they're calling . Sure the graphics aren't at , but if they successfully migrate the gameplay elements that have made the Battlefield series so great over the years into this game then it'll definitely be a hit. Of course DICE isn't the only developer making this move.
Ever heard of Doom? Yeah, . The mother of all first person shooters. Well , the development firm behind Doom as well as many other classic franchises (, ) have decided to re-release one of their most successful games ever for browsers: . Quake 3, in case you never played it, is a multiplayer FPS that used to be the standard when it came to PC shooters. Now you'll be able to play it in your browser for free. Even id Software, one of the most traditional PC developers, has realized that it's time for a change and this proves it. Besides, show me a computer built in the last 5 years that can't run Quake 3! You can't. So what that means is that basically anyone can play it, and they'll want to of course because it's a great game and it's free. How do they make money then? Well if there's one thing Google has taught us it's that the way to make money on the internet these days is through advertising. Both Battlefield Heroes and Quake Live (the tentative name for the re-release of Quake 3) will be ad supported. I just wanted to make a quick post about this because I've been thinking about it a lot lately. I'd hate to live in a day where I can't sit down behind a computer and play a game. After all, that's what really got me into gaming in the first place. I'm very excited to see what happens in the PC gaming industry over the next 5 years...it's a fun time to be a gamer!
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Vista SP 1
Apr 1st
Alright so this past weekend I was working on my Vista laptop, trying to get some homework done as a college student is ought to do on a Sunday afternoon, and I noticed that I had a new available. It just so happened that this update in particular was the much-anticipated Service Pack 1 for Vista, so I promptly installed it and I have to say if you were waiting for SP1 to get Vista I don't really know why. That's not to say that SP1 isn't a great addition to Vista, but there are no groundbreaking features or anything for people to get excited about. What there is, however, are some under-the-hood performance boosts as well as a lot of fixes.
So if you're familiar with Windows service packs at all, you know that the reason they're so important is mostly that they offer a roll-up of all of the fixes that have occurred since the last service pack (or the launch of the operating system in Vista's case). What this means is that you can slipstream in all of the updates from the past year or 2 so that when you install Vista on your computer you have the bulk of the updates from the get-go. This is great for easing bandwidth use so that you don't have to download 5 gigabytes worth of updates when you first install. Also back in the day when Internet speeds weren't what they are today (the dial-up era I'm talking about) it could take hours if not days to download the mass of updates you would need for a fresh install of Windows. The service pack side-steps the process of downloading all of those updates so that you only have to get maybe a few of the newest updates instead of every update ever released for the OS since its launch.
Now I started out by saying that there are no flashy additions to Vista found in the service pack but that's okay. The real reason most people like to wait until SP1 to jump into an operating system is the bug fixes. Sure, any early adopter of Vista (myself?) has been getting these fixes in small increments over the past year and a half or so, but now a lot of the initial complaints about Vista have been fixed via patches and they're all available in SP1. Whether you were worried about driver support (that issue is still there by the way, just not nearly as big of a problem as when Vista launched) or buggy software you don't have a whole lot to worry about anymore.
"But I haven't gotten SP1 yet! What's the deal?" Well trust me I feel your pain. I have 2 Vista boxes, one desktop and one laptop, and I still have only received SP1 via automatic update on my laptop. The reason for this is that SP1 has been a slow rollout, not just a "flip switch" update. What I mean by that is that Microsoft is slowly releasing it out to Vista users instead of just making it available to everyone who uses Vista right off the bat. There's a few reasons for this, the most important of which is that there are still a handful of incompatibility problems with Vista software that need to be patched before SP1 can be installed. If you're running Vista on a new machine that you purchased with Vista installed on it and it's Vista certified, chances are if you launch Windows Update you'll be able to download and install SP1. If you upgraded from a pre-existing machine, for example your old Windows XP machine, you might have to wait a bit longer. Either way make sure you have all previous updates installed, including updates that are marked 'Recommended' in Windows Update, because SP1 is only available once you have installed all of the updates that led up to it. It's important to install updates as soon as they come out either way because it secures your system. Make sure you have automatic updates on, that Vista will automatically install 'Recommended' updates along with 'Critical' ones, and install all available updates.
For example on my laptop which has SP1 I had to install an Office 2007 service pack before I could install SP1. On my desktop however, which is a computer I upgraded to Vista from XP (my laptop was purchased recently, is Vista certified, and came with Vista installed when I bought it), I still have not been able to download and install SP1 through Windows Update. I think the main problem is that I might have failed to install some of the previous updates and so I obviously can't get SP1 yet. If you don't want to use Windows Update by the way, you can always download Vista Service Pack 1 from Microsoft's website.
So that's my Vista SP1 post. I'm going to include a list below from Paul Thurrott's website where he gives a great rundown of everything that you get in service pack 1. Go ahead and check out his (as well as his website in general, it's great stuff) for more information.
Q: What features are included in Vista SP1?
A: The following end-user features are included in Windows Vista Service Pack 1:
1. A collection of previously-released and new security fixes, bug fixes, and other minor updates.
2. An update to the Windows kernel to bring the Vista kernel (version 6.0) up to date with the version in Windows Server 2008 (version 6.1).
3. A change to the Kernel Patch Protection ("PatchGuard") feature in the Vista kernel that prevents security companies like McAfee and Symantec from integrating as tightly with the OS as they could in previous Windows versions. This will include a set of APIs aimed at helping developers write code that interacts with this security feature.
4. A change to Vista's Instant Search feature that will allow third party desktop search product makers to more closely integrate their products with Windows Vista. In the initial shipping version of Vista, the Instant Search indexer still runs at full speed even if a third party product is installed, reducing overall system performance.
5. A change to Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) that will remove the Reduced Functionality Mode (RFM) and Non-Genuine State (NGS) mode for Vista installs in expired non-activated and non-genuine states. See for more information about this change.
Again, you can read the rest of Paul's Vista Service Pack 1 rundown
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