Posts Tagged ‘doom 3’

Very interesting thread of conversations (and anger) happening in The Sims community these days.

EA says The Sims 2 will refuse to run if you have Nero, CloneCD or Roxio’s EasyCD installed on the same PC. Although they link to a patch to bypass this, a lot of people are upset by this. One person in the thread has filed with the BBB of San Mateo county. Some people are experiencing the problem, others don’t see it so it’s a crapshoot. A lot of people had the same problem with Doom 3 and CloneCD.

It’s interesting as I don’t have my normal software installed yet, after a few bouts with re-installing XP, I just haven’t got around to it. Normally I would be running Daemon tools so I can mount images that Microsoft sends me and I have Nero installed for burning data backups. I also find it interesting that the Sims 2 support message found here says that the game will not run if it detects “CD/DVD Emulation Software”. They list CloneCD, Nero, and Roxio as some titles. Maybe I’m just green but CD emulation software is what Daemon Tools or Virtual CD offer. Something that lets you mount an ISO image as a real image. I don’t see Nero or Roxio being these as they just offer you the ability to burn CDs.

I do agree with some of the masses. You should not have to uninstall legally purchased software to be able to run a legally purchased game title. I’m somewhat on the fence in that Maxis support is trying to do a balancing act here, but as one posted put it, the warez kiddies and crackers already have a fully working version that doesn’t have this problem. So now I can see there being a large number of legitimate users out there that are in the dark.

Feel free to add your pithy observations about this incident.

The last few weeks has been pretty active, and strange, for me.

First, I have re-installed no less than 3 full revisions of Windows XP. The first install I got hit by some happy-go-lucky hacker who decided he was going to use my system as a public file share. He snuck in my system as I was going online to get the updates from Windows to get patched. I spent the better part of an hour fighting with him, bouncing back and forth denial of service attacks and on-the-fly created virii (viruses? virus’?) to try to take each other down. In the end I got fed up and unplugged and came back later after he gave up and found an easier target. The second install didn’t seem to quite work because I had been infected by something on the first attack so all my executables were hit and with each browse using Windows Explorer, it just made it worse. I got a copy of PC-cillin up and running but it was too late. Too many files infected and too much damage. Another reformat and re-install. Finally third times a charm and I got everything back up and running after a frantic 20 CD backup of all my files that I hadn’t got around to looking at yet.

Next it was a graphics wars. A few months ago I (reluctantly) went on a salespersons advice that a GeForce 5700 FX card would be a good deal. This was against my wish to stick with ATI. I’ve been using them on all my systems and never had a problem. Don’t get me wrong, nVidia makes a great chipset and they’re right up there. I never had any problems when Diamond was around and worshipped my Viper series cards. These days it’s nVidia or ATI but I’ve been sold on ATI since the 7000 series and really haven’t looked back. Also the salesperson was well respected and I valued Memory Express‘ opinon (over something like Future Shop where they barely know the difference between a video card and a hard drive, but that’s another blog). However I’ve had nothing but problems with the card. The performance was fine and I was getting 60+ fps in Doom 3 on my gaming computer, but drivers were just ugly and I would constantly get booted out of old games that worked fine and new ones like The Sims 2 that I just picked up. So another trip to Memory Express, a new 9600XT and I’m a happy camper. Everything is working fine and I got a nice copy of Raven Shield to boot. The GeForce is off to the server machine where I can reel from the speed at which the text screens go scrolling by as hackers pummel my Linux firewall.

Then, I get knocked down with an emergency trip to the dentist to remove 2 wisdom teeth that had gone south. Armed with a load of Tylenol 3s and Penicilin, I was out for 20+ hours a day sleeping off the high. This is directly inverse to my normal routine of sleeping for 4 hours and being active and awake (okay, not so active but at least awake). So off work for 3 days and I’m now just catching up with various people hunting me down because I’m on the “critical path”. Whoever invented that term needs to be shot.

Finally last night my kitchen sink overflows and fills up my kitchen with, well, water. Nothing like having a plumber with a serious case of butt-crack in with his 50 foot snake. Hmm. That didn’t come out quite right. Then the cleaning people are in, blowing my carpet. Hmm. Never mind. Anyways, at least I get a free steam clean of the entire pad from it so there is some good to all of it.

Let’s see. 3 full re-installs of XP. More hardware (like I need it). 2 wisdom teeth. 1 broken sink. Yup, it’s been a busy week.

And here I thought I was almost getting caught up on tools and getting something released, Sims 2 comes around the corner and goes gold on me. According to the EA website, they’ll have it in the stores on September 17th. Off to Future Shop to grab a copy now and see what I can mess with.

I have to admit that I’ve been in the dark on Sims 2 and haven’t paid too much attention to it but it certainly looks interesting. I would be interested in seeing what you, the fans, reaction will be when you get it in your grubby little hands. Fab or flop? I’ll be happy when they finish SimAnt 2.

In any case, don’t worry, I have a lot of work left to do on The Sims and new and updated tools. Will be interesting to see what tools they package with The Sims 2 and if there are any gaps though. Let me know if you know something I don’t (which means anything since I know nothing).

And here I was worried that I wouldn’t have anything to play while waiting for Half-Life 2 after finishing Doom 3.

I’m still worried.

Dear boss,

With the release of Doom3 today, I am taking two weeks of vacation effective immediately. I will not be reachable by direct email, cell phone or smoke signals. Should you feel the need to contact me, please leave a message and I will respond when I stop playing the game because I started hallucinating.

It make take me a while to respond as I expect my fingers to have fallen off by that point. Also, I will most likely be unintelligeable so be prepared not to understand a word I say. After two weeks, please alert all my co-workers to my return. They will need to prepare for my two weeks of body odor as well as purchase very dark sunglasses. I expect I will be very pale by then, perhaps blindingly pale.

Sincerely,

Your local Space Marine.

Brian Hook, founder of the independent game company Pyrogon, posted A Pyrogon Postmortem, an article of the reasons he believed his company failed. Read the article, it is a very interesting read.

Here are some highlights that I’ve experienced myself over the years in one way or another and echo so true with my own productions, attempts, and otherwise crap that I call software.

Publishers Never Say No, They Just Stop Answering E-Mails

Publishers will always act interested and will never say “No, we’re gonna pass”. Disinterest pulls a publisher out of the loop, which could put them at a competitive disadvantage, and saying “No” is a bridge that few publishers want to burn even with relative nobodies.

A Good Demo Is Not Enough — It Must Be Jaw Dropping

You need a killer demo, not just a good one. Talk is cheap, and a 300 page design doc, presentation, and even a team “on paper” won’t get you a deal. You have to spend time and effort putting together something that is so mind blowing the execs are flat out scared you might sign with someone else. It’s the difference between a pretty girl smiling at you and a naked pretty girl straddling your lap and licking her phone number onto your face. Publishers need to feel like the latter if you want to get a deal.

Bottom line, think small and grow. Baby steps. Don’t try building the next killer Doom 3 because you’ll still be sitting there years from now trying to catch up with hardware. There’s a reason why Valve, iD Software and other companies make the games they do. They throw millions of dollars of research into building a robust engine they can market. Doom 3. Half-Life 2. Unreal Tournament. They’re just window dressing for the real kill. The marketing and sale of the engine (and the royalties through licensing that come with them).

The guys over at GarageGames have it right. They took a AAA engine and sell it for $99. Yup, for less than a C-Note you can get a full featured engine, source code, tools, and support and build yourself a professional quality game like Tribes and Tribes 2 (which was built using the Torque engine). Will it compete with Doom 3, HL2 and others? In certain areas yes, in others no, still others it will kick ass (like the terrain engine which lets you build almost limitless sized worlds with no degradation on performance).

Grant you, combine some of the features of all of these and you would have a beast not to be reckoned with. The vast terrain engine of Torque, the seamless integration of worlds from Dungeon Siege, the dynamic physics of Half-Life 2 and the on-the-fly level compiling power of Doom 3 and you can write your own cheques.