Thursday, December 6, 2001

DNF to Include Bots -- 10:30 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

George Broussard made this post, indicating that Duke Nukem Forever will include full bot support. This is assuming that the game will one day come out. Here's the scoop:

It's been a really long time since we posted anything about DNF, so I thought I'd post this. We're happy to confirm that DNF will feature full bot support.

The bots are in and working now. Very well in fact. This was essentially one of the last major hurdles/features in our multiplayer plans.

The bots understand and use our skeletal animation system and are proficient with 2-3 guns at the moment. We expect near full weapon proficiency before Xmas.

You can start a match, select how many bots you want to play against, tweak their settings and have a blast. We've setup games with nothing but bots and watched them fight it out and watched the score distributions.

We were initially a little concerned that getting the bots to UT's level would be difficult, especially with our animation system, but it was surprisingly easy. Jess got them in and online in about 2 weeks. The hard work is done, and now it's just polish issues like teaching them new guns, inventory items, and game types as we go along.

Thanks Blue.

Visor ROM Transfer Update -- 9:48 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

I updated my HOWTO for transferring the Handspring Visor's ROM today. I added a link to a thread on VisorCentral that has fixes for many common problems. I also added the exhortation to sync your PDA before trying this. Better safe that sorry.

Wednesday, December 5, 2001

Back on Broadband -- 11:16 pm CST, Update by J.t.Qbe

Around midnight Eastern time I took a look at the cable modem and the lights were blinking as they did back when I had AT&T cable, so I fired up the Linux box and gave it a spin. Sure enough, I was back online! AT&T said that Michigan would be back online on Thursday, so they were right on target. Yay!

The Master comments: Not bad, they actually gave an expected fix date, and made the date. Amazing. TW would NEVER manage that. :-)

A.T. Hun comments: Sweet. Back in the real world o' high speed. And no more MSN to boot!

Stocks Recovering -- 5:53 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

I saw on The Motley Fool that the stock market surged up today. The Dow is back over 10,000 and the NASDAQ is back over 2,000. To tie this into computers and gaming somehow, I saw that NVIDIA will replace Enron on the S&P 500.

Excite@Home RIP -- 5:37 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

News.com is reporting that Excite@Home will go out of business on February 28, 2002. That's not a shocker by any means, but now there is an official date.

No Nazis in German Wolfenstein -- 5:11 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

id's Todd Hollenshead was quoted on Shacknews about the fact that there will be no Nazis or Nazi symbols in the German version of Return to Castle Wolfenstein. Here's a snip:

As you probably know (since you're not all that far away), you cannot legally sell a game in Germany where you fight Nazis. That type of content, along with Swastikas, the Deathshead symbol, and lots of other Nazi iconography is strictly taboo there: it's effectively the *legal* equivalent to a drug like marijuana here in the U.S. It would be illegal to sell, or even possess any game that contained that content. So the real choice for RTCW for the German market is to either change the content, or simply not sell it.

This is in response to a news blurb on XGR which announced this as if it were some kind of revelation. Some of their users are replying with cries of "censorship!" I might not agree with the ban either but that doesn't mean that id, Nerve, Gray Matter, and Activision should violate laws just to make a point.

The Master comments: I would also recommend that all the censorship freaks remember this is Germany they're talking about. Rights are a little different there than they are here.

A.T. Hun comments: Of course, lest we get all high and mighty, there are more than a few people that get uppity about the Confederate flag and have tried to ban it. I personally can't figure out why you'd want to fly it because of what it represents, but I think the parallels are there.

M$ Busted for Piracy? -- 9:58 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

It appears that Microsoft may be guilty of a little "do what I say, not what I do." A French court found Microsoft guilty of using patented code in a product they still sell, originally produced by a company they absorbed. Worth a chuckle. Thanks Blue.

@Home Bondholders Threaten to Sue -- 9:49 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Excite@Home's bondholders are threatening to sue AT&T for withdrawing their bid for Excite@Home's assets. OK, let me get this straight. You reject AT&T's bid for being way too low in your estimation. In revenge, you cut off all of AT&T's customers. Then, after AT&T withdraws their bid, you have the unmitigated gall to demand that they reinstate it? Wha? I think this bit from the article sums it up best:

Although the bondholders say they have reason to be angry at AT&T's withdrawal, they may also be to blame in the Excite@Home morass.

According to numerous sources close to Excite@Home and AT&T, Excite@Home creditors engaged in a dangerous game of chicken with AT&T. They underestimated Ma Bell's resolve and its ability to move customers to its own network, so they lost the game.

J.t.Qbe comments: There's no shortage of idiots in the world, especially at Excite. I guess they're following the principle, "If you can't be right, at least be loud". Meanwhile, AT&T's web site says that Michigan will be reconnected tomorrow. . .

Past Two Days' News

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