Thursday, September 18, 2003

Pondering the Imponderable -- 11:02 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Our thoughts are with Stephen "Blue" Heaslip, one of the elder statesmen of the gaming community and the man behind Blue's News. According to a post on his site, his mother suffered a massive stroke. We hope everything turns out as well as possible for them all.

Epic, Microsoft, and You -- 10:15 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Beyond Unreal contacted Epic's Tim Sweeney to ask what effect that Epic and Microsoft's new publishing deal will have on future games and the operating systems they work on. Here's what he had to say:

UT2004 is on track for release for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux, published by Atari. Atari and its corporate predecessors Infogrames and GT have always done a great job of publishing Epic's games. They'll continue to have our full support and we'll have theirs.

Two future Epic games are signed with Microsoft. These games haven't been announced yet, so it's a way too early to lay out a platform roadmap, but Epic has always done the right thing when it comes to supporting popular computer and OS platforms, and there's no reason to assume that's going to change now.

I hope this remains true. Thankfully, Epic is the kind of company that can pretty much dictate its own terms.

Star Wars Trilogy to DVD Next Year? -- 12:46 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

From the "I'll believe it when I see it" department, Digital Bits is reporting that Lucasfilm will finally release the original Star Wars trilogy on DVD in Q4 of 2004. It will be a four DVD set, one for each movie and one bonus features disc. They also indicated that this will be the Special Edition versions of the movies. That's fine with me. I especially like the SE edition of A New Hope. Thanks Shacknews.

ToEE Via Kazaa, Legally! -- 12:41 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Atari has produced a downloadable version of Temple of Elemental Evil and made it a free download through Kazaa. The catch? You can only play it for six hours. After that, you have to pay $49.95 to unlock it. Basically, it's the full game. It's a cool concept. I wish that you could get it cheaper than in a store since there is no box, manual, CDs, etc. I can see where a brick-and-mortar retailer would freak if you could download and buy it for 1/2 price. I also wonder if you would need the manual to play the game (I know I need the one for Neverwinter Nights). Still, my hat's off to Atari for coming up with new ideas. Thanks Evil Avatar.

J.t.Qbe comments: My download is halfway complete (love my DSL!). I've heard enough good things about the game to give it a try and see if it'll work on my "old" 800 MHz system. If so, I'll probably end up buying it. If not, nothing lost. Thanks, Atari!

Senator v. RIAA -- 11:22 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Senator Sam Brownback (R-Kan) introduced a new bill aimed clearly at the RIAA. Wired has the scoop. The bill would require the RIAA to file a "John Doe" lawsuit to obtain a person's online information instead of just getting a subpoena. It would also create a labeling system so that any products with digital rights management (DRM) would be labeled as such. I hope this passes. It would allow the RIAA to go after pirates, but they would actually need to have facts first. It would also enable me to know what I'm buying and then make a decision as to whether or not to buy something with DRM (I won't). Thanks Ars Technica.

UPDATE! I just called my Senators Kohl and Feingold to express my support for this bill. And yes, I gave them my full name and address along with my comments. Sentor Brownback's site has more information too.

Wednesday, September 17, 2003

Half-Life 2 and Linux Users -- 9:18 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Linux Games posted an article on a Linux user's view of Half-Life 2. I think us Linux users are pretty much up a creek. I can't imagine that Valve would ever make a Linux client. Since it is a DirectX 9 app, it won't work under WineX for now. With all of the problems that The Master and others have had with Steam, I'm not so sure that I'd even want to touch the game until everything's ironed out. Plus, for some reason that I can't fully explain, I'm just not that excited about HL2.

Steam, Again -- 8:42 am CST, Update by The Master

Okay, I have GOT to be a sucker (A.T. Hun notes: true). I wasted two hours of my life last night, when I should have been sleeping, downloading the new Steam installers and trying them again. I should have just flushed my entire Valve folder right down the toilet. And here's why:

• They reduced the number of download locations for the steam installer from 4 to 2.
• Now, you can only download from either Fileplanet or Fileshack. That's fine, but they're both subscriber only, and they are NEVER going to keep up with the download demand.
• I finally settled on Fileshack, but it's download system aims to start your download at the average time. So, I got to watch the last minute of my download wait for 10 minutes. Nice job there.
• Finally got the installer, and ran it. It didn't try to import my current valve folders, even though they're still on the HD. Instead, I get to download ALL my HL content from Steam.
• And, finally, this thing is STILL trying to talk to the damn Steam network constantly, and every time it tries, not only does it lock up the Steam application, it also locks up EVERY SINGLE DAMN INTERNET APPLICATION ON MY SYSTEM. ARRRGGGHHH!!!

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