General Chat

AS A GAMER, WHAT WOULD YOU WANT TO SEE AT AN AUSTRALIAN VIDEO GAME EVENT / EXPO / COMPETITION?

Lots of pretty art to look at, freebies like tee-shirts and hats and water bottles. Lots of stalls !!!!! And also very importantly it should be aimed at not just males but the female gamers too (if your going to have big boob women with logos on there white see through shirts I want the male equivalent there as well)
Warcraft 3 lans XD

beer

i'd like to see lots of beer.

*ahem*

on a more respectable note though I think having playable demos and video trailers for games from the best devs in Australia is a must. guest speakers, both developers and professional gamers would be interesting.

LANs of course, for any game and platform that supports it.

Any well made multiplayer mods would be cool too. Games made by gamers.

I think it'd be kinda cool to have an "extreme grind session" in WoW where a whole bunch of people start brand new characters on a fairly empty server, create a raid of 40 lvl 1s and then just grind up until the first dungeon instance (lvl 10-20), or do some PvP sessions in battlegrounds. and then after that, just for shits and giggles, raid the opposing faction's main city and get our lowby characters slaughtered. It'd be a whole different experience playing WoW as a pseudo-LAN.

>insert more ideas here<

Is this meant to be like a game focused Supernova event?

Well to give you more of an idea of where I'm coming from here, I'm not talking about AustralianGamer.com putting an event on. We have enough trouble keeping our own website updated, as opposed to organising a full fledged industry event (i.e. time and money)

However we have been approached and asked advice in regards to a large scale gaming event known as 'www.Game1.com.au', which will initially be a sub section of the 'Auto Salon' shows that tour around regularly. The reason I'm excited is because these guys seem serious about putting on a gaming event with the needs and wants of the gamers in mind, without having to be exclusively controlled by the needs and wants of the 'big three' or the publishers per say.

The tournament would be the main focus, because if that can be nailed ... if it's possible to organise the biggest australian video game tournament EVER, with the biggest cash prize EVER, with coverage in all the gaming publications, websites, communities, etc. Then getting involvement from the publishers and game companies shouldn't be an issue.

I'm certainly excited at the possibilities and I'm hoping that there are enough interested gamers around to accomidate such an event. I believe there are. What do you think?

Make it not clash with other game events for a start. I note the Sydney event dates overlap the new Game Connect Asia Pacific dates.

Overlapping or clashing dates with key industry events will make it much harder for Australasian developers to get involved.

Just remember, don't forget the booth babes ... *drool*
:)

If it's a sub-section of Auto Salon, then there'll be babes in skimpy outfits whether you like it or not [;)]

You know, I really enjoyed the footage of the happenings during Quakecon, and I think aspects of that could really carry across well to a game event here. The tournaments for many kinds of games, for single players to clans was really exciting to watch at Quakecon. It would be great to get some new games previewed here, as mentioned. Seeing as it's Auto Salon, and also Need for Speed : Most Wanted seems to have sold pretty well here, a showing of NFS:Carbon would be pretty ideal. Or even a playable Battlefield 2142 lan like at E3, but I guess securing something like this would be pretty hard to achieve.

In summary, competitions, lans, and hands-on's of new games would be great. Or even a hands on of the wii and any wii game. That would be cool [:)]

http://www.go3.com.au/

Hmmm, well this is getting interesting...

GO3 actually looks pretty interesting. It looks like it's been set up just like an E3 trade show with room for a large number of exhibitors, as well as a GDC (developer related lectures and workshops), and there's also a huge lan with tournaments.

Originally posted by Souri

GO3 actually looks pretty interesting. It looks like it's been set up just like an E3 trade show with room for a large number of exhibitors, as well as a GDC (developer related lectures and workshops), and there's also a huge lan with tournaments.

I can't see this being well attended by industry people outside of Australasia and South East Asia myself. Perth is just too out of the way. Australia has struggled to get people to AGDC as it is.

Wonder what the GDAA makes of this new conference? Would the average Australian gamer from Melbourne/Adelaide/Sydney/Brisbane make the trip?

Perth has hosted something similar to this for years (albeit more focused on consumer electronics in the past).
Auran has attended these (to promote their Trainz software to hobbyists and their other "not strictly games" business tangents to find new markets).

Interesting politics going on. Is this going to be a case of the IGDA Conference vs the GDAA Conference? Will it become a "mine is bigger than yours" back-and-forth like our Federal Governments trying to prove that theirs is the smarter state?

Can't we all just get along?

I'll probably go along, but mainly for the Demoparty (I'd LOVE to see the Australian Demo Scene become as sophisticated as that of Europe).

Scott.

There's an article on [url="http://blogs.theage.com.au/screenplay/archives/gaming_news/002965.html#…"]Screenplay [/url] on the upcoming games exhibitions, and it looks like things are really exploding on that front.

There's Game1 which Yug posted about that'll be on in Melbourne (4th & 5th of November at the Melbourne Exhibition Centre) and Sydney (2nd & 3rd of December at the Sydney Showground Olympic Park) http://www.game1.com.au

eGames & Entertainment Expo in Melbourne (Melbourne Exhibition Centre from the 17th to 19th of November), surprisingly running 2 weeks after Game1 http://www.egamesexpo.com.au

Go3 in Perth (Perth Convention Exhibition Centre from March 30 to April 1, 2007) http://www.go3.com.au

ffs i cant afford to travel =[

this would be a great idea to hav one here. it should be like E3 but with little tournaments going on with games like CODMW2, Gears Of War 2, Halo 3, Tekken 6 and games that aren't released yet

Old thread, but there are indeed gaming tournaments in Australia.

We just aren't aware of them.

I found these guys on Facebook.

Look like they might be in for the long haul.... and seem to want to do the right thing by gamers.

They've only just started up.

I'll support them as long as they're trying anyways..... seeing nothing else seems to get any momentum.

Check them out for yourself.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/E-Tournaments-Australia/318868995093

http://syntaxparty.org/nfo.html

Come and join us. 2009 was a great party, let's make 2010 even better.

Having such a smart idea would be great for the entire Australian populatio (the gaming one) to go to such a thing. I have to say if it has tournament over 5 games of different formats, not released demos, huge huge huge prize money, most of all held in like Melbourne or Adelaide and cheap admission, you could get thousands of game lovers paying to get in and even myself.

would love to see that happen here in australia

this would be amzaing playing for money using ur talent, i am bored of playing by myself against the computer and friends because i am to good for them.fifa 12 , pes 12 and rugby 211(union and Nrl) i am so pumped so everythings set show us the location of this expo.

A tekken tag tournament 2 is being held at a brazilian jiu jitsu school on the 15th of september in brisbane.

http://www.facebook.com/events/451490214884521/?context=create

This event is to raise money to finish a brisbane based brazilian jiu jitsu and mixed martial arts centre.

There is $2500 in prizes that includes a samsung galaxy s3 and tekken merchandise.

As a add to the event there will be a $100 cash prize for best video game cosplay, you do not need to enter the tekken comp to enter the cosplay competition which has no entry fee.

Entry fee is only $10 and there will be free food and drink at the event.

hope to see you there.

Kindest regards,

Phil

Wow, I started this thread 6 years ago ... I feel old :P

Funny enough, I'd be interested to hear people's opinions on the same question again now, especially since eGames/GenConOz/GO3 didn't work out, and what people think of EBX.

I'd like to see a room full of PC's, the screens on Minecraft and the compettion is for who can stay alive longest on setting HARDCORE

They knew i wanted something big for my 26th birthday - what better a gift :)

Thanks Souri, i enjoyed fear, and was going to purchase it again, just to play online, but the combat edition sounds like a good pocket saver.

Heh heh well it was a great movie

I'm a bit taken back to hear that kinda talk from the elderly/young. Just not used to it [:)]

In my experience, E3 never was a place to get a deal done anyway. GDC and apparently DICE are much better.

Regardless, even if E3 is toned down to more of a "meeting rooms only" type event, most of the same relationship building opportunities will still exist for Australasian developers.

Yeh, I'm sure there was concern when the initial reports were saying that E3 was being cancelled next year, but with the recent downsizing announcements, it looks like Mario is correct in saying that the same opportunities will still be there, albeit with less crowds [;)]

More recent reports are saying that E3 will be becoming "E3 Media Festival" with an expected attendee count of only 5000.

http://www.next-gen.biz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3546&…
http://www.next-gen.biz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3550&…

I think now it will be back to the seperate publisher shows that were going on and around E3 in anycase. It does restrict access to alot of these people, since they are usually invite only. But E3 never really seemed to make alot of sense anyway, with GDC a month or so earlier, and GDC being more game developer oriented, E3 being a mainly media event to show people of the media all the goodies. Which often is roughly the same as what is shown at GDC.

The other big benefit I think is E3 crunch will disappear - thats awesome for most developers since it was a huge extra expense of effort for no monetry reward. Maybe a E3 award.. but thats about it. In a multi-million dollar project, spending an extra few hundred thousand for no reason was very wasteful.

I dont think much will be missed - but I expect the media to whinge and complain they dont get free tickets and all paid drinking binges to the parties anymore. Hehe.. can just see half of the gaming mags now.. venting their frustration in editorials in next months issue :) "I cant go to E3 next year!!! booooo-hoooo" :) ahh.. gotta love the irony..

well actually, the general impression i get from the media outlet types is one of relief that they never have to go to the insane frenzy of another E3.

and then there's this response from another spectrum of the game industry: http://www.angry-gamer.net/pmwiki.php/Editorial/No_E3_Makes_Angry_Gamer…

quote:Originally posted by Grover

The other big benefit I think is E3 crunch will disappear - thats awesome for most developers since it was a huge extra expense of effort for no monetry reward.

I've seen this mentioned a couple of times, and I don't understand the reasoning behind the conclusion.

Publishers will still be showing games to distributors, retailers, and media behind closed doors, so there will still be the need to produce marketing builds for E3.

You might be able to get away with builds being a little rough around the edges and unstable (given the publishers are normally 'driving' in such demonstrations), but fundamentally the E3 special build will still be the thorn in the side of developers.

Hate to burst your bubble
http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/genpets.asp

yeah I knew that!

hehe, I didn't. The site gave me a few minutes of wtf before I thought to check if it was legit.[:)]

Damnit, I got my hopes all up for a Giger Xenomorph, then they show this candy ass little brown thing.

id buy it if it was green.

Sounds supa!

Sorry, couldn't help myself :P

Might be worth you hitting up all the developers individually and offering your skills. Also, maybe talk to Mick from lavainjection.com.au about how he goes about things, as he already does what you are wanting to do.

geez. I dunno about anyone else.. but how much is that like TimeSplitters? (Ie in styling).

Wow, that was definately a surprise I did not expect TF2 to see the light of day any time soon... Does this mean Duke Nukem Forever will ship with HL2:Episode Three??

I like the style of that TF2 image, very cool.. Hope the gameplay is good!

yeh the gameplay will be definately over-dramatic and comical.
interesting... [8D]

Looks kinda neat but does still have to face the facts that unless they up the gameplay as well then its STILL behind in structure to games like BF2 and quake wars (well an assumption so with QW), just nicer looking then before. Im glad theyve killed that oversaturation of orange though (or was that team colours, barely played TF1 and a long time ago?) and yeah it does look kinda timesplitters esque (a stylistic direction i really admire actually) but with a bit of pixar thrown in which is the comment im hearing a lot. Certainly not a bad thing considering the positive press that image gets.

Yeh, TFC classes gameplay is pretty rudimentary. It really is bare-bones when compared to the what Tribes, Enemy Territory / Quake Wars, and the Battlefields have done. Hopefully they've implemented a lot of new ideas in there rather than making a port of the old TFC with extra shiny graphics.

Apparently that released picture of TF2 is [url="http://www.halflife2.net/forums/showpost.php?p=1970494&postcount=845"]an ingame screenshot[/url]. Nice [:)] Definately got some depth of field happening in there.

The trailer's been released. Very cool!

http://www.valvesoftware.com/ep2/teaser/tf2_teaser01_720p.wmv

That link dosent seem to work, however i found it in spiffy HD quality at gametrailers.com

The screenshot didnt do much to excite me but that trailer did. Looks like it could be a heap of fun.

the trailer is also up at gametrailers.com. the valve one didnt work for me (or its a stream, in which case, pfft)

also if you didnt know about Portal which is also shipping with Ep2, check out the trailer for that at www.gametrailers.com as well. both hd.

Interesting. Cross between Serious Sam and TFC. Hmm, not sure, but we'll wait and see how this saga pans out.

well i think its a wonderful looking game. i just pray people will play it. the current TFC online population is AU is very small. i just did a server refresh now (5.30pm) and theres 26 people playing. and its not really viable to join overseas servers. im on '24mbit' internet and im getting 250 pings in the US

I just hope there's a way you can purchase it seperately [:(]

To me $50ph seems pretty reasonable for a trade mark: it's something they could make a LOT of money from. Really if you've spent years developing you skills you should be making people pay you fairly for them.

The games industry won't pay you anything like that much, but "making games is fun" apparently, even if the game's a load of crap. Souri has a list of Aus game dev salaries floating around on sumea somewhere, it was made by ambit recruitment.

Remeber though that there are people who may undercut you by huge amounts. Charging those rates you have to be worth it.

When you get to a point where you earn enough money to support yourself, you need to stop thinking 'how much should this company pay me for the job' and think 'how much is this job worth to me'.

Think of things as a time basis ... this is taking up this much of your time, what is your time worth to you. Is it worth $50 an hour? Then thats how much you should charge. Thats my thoughts anyway, cause to be honest, design is subjective to the designer.

That said, I am a web graphic designer, and any work I do for other people, logo design or otherwise, if they ask for the source files I just give it to them. It's not 'MY' I.P., because I'm contracting to them to create something for them. Am I missing something here?

I doubt any company would want their trademark owned by someone else!

I know when someone contracts my university to do something if they want to own the IP they have to provide pretty good reasons and pay a lot more than otherwise.

I think it depends upon what that IP is. If it is the IP to a well known game license, well, you'd pay a lot to acquire it if you were to do so.

If it is just a company's trademark that will just be used by the company, not directly used by the company by selling it as a product, or products directly derived from the IP, then it isn't worth that much really. Though, a company like BP would take their trademark quite seriously, even as going as far as registering a particular shade of green so as to protect it's use from other companies, especially those in the energy biz - so they may see it as having far more worth to them.

I would also ask myself, how much came from me, and how much came from the company that contracted my services. If all you did was follow their specs and translated their ideas into the end form, then maybe you shouldn't be asking all that much if nothing. If you came up with 100% in that they gave you something very vague to go off of if nothing. Then you may wish to ask for more.

Something else I would factor in, is how more worthwhile would it be to have this work in your portfolio as opposed to not having it. Meaning if you ask too much and then they decide to go with another concept or their old one, then you won't be able to list the work in your portfolio. Though, this will only matter if you have only just started your career, as you want the "credentials" via a body of work so as to be able to negotiate better deals for yourself.

You may already have years of experience, but I would ask how realistically this translates into your "skill" level. Some people will go years thinking they are hot-shit, when all they are is the scum at the bottom of the barrel. Others will find some place in between that and the very best in their field. It is usually the very best that can ask for the best rates of pay as they are the ones in high demand. Those in between have to compete with the very large number of others that are also in the "in-between" category - so even if they are "good" or even "great," so are hundreds of others I'm afraid.

Sorry if that is all a bit sour, but that is my point-of-view :/.

A trademark is a large part of a company's identity. If the company identity means something to them then the trademark is valuable.

I'd meant to add some points that you've made here later tonight Cynical- the points that are covered by "Remeber (spelling!) though that there are people who may undercut you by huge amounts."

I've noticed many in the games industry seem to treat IP belonging to individuals as unimportant. It's more important than IP owned by companies imho because the people who produce it are often at the bottom of the food chain.

Wouldn't surprise me if you and I might have a few differences of opinion in this area.

Well yes, to some companies Lorien ? that is why I mention BP. But to most it doesn't matter that much at all, especially if they are relatively young by company standards. If they can come up with one concept, they can come up with another.

And yes I think we do have difference of opinion in this area as we probably do in lots of areas, but, I am just being realistic for a change instead of idealistic ? I find to many people hide behind it. Idealism is a good thing, but when you are in the position that the starter of this thread is in, then being idealistic when you cannot afford to be, may not be the best approach ;). Though it does depend on the specifics of his situation.

The more established a company is and the more they rely- or would like to rely- on brand recognition or reputation and name recognition, the more valuable the trademark is.

I'm not sure about "most"- perhaps most small companies. edit: and small companies get bigger, but trademarks often stay the same.

I think we should have this conversation off the forums Cynical, it's hard to discuss properly with you without letting out a whole lot of really identifying stuff about you. Just deleted a heap of stuff from this post for example (pre-edit delete).

Nothing bad I hope ? that you deleted about me that is.

To most companies, their ?brand-image? or trademark is not that important. Not that important as say ?Coca-Cola? is or Nike's swish. It is just another image in a sea of images, and depending on the company, one is as good as another for most of their purposes. I think how much ?exposure? you plan to have for that trademark also factors into to it. In that ?Coca-Cola? is really marketed to just about everyone, but, something else like a company that makes small widgets that go into a range of manufactured products, well, it only matters to a much smaller market ? say one of Australia's manufacturing industries, not even to Australia and as a whole.

Companies change their ?branding? all the time, especially if they are small companies serving small niche markets. What keeps people buying your products is the reputation attached to that brand ? though, I'm sure it is not the case all of the time.

FYI: you do know my email Lorien, so you can always send me an email.

No, nothing bad. Will do.

Well, seems like this conversation got a lot more complicated than it needed to be :)

Because the company did not commission your services, yes they will need you to explicitly assign the rights to the design to them.

If they had commissioned you, a straight fee for time spent would have been appropriate. Because you went out on a limb "on spec", and seem to have nailed exactly what they want, I'd feel free to charge them a bit extra.

Your time comes to $510. A logo from a design studio could cost them thousands (and actually trademarking a logo would cost 10s of thousands potentially). I say your bumped up $900 fee is fair.

At the end of the day get as much as you can but be prepared to compromise. "owning the IP" in this instance is worthless given the logo has been designed for a specific company and you probably wouldn't be able to use it elsewhere. And if I was them, there is no way I'd start using a logo for my company that was still owned by someone else.

Thanks for the replys guys.
I got the deal all sorted out with the company.

I was aprroaching it from a games perspective, where you make the game, sell the game, but if someone wants to buy the source code, thats extra.
Like Unreal2k7, the game will cost $100 for us, but will cost $100,000,000 to buy the source for it.

Being a software company, they aprroached it from what they are used it, which is making someone, and handing it all over to the client for no extra charge.

I decided in the end to cuy my loss's, take the money and run, while the company still likes me, rather than charge them more for something they perceive is theirs.

In the end, the original logo was their design, I only did it in 3D.

I might as well post the outcome as it stand now.
They give me $510, and I give them a 640x480 360 render, a 1280x1280 psd single frame render for posters and banners and stuff, all the source files (max files and PSD's) and they own it all. This gives me more money than I had at the start of the deal, and a contact that could get me more work.
If your interested, the old and new logo can be found here....
http://www.sevenpurplehampants.com/gallery/v/art/comparison.JPG.html?g2…
Dont flame me for it. After all, it is good enough for some cash. :)
Left hand side is their old image they aparently paid through the teeth for. And the right.. is mine.

Thoughts?

quote:Originally posted by lorien

...The games industry won't pay you anything like that much, but "making games is fun" apparently, even if the game's a load of crap...

Of course that's true, and it's the same for most every creative industry, but still only if you're willing (and quite frankly silly enough) to undervalue yourself and accept that - especially when we're talking contractual/freelance basis. To be honest, if you're not earning at least AU$50-AU$75 per hour contracting in games you should be asking yourself why. Especially when there's $3500 software to upgrade each 6 months, bills to pay, hardware to upgrade etc before you even see a profit.

G'day moo, yeah Sydney is more expensive the Brisbane. Have a look at domain.com.au and realestate.com.au for a general idea of prices.

Brisbane - Melbourne - Sydney
Cheapest to most expensive.

It's worth noting that most of the game dev studios are based in Brisbane or Melbourne because of tax breaks and other incentives as well.

It comes down to more a personal preferance as well ... Brisbane is hot and sunny, bit more of a country town, laid back, but still quite modern ... Sydney is the biggest city in Australia, all go go go, lots of history, very fast paced, kinda dirty ... Melbourne is very cultured, a cafe on every street corner, very trendy and friendly.

Thats my take anyway :)

Don't forget to mention that Melbourne has 4 seasons in a day and it's absolutely freezing during winter.

Sydney isn't dirty as far as I can tell.

Melbourne is shallow - or is that just "trendy?"

Melbourne's a far better place to live than Sydney- just ask all the escaped Sydney-siders down here...

Sydney not dirty Cynical? That smog blanket settles on everything.

Well if it is smog that you mean then Sydney is a large city, and every city has smog - even those that have well developed and maintained public transportation systems. You can blame the oil and car companies for all the smog: http://www.sonyclassics.com/whokilledtheelectriccar/

Every city has its advantages and disadvantages to living their. For all of Melbourne's advantages, and I am not saying I wouldn't live there, I find the place to be rather shallow and full of leeches trying to get something for free - usually at your expense.

Interesting- I found that in Sydney. Though I know what you mean about some individuals down here...

The oil companies have a lot to answer for.

Thanks a bunch for all your answers. It's great with all of these opinions, before we can make up our minds. I have a mate who visited Melbourne and Sydney earlier. He describes Sydney as one big pile of garbage with a pretty opera house, while he loved Melbourne. I would prefer Brisbane for the weather, the prices and the job opportunities, so I'll use your answers as arguments to convince me girlfring :)

I still wonder about one thing. Is it normal to rent places from big real estate sites like domain.com.au and realestate.com.au that's mentioned earlier? In Denmark, there is a big gap between buying and renting apartments. Renting isn't organised the same way. Often when you need to rent an apartment, you'll be on the lookout for paper notes hanging in supermarkets or reading a special section in the local newspaper, while when buying an apartment you'll go to a real estate broker.

Not really Moo, even most of the individual real estates out there that list their rentals online tend to list them on Realestate.com.au.

Unless you are wanting to rent a 'room', that is, if you are looking for shared accomodation.

You can browse the rental properties online, but I've always needed to inspect them in person before I could lodge an application.

quote:
one big pile of garbage with a pretty opera house

That's imho, I was born there and lived there for 2 thirds of my life. Best yet, they built a bloody big block of flats slap bang in front of that opera house (there's a good quote about opera houses in my profile btw)

edit: though don't take it too seriously- on my part or Boulez's.

Fission weapons these days are mostly used to set off fusion weapons.

This sort of bomb is a detonator now.

WERE ALL GONNA DIE!!!

Well..if you're dead.. you can't complan about being dead.. therefore...eh *shrugs shoulders*

I know it was not the effect you wanted Lorien but I just want to say: cool! [8D]

quote:Originally posted by Caroo

WERE ALL GONNA DIE!!!

[:)] Hope not- just these toys are far too crazy to play with, and the people who get to play with them can't be trusted with a box of matches imho...

Cool is not the word I'd use- they are amazing photos. Mindboggling.

I gather China has stopped sending food and fuel aid to NK not because of the missile tests, but because NK stole the trains the last aid shipment was sent on. They sent the crew back over the border without the trains.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1660166/posts

edit: that's not quite what the link I provided says- I found something a couple of days ago and googled "north korea train theft china" to get this one. Take with a grain of salt. It looks likely NK have been stealing aid trains, and China has kept on sending them.

You can find more photos at http://simplethinking.com/home/rapatronic_photographs.htm

and here http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=456 with some tidbits

quote:
Before long a professor of electrical engineering from MIT named Harold Eugene "Doc" Edgerton invented the rapatronic camera, a device capable of capturing images from the fleeting instant directly following a nuclear explosion. These single-use cameras were able to snap a photo one ten-millionth of a second after detonation from about seven miles away, with an exposure time of as little as ten nanoseconds. At that instant, a typical fireball had already reached about 100 feet in diameter, with temperatures three times hotter than the surface of the sun.

Thanks to atomicforum.org here are a bunch more still. Colour photos (I don't think they were made with a raptronic). The 2nd and last in particular are f**cking scary.

http://img455.imageshack.us/img455/8116/bombah18testno62et.jpg

http://img455.imageshack.us/img455/4149/procyonbreakaway8gd.jpg

http://img480.imageshack.us/img480/701/tsar449fj.jpg

http://img498.imageshack.us/img498/3027/tsar450im.jpg

http://img498.imageshack.us/img498/8550/tsarfireball7xt.jpg

Theres actually a brilliant BBC show specially about this, with some tremendous live footage of fusion tests from both US and Russia - some 180 odd air tests, before they decided they should prolly be doing it underground. The Russian one was the freakiest, it was the supposedly largest ever above surface test ever done, and the plane that dropped it barely escaped the blast (was apparently quite busted when it got back to base). I'll see if I can find the vid.. really quite unbeleivable - esp putting so much radioactive material into our atmosphere.. way to go big thinkers..

Not BBC.. was this one. If you want a serious scare.. you gotta see that 58 Megaton mother going off.. its a little unnerving to think these are 'old' weapons.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00000IML5/002-7381387-3757617?v=glanc…

The bomb that took out Hiroshima was around 1 kiloton (equivalent to a million tons of TNT- except that all the energy is released in the first few microseconds, making it far worse).

58 Megatons is 58 000 times worse... And although a larger bomb has never been made all they have to do is keep pumping in more hydrogen isotopes to get more yield.

Here's the wikipedia writeup of this russian monster http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba

Apparently the mushroom cloud was over 60 kilometers high, and this bomb would have caused people 100kms distant third degree burns.

People like Caroo are lucky- you guys/girls have grown up without anything like the threat of total anihilation that us oldies remember. Sting put it well:
quote:
But what could just save us me and you is if the Russians love their children too.

I hope the North Koreans do.

There was a great quote a man said once.. can't remember who it was. but it's a valid quote.

"Every generation of the human race past 1900 beleaved for a time that they would be the last generation to be alive on this world."

And it is true. But guess what... They havn't been. And this event will stand testiment to it.

North Korea will not nuke anyone. The concept of total annhilation, while maybe appealing to the dictator, would be the last thing wanted by all the generals around him. And the people as a whole in North Korea wouldn't exacaly find the idea of being the worlds undoing an appealing title ether.

victory through total devastation has only been done once. And it changed the world for the better, Including the country it was thrust upon.

I think the Americans are more likely to nuke someone (again! the US is the only nation to have used WMDs in war). Only a few months ago the worlds top 1000 physicists felt they had to remind Stupid George that using nukes is suicidally insane- he'd been making noises about wanting to use bunker-busting "tactical" nukes.

That doesn't make this OK at all though.

I think my generation (I'm firmly in X, heading up to 34 all too soon) has alwas hoped we wouldn't be the last alive. We are probably more aware of how close things came than generation Y though.

I think its actually the opposite, but we dont have the constant percieved threat (like the 70's and 80's), but the threat is alot more likely. There was an excellent documentary about the Russian security problems with their nuclear arsenal (an ex-nuclear scientist even took the reporter into a nuclear research facility, through a hole in the fence out the back!). The real problem is the US though - they produce threats to maintian their control of their free-thinking population. And they have shown in the past how happy they are to use nuclear weapons even when it was unnecessary (Nagasaki and Hiroshima were scientific tests - the Japanesse ambassaor had already given the US a peace offer). Way to go, to kill 70,000 people on the premise of science.. eh. More interesting is straight after those tests the Japanesse allowed many hundereds of US 'personel' to go and inspect the sites and take samples.... sad really.

Just a thought.. do you think it interesting/odd that there be a suddenely huge threat created to the US, just 4 months before their elections? Do you think it a little odd that NK suddenly not decide to launch one test missile.. but a whole flurry of them (apparently a good portion of their long range stock)? Seems very convienient .. especially if it escalates and requires a 'strong president' to take action... :)

.. Roosevelt was the only president to have a more than 2 terms in office.. do you know why :)

"Today I am become Death"
Quoted by J. Robert Oppenheimer

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists maintains [url="http://www.thebulletin.org/doomsday_clock/current_time.htm"]The Doomsday clock[/url]

1991 : seventeen minutes to midnight
Today : seven minutes to midnight

1980 : seven minutes to midnight
1981 : four minutes to midnight
1984 : three minutes to midnight

and in 1953: two minutes to midnight is as low as it has yet been.

Another freaky stat - 330 total atmospheric 'acknowledged' nuclear tests by US and Russia combined (with US having the 180 odd on their own). Alot of researchers put this total at only half of the actual tests though - since there were a massive number of 'secret' tests that violated the treaties both the US and Russia signed (as well as other non signees like China). Just a single megaton atmospheric test was shown to have dropped radioactive fallout around the entire circumference of the earth (at about 11 degrees latittude from where the test was done in the pacific). Makes you wonder - with many of the fallout isotopes having half-life's measuring thousands of years.... and most are deadly if inhaled.... how silly we are...

Here's another example of how silly we are

http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=167
quote:
the Strategic Air Command (SAC) in Omaha had decided that these locks might interfere with any wartime launch orders; so in order to circumvent this safeguard, they pre-set the launch code on all Minuteman silos to the same eight digits: 00000000.

For seventeen years, during the height of the nuclear crises of the Cold War, the code remained all zeros, and was even printed in each silo's launch checklist for all to see. The codes remained this way up until 1977, when the service was pressed into activating the McNamara locks with real launch codes in place. Before that time, the the lack of safeguards would have made it relatively easy for a small group of rogue silo officers or visitors to implement an unauthorized nuclear missile launch.

God Bless America...

Edit: seems to be some contaversy over this- people calling each other liars and such. HOWEVER I can't imagine the Amercian military being overly enthusiastic about this coming out, and one of the sources cited in the link is very reputable indeed.

As one of the comments says "For some reason the words 'Military Intelligence' are coming to me, in a rather sarcastic tone."

Painting found in a minuteman launch control facility

From http://www.geocities.com/minuteman_missile/index.html (site now down for bandwidth over utilisation)

[img]http://www.sumea.com.au/forum/attached/lorien/200671082821_minuteman_pi…]

I love those rapatronic photos.

*finds copy of Trinity & Beyond to watch again* - such a great doco.

you know with all this talk about nukes..and the power of a nuke.. i think it would good to put things in perspective..

watch this.. then your nukes arn't all that scary:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2002996851503214453&q=meteor

and remember. We have NO defence against meteors X3

:) thing is meteors are one offs, we don't make them or chuck them at each other when having our little tantrums, and there's something like 30 000 nuclear bombs around still.

Amen - the doco on Russias deteriorating arsenal of nuclear warheads, was far scarrier than even Trinity. The fact that the gov often doesnt have enough money to pay the guards maintaining security at storage sites is insane. They even showed how easy it was to get inside these places. Id also take an asteroid anyday... death by radiation sickness .. or by vapourisation, or a tun of rock / water landing on you. :)

Also.. nuclear arms are just another example of how utterly infinitely stupid we are as a collective. You cant blame a rock for stupidity - really would be doing the galaxy a bit of a favour I think :) It always make me laugh how important we think we are, in the grand scheme of things we are a blip in the evolutionary tree.

Totally off-topic, but are you sure you're not an atheist Grover? [;)]

You think that?s scary, then try looking up [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_oil"]Peak Oil[/url]
There are a lot of sites around now describing very scary outlooks on the future, like [url="http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/"]this one[/url] for example.

Apparently civilisation as we know it is about to end.[:0]

Im glad Peak Oil is finally becoming a talked about thing. Pity its too late to actually do anything about it.

I admit to never having played a Monkey Island game (though it's on my ever lengthening to-do list), but I've been reading his [url="http://grumpygamer.com/"]web blog[/url] for some time now (when it's actually updated that is) and I very much enjoyed this interview.

If you do ever play one, make sure its either the original or number 2, the other 2 after that lacked the atmosphere of the originals. If you find a copy of them (or download them...) or any other Lucasarts adventure game its best you use the ScummVM to run them properly on todays machines. Give it a go, its worth it [:)]

Oh and while we're on the subject of games with great storylines, EVERYONE needs to play Grim Fandango.

I have some incredibly fond memories of LucasArt's SCUMM adventure games. Maniac Mansion, Zack Mckracken and the Alien Mindbenders, Day of the Tentacle, Monkey Island 1 and 2, Indiana Jones and Last Crusade, and Sam and Max Hit the Road. They all had fantastic stories which really took you on an adventure, and offered bundles of humour as well. There're so many famous (well, to those who've played them) one liners and quotes from all of those games. I'm not sure if I'd have the patience to play those games these days though. Sometimes when you get stuck, you can stay stuck for weeks (this was the time before the internets and information/solutions weren't as easy to come by!).

I wish Ron Gilbert would do more of his flash comics. [url="http://grumpygamer.com/comic-5692"]They're hilarious[/url]!

"thats the seccond biggist duck i've ever seen"

Herman Toothrot: If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, what color is the tree?

[The player must now go through 40 or so answers before finally being allowed to select:]

Guybrush: All colors?
Herman Toothrot: Exactly. Now, what has this experience taught you?
Guybrush: That philosophy isn't worth my time.
Herman Toothrot: I'm very impressed. It takes most people years to reach this point.

look behind you! a three headed monkey!

He doesn't understand the difference between a single email and the internet...

quote:
Ten of them streaming across that internet and what happens to your own personal internet?

I just the other day got, an internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday and I just got it yesterday. Why?

Did someone hire this guy to explain video games to Phil Ruddock?

Wow - thats some pretty scary rambling. Especially the last bit when he tries to wrap it up as a reason for not having any change to net neutrailty. Man, you gotta wonder what these people are smoking.

Why not get advice? In a position like that? Surely they would have consultants to provide a decent picture for this nugget to understand? mah.. more examples of the stupidity of the US and their policy making I guess :)

I thought Totally Rad was one of the best games
ames ever. At that point in my life Bill & Ted were role models, and I thought it rocked. :P

Scott.

ROFL! [:D]

I especially liked Wargasm... and the comment under it, 'I think George Bush has these.'. Classic!

Yeah, we'll go and take a few photos, play some games, molest Mario, etc

Thanks for sharing this information. I found it very informative as I have been researching a lot lately on practical matters such as you talk about...

what the hell is this guy shitn on about?

buffy was crap as.

was never such a great fan of buffy, but from random exposure to it and other recent sci-fi, starting to be quite amazed at how (dare i say it) post moder the dialog tends to be. verging towards self aware, at least of the irony of the often ridiculous situations that the characters find themselves in.

(perhaps not that accurate)
'so what was it like' [to be evil willow]
'totally consumed by evil, so much that you could taste it'
'what did it taste like'
'a bit like chocolate'

he also did firefly/serenity, and if you dont like them... well i question your taste [:p]

I liked that! He's kinda funny. I thought he really had a point, particularly in the bit where he was talking about how we relate to the strong female characters and how men find they can relate as well. There's something different in a storyline when the protaganist is a woman... that's what I reckon.
But yeah, I enjoyed it.

ditto denz. spot on.

I love Buffy especially the early seasons, however Angel and Firefly are just brilliant. Joss writes awesome characters.

Its disappointing this continues to be an issue in Australia.

New Zealand has an R18 rating, but the classification office still has the ability to ban games if they consider them harmful to society (the games I recall being banned are Manhunt and Postal).

We also have legislation in place which makes it illegal to sell games to persons below the rated age, or to buy them for someone below the rated age (even if you are the parent). Though in reality this isn't really that well enforced (this is slowly changing though).

If Australia were to adopt this system then it would provide a mechanism for adult Australians to access more mature content, while putting additional controls in place to ensure minors didn't end up with inappropriate material.

Its frustrating to see games not really being taken seriously (because games are only for kids, right?) year after year.

Our Attorney General is a wonderful bloke... Just ask him about Escape from Woomera if you want to really piss him off [:)]

I've been told it's Phillip Ruddock who decides whether we have an R rating. He's same guy who was minister for immigration when Sharaz Kayani doused himself with petrol and set himself on fire in front of parliment house...

from http://www.isiswomen.org/pub/wia/wia201/young.htm
quote:
The Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs and the minister Phillip Ruddock have been quoted on various occasions as estimating that it will cost Australian taxpayers $750,000 (US$383,925) to provide the necessary care and medical treatment for Mr. Kayani's 10-year-old daughter Annum who has cerebral palsy. But although Mr. Kayani has written the Australian government pledging not to expect "one cent" from the authorities for care for his daughter, this had no impact on his application, which has been pending since September 2000.

Guess why he set himself on fire... [:(]

I haven't even heard that this game was being made, and it's peaked my interest a bit since I really liked the movie. (Off to find out more on the game)

the latest update on Gamasutra about this includes some examples of the violent content that lead to this game being banned. Some pretty horriffic stuff in there, so I can totally see why they wouldn't want this played by minors. Certainly this is
an adult's game that was banned because it is unsuitable for children, if you need a more blatant example of the flaw in the Australain rating system, I don't know where you'll find it.

Anyone else think this will all be a non-issue in the very near future, now that digital distribution is becoming a more common and better alternative, considering the markup we pay on games when we buy from local retailers?

Logically - you're all correct. There should be a 18+ rating for games so that the adults can enjoy adult games [though...truly.. as most games banned has been snuff/torture related, I don't think "Mature" or "Adult" is the right way to categorize this stuff.]

These games are not for kids. They where never designed for kids and more to the point games are getting to the point where the frequency of games aimed at adults is quite high. Therefore the rating system needs to be reviewed and retooled.. it WILL happen.. but only when the ratings board gets refreshed with new blood.

personally, I think anything Tarrenteno makes or assists with is a load of streaming shit. But I?m a vast minority on this. Most love him like the sun shines out of his ass.

I agree, it was really impressive, one of the coolest abduction scenes in a game! And the whole portal thing going on is really cool

Very cool game, and very polished looking graphics. It never ceases to amaze me how good looking the doom 3 engine is for metal + interior scenes, but I do hope they have other levels with different settings though! I love how a lot of things are interactive at the pub (you can even play the games at the arcade machines), and the effects when everything gets sucked to the spaceship is pretty cool.

The demo was awesome, I was sucked in right from the start and I loved every minute of it.

Hrm. I musta missed something. Lets see... tunnels.. indian.. spirits.. lots more tunnels.. alien bad dudes.. door key puzzles.. more tunnels (and some crates)... more alien bad dudes.. oh.. spirit door key puzzles..

Is it just me.. but I am so sick of tunnels. And so very sick of door key puzzles (its really quite stupid to be calling them puzzles even - sorry). Oh.. I forgot.. the grav and portal thing.. sigh..

I hate to say it.. imho, its so much more of the same, with different camera angles... woop.

So many horrible cliche moments too.. maybe have played too many FPS's.. getting old and grumpy, but Id love something that gets me thinking, and exploring. I _HATE_ 'fps on rails' games (Ie linear paths for everything, no thinking required). Gimme some Oblivion.. or similar anyday.. 5/10 for me.. even the gfx I thought were a little too monotonous and classic dark/doom styled. I know it makes all the lighting effects stand out more.. but geez.. theres only so much of dark tunnels that I can take..

Bitter... bitter old man.

Actually I think Grover is kinda right, but... I think they have well used the portal technology and the "localised" physics - even if it is nothing more than sticky walls, not really localised physics.

It is interesting that portal technology has been in use since Quake 2, if not the original Quake - if I recall correctly - but never been used this way. I suppose it has taken the hardware some time to develop to a point where it can be effectively achieved - something I've most certainly wanted to see since I first read about what the technology could potentially achieve.

I haven't played the demo, no way in hell it will work to any satisfaction on my notebook - and I would probably get more quickly bored at it than Grover - but I have seen vids, and some of those door "puzzles" are kind of cool Grover ;). But yeah, looks linear with heavily scripted and generic AI. Heavy with the indoor surreal, sci-fi horror atmosphere, with no real depth of scenario.

But hey, who says it has to be Oblivion - maybe pure FPS is enough with pretty graphics and original use of tech is enough.

Bitter... bitter old man. :P

Well what Grover and Cynical are saying is quite true now that i think about it more, a week after I played it. The novelty did wear off abit, however i'm still pleasently impressed. Having played many recent fps games it was kinda original and they seem like they have a good thing going, i'm curious to see if the rest of the game will keep up the pace of the demo, it could get repetitive.

The problem isnt with prey, the problem is with fps games in general, they dont tend to think out of the box too much. With presy they did slightly, but at its core its pretty similar to Doom/quake etc. I'm not really a fan of the genre so i really dont care either way. One game that has caught my attention however is Bioshock. It seems like it will be more than you standard corridor crawler, but who knows.

Skunx - yeah what you say is quite true. Its more to do with the genre I guess, than this particular game (and of course my 'old bitter man' tastes too :) ).

I'll say what I did like, and that was the begining. I like immersion, where you have a tangible feel for a universe that can be associated with some sort of reference point (not sure that makes alot of sense.. but hey). But what breaks these games for me (and has done since early FPS, although there were a few amazing ones that didnt) is the suspension of belief. If I am in a pub and I cant open a door, and am forced into a particular position, location and action (with pretty much no other option), I am less playing a game, and more watching a movie.

If I want to watch a movie I'll put on the Madagascar DVD and have a laugh, when I play a game, Id like a challenge and an experience that doesnt bind me to dotted line gameplay. Prey is actually more like a dotted line game play, because you cant go back to other areas (nice for design, bad for gameplay). Even Doom allowed simple things like this. Sure, I may be picky, but to me its a hampering restriction of gameplay.

This is a bit of a long rant again, but I'd like to show a couple of examples of old (very old games) that showed you could have fun and thinking in the one game. Terminator Future Shock, was a brilliant example imho: Sure there was a tun of door key solves, but there was also a huge amount of different areas to explore and detour through. Outcast: While not really a fps at all.. its the open gameplay and the ability for the player to choose their path through the game, and in the same manner more recently GTA, which is why I beleive GTA is so utterly popular like the Sims. The gameplay is much more left to the user for the decision making, than the designer.

We have had FPS's for over a decade now, and the fact a modern FPS cant jump of the rails and give an interactive and explorative experience says something about how 'locked-in' game design for fps's are these days. Far Cry is probably the most recent example of open FPS play, however it was still very contrived. I think games like Battlefield have gone a long way to help open up the genre, or maybe create a new genre, but I sure would love to see a FPS break the mould for once - and actually do it. Imho Prey does nothing for the FPS world, is just another one like the other ones with some gimmiks to make people think they are getting something new. Imho, a bit of a shame for this genre... theres so much scope left in this genre.. if only people would make that step, theyd have a GTA sized hit on their hands.

I should note, there are some that have tried to tackle this idea, and with good/interesting results. I think Mafia was a pretty decent effort, albeit a little 'un-fun' in many places, but that was more to do with the missions than the game env (which was amazing).

Id love to see a re-focus of many genres back on gameplay now, because tech wise there are little differences between games nowadays (to the average user), and we have had games rely on tech for so long as the core reason to play/buy them.. its about time gameplay became prevalent again. Wouldnt it be great to see bullet points on a box talking about gameplay features rather than "lastest DX shaders" or "advanced physics system"... mah.. bitter bitter old man.. sorry.

Future Shock (or Skynet) was great, though, breaking your ankle trying to walk up steep ground and dying instantly, was a major down point to the whole game IMHO - you could also see further into the distance from the corners of your view point among other things, but I was too young to care :). Never played Outcast but wish I had, might see if I can get a copy from somewhere. Meet the guy behind the voxel terrain engine, Yves Grolet is a really nice and funny guy - he consulted on a project I worked on.

Found Far Cry to be kind of boring though :/

Yves Grolet made a truly interesting engine - Appeal was even kind enough to go in quite detail about it 'back in the day'. Oddly.. I think with the processing power we have now it could really make an utterly spendid scene.. ahh the good ol days. :)
http://www.appeal.be/products/page1/Outcast_GDC/outcast_gdc_1.htm%20 (sadly dead now - was a very good, detailed doc on voxel rendering, animation and all sorts).

Probably the best score for a game I have ever heard too - Moscow symphony with brilliant emotive slides during the game.
http://www.outcast-thegame.com/gallery/audio.htm

Holy crap that soundtrack kicks ass!! Nice one grover [8D]

Hehe.. if you can find a copy of the game (almost impossible - even an abandonwarez one) the whole score comes on a seperate CD - its just one of those awesome symphony's that really do great justice to the game itself ( The game movie intro is amazing on its own! ). One of my all time fave games, especially the forest level where you can climb trees an look out across such a huge expanse.. ahh.. voxels.. the good ol days.. man Im feeling old.. :) .. soz.. back to Prey... dont like it. :)

haha that's awesome - I'd soooo play a point and click DS adventure game of that. Loving the colour seperation.

sweet

It's going offline on July 16

Why were they using Renderware for a non-commercial project? o_O

quote:Originally posted by Souri

Why were they using Renderware for a non-commercial project? o_O

That decision had been made before I joined the project. A couple of programmers had experience with it.

Renderware caused the project thousands of issues- both legal and technical. I've been asked not to discuss them I'm afraid.

However if anyone would like to ask stuff about acmipark this thread seems like a good place.

I just found a lengthy rant about acmipark by Helen Stuckey (boss of the acmi games lab) on firstmonday http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/special11_2b/stuckey/index.html

As usual she's saying some nice stuff about my sound programming [;)]

I still to this day wish we could've pitched HotDogs HotGals to Hooters and used their licence instead of sticking to the original IP, I cannot fathom why the CEO didn't want to do it, I think it would've been perfectly suited to it and made me millions... coulda had a whole meal deal thing like this, woulda been able to play with all the big round bouncy things, not to mention the baloons as well, and think of the launch party!!! jesus!!!

<.< yeah.. But being EA games you feel as if your getting a bargin from saten....

Allready taken advantage of it. 34.95 for battlefield 2? sooooooooold. Been meaning to buy that game for a long time. I was allmost tempted to ask them to just skip the pizzas and bring the game round (btw it comes to about 40 with delivery) but saved me cooking dinner one night.

I've already bought Battlefield 2, and the others I'm not really interested in - they're good games, but I wouldn't spend too much time on them. If they had something else on offer, like Guild Wars or another online game, I'd be so onto it [:)]

Well Gavan mate. Welcome to sumea and good for you on taking yet another step closer to getting into the industry. Taking the time to meet and greet others.

In whatever you want to do take this piece of advice that many have said to me.

Be passionate about the job. Sure it's filled with tales of shit and woe , but it's only by positive thinking and working and trying to achieve that which others wont that the industry fills with better people.

Be nice to others. Both the rich and poor classes work in this industry and try to maintain friendliness and never snob off others if you have been given opportunities that others cannot afford. The only people below you are those who treat others as tools and items and not as talented people.

Even if this sounds overly dramatic, just keep it in mind. Be a nice bloke.

Cheers.

Nicley said Caroo

Welcome to the site, Twinsen [:)]

Welcome to the party