CobraA1

Reply to DRM problem with used copy in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

[quote]Is it really true that when you buy SoaSE and link your CD-key to an account, they stay together forever and thus screw over anyone unfortunate enough to buy a used copy containing that CD-key?[/quote] Basically, although I would not use those exact words. I personally like this a lot better than EA's invasive copy protection system. Maybe someday a transfer system can be put into place, but right now yes it is permanently tied to your account. Whether we like i

Reply to did you love homeworld/homeworld 2?? in PC Gaming Sins Forums

Yup, I loved Homeword and Homeworld 2 :). I liked the story, loved the sheer scale of the ships, and loved the way they managed to make 3D navigation simple. [quote]a) disable UAC disable DEP (data execution prevention) manually with command line[/quote] I just create an exception in DEP. No need to diable it. Shouldn't need to disable UAC, either. Start -> Control Panel -> System -> Advanced System Settings -> Advanced (tab) -> Performance /

Reply to Steam Launches Hit PC Games from EA in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Although Relic "owns" the homeworld rights they don't really have much of a say on what games they make anymore. THQ currently owns them and the rights but they have no current "known" plans for a sequal to homeworld 2. So anyone who wants homeworld back needs to write to THQ instead of relic.[/quote] Alas, this is the story for many great games - frankly, one practice I'd love to see stopped is the insanity of "rights" to games being separated from the original developers and

Reply to Google Chrome Gets Out of Beta in Personal Computing GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]32-bit browser never supports 64-bit plug-ins. Similarly, 64-bit browser never supports 32-bit plug-ins. This is the general rule for every OS - Windows, UNIX, or, any UNIX-like OSes.[/quote] Which to me is actually quite odd, considering how well the 64 bit OS itself handles 32 bit applications. I dunno about Linix, but 64 bit Windows normally works quite well with 32 bit applications. I'm wondering why browsers are different in that respect.

Reply to IGN: SINS is 2008 Game of the Year!!! And Best Strategy Game, Best New IP, and Most Innovative!!! in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

Great to see Sins winning so many awards - but some of the comments in IGN's comment section are kinda disheartening. I guess there [i]is[/i] a bit of a point to the game taking so long - to be honest, I make sure I have a lot of free time before I play Sins, because even on smaller maps, I know time is going to fly and it'll be many hourse of game play. This isn't a game you can finish in a short period of time.

Reply to Google Chrome Gets Out of Beta in Personal Computing GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]That's better. In Linux we face a problem with Java plug-ins. 64-bit browser don't recognize 32-bit plug-ins.[/quote] Alas, that's an issue in Windows as well. I ended up dumping 64 bit Java and going totally 32 bit Java because of of that issue. BTW, V8 is just JavaScript. It is not Java. You still need a virtual machine to run Java. JavaScript is not Java. Java is not JavaScript. To be more precise, what we commonly call "JavaScript" i

Reply to PC Game Piracy Examined in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Particularly now that I've reached an age where my reflexes are slowing, and I have to rely more on tactics and experience.[/quote] Yeah, you can only be young once. A lot of the new casual games look like fun, but I often ended up more frustrated than entertained. There's only so many times I care to restart and retry a level.

Reply to Google Chrome Gets Out of Beta in Personal Computing GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I think you wanted to mean - for Chrome, Google developed their own virtual machine.[/quote] No, I meant what I said. It's a direct compile to machine code . Starting at 24:34 in the video I linked to, they explain it. [quote]But, the most amazing news that I found about it is that it is Open Source. Is it true? I can't believe it.[/quote] It's true. Why are you surprised? Google has been a big player

Reply to Google Chrome Gets Out of Beta in Personal Computing GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]The Google Analytics stuff is just creepy, and getting darned near as ubiquitous as doubleclick.net tracking cookies.[/quote] I've got mixed feelings on this. As somebody who does a bit of web development, it is nice to see how many visitors you're getting, what browsers they're using so you know what to design for, etc. [quote]But, is this speed due to compromise the security?[/quote] Not necessarily. Right now, Chrome is the only browser that co

Reply to PC Game Piracy Examined in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I think game developers, artists and the media conglomorate in general need to realize that there is not an indefinite amount of cash to be had from their customers. The vast majority are like me, relatively low-wage income and we have to pay for the hardware to run their software, hardware to play the cd's and dvd's, televisions to display their programming. Then we've got rent, electrical, heating, clothing, food and what have you.[/quote] I have to agree with this. Give us a

Reply to HELP: good MMORPG in Everything Else GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I'm starting to feel like, what's the point of playing a game if you have nothing to "really" lose.[/quote] For me, the whole point of a game is really to get away from real life and its worries. dingbat91: I saw your post in the StarQuest forums, thanks.

Reply to HELP: good MMORPG in Everything Else GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]if your interested in a sci-fi mmo then may i point out starquest online[/quote] What is the subscription fee? They show all kinds of info about a 30 day trial, but I'd like to know how much it costs after the trial is over, which seems to missing from their website.

Reply to Google Chrome Gets Out of Beta in Personal Computing GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]I don't find too many options regarding security. What I really like is its speed.[/quote] Yeah, that's a bit of a problem - Chrome was a bit of a mixed bag for security. They got the architecture right, but the UI for handling security needed work. Good to hear it's fast, though. That, plus I liked the way you could detach and reattach tabs.

Reply to HELP: good MMORPG in Everything Else GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Is EVE online good enough to pay for?[/quote] Is EVE good at all? I've heard it's absolute anarchy. Personally, I keep falling back to WoW. I don't know why people dislike it. I suppose it's understandable if people don't have enough money. It all depends on your tastes. Some people like PvE, some people like PvP. Some people don't mind spending hours grinding, some people hate grinding. Personally, I like PvE and I hate grinding. But that's just me. Tas

Reply to Google Chrome Gets Out of Beta in Personal Computing GalCiv2 Forums

Out of beta already? That's pretty fast for Google. Usually the "beta" tag is permanent for their products. [quote]At the same time I've noticed that some scripts are not working with it.[/quote] Yeah, they use a custom JavaScript engine called "V8" that is supposed to be lightning fast. But it's not something that has had a lot of testing on a large scale, so I wouldn't be surprised if it had a lot of bugs. My biggest question is: Have they improved the security of th

Reply to PC Game Piracy Examined in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Sales are not pirated copies. If you sell a million copies of the game and a thousand people pirate it, that might look successful but the piracy rate is irrelevant.[/quote] Is it? How do you know that? It's a question of statistics and correlation. If you have some statistics available that proves or disproves a correlation, I'd be interested in seeing those statistics.

Reply to PC Game Piracy Examined in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

Not enough time for a full reply, but the article looks pretty good. . . . except the part about ring 0 access and emulators. I think he's confusing emulators (which only need access to a turing complete instruction set) with virtualizers (which work with the hardware to create virtual machines). Virtual Machines need ring 0 access, but true emulators don't need it. Other than that, good read so far.

Reply to To the Dev Team in Sins of a Solar Empire Sins Forums

[quote]3. Impulse. Sins is Linux compatible. Impulse isn't. You aren't going to bother with making Impulse Linux-compatible. That means that the people wth Linux will have to get their patches and micro-expansions some other way. Like through piracy. Dumb move.[/quote] For one thing, I don't see Linux as being offictially supported - a quick glance at the system requirements, and I don't see Linux listed anywhere. I would say that the compatibility is more accidental and not so

Reply to Software protection becoming an annoyance in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

Heh. This movement is growing. First Steve Jobs , now Gabe Newell, eh? Frankly, I think the old forms of DRM are slowly dying. They never worked, they didn't stop the pirates, and they inconvenienced the customers. SecuROM was the only company that really saw any benefits whatsoever. EA didn't really benefit because their games were still pirated. Wal-Mart didn't benefit because they had to deal with returns. T

Reply to Vista is gone - but it went down kicking and screaming in Personal Computing GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]- Better overall visual experience. Sure, Aero can be slow for older computers, but proper hardware provides a better experience...[/quote] On computers with video cards, Aero is actually faster due to using the GPU instead of the CPU :). It's a myth that you need a "high end" system to use Aero. Quite the contrary, I had a three year old card that ran Aero nicely. Aero capable cards can be found for $20 or less. For $20 I can turn any computer that runs Vista

Reply to Vista is gone - but it went down kicking and screaming in Personal Computing GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]He has Vista I have XP. My computer is faster.[/quote] Maybe it's the OS, maybe it's the computer. Maybe some things are fast, maybe some things are slow. Maybe in some places they made speed/feature tradeoffs. Maybe Vista works for some people. [quote]I was running XP (64bit) and had good luck with it but made the move to Vista 64bit because of the lack of software and driver developement for XP 64bit. [/quote] Agreed - 64 bit Vista has much more supp

Reply to Vista is gone - but it went down kicking and screaming in Personal Computing GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Some time ago I decided I'd had enough of Vista and would go back to XP. After 2 BSODS and explorer crashing when I tried to rename a file, I decided now was the time.[/quote] I haven't had a BSOD for quite some time; I'd guess a driver is to blame. I've had my share of BSODs in XP anyways, so I'm not sure XP is all that different in that regard. But I guess that doesn't matter now that you've made the switch. I plan on sticking with Vista myself. It has worked well for

Reply to Is there a negative correlation between a game's sys reqs and sales? in PC Gaming GalCiv2 Forums

Valve's hardware survey is a fine example of how to do things the right way: Instead of spending endless days philosophizing about it, they went ahead and gathered statistics. They don't need to make guesses about their audience - the have the numbers. That's probably the most valuable tool any game developer can have. Sure, people can philosophize about why the numbers are what they are - but at the end of the day, the numbers speak for themselves, and you'll pay attention t

Reply to Let's solve the piracy problem. in Everything Else GalCiv2 Forums

Let's pretend that you've been given the task of creating a demo for a game - what would you do?

Reply to GalCiv II on Linux? Should I bother? in Galactic Civilizations II GalCiv2 Forums

[quote]Oh, and I've had real troubles running GC2 under Vista on my brand-new laptop, as well (of course, I've had real troubles running Vista under Vista on my brand-new laptop -- even after SP1, Vista, well, sucks).[/quote] I'm curious to know what troubles you've had - I've had almost no troubles with Vista since SP1, and I've never had troubles running GC2 in Vista.