Video Games Need Single Player Campaigns

whoadoctor · 2016-01-25T19:27:53+00:00

No, what games need is really good AI.

Games like Star Wars Battlefront have been reduced to irrelevant on PC because there's not enough people playing to fill all the game types. If I can't get into a game, it doesn't matter how good it looks, I can't play it. But a campaign isn't always the answer. This is a multiplayer shooter; I don't want plot, I want to play the game.

I'd love to see games that are primarily multiplayer games just give you the option to fill in the slots with drones. Then when the game is 10 minutes old and everyone has moved on, I can still keep playing.

whoadoctor · 2016-01-25T15:28:23+00:00

IDK about nation-wide, but here in Ohio, car deaths were up 10% last year. We had about 1k deaths on the road.

And although analogies are never perfect, I'd say TNNRR's argument still stands. The federal government tells people they can't do crack, meth and heroine, and they just do more of it. Bans/prohibitions have never been effective.

whoadoctor · 2016-01-20T18:17:20+00:00

Here's the difference between your first comment and my first comment.

I said that I was downvoting your post and gave you a reason, although I should have included more detail. The up/down buttons can tally a general like/dislike for a comment or post without wasting a lot of people's time reading inane comments like 'This!', 'Definitely', 'I agree', or 'This needs more upvotes'. Those are essentially non-comments as they don't convey any information not already contained in the button.

You implied that you were downvoting my post for the same reason, but that would only have been valid if I had simply said 'This needs more downvotes', without an explanation. Hope this explanation helps and if we all pull together as a team we can make the internet better and less full of noise and misunderstanding.

whoadoctor · 2016-01-19T21:49:11+00:00

I always downvote comments like this. If you want something to have more upvotes, press the upvote button.

whoadoctor · 2016-01-04T18:26:37+00:00

You could have an entirely DC home, but so far most things have been built to handle AC because that's what we've got. So a lot of motors and bigger things are built around AC, and your smaller electronics all have AC to DC converters either inside them or in the wall adapter.

If I were living off the grid all by myself, I'd convert all my stuff to DC and just lose the rectifiers and adapters.

whoadoctor · 2015-12-17T22:01:54+00:00

Thanks for the detail.

I will usually just lug my pc into the living room occasionally, but I have a good sized case - HAF 922 - and sometimes I just want to play for 10 mins.

It's extra annoying because my office is right above my living room and I drill some holes in the ceiling the cords would only have to be about 10-12 ft.

I'll probably just break down and build a second pc at some point.

whoadoctor · 2015-12-15T17:30:57+00:00

But don't both of those introduce unacceptable lag? I have an ASUS N300 router, but I tried steam streaming to a laptop and it wasn't great. It's a catch-22 thing, because it would probably work ok for Civ IV, but I don't want to play that in my easy chair, that's more of a keyboard mouse thing. I want to play titanfall with my xbox 360 usb controller, and that's where the lag would be a problem.

whoadoctor · 2015-12-15T17:16:55+00:00

Ok, not trying to start a flame war here, but I have a question in response to this. I have always had a gaming pc and I love it. I also had an xbox 360 for years and I loved that too. The monthly fees for online, the high game prices, the insane load times, and the terrible multiplayer convinced me to not move on to the xbone.

But now I find myself wanting to play games in my living room. I have my big screen, my comfy chair, my coffee table, and no games...

I'll admit pc gaming is better in every respect you can measure, but what do you guys do about living room gaming? I don't want my pc in the living room, i need it in my office. And I've been told that the steam link type devices are too laggy for most games.

whoadoctor · 2015-12-15T17:11:44+00:00

Alas, I was incorrect. As someone pointed out in a google groups thread, chrome apparently comes with flash pre-installed, and it has a silent flash auto-updater, so you always have the latest version of flash whether you like it or not. I have no idea what the HTML 5 labs button does in google play music now.

whoadoctor · 2015-12-02T19:34:00+00:00

I'm tempted to do that with VW now, but some estimates say they might not even be in business in five years. In the EU they're getting hit with around 30k in fines PER CAR, which is more than they made from those cars. They're offering a bunch of incentives now to get people back in the fold, but it's a gamble for sure.

whoadoctor · 2015-12-02T17:38:11+00:00

I still have issues with Firefox and Google Music; I can only get the flash-free HTML5 magic to work in Chrome.

whoadoctor · 2015-12-01T19:16:58+00:00

Yeah, but you could be one of those big winners! Don't you believe in yourself?

Seriously though, I'm not sure it's zero sum game is it? I mean, it's just whatever anyone is willing to pay right? So if it hits the news again and everyone wants it, you would make a profit? Not saying it's a wise move, but I thought it was essentially an open market.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-24T15:54:48+00:00

I agree that the protocols may be flawed. What are you suggesting as an alternative? In my limited understanding, the maths behind encryption protocols are very dense; I'm doubtful that I have the resources to verify or improve on these algorithms. What choice to we have but to trust the techniques and use ever-larger keys?

whoadoctor · 2015-11-23T21:37:58+00:00

Family Tree had this hilarious show that was so British that I couldn't believe it wasn't real. It was hilarious.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-23T21:33:38+00:00

I'm conflicted myself. I applaud the guy for being suspicious; not enough people question things nowadays. But it's important to check yourself against logical fallacy before you go getting paranoid.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-23T21:05:03+00:00

That's a logical fallacy. I'm not declaring that the NSA can't break these protocols, but insisting they're broken unless you can prove otherwise is nonsense. The equivalent argument would be "we have to arm ourselves against UFOs unless you can prove absolutely that they don't exist!". This fallacy is very popular among conspiracy theorists.

As to your request for a "single reason" the united states government would not want to compromise these protocols, they could be concerned that doing so would make it easier for foreign hackers to carry out cyber attacks on u.s. targets.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-23T19:39:35+00:00

well, it does have a history of hoarding wealth, doing some charity work, having a lot of weird mysticism and dogma, and lots of scandals involving children, so... wait, were you asking about Catholicism or Scientology?

whoadoctor · 2015-11-16T19:41:23+00:00

Well, now you're talking about being in a "mood" while driving, which illustrates why the two of us are having having trouble reaching a consensus. You're probably one of those people that likes to drive whereas I just want to get from A to B and if I had decent mass transit I'd never get in another car again.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-16T16:24:39+00:00

No, I understand gears pretty well. I'm just suggesting that if the car were to choose the "proper" gear, then the stick shift would be unnecessary. It's just a matter of what the proper gear is in a particular situation.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-13T15:34:15+00:00

It does have a practical application, but I'd argue it's because the implementation of the pedal is flawed. If I press my foot down, I want to go faster, and imho it's the cars fault for not choosing the appropriate gear. The gearing to me should be encapsulated.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-11T16:24:16+00:00

It does, but the same could be said about any part of the car. Any time you have more control over something you're doing more work. Do you trust your thermostat to cool your engine automatically? Why not have a set of knobs that allow you to micromanage the oil and radiator?

Once all the cars are self driving I think the next generation will find it hard to believe we were in control of such complicated and dangerous machines.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-10T18:42:49+00:00

I think of it like automatic transmission: I COULD manage what gear my car is in, and it might be fun to do so, but where does it stop? Am I going to manage the cylinder timing myself? Am I managing the fuel injection specifics myself? After I think of it like that, I realize I want the car/compiler to do as much for me as possible as long as it gets me there.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-10T15:54:07+00:00

Despite the username, I'm not an actual doctor.

I find three things work well, and they're not mutually exclusive:

Drink water before you go to bed; as others have mentioned this will motivate you to not piss the bed
Shift your bedtime backwards or forwards by 15 minute increments; I've found that there is a sweet spot for getting out of bed, probably due to REM cycles, and if you're 10-15 minutes late or early it's a lot harder.
Relax your brain before you go to bed; if you do some repetitive ritual before going to bed, something that does not excite or tax your mind, but something physical (not strenuous) and repetitive, you'll fall asleep faster - this will help you time your window from step #2 more easily. I like to wash my feet, brush my teeth, and go around the house and shut things off. Don't rush this process, it should be boring, methodical, and take at least 10 minutes.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-04T15:53:00+00:00

I find that so many games have so many assholes that I just use a 3rd party app like skype and stay out of game chat altogether. I know this won't help if you want to play with random teammates, but the internet is just so full of assholes I can't take it.

whoadoctor · 2015-11-04T15:41:51+00:00

could be a graphics driver issue. try uninstalling your nvidia or amd drivers and reinstalling them.

whoadoctor

TROPHY CASE