Madus_Maximus

Wow a whole THREE players?! I love it how modern games boast they can have like 16 vs 16 player games, and that's a big number apparently, then you go back about 10 years (even further) and you see games for like 32 vs 32, 64 vs 64, or with OFP, whatever your system and the server can handle pretty much. Gaming has taken massive steps backwards over the last few years in everything but the technical side. Gameplay sucks in pretty much everything out there, or it's no different than what you played years ago, it just has shilghty more polygons in the models.

CM burnt many people waaaaaaaay before their latest foray. They're well known for poor short term support of their games and for over promising, under delivering on things. Their reputation precedes them. Sadly for them, it's not a good reputation.

They lost me when they mentioned the use of the Ego engine.

That was the problem. All "mods" were actually hacks in the literal sense. They really should have used a different engine for it. They have too much vested in Ego for them to let people see how it works, which is another reason why it was a very bad decision to use it for a game of the size and scope of "Operation Flashpoint" (that still makes me want to spit every time I say it now. DAMN YOU CODEMASTERS!).

I wonder if they came to the conclusion that their "Award Winning Ego Engine" is obviously not up to the task of something of this scale? Be interesting to see what they do for the "sequal" assuming they bother now. I hope they do bother, I could do with another epic laugh like this gave me.

Don't say that "over there" or you'll get banned!

Yes there are, that's why there's laws governing it. Intel was and is a monopoly, there's even stricter laws they have to abide by due to that. They broke those laws, they got called out on it and are €2billion less well off. It's just a slap on the wrist compared to what they make, but short of splitting the company up or forcing them to cease trading there's not much else they can do.

"Of course, as AMD did. If you can't win, whine that the guy who is beating you isn't playing fair. Sour grapes and all that." That's the thing though, Intel WEREN'T playing fair. A €2billion fine by the EU courts goes some way to show that point, and they're being investigated by the US DoJ too for the same thing.

Not so much that, but the way they're written to take advantage of the multiple threads and so on. Look at things like the SunSPARC CPU's, they have 64 threads per core and 2-4 cores per CPU (or something similar). On a single thread basis, something like a Core 2 Duo will decimate them in terms of performance, but if that software is written for true multi-threading rather than one or two at a time, the SunSPARC CPU absolutely obliterates any Intel (or AMD) on the market. If you write the software properly from the beginning you get more out of it in the end, and those more powerful peices of hardware can be scaled more. Look how poor performance is (comparitively) on the i7's in most games, then look how a Core 2 Quad/Duo performs in the same game. They're more or less the same dispite the i7 being a much more powerful chip, but the software isn't made to take advantage of those extra cores and threads and so on, so it bottlenecks and dissapoints (then makes you think you wasted your money on it for a gaming rig lol). One thing I find quite interesting with all this is that AMD are actually leading the way in terms of tech and architecture. Intel just happen to be able to implement AMD's ideas on a much larger scale than AMD because they have a much larger fab capacity. The "revolutionary" design of the Nehalem CPU's is VERY VERY VERY similar to the Opterons, Intel just manage to get them smaller and to the production stage faster and have much more marketing weight behind them. AMD have been focusing more on the server market recently, but when they start to focus on the desktop market again we'll see them slowly claw their way back up, much like they did with ATI. NVIDIA had a nice stretch with no real competition, now look at the 5XXX series.

Methinks all vegitation uses Linda, at least in ArmA 2, I'd suspect so in ArmA 1 too but I'm not 100% sure on that (it'd make sense though). The best "tech demo" would be VBS2, it does more than ArmA 1 or 2 can do, but it's not free. Maybe you should email BIS about it. Is there a particular reason you want to know this? Like maybe try making your own game on top of it or something? Or just curiosity?

The iPad wasn't recieved all that well because people overhyped it and it's not yet clear to most just where it'll fit within the market. Give it time and we'll see if it works or not. They expected it to be the second coming with God tagging along to say hi too. That's one of the problems with Apple (well, not Apple, but the community around it), they're forever expected to pull of miriacles every time they hold some sort of event. The tech news world loves Apple news because they know it'll generate click throughs and give them ad money, so every little tiny peice of news and rumour is posted and then pulled apart and over analysed. Sometimes you get something that beats even the rumours, like the iPhone (say what you want about it, but there's no denying it's changed the entire mobile phone industry. Before the iPhone most UI's were made for buttons and were clutterd and confusing to use and had features that were either never used beyond the first try, or were just poorly implemented. Since the iPhone everyone and their dog has a touch screen phone with a more simple user friendly interface and everyone seems to be coming out with their own App Store). At the end of the day it's personal preferance. You may think Macs are overpriced and useless, and for your needs, maybe they are, but to someone else they're the best solution. The media industry is a perfect example. Media creation is faster on a Mac, either literally so (as in things are processed faster within OSX than Windows even on the same machine) or the interface allows more efficient productivity. When I'm editing stuff in Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign and swapping between them all the time, you have no idea how god damn useful Exposé is until you don't have it. It's mostly about time saving and getting from A to B faster with as few clicks as possible. On the gaming front. Nope, not as many games come out for Mac as PC, but then not many games come out for PC these days either. The days when a monster rig was a must have for gaming is going the way of the Dodo, instead those monster rigs will turn into media editing rigs to actually make use of that power, even then, an uber gaming rig still holds no candle to a Mac Pro in content creation. But then that's two different architectures and two different tools for different tasks. A desktop is generic and can be used for gaming, a Mac Pro is a workstation and is more or less a server. It's more for high throughput over prolonged periods of time rather than bursts of performance used in gaming. Try doing the same workloads on an i7 rig as a Mac Pro. It'll do it, but the Mac Pro will be able to do it for longer and higher sustained rates (and a higher temp envelope too). Use what you need, or use what you have and make the best of it. I'd never in a million years tell a hardcore gamer to get a Mac, unless there's one that will play all they want. Most people get Macs for the OS, not the hardware, just like most people (power users) prefer PC's for the hardware rather than the OS. It's interesting in these sort of debates how folk slam the Mac for the price/hardware and so on but rarely sing the praises of Windows lol. Not many to be sung though in my opinion. EDIT: Oh and yes, Macs can run Linux. Intel Macs can run any x86 software (assuming you have the required OS installed too, obviously). The old PowerPC Macs can run Linux too, assuming they're compiled for the PPC architecture. SUN do a PPC version of Solaris too methinks which will run on old Power Macs. Ubuntu has a PPC distro too, although I'm not sure what version that's at, I cant say I've checked for a while. A lot of people turn their old G3, G4 and G5 boxes into Linux file servers for their home network, they're pretty damn reliable too from what I gather.

I think you missunderstood my point there. I was saying that most Mac users were once Windows users, meaning they understand both platforms because they've used them both on a daily basis as their primary system for however long it is, which means they're generally more rounded in their experiences. You can't have a credible argument if you've never used what you're claiming is crap can you? Most people don't like change, they think it's "wrong" or "stupid" if something is different when trying to achieve the same end goal. It's human nature, we like what we're used to and don't like to learn other ways. That's not to say either way is wrong, it's just what you're used to. ---------- Post added at 07:05 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:58 PM ---------- Apple do VERY well in the personal computer market, they just don't have as many users as Microsoft. That isn't to say one company is a failure and the other isn't. Looking at Microsoft over the last few years you could argue they've been failures. Vista, 360 (hardware wise, they've made sweet FA on the XBox compared to what they put into it), Zune, Windows Mobile, Bing. Microsoft make money by selling in massive bulk, like PC makers. They sell cheaper products in higher numbers to maintain their bottom line. Companies like Dell would LOVE the profit margins Apple enjoy with the Mac. OEM's make their good profit on the premium end machines, those premium machines which Apple own the market with. Most plus $1000 computers sold in the US are Macs, infact, 90% of them. That means Dell and HP and so on are losing their market with their top end machines and instead have to offer many much lower spec, lower quality and cheaper machines and sell them in rediculously high numbers. Microsoft doesn't care either way, they get the same fee from the licence if the PC is $100 or $100,000 which is why a lot of people slagged off the Laptop Hunter adverts, they basically said you're an idiot to buy a premium machine when you can get one that "makes do", their hardware partners bottom line was put at risk.

By the same token all the people who say Mac fans are like that, are just like this. They have an equally religous type zealotary of putting them down and calling them religious zealots and claim they all have the same charactaristics you listed. How ironic, don't you think? You also have to take into account that most Mac users were once Windows users. The majority of those users will have a much better and more rounded understanding of both systems (because they've USED BOTH for a reasomable length of time, not just messing around in the Apple Store or at School/College/Uni) and as such it's a more credible argument when they claim Macs are better than Windows machines. Using the market share argument is about as rediculous as you claim Mac users to be. We should all use say IE because most do? Or maybe we should all drive Fords because they have more users than Lexus? Dispite this small market share, they manage to make 9 in every $10 spent on any machine over $1000, they're premium products. Apple are about $500million short of Microsoft in terms of cash equity, well above the likes of Intel and Google, so that small market share really doesn't seem to hurt them any. They're as big a company as Microsoft on the financial side of things. Oh, and in regards to putting Windows on a Mac. It's there as an option. A lot of people who switch will still want to remain in the world they've been used to for all those years for certain things. Maybe they need to test browser copatibility in different versions of IE and other browsers within Windows? Even if browsers are on all platforms it doesn't mean they'll render exactly the same. Maybe they own a licence for some expensive peice of software in Windows and don't want to have to pay for it again (or jump through all the hoops to get it transfered) for the Mac version. Maybe they want to play a few games? Although that's becoming less of an issue with the drastic rate the PC gaming market is shrinking. It physically runs on the hardware so why not use it if you need it? Macs also run Windows better than PCs because the drivers are optimised for that hardware. With PCs the drivers are usually generic even when made for a specific bit of hardware (like GPU's, the same set can be used on many models), and the configurations are almost endless. Macs DO crash, most often caused by a 3rd party app, not the OS itself (Windows has become much more stable over the years so this is generally the case on Windows too). The most common culprit of Mac crashes is Flash, thanks to Adobe's lack luster efforts of making a decent plug-in. Macs CAN get viruses, but there's currently only 3 of them out in the wild and they can only be installed by the user. They normally piggy back another installer (almost always found in illegally downloaded software). The user need to put their password in to install things that access the root, and bam, the virus goes in along with the application you're installing. There's NO defence against user screw ups, but a well designed robust system helps reduce the problems caused by it. Mac viruses aren't destructive though, they're not really maclious in the sense that many Windows viruses are. They have to operate very different to do anything anywhere near as destructive, which as yet, nobody has been able to achieve (and it's not from lack of trying). UNIX OS's are just far more robust than Windows, period. Don't use the market share argument either, that's bull. It's simply easier to attack Windows. Being the most common helps, but being poorly deisgn is the main reason. Linux servers are the most common type of web servers, their market share compared to Windows server is similar to the Windows to OS X share on the desktop, yet Linux has far fewer viruses and malicious files hitting it than Windows server. More specifically, Apache vs IIS.

Someone mentioned Boot Camp a few pages back and I never saw anybody give him an answer about it. Boot Camp is a partition utility within OS X (it's free, it comes with the OS). It also installs all your drivers and so on and gives you control of things like your keyboard (Apple keyboards are slightly different layouts and don't have a Windows key, for obvious reasons) so you can map it and stuff and have access to the media keys inside Windows. When you run Boot Camp, it'll ask you how much space you wish to devote to a Windows install, then it'll restart and it'll install just like any other Windows installation. When it's installed you put your OS X DVD into the drive and load the Boot Camp drivers, which will install the drivers for the GPU, audio card, networking and all the rest. That's is, it's nothing complex. Windows also runs better on a Mac because the drivers are tailor made for that hardware, it's optimised. Quite a lot of "best Windows machine" awards have been given to Macs because of this. About the £35,000 config. I call BS. The highest price I could get a Mac Pro to is £16,330.89 incl. VAT. That's with literally all the most expensive options selected including adapters that aren't required, One-to-One traning, printer, MobileMe and 3 year Apple Care. You must have specc'd up an Xserve to come anywhere near that price or multiplied the Mac Pro by two. You can install OSX onto machines with an EFI (or by flashing the BIOS to be one, or emulating it). It's not exactly legal, but Apple have yet to say anything against it if it's for hobbiests. They just take issue if you then go on and sell those machines, like Psystar. On a side note. There's actually more custom hardware in a Mac than you think. It just happens to be of the same x86 architecture used in PC's. Ironically, PC's weren't made with off the shelf components so they were easier to upgrade, they were made that way because IBM didn't have enough time to come up with their own hardware and it was cheaper, then the clones appeared, thanks to some folks making their own BIOS that did the same as the IBM one much like how Macs are now, with their own EFI. EFI's are actually the prefered method these days by the way. Microsoft have been trying to get BIOS replaced with this for years, but board makers and OEM's don't seem to want to do it for some reason. EFI is a more modern up to date BIOS.

Quite literally from all accounts. How the hell did that pass Q&A? They's a MAJOR bug, or maybe all their test rigs are cooled by liquid nitrogen or something.

Just like the iPhone. Or the 360 with Microsoft, or PS3 and PSP with SONY, or the Wii and DSi with Nintendo. What's your point? A controled environment works better on these kind of things, there has to be quality control. Look how well the Android market is doing. Wow! AWESOME!

Hahahaha! That's awesome Sanc!

You're not the audience then, so don't buy it.

There's a few cities in the US that operate entirely on open source stuff, I think Chicago is one. They use Linux, OpenOffice, FireFox and so on. Only the media departments don't use OSS, they use Macs. A lot of the US Government branches have and are moving over to Macs too like the US Army, CIA, FBI and NSA. Even the White House is a Mac friendly place now. I think people are starting to see Microsoft for what they are. A monopoly who force their poorly coded or non standards software on you to force you to buy their other software if you wish to remain compatible. Their vendor lock in has stiffled innovation and growth in the industry, most notably the web. Their plan worked too well and now it's biting them in the ass lol. Their lock in has left them with IE6, which means each new version can't really be super standards compliant even if they wanted it to be because of their ties with their other tech that relies on their proprietary code and their versions of stuff (like ActiveX and their DOM).

The fail keeps coming thick and fast. It's the only thing prolonging the games lifespan, people looking for all the half assed poorly made crap and limitations. If this game does get a sequel (which apparently it's getting) then let's hope someone makes a counter marketting campaign to show what this one is like, maybe people will think twice.

It uses 3G for connecting where there's no WiFi (if you choose to get the 3G model). It has GPS. You can connect camera's to it should you wish and I'd be quite surprised if 3rd party manufacturers don't start making other things that connect with it via the Dock. There are a bunch of Apps for the iPhone that let you touch up photo's already, and 140,000+ of the iPhone Apps (ie: more or less ALL of them) work on it "out of the box". Let developers get their mitts on this and we'll start seeing some very interesting apps soon enough, just like with the iPhone. It's not even availale for pre-order yet, so let's wait and see what happens no? I remember when the iPhone was announced, people were saying it's useless and nobody would buy it, even Steve Ballmer (but he's an idiot who likes to badmouth his competition like that anyway). Look where it is now. It's dominating the smart phone market and has eclipsed Windows Mobile in just around 3 years, and Windows Mobile has had a decade or so head start. ----------------------------------- Oh and Apple patents lots of things for protection. They very rarely sue, it's most often the other way around. They use them in countersue cases. They got stung in the past by Microsoft when they released Windows, which looked a HELL of a lot like the Mac OS and functioned pretty damn similar too. They tried to sue but it didn't work because they couldn't own copyright on the concept and the contract with Microsoft allowed them to make "software with a similar looking and functioning menu system" because at the time they were making software for the Mac. They obviously didn't expect them to create their own OS from it and use the design of the Mac. Since then Apple has filed for patents on pretty much anything they research and develop. A good result (for Apple) of this patent hoarding came when Microsoft (Who were under invetigation by the US Justice System for anti-competetive conduct at the time) once again used something Apple owned, but they owned the patent on it this time and they decided to make a deal rather than sue. If you want to know, Microsoft used code from QuickTime to create a competing media player codec and player. This failed, they couldn't compete, and instead started to bundle Flash Player with IE for the task of media playback in the browser. This is why Flash is as prevelent as IE is now for better or worse. Apple made Microsoft a deal, many just see this as the "Boston '97 Deal" where Microsoft invested $150million in Apple shares (non-voting stock) and people claim they "bailed Apple out", which is rediculous if you look at some of their investments around the time. Just a year or so before they bought NeXT Step, Steve Jobs' company, for $400million in cash. Apple weren't in financial crap, but their reputation and product lines were and it couldn't last for much longer. Microsoft ended up having to pay Apple $2billion in damages for their copyright and patent infringements. Apple also got Mac Office out of it, with the same number of major releases as Windows got. OK somewhat off-topic rant done! It just gets my goat when people make sweeping statements without knowing anything about the background to whatever it is. As an extra side note: Apple make a miniscule (almost negligable) profit from iTunes Music/App Stores. They just about break even. The majority of the money they do make is put directly back into maintaining the system. It's not cheap running thousands of servers with hundreds even thousands of terrabytes worth of data on them. It's the rights holders (for music/movies) and develoeprs (App Store) who get the lions share.

Sure you can, but you still end up covered in shit.

As long as they don't use Operation Flashpoint in the title I won't care. The whole piracy excuse is just that, an excuse. If the game was good and didn't restrict the legitimate users (talking in general here, not DR which we all know has NO copy protection), and they added some sort of extra incentive to get a legit version (not just some crappy DLC like an extra rifle or something), then they'd still make a pretty good amount of money from the PC version. Look at Stardock, they make very addictive and well made games that run on a massive cross section of machines. It's gameplay over shiny and it works for them. I'm not saying this is the best approach for all games as some games are expected to have better graphics than others, but in general they should put the effort into making things work on maybe not the BEST machines but at least mid range ones. ArmA 2 does to an extent. It'll run pretty nicely if you have a decent GPU if the rest of your rig is "mid range". Stardock also have incentive to get the legit game by giving you extra content patches by registering with the code in the box. Not crappy token gestures like some naff DLC, but a good chunk of extra stuff for your game that's actually worth having. I think they work patches like that too. If you want fixes, get the legit thing. Supporting your game properly and fostering a good community is what sells PC games. Put a little extra effort to care about the people who use your products and make it known and that'll pay dividends. Look at BIS. They supported OFP for around 4 years after it came out, they're doing the same with ArmA 1 now. We know they'll do the same for ArmA 2. We know that even if the game starts out a little rough around the edges (or VERY rough around the edges lol) they'll polish them over time untill they're as smooth as can be, and we'll buy their next products because of it. We know they care about us and not just our money.

Nah, let them do it. They'll just fail faster and we won't have to put up with them as long.

For all those who "don't get it".