OmegaUltima's Domain

DRM is going to be the next thing to kill Video Games.

2010-03-13T22:05:00.001+10:00

Video Games suffered at the hands of Clones and E.T for the Atari in the 1980's, eventually making the market crash.

In the 2010's, Video Games are suffering the problem of DRM by stupid video game companies.

I'm looking at Ubi-soft and EA.

Persistant internet connection my ass. Companies wonder why people pirate their games - It's because they obviously want to own the fucking game and not pay for a license.

Seriously, Steam is its own DRM. Why in the hell does secuROM need to be on STEAM?

Enjoy your annual loss at the end of the year.

RE: ACCM R18+ Article.

2010-03-05T17:19:00.001+10:00

During December 2009, The Australian Government began a public consultation into the Federal media Classification system and whether it should be modified to allow the introduction of an R18+ classification system for video games. This issue arose after the numerous banning of games including "Fallout 3" in 2008 and the widely anticipated "Left 4 Dead 2" in 2009, as these games could not be fit into the MA15+ rating due to their content and must be alterated in order to be allowed. Australia does not have an R18+ classification for video games, but does for other media content like movies and books.

As of the moment, over 55,000 submissions have been counted by the Government, both from parties who want the R18+ classification, and those who do not.

The Australian Council on Children and the Media (ACCM) an organisation owned by a private company called Youth Media Australia, who deal in raising awareness of certain media which is unsuitable for children released their own report in regards to the R18+ classification and why it should not be allowed.

The group are fairly well known for the fact that they publish opinionated reviews on media that have been reviewed by the Classification board on whether they're appropriate for children or young adults. This group also publishes opinionated articles on things such as violence in media. The reason I center around the word opinionated, is because this group makes a lot of accusations and doesn't bother to put relevant research.

Their publication focuses on rebutals on why we don't need an R18+ rating for video game, thus raising some concerns - Why we do need one, and why parents should want one.
----
1. "The average age of gamers is now 30"
ACCM response: The gaming industry and gamers make much of the supposedly maturing and gender-balanced population who play video games. So what? One can say the same thing about many populations, such as car drivers and alcohol users, without this being an argument for, in effect, making drinking or car driving more easily available to minors.

This is a straw-man arguement. One of many.

The statement simply reads; "The average age of gamers has reached 30. Thus, there has been a surge in content is being produced for that demograph."

The population of video games have nothing to do with Drinking, or Driving. Video games are an ageless medium. The ACCM implies that by the average, that must mean the current. As video games popularity rapidly grows, that average can only increase.

2. "There's no proof of harm":
ACCM response: The link between the consumption of media violence and violent behaviour is twice as strong as the link between passive smoking and lung disease and we have taken many precautions as a result of the latter.
The negative effects of violent media content have been established for decades but the evidence that violent video games, with their immersive, highly arousing, reward-the-punisher qualities, are harmful, is particularly clear and damaging. Sophisticated statistical analyses and longitudinal studies are able to discount the catharsis and correlation-is-not-causation arguments.

This was never on the R18+ Classification discussion paper. Regardless, attemping to link Video Games to Aggressive behaviour has always been a slippery slope, this current study has been a warzone for psychologists and other Doctors who've been studying the issue. One side has people who claim there is a link; such as C.A Anderson who's research claims the 'Book has been shut for 40 years on media violence', and other people who claim there's no evidence that suggests it's strong in comparison to real life factors.

The ACCM have taken a liking to Anderson's research and even the quote that "Video Games are worse than Cancer". But what Anderson doesn't note in his studies that GamePolitics.com reports - is the fact that in America, Europe and Japan, violence levels have sharply dropped since the 1960's; around the same time when TV media became very popular, and video games came around in the 1970's.

http://www.apa.org/science/about/psa/2003/10/anderson.aspx
http://www.gamepolitics.com/2009/03/17/researchers-suspect-quotperfect-stormquot-political-opportunism-game-violence-studies

The ACCM can go ahead claim there is a link in video games and aggressive behaviour. However there is still no concrete evidence to this day which supports this claim while not ignoring other factors.

3. "A large percentage of Australian adults want an R18+ for games":
ACCM response: The gaming industry make much of the 91% of a sample that answered yes to the question in a survey: "Do you think there should be an R18+ for games?" (in the same way as adults can easily access R18+ material in other media)? The disingenuousness of this motherhood question is remarkable. It is perfectly obvious that nothing like that percentage would say yes if the grisly content of R18+ games (not to mention their harmful effects and inevitable use by children) were explained to the respondents.

The ACCM makes a startling assumption that they believe that adults, even those who know what the R18+ classification would bring, don't actually know what counts as R18+ content. This is simply just reads "We know what's best for you."

When the consultation began, people received both sides of the debate to decide on; what happens if it was included and why it shouldn't be. It's reasonable, therefore, to believe that any reasonable person who contributed would've seen these, and voted on the correct choice with their decision. The majority choice we'll see when the consultation results are finallised.

The thing I see with the ACCM at the moment is that they're afraid of change. To this date their website features a lot on video game violence, but they have not provided any information on how to utilise the technologies content lockout system. It's not a foolproof method. But it's better than burying your head in the sand.

4.. "Content that is presently being squeezed into MA15+ will go instead into R18+"
ACCM response: The argument that some pretty violent material is currently being "squeezed" into the MA15+ classification, is surely an argument for stricter classification, not for releasing into an R18+ category.

Our classification system is already strict, making it more strict will create more problems, it will mean adult games get censored for even younger audiences.

What the ACCM is ignoring is that when a game that's intended for adult audiences that cannot come into the country, the publisher is permitted to tone down the game to be re-rated. If a publisher is determined enough to release the game to their audience, an R18+ rated game will eventually be censored enough to fit into the MA15+ rating.

The ACCM also ignores the fact that despite the level of censorship in a game, the underlying tones that the game was developed for adults remain.

The only way to combat this is to allow an R18+ classification. The content is released uncensored and not appropriate for children, but at least you can enforce that even with a parent, the game cannot be brought by or for a minor. This way games which fit appropriately into MA15+ are MA15+, and those which aren't are R18+.

5. "An R18+ classification will provide greater protection for children"
ACCM response: Violent games are harmful (see point 3, above), and if they are harmful to young adults, then a fortiori they are harmful to young children, many of whom will, inevitably, get access to them. Has the gaming industry found a way of ensuring this will not happen, a challenge that has so far defeated distributors of film, internet material, and magazines. Why stress the responsibility of parents to control access to R18+ videos and then make their task harder? (see further point 6, below).

A point to note again is that violent video games have not been connected to aggressive social behaviour no matter how much ACCM likes to tote it.

A very interesting thing here is that the ACCM claims that restricting children from playing restricted content has been "A challenege that has defeated distributors of film." In fact this claim is false, as current TV's, DVD's, Blu-Rays feature content lockout systems that will stop children from accessing certain content that's not suitable for them.

The only problem is parents need to first turn on this feature in order to use it.

I have to agree with the ACCM on the fact that it's inevitable that children will get their hands on such content one way or another. The problem with the ACCM is that they have committed no effort to report to adults on how to stop children from playing such video games with the current technology. Where-as a specific gamers group going for the A-G seat in South Australia, has.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuFV3cqpnFk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i57YxSq1HMY

Restricting something based on the idea that a child would get their hand on it may have been an option in the past, but with the technological advancements we have made over the past 10 years, it shouldn't really have to be the case anymore.

It's a very important thing to remember is that if you're a parent who wants to have R18+ content in your house, but doesn't want your child to get a hold of it and you're not willing to exercise your parental responsibility. Don't have it in your house hold.

" Parents should be more responsible"
ACCM response: Parents find that videogame use by their children is harder to control than use of TV or mobile phones, that is, if they are among the minority who actually pay much attention to classifications. A recent report from New Zealand, where R18+ games are freely available, is summed up by the sentence: "There is widespread disregard for restrictions." (http://www.parentline.org.nz/r18-means-r18).
I can understand parenting to be tough depending on the circumstances, whether you're a single parent or both parents are working. I believe it comes down to this however; common sense. Investigate your options as a parent, they are your child and you are responsible for them. Nobody else is.

It should be noted to many that the classification system act as a suggestion, not a mandatory guideline. An adult is allowed to buy a game not recommended for a minor at his or her will, but it comes onto the judgement of the parent and their responsibility. The classification is just there to act as a helper.

Todays technology should not limit parents in looking up this information online and reading reviews and determining for themselves if it's appropriate or not.

7. "Gamers know better than non-gamers that games are not harmful"
ACCM response: The gaming industry reports that gamers see games as less violent and harmful than non-gamers do. The implication is that they know better. But do they? The enthusiasm with which some gamers describe extremely violent games ("good harmless fun") suggests researchers who maintain that such games have a desensitising effect are right

I tried looking this up on Google but I found nothing. I don't even think the Gaming Industry would even say this. Are you making stuff up again ACCM? ;)

Technically this idea only proves that gamers know the difference between reality and fiction. Put a gamer in the middle of a war and I'd believe they'd know very well where they are and where they're not.

8."An R18+ category will allow the games industry to expand and grow"
ACCM response: The industry is already enjoying very healthy, 15% p.a. growth (retail sales in 2009 $2bn) If, as it claims, it is really concerned for the welfare, happiness and rights of "democratically-deprived" Australians, it would concentrate on promoting prosocial, altruistic videos. These have been shown to effectively encourage prosocial attitudes and behaviour in users.
In comparison to America, we are democratically-deprived as "Freedom of speech" isn't grafted into our constitution as a right like our American allies.

The ACCM reports their finding from the Global statistics, not Australia. Australia has a fair number of Game Development studios focusing on indy gaming or portable/social network gaming.

The ACCM fails to note that a lot of violent video games as of the recent 3 years have heavily focused on cooperative social gaming - Team Fortress 2, Left-4-Dead, Boarderlands, Call of Duty, all require gamers to work together as a team. One can even argue that they encourage pro-social attitudes.

Oh snap.

9. "Australia is the only developed country without an adult classification for games"
ACCM response: The classification schemes differ between developed countries for many reasons- cultural differences, different bases for legal systems, and existence of Bills of Rights. They also differ in the type of material allowed in Mature and Restricted categories. What one country considers is OK for R may not be allowed there by another. We are no lesser a country for sticking to our own opinions.
Your opinions, you mean.

Meanwhile, the rest of us who voted for the introduction of the video game rating would rather our country on par with other democratic nations rather than be the backwards nation we are. We'd rather more freedom built into our rights. We want to choose what's good for us and what isn't. We'd rather protect ourselves and become more independant. And more or less, we do not want the government to attempt to become involved in how we bring up our children and govern our lives.

Jace's Road to Japan

2009-08-16T16:27:00.000+10:00

I need to blog more about what's going on around my area, so how's this for a change?

A friend I made during my studies at SouthBank TAFE who's also here at Queensland Univerity of Technology is heading over to Japan in 12 days to study abroad as part of his bachelor in Interactive Entertainment. He'll be over at Kansai Gaidai University for nine months and has been blogging this adventure since September Last Year. If you're interested in heading to Japan to learn about the culture or perhaps interested in how he'll cope being three thousand kilometers from home, you can find his blog below.

http://www.road2japan.com

To think, my sister's also heading over to Kyoto in Japan for a couple of weeks sometime in the next upcoming month. When the hell am I gonna go over there for a bit?

Re: Kotaku - 11-Year-Old Genius Says Video Games A Waste Of Time

2009-06-06T16:58:00.000+10:00

11-Year-Old Graduates From LA College

That all? A community college? Not a Grammar school or private university? That's not really enough to call him a Child Prodigy, shove him in one of those, then when he graduates, it'd be enough. But graduating from a university which isn't even highly notible, I dunno.

March Tian Boedihardjo is the real shit. Oxford University at 9 years old.

3D environments - How to make a height map in 3Dsmax

2009-04-26T11:12:00.000+10:00

For a while now I've been wanting to write tutorials and create videos for programs that I use and generally outline what my workflow process is like. I've only been arsed as of recent just so I can get some critique on how I work and refine what I know. Since I've been given the task of designing a 3D environment for an assignment at uni' I figured it'd be great to show exactly how I went along to create them. So this will be rather interesting.

If you've ever sat and played in a 3D modeling program, you'd have realised at one point or another that modeling, rigging and animating in a third dimensional space can be a tedious process. Let's assume you've been able to model static objects, such as a chess pieces and furniture and you're feeling fairly competant in your abilities at the moment. So what say you when you get asked by your boss (or in my case: an assignment) to create a 3D environment.

You -could- make a plane with 100 rows and 100 columns and manually shift verticies up an down to get the terrain you want, but that kind of process will take hours upon hours. For those of us who use 3Dsmax, there exists a modifier you can use to make terrain in no time at all. (I'm still looking if Blender or Maya have something similar".)

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How to create Terrain in 3Dsmax

1. Define your terrain.
Before you can start, you'll need a fair idea of what you want your terrain to look like. Already you may have thought of one in your head, however if in doubt - draw it on paper or in a paint program on your computer. It doesn't have to be excessively detailed but you will need to know and label where mountains and depressions will be in the land.

I'm going to be working with the concept image I made a few weeks ago and posted in a previous entry for the assignment throughout this entry. I had used google maps to draw out the land since it is based off a real world location. As I don't know the real world elevation of Brisbane, I'll have to improvise with the example below.

Just a note that your concept does not need to be as detailed as my concept. I'll be using it as a texture so that's why I've done it like this. But detailed concepts really help in planning stages.

2. Setting up 3Dsmax

We'll begin by setting up 3Dsmax to work with. First, open 'Max and make sure the measurement units 'Max uses are set up to something you can work with. I'll be using meters throughout this entry and in all my creations. To change them, you'll find they're in the units setup selection under the customize toolbar at the top of the window.

Once that is set up, make sure you're sitting in Four port view. This means you can see four view ports in front of you - top, front, side, perspective. If you are stuck in one port view, hit ALT+W. Now we begin.

3. Creating the terrain plane

Now we make our terrain plane. Click on the create object tab and click on plane from the object menu. If you don't see it, make sure you're on standard primatives before you start. Once plane is highlighted, click and drag on the space in the TOP viewport. It doesn't matter how big you make it or if it's centered on the grid, we'll do that in a moment.

We want it created in the top view port since Max uses real world coordinates and putting it at the front or the side will create the terrain on its side - which would be fine if we were creating a game where the world wasn't round, which we aren't making.

Now we set up its size - once it has been created, you will need to swap to the modify tab and alter now big your plane is in the parameters menu. 'Width' controls width along the X axis, 'height' - the Y axis. Hopefully you know how big you want your terrain. My terrain in this example is 4km by 2km, which is enourmous.

Click your plane and hit F4.

You'll notice your plane is divided into 4 columns by 4 rows. You have a plane with 16 polygons. Unfortunately, this is much too low to show terrain detail. Under Length Seg and Height Seg in the attributes menu, you will need to raise these numbers to 100x100. Once your done, your plane should have a lot of polygons on it. If you raise the segmentation values, you'll get more detail.

Hit the 7 key.

The drawback however to adding more segments is you're making more polygons. This is a crux for game developers as more polygons means more work for the engine to do, and most computers cannot take more than 250,000 polygons on the screen at a time without suffering frame rate drops.

100x100 gives your terrain around 20,000 polygons. 200x200 creates 80,000 polygons.

Whatever the purpose of your terrain is, you should take note of the polycount.

Once you're done, center your terrain on the grid by right clicking on the "move" icon. Change real world variables to 0. Your terrain will center.

4. Texture
I'll be covering the material editor later on since it is rather huge. So I'll just show you how to stick your texture onto your plane.

Press M and the material editor will come up.

On the Diffuse section, click the empty box (or the M on my screenshot) and you'll be taken to another screen.

Double click on Bitmap and find your texture. When it's done, one of the grey spheres on the material editor will have your texture. Click and drag that sphere onto your plane and click the button I've highlighted.

Now, you should be able to see your concept image on the plane.

6. Height

Ok, so now we get to the interesting part - applying geometry to our plane to give it terrain. For this we'll need to give our plane the displacement modifier.

The displacement modifier will change the veriticies of our plane by rising them up and down based upon an image file we'll attribute. The displacement modifier works by looking at this image file and finding brightness values between 0 and 255 - Where white is highs and blacks are depressions. 3DSmax will shift verticies based off these values. How high and low the verticies will move from each other are

For the moment I wanted to focus on the crater up on the top left side.

This height map. Gives me this:

Insta-Terrain.

Are you sure you don't just want to take a hike? _Revised 03/2009

2008-11-27T09:09:00.000+10:00

There's one thing that is beginning to annoy me considerably nowadays; it's the fact that operating systems of today are treating themselves as completely invulnerable and infallable. The kicker: It's not the companies which are doing this, it's the software's own individual fanbases.

What makes it all unique is the fact it's not the Macintosh fans who are the generally aggressive ones - It's the Linux users.

I thought it was bad during 2006 when Apple started to air the old "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" ads around the internet, focusing on the potential flaws of Windows Pc's rather than focusing on their own original positives. I'll be honest, I groan whenever I hear it come up on the TV and have always done so. It was such a cheesy ad. This year however, it's the linux fanboys who jump on the bandwagon. Instead of being on the TV's though they're flooding Digg and ZDnet with their own form of propaganda to compete with zealot Mac users. The irony about their proceedure is that they're following the Mac forumla; focus on the crap things about Windows which owns a big part of the OS market, rather than take out it's distant twin brother at the same time - Apple currently owns a good 25% of the market share and it's growing. Linux, doesn't even own 1%. If OSX is promoting itself as the most stable and best operating system since the Amiga OS, why the hell aren't Linux fanboys focusing on why their OS is much better than OSX rather than Windows?

-
The common misconception in regards to software when it comes to users is that just because they're not using windows that there will be less of a chance they will get hacked, contract a virus, suffer from unusable drivers, suffer an update catastrophy, suffer a fatal crash and so on.

In truth, no system is infallable. No system can provide the best experience 100% of the time and certainly not is one system simply made for everyone - Not Linux, not Windows and neither OSX, despite what their users claim and owning companies hope.

So what annoys me about what people say about Linux?

1. "The most friendlest user interface". (This has become common through two of the most popular personal distrobutions, Ubuntu and SuSE.)

The next person who tells me this will be told to jump off a cliff. During a month of using two linux operating systems: Ubuntu and RedHat, I found it doesn't have the friendliest interface of all the operating systems. The line for myself is literally tied between XP and OSX. Vista loses a considerable place because of it's annoying UAC interface (Turning it off makes the experience a hell of a lot better though).

Note: I'm not talking about KDE or Gnome. Those are GUI frontends, I'm talking specifically about the user interface, as in what you can change and what you are prohibited on altering. Linux has lots of distributions, though the frontend alterns between them, the core interfaces are generally the same. (From what I know upon testing four distributions)

When I first installed RedHat I began to customise it to my liking and went to make sure that the system was up to date with the latest kernel updates. So I ran the update appication that's supposed to update a lot of the libraries and the Kernel automatically. On the reboot, those updates had disappeared and Redhat was incapacitated. I was forced to reinstall, on the second go it didn't happen.

And yes I know - For Windows users, updating generally means "Keeping up with the world". For a Unix user, the general term is that you 'don't fix what ain't broke'.

Regardless, when I went to upgrade Ubuntu two years later, it happened again.

What annoys me at this present moment is that this particular fanboy does not admit that linux can screw up due to a screwed up update or driver install. It happens, and does. -Linux is not infallable-. Just like any other OS. Accept it. Windows had a problem with their update system in 2007: With SP3, some drivers began to stop functioning (hense why I'm sitting on SP2 on my dual-boot). The only reason OSX does not have this problem (to a varying degree) is because OSX is licensed to only run on apple machines which have their hardware, not the hundreds and thousands that exist for the PC. Linux has this problem, so does Windows. Driver and compatibility problems are inevitable for these OS's. They exist, they are real, they'll probably be around for a long time as they have in the past.

What about the interface in general? Well, granted, it isn't too different from Windows or Mac. Except for the fact you're given more options than necessary that can switch between making or breaking your computer.

For example: when Linux first installs, it sets your monitor refresh rate to 60hz. 60hz on a CRT monitor can damage your eyes, the casual setting for CRT monitors is 85hz (LCD's should be set at 75hz regardless for less eye strain). To set it to a decent refresh rate on a Linux system, you have to manually configurate your monitor's frequency within the Linux operating system settings. Setting the wrong vertical and horizontal frequencies can make your computer monitor fry, especially if your monitor is ancient.

For the average user today, a friendly user interface is one that's needed. That means there needs to be an ease-of-use with pre-set configurations that won't cause people's hardware to explode. Linux cannot provide support for this as more information can be found further which relates to linux's assumption that you are a computing god.

2. "Linux installions are completely easy and automated"

I'd have about a hundred thousand in the bank for every time I heard " is easier to install than ".

There are two ways to install Linux on most distributions but it sits on one for most of the early distributions. None the less you have the option of installing linux distributions through a helpful GUI, or by going through a text mode. A GUI installtion is helpful for those who are new to the Linux interface or for those who don't know how to install with the text option. The GUI mode is probably the only time I'd have to agree with the above title, otherwise, text is the most unfriendliest, hard and most unpleasent experience I've had when it comes to installing linux. This is because Linux assumes you're a professional at linux.

As usual, it depends on the distribution. However, even with some of the newer distributions, read; Ubuntu, I would be thrown at the text installation with an input command and nothing else to do. Other users have reported the same occurance when selecting GUI would dump them on Text installations, and they couldn't proceed because they didn't know the first thing about installing linux via text.

I could learn Linux code myself? The problem with this is that while I wouldn't mind, I don't speak for others who don't wish to learn and want something that has ease-of-use. More on that on the next topic.

It's come to my realisation that most linux users are only familar with Ubuntu and SuSE. During Redhat and Debian I was bothered a majority of times during the process of installation to answer questions in the middle of installing. Since Vista Ultimate, this hasn't happened a lot for Windows users. Alternatively, windows XP was very picky. Mac users, I'm not sure. I don't own a Mac myself. Too expensive.

Now, ironically I've heard from many people that the installation for OSX is seamless and easy to do compared to Windows XP. It would seem that way as the impression I was given after helping out a friend put XP on Bootcamp on his computer definitely made it seem that Apple was intentionally making it seem that Windows XP was harder:

I had a friend who wanted to install XP so he could play Steam games. So he installed SP1 without a problem. What he found though was that the drivers he was given that would allow his Apple's hardware to work on Windows XP would only work on SP2, not SP1. SP1 is as old as 2001. Good going Apple, how about next time you include an installation of SP2 on that driver's disk instead of causing hell for your customers?

3. Linux and User friendliness Take 2, Text or GUI?
When I began talking to a Linux-Vet as a Windows migrant I was disapointed when he called me out on using the GUI, saying it was 'pure crap' and that to obtain the most of Linux, you use the text version of linux. Granted text is probably useful for linux users who have their box doing one thing, such as running a webserver. But nowadays the average user utilises a GUI. They want to see things that they can click and work with, they don't want to read or code, more or less learn the code.

The thing that gets me is that Linux users say that the average person should be using Linux, however the average person does not have the time to sit down and understand the code that linux pukes out of itself. This is why both Windows and Mac are well suited for those who just want to get the job done on their PC. This is why Linux cannot be suited for the average person until at one point in time that all the codework is done automatically.

Sure, in a perfect world it'd be great if everyone could learn the language. But some people just do not have the time. This is why Mr. Christopher Dawson of ZDnet that most people perfer Windows over Linux. Regardless of the driver issues, they want the operating system to be able get the job done for them and maintain the PC automatically. Linux is unable to do this by itself. It isn't a matter of viruses or malware, it's regarding usability and the computer's ability to sort itself out automatically.

However, granted. You can get by without using the terminal (my friend says "ha"). To get the most out of linux and on most rough occassions you need to learn the code and you need to use the terminal. An example of when you need to use the terminal is when you're installing software, as most program installations on Linux are not automatic, they're mostly manual.

When linux matures enough for the user not to need the terminal at all, should be the day when Linux will be the OS that people should look for.

4. Linux users say Linux has no viruses or malware

If you took note during 2006 you'd note that there was alot of people who said it was impossible to hack into an OSX computer, or OSX has no viruses. It came later that a number of viruses specially designed for OSX had been released on the web that same year. In particular, a worm that went around on USB that would literally 'brick' your apple PC. In 2008 with the PWN 2 OWN Competition, the Mac was the first to go down through a browser exploit.

What did I mean earlier by 'distant twin brothers' just before between Linux and OSX? Both these operating systems are both brothers in the form of the system they're based after - the Unix system. They're both distant however; one's open source - Linux, one's closed source - Mac.

The point being that since Unix is such an old system structure there is a sizable amount of old data there that is open source that can result in the creation of viruses. Yes, for linux too.

Linux has viruses, Mac has viruses, Windows has viruses and the Amiga and Commodore 64 has viruses. There is no operating system that currently exists that can't be screwed over by a virus. It's just a matter of how viruses can get onto your PC and how quickly they can distribute themselves. Unfortunately for Windows users, they're the most targetted.

So why Windows and not Unix based OS's since they're so old? Because Windows is a true closed source operating system that is not based on a predicessor system. Where Linux and OSX are based upon Unix, Windows is coded from the ground up on a new language. For many mischevious coders, you'll find that they like writing programs, not specifically viruses on Windows solely because it's a new environment and the code alternates constantly through updates. The unix system core however remains static.

5. You can use Wine to....
When all else fails you'll find people are quick to resort to note virtual machines and emulation software. It's the same thing as asking me "Why don't I purchase a Mac with bootcamp and get the best of both worlds?". To me, personally, it's unnecessary and wasteful. The odds are I'd only use one OS more than the other and the odds are that OS would be Windows because it runs the applications and games I want. And more over, I'd still be paying for it AND OSX. While it's true there are alternatives on the other OS, opensource and not, there are certain features I've chosen these softwares for. Some can be run on other OS's while other's don't, and I'd rather stick to one OS that I'm sure all the other ones will work on without having to use emulation software or switch between the OS's. Switching back and forward and keeping both OS's up to date is time consuming, hard drive memory consuming and pointless depending on what you do. I'm sure others are attributing other OS's and their particular favourite OS to this too.

As for buying a Mac, they're expensive. I have better odds finding authentic hardware which performs similar to Alienware computers at quarter the price. It's just a matter of looking at the right websites and shops.

My deal with emulation software is that it's not perfect, it's designed to get it to work but not designed to be 100% compatible with whatever you're trying to run. It's not a fool-proof way of beating a native OS. The drivers the emulation software uses are emulated in themselves. These emulated devices are very much software and try to emulate the real thing, which is compeltely different from, say, a physical graphic card. You'd have less success trying to run Crysis in XP on Vmware, the most powerful emulation tool on the market right now than you would running it natively, this goes for any other program and their OS.

The point is, emulation doesn't do the job well enough. It gets it done most of the time but it's not perfect. It's an emulation, not the real thing.

6. It could run applications better than windows
First thing I got when I typed that into google was a site that said "Osx and Linux can run WEB applications faster than Microsoft."

Note as well even if applications may run better on Linux than Windows, the same could not be said for each of the 26+ distributions of Linux. Support and compatibility differs in the computer.

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Linux is not suited for the average user. As stated in number 3, Linux has not evolved to the point where it doesn't need its users to enter text in what is known as 'The Terminal' to do everything. Linux is almost 25 years old, in 1985 you were commonly expected to learn and know how to code on computer platforms before GUI's had the ability to do everything for you. Back then, the average computer user was the guy who can be seen as the 1980 stereotypical nerd. He was always interested in technology and was always in front of his computer, tweaking it and programming it to run for and with everything. He started on Apple, went to the Commodore 64, and then to what we know as the PC. Most of all, he accels in programming and typing up code.

What most people are failing to realise, linux users and otherwise, is the average computer user today since 1995 onwards is your grandfather, girlfriend, boyfriend, brother, baby sibling and parents. These people have no interest in making their computer's better, or tweaking it or more or less programming. If they do, good for you - you are a lucky person. However the common answer you'll find is that they aren't interested in maintaining a computer; they're interested in just using it with no strings attached. They might find some use in the basic programs that the OS provides, but they may be often required to install their own. Using the terminal, programming and opening/editing/rearranging files is not on their list of priorities. Their priority is having their computer already set up for them for Socialising, Creativity and Entertainment purposes. The minority of people who used to be the majority until the Internet were those whos hobbies were that of coders and programmers. Those guys have moved onto computer IT and Engineering. Even still, they're now a minority in comparison to the rest of the world getting into IT.

I see a lot of Linux websites on the most occassion who say "The age of Linux is upon us". Well as far as I know it's been like that for 25 years and you're still sitting on 1% of the market. You say this every year guys but Linux does not get any easier because you still require people to code. Resources aren't united on a single knowledge base on the web and a lot of the materials are found all over the net, which makes looking for things difficult. If you want a real age of Linux, aim it at the demograph properly and eliminate the tediousness of using the operating system.

I still wait on the day when an OS becomes the perfect OS, and despite all that I hear, Linux isn't there yet. On that note I don't believe that Windows is the bees knees no matter how much I use it. I have the occassional crash I can sort out, compatibility problems, drivers and so on. I hate WGA, the fact I've had to reinstall windows a number of times due to idiocy of installing a number of bad programs and then be told my serial number is invalid is absolute bull-shit. I dislike the fact that 64bit windows does not have the capablity of opening a 16bit program. I've been using Windows since 3.1 and DOS, the only reason I still use it and dish out the cash to pay for it is because Windows is still very much like my AMIGA 500 back in the day, it was easy to use: Point and click, task done. I would probably use OSX because it costs less as itself but Apple forces me to buy a Mac to use OSX rather than have it on a non-mac Pc, otherwise I violate their EULA (not that it stops a lot of people).

Just because Linux is free doesn't mean I want to have an OS that I must learn to code for in order to do menial tasks, and neither does a lot of the population around the world. It may have been that case in the 1980's and perhaps the 1990's. But we're decade's beyond that now. Catch up.

G'day.

2008-11-27T08:14:00.001+10:00

With university and other festivities out of the way I can finally work on this blog, for which I will begin by properly introducing myself for those who are not familiar with me and are wondering exactly what this blog is about. I'm a 21 year old undergraduate at Queensland University of Technology. I'm currently studying for a Bachelor of Interactive Entertainment, my major is art and animation.

I've had an interest in video games and technology from a very early age, I was 3 when I first began to play with the Commodore 64 and the Commodore Amiga computer before I then began to play on the SEGA Master System II and the Nintendo Entertainment System. It was then that when I wanted to grow up I wanted to make video games for others to play.

Time passed and generally my liking of video games had not changed, however I instead found abilities in other fields such as Technology; I was able to repair wiring and maintain computers and windows based pc's. I also found an interest in a wide range of art forms. At the end of year 12 I had the intention of getting into IT and admininstrations, I found however that this was generally impossible living up on the Sunshine Coast since it was still a developing region (as far as IT goes). I moved to Brisbane in 2007 and found myself questioning if IT was still something I wanted to make job out of, there were hundreds and thousands of others rushing for the same jobs. I began Tertitary studies to prepare myself professionally and put down for games as one of my third preferences, unfortuantely though it was my third preference which had opened for me, and I found myself enrolled at Southbank Institue of Technology in a Multimedia course in learning the video Game creation.

Afterwards upon completion I determined that this is what I wanted to do, I had enrolled in QUT to further push my knowledge of the games industry as well as to work along side my brother. I had a decision to whether I wanted to get into Programming, Design, Animation or modelling. Unfortunately I had found myself still wondering exactly what profession I wanted to persue; Programming was exceptionally fun during TAFE but I did have problems of my own as I found it was a painful experience of trial and error, I decided to keep this as a hobby. Design appealed to me mostly however I think that the major risk of coming with the job had turned me away. Modelling didn't interest me too much.

Animation on the otherhand, I didn't do too much during TAFE for me to come to a rough decision. Though I noticed during the outline that persuing a major in this field would also open me to other professions which focus on animation, such as television shows and movies. Who does not want to bring things to life?

So, what's this blog for then? This blog is designed to follow me through my second year of university as well as to promote pieces of my portfolio and get some criticism on them. This blog will also have other stuff like my views on certain things on life or events.