Twenty Sided

By Shamus Posted Tuesday Mar 11, 2008

Filed under: Personal 77 comments

It’s Saturday night. We’ve finished our weekly D&D game, and have decided not to squander the evening rhythmically tapping the “Stumble” button as we did last weekend. That is, we decide to find some productive way to waste time.

I’ve been meaning to play Final Fantasy VI, and I even have vocational justifications for doing so. The (still unannounced on this site) project I’m involved with is a Nintendo DS title that is descended from the FFVI visual aesthetic. Imagine if, instead of moving to polygons, the makers of jRPGs had simply continued to refine the established gameplay and presentation. We’re talking about something that looks like some sort of “high res” Super NES level graphics here, as if it came from some alternate dimension where technology advanced along a different vector. In any case, the game I’m going to be working on draws from the same chibi-style fixed-angle orthographic presentation concept, and so to avoid making an ass of myself I really should familiarize myself with the medium.

The other three guys with me have all been through the game multiple times and are excited about the prospect of me experiencing the game for the first time. So much so that they’re actually anxious to sit and watch me play the game. I have the Final Fantasy Anthology (which includes FFVI) for the Playstation(null), which I plan to play on my Playstation 2. Except, my memory card doesn’t seem to be working.

We try the usual folk remedies: Blowing on the contacts, moving it to the other slot, and muttering various childish expletives at the thing. Surprisingly, none of this works. Not even the cussing. Eventually one of the guys gets around to noticing that I’m using a PS2 memory card on a PS(null) game, which, not that anyone ever told me, doesn’t work. How was I supposed to know? I’m new to all this old technology! I usually just plug the thing into the other thing and it it does whatever its supposed to do! Why can’t it just use the PS2 memory card? This last question has apparently been an imponderable among PS2 owners since the arrival of the platform eight years ago.

So it’s eight in the evening and we need an old-school PS memory card. Oh yeah. We’re in the midst of a snowstorm. Still, this is important and clearly an endeavor worth risking our lives over. We pile into the car and head for EB Games at the mall.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “The Memory Card”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

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Line Rider

By Shamus Posted Monday Mar 10, 2008

Filed under: Links 31 comments

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As far as memes go – and I’m not sure if this would classify as a meme or not – Line Rider is an unusual, slow building phenomenon. I first became aware of it way back in October of 2006 at Haibane.info. Back then, it was a very simple little flash game. You scribbled some lines on a seemingly infinite canvas, and then a little guy on a sled would ride down the lines – provided you drew something ride-able. (If he fell too hard he’d get knocked off the sled.)

Sometime later I noticed a lot of people were making little movies of their Line Rider courses. Most of them looked like this one:

This is what my attempts looked like as well. There are lots of stray lines, wiggly lines, and vast white areas where it’s difficult to get a sense of speed because there is little against which we might judge relative velocity.

It turns out to be quite hard to make a lengthy and exciting Line Rider course. The only way to know how the guy is going to react to a tricky curve is to start the show and watch it happen. If you’re making changes to the jump at the end of a minute-long course, you have to watch the whole thing to know your changes worked. Not right? Make another adjustment and watch the whole thing again.

I call this “artistic friction”, although I’m sure there are other names for it. Level designers for videogames endure this as well. Make a change, compile it, fire up the game, see the results, go back and make another small adjustment. Rinse. Repeat. This sort of thing greatly discourages experimentation, and makes it hard for an artist to polish his or her work. The longer you work on it, the longer it takes to test each new addition. The expense of fine-tuning your work is so great that the temptation is just to let it be once you get it to “good enough”.

Still, as the Line Rider meme grew there were people willing to sink vast blocks of time into the process of making a little two-minute movie. Suddenly the challenge went from just getting the guy to do little stunts, to doing so while having interesting scenery: Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Line Rider”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

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Fear the Con

By Shamus Posted Monday Mar 10, 2008

Filed under: Links 36 comments

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Fear the Con, a meeting for fans of Fear the Boot to get together and play some tabletop games, took place this past weekend. I’m a long way from St. Louis, but I was really hoping to be able to make it anyway. Sadly, it just wasn’t in the cards for me this year. I was sorry to miss it. The various FTB hosts were there, along with Shawn, my partner in crime. Note to everyone: Sorry I couldn’t make it. Would have been nice to shake hands with you guys.

I’m really enjoying the forum thread with pictures from the con.

A week or so ago someone put up a poll in the Chainmail Bikini forums, asking how many readers also listened to FTB. (Answer: A little better than half.) Now I wonder how that works with this site. How many people that read this site also listen to the FTB podcast? Just wondering.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

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36 comments

The Publishers vs. The Pirates, Part 3

By Shamus Posted Friday Mar 7, 2008

Filed under: Video Games 59 comments

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I wasn’t originally planning on doing a Part 3, but there were so many great responses to Part 2 that I decided to extend the series. First up is Justin Alexander, in the comments here:

[…] I am curious about one point: How would you suggest companies register legitimate buyers of their product (as suggested in #4) if even entering a license code is considered too onerous for the customer (as outlined in #1)?

This is a good question. I originally had a bit about this in the previous post but I cut it when it began turning into a lengthy digression.

The answers to these are related. Entering a license code is a lot less onerous when you’re getting something in return. License codes are really annoying when all I’m getting in return for my trouble is permission to play what I ostensibly already own.

(Having said that, they could certainly be a little shorter. The standard seems to be around 35 digits. It’s usually case-insensitive, they use the letters A-Z plus the digits 0-9. You can think of it as a base 36 number system. That gives you a number space of 36³⁵. If I’m reading my calculator right, that’s…

295,520,441,454,768,124,465,870,765,979,050,000,000,000,000,000,000,000

Or 2.96×10⁵⁴, which seems excessive if all you need is a unique identifier for the game / user. In fact, there are “only” 8.87 x 10⁴⁹ atoms in the Earth, which means that with a 35 digit system we could give each and every atom in the planet its very own license key, and then some. Of course, license keys are used for more than just identification, they’re used for authentication, which is why they’re so long and annoying. Only certain ones are valid – usually according to some inscrutable system – and they need a large number space to minimize the risk of you just “guessing” a valid key.)

But at the heart of the issue it’s not the length of the license key that matters, it’s the reason for entering it. Nobody objects to putting the CD in the drive to play a PS2 game, yet lots of gamers object when asked to do the same on a PC. People don’t usually object to entering personal information as part of creating an account so they can get something of value. Yet they will balk at doing so if the process is the digital equivalent of airport security. In the case of both CD checks and license keys, users can tell that they are being forced to do these things because the publisher regards them with a lack of trust. It conveys contempt for the customer and a willingness to needlessly waste their time, which interferes with making the customer view you as a friend. So it’s not really the hassle itself, it’s the reason behind it. The system carries the implied insult, “I think you’re a pirate. Perform this task to prove me wrong.”

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “The Publishers vs. The Pirates, Part 3”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

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Dueling Analogs

By Shamus Posted Friday Mar 7, 2008

Filed under: Links 21 comments

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Check out the Dueling Analogs tribute to Gygax. Yeah, I know I linked it the other day, but author Pierski has since changed it. The map on the table comes from here, with my blessing. It may seem silly to point this out:

Me: Oh look! I got a mention in a webcomic!

Sensible Person: You’ve written two webcomics of your own, dumbass.

But it’s one thing to put up your own stuff, and another when someone else likes it enough to make it part of their own work. Even more amusing to see my map placed in a context where it’s being used by Gary Gygax and God.

I just wanted to point that out, is all.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

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The Publishers vs. The Pirates, Part 2

By Shamus Posted Thursday Mar 6, 2008

Filed under: Video Games 122 comments

 The Publishers vs. The Pirates, Part 1Previous Post

Next PostThe Publishers vs. The Pirates, Part 3 

Maybe you thought this was just going to be a two part rant, but this time around I have some real, practical advice on combating software piracy. But first:

I am always grateful when publishers remain steadfast in their support for the untamed, savage jungle that is the PC. Twenty years of Darwinian attrition has made it clear that this is not the platform for the meek. If you’re not sucked dry by warez leeches, you’ll most likely be devoured by something far larger and higher up on the foodchain. If you manage to avoid being consumed, there is always the chance that your efforts will be found wanting, and natural selection will cull your team in favor of something that is smarter, lives longer, or is better at replicating itself.

It is also true that at any moment you may simply exit the jungle and take up residence in the greener pastures named Nintendo, Sony, and (strangely enough) Microsoft. Places where there is enough for everyone and you earn a living by farming money. So if you stick with the PC, you have my thanks.

But if you’re set on staying in the PC realm then you need to be at peace with the idea that anyone who wants to play your game without paying you is going to be able to do so. In PC gaming, there has never been an unbreakable DRM scheme. Not once, ever. Most DRM systems have a lifespan measured in days. A small handful might live a fortnight. No matter how convoluted the system you devise, it just takes one guy to wedge it open and let everyone else through.

Michael Fitch can rant against the people who rip off his company, and he’s justified in doing so. While people argue about the degree to which damage has been done, the fact that damage has been incurred is manifest. But as I said last time, piracy is a social problem, not a technological one. The solution is therefore going to be social in nature, not a new DRM scheme. You can’t convert all of the pirates into customers, but – as Fitch noted – you don’t need to:

So, if 90% of your audience is stealing your game, even if you got a little bit more, say 10% of that audience to change their ways and pony up, what’s the difference in income? Just about double. That’s right, double. That’s easily the difference between commercial failure and success. That’s definitely the difference between doing okay and founding a lasting franchise. Even if you cut that down to 1% – 1 out of every hundred people who are pirating the game – who would actually buy the game, that’s still a 10% increase in revenue. Again, that’s big enough to make the difference between breaking even and making a profit.

So the goal here should not be eliminating piracy, which is absurd and impossible. Instead, work on converting as many of those pirates into customers. Here are five ways to get people to pay for your stuff. Again, these are social changes – this has nothing to do with building a better DRM system. As a bonus, a lot of these things are free. Continue reading ⟩⟩ “The Publishers vs. The Pirates, Part 2”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

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Daft Hands

By Shamus Posted Thursday Mar 6, 2008

Filed under: Movies 31 comments

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I’ve always thought of posting memes as the lowest form of blogging. A meme is a viral idea. Once something is classified as a meme it’s already popular, which means you are, by definition, telling people about something they’ve probably already seen. I try to keep that sort of business to a minimum. My writing is already in a rut so deep I’d need mountain climbing gear to escape it. You could probably replace me with an automated script that denounced all new PC Games as trash, all new graphics technology as rubbish, and then at regular intervals decried the lack of PC games. I doubt anyone would even notice.

The last thing I need to do is augment my predictable subject matter with links to stuff you saw five weeks ago on a site bigger than mine, back before the whole thing became Old News. I know this because every time I post those sorts of links I get people telling as much. (Because, when it comes to viral data, there is nothing people love to share more than the fact that you’re not living up to their expectations.)

Having said that, this meme fascinates me: Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Daft Hands”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

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