TheMightyEthan

Oh, sorry, missed that bit of your writeup and didn't read the actual link. *Edit* - Don't think of it like a console, think of it more like a standard, like Bluray or whatever. There's certain requirements that the device has to meet to be branded a Steambox, but as long as they meet those requirements (and maybe pay a royalty?) anyone can do it, just like how you can buy a Sony or Philips or Toshiba bluray player.

I agree with that except I haven't played The Unfinished Swan.

Gabe confirmed Valve's own version of it will run Linux. He said you can put Windows on it if you want, and that it won't be hard, but it still seems like they're shooting themselves in the foot for the out-of-the-box version to be incapable of running 99% of the Steam catalog.

The people on this forum.

Yeah, based on that article it looks like it's more along the lines of what we were originally discussing: Valve setting standards that allow other manufacturer's to make their own computers and call them Steamboxes or "Steam certified" or whatever.

I can't imagine they could win anything in that kind of suit. If they think the deal was shittier than going bankrupt they shouldn't have taken it, it was their own fault. If they say that it was better than going bankrupt then their investors weren't harmed by them taking it and they have no damages.

I liked it. I recommend it to anyone who liked the first game.

I still don't think much tops the 2011 poll showing Congress being less popular than the US switching to communism. http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/11/congress-less-popular-than-communism-bp-during-spill-nixon-during-watergate-or-king-george-during-american-revolution.html It especially cracks me up that Congress is approximately half as popular as King George was during the American Revolution.

I haven't played it yet (it's on my list), but my understanding is it's based on Heart of Darkness, so that could explain why the plot seems cliche.

Yeah, obviously a lot of that is pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking, but it gives us at least some kind of a direction on what kind of processing power they're talking about. Obviously they've got something convincing enough to get Valve on board. Price point is definitely a problem. I just can't see who they're targeting. Anyone PC savvy is going to look at that price and go "why would I buy that when I can build my own gaming PC from parts for $500-600?" And anyone not PC savvy is going to look at that price and go "why would I buy that when I can buy a PS4/Xbox 720 for $400?"

I imagine the hype will go both ways, from different segments. This article at Joystiq has more details from the Kickstarter pitch about the X7A this is supposedly based on:

Why would that drop frames? Having the trees be different would just take more memory, it shouldn't be any harder to render quickly.

All your other points sound very valid to me, but this one specifically they said that they just made a whole bunch of copies to show how much shit it can render, which is why it looks dull and repetitive. If it were to be used in an actual game with actual artists then they could have every tree be different and whatnot.

So apparently this is a thing: If this isn't all just marketing BS, why isn't anyone else working on tech like this?

I totally agree. When my wife and I went married my whole extended family went together to get us a whole set of really nice kitchen knives (expensive enough that my parents had been slowly collecting them one knife each year for their own kitchen). They're amazing.

Yeah, with only slight tweaking of the control scheme this would be perfect for a phone.

Not really. Very occasionally on my TV there will be a little bit of aliasing if there's a thin line of something bright against a dark background, but I can only recall one movie where I noticed that (Avatar), and it was only in one shot. In the cinema there shouldn't be any drop in resolution because [i believe] they actually use two separate projectors, both projecting at full res. Even on the home TV, the drop in resolution is definitely less distracting than the fucked-up 3D any time something moves fast across the screen in active 3D. Contrast my one shot from one movie noticing the passive 3D against the fact that watching the Hobbit in active 3D it was noticeably messed up in every single action scene. *Edit* - I loved the 48 fps but I'll never go see another active-3D movie again.

Yeah, from what I hear that's the best technique. Like how in an RPG you don't do any of the main/primary/urgent missions until you've completed every available sidequest first.

The 48 FPS 3D really reinforced to me that passive 3D glasses are far superior to active (the 48 fps version is only displayed in active 3D, but the 24 fps version can be seen in any kind of 3D theater). With the active 3D anytime anything small moved fast, like a bird or a sword or anything, the 3D got fucked up and the depth got way off because your eyes weren't always seeing the same frame at the same time and so the different perspectives fucked up the effect.

How could it possibly be Linux-based? It won't be able to run 99% of Steam's catalog.

Done.

That's only $20 on PSN?

Plus robot hands are way cooler.

http://www.joystiq.com/2013/01/04/rumor-used-wii-us-let-you-download-previous-users-games/ Apparently if you buy a used Wii U you can download any games purchased by the previous owner, even if all their accounts have been deleted off the machine. That seems like a pretty massive oversight on Nintendo's part.

Whatever, it was the best since Brotherhood. I might even have liked it more than Brotherhood, not sure on that yet.