Posts by Thrik

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A superb advert.

Yes that design is a bit five years ago. Scan lines?

Yeah seems a bit pointless. Might as well just let the past be past and focus on expanding existing places like, well, Mapcore.

It seems especially pointless considering there's many other (better) Source resources out there, plus CS isn't going to last forever. Where's the site going to be once CS isn't hot anymore? At least if you'd used a name not tied to one specific game you could keep expanding in the future to new games like Mapcore can.

How is it an illusion? I said that it isn't an inviting OS, and it isn't. Replace 'inviting' with 'appealing' if it helps you to understand what I meant.

To elaborate, there are a number of distros which as Ginger has just demonstrated confuses many people. None of them have any particularly attractive features that lure people in, and even when directly asked you guys have failed to give any.

Also, has Linux ever actually innovated itself? I mean I see no end of people saying things to me like "It can do X, just like Windows/OS X!", but I've never had someone tell me something Linux can do that's unique. Doing what someone's OS can already do isn't an attractive selling point.

I once again repeat that I'm not putting Linux down, but am instead pointing out that there's simply nothing going for it that's going to ever attract average users in its current state. It might be a solid OS, but it's not a special OS.

Its lack of widespread success isn't because people only listen to bad reviews or because they're ignorant; it's because Linux has nothing striking. It's just an alternative, and in this world that's not good enough — even if free. That's why it's not managed to become anything more than an enthusiast platform in the last decade or so.

Why should I? Linux users rarely offer the courtesy of saying "Windows XP" or "Windows 2000" when talking about Windows. I hardly get the impression there's that much distinction between the different distros anyway.

But to backpeddle a bit, yeah, I agree with Ginger in that the multiple overlapping distibutions simply adds to the confusion and makes the end user experience of working with Linux complicated in yet another way.

The fact is that Linux is far less inviting for average users than Windows and OS X, to the extent where even its freeness cannot save it. Until Linux comes up with some kind of killer draw that isn't security or its price, it's forever destined to be restricted to enthusiasts and servers.

Okay, yes, for the sake of clarity let's simply assume that those talking about Linux in this thread mean "Linux-based OS".

Sure Zacker, but once again we come back to the incentive of using Linux for someone not interested in all the tweakery: an average user. Being free obviously isn't flying as otherwise it'd be a lot more popular than it is.

I'm not trying to put down Linux or even criticise it, but after hearing dozens of "lol windows" comments and whatnot from Linux users over the years (not necessarily you guys) I've about had enough and want them to stand their ground. Put up or shut up as they say.

So other than being free (which isn't really a concern for someone who does a lot of work on a computer and is prepared to pay for the best possible experience), there's really not much incentive for someone who isn't interested in all the under-the-hood stuff to use Linux.

I get the general impression that Linux is more for tweak maniacs and those who love absolute control (as someone else said earlier). But really, the market of people who don't want that and simply desire an operating system that works beautifully for them from the get-go is a lot larger.

That's why Apple's admittedly pompous (at least in the latest ads) but truthful "it works out of the box" advertising mantra is working so well right now. I think this lack of wanting to configure/control everything is something that many die-hard Linux users really can't really get their head around.

I'm still not seeing any hard incentives to use Linux. And if you're going to keep using the virus/spyware thing, can I please refer you back to my original post?

Quote from Thrik

I'm not really sure what the incentive to use Linux is. I understand that it's a fairly well-developed operating system, but what makes it special? What does it have over Windows and OS X, both of which are extremely comfortable operating systems that for most people never have any significant stability/speed issues?

OS X is about as user friendly and secure as a commerical OS gets, and there is a lot of good software for it now. The only downside is shit game support, but let's discard that for now since you can always dual boot. I won't hold it against Linux either. :wink:

But the simple answer to that is to be an intelligent user. I've not had a virus hit my machine in years, and I'd imagine the same goes for anyone else who knows how to use a computer properly.

As for the rest of your post, I'm not really sure what you're talking about. Squirrel gave the argument "you have complete control" and my post was in response to that.

Just look at mine and Ginger's posts and you can join the "I read about that" club too.

"Complete control of your operating system"?

So it is indeed as I originally suspected: Linux is simply designed for control freaks and efficiency-obsessed programmers.

I just did too! :wink:

I'm not really sure what the incentive to use Linux is. I understand that it's a fairly well-developed operating system, but what makes it special? What does it have over Windows and OS X, both of which are extremely comfortable operating systems that for most people never have any significant stability/speed issues? Yeah, they did in the past, but that's not an issue.

For the sake of this argument, "it is free" is not a valid answer since if I'm going to spend almost endless hours on a system for both leisure and professional work, I'm prepared to spend a bit of cash on it. Also, I don't want to hear any "It can do X just like Windows/OS X!" answers since I can just carry on using Windows or OS X for that.

I'm being serious here btw and am prepared to listen to any equally serious answers.

Yeah, it does seem a bit like the sudden improvement in the episodes towards the end of series two was a kind of reaction to people getting really pissed off with the slowness. The writers and shit are quite active with the community and do podcasts and whatnot so it's almost guaranteed they were aware of the bad vibes.

Hopefully they'll bear this in mind and keep the third series moving with a similar momentum, even if not quite as constantly exciting as the last episodes in series two were.

And if this thread hadn't implied it enough, yes guys, the end of series two really does get very awesome. It might be worth holding out and watching them through just for those alone, and hopefully the third will carry on the same.

Well the game was designed by Michel Ancel (Rayman), and he's French.

Haha awesome, I love YouTube. Someone's put the whole intro (including ingame stuff) up, which those who're on the edge about trying it might want to watch.

Put me in the mood for sorting out my GameCube for some this weekend. ;D Looks even better than I remember it too graphically, which is a kind of rare thing to say. ¬¬

I've seen both series, really liked them.

The second one is really slow for the first half and I was also losing interest, but the second half really picks up. The whole hatch thing is pretty much completely resolved by the end and the finale (I thought they were going to drag it out for ages) is superb. Very climatic.

Yeah, truly. It's without a doubt one of the best games I've ever played on any medium, and I put it in a similar league to the likes of Monkey Island and Grim Fandango.I'm still bewildered by its lacking sales considering how good it is. I mean, it's hard to emphasise to those who haven't played it just how good it is, short of simply saying "just play it".

So seriously. Anyone who hasn't played it needs to ASAP at risk of severely missing out. It's available on PS2, Xbox, GC and PC, though the PC port was a bit shittily done when I played it. I recommend getting it for a console.

As far as general play goes it's comparable to Zelda, though obviously it's a lot different in that it's futuristic and has a different style. It's got the massive bosses, dialogue, puzzles, big world and all that shit though.

The YouTube trailer is worth seeing, even though it only shows the action stuff.