Tuesday, April 4, 2000

UT Linux 413 Patch News -- 4:32 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Epic's Brandon "GreenMarine" Reinhart updated his .plan with news on the OpenUT project (the Linux Unreal Tournament open-source project) and the Linux 413 patch:

A 413 for Linux is in testing with a few of our server operators from the UTServers mailing list. This version of 413 does not include any code from OpenUT. I will probably release this patch in delta compressed and non-compressed format.

I am going to talk to Daniel Vogel about releasing an OpenUT enhanced 413 afterwards. I was integrating the CVS features, but I can't test them all and I am running short on time. The programmers who have contributed to OpenUT have gotten a LOT of stuff in great shape.

They've added support for music, a much less cpu intensive mixing scheme, support for control through SDL, support for MesaGL through SDL, and lots of stability features. All of this code is available through the OpenUT website, openut.sourceforge.net. There will also be a new public source distribution to follow the 413 Linux release.

Xian .plan Update -- 2:30 pm CST, Update by The Master

Christian Antkow updated his .plan with a note to those who quote him. Since this is a good thing to keep in mind when running a news site, I figure I'll post it:

An interesting quote on a webpage I don't feel like linking, in response to my .plan update last night.

This is the second time a member of id Software has expressed that they are bored with plain Vanilla Deathmatch. "Hello, McFly!" why didn't you put something more than Vanilla Deathmatch In the game box.

Since when does pleasant change equate to bored with Deathmatch?

Before people go about putting words in my mouth publicly, and making assumptions, at least do me the courtesy of asking for clarification.

In my not-so-humble opinion, deathmatch kicks ass. It's an adrenaline rush, great fun, and I enjoy it immensely.

One of the great strengths of the Quake III engine is it's extensibility, and it's always a treat to see what the community comes up with by playing a well made and fun mod like Q3Fortress.

Actually, I think pleasant change began to equate with bored when it did so in the writers mind. Too bad they had to shove that equality down Xian's throat. Please, people. If your going to run a news site, keep things in perspective, huh?

A.T. Hun comments: Hehe, I know who THAT was. I saw it earlier today. It was Evil Avatar. EA takes every opportunity to take pot shots at Q3A. I'm sure he'll have some VERY interesting comments on Xian's new update . . .

Review: DM-Q1DM4 -- 12:05 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Do you play Unreal Tournament? Do you still like the original Quake? Well then this map is for you! This map is a conversion of Q1DM4 "The Bad Place" for UT. Check out my review and see how it stacks up to the original! After that, you can check out the rest of our reviews too!

SpamCop is the BOMB -- 8:44 am CST, Update by The Master

Gotta put a big THANK YOU up to SpamCop for it's wonderful service, and to J.T.Qbe for pointing SpamCop out to me a month ago. I now get to complain about spam faster than ever before. I like not having to do my own analysis of email headers :-)

Now, if popsite and china.com would finally clean up their completely loose attitude toward mass mailings, we'd eliminate half the dang spam ON the net...

Monday, April 3, 2000

Xian .plan update -- 11:36 pm CST, Update by The Master

Christian "Xian" Antkow updated his .plan with kudos for the Q3Fortress team. From what I'm hearing around the 'net, Q3Fortress is looking very sweet. Maybe somebody around here will review it. I've still got to download it. This cold is keeping me down, tho.

A.T. Hun comments: I don't want to speak for him, but I believe that J is planning on doing just that. BTW, make sure to check out all of our reviews! (shameless plug)

Michigan State: National Champs -- 10:11 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Congratulations to the Michigan State Spartans men's basketball team for winning the NCAA championship, defeating the University of Florida!

Wraith on Game Exploits -- 4:41 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

As if his review of Force Commander wasn't enough (see below), Wraith also sent along an editorial entitled Waiter, There's a Bug in My Code! This thought-provoking editorial deals with what you should do when you are looking through a game's source and find an easily exploitable bug. This comes from first-hand experience when they found such a bug in the Shogo source code. What could have been a disaster for the Shogo community, turned into his excellent Bloodbath mod. It's a good read for mod-makers and online game players alike.

Judge Rules Against Microsoft -- 4:39 pm CST, Update by J.t.Qbe

Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson today released his conclusions of law that Microsoft violated antitrust law. Specifically, Jackson wrote that "Microsoft maintained its monopoly power by anticompetitive means and attempted to monopolize the Web browser market," which violates the Sherman Antitrust Act. Microsoft also violated the Sherman Act by "unlawfully tying its Web browser to its operating system."

Next comes the remedy phase of the trial, where Jackson decides what to do to Microsoft. Will he only restrict Microsoft, or will he break it up and sell it to Red Hat? (See Saturday's news for more on that). A.T. Hun comments: Note to Carl and the other humor-challenged folks: That's a joke.

Ok, today's news comes as no big surprise. The interesting news will come when Jackson decides what to do to Microsoft. . . and then they appeal. . .

Force Commander Review -- 4:35 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

What should I happen to get in my email box this morning but an message from Wraith (the maker of many mods for Shogo), offering to write a review of LucasArts' new real-time strategy game Force Commander. Quite naturally, I happily accepted. Here's a snip:

One thing that is immediately noticeable, however, is resource management. No more harvesting Crystals or whatever. You get Command points for capturing bunkers, winning battles, and the like. You use those Command points to purchase units. So . . . instead of a mad rush to capture the resources, the focus is on the gameplay. That was one of the major turn-offs for me with RTS games; I got sick of StarCraft fast, simply because I realized that I was spending most of the time farming, not killing. If I wanted a "farming" game, I'd buy something like "HogCraft: In Search Of Farmer Jones".

You can read his excellent review here. You can find this and all our reviews on our brand-spanking new reviews page! Thanks again to Wraith for a very sweet review.

Kenn Hoekstra Interview -- 1:41 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

The Mushroom's "Legit" section (check out the rest of their site to find out why they call it that) has an interview with Raven's Kenn Hoekstra. Questions cover Heretic II, Soldier of Fortune, and even a little about Kenn himself. My favorite is this one:

16. If you couldn't work in the game industry, what would you be doing?

I'd be doing what all English majors do... "Do you want fries with that, sir?"

Progress Report on Linux Port of Shogo -- 11:45 am CST, Update by J.t.Qbe

Step right up, read all about it. . . Ok, so there probably isn't much new in it, but Hyperion has issued a progress report on their work. Read it here.

Daikatana Non-News -- 10:25 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Still no news on Daikatana :) Of course, there is this pot shot taken on User Friendly this morning.

Speaking of Daikatana, my man Ryan "Joltox" Greene emailed me with another hypothesis on why Noel Stephens may have had his .plan pulled out from under him.

Regarding Noel's plan, there is a pretty big protest going on against Thailand based on its Government pretty much allowing kiddie sex tours to go on there . . . so a search for Don't! Buy! Thai! (yes, I meant to do that) and you should find out more info if you are interested. Or you can just go to their site, here: http://www.geocities.com/~dbtadmin/

The point? Eidos/Ion may have caught a bit of flak based on Noel saying he wanted to go there. The people who are into the boycott are pretty passionate. Based on his reaction to the people that emailed him (I don't care what is going on there, I'm going anyway, and don't bother me about this in the future) he may have really ticked some folks off. I know his reaction ticked me off.

Dunno if that had anything to do with it or not. I was previously unaware of such problems in Thailand. Although why anyone would pick Thailand as a vacation destination is beyond me.

Past Two Days' News

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