Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!umich!samsung!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!att!cbnewsm!nsw From: nsw@cbnewsm.att.com (Neil Weinstock) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech Subject: Re: Game vs Multitasking Message-ID: <1990May29.053417.4690@cbnewsm.att.com> Date: 29 May 90 05:34:17 GMT Sender: nsw@cbnewsm.att.com (Neil Weinstock) Organization: The Flying Squid Patrol Lines: 66 A couple of items here caught my eye. >Mikko "Assembler rules OK!" Tsokkinen writes: [ ... ] >1. Should game be HD-installable? > - IMHO I think this is quite useless because many HD drivers eat chip-memory ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > and you will run out of it especially on 512k chip-ram machines. And you > can make Disk-based routines lot more faster and more data in one disk > which helps people without HD. Useless is a relative term. I can assure you that any hard disk owner wants to install everything on the hard disk. If those with 512K chip-ram can't do it cuz of memory constraints, that's probably reasonable, those folks can still run it off the floppy. But why should those with 1M chip-ram and HD be forced to use a floppy? I hardly *ever* use my floppy for other than installing software, and perfer to keep it that way. [ ... ] >4. Should game be exitable? > - IMHO exitable games are harder to protect and you can't destroy anything > in memory and you will end up again without enough memory:-( Aarrrgh. I don't like to reboot, period. I don't see why I should have to just for a stupid game. Look at it this way. Nowadays, the degree of system friendliness of a game is my top consideration when deciding on a purchase. It didn't use to be that way. I bought several games of the boot-from-the-floppy-then-reboot variety, then found out that I never play any of them because I can't stand the routine. I've logged more hours playing the version of Tetrix posted to the binaries group than all my other games combined. Why? Because it's right there, nice and convenient (also addictive as hell, but that's another story ;-). On the one hand, we all talk about how the Amazing-Amiga-Is-The-Only- Computer-With-True-Multitasking, then go and write and buy these games that torpedo the whole concept. Blech. I wonder how many people would play rogue if you had to load it in from 9-track tape every time, then restart Unix afterwords? > And I would like also to know how many of you people really play games while >doing something else? If you do, do you really like those every now and then >updating games with poor graphics (thanks to memory shortage). That is an unfair blanket statement, and you know it. Besides, I think that what most people really care about is the ability to exit cleanly. They may not be able to actually "do work" while playing the game, but at least they don't have to shut everything down. What's to stop you from providing a "friendly" and "nasty" mode, anyway? If I want to tolerate slower operation in order to be able to download while playing (for example), that's my business. As for memory, your argument falls apart once you consider the existence of machines with more than 512K chip RAM. You're going to tell me that on an A3000 with 2 Meg of chip and 16 Meg of fast RAM, your game is going to encounter *any* memory restrictions at all? Just one paying customer's opinion... - Neil --==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==-- Neil Weinstock @ AT&T Bell Labs // What was sliced bread att!edsel!nsw or nsw@edsel.att.com \X/ the greatest thing since?