Wish Beta 2 on Fileplanet

[schild]

Second, having watched a few too many movies myself I find it easier and easier to point the finger at crap.  However, while I do agree that it becomes easier to find redeeming parts of bad movies it doesn't remove the fact the most movies still suck.  Maybe I'm just getting picky, but each year I find there are fewer and fewer movies even worth watching.

I find it easy to point my finger at crap as well. The problem is, I can also rationalize why the morons and critics out there liked it.  

Addendum: There are no good space operas.  No offense, but saying Riddick is the best of the lot is pretty empty praise.  I didn't really think much of it myself but I could just have shitty taste in movies.

Addendum: There are no good MMORPGs. No offense, but saying World of Warcraft is the best of the lot is pretty empty praise. I didn't really think much of it myself but I could just have shitty taste in games.

Funny how that works.

[MrHat]

Riddick rocks comparatively. You can watch it as a brainless movie or high art and easily qualify either opinion.

Riddick... high art?  Let's not get carried away.

I said it could be qualified. Or at least argued. I didn't say it was true. I would challenge anyone to show me a better space opera besides Star Wars Ep. V which is marred by it's brothers.

Just watched Riddick again, and I rather enjoyed it the second time through.  There are a few annoying parts, but you have to suspend your belief a bit.

Oh and if you haven't seen Croupier, you are not qualified to talk about any movie.  Mad props Schild, mad props.

[schild]

Oh and if you haven't seen Croupier, you are not qualified to talk about any movie.  Mad props Schild, mad props.

Yea, I saw it right after it came out and have watched it about once a month since. It was time to respect the Clive Owen. Easily one of the best narrator driven movies in recent history.

[stray]

Easily one of the best narrator driven movies in recent history.

The Woman Chaser tops my list.

[Signe]

For some reason, I didn't 'get' that movie at all.  It made me confused.   That Diesel bloke is really a dreadful actor.

[HaemishM]

I liked Chronicles, but thought Pitch Black was a better movie overall. Riddick was a decent action flick. I like Vin Diesel, but I don't expect him to act, nor do I expect him to do arty things. I expect him to look menacing like a typical action hero. The biggest problems with Riddick were that it brought in this entirely huge story that felt distinctly seperate from the world established in the first movie. It was narrative scope creep. I'd watch another Riddick movie without hesitation.

I apparently am not in the chosen few to be allowed into the Wish Beta just yet. I weep with wistful longing for my goats.

[Big Gulp]

Riddick was pure and utter shit.  Need I go through just how fucking stupid that movie was?

Necromongers
Crematoria
Elementals
Furians

Come on.  If some 12 year old came up with these names we'd roll our eyes and just chalk it up to immaturity.  In an actual screenplay it's pretty fucking unforgiveable.  Add in the fact that the action parts are pretty goddamned yawn inducing and the cliches fly thick and heavy, the acting sucks, and the story is idiotic and you have a movie that defines "piece of shit".

Anyone who'd even call it good deserves to have their license to criticize movies revoked.

[HaemishM]

It was better than Attack of the Clones.

[Big Gulp]

It was better than Attack of the Clones.

So is a cheese grater to the nutsack with a hint of tobasco thrown in.

[Alkiera]

The fact that most of those names are slight modifications of the same concepts from WarHammer 40k, which most people here seem to have played at one point or another, might help you.  In fact, the whole setting was SO '40k', it's silly.

Franky, I thought both Pitch Black and Riddick were good, enjoyable flicks.  I do not call myself worthy to judge if something is 'high art' or not, but given that what alot of people think is 'high art', I think most of it is be crappy and out of reach... great for critics and art majors, usually crap to everyone else.

Yeah, it requires some suspension of disbelief.  Then again, I don't think anyone who went to see it expected anything else.  If you DID manage to get into the theatre without realizing Riddick was a sci-fi film...  What rock do you live under?

In an attempt at re-railing this thread... I also have not been yet chosen to enter the Wish beta.  Not having played the first one, I don't have any goat-related preconceptions, but I am kinda curious what they've done.

Alkiera

[WayAbvPar]

I apparently am not in the chosen few to be allowed into the Wish Beta just yet. I weep with wistful longing for my goats.

I 'won' and got my account activated on the 1st. Haven't clicked the link in the email yet. I am very afraid.

[stray]

I don't think anyone here is asking for high art. "Not shitty" is good enough. "Not shitty" = Tolerable acting, more than 2 or 3 characters you don't hate, good pacing, a storyline that isn't too predictable, etc.. Just the basics.

Just because it's Sci-Fi or whatever doesn't mean you have to drop your guard, or that it doesn't abide by the same "Shitty" or "Not Shitty" standard we apply to everything else (Again, I haven't seen it myself, so I'm not judging it just yet).

Take the "Road Warrior" for example: Was that meant to be "high art"? No, but it stands right up there with all of the other great films that have been made. And puts the bulk of "artsy" ones to shame.

[Nebu]

Addendum: There are no good MMORPGs. No offense, but saying World of Warcraft is the best of the lot is pretty empty praise. I didn't really think much of it myself but I could just have shitty taste in games.

Funny how that works.

I'm laughing... I happen to agree.

Does anyone else find it interesting that a thread about Wish has turned into a movie review thread?  Perhaps that speaks volumes.

[HaemishM]

No, the tell-tale "baaaing" of a train of goats crossing the road speaks volumes. But it's in goat language, so no one bothered to translate.

[Signe]

If I'm not supposed to see Vin Diesel as an actor, what am I supposed to see when I watch one of his films?  Besides the fact that he's big, muscley and has a nose as wide as the Missouri River... what else is there?

[Alkiera]

Gaaaaaahh!

I decided to actually install the client...  And discovered a problem.  MR is yet another company that, idiotically, ignores several Windows standards and assumes, and forces, you to have free space on your system disk.

I have my drive partitioned so that I can easily remove and re-install the OS regularly, as I feel is neccesary when running Windows.  The system disk, in this case 'K', is just large enough to hold the OS and leave room for updates and drivers and whatnot.  There is ~800 meg available there on average.

The first thing the wish_beta.exe installer does is extract WishInstaller.exe to "K:\Program Files\tempinstall\"

Nevermind that this is stupid in and of itself.  Windows has registry entries and system calls to determine where the admin has asked temp files be placed.  I've designated they be put on a different drive(H), and 99% of all apps understand this.

100% of the games that have had issues with this are MMOGs.  WHY???  What is it about being an MMOG dev that makes you unable to write a standard installer script?  Most of the MMOGs I've run actually have simpler installations than other apps, it should be easy.

Again, GAH!

Alkiera

[HaemishM]

I imagine it's probably because every time they run the program, they want to do a file check to ensure proper sync between client and server versions. I also imagine it wouldn't be too hard to write such checks so that they don't HAVE to default to your system disk, but for a beta, that's probably asking too much.

[Alkiera]

It's actually easier to write file I/O to work in the program's working direcotry than it is to write it for a specific location... and causes infinitely fewer problems.  If I could write apps that did this properly when I was 12, ideally full adults who are professional programmers should be able to manage.

It boggles the mind.  Seriously.

Alkiera

[Viin]

Did anyone see Chronicals of Riddick: Dark Fury? If you like Anime-like stuff, you might enjoy it. Available on Netflix as well.

[Murgos]

I imagine it's probably because every time they run the program, they want to do a file check to ensure proper sync between client and server versions. I also imagine it wouldn't be too hard to write such checks so that they don't HAVE to default to your system disk, but for a beta, that's probably asking too much.

I wouldn't know.  I ran the client once, that was enough.

[Margalis]

Holy shit people, Riddick sucked. It was terrible, even as space opera.

The names were retarded.

The plot made no sense. The Necromungers (or whatever they are called) are a religion of sorts founded by some guy who discovered the "Underverse." WTF is the Underverse? How did he get those powers? Why does he have to kill everybody? How did he raise an army in the first place? It seriously would have been better if there was NO explanation at all, just "this guy with special powers and a big army wants to kill everyone."

The acting was terrible. Jack/Kira was awful. Vin was Vin, it's getting old. The movie structure was terrible, very poor pacing. It had none of the charm of Pitch Black, which was just an OK movie to begin with. The entire thing was just half-baked. The initial premise (to fight evil get someone just as bad) was good, EVERYTHING else was awful. There is a good movie to be made there - but that wasn't it by a longshot.
---

Sorry...let's continue talking about how Wish won't run for anyone!

[schild]

Sorry...let's continue talking about how Wish won't run for anyone...

...and why nobody cares.

I think it comes down to something very, very, very simple.

All the people in a game on the same server is the most hare-brained idea since a Joey spinoff. Everyone knows watching Chandler go on a bender would have been a lot more fun and wouldn't have needed scriptwriters.

[Margalis]

I don't even understand the premise. Let's say the game does really well and has a lot of subscribers. How do they all fit on one server? I don't mean technically as in handling load, I mean how do they all physically fit?

WoW has what 80 servers or something? FFXI has 20-30 or so. That isn't just load. It's also to alleviate overcrowding, camping, etc. Take the average levelling zone in FFXI and multiply the population by 30 and basically every square inch would be taken.

So is the world just really really large? Is there a ton of instancing? Is there some randomly generated content?

A world that is 30 times the size also implies 30 times the content. It's a lot easier to make 30 smallish worlds than one gigantic one.

[schild]

A world that is 30 times the size also implies 30 times the content. It's a lot easier to make 30 smallish worlds than one gigantic one.

Hence the reason I have more faith in the rebirth of Jesus...


...and I'm Jewish.

[stray]

Yeah, good question. It's been done before though: Eve. But it's easier to justify there because it's in space. Wish, on the other hand, can't even satisfy one player.

Anyways, anyone seen Shaun of the Dead yet? Shitty or Not Shitty?

[Margalis]

I would challenge anyone to show me a better space opera besides Star Wars Ep. V which is marred by it's brothers.

How many space operas can you name anyway? It's not like that's a very popular genre. I suppose it was better than Wing Commander: The Movie...

There was a good movie in there somewhere. I good writer could have taken the basic premise and made something really cool out of it.

[schild]

The Last Starfighter
The Fifth Element (arguable, EASILY)
Solaris (Russian and American)
Starship Troopers
Red Planet
All the Star Wars Movies
All the Star Trek Movies
Titan A.E.
Final Fantasy: Spirits Within
Pitch Black
Last Starfighter
Stargate
Dune
2001/2010
Event Horizon (arguable)
The original Planet of the Apes (the sequels are barely movies, let alone in a genre besides crap...though unfortunately some fun to watch)

and

There's tons of space opera TV from Battlestar Galactica to Firefly.

That's mostly off the top of my head. I'm sure there are a lot more. Pitch Black/Riddick tops my list there with Solaris, Fifth Element, and the Stargate movie. I personally would put Event Horizon in horror because it is a horrifying movie that fucks more with the mind than the idea of space and time. The space-time thing in there was a gimmick. But like I said, arguable.

[schild]

Shaun of the Dead was very good. Rented it the other night. Plan on purchasing it when a proper special edition comes out. Between Dawn of the Dead 2004, 28 Days Later, and Shaun - I'm pretty happy with this years crop of zombie movies. I mean shit, I even enjoyed RE: Apocalypse. But then, I didn't see any Uwe Boll movies, which probably would have tained me forever.

[Trippy]

The first thing the wish_beta.exe installer does is extract WishInstaller.exe to "K:\Program Files\tempinstall\"

If the .exe is just a ZIP self-extractor wrapper and you have something like WinZip installed you can just right-click extract the files somewhere else then run the setup.exe/installer.exe manually. I do this a lot with things like driver installers cause I want the files left around after install instead of having the installer "clean up" after it's done installing.

[Alkiera]

It's an actual installer, just a poorly scripted one.  Vise, I think.  The sad part is as best I can tell, it's extracting another installer.  Why the layers?  Installers shouldn't be like onions.  Is Wish really a lil tiny Russian wooden doll, inside half a dozen layers of installers?

Alkiera

[Kenrick]

Is Wish really a lil tiny Russian wooden doll, inside half a dozen layers of installers?

Alkiera

That's the best definition of vaporware I've ever seen.  :)

I'm still waiting for my bloody email.

[Mi_Tes]

I got the "Your account has been activated!" email, but given that I HATE point and click, was unimpressed when trying it at E3, and have no faith in the current direction of Wish, I won't be playing.  

Mutable Realms might want to try to lure the several thousand remaining Horizon players since they seem to be the only ones this game might impress.

[Signe]

They've been fiddling with the live content the last couple of days.  Gremlins attacking one day, and wolves the next, I think.  Once you get in the game, it's worth reading the newspaper... though you can find copies posted in some forums.   Players who take part in the live content can become famous as part of the lore.  

I like these sorts of things.  I think, however, that this won't be near enough to make this game popular.   One thing that would go far is to add WASD or, at least, tweak the PnC system they have.   Coupled with the camera control, even though you can adjust this, makes movement ackward.  You would think that with the requirements for this game, they would be able to include WASD without too much strain on it.

I don't know why the requirements are so demanding for this game.  The graphics are not spectacular or anything.  Maybe it has something to do with trying to have only one server for everyone.  Who knows?  I always suspect the teams of not being clever enough when the specs get too outrageous.  There also seems a to be a lot of graphic cards left unsupported.  Hopefully this will change a bit by release.

Edit:  Going with what Mi Ties said... for some reason they're targeting this game towards UO players.  I just never got that.  I agree that this would be more appropriately aimed at Horizons customers.  It may even be better than Hz, eventually.  (not hard)  Both Hz and UO had live content... maybe it's the open skill system?

[Soukyan]

It's good to tweak live content, but more important is first establishing a solid server architecture that can handle the ULTRA MMOG environment that they've been boasting for years. They need to place a call to CCP Games and find out how Eve does it because even with all the "space" in that game, they still have a solid cluster that supports over 12,000 concurrent players. So once Wish can support that many simultaneous connections, then they can go figure out how to provide that much content and that big of a world.

[Rasix]

Apparently my account is live. I don't ever remember signing up for this thing, especially with my new email.  Fucking odd.

Go away Wish emails, I have no intention of playing.