Random News Stories

[Junkenstein]

Daikatana 2 on kickstarter:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-36158610

Two gaming veterans who helped create iconic title Doom are seeking cash to make a "classic" first-person shooter.
John Romero and Adrian Carmack are seeking $700,000 (£480,000) on Kickstarter to make a game called Blackroom Daikatana 2, Electric boogaloo.

If you're gullible enough to give Romero any more money, you don't deserve to have it.

Others have written in detail about the shitshow that was daikatana's production and mechanics ("Of course every weapon should also unavoidably hurt the player. This is a game for PROS") so it will probably we worth watching this just to behold an onslaught of fuckups and failures. And many, many tears.

[Cain]

2BRUTAL5CASUELS

I mean, that stuff is pretty fucking cingeworthy on its own.  Especially when Dark Souls manages to actually deliver without the devs (or, more amazingly, most of the player base) being complete douchebags.

[Junkenstein]

Best assassination of Romero/Daikatana. Anyone responsible for these decisions should be barred from making future ones:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiJNuG2pII0

http://lparchive.org/Daikatana/

[Junkenstein]

News#1 - Bitcoin still a thing.

News#2 -
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-36168863

Australian entrepreneur Craig Wright has publicly identified himself as Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto.

n December 2015, two magazines, Wired and Gizmodo, named Mr Wright as a candidate after receiving documents believed to be stolen from him that revealed his involvement with the project.
Soon after these stories were published, authorities in Australia raided the home of Mr Wright. The Australian Taxation Office said the raid was linked to a long-running investigation into tax payments rather than Bitcoin.
Questioned about this raid, Mr Wright said he was cooperating fully with the ATO.
"We have lawyers negotiating with them over how much I have to pay," he said.

Satoshi Nakamoto is believed to amassed about one million Bitcoins which would give him a net worth, if all were converted to cash, of about $450m.

Legal fuckery ahoy. Should be amusing and filled with unintended consequences.

[Cain]

Bitcoin enthusiasts don't believe him 

This is what happens when you cater a product to pathological conspiracy theorists

[Junkenstein]

Never saw that coming.

In other news:
http://spioenkop.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/the-islamic-state-going-diy-inside-diy.html

A video obtained by VICE News and uploaded on the 27th of April 2016 shows off spectacular footage taken by the headcam of an Islamic State fighter as he and his comrades fight their way to Peshmerga positions near Naweran while under heavy enemy fire. The attack, which took place North of Mosul, clearly shows the panic and chaos that occur while on the battlefield, a completely different picture from the one presented in the videos published by the Islamic State's media department, which almost exclusively shows well-trained fighters of the Islamic State defeating their opponents without any fear or regard to their own safety.

The footage offers a rare glimpse into the attacks that Peshmerga forces have been facing ever since the fall of Mosul, but now from the perspective of the Islamic State. This video doesn't offer the whole story however, and because this attack has been documented extremely well by both the Islamic State and Peshmerga, we will attempt to break down the footage and images released by both parties and paint a clearer picture of this attack conducted by the Islamic State.

While VICE News claims the footage was taken in March this year, the depicted attack actually occurred in mid December 2015. As the Islamic State's resulting defeat was widely reported on in Iraqi Kurdistan and abroad, it is not entirely clear how the supposed date got mixed up and suddenly ended up being March 2016.

Pretty long, pretty good. Plenty of pictures for those curious about what the front line fighting realities are.

I did start to think by around halfway through that Abu Hajaar is likely to be a CIA agent or somesuch. There's a few points where it just feels like he's fucking with them for his own amusement.

The blog in general seems pretty good for IS related news too.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Never saw that coming.

In other news:
http://spioenkop.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/the-islamic-state-going-diy-inside-diy.html

A video obtained by VICE News and uploaded on the 27th of April 2016 shows off spectacular footage taken by the headcam of an Islamic State fighter as he and his comrades fight their way to Peshmerga positions near Naweran while under heavy enemy fire. The attack, which took place North of Mosul, clearly shows the panic and chaos that occur while on the battlefield, a completely different picture from the one presented in the videos published by the Islamic State's media department, which almost exclusively shows well-trained fighters of the Islamic State defeating their opponents without any fear or regard to their own safety.

The footage offers a rare glimpse into the attacks that Peshmerga forces have been facing ever since the fall of Mosul, but now from the perspective of the Islamic State. This video doesn't offer the whole story however, and because this attack has been documented extremely well by both the Islamic State and Peshmerga, we will attempt to break down the footage and images released by both parties and paint a clearer picture of this attack conducted by the Islamic State.

While VICE News claims the footage was taken in March this year, the depicted attack actually occurred in mid December 2015. As the Islamic State's resulting defeat was widely reported on in Iraqi Kurdistan and abroad, it is not entirely clear how the supposed date got mixed up and suddenly ended up being March 2016.

Pretty long, pretty good. Plenty of pictures for those curious about what the front line fighting realities are.

I did start to think by around halfway through that Abu Hajaar is likely to be a CIA agent or somesuch. There's a few points where it just feels like he's fucking with them for his own amusement.

The blog in general seems pretty good for IS related news too.

My son has told me that the ISIS freaks do not seem to be under any real direction at all.  There are rumors of ISIS giving sub-unit commanders the chop for attacks failing.

[Junkenstein]

2BRUTAL5CASUELS

I mean, that stuff is pretty fucking cingeworthy on its own.  Especially when Dark Souls manages to actually deliver without the devs (or, more amazingly, most of the player base) being complete douchebags.

It gets a little funnier, Romero pulled the thing until he has a working demo. Apparently potential backers were somewhat reluctant to commit.

The fact that there were even ANY potential backers is mildly stunning. Its quite worrying that there are apparently people that remember daikatana fondly. This was a FPS so broken it was actually frequently impossible to progress without console commands. A FPS so retarded that it included a shotgun that fires 6 times, every time. A Shooter that would make the current SJW crowd shit itself in disbelief at some of the incredible stereotypes exhibited. If there is any kind of God of Games, I'd put decent money on Romero being his anti-thing. That isn't even touching his previous attempts at marketing/PR.

The eventual trainwreck should be that year's version of gaming horrormirth.

[Cain]

Its weird though, because you'd think someone who was there with Id Software right at the beginning would at least have some idea of how to make a decent FPS.   I guess John Carmack was the creative genius of that operation.  Actually, that would make sense, since the new Wolfenstein games are actually pretty damn decent.

[Junkenstein]

John Carmack was, and I think still is the guy who was actually pushing stuff. I'm pretty sure there were a few articles about how he tends to release a new game as part of a new video engine upgrade which is where the odd development cycles (Rage to Doom 4) start happening. Carmacks games have always been solid, if not exceptional. He's also had a hand in VR along the way too. The man gets shit done. 

Romero amuses me because he was(is) such a cracking example of dunning-kruger. The whole Diakatana fiasco is a great example as the logic basically ran "I was involved in making a few doom levels and converting metal songs to 8bit versions ergo I was involved in making Doom, ergo I know exactly what you must do to make a FPS as successful as Doom. Give me money." And people did. In droves. Despite every red flag being waved at them. Silly cars, ridiculous offices, "Rockstar Developer" bullshit and the terrible, terrible marketing guaranteed failure. That the eventual product was terrible was no surprise, it's actually practically inevitable. It's very telling that he keeps referring to 20+ year old projects as he has literally done nothing of worth in the interim. Assuming his next effort comes out anyt ime near one of Carmack's the comparisons will be immediate and I know who my money is on for the better reviews.

[LMNO]

Trump meets Kissinger. 

I am rapidly approaching horrormirth.

[Cain]

Would that be Henry "Kissinger is a friend, and I relied on his counsel when I served as secretary of state" Kissinger?

Also, it could be worse.  I mean, you may remember this conversation:

Nixon: I still think we ought to take the North Vietnamese dikes out now. Will that drown people?

     Kissinger: About two hundred thousand people.

    Nixon: No, no, no, I'd rather use the nuclear bomb. Have you got that, Henry?

    Kissinger: That, I think, would just be too much.

    Nixon: The nuclear bomb, does that bother you?...I just want you to think big, Henry, for Christsakes.

And we're all still alive.  Somehow.

[Junkenstein]

Would that be Henry "Kissinger is a friend, and I relied on his counsel when I served as secretary of state" Kissinger?

Also, it could be worse.  I mean, you may remember this conversation:

Nixon: I still think we ought to take the North Vietnamese dikes out now. Will that drown people?

     Kissinger: About two hundred thousand people.

    Nixon: No, no, no, I'd rather use the nuclear bomb. Have you got that, Henry?

    Kissinger: That, I think, would just be too much.

    Nixon: The nuclear bomb, does that bother you?...I just want you to think big, Henry, for Christsakes.

And we're all still alive.  Somehow.

There are some conversations that make you less human just for being a part of them. This is one of these.

[Junkenstein]

In other news, Boko Haram has never stopped being a thing despite everyone stopping giving a fuck a couple of years back,

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-36321249

One of the missing Chibok schoolgirls has been found in Nigeria, activists say, the first to be rescued since their capture two years ago.

Glad to see that hashtag was effective. Also nice to see how much actual effort has been put in to bothering to fucking do anything here. It's actually a little strange to me as given the natural resources in Nigeria and surrounding areas I would have thought that someone would have thrown a little more effort at the problem for a longer term gain.

[Cain]

Well then.

By this time tomorrow night, Austria may have voted the Freedom Party's candidate in as President.

For those of you unfamiliar with the Freedom Party, it is probably one of Europe's best known "fascism-lite" parties, its first leader a former Nazi party official no less (Anton Reinthaller, Minister of Agriculture in the Seyss-Inquart administration in Austria, and member of the SS).  It was almost single-handedly responsible for turning immigration into a political issue in Austria, historically advocating pan-Germanism and castigating the welfare state.  It is closely aligned with the French Front National, Vlaams Belang, Swedish Democrats, Danish Freedom Party, Alternative for Germany...the usual suspects.

In theory, Austria's presidency is a figurehead, a ceremonial figure...but on paper, the office has powers more comparable to, say, France or Russia's semi-presidential system than say Israel or Ireland.  These powers have not been used in the past much...but that may change.  The Freedom Party already forms part of a coalition government with the more traditionally conservative Austrian People's Party, and in theory the next Parliamentary elections are in 2018.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-36353200