Tuesday Tasting: When Good Things Go Wrong
Each week, Ariel Waldman serves a tasting of the latest in sex and tech.
2 Girls, 1 Cup Curiosity Gets Malware
Curiosity killed the cat, but it can also certainly kill your computer. The 2 Girls, 1 Cup grotesque viral phenomenon isn't slowing down. The sheer buzz around a video most find too terrifying to describe is building in search engines, with hacker trolls trailing behind. Sites now claiming to host the video are infact infested with malware. As if the sight of the reactions (uncontrollable puking, dry heaving, etc.) of other people watching 2 Girls, 1 Cup wasn't enough to deter us from seeking out the video, the possibility of malware on our precious Macs/PCs has us avoiding hitting play for good.
Uber-dexterous Robotic Hand Copies Humans
We were just as excited as Engadget to learn about the new "uber-dexterous robotic hand" that was recently released. Supposedly, it's being held up as "one of the holy grails of science". At first glance, the sensor-saturated hand seems like it could be the perfect balance of man and machine for personal pleasure. That is until, we read that the dynamic device would be "using artificial intelligence to create software that could "learn and copy human hand movements." Sure, great for those who lost a limb, but for those of us interested in using technology for temptation, who would want a pleasure device that mimics the clumsiness of your college boyfriends?
Parents Recommended To Buy Game Promoted By Nude Models
The National Institute for Media and the Family compiles a yearly "buying guide" around the holidays for approved and disapproved games, based on family values. Kotaku of course caught the "helplessly out of touch" organization recommending video games with specific promotions of naked Page 3 girls. The game featuring the girls was Need For Speed: Pro Street. To give NIMF a break, naked girls may be the perfect escape from eggnog overdoses during the forced holiday family-time. Just be sure to hide the console from the kids.
Bad Game Designer, No Twinkie!
Ernest Adams has released his list of game design features and faux pas that will leave many a game designer weeping for cream stuffed pastries. Thankfully, Mr. Adams is not a whining know-it-all spewing forth ideas on why he is right and everything else is incredibly wrong. No, he is a freelance game designer, writer, lecturer, and a member of the International Hobo game design consortium. Thats right. Hobo.
Novelty is one of the many ways that video games entertain, and a quality that sets video gaming apart from, say, board gaming. Mahdi Jeddi writes to complain about games that present all their features in the first few levels, and then dont have anything new to offer in the later stages of the game. As he says, If they have budget limitations, they can spread the introduction of new features across all levels, and maybe make some special levels for one feature. This way the game will maintain its freshness to its end and the player will be saved from boredom.
I think this Hobo is onto something. I hate when Ive unlocked everything Ill ever be able to do in a game after only having played for a couple hours. Ive stopped playing a number of games less than halfway through as Id already reached the status of Grand Master Jesus and was untouchable. Only with the awesome Psychonauts did I look forward to new and fun powers after every level.
He then goes on to say how vital translation and localization is
In the past, very few games were translated to Spanish, mainly graphic adventures, and those were probably the only ones correctly translated. I especially remember the Lucasarts games because they had good translations, and even the American-themed jokes were changed for Spanish-themed ones
Today, with games being more complex and full of multimedia content, I think localization has become a bigger task, and while some games are correctly adapted, many others arent.
I played Call of Duty in English for the first time, and the voices added to the realism, but in the Spanish version the translation is extremely poor. In the original version the officers shouted orders, emphasizing points; panicking soldiers reflected panic in their voices; hidden people whispered at you, and even different nationalities had distinguishable accents. In the Spanish version, theres no voice acting at all, its only reading. Its the same tone and pattern for every line of dialogue, no matter what the situation or the environment.
I cant tell you how many games Ive played that were ported to Canada and nothing was done to localize the language aside from a clichéd Eh! and Its OK if you get shot, we have free health care! dropped onto the end of every sentence. Well thats just a little racist and I wont be sending any of you Call of Duty boys Twinkies. Mainly because Im lying, but partially because Twinkies are just gross and filled with toxic goop!