GTA4: The First Morning in the Liberty City

I remember when I discovered the original GTA in 1996, I used to come over to my friends house just to play the time limited demo. I just loved how open ended the game was, allowing me to do pretty much anything I wanted. There was something very special about the freedom GTA allowed, and it was nothing like any game before it.

Today, 12 years later, is the official release date of Grand Theft Auto IV. I have been saturating myself with leaked videos of the game and every bit of associated news. Naturally, I had to get it the first chance I could. I was surprised to find that I was not alone. When the doors finally opened at 12am, there were at least 100 other eager fans waiting to get their hands on this highly anticipated title.

So what do I think? This review can only be categorized as first impression as I am only few hours into the game. But already, the game holds up to all of the hype. Sure, there are a few glitches. But the sheer density of detail is amazing. As I walked out into the street during my first morning in Liberty City, I immediately felt like a part of it. Construction noises in the background, pedestrians talking on cell phones, honking of the cars all combined into all too familiar noise of the urban life.

Walking casually down the street I wondered into a diner. With no loading times, Niko pushed open the door. As I was marveling at the tiny details of the place, I was approached by a random thug who began threatening me. This was unacceptable and i fumbled for the right button to throw a punch. Watching the character throw his first hook, complete with smooth, believable animation made me smile. Unfortunately, the thug retaliated with a fury and soon his friend joined in the assault.

It was difficult seeing Niko getting beat up, so I decided to take off. Throwing open the doors of the diner I ran out, with the two thugs giving chase behind me. They clearly were out for blood and did not hesitate to run after me. Fortunately, a police cruiser happened to roll by just as my very first two enemies began finishing what they started.

Cops stooped the beautifully modeled car and got out immediately, shouting at the thugs to throw their hands up. Next thing I know is there is a fire fight. Whats amazing, I am not involved. This is the first for the series. Cops actually protect you as long as they see other people as aggressors.

After an exchange of fire, the cops prevailed. They got back into their cruiser and drove away unceremoniously, just another day on the job I guess. I decided to stick around and watch what happens next. Soon an ambulance arrived and shortly paramedics were trying to revive the fallen crooks. "Don't you die on me!" shouted the paramedic as he was working to heal one of them. The bad guy was slowly getting up from the ground, moaning "I need some vodka".

All this was non scripted, completely dynamic scenario. All this in my first morning in the Liberty City. I can only imagine what the evening has in store.

Will MySQL Keep Lighting up LAMP?

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On January 16th this year Sun Microsystems announced the purchase of MySQL, world's most popular open source database software. So what does this mean to countless developers who rely on this free tool to house their data? This question will be coming more and more relevant as todays powerful open source projects begin to get acquired by for-profit corporations.

MySQL is part of a very popular set of software called LAMP stack. LAMP stands for Linux, referring to the operating system. Apache, the Web server. MySQL, the database management system (or database server). Perl, Python, and PHP, the programming languages. LAMP is often seen as the best open source solution to compete with proprietary and commercial products, such as Windows, IIS, and .NET. Its open source nature and low cost of deployment make it very attractive for many companies.

The easiest way to see the power and functionality of the LAMP stack in action is to take a look at some of the pre-packaged applications available that use LAMP technology. A well-known example of this is the WordPress blogging system. PHP is the application environment, extracting data from the database and formatting it for display in a Web browser. All of the "articles" or posts are stored in a MySQL database.

Now that Sun owns MySQL, many in the open source community fear the worst. What if Sun makes the database compatible only with its own, proprietary flavor of Unix: Sun Solaris? The article posted on CIO Magazine website addresses these fears.

Former MySQL CEO Marten Mickos, now Sun Microsystems' senior vice president for databases addressed these fears head on: "If we aren't committed (to keeping MySQL Linux compatible and open source) , then any one of you can take the MySQL code and fork it to make a new MySQL product, which I am sure you would do if Sun tried to convert LAMP to SAMP."

For now, at least, there seems to be no concrete reason for LAMP programmers or enterprise users to worry about the future of LAMP applications. While Sun may have had problems with Linux, its continued partnership with Red Hat, its new server partnership with Ubuntu and Mickos' statements, it's clear that Sun/MySQL's recent actions all point to a long and prosperous life for LAMP.

Stephen Hawking on Future of Humanity

TED Link

This week, TED website released another amazing and inspirational talk. To start off, what is TED? It stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from those three worlds. The TED Conference, held annually in Monterey, is the heart of TED. More than a thousand people attend and the event sells out a year in advance. Over four days, 50 speakers each take an 18-minute slot, and there are many shorter pieces of content, including music, performance and comedy. There are no breakout groups. Everyone shares the same experience.

Recently, these presentations have been made available online. I make a point of it to watch at least some of them because the people who present have such wealth of knowledge and insight to offer that I always learn something new.

For todays entry I would like to comment on the talk by Stephen Hawking, a world renown living physicist. His research and contributions have greatly contributed to our understanding of the universe. In his talk he seemed confident that if within the next 100 years we do not send out a mission to colonize another planet, our race will become extinct. This is a very powerful message from someone who obviously thinks about these things on the daily basis. It seems like the stuff from fiction books. However, seeing our numerous environmental problems and how they may potentially make this planet unable to support our race, colonization of other worlds is something we should start seriously considering.

April Fools Day On The Web

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April 1st is April Fools Day. This is a day dedicated to pranking your friends and co-workers. However since the beginning of the web this holiday has been marked with numerous hoaxes of the digital flavor. This year is no different, companies like Google commemorated the day with several fake news releases.

My favorite this year is Virgle an alleged collaboration between Google and Virgin to start a human colony on mars. The website of the project looks completely legitimate and complete with application form for interested colonists, FAQ and other information. Prospective applicants can get their common questions answered such as "How are you planning to reach Mars?" and "Where will you build the settlement?". This may be an April Fools hoax right now, but knowing ambitions and talents of Richard Branson and the Goolge crew this may become a reality one day.

Another fake product released by Google that i thought was pretty funny is Gmail Custom Time. This new option in Gmail allows sender to make a custom time stamp on the email allowing messages to look like they were send in the past. Unfortunately, there are some limitations according to the press release: "You'll only be able to send email back until April 1, 2004, the day we launched Gmail. If we were to let you send an email from Gmail before Gmail existed, well, that would be like hanging out with your parents before you were born -- crazy talk."

Google was not the only company to jump on the April Fools wagon. Online Dating Dating Industry Journal released news that eHarmony Founder Finds Love on Match.com.

Big April Fools joke this year that has been common to many different websites is referred to as"Rick Rolling". To Rick Roll someone is to trick them into clicking a link that takes them to a cheesy music video of a song by Rick Astley.

RateMyCop.com: New Contravercial Website

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RateMyCop is a new website that was launched on February 28, 2008. It allows anyone to sign up and rate their interactions with police officers. It gives the general public a way to speak out against abusive officers or praise the ones that go above and beyond the call of duty. The company raised alarms when it began collecting officer names and badge numbers, publicly available information, for their database. Currently it has 450 police agencies nationwide with 130,000 officers available to be rated.

Not surprisingly the Police associations that represent more than 100,000 police and sheriffs in California are now seeking legislation to see if they can eliminate the site. Police claims it puts them at danger. However I do not think they will be successful as they have no real grounds. It does not provide any personal information and it does not compromise officer safety. I think the real fear of Police is that it gives general public too much power. It makes police officer behavior more transparent. This is a good thing as far as I am concerned. Public have the right to remain informed.

Critics of RateMyCop.com say that most of the reviews will be negative and dishonest. They say people will get caught breaking the law then go on this website and give the officer who given them a ticket a negative review just for doing his/her job. This is debatable. Many people use this website to say positive things about police officers. In fact it already shows that most police officers are good and it is just the few bad apples that give police a negative image in the eyes of the public.

So to test this theory i went on to the website and the first thing I saw is the 10 most resent reviews and 9 out of 10 of them were positive. So lets see what some of them have to say? The first one for officer David Ludwig sates: 4/5 Stars "Pretty decent guy. Knew him from way back in the late 80's." Next one is for Mark E Laherty from SFPDl: 5/5 Stars "very professional in his behavior." Well so far so good, I don't see any rants or death threats.

Here is a negative review for Eldon Pullins from Quincy Police Department: 3/5 Stars "This cop turned a blind eye to a forgery and never followed up with my complaint. If he ever shows up at your door, just say "next". Just as I predicted, it took me much longer to find another negative review amongst the dozens of positive one. User by the name of "Tyrone" had this to say about Edgar Argersinger of Orange County Sheriff's Office: 3/5 Stars "He is the supervisor at the court where I was in jail. He yelled at all his deputies and called them names. He scared me and the other inmates."

This service has great potential. One of the features that is in the works will allow officers to log on, prove their identity and respond to the negative reviews. This could create the kind of dialog between police and the people that is much needed in our society.

Google Street View Causing a Stir

SlashDot Link

There have been two stories in the media this week concerning Google Street View. First had to do with CNET article that compared this feature of Google Maps to George Orwell's terrifying dystopian vision of 1984. The second article was about US Defence Department banning Google map-making teams from making detailed street-level video maps of American military bases. As someone who is very found of this feature and finds it really useful I decided to dedicate this weeks blog to Google Street View.

Google Street View was launched on my May 29th 2007 (my 25th Birthday!) and since than has revolutionized how people look at maps. This feature allows users to see 360 degree photographs on any spot on the map. This feature is only available in certain US cities but the number is growing fast. The photos are fairly high resolution and show many details of a particular area.

Living in San Francisco, I have used this feature on many occasions to look for potential areas to park my car. The images are not updated often enough to actually look for a particular parking spot, but they do allow to see weather there are metered parking and how long the parking time limit is.

However this feature is scaring enough people that CNET included it in their article on technology that's just wrong. Writers compare it to something out of a scary science fiction novel where government can watch your every move. Personally, I do not think there is any reason to worry about this particular feature allowing "Big Brother" to spy on us. First of all, the images quickly go out of date so it is impossible to use them to track someones movement or whereabouts. Second, it is available to everyone and not just the government. Lastly it even includes a feature to report images that may be inappropriate or compromise personal privacy.

In the second story related to this topic, Government has asked Google to take down images of all US Military bases from Street View sighting security concerns. This is what you will see now when trying to use this feature around military bases. Although I am always weary when government is allowed to sensor access to information, I believe that it is justified in this case. Although the chances of someone actually using this information for something destructive is low, military should be allowed to keep maximum amount of security around its assets and personnel.

Pangea Day

TED Blog Link

Today, while reading TED Blog, I came across this even called Pangea Day. On May 10th 2008 "sites in Cairo, Dharamsala, Kigali, London, New York City, Ramallah, Rio de Janeiro, and Tel Aviv will be videoconferenced live to produce a program of powerful films, visionary speakers, and uplifting music."

The idea is to use the power of moving image to unite. To allow people to see the world from someone else's eyes. Here is a promotional trailer that was released just yesterday:



I truly believe that an effort of this magnitude will leave a positive mark on the world. It great to see the power of technology being used for this kind of effort. A globally organized event like this could have never happened before todays huge bandwidth and super computers.

Please join the effort and participate by going to pangeaday.org to sign up for the news letter, see the list of events in your area and learn more about it.

Positive Aspects of Games and Gamers

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Media has a long history of bashing video games for just about anything. Here is an example of the blame put on games for the Virginia Tech shootings. This is just one of many such instances unfortunately. Anytime someone looses it and they happened to play games, media is quick to place the blame. But today I want to discuss the positive aspects of playing games and gamers to counter these miss conceptions.

There are many examples of games and gamers doing positive, even life-saving, deeds in our society. Here are a few of the most resent:

Twenty-eight year old Paxton Galvanek was driving home when he witnessed an SUV lose control a flip over several times. He stopped the car and ran over to see if he could help. He was quickly able to asses the situation, prioritize the injuries and administer basic treatment. He learned these things from playing America's Army which includes actual medic training.

Another example comes from a gamer who saved a life of his nephew by undergoing a dangerous liver transplant. A procedure where chance of donor death is 40%.

In addition there are now studies coming out that show that brains of video gamers are more developed in areas of coordination and spacial orientation. In fact one study shows that video games may help recovering stroke patients.

There is no doubt that doing nothing but playing games all day is not healthy for anyone. However the average gamers are not lethargic couch potatoes. Most of us have jobs, families and other interests. My argument is that media needs to stop this hate for games and accept this most resent and promising entertainment medium.

Spore Release Date Announced

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When I first heard of Spore, the concept intrigued me. The core idea behind this game is to create a life form and follow it's evolution from a single cell to civilization to inter galactic travel. Players are given tools to create their creature as well as virtually everything else including buildings, trees, vehicles and other objects. Players will be able to create a dynamic, evolving universe of their imaginations. This is accomplished through various intuitive editors that are simple and easy to learn but powerful enough to facilitate great creativity. This ambitious concept came from Will Wright, a legendary game designer. He first became famous when he created Sim City, a game where the player is able to start their own city and manage every single detail of its growth. He was also the designer of Sims which gave players ability to create their own person and develop all aspects of their Sim's life. When Spore, originally code named "Sim Everything", was announced it had the whole gaming community buzzing with excitement.

Originally slated to be released in April of 2007, Spore was plagued by delays and set backs. When last year it was announced that it was getting pushed back to 2008 many thought that Spore was joining the ranks of other ambitious projects that never make into reality. However Electornics Arts cleared those fears when it announced the release date for this September 7th 2008. Furthermore they are simultaneously releasing it on PC, Mac, Nintendo DS and a cell phones.

For 10 years, while designing this game, Will Wright researched things like art, biology, evolution and other deep topics that are not usually associated with games. In an interview he was quoted as saying that this was his dream project, that one game he always wanted to create. If this game is as successful as it is expected to be, it will create a new genre in games called Massively Singleplayer Online.

The reason behind that new term is that Spore is a single player game at its core. However, all of the content is created by other players and will be procedurally imported into the user's gaming universe. In Massively Multiplayer Online games such as World of Warcraft where you are directly interacting with others online. In Spore you are never directly interacting with other players, but the content of your world is populated using the things others have created. This concept has never successfully been tried before and if Will Wright gets it right with Spore, he will not only create another instant classic but also blaze a brave new path for other game designers to follow.

Open Source

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After reading this article it got me thinking: are there any disadvantages of open source software?

To start off, here is a brief introduction to open source software in the form of comparison between Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. One of the most popular and widely used open source applications is the Mozilla Firefox web browser. It is a direct competitor to Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Both of them can parse web pages equally well. Both have lots of features. The major difference is how they are developed. IE is a product of Microsoft which is a private, for profit, firm. Microsoft hires developers and pays them money to create, maintain and update their product. On the other hand Firefox is a piece of software that is developed under open source license. This means that anyone can get the source code for the browser. Although the non profit Mozilla Foundation guides the central vision of this product, there are thousands of volunteers who contribute to its development and testing. They are not compensated monetarily and provide their labor completely for free.

Firefox is just one example out of literary thousands of open source projects many of which rival their for-profit counter parts. So the question is there any draw backs to these?

From my personal experience I found that, in general, open source software is less user friendly than the stuff you pay for. This could be because this software is designed with more savvy users in mind. Developers are not concerned about the less knowledgeable users and assume that if you were able to find open source tool, you should be comfortable with a more advanced interface.

Another problem that I often run into is that it takes more time to setup and get the open source tools working. Perhaps this is because the makers spend their development resources on the product it self rather than the installers and wrappers.

Open source software is a great resource to individuals and groups. Often these tools are better than their costly counter parts. Despite some of the problems I have had with some of open source tools, I believe they are a great service to the internet community and I thank all open source developers.

Optimized Next-Gen Titles on the Horizon?

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If you have seen one of those beautiful demos designed to test your GPUs full potential chances are you have watched 3D Mark by Futuremark. Here is an example of their demo designed to stretch the limits of your video card and provide a score of its performance.

This product has been the leading benchmarking tool for graphic card performance for years. 3D Mark scores are often used to compare and pick the industry's leading GPUs.

Futuremark has been known to utilize the latest technologies in their demos making them not only beautiful to look at but impressive from the technical perspective. It came as no surprise when in today's press release Futuremark announced formation of a group named the Futuremark Games Studio

The CEO of Futuremark Corporation, Tero Sarkkinen, was quoted as saying "For years, our fans have been asking us when will we start making games. Very soon they are going to get it - and then some!"

As a game developer working on a nex-gen title I understand the challenges involved in graphic optimization. A beautiful looking game is doomed to failure if an average gamer is unable to run it. Doom3 and Crysis quickly come to mind. Both of these games are absolutely beautiful. Doom with its impressive lighting and atmosphere. Crysis with its lush vegetation, realistic water, and dense jungle. Yet nether of these games are particularly fun to play because for most players, even with relatively up to date systems, the frames per second are noticeably low.

It will be interesting to see if the many lessons learned from testing thousands of graphic cards will help this new development house to produce games that are not only impressive to look at but also run smooth without having to submerge your CPU in liquid nitrogen.