Dialog
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Apple boosts in-house chip program with $600 million acquisition
Apple has signed a licensing deal with its long-time supplier Dialog and acquired assets including 300 employees, the two companies announced. Apple will pay the UK-based firm $300 million now plus another $300 million in the future for delivery of products. It also awarded Dialog a number of new contracts for power management, charging and audio subsystem chips.
Flameseeker Chronicles: Five of the purest joys of Guild Wars 2's PvE
I had a really bright idea to title this post "Five things that don't suck about Guild Wars 2's PvE." However, being a denizen of the Interblags, I paused as I typed out those words. "You know, Elisabeth," I said to myself, "someone somewhere would probably see that as an invitation to troll." "But Elisabeth," myself responded, "isn't everything on the Interblags an invitation to troll?" I had to confess that I made a fair point. I mean, it was probably a silly title anyway. There are a lot of things, I tend to think, that don't suck about Guild Wars 2's PvE, and I don't want to give you the wrong impression. Saying they don't suck is a pretty negative way to frame it, don't you think? I'm glad we agree. Anyway, read on to catch some of the most non-suckiest things in Guild Wars 2's PvE.
Breakfast Topic: What game sound has snuck into your daily life?
You know those pesky ganarg up in Netherstorm? The ones that make the weird, "ee-OOH" Scooby-Doo sound when you kill them? I make that sound occasionally in real life, for no apparent reason at all. I never spent an inordinate amount of time leveling characters in Netherstorm, and I hold no particular fondness or enmity for the ganarg. (Although the dudes with the rotating blades? Yeah, those dudes and me are on the outs.) I really have no idea what provokes me to pipe up with this odd sound effect. I mean, come on, The Burning Crusade was forever ago! Maybe you can explain the relationship between ganarg engineers and stepping out of the shower. I know I certainly can't. In fact, death sounds of all sorts are particularly fertile territory in a gaming family like mine. EverQuest human male death sounds still get a lot of traction when we collapse on the couch at the end of the day. Moving on, I guess there aren't too many weeks that go by without at least a handful of murloc calls. For WoW players, isn't that pretty much a given? But even regular dialog goes a long way. Orcish has proven useful in general family life: "zug-zug" when reminded to do your chores or "Lok'tar! The dishwasher is loaded!" when the feat is complete. I can't say that anything from Mists has infiltrated my consciousness like the infernal Scooby-ganarg -- not yet, anyway. But I've found most players develop an affinity for some in-game sound. WoW Twitterati @elepheagle reports liking the sound effect of tilling untilled soil. He says he finds it soothing. Maybe that's what I need: more tilling, less Scooby. What about you? What sounds, new or old, from World of Warcraft have snuck into your everyday consciousness? Is there a phrase or line of dialog you just can't shake? Do you hear the death rattles of long-ago bosses in your dreams?
Microsoft showcases new copy, move, rename functions in Windows 8 (video)
Windows 8 has yet to see the light of day, but new details on the forthcoming OS continue to emerge. The most recent preview once again comes courtesy of Microsoft's Building Windows 8 blog, where the company has posted new information on the software's copy, move, rename and delete functions. With the new system, all pending copy operations will appear in one dialog, where users can pause, stop and resume any job, while monitoring data transfer rates on a real-time throughput graph (pictured above). Redmond's developers have also made it easier to resolve file name collisions, with a new dialog that displays thumbnail images of source files directly alongside preexisting documents of the same name. This allows users to decide which files they'd like to copy or replace by simply hovering their mouse over the image to see its file path, or double clicking it to open in full view. For more information, check out the demo video that's waiting for you after the break.
Mac 101: Enter directory paths when in open/save dialogs
Last week I told you about easily switching directories (folders) while in an open/save dialog. This was great when you knew where a folder was located in a specific place, and you could drag + drop it on the dialog. But what if you want to type in a directory path (i.e. ~/Desktop)?While in an open/save dialog, pressing Command + Shift + G will allow you to type in a directory path. For instance, if I wanted to open my Documents directory for my user, I would type ~/Documents. The tilde (~) tells the computer to look in the current user's home directory.Want more tips and tricks like this? Visit TUAW's Mac 101 section.
SWTOR has dialogue trees, irreversible choices, love interests
In the midst of all the frenzy over the announcement of Star Wars: The Old Republic, we learned that players will have NPC companions like they do in single-player BioWare games. But there's more: BioWare has said that players will be able to engage in dialogue trees with their companions, and the decisions made in those trees will have irreversible implications.Anger your companion, and he or she might leave your party forever, or become your enemy. BioWare also hinted that romances with NPCs will be possible -- again, as in the single-player games. This all fits nicely into SWTOR's commitment to storytelling as an addition to traditional MMO gameplay. Things just gets better and better, don't they?Some questions are raised by this: how will players socialize with one anotherwhen they're constantly tied up in dialogue trees? Will it use the old BioWare dialogue method found in the KotOR games, or will it use the new, cropped Mass Effect one? Stay tuned, ya'll!%Gallery-35034% Bioware has finally unveiled Star Wars: The Old Republic, their new MMO! Massively's got you covered on all the details -- from liveblogging the announcement to screenshot galleries and more. Join us in the Galaxy far, far away!
Terminal Tips: Stop Safari "saved text" dialogs
We're continuing with Safari hacks for today's Terminal Tip. Have you ever typed text on a web page, but then realized that you want to go to another page without saving your input? However, when you close the window or tab, Safari rudely tells you that you have saved text and if you navigate away, your changes will not be saved. While these dialogs can be useful, most of the time they're annoying. If you want to get rid of them, just type in this Terminal (/Applications/Utilities/) command and press enter: defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugConfirmTossingUnsubmittedFormText NOYou will no longer see the dialog when you have typed text on a page and want to navigate away. To reverse the command, replace "NO" with "YES." Want more tips and tricks like this? Visit TUAW's Mac 101 and Terminal Tips sections.
Exclusive interview with AoC Senior Dialog Writer Aaron Dembski-Bowden
Age of Conan has received acclaim from all quarters, especially for the quality of the Tortage quests, dialog and voiceover acting. The credit for a bewilderingly vast amount of this material goes to Aaron Dembski-Bowden, a young British writer already known for his work in the tabletop roleplaying field. We tracked him down and managed to secure an interview. Despite the look in his eyes above, which is the sort of thing you see immediately before your character's arms and head are cut off, he proved a very approachable guy... Let's start with your background, your work to date, what position you held in the AoC team, and what responsibilities that entailed. I've done a bunch of pen 'n paper RPG work (primarily for White Wolf on their World of Darkness game lines) and Mongoose Publishing's various Fantasy genre licences. I'm currently alternating between videogame work and writing Warhammer 40,000 novels for the Black Library, Games Workshop's publishing house. Also, in the few moments of clarity that reach me through the haze of over-coffeed sleepless nights, I still cling to the shreds of useful lore I picked up from my writing degree. This is the part where I should say I've always wanted to be a writer. That's not entirely true. I wanted to be a writer in my teens, when I realised I was too much of a coward to be a paramedic. All that lifesaving sounded like hard work, y'know? And before I wanted to be a paramedic, my only ambition was to be one of the kids that got to hang out with Optimus Prime. In my defence, I was about 4 at the time.
Interview with AoC dialog writer Aaron Dembski-Bowden, part 2
The original Conan stories had some fairly racist dialog. How did you reconcile a hero who makes a point of never abandoning a fellow 'white man' with the gamers of the 21st century? I just didn't present that aspect of him. That links into a later question, actually... Inter-cultural enmity is very much a part of Conan's world, though. Some AoC servers now have 'cultural PvP' where you can attack anyone who's not your countryman. Obviously, much of Howard's original inspiration came from real-world cultures, so stuff like the 'dusky' Stygians being treacherous and decadent is that much closer to the knuckle than, say, a more fantasy-based setting with elves and orcs and so on. How did you feel writing for a world with such a lack of inter-cultural tolerance? Honestly, I didn't feel bad about writing this world for two reasons: one personal, one professional. Firstly, maybe I should have felt bad about it on a personal level, but I never did. That's because I have such little respect for Howard as a person, it was easy to dismiss his attitudes as those of a bastard and not feel bad about it all by ignoring them. I have immense and total respect for his skills as a writer and a storyteller, I know his writings very well, but the guy himself was racist, sexist and the reasons for his suicide always unnerved me. I think there should be room in the world to say 'I love Guy X's work, but I don't want a cup of tea with him' without being fired or sued. Secondly, and far more importantly, because all quests had to be generic for The Player instead of race/class combos, the only intercultural intolerance in the game itself comes from dialog. I did a huge bunch of nation-based dialog options to try and squeeze in the variety wherever I could. That felt great, because it was fun as hell. Just focus on aspects of the culture that aren't linked in any way to today's cultural climate. Stygians have fewer rights than snakes in their homeland. Aquilonians and Cimmerians can mock that instead of calling a Stygian all manner of names because he happens to have dark skin. And those aspects of the cultures are by far the most interesting and relevant parts of the lore, anyway. The Cimmerians believe their god doesn't even answer prayers. A Stygian in the thrall of Set-worship, who sees his god as all-powerful, would focus heavily on cultural differences like that. Mentioning that stuff was cool, and was the main way I missed out on the open racism inherent in Howard's work. On a similar subject, as a dialog writer, how did you tackle the characterization of women in Conan's world? We couldn't help but notice that the second NPC you encounter is a hapless prostitute chained across your path, who begs you for your help! Yeah. A lot of Hyboria as written by Howard was sexist and racist up to 11. A lot of people who've dealt with Conan in the past use the excuse that Howard was from a different era – a product of a different age. It's something even people on the project have said. There's an obvious truth to that, but I don't really accept that as an entirely valid justification. I'm of the mind that the year you were born doesn't really excuse you for being a bastard. I also wasn't overly keen on the way some aspects of the game pander to it. F'rex, calling the whorehouse 'the Bearded Clam' still grinds my gears just a little. The 'boobs and blood' marketing never sat well with me, to be perfectly honest. But then, that's Howardian through and through. Just amped up even further to get attention. I tried very hard to present Howardian writing in both technical form and getting the spirit right. 'Boobs and blood' marketing has never worked on me overmuch, and I tried my best to resist it in the dialog. Game direction did repeatedly say no to explicit sex, which I always thought was a strange touch given other attitudes on display. I dealt with it as best I could. Several characters (like the mistress of the Tortage whorehouse; the barmaid Alyssa; Countess Albiona) have dialogue relating to sex. I tried to make it thematic and cool without being gratuitous or sounding like something from Beavis & Butthead. The conversation you can have with Sancha in Tortage, when you can question why the whores are complaining about not being paid for their 'pleasurable job', is some of the stuff I'm proudest of. I feel like Sancha's reactions in that conversation tree bring some of the game's attempted maturity to the fore. You make it sound as if there were 'creative differences', as the boy bands put it, between yourself and the game's directors. Not so much. I mean, on a project this size there'll always be differences, but it was actually pretty smooth sailing. Game direction never stamped on any of my pretty-pretty-princess dreams. However, to explain better: the inspirational quote on our internal homepage, for every day of the project, was 'Combat, combat, combat – the game in a nutshell'. That's fine; that's what sells copies of the game more than anything. Let's just say that I was always made very aware that the writing on the project was considered overall as something of a side consideration. More like polish, really. Game direction as regards to the writing was very loose. The strictures I mentioned (no race/class quests, and no sex) were in place, and that was pretty much that. No dream-stamping in view. Besides, I'm sure anyone on any project can point to things they wished they could do differently. Saddur is supposed to be a eunuch, right? Yeah. I really dig his voice, too. Before I heard it, I'd always imagined he'd sound like the narrator in Baldur's Gate. You know the one I mean. That guy. 'You must gather your party before venturing forth.' I put that line in AoC, by the way. And it was freaking worth it, tells ya. How do you feel about writing for a backstory that the player has no choice in? In a shared world, it seems weird that every single Age of Conan character washed up on the same beach with the same Acheronian mark on their breast. Would you have liked to give players more freedom? I'd have loved to do more with it. I've got two things to say to that, I guess. One would be that, well, it's an MMO. We tried hard with the story, but the fact it's an MMO was severely limiting in that regard. It's the same with WoW – you need to suspend your disbelief because the world is populated by a thousand other versions of people on the same story as you. Every Horde character that levels in Eversong Woods and the Ghostlands is 'that one character' responsible for bringing in Dar'Khan's head and getting the Blood Elves involved with the Horde. Same deal here. We wanted the story to be a personal one, but the necessities of the MMO format mean you've got to...hand-wave a little. The second thing I'd say is that we've got a dedicated Live team, which (ahem) I happen to be part of. I genuinely have zero idea what the future holds in this score, but if someone ever said I had to do dialog for more starter areas in future patches, I'd not be stunned. Tortage has been incredibly well-received, after all. Most reviews I've seen pin Tortage, its dialog and its varied quests as the high quality point of the game. I stress, again, that I have no idea. I just wouldn't be surprised at more starter areas in X years. That's not insider info; it's just something I think would be cool. AoC has had a spectacular reception so far, with editions selling out all over the place. Did you expect this much success? Honestly, I did. I don't think it's a disservice to say that the main appeals of the game are the GFX (including the blood 'n guts fatalities elements) and the PvP play style. That was always going to sell the game well, and the boobs 'n blood marketing style was hardly a hindrance. I make no claims to being some erudite, highbrow genius that rules above such things, but the focus on certain aspects of the game meant I was sure it would sell well. I still find the concept of an 18+ game apparently selling game-time cards hilarious, though. What, you have a gaming rig capable of AoC, electricity bills, an ISP, and you buy game cards?) but...whatever. Let's not fight, dear. What has pleased me is that beyond the incredible GFX and the PvP, a lot of other jazz is getting praised, too. And yeah, sure I mean my work – but also the VO quality, the quest system, the music that's beyond awesome, and a thousand other touches that make the game whole. Thanks again, Aaron, and congratulations on the ongoing success of Age of Conan!
TUAW Tip: Speed up Sheet animation
I was reading this article from MacDevCenter on how productivity maven Mark Hurst sets up a new "Good Easy Mac" for his own maximally productive use. He's got a number of interesting choices (check them out for yourself), but one of the coolest tips was a link to a MacOSXhints hint that describes how to speed up your sheet dialog boxes. These are the boxes that appear when you open, save, or print and by default OS X animates them so that they drop down and expand. Well if you open a lot of these sheets like I do, this can get annoying after a while, especially if you use Default Folder X, which adds its own delay. Anyway, a simple terminal command can radically speed up the appearance of these sheets, which over the course of a day can really cut down on the annoyance factor. All you have to do is open the terminal and type:defaults write NSGlobalDomain NSWindowResizeTime .001If you want to restore the default behavior just replace the '.001' with '.2' Anyway, try it, I bet you'll like it.
