Mac OS X NWN Technology Demo Released 303
h0tblack writes "At long last the Mac OS X demo of Neverwinter Nights has been released. We now have a torrent running to get the demo distributed and take the load of off the official servers (macgamefiles should have the demo soon). Download the BitTorrent for Mac OS X client if you don't already have it.
Then grab the torrent file for the tech-demo from bytemonsoon.com. After downloading the demo, PLEASE leave your BitTorrent window open, this will mean that the load is shared amongst us all and more people can download faster."
ok, then (Score:5, Funny)
Re:ok, then (Score:2)
Re:ok, then (Score:5, Funny)
Re:ok, then (Score:5, Informative)
To undertand this, you've gotta realise that clients will upload to YOU based on the upload rates they directly experience from you.
When you join the torrent swarm, you initally have no pieces so the download is slow at less than 5 K/s. Eventually you will have one chunk (about 1 MB) and then, in an effort to boost your node's 'ranking' with other nodes, it uploads furiously, making the upload rate faster than the download rate.
But then your node will rise in priority among other nodes because you are uploading, thus they will upload more data to you. In the long run, your upload and download rate will be equal unless you already start with a chunk of the file you got elsewhere that can be shared, or there are a lot of seeds (nodes with the complete file that are uploading only) and bandwidth to spare.
At the end, look at the count for data uploaded and downloaded. They should be quite similar.
Re:ok, then (Score:2)
Re:ok, then (Score:2)
Re:ok, then (Score:5, Informative)
Foolish AC ;-) Go back to your Kazaa Lite. Bram (Cohen, creator or bittorrent) already thought of this. Feel free to send outrageous upload statistics to the tracker. That information is not used to determine how much people upload to you. Other clients only consider the upload rates they experience directly. The ONLY way to get high download rates on bittorrent while not uploading is to connect to a swarm with high seed:leecher ratio.
Re:ok, then (Score:2)
I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:5, Interesting)
Why don't the
Mirror of the .torrent file (Score:5, Informative)
Any other mirrors?
Re:Mirror of the .torrent file (Score:4, Informative)
Firstly, this is a demo for a mac game so you might not want to download it if you only have a windows machine.
Your office firewall might be blocking outbound connections on ports other than common ones (80,21, etc.) so you can't connect to the tracker.
Also, it could be that the tracker is overloaded. It's the bittorrent equivalent to a 404 error. (The tracker keeps track of what IPs are downloading so clients will know whom they should connect to in order to get parts of the file, and they also keep track of many transfer statistics. Bandwidth used by the tracker tends to be between 1/1,000th and 1/10,000th of the overall transfer used to upload and download the file. But with VERY popular files, even a tracker can get swamped just like a slashdotted site.)
Re:Mirror of the .torrent file(responding to self) (Score:2)
Actually this is not entirely true. My bad. A 404 error means that it can't be found, which is different from being overloaded.
So basically 'problem connection to tracker' can sometimes be the same as 404, but other times it can mean the same as 'server too busy' but I don't know if there's a surefire way to tell which one it is.
Re:Mirror of the .torrent file (Score:2)
Find a job making them
Re:Mirror of the .torrent file (Score:2)
Maybe its possible they are blocking that port for outbound connections at work?
PS. If you simply uninstall zone alarm, it doesnt remove any of its firewall rules, only the application that asks if you want to let a program access the internet. Took me a while to make the connection of 'random programs not working' to those are the ones I didnt allow because i wanted to be asked (ahem, IE)
Re:Mirror of the .torrent file (Score:2, Informative)
Re:I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:3, Informative)
in this case, the whole of bytemonsoon will probably be down shortly.
also, there was a site for
http://torrents.slash0.org/ [slash0.org]
Re:I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, the transfer of the files should be alleviated by using BT as opposed to the server having to serve the files. However, BT still relies on a single point of failure per download, that being the tracker.
For each person that wants to connect, they have to connect to the same tracker, which needs to manage telling each client where the peers are, mananging the throttle, etc. While not as bandwidth intensive as serving the actual files, under a good slashdotting, the tracker itself will get overloaded, and as a result, become ineffective for people.
The logical conclusion would be for /. to run a tracker, because it's obvious from their traffic that they could probably handle it. Maybe even make that a subscriber perk? Taco, are you listening?
Re:I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:2)
Re:I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:2)
Agreed, and I wasn't trying to condemn bytemonsoon or torrentse.cx for not being able to handle the load. Just pointing out that, while they aren't having to serve the entire files, they still suffer from having to make connections.
In other words, I d
Re:I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:2)
Re:I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:2)
The second question is whether "linking" to files on P2P networks is considered equivalent t
Re:I guess that's it for bytemonsoon (Score:3, Informative)
Not bad... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Not bad... (Score:2)
It's a good game, and though it's probably not extremely profitable for Bioware (if at all---YET...), they're sticking to their original statements and following through. (So Thank you Bioware
Should be Interesting (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Should be Interesting (Score:2, Informative)
Newer? My iBook was the bottom of the line 2 years ago, and it has a radeon in it.
Enter the complaints about one-button mouse commments, but keep in mind that most of these RPG's have a ridiculous amount of required buttons
It's a good thing I can hook up my 5 button MS mouse to my iBook.
Re:Should be Interesting (Score:5, Insightful)
Probably about the same way as it did a couple of years ago when the first public test of Quake III Arena was released for it (a week before the PC version).
Re:Should be Interesting (Score:2)
SCNR
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Should be Interesting (Score:3, Interesting)
It's real interesting how ignorant posts about Macs get modded up like this.
My little tibook runs Wolfenstein 3d better than my PC with 3 times the mhz rating (both have 64mb Radeons too.) Remember, mghz does not reflect performance when you're comparing two different architectures, the PPC is a lot more efficient. Macs deal with graphics just fine, thanks.
And yes, you can use any USB mouse you like on your Mac, you're not limited to one button. Macs are designed so that you can use a one button and do
Re:Should be Interesting (Score:2)
2: OK, MHZ is not an viable measure of performance. But the PPC isn't any more efficent than a PIII (unless what you are doing is Altivec optimized). At least not according to most benchmarks. So a 1Ghz PPC G4 should perform like a 1.5Ghz P3 (after some Altivec optimization), which is roughly equivilent to a 1.6Ghz Athlon XP, which is rou
Re:Should be Interesting (Score:3, Interesting)
Nonetheless, they're comparable, and if all this hype about Macs being so 'underpowered' was true you'd certainly expect the AMD with 3 times the clock speed and a comparable videocard to toast the poor little TiBook. In fact, it doesn't, and that's my point.
Exactly.
Saying that Macs are
Good old Bioware (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Good old Bioware (Score:4, Funny)
Windows, MacOS X, and PalmOS?
Re:Good old Bioware (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Good old Bioware (Score:3, Informative)
Trend? No, this is not a trend. This is merely Bioware's partial answer to the claim they made three years ago [google.com].
-- Bioware's official NWN FAQ, until it was changed late June 2002 (after the Windows version went gold [slashdot.org])
Those [slashdot.org] who forget [slashdot.org] the past [slashdot.org] are doomed [slashdot.org] to repeat [slashdot.org] it.
Will this really be viable? (Score:5, Insightful)
Probably not. However, it appears Bioware are pressing ahead (and doing it inhouse) because they are a games company that wants to be around in the long run, and stay one step ahead of its competitors. Writing portable code isn't something that comes as second nature to most Windows coders, least of all games coders, but they clearly think (correctly) that Linux is going to be a force in the long run on the desktop.
By teaching themselves the ins and outs of porting games, they've learned (the hard way it seems) that portability has to be a concern from the beginning. Using SDL isn't hard, but it makes porting so much easier it's untrue. Make sure any 3rd party engines you use will run on other platforms or are easily made portable. And so on.
I think it's telling they outsourced the porting of the Mac client, but kept the Linux port in house. They could have easily hired LGP for instance to port it, or done what was done for Unreal Tournament and get a freelancer in, but they didn't. That makes me think they value the experience and want to keep it internal to the company. Assuming BioWare stick around, I'd expect to see more Linux ports in future.
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:5, Informative)
Hopefully (Score:2)
I have NWN for PC already and have downloaded the Linux files as well. I was disappointed that the mac/linux versions weren't
Re:Hopefully (Score:5, Funny)
If I make you my friend will you buy me a copy as well? I promise that I will play it.
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2)
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2)
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2, Insightful)
Is it really second nature to any coder?
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2, Interesting)
If you know how to do it it's easy. I was once responsible for a system supported on SunOS 2, VM/SP (IBM mainframe), and VMS.
When the decided to port it to Windows NT after about 3 years they did it in 2 weeks.
BTW, it was code that did data marshalling/marshalling across TCP/IP.
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2)
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2)
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2)
Happy Birthday Neverwinter!
Tomorrow is the 1-year anniversary of the game coming out. Mac users get NWN, and PC users get Shadows of Undrentide. Life is good.
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:4, Informative)
The last I heard, BioWare still wasn't planning on porting the toolset even now with a C++ Builder Linux environment available from Borland, likely because it uses the CLX framework and the version BioWare used was likely only using VCL.
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2)
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:3, Insightful)
First, it makes the Aurora engine much more appealing to potential licensees, especially if they follow id's model (buy the engine, and get all platforms included). The Linux and Mac gaming markets are miniscule compared to those running Microsoft OS's, but having all versions available may give a 1%-2% increase in sales. It's still an advan
I fear not (Score:2)
I'm worried that what you're saying here won't prove true. Think about it. Every Linux user who is also a gamer is already dual-booting Windows. With me so far? So a game developer has to choose:
1. Don't spend the time/money to make a Linux version and sell 1 million units. To windows users. Including the Linux guys who'll just reboot to play.
2. Spend the time/money to make a LInux version and sell..
Re:I fear not (Score:2)
I absolutely second that. There are only two games left, that I boot MS Windows 98 for. I did not have the itch and time to get WineX running with them (there are reports that they run), yet, but when I will, Win98 will be gone.
And I will not buy any game that won't run on Win98, because I am n
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2)
Remember there are two parts to the system, the game and the engine. The game is already done for the PC version (and is probably MOST of the work) all they need to do is port the engine.
Finally, I'll buy it :-)
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:4, Insightful)
I wanted to respond to this even though its pretty late in the day and this topic is no longer near the top of the stack on Slashdot.
Writing portable code has benefits in and of itself, regardless of the economic factors of any particular platform. (I believe most games are profitable on the Mac however)
Portable code that has been run through multiple compilers, run in multiple environments, QA'ed by multiple testing teams, etc. is in my experience a damn sight more bug free than single platform code.
Just the differences in compilers can bring to light surprisingly subtle bugs in code.
Do yourself a favor and try to compile your projects with different compilers on different platforms. You may be surprised at the things that you find that would've slipped under your radar using only 1 toolchain on 1 platform. This does not mean GCC on Linux and BSD on x86. It means GCC on Linux/BSD for x86, GCC on Darwin/PPC, VC++ on Win32, and maybe another combo.
Re:Will this really be viable? (Score:2)
guys at Bioware themselves are Macheads. They did it
partially to shut us up. =)
My modem is blazing away! (Score:5, Funny)
Right-o! As someone who is keen on the whole "distributed" part of the internet, I shall leave that window open as soon as my download is done. You will all have the benefit of the uplink of my 2400 baud modem! Torrent away!
Re:My modem is blazing away! (Score:2)
That's not so funny to me! I was actually seeding three torrents on a lame 28.8 connection last weekend!
My downloads (collectively about 500 MB) were between 86 and 96 percent done, transferring over a lovely cable connection. But I was planning to go to my parents' place on the weekend where the best internet available is 28.8 dialup due to the remoteness of the location and bad phone loops.
I was pretty annoyed when m
this is weird (Score:2)
Re:this is weird (Score:2)
You can upload the same data to more than one peer in the swarm ;-) The lopsided transfers are only a temporary effect at the start of the download. See my explanation here [slashdot.org].
Don't even run OSX (Score:3, Funny)
Not that I suspect bandwidth is going to be a problem, I peaked at 2030 kB/s downloading. But I've always felt bad for mac users getting shafted and wanted to help.
Just don't tell my employer.. not sure they would be too impressed watching me output the 1300 kB/s I'm doing atm..
Re:Don't even run OSX (Score:2, Funny)
I've always felt bad for mac users getting shafted and wanted to help.
I've always wanted to shaft Mac users too.Signed,
Bill
BitTorrent or NWN (Score:5, Insightful)
Four and a half sentences about BT.
I think the heading should have read "OS X NWN Demo Available via BitTorrent".
NWN OSX Demo Available - Please Have Mercy (Score:2, Insightful)
With a file this size the Bittorrent may
Re:BitTorrent or NWN (Score:2)
One and a half sentence about NWN.
Four and a half sentences about BT.
One year sentence about posting the two sentence above
Death sentence for modding funny post as insightful
confusing (Score:5, Funny)
Re:OS X? (Score:2)
No, this is hex we're talking about - OS/2, OS/3, etc, OS/A, OS/B, and so on. OS/X is _very_ mature!
Re:OS X? (Score:2)
And, tada: Linux installer/binaries in SoU Expack. (Score:4, Interesting)
It was announced yesterday that the Shadows of Urentide expansion pack which goes on sale tomorrow comes on disk with a linux version.
Yes, it's way the hell after the announced simultaneous three platform release, but at least it's here and if you're not too busy playing Tux Racer and complaining about lack of instant gaming support, it's the most extensible and community supported RPG system to date. Have fun and remember, the campaign the game ships with ain't nothing compared to some of the great stuff the community has produced, so don't limit yourself. (Although the story in SoU's single player campaign looks pretty good in its own right.)/p
Re:And, tada: Linux installer/binaries in SoU Expa (Score:2)
I do see a post on the forums stateing "Shadows of Unrentide will run fine in Linux"
I'm still waiting until the Linux client is official before I even consider NWN...major turn down for me is the lack of FMV, the movies might not be important but I'm a story driven person and missing parts of the story just to play the game doesn't fly with me, I'll wait for the "Directors Cut"
Re:And, tada: Linux installer/binaries in SoU Expa (Score:2)
Re:And, tada: Linux installer/binaries in SoU Expa (Score:2)
But is it playable? (Score:3, Insightful)
Mirror for the Torrent File (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Mirror for the Torrent File (Score:2)
We need a bittorrent for bittorrent/bytemonsoon (Score:2)
And then a healthy dose of Slashdotting on top of that.
Read their news blurb at the bottom, if you can get to the site:
http://www.bytemonsoon.com/
.torrent needed for Mac? (Score:3, Funny)
KIDDING!
Performance Notes on NWN Demo (Score:5, Informative)
Game Settings: All options MAXED, no anti-aliasing
Resolution: 1440
Pros: Runs flawlessly, no hitches, slow framerates or draggy performance.
Cons: No NPC voices. No speech during spellcasting. No shiny water. (tho I don't remember if my vid card supports it)
Very nice job, runs great. Now just gotta wait for the DM Client!
Re:Performance Notes on NWN Demo (Score:2)
Bioware slimmed down the download by not including the extra voice files. Apple's implementation of OpenGL doesn't support the calls necessary to create shiny water (sub-pixel shading, IIRC, though I probably don't...
DM Client: In the Mac box...
NWN Performance notes :Edit: (Score:4, Informative)
Turns out a couple of the glitches aren't glitches at all.
1) Only 4 voicesets were included to compress the filesize for downloads.
2) Shiny water is not dependant upon your video card under OSX, because the current Mac implementation of OpenGL does not support it as of yet.
So, in review...neither of the glitches are bugs at all.
Game still runs flawlessly, smooth gameplay, excellent mouse response.
Gaming on the Mac... It's why I switched! (Score:2, Funny)
Props to redvsblue.com [redvsblue.com] and their work.
What you're all forgetting, of course (Score:3, Informative)
You'll have a ball.
Got BitTorrent_OSX_3.2.2a.dmg, now what? (Score:2)
: file BitT*
BitTorrent_OSX_3.2.2a.dmg: VAX COFF executable not stripped - version 3277
:
VAX COFF? WFT? No mention that I can find of
Re:Got BitTorrent_OSX_3.2.2a.dmg, now what? (Score:2, Informative)
drag the file on to Disk Copy's window or the icon on the Dock.
or, just ctrl+click or right-click (depending on how many buttons your mouse has) on the file and go to Open With -> Disk Copy.
Some of y'all might encounter... (Score:2, Informative)
At last! (Score:2, Interesting)
I am running a 17" iMac (800Mhz G4/256MB/Ge4 32MB) and the action is excellent, not choppy at all. I was worried that the performance of the game would leave people without a high-end machine in the dust, but everything seems pretty good so far.
Nice job Bioware and MacSoft!
Re:You can play games on a mac (Score:2, Funny)
Re:You can play games on a mac (Score:4, Funny)
How do you frag anyone with just one mouse button?
Simple: morse code.
Re:You can play games on a mac (Score:2)
Re:Keep it open? (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately this results in some things becoming virtually unobtainable once people are no longer interested in a file, but there's usually at least a few people still seeding and leeching files even with somethings that are months old.
Re:Keep it open? (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd guess it's an attempt at satire, since the most intuitive and logical thing to do (yep, I got the file, now I can close the window), is also the most wrong thing you can do.
Yeah, it works for what it was designed to do, but it's awful as a general P2P system, which is what much of the SD crowd is elevating it to.... As you yourself say, it's worthless for anything but new files, e
Re:Keep it open? (Score:2)
Keeping windows open is really a step backwards, I agree.
Fortunately mldonkey is working on the protocol, so soon Mac users will have a nice modern program that runs as a background process instead of a 'window' and can be run 24/7 without disturbing the GUI environment except when the user wants to check up on its progress.
Re:Keep it open? (Score:2)
Of course, this won't work for the, um, less legal things being served up via BitTorrent
Re:Keep it open? (Score:2, Informative)
Of course, once virtually nobody is interested in the file any longer, the main "seed" machine should have no trouble fulfulling the entire request for the file itself since, by definition, there won't be any competition for it. And, should the file suddenly gain new p
Re:Keep it open? (Score:2)
Because it's stupid having to "keep the window open" in 2003.
"Its just the model under which the client was designed."
I'd say the model is wrong...
Re:Keep it open? (Score:2)
Re:Ah, Mac games (Score:2)
Sure if you're a game junkie who's got to play every game released every year then yeah, there aren't nearly enough Mac games to get you off.
On the other hand there aren't usually more than a handful of good games that show up in any given year in my humble opinion and most of them make it to the Mac.
Boy, that's one slow transfer. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Boy, that's one slow transfer. (Score:2)