On Sun, 4 Jun 2000 12:11:03 +0200, Laurens Holst wrote:
>> BTW, there is an UMAX homepage?
>No.
It would be nice.
>> If you distribute the game for free and put a reminder on the opening
>>screen like "If you like this game, please, e-mail us at: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>>and say us, so we may continue developing"
>I think that if you do this, you are quite close to the end of MSX (I don't
>want to hear it, Rieks). There still is some kind of 'symbolic' meaning of
>asking money for your product, and I think it's a very important one. You
>feel very satisfied if you release it on a fair and actually end up with
>more money than you had when you left home.
So, it's a money talk, and not about "users' response".
>Also, free software is most of the time released when it's finished, or when
>an update is finished. The software will not be released at the fairs. I can
>see it with my own free-released software. And that way, the number of
>releases at the fairs is drained, resulting in less booth-keepers and
>visitors.
Ricardo' softwares are, sometimes, released in the fairs. Commonly he
distribute something "beta" to some users (in the #MSXZone IRC Channel) and
that's all. (-; The updates he doesn't wait to release, but the first version
sometimes he does.
>> until the Shopping, where I talked with the guy in the shopping and then I
>> stopped due to lack of time. I'm interested in RoA, and I'll buy it. I'm
>> sure I'll have not time to play, but I'll buy.
>The first part is not that long... You can at least finish that one I think.
When I have time, sure. But here, in my country - mainly in Sao Paulo, we have
some problems with distance. P.e.: I "spend" about 2 hours per day (in a very
good day... sometimes I spend 4 hours) just to go to university and get back home.
Besides, my class in the university start at 9:00 (am) and stops only 18:30
(6:30pm), so I usualy go to the university at 7:30 and get back at 20:00.
The "remaining time" I use for several things. Mainly study and do homework,
but also to update pages, programming, and several other thing. The game
should be short, but my time is even shorter.
>The big difference is that BrMSX for example is an on-going project. Things
>like utils/tools and emulators should be free. But those are most of the
>time still in development, and can have early releases. See chapters GEM, my
>TI-83 tools, TERM4MSX, and much more.
THIS is the difference between a free and a closed project. The "closed"
"ends" sometime, so I don't think I'll need to send my opinion.
>However, a game is something entirely different. It's a hell of a big
>project, teking years of preparation, and there is only one release. I
>really think there is nothing wrong with asking a little money for it to get
>that satisfied feeling. It also increases the 'value' of the product, I
>think... Also, I think less of a free-released game, I would expect little
>quality and lots of bugs from it. It would be on the back of my harddisk for
>quite some time before I decided to play it, and perhaps to finally discover
>it's a really awesome game, worth quite some bucks.
I do not think it's wrong to sell it. I think it's wrong to sell it and
expect the "open project" feedback.
>I see only one big 'disadvantage'. The MSX emulator-people won't buy it
>(emulator people never do, myself included), so they will never be able to
>enjoy the game as long as the creators are still active (since the code of
>honour not to copy games of still active people is -fortunately- respected
>everywhere).
Well, I use emulator (for programming purposes, but I use it) and buy
games. And two things that I hate on "sold" programs: Copy Protection
(once I cannot copy the disk I will be in serious trouble if the disk
become damaged) and almost no one works on emulators, due to these
crappy copy protections.
Note: I will continue buying programs, even with or without copy
protection. You'll argue that people will copy and distribute the
software if it's not copy protected. So I say: how bad education has
this people!
I would preffer free software, but I think it is your right to charge
by your effort. If you want to sell your program and I like it, I'll
buy it for sure. I buy programs by the authors. As a programmer myself,
I know that doing a big project such a game is a lot of hardwork!
Which really makes me sick is when I buy some disk without see what is
inside (sometimes we have no other way) and see that the program is only
a basic loader for some Screen12 images addapted from PC. And those disks
are sold by the same price as a good game! Argh!
----- Abra�OS/2, Daniel Caetano ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
/| | | |\
\| ___ |/ OS/2 Sites: http://www.quasarbbs.com/daniel/
\/ ----- \/
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/8752/os2hp/os2index.html
| | MSX Sites: http://www.fudeba.cjb.net/
-- -- Drawings: http://www.djgallery.tsx.org/
...Programar e' a arte de organizar zeros e uns de forma que eles produzam trabalho
util!
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