Said simply "No". I don't think it's at all expensive, considering in the timespan of S2 if I'd DL'd all 1024 skins it would only have cost me a couple of quid.
I said no because I don't see the point in 1024 skins unless you're using them for something other than just racing online.
My first reaction was "what the hell? we bought the game? what is £1 going to do anyway? we already bought the game." But thinking about it more, it seems to be a very good option.
The bandwidth has clearly escalated to the point where the devs decided more money was needed. Anyone else would have simply started charging a monthly fee like all the other online games. With the pay-for-hi-res-skins deal, you actually get what you pay for instead.
I'd just like to point out that LFS has already been final, the game that is currently alpha is built on top of it.
Personally I dont see many bugs in non-test patch versions. Yes there are ommissions, no wind buffetting from walls (cars driving next to a wall should be slowed down by displaced wind deflecting off the wall) is a noteable one at South City and the oval as one example. However, I also see the inclusion of minutely detailed features I never thought i'd get like the sound editor.
One other point, before I finish saying my piece. I paid £24 for LFS and still play it, albiet not as much, a whole year after purchase. I have had my monies worth, I think you have too.
Whether I will use this service or not, I think its a great option. The devs deserve every penny they can get. Onya, Scavier , and thank you for a great sim.
Crazy Harry, you should try to overcome your confidence problem and resist peer pressure. Those lfs loving fragmaster buddies of yours may be a bad influence on you.
Most skins available are crap or "uber d0r1ft000000!!!!!!!1111111" stylieeeee (ala: crap)
I don't care about hi-res versions of other people's skins, _if_ I do for the few people that I feel are worthy, I'll download them myself from here or master skinnerz
Anything I want in hi-res I'm capable of doing myself
Automagic skin downloads are disabled here as most skins aren't worth the disk space they'd occupy
I'm 101% against charging for such things (don't give me the crap about bandwidth) but I'm also 101% against people putting ads on sites to gain revenue too.. so this isn't just an issue with LFS.. maybe I like the open-source theory too much hence just about everything I create / do that isn't specifically for a client I do for free
I think for £1 to get hi-res skins online is really a bargain, I normally am not too fussed about skins while I am racing online, I am either far ahead of everyone so that I never see any cars in the race or when I am battling it out with people I usually don't look at their skins as I am overtaking. I would only notice it when I watch the replays which isn't very often really... nevertheless I will pay for hi res skins come patch X. My computer probably wont cope as it has a hard time of running lfs and 22 people when starting last so any extra load on the resources wont go down well, but what the heck....
Yeah you are most probably right, my old athlon xp 2600+ is having a hard time coping with many things nowdays. At the moment I can still play LFS with a full grid and start at the back although it does drop to 16fps but it is still playable. I am running it at 1500x1040 x8af x4aa so I am running it at quite high quality so reducing the resolution and anti aliasing would improve my performance but i don't really want to do that
Having hi res skins online will probably make my LFS run slightly worse btu I am planning a brand spanking pc upgrade in JUNE so then it wont be an issue... time to buy a radeon 2900
In the mean time i shall just wait until then before I pay for extra hi res skins.
Unfortunately bandwidth is the point here. Even if LFS was open source/free, the bandwidth would still have to paid. It's not given away for free from the companies that own all the pipes.
I guess this really depends on figures that we don't know about, ie: does the total figure for sold licenses really allow for the extra bandwidth used. A rhetorical question as such before people start jumping, I don't want to know figures, but something I would think comes into play at some stage of the thought process.
I'm well aware how backbones and hosts etc work
I guess I should add though, that the price isn't the issue here.. I certainly don't think it's expensive and don't begrudge the devs making a "few quid on the side".. I just have different theories for some things and other reasons that I listed above and just posted my reasons for my vote choice
So, basically, you think you deserve everything for free then?
Re: the websites/ads. When you are viewing a website, you are receiving a service, you are gaining information. Space and bandwidth aren't free. Eventually, someone has to pay for it. You expect service for free, even if the payment is simply to have to see an ad...thats a bit greedy isn't it?
As far as the downloads in the game go, it is a huge chunk of bandwidth to serve all of those file.
And, you must charge your clients for your services, correct? As the consumers of the game, we are the clients...clients get charged for services.
But alas, you don't need the skins anyways, so why even post. After all, most skins aren't "worthy" enough to reside on your precious hard drive.
Here's the deal though. Some of the best skins I have come across so far, have been from the in-game download. A lot of people don't post on the forums or elsewhere with their designs, as they design just for themselves. If I get 3 or 4 good skins out of the few bucks I spend, then the way I see it, I've come out ahead.
And by the way, Open Source has nothing to do with free ($$) software. Open source is about free as is "freedom", not the money. Many many many OSS projects are for-fee... with that, you must not really be that much into open source...you would have known that.
I didn't say that and have no problem paying for things I want.
I go to great lengths to block ads, including DNS null zones, firefox adblock rules and various firefox CSS edits.
I know all about web sites, space and bandwidth.. it's been part of $DAY_JOB for the past 5 years.
It's not greed, greed would be where I took everything I can and gave back nothing... on the contrary, I give back a fair share of what I take too, in various formats.. whether that be coding something for someone, hosting a web site for free or some other "favour".
No doubt.. just as I use a fair chunk of bandwidth on a monthly basis too.. but you won't ever find even a 'donate here' link on anything I have.. it's just not the way I work. As I said, maybe the costs of sold licenses could have funded this.. maybe not, it's not something we'll find out or entitled to know.. it's just not something I'm for paying for when I have other avenues that I can take.
Of course, just like I was charged for my S1 and S2 licenses. Do I charge for everything I do? nope. Infact, I've just finished adding around 30 hours of extra work for a client's site that I finished a few months ago. I haven't and won't be sending an invoice. I've also coded (twice, once being a major overhaul / update) and hosted for 4 years another site for a local voluntary organisation. I've also done a fair bit for a few communities and continuing to do so, all free.. I'd never consider charging for my time or downloads in this respect.. it's just how I am. Sure, I'm far from the only person on the planet to do someone a good turn, but you made it sound like I just grab everything and give nothing.
Many skins aren't, but I have my "favourite artists" so to speak, of which all post their works either here or at master skinnerz.
This is a public forum for posting opinions etc isn't it? Last time I checked, I was part of said public
Fine.. the people's work who I like do post here and elsewhere.. so we both win
Of course, but much of the open-source community is about "free". There's _very_ little open-source code that I've paid for, but have a lot of things installed across my 3 BSD servers and some open-source / freeware on my windoze box.
Maybe I should have extended open-source to include Freeware / Public Domain.. I grew up with the PD and BBS era, maybe that's my downfall.
I spent 3 laps under someones rear wing last night before I got passed them. I wasn't thinking about open source freedom. I was thinking 'YAY - he's not blurred!'.
EDIT: Can we loose the flashing avatar please bragi? Pretty please with sugar on top? I'll set a sheep on you if you dont....
lol
done ()
it really hurts (it's my avatar since 1997) and a lot of people suffered epilepsy attacks by watching it during these years.
anyway.. i have a spare one.
btw becky: any chance to see your broadcasts again now that stcc "closed"? (please)
thanks mate.. it was pretty simple but i'm sooooo lazy to check things by myself.
The old ones are stil available for download here. I wont be making any new ones this season. There's a very real chance i'll make broadcasts of some kind again in the future, when both LFS and myself are ready to ramp it up to a whole new level. There's a lot i'd do differently next time around though...
No, I didn't think so.
, and thank you for a great sim.
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