Two sides

[Vraciu]

Now were getting somewhere. Those of us that suck at furballing get frustrated at the effort put into that. My first choice is a tank, then bombers even a TBM if I get bored. Fighters is just a quick frustrating death for me.

Well, some would say that by catering to your crowd we now have a fraction of the player base we once had, so let's call that a bust.

AH remains a great game.   It should be quite popular.  How do we retain new blood?  This is the only question that matters right now. 

I suggest a Chinese or Japanese language version to tap into those markets might grab a few warm bodies.  It would give the Brit/Euro and Aussie/NZ crowd some action when the US players are in bed.

[hitech]

I had to take a COBOL class for my AS in programming several years ago. It is a rather unique language.

But did you ever have a room mate drop 500 punch cards of COBAL code on the floor? And only get 1 run of the code per hour?


HiTech

[CptTrips]

But did you ever have a room mate drop 500 punch cards of COBAL code on the floor? And only get 1 run of the code per hour?

It's spelled COBOL!  Or so the Archaeologists tell us. 

Actually it wasn't that bad.  Didn't have to do punch cards thank Cod.  I missed punch cards in my Assembly class by one year.

I do remember in the lab having to submit print jobs for the one high speed printer and waiting around for the output to be stuck in your little cubby hole in a wall of the lab like you were having mailed to you.  lol

That high speed printer was in a glass enclosed room and you could look in as you walked down the hallway to the lab.  One day a friend told me he had been walking down that hallway and heard a "Brrrrrrrrhrhrrhrhrhrhrrr!"  and the sys admin jumped up from his desk and was running around like a chicken with it's head cut off. Apparently some one had submitted a job that had a page feed in a tight infinite loop and the high speed printer just started spewing out reams of paper like a river.  LOL  I'm sure that wasn't on purpose.     

I had taken an AI class in LISP.  All I remember was typing parenthesis within  parenthesis within  parenthesis within  parenthesis for days.  The  parenthesis keys on the keyboard were worn down to nubs. I saw parenthesis in my sleep.   The horror.   The horror. 

 

[save]

But did you ever have a room mate drop 500 punch cards of COBAL code on the floor? And only get 1 run of the code per hour?


HiTech

I did, that's what made me change to another language (Forth), on microprocessors, instead of DOS/MVS on mainframes.

[Vraciu]

But did you ever have a room mate drop 500 punch cards of COBAL code on the floor? And only get 1 run of the code per hour?


HiTech

Closest I got to that were those dang Scantron things for grading tests.    Shudder.

[SilverZ06]

But did you ever have a room mate drop 500 punch cards of COBAL code on the floor? And only get 1 run of the code per hour?


HiTech

  No, we used COBOL for Visual Studio.

[waystin2]

I will not speak to the two sides discussion but I can speak to why I and a several other Pigs have cut our hours in the Melee.  Lack of of that "chaotic anything and everything is and could happen" activity.  I know that is a hard to quantify thing but the choice of lots of activities and tons of foes and ways to fight against those foes is what the Pigs have always enjoyed.  Less players, less joy.  It is simply due to player population decline.  Not game mechanics, or player behaviors, etc.  We are and will still be very active in AH FSO & events but spend the bulk of our gaming hours elsewhere.  See all of you up there and out there.  OINK

Way

[CptTrips]

No, we used COBOL for Visual Studio.

Visual Studio?   

When Hitech took COBOL, laptops looked like this:



10 bonus point for anyone that recognized that contraption.

[Vraciu]

I will not speak to the two sides discussion but I can speak to why I and a several other Pigs have cut our hours in the Melee.  Lack of of that "chaotic anything and everything is and could happen" activity.  I know that is a hard to quantify thing but the choice of lots of activities and tons of foes and ways to fight against those foes is what the Pigs have always enjoyed.  Less players, less joy.  It is simply due to player population decline.  Not game mechanics, or player behaviors, etc.  We are and will still be very active in AH FSO & events but spend the bulk of our gaming hours elsewhere.  See all of you up there and out there.  OINK

Way

The lack of action is compounded by the third country.  It all works together and feeds off itself.  If you dilute player density you'll reduce action.  Reduced action causes a reduction in players.   Repeat.

So the key becomes retaining the new blood that comes in.

[Shuffler]

Visual Studio?   

When Hitech took COBOL, laptops looked like this:

(Image removed from quote.)

10 bonus point for anyone that recognized that contraption.

Difference Engine (Calculator)   

[CptTrips]

Difference Engine (Calculator)   

Winner winner, chicken dinner.

[hitech]

Visual Studio?   

When Hitech took COBOL, laptops looked like this:

(Image removed from quote.)

10 bonus point for anyone that recognized that contraption.

Not quite but I learned basic using a teletype on this.

[FLS]

 

[Vraciu]

Visual Studio?   

When Hitech took COBOL, laptops looked like this:

(Image removed from quote.)

10 bonus point for anyone that recognized that contraption.

It's an abacus.   

[Ramesis]

But did you ever have a room mate drop 500 punch cards of COBAL code on the floor? And only get 1 run of the code per hour?


HiTech

I hated COBOL... spent most of 6 mos debugging COBOL spaghetti code written by Air Force
coders at the block house on Gunter AFB 
And yes HiTech, I have also had to pick up (and have dropped) a lot of punch cards back in the '60s...
You left out having to sort them out