What were they thinking?

[Deleted member 83233]

You're ignoring the progression of the medium. Nobody starts out with a perfect design. We've arrived where we are now through years of refinement, standardization, changes in operating systems, DRM systems like Steam (where we don't need manual based protection) and even pure laziness. All things get refined through years of practical use. Look at web sites for another example. You can call those early designs bone-headed in retrospect, but if you take into consideration when this was the case, what machines these "issues" did and did not come up on (IBM PC as opposed to say Amiga, or Macintosh) then you can't really make the same assessment.

You may not like it, and that's fine, but even non-game applications of the DOS era were the same. It's just how it was. With all of the other issues of the time, like finding a port address, IRQ, and DMA channels to set your sound-card on so your 16550 (or 16450 or 8250 ) UART card wouldn't cause your system to hang, figuring out how to exit a game really becomes a non-issue. You may as well say that PC gaming sucked. Which it didn't. It was just a LOT different. Those of us who lived through that entire era both hated the issues that came with it, and wear it as a badge of pure awesomeness now (at least within our own nerdy circles.) It's just the way it was, and you adapted.

 

[gimp]

alt+f4 doesn't work in many games so I think you are fos. The only place I use it commonly is to close Win8.1 metro crap apps.

uh... alt+f4 is a Windows function. Games don't need to "support" alt+f4, when it's a Windows function. He is not full of shit, as he even stated it's a Windows command/function. It's built in to the OS.

 

[Deleted member 83233]

uh... alt+f4 is a Windows function. Games don't need to "support" alt+f4, when it's a Windows function. He is not full of shit, as he even stated it's a Windows command/function. It's built in to the OS.

Precisely. Windows function. It's basically a pseudo-failsafe. One step short of Ctrl-Alt-Delete to get to the Task Manager. (or soft reset in the case of DOS )

 

[rezerekted]

uh... alt+f4 is a Windows function. Games don't need to "support" alt+f4, when it's a Windows function. He is not full of shit, as he even stated it's a Windows command/function. It's built in to the OS.

Games can lock out that keyboard function and many do.

All I said was "what were they thinking?" and you ppl want to burn me at the stake for it. Move along, nothing to see here.

 

[Deleted member 83233]

Games can lock out that keyboard function and many do.

All I said was "what were they thinking?" and you ppl want to burn me at the stake for it. Move along, nothing to see here.

No. Nobody well at least in my case, is trying to burn you at the steak. Maybe singe slightly I'm just providing a counter argument. It doesn't seem like you're willing to cut those devs slack for being pioneers. I'm just saying that you should. That doesn't make their design decisions visionary by any means, it just means that there were no standards, so how can you hold them accountable to today's standards, or the standard's of an operating system that didn't even exist then? You're entitled to hate it if you want. I was just trying to provide some perspective.

 

[rezerekted]

No. Nobody well at least in my case, is trying to burn you at the steak. Maybe singe slightly I'm just providing a counter argument. It doesn't seem like you're willing to cut those devs slack for being pioneers. I'm just saying that you should. That doesn't make their design decisions visionary by any means, it just means that there were no standards, so how can you hold them accountable to today's standards, or the standard's of an operating system that didn't even exist then? You're entitled to hate it if you want. I was just trying to provide some perspective.

Yea, I understand that but we need standards. Just think how much easier it would to be to play flight sims if they all used a standard key config? But no, almost every flight sim you have to learn a new key config every time. Standards are good, IMO.

 

[SvenBent]

Games can lock out that keyboard function and many do.

All I said was "what were they thinking?" and you ppl want to burn me at the stake for it. Move along, nothing to see here.

So you are under the assumption its a default key combo, that a game has to take action against. yet you still don't find it and obvious possibility?
Arguing that not ALL games use it does not mean its not obvious possibility.

Why did you post it on a public place if there is "nothing to see here" back peedling?

 

[Deleted member 83233]

Yea, I understand that but we need standards. Just think how much easier it would to be to play flight sims if they all used a standard key config? But no, almost every flight sim you have to learn a new key config every time. Standards are good, IMO.

Standards are in fact good. I don't think it necessarily applies to a flight sim though, but that's just me. I think you'd find hopping into different planes that they're not all perfectly standard either. What I will say is that all UI functions for menus and non-game-play elements should be standard THESE DAYS, and then all in-game controls should be 100% assignable. (well, except for the few UI standardized combos and OS hot-keys)

 

[rezerekted]

So you are under the assumption its a default key combo, that a game has to take action against. yet you still don't find it and obvious possibility?
Arguing that not ALL games use it does not mean its not obvious possibility.

Why did you post it on a public place if there is "nothing to see here" back peedling?

Because you are starting to annoy me. And your first paragraph is making no sense at all.

I declare this thread dead.

 

[merlin704]

Hey guys! I have some games installed so I'm basically an expert in all things game related.

 

[merlin704]

For some reason this thread reminds me of this.

 

[[Paragon]]

Do you even boot disk bro? Check out these sick auotexec.bat and config.sys files. Yeah I run DOS, wanna fight about it?

Something, something more DOS games than you.

*Ahem* On manuals, I do miss the really nice ones sometimes. Though I hated having to keep track of my xwing manual just so I could play. Hmmm maybe I need to get some DOS goodness going on my RetroPie.