Thank you so much for sharing the fun!  =)  Nice work, very nice.

I couldn't wait 'til my birthday in 2005 (it was the end of June), because that's when I told myself I'd get into the MMO world, and there was only one choice for me.  Weeks later, we were still dealing with the handoff to SOE, and I felt like someone had just numbered our days.  I'm surprised we made it this far, and I wish we could keep going.

That first time online...

10 or 12 servers, and tons of people, everywhere. 

Learning the ropes, getting helping hands from strangers, and finishing that first session with a random kiss in the rain. 

Since then I've seen

Fly Virii,

Assassins,

The General,

Flit Guns,

Anome,

many appearances by The Kid,

Morpheus and Neo being as dead as any soap-opera character,

The Effectuator,

random fun with Niobe,

Overrides running around,

and much more. 

I even had time to uniwittingly give Persephone a lap dance in the middle of PvP.

There were Factions galore, at one point so many I lost track of them all.  But I remember Serenity.  And HAL.  And can credit The Vixens as my reason for being here today to see the end.

Nope, those aren't Quicksilver Gloves...

Shortly after joining HAL:

First time seeing the Sati sky...

Weird bug leaving me off the map--had to be Recalled to get back into the "real" Matrix...

My first Crew, which was in HAL

First time into the Machine Archive

Shy about my application to The Vixens

Topsy Turvy time, overturning an Ambush

And speaking of being upside-down...this was always one of my favorites...

Playing with "The Simpsonizer":

Farming the last of the Node Keys with Valent1ne:

A surprising doppelganger

The Flatulent Finish...

...that blew off his head

Rooftop Party:

Halloween Fun & Games:

Bartering with Omega:

More Vixen partying (we do a lot of that, y'know):

Party for Xenella:

Words fail me.

Yay!  You're one of the best, Jean:  I knew it was only a matter of time before you got noticed.

GREAT job, and really well written to boot!

I just love when a great person gets talked out of leaving.

Still glad to have ya back!

So just how Epic is this thread?  Worth reading through 37 screens of?

Happy (belated) Birthday!  Hope you had lots of fun and games and good times and things we don't talk about in polite conversation (but you brag about to your friends who missed it).

well, lookie what I found:

http://mxovault.ign.com/View.php?vi...ry_select_id=13

Hope this helps!

Sin wrote:

I heard that there used to be radio stations, can I still set one up of my own?

If so, how would i go about doing it?

My understanding is that the /radio command will launch the in-game radio engine, and that it will connect to an external URL (for a radio station).   The station will then launch in-game as your music soundtrack.  You can then access the Radio control panel to adjust volume, stop/start, etc.

The syntax for that command is

/radio play [url]

e.g.,

/radio play http://Catzi.serverroom.us:6770    <--Catzi Radio

As far as setting up your own station, that's something you'd do outside of the context of the game.  Check in with someone who does this for details.

Anyone care to recommend Internet radio software here?

One simple thing to try, that won't do you any harm but does often clear up screwy browser behavior:

Empty your Temporary Internet Files folder.  In IE, this is a matter of choosing Tools-->Internet Options, and then looking for the "Temporary Files"/"Temporary Internet Files" section. Your mileage may vary by OS and version of IE--for example,  my IE 7 on XP x64 has a "Delete" button on the General tab under the "Browsing History" section. Tell it just to delete the files (you can leave cookies, history, etc. if you like). 

Then check the size of the temporary files folder.  Make sure it's not more than about 50MB.  This won't affect you downloading stuff bigger than 50MB, but it *will* keep your browser from filling your hard-drive with crap that it then can't find. 

If that doesn't help...

I find more page issues (and JavaScript errors) when I have the Phishing Filter on.  You might consider turning it off long enough to try again, and see if that's the problem.  Or see if adding "forums.station.sony.com" to a list of "Allowable Sites" in your Internet Options clears it up. 

Basically, what IE Security (and the Phishing Filter) do, is try to make some decisions about whether the page you are loading really is secure.  They don't always guess right, but they'll err on the side of caution, blocking and/or shutting down content and page behavior just in case.

When you tell it a particular site is allowed, anything coming from that domain is "whitelisted", or rather, not checked as closely.

If neither of these solves the problem...

Then it's time to look more closely at detailed browser settings:  specifically, how it allows scripted content and/or ActiveX controls to run.  Hopefully you won't reach that point, though.

Well the good news is, at the end of this long, sloppy road, The Matrix Online appears to work rather well with Windows 7.  I have been testing it since before update 66, when for the umpteenth time I turned on my Vista machine and it decided today was another day in which winboot.exe would be corrupted or not found, and the entire system was lost and could not be restored.

If anyone's interested, I might start a thread with details. 

azarazamataz wrote:

Im sorry i didnt trail through all six pages but im not exactly a computer wiz lol, ive started building my own comp and im worried about gettin vista, i was thinking of getting vista 64 bit but i heard that has some major compatability issues, my question is...

Has anyone got this game to work on vista 64 bit or is it the whole OS that is a complete pile of Decaying code ^^ lol

The answer is a poor one:

Some can, some can--but with issues, and some can't at all.  Or like me, some get it running beautifully, randomly experience issues that don't stop play....but have no idea how long it'll last before the game suddenly stops or crashes.

I would say, if you're building your own computer:

1) You don't have to have SLi, but you do want a decent video card--in some cases, performance drops with SLi.

2) Quad-core will probably handle things fine

3) Definitely plan on 4GB of RAM if you're using it for gaming

4) Make sure the parts you buy are newer than the release of Vista--better still if they say, "Vista Compatible", "Vista Certified", or (best) "Vista WHQL Compliant"

5) Get used to:

     - Disabling Aero (you can configure the game to do this when it launches) if you run Ultimate

     - Running all your games "As Administrator" (can also be config'ed in the icon)

     - Not using anything above-and-beyond ridiculous, like, say, having DreamScenes (a high-definition animated wallpaper) running with Aero on and expect anything to be stable

     - Having some games show up in the Start Menu, and some appear in the "Games" panel...which determines how you can configure their launch

I hope that answer is somewhat helpful.

Feh.  Silly thing...you need a Game Boy!

Or even a Nintendo DS--those look more like a PDA, so people will think you're working!

Or, since you're babysitting servers, they'll think you're fiddling with a Smart Phone.

See?  I thought the whole thing out for you--if they say, "Hey!  Is that a Game Boy?  I think one of my kids has those.  In my summer home.  Or maybe that's the thing he left on the company jet last week when we flew to Tahiti...", you just sneer and say, "Pfft!  HARDly...I'm configuring Wi-Fi for the DS."  <--sounds like you're talking about some server or something.

Fear + Uncertainty + Doubt = Videogames at work

I'm still new to HDTV-land:

Given that The Matrix trilogy were not shot in HD, what's the gain here?

If anyone's found "before/after" pictues of what the improvement is, I'd love to see it.

You crazy kids, with your XBoxes and your eXperiences...

Christmas is gonna be late, but you will get your GTA 4 downloadable content (I thought I'd heard it was already available, but maybe that's only in the US?).

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sciencea...n-February.html

The funny part is Sony UK's head responding that 'nothing is ever exclusive'....which I guess is another way of saying, "Exclusive means 'exclusive to everybody'..."

http://www.videogamer.com/news/29-1...-2008-9789.html

Anyhow, much as I love Halo on the PC, I cast my lot with Sony.  Which is okay, because I completely suck at thumbstick FPS, and you'd all trample me into little bits.

shearman wrote:

George Carlin forever.

 

Jeff used to be ok, but fame has made him worse.

George Carlin for a while.

<3 to Carlin, may he rest in peace...but those last few years were a bad cup of coffee:  dark, bitter and cold.

On a different note, I just read Michael Ian Black's "My Custom Van".  Interesting blend of the sacred and the profane...and at times completely insane.

I have no idea how things work under the hood, but I bet it would be simpler if SOE offered the ability to transfer a character.  Let everyone have more slots on either server, but then be able to choose to move their RSI to the other box. 

So then the question becomes, how often would you be allowed to move a character?  You wouldn't want anyone abusing it by griefing someone on Syntax and running off to Recursion...then showing back up again to hit and run.

Just a thought.

mennis wrote:

Thanks for the response, but the severity of this issue, and the fact that it is so widespread is a really bad indicator for me.  The fact that it is still, after all this time, an issue without fix, just makes me think moving on to another mmo might be a better option.  Having to worry about what i can, or cannot wear, or what people around me can, or cannot wear, is just too much.

 

Thanks guys.

I certainly understand your frustration, but I can't see as moving to another MMO will help much.  Simply because I have a Vista machine for which *everything* runs sucky, I'm more likely to blame Microsoft.  Their own Windows exec grousing about his new "$2,100 e-mail machine" sums it up quite nicely.

The trouble is deciding which is better: "Moving on to another MMO" or "Moving back to another OS"?

http://blog.seattletimes.nwsource.c...le_class_a.html

Yay!  Congrats Asna!  We always knew you were cool--now the whole Matrix thingy knows too!

Incidentally, two other things about the 3GB threshold:

1) Your motherboard may have a setting for "Software Over 3GB Remapping".  You can try enabling that to see if there is a difference.  All it will do is try to shift the registers around to fool the machine (but I bet this doesn't help the OS if you're on XP).

2) With Vista, I still had problems with it only seeing part of my RAM...and Vista Service Pack 1 fixed it.

I'm not sure what this is...would you mind telling us more about what you mean by "shift out my green screen thingy"?

I've been having many a Vista problem, and would try anything just to see if it helps.

Thanks.

Some of these people reported the problem in May.  So the other suggestions here are useful.

And also...if you go into the advanced options for the game and try using the different overlay filters (or turning them all off), that might help too.  There are three of them, and you'll recognize them by names like "Over-bright", "green", etc.

Today (November 6th), we have the Halloween darkness taken away.  So anyone who still experiences this problem may want to read this and the other solutions above.

If you are using Vista, be sure you run MXO as Administrator (right-click the icon and choose "Run As Administrator").

If you are using XP, and are logged on to a Limited user account, try logging on as an Administrative user and running the update again.

Either way, post back here with what you find.  And good luck!

For the record, I have two Vista machines.  The good machine is quad-core, blah blah, hardware, and runs MxO pretty much as-is.  I occasionally get the shadowed face bug, and if I open my inv or put on the wrong item, I get that blank screen/16-color effect.

I'm sorry to report that as of last night (keep in mind it's Halloween-time when this happened), I experienced the blank screen/16-color problem on the good machine simply by walking too close to another player (presumably wearing one of the "bad" items).

The bad Vista machine...is still bad.  But it's bad for EVERY game...Office, IE, and any regular software runs fine, but any and all games will crash to desktop with either no error or "Application Error 1000". 

For the bad machine, I am going to still hammer away at the issue, only because I WANT TO KNOW.  If I don't become a sooper-geenius after dealing with this stuff, it'll only be because the answer to the problem was occult in nature and I was never introduced into the inner mysteries that would enlighten me to solve it.

Tip one: don't raise the priority of any process above "Normal" unless you really know what you're doing. putting it at "High" will actually stop stuff that needs to run from working on your PC.
Tip two: if you have windows Vista and you use an administrative account, you can turn off the constant authorisation prompts (the User Access Control or UAC) from the "Users" control panel.

I must admit, with my own patching problem I had reached a certain point of aggravation...and tend to shut down every last non-critical program or service before I raise the game.  Just the same, I find I can still stay (relatively) stable in High...my taboo is never to try "Realtime" (I guess at least I know that much ).  It was just very annoying to see the game run at "Very Low" priority, even after I'd launched and was running in Windowed mode.  If the user has engaged an active window, that active window should be the priority, barring necessary background services.  I can't accept that the background services devoured every last little resource and I had all the overhead of Notepad left for MxO.  Not with a machine that hits 5.0 on the WEI.

Phi is correct--you can truly mess things up if you don't know what you're doing (and I should have said so...or just plain not mentioned Priorities and Services at all).  I should state that I specifically push, prod, and then format and re-do this machine of mine for the express purpose of conquering Vista.  I wouldn't try crazy crap like I've posted on other threads, using a machine I depended on...

Sotirios wrote:


MXOWinterMute wrote:

Update: After a couple of days of crash-free stability, Vista fell right back into its old tricks.

So.

Quickest, easiest fix for crash-to-desktop has been to simply disable the dumb Desktop Window Manager.  You can do this temporarily, if you like:  just go to Start-->Programs-->Administrative Tools-->Services.  Look for "Desktop Window Manager" and click Stop (to temporarily stop it) or right-click "Desktop Window Manager", choose properties, and then "Disabled" (to shut it down for good--you were warned, it ain't all glassy n' pretty 'til ya turn it back on again).

Most people don't have Administrative Tools--right-click your Start button and choose "Properties", then from the Start Menu tab, choose "Customize" and you can enable "System Administrative Tools" as you wish.

Easier thing to do there, is rightclick->Properties on matrix.exe, launcher.exe, and click "Disable Desktop Composition" (Compatibility tab).  This will disable Aero while MxO is running, and restore it when finished, and keeps people away from messing with possibly crucial services.

It was a good suggestion, but, no, that didn't work. 

What got me was, I started getting CTDs with more and more games.  At first it was older ones like Halo 1 and Call of Duty 2.  But when Blacksite: Area 51 and Call of Duty 4 started doing it, I realized something had to be done.

Right now I have a complete format and reinstall of Vista Ultimate 64 from the ground up.  For kicks I decided to keep it simple--MxO crashes the most, just put MxO on.

I got about a week before it started into its old tricks again (and whatever you do, don't read my thread on the installation update woes).  I've learned ridiculous amounts of Vista tricks, and all for naught.

My latest attempt is to 1) Disable User Account Control, and 2) the moment I launch Station Launcher, raise its priority from "Below Normal" to "Above Normal".  Repeat for the game's .exe, and don't forget to be running the launcher as Admin.

I can't say that's a good fix yet--I want to be sure I can do it consistently--but I'm keeping my fingers crossed just the same.  When I can get through 8 or 9 sessions in a row with this method I'll be ready to call it good.

On a side note, I have no crashes on a quad-core machine...so I'm wondering if Vista x64 tries to multithread and does it badly with 2, and was better designed for 4 or more?  Gabe Newell had said something about that--that programmers really won't see the benefits of multithreading until they go above 2 cores...

Now, the sky will not become so black we can't play right Virrago? Or else you just have to give us all permant blue headlights

 

Hey, thanks for posting about Fan Faire...I don't get out much, so I'm glad to hear there's plenty of us out there showing support.

In the meantime, if you're thinking about updates...it might be nice if we could get the same kind of system Microsoft offers, where you *could* get an update pushed down...or if you're having problems (like I did with a fresh Vista install), you could just download a self-extracting executable.

Just a thought.  Thanks again for writing us with an update.

This can be fun!  Looking forward to grabbing several of these.  Plus it makes an added bonus for those of us who help other players farm keys.

Thanks! 

With what you've said here about how it works, I'm going to take two tacks then--try running in compatibility mode for XP SP2, and also make sure my Firewall has an exception set up for the program.  I didn't get any "Allow/Deny" prompts, so I just assumed.  But you never know--it might have been trying to read Health and IS and getting stompled by my firewall.

Here's something that'll answer it--how do you display MegaCity time?  Run a calculation off the user's clock/time zone, or actually call some SOE web service somewhere?

I'll post again when I've had a chance to run the Applet in Compatibility Mode...

Well, that was pretty cool!  Look how it adds itself to the taskbar in Vista Ultimate:

(the l'il green box)

Oh, by the way, I'm using the blue-lit keyboard--like Asna posted.

The good news is, it behaved normally, display and all.

The bad news is, I don't get IS/Health bars updated.  They just sit at zero.  I tried running it normally, running as Admin, and next time I'll try running it in Compatibility Mode for XP SP 2.  And I'll keep you posted!

 Nice job.

Specs for Vista Machine:

ASUS A8N SLi Deluxe Motherboard

AMD Athlon X2 4400+ @ 2.2GHz

4GB OCZ Platinum RAM at recommended voltage and timings (4 x 1GB, Dual-channel enabled, etc.)

2 separate (but identical) WD SATA 2.0 (3.0Gb/s) HDs, with ReadyBoost on dedicated hi-speed Patriot XT 4GB USB Drive

2 x BFG Tech nVidia 8800GTS OC, 512MB ea.in SLi

Sound Blaster Audigy X-FI Audio card

SATA 2.0 DVD +/- RW drive

Vista Ultimate 64-bit edition

WEI 5.0

Just had my first session with it - nicely done!

I like how you have a tic at the far right to show the top of the IS/Health bars, and I'm impressed with how smoothly it updates in realtime.  MegaCity time is a nice bonus, because I'm sometimes trying to keep track of when various events start.

You'll be pleased to know I was running it on an XP x64 Edition machine and had no compatibility problems.  I even placed it in the 64-bit Program Files folder for the Logitech Keyboard, made myself a Start Menu shortcut, and ran it from there (testing the bounce, as it were).  It properly executed in a 32-bit context.

I'll try it on Vista next...if I can get the thrice-accursed OS to run MXO without randomly crashing to desktop, may its disease-infested carcass forever rot with radioactive parasites in Steve Ballmer's basement behind the home theater system where he can't reach it and can't watch anything but Zombie films without gagging and--

--oh.  Sorry.  What was I saying?

I'll try it on Vista.

Nice work. ^_^

P.S.:  if it means anything, I ran it on:

ASUS A8N32-Deluxe SLi motherboard,

AMD Athlon X2 4400+ @ 2.2GHz,

4GB Corsair XMS2 PRO PC 3200 DDR @ 4 x 1GB (dual channel enabled)

dual XFX nVidia GeForce 7950GT 512MB x 2 video cards (dual channel enabled)

Fujitsu 3.0Gb/s SATA2 HD (primary - OS), 350GB @ 7200RPM

2 x Samsung 3.0Gb/s SATA2 HD (RAID 0), 1.4TB total (game)

Aegia PhysX 100 Series

Audigy 2 ZS

Cool - thanks for the info. 

I will try your Beta 2 in the next day or two, then.  Looking forward to it, and thanks for the hard work.

The kayaking pics are stunning--looks like some gorgeous scenery.  And I had to ask..is that actually a snake that climbed up on your boat?

I would love to give this a try!  I have a Logitech G15 and really enjoy running across programs that make use of the screen to display stuff like the clock, health stats, etc.

Am I correct at the time of this post that the last link you posted is the most recent?  Or should I wait for another build?

Thanks very much for all your hard work!

Having a small one has made me not very movie-savvy.  So....I'm kind of puzzled.  Why all the hate for this guy  "Shia LeBoeuf"? (pardon if I misspell)

That's very interesting, I really hope this will lead somewhere.


More surface area = more absorption of solar energy = more useable energy.  Efficiency of solar cells have been a thorn in the technology's side for years.  Look at this rendering of the completed ISS (International Space Station):





See how much surface area solar cells must use to power the station?  That's huge in relation to the size of actual habitable space.  If we can increase effiency at all we're going to be able to shrink the size of solar cells and make solar power a whole lot more practical and affordable.

I just hope this goes somewhere.

In the '80s I recall seeing the Shuttle deploy a solar collector ridiculously thin--I think it was a few millimeters.  So, while size matters, mass shouldn't.  The point is to make a giant flat square large enough to create a shadow that will power all our cellphones while blotting out the earth from the sun in a massive eclipse.

Then, the vampires come.

(I may have reached a logical impasse with that last part)

Well, I tried all of the above except disabling BitLocker.

The good news is, I solved my problem!

The bad news is, it was an ugly solution and I'm not proud of it.

I started turning off things that check files, cache, or otherwise throttle back the network.  And in the end it was doing the following scattershot tactic that caused the entire operation to complete:

I disabled every option in the Security Center and stopped every Service that wasn't specifically needed for copying files over the Internet.  That means I not only did the little things like shut down Superfetch, Background Intelligent Transfer, and the Print Spooler...I also turned off the Firewall, Windows Defender, my Antivirus software, the Phishing Filter, and every non-essential executable in the Task Manager.  Containing my flinch, I walked away for three hours and said a brief prayer to the Gods of Folly.

Once all was done, I rebooted, raised shields again, and ran a full and thorough virus scan.  Swept for spyware.  Everything checked out clean and I just finished a lovely two-hour session with these purty graphix.

Thanks Phi for the suggestions...it got my brain a-thinkin' again.  I promise not to tell anyone you unwittingly inspired me to beg to be hacked!

(horrifed, suddenly, at the realization that I'll get really good at Vista, right about the time they pull the plug on it and expect us all to go to Cloud, the ultimate vaporware)

Hrm...the Full System Check bombed, so I'll post again when I have a chance to copy/paste.

But I wonder...I can't recall if BitLocker Drive Encryption is enabled in Ultimate by default, but given that it encrypts files, I'm wondering if this time around on the format-install bandwagon, I got a hash that's not playing nice-nice with MXO files?  This error seems to occur regardless of if I'm on C:\ or D:\.

If copy/paste fails, I'll try turning BitLocker on/off, depending what it is/isn't by default.  Maybe then I'll even blow away the secondary drive and start with a clean File Allocation Table...