Command & Conquer (1995 video game)
Command & Conquer is a 1995 real-time strategy video game developed by Westwood Studios and published by Virgin Interactive. Set in an alternate history of modern day, the game tells the story of a world war between two globalized factions: the Global Defense Initiative of the United Nations and a cult-like militant organization called the Brotherhood of Nod, led by the mysterious Kane; the groups compete for control of Tiberium, a mysterious substance that spreads across the world. Westwood first conceived Command & Conquer during the final stages of the development of Dune II, it expands on ideas first explored in that title. Inspired by the events of the era the Gulf War, the team gave the game a modern warfare setting; the game contains live-action full motion video cutscenes, which star Westwood employees and a single professional actor, Joseph D. Kucan, who plays Kane. Command & Conquer was a commercial and critical success, selling over three million copies and winning numerous awards.
It has been cited as the title that popularized the real-time strategy genre. The game was the first in the Command & Conquer series, which sold 30 million copies by 2009. To mark the 12th anniversary of the franchise, Electronic Arts, the current publisher and owner of the series, released the game for free in 2007. On November 14, 2018, EA announced they will do a remastered version of Command & Conquer and its sequel, Red Alert, in collaboration with Petroglyph Games. Command & Conquer requires the player to construct a base and to gather resources in order to fund the production of buildings and combat units to attack and conquer an opponent's base; the game contains the Brotherhood of Nod. GDI units are expensive. Meanwhile, Nod armies are made up of a mix of cheap and numerous units, mixed in with unusual units such as rocket bikes and stealth tanks; as a result, GDI focuses on large-scale strategic attacks, while Nod creates bigger armies and uses unconventional tactics. There are fifty units and structures in total.
Tiberium, the game's sole resource, is gathered by harvester units that carry it to a refinery structure for processing. When the player constructs buildings, additional units and structures become available for purchase. Command & Conquer features one each for the GDI and Nod factions. Which missions; the objective of most campaign missions is to take control of enemy buildings. The missions begin with live-action full motion video cutscenes; the original DOS release features multiplayer with a rarity at the time. Multiplayer over an Internet connection was added in Command & Conquer Gold, which features SVGA visuals; the game's Sega Saturn and PlayStation ports lack multiplayer support, but the latter release includes the fifteen single-player missions from The Covert Operations expansion pack. The Nintendo 64 version features updated graphics, with environments; the FMV cutscenes were removed and replaced with static images, accompanied by voice acting and sound effects. While the Nintendo 64 version includes four new "Special Ops" missions, it lacks multiplayer support.
Command & Conquer is set in an alternate timeline, after a meteorite crashed near the river Tiber in Italy. The meteorite brings with it an toxic alien substance called Tiberium, which becomes valuable because of its ability to absorb and crystallize precious metals from the surrounding soil. An ancient, cultic secret society called the Brotherhood of Nod claims to have foreseen the potentials of this new substance, investing in the development of technology to harvest and refine Tiberium crystals ahead of the scientific community. Nod soon controls nearly half of the supply and uses these assets to sustain a growing army of followers worldwide; the group is led by a self-proclaimed messianic figure known only as Kane. Following a series of international terrorist bombings that culminate in the destruction of the fictional Grain Trade Center in Vienna — attacks which are attributed to the Brotherhood of Nod — the United Nations Security Council realizes that Kane and Nod are commencing a global campaign of terrorism, authorizes the Global Defense Initiative to intervene on its behalf, setting a conflict in motion that escalates into a world war.
Command & Conquer features two sub-plots based on the two playable factions of the game. Commanding the Global Defense Initiative's troops, the player becomes instrumental in eliminating Nod's European forces. Under the command of General Mark Jamison Sheppard, the player completes missions that range from securing a beach, to rescuing civilians and scientists, to defending GDI bases from Nod assaults. Combat occurs in countries of Eastern Europe. A major plot element is an international scandal caused by a Nod media manipulation, which convinces the world that the GDI deliberately attacked and massacred the Polish city of Białystok; this leads to a cut in GDI funding. The player besieges the Temple of Nod in Sarajevo, which Kane uses as his main base of operations; as a new recruit in the Brotherhood of Nod, the player performs tasks for the Brotherhood's second-in-command, a man known as Seth. After Seth attempts to deploy the player in an operation against the United States military without Kane's approval, Kane kills him and thereafter issues commands to the player directly.
The player's goal is to drive GDI forces out of North Africa through the use of both conventional and unconventional warfare
Thief II
Thief II: The Metal Age is a 2000 stealth video game developed by Looking Glass Studios and published by Eidos Interactive. Like its predecessor Thief: The Dark Project, the game follows Garrett, a master thief who works in and around a steampunk metropolis called the City; the player assumes the role of Garrett. Garrett takes on missions such as burglaries and frameups, while trying to avoid detection by guards and automated security. Thief II was designed to build on the foundation of its predecessor. In response to feedback from players of Thief, the team placed a heavy focus on urban stealth in the sequel, they minimized the use of monsters and maze-like levels; the game was made with the third iteration of the Dark Engine, used to develop Thief and System Shock 2. Thief II was announced at the 1999 Electronic Entertainment Expo, as part of an extended contract between Looking Glass and Eidos to release games in the Thief series. Looking Glass neared bankruptcy as the game was developed, the company was kept running by advances from Eidos.
Thief II received positive reviews from critics, its initial sales were stronger than those of its predecessor. However, the game's royalties were processed which compounded Looking Glass's financial troubles; as a result, the company closed with plans for Thief III cancelled. The third game in the series, entitled Thief: Deadly Shadows, was developed by Ion Storm and published by Eidos in 2004. Thief 2X: Shadows of the Metal Age, a praised expansion mod for Thief II, was released in 2005. In 2014, Square Enix published a reboot of the series, developed by Eidos Montréal. Thief II is a stealth game that takes place from a first-person perspective in a three-dimensional graphical environment; the player seeks to evade the notice of opponents such as guards. The player must minimize the visibility and audibility of the player character, Garrett, to escape detection. Players try to avoid loud flooring in favor of shadows and quiet flooring. A light monitor on the heads-up display indicates the player character's visibility.
While it is possible for the player character to engage in direct combat, he is defeated. The game's 15 missions take place in large levels. Guards may be knocked out with a blackjack or killed with a bow or sword, their fallen bodies may be picked up and hidden. In addition to human enemies, the game features security automatons and surveillance cameras. While completing objectives such as frameups and blackmail, the player steals valuables that may be used to purchase thieving gear between missions; the player's main tools are specialized arrows, including water arrows to douse lights, moss arrows to dampen the player character's footsteps and rope arrows to reach higher ground. Thief II is designed to be played methodically, the player plans ahead by scouting, reading the game's map and observing patrol patterns; the player character has a zooming mechanical eye, which connects to throwable "Scouting Orb" cameras. One Scouting Orb may be deployed at a time; the player listens for noises, such as humming, to determine the locations of enemies.
On the highest of the game's three difficulty levels, killing humans results in a game over, in certain missions the player must not knock out any guards. Like its predecessor Thief: The Dark Project, Thief II is set in a steampunk metropolis called the City, whose appearance resembles that of both medieval and Victorian era cities. Magic and steam technology exist side by side, three factions—the manipulative and enigmatic Keepers, the technology-focused Hammerites and the "pagan" worshippers of the Pan-like Trickster god—are in operation. Thief II takes place one year after the first game. In the aftermath of the Trickster's defeat and the failure of his plan to revert the world to a wild, primitive state, a schism in the Hammerite religion spawns the "Mechanist" sect, which fanatically values technological progress; the new inventions of the Mechanists are used by a resurgent police force to crack down on crime. The pagans are in disarray, have been driven into the wilderness beyond the City.
From there, they engage in guerrilla warfare against the Mechanists. The Keeper faction is dormant; the game continues the story of the cynical master thief who defeated the Trickster. Pursuing Garrett is the new sheriff, Gorman Truart, who has imposed a zero tolerance policy on crime. Viktoria, the former ally of the Trickster joins with Garrett to combat the Mechanists; the game's primary antagonist is the founder of the Mechanists, Father Karras, a mentally unstable inventor who despises the natural world. The game begins. However, he is betrayed by his fence and ambushed after an early mission, he determines that Truart, the local sheriff, is hunting him. Keepers take Garrett to hear a prophecy about the "Metal Age"; as Garrett leaves, one of the Keepers informs him that Truart had been hired to kill him, he gives Garrett a letter that directs him to eavesdrop on a Mechanist meeting. There, Garrett overhears Truart and Father Karras discussing the conversion of street people into mindless "Servants", who wear masks that emit a red vapor capable of reducing themselves and nearby humans to rust.
Truart promises to provide Karras with twenty victims for the Servant project, not realizing that Karras is recording his words for use in bla
Zynga
Zynga Inc. is an American social game developer running social video game services founded in April 2007 and headquartered in San Francisco, United States. The company focuses on mobile and social networking platforms. Zynga states its mission as "connecting the world through games."Zynga launched its best-known game, FarmVille, on Facebook in June 2009, reaching 10 million daily active users within six weeks. As of August 2017, Zynga had 30 million monthly active users. In 2017 its most successful games were Zynga Poker, Words With Friends 2, with about 57 million games being played at any given moment, CSR Racing 2, the most popular racing game on mobile devices. Zynga began trading on NASDAQ December 16, 2011 under the ticker ZNGA. Zynga was founded in April 2007 by Mark Pincus, Eric Schiermeyer, Justin Waldron, Michael Luxton, Steve Schoettler, Andrew Trader under the name Presidio Media; the company name changed to Zynga in July 2007. Zynga was named after Pincus' American bulldog "Zinga."
The company uses an image of a bulldog as its logo. Zynga's first game, Texas Hold'Em Poker, now known as Zynga Poker, was released on Facebook in July 2007, it was the first game. Zynga became the Facebook app developer with the most monthly active users in April 2009, with 40 million people playing their games that month. Soon after, the company opened its first external game studio in Baltimore, Zynga East, led by Brian Reynolds. In June of the same year, Zynga acquired MyMiniLife which built and launched FarmVille on Facebook. By August it was the first game on Facebook to reach 10 million daily active users. A little over 6 months in February 2010, Farmville had over 80 million players. On November 23, 2009, FarmVille.com went live as Zynga's first stand-alone game. On May 18, 2010, Facebook and Zynga entered into a five-year relationship to expand the use of Facebook Credits in Zynga's games. In December 2010, Zynga's game CityVille surpassed FarmVille as its most popular game with over 61 million monthly active users and a base of over 16 million daily active users.
Zynga filed with the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission to raise up to $1 billion in an initial public offering on July 1, 2011. At the time, the company had 2,000 employees. Zynga began trading on NASDAQ on December 16, 2011. On June 26, 2012, during the Zynga Unleashed conference, Zynga announced the "Zynga With Friends" network, aiming to connect players of Zynga game titles across multiple platforms. Zynga announced the Zynga API, intended to help developers build social games; the company announced that three new partners were developing games for Zynga.com including 50 Cubes, Majesco Entertainment and Portalarium. The company unveiled the Zynga Partners for Mobile program to help increase Zynga's presence on mobile devices. In October 2012, Zynga announced a partnership with bwin.party, an international real-money gaming operator, to launch real-money gaming in the U. K. including the release of online poker, a suite of 180 casino games, the first online FarmVille-branded real money slots game during 2013.
The partnership opened up a lucrative new revenue stream for Zynga. In early 2013, FarmVille, one of Zynga's most popular games at that time, had reached $1 billion in total player bookings. On June 3, 2013, Zynga announced layoffs of 520 employees — 18 percent of its workforce — and close offices in New York, Los Angeles, Dallas. By July 2013, Zynga has lost nearly half of its user base from the previous year. Investors decreased Zynga's valuation by 400 million. On July 25, 2013, Zynga said they would not be pursuing real money game production in the US. Following this announcement, shares dropped 13%. In July 2013 Zynga hired Microsoft's Interactive Entertainment President Don Mattrick as its new CEO. Pincus remained as Zynga's chief product officer. In January 2014, the company announced the layoff of 314 workers, about 15% of its total workforce. In April 2014, founder & former CEO Pincus stepped down from his role as chief product officer, he remained as Chairman of the Board. First quarter results for 2014 showed daily active user numbers fell from 53 million to 28 million year-over-year.
In April 2014 the company announced its new hire of Alex Garden, co-founder of Relic Entertainment and former Microsoft Game Studios executive. In July 2014, Zynga signed a lease for office space in Maitland, near Orlando. Less than one year the office in Orlando closed. Don Mattrick left Zynga in April 2015, replaced by predecessor Mark Pincus. Frank Gibeau took over as CEO with Pincus once again stepping aside. Gibeau's last position was as head of mobile for Electronic Arts. Before that he was President of Labels at EA, overseeing a large studio organization developing games for EA's top franchises. Gibeau joined EA in 1991 and rose through the marketing organization before stepping into his first studio role in 2008, he joined Zynga's Board of Directors in August, 2015. As of January 2018, Zynga had 1,681 employees 80 million monthly active users, a market capitalization of $3.39 billion. According to the company, Zynga has had over one billion people play its games since its inception in 2007.
In its first round of funding in January 2008, Zynga received US$10 million. In July of the same year, Zynga received US$29 million in venture finance from several firms. During its first four years of operation Zynga raised a total of $854 million in three rounds of fund raising; the last round, in February 2011, raised $490 million. On July 1, 2011, the company filed its Form S-1 registration statement with the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Zynga priced at $10 per share and began trad
Video game programmer
A game programmer is a software engineer, programmer, or computer scientist who develops codebases for video games or related software, such as game development tools. Game programming has many specialized disciplines, all of which fall under the umbrella term of "game programmer". A game programmer should not be confused with a game designer. In the early days of video games, a game programmer took on the job of a designer and artist; this was because the abilities of early computers were so limited that having specialized personnel for each function was unnecessary. Game concepts were light and games were only meant to be played for a few minutes at a time, but more art content and variations in gameplay were constrained by computers' limited power; as specialized arcade hardware and home systems became more powerful, game developers could develop deeper storylines and could include such features as high-resolution and full color graphics, advanced artificial intelligence and digital sound.
Technology has advanced to such a great degree that contemporary games boast 3D graphics and full motion video using assets developed by professional graphic artists. Nowadays, the derogatory term "programmer art" has come to imply the kind of bright colors and blocky design that were typical of early video games; the desire for adding more depth and assets to games necessitated a division of labor. Art production was relegated to full-time artists. Next game programming became a separate discipline from game design. Now, only some games, such as the puzzle game Bejeweled, are simple enough to require just one full-time programmer. Despite this division, most game developers have some say in the final design of contemporary games. A contemporary video game may include advanced physics, artificial intelligence, 3D graphics, digitised sound, an original musical score, complex strategy and may use several input devices and may be playable against other people via the Internet or over a LAN; each aspect of the game can consume all of one programmer's time and, in many cases, several programmers.
Some programmers may specialize in one area of game programming, but many are familiar with several aspects. The number of programmers needed for each feature depends somewhat on programmers' skills, but are dictated by the type of game being developed. Game engine programmers create the base engine of the game, including the simulated physics and graphics disciplines. Video games use existing game engines, either commercial, open source or free, they are customized for a particular game, these programmers handle these modifications. A game's physics programmer is dedicated to developing the physics. A game will only simulate a few aspects of real-world physics. For example, a space game may need simulated gravity, but would not have any need for simulating water viscosity. Since processing cycles are always at a premium, physics programmers may employ "shortcuts" that are computationally inexpensive, but look and act "good enough" for the game in question. In other cases, unrealistic physics are employed to allow easier gameplay or for dramatic effect.
Sometimes, a specific subset of situations is specified and the physical outcome of such situations are stored in a record of some sort and are never computed at runtime at all. Some physics programmers may delve into the difficult tasks of inverse kinematics and other motions attributed to game characters, but these motions are assigned via motion capture libraries so as not to overload the CPU with complex calculations. For a role-playing game such as World of Warcraft, only one physics programmer may be needed. For a complex combat game such as Battlefield 1942, teams of several physics programmers may be required; this title belonged to a programmer who developed specialized blitter algorithms and clever optimizations for 2D graphics. Today, however, it is exclusively applied to programmers who specialize in developing and modifying complex 3D graphic renderers; some 2D graphics skills have just become useful again, for developing games for the new generation of cell phones and handheld game consoles.
A 3D graphics programmer must have a firm grasp of advanced mathematical concepts such as vector and matrix math and linear algebra. Skilled programmers specializing in this area of game development can demand high wages and are a scarce commodity, their skills can be used for video games on any platform. An AI programmer develops the logic of time to simulate intelligence in opponents, it has evolved into a specialized discipline, as these tasks used to be implemented by programmers who specialized in other areas. An AI programmer may program pathfinding and enemy tactic systems; this is one of the most challenging aspects of game programming and its sophistication is developing rapidly. Contemporary games dedicate 10 to 20 percent of their programming staff to AI; some games, such as strategy games like Civilization III or role-playing video games such as The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, use AI while others, such as puzzle games, use it sparingly or not at all. Many game developers have created entire languages that can be used to program their own AI for games via scripts.
These languages are less technical than the language used to implement the game, will be used by the game or level designers to implement the world of the game. Many studios make their games' scripting available to players
British Open Championship Golf
British Open Championship Golf is a 1997 sports video game developed and published by Looking Glass Technologies. A simulation of The Open Championship, it allows the player to engage in multiple forms of golf, including stroke play and fourball; the player competes at reproductions of the Royal Troon Golf Club and the Old Course at St. Andrews as and against famous golfers of the time. Announcer commentary is provided by actor Michael Wide World of Sports host Jim McKay. British Open Championship Golf was the third self-published game released by Looking Glass Technologies, it was directed by Rex Bradford, designer of the early golf title Mean 18. The team sought to create an accurate simulation of tournament golf play, which they felt was missing in the genre. To achieve this goal, they focused on recreating the atmosphere of a tournament, included reactive crowds and announcers; the game was placed in competition with popular golf series such as PGA Tour. The game was a major commercial failure, Looking Glass ceased its self-publishing operations after its release.
Despite this, it was well reviewed by critics, who praised Jim McKay's commentary and the game's graphics and atmosphere. Criticism was leveled against its lack of multiplayer or course creation functionality, some reviewers found fault with its brevity. British Open Championship Golf is a three-dimensional video game that simulates golf, a sport in which players attempt to hit a ball into a hole with as few strokes as possible. In particular, the game is based on the oldest tournament in golf; the player may compete as a pre- or self-created amateur golfer or as one of eight celebrity athletes, including Sandy Lyle, Vijay Singh and Ian Baker-Finch. Three modes of play—Practice and Tournament—are available. Practice and Match are non-binding preparatory modes: the former allows the player to practice each hole of a course, the latter engages the player in a pre-tournament match of stroke play, match play or fourball. In the Tournament mode, the player competes in The Open Championship, which consists of four 18-hole matches.
Before making a shot, the player may adjust the general direction of the swing. As with other golf games, a "swing meter" is used to simulate the act of swinging the club; the player clicks three times: first to initiate the backswing, which causes a timing indicator to move along the meter. Changes in the timing of these clicks alter the shot. A red section on the far end of the swing meter represents overswinging, which negatively affects shots; the crowd reacts to the player's shots, Tournament mode features announcer commentary that analyzes the match overall. The player may choose one of two courses: the Royal Troon Golf Club and the Old Course at St. Andrews; the player's caddie provides information about the idiosyncrasies of each course. The game simulates the strong wind and weather typical of the courses' real-world counterparts, which lie near the seaside; the player may adjust environmental aspects such as wind speed and the wetness of the soil. During a match, the player uses information on the heads-up display to determine such factors as wind speed and direction, the ball's distance from the flag and the height difference between the ball and the hole.
Looking Glass Technologies began developing British Open Championship Golf in 1995. The project was led by Rex Bradford, designer of the influential 1986 golf title Mean 18, he had worked on earlier Looking Glass games, such as Terra Nova: Strike Force Centauri. Bradford decided to revisit the golf genre because he felt that other games did not recreate the structure or capture the atmosphere of golf tournaments; the team sought to fill this perceived void by more simulating the tournament experience, with a particular focus on crowds, commentary and the caddie. Bradford believed that these elements recreated "the television-style ambiance of being in that moment." Graphically, a focus was placed on buildings and animated objects, in order to make up for the less spectacular nature of links courses. The game's environments were generated with the same stereophotogrammetry techniques used to create the landscapes in the company's earlier Flight Unlimited; the team's reproduction of the Old Course at St. Andrews was the first authorized for a video game.
Looking Glass announced British Open Championship Golf on July 18, 1996. Coinciding with this news, the company launched a website to cover The Open Championship of 1996. According to Bradford, the company was "hoping to make a splash" with the game, placed in competition with popular series such as Links and PGA Tour, he noted the quality of these titles, stated that, had the team not been trying to innovate, they would not have attempted to compete in the genre. Looking Glass revealed in November 1996 that Jim McKay, host of the Wide World of Sports, would provide color commentary for the game. Actor Michael Bradshaw was hired as the play-by-play announcer; the pair recorded more than 5,000 lines of dialogue in total. In January 1997, Looking Glass and Eidos Interactive announced a four-year partnership; as a result, British Open Championship Golf was distributed and marketed in North America and published in Europe by Eidos. However, like Flight Unlimited and Terra Nova, the game was self-published in North America by Looking Glass.
In March 1997, near the end of the game's development, part of th
Flight Unlimited II
Flight Unlimited II is a 1997 flight simulator video game developed by Looking Glass Studios and published by Eidos Interactive. The player controls one of five planes in the airspace of the San Francisco Bay Area, shared with up to 600 artificially intelligent aircraft directed by real-time air traffic control; the game eschews the aerobatics focus of its predecessor, Flight Unlimited, in favor of general civilian aviation. As such, new physics code and an engine were developed, the former because the programmer of Flight Unlimited's computational fluid dynamics system, Seamus Blackley, had left the company; the team sought to create an immersive world for the player and to compete with the Microsoft Flight Simulator series. Commercially, Flight Unlimited II performed well enough to recoup its development costs. Critics lauded the game's graphics and simulated airspace, several praised its physics. However, some considered the game to be inferior to Microsoft Flight Simulator'98. Following the completion of Flight Unlimited II, its team split up to develop Flight Unlimited III and Flight Combat simultaneously.
Both projects were troubled, they contributed to the closure of Looking Glass in May 2000. Flight Unlimited II is a flight simulator video game: its gameplay is a simulation of piloting real-world planes. Players may control the Piper PA-28R-200, de Havilland Canada DHC-2 Beaver, Beechcraft Baron 58, North American P-51D Mustang or Cessna 172; the interactive cockpit of each plane is based on its real-world counterpart, it contains simulated flight instruments such as an airspeed indicator, a heading indicator and a VOR indicator, among others. The player begins by using the fixed-base operator interface. In a Quick Flight, the player selects the flying conditions before taking off; the game's six lessons detail such maneuvers as takeoffs and taxiing. Adventures are pre-built missions, with objectives such as landing on an aircraft carrier, helping a prisoner to escape from Alcatraz Island or dropping turkeys into Candlestick Park. There are 25 adventures in total; the game is set in a reproduction of 11,000 square miles of the San Francisco Bay Area.
The player may land at or takeoff from the area's 46 airports. Weather conditions such as rain and fog are simulated. Players share the game's airspace with up to 600 artificially intelligent planes, which fly and respond to the player in real-time. Real-time air traffic control directs the AI planes to prevent collisions; the player interacts with other planes by constructing radio messages with a menu. Three cockpit views are available: IFR, which allows the player to monitor and interact with all flight instruments. External camera angles are available, the player may ride as a passenger in any AI plane. Following the completion of Flight Unlimited in 1995, project leader Seamus Blackley planned to use that game's computational fluid dynamics code to create a combat flight simulator called Flight Combat. However, a new manager at Looking Glass Studios demanded that Blackley instead design a direct sequel to Flight Unlimited. Blackley refused and was fired, leaving the company in late 1995. Constantine Hantzopoulos became the lead designer and project leader of the fourteen-member Flight Unlimited II team.
The team eschewed the aerobatics focus of their previous game in favor of general civilian aviation, in order to compete with the Microsoft Flight Simulator series. Looking Glass announced the game on December 18, 1996, it was slated to include 6 planes, 45 airports and 8,500 square miles of terrain from the San Francisco Bay Area. The Bay Area was chosen because of numerous airports. In January 1997, Eidos Interactive partnered with Looking Glass to provide the game's marketing and distribution; the team opted not to reuse the technology of Flight Unlimited. Hantzopoulos learned from Blackley that it was necessary to recreate the "visceral feel" of real flight, but Blackley's CFDs system was "all black box spaghetti code" that the team could not understand. Programmer Jim Berry, who had worked on simulators such as Falcon 4.0, wrote new physics code based on force vector calculations to replace the CFDs system. To gather data for the new physics and Berry flew in real-world planes with designer Ed Tatro and aerobatic pilot Michael Goulian.
James Fleming coded Flight Unlimited II's new terrain renderer, ZOAR. Flight Unlimited uses distance fog to limit visible terrain, but this causes pop-in issues that the team sought to avoid in the sequel. Instead of removing textures that exceed the draw distance, the new engine uses mipmapping to lower the polygon count of distant terrain; this increases the viewable area and allowed the team to use fog as an atmospheric effect, rather than as a "crutch". The team's goal was to create the "best, most realistic civilian flight simulator", which would provide an immersive world for the player. Radio communications between ATCs, AI planes and the player occur in real-time: a "sophisticated audio splicing system" gathers pre-recorded voice fragments into contextually appropriate sentences; the team recorded the engine noise of each of the game's planes, they designed cockpits more interactive than those in Flight Unlimited. 300 times more terrain area was included in Flight Unlimited II than in its predecessor.
To generate the terrain, the team combined dig
Lexington, Massachusetts
Lexington is a town in Middlesex County, United States. The population was 31,394 at the 2010 census, in nearly 11,100 households. Settled in 1641, it is celebrated as the site of the first shots of the American Revolutionary War, in the Battle of Lexington on April 19, 1775, it is the sixth wealthiest small city in the United States. Lexington was first settled circa 1642 as part of Massachusetts. What is now Lexington was incorporated as a parish, called Cambridge Farms, in 1691; this allowed them to have a separate church and minister, but were still under jurisdiction of the Town of Cambridge. Lexington was incorporated as a separate town in 1713, it was that it got the name Lexington. How it received its name is the subject of some controversy; some people believe that it was named in honor of an English peer. Some, on the other hand, believe that it was named after Lexington in England. In the early colonial days, Vine Brook, which runs through Lexington and Bedford, empties into the Shawsheen River, was a focal point of the farming and industry of the town.
It provided for many types of mills, in the 20th Century, for farm irrigation. For decades, Lexington grew modestly while remaining a farming community, providing Boston with much of its produce, it always had a bustling downtown area. Lexington began to prosper, helped by its proximity to Boston, having a rail line service its citizens and businesses, beginning in 1846. For many years, East Lexington was considered a separate village from the rest of the town, though it still had the same officers and Town Hall. Most of the farms of Lexington became housing developments by the end of the 1960s. Lexington, as well as many of the towns along the Route 128 corridor, experienced a jump in population in the 1960s and 70s, due to the high-tech boom. Property values in the town soared, the school system became nationally recognized for its excellence; the town participates in the METCO program, which buses minority students from Boston to suburban towns to receive better educational opportunities than those available to them in the Boston Public Schools.
On April 19, 1775, what many regard as the first battle of the American Revolutionary War was a battle at Lexington. After the rout, the British march on toward Concord where the militia had been allowed time to organize at the Old North Bridge and turn back the British and prevent them from capturing and destroying the militia's arms stores. Lexington was the Cold War location of the USAF "Experimental SAGE Subsector" for testing a prototype IBM computer that arrived in July 1955 for development of a computerized "national air defense network". Lexington is located at 42°26′39″N 71°13′36″W. According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 16.5 square miles, of which 16.4 square miles is land and 0.1 square miles, or 0.85%, is water. Lexington borders the following towns: Burlington, Winchester, Belmont, Waltham and Bedford, it has more area than all other municipalities. By the 2010 census, the population had reached 31,394; as of the census of 2010, there had been 31,394 people, 11,530 households, 8,807 families residing in the town.
The population density was 1,851.0 people per square mile. There were 12,019 housing units at an average density of 691.1 per square mile. The racial makeup of the town was 68.6% White, 25.4% Asian, 1.5% Black or African American, 0.1% Native American, 0.0% Pacific Islander, 0.5% from other races, 2.6% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2.3% of the population. There were 11,530 households out of which 38.6% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 66.0% were married couples living together, 7.7% had a female householder with no husband present, 24.1% were non-families. 20.8% of all households were made up of individuals and 12.3% had someone living alone, 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.66 and the average family size was 3.10. In the town, the population was spread out with 26.4% under the age of 18, 3.5% from 18 to 24, 22.7% from 25 to 44, 28.5% from 45 to 64, 19.0% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 44 years. For every 100 females, there were 88.7 males.
For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 83.5 males. In 2013, the mean home price for detached houses was $852,953, the median price of a house or condo was $718,300. According to a 2012 estimate, the median income for a household in the town was $191,350, the median income for a family was $218,890. Males had a median income of $101,334 versus $77,923 for females; the per capita income for the town was $70,132. About 1.8% of families and 3.4% of the population were below the poverty line, including 3.2% of those under age 18 and 3.4% of those age 65 or over. By race, the median household income was highest for mixed race households, at $263,321. Hispanic households had a median income of $233,875. Asian households had a median income of $178,988. White households had a median income of $154,533. Black households had a median income of $139,398. American Indian or Alaskan Native households had a median income of $125,139. In 2010, 20% of the residents of Lexington were born outside of the United States.
Lexington's public education system
