Mangagamer (Previously "Hell may have frozen over?")

Visual Novel Community Archive, 2000-2009
#261

I think you’re just losing it. You’re not even trying to make coherent arguments anymore.

First of all, we were arguing about honorifics. Foreign honorifics can easily be added to the English vocabulary because there is no English equivalent of it. As I keep saying and you keep ignoring, it’s already quite widespread with French honorifics. They’ve become an accepted part of English vocabulary. I don’t see anybody freaking out that we’re using French words instead of the English equivalent. The biggest reason for the acceptance of French and other European languages making it into English easier is probably because they seem less foreign than Asians.

I’m not the only one who’s arguing that English is an ever-changing language that’s quickly being internationalized. In a decade or so, it probably won’t be anything like it is now because it will be so heavily influenced by foreign grammar and vocabulary. Here’s an article about how English is evolving: http://www.wired.com/culture/culturereviews/magazine/16-07/st_essay.

I’m backing up my arguments with examples or sources. Can you do the same? Can you really argue that adding foreign words into English makes it “improper” English? Can you even successfully argue there is “proper” English?

#262

That’s what I thought when I first saw the game, especially with its many similarities to Green Green. I typically don’t like those type of games, but I wanted to play the game for Natsume. In retrospect, I believe the quote means that the guys expected the trip to the island was going to a ticket to sex for them, but the results turned out different than they had expected.

#263

Thanks for the review, Reikon. Definitely a different experience than I was anticipating with this title. MG made it sound like a sex romp, so it’s heartening that it’s got a bit more substance than that.

Interesting that they plan (or are at least talking about) patching the “language files”, although that doesn’t really make me feel much like ordering the game before they do, you know?

Something tells me these guys definitely didn’t do enough market research. They should be promoting Edelweiss completely differently than simply promoting it as a “a ticket to ride for sex”. They could really REALLY use a forum on their site. Hopefully, they can recover from their rather bumpy start.

#264

Reikons review is right on with everything about the game. I am disappointed it isnt a sex romp but it made up for it in being funny. MG definitely needs to make better descriptions for the game and not try to aim a game that isnt a sex romp at people who would want that. I like they are responsive to the problems so i’ll most likely keep on buying the games. I agree with the forum they need one badly.

#265

that sounds rough I dont think I could get through all those typos.

#266

One thing that I noticed on the MG interview was how much it matched the previous Bandai Visual’s “strategy”.
That is, thinking that their product and market would be the same for Japan and overseas.

Having worked on exports before, I’ve learned that you have to find a compromise on what you offer and what your customers are willing to pay for your products. But I doubt MG is aware of this.

MG’s advantage is of course, having the games translated in english (and uncensored graphics).

But subpar translations, drm and “download editions only” of their products will alienate their potential fanbase and provide a product that customers will feel is not worth paying for.

But hey, I’m always optimistic and hope for MG improvement :slight_smile:

#267

Has anyone here gone through Hinatabokko /Which girl should I choose? I’d like to know how it is. The description doesn’t sound like it describes the game very well. Erogamescape people voted it as pure love, and the game looks pretty laid back to me. It seems like a game I’d like, but I also hear it’s pretty short.

MG really needs to stop making all their games sound like sex romps.

#268

Actually, based on how TCP/IP works, what OLF wrote is correct. When you send something (a page request, clicking submit, etc.), the packets will bounce from router to router until it hits the webserver(s). Although there are ways to capture those packets (as a result, find out what you are sending/receiving), it is extremely impractical given the amount of data it could collect. Now, SSL does not necessarily make it more secure: it just makes it slightly more difficult to “understand” the data, as you will have to “decrypt” it before you can use it.

Said all that, that does not mean you should not do your due diligence, specially considering, a lot of times, crimes are crimes of opportunity. If they really want to grab my credit card number, I am certain they will find ways to do it. But, if they want it, at least, the will have to work a bit more to get it.

I would like to close the SSL issue (or, at least from my perspective) with this comment/analogy: SSL is like that lock you put in your door to secure it. You might feel safe but have you consider what a sledgehammer can do to it?

#269

“slightly” more difficult? It makes it a hell of a lot more difficult.

If, say, you’re buying eroges using your work internet connection (which you shouldn’t be), and I happen to be sitting on the central router with tcpdump running, and the data is sent over plain HTTP, I’ll get your credit card number on my screen. With SSL, unless I have a totally impractical amount of computing power (an amount that does not actually exist today, unless you’ve discovered some weakness in RSA), there’s no way I’d be able to get your credit card number. To get it I’d have to work out the online shop’s private key, which I could feasibly get by getting root access to said online shop’s web server (but if I did that I could get the credit card number anyway)

I think that’s a terrible analogy, because sledgehammers are easy to come by and use. I think, replace ‘sledgehammer’ with ‘nuclear warhead’ or something similar and you’d be closer to the truth.

Put simply, there really is no good reason to send your credit card number over anything but encrypted channels. Given that any ‘hop’ to the destination machine could feasibly be compromised (and it would be very easy to write a piece of code that’s intelligent enough to inspect HTTP GET and POST queries, extracting interesting-looking fields, such as anything like ‘credit’ ‘cc’ ‘ssn’ ‘pass’, ‘pwd’ etc. and log that), it really is negligent to use plain HTTP for sending credit card information. Which isn’t being done here, thank goodness.

#270

By the way, if anybody wants to try Edelweiss, I can upload the trial from the disk they gave out at AX.

#271

I had asked Circus staff at Anime Expo whether it would be okay to upload the contents of the sampler disc and they said that they’d need to get permission from the other parties involved. :confused: I wonder if I should poke them again… If only they’d reactivate their YouTube video of the “intro video”… That was hilarious XD

#272

Weird, it’s a demo, so you think they’d want to distribute it.

#273

Maybe they wanna avoid the whole mess that happened with the English demo version of Princess Maker 2. :stuck_out_tongue:

#274

Hahahaha. That might be referring to the animated adaptation of Koihime Musou that just started airing recently in Japan. By the way, the subtitle of the Zeta Gundam movie was called ‘A New Translation’

#275

You only have to, you know, know about Internet Security. Or use google. You could also, for instance, read this discussion and its following comments such as this one. You could also, I don’t know, read the rants here about “on the lamentable state of SSL security implementations.” Or you could also hang on the SSL community discussion forums.
And stuff. You know, do your homework when you talk about something.

My point wasn’t about how no one can be threatened and the Internet is secure, just that SSL in the present Internet environment is pretty useless.

#276

I’m afraid I have to disagree: SSL is NOT useless. The Internet is a far more secure system with SSL, than without it. If SSL went away, then credit card and ID thefts would be waaaaay more common. SSL is an incredible step towards Internet security, and it is one of the largest stumbling blocks “business hackers” must work against to get what they want. That been said, here’s the real issue: SSL is obsolete and used wrong. SSL was only designed for channel security: all things said and done, it solely protects information going from Point A to Point B. There are hundreds of exploits which circumvent this in the wild. SSL’s outdated nature, especially comes to light when one notices how the certs are stored on the opposite ends. Skilled hackers don’t attempt to decrypt the data being flowed, they attempt to steal the cert, THEN decrypt subsequent data that’s flowed (usually on the business end). The issue is not that SSL is useless - the issue is that SSL is only one piece of a much larger machine that needs to be built. SSL alone will not protect the Internet. An updated SSL with other security protocols to aid it, is the real answer. However being obsolete and used incorrectly does not equate to useless. The Saturn V rocket is obsolete, but if NASA used one right now, it would still reach the Moon. On that same light, using the Saturn V to put a satellite in orbit is a wrong use, but it would work. So its not a useless rocket and has incredible potential - indeed I read about an updated version being planned for new moon trips or going to Mars. Same goes for SSL… errr… as in not being useless, not going to space. :wink:

Getting kinda on topic, the MG site not having SSL is sloppy and unprofessional. It’s taking an unnecessary risk, where no risk of that kind should exist. About 3 to 5 minutes of scripting can correct the issue. It also leaves them liable to lawsuits steaming from credit card theft, as having SSL for payment systems is an international standard and holds legal precedence. MG needs to fix it: for their customers and themselves.

#277

As Pete Lindstrom asked, “the question at hand is, if SSL were removed would it increase the number of attacks/exploits against a website?” I guess there are two sides about this aspect, and it’s true the security community is a bit divided about the question. For my part, I’m in the “the number of attacks/exploits against a website won’t change in a significant manner” side.

It’s what makes it useless, though. As I wrote, “SSL in the present Internet environment is pretty useless”. I’m not saying that SSL in itself is, but that the way it currently exists in the Internet makes it pretty useless and that its absence wouldn’t change a damn thing as far as internet security is concerned.
For my defence, as the links I posted showed, contrary to what freakazoid posted about how I was “the only expert around that noticed that”, most experts in the security field share my opinion.

#278

lol… you didn’t confirm or deny if you’re an expert or not. :stuck_out_tongue:

Back on a serious note: I’m obviously on the opposite camp from you, in regards to a theoretical non-SSL Internet. By and large the vast majority of network “hacking” attempts I’ve seen, are data sniffers or their ilk - which SSL at least prevents. It also prevents any Dick-and-Tom wanna be hacker from stealing vital info. Look how easy it is to circumvent/utilize SMTP: thanks to that SPAM is a nightmare.

Internet is an awesome thing, but it was poorly designed and executed from the start. Even the US military that built it, uses something else. I doubt they’re willing to share how it work too. :wink:

#279

Actually, as mentioned before, MG does have SSL when you submit credit card info. It’s just not on the page you enter the numbers in, so it’s misleading. I believe even Amazon did this way back, where the login page wasn’t encrypted, but it submitted the info over SSL.

#280

The internet was designed for sending text documents basically. That’s why. The whole architexture of the net is built around me sending you the latest ASCII text file i made…by posting it on a server and you downloading it.