The latest academic research has found that games such as Half Life and Doom could actually be used to train people in fire safety, evacuation procedures and even save lives. Missing a link? Let us explain. By using the engines from games such as these, which involve looking at a scenario from a first-person perspective, the team at the university was able to adapt the environment into a 3D model of a real world building. In just three weeks a single developer was able to programme three fire evacuation procedures complete with smoke and fire which the Durham experts say is significantly quicker and more cost effective than beginning from scratch. The scientists found three main advantages of using this technology. That it can be used to identify problems with the layout of the building, that it can help familiarise people with evacuation procedures and that it can teach good fire safety. Many dangerous situations occur in a fire because people don't know the bits of the building they don't use on a daily basis, like the fire exits and stairwells, well enough and therefore panic due to the unfamiliarity with procedure.
As opposed to starting from scratch this method takes a huge wedge of time off building a virtual reality model. The games are also tested extensively before use in both usability and performance also meaning less work for the team. According to the boffins the code within these games also enables easy programming of features such as wind, smoke, fire and water. Lead author Dr Shamus Smith from Durham University's Computer Science department said, "Although virtual environment toolkits are available, they usually only provide a subset of the tools needed to build complete virtual worlds." Dr Smith explains further that in order to include features such as fire and water the programmer usually requires additional programming skills and a substantial time investment on the part of the developer. "By using readily available computer games, these features can be very easily simulated and are obviously vital in creating a virtual fire evacuation scenario".
Steve Wharton, of Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Service agreed that, "Using virtual models such as this one is an excellent way to raise fire safety awareness and test the effectiveness of a building's design. Virtual models also provide an effective way to train fire-fighters in a realistic, yet safe, environment." Further to the theoretic usefulness of this simulation, the team tested it on real people, showing them the difference between the usual simulation and the computer game-based one, those tested agreed unamimously that the latter was the most helpful and realistic, and that they really enjoyed shooting the fire demons in the ladies' loo on level six. ( www.atomicmpc.com.au )
The name Starcraft is synonymous with the typical RTS, a name that will burn brightly in the nerdy hearts of gamers and strategists for untold years to come. The very last place you’d expect it to be uttered is the title of a university course, specifically, Berkeley. Held every Thursday at 7pm the lectures cover the strategy of the game, unit makeup and use, how to analyse a replay and many more. We grabbed the course description from their site, just to see what they were really on about:
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) announced that the PC gaming industry is "blooming," following the industry's positive reception of the company's ATI Radeon HD 4800 graphic card series. 
Do you want to know why your teenager is dropping out of college? According to the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC), it apparently has nothing to do with the cruddy state of the job market, discouraging prospects for graduates and exorbitant university fees. Instead, World of WarCraft is to blame. Activision Blizzard's World of Warcraft has something of a rep for being addictive, with nerdy fans spending hours in rain, hail and snow just to buy a copy of the Lich King that they could very well have just ordered online. Even South Park managed to fill two whole episodes with the subject, when Guitar Hero only achieved one. But according to FCC Commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate, the game is not just a fun distraction, but represents a dire threat to the education of an entire generation, and only she can undertake a quest singlehandedly to stop it. ( www.theinquirer.net )
One of the most anticipated PC games of the year, Grand Theft Auto IV did not have a great start: except from the fact that those who opted for digital distribution had no pre-loading options, it appears that those who managed to install the game are constantly suffering from GTA IV crashes, freezings and other performance related issues. Is there a way to fix these problems? For the moment, Rockstar remain silent – it’s probably still early and they have to analyze the tons of reports regarding poor performance and lock-ups. However, one thing is clear: there are many people having problems and we only have one possible suggestion right now for trying to fix the game: try defragging your hard disk drive after installing GTA IV. It might be a long shot, but it’s worth trying, since a heavily defragged game (and with a 15GB install, Rockstar’s title can do that) can lead to crashes, freezings and other problems.
Stumble It!
