Poll of the Day > blowing up computers to kill people in video games

(+) Yeah! (+)

Knights of the Old Republic II.

I need to kill some important dude. I can go into one computer with proper secuity acess and blow up the computer standing next to him, thus killing him.

Why would you ever legitimately need to blow up a computer? Why even have that as an option.

Oh, I thought you meant like in Surrogates where if you want to beat someone at Dota you send your opponent a virus that makes their PC explode

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Computers can explode if they get wet

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argonautweakend posted...

Why would you ever legitimately need to blow up a computer? Why even have that as an option.

It's not necessarily a deliberate function:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_poke
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halt_and_Catch_Fire_(computing)

40 years ago it was possible with some computers to send them a command that would literally do physical damage to the computer. That's essentially what you're doing in KotOR - using your superior hacking skills to exploit existing weaknesses and causing the entire system to overload and explode. It's not like any asshole can walk up to that console and get Space Clippy showing up asking if they want help blowing up a nearby terminal.

Is it realistic? No. But then again most future-tech in sci-fi rarely is. A realistic cockpit/bridge wouldn't be exploding into sparks every time a ship is damaged, but it happens pretty much all the time in Star Wars, Star Trek, and every other show ever made. Holodecks like the ones in Star Trek wouldn't be wired into the rest of the ship in ways that a single programming bug could cause catastrophic crises, but that happens every other week on the Enterprise. Most robots would be so hardwired to obey that it would be nearly impossible for anything like a robot rebellion to occur, yet that doesn't really stop 80% of robots in fiction from killing their masters. And so on.

Also, kind of a neat coincidence if you're actually playing KotOR2 right now - I'm playing as well (I just finished Dantooine and am moving on to Onderon, with Korriban as my last planet waiting until later).
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Mead posted...

Computers can explode if they get wet

You're thinking of Mogwai.
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Goldeneye it was possible

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I can't help but think about when a computer explodes on StarTrek (particularly Voyager) 'cuz there'd always be flying rocks... why are there rocks?

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Lokarin posted...

I can't help but think about when a computer explodes on StarTrek (particularly Voyager) 'cuz there'd always be flying rocks... why are there rocks?

dilithium crystals duh

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I am playing Kights II right now. This time I decided to play with blasters and droids. I use some force powers but the majority of my damage is blasting.

My main character has gotten great, and i have some good equipment, but I was told you can get so good you just mow hoardes down in seconds. I don't know if I'll get there, even if this game isn't exactly difficult. I feel like to get to that level I messed up a step.

argonautweakend posted...

Knights of the Old Republic II.

I need to kill some important dude. I can go into one computer with proper secuity acess and blow up the computer standing next to him, thus killing him.

Why would you ever legitimately need to blow up a computer? Why even have that as an option.

tbh, kinda sounds like it was some kind of a security measure to keep it from falling into wrong hands or something.


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argonautweakend posted...

Why would you ever legitimately need to blow up a computer? Why even have that as an option.

SPOILERS for "Die Hard, Live Free".

This is how the bad guys kill the hackers that unknowingly helped them. They put C4 in their computers.

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