The Game

The Game or The Games may refer to:

Sports and games

College sports

Books

Burnout Paradise

Burnout Paradise is the fifth game in the main Burnout racing video game series and seventh overall. It was developed by Criterion Games and published by Electronic Arts. It was released in January 2008 for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 and on 5 February 2009 for Microsoft Windows. It was also released on the PlayStation Store in September 2008 and via Xbox Live Marketplace's Games on Demand 25 August 2009. It was later added to the libraries of Greatest Hits and Platinum Hits titles.

Paradise's gameplay is set in the fictional "Paradise City", an open world in which players can compete in several types of races. Players can also compete online, which includes additional game modes, such as "Cops and Robbers". Several free game updates introduce new features such as a time-of-day cycle and motorcycles. The game also features paid downloadable content in the form of new cars and the fictional "Big Surf Island".

The game was received well by critics, with aggregate score sites GameRankings reporting an average score of 88% and Metacritic reporting an average score of 88 out of 100. The game won several awards in 2008, with Spike TV, GameTrailers and GameSpot all awarding it Best Driving Game. Reviewers felt the game had an excellent sense of speed, and praised the open world gameplay, a first for the Burnout series.

Game

A game is structured form of play, usually undertaken for enjoyment and sometimes used as an educational tool. Games are distinct from work, which is usually carried out for remuneration, and from art, which is more often an expression of aesthetic or ideological elements. However, the distinction is not clear-cut, and many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator sports or games) or art (such as jigsaw puzzles or games involving an artistic layout such as Mahjong, solitaire, or some video games).

Key components of games are goals, rules, challenge, and interaction. Games generally involve mental or physical stimulation, and often both. Many games help develop practical skills, serve as a form of exercise, or otherwise perform an educational, simulational, or psychological role.

Attested as early as 2600 BC, games are a universal part of human experience and present in all cultures. The Royal Game of Ur, Senet, and Mancala are some of the oldest known games.

Paradise

Paradise (Persian: پردیس, Paradise garden) is the term for a place of timeless harmony. The Abrahamic faiths associate paradise with the Garden of Eden, that is, the perfect state of the world prior to the fall from grace, and the perfect state that will be restored in the World to Come.

Paradisaical notions are cross-cultural, often laden with pastoral imagery, and may be cosmogonical or eschatological or both, often compared to the miseries of human civilization: in paradise there is only peace, prosperity, and happiness. Paradise is a place of contentment, a land of luxury and idleness. Paradise is often described as a "higher place", the holiest place, in contrast to this world, or underworlds such as Hell. In eschatological contexts, paradise is imagined as an abode of the virtuous dead. In Christian and Islamic understanding, Heaven is a paradisaical relief. In old Egyptian beliefs, the otherworld is Aaru, the reed-fields of ideal hunting and fishing grounds where the dead lived after judgment. For the Celts, it was the Fortunate Isle of Mag Mell. For the classical Greeks, the Elysian fields was a paradisaical land of plenty where the heroic and righteous dead hoped to spend eternity. The Vedic Indians held that the physical body was destroyed by fire but recreated and reunited in the Third Heaven in a state of bliss. In the Zoroastrian Avesta, the "Best Existence" and the "House of Song" are places of the righteous dead. On the other hand, in cosmological contexts 'paradise' describes the world before it was tainted by evil.

Data

Data (/ˈdeɪtə/ DAY-tə, /ˈdætə/ DA-tə, or /ˈdɑːtə/ DAH-tə) is a set of values of qualitative or quantitative variables; restated, pieces of data are individual pieces of information. Data is measured, collected and reported, and analyzed, whereupon it can be visualized using graphs or images. Data as a general concept refers to the fact that some existing information or knowledge is represented or coded in some form suitable for better usage or processing.

Raw data, i.e. unprocessed data, is a collection of numbers, characters; data processing commonly occurs by stages, and the "processed data" from one stage may be considered the "raw data" of the next. Field data is raw data that is collected in an uncontrolled in situ environment. Experimental data is data that is generated within the context of a scientific investigation by observation and recording.

The Latin word "data" is the plural of "datum", and still may be used as a plural noun in this sense. Nowadays, though, "data" is most commonly used in the singular, as a mass noun (like "information", "sand" or "rain").