Alright, so I haven't been updating much. I have been hard at work on a number of projects, the largest which will be replacing this blog fairly soon. Also, I've been in front of a camera, and hammering out gameplay footage for a series of videos. I think I've said all of this in previous posts, but I wanted to remind my five readers that it is happening. I wrote scripts for two videos last night, and the camera and tripod are on the table in front of me as I type. I intend to shoot those two and at least one more today. I want to get in two more, but it's going to be hard.
I need to shave...can't look scraggly to the public. I've already got enough going against me in these videos.
I need to track down a lapel microphone, and eventually replace my camera. The fact that firewire is trying to go extinct is hurting my project quite a bit. I dropped into Best Buy last week, and well...forty dollars is a bit too much. Not to mention, they only have one cable in the entire store. I'll get this stuff taken care of over the next few weeks, but the first couple of videos are going to have to have cheap production values. I will fix that! I promise! The fact that is, I have the gear to get good sound, at the very least, but it's not working so well right now. For some reason, ProTools and my shotgun mic don't work very well together. Also, the microphone jack on my camera acts murky when I plug a microphone into it.
I need for this whole thing to work out. The site as well. It's going to be a tough bit of road, but there are some things going on in the background that I hope will help. N4G is going to be key in getting a viewer base built up. The thing that kills my efforts is that I'm not funny. I'm not trying to be funny, either. That's what usually sells, and I'm not going to make that effort either.
Anyway...let's see if it works.
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Sunday, August 5, 2012
Ultima VII--Progress and A Dialing of Difficulty Downward.
I'm not entirely certain that anyone remembers me saying that I'd be posting about my time in Britannia's Age of Armageddon, but I sure do, and it's about time I delivered.
So, the truth is, I absolutely hate the combat. Maybe I'm just not used to it yet, but it's just a little irritating. I'm not saying that it's the core of the experience, because it really isn't, but given that I know that I'm going to have to fight some dragons somewhere in my future, I'm don't feel like I'm going to be ready. However, I dialed down the combat difficulty, picked up two more companions, beat down some bandits, and now I'm equipped for war with the Guardian.
Now for the good stuff: the story is progressing in an amazing way. I'd say spoiler alert, but let's face it, none of you are going to care about spoilers if you haven't played this particular game from twenty years ago. So far, two brutal ritualistic murders have taken place in the wake of two Fellowship members coming into towns. I don't know if it's obvious enough so let me say it: The Fellowship is evil. As are Elizabeth and Abraham. You know...EA...like the vile corporation that raped Origin Systems and destroyed this franchise. Okay, moving on.
Along the way I've found some of the adventurers from previous games, such as Iolo, Shamino, and Sentri. While I've never had Sentri in my party in the earlier games I've played, I have recruited Iolo. Shamino, however, has only met my character in the first Ultima...as it was his castle that I ransacked and ripped through to save a princess who would tell me where his time machine was. Yeah, scroll back a ways and check out my review of that one to see how nutty that game was!
Between murder sites, character recruiting, and begging Lord British for healing, I met a gypsy named Margareta, who told me a lot of what is to come in the game. Apparently I will be fighting Captain Hook, meeting a Time Lord, and even chatting up with some wisps.
Not a screenshot.
I also spoke with another mage who'd lost his mind and was put on the trail of a magic carpet. This is one of my primary objectives right now, because I would love some help traveling around the map. Let's face it: traveling through the swamp sucks with a party of this size, because touching the water poisons you. Well, small price to pay to see greater Britannia. However, I think that it's not so much the Avatar that gets poisoned as it is Spark. The little kid has a death wish.
Yeah, I haven't gotten very far. I have made progress, but it's a beast of a game. I do have some leads, including a serpent knife, and of course the vile EA(!). As long as things keep going this well (yes I think it's going well!), I will post more about my trip through Britannia in the coming Age of Armageddon. I think that I will play Ultima VIII: Pagan and do just the same. If you think I should, drop a comment! Show me that you are reading rather than letting me just look at my statistics and guessing that people give a crap!
Sunday, July 15, 2012
Things I Liked from Comic Con...or just the past week.
Aahhh, Comic-Con. A word...or two...that just seeps geekiness. Comics, television, film, video games, the works, all in one place. Big announcements, panels with writers and artists, etc. It's a place I've never been and don't really want to until I'm someone who people are asking stupid questions like "Where did you get the idea for The Alternative?" While most of the news from the show so far has just been a bit average, I have seen two things this week that either surprised and found me interested, or caused me to drool like an idiot dog deciding which car to chase.
The first of these was the Ouya, however you pronounce such a bizarre word I can't really tell you other than its probably the worst big name on peoples lips since the WiiU. Still, like the WiiU it seems poised to challenge the industry with some kind of change. In this case its "free video games". While I could easily get excited about such a concept, it's a bit too early to see what is really going to happen. I have gotten a bit ahead of myself so let me step back a bit, because, as anyone who has slogged through this mess of opinionated garbage, I never edit my blogs. It's not like I've ever broken ten readers on a single article anyway.
The Ouya is an indie console for indie developers who make indie games for a buck on cell phones and the like. They are posing the idea that all of the games of our memory were played on the television, in our living rooms. Well, I can't argue there. They are convinced that they can be an industry player too, which is a great thought on paper. Given their position in development, they are missing one very important thing: the big industry names. I don't think we will ever see a Nintendo name on this thing, but I do think that they should have hit up Sega about putting Phantasy Star Online 2 just so they can attach what appears to be a promising game onto their console very early. It won't be hard to get this rolling either, since the console runs on the Android OS.
From the creative perspective, this device is fascinating, in that it seems driven to be a market for independent developers, as the iPhone, and Android cell phones have been for the past couple of years. Ouya is trying to bring the enemy into the very place that other games are trying to keep alive. While I truly detest the idea of bringing a million Angry Birds clones to my television, my indie developer aspirations are fueled by the idea that I don't have to play a game I made on a telephone. I can download it to the little plastic box and give it a spin there.
Tradition and the modern meeting for mass consumption is a nice thought, so let me put the sweet chocolate sauce on this: the console is available to be bought for $100 right now. Just jump over to their kickstarter page (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ouya/ouya-a-new-kind-of-video-game-console), and you can pay for a console early, meaning you have one on launch day, or maybe even earlier. Since they have more than surpassed their goal, you are just insuring that you will jump into an interesting new landscape for gaming.
But I am a touch skeptical...more on that as the Ouya thing develops...
And now that I'm down considering the possibilities of the Ouya, it's time to tell you why I'm due to return to the comic shops in a stupid, gaping jaw, salivating all over Batman back issues and crying in joy when I get home to open it, why yes it's a new Sandman comic story. Not only is it a new Sandman story, it's a new Sandman story written by Neil Gaiman! If that isn't enough to get you excited, then clearly you either haven't read Sandman, or you just don't like it. If it's the latter, I am sad for you, because I loved about 93% of the original run of Sandman. Yeah, there were a few issues that just kind of dragged for me. For the most part though, Sandman is a bulletproof book, and hearing that we are getting more stories of Morpheus, it's a good time to be a comics fan.
Oh, and there is this awesome Brian Wood comic coming out...Star Wars, during the time of the Galactic Civil War...I'm there for that too.
I might have more to say about that one when it starts coming out. For now, I pause, step back and ...hit the post button.
The first of these was the Ouya, however you pronounce such a bizarre word I can't really tell you other than its probably the worst big name on peoples lips since the WiiU. Still, like the WiiU it seems poised to challenge the industry with some kind of change. In this case its "free video games". While I could easily get excited about such a concept, it's a bit too early to see what is really going to happen. I have gotten a bit ahead of myself so let me step back a bit, because, as anyone who has slogged through this mess of opinionated garbage, I never edit my blogs. It's not like I've ever broken ten readers on a single article anyway.
The Ouya is an indie console for indie developers who make indie games for a buck on cell phones and the like. They are posing the idea that all of the games of our memory were played on the television, in our living rooms. Well, I can't argue there. They are convinced that they can be an industry player too, which is a great thought on paper. Given their position in development, they are missing one very important thing: the big industry names. I don't think we will ever see a Nintendo name on this thing, but I do think that they should have hit up Sega about putting Phantasy Star Online 2 just so they can attach what appears to be a promising game onto their console very early. It won't be hard to get this rolling either, since the console runs on the Android OS.
From the creative perspective, this device is fascinating, in that it seems driven to be a market for independent developers, as the iPhone, and Android cell phones have been for the past couple of years. Ouya is trying to bring the enemy into the very place that other games are trying to keep alive. While I truly detest the idea of bringing a million Angry Birds clones to my television, my indie developer aspirations are fueled by the idea that I don't have to play a game I made on a telephone. I can download it to the little plastic box and give it a spin there.
Tradition and the modern meeting for mass consumption is a nice thought, so let me put the sweet chocolate sauce on this: the console is available to be bought for $100 right now. Just jump over to their kickstarter page (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ouya/ouya-a-new-kind-of-video-game-console), and you can pay for a console early, meaning you have one on launch day, or maybe even earlier. Since they have more than surpassed their goal, you are just insuring that you will jump into an interesting new landscape for gaming.
But I am a touch skeptical...more on that as the Ouya thing develops...
And now that I'm down considering the possibilities of the Ouya, it's time to tell you why I'm due to return to the comic shops in a stupid, gaping jaw, salivating all over Batman back issues and crying in joy when I get home to open it, why yes it's a new Sandman comic story. Not only is it a new Sandman story, it's a new Sandman story written by Neil Gaiman! If that isn't enough to get you excited, then clearly you either haven't read Sandman, or you just don't like it. If it's the latter, I am sad for you, because I loved about 93% of the original run of Sandman. Yeah, there were a few issues that just kind of dragged for me. For the most part though, Sandman is a bulletproof book, and hearing that we are getting more stories of Morpheus, it's a good time to be a comics fan.
Oh, and there is this awesome Brian Wood comic coming out...Star Wars, during the time of the Galactic Civil War...I'm there for that too.
I might have more to say about that one when it starts coming out. For now, I pause, step back and ...hit the post button.
Thursday, July 5, 2012
More Rambling About Final Fantasy
Longtime readers will recognize a trend about my gaming. Yes, I love JRPG's. For whatever reason, I enjoy running around beautifully rendered worlds with generic archetypes with insane hair and seeing the deepest points of the uncanny valley as I do so. And those who just even just scan through know that I have the softest spot for the Final Fantasy franchise. Evidence of this is found in my defense of the 13th entry and its successor and beyond. I still enjoy the games, despite their flaws. So you should know very well how exhausted I am.
I have completed every single player, roman numeral entry in the series. I have played a couple of the off-shoots. And here I sit, during the 25th Anniversary celebration of the series as a whole. A history of great games is past, and there are thousands of people noting a list of successes that has come as a result risks taken by a company so many years past. But among them, there is anger, distress, frustration cold and bitter over decisions made by the persons holding the reins. These people don't want the changes made in the series.
Frankly, I feel that they just want more of Final Fantasy VII.
And I'm only right about a few of those people, I'm sure. But let's face it, nostalgia is both the best thing about Final Fantasy, and its curse. The majority of the first nine titles are indisputably among the most important games in history. Very few fans really argue about the quality of these titles, and will usually agree to disagree about which is the best. For some, these are their favorite games. I wouldn't argue with them either. There is something very special about playing a Final Fantasy game, and I always look forward to a new entry in the franchise. Hell, I'm even looking forward to Square announcing Final Fantasy XIII-3 at the anniversary thing in Japan at the end of August. It's unique to the Final Fantasy franchise, and no other series gives me that feeling. There are many great games out there, but Final Fantasy does the trick.
So you can imagine my frustration when I have to see the constant bickering on the internet about a Final Fantasy VII remake being the sole savior to the franchise. That's short sighted. Square-Enix was correct to say that it would be the end to the series. They are trying to make a game that satisfies both their creative needs and bring long estranged fans back. Whether you like XIII and its sequel or not, they were trying to bring some fresh blood to the series. It's not perfect, but it's a motion for progress. The sales numbers aren't all that much lower from previous installments, but the sales of other franchises are much higher, and that bothers the number crunchers of Square. The quick trigger anger flood of the internet scares them with poor review numbers on aggregate sites like MetaCritic.
The voice of the internet is hurting the video game industry in an indescribable way. Everyone sees the first person shooter as the way to make money, or even the duck and cover third person shooter. Pair that six hour campaign with a decent multi-player with DLC every few months, and you have a temporary success. If not a shooter, a sandbox game so full of content that some gamers just run out of interest by the time the finale rolls in to surprise people that they have actually reached the end. 'Casual' games allow people to fill the five minutes that they are waiting for the bus or class to start. These aren't bad points in gaming, and these are all extreme examples, but they aren't the complete experience of video games.
Innovation is supposedly driving the industry, but stagnation is the truth behind that 'innovation'. So many companies are so driven to reinvent the wheel that they forget that the simplest things are often what people were drawn to in the first place. Let's bring this back to Final Fantasy:Final Fantasy VIII contains what is probably the most needlessly complex stat system I've ever seen in a Japanese RPG. Some embraced the change and made it through a story that definitely sits in the love-or-hate category, and possibly even shattered the games difficulty in the progress. They immediately called in a system reminiscent of Final Fantasy VI, and it worked much better in the long run. The Wii even relies on simplicity, which is why so many people are drawn to it. The WiiU hasn't proven itself, but it seems to want to incite simplicity, despite having the potential for extreme complexity. The reality is, at the end of the day, it's just another button to press, and that has always been the core of the experience. For all of their innovation, we have reached a stage that we are just finding slightly different things for those buttons to do. Adding in a RPG leveling system for the kills accumulated in multi-player was innovative, but it's not a wholly different way to play those games. You still kill people in an arena and collect weapons that are stronger and kill more people in the process. World of Warcraft built on Everquest, which, in essence, was the same thing that Ultima had been doing or past twenty years before it had released. No one reinvented the wheel. They just put it in a different spot on the car.
So when Final Fantasy XIII dropped and players found themselves doing something rather alien to other games in the series, they were upset. They were also upset by the story, but let's face it, Final Fantasy hasn't ever been perfect in that department. It's Japan. They have their themes that always show up, and it was full tighter because of that threading. Nothing was truly shocking here, though, aside from the giant corridor from Act I to the end of Act II. Enough people realized this to have a good time, and we even got a great sequel out of it. It's not perfect, it's not as good as the classics, but it's still a lot of fun when you allow yourself to enjoy it.
Final Fantasy XV is no doubt coming down the pipeline. Square won't let their most important franchise to die out. People's expectations are rather low. That might be a good thing, because the people who will jump in regardless will probably be satisfied that it's a decent game. There is also the possibility that the experience that they picked up working on the potentially FFXIII Trilogy will show them with a fresh and exciting experience. More likely, it's going to be another average entry in a series that used to excel on every occasion.
But speculation is something that is dangerous and exciting. I don't know whether to expect another sci-fi inspired entry or a return to traditional fantasy entries, but I do know think that the XIII battle system is done after the potential XIII-3. There is going to be a push for control over a complete battle party rather than the methods used in XII and XIII, which both had perks. I know there will be characters that I like, and probably even more that are annoying to ends unseen. I'd like to see a return to simpler times, such as in IX, where the equipment setup doesn't require constant modification and reading of the strategy guide to understand how to get a proper weapon in the end game. Some variation on classic character building and possibly another variation on FFX's sphere grids will possibly arise, and I'm okay with that. I wasn't iffy about FFXII's license board, but it was functional enough. The Crystarium was great, despite being a time sink once the other three classes opened up in the last act. Whatever comes, I'm ready though.
I'm not trying to sell anyone on Final Fantasy. If you hate Final Fantasy, there is nothing in this blog to get you to enjoy it. If nothing else, you probably either read it and think I'm an idiot, or are at least interested in what keeps people playing these games.
Nostalgia keeps us buying the new ones. Nostalgia makes us buy the remakes and rereleases.
Now, where is a series box set to commemorate that 25th anniversary?
Oh wait, we aren't getting one...we're getting a music game that does look entertaining, and a VII PC Port rerelease with achievements.
I guess Konami and Capcom are the only ones who know how to throw a good anniversary shindig.
http://castlevania.wikia.com/wiki/Castlevania_Best_Music_Collections_BOX
http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/23/capcom-celebrates-street-fighters-25th-anniversary-with-a-huge-collectors-box-set/
I think I need to make my own box...and since I'm teaching myself photoshop, this might be the best opportunity.
Check back soon for some photo editing notes and examples.
I have completed every single player, roman numeral entry in the series. I have played a couple of the off-shoots. And here I sit, during the 25th Anniversary celebration of the series as a whole. A history of great games is past, and there are thousands of people noting a list of successes that has come as a result risks taken by a company so many years past. But among them, there is anger, distress, frustration cold and bitter over decisions made by the persons holding the reins. These people don't want the changes made in the series.
Frankly, I feel that they just want more of Final Fantasy VII.
And I'm only right about a few of those people, I'm sure. But let's face it, nostalgia is both the best thing about Final Fantasy, and its curse. The majority of the first nine titles are indisputably among the most important games in history. Very few fans really argue about the quality of these titles, and will usually agree to disagree about which is the best. For some, these are their favorite games. I wouldn't argue with them either. There is something very special about playing a Final Fantasy game, and I always look forward to a new entry in the franchise. Hell, I'm even looking forward to Square announcing Final Fantasy XIII-3 at the anniversary thing in Japan at the end of August. It's unique to the Final Fantasy franchise, and no other series gives me that feeling. There are many great games out there, but Final Fantasy does the trick.
So you can imagine my frustration when I have to see the constant bickering on the internet about a Final Fantasy VII remake being the sole savior to the franchise. That's short sighted. Square-Enix was correct to say that it would be the end to the series. They are trying to make a game that satisfies both their creative needs and bring long estranged fans back. Whether you like XIII and its sequel or not, they were trying to bring some fresh blood to the series. It's not perfect, but it's a motion for progress. The sales numbers aren't all that much lower from previous installments, but the sales of other franchises are much higher, and that bothers the number crunchers of Square. The quick trigger anger flood of the internet scares them with poor review numbers on aggregate sites like MetaCritic.
The voice of the internet is hurting the video game industry in an indescribable way. Everyone sees the first person shooter as the way to make money, or even the duck and cover third person shooter. Pair that six hour campaign with a decent multi-player with DLC every few months, and you have a temporary success. If not a shooter, a sandbox game so full of content that some gamers just run out of interest by the time the finale rolls in to surprise people that they have actually reached the end. 'Casual' games allow people to fill the five minutes that they are waiting for the bus or class to start. These aren't bad points in gaming, and these are all extreme examples, but they aren't the complete experience of video games.
Innovation is supposedly driving the industry, but stagnation is the truth behind that 'innovation'. So many companies are so driven to reinvent the wheel that they forget that the simplest things are often what people were drawn to in the first place. Let's bring this back to Final Fantasy:Final Fantasy VIII contains what is probably the most needlessly complex stat system I've ever seen in a Japanese RPG. Some embraced the change and made it through a story that definitely sits in the love-or-hate category, and possibly even shattered the games difficulty in the progress. They immediately called in a system reminiscent of Final Fantasy VI, and it worked much better in the long run. The Wii even relies on simplicity, which is why so many people are drawn to it. The WiiU hasn't proven itself, but it seems to want to incite simplicity, despite having the potential for extreme complexity. The reality is, at the end of the day, it's just another button to press, and that has always been the core of the experience. For all of their innovation, we have reached a stage that we are just finding slightly different things for those buttons to do. Adding in a RPG leveling system for the kills accumulated in multi-player was innovative, but it's not a wholly different way to play those games. You still kill people in an arena and collect weapons that are stronger and kill more people in the process. World of Warcraft built on Everquest, which, in essence, was the same thing that Ultima had been doing or past twenty years before it had released. No one reinvented the wheel. They just put it in a different spot on the car.
So when Final Fantasy XIII dropped and players found themselves doing something rather alien to other games in the series, they were upset. They were also upset by the story, but let's face it, Final Fantasy hasn't ever been perfect in that department. It's Japan. They have their themes that always show up, and it was full tighter because of that threading. Nothing was truly shocking here, though, aside from the giant corridor from Act I to the end of Act II. Enough people realized this to have a good time, and we even got a great sequel out of it. It's not perfect, it's not as good as the classics, but it's still a lot of fun when you allow yourself to enjoy it.
Final Fantasy XV is no doubt coming down the pipeline. Square won't let their most important franchise to die out. People's expectations are rather low. That might be a good thing, because the people who will jump in regardless will probably be satisfied that it's a decent game. There is also the possibility that the experience that they picked up working on the potentially FFXIII Trilogy will show them with a fresh and exciting experience. More likely, it's going to be another average entry in a series that used to excel on every occasion.
But speculation is something that is dangerous and exciting. I don't know whether to expect another sci-fi inspired entry or a return to traditional fantasy entries, but I do know think that the XIII battle system is done after the potential XIII-3. There is going to be a push for control over a complete battle party rather than the methods used in XII and XIII, which both had perks. I know there will be characters that I like, and probably even more that are annoying to ends unseen. I'd like to see a return to simpler times, such as in IX, where the equipment setup doesn't require constant modification and reading of the strategy guide to understand how to get a proper weapon in the end game. Some variation on classic character building and possibly another variation on FFX's sphere grids will possibly arise, and I'm okay with that. I wasn't iffy about FFXII's license board, but it was functional enough. The Crystarium was great, despite being a time sink once the other three classes opened up in the last act. Whatever comes, I'm ready though.
I'm not trying to sell anyone on Final Fantasy. If you hate Final Fantasy, there is nothing in this blog to get you to enjoy it. If nothing else, you probably either read it and think I'm an idiot, or are at least interested in what keeps people playing these games.
Nostalgia keeps us buying the new ones. Nostalgia makes us buy the remakes and rereleases.
Now, where is a series box set to commemorate that 25th anniversary?
Oh wait, we aren't getting one...we're getting a music game that does look entertaining, and a VII PC Port rerelease with achievements.
I guess Konami and Capcom are the only ones who know how to throw a good anniversary shindig.
http://castlevania.wikia.com/wiki/Castlevania_Best_Music_Collections_BOX
http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/23/capcom-celebrates-street-fighters-25th-anniversary-with-a-huge-collectors-box-set/
I think I need to make my own box...and since I'm teaching myself photoshop, this might be the best opportunity.
Check back soon for some photo editing notes and examples.
Thursday, June 28, 2012
It's Moving Time again.
Not from my house, but from my computer.
Because the lovely Jo has decided it is time, a new laptop will be arriving at my doorstep tomorrow while I serve the Retail Demons in Capitalistic Ritual. The beast in question is a Dell XPS with a 17.3 inch 1080P 3D monitor, a single TB hard drive, 8 GB of ram, a NVidia GeForce 555M 3GB video card, a blu-ray burner, and a lot of other things. I could paste the details, but hey, that's not really worth your reading time. In short, this thing is beautiful. The computer isn't the only piece of the puzzle. A Dell color laser printer/scanner is also in the setup, as well as Adobe Premiere Elements 10, Photoshop CS6 Extended, Dream Weaver, and a Wacom Bamboo tablet.
Needless to say, this is going to be an incredible machine.
But this is just a catalog of things that I need to get done on the new machine so that I can get rolling when it arrives. Software to install, files to move, things of that nature. So, this is, more or less, pointless to read. But if you clicked into this place to give me another blog view with which to fuel my ego that someone gives a crap about what I'm doing with this machine. Anyway, here we go.
Photoshop CS6
Premiere Elements
Dream Weaver
Sketchbook Express
ProTools
Diablo 2 and the GOG Library
MS Office
Focus Writer
A Media Player (Undecided)
Rhythm Rascal
Power Tab
Files:
All manuscripts
D2 save files
A nice dump of my entire music collection onto the HD
I need some source photography for PS experiments...I have an email out about that...
That about wraps it up. If anyone reads this and knows of a stylish and awesome media player that I can use to rip my music and then play it back without mucking up the file names images etc drop a comment. Thanks much three readers. I'll post pics in time. Possibly ones that are awesome.
Because the lovely Jo has decided it is time, a new laptop will be arriving at my doorstep tomorrow while I serve the Retail Demons in Capitalistic Ritual. The beast in question is a Dell XPS with a 17.3 inch 1080P 3D monitor, a single TB hard drive, 8 GB of ram, a NVidia GeForce 555M 3GB video card, a blu-ray burner, and a lot of other things. I could paste the details, but hey, that's not really worth your reading time. In short, this thing is beautiful. The computer isn't the only piece of the puzzle. A Dell color laser printer/scanner is also in the setup, as well as Adobe Premiere Elements 10, Photoshop CS6 Extended, Dream Weaver, and a Wacom Bamboo tablet.
Needless to say, this is going to be an incredible machine.
But this is just a catalog of things that I need to get done on the new machine so that I can get rolling when it arrives. Software to install, files to move, things of that nature. So, this is, more or less, pointless to read. But if you clicked into this place to give me another blog view with which to fuel my ego that someone gives a crap about what I'm doing with this machine. Anyway, here we go.
Photoshop CS6
Premiere Elements
Dream Weaver
Sketchbook Express
ProTools
Diablo 2 and the GOG Library
MS Office
Focus Writer
A Media Player (Undecided)
Rhythm Rascal
Power Tab
Files:
All manuscripts
D2 save files
A nice dump of my entire music collection onto the HD
I need some source photography for PS experiments...I have an email out about that...
That about wraps it up. If anyone reads this and knows of a stylish and awesome media player that I can use to rip my music and then play it back without mucking up the file names images etc drop a comment. Thanks much three readers. I'll post pics in time. Possibly ones that are awesome.
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Ways to Show Immaturity as a Video Game Journalist
If anyone has paid attention to the internet following E3, they have probably seen a number of articles deconstructing the recent announcements from the Big 3 and beyond. If you have looked for an article from me about E3, don't. I've decided no to make any comment beyond a long sigh. So, just go ahead and let one out for yourself, lasting about twenty seconds, and move on.
The other thing that is common are articles that just show how far the "video game journalist" has to come before they will have any level of acceptance as writers. And while I'm not here to defend my hobby, because it's not real journalism folks, I will say that we could at least act like professionals. This means that we need to let things take their course before we say that something doesn't work. Sure, we can speculate, and post our speculations. I've done that myself, saying that Microsoft has something to prove with their next generation. No console has blown everyone's minds out the gae on the third generation, so there is some history to the statement. That doesn't mean that Durango is going to be awful, or that it will have growing pains. It's a statment, based on history. Okay, let's move on.
1. "Franchises that Need to Die" lists:
This one is just immature. I've seen countless articles on N4G saying that various game series need to end. There are often some positive reasons for their statements, such as putting the spotlight on other franchises, or that some games over saturate certain markets. More often than not, it's a cheap ploy for page views by writers who want to make money off of site advertisement. We all want that, but writing unique content for your page helps more for this, or breaking a story before anyone else. Instead, we get frequent pieces about how Call of Duty has too many games, and that Final Fantasy is garbage now. Some go as far as to say that Halo should never have had sequels. Well, let me break it down for you folks. The video game industry runs on money. A lot of it. Millions of dollars go into these productions, and it's a nightmare trying to recoup the costs. Franchises help this more than it hurts. A new Call of Duty every year doesn't mean anything more than Activision grabs a quick million seller, and they even have enough of a creative soul to make it different. That can't be said for EA who could pretty much copy one set of Madden code into the next year and add whatever cheap new feature they have left to try, and shove that thing onto store shelves. But that's a different conversation. Final Fantasy is one of the most important role playing games on consoles, and to end that has dangerous repercussions. Taking away Final Fantasy would bring Square Enix to it's knees, and possibly mean a lot of lost jobs for a big named studio. As for Halo, gamers should be so lucky that there is a studio that cares as much about it's IP as 343 Industries, and Bungie before them. Halo has a rich, well crafted lore that is about to be explored in the games themselves. The single player campaigns have always been brilliantly crafted, and have even been the blueprint for FPS games since the series reached the public in 2001. Not to mention, the console shooter is now a standard because of Halo. Without it, we probably wouldn't have gotten The Elder Scrolls franchise on consoles. That's just the short version. I've seen a lot of other games hit lists like this.
2. "Why X-Console/X-Idea is Going to Fail"
I'm slightly to blame here, considering that I never had any faith in the Playstation Move. But hey, let's face it, Sony hasn't ever had that much push for their peripherals (remember the Pocketstation). So, take what I'm going to say with a grain of salt if you must.
There are dozens of naysayer articles about the WiiU and the tablet controller, and people have every right to believe that Nintendo is nuts for doing this. However, none of us own the WiiU yet, and not even the mightiest of crystal ball will tell us the fate of this device in gaming. Obviously, someone thinks this is a good idea. Look at Microsoft's Smart Glass technology that is going to be launched on the X-Box 360 this generation. That is Microsoft experimenting with a similar concept to Nintendo, doing a preemptive take on what could be their own tablet control. If Nintendo pulls it off, expect Sony to rush their way into some overly complex design of the exact same thing that may somehow involve shoving a Playstation Eye into the box because they still have warehouses full of the stupid things years after that toy died on the PS2.
In reality, there is no way to determine how successful a product is going to be at an early stage in its life. If we did that, then we wouldn't be looking forward to new 3DS games right now. The PSP wouldn't have...had...an...acceptable run. The PS3 definitely wouldn't be the giant it is in the industry. Speculate, but be realistic. Some things work out, and the rest fall by the wayside and end up on the shelf of a collector who likes weird obscure things. The WiiU is a risk, taken by Nintendo. As a business, they believe in it. Microsoft believes in Smart Glass, and they believed in the Kinect. Sure, I hate the Kinect, but I'm glad it has panned out for them. It puts revenue in their pockets, and keeps them in R&D to prepare for the next move.
3. "Top 10 Best Games Ever."
People have been playing home video games for almost forty years. That's a lot of games. When you factor the amount of consoles, iterations of home computers, hand held consoles, cell phones and tablets, you have an enormous library to pick games out of. These might be your favorite games, but that doesn't mean that you should toot your horn on the internet with a blog about it, post it to N4G to get attention, and, at times I have seen this phenomena, get angry when someone points out that you putting Super Mario Bros. in your list means you haven't played anything.
Opinions are just opinions, and fighting about them doesn't really get you anywhere. State it, be prepared to back it up, but it doesn't mean that someone is wrong when they say you haven't played enough games. It's disgusting how people act when they are trying to put themselves out there as professional writers. Sure, if this piece gets circulated on N4G I'm going to probably see two year old blog posts of mine brought up where I may have said something that contradicts this article, but who cares. That was two years ago. I've changed since then, and so has my opinion. Just like the opinions of those ten best games out of the thousands that exist, it's flexible.
As for why it's detrimental to your writing career, it's just not creative. If you break out your top ten games, then you are writing a piece about yourself, and you don't have anything else to talk about. It's filler. Your top ten NES games? Equally weak. Everyone has a pretty good idea about the best titles in the NES library, and even the best obscure ones. Web celebrities can get away with this because we are already interested in their opinions anyway, but even then, it's a quick thing. Screw Attack does decent top tens, but they also put a comedic spin on things. Top Ten Games that Make you Want to Bone? That's a brilliant list to put out on Valentines Day!
People do enjoy a good list, and maybe they will even enjoy this rant on the poor state of content generation for blogs on my website that has an incredibly small amount of entertaining content on it. I understand why people do it, and I even think that I will stick some of my favorites on a list some day just for the fun of it. But that doesn't mean that I'm going to run that list right over to N4G so I can pick up some views of it. N4G is a great resource for up and coming writers and websites to build a viewer base. Don't exploit it for your Top Ten Genesis games not Starring Sonic the Hedgehog. The five viewers you pick up is not worth as much as the review of Pier Solar, which is a recent homebrew Genesis game actually programmed onto a Genesis cartridge.
If you disagree, fine, but I'm tired of the cheap shots made on video game websites. I've been watching the Vita not do so well, but even I know that I will pick one up if they ever get some games I care about on it. I don't see it crashing and burning, and even if I did, I have the intelligence to realize that spilling a list of reasons why it's doomed is counterproductive. Think forward, to what's coming, or just write retro columns. Negativity in the gaming community is part of why we all seem to have so much trouble getting along. I exist in a great spot in the middle. I'm well played on many genres, even thundering my way through most of those Call of Duty games that it's fun to hate these days. I've got a few Madden titles, but only one per console at maximum. My JRPG collection contains some obscure titles, and my interest in shmups is only hindered by my inability to drop several hundred dollars on Saturn imports. Just think before you crack open that WordPress editing screen to show why you think Nintendo is mad to put money in something for kids again. Remember, you were a kid once. Didn't you have enough fun to still be playing games twenty years later?
The other thing that is common are articles that just show how far the "video game journalist" has to come before they will have any level of acceptance as writers. And while I'm not here to defend my hobby, because it's not real journalism folks, I will say that we could at least act like professionals. This means that we need to let things take their course before we say that something doesn't work. Sure, we can speculate, and post our speculations. I've done that myself, saying that Microsoft has something to prove with their next generation. No console has blown everyone's minds out the gae on the third generation, so there is some history to the statement. That doesn't mean that Durango is going to be awful, or that it will have growing pains. It's a statment, based on history. Okay, let's move on.
1. "Franchises that Need to Die" lists:
This one is just immature. I've seen countless articles on N4G saying that various game series need to end. There are often some positive reasons for their statements, such as putting the spotlight on other franchises, or that some games over saturate certain markets. More often than not, it's a cheap ploy for page views by writers who want to make money off of site advertisement. We all want that, but writing unique content for your page helps more for this, or breaking a story before anyone else. Instead, we get frequent pieces about how Call of Duty has too many games, and that Final Fantasy is garbage now. Some go as far as to say that Halo should never have had sequels. Well, let me break it down for you folks. The video game industry runs on money. A lot of it. Millions of dollars go into these productions, and it's a nightmare trying to recoup the costs. Franchises help this more than it hurts. A new Call of Duty every year doesn't mean anything more than Activision grabs a quick million seller, and they even have enough of a creative soul to make it different. That can't be said for EA who could pretty much copy one set of Madden code into the next year and add whatever cheap new feature they have left to try, and shove that thing onto store shelves. But that's a different conversation. Final Fantasy is one of the most important role playing games on consoles, and to end that has dangerous repercussions. Taking away Final Fantasy would bring Square Enix to it's knees, and possibly mean a lot of lost jobs for a big named studio. As for Halo, gamers should be so lucky that there is a studio that cares as much about it's IP as 343 Industries, and Bungie before them. Halo has a rich, well crafted lore that is about to be explored in the games themselves. The single player campaigns have always been brilliantly crafted, and have even been the blueprint for FPS games since the series reached the public in 2001. Not to mention, the console shooter is now a standard because of Halo. Without it, we probably wouldn't have gotten The Elder Scrolls franchise on consoles. That's just the short version. I've seen a lot of other games hit lists like this.
2. "Why X-Console/X-Idea is Going to Fail"
I'm slightly to blame here, considering that I never had any faith in the Playstation Move. But hey, let's face it, Sony hasn't ever had that much push for their peripherals (remember the Pocketstation). So, take what I'm going to say with a grain of salt if you must.
There are dozens of naysayer articles about the WiiU and the tablet controller, and people have every right to believe that Nintendo is nuts for doing this. However, none of us own the WiiU yet, and not even the mightiest of crystal ball will tell us the fate of this device in gaming. Obviously, someone thinks this is a good idea. Look at Microsoft's Smart Glass technology that is going to be launched on the X-Box 360 this generation. That is Microsoft experimenting with a similar concept to Nintendo, doing a preemptive take on what could be their own tablet control. If Nintendo pulls it off, expect Sony to rush their way into some overly complex design of the exact same thing that may somehow involve shoving a Playstation Eye into the box because they still have warehouses full of the stupid things years after that toy died on the PS2.
In reality, there is no way to determine how successful a product is going to be at an early stage in its life. If we did that, then we wouldn't be looking forward to new 3DS games right now. The PSP wouldn't have...had...an...acceptable run. The PS3 definitely wouldn't be the giant it is in the industry. Speculate, but be realistic. Some things work out, and the rest fall by the wayside and end up on the shelf of a collector who likes weird obscure things. The WiiU is a risk, taken by Nintendo. As a business, they believe in it. Microsoft believes in Smart Glass, and they believed in the Kinect. Sure, I hate the Kinect, but I'm glad it has panned out for them. It puts revenue in their pockets, and keeps them in R&D to prepare for the next move.
3. "Top 10 Best Games Ever."
People have been playing home video games for almost forty years. That's a lot of games. When you factor the amount of consoles, iterations of home computers, hand held consoles, cell phones and tablets, you have an enormous library to pick games out of. These might be your favorite games, but that doesn't mean that you should toot your horn on the internet with a blog about it, post it to N4G to get attention, and, at times I have seen this phenomena, get angry when someone points out that you putting Super Mario Bros. in your list means you haven't played anything.
Opinions are just opinions, and fighting about them doesn't really get you anywhere. State it, be prepared to back it up, but it doesn't mean that someone is wrong when they say you haven't played enough games. It's disgusting how people act when they are trying to put themselves out there as professional writers. Sure, if this piece gets circulated on N4G I'm going to probably see two year old blog posts of mine brought up where I may have said something that contradicts this article, but who cares. That was two years ago. I've changed since then, and so has my opinion. Just like the opinions of those ten best games out of the thousands that exist, it's flexible.
As for why it's detrimental to your writing career, it's just not creative. If you break out your top ten games, then you are writing a piece about yourself, and you don't have anything else to talk about. It's filler. Your top ten NES games? Equally weak. Everyone has a pretty good idea about the best titles in the NES library, and even the best obscure ones. Web celebrities can get away with this because we are already interested in their opinions anyway, but even then, it's a quick thing. Screw Attack does decent top tens, but they also put a comedic spin on things. Top Ten Games that Make you Want to Bone? That's a brilliant list to put out on Valentines Day!
People do enjoy a good list, and maybe they will even enjoy this rant on the poor state of content generation for blogs on my website that has an incredibly small amount of entertaining content on it. I understand why people do it, and I even think that I will stick some of my favorites on a list some day just for the fun of it. But that doesn't mean that I'm going to run that list right over to N4G so I can pick up some views of it. N4G is a great resource for up and coming writers and websites to build a viewer base. Don't exploit it for your Top Ten Genesis games not Starring Sonic the Hedgehog. The five viewers you pick up is not worth as much as the review of Pier Solar, which is a recent homebrew Genesis game actually programmed onto a Genesis cartridge.
If you disagree, fine, but I'm tired of the cheap shots made on video game websites. I've been watching the Vita not do so well, but even I know that I will pick one up if they ever get some games I care about on it. I don't see it crashing and burning, and even if I did, I have the intelligence to realize that spilling a list of reasons why it's doomed is counterproductive. Think forward, to what's coming, or just write retro columns. Negativity in the gaming community is part of why we all seem to have so much trouble getting along. I exist in a great spot in the middle. I'm well played on many genres, even thundering my way through most of those Call of Duty games that it's fun to hate these days. I've got a few Madden titles, but only one per console at maximum. My JRPG collection contains some obscure titles, and my interest in shmups is only hindered by my inability to drop several hundred dollars on Saturn imports. Just think before you crack open that WordPress editing screen to show why you think Nintendo is mad to put money in something for kids again. Remember, you were a kid once. Didn't you have enough fun to still be playing games twenty years later?
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
More Coming Soon
Okay, so it's time for me to propose things that I'll try, and possibly not come through on. However, given the circumstances that have befallen me as of late, I think that I'm in a better spot to move on some of these ideas.
Alright, the first is the previously mentioned overhaul of my blog. I don't know if I will be moving it into another site, but it will be sectioned off into different things based on whatever I am writing about. There will be a visual element to this. And that leads to another thing:
Working with a friend of mine (you know who you are), I have put together some of the basic ideas behind a shmup which borrows ideas from the Metroid series, and even games like Mass Effect to make an interesting variation on the traditional scrolling shooter.
I've written the base of a script with which to review Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, which I consider an absolute blight on the series name. I will be reviewing this once I have access to some of the toys I'm going to bring up below.
Next, given the mention of toys, I am getting ready to record a couple of songs. I have two songs ready to record, and a few other things in mind. I might try to get an EP together, and maybe even sell it. This would include artwork and liner notes, prepared by the idiot whose blog you are currently scoffing at.
I would like to launch a blip video thing on the new site, and on that, I would feature the review, possibly a "making of" type thing for the EP, and whatever else came down the pipe, including a fake PSA that has been boiling in my brain for the past few weeks. Video game reviews are part of this consideration, but I don't have anything concrete in mind just yet.
Before the power supply to my net book bit the dust two weeks ago, I was gathering steam to continue work on The Alternative, and I think that it's going to be moving at a pretty decent rate once (again now) the new toys arrive. I would like to see it finished by the end of August, with work starting on book two by October. There are a couple of short stories that need to be finished as well, but I suck at composing short fiction in a decent time, so I make no promises.
Some that read this might remember a short lived video game podcast called Z-Trigger which I co-hosted. This idea is not dead to me, and some of my (yes I'm getting to it) toys will allow me to find a new form for this concept. I just hope everyone is still interested when I finally get to it. If you are reading this, go ahead and shout about how incompetent I am at the end of this post.
There is an idea floating in my mind about an e-mag genre literature journal. This idea is in embryo stage, and I'm not sure if it will make it anywhere. I would build this site, moderate, be the editor, and possibly even make collections out of the stuff I publish. This is very low on the list, given its ambition.
I'm trying to think if there is anything else coming up in the queue before moving onto the supplies that are going to make these projects more likely. There is a lot in my head, and I'm always adding to it, mostly because I'm completely mad. The way I see it is that if I have a lot of prospective projects to work on, I'm never bored when I sit down before a computer. Especially when it is...oh, you know, a Dell XPS laptop with eight gigs of ram, a terabyte hard drive, blu-ray, possibly even 3D, Photoshop CS6 Extended, a newer version of Premiere Elements 10, and the most up to date version of Dreamweaver.
Yes, all of these things are coming soon, and the trimmings just don't stop there. I am also looking into a Wacom tablet to make them all more possible. This is all part of a long winding path that might even lead into more school, but more importantly, a new set of experiences that will flesh out my creative portfolio. Having a working knowledge of Photoshop and Dreamweaver paired with a growing knowledge of HTML and CSS would do wonders for me. Now if only I can get those pesky weak art skills off the ground. But, regardless of the hideousness of my line work, I have ambition, and that is always number one in my book for having a great time.
There is a bit of time before all of these things can really kick off, but some of the basic tools are already in my hands. The new laptop, Dreamweaver, and especially the tablet, are still a bit of time off. I don't even know when the tablet will be confirmed, but given the nature of such a device and how it can be integrated into the all of the other tools, it's almost essential.
I don't know where I will begin exactly. Given how many different things I could do, and how they all tie into one big plan, I have options. Time is of the essence, and unfortunately there is never enough of it. I see the music option to be a viable one, given the nature of what I already have invested there, and, not to mention, how much easier it would be to put together a decent documentary about the process. Short, but, hopefully, interesting. These are all pieces, and the big picture is far too big for even me to see. Mostly because there is an idiot painting this portrait. And it's time for the idiot to stop typing.
Keep watching. Something is coming. Even if it is just bizarre and cool looking photoshop art.
Alright, the first is the previously mentioned overhaul of my blog. I don't know if I will be moving it into another site, but it will be sectioned off into different things based on whatever I am writing about. There will be a visual element to this. And that leads to another thing:
Working with a friend of mine (you know who you are), I have put together some of the basic ideas behind a shmup which borrows ideas from the Metroid series, and even games like Mass Effect to make an interesting variation on the traditional scrolling shooter.
I've written the base of a script with which to review Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, which I consider an absolute blight on the series name. I will be reviewing this once I have access to some of the toys I'm going to bring up below.
Next, given the mention of toys, I am getting ready to record a couple of songs. I have two songs ready to record, and a few other things in mind. I might try to get an EP together, and maybe even sell it. This would include artwork and liner notes, prepared by the idiot whose blog you are currently scoffing at.
I would like to launch a blip video thing on the new site, and on that, I would feature the review, possibly a "making of" type thing for the EP, and whatever else came down the pipe, including a fake PSA that has been boiling in my brain for the past few weeks. Video game reviews are part of this consideration, but I don't have anything concrete in mind just yet.
Before the power supply to my net book bit the dust two weeks ago, I was gathering steam to continue work on The Alternative, and I think that it's going to be moving at a pretty decent rate once (again now) the new toys arrive. I would like to see it finished by the end of August, with work starting on book two by October. There are a couple of short stories that need to be finished as well, but I suck at composing short fiction in a decent time, so I make no promises.
Some that read this might remember a short lived video game podcast called Z-Trigger which I co-hosted. This idea is not dead to me, and some of my (yes I'm getting to it) toys will allow me to find a new form for this concept. I just hope everyone is still interested when I finally get to it. If you are reading this, go ahead and shout about how incompetent I am at the end of this post.
There is an idea floating in my mind about an e-mag genre literature journal. This idea is in embryo stage, and I'm not sure if it will make it anywhere. I would build this site, moderate, be the editor, and possibly even make collections out of the stuff I publish. This is very low on the list, given its ambition.
I'm trying to think if there is anything else coming up in the queue before moving onto the supplies that are going to make these projects more likely. There is a lot in my head, and I'm always adding to it, mostly because I'm completely mad. The way I see it is that if I have a lot of prospective projects to work on, I'm never bored when I sit down before a computer. Especially when it is...oh, you know, a Dell XPS laptop with eight gigs of ram, a terabyte hard drive, blu-ray, possibly even 3D, Photoshop CS6 Extended, a newer version of Premiere Elements 10, and the most up to date version of Dreamweaver.
Yes, all of these things are coming soon, and the trimmings just don't stop there. I am also looking into a Wacom tablet to make them all more possible. This is all part of a long winding path that might even lead into more school, but more importantly, a new set of experiences that will flesh out my creative portfolio. Having a working knowledge of Photoshop and Dreamweaver paired with a growing knowledge of HTML and CSS would do wonders for me. Now if only I can get those pesky weak art skills off the ground. But, regardless of the hideousness of my line work, I have ambition, and that is always number one in my book for having a great time.
There is a bit of time before all of these things can really kick off, but some of the basic tools are already in my hands. The new laptop, Dreamweaver, and especially the tablet, are still a bit of time off. I don't even know when the tablet will be confirmed, but given the nature of such a device and how it can be integrated into the all of the other tools, it's almost essential.
I don't know where I will begin exactly. Given how many different things I could do, and how they all tie into one big plan, I have options. Time is of the essence, and unfortunately there is never enough of it. I see the music option to be a viable one, given the nature of what I already have invested there, and, not to mention, how much easier it would be to put together a decent documentary about the process. Short, but, hopefully, interesting. These are all pieces, and the big picture is far too big for even me to see. Mostly because there is an idiot painting this portrait. And it's time for the idiot to stop typing.
Keep watching. Something is coming. Even if it is just bizarre and cool looking photoshop art.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)