Monthly Ramblupdate - May 2015

Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me a better introductory phrase!  I need only to get started, and I will proceed on a ramble of most ramblonic ramifications.  According to the online Etymology Dictionary, the word 'ramble' comes from a dutch word meaning the 'nightly wanderings of an amorous cat.'  I think this is hilarious, especially since we use the word so much.  I really love etymology.  

Alright, what's up?  Well, on this very day I am going to start a garden at a local community garden.  I'm pretty happy about that.  I really love gardening, and since I don't have a yard, or even a porch, it will help get me outside.  Of course, the weather is heating up, 90 degrees this week, so outside is kind of a shitty place.  Still, it's worth it.  

In other news, I'm looking forward to playing an adventure game with my best girl.  We've picked out Blackwell Legacy,  which is supposed to have a good story.  I'll let you know how it turns out.  She's also a big fan of Mario Kart, and to that end, I've been hunting around for a used Nintendo Wii and copy of Mario Kart Wii (6?).  Granted, it's not Mario Kart 8, which is really a fantastic game, it's not a Wii U either, but it's a much cheaper alternative, which fits my budget.  I spent $100 on Magic Cards last month, and I really need to take it easy on spending.  

Yes, Magic the Gathering has devoured my brain.  I play it regularly, I even started a Magic Online account.  Magic Online is clunky, but it's nice to have a digital way to organize my cards.  The game has a learning curve that could wrap around the world,  but I finally feel like I'm catching up to todays standards.  It helps that I started listening to the Limited Resources Podcast.

Oh, that's right, I've been consuming other media as well.  I'm currently reading 'Never Let Me Go" by Kazuo Ishiguro.  He writes a lot of British stuff.  This book is the most unusual genre fiction story I've ever read.  It's the sort of book that is really easy to spoil, so I'll try not to.  There is an air of mystery that pervades early on and carries through the whole book.  However, there is also a powerful sense of sentimentality, but I wouldn't say it was sappy.  I recommend this book, though it may not be quite what you're used to, if your into Sci Fi and other nerdy things.  Nonetheless, I really do recommend giving it a chance.  

On a more sci-fi front and center note, Jane and I just finished up "Other Space" a sci-fi comedy released by Yahoo.  Yes, even Yahoo has TV now.  But Other Space is really funny, and actually tends to contain at least one legit science fiction plot point in every episode.  It's a bit like a live-action Futurama.  I recommend it and I hope it gets picked up for a second season.  The first one is kind of short.  

Hmm, yes, I think this may be all the nerd fit to print.  Looking forward to Blackwell Legacy and Nintendo Wii!  Hasta Pasta,

-D

P.S.  I think the entertainment world is long overdue for a sitcom about hens and roosters.

Frmonthly Frupdate: Frebruary 2015

First, let me show you this ridiculous and hilarious animated gif of Mario going completely berserk ala "the Night Santa Went Crazy" by Weird Al.  I got this from BrandonDeSanta in the Retro Video Games google+ group, though I don't know if he's the one who made it.  You can just watch that and laugh for a while if you like.  This is just one of the gems I encountered over the past month.  

I consumed a lot of Sci Fi this month.  The best of which was a movie called 'Predestination', based on a Robert Heinlein short story called 'All You Zombies.'   I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but I definitely recommend the movie.  I was pleasantly surprised and impressed.  I will be reading the short story... shortly.  Beyond that, I watched two Keanu Reeves movies:  Constantine and Johnny Mnemonic.  Constantine is great, a very stylish and well-shot movie.  I'm kind of a sucker for God vs Devil possession movies and action adventures. Johnny Mnemonic was kind of hokey and dated, but still lots of fun.   Additionally, I read Neuromancer by William Gibson, which is sort of a sequel to Johnny Mnemonic.  The common link is the character of Molly, who is awesome (and called 'Jane' in the film version for some indiscernable reason). I've got the book version of Johnny Mnemonic coming soon.  Fun fact:  Johnny sold his childhood for a measely 80 gigs of memory. 

I read a couple other Sci Fi novels:  Kindred, by Octavia Butler, a time travel story about Slavery.  It was a harsh read, but well written.  Also, Wind up Bird Chronicle, which wasn't straightforward sci fi, just very strange like most Murakami.  But I really like Murakami for his strangeness. 

In Gaming news, I beat Starseed Pilgrim.  FINALLY.  It was pretty cool.  I was tempted to start over again from the beginning, but resisted.  I really, really like that game.  Next, I revisited Six Days a Sacrifice, of the Chzo Mythos by Yahtzee Creshaw, and managed to beat it quickly.  I enjoyed that series, and the final game ties together a lot of thematic points and characters.  It's not perfect, but I appreciate the effort.  Playing that game has got me in the mind to play more point and click adventure games.  We'll see what the future holds!

In other news, I'm looking forward to a move in February.  The plan is to get my own apartment at a more convenient location.  Should be fun!

-D 

P.S.  Another Funny animated gif, gotten from Google+ user Miss Electro Head

Merry Monthly Update: December 2014

Falalalalalalalalala,

I think things of note in the past month are all the many fun links I discovered by using google + and joining all these indie game, game map and game design groups.   I will be assembling a collection of said links in a post coming soon to an internet near you.

Another thing is that I started playing Chrono Trigger again.  Been a long time for that one.  So far, so good, it's a nice way to get my 16bit jRPG fix.  I think I might actually like the game more this time around than I did when I first played it.  I think it's a lack of competition - back then I was always playing like three jRPGs.

A third thing is I read a Michael Moorecock book: The Sword of the Dawn.  Very interesting, vaguely familiar and completely pulpy fantasy novel from the 60s.  It’s a far-future dystopia situation, following a sword-fighting German hero named Hawkmoon.  It takes place on earth, but bears little resemblance to our world.  There’s magic, and technology, and the names of current countries are vaguely based on present-day countries.  It’s fun sometimes to figure out what they are.  Amerikh – America.  Granbreten – Great Britain.  Asiacommunista – china.  It was a fun book, light reading with plenty of swashbuckling and a dash of gruesomeness.

In December, if everything goes according to plan,  I’m going to stop by the comic shop and buy another book in the series.   I'm also going to play Chrono Trigger and Magic the Gathering - queue of unplayed Steam games be damned!  And I guess I’ll see my family or something.  

-D

P.S.  I also picked up the novel Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut.  So far, it's very Kurt Vonnegut, which is a good thing.  

Monthaly Oopdate: Sptember

Nice classic fantasy styled art for A Feast for Crows by  Stephen Youll

I have had two projects in nerdland this past month.  One was reading the fourth book in the Song of Ice and Fire series - A Feast for Crows.  I started this book because I had a coworker who was reading through them, and in our discussions of events within, I realized how much I had forgotten from this book.  And I also realized that I had skimmed through major parts of both book 4 and 5 in the series.  My reason for doing this is that I had been gripped by the plot of the series, and I wanted to know *what was going to happen*  So, admittedly, I tore through the books at a faster pace than I could read them.
  
Having done that, I took it word by word this time, and tried to enjoy the prose.   Martin has a distinctive writing style, marked most especially by the high level of detail in his fictional world.  These details fill a greater part of A Feast For Crows than the previous books in the series.  There is a growing picture of the last twenty years or so,  slightly fuzzier picture of the last one hundred years, an abstract vision of the last five hundred years, and after that everything seems to be unconfirmed myth;  Stories old Nan tells.

I would love to have a look at whatever timeline Martin works from.  Sometimes he's called the "American Tolkein.' and while at first listen, that description bothers me.  Perhaps just because I'm protective of Tolkein,  maybe because the comparison is too convenient, but I'd like to think it's because their aesthetics are so different that I reject this comparison.  Martin is grittier, with a harsher realism and less fantasy, certainly less whimsy than Tolkein.  However, after re-reading A Feast for Crows, I may have to change my tune.  Martin's painstakingly detailed world is something worthy of that comparison.  Lovers of Tolkien have long praised the richness of Middle Earth lore, even before reading the Silmarillion or Book of Lost Tales, the Middle Earth Mythos creates a sense of history in an entirely fictional world.  George R. R. Martin has also created a similar sense of history in perhaps a more specific way.  I feel that Tolkien paints his world in water colors, whereas Martin paints his world with Legos.  Millions of Legos.  I enjoy it, and I'm well on my way to finishing the next book:  A Dance of Dragons.  

Starseed Pilgrim fan art by Hipster Skeleton on Steam

The other project I've been working on this month is that I've been desperately trying to beat Starseed Pilgrim.  Yes, it's beatable, and I think I know how.  I've gotten close.  So very close.  Love the abstraction in this game.  It's interesting to me that this would be a game set apart from all the other choices I have.  Still, it's a game that is best left to the imagination, so I'd rather not spoil it for you.  Instead, I'll link you to some pages that reference it.  It really is worth playing, just for the first two hours getting to know it, if not the next 98 hours spent trying to beat the thing.

I read a great article on the game called 'The Five Stages of Starseed Pilgrim.'  I think this article does a good job of summing it up.  The writer calls it a 'fightclub game' - a game you're not supposed to talk about.  I hadn't heard that one before, but it more or less sums it up.  One final thing about the game is that there is a new game criticism website inspired by Starseed Pilgrim:  Starseed Observatory.   I just found it, but it certainly looks interesting.  

but then I read this article:  

http://www.polygon.com/2014/8/28/6078391/video-games-awful-week

I think it's important to remember every so often just how completely some people overreact to Feminist Frequency.  It's shocking, and I usually just avoid looking.  It's okay to disagree, but so many people throw their credibility out the window with these tantrums.  I guess they must really be threatened.  Joss Whedon (name drop) weighs in on this one, it's worth checking out if you can stomach the content.  Whatever the case may be, I'm still very hopeful for the future of Video Games as a medium.  The industry on the other hand... is anybody's guess.  

-D

Mrthnly Urpdrt: Arrgrst!

Today I ran into a young woman at the bank, she was carrying a Legend of Zelda bag.  As I stood in line behind her, I considered saying something, but succumbed to shyness, as I am wont to do.  However, on my way out of the bank, I saw her unlocking her bike, parked a couple spots down from mine, and I decided I would just go for it.  I complimented her on the bag and we proceeded to talk video games for a little while.  She was totally happy to chat, and not in a hurry to escape, as I presumed she would be.  However, as we chatted, I began to feel more and more out of touch and like I really didn't know what I was talking about.  Also, I felt old, as i couldn't reference SNES or NES without her eyes glazing a bit, though she smiled and was very friendly.

Wow.  Dare to dream!

One thing we did talk about was our excitement about the upcoming Zelda Games, and the strength of the Nintendo brand in general.  Once the dominant Video Game company worldwide, Nintendo has been waining slowly for the past decade.  However, they continue to strengthen and revitalize their core games, and with any luck they will be able to thrive into the next decade.   I'll tell you one thing:  I've begun to covet the Wii U.  It's the only console that interests me at all.  Steam and my PC should be able to cover anything I might miss out on from Sony or Microsoft, but Nintendo has carefully guarded their product.  I can't say it's a bad idea.  

On a separate note, a local coffee shop has a subscription to Game Informer magazine, which, it seems to me, is the only print video game magazine left after the departure of EGM and Nintendo Power.  I had originally dismissed it, but after reading a random issue, I found some pretty insightful writing.  Also there was a wide range of topics, from game history, industry talk and independent games.  Seems like a pretty decent mag to stay connected.   Hmm, their website seems entertaining and eclectic.  Mayhaps I will have a look.

This past month I haven't really been playing video games.  It's an affliction I'm struggling with of late, though my latest excuse is that it's just too damned hot.  How hot is it?  Well, let's see, yesterday it was 100 degrees by 12:30pm.  Today will be the ninth day in a row over 100.   In fact, it's so hot that my computer will overheat and shut itself down.  My room cooks in the sun all day, and generally spoils my mood.  Suffice it to say, I've resolved to buy a window air conditioning unit for my room.  

I have, however, been reading a library copy of 'A Feast for Crows' by George RR Martin.  This is my second time through, and my intent is to read it more closely this time.  Previously, I had been sort of obsessed with 'what's going to happen?!' that I skimmed ahead to find out.  Now I'm trying to enjoy the prose and the pacing.  So far, so good!  

-D

Nice podcast on the death of EGM, for those who are interested

[Insert Appropriate Season] Reading BINGO

I love reading.

I've realized that it's something that I don't talk a lot about here considering how much I think that I read.

First off, I'm not a speed reader.  Since my early years in college, I realized that I read, on average, about one page every two minutes with a mass market paperback sized book.  With some books (A Storm of Swords, The Stand, Mort) I can manage about one and-a-half minute per page.  And often enough, every time I finish a book I have somewhat of a hard time deciding what next to read.  Granted I have no shortage of books that I haven't read, but it's like when you (used to) walk into a movie rental store with a general idea, but once you see the stacks of movies lined up, your mind goes blank and you all of a sudden don't know what kind of film you want to watch.

This summer (and probably longer) I found something that will help with my dilemma (which is a word that I cannot spell without help).  My friend Megan over at TheWhynottBlog, via the Books on the Nightstand podcast started doing a Summer Reading Bingo project that started back on June 1st.

Now I don't plan on approaching this the same way that Megan is, but instead I'll be running my own BINGO game.  I went to the BotN page for my own BINGO card and after hitting the refresh link twice I had a card that I was happy with that included the following 24 (out of a possible 48) categories:

• B
• Reread something
• With a number in the title
• Nonfiction
• That you saw someone else reading
• An audiobook
• I
• Has been on your TBR for longer than two years
• Science Fiction
• Recommended by a family member
• Published in 2014
• Set in another country
• N
• Fantasy
• That you think you will dislike
• FREE SQUARE
• Poetry Collection
• Six words or more in the title
• G
• That you chose because of the cover
• Part of a series
• Longer than 500 pages
• Graphic novel
• With a child on the cover
• O
• By an author who shares your first name
• Found in a used bookstore
• With a red cover
• Thriller/Suspense
• With a one-word title

Megans plan is to act as BINGO Master (if that's actually a name) and she'll pull a category from the master list every week although being able to read a book a week is not a requirement (it was a requirement for the "Film as Narrative" class I took during summer school in college).  The goal is to acquire a BINGO by August 31st, allowing enough time to read at least 4-5 books.

 After the BINGO occurs though, I'll probably just go for blackout at that point as I'm looking forward to deciding which books will fill that particular category.  I'm trying really hard not to pick out which book will fill which category before I pick but it's hard not looking at a category like "Fantasy" and not immediately thinking of something by C.S. Lewis, Terry Pratchett or J.R.R. Tolkien.  Oh, and I should also say that with the exception of the "Reread something" tile, everything that I read with be something that I have not read before, hence one of the whole reasons for doing this.

When I first started as in a week ago, I was reading Jam by Yahtzee Croshaw (post coming soon) and The World Without Us by Alan Weisman. So I just picked The World Without Us to fill the FREE SQUARE space.  The tiles that Megan has chosen (as of 6/27/2014) have been "Poetry Collection," "Audio Book," "Recommend by BotNS" and "Science Fiction."  So it looks like I am going to have to find a collection of poetry, although I do have a collection of H.P. Lovecraft's poetry contained within a larger volume of his collected works.  That will suit just fine.

As is the case with standard BINGO, since my card does not contain the "Recommended by BotNS," once I reach that category, I'll skip it and go to "Audio Book," of which I have a pretty nice selection from a past Humble Audio Book Bundle a while back.  "Science Fiction" will also be an interesting choice since I have some modern SciFi that I haven't read as well as some that were considered SciFi when they were written back in the early 20th century.  It will be interesting to see when I know I will get BINGO and how long it will take me to read all the necessary books to do so.

So go and visit The Whynott Blog for Summer Book BINGO and for other book related bloggings as you're more likely to find a greater variety of books than what I would be able to give you.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

I Feel Our Need To Feed Goes On

Miscellaneous Update Post for the coming February

Hey there, people.  I've been experiencing writers block lately, which means it's time for a random babble of a post.

I put four hours into the Stanley Parable, which I devoured like a great novel.  That game is so great.  I think I've about exhausted the narrative.  And I really wish there was more.  I worry about redundancy and over-marketing, but I would happily play a sequel to the Stanley Parable, and happily play through the games themes and methods again and again until they become tired.

I also want to mention that the Stanley Parable does a lot in terms of video games as art.  Thinking of Roger Ebert's famous dissing of video games as being devoid of artistic intent, the Stanley Parable plays with choice, and futility in a very special way.  Even though the Stanley Parable is like a choose your own adventure book, the fact that it is a video game, and not a book, goes a long way for my sense of immersion.  I love the way a good book immerses me, but the illusion of choice present in a video game is used very well in the Stanley Parable. I really think it qualifies as a work of art, and as a unique one.

On a different note, I've been volunteering a local thrift store lately.  Also at the bicycle repair co-op and the food co-op.  Good times.  I really like the thrift store - I'm in the book room.  I love books!  I love going through them, it's easy!  There is a TON of turnover in the book department, and we have to give away boxes full of books every day (and we receive at least as many every day).  It can be heart-wrenching getting rid of some of them, and I do my best to save the ones I think really deserve to stick around.  I think that I can do a lot of good there.

The books that we see the most of are Self-Help/Health Books, biographies and thrillers.  These books tend to be in great condition, as though they were only read once, or even never read at all.  Often times they are heavy slabs of pages and take up lots of space on the shelf.  I guess that the biographies are often bought as gifts, and generally bulky books are inconvenient to read and to store.

Umm,  in further stuff, I've started watching a show called 'Lost Girl.'  This Canadian show seems like a resident of the house that Buffy built.  A Faerie underworld full of people who feed on humans and have special powers.  The lead character is a succubus who feeds on sexual energy, leading to a healthy dose of fun sexy times.  But like any good show, what makes it good is the characters.  My favorites are Kenzi, Hale and Trick.  And the Morrigan.

Oh, also, today we got rain in Northern California.  First time in, idunno, sixty days?   This summer we had seven days in a row over 105 degrees, and in December we had seven days in a row below 32.  These were both records for this area.

And that's all the news fit to print.

-D

Monthly Update: December 2013

Yes, I know that I've missed two Friday posts in-a-row and no to both the questions I already asked on your behalf.  1) No, this was not on purpose.  Thanksgiving got in the way of when I usually do my Friday writing plus Thursday 28th was my only day off from work last week; as in I worked Sun - Wed and Fri through today.  2) No, this is not becoming "a thing" as the hep kids like to say.

Monday, Monday, Monday!  Monday Night Football?  Nope, I'll be at work and since the 49ers already won this week, I don't think that I'll care.  I'll probably still steal a glance if any of the residents have it on, which they probably will.

On the video games front, I finally got back to Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together which I restarted back in February and haven't played since April.  With any luck, I'll come out with a First Impression before the end of the year, but I realize I've been saying that since April, but there you have it, another statement of intent.

On the 3/DS, I've gotten back to Infinite Space.  Sort of.  I am currently stuck on a battle that I previously mentioned.  It may be time that I resort to GameFAQs for help on how to defeat this particular boss.  It's a beast that, at least at this point in time, looks unsurmountable, which can be a bit of a mood-killer if you've already invested over 20 hours into a game.  So that may have to happen.

Steam is almost through with their Autumn sale and I would like to admit that for the most part, I've been a good boy.  Conklederp told me to tell her if I wanted any games for Christmas and I said that there were some games that I had on my wishlist there that I'd been looking at, so I've been trying (trying really hard) not to buy anything.  Except I may have already bought a game or two.  But in mine own defence, they were both under $3 each.  I have to keep telling myself that unless I plan on playing the game that's on sale immediately, there really isn't a reason to buy it as it will be available at a cheaper price in the future when I am ready to play it.  Plus, I'm sure that in less than a month, there will be a Steam Christmas/New Years sale, so I'll have another week of restraint to look forward to.

A week or two ago, Salty Liver (Conklederp's friend from school whom I now work with) mentioned that she had bought Assassin's Creed II, which has now become a nagging seed for me.  For whatever reason, I've never been overly interested in that particular series.  Sure I looked at the games from afar, then a bit up close when two were released on the DS, but nothing more than that.  Then she brings up that AC2 is a lot of fun and before I knew what was going on, a seed was planted in my brain and I'm trying very hard not to water it.  I don't need another long series of open world games on top of all the games that I have yet to play.  And yet, I feel the Miracle Gro being put next to the watering can.  

Enough of clever metaphor, too meta for me. . .eh, eh!?

About a month or so ago, I decided that every December I would read Terry Pratchett's The Hogfather. When I first read it back in April, I quickly felt that not only did The Hogfather encapsulate everything that the Christmas season is supposed to be about (giving, helping people), but it also pointed out all the hypocrisy and blind-eye-turning that goes on during the end-of-the-year holidays.  This wasn't a revelation to me, but I just loved how Pratchett put everything together.  The only problem with starting this, is that I am currently reading six other books.  But that doesn't matter.  It's a great book and it shall be read again and if I still feel the same way after reading it a second time, it will be come an annual tradition.

Sticking with books, I picked up a copy of The Complete Lovecraft, which is a volume that you can buy for retail at a Barnes & Noble.  The reason the book was bought, was because, as far as I know, it is the only complete collection of fiction by H.P. Lovecraft.  Something very important however, is that there are two editions of the book.  The first edition is apparently full of misspellings, accidental corrections and typos.  The second edition has all of those errors corrected.  Now since the books are all individually wrapped in plastic, the only way to know which edition you're buying is by the color of the satin bookmark attached to the binding.  The first error filled edition has a yellow/gold color satin bookmark.  The second proofed edition has a purple bookmark.  Buy the book with the purple bookmark.  The only drawback to buying this and not, say, the edition from the Library of America, is that the book is not annotated.

Another tome that I recently purchased was The History of The Hobbit: One-Volume Edition.  I had previously heard about the two volume set, but since it wasn't part of Christopher Tolkien's History of Middle Earth series, I wasn't sure if it was "legit."  After seeing Richard Armitage (Thorin in The Hobbit trilogy of films) bring up these books and looking deeper into their existence, my fears were relieved and more so since the book arrived last week.  I'm looking forward to reading it, once I finish volume XII of the History of Middle Earth: The Peoples of Middle Earth, which is the last book in the series, published in 1996; a series that I began back, I think sometime in the early 2000's.

All of this is what December 2013 is looking to be.  It's honestly hard to believe that 2013 is almost over.  I have memories of January 2013 (just not all of the 1st though) and to be 12 months ahead of that, it's always an odd feeling.  Odd, yet familiar and slightly comforting.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Instrumental

Well, that was one hell of a month

Hello friends and family, anonymous readers and adver-bots.  How are you?  Welcome to August.  

I haven't done much in the video game world lately.  After reading this article, on designing difficult games, I played a few stages of Adventures of Lolo.  I also booted up VVVVVV just for shits and giggles.  That game is still fantastic.   Today a game called Papo y Yo went on super sale, so I'll have to buy it.  And a good friend - who will remain nameless, hint, hint - went and generously bought me a copy of Worms Armageddon, which I have yet to open.  I'll be getting to this stuff soon though, with all the free time I have now that I'm unemployed.

Yes, I lost my job on Thursday.  Don't worry, I wasn't alone.  Maybe 75 other people lost their jobs.  The month of July was spent wondering when this was going to happen, as the month of June was spent watching my workplace crumble while we ran around, working our asses off, but were helpless to do anything to prevent it.  It was not fun by any stretch of the imagination. 

So yeah, no job, which means no money, which means Papo y Yo will be the last game I buy for a while.  But it also means a lot more time, which, as they say is money so-- that's exciting.  I will have more time to play games and more time to write, and I plan on doing both of them, so expect to hear a lot more of me in the weeks to come.

Of course, this will only be for a little while.  I've pledged to give myself at least one week of unemployment ecstasy before I start earnestly looking for a new job.  But I may stretch it for a little longer, depending on how I feel.  I am still in the planning stages.  I hope to do some soul searching in the time between, and I really hope to not be on unemployment when my meager savings runs out.  

I did manage to catch World War Z, and it suuuuuuucked.  It was just terrible.  Pointless.  Bad dialogue, bad action, bad plot.  I really need to read the book now, because, the good news is- it's completely different! I suppose the one decent thing about the movie was that it was kind of fun to watch fast moving zombies pile up on one another.  There was a sort of concept that the zombies were just one big disease, like influenza or HIV something, and it was just these mad gobbling bacteria, moving like a single large creature.  That idea is cool, and if there had been more exposition and less wasting my time I might have enjoyed the movie.  Why are so many movies roller coaster rides now?  I do not recommend.  I do, however, recommend this fun little rewrite of the movie. 

I also saw another movie, a kid's movie from the 80s.  It was called "Cloak and Dagger" - and this one I recommend.  For one thing, there was more exposition in the first fifteen - twenty minutes than the entire World War Z movie.  Another is that Dabney Coleman is in it.  And a third thing is that the little kid actors aren't bad.  Also, it was fun, and interesting.  I really liked this movie, I recommend it.

One last bit:  I just read Margaret Atwood's "Oryx and Crake."  I also recommend this book.  I was hooked within a couple pages.  Without giving too much away, it's a post-apocolyptic novel.  However, it also does the flashback thing.  When the flashbacks started, I was annoyed because I wanted more of the present.  Then I ended up really liking the flashback portions, and then I just wanted to do nothing else, but read this book. I would think about it while I was at work, or riding the train.   I love it when a book or game is so good that I find myself daydreaming about when I get to read it again.  Oryx and Crake - I highly recommend it.  

-D


***next day update:
I watched the movie Prometheus last night.  I'm going to spoil a little bit of it by describing the plot flow.  But that's all I'll spoil.  Anyhow, at the beginning, the movie takes its time, and I really appreciate it.  The scenery is beautiful, and the character introduced is likeable and interesting.  The movie progresses slowly until about halfway through, when the action picks up.  At this point things seem to change so fast, and characters start throwing out conclusions, and performing actions that don't seem to have justifications.  It's very strange that a movie that showed so much patience would ultimately show too little.  Anyhow, I recommend the first 30 minutes or so, but I can't really recommend the rest.  

Read my chips - books and video games, vs or co-op?

Of all media, my first love was books.  Before I'd ever seen an 'Intendo' or played Atari, or, as far as I can tell, even watched TV, my Mom would read to us kids every night before going to sleep.  And I don't mean to brag, but she was a fantastic reader.  My Mom always loved children's lit, and she read with great enthusiasm.  It didn't hurt that she had tastes suited to her particular talents, the two favorites being Shel Silverstein and Dr. Seuss.  Highly lyrical writing, my Mom would read these to us over and again in her bubbly, sing-song reading voice, and we grew to love and anticipate reading time.  She would hold the books open for us to see, and I would follow my mom's voice and the words on the page, slowly decoding them as I learned to read myself.

The first career I ever wanted was to be a novelist.  Long before I knew anything about what it was like to have a job, or support myself, I was sure I wanted to write books.  The earliest effort I can still recall was a story about Dragon Warrior II (fanfiction!).  I borrowed the plot, setting, names and most of the action from the game, but I filled in the details.  I seem to remember I finished the first chapter and it was maybe ten binder pages long.  It involved the main characters being sent on their journey by the king, and then going to the weapon and armor shop to buy their gear, then going to the Inn to sleep.  Pretty generic, I know, and yet I still remember what the town looked like in my mind, the real-world variation on the 8-bit Dragon Warrior graphics.

The power of the imagination is really amazing to me;  even (seemingly) generic, unoriginal thoughts have their own unique qualities.  And books have an amazing ability to bring this out in people like me.  Even a writer who spends very little time on character description - my mind will simply insert a character of my own making based on... it's own arbitrary decisions, I guess.  Nothing can quite do this for like a book.  I'm not sure why, but I think it may be the fact that there are no pictures.  That through words, only, my imagination builds a world of depth.  (I'm really going to begin speculating here, so... consider yourself warned.  )

If the internet explosion of fan art is any indication, other people get their own inspired images video games and other media.  Not to mention my own example of Dragon Warrior II.  However, that example was informed by the act of writing, the imaginary world took shape as I wrote about it.  I am tempted to cite the lower-detail, symbolic imagery of DW II and other 8-bit games, not to mention comics and cartoons-- in an effort to claim that the more realistic graphics of movies, tv and modern video games somehow dumb down the imagination and don't challenge it as much.  But that's probably bullshit.  I mean, there is intuitive sense there, but I have seen plenty of movies and had dreams about them, and seen new worlds of creativity using the imagery contained within.

It's not like I can measure this shit, but I am wildly tempted to place video games and books in a Versus context, instead of co-op, as I did with my DW II writing as a young'un.  Am I just aggressive and cantankerous?  Or is there something there, and I can't quite figure it out?  Whatever the case, I do know that I'm prone to asking rhetorical questions, so that must count for something.

In conclusion, I haven't been playing a lot of games lately, and I feel like what I really need is a good book.  I'm thinking Murakami.  I also think that books and games are fundamentally similar, and obviously different.  I'm mostly interested in how they are similar, and I'd like more of that part, please.  Thanks.

-D