Miscellaneous Mid-Month Update

Hello hello, my adoring public.  Pause for the sound of crickets.

I'm just hopping on a borrowed internet connection to comment on my recent absence.  I've had a few recent changes that have hampered my ability to post.  I went from a slow job with plenty of time to use the internet, to a new, fast paced position with virtually zero internet time.  In addition, I moved, and I haven't gotten my internet  connection worked out at the new place.  AT&T sent me a broken modem, so now I need to find time to have a technician come out and check everything before replacing the modem.  On top of all of that, I have a new girlfriend companion - party member, and we are keeping our weekends busy.  In our downtime, I've unpacked my nintendo 64 and played some Star Fox, Turok and Mario Kart.  It's good times, and my gal-pal has great nostalgia for that system.  

In addition, I'd like to share some links regarding the newly late Terry Pratchett and Leonard Nimoy.  These are important and rad creative people, and I would be remiss if I didn't say a little something on this blog.

But these will have to wait.  For another near-future sample sized internet connection.  Until then,

-D

MIDI Week Singles: "Dreams of the Shore Bordering Another World" - Chrono Cross (PSX)

"Dreams of the Shore Bordering Another World" from Chrono Cross on the Playstation (1999)

Composer: Yasunori Mitsuda

Record Label: Digicube SSCX-10040

Game Developer: Squaresoft

This song came up earlier while procrastinating from doing my homework and I thought, "Why have I not written a post about this song yet?"  I had no good answer, you y'all're getting to listen to this today!

Despite the fact that I don't feel that Chrono Cross was a particularly good sequel to Chrono Trigger, it was a good game that had a great soundtrack.  This track is used as the overworld theme once Serge crosses over to the "Other Aruni."  It's beautiful as a stand alone piece, yet has that special something that allows it to be played over-and-over as theme while your characters traverse the world.  I also really enjoy the simplicity of track, that it is performed by five voices: violin, piano, guitar, bass and a voice; especially during a time when I felt a lot of music from video games were trying to layer too many voice because the hardware at the time allowed more than limited number previously on the 8 and 16 bit consoles.

In the end, if you ended up having a negative view of Chrono Cross, at least give the soundtrack a try, great tracks like "Dreams of the Shore Bordering Another World" fill the entirety of the album.  You might be missing out otherwise.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
I Reached The Shore And Saw It Come

RIP Sir Terry Pratchett

Jesus.  The third in memoriam type-thing in just over a month.

Yesterday morning, Emilie told me that Sir Terry Pratchett had passed away.  From the article she was reading, she said that he had passed away with his cat on his bed and with his family present.  Then she read the first part of a triptych of tweets that came out posthumously.

AT LAST, SIR TERRY, WE MUST WALK TOGETHER.
— Terry Pratchett (@terryandrob) March 12, 2015

I would be lying if I said that I wasn't emotionally moved.  "Knowing" the character of DEATH from his Discworld series, a flood of memories of the various circumstances that involved DEATH throughout the books that I have read came back to me and it was like I could see/hear the passage being read in DEATH'S voice and that the sentence was something that was in one of his books.  (Unlike that previous sentence which was poorly written and rewritten and yet somehow remains in existence).  There were two additional tweets that read, "Terry took Death's arm and followed him through the doors and on to the black desert under the endless night" and "The End."

I haven't read all of the books in the series although I recently finished The Last Continent.  I was introduced to Terry Pratchett and Discworld through a friend back in 2003 with Mort and I immediately fell in love with the world, the writing style with it being similar to Douglas Adams' The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and yet how serious the overall stories could be.  To date (with only having read 22 of the 41, soon to be 42 books in the series and I know that these are books that I will (and have) read over and over again.  Nanny Ogg, DEATH, and Rincewind are a few of my favorite characters and I know that everyone will have their own list and there is no point claiming one list over another, but it's not always just the characters themselves, but how they react and how real they feel despite the fantasy whole of the world.

I've never read any of his Free Wee Men and with the exception of his collaboration with Neil Gaiman on Good Omens, I have not read anything else that he as written, Discworld or otherwise.  I also do not put his young adult novels out of reach, my current reading is not above anything that Sir Pratchett has written.

What impressed me the most about Sir Pratchett's writing was that he was able to be consistently funny.  I found his humor similar to Douglas Adams and Monty Python (maybe because they are all British), but every book of his that I have read has been humorous and meaningful without ever reaching the level of preachiness that a lot of moralistic stories fall to.  Sure, not all of the stories of his that I have read have garnered the "Oh wow that was an amazing story!" reaction but I have enjoyed them nonetheless.  Some of the humor, especially dealing with the Wizards is lost on me, but not all of it as I have plenty of experience in dealing with seniors who are convinced that they are right, you are wrong and that black man in the white house needs to go.

I recall reading back in either 2010 or 2011 (four years after his initial announcement) that Sir Pratchett had been diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's disease or what I loved that he referred to it as an "embuggerance."  I saw him/his representative make a number of posts via the Facebook over the last couple of years, but already working in an assisted living facility and dealt with residents with Alzheimer's disease and dementia, I shamefully did not follow through with reading the articles as I selfishly needed to be outside that world while not at work.

This is the extent of my knowledge and experience with the late Sir Terry Pratchett.

Sir Terry Pratchett will be missed, but at least we all still have the Discworld to remember him by.  I feel that this is all that I am capable of saying in a woefully inadequate manor.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Tell My Wife I Am Trawling Atlantis

MIDI Week Singles: 'Speeder Level' - Battletoads (NES)

  
"Speeder Stage" from Battletoads on the Nintendo Entertainment System (1991)
Composer: David Wise
Record Label: unknown
Game Developer: Rare

 

Battletoads: a blatant TMNT ripoff that was still a lot of fun.  Arguably it's the better game.  It does feature some catchy tunes, and none more so than the Speeder Bike theme from the third level.  This level is infamous for its difficulty, and for many gamers, the fun stopped here.  But despite it's incredible difficulty, the speeder stage was a ton of fun.  And who doesn't love a good, upbeat racing theme, perfectly crafted for endless looping?

It is worth Noting that this track was composed by David Wise, previously featured here for his work on Donkey Kong Country 2, another game from developer: Rare.

-D

Concert Review: RePLAY - A Symphony of Heroes

Last night, Conklederp and I had the pleasure to attend the Oregon Symphony at Arlene Schnitzer Hall (locally referred to as the "Schnitz" I just found out) with what appeared to me to be a full house.  The music being performed was not that of Beethoven, Bach, Tchaikovsky, Hayden or Glass, but of Soule, Curry, Uematsu, Mitsuda and Yamane.  It was a symphony of music written for video games.  It was very nearly everything my 15 year old self was asking for regarding the recognition of video game music all the way back in 1995.

"RePLAY" is the followup to"Play!," a video game concert series that ran from 2006 through 2010.  For whatever reason, I was never able to attend any of the "Play!" performances, although I assume that if I were to go back and look through my Google calendar I might find that my schedule never coincided with a close-by performance.  This year, RePLAY currently has a very limited schedule with the only other listed performance being in Phoenix, AZ in June.  If you are within travelling distance of that Arizonian town, I highly recommend attending.

I will not list all of the songs that were performed during the concert as that information is available on RePLAY's website, but I will say that there were some surprises.  When I first heard that there was going to be narration between each piece, I was a little put off.  I wanted the night to be about the music, that someone could sit back and listen the music from a video game and enjoy it for the music's sake.  Well, whomever they hired to do the writing did a fantastic job and the narration, although canned, was done by Nigel Carrington, the narrator from Dear Esther.  For me that added quite a lot of credibility to what could have ended up being very cheesy in all the wrong ways.

Another surprise was that bookending every piece was music from Dear Esther composed by Jessica Curry.  This threw me a bit because here you have music from a game that was very well received by "critics," it is not what the larger video game audience would call a video game.  To receive this kind of recognition while featuring music from such franchises as Mass Effect, Halo, Castlevania, and The Elder Scrolls was huge, not only for Jessica Curry but for The Chinese Room, the makers of Dear Esther (as well as co-creators of Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs and the upcoming Everybody's Gone to the Rapture).

After the performance, both Conklederp and I commented about the selection of games that where chosen and the apparently lack of Nintendo.  While some of the selections from Castlevania, Chrono Trigger / Cross and Kingdom Hearts were released on Nintendo platforms, none have been exclusive titles such as Journey or Shadow of the Colossus.  I must admit that I was a little sad that there was nothing from The Legend of Zelda, Super Mario Bros. or Metroid, but someone with a different gaming background could say the same about there not being any music from Sonic the Hedgehog, Call of Duty, or World of Warcraft.  But selecting music from a catalogue of well over I don't know how many games ever made and being able to secure the rights from their respective studio (and/or composer) and publicly perform that music to a paying audience probably has some limitations.  In the end, I knew music from eight of the 19 featured games and those that I did not know or recognize, were still beautifully performed by a great orchestra.

Since beginning in 2004 with "Dear Friends - Music from Final Fantasy," video game music performed in the United States has seen some growth and recognition [citation needed] and I can only hope that it will continue to do so with it reaching, at least, the status that film soundtracks from composers such as John Williams, James Horner, Michael Kamen, and John Barry have been given. There is still a ways to go, but I would like to think we are headed long the right path.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Instrumental 

Ramble: Erosion and Minecraft

Aside:  I think I might finally buy Minecraft.  I don't know.  I haven't bought a full-priced game in years.  Minecraft is $27.  I know, what a cheapskate.  

The thing that makes me hesitate most is time.  I have gotten the impression that Minecraft takes a lot of time.  One brick at a time, as a matter of fact.  That bugs me.  There's got to be a better way.  I've seen some incredible things people have done in Minecraft, but how much time?  Oh how much time.  Anyhow, on to what I was actually thinking, but may never end up doing.  

 I saw a beautiful picture today --wait-- I can show you here:

 
Isn't that beautiful?  It's like, a waterfall, flowing into a pool, but the pool is sunken in from the forest floor, and it's surrounded by dense green foliage.  It's amazing!  And I'd love to recreate this in a video game, and the obvious video game is Minecraft.

Except, then I came up with another idea, and I don't know if Minecraft can do this.   How did this pool get to be sunken?  Maybe it's because the soil around it is not very dense, and thus is eroded more easily.  That seems reasonable.  It's what happened to the grand canyon, right?   Well then - in Minecraft, can you do something like this?  Can you set up a river, surrounded by a not-dense landscape, that will slowly erode away?

Wouldn't that be sweet?!!

I've always loved it when games and stories feature a developing landscape over a period of years and centuries.  It's the best!   I would love, love, love to have a game or simulator where I could start out with one design, and let time work its influence over a period of virtual years.  And then, maybe get to go futz around in the landscape, just for giggles.

It's all a matter of setting a series of timers, right?  Water flow, density of earth, wind, rain, tides.  Weee!  More water leads to more life, but cut off the water source, and things will dry.  Plants will die, different plants and animals will thrive.  You can craft stories around this and let them play out in real time.  

Anyway, that's my idea.  I'll let you know if I make any progress whatsoever on it.

-D

MIDI Week Singles: "Zoness" - Star Fox 64 (N64)

"Zoness" from Star Fox 64 on the Nintendo 64 (1997)
Composer: Hajime Wakai
Record Label: Pony Canon PCCG-00421
Game Developer: Nintendo

First off, did you know that with this song (and 22 others), this was Hajime Wakai's first soundtrack that he composed?  Sure he worked on Yoshi's Story doing sound effects, but this, right here is his first soundtrack.  Damn.

That aside, the music used in the Zoness stage in Star Fox 64 was probably my favorite track from the entire game.  Coupled with the fact that Zoness was one of those stages that you had to make the conscious decision to go to meant that you either enjoyed the level, enjoyed the music or you hated it and wanted to get to Sector Z to finally destroy both of those damn missiles before one of them collided with the Great Fox.  

But for me, it was the music in Zoness.  After completing the game you were awarded with being able to listen to the soundtrack and I don't know why I never got around to purchasing the soundtrack when I first had the chance, but since then I've been able to acquire the whole thing and this was the first song I listen to upon fixing all the ID3 tags; or maybe I made that part up, but it sounds good anyway.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Instrumental

Monthly Update: March 2015

"Lousy Smarch weather!"  I can't help but think of "Smarch" whenever I see the month of March. although I guess that could be somewhat appropriate with the East Coast buried under a few meters of snow and us the Pacific Northwest being burned alive with average temperatures of 55° F, which is warm for February for us.  But onto why we're really here!

In February, we saw the Humble Bundle people put up a massive Star Wars game bundle with 11 games, none of which have I ever played before.  Later in the month I'll actually go into what makes a Star Wars game fun for me to play versus some other science fiction so be prepared for that one later in the month as well as for people to rip me a new one for not being über Star Wars canon knowledgeable.

I've also gotten back into Dungeons & Dragons (As I mentioned last month) and I am presently really enjoying the game.  For our group, I'm DMing and we've managed to get in two sessions, about every other week, but as with every D&D group ever, scheduling is always an issue.  I know that I said I would do a write up last month, but I may actually get around to it this month after I complete my final schooling electronic paperwork assignments for the month.  And I still need to get back on that painting wagon again, but I'm hoping for some nice detail brushes to come into my possession soon.  

On a similar note, I uncovered a D&D story that I wrote back in 2002-03 and I am going back, rereading and converting everything to a 5th Edition model.  The nice part about this is that I am figuring out some story elements that I sort of flubbed on or just ignored to make the story work and it's a lot of fun to go back into this world/story that I concocted.  I'll tell you what, it's somewhat nice to know that my storytelling capabilities didn't completely suck 12 years ago.

I've also decided to put Dragon Quest VI on the back burner for a bit as I just seemed lost with the story.  I don't know if it was because of intermittent play or because I am genuinely not as interested in the story as I want to be, which might be a fault in itself; forcing myself to play something because I feel that I'm supposed to like it is probably not the best way to play a game.  So now I'm going back to Radiant Historia, which I started very briefly I don't know how long ago because I love the concept of the game and the short amount of time that I did put into the game, I recall loving what I was experiencing.

Ah, and I also started up Borderlands after finishing RAGE, which both need articles of their own, which may or may not happen (see paragraph #3).  I am afraid though that it will turn into another Skyrim, which I always seem to be learning something new about once every few weeks.

Lastly, Conklederp and I will be attending the RePLAY orchestral video game concert up here in Portland in a few days so as I may have said (see paragraph #3), there may be an article at the same time.

JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

This Thing Is Too Precious To Ever Sleepwalk Your Way Through This.

P.S.  And then there's the whole Elder Scrolls Online going free later in the month and becoming Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited.  And I thought I read somewhere that the game is not considered canon?  I may need to look into that.