I have returned! I have a sunburn! I have a lot of laundry to do!
The trip is over. I'll put some more detail into a new entry but for now I have t deal with the fallout (such as laundry, cleaning getting my internal clock reset). I specifically planned to have the weekend before heading back to work to do this stuff.
So of course that's when my Dad shows up expecting to be entertained for the weekend. Crap.
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Good News, Bad News
The good news is that my land-lady just wanted to give me the "official" copy that the previous land-lady forgot to give me. The last one was very, very good as a building manager but was abhorrently bad at the paperwork, thus the difficulties in actually proving I am paying for my parking spot, banking mix-ups, the hole that is still in my kitchen wall and the complete failure of getting the buzzer for the front door working.
The bad news is I'm getting a friggin' cold! Just in time for my trip. I'd blame everyone at work showing up sick but I know I got it when I went to a former co-worker's place for a movie night and tried sheesha with about four other people hitting off the same hookah. And I knew that was going to happen...
The bad news is I'm getting a friggin' cold! Just in time for my trip. I'd blame everyone at work showing up sick but I know I got it when I went to a former co-worker's place for a movie night and tried sheesha with about four other people hitting off the same hookah. And I knew that was going to happen...
Head in the Game
So 48 hours and change until I wing my way to Hawaii. I've been fighting a cold for the past week (which is still trying to conquer my fun). Now that sort of thing was inevitable but still annoying: just a variation of getting sick every Friday before a long weekend.
Strangely enough, I'm not quite as excited/nervous as I thought I would be. I'm managing to stay focused at work and the huge list of "to do" items for the trip is languishing somewhere on my desk top. I've covered all the major items but my usual list of checks and other preparation I haven't really touched yet (besides buying a new set of swim trunks that said "M" on the label but fit like "XL" around my skinny ass).
Oh, and of course a monkey wrench has been thrown into my pina colada. I received a notice yesterday that my land-lady wants to "review the terms of your lease". I'm not exactly sure what that means but it simply cannot be good. I'm pretty damn sure I've done nothing that would merit a "review" but we'll see what happens. I have a sneaking suspicion that I'm being blamed for the monstrous amount of detritus near my car in the parking garage that has been spewed out by the white trash that parks beside me. I would think that it should be obvious where it's coming from: the clean, empty, well-maintained compact car or the rusted-out 4x4 that has beer bottles, fast-food bags and cigarette packs piled to the roof (and spilling out onto the pavement every time a door opens).
If that is indeed the case, I'll let my land-lady know I'm going away for a week and she can see the results for herself.
Strangely enough, I'm not quite as excited/nervous as I thought I would be. I'm managing to stay focused at work and the huge list of "to do" items for the trip is languishing somewhere on my desk top. I've covered all the major items but my usual list of checks and other preparation I haven't really touched yet (besides buying a new set of swim trunks that said "M" on the label but fit like "XL" around my skinny ass).
Oh, and of course a monkey wrench has been thrown into my pina colada. I received a notice yesterday that my land-lady wants to "review the terms of your lease". I'm not exactly sure what that means but it simply cannot be good. I'm pretty damn sure I've done nothing that would merit a "review" but we'll see what happens. I have a sneaking suspicion that I'm being blamed for the monstrous amount of detritus near my car in the parking garage that has been spewed out by the white trash that parks beside me. I would think that it should be obvious where it's coming from: the clean, empty, well-maintained compact car or the rusted-out 4x4 that has beer bottles, fast-food bags and cigarette packs piled to the roof (and spilling out onto the pavement every time a door opens).
If that is indeed the case, I'll let my land-lady know I'm going away for a week and she can see the results for herself.
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Signifying Nothing
Okay, actual computer game review time! This week, I review the long-time coming, finally here Spore.
Anyone who plays video or computer games as a hobby has of course heard of Spore. Wil Wright of The Sims mythology (at this point) has, for a few years, been presenting his visionary, er, vision of a game that lets you start as a single-celled creature and eventually take to the galaxy. In that time, there's been a lot of hype, a lot of excitement and last week a lot of purchases (and if you've ben following along, a lot of pirate copies, DRM political fallout and general hullabaloo). I picked up a legit copy and I'll totally avoid the DRM controversies here and review the game itself.
If you've read more professional reviews, much has been made of the fact that this game is actually five different games strung together. While very true, most good games are really just a set of interacting mini-games (Sid Meir's Pirates! being a very good example). Spore simply puts more distinct boundaries between them, the "meta-game" being the customization of some many aspects of you cell/animal/tribe/society/civilization.
The much talked-about customization - the result of functional/procedural programming techniques - shines through in (almost) every aspect of the game. A very significant game in and of itself, you can (and probably will) spend hours designing, building and tweaking pretty much everything you can control in this game. It's very much akin in spirit of biological Lego, very versatile and if the Sporepedia - the in-game catalog of what others around the globe have created - is any indication very, very much in use by the people who have picked up the game itself and the Creature Creator which is a free download. It is however more of toy than a game which is never a bad thing. I'm sure that some people will pretty much stick to that aspect (and hey, if you have fun, it's good) but for me it can only hold my attention for so long. While I can appreciate that facet of the title, for me it does not make a game in and of itself.
Let's move on to the game play itself. There are five distinct "phases" to Spore: single-cell, creature (where you evolve into a shore-going animal), the tribal phase, the civilization phase and the final (although vast) Space Civilization phase. Each has its own distinct game-play mechanics and goals and each are very reminiscent of other games out there.
And that in and of itself the problem. While the first four phases are fun, they seem a tad too easy and/or limited in comparison to the titles they emulate (RTSes, 4X etc). Having following this game for quite a while I can see that much of the game play has been very much "cutified" since the inception. Now I won't go blaming the publisher for that, but someone, somewhere made the decision to dumb it down for the (potential) console kiddies. Each of the first four phases left me wanting more in both game play and challenge. But once I went through each of them a few times (learning a few things on each replay of each phase) I finally moved on to the biggest part and some one say the "real" game: Space!
The last phase is very, very much a "sandbox": hundreds of stars, multiple civilizations and a plethora of things to do such as colonization, trade, exploration, conquest, diplomacy and so on and so forth. It's very much a 4X-style game with a wide berth for customization. I am a huge fan of the genre myself (Sword of the Stars, Galactic Civilization, Masters of Orion and others of that ilk) and at first this seemed to offer what each of those games had and more.
At first, it was fun as you start to go beyond your home world (although I did find a nasty bug) exploring your own solar system, discovering another star-traveling civilization, establishing a colony on a whole new world. The classic stuff. Then it got annoying. Very, very quickly afterward it got frustrating. And then it got turned off.
Now I'm willing to forgive some things to a certain extent. Remember what I said about the "dumbing down" of the other phases? The Space phase controls are very complex (and I question some design decisions there) and it does have a pretty steep learning curve. I'm pretty sure that this part was not "consolized" and I honestly can't see a decent conversion of the control scheme to a console controller. I'm actually fine with that to a certain extent: having an actual learning curve is usually a good sign. But as I attempted to explore, expand etc "random" events kept popping up with annoying frequency. You had to go fight off pirates (yay), save your colonies from ecological disaster, fend off incursion of alien civilizations (one of which I accidentally ticked off by taking something of theirs) and so on. And these alerts, crisis and general baby-sitting kept happening every couple of minutes. To the point of distraction. Now I do understand that these are supposed to be distractions but the sheer volume of them made the game frustrating to the point where I was no longer having fun. And that's the point a game gets turned off.
It's like Mom calling you to wash your hands, take out the trash, mow the lawn, get ready for dinner etc. every single time you settle down start building your sand castle.
I fully intend to try out the space phases again, but if I encounter the same gale-force level of events that preclude me of actually doing what I want to do sometimes then I uninstall (using up one of the three installs I'm permitted). I'm not holding my breath though.
So in short: "Spore" is an excellent showcase for what can be accomplished by using advanced programming techniques with the creature and world creation tools. However the game play itself for the first four phases are watered down versions of other games already available on the market with the fifth "sandbox" phase completely spoiled by the volume and difficulty of the continuous interruptions spawned by the game. I think if the developers didn't dumb down the game play elements of the first four games and actually gave the player a chance to play the fifth we would have a watershed moment in computer gaming. Instead we have a watered-down version of other, better games and given a hiding behind the shed for attempting to have fun.
Anyone who plays video or computer games as a hobby has of course heard of Spore. Wil Wright of The Sims mythology (at this point) has, for a few years, been presenting his visionary, er, vision of a game that lets you start as a single-celled creature and eventually take to the galaxy. In that time, there's been a lot of hype, a lot of excitement and last week a lot of purchases (and if you've ben following along, a lot of pirate copies, DRM political fallout and general hullabaloo). I picked up a legit copy and I'll totally avoid the DRM controversies here and review the game itself.
If you've read more professional reviews, much has been made of the fact that this game is actually five different games strung together. While very true, most good games are really just a set of interacting mini-games (Sid Meir's Pirates! being a very good example). Spore simply puts more distinct boundaries between them, the "meta-game" being the customization of some many aspects of you cell/animal/tribe/society/civilization.
The much talked-about customization - the result of functional/procedural programming techniques - shines through in (almost) every aspect of the game. A very significant game in and of itself, you can (and probably will) spend hours designing, building and tweaking pretty much everything you can control in this game. It's very much akin in spirit of biological Lego, very versatile and if the Sporepedia - the in-game catalog of what others around the globe have created - is any indication very, very much in use by the people who have picked up the game itself and the Creature Creator which is a free download. It is however more of toy than a game which is never a bad thing. I'm sure that some people will pretty much stick to that aspect (and hey, if you have fun, it's good) but for me it can only hold my attention for so long. While I can appreciate that facet of the title, for me it does not make a game in and of itself.
Let's move on to the game play itself. There are five distinct "phases" to Spore: single-cell, creature (where you evolve into a shore-going animal), the tribal phase, the civilization phase and the final (although vast) Space Civilization phase. Each has its own distinct game-play mechanics and goals and each are very reminiscent of other games out there.
And that in and of itself the problem. While the first four phases are fun, they seem a tad too easy and/or limited in comparison to the titles they emulate (RTSes, 4X etc). Having following this game for quite a while I can see that much of the game play has been very much "cutified" since the inception. Now I won't go blaming the publisher for that, but someone, somewhere made the decision to dumb it down for the (potential) console kiddies. Each of the first four phases left me wanting more in both game play and challenge. But once I went through each of them a few times (learning a few things on each replay of each phase) I finally moved on to the biggest part and some one say the "real" game: Space!
The last phase is very, very much a "sandbox": hundreds of stars, multiple civilizations and a plethora of things to do such as colonization, trade, exploration, conquest, diplomacy and so on and so forth. It's very much a 4X-style game with a wide berth for customization. I am a huge fan of the genre myself (Sword of the Stars, Galactic Civilization, Masters of Orion and others of that ilk) and at first this seemed to offer what each of those games had and more.
At first, it was fun as you start to go beyond your home world (although I did find a nasty bug) exploring your own solar system, discovering another star-traveling civilization, establishing a colony on a whole new world. The classic stuff. Then it got annoying. Very, very quickly afterward it got frustrating. And then it got turned off.
Now I'm willing to forgive some things to a certain extent. Remember what I said about the "dumbing down" of the other phases? The Space phase controls are very complex (and I question some design decisions there) and it does have a pretty steep learning curve. I'm pretty sure that this part was not "consolized" and I honestly can't see a decent conversion of the control scheme to a console controller. I'm actually fine with that to a certain extent: having an actual learning curve is usually a good sign. But as I attempted to explore, expand etc "random" events kept popping up with annoying frequency. You had to go fight off pirates (yay), save your colonies from ecological disaster, fend off incursion of alien civilizations (one of which I accidentally ticked off by taking something of theirs) and so on. And these alerts, crisis and general baby-sitting kept happening every couple of minutes. To the point of distraction. Now I do understand that these are supposed to be distractions but the sheer volume of them made the game frustrating to the point where I was no longer having fun. And that's the point a game gets turned off.
It's like Mom calling you to wash your hands, take out the trash, mow the lawn, get ready for dinner etc. every single time you settle down start building your sand castle.
I fully intend to try out the space phases again, but if I encounter the same gale-force level of events that preclude me of actually doing what I want to do sometimes then I uninstall (using up one of the three installs I'm permitted). I'm not holding my breath though.
So in short: "Spore" is an excellent showcase for what can be accomplished by using advanced programming techniques with the creature and world creation tools. However the game play itself for the first four phases are watered down versions of other games already available on the market with the fifth "sandbox" phase completely spoiled by the volume and difficulty of the continuous interruptions spawned by the game. I think if the developers didn't dumb down the game play elements of the first four games and actually gave the player a chance to play the fifth we would have a watershed moment in computer gaming. Instead we have a watered-down version of other, better games and given a hiding behind the shed for attempting to have fun.
Sunday, September 07, 2008
More of the Same
Ya know, in the past week, nothing new has happened. Seriously, it was pretty much a boiler plate seven days. I worked, bought far too many books and DVDs, month end went into overtime (actually still is dammit), I went to the gym a lot, smoked cigarettes, drank coffee, avoided housework, watched UFC at Big M's (great new digs by the way M) played a bit on the computer and went about the daily grind.
I can't help it: I have the feeling that there is a size 22 shoe hovering over me in near-orbit. Chock full of radioactive space athlete's foot. Or something.
Call me paranoid. Now apologize.
And ... that's it. Really. My life is a neutral gray right now. That's not a necessarily bad thing but it's not exactly a state of bliss either. I am not used to this. What I am used to generally makes me break out in a cold-sweat at 3AM and of course it's nice that I can wake up and not have to have my little early-morning scream but it's also weird.
And even this post is boring.
Hello?
Anyone there?
See?
I can't help it: I have the feeling that there is a size 22 shoe hovering over me in near-orbit. Chock full of radioactive space athlete's foot. Or something.
Call me paranoid. Now apologize.
And ... that's it. Really. My life is a neutral gray right now. That's not a necessarily bad thing but it's not exactly a state of bliss either. I am not used to this. What I am used to generally makes me break out in a cold-sweat at 3AM and of course it's nice that I can wake up and not have to have my little early-morning scream but it's also weird.
And even this post is boring.
Hello?
Anyone there?
See?
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