Weekend Summary

So if you read my last post, you might remember that I said I was going to visit my cottage this past weekend. Well I did, and it was pretty great. The weather was really nice, so I had a pretty good time just sitting and relaxing with all the nature surrounding me. My Mom has some hummingbird feeders up, and there were hummingbirds around them for a fair bit of the time, which was cool. They were really cute. There was one that was really surly and chased the other birds away from the feeders, even if he didn't want to actually go on them himself. Pretty funny.

I also saw a WILD TURKEY. This is the first time I had ever seen one, actually in the wild. Unfortunately I was in the car at the time, so I couldn't follow my manly instincts to go hunt it with nothing but a sharp stick and mud camouflage. And, as science tells us, the urge gets stronger the closer we are to Thanksgiving, so it was pretty hard to resist. Count yourself lucky this time, TURKEY!

Other than that, I went on a couple of rides in my Dad's boat and visited some family that I haven't seen for a while, so that was good. And I think I might have gotten at least a small creativity boost from the change of scenery, which was mainly what I was looking for. I got an idea for a new story, and after thinking about it for a while, I actually had an idea for like, kind of a different form of storytelling. I'll have to think it out a bit more, but hopefully I'll be able to nail it down and start posting it on this blog. If so, I think it would be kind of like a multi-part shortish story. Can't promise anything, of course, since everything I've promised so far hasn't really happened yet.

Anywho, I also saw Elysium while I was up there, and it was pretty good. The sci-fi stuff was cool, and I really enjoyed Sharlto Copley, and especially Jodie Foster. I thought she did just an amazing job. I also laughed at the shape of the space station...nice Halo ring there, guy. Not that that was bad though, it was actually pretty cool looking. That's not to say that there was nothing wrong with the movie, of course.

I guess some spoilers might follow, but nothing really too specific.

So, my big issue with Elysium was how many stupid movie cliches were in it. You know, that kind of thing that makes you go 'aw, come on, really?' when something works out juuuust right. Also how the main character seemingly has like super-hero level endurance, even after being stabbed. How everyone is at the right place at the right time, and how the guy's computer is just magically able to interface with all of Elysium's stuff.

It's the same problem I had with Pacific Rim, which could have been just a cool story about giant robots and monsters, but for some reason they stuffed in a terrible love story too. I mean it was just awful. There was nothing that bad in Elysium, but it's still disappointing to see these lazy storytelling methods being used so heavily in mainstream movies. Like, I feel like we could do without the magically-best-in-the-world-at-what-he-does protagonist who always knows what to do. Maybe that's just what people want to see though, I dunno.

Anywho, as I said, I still enjoyed Elysium, but yeah, I felt it could have been better. So I guess that's it for today, sorry it's not really much again. Hopefully I'll be able to get things straight and get to work on something again soon.

On Magic the Gathering

Is there supposed to be a colon in there? I don't know. Anyway, no post yesterday unfortunately, as I really haven't had any ideas on anything to write about lately. I guess I'm still going through a bit of an uninspired period. So, for a change of scenery, I'm probably going to go up to our cottage this weekend. Dunno if it will help any, but can't hurt. Hopefully.

Anyway. Yesterday later on in the day I decided to start playing Duels of the Planeswalkers 2012, which is a Magic the Gathering game on Steam. I'd bought it a while ago in a Steam sale, for a couple of dollars. The reason I got it is that I'd been introduced to some of my friends to Magic a little bit, and always thought it looked pretty cool, but it seemed like it would be a bit hard to get into. So I thought that getting the game might be a good way to learn the game better, since I don't really have anyone locally that I could play regularly with. So yesterday I FINALLY decided to give it a try, and so I thought I'd talk a bit about how that went.

First off, I should just point out that I know playing Duels of the Planeswalkers is a bit different from playing the game with actual cards. Not super different, but the game does things like gives you pre-made decks, highlights cards when you can play them, and stuff like that. So it's clear to me that you'd need a LOT more knowledge and experience to play the card game as well, like knowing when you can play what cards, and more importantly, when you SHOULD. But still, I feel like this is a good way to learn and get used to the more basic mechanics and dynamics.

So in playing the campaign, I chose the black zombies deck. I feel like I tend to be drawn to the black, white, and to a lesser extent, red colours. Just because I like dark stuff, and angels, and red has some vampires in it too. But yeah, the zombies are just really fun to play with, because if you get the right cards, you just get an overwhelming force. I feel like I should be trying some other decks to learn about some of the other colours' mechanics, but I just have too much fun with the zombies. I suppose there's plenty of time to learn the other colours, though, and I can do so by fighting against them. So let the zombie hordes reign for now.

Then there are the little challenges that you can do in between battles in the campaign. Basically they put you in a very specific situation, usually with you being on the ropes, and you have to figure out a way to fend off your opponent's attack, and beat them in the next turn. The beginning challenges were easy enough, but once it got into the medium challenges, I got stuck as hell. There are just sooo many little rules and subtexts and crazy strategies, that it's easy to see how one would be able to get engrossed in the game for years. I actually ended up having to look up the solutions to the medium challenges, online, which I am not proud of...but I still felt like I learned from each one. I definitely felt stupid after a couple of them, which seemed to have really obvious solutions that I just missed, but at least I know some more things to look for now.

So yeah, I'm having a lot of fun with it so far. I think when Duels 2014 goes on sale I'll probably pick it up. I actually have some real cards too, but I don't know how invested I'll get in the real game, just on account of how expensive the cards are. It might be cool to just become a casual player, though. We'll see what happens!

Some Music I Like

So I haven't done any posts about music in a while. I've always been kind of hesitant to get involved in conversations about music, because I find that my taste in music is a little weird. For one thing, with a few exceptions I generally don't attach myself to any specific type of music, I just like things if I like how they sound. So, for example, I generally don't like rap and hip-hop, but there are some hip-hop songs that I really like. So when people ask me what kind of music I like, I don't really know what to say, since there are songs from pretty much every kind of music that I like. I also don't really attach myself to bands for the most part, so when people get into talking deeply about certain groups and albums, I don't really have anything to say. It kinda sucks sometimes, haha.

But, as I said, there are SOME exceptions. One of my favourite types of music right now, and has been for at least a little while, is liquid/melodic Drum and Bass. Liquid is a term that can be applied to electronic music that means it's more like, chill and smooth. At least that's my interpretation. I also like some liquid/melodic Dubstep, but MOSTLY because some of those songs tend to have really nice Drum and Bass in between the wub wub parts. Then if I find the wub wub parts at least tolerable, I like the song. Anyway, you can find a collection of these types of songs on my Youtube playlist here, if you like.

Next, I want to talk a little about a group that I just learned about recently, Walk off the Earth. They are an indie band from Burlington Ontario, which I thought was pretty cool. I actually found out about them from hearing one of their songs in an HMV, and liking what I heard. I used Shazam on my phone to find out what the song was called, which turned out to be this.

So the thing that I really liked about it at the start was the deep harmony that was in the chorus. I realllllly like harmony like that. But the drums and bass were really cool too, and so I decided to do a little more digging into some of their other videos to see what else I might find. There were a few that were just alright, but I also found some really good ones. The one below is just soo nice and chill, and features a ukelele prominently, so, like, it's automatically good.

Another thing that I really like about this band is the girl's voice. It's one of those voices that somehow sounds so effortless, like singing for her is as easy as talking. The guys in the band have nice voices too, but hers is the one that stands out to me the most. Then I found the video below, which is a capella (for the most part), which is another thing I really like, probably mostly due to the harmony of the voices. It's of a Taylor Swift song, but don't let that push you away.

Honestly, pop music these days is kind of weird for me. There are some songs from people like Taylor Swift, KeSha, and Katy Perry that have really beautiful melodies in some parts, but then just have generic sounding noise in the rest, and ridiculous, vapid lyrics. It just confounds me how these minds can be capable of creating really nice music, but don't do it for the whole song. Ahh well, to each their own, eh? I suppose if I'm able to find at least a small thing that I like in those songs, it's better than nothing.

Anywho, yeah. I haven't done a huge amount of looking into Walk off the Earth's discography, because I'm lazy, but it seems to me like they're worth looking into. Check them out if you like what you hear up there.

A Final Word on Dragon's Crown

So I don't really have anything to write about today, but there is one small thing I want to mention. Dragon's Crown is coming out this coming week, which means that reviews are starting to pop up. If you're not aware, this game has been very controversial for its art style, which you can easily read about with a quick Google search. Now, if you think that the art style is just silly, or you don't really like it, that's fine. You're wrong, but you're entitled to your wrong opinion (lolol). But I have also seen comments where people are talking about how it's actually a 'problem'. And that's where my understanding ends.

To those people, I say: if you are offended by a piece of art or media, that's your fault. Like, sorry if that's a tough truth to swallow, but it doesn't make it any less true. You can control the way you react to something. Do you really think that if something doesn't make you feel good about yourself, it shouldn't exist? Are you really that self entitled?

*drops the mic*

Boring Friday Post

Well another boring day with nothing really to write about. I guess it's kind of just that summer drought of everything. Meh. Well, I had a cool dream last night. I was Spider-Man, actually swinging around on webs and jumping on rooftops, and fighting crime. And I was part of some secret council or something, though it was never clear what it was for. Or I just don't remember. But yeahh...

Anyway, I worked on another drawing to keep practicing on my tablet, this time it's Omega Red. He's another one of my favourite Marvel villains, which kind of sucks because he's not really in anything recently. And I realized one reason why my drawings aren't that good is cause it's just line art, I don't know how to do any shading or lighting or anything. So that's too bad.

Anyway, I just did kind of like a new version of his costume based on what I remember and what I thought might look neat. And also put a belt cloth. I guess that's kind of like my signature. I don't know why I like them so much, haha. I don't even know what the proper name for them is. I just think they look cool! The next idea I have is for Green Goblin, but the picture in my head might be beyond my abilities to actually make. So maybe I'll post it if it's good enough. Though I suppose my standards can't be too high as it is, lol.

Gotta grow the BRAND.

On BioShock DLC and Some Other Stuff

So yesterday the first story DLC was announced for BioShock Infinite was announced, in which you play part of it as Elizabeth, and it takes place in Rapture. That just made me really excited, because it sounds SO COOL. Also, the first non-story DLC actually came out yesterday, which introduces a Horde-like mode. I'm not hugely pumped about that, but since I bought the Season Pass, I got it anyway. There are some pieces of unlockable art and stuff, so I'll probably give it a try, but I've not loved combat-based DLC in the past. But maybe this one will be fun, who knows.

Otherwise, I spent some time in the last two days working on drawing on my tablet. Instead of doing a comic, I decided to just do a regular drawing, since I figured that would be just as good for practice. And I think it was, too, as I could feel myself getting a bit more comfortable with it even as I progressed through the single drawing. So hopefully I'll keep at it and getting better, to the point where I can actually start on my webcomic idea. Seems like I'm gonna have to build up my hand muscles though, cause my hand was pretty sore after finishing it today, lol.

Anyway, I decided to draw Lady Deathstrike. She was always one of my favourite X-Men villains, because she looks really cool and has a cool name. Then, even though she wasn't actually in The Wolverine, I kinda got inspired to do it from all the Japan-y stuff in there. Originally I was kind of planning to do my own take on her costume, but it ended up pretty much being the same as her original one. Oh well. The only semi-difference is her arms. My idea was to have them be basically just her adamantium-laced bones, with some machiney stuff in the middle. The machiney stuff just turned out to be some lines, though...because I am lazy, and not good at drawing little intricate stuff like that. Oh well again.

So I guess all in all, it turned out okay. Obviously I'm not very good at drawing, but it came out about as good as I can draw with a pencil on paper, so that's encouraging for me. It's a lot easier to edit digital drawings, so that's why I wanted to learn to use the tablet in the first place. Only problem is that it took a lot longer to do this, since I kind had to go over it multiple times to clean up the lines, but I think that will improve in time. Anyway, here it is.

On The Wolverine

The movie, not the character. Or the animal. Though both of those are pretty cool too. Anyway, I saw the movie last night, and I thought it was really good! There were some things in there that kind of bothered me, but after thinking about it for a while, I realized that most of those things were because I was comparing the movie to things I already knew about the Wolverine story from comics. And that's really one of the biggest problems with super hero movies, I feel like, that they have SO many different kind of people and fans that they have to please.

Just real quick I want to talk about that a little bit, because I think it's kind of an interesting issue. Like, going into a movie about a character that you know really well, and has had so much backstory already, what mindset is the best to have? If you go in just trying to give the movie a blank slate, you might just be able to enjoy the movie for what it is, but I think that's a really hard thing to do. Then, if you go into it with expectations based on what you already know, you're probably going to be frustrated/disappointed in the changes and the decisions the movie makes. And there usually are going to be a lot of changes, since the mediums of comics and movies are so very different.

Anyway, now I'll talk a bit about some specific things in the movie, so if you haven't seen it yet, be warned that lots of spoilers will follow.

So first off, I really liked Viper. Not only cause she was really pretty, but I liked her like, mannerisms too. So sassy. The only thing that bothered me about her was, why was she even in this movie when there was not even a passing mention of Hydra? I mean, there wasn't any that I saw, maybe I just missed it. But I thought it would have been way cooler if Hydra had figured into the plot somehow, even in a small way. And if there really is no mention of Hydra at all, why not just use a different character? IIIIII dunno. Just seemed kind of weird to me.

I also found it weird that Wolverine was like getting on with Mariko (who was really pretty too, btw :D). When I was watching the movie, I thought that she was Wolverine's wife from the comics, but it turns out she wasn't. I mean I guess they just chose to stray from the original story, so that's fine. That was just one of the things that confused me about the movie though, since I was only vaguely familiar with Wolverine's time in Japan. Since I knew the woman Wolverine fell in love with died, and Mariko didn't.

Was kind of disappointed with Silver Samurai, too. I mean he looked awesome, but I was kind of hoping that he'd be like the major villain of the movie. I guess he kind of was, but he didn't have any presence until the last, what twenty minutes or so? And then there was the bit about heated adamantium being able to cut adamantium. Isn't heated metal supposed to be weaker? I guess it was a reference to Silver Samurai's tachyon field power, but if so, then why was Wolverine able to activate it? Ehhhhh....

So far I've mostly been complaining, but I really did enjoy the movie. The action scenes were great, and the squishy relationshipy scenes weren't bad. Certainly not as terrible as the ones in Pacific Rim. And I forget her name, but the girl with red hair was a great character too. And Jean spent the entire movie in a nightie, so...I mean it's hard to go wrong with that.

And then the extra scene at the end was cool, and pretty ominous. I felt like they were probably referencing Apocalypse, but maybe that's a bit too big. I mean, where do you go from there? Though, I guess they already did the Phoenix Force, so maybe nothing's out of the question. I think it would be cool to see Omega Red, since he was, in my opinion, always one of the cooler villains. But who knows?

This just reminds me that I need to get caught up with the other Marvel movies. I still haven't seen The Avengers, or Thor, or Iron Man 2 (even though I already saw 3...), or Captain America. Thing is...none of those were ever any of my favourite Marvel characters. I guess I should still see them though, since all the movies are tying together, and they were all probably pretty great. But I'm just soo lazyyy~.

I Have Nothing to Write About

Well I'm not dead. Just uninspired! Been feeling pretty bored lately, dunno why. I've been semi-marathoning the Game of Thrones show this past week, so I dunno if that has anything to do with it. Maybe TV makes you dumber after all. My whole life is a lie.

Anyway, today I just came back from the dentist for a cleaning/checkup. There were no problems and the cleaning went through with pretty minimal pain, so that's about as good as you can ask for with a dentist visit.

Mmm what else...Game of Thrones is pretty good. So far it's pretty great, but I'm surprised at how much they've left out of and tweaked the story. I'm definitely glad I read the books first. Well, through Storm of Swords anyway, have just started Feast for Crows. The main complaint I have about the show is some of the casting choices, and it's a small complaint at that. All of the actors capture the characters' personalities really well, but some of them just don't look like the characters I had in my head, and I can't get past it. Oddly, pretty much all of the Lannisters fall into that category. But anyway, yeah, still good.

Um...getting a bit back into Street Fighter 4 after buying the Arcade Edition on Steam. I was pleasantly surprised how nice it looks on my laptop. I've been playing my old favourites, Cammy and Juri, and I've also picked up Oni to try to learn him. The main reason being that one of his colours makes him look like a demonic super saiyan, but he's really fun to play too. I haven't tried playing online yet, but I might give it a shot.

Welp, that's it for now I guess. Hopefully next week is more interesting or something jeez.

Comic: Mind Blown

Okayyyy...so. Today I decided to try something a little different. It's connected to my secret project in a way. I guess I'll reveal now that my secret project is actually a web comic, that will be like a regular installment, continuous story kind of thing. But it turns out that drawing on my tablet is harder than I thought/remembered. Well, drawing something that looks nice is, anyway. So I thought it might be a good idea to do some (a lot of) practice before getting into something that I actually kind of care about. So that's what I'm starting with today.

Sorry that it looks sooo bad. I didn't really mean it to look good though, I guess...just getting used to making shapes on the tablet, seeing what's best for doing what. One thing that's clear, again, Photoshop Elements sucks. I need to find a better solution for drawing in but I'm soooo lazy. Anyway, here is the inaugural comic, in all its terror.

Mind Blown

Click for larger size. Probably?

So...I don't know. Was that even funny? Hopefully. It was kind of funny in my head, hopefully it translated. It's actually something that happened to me last night. I keep finding these spider webs on my lamp and the stuff around it, but I have never seen the spider. CURIOUS.

What's Your Dream Superhero Game?

So I was reading Official Xbox Magazine this morning, and they kind of offhandedly said that they would like to see a Green Lantern Kinect game, and asked what superhero games we would like to see. I thought that was kind of a neat question, so I started thinking about it a bit, and I came up with some cool ideas. Well, I think they would be cool, anyway. These ideas probably wouldn't work as full triple-a games, but as smaller, budget titles, they could work. Here's what I came up with.

Green Goblin
Well, starting off, why do we always have to be playing as super heroes? Villains could be fun too, y'know. To be honest, I don't really have a specific idea on why this would be a good game, other than the fact that I think it would be awesome to fly around on the glider throwing around pumpkin bombs like a maniac. If you've read Warren Ellis' Thunderbolts run (which, if you are a superhero comics fan and haven't read it, you really ought to, it's great), you know how awesome and hilarious the Green Goblin can be. And I don't mean the crappy, ugly Goblin from the movie, the one from the comics/90s cartoon, damnit.

Venom
Honestly I'm kind of shocked that Venom hasn't just been in more games, let alone having his own. I have still not forgiven Capcom for snubbing him for Marvel 3. ANYWAY, I think now would be a great time for a Venom game, since the Flash Thompson Venom is basically a hero now. He works as kind of a more black-ops type soldier, which means his missions could be broken up perfectly into game levels. And the best part, the common 'morality' system that we've been seeing lately would work perfectly here. Players could play it on the 'good' side, going by the book and keeping the symbiote in line, or they could go a bit rogue, and let the symbiote take over. For the latter, you'd be a lot stronger (and look cooler, obviously), but maybe you'd actually lose control of your character sometimes, and struggle to get control back. I think that might make for an interesting experience.

The Hood
Well, you can be forgiven if you've never heard of this guy, so I'll just give a quick summary. He used to be a petty thief, but then he found a big red cloak that happened to be possessed by the demon lord Dormammu.This gave him really sick powers, and so he quickly became the crime lord of his own gang. The thing that really makes him interesting, though, is that he has a family that is unaware of his life of crime. So maybe there could be some tactical element to the game where you have to manage your crime syndicate while keeping your family safe from it. And then of course you'd be able to go out into the field yourself, fighting with your guns and demon powers.

Black Cat
So, Black Cat has always been kind of grey character morality-wise, balancing being a jewel thief and helping Spider-Man in his heroics. So this is another instance where the player could kind of decide how they want to play. I would view it as like an open world where you could choose between robbery missions or hero missions. Ideally, you'd have to do some of both. Like maybe you would have to do robberies to get money to upgrade your equipment. I dunno why would have to do hero missions, but it'd probably be easy to come up with something after some thinking. And of course Spider-Man would factor heavily into the game, with plenty of opportunities to help and interact with him.

Watchmen
I know, I know. But hear me out. During the Steam Sale, I bought the two Watchmen: The End is Nigh games for $4.50, because hey, it's Watchmen, and it's less than five bucks, right? Why not, they can't be that bad. Well, they ARE. They're really terrible. And that made me sad. I mean, it is kind of cool to run around as Rorschach and beat fools' brains out, but that's about the extent of the tolerability. I think it would be cool to have a game where you can play as any of the Watchmen, not just Rorschach and Nite Owl. Well, maybe exclude Dr. Manhattan, due to the whole omnipotent thing. But Before Watchmen showed me that there are more interesting stories to tell in the Watchmen world, and I mean at this point the ship has sailed with games, movies, and more books, so why not go for it?

Well, I mean, there are plenty more superheroes that would probably make cool games, but I have things to do so I'm going to stop here. And sorry to any DC fans, I've always been more of a Marvel guy, and all the well-known DC heroes already have their own games. But anyway, if you have any good ideas, you could put them in the comments if you wanted. Or not! That's cool too.

Hatred Begets Hatred

So this isn't a very nice topic, really, but I guess it's still something we should talk about. The thing that made me start thinking about this today was that I saw a link to an image that showed letters sent to a lesbian couple. It was from a group of people who were trying to 'cleanse' their city of gay people. And they said that though they try to remain non-violence, they are sometimes forced to use violence in their persuasions. There were actually multiple letters shown, indicating (and I guess proving) that the group was going to be persistent in their insistence.

Obviously, this link was met with a lot of negative feedback. Understandably, too; it really is a terrible thing. There were also comments (including by the person that posted the images) saying that they wanted to commit some sorts of acts of violence on the people who sent the letters. And that seems like a natural reaction, but...it honestly gave me a bit of pause. If we, the rational people, are condemning the hatred and threats of violence, then should we be expressing the same towards them? I don't think so.

Now, of course, someone who is gay can't really be compared to someone who is acting on their beliefs. The former is being judged on who they truly are in their core self, and the latter is being judged on how they're acting as a result of beliefs, which are chosen. It is still a similar situation, though, since both are being judged, in a way, based on who they are. And I do realize of course that a gay person being gay doesn't really have any effect on the rights and safety of others, while someone hating gay people does in fact harm others. But I don't think that means that we should hate or become violent towards them, lest the chain continue.

Instead, I really feel like we should pity these people. I mean really, when you think about it, they actually have some sort of mental retardation. I don't mean that in a derogatory way at all either; it seems to me that there is something wrong with their brain such that they have a warped view of reality. The reality is, of course, that gay people have no more negative effect on other people or society as a whole than straight people. There must be some reason that they can't realize that.

And the reason, I guess, for a lot of (maybe even most?) people is their religion. But, I think my point still stands here. I feel like if someone in their right mind was part of a religion that required them to hate certain other people, they would realize that something is terribly wrong with that. Like, it sounds kind of weird, even to me, to say that everyone that is part of these religions has some sort of mental problem, but...what other explanation is there? Why would any logical, rational person accept hatred being acceptable?

I dunno man. This is a pretty controversial topic, and there's no way that I can say for sure that I am right. It's just something I was thinking about today, and for whatever reason I just wanted to get my thoughts out there. Hatred makes me sad. Imagine how much nicer the world would be if everyone was judged by nothing else than their actions. I always make a bit of a face and grumble when people call me a hippy because of my hair, but maybe they were on to something after all, eh?

So what is the solution then? I really don't know. But I do truly believe that reciprocating hate does no good for anyone.

Woops

Oh, it's post day. Uh oh. Gotta make a post. Think man, think. Think think think. Well, I guess I better post something.

Honestly I'm too hot and tired today to even do anything. Also the Steam sale continues to suck so I'm in a bit of a grumpy mood. But I'm going to see Pacific Rim tonight so hopefully that is cool.

One thing I guess I'll mention quickly is that today I saw a character design that I inexplicably fell in love with. Well, I guess it's not that inexplicable, since it's a nice looking design, but I can't really put my finger on exactly what I like so much about it. Here it is:

The character is named Four, from the upcoming game Drakengard 3. It's a series that I don't really know anything about, except that it's an RPG and it's supposed to be really depressing. Recently there was a game called Nier released that I think was made as kind of a spiritual...not really successor, but...member(?) of the series. I own and mean to play it, but haven't yet.

Anyway, I dunno, I just really love her. From the modest but stylish...what is that, like a dress with a corset thingy over it? Nice. Then the cloak/coat (I can't tell if those are sleeves behind it) with the fuzzy trim, I mean come on. The useless goggles. I want to put this as my Facebook cover image, but it's too stupidly short, and without the argyle socks, what is even the point?

So all that is really nice looking, but then you get to that gnarly-looking gauntlet that makes you go 'whoa, hold on now'. Looks like there's more to this girl that meets the eye! I don't know what, because the game has only been previewed in Japanese, but it's caught my interest. I think it's a PS3 exclusive, but that's okay, because I've pretty much decided to get a PS3 later this year anyway.

So yeah, I dunno, sorry for the bad post. But the heat wave is supposed to have lifted by Saturday, so hopefully by then I'll be able to get back into the routine of actually getting work done.

On Before Watchmen

When Before Watchmen was announced last year, it was met with a lot of criticism. Watchmen author Alan Moore publicly condemned the project, and many fans thought that it was just a cash-grab by DC. Personally, I understood that sentiment perfectly, but I was still kind of ambivalent towards the idea. I am a huge fan of the original, after all, so I thought that getting more Watchmen could possibly be a good thing. So, I decided to keep an open mind and give it a chance. I knew that I wanted to wait to pick up the trades, though, since they are a bit cheaper, and save a lot of space. This past week the last of the books were released, and so finally I've gotten to read them.

So, now I'll be going through each separate mini-series, giving general thoughts, and staying as spoiler-free as possible. I actually ended up being surprised by what I found and felt.

Ozymandias
I started with the book on the world's smartest man, Ozymandias. Ozy wasn't one of my favourite characters in Watchmen, but I kind of liked him just because he's such a pompous douchebag. Those kinds of characters are always amusing to me. Him being behind the big twist of Watchmen was really interesting too, of course. So, I was hoping for more of the self-important jerk that we all know and love/hate, and the book definitely delivered that. The art has a bit of an odd style to it, but it quickly grew on me, and now I find I like it quite a bit. The artist, Jae Lee, was really able to capture Adrian's pride and arrogance.

As for the story, it basically glossed over Adrian's entire life. It definitely had some interesting parts, but I kind of felt like it jumped around too much, trying to cover too much in too short a time. That ended up making some of the resolutions feel kind of weak and rushed. Also, I kind of felt like a fair bit of the content in the book was stuff that we already knew about. There were some scenes that were copied directly from Watchmen (as there were in most of the books), but Ozymandias in particular seemed to delve into familiar territory. Still, there was some extra insight into the beginnings of his master plan, so that was neat. There were also some connections that were revealed in Dr. Manhattan and Moloch's books (which are discussed further down), so keep that in mind if you're not planning to grab the whole series.

Overall, I liked Ozymandias, but it wasn't one of my favourites.

The Curse of the Crimson Corsair
So this was kind of an interesting one, as it's a bit of a prequel to the Tales of the Black Freighter parts of Watchmen. I really enjoyed those parts, so I was looking forward to this one. And, for the most part, I wasn't disappointed. The art and writing in this book are both quite reminiscent of the Black Freighter, which is to say that they were both really good. The story itself is very dark and pretty interesting, though I was hoping for a bit more of a direct connection to the story and characters in the Black Freighter. Still, if you enjoyed the Black Freighter bits of Watchmen, I think you'll really like this too, as I did.

Dollar Bill
So this was a one-shot on one of the members of the Minutemen, Dollar Bill. I personally didn't really find it all that interesting, but it came as kind of a 'freebie' in the Ozymandias/Crimson Corsair trade, so I wasn't really disappointed. It did give a small bit of extra insight into the Minutemen, so that was kind of neat. If you're picking up the trade then you don't have to worry about it, but if not, and unless you're really interested in Dollar Bill or the Minutemen, this is probably one that can be skipped.

Minutemen
So this was one that I wasn't hugely looking forward to, since I never really had a huge interest in the Minutemen from reading Watchmen. I kind of hoped that there might be some more insight into Silhouette, though, since she seemed like an interesting character, but didn't get much attention in Watchmen. Well, somehow I got lucky, because Silhouette figures heavily into Minutemen's storyline. The book does go into some familiar territory, but for the most part it's all new stuff. And mostly, that stuff goes into how effed up the Minutemen really were.

And boy, were they. I mean, we all know about the Comedian-Silk Spectre I thing, but there's a lot more than that. It seems that, despite the best intentions of most of the members of the Minutemen, things just keep going badly. The stories are told from the perspective of Nite Owl I, after he's retired, reflecting on the things that happened in his career that he regrets. What results is a very dark and, I found, very affecting story. The art style is kind of simple, but seemingly as a throwback to older comics, it works really well.

Even if you weren't hugely taken by the Minutemen in Watchmen, if you are a fan of the series, I can recommend picking this up. It was, to my surprise, definitely one of my favourites of the bunch.

Silk Spectre
So, Silk Spectre (II). I always found her to be a likable character in Watchmen, but she wasn't really one of my favourites. To be honest, I didn't really know what to expect of this book, so I guess I went in with a bit of an open mind. And, once again to my surprise, I loved it. It was really different from the other books in the series, it was more like a teen coming-of-age story. There was romance, there was comedy, there was action, and there was heartbreak. Laurie was kind of a jerky kid, but I mean we all were, and so I found her to be really easy to root for. I really liked the art in this book too, it just has a great style and conveys the emotions of the characters really well.

I could probably even recommend this book to people who aren't Watchmen fans. I can easily put this into my top two favourites of the series along with Minutemen.

Nite Owl
Well, of course I always liked Nite Owl, but he wasn't one of my favourite characters. I guess I've always found the standard, gadgety-style heroes to be a bit uninteresting. But still, he was obviously a huge part of Watchmen, so I had a fair bit of excitement for this book. It covers a short period of time when Nite Owl and Rorschach were still working the beat as a duo, and seeing them work together was pretty cool. One odd thing about this book, though...for some reason, we get more of a look into Rorschach's background than Nite Owl's. I mean there is some background there for him, but I felt like there was more character development for Rorschach.

So, if you're a Rorschach fan, that might be enough to pick up this book (I did find that I enjoyed it), but if you're looking for more background and development from Nite Owl, you might be disappointed. The art style is pretty nice, but maybe a bit line-y for my taste. Oh, and there are a lot of boobs in this book. Like, a lot. If that matters to you, one way or the other.

Dr. Manhattan
So, this was kind of a weird one. I guess since we already know pretty much everything about Dr. Manhattan's background, there wasn't much more to tell. Well, that's not totally true, there is a small amount of new background, but for the most part this is a story about something else, and...like I said, it's weird. I don't really want to spoil it, though. I will say that it started out really abstract, such that I had a bit of a hard time following it. But as it went on, I started to understand it a bit better, and it ended up tying into the main Watchmen story in a really neat way. It also has a cool tie-in to Ozymandias' story. I also really enjoyed the art.

So, I dunno about how to recommend this one. I guess you could say it's essential reading if you're getting into the Before Watchmen series, since it gives the most significant 'prequelness', but...if you're not worried about that, or Dr. Manhattan himself, or the tie-in to Ozy, it's probably skippable.

Moloch
So this was one that I didn't even know existed until I saw it in the Nite Owl/Dr. Manhattan trade. It's a short, two-part series about the former villain Moloch. I actually found this to be pretty interesting, since we aren't really given much background on Moloch other than that he used to be a foe of the Minutemen. The story of his life actually ends up being really sad; I found myself feeling really sorry for him. The simple but expressive art style helped this along. I think I would definitely recommend this to series fans, especially if you've read the Ozymandias story too.

Comedian
Okay, well this is one of the ones that I was looking forward to the most. Comedian was one of my favourite characters in Watchmen. Even though he did some terrible things, I always found his nihilistic view to be interesting and amusing. And, though we do see a lot more of that style in this book, I found that the story...I dunno. It kinda fell flat. It tells mostly of Comedian's time in Vietnam, which was mentioned in Watchmen, but there was plenty of room to flesh it out. There was a fair bit of focus on the political stuff going on at that time, and I didn't find that stuff very interesting.

I was kind of hoping that it might go a bit more into how Comedian got his unique world view, but since it took place so late in his career, he really was pretty much already set in his ways. The story was still kind of interesting, Comedian himself was amusing, and the art style was pretty nice, so I wouldn't say that this book was a complete disappointment. I just felt like it could have been a lot more.

Rorschach
Ahh, here we go. Like a lot of people, Rorschach was my favourite character in Watchmen. Though, like Dr. Manhattan, we were given a lot of insight into Walter's background in the original book, so there probably wasn't a lot that could be added here. And...I can't say that I was disappointed by the book, but, like the Comedian, I did feel that it could have been done a bit better. I think that its main problem was that it could have used another issue or two. It clocked in a four issues, while the longest stories in the series topped out at six, so I really can't see why Rorschach was constrained. The book did feel a bit rushed to me, and as a result the resolutions to the storylines felt a bit weak.

And weirdly, there were two storylines...that didn't really seem connected to each other at all. Again, though, I think that another issue or two worth of content could have gone a long way to tying everything together, and tying things up in a more satisfying way. I also am sorry to say that I didn't terribly enjoy the writing in Rorschach's story. It wasn't bad, but I kind of felt like it was trying to stand up to Moore's writing of Rorschach, and it just didn't for me. Maybe I'm just not a huge fan of Brian Azzarello's style. It wasn't something that ruined the book for me, but again, it was something I felt like could have been better.

But enough of that, let's talk about the good stuff in the book. For one, I REALLY enjoyed the art. It's kind of a painted style, that reminded me somewhat of Gabrielle Dell'Otto, or one of my other favourite (though lesser-known I imagine) artists, Clayton Crain. It's just really nice in my opinion. Also, we got a lot of Rorschach just being Rorschach. He lives like a slob, never says die, and is absolutely ruthless to criminals, but still has a heart. It's almost endearing to see him trying to interact with people in his 'normal' life.

Originally after finishing the book, I was more disappointed, but after letting it sit and thinking about it, the more I'm okay with it. I think if you're a Rorschach fan, you will like, if maybe not totally love, this book.

So there you have it, my thoughts and short analysis on Before Watchmen. Overall I'm pretty pleased with it, and had some pleasant surprises in what turned out to be my favourite books. I know that a lot of people still look down upon the series, thinking it a petty grab for cash, and I can't condemn that point of view. But if you're a big fan of the original book like I am, just looking for some more Watchmen, I think you'd do well to pick these books up.

It's Too Hot To Write Anything Interesting

Gawd man it's been so hot these last couple of days, and it's supposed to just get worse over the next few. So this week is looking like a stay inside and do nothing week. Yeahh. Anyway, I guess the most significant news is that on Friday I managed to clear off my desk and get a second monitor set up, so that's pretty sweet. I haven't had two screens since I stopped working last year, and I forgot how NICE it is. Getting work done is a bit easier now, so I'm pretty happy about that.

Also, I've been reading through all the Before Watchmen trades, and I'm almost done. Just have one more book to read, which has the Comedian and Rorschach stories in it. So far, they've been really good. I should finish the last book today, so either tomorrow or Wednesday I'll write up some of my thoughts on each of the stories. It will be as non-spoilery as possible, so check it out if you're curious about them.

What else...well, EVO was this past weekend, and I watched as much of it as I could. If you don't know, EVO is a big annual fighting game tournament, featuring tons of different games. I have always been a big fan of fighting games, but I've never had the patience or inherent dexterity to be very good at them. So I really enjoy any chance I get to watch the best players in the world go at it. This year was unsurprisingly great, with old favourites like Street Fighter 4 and Marvel vs. Capcom 3 putting on a great show. Smash Bros. Melee made its debut this year too, and it was pretty fun to watch, though it would have been nice to see a greater variety of characters (but that's the case for most of the games at these tournaments, really).

The highlight of the show for me, though, was King of Fighters XIII. I was taking a look at getting this game when it came out, but never did, either due to money concerns or other things coming out at the same time, can't remember for sure. Anyway, this year I was able to watch the stream in full HD (due to better internet and unlimited bandwidth), and it really struck me how beautiful KoFXIII really is. Just really gorgeous animations and backgrounds. And I've got a bit of a soft spot for KoF too, since a school trip back in grade eight I think. My friends and I brought our Gameboys, and someone had a KoF game, so we played over a link cable. None of us really knew how to play so we just mashed, but somehow I managed to completely dominate with Iori. He was used a fair bit in this year's EVO, so that was cool to see for me. There are rumors that KoFXIII is going to be coming out on Steam, and if so, I will probably be all over that.

Speaking of Steam, the Steam Summer Sale is now in full swing. This year, though, I find I'm not really as excited about it as I have been other years. I guess the main reason is that with sites like Amazon, GoG, and Green Man Gaming (and even Steam itself) having weekly sales on tons of games, the annual Steam sales just seem a bit old hat. I guess it could also be that I've realized that my backlog is huge, and a good deal becomes worse if you buy a game but never actually play it. Guess I'm just starting to get old, and maybe even a bit wiser.

The final thing I just want to mention today is that Fan Expo will be happening in Toronto in a bit over a month. I missed last year, but I'd gone the past few years, and it was pretty cool. I'm planning to go again this year, just to see what I can see and maybe pick up some cool stuff from the retailers. I'll probably go regardless, but if anyone reading this (and who is close to Toronto) wants to go check it out, just let me know. It's not super cheap, but there should be some cool stuff. Nathan Fillion and some other Firefly people are gonna be there!

Anyway, that's it for today. I'm going to go remain completely still until Autumn rolls in.

On Remember Me, After Actually Playing It

WELP, here we go. I feel like this has been kind of a long time coming, considering I've been following this game since it was announced, which I guess was like a year or two ago. So, after finally playing and completing it, I'll give my thoughts an analysis on basically all aspects of the game. It won't really be like a proper review, since I'm not going to rate/score it, but I guess besides that it will be kind of like a review.

Oh, and I will try to avoid any major spoilers, especially with respect to the story, but there may be some minor spoilers, so just be warned. Anywho, let's start with the visuals.

Visuals
Overall, the graphics looked very nice! Even playing on my decent-but-still-a-laptop laptop, on about medium settings, it still looked great. I spent a lot of time gazing around the environments, and didn't spot any weird artifacting or textures that stuck out. The character models looked pretty nice too, especially the main character, Nilin. Close up, the texture of her skin looked pretty real, and even shiny as though covered with sweat. Although it is Unreal Engine, so it might have just been that. And then in areas where it was raining, Nilin's clothes got noticeably wet, and even her hair matted to her forehead. Small touches, but neat stuff.

The animations were really nice too, again, especially for Nilin. There are some areas of the game where she is kind of stumbling around in a daze, and it looks really convincing. Her normal movement animations are similarly great, and I have to give a special shoutout for the stairs animations. They were good! The combat animations were a bit harder to keep track of, since they are so quick, but they seemed smooth and felt satisfying. Of course, nothing is perfect, and I did notice some weird animation glitches in some places, but they were infrequent. The only criticism I would give is that the facial animations and lip synching were kind of meh, but it's a minor complaint.

Finally, I'll talk about the visuals of the world itself. The world just looks incredible - it might be my favourite part of the game. There are a lot of more, like, sterile environments, like when you are inside buildings, but the world really shines when you are out in the urban environments. The futuristic ads and billboards that are posted all about are really cool to look at, but my favourite part was the graffiti. There are a bunch of really awesome and beautiful designs scattered throughout the street-bound areas, and although they were repeated a few times, I didn't mind seeing them again at all. There were also some words scrawled out on the walls in the urban areas, a lot of which were in french, which was neat for me since I could understand almost all of them.

And then another neat thing in the world was how in tons of places, little labels and messages would pop up augmented-reality style. Like, for example, as you approached a storefront, a message would pop up saying the store's name, and what you could buy in there, complete with prices (even though you couldn't go inside, which was kind of disappointing). Or if there was an area where something was on fire, a message would pop up when you approached saying 'danger', and telling you the actual temperature of the area. There were tons of little cool things like that scattered all around the world.

So, overall, the visuals of the game were really great. I would love to see what they look like on maximum settings - it would probably be amazing.

Gameplay
HMM! Here's where things get...interesting. Let's start off with the platforming. It's...okay, I guess. I found that the controls were a little bit wonky, but that could have been my laptop chugging a little bit. In general they worked fine. But when we talk about using the platforming to explore the world, here's where things get a bit unfortunate. The developers seem to have, for some reason, really wanted to discourage exploring. Which is a bit ironic, for two reasons. First, because the world is so COOL! You really just want to explore it. And the other reason it's weird is that there are hidden collectables to pick up. I mean, Of course it's not supposed to be easy to collect everything, but in this game it's almost kind of punishing to try. How so?

Well, first, I should mention that when you're platforming, the game always tells you where to go next. A little orange indicator always appears on the next ledge that you can grab or jump to. That feature seems like it's probably a bit polarizing...though I haven't really played enough platformers myself to determine whether it's good or bad. I guess I was kind of indifferent towards it.

But anyway, when looking for collectibles, hidden areas aren't always indicated to you in this way. Sometimes you will see multiple orange indicators show up letting you know there are two ways to go, but sometimes they're not there. So that means that sometimes you'll have to take a leap of faith, wondering if you can get over there, or jump down onto that platform. But, most of the time you can't leading to an anticlimactic death. And dying in this game isn't terrible, since the checkpoints are very well placed (a definite positive point for the game), but it's still kind of frustrating. There are some places where you feel like you should be able to jump somewhere, but you can't. I just found it kind of deflated my desire to explore.

Another thing that ruined my exploratory fun was that along the critical path, there are tons of times when you go into a new area, and the door closes behind you. This means that if there are clearly two different paths, and you chose the 'right' one (the one that continues the story rather than leading to a collectible), you can't go back. I personally missed a few collectibles exactly this way, and it was really frustrating. This is why I actually liked features like in the BioShock games, that pointed you towards your next objective. I could use that to explore all the other areas first, making sure I didn't miss anything. Maybe that's just a personal preference, though, so your mileage may vary.

Anyway, let's talk about something a bit more positive now: the combat. Surprisingly, for the most part I enjoyed it. Admittedly, I haven't played the Arkham games yet, so I might have a bit of a different standard for this sort of combat than most, but I thought it was pretty good. When you are able to get into a groove with the timing of doing combos and dodging, it feels really nice. There were some times that I felt like I was wrestling with the game a bit, like those 'omg I totally dodged' moments, but I think for the most part those were more my fault than the game screwing me over.

Next I'll talk about the combo lab system, building your own combos. It was pretty okay, better than I thought it would be, but I still felt like it could have been a lot better. Basically, you can unlock 'pressens' of different kinds, which have different effects. These pressens can be slotted into combo strings to fill in the button presses needed to perform the combos. So, basically, you can form any combos you want mixing in damage, regeneration, or cooldown-reduction (for your super moves) pressens. The thing is, though, I found the most effective thing to do was to just make separate combos for each. Like I'd make full damage combos, full regen combos, etc. And then I would just use whichever combo I needed at the time. Like if I was low on health, I'd use my regen combo, or if I was full on everything, I'd use my damage combo.

I think there are a couple of reasons why this combo lab system kind of failed. First, there was no real benefit, at least in my eyes, to mixing up different sorts of pressens in the combos. Like, you could have a combo that did a little bit in each different category, or do a combo that was really strong in whatever you needed at that moment. I feel like they should have included some kind of bonus for mixing up pressen types. There are achievements, but there needed to be something more compelling than that, I think.

Then the other big failure of this system was that, you could unlock multiple pressens of the same type, but they were all exactly the same. Like, for damage pressens, you can unlock three X ones, and three Y ones (all the combos activate by pressing different combinations of the X and Y buttons, on the Xbox controller). But none of those actually differ from each other in terms of effect. I think it would have been much cooler if the different pressens of the same type different in effect, or at least in terms of strength. I think that would have added some more strategy in terms of forming combos.

As for the enemies, they were pretty varied, which was good. Different types of enemies often required use of different pressen types and super moves, which was definitely smart design. None of your moves ever became outdated or useless as the game went on, which was nice. I definitely have to give a special shoutout to some of the boss fights, though. Some of the boss fights were just against powered-up normal enemies, but there were a couple that were actually unique characters, and those were really fun. They required clever use of your super moves, and were almost like puzzles that you had to figure out while fighting a constant stream of adds. They were well-paced, though, and never became frustrating. The only sad part is that, in my opinion, the best fight in the game came in the middle. That was kind of sad, but the last boss was still pretty good too, so it wasn't too terrible.

So yeah, despite my problems with the combo lab, overall I thought the combat was pretty enjoyable. Would have liked to have seen more unique boss fights, since the ones that were in there were so good, but oh well.

Now, finally, I'll talk about the biggest feature of the game, the memory remixes. This was probably the most-touted feature of the game, and for good reason. They looked really cool. You'd be able to watch a person's memory play out in the form of a scene, then tweak different aspects of the environment to change the outcome of the memory. Sounds really neat and unique. But how did it turn out? Well...

First, I must say that the technology used to make these remixes is really impressive. You are able to rewind and fast-forward through the scenes really smoothly and easily, with the graphics and sounds cooperating perfectly. As for the actual scenes themselves, though...to be honest, I was kind of disappointed. I mean, it was pretty cool changing things and then seeing the outcome, but I found that the different endings that I got were all kind of...similar. Like, other than getting the outcome that I was supposed to, I found that changing other things didn't have much impact. That was kind of sad, since the developers had said that there would be plenty of different outcomes aside from the critical path. But in the end there was really a lack of variety in the outcomes, which made the remixes...kind of boring.

Another issue I had is that one of the remixes was shown almost in its entirety in the game's previews. Considering that there are only four remixes in the entire game, that's a pretty significant amount. And worse yet, the final remix of the game is only slightly different from one of the earlier ones. I mean, I understand that these scenes must have been difficult and expensive to make, but I feel like what they ended up putting out wasn't worth it. Truly disappointing to me, someone who was really looking forward to the narrative possibilities of what they promised.

Just before I end the gameplay section, I have to mention Chapter Five. There is a chase section in this chapter which is, in my opinion, just terribly ill-conceived. You have to run from *something* chasing you, which I think is a fairly common thing, but in this game...it just didn't work well. I don't know if it was the controls, or even if it was just me, but I got hit with a frustrating amount of insta-deaths. And it wasn't one of those 'oh, man I know what I did wrong there' things, it was more 'okay wtf just happened there' ones. That's just frustrating. MAYBE on a better rig clearing up any chugging would clear up the issues, but...I dunno. I just did not have any fun at all with that part.

So anyway, overall with the gameplay, it feels to me like they started out with the idea of building a game around the memory remixes, but then realized they'd bit off more than they could chew. Then they ended up having to fill up the game with other forms of gameplay, with mixed results. A bit sad, really.

Story
So, I'll just put a small part on the story here. Overall, it was...pretty okay. It was kind of meh, but there were a few twists and turns that I found genuinely surprising and interesting. The general topic of dealing with the concept of commercializing memories was reasonably interesting too. So, while it wasn't really anything to write home about, I was decently satisfied with it.

I do want to mention the voice acting, though. It was pretty spectacular across the board. I mean, some of the enemies and background characters' voice acting was kind of silly, but all the main characters did a great job. Nilin was especially convincing, lending her a likability that made her easy to get attached to and root for. Well...I should say, all the main characters did a great job, except one. The Atlas in your ear in this game, Edge...his performance was pretty terrible. I don't know if this guy just phoned it in, or if he's the kid of a producer or what, but it was really obvious that he was reading a script. Kind of weird and jarring considering how well the other voice actors did.

Final Thoughts
So when I think about this game and what it could have been, I am just disappointed. But, honestly, when I am actually playing the game, engrossed in the world and characters, I have a really good time with it. It's one of those games that I hate, but I love it even more. It can't take over the title for my MOST hated/loved game (that would go to P.N.03), but still. I would definitely recommend this game to fans of third person action games or those looking for a neat story and unique world, but definitely wait for bargain bin/steam sale prices.  
  

Thursday Preview Post

So today's post is going to be kind of a preview of some things that will be coming up being posted on my blog. I'll start out with the suuuper seeecaret project that I've been talking about for a while. I've decided to put it on hiatus for a short while, but this time I actually have a legitimate reason! I think that the reason I've been putting it off is that my work space is kind of cramped and sucky. So, I'm going to be looking to get a second monitor (well, first I guess, since I use a laptop, but second screen). And in order to make room for that, I'm going to have to get a new shelf unit to put all the figures that are sitting there currently. Or, at least find some way to clear them off. So I'm not sure how long that will take, but hopefully not too long.

Once I get my desk all cleared off for space and have a second monitor, I'll be able to start working on other projects too. Like, one that I've been thinking about lately is coming up with a design for a fighting game that would be like a spiritual successor to Bloody Roar. If you're not familiar with that franchise (which you could be forgiven for, it's not hugely popular), it's a 3D fighting series in which all the characters can transform into a beast form. In human form, combos can be formed out of the punch and kick buttons, but in beast form, a third attack button is added. You can also only do super moves in beast form, but when you do, you transform back into human form right after, and have to full up your beast mode bar again before you can transform back. Or, you can go into this rage mode (I forget what it's actually called), which transforms you into beast form for a short time, but in that time you move more quickly and can perform as many super attacks as you can fit in.

So anyway, my idea is to design a 2D fighting game with similar mechanics. I wanted to go 2D since dealing with only two axes would be more straight-forward, and also I think this kind of game would look cool with more of a hand-drawn look. I was also thinking some sort of dodging system would be cool, like instead of blocking (which you could do, but you would take chip damage), you could try to dodge your opponent's attacks by doing precisely timed button presses. Or something like that. Anyway, I've already come up with a few ideas for characters, and the plan is to draw them up and post them and more design ideas on the blog. Probably would never actually turn into anything, but should be fun anyway.

Also, earlier this week I completed Remember Me, which if you don't remember/know, was a game that I originally was really looking forward to, but as development went on and I saw more about it, I started getting more and more worried that it wouldn't turn out too well. Well, I decided to get it and play it anyway, and the results were kind of surprising. So I'll be writing up a bit of a dissection of it in the next few days, I just want to let it sink in a bit more to make sure I definitely know how I feel about it. Back when I finished Mass Effect 2, I really enjoyed the game as I played it, but then afterwards when I started thinking about it, I started thinking of things that really actually annoyed me about that game. So basically, I just want to make good and sure that I consider everything carefully.

Next up - yesterday I bought all four trades of the Before Watchmen series. They were pretty controversial among fans since Moore and Gibbons weren't involved (and Moore even (unsurprisingly) condemned the very thought of them), but I personally was willing to give them a shot. I haven't read any of them just yet, but flipping through, they look like they're going to be pretty good. I am a HUGE fan of the original Watchmen, if you didn't know, so I'm really interested to see what all these authors and artists were able to do with the prequels. So once I'm finished reading all of them, I'll probably write a post with my thoughts.

Well, I think that's all for now. Hopefully once I get my workspace in better shape, I'll be able to get more quality work done on this blog just in general. I feel like I've been slacking on it a bit lately. But, hopefully the best is yet to come!

On Technology and Identity

Suggested listening for this post: The Veldt by Deadmau5

So this might be kind of a weird one. A bit abstract, and more than likely pretty incoherent. But it might be kind of fun/thought provoking, so let's do it anyway.

So, in League of Legends, there is a special skin for one of the characters, and one of the quotes for it is 'in darkness, I am truly alive'. Kind of a silly quote for a character that's supposed to be all dark and evil and edgy, but for some reason, it got me thinking. Well, it was thanks mostly I guess to the fact that there was a blackout from the big rain storm yesterday, which lasted for about three and a half hours, in the evening. So, I actually did spend a while in the darkness, and noticed something kind of weird.

While the power was out, I felt...off somehow. Like, uncomfortable, and a bit irritable. Granted, I still had my phone and my laptop, but god only knew how long the blackout would last, so I didn't want to waste any batteries. Essentially, I was technology-free. But even still, I wasn't bored - I had a book and a flashlight to read it by. But then, why didn't I feel right?

Well, later that night after the power had come back on, I was thinking about it a bit. It occurred to me that with all technology gone, you have nothing to idly distract yourself. You are really just there, with nothing to hide behind from who you really are. And, I guess that can be kind of uncomfortable, depending on what kind of person you are. Or maybe it just is for everyone, I guess I wouldn't know, haha. So, in a manner of speaking, in the darkness, with no distractions, is when we are truly the most alive.

And of course, technology isn't the only thing that can distract us from ourselves - we have books, and games, and other hobbies to pursue. But technology just makes it so much easier, doesn't it? Like, with a TV or computer, you can just put on a show, or a movie, or a stream, and sit back and not really think about anything at all. It's certainly nice and relaxing, but what is it what is it really doing to us, mentally?

Well, that's where the identity part comes in. It feels to me like one could easily lose their identity to technology. Of course there's the sci-fi idea of like, uploading one's consciousness to a computer or something, and that's a bit more literal than what I mean, but it's kind of the same. Because if we're always invested in this technology that's all around us, we never really have the time to sit and just think about ourselves - who we are, and for younger people, what that even means. I know that I myself was struggling a bit with the idea of 'who I am', for a long time I didn't even really understand what that meant. I do now, after speaking to a counselor and doing some work on it, but a lot of people these days probably don't have that opportunity.

So, I mean, this isn't really a call to action, or a rally against technology or anything like that. It's just something that I was thinking about, and thought it was kind of interesting - that in stealing up all our time and attention, technology is kind of metaphorically sucking in our own selves at the same time. The solution seems easy enough, to just take some time to think specifically about ourselves and who we are, but how easy is that really? I dunno!

Anyway, that's about all I have to say for that. In other news, a new gameplay trailer for Grand Theft Auto V came out today, and it actually looked pretty neat. I was completely disinterested in GTAIV after playing only a few hours of it, but this new one has caught my interest. It sounds like Rockstar is pouring a ton of effort into what will basically be this generation's swan song, and it looks like it's really paying off!

Short Sunday Post

Well the main reason for making a post today is that I realized I forgot to post one of the pictures I got from the zoo. It was one of the good ones too, so I thought I'd better put it up for people to see. Well, in theory.

He's called some sort of waxy frog or something. Pretty cute anyway.

So anyway, there's that. Otherwise, not too much going on this week. Just going to be trying to stop procrastinating on the secret project, mainly. I'm also going to try to finish Remember Me in the next few days - I only have two chapters left to go, which will probably take like 4-5 hours at the (slow) pace I'm going. It's been very up and down, to say the least. Anyway, when I'm done, I'll probably do some sort of deconstruction of it, giving my opinions on everything about the game. Should be fun.

Also, this week on Wednesday I'm planning to go downtown to the comic shop again. A while ago I posted that I was going to pick up the first two trades of the Before Watchmen series, but I never ended up getting them. Even though the distribution company said that they were being released that week, my comic store, the Silver Snail, never got them in. But this week, the trades are actually on Silver Snail's list, so I should have more success. If they don't get sold out, but hopefully that won't happen. Once I read those, I'll probably post some thoughts on them as well.

Umm...yeah I think that's pretty much it. The weather has sucked lately, just really hot and humid. Stupid summer. Well whatever, another month or two and we'll be into fall, hopefully.

Trip to the Zoo!

So before I start, I regret to say that my super secret project is not ready to go live yet. And that makes me so sad that I didn't even spell it in a funny way. But..I'm not giving up! I feel like it's one of those things where it's going to hard for me to get started on it, but then once it gets going it'll be more smooth. So hopefully I'll get to really working on it this weekend. But probably not today though, I'm taking a rest day today. Why am I so tired? Well...

Yesterday I went to the Toronto Zoo! I went with my mom and sister for my sister's birthday. I actually hadn't been there in years, even though it's like a twenty minute drive from my house. I guess it's like that thing where you don't go to the tourist attractions that are in your own city. Like, I've never been to the CN Tower at all! Well, never gone inside anyway. Weird, huh?

Anyway, it was a really fun day. It turned out being sunnier than we expected so I got some sun burns, but that was just a small blemish. We saw a bunch of neat stuff, and this time I actually took quite a few pictures. So for this post, I think it will be mostly just small descriptions attached to the pictures. Less writing than usual, probably, but hey, it's a rest day! So anyway, let's get started.

So the main attraction at the Zoo right now is a pair of giant pandas. They're pretty young right now, but when they get a couple of years older, the Zoo is going to try to mate them. Since they are so endangered, that should be a neat story to follow. The first one we saw was the female, and unfortunately she was hiding a bit.

One thing the pandas really seemed to enjoy doing was just covering themselves in the bamboo they were eating. I'm sure Hedonism Bot would be proud. Here's the male, who was either more outgoing, or more likely, too lazy to hide himself.

So next we went to the Australian area, where we saw some emus and kangaroos. Unfortunately the kangaroos were kind of far away, but at least an emu gave us a good photo op.

May have to click to enlarge to actually see these guys.

Then we saw some wallabys! They were pretty cute.

Then we went inside into the Australian Pavillion. The first thing we saw in there was a tree kangaroo, which seemed to be pretty tired. He just chilled in his little hammock.

There was also a bird just standing on the ground, with no enclosure. He seemed kind of stand-offish, though, so I didn't get too close. It was like, WHATEVER BRO.

Next we've got some reptiles! Check 'em out.

Definitely one of my favourite pictures I took. Charming!

This one didn't turn out as well, but he's like a mini version of the guys above. And the lightning bolt markings are cool.

That head popping out of the ground is a komodo dragon. It was really hot, so he was probably chilling underground for most of the day. Feel kinda lucky we even got to see that much of him!

The last thing from the Australian Pavilion was a tank of jellyfish. Since the camera on my phone sucks, the picture doesn't look as cool as the actual tank did, but gives you an idea.

Then we went back outside and went over to one of the food areas to decide where to go next. There we happened upon a couple of peacocks walking around picking up stuff people dropped. They were quite friendly.

So next we went to the Arctic Tundra area, but since it was so hot out, most of the animals were hiding. But we did manage to see the polar bears and snowy owls, which you can see below. One of the polar bears did several cute poses.

This one is a different bear, incase the change of view confused you.

So next we went into the Americas Pavilion, which had a bunch of really cool stuff. First up was a little room with some birds flying around all free-like.

Okay, so the little guy above, the blue-green one with a long tail. THIS GUY. He's called a blue-crowned motmot. He introduced himself to us by coming out of nowhere and divebombing us as we walked along the path. Then we followed him around, because he looked so neat. Then he divebombed us again, this time coming so close that I felt the wind coming off his wings. But, from the way he was acting, he was obviously just playing around and having fun, not being aggressive.

So when we were leaving the room, the doors have a sign that ask to leave the doors closed, so the birds don't fly through. But you have to open them to get through, right? Well, when I walked through, the cheeky little motmot decided to come with me, actually whacking me on the head with his tail as he went through. We found a zookeeper and told him what happened, and he knew which bird we were talking about before we even mentioned it. Apparently he's a bit of an escape artist. So the keeper went to shoo him back into his room, so it was all good in the end. Anyway, here are a couple more pictures of him, and one more bird from the same room.

This guy is kinda hard to see, but he's right in the middle of the shot. We don't know what he is, couldn't find the sign, but he kind of looks like a mini toucan.

Moving on then, let's check out some of the other things in the Americas Pavilion.

Owl!

Another owl in the same cage, chillin' up against the side.

A rather large boa constrictor. Got almost the whole thing in the shot!

Another one that didn't turn out so great, but it's a smaller boa constrictor.

Kinda hard to see, but the bumpy brown blob to the top right is actually a giant octopus. The coloured blocks at the top are his toys.

This is an eyelash viper. Cool colour, I thought.

A gila monster. He seemed really friendly, when I looked in at him he came right up to the glass.

Oh hello.

Considering how venomous he is, I'm not sure if he likes me or hates me.

And finally a nice whole body shot. And another gila monster in that little wooden nook.

Some giant snails. Like, probably about four inches long. Gah.

Cool lookin' tarantula. With the web everywhere, makes a neat picture I think.

Alligator! Legs in kind of a silly position.

Finally, outside the Pavilion there was an otter tank. He was swimming around playing with stuff in his tank.

Here he's playing with a little white cloth...thing. Not sure if it's actually one of his toys or a piece of garbage :/

Here he's playing with a little piece of bamboo.

Anyway, next we went to what was called the mayan temple ruins. There was a bunch of cool stuff in there:

Here's what appears to be a family of capybaras.

Little guy's pretty cute. Still makes a weird name for a studio, though. Imo.

No animals here, we just walked behind a little waterfall. Looked pretty cool.

Not really easy to see...but you kind kind of see the outline of a sleeping black jaguar's head.

JESUS MONKEY

Terrible reflection off the glass (THANKS, LIGHT), but that there's a jaguar.

A gaggle of flamingos. I do believe that's the technical term.

Some macaws! One of the blue ones could actually say 'hi' and 'bye'.

So next we went to the African area. Get ready for a big old string of pictures here!

Penguins, pelicans, and...ducks? Maybe?

Giraffes! I think they were waiting for their dinner or something.

Some antelopes. Kinda far away, unfortunately.

A white lion! Not sure where the regular lions were though, maybe visiting another Zoo.

Zebras.

Unfortunately you can't see it very well, but that zebra in the centre had a really cool design above its eyes and on its forehead.

A cheetah. It was being really coy and walking up just far enough to not give us a good picture.

"Umad *trollface*"

HIPPO. When we first got there, the hippos were hiding, but started lumbering out while we watched. They were heading for a swim and a snack.

An elephant. Yep.

NIGHT ELF PIG. Kind of hard to see but that white line above its face is a long crest of hair coming off its ear.

Digging around in the dirt, made for a funny sight.

A tiger! He looked really hot D:

Along the way in the Africa area, we saw some llamas (I think...) being walked around by some zookeepers.

His wide stance made him look really gruff and funny to me.

Finally, another peacock, this time a male one. He was really friendly too, let me get up really close.

So that's about it! It was a really fun, if tiring day. We didn't even get to see everything, so hopefully I'll be able to go back again sometime this summer. And this time...I'll wear sunscreen.