| "New Rules for Digital Gentlemen" My thoughts |
[Dec. 5th, 2009|02:43 pm] |
So, I was doing some cleaning in my room just now and came across a copy of "Wired" magazine. I've been receiving a few complimentary copies of this; I don't know why, probably came with some game I bought or some online subscription I've got. In it was an article called "New Rules for Digital Gentlemen." This article was filled with little tips about proper ethics and manners in today's world. Now some of what I read made sense (call people back if the call drops, online conversations aren't all about just you), others were clearly a joke (don't waterboard terror suspects, never read the manual first), but some, to me, sounded like a lot of people would actually take them seriously. So, being the irrepressible muckraker and glutton for punishment that I am, I can't resist sharing some of my "favorites" and what I think of the idea of actually following this crappy advice:
1. "Kick out your unhelpful team mates on multiplayer games (i.e. multiplayer FPS's, Rock Band/Guitar Hero, etc.)" Okay, that to me is mean, especially if you've known the people for a while. Kicking someone to the curb just because they don't help you get a high score is cold-blooded and selfish. My suggestion? Try to help them get better; practice with them, give them suggestions, that sort of thing. I know trends tend to come back, but let's not try to revive the 1980's look-out-for-no.1 mentality.
2. "If you can't buy it online, feel free to bittorrent (but it's only morally justifiable if you're doing it as a protest)." Oh give me a break. I can see it now, some guy sitting in front of his computer saying in a bored voice "all movies should be on the internet, rah rah rah, okay, now we download." Breaking the law as a protest isn't cool, no matter what people who wish it was still the 60's may tell you, especially when you're protesting just for your personal benefit. I know that sometimes what's morally right and what's by-the-book right aren't always the same, but it's not cool to break copyright laws and steal by downloading pirated movies or bootleg copies of stuff. My suggestion? If you want to protest it, go to a message board or write to the companies that don't provide easy access to the movies in some way online. You'd be surprised sometimes how much companies are learning to listen to their customers.
3. "Don't send e-cards." Why not? Saves you a stamp, shows a person you're thinking of them at the holidays/their birthday/their anniversary etc. I just wouldn't overdo it.
4. "Don't ask someone you're attracted to online if they're really a girl." Frankly I don't think it's too much to ask for a little honesty. Sometimes, I admit, I don't ask myself, but that's mostly for people I don't think I'd be attracted to, given what I can glean of their personality from our conversations. If you honestly find yourself growing attracted to a person and think you might like to get to know them better at some point, it would definitely be alright to know ahead of time just how much of an alter ego they're creating for themselves online.
5. "Seek out your coworkers on Facebook, but don't bother to get rid of any of your embarrassing photos, it will make you seem less serious and less open to ridicule." Yeah, right. Like nobody's going to laugh at you or crack jokes about the picture of you when you lost a bet and had to run down the block in your underwear in shin-deep snow. They'll be calling you "Blue Streak" around the office in no time. While being friendly and open with your coworkers is a good idea, don't feel like you're not entitled to a little lost concept these days called "dignity." On a side note, it's ironic to me that the people who act like your life has to be an open book to the general public are often the ones who are the loudest complainers whenever they think the government is intruding on their privacy. Oh, so everybody in the known world should know about your sex life, but the government can't be allowed to know if you illegally download home made bomb plans? Fucking hypocrites. (note, I do believe that the government shouldn't invade anyone's privacy without legal cause to do so, like a search warrant.)
6. "You can reinvent yourself online." Only for roleplaying purposes. Seriously, lying and misrepresenting yourself is not a good idea and a bad habit to get into, 'nuff said.
7. "It's okay to make fun of furries only if...oh, never mind, it's always okay to make fun of furries." M'alright, I dunno for certain if this one was or wasn't meant to be taken seriously. And don't say "of course not," because, well, c'mon guys, look at our popular public image. Most people outside the furry community are convinced 99 percent of us are gay perverts who have sex in animal costumes. And now apparently even Wired knows about us. We have got to start cleaning this shit up and drawing some lines on what we'll accept when it comes to public behavior.
And so we come to the end of this list of modern etiquette rules that I find rather dubious. So what's the moral of this story? The best manners, I've found, are the ones that are old fashioned guidelines with a modern twist. Follow what your parents taught you; think of others and not just yourself, take time to stop and enjoy life, all the good old life lessons. Anything that seems to deviate from them needs to be taken with several grains of salt. |
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| (no subject) |
[Sep. 22nd, 2009|11:58 pm] |
So, I've heard a new MMO is out, Fallen Earth. This one's got a post-apocalyptic setting to it, so it's somewhat original, at least as far as MMO's go.
If many folks I know are going to try it, I think I might too. So, is anyone planning on giving it a spin? |
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| Have a drink on me |
[Aug. 28th, 2009|06:07 pm] |
So, I've decided, since I've turned 25, to start experimenting a touch more and trying out some alcoholic drinks to see if I can find anything that suits my taste. My primary reason for doing this is because I'm not a total wuss and I'm not afraid to try new stuff, plus I think it would be a good thing to have an adult drink I can order in social situations. So far I've tried two. The first I actually tried a while ago, vodka. This I've had solely in the form of screwdrivers, which as most people may know is vodka and orange juice. My experience with this has been mixed, no pun intended. Some have been good, tasting a lot like an orange-flavored lemonade. Others don't taste so great, which I suspect is a result of the drink being improperly mixed or using a cheap brand of vodka. The vodka itself, from what I can tell, has very little flavor of its own, but what flavor there is when overpowering the rest of a cocktail's ingredients is a very fuel-like flavor.
Most recently, I tried whiskey. Now my first impression was bad. I went with a brand called Maker's Mark, which was recommended to me by the store staff and, as I later found out, my grandfather on my mother's side used to have a shot of from time to time. But when I tried it, I found the flavor to be extremely bitter and to have that fuel-like quality again. I was pretty disappointed, but I gave it another try, thinking it was one of those things you can't judge too quickly. My second impression was a bit better. I drank about half a shot glass of it, first a small sip, then enough to roll around in my mouth a bit. I found that the warming sensation it creates in your mouth and as it goes down is pleasant and there is a subtle, sweet flavor to whiskey, almost like honey, when you don't drink it too fast. However, the fuel taste still came up, not when I had the whiskey in my mouth, but in the aftertaste; it was like I could taste the fumes in my mouth. I also found that drinking it at room temperature was better than when I tried to put it over ice.
So that's been my experience so far. I'm thinking I may try gin next; I understand it's flavored with juniper berries and other ingredients, but if anyone knows of any drinks to suggest, I would be interested. I'd like to find a liquor that has a sweet(er) flavor with little kerosene-like aftertaste, if one exists. |
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| Maybe not the best role model... |
[Aug. 25th, 2009|01:56 pm] |
Last year, a movie called "Milk", came out; a drama based on the life of Harvey Milk, the first openly homosexual man to hold a public office. He was a San Francisco supervisor who was an advocate for gay rights that, tragically, was killed by a disgruntled former supervisor, along with the mayor of San Francisco at the time. While I haven't seen the movie I've read a synopsis of it; the movie largely chronicles Milk's political campaigning and his work to secure equal and fair treatment of homosexuals in San Francisco.
While I think fair and equal treatment for all people is a good and noble cause, I'm not convinced Milk is the best person for homosexuals to consider as an example and a martyr. While doing some reading online, I discovered that Milk at one time was heard to be supportive of Jim Jones. For those of you who don't know, Jim Jones was a charismatic socialist and communist advocate in the United States. He lead a group to form a colony known as Jonestown. After a visit from a U.S. Congressman, during which several people tried to defect from the colony and return to the U.S., gunmen from Jonestown attacked the planes they were on and killed the congressman in the process. Jones then had the majority of his colony commit suicide. According to survivors, Jones continued to urge people to kill themselves, saying they were giving their lives in the name of communism and socialism, even as mothers with infants came forward to accept poisoned drinks which they used to kill themselves and their children.
It may seem like a completely unrelated issue, but I think the fact that Milk could be supportive of such a person calls his character into suspect. It's does so particularly because of the time it came about. Milk wrote a letter to Presidenty Jim Carter, stating his support of Jones during a time when Jones was being accused by two defectors of refusing to return their son to them.
I know this may seem like an ad hominim argument against Milk, but I'm not disputing his politics, nor his advocacy of gay rights. What I'm trying to say here is that the recent Hollywood movie shouldn't lead people, particularly homosexuals, to believe that Milk is a perfect martyr and an exemplary example of what homosexuals should strive to be. The fact that he could have a favorable attitude towards a man like Jim Jones suggests one of two things. The first possibility is he had very little focus in his life outside of homosexuality and using that as a political platform. This would mean Milk would have had very little knowledge of the truth about Jim Jones and was advocating him simply because he was rebelling against the norm in America, just like Milk was.
The other possibility is Milk genuinely did believe there was nothing wrong with communism or socialism. I find this personally hard to believe, though, since supporting a form of government and economics that takes away personal rights and freedom would fly directly in the face of the spirit of his advocacy of giving rights and freedom to homosexuals.
In summary, I think that Harvey Milk was probably a great campaigner and spokesperson for gay rights. However, I think he still made some of the cardinal mistakes of gay activists and other minority groups; he allowed his focus on homosexuality to drive concern for everything else from his mind and was too willing to support anyone he could see as a fellow revolutionary thinker. I guess the lesson here is once again for people to remember the old adage parents often tell their children: "Do as I say, not as I do." |
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| Game review: NecrovisioN |
[Aug. 18th, 2009|03:14 pm] |
A couple days ago I downloaded a new single player FPS off of Steam: NecrovisioN. Now believe it or not, despite the title, it's not a game mixing necrophilia with voyeurism (how the hell would they even pull that off? Maybe having you spy through a hole in the wall of a mortuary I guess...but enough of this disgusting train of thought). Instead, it's a mix of alternate history with survival horror. One of the best things about it is that for a change, it's set in a historical war BESIDES WWII. In this case, you're transported back to "The Great War", WWI. You play Simon Bukner, an American who enlisted with the British army (possibly out of a strange desire to sleep in the mud and listen to artillery fire all day) and who finds himself separated from his allies after an ambush on his battalion. Shortly thereafter he discovers that things are even more nightmarish than they usually are in the middle of a war, as demons and undead monsters are starting to attack anyone and everyone they come across.
This review can only really be a first impression, since I've only played the game for one sitting so far, but still, I think I've noticed a few things about the game worth mentioning. First off, the gameplay. So far its been your standard FPS: You run, you shoot, the various enemies fall down dead or burn or get turned into sausage filling. There's an option that allows you to use ironsight aiming, and one thing I want to say here is I love ironsight aiming. I think it's a big step towards realism in FPS games that shows people that despite how easy Stephen Segal, Chow Yun Fat, Bruce Willis and virtually all other big name action stars make it look, very few people are going to be a marksman shooting from the hip. Unfortunately, in NecrovisioN, it just doesn't work. Not every weapon is designed with an ironsight and the enemies fire at you so quickly you can't have enough time to line up a shot first. This wouldn't be such a problem, except the enemies apparently have magnetic bullets and you've got a skeleton made of steel, because every shot seems to find its way into your Yankee ass. But that's when another flaw of the game comes along to strangely balance things out when you discover you have regenerating health. I never realized Wolverine fought in WWI, but then again who the hell knows how old he is anyway? On the other hand since your health regenerates that pretty much makes all the health packs you find pretty unnecessary and that power alone makes you pretty much able to take out an entire trench-worth of German soldiers without having any scars to impress the French prostitutes with.
NecrovisioN's graphics are definitely right up there with titles like Bioshock and F.E.A.R., so there's plenty of eye candy to go around. The sound effects are good and the voice acting's also top notch, although the character movement is rather flamboyant, as if all the characters have some kind of shell shock twitch. The voice acting, unfortunately, is also a bit hard to appreciate when you can't hear the well-spoken narration of a soldier's diary page over the sound of an air raid rattling the fillings out of your teeth. The story also appears to be a good one with details and intrigue slowly revealing themselves over time. However, it's delivered in a rather disjointed way. Some of it's shown in the process of the game, while in between levels you can be watching montages of what might be past events, while after the prologue to the game you see a cinematic that seems to be completely out of order with everything else. It gives a sense of confusion, like whoever wrote the screenplay for the game accidentally dropped the folder on his way to the editor's office and got the pages all out of order.
After the first play, NecrovisioN still has my attention and interest. Despite its flaws, if you make a few adjustments to expectations, it may not be an award winner, but it's still a good solid FPS and its refreshing to see a game about a period of history that's remained largely untapped in the entertainment industry. |
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| The big day comin' up |
[Aug. 4th, 2009|08:58 am] |
Well, in another week it'll be my birthday. On Aug. 11, I'll be 25, officially a quarter of a century old. A lot of people seem to treat this as a pretty big age; the impression I get is that this is supposed to be the age you're officially not a kid anymore. They certainly seem to think so in most of the music you hear these days, if I recall, and that as a result, your life is over. Sort of reminds me of that old song "Summer of '69". God I hate that song.
Frankly I don't know what to think about officially being in my mid-20's. It is something of a step, sure, but frankly I don't know if it's really that big a pivotal moment in my life. I certainly don't intend to give up anything like my drive to stand up for things. For the last three or so years, honestly, I've sort of adopted a "be prepared, but take it as it comes" attitude towards life and its little (and not so little) hurtles, but I've also tried to not be adverse to taking action when it's called for.
In all, I'm not sure how to take this new age coming up. I recognize it's another step down the road of life, but I'm unconvinced it has to be the death of youth and all the interests and qualities associated with it. |
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| Somehow I think I'll survive |
[Jun. 30th, 2009|06:08 pm] |
I've been contemplating getting lasic surgery lately. For those of you unfamiliar, this is lazer surgery to repair your eyes. I've been thinking about trying to see if maybe I can get rid of my glasses, so I got set up with a local doctor my dad used to work with so I could get a recent general exam to present the surgeon with when I arrange for a consultation. Just today, though, I got called back to the doctor's office and he gave me news that didn't completely surprise me, but I'd been hoping I could avoid.
I'm diabetic.
It's really not that big a shock to me. My maternal grandfather had it. My dad has it. It was practically inevitable. Now before people start telling me how sorry they are, let me just say while I appreciate the empathy, nobody has to feel too sorry for me. I'm not going to let this turn my entire life on its ear. As far as I can tell, what this means is that in order to keep my blood sugar level under control, I'll need to cut down on snack foods with lots of carbs (like potato chips) and sugary stuff (candy, chocolate, etc.), take the prescription the doctor gave me and try to be active and exercise a bit. So in other words, take a few pills, eat right and move my lazy ass once in a while. Somehow, I think I'll cope, heh.
The good news, though, is that getting my blood sugar level back in place should help with a couple problems I've been having. I've found for a little while now I've been kind of drowsy at work when I haven't had anything to do. During the slow periods, I'll often take the time to get caught up on reading the paper, but I'll find myself staring to nod off for little periods. My other problem is at times I'll find my short-term memory isn't that good. I'll get lost trying to remember what I'd wanted to say to someone a few minutes ago. So if this medication can help with those problems, that would definitely be something I can live with. |
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| Strangely vivid dream |
[Jun. 20th, 2009|10:47 am] |
Last night, I had a dream that was remarkably vivid. At least parts of it were. I dreamed that I was living in a major coastal city, working at a newspaper or some kind of news business (okay, not a lot of deviation from reality there). The newspaper was in a fairly large building with multiple stories; I remember seeing on an elevator keypad a button for the 15th story, and it wasn't the top floor either. I seem to remember my apartment was located there too. It was an old building, though, and didn't feel very well built. While I was up in one of the higher floors, I could feel the building rocking back and forth. I mentioned it to some of my coworkers and they said they felt it too; made me feel a bit better that I wasn't just being paranoid.
Suddenly, the building falls over; it didn't fall down, it fell OVER, twisting around and then falling sideways, while people were still in it. Then it started to roll over and over. I got up as it started rolling and started running against the direction of the turn like a hamster in a running wheel. The building rolled all the way down to the beach and stopped partway in the surf.
I remember climbing out of what used to be the basement of the building; what happened next is a little blurry, but I remember seeing on a map that I was somewhere on the California coast and the United Kingdom had become located only a few miles offshore. One of my coworkers was selling stolen jewelry, which made me think of that movie "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels." It was widely believed the reason my apartment/workplace had fallen over was terrorists had put bombs at the support beams; everybody had believed they'd never be so bold as to try something like that, but they did. The terrorists were now believed to be hiding in India.
I was later called down to a police station, where I was supposed to be questioned about my coworker fencing the jewelry. I was going to deny any involvement. Before I could be questioned, though, I passed by my building, now sticking up at a steep angle, sort of like the leaning tower of Pisa, and saw they were selling the latest version of the Xbox (not the actual upcoming version but some version of the future) for four dollars; they'd been in the building when it fell and now rather than pay someone to clean it all up they were letting people go in for four bucks and take any of the still-working units, if they could find one.
I went in before paying my four bucks and started looking around. Then there was some sort of transition...I don't remember exactly how it happened, but I had joined some master criminal's break-in crew. We were going to steal something from a building where they were opening a museum-like exhibition of rare artifacts of some kind. The master criminal was a blood elf (like in WoW); he and I posed as guests to the grand opening of the exhibition while the rest of his crew distracted the guards in front of the building. He lifted a couple of the artifacts and got the attention of the security team as part of a larger plan to get deeper inside the building...and that's when I woke up.
Weird, eh? |
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| A new book/tv series? |
[Jun. 16th, 2009|02:35 pm] |
Well, this is interesting; I wonder if I'm the first anthro to find out about this. I seriously doubt it, but I haven't heard much from anyone else on it:
www.silverwing.tv.
I read synopsis of the four books the series is following. I can only say it would be great if there was a fifth. |
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| Another day in history... |
[Apr. 20th, 2009|04:28 pm] |
http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0420/p06s07-wogn.html
Today a remarkable series of events occurred.
First, Mahmoud Ahmdinejad, President of Iran, got up in front of a UN conference to address racism and gave a speech where he once again denied the Hollacaust, claimed the United States was causing suffering and discrimination against the people of Afghanistan and Iraq, that the Jewish people were behind a Zionist conspiracy and that Israel should be wiped off the globe. The content of his message wasn't a surprise, nor was the fact that it went on for 30 minutes instead of the seven he was given. What's surprising is that nine years after a similar incident, the UN STILL hasn't learned not to let this fuck head in front of a microphone.
The next remarkable event was that partway through his speech, 23 members of the European Union experienced a remarkable sensation. To paraphrase Dr. Seuss "And in Whooville they say, The EU representatives balls grew three sizes that day." And with this testicular growth, the representatives walked out on Ahmdinejad's speech.
The third amazing event was that after the speech, Ban Ki Moon, current Secretary General of the UN, stood up and condemned the Iranian President's entire speech. What is amazing isn't his condemnation...but the fact Ban sat there through the entire thing rather than get up and beat the motherfucker unconscious with his chair 30 seconds into it. |
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| Socialism just needs the right people in charge? Yeah right... |
[Apr. 18th, 2009|11:40 am] |
For those who actually think having the government regulate everything so things like wealth are spread homogeneous and smooth across a country is a good thing, I offer this story:
An economics professor at Texas Tech University, Lubbock, TX said he had
Never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire
Class.
The majority of that class had insisted that socialism worked and that
noone would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The
Professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.
All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade
So no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test
the grades were averaged, everyone got a B. The students who studied hard
Were upset and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the
second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even
less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too, so
they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When
the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.
The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all
resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for anyone else. All failed to
their great surprise and the professor told them that socialism would
ultimately fail because the harder to succeed the greater the reward but when a
government takes all the reward away, no one will try or succeed. |
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| (no subject) |
[Apr. 2nd, 2009|02:55 pm] |
Well I realize it's been a while since I posted anything, so just to toss something out here for potential discussion:
I've heard alcoholism described as a disease. The motivation I've perceived behind this trend is because a lot of people want to emphasize the fact that people who are alcoholics develop a dependency on alcohol which is physical and therefore not their fault. They emphasize this to generate understanding and patience for alcoholics.
I think having understanding and patience with those who are trying to give up drinking or at least excessive drinking is a good thing; doing such things are hard. However, I think characterizing alcoholism as a disease is stupid. It's not brought on by a bacteria or a virus or some kind of involuntary medical malady like a tumor. It's not a disease, it's a condition. Alcohol doesn't force itself on people voluntarily, they choose at some point to overindulge in it. Now I'll be the first to concede that after a certain point, alcoholics become physically dependent on drinking, which robs them of much of their ability to stop. But the same can be said for drug addicts, but you don't hear many people trying to call addiction to heroin or acid or LSD or cocaine a disease, at least not in the same sense as alcohol addiction.
Referring to alcoholism as a disease gives it a certain vibe; it makes it seem like the alcoholic isn't responsible for his or her alcoholism; after all, who could be blamed for having a disease? You don't yell at someone for catching the flu, or sneer at a person for getting cancer. This new trend smacks to me of the larger societal trend of "never judge anybody". Well frankly, I say it's bs. People fighting a chemical dependency, be it booze or drugs, deserve all the support and understanding they can get. But I say don't gloss over the fact that they did get themselves into the mess they're in, just don't hesitate to help them get out of it. |
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| Not unfounded after all, it seems |
[Mar. 26th, 2009|01:34 pm] |
Anybody who'se played mainstream video games has probably heard of the Resident Evil series. I myself have played most of the games to-date (with the exception of some of the spin-off prequels like Resident Evil Zero that enhanced the back story of secondary characters virtually nobody gives a damn about). While I haven't played the latest one, Resident Evil 5, I have watched the video review of the game by Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw. Now RE5 has, from what I've heard, been getting a lot of mud thrown at it because people thought it would have racism in it because the setting was in a politically unstable region of Africa. Now I figured it was just the usual hyper-sensitive bullshit being spouted as it always is by the knee-jerk, politically correct crowd that could find racism in calling chocolate "dark" chocolate. But, if Yahtzee was being truthful (and while he's often profane and a bit narrow-minded, he's at least honest as far as I can tell) then the hyper-touchy twits may not be entirely unjustified for getting all worked up.
You see, in his review, Yahtzee said that the game changes the setting midway through the game. It goes from being set in a modern, albiet poverty-stricken, African village with mutated villagers dressed in modern clothing as the enemies, with a fair number of white villagers mixed in with the black ones. But then the scene changes, and the players find themselves in mud-hut villages fighting black men in loincloths and grass skirts, yelling stuff like "unga bunga" and throwing spears at them.
Now, I know that beneath the surface this isn't racism. This is the game designers attempting to be logical; if a terrorist were to use some kind of bioweapon (as one does apparently in the plot) then it would spread not just to the civilized areas of Africa but also the uncivilized ones. Regardless, common sense would tell all but the most brain dead meat puppets that the immediate reaction a lot of people are going to have to this is to suspect everybody on the RE5 design team has swastika tattoos or keeps a white hood in their closet. How the design team couldn't have realized this, and how the company could approve the game without realizing it, is a mystery to me.
Still, as I said, even if this is true, I think it was done not to insult Africans or black people, it was done to be accurate to the location. At the risk of parroting Yahtzee, I don't think the folks at Capcom are racists or bigots. They're just STUPID. |
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| Jumped the shark? |
[Feb. 20th, 2009|02:53 pm] |
So, I've picked up all the latest episodes of "Black Lagoon", an anime I've been pretty impressed with so far. I recently finished the first disc in the "second barrage" season, and it was the most disturbing episodes to date.
First, a brief overview: the Black Lagoon series is about the adventures of a group of mercenaries known as the "Black Lagoon Company". The company operates out of Ronapur, an island off the coast of Thailand in the South China sea. The island's central city is what Obi-Wan-Kenobi would've described as "a wretched hive of scum and villiany". It's filled with pirates, gangsters, kidnappers, drug smugglers, arms dealers, thugs, maniacs, ex-military-turned-criminals, basically anybody who does something remotely morally questionable. Violence is a regular thing and anyone on the street from a nun to a 3 year old could shoot you in the back at any time.
Now, to the latest espiodes. As I said, they were the most disturbing I've seen to date. Two kids show up in the city and start raising hell. And when I say kids, I mean it; they can't be older than 10, a pair of twins, a boy and a girl. They're brought in by an Italian mobster who wants to try and take over the criminal trafficking in the city, but the twins are completely out of control. They torture and kill, and wind up killing a pair of soldiers from a Russian ex-military unit that's become an organized crime syndicate. Some digging is done and it's discovered the two are from Romania. A dictator there passed a no abortion law as a means of creating a labor pool, but when he was assassinated, orphaned children were sold into slavery for pedophile pornographers that tortured them and forced them to kill for snuff films. These twins went insane from the abuse and turned into homicidal maniacs.
The Russian syndicate, and all the other gangsters, didn't give a damn. They still wanted revenge for the people these two kids killed. In the end they both died, one shot by a sniper with the Russian syndicate while the female captain leading them just watched him bleed out in front of her, sighing afterwards that she's getting too old for this or something. The Black Lagoon company is hired by the second kid to try and help her escape (crazy doesn't mean stupid), but one of their contacts shoots her because the Russian syndicate paid him more.
This story arc was deeply disturbing and definitely makes a person think about madness, how much responsibility you can hold someone to for their actions when they don't know any better, and who's the real monster when someone could know how horrific a person's life was that made them the way they are and still not care. On a personal note, I didn't appreciate the way they dragged anti-abortion sentiment into things; it's like they're trying to associate an effort to protect innocent lives with delivering unwanted children into the hands of child molesters, which disgusts me (both the delivering and this passive attempt to link the two).
But now to the heart of why I'm writing this; since the series did such a disturbing and thought-provoking story arc, you'd think that the characters would be changed in some way for the experience. But instead, things pretty much appear to have picked up as if it never happened, a momentary distraction, nothing more. I get the idea that we're supposed to see that these are hard-nosed criminals who live in a world where violence and depravity are all too common and they've become jaded to a lot of it, but I think even the most detatched assassin would have to be shaken by two raped and tortured children going insane and butchering people. In the end, the only person who gets noticeably shaken is Rock, the newest member of the Black Lagoon Company. Rock used to be a Japanese businessman who got tangled up in his company's own shady dealings and decided he was sick of being used like a tool. He's not the hard case everybody else is, but even he, in the end, after the second kid was killed, seemed to move on from the experience with disturbing quickness.
Where does a series go after something like this? I realize that it is sort of realistic, having terrible things happen, but then life goes on. But to have it go on without any of the people involved being noticeably affected? That doesn't seem right. Also, where do you go after something like this? I don't think they could possibly come up with a crisis that's more unnerving and more revealing of the darker nature of some of the characters. And we're expected to just look past that from now on? In the words of Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw "Everything from this point feels like a step backwards." I intend to finish the series, but honestly, if they expect us to be able to sympathize with some of these characters from this point on, that itself is disturbing. |
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| Warning, another mope-fest |
[Feb. 18th, 2009|10:41 am] |
I come into work this morning and the computer network's down so it takes a while to get logged in. When I do, I find an email from my editor pointing out a line in one story that doesn't make sense to her. So I show her the document I got it from and she says it's confusing and looks like a word's missing. So I go back to my desk and try to adjust it so it's easier to understand. She comes to me, sounding irritated I was poking at it. I tell her I'm trying to fix it, and she tells me to get out of the document. I follow her to her office and ask if the previous line and this new one doesn't make sense, how does she want it to read? She tells me to "go sit down", and says in a way that gives me a vibe she's monumentally disappointed with me and that I'm teetering on the edge of being fired for my incompetence.
I love my work. But I frequently want to just throw up my hands and quit. I try my hardest, I try to improve, but the people I'm supposed to be satisfying with my work never seem to be satisfied. I feel like I'm expected to get everything right all the time and every mistake, no matter how "human", is something that I shouldn't have made and I could have avoided if I'd just done this, that or something that anyone else wouldn't need to be told. For me, I feel like there's no room for an honest mistake, it's always something to which blame can be assigned and it's always assigned to me. If I ever try to defend myself with any sort of tenacity, the reaction is always like one I've frequently seen when I try to debate a subject; the situation is always stated back to me in a way that makes what I'm saying look incredibly unreasonable and unfair of me or the person just throws up their hands and gives up in a way that makes me feel they're not conceding I have a point, they've just lost their patience with having to deal with someone as dense as me.
Lately I go through every day wondering if I'm going to make it without someone just saying that's it, they've had it, I'm out of here, here's my pink slip, get out of their sight, why the hell the hired me in the first place they'll never know. I don't feel like I can talk about my problems at home 'cause lately it seems, just like at work, I'm told there's SOMETHING that -I- shoulda-woulda-coulda done. I rarely, if ever, hear genuine commiseration; seems I haven't heard very often "Don't blame yourself, mistakes happen" or "That really wasn't fair to you, so don't worry about it and keep doing your best". It's always "well you should take this away from this experience" or "Well maybe you can do this from now on" or "Well you need to remember this." No, I'm not perfect and I've still got plenty to learn, I fully admit that. But I don't think I need a reminder with every stumble I have. And every once in a while I'd like to think I'm entitled to say "whoops, didn't mean to do that, but spilled milk," instead of having to carry every thing I've ever done wrong on my back for the rest of my life.
Never good enough, and people seem to get increasingly fed up with my lack of being able to avoid a given mistake for the rest of my life once it's been brought to my attention. Sometimes I feel like I'm being pigeon-holed into inevitable failure by the constant increase of people's expectations, never to be reached like the carrot on a stick dangled in front of a burro's nose. |
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| L4D finale; speaking from experience |
[Feb. 7th, 2009|02:18 am] |
Having now played Left 4 Dead for some time now, I think I've gotten a pretty good grip on the best ways to get through a stage finale. For those who don't know, L4D stages each have a finale where you have to stave off massive waves of infected zombies until your rescue arrives. This is pretty challenging, but I've noticed several strategies which seem to work best.
One particular strategy most people seem to use is called "The closet standoff". This is where a group all takes cover in a closet or similar small enclosed space. The advantages of this is there's only one opening you need to concentrate on, so you can put all your firepower in one direction. It also means you can only be attacked from one direction. The downside is when either a smoker (an enemy with a long tongue that can pull people away) or a tank (a massive monster that takes a lot of shots to take down) shows up. A smoker can pull one of your group away from the closet if not shot fast enough and (if a big clot of zombies shows up, it's going to be tough to get to them in time. And no matter what, once the tank shows up (there's always two in every finale) you've got to scatter, otherwise he'll pin the entire team in the closet and pound everybody into the floor.
A more flexible strategy is one I like to call "High Ground". One person on the team is a designated sniper; he takes the hunting rifle (one of four improved weapons you pick up in the game) and before the finale starts, finds the highest vantage point for the standoff location. The sniper then covers the rest of his team mates as well as he can, shooting zombies when they start to get too close to their team mates or when he can see a large gang of them charging en masse. His top priority, however, comes when he can see a special infected coming in; he needs to hit those before they can do anything to his team mates. If he can't see an enemy, it's not his responsibility to shoot at it. He's also not to go charging off after any one particular person in trouble, his job is to stay where he is and cover the battlefield. He can move a bit if he needs to get a better view, but he's not to come out from behind his team mates. If someone gets pinned by either a smoker or a hunter (a special infected that can leap on team mates and pin them) he can shoot them to save his team mate, but otherwise he needs to rely on his team to be able to carry their own load.
The rest of the team in a High Ground strategy needs to huddle together to watch each others backs as the zombies swarm in. When the sniper can't get to a person in time to save them or can't see them, somebody else needs to step in. When the tank shows up, things get a bit tricky; the person with the most health (preferably someone whose health bar is still green and is carrying an automatic shot gun) has to become tank bait. Their job is to lead the tank into the line of fire. At every finale is a mounted turret gun that teams can use; the bait needs to lead the tank out into the open so one team mate can nail him with it. The best case scenario is that two team mates trade off leading the tank, shooting him as they do, one stays on the turret and the sniper puts every round in that mother f***er's ass he can. |
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| Is it still a surprise I'm so tightly-wound? |
[Jan. 14th, 2009|02:45 pm] |
Over time I've had a few people make the observation that I tend to be rather high-strung. I don't deny I can be rather tightly wound, but I think I have a good reason to be. Here's something that happened to me only just yesterday.
I was covering a city council meeting, one of the regular monthly meetings I cover. The subject of a ballpark the city's been trying to build for a few years now came up again, this time when the city staff needed authorization to apply for a grant to start the next phase of construction. One councilman in particular has had serious misgivings about this project and thinks the city won't get the use out of this park it needs to justify the several million dollars it's putting into this project. He's made this point before, multiple times, and once again last evening he did the same thing he's done before; demanded to know how much each construction item is going to cost, then get into a verbal tennis match with the city manager about how it costs too much and if they don't get enough people coming to the ballpark, it won't be worth it.
Well during this debate, I can't help but realize the comparison it has to the movie "Field of Dreams", the one where Kevin Costner plays a farmer who builds a baseball field on his land when he hears what is ostensibly the voice of God inspiring him to do so with the phrase "if you build it, they will come." The ballpark debate has come up so often at city meetings, I can't resist. I give the town clerk a note, asking her to pass it along to the town manager, saying he should tell the councilman to watch Field of Dreams. I'm not sure if he got it, but it just struck me as a funny joke to make.
Now, a news reporter is ethically responsible to refrain from putting his personal opinion into his stories. He's also not supposed to voice his personal opinion in a public manner on subjects that he writes about because it can taint his credibility as an un-biased source. I wasn't trying to voice my opinion on whether or not the city needed a ballpark with my joke; I was only trying to poke fun at how the council continues to agonize and beat this dead horse of a subject. Regardless, after I told my mother about it, she had to bring up the fact of how it's going to look; like I AM trying to insert my personal opinion publicly, and that if the councilman takes offense, it possible it will get me in trouble.
The pisser is I know she's right; my boss's boss has the capacity to become a colossal cretin and this is definitely the sort of thing he wouldn't hesitate to tear me a new one over. Hearing it said has even made me doubt whether I honestly didn't mean to express my opinion publicly; I don't believe I meant to, but now I can't help questioning whether I did subconsciously. It's teeth-grindingly frustrating to me because for once in longer than I can remember I actually worked up the balls to loosen up and crack wise. And for that momentary loosening of my sphincter I may get slapped hard for it. I feel like I can't stop being guarded and on edge because of moments like this. Everybody else seems to be able to act like a smart ass an get away with it, even winning most people's approval for what they say and do, but me? No, I can't so much as crack a joke, I'm pigeon-holed into being the poster child for the dweebishly goody-two-shoes. I'm not allowed to be human, I've got to always say and do everything so nobody gets offended and every point of protocol adhered to so I don't even have the appearance of not being perfect from a professional standpoint.
So I guess for those of you wondering, this is a prime example of why I'm so twitchy at times. Because to my memory, this is how the majority of my attempts to not be so high-strung have gotten me. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jan. 8th, 2009|03:07 pm] |
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I just recently read a synopsis of Uwe Boll's "Postal". Frankly, I think this was the only game Boll is qualified to make a movie about. Plus supposedly Boll makes an appearance where he gets shot in the crotch; it may be worth seeing just for that. |
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| A Christopher Nolan version of the Penguin; my take. |
[Dec. 29th, 2008|09:29 pm] |
By now I think a lot of people who enjoy Batman movies have seen Batman Begins. A fair number have probably seen The Dark Knight. The director, Christopher Nolan, has an interesting taken on the concept of Batman and his rogue's gallery, working them in a way that's more realistic and believable; rather than making them mutants with fantastic alterations to their appearances, he makes them more possible. His crowning achievement so far was Heath Ledger's take on the Joker; no longer a person who had his skin discolored after being exposed to chemicals and survived somehow to become a demented criminal, he became a scarred sociopath and a multiple murderer.
Now as some may know, Nolan is planning on his next villain to be the Riddler; odds are it's going to be some criminal with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). In an interview, Nolan once said that some of Batman's rogue's gallery would prove very difficult to work with the way he's trying to re-imagine the Batman series; with more realism. I suppose he thinks that a bird-featured villain isn't much to work with and seems to silly. But, I think there's a way.
Imagine, if you would, Oswald Cobblepot growing up. Like Bruce Wayne, he's born to a wealthy family, but he's not exactly what you'd call a GQ model. He's looks very much like a bird, with a long nose and a short, squat physical build. He's not deformed, per se, but he's not particularly handsome. He's also shy and introverted growing up; he's the kind of kid you often saw in the back of the classroom.
All this led to him being the victim of every bully and thug he ran into growing up. He was abused and harassed by his classmates in private school. Then, when his family lost its fortune and he had to start going to a regular public school in Gotham, he was physically assaulted by creeps and punks. Finally, after years of traumatic bullying, he snaps. He turns to crime as a way of taking revenge on those who step on others, both upper and lower class. He kills street muggers and drug dealers like an out-of-control vigilante. But he also sees upper class snobs and bratty trust fund jet setters as social parasites, from whom he steals, kidnaps and holds for ransom, torturing them if he sees fit. He dresses in expensive clothing as a way of mocking the wealthy. His personal philosophy would be that when the victim is a creep, a cretin or a monster themselves, that justifies whatever you do to them as payback.
His demeanor would be very polite and well mannered, but with a twisted sense of right and wrong. He wouldn't recognize the fact that by the choices he'd made and the things he'd done, he'd done just as much damage as those who abused him, only in a different way. What happened to him growing up would have been wrong, but justice and revenge aren't the same thing.
Anyway, my thoughts on how the Penguin could be made into a believable character. |
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| Two sides to the story |
[Dec. 14th, 2008|11:01 am] |
http://features.csmonitor.com/environment/2008/12/13/white-house-removes-protections-for-endangered-species/
Okay, anybody who knows me knows I've been a proponent of President Bush and have insisted that he's not the fool everybody says he is and his administration isn't a bad one. In general, I still maintain that stance. But I will readily admit they don't get it right all the time, and this is a prime example of that.
Reading the story, this appears to be an example of when people go overboard to solve a problem, using a hatchet to brush a fly from a friend's forehead, as the (I believe) Chinese proverb goes. When they tried to put polar bears on the endangered species list due to global warming, that was clearly an attempt by leftist politics to create a tool to be used against anyone who didn't meet their standards for business practices. "Oh you can't build that factory, it might affect global warming and endanger the polar bears." "You have to cancel that line of cars, we have to think of the polar bears and global warming?" "Are you trying to increase global warming and kill the polar bears? Pull that line of appliance we say aren't green enough off the shelves now."
The whole thing could have turned into a bad can of worms. But in attempting to head off bad legislation, the removal of scientific verification requirements for projects is also bad legislation. It's true many environmental scientists have political agendas, but not all of them. I think the smarter course of action would have been to override this polar bear/global warming endangered species listing, then come up with more stringent requirements for scientists who provide the data on whether or not a project in question will affect the environment in a negative way. Scientists should have their past testimonies on environmental impact studies scrutinized to see if they've been pushing a political agenda.
We can't just cut all scientific evaluation out of the process of building and industry. A responsible and informed appraisal is needed. |
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