Sometimes it's cool getting game-related tchotchkes. Sweaters, t-shirts, mugs, letter openers, jelly beans, desktop cigarette lighter, cigar box... but I've never received a bullet.
At least not from a video game publisher.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Zombie Related: Why is it...?
Any zombie film or TV show or game I've ever come across that has a "real world" setting always has one gaping hole in overall logic.
Whether it's Dawn of the Dead, 28 Days Later, Zombieland, The Walking Dead, Resident Evil, The Crazies, Shaun of the Dead -- the list is pretty long -- there never seems to be any outright acknowledgement that zombies have been a part of popular culture, in films, books, video games, legends, for a long time.
Wouldn't it make sense in these movie universes that people have seen zombie movies before? Shouldn't they just know that they should avoid being bitten and aim for the head? That they'll follow loud noises? That zombie are essentially running on the basest of instincts and react predictably to a set of stimuli? Wouldn't the characters understand any of that?
Apparently not.
Any piece of zombie literature, film, video game exists in its own bubble where no one anywhere has ever had dealings with zombies before. (Unless it's a sequel.)
And for some reason this really annoys me.
Or am I just not paying enough attention for evidence to the contrary?
Whether it's Dawn of the Dead, 28 Days Later, Zombieland, The Walking Dead, Resident Evil, The Crazies, Shaun of the Dead -- the list is pretty long -- there never seems to be any outright acknowledgement that zombies have been a part of popular culture, in films, books, video games, legends, for a long time.
 |
| Zombies? Never heard of 'em! |
Apparently not.
Any piece of zombie literature, film, video game exists in its own bubble where no one anywhere has ever had dealings with zombies before. (Unless it's a sequel.)
And for some reason this really annoys me.
Or am I just not paying enough attention for evidence to the contrary?
Monday, May 14, 2012
Boldly Going, etc.
The Armchair Empire has undergone a lot of changes in its nearly 12 years of operation but the biggest change is right around the corner.
And it's entirely out of necessity this time. Usually changes have been cosmetic in nature -- logo change, etc. -- but this change comes about because the old infrastructure and tools for posting AE's content are cumbersome and unwieldy when it comes to timely posting of articles. I've been using FrontPage 2003! As you can imagine, it's showing its age in Internet terms. And there was no such thing as YouTube. Or Facebook. Or Twitter. And Myspace was the new thing that everyone was talking about. So incorporating any of those items into the site, making them features of the site, would essentially mean tearing down the entire site and trying to rebuild thousands of pages of content. It was a daunting task to consider.
We looked at our options. And almost all of them would either mean a massive time or money investment. (Or both.) Neither option was appealing because I don't have much of either one (and I'm pretty sure Jeff's in the same boat).
So, as we approach E3, there will be a cataclysm.
The classic Armchair Empire will fracture and splinters of the site will spiral off into space. The flagship Armchair Empire will still exist (as will a dozen years of content including the Top Ten: Best Cleavage) but we'll be posting everything new to The Armchair Empire Infinite (working title), which will showcase a more integrated approach with the likes of Facebook, YouTube, personal blogs, Twitter, et al to provide more interaction and an actual discussion. All the fresh links on armchairempire.com will be content from Infinite.
We have every confidence that this move will mean more timely posting of reviews, opinions, and other features from writers that have been with The Armchair Empire in one form or another for a long, long time. To these people, I'm very thankful. If it weren't for them, The Armchair Empire would have folded long ago. (Of course, I love you readers, too! You're awesome -- take the rest of the day off!)
And it's entirely out of necessity this time. Usually changes have been cosmetic in nature -- logo change, etc. -- but this change comes about because the old infrastructure and tools for posting AE's content are cumbersome and unwieldy when it comes to timely posting of articles. I've been using FrontPage 2003! As you can imagine, it's showing its age in Internet terms. And there was no such thing as YouTube. Or Facebook. Or Twitter. And Myspace was the new thing that everyone was talking about. So incorporating any of those items into the site, making them features of the site, would essentially mean tearing down the entire site and trying to rebuild thousands of pages of content. It was a daunting task to consider.
We looked at our options. And almost all of them would either mean a massive time or money investment. (Or both.) Neither option was appealing because I don't have much of either one (and I'm pretty sure Jeff's in the same boat).
So, as we approach E3, there will be a cataclysm.The classic Armchair Empire will fracture and splinters of the site will spiral off into space. The flagship Armchair Empire will still exist (as will a dozen years of content including the Top Ten: Best Cleavage) but we'll be posting everything new to The Armchair Empire Infinite (working title), which will showcase a more integrated approach with the likes of Facebook, YouTube, personal blogs, Twitter, et al to provide more interaction and an actual discussion. All the fresh links on armchairempire.com will be content from Infinite.
We have every confidence that this move will mean more timely posting of reviews, opinions, and other features from writers that have been with The Armchair Empire in one form or another for a long, long time. To these people, I'm very thankful. If it weren't for them, The Armchair Empire would have folded long ago. (Of course, I love you readers, too! You're awesome -- take the rest of the day off!)
Thursday, May 10, 2012
The PAST! (Part 2: Even Further Back!)
 |
| From memory (sorry, I don't remember all the last names): (Upper, left to right) Mr. Graham, Louis Ferris, Jason Podas, Paul Vorachek, Jason Lange, Nathan Pasecreta, Greg Olson, Steve Domaas, Aaron Bradford, Me! (middle row, left to right) Jarred Trudell, Daniel Tryko, Robbie Simpson, Courtney Edwards, Trevor Anderson, Aaron Schiller, Brian Purca (sitting, left-to-right) Nadia, Emily Campbell, Michelle Tansey, Melanie Green, Kelly, Tara Bruno, Tanner Ansley, Jessica Matheson, Debbie Van Sickle. |
In that picture I'm 12-years old (and the original GameBoy was blowing my mind). And more than 20 years after that picture, I'm almost unrecognizable.
In 1989-90 I was definitely more angular, had more hair (though its length has remained consistent), and I smirked a lot. In comparison to my current state... well, now I look tired. There are some years on my face, which is definitely filled out, but it's the hockey bags under my eyes more than anything that show the distance between Then and Now.
My elementary school, Herbert Spencer, is celebrating it's 100th Anniversary on Saturday, June 9, 2012 and there was a call in the local paper for memories of the place and the people that have passed through its halls. (Get in touch with Principal Fulton -- tfulton@sd40.bc.ca -- to submit your own memories.)
So, I cracked open the "memory" binder that my Mom filled up over the years. It's a treasure trove of personal memories and a showcase of evolution between school in the '80s and the '10s. I'll start rolling some of these things out over the next while.
And if you attended Herbert Spencer Elementary in New Westminster, think about dropping by for the 100th Anniversary celebrations!
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
The Gaming Legacy of Jason "Jace" Hall
Additional: After this blog was posted Jace Hall responded on Twitter with "#ThisIsBadlyMisinformed #YouAreAskingToBePwnd." I responded "So educate me." No response as of yet from Mr. Hall on that one but I'm more than happy listen and be educated so I can correct myself, if that's the case.
I'm positive I read about this particular issue in Computer Gaming World (though it might have been PC Gamer) but Wikipedia has the information quoted from the Wall Street Journal (2004), Jason "Jace" Hall began to make a high Metacritic score a contractual obligation:
"If a product does not receive specific scores or better from aggregator sites like Metacritic, some deals require game publishers to pay higher royalties to Warner Bros."
In my mind, Hall's decision here is the source of a lot of angst in the gaming world. (But he's not alone when it comes to execs that could also share in the blame.)
First off, any royalties and "gain sharing" should be based on sales. Full stop.
If a game sells a bazillion copies intergalacticaly, then the developer and publisher should reap the rewards. In the "Hall Method" the game could sell more than a bazillion copies, score poorly with critics -- whatever broad definition of "critics" you want to use -- and the publisher is the sole beneficiary. The main problem with this method is that critically acclaimed games can be duds about the same percentage of the time that multi-million sellers can be critically panned.
There's a clip of John Carmack putting Jace Hall in a sleeper hold on Hall's "The Jace Hall Show" -- Carmack actually knocks Hall out (jump to 1:04). If you watch the clip, his whole body suddenly goes limp. And there was a small part of me that said, "Good."
(And also, "Carmack is a fluffy cat away from being a Bond villain.")
To this day, there are still developers and publishers signing deals like this. (No, I'm not basing this on any concrete proof.) Tying arbitrary and completely subjective scores to whether a game developer gets a bonus is the same as pulling a lever on a slot machine. Why do it? Is it just because "that's the way things are"?
I'm positive I read about this particular issue in Computer Gaming World (though it might have been PC Gamer) but Wikipedia has the information quoted from the Wall Street Journal (2004), Jason "Jace" Hall began to make a high Metacritic score a contractual obligation:
"If a product does not receive specific scores or better from aggregator sites like Metacritic, some deals require game publishers to pay higher royalties to Warner Bros."
In my mind, Hall's decision here is the source of a lot of angst in the gaming world. (But he's not alone when it comes to execs that could also share in the blame.)
First off, any royalties and "gain sharing" should be based on sales. Full stop.
If a game sells a bazillion copies intergalacticaly, then the developer and publisher should reap the rewards. In the "Hall Method" the game could sell more than a bazillion copies, score poorly with critics -- whatever broad definition of "critics" you want to use -- and the publisher is the sole beneficiary. The main problem with this method is that critically acclaimed games can be duds about the same percentage of the time that multi-million sellers can be critically panned.
There's a clip of John Carmack putting Jace Hall in a sleeper hold on Hall's "The Jace Hall Show" -- Carmack actually knocks Hall out (jump to 1:04). If you watch the clip, his whole body suddenly goes limp. And there was a small part of me that said, "Good."
(And also, "Carmack is a fluffy cat away from being a Bond villain.")
To this day, there are still developers and publishers signing deals like this. (No, I'm not basing this on any concrete proof.) Tying arbitrary and completely subjective scores to whether a game developer gets a bonus is the same as pulling a lever on a slot machine. Why do it? Is it just because "that's the way things are"?
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
The Weekly Checkpoint #6
Mr. Nash and I talk about a lot of things in the most recent Weekly Checkpoint (#6), including Walking Dead, Rock Band iOS, Sony All-Stars, Serious Sam 3 and so much more!
Comments, feedback, follows, etc. are always appreciated:
Comments, feedback, follows, etc. are always appreciated:
Monday, May 7, 2012
The PAST!
The idea of Time Travel has always intrigued me. Time Machine, Quantum Leap, Back to the Future, LOST, 12 Monkeys, Garygoyles... basically, anything that plays around with Time, where someone attempts to move backwards or leap forward to alter history somehow, always intrigues me. The concept is usually what hooks me.
Time Travel in any usable capacity will probably never happen. And honestly, we're all time travellers -- all moving forward. But not backward.
If I fell asleep tonight and woke up in 1986, would I track down my past self -- 9 years old at that point -- and attempt to impart some wisdom? How would my past self react? What if tomorrow I bumped into my future self on the street and he started babbling about the Future? Would I write him off as insane? Fortunately, I'll never really have to answer that question but I'd probably at least hear him out, provided he could convince me that he was, in fact, from the future and was actually my future self.
That part's easy. All I need to do it think of a phrase now and earmark it for use if I ever run into my past self. The me in the future will also have knowledge of that phrase and be able to convince the current me on the spot that he's a future version of me. If that makes sense.
The only time travel we have access to is our memory and documentation, like photos and diary entries. I can flip open an old piece of writing or flip through old photos and be "in that moment." Pictures are really good for that, at least for me.
I don't even have to be in the picture; I could have been the one to take the photo. But somehow the picture manages to capture emotion and my own back story. It also captures details that I otherwise would have completely forgotten. Like the colour of objects, who was there, the relationship between the people in the photo (at that moment), and what was happening in the background, either historically or in the actual background.
I'll be the first to admit that I tend to wallow in the Past like a pig in filth. I like to remember "How things were" rather than thinking about "What things will come." And it's to my detriment -- and by extension, my family's -- that I do this. I'm really making an effort to not wrap myself in layers of nostalgia but it can be pretty damn tough.
That's probably what wisdom I'd try to impart on my 9-year old self: Live in the now, prepare for the future, and think fondly on the past but don't wallow in it.
Time Travel in any usable capacity will probably never happen. And honestly, we're all time travellers -- all moving forward. But not backward.If I fell asleep tonight and woke up in 1986, would I track down my past self -- 9 years old at that point -- and attempt to impart some wisdom? How would my past self react? What if tomorrow I bumped into my future self on the street and he started babbling about the Future? Would I write him off as insane? Fortunately, I'll never really have to answer that question but I'd probably at least hear him out, provided he could convince me that he was, in fact, from the future and was actually my future self.
That part's easy. All I need to do it think of a phrase now and earmark it for use if I ever run into my past self. The me in the future will also have knowledge of that phrase and be able to convince the current me on the spot that he's a future version of me. If that makes sense.
The only time travel we have access to is our memory and documentation, like photos and diary entries. I can flip open an old piece of writing or flip through old photos and be "in that moment." Pictures are really good for that, at least for me.
I don't even have to be in the picture; I could have been the one to take the photo. But somehow the picture manages to capture emotion and my own back story. It also captures details that I otherwise would have completely forgotten. Like the colour of objects, who was there, the relationship between the people in the photo (at that moment), and what was happening in the background, either historically or in the actual background.I'll be the first to admit that I tend to wallow in the Past like a pig in filth. I like to remember "How things were" rather than thinking about "What things will come." And it's to my detriment -- and by extension, my family's -- that I do this. I'm really making an effort to not wrap myself in layers of nostalgia but it can be pretty damn tough.
That's probably what wisdom I'd try to impart on my 9-year old self: Live in the now, prepare for the future, and think fondly on the past but don't wallow in it.
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