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| august 2010 microblog digest |
Posted 2010-09-02 23:40:15 by
Jim Crawford
Archived from http://twitter.com/mogwai_poet:
August 02
- Played 4p co-op Doom in San Diego. Alex quickly turned into the antagonist. It's weird how much I enjoy a good griefing between friends.
- The gate bursts in the Arkham Horror expansions do a great job of slapping the late-game complacency out of you.
- Via Alex: according to NPR, the "Internet Jerkwad Theory" states that "an audience plus anonymity equals chaos."
- http://j.mp/83mhYU -- "Treated as an architectural premise, Die Hard becomes an exhilarating catalog of unorthodox movements through space."
- http://bit.ly/8XHCqM -- "Washing Machine Self-Destructs." I can't believe he stayed close enough to film this happening.
August 03
- What Alan Wake Gets Wrong, and Right, About Being a Writer: http://bit.ly/a1x7T9
- What Final Fantasy VII Gets Wrong, and Right, About Selling Flowers for a Living: http://bit.ly/a2DUNz
- It's vastly more likely that you're white noise hallucinating an instant of life than that the known universe exists: http://j.mp/eZ4Z8
- Living your life in constant fear that you'll wink out of existence in the next second must really help make the most out of that second.
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows gameplay video: http://j.mp/aXG7GP -- I'm having trouble thinking of a lazier use of a magical setting.
- For fans of the genre, Achievement Unlocked 2: http://bit.ly/9tpwuY
- I never understood why so much geek culture is built around fetishization of feudal monarchy. Didn't you guys live through high school?
August 04
- In my dream, European public transit included a system of gigantic grasshoppers taking commuters between Germany and Denmark in seconds.
August 05
- If this is a relapse of February's infection, then it's the one that survived both the Azithromycin and the Cefuroxime. Keep your distance.
- In this hour, I review the opening of Limbo: http://bit.ly/aErdht
- Eyes: http://bit.ly/ax2wyR
August 06
August 07
- Rather than just saying "stat" all the time, doctors should spice it up by using additional languages. Start with "tout suite," maybe.
- http://bit.ly/4IhNsT -- The Web 2.0 Suicide Machine: automagically delete your social networking accounts today!
- http://bit.ly/cohARy -- The Making of: Maniac Mansion. "It was [Ron Gilbert's] idea that a game should be fun to play."
August 09
- http://bit.ly/dqq69E -- Vinay Deolalikar of HP Labs claims proof that "P is smaller than NP for infinite time Turing Machines."
- In a just world, P vs. NP would be a trending topic right now.
- (To be fair, this wouldn't be the exciting proof; this would be the proof that we live in the world we already thought we lived in.)
- Synth progress: started on key/scale/patch selector using existing half-assed textmode interface. Need to rethink note quantization process.
- Also, Windows binary of the latest stable version: http://bit.ly/bMEajh (This uses the half-assed textmode interface I was talking about.)
- Tom Bissell talking about playing GTA 4 on cocaine: http://bit.ly/c8dHUs (Excerpted from http://bit.ly/daEl0J)
- If that excerpt makes you want to read his book, "Extra Lives," be warned that Tom Bissell is philosophically opposed to spoiler warnings.
- I'd link you to the essay in which he explains why, but in it he spoils key story moments of several games, basically on principle.
August 10
- Yakuza 3, reviewed by actual yakuza: http://bit.ly/c5Qsy8
- Fantastic new service exploits security holes in iOS to jailbreak your iPhone or iPad just by visiting a web site! http://j.mp/aXJqKd
August 11
- Demo scene documentary in progress: http://bit.ly/8Zqosn -- Future Crew episode: http://bit.ly/cV2Mrf
- Every one looked awkward. That's how I remember coder life. It still weirds me out to see normal-looking programmers. I don't trust 'em.
- Narrative card tricks in Starcraft 2: http://bit.ly/cexGYe -- "In fiction terms, the writer is almost always on the side of the hero."
- It's no On The Rain-Slick Precipice Of Darkness Episode 3 -- it *says* it is, but it's not -- but it'll have to do: http://bit.ly/ccJe7w
- Photographs of Russia on fire: http://bit.ly/ap3OLu Did you know Russia is on fire? Well, it is.
August 12
- Minecraft's accidental business model: 60k users is nichey enough that everyone feels their money matters, but big enough to make you rich.
- I bet Notch has a million dollars sitting in a checking account and is still living in the same crappy studio apartment.
August 13
- Synth update: added hooks for a UI to control basic parameters, like patch and quantization key.
- @Johnicholas Emailed a zipball. Everything but the Windows code is out of date. Can ask Indy to add you to the git repository if you want.
- Protip: if your new girlfriend asks you to defeat her "seven evil exes," she's going to be referring to you as #8 within a year.
- Most likely to a guy who owns a functional replica Lancer. What I'm saying is, listen for an approaching chainsaw.
- Approaching storm: http://bit.ly/bQ2MT0
- Kieron Gillen interviews Ken Levine re the recently announced Bioshock sorta-sequel: http://bit.ly/bQzz31
- http://bit.ly/dbcVzG -- "Journalism Warning Labels: Contents Not Verified"
August 14
- Cat update: cats in the house.
- I saw Danu once behind the toilet and once behind the front door; Aoibheal vanished immediately.
- I suspect they're both hiding in the darkness, i.e. in my flatmates' room and/or closet.
August 15
- The promise of "serious" games is that games are accessible, so if they teach a useful skill, they do so in an accessible way.
- You see Portal and think "I want the ramifications of that rule set embedded in my brain." And by the end of the game, you have it.
- The *cheat* of games is that they focus on accessible skills, and you never see the ones that focus on skills that aren't easily conveyed.
- Polytron first showed their Fez prototype years ago and have spent the time since trying to figure out how human brains can understand it.
- @Johnicholas (My last four tweets were sort of directed at you.)
- Dresden Codak has been livetweeting Singularity Summit 2010 all weekend: http://twitter.com/dresdencodak
- (Forgot an important part: you *expect* Portal to teach you its rule set. Playing games is never learning-real-skills-hard.)
- @Johnicholas I know the game, but not of Berlekamp. Do you mean this book? http://bit.ly/djWawA
August 16
August 17
- A great howto on the iterative creative process as applied to game design: http://bit.ly/bvZ5qj
- There are no games that are "too short." There are games that provide unsatisfying experiences. http://bit.ly/b9GjBE
- Valuing games in hours per dollar is reasonable when you're a student or are unemployed and have no money but lots of free time.
- I have enough money to play all the games I care about, but not nearly enough time. Length is a *cost* I pay to play a game.
- Some awesome experiences take 10 or 100 hours to convey, but if yours can happen in just 3 hours instead -- or in 15 minutes -- it *should*.
August 18
- @Johnicholas Well, devs already try to keep that stuff small. The problem is that the public demands a lot of content, leading to filler.
- I was basically enjoying Alpha Protocol until I discovered it has boss battles. Seriously. I'm running around on foot, fighting a tank.
- I know it's the fault of idiot monkey-see-monkey-do designers, but it's hard not to blame the boss fight concept for every game it's ruined.
- http://j.mp/99R9Gj "The government should publish how much of our money they're spending to create fear and then spending to address fear."
- POV of rocket booster separating and falling back to Earth after shuttle launch: http://bit.ly/bObD3O
August 19
August 20
- The Music of Video Games: Blaster Master (Alternate Reality Edition): http://bit.ly/qGuoT
- More highlights from the Alternate Reality Music of Video Games series: http://bit.ly/19u57x http://bit.ly/56IB2 http://bit.ly/choj1E
- (Part of my enjoyment of this is that it's very difficult to replicate a NES game's musical sound design this precisely. Try it sometime.)
- Winner talks you through the final match of Quake 3 ESL championship: http://j.mp/bmPjkC -- Fascinating, and more accessible than I expected
August 23
- John Walker's retrospective of the original Grand Theft Auto: http://bit.ly/afA3Kd
- GTA was bizarrely retro even back in 1997. It was basically a score attack game: multipliers, finite lives, and no checkpoints or saving.
- Rockstar is still offering it for the price of your contact information, if you've got a Windows machine: http://bit.ly/L1Ygy
- GTA lead Dave Jones had previously created Lemmings and subsequently Crackdown. (Then he spent 3 years on APB. Thankfully, that's over now.)
- The 80stastic "Planetparty," by Games: http://bit.ly/c7Jnl2 -- Anyone know the story behind this?
- I've been messing with Flixel: http://bit.ly/ctnGQE -- Seems like a pretty straightforward API.
- For reference, if I complained to you about XNA while I was coding to it: XNA probably would've been *fine* for what I asked Flixel to do.
- (In other words, XNA would be a perfectly servicable Flash game development API. It only breaks down as an Xbox 360 game development API.)
- The bass lines of Sonic the Hedgehog: http://bit.ly/gfl9n
- Day of the Tentacle cosplay: http://bit.ly/agZpVp
August 24
- Deathspank 2 already? Too soon. Wasn't established as episodic, so feels like a cash-in -- or like they held content back so we'd pay again.
- It occurred to me I should try framing that link such that it would be of interest to people other than Flash developers. Viz.:
- Hey guys, here is a small game I totally just made! http://bit.ly/ctnGQE
- @halsted I know he left even before the first game's release, but surely he was heavily involved in design and writing?
- http://bit.ly/9iKHUi -- "Every person I know who's lost an eye immediately thinks, 'I should think about getting a camera.'"
- Portal is required "reading" for freshmen at Wabash College: http://bit.ly/9Xj8Z7
- Pretty sure I twitted this in 2009 -- "highlight reel of weird imagery" -- but the link's broken now, so to make sure: http://bit.ly/1dhA7p
- When producing a song I listen repeatedly. I'm pretty sure this was assembled from pieces and never actually listened to: http://j.mp/aQ0OSc
- Has anyone timestretched "100 Ways To Love A Cat" to 800% yet?
August 25
- Video interview with Erik Wolpaw about Portal 2: http://bit.ly/c1Qvhx
- Street busker playing Wu-Tang Clan cover on electric guitar and foot-drums: http://bit.ly/cO3jRQ
- Comprehensive video of Georgia Tech's Art History of Games Symposium is online: http://bit.ly/avdXoc
- Guh, the Art History of Games videos are literally painful to listen to. Literally literally. Someone get a noise-reduction filter in there.
August 26
- In a hundred years, this will be the only known extant photo of President Obama: http://bit.ly/btEAvE
August 27
- http://bit.ly/2Lb3h4 -- "Is Chewbacca trapped in my nightstand?"
- http://j.mp/aCTlLC Great idea guys! Let's take the strongest female game lead ever, and give her to the most misogynistic game studio ever.
- Madagascar's Stone Forest: http://bit.ly/b7jgKS
- Idle Thumbs dudes discuss Kane and Lynch 2; propose best game idea: 3rd-person co-op-only shooter in which player 2 is the camera operator.
- http://j.mp/a07Jca "'New shit has come to light': Information seeking behavior in The Big Lebowski" (I'm really just linking to the title.)
August 28
- San Francisco Rush for the N64 has one of those soundtracks that sticks with you: http://bit.ly/bXV1o5 http://bit.ly/bJ52z0
- The page is down now, but I think this is a laser shining through a droplet of water which is acting as a magnifier: http://bit.ly/cNKCqE
- http://bit.ly/9cvD7j -- Come onnn, kart racer. No whammies!
- Just realized: Yoshi's tongue in Mario Galaxy 2 uses a target-painting system straight out of a chase-cam shooter like Rez or Afterburner.
- More details on the laser/water microscope trick. (Featuring scarier microbes but no cat.) http://bit.ly/bPUA2B
August 29
- "My friend, when he was a kid, was bummed that he was too young to be the first person on Mars. Now he's bummed that he's too old to be."
- Brass octopodes: http://bit.ly/8X7RZc
- Scientifically-produced "most unwanted music" will statistically be liked by fewer than 200 people in the world: http://j.mp/12H0UE
- (Features include a children's chorus singing holiday Wal*Mart jingles and an operatic soprano rapping about life on the ranch.)
August 30
- Pretty sure you need an RSS feed to be a "podcast," but here's an mp3 of Bethesda/id employees talking game development: http://j.mp/atMUvX
- I'd been meaning to cancel Live Gold anyway. I never use the service. Do you still have to call support to cancel automatic renewal?
- Instructions on how to cancel auto-renewal on your Xbox Live Gold account: http://bit.ly/cna490 (Recommendation: mute it before playing.)
- Can't test it myself; xbox.com dies partway through the process. Would be hilarious if everyone tried to cancel at once and broke the site.
- (Not that I think an extra dollar a month is a big deal; locking client-hosted multiplayer behind a subscription was *always* asinine.)
- http://j.mp/9f71K2 -- "How do most wrongful convictions come about?" Police misconduct, coupled with refusal to acknowledge errors.
August 31
- Synth update: Danny installed the latest NDK, which solved basically all our performance problems on the Droid. So that's nice.
- http://j.mp/biZZBm Loved this book to death. I have intense nostalgia for low-level coding. Wish I weren't so goddamned practical nowadays.
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