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beevean · 2 years

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So it's finally time to talk about Megaman's first jump in 3D huh? :P

Talk about a mixed bag. Where do I begin?

Honestly, calling it “Mega Man” is very misleading: you could replace Rock with Link and nothing would change. There is absolutely nothing that connects this game with the main franchise except for the fact that the protagonist is a blue robot: you can’t choose which level you can beat first, there’s no rock-paper-scissors system, there's not even a villain until the very end. This is very much a Legend of Zelda tribute, with a little Metroid sprinkled in for good measure. Not a bad thing, but I can understand why this game took years until it became appreciated.

That being said, this game is utterly charming. I adore the graphics and the genius idea of leaving expressions and face movement to texture rather than create those ungodly abominations typical of the era. The anime style gives it an unique charm. I also enjoy the very dated voice acting :P it’s cheesy, but not unbearable like MM8′s or X4′s. Not much to say instead about the music, because there are very few tracks in this game and not all of them excel. I liked the theme of the Main Gate, the Sub City (that whole place was so cool), the final boss and especially the Bonne theme :P speaking of which, the story is fairly simple and nothing to write home about, but it’s the main characters that make it enjoyable: Rock Volnutt (no I’m not calling Megaman it sounds stupid) and Roll are both adorable, Telsei is delightfully hammy, and I perfectly understand why Tron got her own game :P or gets shipped with Rock

Well. The story is nothing to write home about until the end. Then an insane machine appears and rants about Carbons needing to be purged, and Data (who until now was just your checkpoint) is hinted to be much important than you'd ever think. Bold choice to dump your lore in the last 10 minutes of the game.

(random but I love Juno's design and serene personality, he's very... wrong and eerie)

The world is interesting to explore. I like the idea of the world covered by endless water, the setting is clearly dark and post apocalyptic already but the whole tone is fairly good hearted. The city has this Sonic Adventure-esque feel, with all the people you can talk to. I liked that at the end the game gives you the chance to say goodbye to everyone :) although I imagine it has more impact if you bothered with the sidequests lol. My favorite section was the Old City - going from this tone to this tone was jarring to say the least, the clear blue sky and bright houses replaced with factories and pollution and aggressive stray dogs, and while the area is supposed to be old, I got the feeling that it was poor and degraded.

The ruins in particular got a huge breakthrough once I got the Spring Jump. They open up, and that’s when you discover that they’re all interconnected, and it almost feels like going back to Metroid 1 or Metroid 2, the former because it’s so easy to get lost but also so easy to find rewards, and the latter because of the creepy ambience and I won’t lie, sometimes I saw a scary enemy and I noped the fuck out of there :P also you get the weapon that destroys walls in the endgame, meaning that this game introduced the Final Victory Lap™ 5 years before Metroid Fusion did

But holy fucking shit the controls ruined everything.

I genuinely can’t decide if this game has worse controls than X7. Obviously X7 as a PS2 game has zero excuses for feeling like a nightmare, and to be fair Megaman in Legends is pretty fast, even before getting the Spring Jump and Jet Skates. But the camera is unbearable - the ruins are fine since they’re mostly tight corridors and small rooms, but navigating in the main world is awkward due to having to constantly reorient yourself, the camera doesn't autoaim and if you do use the aim mission you can't move, when you get hit the camera flips for no reason, and most of all it makes stupid bosses a steeper challenge than they have any right to be.

Honestly, I dreaded every single boss. Who thought it was a good idea to make you chase aggressive machines, with a camera that you either have to slowly turn around or keep pressing Circle to reorient yourself? Who had the brilliant idea of that stupid boat battle, where you have to manually aim at both the torpedoes and the missiles and the ships in the air, spinning around like you’re drunk while Roll takes her sweet time to get to the destination? That stupid bitch boss of the second dungeon would be a piece of cake in any decent game, but here, oops it dived a little early and you can’t jump away in time because there’s the slightest teensy tiny delay and you have to jump to hit its only weap spot and the jump is as stiff as the rest of the controls, fuck you retry the entire sub gate again :) The only reason I beat Bruno was because the game was kind enough to give you a shield, i.e. the Gate entrance. Yeah okay this game is old, I get it, it was meant for controllers without an analog stick, this was the norm at the time and I understand, call me spoiled but it was an exercise in frustration I just wasn’t expecting!

The final boss was a whole experience and a half. I wrote this post 9 days ago, and it took me 3 days to beat the beast that is Juno. By the time I was finally done, my hands were shaking. The thing is, this boss would have been a great challenge in a good game, ngl dodging lasers was almost fun, but a fast hard hitting enemy combined with a camera that hurts just to be moved? Yeah. Pretty miserable.

Speaking of the bosses! This game really wants to have its cake and eat it too. I'm okay with a Metroidvania style of "once you die you're kicked back to the last save point". I also accept "if you get a game over you have to retry the whole level again". But both of them together? Why? Those sub gates can get quite long, if not in structure it's because plot happens and you can't skip it. You have to go through all the dialogue, collect all the necessary items, then you die in a couple of hits at the boss because you have no idea of its strategy, and welp time to do it all over again! I swear, adding Data before a boss or having a number of lives would have helped a lot. Well, Data appears right before Juno, at least - thanks. I was annoyed at ZX for the amount of backtracking you had to do if you game overed but this is way worse!

This game pissed me off. With X6 and X7, I kinda knew what I was getting into, they’re both pieces of trash with little redeeming qualities. But here, I can see a good game! It’s good, it's funny, there’s love and passion put into it! But for every fun cutscene and exploration, there’s am infuriating battle that is infuriating for all the wrong reasons, and I wanted to like this game but I couldn’t, I’m sorry, maybe it's because I’m too spoiled or too inept. I know that Legends 2 has better controls... but I really don't want to touch another Legends game for a while.

#megaman #megaman legends #sorry for the negativity in the tag

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killianmesmalls · 3 years

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On your comments about Jack: ye-es, in the sense that Jack is a character who definitely deserved better than he was treated by the characters. The way Dean especially treats him reflects very badly on Dean, no question. But, speaking as a viewer, I think the perspective needs to shift a little bit.

To me, Jack is Dawn from Buffy, or Scrappy Doo. He’s an (in my opinion) irritating kid who is introduced out of nowhere to be both super vulnerable and super OP, and the jeopardy is centered around him in a way that has nothing to do with his actual character or relationships. He’s mostly around to be cute and to solve or create problems — he never has any firm character arcs or goals of his own, nor any deeper purpose in the meta narrative. In this way, he’s a miss for SPN, which focuses heavily on conflicts as metaphors for real life.

Mary fits so much better in that framework, and introducing her as a developed, flawed person works really well with the narrative. It is easy for us to care about Mary, both as the dead perfect mother on the pedestal and as the flawed, human woman who could not live up to her sons’ expectations. That connection is built into the core of SPN, and was developed over years, even before she was a character. When she was added, she was given depth and nuance organically, and treated as a flawed, complex character rather than as a plot device or a contrivance. She was given a voice and independence, and became a powerful metaphor for developing new understandings of our parents in adulthood, as well as an interesting and well-rounded character. You care that she’s dead, not just because Sam and Dean are sad, but for the loss of her development and the potential she offered. So, in that sense, I think a lot of people were frustrated that she died essentially fridged for a second time, and especially in service of the arc of a weaker character.

And like, you’re right, no one can figure out if Jack is a toddler or a teenager. He’s both and he’s neither, because he’s never anything consistently and his character arc is always “whatever the plot needs it to be.” Every episode is different. Is he Dean’s sunny opportunity to be a parent and make up for his dad’s shitty parenting? Yes! Is he also Dean’s worst failure and a reminder that he has done many horrible things, including to “innocent” children? Yes! Is he Cas’s child? Yes! Is he Dean’s child? Yes! But also, no! Is he Sam’s child? Yes! Is he a lonely teenager who does terrible things? Yes! Is he a totally innocent little lamb who doesn’t get why what he is doing is wrong? Yes! Is he the most powerful being in the universe? Yes! Does he need everyone to take care of him? Yes! Is he just along for the ride? Yes! Is he responsible for his actions? Kinda??? Sometimes??? What is he???

Mary as a character is narratively cohesive and fleshed-out. Jack is a mishmash of confusing whatever’s that all add up to a frustrating plot device with no consistent traits to latch on to. Everything that fans like about him (cute outfits, gender play, well-developed parental bonds with the characters) is fanon. So, yes, the narrative prioritizes Mary. Many fans prioritize Mary, at least enough that Dean’s most heinous acts barely register. To the narrative (not to Cas, which is a totally different situation), Jack is only barely more of a character than Emma Winchester, who Sam killed without uproar seasons earlier. He’s been around longer, but he’s equally not really real.

I debated on responding to this because, to tell the truth, I think we fundamentally disagree on a number of subjects and, as they say, true insanity is arguing with anyone on the internet. However, you spent a lot of time on the above and I feel it's only fair to say my thoughts, even if I don't believe it will sway you any more than what you said changed my opinions.

I'm assuming this was in response to this post regarding how Jack's accidental killing of Mary was treated so severely by the brothers, particularly Dean, because it was Mary and, had it been a random character like the security guard in 13x06, it would have been treated far differently. However, then the argument becomes less about the reaction of the Winchester brothers to this incident and more the value of Jack or Mary to the audience.

I believe we need to first admit that both characters are inherently archetypes—Mary as the Madonna character initially then, later, as a metaphor for how imperfect and truly human our parents are compared to the idol we have as children, and Jack as the overpowered child who is a Jesus allegory by the end. Both have a function within the story to serve the Winchester brothers, through whose lens and with whose biases we are meant to view the show's events. We also need to admit that the writers didn't think more than a season ahead for either character, especially since it wasn't initially supposed to be Mary that came back at the end of season 11 but John, and they only wrote enough for Jack in season 13 to gauge whether or not the audience would want him to continue on or if he needed to be killed off by the end of the season. Now, I know we curate our own experiences online which leads to us being in our own fandom echo chambers, however it is important to note that the character was immediately successful enough with the general audience that, after his first episode or two, he was basically guaranteed a longer future on the show.

I have to admit, I’m not entirely sure why the perspective of how his character is processed by some audience members versus others has any bearing on the argument that he deserved to be treated better overall by the other characters especially when taking their own previous actions in mind. I’m not going to tell you that your opinion is wrong regarding your feelings for Jack. It’s your opinion and you’re entitled to it, it harms no one to have it and express it. My feelings on Jack are clearly very different from your own, but this is really just two different people who processed a fictional person in different ways. I personally believe he has a purpose in the Winchesters’ story, including Castiel’s, as he reflects certain aspects of all of them, gives them a way to explore their own histories through a different perspective, and changes the overall dynamic of Team Free Will from “soldiers in arms” to a family (Misha’s words). In the beginning he allows Sam to work through his past as the “freak” and powerful, dangerous boy wonder destined to bring hell on earth. With Dean, his presence lets Dean work through his issues with John and asks whether he will let history repeat itself or if he’ll work to break the cycle. Regarding Cas, in my opinion he helps the angel reach his “final form” of a father, member of a family, lover and protector of humanity, rebellious son, and the true show of free will.

From strictly the story, he has several arcs that work within themes explored in Supernatural, such as the argument of nature versus nurture, the question of what we’re willing to give up in order to protect something or someone else and how ends justify the means, and the struggle between feeling helpless and powerless versus the corruptive nature of having too much power and the dangerous lack of a moral compass. His goals are mentioned and on display throughout his stint on the show, ones that are truly relatable to some viewers: the strong desire to belong—the need for family and what you’ll do to find and keep it.

With Mary, we first need to establish whether the two versions of her were a writing flaw due to the constant change in who was dictating her story and her relationship to the boys, which goes against the idea that her characterization was cohesive and fleshed-out but, rather, put together when needed for convenience, or if they both exist because, as stated above, we are seeing the show primarily through the biased lens of the Winchester brothers and come to face facts about the true Mary as they do. Like I said in my previous post, I don’t dislike Mary and I don’t blame her for her death (either one). However, I do have a hard time seeing her as a more nuanced, fleshed-out character than Jack. True, a lot of her problems are more adult in nature considering she has to struggle with losing her sons’ formative years and meeting them as whole adults she knows almost nothing about, all because of a choice she made before they were born.

However, her personal struggles being more “mature” in nature (as they center primarily on parental battles) doesn’t necessarily mean her story has layers and Jack’s does not. They are entirely different but sometimes interconnected in a way that adds to both of their arcs, like Mary taking Jack on as an adoptive son which gives her the moments of parenting she lost with Sam and Dean, and Jack having Mary as a parental figure who understands and supports him gives him that sense of belonging he had just been struggling with to the point of running away while he is also given the chance to show “even monsters can do good”.

I’d also argue that Jack being many ages at once isn’t poor writing so much as a metaphor for how, even if you’re forced to grow up fast, that doesn’t mean you’re a fully equipped adult. I don’t want to speak for anyone else, but I believe Jack simultaneously taking a lot of responsibility and constantly trying to prove to others he’s useful while having childish moments is relatable to some who were forced to play an adult role at a young age. He proves a number of times that he doesn’t need everyone to take care of him, but he also has limited life experience and, as such, will make some mistakes while he’s also being a valuable member of the group. Jack constantly exists on a fine line in multiple respects. Some may see that as a writing flaw but it is who the character was conceived to be: the balance between nature or nurture, between good and evil, between savior and devil.

Now, I was also frustrated Mary was “fridged” for a second time. It really provided no other purpose than to give the brothers more man pain to further the plot along. However, this can exist while also acknowledging that the way it happened and the subsequent fallout for Jack was also unnecessary and a sign of blatant hypocrisy from Dean, primarily, and Sam.

And, yes, Jack can be different things at once because, I mean, can’t we all? If Mary can be both the perfect mother and the flawed, independent, distant parent, can’t Jack be the sweet kid who helps his father-figures process their own feelings on fatherhood while also being a lost young-adult forcing them to face their failures? Both characters contain multitudes because, I mean, we all do.

I can provide articles or posts on Jack’s characterization and popularity along with Mary’s if needed, but for now I think this is a long enough ramble on my thoughts and feelings. I’m happy to discuss more, my messenger is always open for (polite) discussion. Until then, I’m going to leave it at we maybe agree to disagree.

#long post #long ask #so long answer #guys it's 1 am #i hope this made sense #watch me read this after sleep and register things i wish i said #oh well #jack kline #mary winchester #spn #supernatural #spn critical #supernatural critical #kinda?#eh just in case #spn meta #supernatural meta #jack meta

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im-the-punk-who · 3 years

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@rnmmarchformeta Day 1: Tonight’s theme is: Themes

Malex and Music: Tracing a relationship through music used in the show - Part 1

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Given that both Michael and Alex have a personal connection to music, I wanted to go over some of the intricacies of what the music choices and lyrics/stories behind the songs used might tell us about Malex. The music choices in Roswell New Mexico are deliberate and often incredibly pointed. Particularly in the case of Michael and Alex there are elements of their relationship that are not so much underlined as written about only in the lyrical choices that play under their scenes. This choice for me made rewatching the series a lot of fun because as I discovered the lyrics to some of the more obscure song choices I kept discovering new intricacies and motivations for each of their decisions. Below the cut for length.

(Author’s note circa 2007: (rawr xD) I’m focusing specifically on the parts of these songs that play over or in direct correlation to scenes where Michael and Alex are both present. I would love to explore this theme in the wider context of the whole show and how their interactions with other characters might change some of these but...this is already like 6k and that’s just how the peas and carrots cooked. That said I will be referencing other characters and relationships as relevant, particularly, I will be talking at some length about Milexa and the airstream scenes in 2x06. I personally have a favorable reading of the scenes and what they mean for Michael and Alex. I also talk briefly about Milexa in a few other spots - they’ve been marked as ‘Milexa’ or ‘Miluca’ if you wish to skip them, although I don’t know if this will make sense as a whole without them. But, should you wish. Proceed accordingly. <3)

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Posted on AO3 here.

Sedona - Houndstooth (1x01)

The first song we hear in relation to Malex is ‘Sedona’ by Houndstooth. The song plays during the reunion as we see Alex confront Michael about the chemicals found around his airstream. The verse that plays underneath the scene references how, due to its scenic beauty, the town of Sedona was once a highly sought after filming location but had fallen into obscurity when cowboy movies went out of style in the late 70′s.

Similarly, Alex tells Michael that he is ‘wasting his life.’

“Does the macho cowboy swagger thing ever get old for you?”

“Did it get old for you?”

For me, this scene is as much an introduction to the past between these two as their present. Gone but not forgotten, their interactions are a ‘script’ that the two of them play off of. In other words, Michael and Alex don’t so much interact as play off of what the other expects from the other. This becomes especially clear when in 2x05 we learn that Alex has at least once before warned Michael about ‘wasting his life.’

When The Truth Hunts You Down - Sam Tinnesz (1x01)

The next scene is this one, in which we see Alex contemplating an old picture of himself. We then see Michael watching him.

Later, the last line is overlaid with Jesse telling Kyle about the existence of aliens.

The truth about Michael’s alienness is quiet literally hunting them, but so is something about Alex’s past. As we get to know him, we learn just how much his father is interconnected with all of the worst moments in his life and everrything he has buried and tried to run from in order to avoid it. Michael, Roswell itself - Alex ran halfway across the world to try to run away from the trauma of his youth, and yet here he is.

“Nostalgia’s a bitch, huh?”

“You know I thought when I got back from Iraq you would be long gone.”

“Is that what you want?”

“We’re not kids anymore. What I want doesn't matter.”

We also find out something of the nature of his and Michael’s relationship and that there are clearly still feelings between them - no matter how much Alex is trying to deny it.

Give Me The Night - Des Rocs (1x02)

This is one of my personal faves from the Malex soundtracks. It just *slaps* okay?

Aside from the obvious nod to Michael’s alienness, this song underscores the divide still between Michael and Alex despite the passionate kiss they shared at the reunion. Michael is initially flirtatious and full of swagger - until Alex shuts him down.

The fallacy of Alex’s rebuke and his dismissal of the feelings behind the kiss are underscored by his refusal to even look Michael in the eye as they talk. Even if he tries to deny them, the truth of his feelings hunts and haunts him because he feels he can never act on his own desires. And in turn when presented with the about face, Michael turns bitter as the push-pull is reinitiated. Michael falls back to the script they’ve been rehashing to save his feelings - ‘puts on a show’ as it were, and Alex falls for it hook, line, and sinker. He is still unwilling or unable to see the truth that lies beneath the surface.

“Isn’t there some law about building on a historical site?”

“A historical - oh you mean because the UFO crashed here? Yeah, we’re not supposed to build on Santa’s workshop either.”

For Michael, who at least to me was obviously hoping things would change this time around, this must feel like a bucket of cold water, especially in the face of Liz Ortecho’s knowledge and seeming easy acceptance of the aliens’ existence. While Max might get his happy ending, Michael is left to keep hiding from the person he loves, never being seen and wondering if Alex’s feelings are even real.

Two Princes - Spin Doctors (1x02) (Miluca)

In rapid fire we have the next three songs as Michael and Alex spend some time at the Wild Pony. This verse plays under the interaction when Alex comes in the bar and spots Michael.

“Though he got kinda hot. In a ‘sex in a truck, smells like a river, never introduce him to your mama’ kind of way.”

“I hadn’t noticed.”

My boy. My child. My bluntest instrument in the tool kit. Has no one ever told Alex Manes that saying you hadn’t noticed an objectively hot guy is hot is basically code for ‘I haven’t stopped staring at him since I walked in and my brain is not functioning at a high enough level to mask that fact’? Son, please, this is a drunk Wendy’s.

(Also this is huge foreshadowing for Miluca - Michael and Maria don’t have sex *in* a truck but it’s pretty close, we find out later that Michael/the aliens smell like rain, and she tells him he’s not meeting her mother at one point. The angle of this shot is also, for me at least, a hint that Michael is going to become the object of these two ‘princes’ affections, at some point.)

Anyway this is basically poking fun at Alex Manes, repressed disaster, for having no clue what love is and trying to express his affection through like, everything except anything anyone would understand as romantic love. (And we will see this in the flashbacks as well as present day - that Alex mostly uses his station or advantages as a way to show the people he loves he loves them, rather than using words. When he offers Michael the shed, brings him the guitar, uses his military connections to find out about Michel’s mom, hacks into Maria’s computer...listen I got more.) But that isn’t enough, as we’re learning. If only there were some way Alex could also learn that lesson.

And seriously, “This one said he wants to buy you rockets?”

How’s It Going To Be? - Stephen Edwards (1x02)

“Is there really nobody in this world that you wouldn’t risk everything to save? Sad.”

Oh Isobel, if only you knew.

So, aside from returning the kiss Michael initiated at the reunion, Alex has soundly rejected every advance Michael has made for a relationship. Despite that Michael seems to have been harboring some hope that things might be different not that Alex is back more permanently. But now with Isobel bringing into question what he’s willing to sacrifice, I think he might be realizing that toll has been extremely steep already.

(Also truly obsessed with how both Alex and Michael have positioned themselves so that they can casually glance over at each other without arousing suspicion. *Boys*. It’s not that complicated what is this middle school?)

We know that Michael doesn’t like having to keep secrets, and again I have to wonder if he’s regretting not telling Alex he’s an alien, or wondering how that conversation would have gone.

From the previous scenes we can tell something in their relationship is coming to a head - maybe Michael is hoping it’s that he can finally stop keeping secrets from Alex and show Alex who he really is - that Alex will stop misreading him. That Alex will change.

But there is also the expectation that if that happens, Alex will likely leave again. Not just because that’s what Alex’s trauma makes him do, but also because that is how Michael frames all of his relationships. As ‘until you leaves’. He is shown to have a habit of catastrophizing because he doesn’t believe himself to ‘belong’ anywhere(HA) and this is one of those times we’re shown that.

Come With Me - Gold Star (1x02)

“Home can be a person.”

And here we have Alex “thinking about who he was” as Maria closes up the bar. Given where this scene leads with him and Michael, I think the rest of the lyrics to the song are incredibly poignant.

Tell me what were you dreaming? Tell me who were you trying to reach? Gimme something real to believe in Or gimme a reason to leave So i left her standing under shining stars in the Silver moonlight by old Borough Hall - whoever you are

We know that after this evening Alex attempts to rekindle his relationship with Michael, still thinking about who he was, and maybe for the first time trying not to run from what he wants. He’ll be unsuccessful this time, but it’s the first clue that Alex is attempting to break a pattern that has held him in place for ten years.

While he may have been misreading Michael’s stunted growth, we’re starting to see Alex contemplate change in himself. This is the start of Alex’s two season long journey to break out of the fortress he’s built around himself. To ‘put his weapons down’ in an effort to be with Michael.

(She lets her guard down on her way back//to close her eyes and fall asleep - “It was late....I was tired.”)

God of Wine - Third Eye Blind

So clearly the writers were like ‘how can we hurt Milo specifically’ because these lyrics are *so good* as we hear malex talk about the way they view their relationship for the first time in the show.

The music starts just as Michael picks up the old photographs, first of the pod squad, then of himself and Alex playing guitars in the desert. As he packs up the airstream to move it off Foster’s Ranch, Michael is also thinking about the past.

Throughout the series, we’re given a bunch of musical lines about how Michael and Alex can’t go back to what they were, that they have to move forward. And it’s true - as we’ll see over and over again the dynamic they’ve had has been incredibly unhealthy for both of them. But they also cannot avoid the other’s orbit. And when Alex comes to talk to Michael it’s the first time we see him actually decide to initiate - to try and take what he himself wants, rather than waiting or hiding from it. But it is also very much Alex falling back into the ‘madness that holds a truth he can’t erase’ of Michael’s really, very, super, incredibly obvious feelings for him. Our boy is not subtle.

But Alex is still hunted by the past - before we know his history we assume that when Alex references ‘who he was before he went to war’ he means Iraq. But Alex’s war is his father. As much as combat can absolutely be a traumatizing experience, for Alex I never really read that as his main source. As he’ll tell Forrest later - “My PTSD triggers are a little more complicated”.

And so when he tells Michael he’s been thinking about who he was “before he went to war” for me that’s more a callback to who he was before Jesse found the two of them in the toolshed. “When this started.”

As Michael tells him “From where I stand nothing’s changed” the words “I know, I know, I know” repeat in the background because WE KNOW. We all know, except Alex.

“And that’s a problem for me, Guerin.”

And the siren’s song that is your madness

“Because every time you look at me, I’m seventeen all over again.”

holds a truth I can’t erase

“- and I forget that the last ten years even happened. And then you look away and I remember all over again. And it almost kills me every time.”

All alone on your face

“I never look away. Not really.”

For Michael this is basically confirmation of what he’s been realizing over the last few days - that Alex has been totally misreading him and that yes, Michael, you’re going to have to use your words on this one.

To which we see Alex’s brain 404-blue-screen for a minute as he realizes what Michael means. Which I personally really appreciate.

And especially since we’ve just learned that a lyric of this song was written on Rosa’s hand the night she died, I can’t believe it’s a coincidence in this being the song that plays underneath this scene - where Alex says he was thinking about who he was before. Everything changed that day for everyone - including Michael and Alex. Michael had gained a terrible secret he couldn’t share, that meant he changed his whole life and started needing to hide and lie and act out, and Alex - not knowing the truth - assumed that it was Michael’s way of trying to push him away and end the relationship. Which leads to the decades long miscommunication of Alex seeing Michael do that over and over again.

For the last ten years, Alex has been seeing Michael as the boy who looks away, then looks back. A Michael whose focus shifts to and away from him and who he sees as wasting his life; directionless and aimless. But as he realizes what Michael is saying he has to recalibrate everything he’s thought their relationship is.

This is possibly the first time Alex has realized that his view of Michael has been wrong. That he really doesn’t know Michael at all.

And we know this interaction has a profound impact on Alex in terms of how he views their relationship. I feel like this is one of those things that becomes a mantra for Alex, later down the line. He repeats it to Michael at Caulfield, and in his song as well, “You never looked away, now I won’t look away” to express his commitment to breaking down the walls he has built up for himself.

Even though we know the relationship is doomed at this point, it’s the first time a stone falls from the walls Alex has built around himself in a decade.

Here - Chance Peña - 1x03 (Alternate title: “Home”)

Okay I would like to petition to make it illegal to have unreleased songs in episodes, Chance Peña help a bitch out. I had to watch a *fish show* to hear the full lyrics because they’re edited in the show! ( I will also note the next lyric is ‘goodbye, my dear’ which. rude.)

Anyway, we’re given these lyrics as Michael wakes up to seeing Alex has stayed the night. I took the editing, with the previous song choices, to be a reaffirmation of this being something new to Alex, but not necessarily to Michael. Michael knows what he wants from a relationship with Alex - even if he’s put the hope aside from time to time the want is always clear.

For Alex though, a relationship with Michael is something that scares him because of his fear that it can be taken away. (”I just thought that I could be happy, and not be afraid that if I loved anything my dad would destroy it.”) He is trying to make it work - “drawing near” to Michael - but he knows that in order to do that he is going to need to be uncomfortable. To face the fears that have held him back and kept him in comfortable limbo for so long.

I’m also going to flail about how, while RNM has the song listed as ‘Here’, the producer of the other show(Battlefish) identified the song as ‘Home’. I hope I don’t have to yell at y’all, other Roswell New Mexico fans, about how often that word has snuck up on me and knifed me in the back regarding malex. Especially since Alex *is* currently - well, here. With his home. Kill me please it would be kinder.

But then of course we see the old insecurities pop up again as Isobel arrives. Even if he is trying - Alex is nowhere near ready to jump out of the closet yet.

Fast Aint Good Enough - Inkwell Echo (1x06)

I debated adding this one because it’s a little bit reachy, but I thought it was significant in that even when they were seventeen, the thing Alex is ‘afraid of’ is his feelings for Michael - not necessarily of being gay but of what people like Kyle and his father do with information like that.

Wish I’d found the words when we were seventeen-

Kyle asks

“What are you so afraid of?”

-just as Alex catches sight of Michael.

(“I wanted to be the kind of person who won battles. It felt good.”)

Aside from Alex’s general need to protect Michael in any and all situations, I feel like the lyrics of this song - about the singer’s attempt to leave an abusive relationship - underscore that even before the toolshed, Alex was fighting. Even before the toolshed, he has been fighting to this cycle he is trapped in.

While he and Michael build their relationship he starts thinking seriously about leaving and not just surviving but he will ultimately choose to trap himself for years in order to hide his love for Michael.

Like so many gay kids, Alex is fighting a system that deems him guilty of sin - and takes his fighting back as a sign of his guilt. And in order to actually be able to love Michael, he is going to have to figure out how to put down the weapons and the hurt and break the cycle.

First Day Of My Life - Bright Eyes (1x06)

Are they serious right now I swear to god.

So obviously, we’ve got the origins for everything we’re told about Michael and Alex’s lives changing based on their feelings for each other in like two and a half verses of song. Forget the entire second season we have everything we need right here.

“It was the first time I liked our hometown, though.”

“Alex made me believe there was a place for me here.”

We know that for both of them this is really a moment of self discovery as much as it is a discovery about each other.

For Michael in particular, who doesn’t know why he’s here or who he really is, and who previously had no plans besides leaving the planet, this is the moment that he realizes what he wants - to be with Alex.

And for Alex, to me, this moment is a brief glimpse into what his life could be like. We don’t have any confirmation if Michael is his first kiss with a boy or not, but we do know that this moment is significant in that it’s the first that makes Roswell feel like a place he enjoys being.

And as he is realizing that, the lyrics echo it -

But I realized that I need you // And I wondered if I could come home

(Screeching from the background: WOULD YOU COME HOME)

But of course, as the song says, these things take forever because...well....

(It’s because Alex is dumb. My poor dumb emotionally stunted child. Please go to therapy.)

In essence, this is the moment that sets Michael and Alex on their entwined path. The path that Alex will have to fight to get back to - the path Michael will lose faith in before he later starts to regain the hope that it exists. I also like to think about the link between the last lines:

Remember the time you drove all night // Just to meet me in the morning?

and the line from ‘Would You Come Home’

Would you meet me in the middle // Could we both stop keeping score?

I like to think about the parallel here, about meeting people where they’re at, and the love and care and effort it takes to be willing to drive all night to meet someone. Listen a bitch is soft and gay don’t look at me.

You Can’t Love Me - Novi & Tyler Blackburn (1x12)

(*Whispers and rocks back and forth* this is fine it’s all fine)

Once again we have a song whose lyrics give us a tailor made road map to Malex, and will pop up later in ‘Would You Come Home’. We’ve already seen the implosion of the way Michael and Alex have been orbiting each other for a decade, but now that Alex knows the truth, he actually has the ability to understand Michael in ways he hasn’t been able to before. (Something we’ll see later in Season 2 when he talks with Maria.)

And because of that, we see the true beginning of the journey of Michael and Alex back to one another in a healthier way.

But part of that journey is going to be realizing that what they’ve been doing and the way they have loved each other in the past isn’t sustainable - and maybe isn’t even the way they want to love each other.

“They’re my family, Alex!”

“Alright, maybe! But you are mine. I don’t look away, Guerin.”

“No. We’ve been holding onto this thing. And it’s gotten us nowhere. Just let it go.”

Even though the words are said in anger, there is some truth to what Michael says. Their relationship so far hasn’t been a good one. Where Alex is trying to repeat the words that Michael said to him that made such an impact on him, Michael is (well, a, trying to save his dumb boyfriend from getting flambayed) using the opportunity to reveal how little faith he has in their relationship. To say that no, this doesn’t feel like love.

But as much as the song lyrics are about loving someone who isn’t good for you, they’re also about changing and growing, and about a commitment to be better.

(Sound familiar? Brb, I’m gonna go jump off a cliff.)

Love is messy, and especially for Michael and Alex, love has always been something that hurts. “Home is where the hurt is” - and a really important part of their journey is realizing that, and realizing there is a different way of loving each other.

Additionally for Alex, this is when he starts to realize the full extent of his family’s involvement in hunting and hurting Michael’s family. It isn’t just his dad - his entire family line has been involved in this since before Alex was born. And still is. This is really where he starts realizing the roots of the guilt and shame he’s going to have to deal with in order to be anything to Michael - not even a partner but a friend.

This is the first step in that journey. Not just the commitment that yes - I want to build a home for you - but that first, I don’t know, maybe I need to put down these weapons and pick up a different set of tools?

ON TO SEASON TWO

#rnmmarchformeta2021 #roswellmarchformeta2021 #rnm meta #Alex/Michael #alex manes #michael guerin #maria deluca #sort of? shes mentioned #1x01 #1x02 #1x03 #all episodes #Day 1 Themes #meta #malex #tw ptsd #tw injury #tw queerbashing #tw flashbacks

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mylordshesacactus · 3 years

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1, 3, 15 and 23 for the askmeme?

What themes would you like to write about that you feel don’t get explored very often?

Hmm. See, I feel like it’s fairly self-evident from my writing what themes I care about and want to explore, and since 99% of that writing is already embarrassingly niche, it goes without saying that I don’t think those themes get enough love XD

Found family is, thankfully, a very popular trope. The slightly more niche themes that I enjoy exploring are...hmm. How to phrase this.

The (inherent eroticism of the) loyal lieutenant trope; that not only is it okay to not want to lead, but that people can want to be a natural second-in-command without feeling resentful or having that itch of ambition. That being the loyal, quiet support and standing back and watching someone you trust implicitly lead can be what you aspired to in the first place.

The idea of kindness and respect being about what the other person needs to feel safe, not what feels right to do.

The bright, dramatic, larger-than-life fantasy realm is primarily populated by ordinary people. This does not have to be a “deconstruction” or “commentary” on fantasy tropes or on the larger-than-life canon characters; they can and should coexist, because they’re part of the same world.

Asskicking =/= authority. Authority =/= leadership. Leadership in its purest form is soft-spoken and sure, with nothing to prove and no need to posture. Authority only requires certainty that the people under your command can be trusted to do their jobs. Leadership requires certainty that the people under your command can be trusted, fully and completely.

Animals Don’t Work Like That, Actually

Canine Body Language Is Completely Different From That, Actually, You’re Thinking Of Cats.

Loyalty requires you to challenge the people you love outright. Anyone worthy of real loyalty might be angry at first, but will ultimately trust you more as a result.

True love means trusting one another to do the right thing, and knowing for a fact that the other person will not betray their greater responsibilities for your sake no matter how much it hurts them. Anything less is not love; it’s selfish obsession.

What loves do you tend to write about?

Oops I kind of gave that one away with #1 huh. Well, a quick summary then: Agape, philia, storge, pragma, are going to feature most heavily.

Which isn’t to say there’s less of eros. And if you’ve read my smut you know I LOVE playfulness in sex and romantic relationships; all intense passion is exhausting, you should be able to laugh together, and honestly it’s healthy to still have the hallmarks of ludus show up sometimes. Especially when my faves have such fucking awful lives, letting them just kind of...be grinning, giggly young women who like each other a lot is nice.

Mania (as in, the term for obsessive love in the Greek tradition and not like, the psychological condition) is such an intensely terrifying and deeply unpleasant force--writing it makes me feel so dirty--that it doesn’t show up very often if at all. It’s always an antagonist, if it does, because it’s so incompatible with love.

And all my fanfic faves are like no philautia we hate ourselves like wlws.

What physical quirks do your characters tend to have?

Oooo, I LIKE this one.

This is pretty clearly OCs, since with fanfic characters I at least TRY to just accurately recreate what their physical quirks onscreen seem to be. So, my OCs...

One linguistic quirk that I like to give to OCs is an oddly specific one--you can get a LOT of characterization into a small package by creating characters who are extremely laconic--writing their dialogue by trying to get across their idea in as few words as you possibly can, and using body language for the rest. The most recent version of this is my WoW character Talet, who I actually write as mostly nonverbal. In her case, this is the result of long-term isolation and partially due to trauma; she can and does speak, but she communicates mostly through lupine nonverbal signals to the point where her ward (officially her “apprentice” but in practice, her adopted daughter) openly describes herself as Talet’s “translator”.

I also have a weakness for characters with extremely still body language; not necessarily stiff or tense, just....still. No fidgeting or wasted movement. And for characters who can be described as soft-spoken--often as surprisingly soft-spoken, like my blunt and impolite mule handler with a low, rough voice...who has a completely contradictory tone, very gentle, very calm. Only with her beasts, of course. Or trauma victims. Or children. Or--

Do you prefer reading series or standalone novels and does that reflect on how you write?

Oh that’s also a good one. I like both! Honestly, SHOCKING information from a fanfic author--I love stories that set up a unique and interesting universe with like...rules? Especially when that universe feels bigger than the one story we get to see in it.

And I’m a sucker for the IDEA of spinoffs, I’d normally adore big sprawling universes that allow for lots of stories to be told in the same basic world. It’s a shame that expanded universes get so bloated and that the writing gets so bad--and I think a major failing of that format is that they so quickly lose sight of the POINT of an expanded universe and try to make every goddamn thing interconnected. The whole POINT is that you can just....read or watch the stories that appeal to you, and while knowing other stories might enrich that experience not knowing them doesn’t detract from it.

(Discworld. The perfect model for how to do this is Discworld. Not interested in the Watch? Cool, here’s a pile of books about other characters. Not interested in Granny Weatherwax? Cool, have fun being wrong but also have fun reading all these witch-free books while doing it. Not interested in Death? Tough shit and have I got news for you about the degree to which not being interested in Death affects its presence in your life, but you don’t have to read books ABOUT Death.)

However, I do have a firm policy about series, and ESPECIALLY about the first book in a series: Cliffhangers are cheating, and they’re weak writing, and they’re only allowed if they’re setting up the actual finale.

(It’s a mark in Rise Of Kyoshi’s favor that I didn’t....entirely....mind the cliffhanger because the rest of the book was so good. And since the Kyoshi novels are a duology, it’s TECHNICALLY allowable)

You CANNOT use a cliffhanger at the end of your first book. That’s a horrible sign in the author’s faith in their own story. If this is your FIRST IMPRESSION, and you don’t think the story you told is good enough, you don’t think your world and your characters are compelling enough, to get me to come back without straight up leaving the story unfinished in order to make me come back if I want to find out basic information?

Cool. You’re probably right. I don’t care anymore.

Your first installment HAS to stand on its own. The penultimate book can end on a cliffhanger if you really must, because at that stage in the plot it’s normal to assume there’s lots of things happening quickly, and it feels like less of a cheap trick; if I got four books into a five-book series, or two-thirds of the way through a trilogy, I was probably already planning to come back for the finale. But the first installment has to tell its own story, whole and entire, or I’m probably not gonna care enough to stick around.

Open endings are not the same as cliffhangers. Open endings are great.

So, yeah. A well-written standalone novel and a well-written series are basically the same, and the initial book in a series at least should also serve as a well-written standalone novel in the first place!

#askmeme #natsu-tigre

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studiesof-fandom-primaryblog · 3 years

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The Journal of Fandom Studies

Volume 2, Number 1, 1 April 2014

Moving forward looking back by Katherine Larsen Editorial

Tracing Textual Poachers: Reflections on the development of fan studies and digital fandom by Lucy Bennett [Independent researcher]

In 1992 Henry Jenkins’ influential work, Textual Poachers, was published, which contributed towards igniting the establishment of the fan studies field of research and re-morphing previous restrictive depictions of media fans. This article traces the work’s influence on my own steps as an early career researcher in the field and how it shaped my ideas and approach to scholarship. Speaking more broadly, it assesses the current state of the fan studies field, and how things have developed since Jenkins’ text was released. I reflect on what general fluxes, concerns and dimensions are currently with us, through a lens of the themes raised in Textual Poachers, most especially surrounding the development of technology and social media, methods in the field and fans’ relations with texts, assessing to what degree we have moved forward, or remained in stasis within fan studies scholarship. This study argues that technological advances have impacted on and shaped four key, often interconnected, areas of fandom and enquiry: (1) communication, (2) creativity, (3) knowledge and (4) organizational and civic power. Overall, this article shows how Textual Poachers is an invaluable source to measure the field and landscape of fandom, and determine the extent to which it has seemingly leaped forward.

‘I’m a Lawyer, Not an Ethnographer, Jim’: Textual Poachers and fair use by Rebecca Tushnet [Georgetown University Law Center]

Henry Jenkins’ Textual Poachers (1992) remains an important text for many reasons. I will focus on its importance as a text that, while not in any way lacking in complexity, clearly and accessibly brings forth the positive aspects of fandom cultures and creativity. This is vital for very practical reasons: there are many institutions and copyright owners who believe that fandom should be owned – by them, and not by fans. In this context, Jenkins’ arguments form a key part of the case for continued, robust fair use doctrines that allow fans to make the things that they love to make.

Doctor Who’s textual commemorators: Fandom, collective memory and the self-commodification of fanfac by Matt Hills [Aberystwyth University]

Following ‘first wave’ fan studies and the seminal Textual Poachers (1992) by Jenkins, much scholarly work has focused on fan fiction or fanfic. This article argues that an alternative genre of fan writing – the autobiographical account of fan memory/experience – forms part of media fandom’s ‘textual productivity’. Defining this as fanfac (reflexively produced fact or faction, often shaped to entertain fellow fans), I examine this mode of commemorative fan writing in relation to a case study of the British SF TV series Doctor Who (BBC, 1963–89, 1996, 2005–). Drawing on prior work in memory studies, I consider how fans’ memories provide a resource that can be self-commodified and sold back to the fan culture, thus making fanfac very different to the typical social relations surrounding fanfic. Fans’ production of textual memories can be thought of as a form of ‘banal commemoration’, which Doctor Who fans themselves auto-commodify within the ‘commemoration industry’ surrounding this TV series that celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2013. More so than ‘textual poachers’ creating fanfic, sections of UK and US Who fandom can be theorized instead as ‘textual commemorators’ producing fanfac, which contributes to, and sometimes contests, the fandom’s collective memory.

Fan studies: Grappling with an ‘Undisciplined’ discipline by Sam Ford [Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Western Kentucky University]

As part of the Journal of Fandom Studies exploration of the field more than 20 years after the publication of Henry Jenkins’ Textual Poachers (which has been widely cited as one of the first major works paving the way for this area of study), this piece looks back at Textual Poachers’ approach to studying fandom, examines the dialogue that has taken place within fan studies over the past six years, and raises areas of consideration for fan studies to consider in the years ahead. In particular, the piece advocates for the need to continue to evolve the types of fandoms explored by fan studies scholars; to challenge ourselves to examine the field’s tendency to prioritize some forms of active audience engagement over others based on the media format or level of technical mastery the audience uses or the type of media text on which the engagement is focused; and to further explore what more widespread interest in, acceptance of, and adoption of the model of engagement from fandom means for our field.

Fuck yeah, Fandom is Beautiful by Francesca Coppa [Muhlenberg College]

First-wave ethnographic work in fan studies, especially that of Henry Jenkins, Camille Bacon-Smith, Constance Penley, Roberta Pearson and John Tulloch, remains foundational to contemporary fan scholarship. Jenkins’ work in particular remains relevant for its ongoing commitment to fandom as a social identity and as a network; this contrasts sharply with the work of later scholars who see fandom as a matter of enthusiastic but individual engagement. It is important for fan scholars both to revisit and to emulate first-wave scholarship because the terms of the relationship between fans and the entertainment industry are being radically renegotiated. Fandom is increasingly understood to have economic and promotional value to content producers, and there is a danger that fandom-as-enthusiasm is being encouraged by producers even as fans are in danger of being alienated from their creative labour and from each other as a community.

Keywords: digital; fan studies; fandom; method; textual poachers; Henry Jenkins; activism; copyright; fair use; fanworks; Doctor Who; banal commemoration; commemoration industry; fan memories; self-commodification; textual productivity; affirmational fandom; engagement; fan studies; fanboy/fangirl; gender; pro wrestling; soap opera; cooptation; ethnography; fan labor; identity; network

#journal: jfs #text: academic paper #researcher: katherine larsen #researcher: lucy bennett #researcher: rebecca tushnet #researcher: matt hills #researcher: sam ford #researcher: francesca coppa

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avoutput · 4 years

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Final Fantasy VII Legacy || Nomura, Complex?

This is the 3rd out of 3 articles. Find the second here.

It’s time to get down to mythril tacks. At this point, I have talked about what this game meant to me when it was released and how it’s newest installment fared as a game. Finally, it’s time to talk about the impact the Remake has on what has unexpectedly become a robust and diverse universe. What does this mean for us at large, the players? This is a no-holds-barred SPOILER frenzy about anything and everything in the Squaresoft/Square-Enix pantheon. This means not just the games in the orbit of Final Fantasy VII, but the entire catalog at Square-Enix. To be honest, this is just the introduction, I don’t know if I even have an intent of going so far beyond the purview of the Remake, but in the spirit of the Final Fantasy gatekeeper, Tetsuya Nomura, I refuse to limit myself.

It’s been almost exactly a month since I started writing this article. It took so long to come back to this because I kept finding more and more content related to Final Fantasy 7 that I either forgot about or didn’t even know existed. On my own shelf sits Advent Children, Dirge of Cerberus, and Crisis Core. I decided to watch Advent Children immediately after beating Remake. As a movie fan and amateur critic, the film is littered with terrible film decisions and was clearly the work of people who spend much of their time penning and creating video game stories. It’s a series of cutscenes without a controller attached and at a certain point, you realize Advent Children was never meant for film fans, but for fans of the game. Specifically for fans desiring an epilogue and more directly fans of Cloud, Tifa, and Sephiroth. The story is almost unintelligible because there is tons of connective tissue left to be assumed by the viewer. It is at once too far removed from FF7 in both linear real time and in-game universe time to be recognizable, and simultaneously inexplicable in what has transpired and why. It takes a crack at explaining it from moment to moment, but largely, it looks like they were looking for excuses to push the characters to act. I am not trying to review the film but rather my intent is to create a modus opendai for the gatekeeper, Mr. Nomura. The more I learned about the world of FF7 that was being created over the years, the more it seemed to lean on the stylings of this one man. In a way, Nomura launched Squaresoft and himself into a whole new stratosphere of fame and broke all expectations. In my first article, I mentioned that for a certain generation of fans, it was the perfect storm, but I would later find out the cause of the storm was Nomura breaking open lightning in a bottle, releasing his brand of design on the world with a multi-million dollar international company backing him.

If I may, let me take a parallel series by the same creator infested by the meta of his own other original creations, namely Kingdom Hearts. In its inception, it looks like two producers at Square were trying to make a 3-D adventure platformer game with characters as popular as Mario, but only the biggest brand on earth, Disney, could possibly beat the king of platformers. Nomura was… walking by and pushed himself into the conversation, and they decided if they could do it, they would let him direct. (Read more here) Yada yada yada, Kingdom Hearts was created. While I can’t seem to find (and didn’t look too hard to find) proof, I can only imagine that with KH having a tenuous new relationship with big-corp Disney, they focused more on a simple game that was straightforward. KH is very much a disney product with a little bit of artificial Nomura sweetener. With its unbridled success, Nomura was unleashed. Kingdom Hearts 2 would go on to be, in my opinion, one of the most unintelligible video game stories ever inscribed to plastic discs. But the power of Nomura’s story-telling is that we all understand it differently. He creates bedrocks, little story islands of unshakable facts that are connected via a salty sea of undefinable liquid moments. Cast out to sea, rudderless and deprived, you try to bring to your mouth this brine only to be dehydrated faster than if you had just sailed the sea and died in the sun between fact islands or lived long enough to tell the tale. And that metaphor is my tribute to Nomura. Long, winding, hard to remember, and just clear enough that you think you got it, but you still have problems with its construction.

It has now been over two months since I have last visited this article. What is keeping me from continuing? The incomplete nature of my knowledge of Final Fantasy VII lore. Unlike the Kingdom Hearts sea, VII is like a series of interconnected caves, and the more you unearth the more you learn. And therein lies the problem. The Nomura-verse is composed of both his methods and his circumstances. His methods, we have discussed, but his circumstance is game development. Unlike movies or books, games obviously have an interactive capability, but they also have a variable development cycle. Some titles come out quickly, others span decades. They also consist of different teams, story writers, directors, and a myriad of producers. This in turn can make it much harder to make a solid universe, especially when new additions start off in a place where a continuous story was never meant to exist. Nomura is at once hindered and strengthened by his circumstances. He can’t tell a better story because the development cycle of his vision is variable, and success is based on sales and popularity. Without success, he can’t create a new addition, and often in games, the end is meant to tie the whole thing up. Were there to be a sequel, a whole new story is thought up and tacked on wherever it fits. Gamers are pretty forgiving of this concept. Still, at the same time, Nomura probably wouldn’t make a concise story because it's not his style. For comparison, see the Dark Souls series. A game that both has deep lore and an involving story, but at the same time, the game doesn’t require you to know a single point to continue moving forward. This is almost the antithesis of Nomura’s style. In Souls, they let the player decide to explore its story caves, but doesn’t confront them with it to continue advancing. This is a strength of video games. A strength that Nomura keeps using to his disadvantage.

Yet, Final Fantasy VII still excelled to unparalleled heights. It engages you in the same way all of the previous games in the series have, but with a slight departure on the strict fantasy theme, instead a merger with steampunk or semi-future. The series was changed forever, and so was gaming. Instead of doing the Dragon Quest method, expanding on the same universe design with different stories, Final Fantasy was emboldened to try completely random approaches with vector entries like VIII and X. For longtime fans, or fans of their original design, Every future title, MMO or Single Player, would go on to be successful, but not fully realized in their original context. Even the return to form in IX was much more playful than any of the original six entries. Gaming franchises have since become playgrounds for developers. Once they are accepted by fans, developers are emboldened and experiment with what would normally be a new IP, but instead use the financial shield of the famous namesake to move forward with new ideas. And in the case of Final Fantasy, when this concept of change works, it means that every numbered game becomes a wildcard. It’s a double edged sword for a gaming franchise that dates back to the 8-bit era. It has fans over 40 years old by this point and they may be willing to buy anything new. But this isn’t new to you and it isn’t a revelation for me. Final Fantasy VII Remake causes me to reckon with these demons I had buried years ago. It rips off a scab I thought had healed. I had given up on the past, a past where I was excited for a singular story, contained in a single universe, in a single title. I had given up on the glory years of Final Fantasy, but the Remake took me back and said, what if we told you everything you remember about the original was true, and everything we added after that was also true, even though you probably didn’t play it or even know it existed. Even if you do your very best, you probably won’t be able to track the story or interconnected characters if you aren’t in the know. It’s like joining a group of long time friends that are constantly referencing inside jokes, all of them just winking at each other, nudging you in the ribs and asking, “Do ya get it?” Truly, the Remake series thus far makes me feel lost at sea when what I wanted to feel like was coming home.

This retrospective has left me feeling broken. Based on the end of the FFVIIR, I sought out to reconcile all of the loose ends to all the connected media. However, spending time with the prequel Crisis Core for over around 40 hours, I realized this was a crapshoot. None of it mattered. It didn’t enrich the characters, it only made the story longer. It just added wibbly-wobbly, timey-whimey “facts” to an otherwise complete(ish) origin point. The FFVII universe can’t handle the weight that is put on it. It’s a faulty bridge over a treacherous pass. On the other hand, that same bridge for some is a point of excitement. You tread the boards, one by one, testing your weight, hoping to get to the other side intact. And I think that is why we keep trying these games and why they keep getting made. We don’t want the fun to end, despite the fact that it has nothing left for us to be excited by. It’s a closed loop that we keep looking for something new in. By the end of the Remake, we are somewhere between ⅓ or ½ way across the faulty bridge, dangling between where we have been and where it is taking us. At this point, I am too mentally exhausted from trying to make sense of it all. Yet I am incapable of not enjoying it, the mental somersaults one does to understand the interconnected mess that is Final Fantasy VII. It’s too dear to me. I got on the bridge for so many reasons, but the biggest one is to be on the other side with all of the other fans who dared to play and dared to complete the game. To be in the know, to wink across the room. I want to be in that hyper-critical utopia where we all have one thing in common: We played Final Fantasy VII in 1997. And we all have something to say about it.

#Article #Final Fantasy VII #Final Fantasy 7 #Final Fantasy VII Remake #Final Fantasy 7 Remake #Tetsuya Nomura #Yoshitaka Amano #Cloud #Tifa #Aerith #Nostalgia #Gaming #Kingdom Hearts #Squaresoft #Enix

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plumbobpost · 6 years

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Fan(fic) Friday: Spotlight on Peni Griffin

Sul sul!

Today, I have a special treat for you guys. I had the chance to ask the very delightful @penig a few questions about Widespot and The Sims in general. For those of you who aren’t familiar with her work, she has created two widely popular hoods for The Sims 2: Land Grant University and the aforementioned Widespot. It’s longer than usual, and Peni expressed the concern that it would needed to be edited down, but in all honesty, her responses were such a wealth of information, deleting any of it seemed wrong.

I’ll stop teasing you, and let Peni speak for herself:

What inspired you to create Widespot?

“I’m always in story creation mode. This has been a large part of the appeal of The Sims 2 for me, as it allows me to tell a particular kind of story that I will never, ever be able to write for publication, and have always wanted to: the story of a community in which we see every character as the hero of her own story, and how all the stories intertwine (often without the protagonists recognizing it) and affect each other as they all go about their business.”

“At the time I started Widespot, I was in a situation in which my normal professional outlets were not available to me. You will excuse me from going into detail on the subject, which can be summed up as Health Crap. For our purposes, the important thing was that I needed a project, I couldn’t work on a book, I had been thinking for some time about the potential of my favorite game as a storytelling medium, and enough discussion of the matter had been generated over at MTS that I found/was directed to the late lamented Mootilda’s thread on creating a clean, safe, populated neighborhood for sharing. ( http://modthesims.info/t/455403)”

“I actually went into some detail about the process on my writing blog at the time.”

( https://penigriffin.blogspot.com/2013/02/so-you-want-to-share.html )

Did you take inspiration from the Maxis neighborhoods?

“To a certain extent, yes. I decided that what I wanted to create was a neighborhood that would feel and play as if it had shipped with the game, but with less mess. No dead people without full character data, no memories that outright contradict each other, no hints in the bios that can’t be fully explored in the game.”

In your neighborhood, you included different story elements for each family that interconnect. What is your process in developing this story?

“Somewhere around here, I have the notebook in which I first started working it out, but I’d have to dig to find it. I remember starting with the admonition to myself to keep it simple, as your first attempt at publishing in a medium should be simple - you have enough to do mastering the new medium without trying to make something complicated with it. I knew my genre was soap opera, and though I’ve never been much of a soap watcher, my mother and husband are, so that set my parameters. I listed the tools at my disposal - the five base game aspirations, the jealousy mechanics, and the generational play. The question I asked myself at the start of the process was: “How do I create the most Drama for the least amount of effort?”

“Probably the notion of having five aspiration-themed households came almost at once, possibly as I started making name lists. I wanted to give elders a big role, because I had noticed that a lot of people thought elders were “boring,” and I knew they were wrong! I’ve always felt that Maxis missed a big trick by not having a Scheming Matriarch in Pleasantview. I wanted to shake up some stereotypes and have sims who didn’t obviously “belong” in their aspirations - shy Romance sims, outgoing Knowledge sims, lazy Fortune sims. I wanted all the households intimately connected to each other, which meant that for simplicity’s sake the story (story being defined as “person with a problem”) should center around one particular event that triggered events in all the households, a cascade of consequence. At which point I wrote down “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a fortune must be in want of a wife,” and decided that the wealthy Mann family coming to town with a highly marriageable son and a Dark Secret was a good place to start.”

“That turned out not to be the trigger, but you have to start somewhere.”

Aside from your official captions, how did you set out to convey plot to those who play Widespot?

“I tried to take pictures of enough key moments that the players could inspect the albums for clues. By playing out the development I had ensured that some important information already existed in the memories and relationship panels, but I also went in and inserted memories that seemed to me significant. I had specific meanings in mind when I gave Mary memories of potty-training her younger siblings that extend all the way back to teenhood and manipulated some of her relationship scores with the testing cheats, but I wanted the players to be free to interpret those memories and relationships according to their own ideas, so I tried to background my own opinions as much as possible.”

“The plot, after all, is the players’ job, not mine!”

As far as literal world building goes, how did you factor in your characters’ surroundings to both their plotlines and their characterization?

“The smallness of the town, necessitated by the decision to keep things as simple as possible, gave me the starting point and the town’s name - it’s just a wide spot in the road, hardly a town at all. Rural areas have a certain vibe; certain types of people grow up there, and certain kinds of people wind up there, so this was on my mind as I designed the characters, built their homes, and decided what order they should be created in CAS and moved in. Each house has a history, not all of which is necessarily made explicit to the player, and some of which really, really made me long for something more than BG Maxis content! But I think most people get that the Land cabin was built piecemeal over time, that a lot of Skye’s house was DIY, that the Beech house is Daytona’s house and the rest of her family just lives there, etc. Skye only got educational toys for his kids, but the Lands have a teddy and a dollhouse as well. The Mann’s house is the only one with a fence, and Rich ensures his privacy with stained glass windows in certain rooms. He also has that ominous closet full of aspiration rewards. (I hate that I couldn’t get him a counterfeiting machine - he clearly needs one.)”

“Some details were dictated by the game mechanics. Penny needed a double bed to get pregnant in, but there’s no particular reason for one to exist on her lot; so the heck with it, everybody in that house gets a double bed and I don’t even try to explain it. The lowest-numbered playable in the hood is always the telescope slapper, so I had to create the Mann family first in order for the guy with the Dark Secret to be the one who was incensed at the possibility of being spied on. But who would beard Rich in his own den when he, Lana, or Junior used the telescope in the daytime? That would be the local cop, wouldn’t it? This is why the Land house (with the nubile Land daughters) is right behind the Mann house and the Mann telescope is pointed straight at it. I also used the house to train the Manns - especially Junior - into wanting to buy things by furnishing it minimally to start with, and then adding items as wants were rolled for expensive artwork, games, etc.”

“When I gave characters their starting skill points, I assigned them partly at random, partly according to the implied backstory and role, and partly according to what would be possible in the game. If logic or a random roll indicated that someone in a household had a skill, I made sure that suitable skilling items existed in that household. Woody has an easel because it’s a solitary tool for gaining creativity points; the other families have the more sociable piano. Neither family is much concerned about the impression they make on the outside world, so they are not oversupplied with mirrors, unlike the other families, where Charisma matters.”

“This all works back and forth; the character or situation requires something in the setting, and then I realize that having this thing here means that I also need this and that means I should improve the relationship between these two characters, or whatever. My first and best playtester insisted to me that Goldie needed a teddy bear, and made a good case for it based on Goldie’s characterization, both in the bios and as played; and she was right, so I added it almost at the last minute. (Which is why, so often, the first thing Rhett does it pick it up and try to talk to someone through it.)”

“One thing that I was aware of during development, but am a little reluctant to discuss, is the possible implications for the setting of the racial makeup of the neighborhood. At the time I was born, in the state where I was born, the Land and Beech marriages would have been illegal; and I had that in mind when I mentioned familial disapproval in the Land bios. Some people pick that up and run with it, most people ignore it. Most people look at the Hart’s Spanish-style house and decide (despite the name) that the family has a Mediterranean or Mexican background, but others have decided that Valentine is black/white biracial and all the Spanish influence comes from Angel. I have no desire to dictate anybody’s interpretation or play style, but I do want to enable as many interpretations and play styles as possible, and this variety is an indication of success to me.”

In a lot of ways, fans have come to regard Widespot as highly as they regard the original three Maxis neighborhoods. Did you envision the neighborhood being this popular?

“I beat my “expectations” about the reception of any particular work to death years ago. While I was building Widespot, I told myself that if the only person who liked it was Aegagropilon (my first playtester), that would be good enough and anybody else’s approval would be gravy. Well, Aegagropilon loved it; and I’ve lapped up quite a bit of gravy since then. I don’t have much of a grasp of how popular it actually is, and that’s not the important thing. The important thing is that I know some people are playing it, and enjoying it, and using it in different ways. How many there are, and how it stacks up next to the many other (and in some cases far more sophisticated) fan made hoods out there, is out of my hands. I’m better off not dwelling on that.”

How did Widespot evolve after you started? Were there any massive deviations from your original plan?

“Development was an alternating process of playing (including building, character design, and actual play) and working things out on paper in illegible notes, which is always how I work. I haven’t properly thought anything till I’ve written it down, but I’m a “pantser” rather than a “plotter” - i.e. I tend to fly by the seat of my pants when creating. Too much planning kills the story for me. So once all the preliminary work had been set up, and the broad strokes of the storyline determined, the rest was done directly in the game, with a little help from the testing cheats, Tombstone of Life and Death, and so on.”

“I knew I needed to wind up with a baby for every adult woman, but I didn’t always know who specifically would be the father of each baby until I saw how characters interacted. I knew one of the households would have a ghost, but for awhile I thought it might be Lana. I assumed Candy would have two lovers but I thought one of them would be Hamilton until she informed me otherwise. As mentioned earlier, I thought the Manns would be the central, triggering household rather than the Harts. I had no plans for the teens or children at all, and they took care of their own storylines”.

On a different note, what was your inspiration for the dynamic between the Harts and the rest of Widespot’s inhabitants? How did you develop the idea for these entanglements?

“As a family of Romance sims, their job was to wreak havoc. And boy, howdy, did they! But only after I realized Angel had to be the town ghost. The family ran much too smoothly when she was in charge - she and Valentine constantly smooching it up, Rhett being Mama’s boy, Candy being Goldie’s social support. Kill Angel, and everybody falls apart and starts making bad decisions. I designed Valentine as a Dirty Old Man; but he refused to be only that. I designed Rhett as a heartless jerk, and he can be that - but he’s also the only one of the immature Mama’s boys in the hood who has lost his Mama. I designed Candy as a golddigger, and yeah, she is - but she also made friends with Daytona and Goldie without any prompting from me, and she put herself in the middle of what turned out to be the hardest knot to untie in the whole hood, the Mann Triangle.”

“And Goldie - well, Goldie was a darling who autonomously put the rest of her family ahead of herself repeatedly, could never finish her homework, and never once brought anyone home from school or came home with anyone else.”

“TL;DR: I didn’t develop the Harts. They did.”

You’ve been very active on both Mod the Sims and Tumblr for a while now. How has The Sims community evolved since you first got involved? Why do you think there is still such a strong following of the series?

“It’s hard for me to speak to how it’s evolved, since I was never part of the Age of LJ and only started playing Sims 2 since after Sims 3 was already out. Also, having been on the fringes of a lot of subcultures in my life, I have become adept at keeping away from the stuff that stresses me out. So I’ve never hung out at SimSecret. I block tags on tumblr. I avoid anything smacking of edition wars, don’t allow anonymous communication, and back out of controversies as fast as I can - with an apology if necessary, because face it, everybody’s a jerk on the internet sometimes, and the most you can hope for is to not be one any more often than you can help.”

“So I have no idea how the Sims community as a whole is going on, and I only have a limited knowledge of the portion of the Sims 2 fandom that hangs around specifically at MTS and attracts my attention on Tumblr (often by tagging Widespot). Within this limited sphere, I have noticed a few changes. I used to see it assumed as common consensus that all Maxis premades were “ugly” and that “ugly” is a bad thing; moreover, that certain sims - Goopy Gilscarbo and Sandy Bruty in particular - are more “ugly” than most and are to be avoided at all costs. Now people are shipping Goopy and Sandy (that’s largely @holleyberry’s doing, I believe) and embracing the cartooniness of sims with enthusiasm.”

“On older websites I often see “realistic” (i.e., modeled on airbrushed photos in fashion magazines) sims that, as far as I can tell, are identical to each other and to the ones on the other old websites they link to. With current websites, however, I can not only tell the sims from each other, I can tell Person A’s versions of the premades from Person B’s at a glance. This is especially marked on tumblr, where I often know who originally posted the pics I’m looking at regardless of the attached avatar.”

“And there has been such a flowering of creativity in so many directions in the last eight years it’s overwhelming, though I don’t know how that compares to the days before I started participating. I like to think of Widespot as the vanguard of a Golden Age of hood-sharing. Nobody moans about the lack of clean fan made neighborhoods anymore; they’re agonizing over whether to play Europa or Widespot or Emerald Heights or Polgannon. And suddenly people are making new face sliders. Neighborhood deco lights up at night now. There’s mods for parking on the street, taking toddlers and pets on vacation, hunting, foraging, beekeeping, on and on and on.”

“I think the main difference between now and eight years ago is, that people were defensive about still playing Sims 2, and a general air of playing a “dying game” hung over us all. Now we are joyous and defiant and declaring that Our Game is the Best and Will Never Die.”

“Or maybe that’s just the people I self-select to see. How would I know?”

As a writer by trade, did you find many similarities between creating Widespot and writing a novel?

“My experience has always been that there’s an underlying unity among all kinds of creation, and in particular that storytelling is storytelling, whether it’s the language of text, sound, line and color, or whatever. My writing habits and skills translated seamlessly into the medium of the game. The chief difference, once you factor out technical matters, is that in most forms of storytelling, you need to provide a discrete unit of Story and give the reader the pleasures of closure and narrative structure, pruning out everything that disrupts that weakens the sense of completeness.”

“When making a sims neighborhood, though, you need to be as open-ended as possible, and you need to discern the optimum moment to turn the hood over to the player, while it’s still bristling with plot hooks and unresolved situations. You don’t need, as I did, to deliberately choose the moment at which a bunch of hard choices must be made immediately; but you need to put the player into a situation in which the choices he makes will matter and shape how the neighborhood develops from that point.”

You often play neighborhoods like Pleasantview and Strangetown. Do you prefer playing your own sims or those created by Maxis?

“That’s like asking if I prefer to read Diana Wynne Jones or Megan Whelan Turner. (And if you aren’t familiar with those authors, boy do you have some great reading ahead of you!) The answer is “both.” I enjoy playing characters I’m engaged with, regardless of who made them. Sometimes I wonder what’s going on with Vidcund and want to play Strangetown; sometimes I want to reconnect with the sims in Drama Acres, my personal custom neighborhood; sometimes I want to play with some of my own plot hooks from Widespot. It’s all good.”

If you had to pick between Widespot and Land Grant University, which would you choose?

“I’d attach LGU to Widespot and play them both. I don’t do either/or choices.”

(She just defeated the Kobayashi Maru.)

Do you intend on creating more neighborhoods?

“I actually have three on hand right now: a downtown called Bigg City (an empty version of which is available on SFS http://simfileshare.net/download/207580/ ); a Seasons/Pets neighborhood I call Knotthole County; and an AL neighborhood called Port Cochere. The populated Bigg City got real complicated, real fast and when Health Crap is in a certain state I can’t work on it. Knotthole County is almost completely built but got interrupted while I was designing the characters; and Port Cochere is an SC4 map and a bunch of illegible notes. And at the moment I can’t work on any of them because I need two disk drives in order to use AGS, and one of them has gone wonky. However, I should be able to replace that soon, and then - well, maybe I’ll finally get that last week of work done on Bigg City. Or maybe I’ll decide (again) that if I’m organized enough to work on that, I should seize the moment and get queries out instead.”

Your content is themed around The Sims 2; have you played other titles in the series?, If so, which installment in The Sims is your favorite to play? For storytelling? For building? For creating sims?

“I’m a late adopter by nature. I started with the original The Sims and played it till I felt I didn’t have anything more to discover in it, at which time I started looking into the Sims 2, assuming that I’d eventually plumb its depths, too, and move on to Sims 3 about the time Sims 4 came along. Then I discovered that Sims 2’s depths are unplumbable, and that it was the perfect vehicle for that all-community storytelling I’d always longed to do.”

“The more I learn about the later iterations, the more certain I am that I will never play them. I’m sure they’re fun in their own ways, and I certainly don’t look down on anyone who chooses to play them; but I don’t like the way they look, I don’t like the lack of a storytelling tool, and most of all, the mechanics and structure of the game don’t enable my style of neighborhood play. The Sims series consists of four distinct games with four distinct sets of strengths and weaknesses; and the first two are the only ones I feel any call to play.”

Lastly, why do you still continue to play The Sims? Do you feel that the games provide a positive creative outlet?

“It still gives me pleasure. And I still have Health Crap and need projects, and have a computer that will play it. The Sims 2 is as much a part of my life as reading and playing tabletop RPGs and board games with my friends. So why would I stop?”

“The game is a positive creative outlet - it has nothing to do with my feelings on the subject. One of the most rewarding things about having made Widespot and LGU is seeing people use them as springboards for developing and experimenting with their own creative capacities. Also, a lot of simmers are deliberately using the game to control or relieve some condition or other. Depression, OCD, chronic pain from which they need distraction - I’m not the only one with Health Crap, and I am honored whenever anyone uses something I made to deal with theirs.”

“They could have done these things without me, of course - but they didn’t. They used something I made for their own benefit, and I can feel good about that.”

Any parting comments, teasers, spoilers, public service announcements, etc.?

“One of the core concepts by which I live my life is that creativity is the quality that defines humanity best, and that it is the birthright of every single one of us. But we’ve been educated to think that it’s something special and separate, accessible only to certain special “talented” people; and brainwashed to think that personal creativity that can’t be monetized is a trivial use of time. On the contrary, creativity is to a large extent what time is for. Whether it’s a book, or a game, or a prom dress, the process of making is fulfilling and enriching, and sharing what we make is nourishing to us and to those we share with. So whatever your medium is, whatever resources are available to you, whatever ideas are quickening in your brain and hands - go for it.”

“It is not a silly waste of time.”

To those of you who haven’t played Widespot, go check it out; you won’t regret it. Thanks again to Peni Griffin for allowing me to pick her brain, and I hope you all enjoyed reading it. I certainly found a new favorite word in “pantser.”

If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, feel free to visit my ask box. If you are interested, give Plumbob Post a follow, and reblog for anyone else who you think would enjoy this blog. Stay tuned for upcoming posts!

Dag dag!

#the sims #the sims 2 #fanfic friday #widespot #peni griffin

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symbianosgames · 7 years

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Tarsier Studios released its horror-themed platform-adventure Little Nightmares last month. It follows a young girl called Six as she tries to escape a huge vessel known as The Maw. She’s chased by the monstrous staff and guests on board, who are much larger than her, forcing her to hide in crawlspaces and climb up shelves to out-of-reach places. She also has to battle an insatiable hunger that growls in her stomach every now and then, which forces her to feed on anything she can find...

Tarsier has been ruminating on the ideas that went into Little Nightmares for the past 13 years. “This game feels like it's been bubbling up in us ever since the company's been around,” says Dave Mervik, Little Nightmares’ senior narrative designer. It goes all the way back to 2004, when a bunch of talented students in Malmö, Sweden, were working on an adventure game called The City of Metronome. The game earned some decent attention, even getting an announcement trailer shown at E3 2005, due to its dark themes, unusual gameplay, and bizarre visual designs - something it shares with its successor, Little Nightmares.

The City of Metronome took place in a city where children are kidnapped, their soul is sucked out, and they are forced to work to keep industrial machines ticking. The main character is made to question this normality by a young girl, and goes on a quest to unravel the mysteries of the corporation in charge. He works his way through the city by recording sounds in the environment with a device on his back, and then changing their pitch, so that the same sound can be both soothing and aggressive. When played back, different types of sound have different effects on characters and parts of the world, either preventing or allowing progression.

Unfortunately, The City of Metronome was never finished, and remains as merely a promising prototype to this day. “To make it into a full game would have needed more time, more people, and more money, so it was just an unfortunate case of having the right idea at the wrong time,” says Mervik. “That kind of game, though, never left our thoughts. It's always been a natural fit for us to make games in this kind of world, telling these kinds of stories. So, although there's no literal link between City of Metronome and Little Nightmares, they both came from the same minds, so they have shared DNA.”

Mervik joined the team at Tarsier seven years ago because he “wanted to make the kind of game that The City of Metronome promised to be.” But before that could happen, Tarsier had to build itself up as a company, and to do so it struck a deal with Sony. From 2008, the company worked on DLC and console ports for the PlayStation-exclusive LittleBigPlanet series and Tearaway, and a couple other PlayStation 3 titles.

As the team at Tarsier was finding its groove as a studio in those years, gaining experience as a more established production house, they began to think about what their first original game might be. “As it happened, the transition to Sumo Digital as the developer of LittleBigPlanet coincided with the point where we had a clear vision of where our future lay, so the timing felt about as good as it would ever get,” says Mervik. “Still, leaving the security of being a Sony-exclusive studio to being out there on our own was a weird mixture of exhilaration and abject terror, but we couldn't have dreamed of a better way to take that first leap!”

There were a number of ideas floating around the studio about what that first original game might be, but the earliest was spawned from a ‘dollhouse’ tech demo made in 2012. “With a cylindrical building as its focal point, it gave players the ability to pan, rotate, and zoom in to a bunch of individual, interconnected rooms, and managed to feel both playful and downright creepy,” Mervik wrote on the PlayStation blog. “It was a simple premise, but one that captured our imagination.”

The "doll house" tech demo

That tech demo would serve as the core of Little Nightmares. What the team liked about its camera view was that it was limiting enough to not let players fully grasp their surroundings or know how close they were to danger. “We want it to feel like you could almost reach into the rooms and touch things, but maybe also wonder whether you should. There was lots that we liked about that sensation, things that married well with the feelings we wanted to create in the player,” says Mervik.

“The way that a dollhouse is both familiar, yet other; the creepy, voyeuristic feeling you can get from peering into someone else's world; there's a power dynamic too, in the way you are in control of what happens in the dollhouse world, which felt like a really cool contrast to play with considering your character's place in Little Nightmares' hierarchy. None of these things are shouted from the rooftops in the game, but if they creep into your subconscious, all the better.”

The idea was, in part, to let the player’s imagination make the environments and the people that lived in them much more disturbing than computer graphics could manage. That’s why one of the best moments in Little Nightmares sees Six crawling in the space between walls, when a pair of arms reach in to try to grab her. Not seeing the creature the arms are attached to somehow makes it scarier. The same goes for the chef enemies, who wear masks over their faces, sometimes reaching under them to itch - not seeing their faces lets you imagine how horrible they must be.

Those arms...

The other big advantage of that camera for Tarsier was that it features full 3D movement, which allows for thorough exploration of any environment. This combines well with the focus on the physicality of objects in Little Nightmares - most of the puzzles ask the player to interact with the environment, such as pushing a chair up to a door so Six can reach the handle. There was, at one point, talk of Little Nightmares having an inventory system, like a traditional adventure game, but that idea was quickly dropped.

“[An inventory system] always felt like it would overcomplicate the tactile core of the game, in which the player is able, and encouraged to, grab and interact with the environment,” Mervik says. “The goal from the beginning was to create a tactile, physical world that would increase the player's sense of connection to it. Of course, LittleBigPlanet did that so well, so of course you draw on your past experience when it makes sense.”

Initially, due to having worked on LittleBigPlanet, Tarsier had much more elaborate platforming sections in mind for Little Nightmares. But these were stripped down over time, and with lots of testing, so that the gameplay better served what Tarsier had in mind for the game: a combination of stealth, puzzle platforming, and chase sequences. “We knew from the very beginning that we didn't want to make a genre piece, whereby it would be all pretty much one thing. We were more keen to strike a balance, so that you could never really relax for too long in one mode,” says Mervik.

Tersier discovered that there was no shortcut to hitting the sweet spot between the three different elements, all of which provided different pacing and tension. It required them to dedicate to a lengthy process of iteration and constant testing for them to arrange the layout of those different components and get the game’s flow between action and story moments right.

Still, even with that effort, players have picked out moments in Little Nightmares that have caused frustration. The root of that frustration is the game’s 3D movement, which gets especially tricky when needing to balance Six as she walks across precariously thin beams. If the movement was locked to a single plane, such as in Playdead’s similar sidescrolling game Inside, that frustration could have been eliminated. But that wasn’t an option for Tarsier.

“This was a world that we wanted players to explore and really dig into, so it felt like it would be a missed opportunity to not let them do that,” Mervik says about the game’s 3D movement. “Once we got this idea of using the 'dollhouse camera', it lit us all up, we just knew it was the right fit for the kind of game we wanted to make.”

That’s not to say Tarsier hadn’t foreseen the issues with those moments that required precision control over Six. Initially, it was much harder, as the coders actually added extra systems to the game to help aid player controls and intent. The two systems that Mervik gave as example of this are called Jump Alignment and Beam Alignment.

“Jump Alignment helps by slightly directing the player movement directions as they are performing jumps,” he says. “This is useful for making them nail challenging jumps between platforms, aiming when jumping at door handles, swinging between lamps, and similar targeted actions.”

“Beam Alignment helps players stay within the confines of a beam while balancing high above the floor of a level,” continues Mervik. “If you press in the general direction of the beam, Six should stay on top of it, but if you do veer too much off course, she will eventually fall down.”

Any issues that came out of the controls or camera view of the game that these extra systems didn’t fix were considered a necessary sacrifice. What the team always prioritized, and wouldn’t compromise on, was the unnerving, otherworldly feeling created by the camera in Little Nightmares. You can see how it enthused the creativity of the team by looking at the game’s wonderful character concepts and art design.

The world that you travel through in Little Nightmares is clearly built for people who are much bigger than Six and so travelling through it is both unwelcoming and challenging. To enhance that, shapes and bodies are exaggerated and bloated, stretched into surreal and sometimes horrific forms. “This is a stylistic approach that is designed to reflect the way Six, and children in general, might see the world. Everything is more than it is - the world is bigger, people are scarier, situations are more surreal - and this grows even more exaggerated in the retelling,” says Mervik. “There's this need to convey exactly HOW big a deal all of these things feel to them, and we wanted to capture some of that same spirit.”

For Mervik, as the narrative designer, the exaggeration in the art style also conveyed the game’s themes and story without words. “To have this world feel so 'other' so that you feel in your bones, that it was built for others, and that you simply don't belong there; and to meet these people whose inner life has shaped their outer form, it almost feels like these kind of ideas have to be seen and felt, rather than simply told,” he says. “Words can have a tendency to cheapen feelings - which, hopefully, I haven't just done!”

For his own input on the game, Mervik was inspired by his personal love affair with Roald Dahl’s children’s books, which depict “gutsy kids against a shitty world,” which he adds “feels as relevant now as it ever did.” But even with his job title, he didn’t get to decide the game’s themes and narrative by himself, as the structure at Tarsier is deliberately flat so that everyone knows as much as everyone else and has an equal voice. “We usually get into groups and talk about stuff for several hours, and by the end we usually know what we want to do without it being this big scary decision type thing,” says Mervik.

“The lack of dialogue or text is actually a perfect example of this. It was a subject that came up very early on, and I probably said words to the effect of 'nah, we don't need to talk in this one do we?' and we took it from there, and all agreed it was the right way to go,” Mervik says. “If I had been the only one who felt that way, that's when the discussions can prove invaluable, because there's clearly a disconnect somewhere and it's important to stay in sync if you want to make everything feel coherent.”

This collaborative studio culture at Tersier is primed towards making games that are unique and of a certain quality. The flat structure, as Mervik says, helps to keep everyone on the same level so that the finished game feels consistent throughout. Room is made for individual creativity within that structure too. For example, the way the characters and locations were invented was from the concept artists being given a brief, and then letting them sketch whatever they like to match it. Once finished, they show the rest of the team their drawings to see what catches everyone’s imagination, then there’s a round of feedback, and the favored concept is then used as a style guide to build assets and the rest of the art.

The one arguable downside of Tarsier’s approach to game development, which relies heavily on both iteration and feedback, is that it can be harder to make bigger games this way. This shows itself in one of the most common criticisms of Little Nightmares, which is that it’s too short. It took most players around two hours to complete, not including the optional items to find and collect.

“It's a bittersweet thing to hear really, since you don't really want people to leave feeling unfulfilled, but at the same time, it's kinda nice to hear that they do want more,” says Mervik. “It can be too easy to conflate quality and quantity, but we were loath to make a game that was long just for the sake of it. In a practical sense too, we're a pretty small company and even if we wanted to make something more bloated, it just wasn't an option. Quality always has to come first.”

What’s clear is that Little Nightmares was always intended as a “smaller, more personal tale about a kid trying to escape a world full of monsters.” It has been that way since the seeds were sown those 13 years ago with the prototype for The City of Metronome. Tarsier knew that to try to make it bigger than it needed to be would be to harm the game overall. Plus, it would mean rushing past good ideas rather than building upon them and see where that process took them. The studio would rather make a high-quality dollhouse than a ramshackle tower block, so that’s what they set out to do.

#IFTTT #Blogger

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pcinvasion-blog · 7 years

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New Post has been published on PC Invasion

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Torment: Tides of Numenera Review

InXile’s decision to crowdfund a spiritual successor to Planescape: Torment was an expression of audacious ambition. Their Torment: Tides of Numenera may use a different setting and rule-set to the 1999 original (Monte Cook’s Numenera, as opposed to the D&D realm now owned by Wizards of the Coast), but the structure, presentation, and themes are specifically designed to evoke its celebrated RPG namesake. This is an extremely challenging path to walk, with the tar pits of nostalgic pandering and inferior re-telling awaiting any misstep.

There are some wobbles towards both of those precipitous drops throughout Torment: Tides of Numenera’s novel length, dimension-spanning tale. But while it clearly draws from similar ruminations on consciousness, morality, and individual power, there’s enough original thought here to set inXile’s release apart from its forebear. The tone is similar, the themes familiar (as universal classics of philosophy tend to be), yet the creative whole is largely distinct.

Purple fish fountain: still the best fountain in games.

That’s in part thanks to the Ninth World setting, which encompasses people, places, and circumstances just as bizarre as the Planes of the original. Again, there are echoes of the previous Torment in the unusual civic rules of the city of Sagus Cliffs, and the consequences of a near-immortal being lost in the pursuit of knowledge above all other cost. This time, though, your own player character embodies one of those consequences.

In Torment: Tides of Numenera, you are the Last Castoff, a product of a being known as The Changing God who creates and discards body vessels as his consciousness hops between forms. Each of those discarded bodies forms a new consciousness when The Changing God departs, and yours begins to manifest as the body hurtles towards the ground at tremendous speed. Adding an extra metaphysical layer to the tale, your mind exists as an actual, labyrinthine space that can periodically (and usefully) be explored during death; recalling the benefits of exploiting your immortality in Planescape.

It’s a brilliant premise for an RPG. You’re dumped in a barely familiar city (Sagus Cliffs), a place literally built upon the strata of billions of years of forgotten history, with the mystery of your own birth and a dispassionate, elusive creator to confront.

Mind labyrinth design by MC Escher.

What follows is an ocean of reading to dive into. Just like its main source of inspiration, Torment: Tides of Numenera is overwhelmingly a game of text, dialogue choices, and even more text. It has the same wonderful isometric location ‘maps’ as Pillars of Eternity (and in fact seems to use Pillars techniques in their creation), rich in strange details like fountains of living, purple fish and fleshy, Hieronymus Bosch-like horrors; but much of the imagery is external, conjured by passages of text or choose-your-own-adventure style interludes.

There are periodic moments of turn-based combat too, their oft-avoidable nature neatly summarised by the terminology ascribed to them. In Numenera conflicts are not inevitable, grinding RPG encounters, they are, in every case, a ‘Crisis’.

As inXile have always stated, Crisis events are unique encounters. Each one has a definitive place in the story, and you’ll never just randomly run into a bunch of guys who want a fight. Many of these encounters are avoidable, but even the ones which are not have ways out that don’t involve slaying everybody in the room. There’s always an option to, say, sway a foe to your way of thinking with a dialogue check, or beat a hasty retreat. It’s not really accurate to say you can make it through the game without any combat whatsoever, but as long as your party are capable of a fighting escape they should be able to handle things.

If you do opt to go all-in on combat, Torment: Tides of Numenera is a relatively straightforward ‘one movement plus one action, or a longer movement’ turn based affair. Characters and foes have both melee and esotery (pretty much tech-magic) skills at their disposal, there are basic rules about weapon strengths vs armour, special attack types vs resistances, flanking, and so on. You also have access to (usually) one-time use gadgets called Cyphers, which are so powerful that each character can only carry a set amount at any given time (hold too many, and debuffs or even death await).

It’ll be mostly familiar stuff to anybody who’s played a turn based party strategy game before, but the lack of too much complexity keeps the battle encounters focused and tight.

I can either destroy these megalomaniac drones, or subvert them with control terminals.

After all, though it has plenty of cRPG trappings, Torment: Tides of Numenera is propelled far more by its writing than by any tactical combat mechanics or interconnected ability systems. That writing is strongest when the mythos of its world connects with a given quest-line, and when the sci-fi-medieval-cyberpunk setting (or however you want to classify it) uses its strangeness to make a point about recognisable, human traits.

Sagus Cliffs, for example, has a system of acquiring citizenship which demands that its participants literally give up one year of their life. That year of life takes semi-sentient, physical form as a Levy, who police the city for twelve months. Tides of Numenera is able to explore and expand on this intriguing concept through the city’s institutions (such as the Order of Truth whose machinery creates the Levies), and through specific quests.

One such mission has you dealing with a malfunctioning Levy, who has been mistakenly formed from a hypothetical year of life where the source basically suffers from a traumatic stress disorder. The presentation and ultimate resolution of that quest (and there are several ways to deal with it) manage to merge worldbuilding and personal dilemma in a truly elegant manner.

These moments are Torment: Tides of Numenera’s greatest achievements, and where it can match Planescape: Torment in narrative-based quest design. They don’t come as frequently or as consistently as in Planescape, but there are enough inspired sections in the game’s two main city ‘hub’ areas, and through certain companion story-lines, to sustain a real fascination with the setting and its people.

Erritis is, without doubt, my companion of choice.

In Numenera’s weaker periods, though, the prose can slip into a purple hue and begin to drag. The weirdness of the Ninth World (and multiple other, ‘off-camera’ areas) is a boon to the story overall, but there are times when yet another memory digression into mysterious alien environments with challenging fantasy names starts to feel overwrought. Especially in cases where the recollection has, at best, fringe impact on the main story. Too much abstract transdimensional musing can make even the most mind-expanding concepts feel bland, and Tides of Numenera skirts that boundary a little too often.

Mechanically speaking, the game revolves around three core stats: Might, Speed, and Intellect. Attendant skills and abilities will improve speech or combat rolls to varying degrees (or degrade them, if you’re untrained in a given area), but those stat checks can generally be boosted by ‘spending’ points from your three main pools. If you’re attempting to nab an item from an NPC, for example, then your Quick Fingers ability will be the primary factor, but your odds can be much improved by using some extra Speed.

The three stat pool caps are increased through levelling up, and can be replenished by consumable objects and by sleeping. It seems designed with the intention to make spending your limited stat pools on speech or ability checks a difficult decision, but the ease with which you can replenish those pools (or dip into the pools of your party companions) means that with a bit of basic stat management you can actually pass almost every check you come across. Sleeping very, very rarely advances quests in a negative way (this happened to me once in the entire game), and is often either free or (once you’re a few hours in and have a little wealth) quite affordable. Consumable stat top-ups are also quite numerous.

The result is a central system which appears as if it wants to make you think twice about spending points from stat pools, and agonise over whether to retain your advantage for a more important event in future, but ends up strangely muted. That’s odd, because failing stat checks in Torment: Tides of Numenera can sometimes lead to interesting outcomes or guide players down alternative quest paths, so the developers need not have feared this consequence.

You know you’re in an intriguing RPG when the option “Examine the cyst” appears.

Those who’ve been following the development will know that Tides of Numenera has been subject to some late in the day cuts (or late in the day admission of cuts), and that may be emblematic of a deeper struggle to reconcile the game’s enviable ambition with available resources. Certainly, aspects like the Legacies are reduced from their original Kickstarter description. The Legacy of your character is still relevant, but it now amounts to an ongoing Tidal alignment which changes according to your actions, concluding with a rather superficial paragraph during the end game credits.

If sections of the main narrative had to be trimmed, however, Numenera covers it fairly well. The game’s two hubs (Sagus Cliffs and the grotesque, living Bloom) are joined by somewhat more linear connective tissue in the form of Valley of Dead Heroes (which also neatly serves as a crypt depository for Kickstarter backer names), and lead to a final, climactic stretch. Everything is wrapped up, and (barring, arguably, one companion) there are no sequel hooks. This isn’t a Tyranny-like situation where the game manages to conclude but also feel a bit like Part One. The end stretch is, however, a bit of an accelerated race to the finish. Threads are concluded and tied off, but in a way which suggests there may have been more extensive sequences planned.

By the end the in-game counter had me at around 26 hours. Progression in this title probably owes as much to reading speed as anything else though, meaning it’s not particularly easy to judge an average completion time. Review code came in early, so I was able to explore as many side avenues as possible in the play-through. Note also that I’d played all of the Sagus Cliffs area before, in the beta, so that area was all familiar and passed much quicker the second time around.

The text adventure parts are largely optional, but all worth a look.

Given how many different outcomes can be attempted and achieved in some of the quests, it probably won’t surprise you to learn that Torment: Tides of Numenera has a lingering bug or two. It was rare, but sometimes dialogue options or responses seemed to react to information which hadn’t yet been revealed. At another point, I’m pretty sure my ‘Tidal Affinity’ skill temporarily vanished from my character sheet (awkward, because it’s useful), and only returned once the protagonist had gained another level.

The most irritating bug was also the strangest. My save seemed to get infected by a persistent noise best described as ‘electronic sparkling’ (belonging, I think, to one of the Ninth World’s pieces of esoteric machinery), which would only ever go away when another significant background sound effect over-rode it. Until that happened, each reload was either a sort of light audio torture or an invitation to play in silence for a bit.

On the more positive technical side of things, the game managed a firm 60fps throughout on my 380X (aside from one scene heavy with fire effects), and had acceptable loading times even on an HDD. As expected, perhaps, but after Pillars of Eternity at launch neither of those things can be taken for granted.

I’m happy to report that this frightful orifice renders in glorious 1080p.

Taking on the mantle of an absolute classic of the PC RPG canon was always going to be ballsy move for inXile. Doing so absorbs a lot of the fondness for the Torment name (witness the success of the crowd-funding campaign), but also involves the acceptance of a tremendous level of expectation. Perhaps even an amount that would be impossible to reconcile with a single videogame.

Torment: Tides of Numenera does meet some of those expectations. Crucially, it nails many of the vital ones; tone, premise, setting. And it gets awfully close with meaningful portions of its narrative. The peaks of its quest design, when characters, theme, and reactive choice all chime together, are superb. That it can’t maintain this incredibly high standard throughout every portion of the game is a shame, but nor is it damning; even Planescape: Torment had its weaker spots. There’s a clarity to the interplay of abilities and stats in Numenera (though too much ease with speech checks), and a refreshing, hand-designed feel to the mechanically straightforward combat encounters.

Sometimes exceptional, always ambitious, and periodically falling short in its aims, Torment: Tides of Numenera is symbolic of the tribulations involved in retreading the path of a long-established creative work. That parts of this game can rival Planescape: Torment in execution means it’s an RPG well worth playing, but, whether due to problems during development or an exhaustion of resources, some areas have not quite lived up to their stated goals.

#Torment: Tides of Numenera

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leafythdocter-blog · 7 years

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Global competency

In matters of national security, environmental sustainability, and economic development, what we do as a nation and in our everyday lives is inextricably intertwined with what governments, businesses, and individuals do beyond our borders.

This new reality helps us more clearly define the role that education must play in preparing all students for success in an interconnected world. The United States have invested unprecedented resources in education, betting that our outmoded, factory-age system can be fundamentally transformed to prepare students for the rigors of a global economy. They have challenged states and school districts to set clearer, higher standards and assess student progress in more creative ways, prepare more productive teachers, and provide effective intervention in failing schools.

These are necessary strategies for change, but insufficient to create the citizens, workers and leaders our nation needs in the 21st century. Missing in this formula for a world-class education is an urgent call for schools to produce students that actually know something about the world--its cultures, languages and how its economic, environmental and social systems work.

The concept of global competence articulates the knowledge and skills students need in the 21st century.

Globally competent students must have the knowledge and skills to:

Investigate the World. Global competence starts by being aware, curious, and interested in learning about the world and how it works. Globally competent students ask and explore critical questions and "researchable" problems - problems for which there may not be one right answer, but can be systematically engaged intellectually and emotionally. Their questions are globally significant, questions that address important phenomena and events that are relevant world wide - in their own community and in communities across the globe.

Globally competent students can articulate the significance of their questions and know how to respond to these questions by identifying, collecting, and analyzing credible information from a variety of local, national and international sources, including those in multiple languages. They can connect the local to the global, for example, by explaining how a local issue like their school recycling program exemplifies a global process far beyond their backyards.

From analysis to synthesis to evaluation, they can weigh and integrate evidence to create a coherent response that considers multiple perspectives and draws defensible conclusions --be it an essay, a problem or design solution, a scientific explanation or a work of art.

Weigh Perspectives. Globally competent students recognize that they have a particular perspective, and that others may or may not share it. They are able to articulate and explain the perspectives of other people, groups, or schools of thought and identify influences on these perspectives, including how differential access to knowledge, technology, and resources can affect people's views. Their understanding of others' perspectives is deeply informed by historical knowledge about other cultures as well as contemporary events. They can compare and contrast their perspective with others, and integrate their own and others' viewpoints to construct a new one, when needed.

Communicate Ideas. Globally competent students understand that audiences differ on the basis of culture, geography, faith, ideology, wealth, and other factors and that they may perceive different meanings from the same information. They can effectively communicate, verbally and non-verbally, with diverse audiences. Because it is increasingly the world's common language for commerce and communication, globally competent students in the US and elsewhere are proficient in English as well as in at least one other world language.

Communicating ideas occurs in a variety of culturally diverse settings, and especially within collaborative teams. Globally competent students are able to situate themselves in a variety of cultural contexts, organize and participate in diverse groups, and work effectively toward a common goal.

Globally competent students are media and artistically savvy; they know how to choose and effectively use appropriate technology and media to communicate with diverse audiences, including through respectful online social networking. In short, they are technology and media literate within a global communications environment.

Take Action. What skills and knowledge will it take to go from learning about the world to making a difference in the world? First, it takes seeing oneself as capable of making a difference. Globally competent students see themselves as players, not bystanders. They're keenly able to recognize opportunities from targeted human rights advocacy to creating the next out-of-the-box, must-have business product we didn't know we needed. Alone or with others, ethically and creatively, globally competent students can envision and weigh options for action based on evidence and insight; they can assess their potential impact, taking into account varied perspectives and potential consequences for others; and they show courage to act and reflect on their actions.

Apply Disciplinary and Interdisciplinary Expertise. Is global competence all skills and no knowledge? Hardly. As true now as at any other time, learning content matters. Global competence requires that the capacities described above be both applied within academic disciplines and contextualized within each discipline's methods of inquiry and production of knowledge. Globally competent students learn to think like historians and scientists and artists by using the tools and methods of inquiry of the disciplines.

Global competence also requires the ability to understand prevailing world conditions, issues, and trends through an interdisciplinary lens as well, in order to understand the interconnectedness of the issue and its broad themes as well as subtle nuances. A competitive advantage will go to those students in San Francisco or São Paulo who know what's going on in the world, can comprehend the interconnectedness of environmental, financial, social, and other systems, and understand how the relative balance of power between societies and cultures has significant short-and long-term consequences. Educating students for global competence requires substantive, developmentally appropriate engagement over time with the world's complexities.

Learning about and with the world occurs within and outside of school, and it is the work of a lifetime. Globally competent students are life long learners. They are able to adapt and contribute knowledge and understanding to a world that is constantly, rapidly evolving.

Global competence is a crucial shift in our understanding of the purpose of education in a changing world. Students everywhere deserve the opportunity to succeed in the global economy and contribute as global citizens. We must fashion a more creative and visionary educational response to the interconnected world of the 21st century, starting now.

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godsfury007-blog · 7 years

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Global competency

The concept of global competence articulates the knowledge and skills students need in the 21st century.

Globally competent students must have the knowledge and skills to:

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scarlett-abbott-blog · 7 years

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Task 6 - Influential Artist Comparative Analysis

Daisuke Yokota - Nocturnes

“If you look at music or film, there is time there. In other words, the work has a clear beginning and end, and in between, you shut out your daily life—you throw yourself into the work. There’s no element of duration to your experience of a photograph; it’s closer to an object. - Daisuke Yokota

I admire Yokota for his thoughts and considerations on the act of memory and the relevant substance of time. His overall belief is that, as we all know, memory fades as time passes by. He focuses on trying to highlight the parts of our memories that we remember for good reason, and does not worry about remembering the rest as it must not be “important” if we forget it so readily. He discovered this whilst developing a huge amount of film from past years of his life whilst bedbound sick. He realised what he could and couldn’t bring to mind and recognise, and wondered why.

Through his unconventional development methods, Yokota almost brings a sense of loss to these images through heavy visual effects which “spoil” the images and obscure the details from our view. Overexposure, dust, grain and huge negative spaces make the shoots feel as alien to us as his memories are to him.

I choose to compare this “wrong” presentation with two of my colour film shoots.

These images share a visual uncertainty with Yokota’s; a knowledge that this is not how the events actually looked, but this is the only way we can “see” them now. This is how memories work. One cannot remember every word said in a day of their life, but main events and faces can be recalled in time. The accidental effects applied confuse the mind and make me actually doubt the honesty of the shots. Just as I doubt my own memory. It’d be interesting to show these shots to the subjects they display and see what they have to say about the images, but I’m afraid they are dust in the wind by now.

The fact that neither Yokota’s nor my visual “faults” were intentional is an amazing coincidence.

The difference holds between our work that Yokota’s memories are faded by time, whereas I never had the memory of my events that he did, thanks to ancillary features such as underage drinking and an unfortunate general disregard for attentiveness. I want to feel this devalues my work in comparison for shame if nothing else, but we both went through the same process of discovering our own memories, and through a lens of distortion we didn’t expect to have. An audience will never have the same experience I have when looking at there, I realise that, but if I felt something whilst looking at Yokota’s images, surely others can feel something upon seeing mine too?

So does colour make a difference? Yokota’s images were never taken in colour and the lack thereof, as I have previously suggested, builds up this sense of timelessness and a certain separation from reality because I will ever see the “present” world this way (chances of onset colourblindness aside). Having desaturated them now, I don’t feel any more endeared to the memories, but rather distanced. I don’t like it. I think perhaps because my images are more lively and friendly than Yokota’s they suit colour more, or perhaps it is because his look more authentically aged, mine are a little too clean. Either way, if I am struggling to connect to the images, the audience has little hope so I definitely want these shots to be in colour. This is strange, as I prefer all of my other work to be in black and white for the very “memorial” effect that I am trying to achieve with these photos, but it just doesn’t work with these images.

Memorial is the most practical use I can think of for photography, unless you count inflection as practical which, really, you should. Somehow Yokota has shown me that by obscuring a memory, you can actually make it more beautiful. The fact that you now have to put personal effort into decoding the images that paint the trail of your life brings hints of conversations and laughs and girls and memories that you would have otherwise filed away forever. Our images do not explicitly state what has happened, but they come so close that they allow the mind to discover those facts for itself. They are but a spark.

Anthony Kurtz - Craft Masters

I would like to expand on why I prefer my working spaces work to that of Anthony Kurtz.

Kurtz’s images are far better taken than my own. I realise that. They are better lit, composed, and shot and thereby give a much clearer image of their subjects. Too clear, I think. Would you rather have a super high resolution photo of your face or a fine oil portrait? Through their super-reality, Kurtz’s images show a little too much detail. One of my favourite things about my work was how a lot of the shot was left to the imagination. In relation to my ideas about memory, they gave memories space to grow and spaces for those memories to fill. I loved the idea that my images would mean something different to someone who knew their environments than they would to a total stranger. This value is only possible because they look “realistic”. They are not studio lit. I did not use a tripod. They look as they would look to an (albeit colourblind) onlooker who actually occupies the spaces they detail. I think that’s important.

Having this comparison between mine and Kurtz’s work has shown me what I love about my images. Because they explore such similar spaces, ancillary factors such as difference of meaning can be removed and a direct comparison can be drawn on specifically our techniques.

So why does taking a worse photo make a better photo? If that’s what I’m saying here? Sure, it may well just be some self-congratulatory excuse that “hey you don’t need to put effort in”. Do I put effort in? Should I put effort in? I think I do absolutely because hey otherwise the images wouldn’t get made or be relevant to my ideas, but Kurtz definitely invests more time. His work has told me that I’m interested in honest and easy photography, not framing the perfect shot. And I’ve realised that this is okay. Art is a funny thing in that usually taking the “easy” way often results in the best work. The best music, the best sculpture, the best photographs. Then again, who am I to say what’s best for a subjective topic?

Technique aside, the main difference between our images is that Kurtz’s subjects are these craftspeople, where mine are their environments. On a presentational scale, this means that Kurtz’s images are instantly more eyecatching (that and from their vivid colours) and can stand alone. I think my photos would have to be presented in series to hold any meaning as each of them only constitutes a part of an idea. If I am to be documenting an environment alone then the full outcome would need to detail different interconnected parts of it to show as much personality as actually featuring a person would.

So what have I learnt from studying his work? Perfection does not bring meaning. Aesthetics do not bring meaning. Not to me, at least. Having seen such well constructed work on a similar subject matter to my own has shown me that I don’t want to try too hard. That sounds like a cop out. I want to put effort and thought into my work, but I don’t want to feel bad if every shot doesn’t take an hour to capture. The less I worry about my images being correct, the closer I can get to true expression and honest image making. Which has been my objective all along, hasn’t it?

Ellen Rogers - Indirection

I don’t want to repeat myself here.

Rogers very clearly has a deep personal connection with her shoots and the subjects within. The locations, the setting and the muses all seem to fit together so specifically and clearly that it’s clear there is more going on that she doesn’t share with the world. Her fashion photography is beautiful, but not of interest to me specifically. I want to talk about the connection that one can see in her work.

I have never so much as attempted to try and recreate any of Rogers’ shooting ideas, but I feel that I can at least try to understand the relationship she shares with her subjects. Because Rogers at least seems to know the people she photographs, the images depict not only those people, but the way she feels towards them. The feature of occasional direct address show how they feel towards her and her work, and I feel this is certainly comprehensible, though I’ve never explicitly tried to do it myself.

Another common feature of Rogers’ work is the way she “half depicts” things. This is especially prevalent in “For Iain”.

Narrow lenses, strange angles and negative space leave the audience feeling there should be something more in these images. I know I’ve said this before but I realise that I somewhat do the same in my work.

This almost perverse act of looking on without full explanation means that our work shares themes of mystery and some hidden deeper meaning. Photography’s about observation, right? Rogers has shown me that it’s okay to be aware of that sense of observation. I’m all for images that present the lens as an invisible force, but if subjects are shown to be aware of the photographer and, in conjunction, audience then it makes the viewing of such an image a cooperative experience. It’s one thing for someone to say that a picture reminded them of something, but if the picture looks back, it can ask them something instead of just suggesting it.

My work differs from Rogers’ in that I am focusing on the “background” of these locations, whereas in most of her work she focuses on how her subjects react to them. Although her images are “constructed” with specific outfits and locations, they differ to, say, Kurtz in that they still feel genuine. The aged outfits suit the aged locations suit the aged lomography. Kurtz blends very clean photography with working environments, elements which clash together and feel, to me at least, unnatural and strange. Not in a good way. Rogers manages to suit her techniques to her subject matter, and I feel that I have done similarly at least to the extent of “cleanliness”.

Kikiji Kawada?

/WIP/

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symbianosgames · 7 years

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The "doll house" tech demo

Those arms...

#IFTTT #Blogger

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