A Very Special Birthday Post!
Today is one of the greatest Thursdays on the Gregorian calendar because 17 years ago today, Nerdwriter Jenny was born! And to celebrate this occasion I made two shiny new icons just for her!
I'm still teaching myself how to use GIMP but I'll get things figured out eventually. There'd be more but I'm a slow learner and my laptop also kind of died.
Hope you like them. :)
Ok so I've been having trouble figuring out what to write about,not from a lack of ideas but from an overload of them. And I'm like, "WTF brain? Why can't you give me one really good idea instead of a bunch of mediocre ones?" And my brain's like," I can't be expected to always come up with the good ideas! Why don't you try it some time!" And then I'm left confused and with the people at work staring at me. ( You know my brain is kind of a jerk. It's probably why I never listen to him.)
So I've decided I'd do a few things. First I'm going to review Chameleon Circuit's self-titled debut album. And by review I mean tell you all how fantastically amazing it is. If you don't know Chameleon Circuit is a Trock band( Timelord Rock). The thing I find kind of amazing about Chameleon Circuit is that the songs are really good. It's not just a bunch of references set to a melody for the hell of it. There are well though out and clever lyrics set to interesting and entertaining melody.
There are a few problematic things about the album. Mostly, that the entire thing is a bit spoilery if you aren't up to date on current episodes. This makes it hard to share with friends who are still making their way though seasons 1 and 2 (or in some cases the Hartnell area.) And I think that the song Type 40 goes on for just a bit longer than it really needs to but other than that it's really fantastic. My favorite songs on the album are regenerate,Exterminate and K9's lament. ATM that is. They change likemy favorite Dr. horrible song.
The other thing I wanted to talk about was Maddison Atkins.Specifically how it uses different mediums to go about telling a story. Maddison Atkins is a kind of Diet ARG. Most of the plot is moved along by videos posted by characters. But most of the charters also have myspace and twitter accounts which players can use to interact with the character. The thing I found some what strange about this is how it affects the world that the story takes place in. Let me explain a bit. See In an arg there are in game places and there are out of game places. If a place,like a chat room or forum, is considered in game then players have to talk in character. If it is out of game players may talk about the game its self and actors and such. The thing I find sort of strange, is that by giving a character a twitter account that makes my twitter page an in game place. So can I talk about the game Maddison Atkins on there? Or do I have to talk about the girl Maddison Atkins. The other thing that is strange is that characters are wondering about the sudden interest every body has in her videos. Which I find somewhat awkward, you see because this is a story (and a reboot at that) I know all sorts of terrible and weird things are about to happen to her. Only I'm not supposed to. And not telling her that feels a little bit like lying. How do you explain in game to a character that you played a version of this game where stuff got screwed up and you died but your story got rebooted and now we are trying to make sure it doesn't happen again? You can't. So you find your self trying to explain your way into the game by saying something like, "oh well your videos seem pretty interesting so now I'm following you on twitter adding you as a myspace friend and any other sort of social networking site you are on. don't ask why but its for totally non stalkerish reasons."
And typing that all out just now I think I realized just whats been bothering me so much about it all.
1.We've hit the reset button; we've restarted the game only things are slightly different this time around. First time around people got really into it made personal connections with the main characters and now all of that is gone. We are meeting for the first time a character that we all knew and loved. I think this makes things just a bit less organic than they where the first time around.
2.Character interaction actually limits how much you are able to immerse yourself in a story. And this one is going to need a bit of explaining as well. When you read a book, you are privy, for the most part, to every aspect of the main characters lives. You can peer inside their head and see their thoughts the way you can't in a story based on character interaction. With character interaction what information you get is limited to the relationship you build with the character. I think
that might have been what got a lot of us players in trouble with Clara first time around. We wanted so bad to get back into the story. We wanted to peer into her head and be a part of her life they way one would could had they been reading a book. Clara didn't like that too much and eventually just stopped talking to us. Part of the reason the game needed a reboot in the first place.
I also realized that I rambled a lot more than I meant to on a topic that not everybody is that interested in. Sorry bout that. Still I rather enjoy character interaction and how talented writers use it to tell a story. I was talking to Jez the other day about how we should write a story over twitter, where all the characters have their own accounts and the story happens through their updates. I still rather like the idea.
Ok I'm going to wrap things up now with one last, HAPPY BIRTHDAY JENNY!, and then some comment questions.
COMMENT QUESTIONS!
1. How do you feel about using social networking sites to tell a story.
2. Have you said happy birthday to Jenny today?
3.Any new music you recently discovered?
4. Did you have a favorite #crapsuperpower on twitter? I think that was one of the first trending topics that made me laugh.
5.This space intentionally left blank
I'm still teaching myself how to use GIMP but I'll get things figured out eventually. There'd be more but I'm a slow learner and my laptop also kind of died.
Hope you like them. :)
Ok so I've been having trouble figuring out what to write about,not from a lack of ideas but from an overload of them. And I'm like, "WTF brain? Why can't you give me one really good idea instead of a bunch of mediocre ones?" And my brain's like," I can't be expected to always come up with the good ideas! Why don't you try it some time!" And then I'm left confused and with the people at work staring at me. ( You know my brain is kind of a jerk. It's probably why I never listen to him.)
So I've decided I'd do a few things. First I'm going to review Chameleon Circuit's self-titled debut album. And by review I mean tell you all how fantastically amazing it is. If you don't know Chameleon Circuit is a Trock band( Timelord Rock). The thing I find kind of amazing about Chameleon Circuit is that the songs are really good. It's not just a bunch of references set to a melody for the hell of it. There are well though out and clever lyrics set to interesting and entertaining melody.
There are a few problematic things about the album. Mostly, that the entire thing is a bit spoilery if you aren't up to date on current episodes. This makes it hard to share with friends who are still making their way though seasons 1 and 2 (or in some cases the Hartnell area.) And I think that the song Type 40 goes on for just a bit longer than it really needs to but other than that it's really fantastic. My favorite songs on the album are regenerate,Exterminate and K9's lament. ATM that is. They change likemy favorite Dr. horrible song.
The other thing I wanted to talk about was Maddison Atkins.Specifically how it uses different mediums to go about telling a story. Maddison Atkins is a kind of Diet ARG. Most of the plot is moved along by videos posted by characters. But most of the charters also have myspace and twitter accounts which players can use to interact with the character. The thing I found some what strange about this is how it affects the world that the story takes place in. Let me explain a bit. See In an arg there are in game places and there are out of game places. If a place,like a chat room or forum, is considered in game then players have to talk in character. If it is out of game players may talk about the game its self and actors and such. The thing I find sort of strange, is that by giving a character a twitter account that makes my twitter page an in game place. So can I talk about the game Maddison Atkins on there? Or do I have to talk about the girl Maddison Atkins. The other thing that is strange is that characters are wondering about the sudden interest every body has in her videos. Which I find somewhat awkward, you see because this is a story (and a reboot at that) I know all sorts of terrible and weird things are about to happen to her. Only I'm not supposed to. And not telling her that feels a little bit like lying. How do you explain in game to a character that you played a version of this game where stuff got screwed up and you died but your story got rebooted and now we are trying to make sure it doesn't happen again? You can't. So you find your self trying to explain your way into the game by saying something like, "oh well your videos seem pretty interesting so now I'm following you on twitter adding you as a myspace friend and any other sort of social networking site you are on. don't ask why but its for totally non stalkerish reasons."
And typing that all out just now I think I realized just whats been bothering me so much about it all.
1.We've hit the reset button; we've restarted the game only things are slightly different this time around. First time around people got really into it made personal connections with the main characters and now all of that is gone. We are meeting for the first time a character that we all knew and loved. I think this makes things just a bit less organic than they where the first time around.
2.Character interaction actually limits how much you are able to immerse yourself in a story. And this one is going to need a bit of explaining as well. When you read a book, you are privy, for the most part, to every aspect of the main characters lives. You can peer inside their head and see their thoughts the way you can't in a story based on character interaction. With character interaction what information you get is limited to the relationship you build with the character. I think
that might have been what got a lot of us players in trouble with Clara first time around. We wanted so bad to get back into the story. We wanted to peer into her head and be a part of her life they way one would could had they been reading a book. Clara didn't like that too much and eventually just stopped talking to us. Part of the reason the game needed a reboot in the first place.
I also realized that I rambled a lot more than I meant to on a topic that not everybody is that interested in. Sorry bout that. Still I rather enjoy character interaction and how talented writers use it to tell a story. I was talking to Jez the other day about how we should write a story over twitter, where all the characters have their own accounts and the story happens through their updates. I still rather like the idea.
Ok I'm going to wrap things up now with one last, HAPPY BIRTHDAY JENNY!, and then some comment questions.
COMMENT QUESTIONS!
1. How do you feel about using social networking sites to tell a story.
2. Have you said happy birthday to Jenny today?
3.Any new music you recently discovered?
4. Did you have a favorite #crapsuperpower on twitter? I think that was one of the first trending topics that made me laugh.
5.This space intentionally left blank