Results of Ruminations

Note: To discuss the themes of Cars 3 and look at how they affected me, I have to talk about the end of the movie. In that sense, I'm spoiling the film...or, at least, the film's plot . Don't read if you don't want to (which is always the way it works, obviously), but I feel like there's more to this movie than the story and whether or not it's "spoiled". And though I believe that, I wanted to make this paragraph a little longer to ensure that no one catches an eyeful of spoilers that they didn't intent.  Major spoilers. ( Source ) Pixar's third entry into its Cars  franchise is significantly better than Cars 2 , in large part because Mater isn't around very much at all so the story instantly improves. Okay, that's probably not fair. Cars 2  had some endearing zaniness, and the chance to expand the world of the franchise was a natural step: First film, bring the urban to the rural; second film, bring the rural to the urban. Both ...

There is great difficulty when approaching the Everyman that is supposed to be Solid Snake. His appearance in subsequent games--most canonical, some not ( Super Smash Brothers Melee and the Ac!d games come to mind)--has slowly, almost reluctantly revealed the explosive past and personality of a character who was originally designed to be more transparent. Hideo Kojima explains in an interview: "When I created the main character [Snake], I knew he is essentially the player...I wanted the character to be vague. That way, players will project their own personalities onto the character, and form a stronger connection with Snake." This technique is not unique to games, yet the tropes of transparent characters rarely see such success. Few narratives can readily rely on a blank Everyman, though some do ( Moby-Dick is perhaps the greatest example). The result is perhaps crucial to Snake as an avatar. That isn't to say the character doesn't have personality or a past. The tr...

NOTE: As always, there's a standing spoiler alert for any game I discuss on this blog. Here, I will be talking about Metal Gear Solid for the first PlayStation. Most of the discussion will focus on and spoil only that storyline, but because the five games that comprise the saga (as of this writing, with MGS: Portable Ops taking a necessary place) are linked, it's important to know that some things may get spoiled if you haven't played everything. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ On Liquid In a certain sense, Metal Gear Solid is Liquid's game. Ever one to want to emulate the Patriots--albeit a type of radical, hate-twisted emulation, similar to the one that he has for Big Boss--Liquid takes it upon himself to manipulate, control, and twist Snake's progress. If anyone controls Snake, it should be Liquid, not the gamer. The controller in the hands of the audience is happenstance, for the entire ballet of Shadow Moses is...

NOTE: This one is best read as a follow up to the one about violence and the one about the next level of gaming. I am, admittedly, rather disappointed in this particular essay, but I want to see what others think before I scrap it entirely. Particularly the end—it smacks of being too preachy. You tell me. Also, there is a footnote. Just FYI. Death of the Avatar Roland Barthes in 'Death of the Author': “Writing is that neutral, composite, oblique space where our subject slips away, the negative where all identity is lost, starting with the very identity of the body writing” (Image, Music, Text, 1977). Replace 'writing' with 'gaming', and we have a new instance of death within video games--indeed, may very well be the only death within video games that matters. “[Gaming] is that neutral, composite, oblique space where our subject slips away, the negative where all identity is lost, starting with the very identity of the body [gaming].” Much has been said about t...

There's a gap, somewhere, as necessary as a space between words, yet perplexing all the same. Video games are unique in many ways, but the most important here is the unreality of the experience, connected via a tiny umbilical cord (now wireless) streaming from the participant to the spectacle. This is not 'naïve realism' versus 'representative realism' or any other philosophical thought experiment. Instead, this is the real experiment of what can constitute definitions of reality, but placed inside of a virtual realm. The game is flat, despite having 3D graphics (or the redundant title of 'stereoscopic vision' being added to give the illusion of dimensional depth to games). The game is silent, despite having 7.1 Dolby Digital sound pumping through the speakers. The game is independent, despite being a console attached to a wall attached to a TV attached to a gamer. Perhaps in a quasi-Buddhist way, we could ask, “If no one is around to play the game, is it...

I've been working steadily the past week on my three-project mess. It's kinda hard to show exactly how much each has progressed, but it's good to see something going on. At least, I think so. Tales: 5,206 new words (that doesn't sound like a lot, but I'm pleased with it. I'm 25% through my goal for the month) Press Start: I have 9,995 words in the project, a number of which I've culled from this blog. (Yes, just 5 words away from 10k! Of course, as I lamented in the last blog post, a lot of those words have to be thrown away. I don't have an overall goal for the month with this one. A large—probably overly-large—portion of this one isn't going to be written until I finish Baudrillard.) Words: This is the revision one. It's going to float around 136,721 words (it's current count) pretty permanently. A better track: 3/44 chapters revised. That's not even 1% yet. Books and Other Snippets I'll probably post a little anecdote about the re...

Admittedly, two of those endings came in the form of video games, but those are significant to me in a particular sense--I'll get to those in a minute. The third of the eponymous endings is this: I have officially finished my last class. I have somehow survived my first year as a teacher. I'm waiting for the reality of that to sink in. While I wait (could take weeks...but don't worry, this blog probably won't be that long), I'd like to put down a little bit of my sentiments. School is Out I've always enjoyed academics. I've enjoyed learning, reading (as you may have seen elsewhere ), and most things attached to academics. I lamented--truly lamented--graduating from college, though the feelings were a little far removed because of the circumstances . I've toyed with the idea of immediately looking into a Master's program and returning to my life as a student. Recently, Gayle and I decided to push back Peter's last (we hope) surgery until mid-June ...

Initial Capitulation It's truly official now: I'm part of the odiously named "blogosphere," a place where I can sign on, think aloud, and general feel like I'm intelligent because I'm on the internet (where anything therein is automatically true). So that's my initial capitulation: giving in to the trend of writing a web log. Well, if nothing else, it'll have correct spelling in (almost) every post, and the grammar will make sense to normal folk–none of this "it's the 21st century, who needs rules?" garbage. So on to my current thoughts. Metal Gear Solid Any gamer who deserves the monikers of 'gamer' is at least vaguely aware of Hideo Kojima's latest installation on the immensely popular Metal Gear Solid series. I don't doubt that it will be a huge commercial success, will help salvage Sony's flagging PS3 sales, and simply and thoroughly kick butt. In a lot of ways. That being said, I've been meaning to post small ...