9 posts tagged “video games”
I'm not quite sure what to make of the project -- it's technically impressive, with production values far higher than I what I imagined a few dudes with no budget would be able to pull off, even if there aren't any textures. However, I'm not sure if I can wrap my mind around the character models or art design, apparently inspired by the Toriyama-designed anime cutscenes from the Final Fantasy Chronicles PSOne collection. Something about it seems off, like Chrono is too bulky and beefy.
That being said, I'm anxious to see how Square will "enhance" CT DS. Don't get me wrong, I love Final Fantasy III DS, another classic remake, but the superdeformed characters didn't always translate very well. This, of course, didn't stop me from sinking several hours into the game, nor will it stop me from enjoying Chrono Trigger, should this rumor pan out. I do, however, think that, when trying to adapt classic games for a modern audience, there's a lot to be said for sprites. See Dragon Quest IX (another Square Enix game), Odin Sphere, and Grim Grimoire for examples of beautiful sprite work.
For comparison, here's some footage of the original Chrono Trigger.
Topher has created a monster. He's gotten me and mines addicted to interested in vinyl toys, what with his Bastardino icon and his Tirehead-dog-thing-humping-his-360. After buying some for the missus, signing up for the Tomopop newsletter (what is Tomopop?), and playing with Castle Crashers, I'm pretty sure I'm hooked.
Thankfully, web 2.0 is a vast labyrinth of deep links upon deep links, leading me to various and sondry (that's the Middle English spelling. I'm taking a Chaucer class, but more on that later) factoids, pichurrs, blog entries, and this video.
Colette's c-blog --> Colourlovers --> Digg --> Video.
While studying for my for my Astronomy exam (P.S. I helped discover a fucking comet!), I came across a star named Thuban, in the constellation Draco. With my encyclopedic knowledge of Final Fantasy X -- I played it for 173 hours; I ought to know something -- I remembered that this was also the name of the last, terrifying optional boss in the Arena. I had a suspicion that the names of celestial beings might pre-date 2001, so I went searching.
And what do you know -- Thuban is the Arabic word for "dragon!" And it's the constellation Draco! Thuban is a Chinese Meth Dragon!* My connections, let me show you them!
Anyway, I've strayed significantly from the topic of this post: how did I found out what a Thuban was? The T entry in the myth alphabet book. Not only was it informative and interesting, but it was accompanied by this stellar image:
I love this so hard. I'm glad that whoever chose to compile this didn't use the same old Greek and Roman and Norse gods and chose to mix it up. Most of these are Slavic, Eastern, or Irish -- a refreshing change from Ares and Thor. I mean, you guys are cool and all, but Kevin Sorbo isn't. Not only are these really cool, indie, low-fi deities, but they're all accompanied by fantastic artwork, each featuring the cutest amorphous blobthing I've ever seen. Seriously, take 15 minutes and scroll through all of these.
Unfortunately, there's no author information to be found, so I don't know where to mail the handjobs and the human sacrifices. That's really about the nicest thing I can say about a serendipitous find. It's just so good.
*There is some speculation that the actual phrase is "Chinese Myth Dragon" but Dragonite smokes hella meth, and you all know it.
It's been a long month.
Between exams, totaling my car (and all of the consequent hassles -- insurance, getting new glasses, shopping for a new computer, etc.), receiving word that I won't be going abroad next semester, and general just-too-much-ery, I haven't had much time to chronicle the goings-on of the internet in this handy dandy blog-cum-social network. The Flaming Lips are great, but I can't just leave them up for months at a time.
In an effort to efficiently remedy this situation, here are a collection of images that, for various reasons, I deemed worthy to leave in the digital Purgatory of my inbox. Sure, they'd get posted eventually, but when? The time of The Ascension is now!
Part of what I've learned during my tenure at Destructoid is that it's polite and considered good form to link back to the original source of compelling and interesting content. Alas, the problem with your friends peddling their sweet internet wares via e-mail is that filenames don't leave manageable paper trails. While I'd love to give credit where credit is due, I'll leave it to karma (as opposed to ad hits) to repay whoever is responsible for this cornucopia of jawsome.
When I move into somewhere more permanent than a dorm (or even my room at home -- between jetsetting around Europe, school, and various cons, I can't remember the last time I was home for more than 2 weeks) I want to dedicate a huge wall to art, inspired by Lippy's apartment in New Orleans. He framed a bunch of posters / ads / flyers and hung them all on one wall, kind of sporadically, with everything overlapping in various artsy places, like some sort of cubist explosion made manifest. I don't know much about aesthetics, but I know what I like. The problem is that I've never had enough prints to cover a space large enough for full effect.
In any case, the point is that a.) I like posters, even though I can't use them; b.) I'm a hobo, but when I settle down, I have an artistic vision of my interior decor; c.) I like this WiReD poster from NextFest.
Yes, this poster is awesome, a cosmic reflection of its eponymous magazine. Game|Life is consistently good, as is Wired as a whole. While gaming magazines are dying the slow, agonizing death of printed media, Wired is varied enough to keep from stagnating, and offers the really in-depth features that are missing from, say EGM or *shudder* GamePro. If I hadn't just spent so much money at E for All, I would totally throw down on a Wired subscription. But, then again, I'd spend more time trying to get them forwarded throughout the mid-South (and, oh my christ, France) than I would actually reading them.
P.S. My favorite poster that I do have is the one that came included in Sam and Max, season 1 (thank you, Telltale!), which I plan on playing this weekend, assuming I can finish Shadow of the Colossus, and can pull myself away from Phantom Hourglass, Katamari Damacy, Puzzle Quest, and Killer 7. If I had a working camera, I would show you it.
P.S.S. lol @ NextLust
I like troubling my little head over really abstract notions of "providence" and "fate" and "coincidence" and "probability" -- due, in part, to Dr. Conn's "God, Death, and the Meaning of Life" course 2 semesters ago (God, I hate that man) -- and this seems like some sort of cosmic, digitized message that conveys ... absolutely nothing at all. It was just a really sick throw.
[Via Gameroom]
Editor's Note: This in no way signifies my support of Major League Gaming. I'm of the firm disposition that video games are not a sport and shouldn't be treated as such. Also, watching other people play video games is boring as balls. I'd rather have a frontal lobotomy.
Here's a another Halo 3 article I just wrote at 3 in the morning for one of the longest-running college newspapers in the country, the Sewanee Purple. The assignment was to be "over the top" and "funny" which translates into "blatantly rip-off The Onion." My mom was right -- I am a no-talent hack!
Delicious bags of tea: Halo 3 bursts the Sewanee Bubble
Joseph Leray
Associate EditorThose of you with girlfriends may not know this, but Halo 3, the testerone-fueled love child of Microsoft Game Studios and its subsidiary, Bungie Studios, came out last week. It was kind of a big deal.
How big of a deal, you ask? Well, it grossed $170 million within the first 24 hours of its release. I don’t know much about math, but I do know that 170 million is way higher than I can count, even if use my fingers and toes.
Furthermore, the release of Halo 3 caused massive damage at the offices of competitor Sony Computer Entertainment: Chairman Kaz Hirai spontaneously combusted and President Jack Tretton chewed his legs off. Both were immediately stricken with impotency.
But the throngs of fuzzy-knuckled Halotards™ already knew this. More interestingly, though, is just how far Halo fever has spread, and the resulting social implications.
Dr. Celeste Ray, chair of the Anthrolpology department weighs in: “The social structures and customs that have been built up by Halo 3 are really interesting. Halo “culture” seems to consist mostly of energy drinks, nicotine, and the ability to be horribly rude behind an internet identity. Homophobia and racism abound.”.
Another defining aspect of the Haloverse™ is the act of “teabagging” the still-warm, bullet-ridden corpses of one’s opponents as a means of humiliation. Teabagging someone involves squatting over their dead body and bouncing up and down as fast as possible, like the first, tiny delirium tremors of a four-month-old fetal alcohol victim.
“It is, essentially, the mortification of Hector by Achilles for geeked-out white kids, a way to braggadociously compensate for daddy issues ” says Ray. “I think there may be lewder connotations, but the jury’s still out.”
Nevertheless, Vice-Chancellor Joel Cunningham has entered the fray. “I’ve been playing Halo for years,” says Cunningham. “Up until the release of Halo 3, I used to hold regular Halo 2 tourneys. It was a great way to meet people. I’ve been teabagging Sewanee students for years.”
The irrational dedication routinely displayed by fans of the series is another interesting phenomenon, explains Ray. “You wouldn’t believe how upset Joel got when he found out that Master Chief dies at the end. Geez, you would’ve thought that Bill Gates personally came over and killed his pets or something.”
Vice-Chancellor Cunningham has won a total of six Halos during his long, illustrious career. He can be found winning the Halos on Xbox Live under the alias “Roncore.”
I doubt I'm going to sleep any time soon, a pattern that I think will perpetuate itself for the rest of the semester. I love my life, but I hate this night.
Remember a week ago when I was gushing over how good the yet-unreleased Beirut album, The Flying Club Cup, was? Well, I haven't really moved past that yet, so here's another video, this time of Owen Pallett singing "Cliquot," courtesy of La Blogotheque.
The thing about Owen Pallett is that the name of his Toronto-based outfit happens to be that of my favorite video game franchise of all time. Convenient, that. In any case, a little digging shows that Final Fantasy actually sings on the album:
Indie backscratching is always cute, and Pallett's old hat -- he's also worked with Arcade Fire, Bloc Party, and Stars."It's not a cover it's a co-write. Zach [Condon] wrote an instrumental and gave it to me and I wrote the melody and lyrics. I haven't heard the finished version and didn't even know it was called Cliquot."
On the decidedly low-fi end of the spectrum, here's a cover of Peter Bjorn and John's "Young Folks", as performed by Dawn Landes.
While I prefer the original, I can appreciate the metaphysical workings of a folk cover of "Young Folks" performed by old folks. Either way, this video comes courtesy of Simon Gooch, who, while he may secretly hate me, has the best last name ever.
Continuing on, I stumbled across some more of those nifty Take Away Shows, this time featuring one of my favorite singer-songwriters of, like, ever: John Vanderslice. Why should you care about John Vanderslice?
Any way, now that Vanderslice's cock is out of my mouth, here's one of three videos, again via La Blogotheque: To make a long story short, I'm a big fan, and I'm definitely picking up his newest album. And so should you.
1. He founded the Tiny Telephone recording studio which has been used by the likes of Spoon, Beulah, Okkervil River, and Death Cab for Cutie.2. He writes really fucking good music.
3. His old band, mk Ultra, is named after a CIA mind-control experiment from the '50s primarily focused on the ingestion of LSD.
4. His first album Mass Suicide Occult Figurines is all of these things: named after a line in Neutral Milk Hotel's "Song Against Sex", available for free download, and amazing.
5. Most importantly, he was involved in an elaborate hoax with Microsoft that included numerous trademark licensing lawsuits, child pornography, and Bill Gates death threats.
Editor's note: All of this video hunting is a direct result of my need to procrastinate while working on an essay about Alfred Lord Tennyson's "Morte d'Arthur." That's in no way relevant, and serves only to justify an otherwise banal post about year-old pop songs.
Like an anthropomorphic seahorse, I will bear the first child of anyone who makes me one of these.
