25 Jun 2007
It’s been entirely too long since my last post. Work has been very demanding lately, and it’s left me tapped. All my critical thinking has been dedicated to my professional life. And I’d bore you with that, but I’d have to kill you afterwards. Which given the general anonymity of the internet is a task that I just don’t have the energy for.
So I’ve been coasting along day to day. And invariably in a time like this the fluff in my Netflix queue sticks me with a bunch of heavy stuff. I’m loathe to switch the brain back on, but eventually I have to succumb. At least afterwards I never regret it.
The film this time was a documentary called Why We Fight. On one level it works to answer the question of how we got to where we are today in Iraq (which is summed up quite well, and you can watch it on YouTube here). But on a deeper level the documentary is an analysis of our gradual slip from an isolationist nation into the self-appointed global police force and what the implications of our militarization has on our social and political structure.
At the heart of the film is President Eisenhower’s farewell address, which is startling in its candor… especially in the context of the modern world where our president is a complete tool. Seriously, I ache after hearing real public discourse like that - the kind that builds real confidence in our nation and its future. But one of the key parts of the message of Why We Fight is that there is no villain. The problem lies not in a person but the military-industrial complex - a interdependency of defense industries and politics that’s good for business but bad for people.
While it seems that Michael Moore’s documentaries lose a good deal of their bite by trying to blame the world’s problems on a single person (be it Charlton Heston or George W. Bush), Eugene Jarecki’s Why We Fight comes out a lot more sensible. Even Dubya comes off as a victim in this huge military machine that we’ve built for ourselves. Unfortunately that also makes the solution more complex: there’s no motivation in the system to stop, so I guess it’s up to We the People to say that spending more than half the budget on defense is officially ridiculous.
I’m finding myself so frequently frustrated with politics these days. I wish that the political wheels turned without having to be so carefully monitored. I realize that I get the majority of my information in entertainment form, but it seems to be the only honest filter out there. I don’t have the heart to take it straight. Wrap it up in a joke, work it into a narrative (I caught Syriana a couple weeks ago, which incidentally is another (well told) story of shitty foreign policy)… just do something with it. Well, something other than spread it out over 24 hours of “crap your pants” fear-mongering that is at the same time both too serious and not serious enough. Wait, I take it back - maybe I can take it straight. It’s just sad that my only reference of what that would be like is footage of our president from 50 years ago.
16 May 2007
Played on Xbox360
It’s hard to really explain how much I love Guitar Hero II. But I don’t really have to, because everyone else seems to as well (reviews: GameSpot, GameSpy, GameRankings). It’s one of those games that anyone can play and have a blast. I played the first Guitar Hero for the PS2, which totally rocked, but the sequel’s arrival on the Xbox 360 is a distinct upgrade. The graphics are totally better, although that’s more a feature for the spectators, not the player. There’s a cooperative mode where one player can play lead and the other can play rhythm or bass. There are more songs. As a 360 title there are achievements, which are well balanced. There are also leaderboards where you can size yourself up against your friends or the whole world (I’m currently ranked around 13,000). The gameplay itself is more of the same, but no one’s complaining about that.
There’s no doubt that Guitar Hero II is a great game. But its popularity opens it up to high scrutiny, and there’s a lot of controversy around some of the features. Two of the most obvious additions for a 360 based Guitar Hero would be wireless controller and downloadable content. The lack of a wireless controller I’ve come to terms with, since real guitars aren’t wireless. But there’s been a ton of controversy around the pricing of the downloadable tracks. If you applied the pricing they’re using to the 50 songs that came with the game it would cost over $100 to download them, yet the game with the guitar was only $90. You can debate how much one of these songs should cost, but no matter what number you arrive at it sure shouldn’t be more than the current box price. I want downloadable content, I do. I bought the tracks that are available, as overpriced as they are. I will happily re-purchase all the tracks from the first Guitar Hero, because I see the value of having them instrumented for coop and whatnot. But I’d rather not get gouged in the process.
As I’ve mentioned before there’s also some controversy over Guitar Hero II’s unlockable content. I personally felt the pain of that the first time I tried to plop down on a different Xbox and play multiplayer. Your experience is pretty limited when you start out with only a fifth of the songs. And you can’t unlock new songs via multiplayer - you have to go antisocial and unlock them in singleplayer first. There’s supposedly an unlock all cheat code, but I could never get it to work. The best way I’ve found to handle this is to put your save game on a memory stick and carry that with you. But even then only one person gets credit for coop unlockables. Coop is an absolute blast, so it’s a shame they didn’t iron out more of the kinks.
The problems are minor in the grand scheme of things as they don’t prevent the game from being fun. I guess it just gives the developer some stuff to smooth out in the software for Guitar Hero III. My only question with Guitar Hero is when can I get more of it? Are we going to get more downloadable tracks? What about the awesomeness that is Guitar Hero 80’s? Is their strategy to sell yearly discs or to rock the downloadable content? It honestly doesn’t matter to me, as long as I can get my fix. So far it seems my appetite for Guitar Hero is insatiable.
09 May 2007
I’m a bit behind the times, because I only just got around to seeing An Inconvenient Truth. It’s definitely a “must see.” Not like “must see TV,” more like “must see or we’ll all die.”
The picture Gore paints is pretty grim, but it comes off as informational rather than sensational. The film works very well for raising awareness, but not so well as a call to action, leaving you with this “now what?” feeling. But that’s probably a smart decision. By choosing to concentrate on presenting the non-debatable facts the film doesn’t give people much room to question whether we have a serious problem on our hands. But what to do about is mostly left as an exercise for the reader.
The one firm call to action is to visit the web site, which in general focuses on small things you can do, not large lifestyle changes. That’s cool, I guess, but that’s kinda like trying to lose weight by switching to low fat cookies instead of, you know, diet and exercise. Now I’m not saying the solution has to be unnatural liposuction (Which I guess in this context would be what? Stop driving cars altogether? “Reducing” the world’s population by half?). There has to be some achievable middle ground. But to think that we can fix this problem by switching to a different kind of light bulb is pretty naïve. We should do those little things, but they’re not going to be enough.
The title of the film is perfect: there’s a clear truth here and it is pretty damn inconvenient. The facts presented to us demand that we change. What worries me most is that I don’t think people are naturally good at change or compromise… especially Americans. Our whole culture is founded on stubborn individualism. Our days of driving huge cars everywhere to eat heavily packaged fast food have to come to an end. And I don’t trust the average American to let that go. Which I guess means we’re all gonna die… which is also pretty darn inconvenient. Drat.
03 May 2007
GameSpy has a periodic article that they do called What We’re Playing where all the staff weighs in on what games they’re playing (aptly named, yes). I find it interesting because comparing all their lists can give you an idea of what games have broad and/or lasting value. But it’s also nice because you get little two sentence impressions without the pressure of a full preview or review. And as I continue this blog I’m seeing the value in that from their end. I try to complete every game I come across and have something interesting to say, but sometimes the journey to get there is so long that it’s worth throwing in offhand comments along the way.
It’s hard to say how much I love this game. Currently I’m working on 5-starring Hard and scraping by in Expert (currently in tier 6). Both of which are totally owning me, so I don’t know if I’m gonna make it, but it’s still fun anyway. Seriously, if you have a 360, get this game.
I’m towards the end of the GDI campaign. The game totally brings together the classic C&C setting with streamlined gameplay from Generals. However it does seem like I can always succeed by just turtling and then building the uber army (no unit caps FTW?).
Holy crap old school RPGs are long; I’ve been playing this one pretty solid during my commute for months. But at least the job system is interesting, making me feel like I’m not grinding the whole time. After killing lots of time getting uber job combos and all the legendary weapons I’m finally enroute to the final boss.
I’m actually approaching my criteria for being “done” with the game. I’ve completed every soloable quest in Outland and most of the group quests, leaving me for a relatively small quest log. It’s actually kinda annoying because there’s no longer a point for me to play at any time other than in a group. The stuff coming in the next patch looks interesting, but outside of that I may end up putting this game down for awhile after a couple weekends more.
Haven’t got back to this for a couple weeks because of other games. I’ve only finished the first dungeon so I’ve got a lot ahead of me. I’m not yet sold on the wiimote gestures for fighting but everything else seems pretty good.
In my commute time I’ve decided to put this on hold so that I can focus completely on finishing FFV. But I’m eager to return to it as that I had a good time with its predecessor.
27 Apr 2007
Played on Wii
There was an article over on GameSpy awhile back about how innovation in games is overrated And I agree with them - there’s nothing wrong with an incremental evolution of an old formula. But it is quite refreshing when something totally different comes along. Trauma Center: Second Opinion is one of those games (links: GameSpot, GameSpy, GameFly). In it you play the role of surgeon, using your wiimote to slice, dice, and stitch your patients into good health. It’s the sort of experience that couldn’t really happen on any other platform (save the DS).
I was surprised by how approachable they made a game about surgery. I’ve had people with almost no experience with the Wii jump in and start removing tumors in a matter of minutes. The controls are easy to pick up, but the game is crazy intense. You’ve got this clock ticking down, the heartbeat monitor beeping, and if you screw up this person is dead. Well, not quite; if you lose a senior doctor scolds you and takes over… even after you’ve become world renowned super surgeon. I guess they figured the whole “Game Over” screen meaning “You Lost a Patient” would be too much for people to bear. Instead they put in probably the most ego destroying Game Over message ever. But all of this together just builds together to make you feel like a total badass for every operation you complete successfully.
You may feel like a super surgeon while playing the game, but it’s a far cry from being medically accurate. I’m pretty sure that most illnesses are not caused by medical terrorism. And I’m positive I’ve never seen anyone on Scrubs fix anyone by removing biologically engineered creepy crawlies (and obviously Scrubs is the bastion of medical legitimacy). So if you’re looking to use this game as training for your future career in medicine… well, good luck with that. I just hope I don’t find myself on the other end in the O.R. with some Trauma Center grad smothering antibiotic gel on anything that moves.
Occupation viability aside, Trauma Center is an easy game to recommend. It’s fun, makes great use of the wiimote, scales to different skill levels, and is basically unlike anything else out there. Plus chicks dig surgeons.