Distance

Recently I came upon this game: Distance


The controls couldn't be simpler. Mouse clicks advance the frame, and you watch the two characters go through their separate days. Then, each day ends with a phone conversation where you're given a choice of two possible conversational routes.



You pick one, then see how things go, then go to sleep, then click through another day, the end of which sees you in this same place, making another choice.




The way this game is sneaky is that the choices slowly become deeper. Do you want to talk about a movie or soul mates?

There are a couple things about this game that really grabbed me.

What this game does well is capture the experience of those awful long-distance relationships. If you've never tried it, it's awful. I would tell you to never try it, but that's a ridiculous thing to say. Every person I know would declare "I would never want to be in a long-distance relationship" but what they're really saying is, "Given the option to do it or not, I pick not." The real question isn't whether or not one would be in a long-distance relationship, in general. It's really, "Would you be willing to engage in a long-distance relationship with [person you currently love very much]?" Those are two very different questions.

Having done this before, it's tough. And what the game really does nicely is taking you back to that place where you're really unsure about everything. Does she still love me? Do I still love her? Can I love someone even if we never occupy the same physical space? What if someone else comes along?


Even more so, and this part rang more true for me than anything, the game reminded me how shitty the phone is. When you have a phone-based relationship with someone, you have good nights and bad nights. And what's really strange is you can't be sure why some are good and some are bad. Why did asking about a beard turn into a conversation with laughs and both people hanging up happy? How did I ask about her dog and somehow turn things into discussing how we don't agree on the idea of soul mates?

You can play it a number of ways as well. The way I played it was certainly trying to make things work, as though I am the person on one end of the phone. I felt really bad when things didn't work out, but maybe making it work involves saying things not so much because it's what you want to say, but saying what the other person wants to hear.

Yeah, it got kinda real for me in front of my computer there.

The thing that makes this game truly excellent is that it values story over all else. I was listening to the fantastic podcast The Indoor Kids and one of the hosts made a great point about the idea that story and emotional attachment are becoming king. Meaning: we're quickly coming to a point where graphically, anything is possible. Games are less and less limited by someone saying, "That's not possible," and they're more and more based on, "What do you want to do?"

The range of emotions I've experienced with video games is pretty much limited to the triumph of finishing Special World and the agony of being killed over and over by this asshole. And these emotions are all created as a result of my gameplay abilities, not because of story elements or characters. And what scares me about games like Bejeweled is that there's no narrative, and really nothing for me to get into from that angle. I think that's a lot of why I rarely enjoy driving games and sports games. Even Street Fighter II had backstories, slim as they may have been. But I don't care so much about faceless drivers, and because I don't follow sports the players are just cardboard cutouts to me.

So when someone asks "What do you want to do?" I would say that I want to feel something as a result of narrative. Maybe it's just a little twinge, but SOMETHING would be a good start.

Resident Evil was one of the first games that was legitimately scary. God of War was one of the first games that used scale to underscore the narrative arc. But what makes Distance so fascinating is that it doesn't find an emotional place within the larger context of missions and collecting. The emotions are the totality of the gameplay.

It can be done, and it can be done on a minimalist level. I think the gauntlet is thrown down. Personally, I'm looking forward to a world of gaming where some of the cash goes towards creating stories that are heartwrenching and hilarious, and characters who are memorable for their traits and not because they make handy mascots.

Captain America and the Avengers

Thanks to my good friend Nica, I was able to enjoy this wonderful game from my childhood at home, revisit the memories, and see just how well the thing held up.

I should say this, for starters: Playing arcade games on a machine that does not require quarters kind of kills a bit of the fun, the reason being that there's really no way to LOSE, lose. Quarter-based games really were like gambling where there was a certain amount of skill that could make it last longer, although eventually you will have to pump in more money to succeed. They are also like gambling in that I am very bad at them.

This game is a classic beat-em-up style where you walk from left to right beating the shit out of everyone and everything that gets in the way.

In order to complete your task, you are given the choice of one of four characters. Allow me to discuss each, going from right to left for the simple fact that I moved from left to right for so much of my life in these games:


Hawkeye: The worst one in terms of powers. He's good at shooting, so he elects to use a bow and arrow instead of a gun. Also, according to the game, he posesses super vision, a skill that I would think would be posessed by the character named goddamn Vision. Not my first choice.

Captain America: Ah, the brave leader. Note that this was in the 90's, a time when Captain America was not very cool. It took about 10 years of him doing shit like being a werewolf for comics to get through the phase where everything had to be about darkness and almost seeing a titty. Also a very unlikely choice.

Iron Man: This was my guy back when. He could shoot lasers, and in the levels that involved swimming or being in space he did not require any sort of bubblehead contraption to breathe. It made the most sense to me, which is kind of hilarious in that NONE of this makes any sense. You can throw a rock and make it explode in this game, but I was concerned with the fact that Captain America's headbubble might crack, and then he'd be fucked.

Vision: Now we get to the reason we went right to left, in order to save Vision for last.

Can someone explain this posture to me? What is he doing? It looks like he's about to break into a little number from Grease. And when he walks? Crosses his arms, upper body completely still, only his legs moving. It looks insane, and very affected. I hated that. Between his bizarre poses and the fact that he was wearing a Speedo and a cape, Vision didn't get a lot of play from me.

So you start walking and fighting, but almost right away you notice that the dialogue is a little funky. For example, one of my favorites:


Hmm...well, that is a tough question to answer, I guess. To be fair, if I were a bad guy this would disturb me a little. If Spider-Man was running around, quipping like a goddamn stand-up, I would be thinking, "Well, he's all there mentally." But if a roided-up guy in an America get-up spouted at me, "Why should it goes well?" I would be a little concerned that he would not be aces when it came to identifying that I was subdued versus having my brain mashed so hard into the sidewalk that the grease stain never really comes out.

Another great one:

Captain America: There is no escape!

Response:


OOOOO, sweet burn!
A little advice to all, if someone insults you and you respond with, "No, YOU are [carbon copy of original insult] then you are probably not going to impress anyone enough that they let you escape with a huge bag of potatoes with a dollar sign on it.

Just a couple of other favorites:

Bad Guy: "You came here to die!"

Good Guys: "What an evil thing you've done!"

Good Guys: "Where is the laser?"
Bad Guy: "Ask the police!"

Best of all, Captain America urges you on time and again with his battle cry of "Okay! Go!" Seriously, every boss you fight, when the boss' life gets about 3/4 drained, the game's theme song starts thumping and Captain America shouts a slogan I'm pretty sure was written for him by a drunk Paul Oakenfold.

But hey, the whole game is full of this kind of stuff, and really you could spend days scratching your head, wondering what the fuck is going on and what the fuck a Mechanical Taco is.



As in any good comic game, there are cameos from a number of characters who make attempts to help you along the way. Just for fun, here are the four other characters who show up. Try and guess which one is the most helpful.

1. Quicksilver: has the ability of super speed, like the Flash.
2. Namor: Super-ultra strong, shares Vision's fashion sense.
3. Wonder Man: Strong as fuck.
4. Wasp: Extremely small, fashion designer to the stars.

Did you answer Wasp? If you did, I have to believe you have played this game before because there is no reason for that character to be the one helpful extraneous character. It's just plain nonsense.

But before long, you get to the final stage.

Scene 4: The Giant Laser Cannon

You fight some more assholes, then you get to the Red Skull. This game does a very classic move where you fight the Red Skull, who is in a suit and has learned one karate kick in preparation for fighting 4 superpowered men at the same time, and just when you think you've beaten him he teleports into a little bubble, revealing a gigantic Red Skull robot!

Red Skull: "It's another trap, you stupid men!"

Stupid Men: "I'll show you the meaning of justice!"

The meaning of justice, we are shown, is punching out a giant robot until it falls onto the Red Skull and crushes him. Ah, horribly crushed on his own petard!

World saved. Dialogue giggled at. Superhero status cemented.



The big question: Is this a good game?

To answer that question out of context is impossible. I mean, really, how can this game compare to something like Batman: Arkham Asylum? Is that even reasonable to consider?

But! The things that were good about it in my childhood days are still good about it now.

The graphics are simple, but they're actually fairly crisp and enjoyable. The colors, too, are kind of brilliant, especially on the main characters (with the exception of Vision, who is a vision in beige).

Plus, it's just long enough. Right about when I'm getting sick of fighting the same stupid assholes with lasers, I get too the end.

There's an appeal to long, involved games. No doubt. But sometimes I want to put on headphones, listen to the first 3 minutes of a bunch of Mars Volta songs, and scroll left to right, punching indiscriminately.

MS Office Gets Sexy

For a presentation I'm doing in a little bit, I needed a piece of clipart to represent the concept "sexy." I did a search which resulted in two bits of media. One was a piece of audio that sounded like the kind of music you would get when Bugs Bunny stuffed oranges down the front of a dress and tried to bang whoever that racist cowboy guy was. Only shittier and made with a free, on-screen keyboard app of some kind.

The other piece was this image:

Now, I'm not necessarily disagreeing with the sexiness of the picture. I mean, maybe it is. I don't know that we all agree on cowboy hats paired with what is essentially a clayface makeup woman, but whatever.

What makes this curious to me is that this is the ONLY image that comes up after searching "sexy." There are certainly other images that work. In fact, I found one of the bottom half of a woman, who is wearing a bikini, has a belly button ring, and is using the part of her bikini bottom that wraps around her hip as a way to hold sunglasses. So it's not that clip art is all for prudes or something.

But apparently the above image is the only one that everyone at Microsoft could agree upon as being sexy.

So I guess nerds know something. And if you are the woman pictured above, and you're out there, congratulations. Maybe it's like being the most tech-savvy member of a bizarre cult that lives in caves created by breaking holes in rocks, jamming branches inside the holes and soaking the branches to swell them and slowly increase the holes until they are big enough to live in. Maybe it's like that very specific reference, but it's still a sort of an honor.

Picture That's Been Reposted To My Dismay

Okay, can we talk about this image that I've seen all over the Facebooks and Tumblrs this last week or so?

Before going any further, just know that this isn't some anti-feminist screed or something. I save that for audio broadcasts. I just have a dislike for this kind of thing because I think it's trying to make a point, but upon further investigation it's kind of silly.

A few things about this that I think need to be acknowledged:

1. First off, if we're reconciling body issues here, let's not do so by attacking the bodies of others. That's pretty counter-productive. It may feel empowering to point out that the skinniness of the women on the top row is repulsive and unnatural, but really making anyone feel repulsive and unnatural is not doing a whole lot to address a problem. That's what brought us here in the first place.

2. Because I've heard it many times, I do have to break everyone's hearts by reminding us all that the good ol days were not as good as we like to think, no matter how much you are enjoying Mad Men. The old rumor that Marilyn Monroe was a size 14? Not really true. Sorry, it's just not true. That's not to say that a size 14 can't be stunning and sexy, but let's not hold up someone who is NOT a size 14 to make that point. Not to mention the fact that fighting to expand the range of acceptable sizes is an asinine pursuit as these sizes have no connection to any sort of reality whatsoever. Guess what? I just invented Derk size. It's whatever the label says, and then you just say it's 6. So in Derk size, everyone is a 6. That is equally logical, which tells you how fucked up this sizing stuff is.

3. I think we can all agree that the women on the top row have some shit going on. The bottom row? Represented, we have schizophrenia, one woman who was married 8 times, an overdose death, and loads of other issues that are more conveniently hidden. Invisible problems are still problems, people. So let's not get too excited about making lifestyle changes or wondering where all the heroes have gone.

4. Okay, there's a pretty wide spectrum of body types here. While I don't endorse putting one's body through a lot of bullshit to please someone else, there is someone in the world who is attracted to every single one of the eight photos on that image, plus a whole hell of a lot of other ones. As much as it's wrong to place beauty expectations on someone, it's also wrong to condemn someone for what they are attracted to (assuming consenting adults). I don't think most people really get to choose that, yet we give people shit for it all the time. It's wrong to hate someone or think less of them because they have a preference.

5. Are we really comparing the 4 women on the bottom, legendary beauties of their time, and saying that the 4 on the top row will occupy that same cultural space? Because although I don't want to dismiss anyone's beauty here, I don't think that the 4 on top will be the first four names to cross most peoples' minds in 2060.

6. Does this comparison even matter if we consider that we're comparing one impossible standard of beauty against another? Is it easier going through the day now that you know you merely have to be as hot as Marilyn fucking Monroe?

7. How about we have a look at some comments from web site where this picture was posted:

i prefer handles

I'll take a "normal" woman over Skeletor any day.

Sir Mix A Lot said it best, Little in the middle but she got much back.

I'll take the bottom row over the upper row. I've always found that if they are too boney, I get hurt.

Well, wasn't THAT enlightening. I'm not sure I can speculate on what exactly the point of the above image is, but I have to say, I'm almost certain it was not to elicit these reactions.




All I'm saying: Let's stop with this stuff. If you talk to people who make you feel bad about yourself, fuck 'em. You need to find new friends.

I mean, what are you going to do? Print this out, fold it up and put it in your wallet? And then you can pull it out and, what, guilt someone into changing the standard of beauty?

If someone doesn't think you're hot, quit trying to change his or her mind. Your time is better spent just about anywhere else, with just about anywhere else.

In the meantime I'll do my part. If I find myself faced with the decision to have sex with four of eight hot Hollywood women, I'll try and make the best of it.

Sentient

01/20/2012

This is either the day Goodreads became sentient and started responding with emotion as opposed to search results alone:

OR it is the day Pete begins the long process of acknowledging the depths of loneliness required to make you see friends in a book database mated with social networking.

Pete's Smartphone

I decided to buy a smartphone.

Partially it was because of a latenight bar discussion regarding whether or not Joesph Gordon-Leavitt was Cobra Commander in the GI Joe movie (he was, for some reason).

Partially it was because I discovered that I could get a plan that would include free data for $10 less than I was currently paying monthly.

After getting it home, I had it for about a day, fiddling around, looking like a grandfather trying to answer a cordless for the first time and looking wide-eyed and frightened when picking it up didn't do the job.

I am proud to say that I used the Navigation feature, the browser, the Twitter and Facebook apps, and the gmail connection before checking out how it works for pornography.

I would rate it as nearly seamless. Which is the opposite of the anatomy of the people I like to watch in the videos.

That was dirty. But fuck off. This is called "Digitally Stimulated" which is fairly vulgar to begin with.

My question for those with smartphones, iPads and the like, is how are you holding this and masturbating? Surely it's on some kind of a stand. What are you using? How is it working for you? Is the masturbation thing why they have all these covers and cases? Why was the ease of this use not profiled when I hit the "compare phone" button on cnet?

Answers are very much appreciated.

Long live technology.

FINISH HIM!

The other day I stayed up far too late watching Mortal Kombat finishing moves.

I know. I'm sorry.

When I was a kid, these were the most exciting video game innovation I'd ever seen. Let me say again: Freezing a man and then breaking him into pieces was the most exciting video game innovation I'd ever seen.

Cut me some slack. We didn't have the Power Glove.

Watching through them again, I have to say there were some that were pretty disappointing, even then. ESPECIALLY in Mortal Kombat III. Take a ride with me through some terrible Mortal Kombat finishing moves.



I always hated Stryker. Not to be confused with the Loveline host. Him I REALLY fucking hated. This whole thing makes no sense. I mean, with today's political climate, I can see it. But in 1997 or so? Plus, the frying someone by taser followed by firing a GUN into the air in celebration is really making my point for me.


(the first one in this video)

After you finish crushing this Native American man to death, remember to thank Felix the Cat for the use of his bag, which can store infinitely large items in a very uninfinitely-sized space.



For whatever reason, it was important to explode people in MKIII. Not enough to impale, then you have to somehow...shake someone to the point of skin melting off, followed by explosion?




Okay, okay, okay. I know that part of the MK suspension of disbelief is not asking the question "If you could finish him like that, why not just do that in the first place?" But never has a finishing move begged the question more. You could be a giant this whole time? What the fuck? Shouldn't you be involved in some separate, giants-only tournament?

It's also a consistent problem with fighting games that the fighters are never weight-classed or anything like that. How Dahlsim ended up fighting E.Honda I will never grasp.



This one bugs the shit out of me from a purely graphic standpoint. If both characters are on a plane, and one comes down on top of the other like a rotating saw blade, how does he then go in front of the foreground at the same time? I call bullshit. If you have a headsaw that can liquify a man, how about you just keep on going through the floor?


(the first one here)

I liked being Kabal. Finally, a guy with the sense to bring weapons. Why the fuck not? Everyone can throw fireballs all around, this other guy has metal arms, but nobody is bringing weapons? This finisher, though...I guess I'm to understand that his mask is feeding him helium? Although that would explain why the scream from finisher two is so high-pitched...



Whaaa....?

I don't know whose idea this was, but I suspect that "Toasty" asshole.