April 29, 2009
April 27, 2009
Uhhh...What?
It's two, two, two utterly bizarre ideas in one!
Up first, Warren Ellis is evidently working on a comic called "Supergod" and the graphic includes a crown of thorns. The only surprising thing would be if it ended up being inoffensive.
Second, we have a software company making a game where Mr. T and Will Wright (of Sim City fame) fight Nazis.
Uhhh...What?
Link 1 and Link 2.
Up first, Warren Ellis is evidently working on a comic called "Supergod" and the graphic includes a crown of thorns. The only surprising thing would be if it ended up being inoffensive.
Second, we have a software company making a game where Mr. T and Will Wright (of Sim City fame) fight Nazis.
Uhhh...What?
Link 1 and Link 2.
Six Days In Fallujah
Konami recently announced an upcoming video game called "Six Days In Fallujah," which chronicled one of the most heated battles in the current operations in Iraq. After getting heat from a number of sources (veteran's groups, families of soldiers, and probably miscilaneous people from the internet), the game has been cancelled. This has led to somewhat heated discussions, though bizarrely not nearly so heated as dicussions about which video game console is the best, about the appropriateness of the game, war games generally, and whether there's a proper place for interactive software to cover real world events in a similar manner to other media. Any thoughts?
Here's my post from the above discussion:
"For me, the "too soon" argument isn't about being too emotionally close to the events. Well, at least, that's not really the point. The point is that we've had more than enough time to settle the history on WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and (perhaps) the first Gulf War. What I mean is that we can pretty much all agree that the Germans were on the "wrong" side of the war in a pretty extreme sense and few would be offended by the portrayal of Germans as the villains of a game. Similarly, Vietnam has been determined to be a morally questionable war, and most representations in modern media reflect that.
The current operations in Iraq, however, a much less settled. It'd be far too easy to fall into caricatures; to represent the U.S. characters as unambiguously morally correct and the people they fight as unambiguously evil, and all the things that come with current caricatures of Islamic peoples. And no, I'm not talking about "political correctness," which is its own caricature, I'm talking about producing reflections on war that are of real social value. The tendency to produce the shallow, simplistic works that I described earlier in this paragraph don't add anything to our understanding of conflict, war, or the specific events of our history. They're produced as entertainment; as propaganda to make one side of a conflict feel superior to the other and justified in their actions. These aren't sober reflections on history but tools to further agendas which are still all too current and relevant. They're also, frequently, crass attempts to cash in on the emotions, patriotism, and sometimes jingoism that follow international conflict.
There is definitely value in using interactive software as a tool to explore history. From what I've seen, however, this is not the product to help interactive software shed its "games" label for something perhaps more respectable."
Here's my post from the above discussion:
"For me, the "too soon" argument isn't about being too emotionally close to the events. Well, at least, that's not really the point. The point is that we've had more than enough time to settle the history on WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and (perhaps) the first Gulf War. What I mean is that we can pretty much all agree that the Germans were on the "wrong" side of the war in a pretty extreme sense and few would be offended by the portrayal of Germans as the villains of a game. Similarly, Vietnam has been determined to be a morally questionable war, and most representations in modern media reflect that.
The current operations in Iraq, however, a much less settled. It'd be far too easy to fall into caricatures; to represent the U.S. characters as unambiguously morally correct and the people they fight as unambiguously evil, and all the things that come with current caricatures of Islamic peoples. And no, I'm not talking about "political correctness," which is its own caricature, I'm talking about producing reflections on war that are of real social value. The tendency to produce the shallow, simplistic works that I described earlier in this paragraph don't add anything to our understanding of conflict, war, or the specific events of our history. They're produced as entertainment; as propaganda to make one side of a conflict feel superior to the other and justified in their actions. These aren't sober reflections on history but tools to further agendas which are still all too current and relevant. They're also, frequently, crass attempts to cash in on the emotions, patriotism, and sometimes jingoism that follow international conflict.
There is definitely value in using interactive software as a tool to explore history. From what I've seen, however, this is not the product to help interactive software shed its "games" label for something perhaps more respectable."
April 16, 2009
George Will
Almost Makes Me Like The Bruins
This ad is hereby immediately nominated to the Hall of Fame for great advertisements. Link.
Oh, Old People
I cannot calculate how much I have loved the teabagging jokes of the last few weeks. In case you haven't seen it, here's Anderson Cooper's contribution, though he clearly doesn't understand which person is teabagged and which is the teabagger. Link.
April 13, 2009
Dollhouse: Episode 9
Man, that was a good one. Anyone else catch the cameo by David Fury (aka, The Mustard Man from the Buffy musical and Framkin, the pupped guy from Angel's "Smile Time")?
April 06, 2009
Farscape
So, every nerd has to at least be familiar with Star Trek and Star Wars to even have a little cred. Buffy's probably in there too, and I wouldn't be surprised if BSG became a part of the necessary nerd knowledge as time goes one.
Then there are the other shows. The shows that only the weird nerds are really into. These are the Babylon 5s, the Hercules/Xenas, SG-1s, Andromedas, and yes, Farscapes. Well, I've been watching Farscape for a while now, and I'm closing in on the end of Season 2 (of 4 total, plus a TV movie), and it's really turned into a good show. The first season was decent, though the quality wasn't quite good enough to distract me from the fact that everyone in space is an Australian. Despite being a sometimes serious show, this made for the more humorous version of space I've seen. But Season 2 really turns the show up to 11 with the greater focus on the villain Scorpius. Yes, just a short while ago I thought he was about the dumbest looking villain in a long time, but they make it work.
Anyway, I guess the takeaway is that if I wasn't before, I'm definitely one of those weird nerds now.
Then there are the other shows. The shows that only the weird nerds are really into. These are the Babylon 5s, the Hercules/Xenas, SG-1s, Andromedas, and yes, Farscapes. Well, I've been watching Farscape for a while now, and I'm closing in on the end of Season 2 (of 4 total, plus a TV movie), and it's really turned into a good show. The first season was decent, though the quality wasn't quite good enough to distract me from the fact that everyone in space is an Australian. Despite being a sometimes serious show, this made for the more humorous version of space I've seen. But Season 2 really turns the show up to 11 with the greater focus on the villain Scorpius. Yes, just a short while ago I thought he was about the dumbest looking villain in a long time, but they make it work.
Anyway, I guess the takeaway is that if I wasn't before, I'm definitely one of those weird nerds now.
April 05, 2009
Harold And Kumar Go To Washington
Just a quick blogging break from a brief I'm writing. An annoying, annoying, long brief.
Anyway, legalization of pot has quietly become one of the bigger stories of this recession. President Obama has been asked about it at town halls, legit journos are writing articles about it, and Senators are talking about restructuring our sentencing for drug crimes.
The most shocking figure that I took from those links is that 47% of all arrests in this country are related to marijuana. That's an enormous waste of money any way you slice it, particularly since it doesn't seem to be having the effect of reducing usage.
Link.
And now, sigh, back to work.
Anyway, legalization of pot has quietly become one of the bigger stories of this recession. President Obama has been asked about it at town halls, legit journos are writing articles about it, and Senators are talking about restructuring our sentencing for drug crimes.
The most shocking figure that I took from those links is that 47% of all arrests in this country are related to marijuana. That's an enormous waste of money any way you slice it, particularly since it doesn't seem to be having the effect of reducing usage.
Link.
And now, sigh, back to work.
April 04, 2009
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