The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

Sometimes I forget why I play games, I guess. I do it because it’s what I do. I mean, I enjoy myself, but often it’s not so much a thrill as a way to pass the time. I don’t always realize it, of course. It takes those rare moments to smack me out of it. Whether it be a game that’s so frustrating, I question why I’m using my leisure time on it, or a game so fantastic, it pulls me out enough to make me go “wait a second, this is so much damn fun!”

I don’t know. I got DJ Hero 2 in from Gamefly, and immediately after putting the disc in, I was thrilled. It drew me in. It made me feel excited and energized. After playing for hours and stopping, I stepped back and went, “Holy shit, I was having fun.”

I remember other moments like that in life, where I’ve looked at myself and realized, “Oh, this is happy, I guess. Crazy.” Like, say, the first time I saw They Might Be Giants in concert. I was completely lost in it. Completely happy, and it was extended over a long period of time. At times, the nostalgic feelings that creep up on me when I view a Christmas tree does the same thing. I feel fantastic. I feel loved. It’s great.

There are times I wonder if the fact that I feel this way indicates how horrible I feel most of the time. “Does everyone normally feel like this on a good day?” I wonder. I’m pretty sure that’s not the case. I’ve got lots of good in my life. It’s pretty solid. No, it’s just a heightened sense. A sense of getting away from everything, and of being completely free. It’s great when a good game experience can give you that rare moment.

Needless to say, I paid to keep DJ Hero 2. I’m really loving it. I’ll write more about it later. But it just reminded me how rare that feeling is. I guess I’m lucky the game gives it to me, at least for a little while.

I bought a game while it was on sale. It was called “Snoopy Flying Ace” and it is a game where Peanuts characters fly around and shoot each other in planes while wearing really, really ridiculous WWII-style costumes. When the planes explode, the characters always parachute out, so you know you’re not ruining Peanuts canon by murdering time-travelling Peppermint Patty during WWII.

Anyway, the game is kind of ridiculous. As ridiculous as you would think a multiplayer-focused XBL game based on Peanuts would be. But Brer likes flying, and I thought we could play through the campaign together, because it has really nice split screen stuff, even online. I bought it cheap to save for his visit. At the same time, I’m like, well, I can at least check out the online, stuff, you know?

Anyway, the point of all this is, the game is fucking fantastic.

Well, the multiplayer is, anyway, and that was clearly the focus of the game. You have your normal variety of modes: Deathmatch and Team Deathmatch (Called Dogfight, both because, you know, planes, and also because, you know, Snoopy), a Capture the Flag variant, a “kill the guy with the ball” variant, and a football-style mode called Pigskin. What’s more, there’s plenty of people playing. This can sometimes be a problem with a game, but I’ve never had trouble getting into a full game, at least in the more common modes. You can bring it up, and be shooting people in a minutes. This is a huge benefit for me.

The game has a fairly large variety of weapons, of which you can take two of into a match, along with a basic forward-facing machine gun you always have. You can set various weapon loadouts per Peanuts character, or just switch them around on one mid-match if needed. You can also fly as your Avatar, just for the hell of it. You can also pick what kind of plane you want to fly, although this is mostly cosmetic: there are stat differences between “light,” “medium,” and “heavy” planes, but nothing in between the classes.
What gets me is that all the weapons actually seem useful. When I first looked at the weapon list, I assumed many would be completely useless. But I’m working on the Weaponeer achievement, and that means I have to use a variety of guns. While I figured that the only good weapons would be the Comet Rockets and the Squitos, I’ve found that there really is a good variety of useful stuff out there. Yes, some are better than others, but if you have different styles, they are useful. Even things like the little spinning melee thing that twirls under your plane is not that hard to get kills with. I don’t see one particular loadout when I play. That’s a damn good thing. The game is well-balanced that way.

The game has kill-streak bonuses like Modern Warfare, too. If you get 4 kills in a row, Woodstock jumps onto your plane tail with two magnum pistols and will shoot people behind you. (No, seriously, that’s what happens.) Getting 9 in a row turns your plane into Snoopy’s doghouse, though I’ve never gotten close to that bonus, so I don’t know what it does. That’s neat, but it honestly doesn’t seem to come into play anywhere near as often as the streak bonuses in things like Modern Warfare. I think that’s a good thing.

There are various maps, many with weird environmental hazards, like robots or evil dragon submarines that you have to dodge while fighting. There are also turrets you can man on the field. The guide I looked at for the game seemed to indicate these are really powerful, and I do sometimes get shot down by them, but every time I’ve gotten into a turmulent, I’ve been unable to hit shit. Who knows. In any case, the maps have plenty of open areas, as well as buildings and things to maneuver around. There’s like… 6 or so of them. This is plenty for a game like this.

Really, I’ve been having a fantastic time. It’s extremely polished, and good fun if you like shooting down other people online. It’s not very Peanuts-y or anything, though there are some nice touches. Die a bunch of times with no kills, and you get labelled a “Blockhead,” along with a silly icon of Charlie Brown with a squared-off head. When you win, it plays a little piano tune and shows a picture of Snoopy dancing. It’s a weird product, but as far as online multiplayer goes, it’s aces. The demo even lets you play online matches for awhile, so I recommend doing that and trying it. It might hook you too.
As for the campaign, I’ve not played it. I’m waiting. We’ll see if it’s fun, but I bet it will be. Probably not the deepest thing, but the mechanics are solid, so I’m sure it’ll be a good time.

I hesitate to ramble about the “kids these days.” I find some people doing that, in reference to their classes, and I just find that kind of… wrong. I dunno, I was a Freshman. I did stupid-ass shit like this when I was in school. That’s why it took so long for me to graduate. I get it. It’s no less annoying to see happen, but I get it. My students are adults, and they can make their own decisions.

That said, seriously, kids these days.

The current assignment we’ve been doing all week involves two things, giving an in-class presentation of 5 to 7 minutes and turning in an MLA works cited list. I’m not grading this hard. If your presentation is long enough, you’re probably pretty good on the content. That’s half the grade. The other half is having the works cited in proper MLA format, since that’s what we were studying. Simply follow the MLA guidelines, and you’re golden.

My students aren’t doing either.

I’ve had presentations that were a minute or less. I’ve gotten tons of Works Cited lists that are wrong even at a glance, much less when I zoom in to the specifics when I actually grade them. It’s ridiculous. There are going to be so many shitty grades on this, and they’re going to be upset about it.
The worst part is that I warned them. I begged them in class, please take this seriously. The assignment was designed to be easy points to make up for harder essays. It’s supposed to be a help. But every time I assign it, I get this sort of stuff. It becomes a lesson about following the rules, which is useful, I suppose, but not my intention. I don’t want to have to give tough love in the classroom, but I guess that’s how it is.

So much of school is simple. You follow guidelines, you get a decent grade. Maybe not a great grade, without knowledge of what’s going on, but a good grade, at the very least. You just follow the rules. Students, please follow the rules. Then you’ll get a good grade. Please follow the rules.

If there’s one thing I’ve been learning about, it’s taking care of yourself.

Early this week, I felt really horrible. It wasn’t completely a sickness. It was strange. I just felt like utter crap, to the point that I couldn’t do anything. I went to bed, and basically slept all of Monday and Tuesday.

Now I feel better.

I never take care of myself, really. It’s damn important to, and I really should. I’ve been trying to get sleep since. It’s frustrating, since I can’t do things like talk to a certain kitty when I’m going to bed early, but it’s not worth falling behind in all the shit I have to do, as well as just generally feeling bad.

So, in the interest of relaxing, I’m not writing anything more than this today. Sorry. But here, uh, listen to this amazing song inspired by Barkley: Shut Up And Jam Gaiden instead. Or maybe check out FakeAPStylebook’s new twitter feeds, FakeNNWMTips and FakeeEtiquette. Hilarious stuff.

I’ll be back tomorrow.

In the DungeonDragons, a slogan they used for awhile was “Never Split the Party.” You have to have a party with a unified front, or else you’re just not going to get anything done. People will die, combats will be failures, everything will break down into bickering.

But that’s, you know, Dungeons and Dragons. Cthulhu-stuff… well, in a way, that’s different. Tension between your party is part of the horror. Not knowing who is going to turn, not knowing if you’re all really on the same side, even as you’re facing a supernatural threat…

That’s what I think, at least. I’ve been playing a pre-made Trail of Cthulhu campaign on Talking Time for awhile (It’s here if you want to read) with a bunch of cool cats. It’s been progressing really slowly, but it hasn’t been, you know, stressful because everyone is willing to be patient for people to act. I’ve found it very refreshing in that regard, and we’ve been getting some solid Roleplaying done. I love being silly, but too rarely do I have an opportunity to do roleplaying of the serious variety. As such, I’ve been really enjoying it.

However, the character I’ve pieced together, using a premade character and extrapolating from the information I was given, is really at odds with the party. Everyone else seems to be playing their characters in a very Lawful Good-esque kind of manner. Very goodie-two-shoes and whatnot. There’s nothing wrong with that. I often enjoy playing characters like that. But that just doesn’t fit Jan’s back story. She’s out for herself, and she only believes in herself. She believes she knows what she’s doing, and she wants to be in control. She’s somewhere in the Chaotic Neutral or Lawful Evil sort of range. She’s working with everyone because their goals coincide with hers.

And now, we’re at the point where they no longer do, and Jan is going to make sure she’s protected. That means bringing no monsters back to her world, and that means stopping Roger, who is infected, from coming back. Clearly, nobody else thinks that’s a good idea, since he still has his mind, and they’re good people. But Jan has wanted to be in charge this entire time, and now she has a bargaining chip. She’s going to push this and establish control.

I can’t imagine a way this would work out well for Jan. Everyone’s made it pretty clear they’re not going to bow down, and Jan probably isn’t going to back off on this. But that’s part of what makes this situation awesome. It’s a true character moment. It’s deep roleplaying. It’s amazing. My character might end up getting beaten up or killed because of this, but it’s totally worth it. It’s a realistic, tense moment in an awesome game. It works. I hope everyone else sees it as being as awesome as I do, even as they knock me out and steal my gun. Heh.

Brer says I’m totally wrong, but man, I got really frustrated with Metro 2033 on easy. Luckily, thanks to the power of Gamefly, I just sent it back. Take that game!

There’s no doubt that Metro 2033 is a unique game. It’s got a very interesting setting and a fairly interesting story. The dialog and such isn’t like, the best in the world, but it was enough to keep me hooked and wanting to continue. Various mechanics, such as your quest log being an actual piece of paper you have to look at in the game world, were really immersive and interesting. That’s just not something done in many games, besides, I suppose, something like Far Cry 2. Of course, this isn’t a game like Far Cry 2, it’s a linear shooter, along the lines of Call of Duty in its pacing and construction. Not so much in the combat, but in the story presentation, I mean. There’s no doubt in my mind that there’s something really neat here for someone with more patience.

However, I’m not currently that person. I’m stressed and tired, and when I want to game, I just want a fun experience. I don’t want to replay sections constantly, and I don’t want to be lost. Metro 2033 did both of these things to me. The combat, even on the easiest setting, is not forgiving. Enemies take tons of bullets to take down (except, strangely, the monsters and mutants, which go down without issue) and are often in places you wouldn’t think to look. They also don’t just throw a few enemies at you. It’s either a giant arena full of people, or nobody. Bigger combat scenarios would require me to replay them over and over, which is frustrating for me, especially when the game checkpoints just slightly less often than it should, causing me to have to replay hard fights at times. It seemed, to me, that the only thing Easy did was up the drop rate of bullets. I was told that bullets are fairly scarce in this game, but on easy, I was drowning in them. I was not being particularly careful with my shots, but halfway through the game I had stockpiled like 800 AK bullets. This did help and remove a potential worry, but it was not enough to actually make the combat easy so I could just breeze through and enjoy the story.
For a game so linear, too, I shouldn’t be lost as often as I was. The game has a compass, that works as a guiding arrow. It’ll lead you right where you need to walk, over stairs, and so on. Sometimes, though, it’ll just randomly decide that, no, it’s just going to point in the general direction of an objective, and let you figure it out. Giving me help, and then taking it away from me is frustrating, especially when it takes it away in the most confusing environments where I need it the most.

It was these facts, plus the fact that Brer was constantly telling me I missed important things (Sorry love! I’m not mad or something, but that really did hinder my fun), that caused the game to become a chore instead of a destressor. For those more willing to deal with a bit of clunkiness, and who love that European PC game mentality that the game has will probably find tons to love about it. For me, though, it was just the wrong game at the wrong time.

Dragon Age: Origins was on sale for cheap from Gamefly, and I had a coupon I needed to use before I lost it. I had always been meaning to get to it, but I never had. Now, for like $12, it seemed like a good idea. I’ve now finished it, and I must say, I’m glad I played through it. It’s not a perfect game by any means, but it did a ton of things right, and was enjoyable overall.

What really got me about this game was the characters. I expected fairly bland fantasy characters from this game, but I wasn’t given that at all. Every character that joined my party was actually a fairly deep, complete individual, which stopped the generic fantasy setting from feeling as generic and fantasy. I really appreciated that. I’m glad Bioware has their shit together on character writing.
In addition, the conversations your party has with each other as you walk around are really great, and basically made me go, “Why the fuck isn’t that in Mass Effect 2?” It really brought the characters to life, and there were a ton of them: I used the same party for the entire game, and they were STILL having new conversations right up until the very end. It was a great way to show that, hey, the entire world doesn’t revolve JUST around your character, while also building up their character arcs even more.

I was especially impressed with Alistair. I went into the game figuring he would be the most generic dude, in order to sort of… be the guy to compare the rest of the party to, a la Ashley and Kaiden from Mass Effect. Instead, I found a very funny, very charismatic dude who was trying to hide his own insecurity and fear behind wit. He was a really complete character, and instead of immediately tossing him to the side, like I assumed I would, I kept him in the party the whole game, and romanced the shit out of him, marking one of the rare moments when an in-game character in one of these games turned out not to be a lesbian. Crazy! (Okay, I was hitting on Leliana too, so I suppose she was bi.)
His character was totally realistic, too. Part of that was the amazing performance on the part of his voice actor. I savescummed to get the “Recruit everyone” achievement, and I felt horrible about doing it. Alistair was really, genuinely hurt that I’d choose to do such a thing. Similarly, when the decision came to make the final sacrifice, because I didn’t lay down the law and allowed romantic talk, Alistair didn’t let me do the noble sacrifice, instead doing it himself without my permission, which also spurred an emotional reaction in me. The way he went about it was just so realistic. It worked. It was fantastic. Great characters.

The gameplay was… obviously not designed for the 360, but it was way more functional than I had expected. Granted, I also attempted to make it as controller-friendly as possible with my build. Instead of picking a class and skills with many activated abilities I’d have to juggle with limited hotkey space, I instead built a Rogue Bowazon Bard Ranger, which meant that I was firing arrows from afar, able to have a good view of the battlefield without jumping around, and that most of my powers were sustained buffs and animal summons, which meant I only had maybe one or two special attacks that needed to be hotkeyed. This worked really well, and actually fit my style in general pretty well too. However, during the short sequences where I had to control a mage, for example, it seemed pretty clear that the game was designed for a PC, as you just had too many powers to switch between.
I’d also have problems selecting things. Since I couldn’t just click on objects, I had problems destroying barriers, for example, or always talking to party members when I was trying to loot bodies. Granted, it worked most of the time, but it was just clunky enough to show that this wasn’t designed for consoles, and would work better on the PC.

Don’t let that stop you from playing it, though, if you don’t want to do the PC thing. It’s still a great game, and a lot of fun. I’m really glad I finally got around to it. Hopefully I won’t wait so long when Dragon Age 2 comes out. Also, hopefully I can borrow the Awakening Disc from someone and play through it. That would also be fun. But maybe I need a little RPG break first. Heh. That was a lot of RPG!

The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra was a super-happy fun fun movie time. It was really hilarious, and had smart writing, and the actors played everything completely straight, which made it an experience to remember. My brother especially loved the movie, so when he heard there was a sequel, The Lost Skeleton Returns Again!, he had to give it a go. Luckily, I was also around to give it a go with him. It was kind of a team go-giving.

It wasn’t as good as the first movie.

Unfortunately, the entire film had a feeling of “done it before” about it. The idea had already been played out in the first film, and to great effect. Obviously, they tried to make it work by putting some returning character plots. Everyone in the first movie who died had a twin brother, of course, and you had cliches in there like Dr. Armstrong being all bitter and drinking, which he wasn’t very good at being. They eventually turned the movie into color, only that sort of low-quality color and old movie might have, and that was a thing, certainly, but I felt it lost some of the charm not being in black and white.

At the same time, the same brilliance in writing was still all over this movie. It was pretty damn funny, and I was laughing fairly regularly. Even the general setup for the film works in the ridiculous was the first one did. This movie is supposed to take place in the jungle, for example, but it’s obvious that the wilds they’re shooting in are the exact same locations as the first movie. Sometimes they remember to set up some ferns and stuff, but sometimes they don’t even do that. It totally works. The plot is also equally convoluted as the first one.

But yes, it’s suffering from sequelitis. The first movie is the sort that you want to own, and watch again and again. The Lost Skeleton Returns Again! was an entertaining view, especially for me, who loved the first, and got some in-jokes, but I certainly can’t see me watching it again. That’s okay, though. If you liked the first one, definitely check it out for a fun evening. Just, unfortunately, don’t expect the sort of awesome that the first film had. It just doesn’t hold up for a second go-around.

Sometimes it takes sleeping for hours and hours to make you realize how tired you are.

Sometimes.

It bothers me how tired I am. Falling asleep at my desk at like 8:30 PM is completely lame. At the same time, if I didn’t need sleep, I wouldn’t be doing that, would I? When I go to bed at 10 and don’t wake up until noon or later the next day, it just kind of proves my need. I needed sleep.

Part of me says this is me getting old. I mean, I’m getting older. Time is marching on. I can’t just stress my body out like that. I need to actually get 8 hours of sleep from time to time.
The rest of me says that this is simply a sign of how stressed I am. Now, I feel like, for the most part, things are under control. Maybe not proceeding at the pace I want, but under control? Certainly. At the same time, I am being pulled in a lot of directions at once with no relief. I know that, if I admit to myself how I feel, that I feel that I need more time to myself. I need rest.

I need to sleep all day on a Saturday.

So, you know, I guess that’s what I did. It would be better if I could go to a Prospit or Derse to get more stuff done during that time, but I suppose I’m not that lucky.

Basically, I’m tired! That’s what I’m saying. I’m tired.

Because I know the number of times I will play through The Passing is limited to maybe one or two more, I recently listened through all of the possible dialogs throughout the campaign. They’re fucking hilarious. I suggest you play The Passing like a million times or just watch the videos here.

It just amazes me how brilliant Valve is. Or at least, it did when I started listening to these clips. The Left 4 Dead maps don’t really change much, at least layout-wise, and you’re expected to be playing these maps over and over again. Putting in, seriously, this much dialog is such a great solution and, more importantly, builds a slightly different narrative each time. It creates the feeling of variation, and also makes the characters extremely strong.

Seriously, Valve has done a fantastic job of storytelling in Left 4 Dead. Do they get enough credit? I don’t know. But you’ve got very deep characters and a fairly cohesive narrative, even when all the players can do whatever stupid bullshit they want. The game is designed to create narrative high and low points, and it actually work. When you play it, it’s not just a game. It is a narrative. There’s sometimes narrative in, I dunno, Modern Warfare multiplayer, but it’s always meta-narrative. It’s always the player interacting with another player. In Left 4 Dead, this is often the case, but it is also, simultaneously, a narrative about the characters. Because the game is all about interaction between these four people, the player narrative becomes the in-game narrative. It works. It works damn well.

It’s something more multiplayer needs to do. It makes it way more engaging. Then again, it’s what makes Left 4 Dead so unique. Brer and I have talked about how to take Left 4 Dead into non-zombie genres. It would work. I would be quite enamored with it. Hopefully Valve can do it! Or someone, I suppose. One just assumes Valve because, you know. They’re Valve.