The Return

Well I’m back. And in Brooklyn. Yay. I guess.

There’s been so much going on that I’m practically at the point of exhaustion, yet there’s still plenty on my plate, like finishing up a piece for Gamasutra that’s about two weeks overdue (at least Simon’s been super understanding). But I’m at SVA right now, and it’s Friday, the first real quiet time I’ve had all week; the end of year is coming up, which translates to looming thesis events to organize and nerve-racked seniors to attend to. So with no real chance to do any “real” work, I may as well blow off some steam with an update.

First off, the move last Saturday went very well, thank God. The weather was actually very nice (I got real lucky because its been raining and snowing ever since) and I had the gracious help of Jason, Mike, and Robin who assisted in the manual labor (plus everything was made even smoother due to some pre-move day moving thanks to MK). And it sure is nice to finally get the hell out of West Harlem. Yeah, there’s some nice spots and restaurants, but like any place on the Upper West Side, you really need money to enjoy anything. Otherwise, KFC and Taco Bell is high dining.
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Plus there’s the folks in the neighborhood, who are the living embodiment of hospitable and charming. Most of my friends love hearing about my encounters with the local denizens, and I have to admit, I do enjoy telling them, though experiencing them is totally different. But the two that stick out the most have to be….

“Cheap Ass Mr. No Penny”
One day, after a long, grueling day of work, I wanted nothing more than food and rest. So I went to the corner KFC for some sustenance (the fact that I went to KFC should prove that I was so tired that I didn’t give a shit) and there was this guy ahead of me who’s order came to $5.01. So he pulls out a large wad of cash (via a loud and obnoxious money clip), takes out a five dollar bill, then turns around and slaps me on the arm… not a nice, friendly tap between which would be appropriate between strangers, but a rather rude attempt at getting attention. And then he asked for a penny cuz he didn’t want to break a dollar bill. WTF, right? And it wasn’t as if he asked nicely, he just demanded one. So of course, I said no. I wasn’t rude or anything, though I did give him a “who the fuck are you?” look. He grumbled, turned back, and handed over another dollar.

Anyway, once I got my food and went to leave, I passed the guy who was now at the soda dispenser and he said to me “See you later Cheap Ass Mr. No Penny!” Again, WTF? So what did I do? I stopped right on the spot, turned around, said loudly, but without yelling, “Fuck off you asshole” and simply continued on my way.

Once outside, I was at the street corner waiting for the light to change to cross when I heard him come out of the KFC and call for me; the guy wanted to “talk”. I should probably mention that he was an older black gentlemen in his mid fifties who was dressed fairly well to do, and here I am some angry young white guy in West Harlem. I didn’t care how bad I looked, plus his all of a sudden pleasant demeanor was making me even angrier, so I just let him have it.

“Shut the fuck up, you fucking asshole. If you had at least asked in a nice manner for a penny instead of just demanding it, I might have entertained the idea. But you’re just some cheap asshole, who can fuck yourself!!!”

And when I game him the finger right in his face, I could hear literally every witness on that street corner (which is always empty except that for that one single occasion for some reason) audible gasp.

But the best part is when I told people that story and some will say that I should have just given him the penny! Whatever. Plus there’s a second incident…

“Get The Fuck Away From My Dog!”
One time MK and I went to C-Town, which is this really run down, el-cheapo grocery store which you’ll only find in the poor neighborhoods, to get some milk and cereal. As I walked into the store, I noticed a small dog tied to a fire hydrant between the entrance and exit. No big whoop. We got out stuff and went on line; in front of us were two older women… one who was paying for her stuff, and an other behind her and in front of us. It should be noted that this woman already had something already purchased and in a paper bag.

All of a sudden, the one in front of us… let’s call her the crazy woman… starts yelling at some kids outside (we were near the exit). Seems that dog from outside was hers. The crazy woman’s tirade basically consisted of “Get the fuck away from my dog you little pieces of shit! Get the Goddman fuck away before I beat the fucking shit out of all of yous!”

First off, the woman in front of the crazy lady was not happy with such an outburst. “Leave them alone, they’re only little kids, they just want to pet the dog, they’re doing no harm!” And crazy lady would go “You shut the fuck up you dumb bitch, that’s my damn dog, I don’t want those pieces of shit touching my goddamn dog!” This was on a Sunday, and the saner woman replied “No one appreciates such language on the Lord’s day” and to that the crazy lady responded with “God is with me you stupid bitch.”

But then, a third older lady shows up and starts yelling at the crazy woman; this new person was I believe the grandmother of the kids who had just finished paying for her stuff and was now ready for a fight. So now her and the crazy woman are screaming at each other, with it almost looking like a real brawl was going to ensue, and the sane woman trying to mediate things. At one point, the crazy woman takes the brown bag and proclaims “Get in my face you crazy bitch and I’ll hit you in the head with my liquor bottle!”

BTW, if you think any of this is bullshit, just ask MK since she witnessed all this as well. Anyway, we just wanted to pay for our stuff, but it took forever for crazy woman to pay for her shit since she was too intent on yelling at everyone. She didn’t yell at us, but I think she wanted some sympathy or something. I just love it when insane people ask me for validation (and it’s happens a LOT). Once we paid for everything, then there was the matter exiting since now crazy woman was standing right in the exit doorway, yelling at the kids, and their grandparents, and even at random folks on the street, with her liquor bottle on the floor, right between her legs.

… Plus there was that one time on Valentine?s Day when I had MK wait at the “okay” deli near my place while I ventured to the “scary” deli since they always have MK’s drink of choice, peach Snapple. It was raining hard that night and as I was about to enter, I noticed a homeless woman standing in the middle of the street with no umbrella, getting absolutely drenched. She let out a loud moan (it was more like a howl at the moon actually), bent down, and liquid came gushing out between her legs, with the force and consistency of a fire-hose, I kid you not. It was fucking surreal.
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What was I talking about? Oh yeah… anyway, my new place is much, much better than my previous digs. MK pretty much summed everything best here. Though I do feel that it’s need to be emphasized: I FINALLY HAVE A REAL FUCKING KITCHEN WHERE I CAN FINALLY COOK!!!

It’s damn near perfect, but not totally. First off, I have to rely on the R train, and we all know the yellow line is the worst throughout the entire NYC subway (though at this rate, all the other routes are on pace to catch up). I even swore to God that I would never move anywhere that would force me to use the R train, but I would have to assume that it will never be as bas as when I lived in Bay Ridge.

Also, I now live with three cats, and I’m allergic to cats. I’m keeping my bedroom door shut at all times to keep them out, but I do know that cat hair is going to make its way regardless. My eyes are sorta scratchy, so is my throat, and my nose is dry, as is my skin… maybe its cat hair, maybe its general allergies, I dunno. So I gotta get an air purifier or something.

But regardless, I really dig the place. Its just so nice to enjoy a meal in a dining room and to not eat hunched over a TV tray in front of… a TV… a few inches away in my bedroom. I’ve been out of college for 6 years, but it still felt like I was living in dorms up until last week. Plus I don’t have to deal with the smell of teeth soup cooking. And the neighborhood is not bad; things are nice and quiet, at least thus far. I’ve been there five days and no one has yelled at me yet, and that’s a record. The opposite of that is when I went to Red Hook to check out a prospective place to live and some homeless guy three an empty tin can at my end just seconds stepping off the subway train. I just have to remember to stick to Sunset Park; just because I live in Brooklyn doesn’t mean I love it. I hate still hate some parts of it with a passion, perhaps even more so now that I’m closer. Speaking off…
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This past Sunday I headed into Willamsburg for the last show in the Data Destruction Tour 2005. I know my bitching about the place has gotten really old, but I will say this: I love how no one in Willamsburg knows where the fuck anywhere is. In Manhattan, ask any random stranger on the street how to get anywhere and you’ll get either fairly accurate directions or an honest “Sorry, I don’t know”. But not in Willamsburg, hence why I found myself lost yet again. It also doesn’t help that every stupid bar and art space is completely nondescript. Besides a lack of sign-age, most places don’t even have building numbers. The event was being held at Vertex which has, without a doubt, the worst arty-farty web design ever. The annoying “emo-design” (as I call it) sensibilities is one thing, but when the pertinent info randomly appears and disappears or move erratically, the site is just plain broken.

Whatever, as for the show, it was awesome, but it did have some kinks, at least in regards to the venue. The audio set up was pretty archaic; the first performer Mark DeNardo had a lot of problems getting the setup to simply work, which lead to the show to start rather late, and he even had to cut his set short. As Mark noted with understandable frustration, there was thousands of dollars worth of sound equipment going through two really tiny and crappy speakers. It’s too bad, since I really liked the very few songs he played which had an indie-ish feel (please note that I really don’t listen to much traditional music, so my descriptions might be totally off base). From what I recall, he uses a Game Boy for the beat and tempo, and sings while playing a guitar.

Up next was Glomag, and like DeNardo before him (along with Bit Shifter and Nullsleep, the guys behind the tour), is another New Yorker and who’s songs had a really high paced, high energy feel, yet with a mellow early 80′s alternative college music scene vibe (as mentioned before, I’m horrible when describing music). Again, the man used Game Boys and even sang, and unfortunately had some bizarre sound problems, but it didn’t hold him bank thankfully.

Third up was Bit Shifter, who I’ve seen play before multiple times, but I have never seen such a strong, heavy set from the guy. It was fucking amazing and Joshua tore the roof down with some of the most intense chip stylings I have ever heard. Some of the sounds he managed to produced from just two or three stock Game Boys were so insane that, especially with the last song, I almost couldn’t believe that there was no computer enhancements and filtering taking place, but he just had three old Brick Boys, just humming.

After a truncated opener and two full sets, it was just the halfway point, and the fourth man up was Huoratron who hailed from “the land of Santa Claus” whose set relied mostly on mixing and distorting Game Boy and various samples. It was very Euro-club, very harcoreAnd the fifth performer was Covox from Sweden. Again, it was a very Euro feel, but more dance-ish, with a combo of Game Boy and synth (via keyboards and voice).

After five performers and almost four hours of music, Nullsleep hit the stage to end the tour. It was Sunday, and I was dead tired from the move just a day prior, plus I had to go to work the next day, plus get back on track with various other projects, but at that moment I really didn’t care because the music was just too damn good, and I got the sense that all the other diehards who had stuck around were in the same boat. Nullsleep started out with one of his classics with all the intensity of Bit Shifter from before, and you could tell that he too was just so proud and happy to have the tour come to such an amazing end. But near the end of the first song, the cops showed up to pull the plug. The look on Nullsleep’s face was classic, but it was for real… it was past midnight and some neighbors had complained about the noise. So not wanted to risk the confiscation of all his equipement, which basically amounts to a Game Boy Color, a modded NES, and some hacked Super Mario carts, he just gave out a loud “DATA DESTRUCTION TOUR!!!” to end the night.

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And earlier in the day, MK and I saw The Cat Returns which was playing as part of the New York International Children’s Film Festival. I really wanted to check out more of the fest’s selections, though once again, the timing was just horrible, which meant missing out on some seemingly really cool stuff, like the new Danny Boyle film Millions, and the all puppet film Strings.

Anyway, the film was indeed awesome as I’ve been told. I’m embarrassed to admit that I still haven’t seen Whispers of the Heart (Cat Returns is the “unofficial” sequel) despite having it on DVD for a few years now (its part of a Studio Ghibli box set from HK).

Plus I’m finally getting the chance to see Steamboy tonight.

As for the rest of the week, got word on Tuesday that MK finally got a new job! Hooray! 9-5 jobs suck, yes, but steady income and health insurance simply rocks. Plus her new spiffy site is finally up and running. Take a look-see.

For Wednesday’s class, I had the students discuss their homework assignment which was to create game concepts that had an educational slant. One game was extremely close to the admittedly obscure shooting/typing game Typing of the Dead despite the student not being at all familiar with its existence. Another was a dating simulation that also fostered the teaching of a foreign tongue, which reminded me a lot of my own dating sim Heartbreakers which I ended up sharing with the class (yeah, I really can’t believe I actually did that). Shockingly, some seemed genuinely impressed by it. Then I did my standard “everyone comes up with a game idea for the first part of the class, then they have switch off and create a sequel, but to another person’s game, one which has nothing to do with their own subject-wise” in-class assignment.
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Later that night was the big midnight PSP launch party at the Sony Store which I was asked at the last minute to cover, but passed on since I need to find any time to rest when I can. I guess that’s the really big news this week… the PSP is finally out and about. And again, I’m hold off till all the production problems have all been ironed out, though that may never actually happen (five years later and there’s still problems with the PS2).

The biggest issue at the moment is the display, with Sony now stating that they will not acknowledge dead pixels as a “flaw” and will not replace a system because of them. You just gotta love Sony sometimes…

There are two camps of folks: either those who are outraged that they paid $250 for a screen that’s screwed up right out of the box or those who say that dead pixels are an unavoidable fact of life with LCD screens, and that people who bitch and moan should just “live with it.” Yes, they are a very common problem, but dead pixels are a flaw, no matter what Sony or anyone else says and their arrogant hard-line policy is just plain bullshit and consumers have every right to be pissed.

Anyway, I’m holding off for a later revision, which might hopefully have a better battery or no problems with the Square button getting stuck (though I believe none of those early problem systems were at the American launch…. but with Sony, you can never be too sure). Though I just hope Sony doesn’t decide to move manufacturing to China anytime soon. Plus I have to get it sooner than later… it’s driving me nuts that Lumines is finally readily out there and I can’t play it!

But I still don’t have a DS, and call me stupid, but I still want one, if only for Meteos. Only one day has passed since the PSP has been out and the DS already looks dead in the water. It’s a real shame that no one can think of a good way to exploit it’s capabilities. Granted, every single PSP game is just console titles in a smaller package, but the graphics and sounds are up to snuff to home standards, which is what everyone always wanted anyway. The DS just makes itself look bad when it tries to compete in such a fashion, and it looks worse when the second screen or touch capabilities are totally forced upon it.

Though there is hope…. yes it’s a conversion, but one that makes total sense: Katamari Damacy is coming to the DS.

And in other gaming news from the past week or so at least what I’ve picked up on in between all the packing and moving and stuff….

- Word on the controllers for the Revolution is that the controllers will either feature touch screens/pad or be entirely based around them. Sounds crazy enough to be true. Even though it could foster new kings of game playing experiences, as evidenced by the DS, I think most designers are just not up to snuff or don’t want to risk the money involved. As shitty as it sounds, Nintendo needs to play the game or trying to supply the best ports possible.

- Back to Lumines, here’s a really nice interview with Mizuguchi regarding the game at 1UP. And here you’ll find a video interview regarding the aforementioned Meteos and how it was inspired by the show 24.

- Speaking of, it’s been revealed that Soul Calibur 3 is going to be a PS2 exclusive. Huh? It makes no sense to walk away from multi-platforms, especially when the best selling version was on the GameCube. Plus everyone knows that the PS2 version was the weakest, though staying focused on just one system might alleviate that. Tekken 5 did turn out pretty damn hot, at least visually (though play-wise its a totally different issue).

You can see pics from the game here. I have to say, I’m not a fan of some of the new character designs, but its the weapons that count the most I guess. Plus the game in general looks less of a leap than part 2 was from part 1. Oh well.

- So EA is not doing so hot after all. Their games this past holiday season fared rather poorly, which is no real surprise since most of them were wretched. I think Goldeneye: Rouge Agent takes the crown for exemplifying everything that is wrong with the company. If I’m not mistaken, Oddworld Inhabitants has severed its ties with EA because of what happened with Stranger; there’s no reason why EA should be disappointed with the poor sales since it they did so little to support its release.

- Found out the other day that Flipnic, an awesome pinball game from the same folks who did Fantavision (remember that game?), is coming to the states for just $20! An another obscure import gem on the cheap.

- On the same note, now there’s word that Chulip, the kissing RPG which I myself, and many others, have been eyeing for almost over a year now, is still coming, but with some graphical changes. Stuff like this always gets me worried, but I guess its better than nothing. Someone on the IC forums said it was outright cancelled, but I believe that was also debunked.

- Here’s some more info on Wanda and the Colossus, which has finally been renamed as Shadow of the Colossus. And be sure to check out the amazing new trailer. So I guess Wanda really is the name of a girl and not the main male character after all.

- There’s also word that Sega is producing a new Gunstar Heroes game. What the hell?! Why now? At one point, I would have killed for a new Gunstar Heroes, but much like NiGHTS 2, I really don’t want to see it anymore. Why? Because the Sega of old has been long dead, and all their attempts to revive the past… hell all their recent games in general… have been pathetic. I’d rather leave past alone in this case, and I’m sure many other former Sega diehard feel the same exact way.

- Oh, and I know it’s really old news at this point since it’s been all over the web in recent weeks, but for those who missed it, here’s that ebay auction for the haunted NES. I’m just shocked that Golden Palace Casino wasn’t the winning bidder (who’s been making a name buying stupid shit online, like grilled cheese sandwiches that look like Jesus or homemade time machines). Speaking off, I really need to get on the ball and create something retarded to make an easy four grand of those retards as well before they run out of cash.

- On the arty end of things, out Suicide Solution, which documents act of suicide in first person shooters. This is sorta like that “performance piece” that I saw at BAM a few years back where some person just video taped themselves dying on purpose in Tomb Raider again and again and again.

- Here’s more art mixed with gaming, though with a more design oriented slant.

- And I forgot to pass this along before, but here’s the winners of the 2005 Independent Game Festival. Nice to see Alien Hominid get some recognition.

- Plus, I know the GDC is long past, but here’s something else which I think needs to be passed along… on the last day of the event, there was a roundtable “bitchfest” which everyone can read abouthere.

For a variety of personal and professional reasons, I am going to hold my tongue regarding comments but I will say that I its a very interesting read.

… So yeah, Steamboy tonight, maybe go skiing this weekend, plus ontop of the work that I’m behind on, install an Airport Extreme card into my eMac (I’ve had no internet at all since moving into Brooklyn… THAT’S why no one’s heard from me much this past week), figure out how to get cable into my bedroom (and without cable and internet, its been extremely boring), and fillout my new iPod.

I guess I really do live in Brooklyn now, don’t I?