The weekend?
- Didn’t get a chance to meet up with Mike (O’Connor, a.k.a. dhex) on Friday night for drinks, which was a bummer. He was held over at work, but I always have shit to do, so I got to take care of some of that, which was good in the end. Mostly worked on the book, though I also got caught up on game-related odds and ends over the past few weeks (hey, its all “research” in the end).
- Also, I wasn’t feeling so hot due to earlier in the afternoon. One of my thesis students is concentrating on level design, and is using the Unreal engine. So I played through her project and immediately became nauseous. I think I’ve already mentioned my inability to play first person shooters due to the motion sickness that results, hence why I won’t give any more than five minutes, tops. But since it was a student project, one of my own, I stuck it out and played as much as I could stomach before I felt like I was going to throw up, which wasn’t much longer than five actually, and spent the rest of the day feeling super sick and dizzy. Its hard to explain why this happens, but I believe it has something to do with the brain not being able to put together the visual sensation of moving while the body stays stationary (I hear its an Asian thing, hence why FPSs are not that popular in Japan for example). But yeah… it really sucks. Its like a chef who’s allergic to certain foods.
I believe the illness is also related to moving in one direction, yet looking another, often wildly about. Hence why Metroid Prime never seems to get me dizzy due to its very controlled means of looking, while Ratchet & Clank, a third person platformer ends up making me want to throw up after a while due to camera going all over the place (which the players controls himself, so I guess that’s my fault them, but you have to move it like every 15 second to see where the hell you are).
- On Saturday, MK & I went over to Rocketship where I picked up Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Lost at Sea, which I’ve been meaning to since forever. I was also delighted to discover that Marvel is reprinting the old Marvel Universe series under its economical Essential imprint. For those who don’t know, or have forgotten, Marvel Universe was Marvel’s attempt at an encyclopedia of its universe, featuring profiles over ever single character, no matter how mundane or insignificant. There’s just something that’s fascinating about having the height, weight, marriage status, and life history of some lame-ass lame-ass villain that only appeared in issues #16 and #37 of Avengers West Coast whom I never knew existed at the tip of your fingertips.
- We also watched Survive Style 5+ on DVD, which I gave to MK for her birthday last week. It’s hard to describe (though I already tried to once before), but you’ll just have to take my word for it that its pretty amazing. And we stayed up till 3 for the classic SNL that definitely paid of thanks to both a Wayne’s World and a Sprockets sketch. Plus there was even an anal retentive carpenter sketch, and MK was less than surprised to hear that the character was a hero of mine growing up.
- The next day began in disappointment as I got outbid on eBay for a long out of print copy of the Iron Man Armor Wars trade-paperback. Once again, why in the fuck has Marvel, which has preprinted pretty much their entire back catalogue up till this point, not touched this one thing?! Is there a real reason for this? Does Marvel hate the folks behind the book, or do they just hate Iron Man? Lord knows, its the truly last good Iron Man epic, before the ultra boring Armor Wars 2, or how he turned all evil and was later replaced by his teenage self in an alternate dimension (which was up there with the Spider Clone saga in terms of pure stupidity).
And then when I decided to finally get a Tron hooded sweatshirt that I’ve been eyeing one of a while now (since I hadn’t purchased the Iron Man trade, I had some “money to spare”… awesome logic, huh?), I discovered that it was only available in small. Double bummer…
… Of course, if anyone knows where else I can find it, I’d be very much appreciative.
Afterwards, MK & I went for food, and in an attempt to do something different, we stumbled across the Union Smith Cafe, which is right at the corner of, funny enough, Union and Smith, not too far from Rocketship actually. I swear to God, best fucking BLT ever. And the apple crisp was insanely delicious. Then we drove into the city for Joe’s, but when MK realized that she had forgotten her sketchbook at my place (she was heading home later in the evening), I got dropped off near the Giant Robot store while she went back to my place. And I ended up buying assorted designer toys and spending money that I really shouldn’t (but then again, I did have money to spare, remember?) including another member of the Knock Man family and a Bastardino, which is little dog in a cactus suit (pictured in the middle here).
Once done shopping, I was just in time for…
- The Oscar’s was last night, which meant another Oscar party at Joe’s. Its basically “our” super bowl, and when you consider how mind-blowingly boring and lame it usually is, the only way to stomach the entire 3 hour+ affair is to have some beer, snacks, and like minded folks to help yell at the television, which included myself and Joe, June, Mike Moosehead (from the BDF, Blackout Shopper, Ebola Borealis, and about seven other NY punk bands) plus MK. Unfortunately “Brokeback” Jay decided to sit this one out…
The big thing going into last night’s show was seeing how badly Jon Stewart would bomb, and bomb he did indeed. Was it his fault? Of course not, and anyone could have predicted a lackluster performance given the Oscar’s uptight and ultra conservative attitude. Its pretty obvious that they hired Stewart because he’s “hip with the kids” and figured that the association would help them drop their stuffy, old white guy stigma, but without actually checking what he does of course. And once they finally realized that his main shtick is giving President Bush grief and pointing out how asinine the war in Iraq is, how do you think they reacted? By putting him on a leash, as was evident all last night. There were points where he clearly regretted his decision to get involved. It also doesn’t help that practically everyone in that room was full of themselves and are seemingly unable to take a joke at their expense (some folks literally looked as if they had sticks up their asses). Stewart’s brand of biting, self-abrasive New York humor just does not fly in Hollywood (just as it didn’t with Chris Rock last year and David Letterman ten years before him). Though another big reason to watch Robert Altman recieve his honorary Oscar, and to see if Popeye would be mentioned at all. And lo and behold, among all the Nashville, MASH, and Gosford Park scenes was one very quick clip of Robin Williams as sailor with a speech impediment, fucked up eye, and gigantism, which got a huge cheer from us all.
Otherwise, I’d have to say that last night’s was perhaps the most boring Oscars ever. An overabundance of montages that highlight “magical movie moments” to help Hollywood further suck its own dick is nothing new, but everything seemed even more hollow that usual. As for the nominees and winners, I actually hardly saw any of the films nominated in the major categories, though I did catch Walk the Line, and while Reese Witherspoon was good, she wasn’t that good. The one which I missed, but really wish I hadn’t was Constant Gardner, but that’s because I love the director’s previous work, City of God (which, I’m sorry, should have gotten best pictures back in 2003, not Lord of the Rings… I liked Return of the Kings and all, but come on now). As for the best picture, Crash, its definitely one of those films that I have absolutely no desire to see, since it seems to be one of those heavy-handed, preachy “eye-opening” flick that uncovers America’s problem with racism, which I guess is pretty eye-opening if you’ve lived under a rock for the past how many years now?
But since we know it’s going to be stupid as hell, then why watch it year after year? Because film geeks, like all other types of geeks out there, are just like catty girls, who like to point and laugh and tear people apart for shits and giggles. Period.
- Anyway, March is finally here, and its going to be hella busy month. In a little over two weeks is ICON, and as most people know by now, that both MK and myself are slated to appear (there’s finally a page for MK). Around that time is the Game Developers Conference, and quite a few folks have been asking me if I’m attending. And unfortunately, while it certain seemed like it for a while, those plans have changed. And on a related note….
I also will be apart of this year’s 24 hour game design jam at Parson’s, which is now called the Mobile Game Mosh. Once again, I will be on-hand the entire 24 hours to report the action on the behalf of Gamasutra, as well as perhaps lend a hand to the various groups by offering a few pointers when it comes to the design side of things.
Some might recall me helping out the team from SVA and being their captain of sorts (and also winning the prize for best visual design). Well this year, I will not be representing SVA because there will not a team from the School of Visual Arts.
Also, once I have fulfilled my duties as senior thesis advisor to the pair of students that are working on game related project, the end of this school semester will effectively end my teaching career at SVA. I’m not sure what my next move will be, if I will pursue teaching or not, and where, but I will say that’s it been fun while it lasted.
