The CvS2 balance of power is shifting, in my favor. It's unfortunate; my win rate lately's been like 75%. I think it's just because we're at the skill level where my preferred mode of battle (defense) beats Vince's favorite tactic (mediium-intensity offense). 'Cuz my god, against an all-out rushdown I just fall to pieces.

'aha! beef spicy noodle soup, sounds good!' says me. and i proceed to splash some in my eye and then, in an unrelated fit of coughing, spray it out my nose; so every sensitive membrane in my head has felt the gentle caress of chili oil.

but it was tasty.

The place still smells of construction and new carpet, and everything's in shades of beige. It desparately needs to be filled with stuff. I thought it's be cool to get new posters--a change of local scenery to accompany the larger move--but what space I'm responsible for has short walls with useless and somewhat ugly wall furniture on them.

Needless to say, no actual work occurred: finding my desk, unpacking, and rearranging furniture consumed most of the day, and a tournament of the game took care of the rest.

It's slowed work down, which is a shame; I'm just about to close out the one part and go on to things that are actually helpful. But it's no big deal. I'm close enough to spend the weekend on side projects, side projects and sleeping in.

(the spell of josh is broken, alas; the ratio of jerk to charm finally reached the tipping point for me.)

I've resumed my old habits of movie-watching. This week: Talk To Her, Pedro Almodovar's women-in-comas movie. (pretty good) The weirdest thing about the artsy theaters I've been frequenting lately: the trailers are different! Just as awful, mind you, with no content and these vapid aphorisms they show between scenes. But if you consitently frequented such theaters, you'd have no idea the outside world existed. No Daredevil, no Final Desination, no that stupid movie where the Earth's core stops spinning and makes lightning destroy the Coliseum...

I wouldn't mind, really, except for the feeling that things are happening that I'm not aware of. That drives me crazy.

Joe's trying to get a Beach Spikers tournament going at work. I'm not sure how successful it'll be: the game's not easily picked up, and nobody but him's really in the habit of playing it. It's 4-player, though.

Am coming to terms with the more awkward of the game ideas we're looking at. It's based in an aesthetic I don't much care for, but if you look a bit below the surface, it has lots of stuff that could be interesting. And a lot of its gameplay elements would work well in the games I really want to do.

Mom has a house! I was worried: she was about to move over the vacation, but just as I headed back the destination house became the target of an ugly divorce property squabble. There was another house she liked almost as much, and it hadn't sold yet, so she isn't out on the streets. (or, really, living in a hotel: but it's just as ucky and temporary-feeling, only way more comfortable.)

Life is slowly returning to normal. I've got a movie backlog that needs to be taken care of: oscar season coinciding with crunch time means a lot of good movies and not much movie watching.

The dad's going to cool it, or at least be more cautious; we keep getting into random tiny fights and it's wearying. So that's nice.

As for the 'you should work less' deal, which has been worrying me ('cuz the last three years of my life have been a running battle between the intensely self-conscious part of me and the workaholic part and gods if the latter hadn't almost won): the connotations of being a loser who needs to stop caring and get laid were added after the fact by the rumor mill. The original worry is burnout; given past history, it's not an unreasonable fear. We have lost people to it, and good ones.

But there's no fear where I'm concerned. Not for a good while yet.

I'll talk it over; there's reassurance to be found.

It's the season for it, though: there seems to be an ill wind blowing all around, and it's not me who feels the coldest part of it. It's not entirely comfortable. There's a sickly joy in the confidences of others--in taking sides--but it can't help but damage in the long run. Mild and easy-going is my default mode (or, more accurately: oblivious, nonconfrontational) but...

Damn! It's not the root cause, merely a symptom. If I believed that morale could be manufactured from nothing, maybe.

The brooding goes in the LJ.

It's surprising how bad Saturn games look; we played a fair chunk of Vince's old collection, and... ouch. It owned the PSX on the 2d games--its reputation for Street Fighters is legendary, and the occasional weird import game--but in 3d, it feels really crude. It's like they couldn't do vertex coloring and texturing on the same poly, or it was super expensive, or they just didn't realize how much better things looked when your artists can light them by hand. But whatever the reason, there's almost no lighting; everything's a flat color.

(ok: radiant silvergun is just really well-designed, and not exceedingly ugly. it's definitely the exception, though.)

A first pass at cleaning the apartment: I can see the way from here to clean, at least. Am feeling a shortage of bookcases. And a lack of discipline in filing papers, but that can't be rectified with a quick trip to Ikea.

And I didn't think about work all day! So there. Jerks.

An insinuation was levelled today: there are people who work too much. Followed closely by its corollary, a slander against people who work on games all day and then go home and play games; the implication that there's something unbalanced there.

The fact of being single.

I feel it, on occasion; it comes and goes. But when it's gone, there's no reason to call it up, to imply a failing on my part that wasn't bothering me. We're all geeks; there's no way around it. Putting your sin on me and then making me a well-adjusted salaryman won't save you from it.

And hurts us all. I do get defensive. I've only recently and tenuously embraced the 'it's okay to love your job' philosophy; gods know that society sends a hundred different messages all saying the opposite.

The game'll be better for it, of course. But the news broke me; I'd been burning at both ends trying to get everything squared on time, and now. I left early today, and will take tomorrow off. It'll be good.

Though the fuck will I do with free time?

(alas, am out of excuses: the apartment must be cleaned.)

I got a livejournal: _mike, as ordinary mike was taken. The underscore variant is probably a mistake, as the cost of failure is being mistaken for some really unhappy guy who compounds his tragedy by being inarticulate and disorganized. And being taunted by strangers on the 'net. Forgive me, mike.

It's a bad habit, but there's this feature that i reflexively blame every time something goes wrong; and every three months or so I wind up wasting a day convincing myself that it really does work. Oh, well. Being Saturday, it was really more like a half-day.

I don't have the patience to resist, so I'm starting in on Zelda. At least there's a menu option to turn on the furigana, so I'm only a little bit helpless.

And it rules. Anybody says they should've stuck with the old boring young adult Link instead of adorable cartoon Link, I kick their ass. It's weird, though: the first level they stick you in is straight out of Metal Gear, complete with searchlights and hiding from the guards with a barrel over your head.

Ok, back to the game.

But I know now what causes the bug that is my nemesis. Booya!

scraps:

Harpy has an intriguing post on music and memory; the memory part, at least, I've been brooding over off and on but am not quite lucid enough to pin anything down.

[I take stuff in broadly but shallowly, remembering sketches of patterns while forgetting all but the neatest and most meaningless details; 'remember this,' dad says of suffering, 'and it will make your triumph sweeter,' though I've never had a problem with that--somehow it's only the moments of joy/pride/contentment that slip away; ff8, a price paid for strength; memento: gimmicky, but a damned fun gimmick; the grandmother, sad and unsettling and ultimately benign]

Joe cracked open Panzer Dragoon this evening, though his Chinese pride dictated that we wait for Houston to defeat the Lakers before we could start playing. It was a pretty exciting match, with justice served in overtime.

Panzer Dragoon is gorgeous. The saturn version made do with super low-poly environments, incorporating that into its stylized aesthetic; but the Xbox update takes the style and runs with it. The standard flying-on-rails-and-shooting gameplay is tight, and the ability to transform gives the game the tiny bit of tactics it needed.

And then Vince lends me his Japanese Gamecube with Zelda, which is super adorable.

I'm not as fragile as some, but when a build totally disintegrates on you, it's completely disheartening; particularly given that you spent all your energy on last-minute features and fixes, and there's precious little left to deal with the weirdness that ensues when everybody else's features and fixes are piled on top of yours.

Am thinking: maybe I should get a livejournal? Network externality (or perhaps effect?) and all that.

Ordered the tablet PC. Two weeks, they're saying. A relief at the decision; now I wait and appreciate the beauty in my Vaio's decline.

Joe has Panzer Dragoon Orta. I hate him, even though I'm too sleepy to appreciate it right now.

Good night.

It's a hard sell. Even invoking the genre 'fantasy' brings up images of such cloying genericity: Elf. Wizard. Castle in green field. Dragon. Dude with sword and optional horse.

It doesn't have to be, but...in my mind it was, of course; I was hoping that a novel mechanic or two would make up for a generic setting. Or that the setting could be fleshed out later. And I got cold feet when I realized that it wasn't true, but that a setting isn't something you can pull out of your ass at a moment's notice. In other genres it's easier because the entire world isn't suspect: you just say 'the real world plus X' and everyone knows what you mean.

So it's something I'll be musing about in the background, to have ready should it be needed.

And there's a camaraderie among those who work late that I enjoy, but feel guilty about taking part in. It doesn't feel like I'm working that hard--certainly not as hard as the others--and I cheat: when you sleep 'til noon, and don't have a life to give up, what are you really sacrificing?

[shut up, you: you put in 12-hour days and weekends, and just 'cuz it feels easy to you doesn't mean just anybody could do it; don't sell yourself short.]

Though I'm happy to say we're one pernicious bug closer now.

The old laptop is failing; I'm sorely tempted by a tablet pc; but given that I spend most of my time typing and not drawing, it might not be the best idea. It really depends on the handwriting stuff, I think; it might just be too clumsy, and I'll wind up getting either a hybrid or another ultralight.

Watched more Haibane Renmei; am up to 11. It's taken a turn Rekiwards, which I'm all for. And Rakka gets a neat job, too. I'm kinda worried: if there are only 13 episodes (are there?) then there's not much time for a full resolution, I don't think. It's as much about the journey, of course, and it's been a delightful one, but it'd be nice to see through properly.

(a bad habit of mine, this judging story progress against estimated time remaining. i used to do it within episodes of a show--'oh, look, it's 9:45, they'd better be wrapping things up'--but i do it less now. at least consciously; but the way tivo gives you a little graphic of where you are in the show totally does not help.)

Random link (from memepool): Buttlord GT, a crude yet lovingly-crafted Dragonball parody.

I've borrowed Sly Cooper from Joe and am playing it. It's light and frothy; easier--and less aggravating--than Mario, but at the same time there's less to it, and the controls and gameplay aren't as solid or tight. It's got a really nice binoculars mechanic, and they've played their Tony Hawk: pressing O snaps you to rails or spires. You're really vulnerable--one hit point, with the option of picking up one or two more--but enemies are for the most part pushovers. There's sneaking lite in the game, and it's cool: all the guards you have to sneak by have flashlights, an explicit version of the Metal Gear radar cone. And the traps you have to face are kinda neat. The first time a beam or searchlight catches you, it triggers the alarm; which exchanges the beams and searchlights for ones made of fire. So the most ubiquitous jumping/dodging puzzles have one hit's worth of forgiveness built in.

So that's where I'm at as far as using the new year as a prod to self-improvement.

He's right: it just seems too fake. Maybe I'm spoiled by knowing too much about networks, but I suspect in this day and age everyone else is too. I was arguing that a man with a gun is probably not the best way to simulate breaking into computer systems, but that you could find a metaphor and gameplay to go along with that'd actually feel like hacking.

Browsing recent stuff, though (like Snow Crash, even, a little, or Gibson's most recent: Idoru, All Tomorrow's Parties) and there's precious little hacking to be found. The net is all about communication, about finding shit out; power comes from knowing people who know people who know things. It's not too far removed from real life; it's almost like making a game or movie set in the present or near future and not ignoring the net for a change.

Not really related, but today they announced the candidate ideas for the next game, pruned down to a handful from the dozens of ideas we all proposed. They're all good, all different; I've definitely got my favorites, but I'd be happy with any of them. Everyone's different; ideas that I'm only mildly intrigued by have their rabid fans, and some that had everyone murmuring with enthusiasm are drawing caveats from unexpected corners. But I'm eager: whichever we wind up doing will absolutely rule.

Just need to finish the current game.

.1 Yph on William Gibson's new blog (in service or celebration of his new book); the last five years found him on the receiving end of dot com cock, I'm afraid, and anything even loosely associated with 'wired culture' is poisoned. Needless to say, I really like Gibson: he has neat ideas backed up with stylish prose.

.2 Ron on Click To Add Title; a Leslie Harpold/Michael Sippey PowerPoint Battle. 'PowerPoint Battle?' he asks, and I reply, 'PowerPoint Battle!', with a big grin like duh isn't that the coolest thing? Apparently not; he neither concedes the coolness of battle nor the fact that the very lameness of the medium, and the battlists' love/hate for it, makes the contest interesting. PowerPoint, his every gesture indicates, is stupid.

But I'm pretty sanguine. There is what might become a medium-to-large-scale victory in the works, and except that I can't tell anyone (or gloat to the appropriate parties) and there's a decent chance that it'll fall through and even this small optimistic note will hang in the blog and fester, I'm stoked.

[i've got a tenuous identity pencilled in between the haibane's halo and the world's end's shadows; but i'm not quite ready, and, seven episodes in, am at the point where they might start laying more clues on me...]

Have I mentioned I like it? It's as surreal and dreamlike, but not as solipsistic as the Murakami book--or as Lain, for that matter. 'Solipsistic' isn't the right word. Circumscribed, perhaps: small and self-contained, with a small number of characters (two? three?) who are removed or insulated a bit from the world outside themselves? Not to knock works like that; it can go really well--god knows there're as many mysteries and clever/beautiful moments to be found inside people as outside--but it definitely has a different feel to it.

But I mean fuck: they had me at Reki brushing out the newborn Rakka's wings. I am so the sentimentalist.

0. Jet Set Radio Future
1. Animal Crossing
2. Zelda: Link to the Past/4 Swords
3. Battlefield 1942
4. Ikaruga
5. Gitaroo Man

So there you have it. Note the extra dollop of indie cred added by #4; #3, 'which of these is not like the others', took the office by storm and provided many hours of delightful WW2-style LAN play. The rest of them kinda go without saying--as perfect as possible examples of their type.

Excuses for the lapse in posting: it's kinda crunch time; and I went on vacation. I would've started up again with the new year, but I knew that if I added another entry to the old design I'd never change it.

Was tempted to do somethng on a Haibane Renmei theme--I'm in the process of being totally charmed by that series--but I can't draw birds to save my life. Even the epiphany that I don't even need to move stuff around, just swap the picture and colors on the current functional if cranky layout, didn't help; couldn't scrape up an image. Plus I'm in a bit of a DIY mood, but a month or two of staring Mr. Treehat in the face should cure me of that.

It's nice to have a blog again.