Issue : Games : Dark Souls

Dark Souls is an action role playing game about a knight that gets beat up and killed a lot in a castle. The game before it was called Demon Souls, but no one brings it up much as playing it is traumatic in the old style.

Now they want to port Dark Souls to the PC? Really? Have they played Dark Souls? That game is hard, as in, "One more try turns into what time is it, hard," "why is light coming through the blinds hard," and, "I don't think I want to play video games anymore after I beat this, good thing I wont be beating this," hard.

The game as it is now is bad enough, but once modders get hold of it... Is this something that really needs to happen? I mean, I want it to happen, but, cmon, I just, here is the thing, a couple months after release on the PC will it be a situation where a dragon will shoot lasers that shoot spikes at you and the spikes are poison, and the scrub enemies have automatic bazookas, and to escape the bridge you have to jump into a Ferrari and swerve around rocks I want to play that. 

The Protoculture Mixtape V.28

Issue : People : Secrets

Iv'e had a pretty nice pair of titties on me for as long as I can remember. Don't know why or how, it's just always been like that. never been a big dude, my metabolism makes it hard for me to get there, but all the same I walk around everyday with em. They look like a small version of the old 50's pin up models, like missiles.

It's cramped my style some, but nothing too major. I have been the problem with them more than anybody else.  Back in the day I was the dude in the public pool with a basketball jersey on, or walking around the summer heat in a pullover sweater, all of that.

I thought I was getting away with something when I really wasn't. I thought it a secret I had to protect with my life, even though when people saw them they would just give me low level shit, saying stuff like, "I know a great bra shop that can handle those," or, "Do you ever just rub on em with your eyes closed when you are alone?" Running around these active environments have forced me learn how to triage peoples intentions as quickly as possible, with the best data coming from the things they say.

My working hypothesis is that people that say words, any words, good, bad, or indifferent, are generally harmless as long as they are talking, and people that don't talk are the most dangerous animals out there, because they collecting everything they hold in for an ultra attack, and they may have so much built up that they can't control the damage, nor do they want to. Kinda like when Jean Grey would turn into Phoenix out of nowhere, and everybody would be like, "where the hell did all that come from?"

Anyway, here are some game industry jobs.

The Protoculture Mixtape V.27

Issue : Games : Monkey Virus

A long time ago my mom gave me all the shit because she thought I was downloading a monkey virus. I had started to poke around the computer she bought, installing this and that, learning as I went along. She would log on after I had been in there to find all type of crazy icons with crazier names on her desktop, and pop ups telling her that space is low.

I continued to learn as I went along and now realize I was probably downloading a monkey virus, as I knew less about what I was doing then as I do now, which isn't much. I kind of resented code back then, as it was the vegetables in the way of enjoying my meal. And scary, because I had an adversarial relationship with math. I understood it, and got how important it is to everything, but still thought of it as something to deal with only when absolutely necessary.

I felt it was always telling everybody what to do, you know, laws of gravity, if this gets put with that then it will always be this. That sort of stuff. At the time I liked to shoot from the hip, as in something could be anything, and this could be that and that could be this, and its all good as long as this and that weren't hurting anybody, and all the better if they complimented each other.

But I learned the hard way that math don't fuck around, as math's response to my philosophy was that this and that could whatever ever as long as they stay in yard and play safe, but not to worry, as math lets you know the second you leave the yard. Long story short, I bricked the first computer I ever touched, some boot sector virus, I still have no idea how she knew that was going to happen.

The Protoculture Mixtape V.26

Issue : People : Grinding

Everybody hollerin' bout how much humanity fucks up, kill off a species here, salt the earth for a generation there, but nobody ever acknowledges when we do something right, or has never been done before. And the chat is never about all the responsibility heaped on us that we never really asked for in the first place.

The other species got it eazy, dogs get to run around just being dogs and shit, cats sleep all day and party all night, and the cat that got the biggest over the years gets crowned the king of the other animals when all they do is chase down a couple animals that cant fight back, then sleep all day and party all night. Humanity is out here grinding everyday, we are even chill enough to take other species in and set them up for life.

They have claws and teeth and hunting instincts, but oh no don't go out and sing for your supper mr. king st. Bernard, let me get off what I'm handling over here and hook you up some vittles cause you can't be eazy about it and wait a couple minutes till the round is over. Nah, that's all on us, we do all the heavy lifting for this planet, thinking, nurturing, inventing, protecting, and all anybody has to say on the subject is about a rain forest that don't exist anymore. That's like a bald spot on the planet's head, it'll live.

Man its scary out here. They don't know what it's like to wake up every day knowing you are on a ball spinning through space, and that everything else you come into contact with will die somehow someday, and that is just how it is, or that there is stuff in the earth that will just start fucking shaking for no reason and if it happens you gotta run and get under something, but something else could fall on that and crush you both, so you are pretty screwed no matter what you do. I saw this one video where a dog figured out this was gonna happen and just took off, what a dick move.

I wish everybody would stop trippin, we got this. I would love to meet a person that wouldn't like to take a break from steering this planet to just sleep all day and hunt all night. If a lemur all the sudden wants to grab the keys and drive I'm all about it personally. Actually I would love to have the competition to keep us honest and on our toes. 

The Protoculture Mixtape V.25

Issue : People : Afterwards

Libya is a country in northern Africa. Sudan is to the south, Egypt to the east, Tunisia to the west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north. Libya's flag has three solid colors running horizontally across its length, red on top, black in the middle, green on bottom. A white crescent moon and star sit center in the black bar. Its capitol is named Tripoli, the locals pet name for the city is, "The Mermaid of the Mediterranean."

Libya recently fired the boss of its country. They fired him by dragging him through the street, pulling out his hair, calling him all types of bitches and whatnot, then shooting him in the gut. Which seems fair, as that dude did a lot more than all of that to anyone he disagreed with. I guess him getting his come-uppings can be argued into the realm of post fight stunting, not unlike when the winner of a fight donkey stomps the loser before making eye contact with the audience yelling "AND WHAT?"

A couple crews that helped to give Mummer his pink slip got into it recently over the detainment of a member of one of the groups. No word on how many people died over it. Somebody heard one of they mans got pinched, posse'd up, and started popping off shots over by the ministry building with the guns they had leftover from the last scrap, trying to get as many miles out of them as possible as bullets are expensive.

The funny thing about putting a gun in someones hand is that the gun never really leaves, as in, it is and always will be an option. People that have never shot one, or successfully defended something with one, have no frame of reference for this.

Virtual cap busting makes it easier to pull the trigger when the time comes, like practice, but once someone sees success with that tool in RL then its in play and calling the shots. The winner of the conflict has to decide if the consequences of using that tool was worth what that tool made go away, because that is all it is good for in real life, making things go away. Not the guns fault though, as it was designed to do just that, what happens after its job is done is always somebody else's problem.

Most video games don't have proper endings these days, and that sucks. Its as if the designers focus so much on the functionality and level design that they forget the game was going to have to come to a conclusion sooner or later, doesn't seem to matter if the ending is happy, sad, or neutral, as long as something happens. A few of the games that do this seem to intentionally omit an ending just to set up a sequel, leaving a few loose ends so the action may continue indefinitely.

The Protoculture Mixtape V.24

Issue : Games : Handhelds

           

   

I started playing handhelds a long time ago, and I still play them today. Back then I had no idea what to do with them, but they came into their own a few years ago. Back then I was the type of kid that did things, but would fall off the grid for months at a time when a game came out that had names like "Fantasy," or, "Quest," at the end of the title.  

Nowadays I mostly play RPG's and puzzle games on them. They are great for that. I can sit there and help Chrono get twisted off "Competition drank," or help Joan D' Ark handle a mess her god told her to deal with while waiting in a doctors office lobby, a dream come true. 

I don't play many MMO's though, well I play them because they are games, but I don't play them as an experience, like I would with a Persona or others of the sort. They feel more like real life than an adventure to me. I enjoy playing traditional RPG's specifically for the reason that they are not real life, or more apropos, my life. I was helping a character sort out their shit, not mine, which is a nice change.

To me logging into a current gen massively multi player role playing game is tantamount to logging into real life, because I mostly play them at the behest of people in my real life that feel I would get something from playing them. And while its fun to travel and level and adventure and such, its just now I have a responsibility to keep up with their levels to hang out in there, always be wearing the best gear, and never talk about the story, characters, or events in the game as if they are anything but a game we are playing. 

Ugh, that's a lot of work just to kill a dragon that lives indoors. But I ain't trippin, because I know that the current crop is only the first salvo. One day all three RPG cars currently on the road, which are, MMO's, Dwarf Fortress, and Minecraft, will slam into each other, and the explosion will be beautiful.

The Protoculture Mixtape V.23   

Issue : Games : Dead Island

I still feel like Dead Island pulled a fast one on me. That trailer... I know a trailer is practice and we talkin' bout the game, but I saw that little zombie girl as a proclamation that Dead Island would be the video game to step forward and challenge a gaming taboo that is convention everywhere else.

While the event between the guy in the polo shirt and the former little girl went down I honestly began to mentally prepare for the possibility of having to defend myself against a little zombie. I began to stress, as in, I don't think I could, even in a game, so how am I going to get out of there if I can't muster the bravery do what that situation calls for. A trailer had me shook.

So imagine my surprise when I load it up, well, loaded it up on the second launch (wamp wamp, yikes! get your publish game right, and really? Xian's lingering placeholder tags, just say no) and hear "Who'do you voodoo bitch." I thought, "Gaddamit, well, maybe they are just jabbing with the jokes, then they will settle down and discuss the serious side of zombie life. And then I saw the character select and just knew what I was hoping would be discussed will not be brought up here.

Not to say the game wasn't fun, its just that I had finished The Road a bit prior, and had everyone gushing around me about the walking dead. I dunno, either way I was proud to see our sandbox willing to step up and meet them out there in dangertown even if only just the tip.

Eh, such is life. The company that lady from Berkeley runs has a new zombie game coming out. I don't doubt the story will be on point, as they care about nerdy shit like atmosphere, story development, and turning heroes into bad guys, then real people, then heroes, and back again, depending on whatever they have to deal with at the moment. Oh yeah, and here are some jobs out there in the floatsam and jetsam for the grabbage.

The Protoculture Mixtape V.22